Kitobni o'qish: «Clutterbuck's Treasure»

CHAPTER I
A COWARDLY ATTACK

When my father died and left me unexpectedly penniless, all those kind friends whom I consulted upon my obvious failure to find anything to do were quite agreed as to this fact: that when a young man is desirous of finding employment in this world, and of making his way and keeping his head up among his fellows, his failure to do so, if he does fail, must certainly be his own fault. He lacks, they said, either energy or perseverance or pluck, or all three; in a word, he wants "grit."

Therefore the reader will kindly understand this about me as a standpoint: that since I failed miserably to find employment befitting a young person of my position, at a time when it was necessary to find employment or go to the wall, I must—by all the rules of the probabilities—not only have gone to the wall, but also be deficient in all those qualities which are most dear to the British intelligence, namely—pluck, perseverance, and so forth.

And yet I did not go to the wall. On the contrary, I am, though still a young man, in an exceedingly comfortable position; while as for the British virtues which I am supposed to lack, I do not think—though I will not boast—that the reader will hesitate to acquit me of the charge of wanting every quality that goes to make an average Englishman, when he shall have read the curious tale I have to unfold.

My father's death, followed by the unexpected revelation of his insolvency, was a terrible blow to me. I had been educated without regard to expense. At Winchester I had plenty of pocket-money, and was, for this reason—and because I was a good athlete and but a moderate scholar—a popular character. At New College, Oxford, during the one year I spent there, I was in a set whose ideas centred rather upon the pleasures of life than upon its duties and responsibilities.

I still had plenty of money, and undoubtedly the last thing in the world that would have been likely to trouble my head at this time was any reflection as to where the funds came from. My father, as I believed, was a rich man, a member of the Stock Exchange, and having the disposal, as I had always understood, of practically unlimited supplies of money.

Then came the telegram from home announcing disaster, and at a moment's notice I found myself fatherless, penniless, and as good as hopeless too; for at my age, and with my inexperience, I was utterly at a loss to know what to do or how to set about to find some means of supporting myself.

My father's business, it appeared, had suddenly and completely collapsed. He had "got himself cornered," as I was informed, though I did not understand the term, and had lost every farthing that he possessed and more. The shock of it all had proved fatal to my poor parent, and he had succumbed suddenly—a broken heart, as I heard someone say; but I fancy my father's heart had always been a weak point in his economy, and the collapse in his fortunes doubtless gave to it the finishing touch.

So then, at the age of nineteen, I found myself master of my own fortunes, which certainly looked very like misfortunes; and in that stress of circumstances it was that I applied to my friends for advice, and received from each the assurance that if I possessed those British qualities to which reference has been made I should certainly find something to do; and that if I failed to "get on" I might rest assured that I had no one to thank but myself. Nevertheless, I found nothing to do. There could be no talk of any of the learned professions; I was too old for Sandhurst, even if I could have passed the examination; the navy was, of course, out of the question.

My ideas wildly wandered from professional football or cricket to enlistment in the line, and from that to life in the bush, or digging for hidden wealth in the soil of Rhodesia or of Klondyke, but the expense of the outfit and journey rendered this latter project impossible. There remained ultimately two resources from which to choose: enlistment or desk-work at a London office, which I believed I could obtain without difficulty if I should be reduced to so unpalatable an alternative.

But office life, I felt, would be worse than purgatory to me. The very idea of confinement and the lack of plenty of fresh air and exercise was intolerable, and I ultimately resolved that I would take the Queen's shilling, and submit to barrack discipline and all the indignities of existence among my social inferiors rather than bind myself for ever to the misery of the city. Indeed, I had quite made up my mind to journey to Trafalgar Square, in order to interview one of the recruiting sergeants generally to be found at the north-eastern corner of that favourite rendezvous, when something happened to set my ideas flowing in a new channel.

My father's house, in our days of prosperity, had been one of those fine mansions overlooking Streatham Common; and though I had left the dismally stripped and dismantled place as soon as the miserable formalities of funeral and sale were over, I had taken a cheap lodging in Lower Streatham, because in the chaos of my ideas and plans it appeared to me that I might as well stay in the neighbourhood of my old home as anywhere else, until the fifty pounds still remaining to my credit at my Oxford bankers had gone the way of all cash, or until I should have made up my bewildered mind as to where, in all this wide and pitiless world, I should go for a living.

I had practically determined, as I say, to enlist, and was walking one warm summer evening along the green lane which runs from Thornton Heath to Lower Streatham, deep in somewhat melancholy reflection upon the step I was about to take, when a noise of scuffling and bad language distracted my thoughts from the contemplation of to-morrow's barrack-yard trials, and brought them up with a run to the consideration of the present instant. I suppose the noise that they were themselves making prevented the four persons taking part in the scrimmage, which I now suddenly saw, from observing my approach, for they continued to tussle and to wrangle on their side of the hedge, while I watched them for a moment from mine, desiring, if possible, to discover what the quarrel was about and on which side the right lay, if either.

