The Middle of Things Part 24

"So I gathered!" he answered.

"I wish I'd been present when Methley and Woodlesford put forward that proposition," exclaimed the old lawyer. "Did they seem serious?"

"Oh, I think they were quite serious," replied Lord Ellingham. "They seemed so; they spoke of it as what they called a domestic arrangement."

"Excellent phrase!" remarked Mr. Pawle. "And what said your lords.h.i.+p to their--or the claimant's proposition?"

"I told them that the matter was so serious that they and I must see my solicitors about it," answered Lord Ellingham, "and I arranged to meet them here at one o'clock today. They quite agreed that that was the proper thing to do, and went away. Then--you and Mr. Viner called."

"With, I understand, another extraordinary story," remarked Mr. Carless.

"The particulars of which His Lords.h.i.+p has also told me. Now, Pawle, what do you really say about all this?"

Mr. Pawle smote his clenched right fist on the palm of his open left hand.

"I will tell you what I say, Carless!" he exclaimed with emphasis. "I say that whatever the papers and doc.u.ments were which were produced by this man to Methley and Woodlesford, they were stolen from the body of John Ashton, who was foully murdered in Lonsdale Pa.s.sage only last week.

I'll stake all I have on that! Now, then, did this claimant steal them?

Did he murder John Ashton for them? No--a thousand times no, for no man would have been such a fool as to come forward with them so soon after his victim's death! This claimant doesn't know how or where or when they were obtained--he doesn't suspect that murder's in it. Now, then--where did he get them? Who's at the back of him? Who--to be plain--who's making a cat's-paw of him? Find that out, and we shall know who murdered John Ashton!"

Viner, glancing at Lord Ellingham and at Mr. Carless, saw that Mr.

Pawle's words had impressed them greatly, the solicitor especially. He nodded sympathetically, and Mr. Pawle went on speaking.

"Listen here, Carless!" he continued. "Mr. Viner and I have been investigating this case as far as we could, largely to save a man whom we both believe to be absolutely innocent of murder. I have come to certain conclusions. John Ashton, many years ago, fell in with the missing Lord Marketstoke, then living under the name of Wickham, in Australia, and they became close friends. At some time or other, Wickham told Ashton the real truth about himself, and when he died, left his little daughter--"

Carless looked sharply round.

"Ah!" he exclaimed. "So there's a daughter?"

"There is a daughter, and her name is Avice--a name borne by a good many women of the Cave-Gray family," answered Mr. Pawle with a significant glance at his fellow-pract.i.tioner. "But let me go on: Wickham left his daughter, her mother being dead, in Ashton's guardians.h.i.+p. She was then about six years of age. Ashton sent her to school here in England. About twelve or thirteen years later, he came home and settled in Markendale Square. He brought Avice Wickham to live with him. He handed over to her a considerable sum, which, he said, her father had left in his hands for her. And then, secretly, Ashton went down to Marketstoke and evidently made certain inquiries and investigations. Whether he was going to reveal the truth as to what I have just told you, we don't know--probably he was. But he was murdered, and we all know when and where. And I say he was murdered for the sake of these very papers which we now know were produced to Methley and Woodlesford by this claimant. Now, then--"

Mr. Carless suddenly bent forward.

"A moment, Pawle!" he said. "If this man Wickham really was the lost Lord Marketstoke, and he's dead, and he left a daughter, and the daughter's alive--"

"Well?" demanded Mr. Pawle. "Well?"

"Why, then, of course, that daughter," said Mr. Carless slowly, "that daughter is--"

A clerk opened the door and glanced at his employer.

"Mr. Methley and Mr. Woodlesford, sir," he announced. "By appointment."

CHAPTER XVIII

LET HIM APPEAR!

The meeting between the solicitors suggested to Viner and to Lord Ellingham, who looked on curiously while they exchanged formal greetings and explanations, a certain solemnity--each of them seemed to imply in look and manner that this was an unusually grave occasion. And Mr.

Carless, a.s.suming the direction of things, became almost judicial in his deportment.

"Well, gentlemen," he said, when they had all gathered about his desk.

"Lord Ellingham has informed me of what pa.s.sed between you and himself at his house yesterday. In plain language, the client whom you represent claims to be the Lord Marketstoke who disappeared so completely many years ago, and therefore the rightful Earl of Ellingham. Now, a first question--do you, as his legal advisers, believe in his claim?"

