Chapter 5

AFTER THE TRAGEDY.

The news was as horrible as it was unexpected. Vernon had anticipated blackmail, he had even believed that in the absence of a third person The Spider might show fight. But he had never dreamed that murder would take place, as such a crime was entirely contrary to The Spider's methods. With a gasp he pulled himself together.

"Have they caught the man?" he demanded anxiously.

"What man?" questioned the constable suspiciously.

"The murderer."

"No, sir; it's not known who killed Mr. Dimsdale. He was found strangled in his library, some time after eleven o'clock. The alarm was given, the police were called in, and the ball came to an end. Now, sir," added the man in a friendly way, "I haven't any right to tell you more, and as what I have told you will be in the papers to-morrow, no harm's done. You go home now, sir, and you'll learn all about your friend when the inquest takes place."

Vernon thought for a second. "Is your Inspector in the house?"

"Yes, sir, but you can't see him."

"I must see him, and at once. I believe I know who killed Mr. Dimsdale."

"Oh, you do, do you?" said the policeman with a subtle change of manner. "Then you come along with me."

"Wait till I pay my cabman," muttered Vernon, and, the policeman making no objection to this, he gave the chauffeur the promised fare. When the vehicle had disappeared down the road, diminishing blackly in the moonlight, he returned, to find that the constable was holding open the gate.

"What name am I to give?" asked the man gruffly, for it was evident that he regarded Vernon with suspicion owing to what he had admitted.

"My name doesn't matter; the Inspector does not know me," said Vernon impatiently. "Hurry up, man! hurry up! Every moment is of value."

Impressed by his imperious manner, the policeman knocked at the closed front door, which was immediately thrown open by a second constable on guard in the hall. By this individual Vernon was introduced into the Jacobean dining-room, after a few hurried words of explanation. Inspector Drench--the constable had informed Vernon of the name--was seated at the table taking notes, and Miss Hest, looking pale and anxious, stood at his elbow. She was the first to speak.

"Mr. Vernon," she exclaimed hoarsely, "you have come at last. Poor Mr. Dimsdale was asking for you all the night. And now----" she broke down.

"How did you get in, sir?" questioned Inspector Drench imperiously, and nodding to the policeman that he should leave the room. "I gave orders that nobody was to be admitted."

"I insisted upon seeing you," said Vernon quickly. "This evening--or rather yesterday evening--I had an appointment with Mr. Dimsdale in his library, but I was decoyed to an empty house in West Kensington, and have only managed to get away."

Inspector Drench stared. "What do you mean by all this, sir?"

"What I say," rejoined Vernon tartly, for his nerves worried him. "I understand that Mr. Dimsdale is dead."

"Mr. Dimsdale has been murdered," cried Miss Hest, clasping her hands and speaking in a thick, emotional voice. "Murdered in his library. No one knows who strangled him."

"I know."

"You!" Drench stood up alertly. "Take care, sir. Anything you say now will be noted," and he shuffled his papers like a pack of cards. "Who is guilty?"

"The Spider."

"The Spider!" echoed Miss Hest. "Who is The Spider, or what is The Spider?"

She looked puzzled, but the Inspector, better informed, looked open-mouthed at the young man. "Do you mean to say that The Spider perpetrated this crime, sir?" he asked, scarcely able to speak from sheer amazement.

Vernon, thoroughly worn out from what he had undergone, dropped into a chair listlessly. "Yes."

"But this Spider?" broke in Miss Hest volubly; "I don't know who he is or what he is. Tell me if----"

"Allow me," interrupted Drench sharply. He was a military-looking man, something after the style of Colonel Towton, and spoke aggressively. "Allow me, for I am in charge here, miss. The Spider is the name--if you may call it so--of a well-known blackmailer, for whom the police have been looking, and are still looking. Perhaps, Mr. Vernon--I think you said that this gentleman's name is Vernon--will explain how he comes to be possessed of such precise information."

"There is no difficulty in explaining," retorted Vernon, annoyed by the suspicious looks of the officer. "Listen!" and he rapidly detailed all that he knew, all that had taken place from his interview with Dimsdale in Towton's chambers to the moment when he leapt from the taxicab to be met by the constable at the gate with the news of the murder. As the recital proceeded Drench tried to conceal his amazement, but scarcely managed to do so, while Frances Hest, for once startled out of her self-control, uttered ejaculations. It may be noted that Vernon suppressed for the moment the fact that The Spider was blackmailing Mrs. Bedge, as he did not wish to spread scandal. But Inspector Drench and the lady were put in possession of all other facts.

