The Lost Mr. Linthwaite/Chapter 17

time the bells of the old cathedral and of the ancient churches were, ringing out in Selchester next morning, Mr. Richard Brixey and Miss Georgina Byfield, seated in a retired yet sunny nook of the city walls, were ruminating, he in his, and she in her way, on the story which he had just unfolded in all its fullness.

He had set before her everything that he had done, and all that he had learnt, since she fetched him away from Fleet Street three days before, and had given her all details with one exception—that of the little matter of the squinting man who had presented himself at Newhaven, which small particular he was as yet keeping to himself, for reasons of his own.

And now he was wanting to know what she, as a sensible young woman, with some business experience, thought of the various incidents and developments, and while she was thinking, he, too, was weighing and adding, viewing things from every conceivable aspect. "Well?" he asked, after a long pause, during which Georgina, evidently very meditative, was tracing patterns with her umbrella in the loose gravel at their feet. "How does it all seem to you?"

Georgina took another minute or two for further reflection. "You said you felt sure that money was at the bottom of it," she remarked at last. "What money? Whose money?"

"It might be Martin Byfield’s money," replied Brixey. "There’s a tidy lot of it, from what I hear."

"But that’s settled," said Georgina. "It’s Mrs. Byfield’s, and they’ve got it."

"She’s got hers, to be sure," agreed Brixey. "But has he got his? Old Semmerby, the solicitor, mentioned that Fanshawe comes of age during this week."

"Fanshawe will be twenty-one on Tuesday," observed Georgina.

"Then he’ll come into his fortune, I suppose," said Brixey. "A lot of money. He’ll get two-thirds of what your uncle left. Now, supposing all this business has something to do with that?"

"What would Mr. Linthwaite have to do with it?" asked Georgina. "He’d nothing to do with the Byfield affairs, had he?"

"Not to my knowledge," answered Brixey. "But he might have had. Perhaps Gaffkin may have discovered something. But I say, look here, don’t you think it was a very queer thing that Martin Byfield died without leaving a will?"

"Mr. Brackett," remarked Georgina, "used to say, at one time, that he didn’t believe he died without leaving a will."

"Then where is it?" demanded Brixey. "No, we’re running against a dead wall there, I think. If there’d been a will, it would have come to light by now.

"But here’s a question I’ve wanted to ask you. Did you never see, or meet, your Uncle Martin in his last days, never go to his house or anything of that sort?"

Georgina shook her head with a decided gesture.

"Mrs. Byfield wouldn't have either my father or myself at the house," she answered. "My uncle was infirm during the last two or three years; and she kept everybody away from him. If I ever saw him, it was in a bath-chair in the streets, and there was always Mrs. Byfield and a nurse with him. Wetherby, his old valet, used to wheel him out."

"So you never had any conversation with him in the last stages?" asked Brixey.

"I never remember speaking to him since I was sixteen or seventeen," replied Georgina.

Brixey considered matters a little.

"Seems a rather blunt way of putting things," he said presently, "but you'd have been in a bad way if it hadn't been for old Brackett, wouldn't you?"

"Very!" answered Georgina laconically. "Mr. Brackett has been a second father to me. Of course, keeping his books and writing his letters is a mere pretext for his kindness. He adopted me. I shouldn't have had anywhere or anybody to turn to but for him."

"He's a good old chap," said Brixey. "And yet, if we're going to be plainly straightforward, there you were with a remarkably, rich uncle next door to you! Seems odd, eh?"

"I've told you that I don't believe my Uncle Martin knew anything about it," replied Georgina. "He was fenced in."

"By his wife," said Brixey. "What you say implies that she wasn't going to let him spare a penny for his niece. Now, he might comfortably have spared a good many pounds. Which makes it all the odder!"

Georgina gave her companion a quick, searching glance out of her eye-corners.

"You don't look into things any further than that?" she suggested.

Brixey returned the look.

"Not good at riddles," he retorted. "What’s this one?"

"Old men are apt to be a bit talkative, aren’t they?" said Georgina. "I've always believed that Mrs. Byfield kept everybody away from my Uncle Martin, because she was afraid of his saying things she didn't want anybody to hear." "You think there were secrets?" suggested Brixey.

"I think she has secrets," assented Georgina.

"Now, why do you think so?" asked Brixey.

"Because I do!" she answered. "Besides, she looks as if she had!"

"Good feminine reasons," assented Brixey. "Well, if comes to this. The foundation of all this business is away back—a long way back. Questions arise. Who was Mrs. Byfield? When did my uncle, John Linthwaite, know her. What did he know? What's it all got to do with his sudden removal from the scene? And where is he?"

"You don't think, after all, that there may be a perfectly reasonable explanation of this?" asked Georgina. "That Mr. Linthwaite may be somehow mixed up with some business affair of these people, and have gone away in connection with it, and that he'll turn up all right in a day or two?"

"When I woke this morning," replied Brixey, "I was a good deal inclined to think that. But by breakfast time I was quite sure that my inclinations were leading me into a wrong path. For one very little, very simple reason.

"I can’t conceive it possible that my uncle should leave Selchester in such a violent hurry that he couldn’t either slip into the 'Mitre’ or send a message to Mr. Brackett to say that ho was going away. The thing’s ludicrous! Moreover, what about the hat and umbrella found in Foxglove Lane?"

"Then you think—what?" asked Georgina. "I think he’s been kidnapped," said Brixey. "Put away somewhere until these folk, whoever they are, have brought off some business on which they’re engaged, and with which his sudden coming to Selchester, and his knowledge of them, interfered.

"I say these folk. But I don’t know what particular folk I mean! Mesham’s one, no doubt. Probably Mrs. Byfield’s another. There may—must, I think—be still more. And what are they after? If I knew that, I’d know a lot.

"As to my uncle’s whereabouts, I'm now inclined to think that he may have been the elderly gentleman who drove with Mesham to Ledfield Junction and is known to have booked for Brighton. Perhaps he was met at Brighton by Mesham's confederates and safely locked up. The whole thing’s getting into more of a tangle than I ever foresaw. And I tell you, my dear young lady, it all spells—money!"

Georgina made no answer to this emphatic declaration, and Brixey, after a pause, suddenly laughed.

"What a lark it would be if a sudden burst-up of some sort revealed the fact that money was coming to you!" he exclaimed.

"To me?" said Georgina, staring at him. "Nonsense!"

"Never mind," retorted Brixey. "I’ve heard and known of some queer cases about money and estates and that sort of thing. Supposing you were discovered to be a rich heiress? Perhaps there’s money that ought to have come to your father, and perhaps your Uncle Martin knew of it, and perhaps Mrs. Byfield has inherited the secret, and perhaps" "I thought you prided yourself on being practical," interrupted 'Georgina.

"Eminently practical," replied Brixey, with assurance. "That’s why I'm suggesting all this. You never know!" He pulled out his watch.

"Past noon," he said. "Let’s be going 'Mitre’-wards. I’m wondering if Gaffkin will turn up. He might."

Ten minutes later Brixey walked into his sitting-room at the "Mitre" to find Gaffkin, who, at sight of him, held up a carefully sealed packet, with one word:

"Papers!"