"Judging by the proofs with which he has furnished us, yes," answered Methley. "There seems to be no doubt of it."

"We'll ask for these proofs presently," remarked Mr. Carless. "But now a further question: Your client--whom we'll now call the claimant--had, I understand, no desire to take up his rightful position, and suggests that the secret shall remain a secret, and that he shall be paid a hundred thousand pounds to hold his tongue?"

"If you put it that way--yes," replied Methley.

"I don't know in what other way it could be put," said Mr. Carless grimly. "It's the plain truth. But now, if Lord Ellingham refuses that offer, does your client intend to commence proceedings?"

"Our instructions are--yes," answered Methley.

"Very good," said Mr. Carless. "Now, then--what are these proofs?"

Methley turned to his partner, who immediately thrust a hand in his breastpocket and produced a long envelope.

"I have them here," said Woodlesford. "Our client intrusted them to us so that we might show them to Lord Ellingham, if necessary. There are not many doc.u.ments--they all relate to the period of our client's life before he left England. There are one or two important letters from his father, the seventh Earl, two or three from his mother; there is also his mother's will. There is one letter from his younger brother, to whom he had evidently, more than once, announced his determination of leaving home for a considerable time. There are two letters from your own firm, relating to some property which Lord Marketstoke disposed of before he left London. There is a schedule or memorandum of certain personal effects which he left in his rooms at Ellingham Hall: there is also a receipt from his bankers for a quant.i.ty of plate and jewellery which he had deposited with them before leaving--these things had been left him by his mother. There are also two doc.u.ments which he seems to have considered it worth while to preserve all these years," concluded Woodlesford with a smile. "One is a letter informing him that he had been elected a member of the M.C.C.; the other is his commission as a justice of the peace for the county of Buckinghams.h.i.+re."

As he detailed these things, Woodlesford laid each specified paper before Mr. Carless, and then they all gathered round, and examined each exhibit.

The various doc.u.ments were somewhat faded with age, and the edges of some were worn as if from long folding and keeping in a pocketbook. Mr.

Carless hastily ran his eye over them.

"Very interesting, gentlemen," he remarked. "But you know, as well as I do, that these things don't prove your client to be the missing Lord Marketstoke. A judge and jury would want a lot more evidence than that.

The mere fact that your man is in possession of all these doc.u.ments proves nothing whatever. He may have stolen them!"

"From what we have seen of our client, Mr. Carless," observed Methley, with some stiffness of manner, "there is no need for such a suggestion."

"I dare say we shall all see a good deal of your client before this matter is settled, Mr. Methley," retorted Mr. Carless. "And even when I have seen a lot of him, I should still say the same--he _may_ have stolen them! What else has he to prove that he's what he says he is?"

"He is fully conversant with his family history," said Woodlesford. "He can give a perfectly full and--so far as we can judge--accurate account of his early life and of his subsequent doings. He evidently knows all about Ellingham Hall, Marketstoke and the surroundings. I think if you were to examine him on these points, you would find that his memory is surprisingly fresh."

"I have no doubt that it will come to his being examined on a great many points and in much detail," said Mr. Carless with a dry smile. "Of course, I shall be much interested in seeing him. You see, I remember the missing Lord Marketstoke very well indeed--he was often in here when I, as a lad of nineteen or twenty, was articled to my own father. And now, gentlemen, I'll ask you a question and commend it to your intelligence and common sense: if your client is this man he claims to be, why didn't he come straight to Carless and Driver, whom he would remember well enough, instead of going to Methley and Woodlesford? Come, now?"

Neither visitor answered this question, and Mr. Pawle suddenly turned on them with another.

"Did your client mention to you that he knew Carless and Driver as the family solicitors?" he asked.

"No, I can't say that he did," admitted Methley. "After all, thirty-five years' absence, you know--"

"You said just now that his memory was surprisingly fresh," interrupted Mr. Pawle.

"Surely," replied Woodlesford, "surely you can't expect a man who has been away from England all that time to remember everything!"

"I should have expected Lord Marketstoke to have gone straight to the family solicitors, anyway," retorted Mr. Pawle. "Obvious thing to do--if his story is a true one."

Woodlesford glanced at his partner, and repossessing himself of the doc.u.ments, began to arrange them in the envelope from which he had drawn them.