CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE
Before Wedgwood had realized the full meaning of Mrs. Patello's announcement she had seized him by the arm and was drawing him towards the room he had just passed.
"Come!" she said in a hushed whisper. "Come and look for yourself! I'll show you—but there's no doubt about it. And to think she's kept it a secret, all these years. Of course, I knew at once!"
The detective followed her into the room; at a word from her the two women busied about the still figure on the bed drew aside. Mrs. Patello, beckoning to Wedgwood to come closer, laid back the linen from the dead man's left arm and pointed to a curiously shaped brown mark that showed plainly above the elbow.
"The Clagne birthmark!" she whispered. "His father had it—in just the same place. I've heard him—Clagne, Janet's husband—say that they all had it—every Clagne, man and woman. I saw it on him—I saw it on this boy when he was a baby. Mr. Wedgwood—this is Walter Clagne, Janet's own son!"
"Then———" began Wedgwood. "She———"
"I told you that she said her own child died! That's been a lie—it must have been Philip Mortover that died! She had both of them, you remember, in her care. And now it's plain to me—she made out that this lad, her own son, was Philip and brought him up as Philip! But—there it is!"
She pointed again to the birthmark and drawing the sheet over the dead man, left the other women to complete their task. Outside the room she turned on Wedgwood.
"What made her do that?" she asked, almost fiercely. "That deception—all these years! Not a suspicion of it on anybody's part!"
"I think it's plain to see, Mrs. Patello," said Wedgwood. "She wanted the Mortover Estate for her own son. Well—Walter Clagne or Philip Mortover—and I've no doubt whatever about what you say—he's gone! But—what about her?"
"You've heard nothing?" she asked anxiously.
"They were at Malcolmson's house, up the hillside across the valley, at seven o'clock night before last," replied Wedgwood. "The storm was beginning to get bad when they left there. And a man saw them at some point in the district that same night, after they'd left Malcolmson's, lost, and enquiring their way—that is, they enquired it from him. They were then at the back of the new colliery works. And that's the last we've heard of them."
"They're lost!" said Mrs. Patello. She made a gesture of her hand towards the room they had just left. "Death!" she muttered. "Death all round—it's a judgment!"
Wedgwood made no reply to that: sentimental reflection was not to his taste. He went downstairs again and told the Superintendent what he had just heard.
"All of a piece with what I know of Janet Clagne," he concluded. "She seems to have been a schemer all her life. But the thing is—where are those two? It's getting on to forty-eight hours since they were seen or heard of!"
"They've come to grief somehow, somewhere," said the Superintendent. "And with all this thickness of snow it may be days before they're found. However, we've heard nothing yet from the men who went up to search round the new colliery. The man who came to me said that he'd told them of a short cut across there, and it's struck me that they may have come to grief amongst the workings. For instance, I know there were trial pits sunk here and there—I saw them myself one time when I was up here. They may have fallen into one, in wandering about."
"Not much use speculating," said Wedgwood. "If we could only get on their track—alive or dead, I want to lay hands on Levigne! He's papers on him that I want to see!"
"Nothing for it but waiting!" remarked the Superintendent.
But even then the period of waiting was nearly over. As the two men warmed themselves at the kitchen fire, discussing events with Mr. Patello who was all aghast at these tragic happenings a man came hurrying in with news evident in his every action. Blunt and business-like he voiced his tidings as soon as he caught sight of the Superintendent.
"We've found 'em!" he exclaimed, almost cheerfully. "Nice job we've had, an' all, up yonder, but we came across 'em, at last. What there is left of 'em, that is!"
"What do you mean?" demanded the Superintendent. "Left of them———?"
"Well, there's naught but their dead bodies," answered the messenger, unconcernedly. "And they're frozen as stiff as boards! Been dead a good while, I should say—both!"
"Where are they?" asked Wedgwood.
"Up yonder, amongst the new workings," replied the man. "There's some temp'ry buildings up there—sheds, and such-like—and they're in one o' them. According to what we could make out, they must ha' crept in there for shelter when the storm was at its height, night before last, and whether it were the weight o' snow, or the wind, or whatever it were, that there building collapsed, d'ye see—anyway, we found 'em buried among the ruins. Nice job we had to get 'em out, too!"
"We've carried them into the new engine-house," said the man. "Mr. Malcolmson's there. He sent me down to see if you were here, and to tell you to come up. But of course you can't do no more than look at 'em.
An hour later, after a hard struggle through the snow, Wedgwood and the Superintendent were taken by the colliery manager into the place where Levigne and Janet Clagne, partners in death as in certain episodes of life, lay side by side, crushed and maimed and still clothed as when the search party came across them. And Wedgwood, sternly business-like, went straight to the point he wanted to reach, and within a minute of entering the room had drawn a quantity of papers from an inner pocket of Levigne's coat.
"That's where he put the papers that Mrs. Clagne signed and that he and I witnessed," whispered the colliery manager. "That blue one."
Wedgwood turned away from the dead, and motioning the Superintendent to go aside with him, began to examine the papers in the light of the lanterns they had carried.
"There'll be something here that'll throw some illumination on things," he muttered. "If only I could find out . . . well, let's see what they are?"
The Superintendent watched curiously while Wedgwood rapidly looked each paper over, murmuring its drift and contents.
"This is the thing Malcolmson witnessed," muttered Wedgwood. "Statement by Janet Clagne that it was within her knowledge that after Matthew Mortover went to Canada he several times corresponded with his father, Gilson Mortover, informed him of his marriage to Louisa Patello and of the birth of his child Avice, and that through these letters Gilson became reconciled to Matthew again. Now what's been Levigne's object in getting that paper out of Janet Clagne? Ah, I see—he wanted it as a proof to the court in making that application on behalf of Avice Mortover! Well, that's that—now, what are these? Evidently the papers that Avice Mortover referred to when she told Nottidge that Levigne had got her signature to some documents. Here's one covenanting, if her claim to the Mortover estates is successful, to pay Levigne fifty thousand pounds!"
"For his trouble, I suppose?" said the Superintendent.
"And his cleverness! What's this, now—a somewhat similar document, covenanting in consideration of Philip Mortover and Janet Clagne giving every assistance in establishing her claim to settle on Philip Mortover, in the event of the claim being successful, one-half the estate. Um—Levigne seemed to have been pretty good at arranging matters, and it was high time this girl was got out of his hands. But these are not what I wanted! And these?" he went on, as he drew two or three folded papers from an envelope. "By God—they are!"
"What—what?" asked his companions, excitedly. "What are they?"
"Papers given by Avice Mortover to John Wraypoole, which Wraypoole had on him at the time he was murdered in Miss Tandy's flat!" exclaimed Wedgwood. "These are they! Look here!" he went on, seizing the Superintendent's arm and swinging him round in the direction of the table on which the dead man and dead woman lay. "One of these two was the actual murderer of John Wraypoole! One—but even now I don't know which!"
And in that uncertainty Wedgwood remained for some time. But months later, when the Mortover Grange affair had been relegated to the usual fate of all nine days' wonders, and Avice Mortover had been established in her property and had married Nottidge, the detective, chancing to meet Mr. Patello in Bloomsbury, took him into the police-station, and after a little desultory chat about nothing, showed him some curiosities of criminal association, and amongst them a billhook.
"Ever seen anything like that, Mr. Patello?" he asked. "Look at it!"
Mr. Patello handled the thing with faint curiosity.
"Well, I don't know, sir," he answered. "Wood-chopper, of course. And very like one that somebody stole from my wood-shed last year. Any particular interest attached to it, sir?"
"Oh, nothing much!" replied Wedgwood. "A man was murdered with it—that's all!"