Turton an hour before I arrived. Turton had come in from the garden covered with mud, and had washed his face and hands.
"Queer old bloke," said the man. "Asked me if I'd ever seen a witch. I fooked a bit ugly at 'im and 'e give me a cigar."
"I strolled out into the garden again, stood on the flagged path for a minute, and then saw a man running toward me out of the fog. It was Saltby, muddy from head to foot.
"Here, you chap!" he cried, and then, seeing who it was, he said, "My God, Hart, old Turton was right, after all!"
"Right?" I queried.
"Yes, about Jacob Arum. The fellow's dead enough. We've just come across his body—three feet down. Ugh!" He pulled a flask from his pocket, and drank.
"Come here," he said. "I'll show you."
UNFORTUNATELY, we brought neither of the scoundrels to trial. I say "unfortunately," because, no doubt, we should have got every detail of the truth out of them in a Court of Law. They were tracked down to a remote village in Cornwall, and Brike shot one of the detectives who had been sent to arrest him.
After that there could be no question of mercy. Brike and the other man were hunted from place to place and, driven at last into an empty cottage, they again showed fight and were both killed in a siege that lasted for nearly two days.
We recovered nearly all the money and the will, which Brike had kept, doubtless with the idea of retaining a hold over his companion.
The "other man" was Michael Arum—Jacob's twin brother. Proof of this was found among the papers in Michael's pocket. Further inquiries, in which the elder Miss Pinson was able to give us some assistance, elicited the fact that he was supposed to have died many years ago, and that he had been a thorough scoundrel, who had served a long term of imprisonment for forgery.
The likeness between the two brothers was extraordinary, and when it is remembered that Audrey Pinson and Turton were the only persons who had seen both of them, and that Turton had never heard Jacob Arum speak, and that Audrey had only seen Michael Arum in a very dim light, it is not so very odd that they did not observe the very slight difference between the twins.
Well, of course, you will ask why Brike did not just bury Jacob Arum and let Michael take his place without telling anyone of Jacob Arum's death. That, on the surface, would seem to have been the simplest plan. But Brike was far too subtle for that. You see, he wanted a doctor's evidence that Jacob Arum was really dead, in case Brike should have been accused of murdering him, if ever the plot was discovered.
Brike had deliberately made Turton an unwitting accomplice, knowing, as he did, that the old professor was steeped in witchcraft, and had lost touch with more practical matters.
Thus, Turton's evidence of Jacob Arum's death would help to clear Brike of a possible charge of murder; also—and this was equally important—Turton's evidence of the supposed reincarnation would help to throw dust in the eyes of those inclined to suspect foul play. The supposition being that although Turton's word as a doctor might possibly be doubted, his evidence, as a recognized authority on witchcraft, of the reincarnation, would be respected.
Brike had run tremendous risks; for instance, someone might have discovered that Michael Arum had actually sacrificed his right hand in order to get this money. Someone, too, might have seen Michael smuggled into the house. No doubt Brike had rowed him down the creek and landed him, as he had landed Audrey Pinson, at the foot of the garden. How long Michael had lain hidden in Brent Lodge, waiting for the moment when the breath should leave his brother's body, we never shall know. Most certainly the truth would never have been known if Brike had not been so very clever.
It was his cleverness that was his undoing. Turton had searched the garden, not for Jacob Arum's body, but for evidence of the witchcraft which—so Turton firmly believed—had restored Jacob Arum's life.
Turton had an idea that the carcasses of the two fowls would have been buried in the garden. He found a spot where it seemed to him that the earth was a little higher than the rest of the surface. And there he had elected to dig. Saltby, had helped him.
You can picture the faces of these two men when the iron hook and maimed stump of Jacob Arum's arm came through the earth.
There was no trace of foul play. Jacob Arum had died of heart failure. The whole plan had been magnificently conceived, and, but for Turton's dabbling in negro magic, the truth might never have come to light.
And I rather think that my good wine played some part in the matter. It was just a straw thrown into the scale of Turton's sensitively balanced brain.
Of course everything had been in Brike's favor from the start. Jacob Arum's dislike of his fellow men; the fact that he had lost his right hand and could not write properly; his faith which forbade him to call in a doctor; the nature of his property, which could be sold at any moment for cash; his real affection for his servant—all these combined to put Brike in a very strong position.
Still, it was a bold plan, skillfully conceived and executed, and, but for the bee in old Turton's bonnet, it would have been rewarded with success.
THE END
