The Gem Collector, Page 3

  CHAPTER III.

  In the days before the Welshman began to expend his surplus energy inplaying football, he was accustomed, whenever the monotony of hiseveryday life began to oppress him, to collect a few friends and makeraids across the border into England, to the huge discomfort of thedwellers on the other side. It was to cope with this habit that CorvenAbbey, in Shropshire, came into existence. It met a long-felt want.Ministering to the spiritual needs of the neighborhood in times ofpeace, it became a haven of refuge when trouble began. From all sidespeople poured into it, emerging cautiously when the marauders haddisappeared.

  In the whole history of the abbey there is but one instance recordedof a bandit attempting to take the place by storm, and the attack wasan emphatic failure. On receipt of one ladle full of molten lead,aimed to a nicety by John the Novice, who seems to have been anythingbut a novice at marksmanship, this warrior retired, done to a turn, tohis mountain fastnesses, and is never heard of again. He would seem,however, to have passed the word round among his friends, forsubsequent raiding parties studiously avoided the abbey, and a peasantwho had succeeded in crossing its threshold was for the futureconsidered to be "home" and out of the game. Corven Abbey, as aresult, grew in power and popularity. Abbot succeeded abbot, the lakeat the foot of the hill was restocked at intervals, the lichen grew onthe walls; and still the abbey endured.

  But time, assisted by his majesty, King Henry the Eighth, had done itswork. The monks had fled. The walls had crumbled, and in the twentiethcentury, the abbey was a modern country house, and the owner a richAmerican.

  Of this gentleman the world knew but little. That he had made money,and a good deal of it, was certain. His name, Patrick McEachern,suggested Irish parentage, and a slight brogue, noticeable, however,only in moments of excitement, supported this theory. He had arrivedin London some four years back, taken rooms at the Albany, and goneinto society.

  England still firmly believes that wealth accrues to every resident ofNew York by some mysterious process not understandable of the Briton.McEachern and his money were accepted by society without question. Hissolecisms, which at first were numerous, were passed over as so quaintand refreshing. People liked his rugged good humor. He speedily madefriends, among them Lady Jane Blunt, the still youthful widow of a manabout town, who, after trying for several years to live at the rate often thousand per annum with an income of two and a half, had finallygiven up the struggle and drank himself peacefully into the tomb,leaving her in sole charge of their one son, Spencer Archbald.

  Possibly because he was the exact antithesis of the late lamented,Lady Jane found herself drawn to Mr. McEachern. Whatever his faults,he had strength; and after her experience of married life with a weakman, Lady Jane had come to the conclusion that strength was the onlymale quality worth consideration. When a year later, McEachern'sdaughter, Molly, had come over, it was Lady Jane who took her underher wing and introduced her everywhere.

  In the fifth month of the second year of their acquaintance, Mr.McEachern proposed and was accepted. "The bridegroom," said a societypaper, "is one of those typical captains of industry of whom ourcousins 'across the streak' can boast so many. Tall, muscular,square-shouldered, with the bulldog jaw and twinkling gray eye of theborn leader. You look at him and turn away satisfied. You have seen aman!"

  Lady Jane, who had fallen in love with the abbey some years before,during a visit to the neighborhood, had prevailed upon hersquare-shouldered lord to turn his twinkling gray eye in thatdirection, and the captain of industry, with the remark that here, atlast, was a real bully old sure-fire English stately home, had sentdown builders and their like, not in single spies, but in battalions,with instructions to get busy.

  The results were excellent. A happy combination of deep purse on thepart of the employer and excellent taste on the part of the architecthad led to the erection of one of the handsomest buildings inShropshire. To stand on the hill at the back of the house was to see aview worth remembering. The lower portion of the hill, between thehouse and the lake, had been cut into broad terraces. The lake itself,with its island with the little boathouse in the centre, was a glimpseof fairyland. Mr. McEachern was not poetical, but he had secured ashis private sanctum a room which commanded this view.

  He was sitting in this room one evening, about a week after themeeting between Spennie and Jimmy Pitt at the Savoy.

  "See, here, Jane," he was saying, "this is my point. I've been fixingup things in my mind, and this is the way I make it out. I reckonthere's no sense in taking risks when you needn't. You've a mightyhigh-toned bunch of guests here. I'm not saying you haven't. What Isay is, it would make us all feel more comfortable if we knew therewas a detective in the house keeping his eye skinned. I'm not alludingto any of them in particular, but how are we to know that all thesesocial headliners are on the level?"

  "If you mean our guests, Pat, I can assure you that they are allperfectly honest."

  Lady Jane looked out of the window, as she spoke, at a group of thoseunder discussion. Certainly at the moment the sternest censor couldhave found nothing to cavil at in their movements. Some were playingtennis, some clock golf, and the rest were smoking. She had frequentlycomplained, in her gentle, languid way, of her husband's unhappilysuspicious nature. She could never understand it. For her part shesuspected no one. She liked and trusted everybody, which was thereason why she was so popular, and so often taken in.

  Mr. McEachern looked bovine, as was his habit when he was endeavoringto gain a point against opposition.

  "They may be on the level," he said. "I'm not saying anything againstany one. But I've seen a lot of crooks in my time, and it's not theones with the low brows and the cauliflower ears that you want towatch for. It's the innocent Willies who look as if all they could dowas to lead the cotillon and wear bangles on their ankles. I've had alot to do with them, and it's up to a man that don't want to be stungnot to go by what a fellow looks like."

