Chapter II

Moris Klaw’s sanctum is certainly one of the most remarkable apartments in London. It is lined with shelves, which contain what I believe to be a unique library of works dealing with criminology--from Moris Klaw’s point of view. Strange relics are there, too; and all of them have histories. A neat desk, with flowers in a silver vase, and a revolving chair standing upon a fine tiger skin are the other notable items of furniture.

The contrast on entering was startling. Moris Klaw placed his hat upon the desk, and from it took out the scent spray without which he never travels. He played the contents upon his high, yellow forehead--filling the air with the refreshing odour of verbena.

“That shop!” he said, “it smell very strong this morning. It is not so much the canaries as the rats!”

“I trust,” began Grimsby, respectfully, “that Miss Klaw is quite well?”

“Isis will presently be here to say for herself,” was the reply. “And now--this bad business of Cresping. It seems I am just back in time, but, ah! it is a fortnight old!”

Grimsby cleared his throat. “You will have read----”

“Ah, my friend!” Moris Klaw held up a long, tapering white hand. “As though you do not know that I never confuse my poor brain with those foolish papers. No, I have not read, my friend!”

“Oh!” said Grimsby, something taken aback. “Then I shall have to tell you the family story----”

Isis Klaw entered.

From her small hat, with its flamingo-like plume, to her dainty shoes, she was redolent of the Rue de la Paix. She wore an amazingly daring toilette; I can only term it a study in flame tones. A less beautiful woman could never have essayed such a scheme; but this superb brunette, with her great flashing eyes and taunting smile, had the lithe carriage of a Cleopatra, the indescribable diablerie of a _ghaziyeh_.

Inspector Grimsby greeted her with embarrassed admiration. Greetings over--

“We must hurry, Father!” said the girl.

Moris Klaw reclaimed his archaic bowler.

“Mr. Searles and Inspector Grimsby will perhaps be joining us?” he suggested.

“Where?” began Grimsby.

“Where but by the 9:5 train for Uxley!” said Klaw. “Where but from Uxley to Cresping! Do I waste time, then--I?”

“You have been retained?” suggested Grimsby.

“Ah, no!” was the reply. “But I shall receive my fee, nevertheless!”

At the end of the court a cab was waiting. Outside the cavernous door a ramshackle man with a rosy nose bowed respectfully to the proprietor.

“You hear me, William,” said Moris Klaw, to this derelict. “You are to sell nothing--unless it is the washstand! Forget not to change the canaries’ water. The Indian corn is for the white rats. If there is no mouse in the trap by eight o’clock, give the owl a herring. And keep from the drink; it will be your ruin, William!”

We entered the cab. My last impression of the place was derived from the invisible parrot, who gave us Godspeed with:

“Moris Klaw! Moris Klaw! the devil’s come for you!”

As we drove stationward, Grimsby, his eyes rarely leaving the piquant face of Isis Klaw, outlined the history of the Crespie family to the silent Moris. In brief it was this:

The late Sir Richard Crespie, having become involved in serious monetary difficulties, employed such methods of drowning his sorrows as were far from conducive to domestic felicity; and after a certain unusually violent outburst the home was broken up. His son, Roland, was the first to go; and he took little with him but his mother’s blessing and his father’s curses. Then Lady Crespie went away to her sister in London, only surviving her departure from the Hall by two years. Alone, and deserted, first by son and then by wife, the debauched old baronet continued on his course of heavy drinking for some years longer. The servants left him, one by one, so that in the end, save for faithful old Ryder, the butler, whose family had served the Crespies for time immemorial, he had the huge mansion to himself. Apoplexy closed his unfortunate career; and, since nothing had been heard of him for years, it was generally supposed that the son had met his death in Africa, whither he had gone on leaving home.

With the passing of Sir Richard came Mr. Isaac Heidelberger, and he wasted no time in impressing his noxious personality upon the folks of Cresping. He was a German Jew, large and oily, with huge coarse features and a little black moustache that had been assiduously trained in a futile attempt to hide a mouth that had well befitted Nero. A week after Sir Richard’s burial, Mr. Heidelberger took possession of the Hall.

The new occupant brought with him one Heimer, a kind of confidential clerk, and, old Ryder the butler having been sent about his business, the two Jewish gentlemen proceeded to make themselves comfortable. The nature of their business was soon public property; the grand old Hall was to be turned into a “country mansion for paying guests.”