"What was Mr. Dimsdale's secret?" asked Frances curiously.

"I can't tell you, as I don't know. After the capture of The Spider he promised that I should be told. Now I shall never know."

"This comes," said the Inspector bitterly, "this comes of amateur detective business. If I had been informed of the appointment I should have made arrangements to capture The Spider."

"If you had been informed," retorted Vernon heatedly, "The Spider would never have kept the appointment."

"Why not? He was ignorant of my plans?"

"He learned mine easily enough, and would have learned yours. You seem to forget, Mr. Inspector, that we are dealing with a genius in the way of criminality. The Spider, whomsoever he may be, seems to know everything. I believe that he is the head of a gang and has his spies all over London. No one person could be so well posted up in secret arrangements otherwise."

"How did he come to know of the secret arrangement between yourself and Mr. Dimsdale?" asked Drench abruptly.

"I can't say, unless Mr. Dimsdale, who had rather a loose tongue, revealed his plan of the trap to someone else. I said nothing."

"Mr. Dimsdale gave no information to anyone in this house," said Frances decisively; "if he had, either I or Ida would have known. As it is, he apparently met this dreadful person in the library at the agreed time. And, now that I think of it," she mused, "I wonder that I did not suspect something of the sort. Mr. Dimsdale told Ida and myself that we could have all the rooms for the ball save the library, as he wished that to himself."

"There's nothing unusual in such a wish," remarked Drench easily. "When a house is upset by a party a man naturally wishes one of his rooms left undisturbed so that he can have peace."

"What happened exactly?" asked Vernon with an air of fatigue.

Inspector Drench signed that Miss Hest should explain, and glanced at his notes as she spoke, to be certain that she was repeating what she had already told him prior to Vernon's entrance.

"It is hard to tell what took place to a minute," protested the lady. "Our guests arrived just before ten o'clock, and everything was going splendidly."

"Everyone was masked, I suppose," said Vernon quietly.

"Oh, yes. But Mr. Dimsdale stood in the Hall until nearly eleven, receiving our guests, and made everyone unmask before they entered the ballroom."

"Why did he do that?" asked Drench suddenly.

"Can't you guess?" put in Vernon impatiently. "Mr. Dimsdale expected The Spider, and wished to see if he would come."

"But he didn't know what The Spider was like. No one knows."

"I daresay. But Mr. Dimsdale knew those whom his daughter had invited to the ball. If an unknown person had unmasked he would have jumped to the conclusion, and perhaps truly, that he was The Spider. Well, Miss Hest?"

"Everyone who unmasked were people we knew," she continued, "for I stood with Ida near Mr. Dimsdale, receiving the guests. At a quarter to eleven Mr. Dimsdale went to the library."

"Alone?"

"Certainly. No one, to my knowledge, entered the library during the whole of that evening until Ida, in search of her father, insisted upon going in, notwithstanding the prohibition, at a quarter to twelve. Then she found Mr. Dimsdale seated in his chair, quite dead."

"Were the windows open?"

Inspector Drench arose. "Come and see the room, Mr. Vernon," he said, moving towards the door. "Nothing has been disturbed, not even the corpse. Everything remains as Miss Dimsdale found it at a quarter to twelve."

"And Ida fainted," whispered Frances in Vernon's ear as the trio crossed the hall to enter the library. "Poor child! It was no wonder, when the sight was so horrid. She's in bed now, crying her heart out. Inspector," added Miss Hest, raising her voice, "you won't want me any longer? Let me return to Miss Dimsdale, as she needs every attention."

"Very good, miss. I shall continue your examination in the morning."

"I have told you everything I know."

"One moment," said Vernon, laying his hand on her sleeve as she moved away. "I want to know if any guest arrived after Mr. Dimsdale went into the library."

"Two. But Ida and I made them unmask. We knew them quite well. Mr. and Mrs. Horner from Finchley. And I may tell you, Mr. Vernon, that Mr. Dimsdale came out of the library at five minutes to eleven for a single moment to ask if you had arrived."

"I wish I had arrived," said Vernon bitterly, "I might have prevented this tragedy. Are you sure, Miss Hest, that no strangers were at the ball?"

"Well," she said thoughtfully, "it is difficult to say, since all were masked. But no stranger was there to my knowledge, and when the crime was discovered everyone unmasked. We knew all the guests, as we had known them when they arrived; still, some stranger might have slipped in. But I must go to Ida. I'll tell you anything else you wish to know in the morning."