  "Really, Pat, dear, I sometimes think you ought to have been apoliceman. What _is_ the matter?"

  "Matter?"

  "You shouted."

  "Shouted? Not me. Spark from my cigar fell on my hand."

  "You know, you smoke too much, Pat," said his wife, seizing theopening with the instinct which makes an Irishman at a fair hit everyhead he sees.

  "I'm all right, me dear. Faith, I c'u'd smoke wan hondred a day and noharm done."

  By way of proving the assertion he puffed out with increased vigor athis cigar. The pause gave him time to think of another argument, whichmight otherwise have escaped him.

  "When we were married, me dear Jane," he said, "there was a detectivein the room to watch the presents. Two of them. I remimber seeing themat once. There go two of the boys, I said to mysilf. I mean," he addedhastily, "two of the police force."

  "But detectives at wedding receptions are quite ordinary. Nobody mindsthem. You see, the presents are so valuable that it would be silly torisk losing them."

  "And are there not valuable things here," asked McEacherntriumphantly, "which it would be silly to risk losing? And Sir Thomasis coming to-day with his wife. And you know what a deal of jewelryshe always takes about her."

  "Oh, Julia!" said Lady Jane, a little disdainfully. Her late husband'sbrother Thomas' wife was one of the few people to whom she objected.And, indeed, she was not alone in this prejudice. Few who had much todo with her did like Lady Blunt.

  "That rope of pearls of hers," said Mr. McEachern, "cost fortythousand pounds, no less, so they say."

  "So she says. But if you were thinking of bringing down a detective towatch over Julia's necklace, Pat, you needn't trouble. I believe shetakes one about with her wherever she goes, disguised as Thomas'valet."

  "Still, me dear----"

  "Pat, you're absurd," laughed Lady Jane. "I won't have you litteringup the house with great, clumsy detectives. You must remember that youaren't in horrid New York now, where everybody you meet wants to robyou. Who is it that you suspect? Who is the--what is the
word you'reso fond of? Crook. That's it. Who is the crook?"

  "I don't want to mention names," said McEachern cautiously, "and Icast no suspicions, but who is that pale, thin Willie who cameyesterday? The one that says the clever things that nobodyunderstands?"

  "Lulu Wesson! Why, _Pat_rick! He's the most delightful boy. What_can_ you suspect him of?"

  "I don't suspect him of anything. But you'll remimber what I wastelling about the sort of boy you want to watch. That's what that boyis. He may be the straightest ever, but if I was told there was acrook in the company, and wasn't put next who it was, he's the boythat would get my vote."

  "What dreadful nonsense you are talking, Pat. I believe you suspectevery one you meet. I suppose you will jump to the conclusion thatthis man whom Spennie is bringing down with him to-day is a criminalof some sort."

  "How's that? Spennie bringing a friend?"

  There was not a great deal of enthusiasm in McEachern's voice. Hisstepson was not a young man whom he respected very highly. Spennieregarded his stepfather with nervous apprehension, as one who woulddeal with his shortcomings with a vigor and severity of which hismother was incapable. The change of treatment which had begun afterher marriage with the American had had an excellent effect upon him,but it had not been pleasant. As Nebuchadnezzar is reported to havesaid of his vegetarian diet, it may have been wholesome, but it wasnot good. McEachern, for his part, regarded Spennie as a boy who wouldget into mischief unless he had an eye fixed upon him. So he proceededto fix that eye.

  "Yes, I must be seeing Harding about getting the rooms ready.Spennie's friend is bringing his man with him."

  "Who is his friend?"

  "He doesn't say. He just says he's a man he met in London."

  "H'm!"

  "And what does that grunt mean, I should like to know? I believeyou've begun to suspect the poor man already, without seeing him."

  "I don't say I have. But a man can pick up strange people in London."

  "Pat, you're perfectly awful. I believe you suspect every one youmeet. What do you suspect me of, I wonder?"

  "That's easy answered," said McEachern. "Robbery from the person."

  "What have I stolen?"

  "Me heart, me dear," replied McEachern gallantly, with a vast grin.

  "After that," said his wife, "I think I had better go. I had no ideayou could make such pretty speeches. Pat!"

  "Well, me dear?"

  "Don't send for that detective. It really wouldn't do. If it got aboutthat we couldn't trust our guests, we should never live it down. Youwon't, will you?"

  "Very well, me dear."

  What followed may afford some slight clue to the secret of Mr. PatrickMcEachern's rise in the world. It certainly suggests singleness ofpurpose, which is one of the essentials of success.

  No sooner had the door closed behind Lady Jane than he went to hiswriting table, took pen and paper, and wrote the following letter:

  _To the Manager, Wragge's Detective Agency,_ _Holborn Bars, London, E. C._

  Sir:

  With ref'ce to my last of the 28th ult., I should be glad if you would send down immediately one of your best men. Am making arrangements to receive him. Shall be glad if you will instruct him as follows, viz. (a) that he shall stay at the village inn in character of American seeing sights of England and anxious to inspect the abbey; (b) that he shall call and ask to see me. I shall then recognize him as old New York friend, and move his baggage from above inn to the abbey. Yours faithfully,

  P. McEACHERN.

  P.S.--Kindly not send a rube, but a real smart man.

  This brief but pregnant letter cost him some pains in its composition.He was not a ready writer. But he completed it at last to hissatisfaction. There was a crisp purity in the style which pleased him.He read it over, and put in a couple of commas. Then he placed it inan envelope, and lit another cigar.