Very strained relations existed between the big Jew and the ex-butler, who, having a little money saved, had settled down in Cresping. One night, at the Goblets--the historic village inn--Heidelberger having swaggered into the place, there arose an open quarrel. Said Ryder:

“Sir Richard, with all his faults, was once a good English gentleman, and, but for such as you, a good English gentleman he might have died!”

It was exactly a week later that the tragedy occurred.

“We come to it now, eh?” interrupted Moris Klaw at this point. “So--we also come to the station! I will ask you to reserve us a first-class carriage!”

Grimsby made arrangements to that end. And, as the train moved out of the station, resumed his story.

“What I gather is this,” he said.

[I condense his statement and append it in my own words.]

The Goblets was just closing its doors, and the villagers who nightly met there were standing in a group under the swinging sign, when a man came running down the street from the direction of the Hall, and, observing the gathering, ran up. It was Heimer, Isaac Heidelberger’s secretary. He was hatless and his flabby face, in the dim light, was ghastly.

“Quick!” he rasped, hoarsely. “Where does the doctor live?”

“Last house but one,” somebody said. “What’s the matter?”

“Murder!” cried Heimer, as he rushed off down the village street.

Such was the dramatic manner in which the news of the subsequently notorious case was first carried to the outside world. The facts, as soon made known throughout the length and breadth of the land, were, briefly, as follows:

Heidelberger and his secretary, who were engaged in making an inventory of the contents of the Hall and in arranging for such alterations of the rooms and laying out of the neglected grounds as they considered necessary, had practically reached the end of their task. In fact, had nothing intervened, Cresping would, on the following day, have seen the old mansion in the hands of an army of London workmen.

At about half-past seven in the evening, Heidelberger had entered the room occupied by Heimer and had mentioned that he expected a visitor. The secretary, who had more work than he could well accomplish, did not pause to inquire concerning him, believing the other to allude either to the architect or to Heidelberger’s man, who was coming down from London. Heidelberger had then gone up to the library, saying that he should not require Heimer again that night.

Between eight and half-past--Heimer was not sure of the time--there was a ring at the bell (that of the tradesmen’s entrance). Knowing that Heidelberger could admit the visitor directly to the library, Heimer, hearing nothing more, concluded that the two were closeted there.

The first intimation that he received of anything amiss was a loud and angry cry, apparently proceeding from the old banqueting hall directly overhead, and unmistakably in the voice of Heidelberger. Springing from his chair, he took a step toward the door, and then paused in doubt. There was an angry murmur from above, the tones of the Jew being clearly distinguishable; then a sudden scuffle and an oscillation of the floor as though two heavy men were at hand grips; next, a crash that shook the room, and a high-pitched cry of which he only partially comprehended the last word. This he asserted to be “holy.”

That Heimer stood transfixed at the open door throughout all this, suffices to brand him a coward. It was, in fact, only his stories of shadowy figures in the picture gallery and his general disinclination to leave his room after dusk that had prompted Heidelberger--a man of different mettle--to wire to London for the servant.

At this juncture, however, moved as much by a fear of the sudden silence as by any higher motive, he took a revolver from the table drawer, and, holding it cocked in one hand and seizing the lamp in the other, he crept, trembling, up a narrow little stair that led to a door beneath the minstrel’s gallery. To open it he had to place the lamp on the floor, and, at the moment of doing so, he heard a sound inside the hall like the grating of a badly oiled lock.

Then, with the lamp held high above his head, he peered inside; and, considering the character of the man, it is worthy of note that he did not faint on the spot, for the feeble light, but serving, as it did, to intensify the gloom of the long and shadowy place, revealed a scene well calculated to shake the nerves of a stouter man than Heimer.

Less than six feet from where he stood, and lying flat on his back with his head toward the light, was Heidelberger in a perfect pool of blood, his skull cleft almost to the chine! Beside him on the floor lay the fearful weapon that had wrought his end--an enormous battle-ax, a relic of the Crusades such as none but a man of Herculean strength could possibly wield.

Sick with terror, and scarcely capable of keeping his feet, Heimer gave one glance around the gloomy place, which showed him that, save for the murdered man, it was empty; then he staggered down the narrow stairs and let himself out into the grounds. Slightly revived by the fresh night air, but fearful of pursuit by the unknown assassin, he ran, as fast as his condition would allow, into the village.

“Here it is--Uxley!” jerked Moris Klaw.