Vernon nodded and released his grip of her sleeve. She flitted away into the central room on her way to Ida's bedroom. Vernon mused for a moment, then followed Drench into the library, where the Inspector, indeed, had already preceded him. The first glance Vernon threw around showed him that one of the French windows was open.

"I thought so," he said pointing out this to the Inspector. "The Spider did not come as a guest, but watched his opportunity and slipped in at the window. At what time is Mr. Dimsdale supposed to have been strangled?"

"The doctor we called in says--so far as the state of the body shows--that the crime was committed about a quarter past eleven. Miss Dimsdale discovered it at a quarter to twelve, thirty minutes later."

"The appointment was for eleven," said Vernon nodding, "so The Spider was fifteen minutes late. But he came in there"--he pointed to the French window--"and he escaped in the same way."

"With the thousand pounds?" asked Drench drily. He did not like to be shown his business by this young man.

"I don't think so," replied Vernon musingly, and cautiously feeling his way, as it were, to a decision. "You see, Dimsdale never intended to pay the money, and therefore was not prepared with the specie from the bank. The Spider, for once, went without his booty, and did worse work for nothing than he ever did for reward."

"Yes," said the Inspector carelessly; "I believe this is the first time murder has been connected with his name--publicly, that is. Who knows what assassinations he may not have to answer for privately? However, here is the room and the corpse. What do you make of both?"

The other man looked round slowly. The room blazed with the full power of the many electric lights, which the Inspector had turned on; also, as the apartment was square and sparsely furnished, there was no nook or cranny that could not be seen at a glance. The three windows had neither blinds nor curtains, in accordance with Mr. Dimsdale's craze for fresh air; but round the desk, which was on the right side of the room, near the fireplace, a high screen was drawn, the same which the girls had used on that morning when they were selecting the guests for the fatal ball. In a chair, turned sideways from the desk, drooped the form of the dead man. He was arrayed in evening dress, but his shirt-front was crumpled, and his face was swollen and discoloured. There was no disorder round about the desk; the Persian mat had not even been kicked out of the way.

"Yes," said Drench in answer to a look from Vernon, "there could not have been any struggle, since all is in order. In my opinion The Spider--if it was that chap, as you seem to think--must have come silently behind his victim, and strangled him with the handkerchief before he had time to call out. He came to kill as well as to rob."

"A handkerchief?" asked Vernon interested. "I thought he did it with his hands, Mr. Inspector?"

Drench shook his iron-grey head. "There are no marks of hands on the throat, Mr. Vernon; only a cruel black line, which shows that a cord or handkerchief must have been used--and used with great force. Though, to be sure," added the Inspector reflectively, "Mr. Dimsdale was so short and fat in the neck that a slight pressure must have caused apoplexy."

"Did he die of that?"

"And strangulation; a mixture of both. But it's odd, Mr. Vernon, that with those uncurtained windows he should have been murdered without anyone seeing the performance. There must have been many guests in the front garden, as people always do wander outside between the dances to get fresh air."

Vernon pointed to the screen. "That served the purposes of both curtain and blind, Mr. Inspector. Behind that the crime could be committed without anyone being the wiser, even if anyone had been on the verandah."

"Provided there was no noise," insisted Drench.

"Exactly; so that makes me believe that your surmise is correct. The Spider, for some reason, may have come to kill, as well as to blackmail. Perhaps, as he learned about the trap--which he must have done to arrange for my absence--he dreaded lest Dimsdale should prove a dangerous person, and so got rid of him. If that mirror"--Vernon pointed to a long, broad looking-glass which covered one side of the fireplace, and which reflected desk and chair and screen and seated figure--"could speak it would tell how the crime was committed. I can guess myself," he ended.

"Perhaps you will let me hear your guess," said Drench sceptically.

"The Spider, I fancy, stole in quietly through the French window, which was open, and came suddenly upon Dimsdale seated at his desk waiting to keep the appointment. Before the old man could turn The Spider had the handkerchief or cord round his neck and quietly choked him. There would be no noise and no struggle. Then he looked for the money"--Vernon pointed to the desk, several drawers of which were pulled open--"but not finding any he stole out again through the window."

"The guests in the garden would have seen him leave the room."

"What if they did? No one anticipated a crime, and no one but Miss Hest and Miss Dimsdale knew that the library was forbidden territory. Moreover, The Spider may have chosen his time to escape when another dance was in progress, the chances being that everyone would return to the ballroom. And you may be sure," added Vernon with emphasis, "that The Spider made use both of mask and domino, so that he might be taken for a guest, and might escape notice."