Then I soon perceived that the fight was an iniquitous and unequal one, for three younger men had set upon one elderly person and were obviously engaged in attempting to relieve him of his money and valuables, an attempt which the old gentleman made gallant but naturally futile efforts to frustrate, hitting out right valiantly with his umbrella, but doing far more violence to the Queen's English than to the heads and persons of his assailants, upon whom the blows of his feeble weapon produced little effect.

I need scarcely say that, having ascertained what was passing, I did not waste time in making up my mind as to which side should receive the favour of my support, and in far less time than it takes to write the words, I had burst through the hedge and rushed to the assistance of the swearing and furious old gentleman.

At my appearance one of the fellows bolted like a hare across the field towards Norbury, and I saw no more of him. Now, I had paid some little attention to the study of self-defence while at Oxford, and though the remaining two rascals stood up to me for a moment, I soon placed my right fist in so convincing a manner upon the tip of the nose of one that he went down like a nine-pin and lay where he fell, while the other, after feinting and dodging and ducking for a few seconds as I squared up to him with the intention, if necessary, of treating him like his fellow, suddenly turned, darted through the hedge, and was away down the lane towards Thornton Heath in the twinkling of an eye, I following.

Away we went at hundred-yards' speed, he leading by about ten paces, and for about fifty yards it was anybody's race. Then I began to gain, and, seeing this, the fellow threw something down and ran on; he careered for another half hundred paces and then ridded himself of something else; and I, fearing, if I continued the pursuit, to lose my chance of recovering the old man's property—which, I rightly conjectured, was what the fellow had relieved himself of—stopped to pick it up while I could. I thus allowed my friend to escape, which was, of course, what he most desired at the moment, even more than the possession of the pocket-book and the gold watch which I soon found in the road and recovered.

Then I returned to the spot where I had left my fallen foe and the old gentleman whose property had been the original cause of disagreement between the contending parties.

CHAPTER II
THE OLD MISER

I found my ally beating the prostrate enemy with his umbrella, and still using language which would have been unseemly in any person, and sounded doubly shocking in the mouth of an old man.

"Come," I said, "you needn't swear, sir; and I wouldn't continue to whack a man who is down, if I were you."

"Kill him! kill him—the cowardly rascal! Kick him on the head and kill him!" shrieked the infuriated old gentleman; "they have robbed me between them, and I'll have his life for it! I'm a poor man, and they've taken my all; kick him in the head, if you're a man, and kill him!"

I could not help laughing. "It's because I'm a man that I shall do nothing of the kind," I said. "Stop dabbing at him with your umbrella and attend to business; here's your property—take it." I presented him with his pocket-book and watch as I spoke, and never did I behold so complete a metamorphosis in the expression of a man's face as now passed over his. He seized his property with both hands and hugged it to his breast. He beamed and chuckled over it, mumbling inarticulate words of delight as he fondly drew forth a bundle of notes and counted them.

It struck me that here was a considerable sum of money for a poor man to carry about with him; for though he jealously hid from me the figures that would have revealed the value of the notes, I was able to observe that there were at least fifteen or twenty of these, which, even supposing them to have been mere "rivers," would represent a decidedly respectable sum. The old fellow observed me watching him.

"Private papers, private papers!" he muttered; "letters from my dead wife that I would not lose for their weight in diamonds!"

"You old humbug!" I thought; "if ever you had a wife you starved her, I'll bet."

But the condition of our prostrate enemy began to give me some anxiety, and I was obliged to transfer my attention from the old miser to him. He lay groaning and snoring, his eyes shut, and his nose still bleeding a little. Suddenly he opened his eyes slightly and looked at the old man and at me. He scowled as he saw me, but his lips muttered "Water!"

"Go and fetch the man some water—you, sir," I said; "you can finish counting your notes afterwards. I would go, but I dare not leave him with you."

"Water for the rogue that robbed me? Not I," said the old fellow; "let him lie and rot first!"

"Then I will go," I said, for positively the rogue looked like expiring, and I was really anxious for him. If he were actually as bad as he looked there was not much danger in leaving him. I knew of a duck-pond near a farmhouse close by, and towards this I proceeded at my best speed, for the fellow must not be allowed to die—rascal though he undoubtedly was.

The rascal, it appeared, had no intention of dying, however, just at present; for when I returned with water from the duck-pond, he had departed, and departed—as I gathered—in company with the old gentleman's pocket-book, for its owner sat on the grass evidently dazed, nursing a portion of the porte-monnaie, for which, I suppose, he had made a good fight, if the jagged and torn appearance of the remnant was any indication of a struggle.

I could see our friend careering down the lane, some distance away, towards Thornton Heath, well out of reach of pursuit, and I was straining my eyes after him in hopes of marking him down somewhere, when the old miser behind me suddenly interrupted my reflections by bursting anew into a paroxysm of abuse and bad language, which threw even his previous excursions into the shade.