"But Miss Hest said that everyone unmasked----"

"Who entered the house as a guest," followed on Vernon quickly; "just so, Mr. Inspector. But The Spider entered as a stranger by the window, not wishing, perhaps, to take any chances. And, of course, we are agreed that he infernally clever, and well posted in necessary details."

"I'm with you there," murmured Drench mournfully, "but it's a pity you and Mr. Dimsdale did not warn me of your trap. I should have caught the man easier than you amateurs."

"I am not an amateur," said Vernon unexpectedly; then, when the Inspector looked at him interrogatively, he added, "I trade as Nemo, of Covent Garden."

"Ah, yes; I've heard of you," replied Drench in a less supercilious tone. "So you are Nemo, are you, Mr. Vernon? I was told that you had solved several mysteries. In fact, a friend of mine at the Yard said you'd a head on your shoulders."

"I'll need it," said Vernon with a shrug, "to unravel this mystery."

"It's no mystery," said Drench quickly, "since you say that The Spider murdered this poor chap."

"The Spider himself is a mystery, and one which the police would give much to solve. I intend to hunt him down--not alone on account of my poor dead friend here, but because he so cleverly decoyed me out of the way."

"Ah, your pride is up in arms?"

"Well, yes; I suppose you can put it that way. But I wish to ask you two things, Mr. Inspector: first, that you will not reveal my trade as Nemo to anyone in society."

"Oh, I promise that easily, especially as I don't go into society, and I can guess that you want it kept quiet. And the second thing?"

"Will you permit me to place my services at your disposal?"

The dexterous way in which Vernon put his request as a favour to be granted pleased the Inspector, especially as he knew from what he had heard of Nemo that such services would be of value. "I shall be very pleased to let you work with me, Mr. Vernon," he said cordially. "What do you propose to do first, may I ask?"

"This house in West Kensington is an empty one, and must have been taken by The Spider for my temporary prison. I must ascertain from the landlord who took it, and thus we may learn something about the looks of The Spider."

"You think he took the house himself: applied to the landlord, that is?"

"Yes, and no; he may have done so, or one of his gang may have rented the house. But if we can catch the person who _did_ see the landlord, we may learn something about The Spider, if indeed the tenant was not the man himself."

"Well"--Drench scratched his head thoughtfully--"there is something in that, Mr. Vernon. But The Spider is so clever that you may be sure he has made himself safe. You think he heads a gang?"

"I am certain, and the woman who played such a clever comedy to inveigle me into the kitchen is one of the gang."

"Perhaps The Spider himself, in disguise?"

"You may be right, as, of course, since I was captured about nine o'clock, there was plenty of time for him to change and get to Hampstead by eleven."

"Moreover, he was a quarter of an hour late," suggested Drench, "but it puzzles me, sir, to think how your trap business came to his ears."

Vernon looked regretfully at the dead man in the chair. "Perhaps Mr. Dimsdale may have talked," he remarked. "I said nothing. But we shall never know now----"

"Until we lay hands on The Spider and force him to confess," ended Drench, nodding. "By the way, I suppose some reward will be offered for his apprehension by Miss Dimsdale? I understand she is rich."

"It's very probable, as she inherits her father's money--about ten thousand a year, it must be."

The Inspector whistled. "That's a tidy fortune," he said meditatively. "I expect the reward will be a large one."

"I expect so also," rejoined Vernon, understanding clearly what was meant, "and if we learn the truth about this crime and capture The Spider you can have the reward all to yourself."

"But you're a professional, Mr. Vernon, and have to make your money."

"I don't want it in this case. The Spider made use of a certain lady's name to inveigle me to West Kensington, and I mean to be even with him."

"Miss Corsoon. I think you mentioned Miss Corsoon."

"Yes, only you needn't talk about it outside your office," said Vernon hastily. "I don't want her to be mixed up in this business. Also, I am not very proud of having been trapped in this way."

"Only the police will know," Drench assured him, and led the way out of the room, after turning out the lights. "You'd better go home now, Mr. Vernon, as you have done quite enough to-night, and look worn out."

Vernon nodded. "When will the inquest take place?"

"To-morrow; the sooner it's over the better. We can work on the clue of The Spider which you have supplied. We'll catch him."

Vernon shrugged his shoulders. He was less confident of success than Drench, since for nearly two years The Spider had entirely baffled the police.