Whether I or the thief, or both of us, were the objects of his frenzy was not very apparent, for his vituperations were incoherent and inarticulate; but I gathered presently that I was at least in part responsible for the disaster, for he inquired, with many added flowers of speech, why I had been so foolish as to go for water and leave him with a cold-blooded ruffian who had robbed a poor old man of his entire fortune.

I was sorry for the unfortunate victim to my ill-judged humanity, and did my best to soothe him.

"You must stop the notes at once," I said; "and as for the fellow himself, why, we'll describe him to the police and identify him in no time; we shall get your money back, never fear."

"It's a lie!" he shrieked; "I am ruined! I shall never see a penny of it; you and your accomplices will fatten upon the old man's savings. Curse you all! I wish you were dead!"

"Thank you," I said; "if that's the case I shall wish you good afternoon and depart, or my accomplices will levant with my share of the spoil." I started to go in the direction of Streatham. The old fellow came to his senses at once.

"Stop a minute!" he cried; "I don't mean that. Stop and help me to recover my money."

"What, from my own accomplices?" said I. He took no notice.

"Help me to recover my money," he continued, "and to bring that rogue to the gallows, and—and you won't be sorry for it!"

"It isn't a hanging matter," I said; "but I am ready to help you if you talk like a sensible man. How much has the fellow taken?"

This was an unfortunate remark, for it instantly plunged the old man into renewed paroxysms of rage and woe. I therefore did not pursue my inquiries, but led my friend slowly towards Streatham, he spluttering and muttering his maledictions, I patiently awaiting the dawn of reason. I inquired, however, presently, whether he knew the numbers of his stolen notes, and as my companion inquired, in response, whether I took him for a fool, I concluded that he did possess this information.

The old man grew calmer after a while, and I accompanied him first to the police station, and afterwards to the telegraph office, where he wrote and despatched a wire to the manager of the Bank of England. The clerk read out his message as we stood at the counter, and I was astonished and rather shocked to learn that my new friend's loss, according to his list of notes, amounted to something very near three hundred pounds.

During the next few days my acquaintance with the strange old man ripened considerably; for together we were called upon by the police authorities to attend, at least once per diem, at the Streatham police station, in order to identify the culprit among a large assortment of suspicious characters brought up daily for our inspection. I think it was on the fifth or sixth day after the robbery that our pilgrimages to the police station were at last crowned with success, and we had the pleasure of seeing once again the unmistakable features of the rogue we were in search of, and afterwards of getting him condemned by a magistrate to a period of enforced virtue and innocence. We were, moreover, successful in recovering a portion of the stolen property, though not all of it—a circumstance which greatly pleased me, for I honestly believed that the lost three hundred pounds represented the whole of my old friend's worldly possessions, as he had led me to understand, and I had been grieved to think of the poor old fellow's sudden misfortune and ruin through the guile of a fellow-creature.

Mr. Clutterbuck, which was the old miser's name, lived in a small villa in Lower Streatham—a dingy, dull-looking house situated in the midst of a moderate garden surrounded by a high brick wall. So far as could be seen, there was no way of entering the abode excepting by a small door in the wall leading up through the square garden to the house; and though I several times, during that week of attendance at the police station and the police court, accompanied the old man home, he never once invited me within doors; neither did he ever express to me one word of thanks for the services I had rendered him in connection with the loss he had sustained and the recovery of a good portion of his property.

Meanwhile, however, this affair had delayed my enlistment for more than a week, and during that period I received an invitation from a college friend in the country to pay him a visit at his house in Gloucestershire; an invitation which I gladly accepted, thanking my lucky stars that some good, at least, had thus come of my strange encounter with the eccentric old miser, Clutterbuck.

Assuredly, when I parted from him for the last time, after the completion of the business which had brought us daily together for a week or near it, I never supposed that any other good could possibly proceed from the acquaintance, or from the delay in my "career" which the affair had occasioned. After my visit to Gloucestershire I should return to London and enlist without further delay; and as for old Clutterbuck, I had neither expectation nor desire ever to behold his face or hear his name again. For how could I know that—

As a matter of fact I never did see the old man again. I went to Gloucestershire and forgot him, or at all events forgot to think of him, until—nearly a month after—I received a letter which brought him suddenly and very forcibly to remembrance—a letter which was destined to lead to a complete "general post" of all my ideas and plans in life, driving from my mind all thoughts of enlistment and office drudgery and everything else of the kind; a letter which told of the miser's end and gave me hope of a new beginning, and which proved, after I had learned its full significance, that even misers may remember benefits conferred, and show a sense of gratitude for which they do not, as a rule, obtain much credit.

I read the letter, first, with my heart all a-flutter with excitement; but presently my agitation cooled down, for, I reflected, even though I should have been chosen as the old man's heir, or part-heir, what could the old fellow have to leave?

"Don't be a sanguine fool, man!" I said to myself. "There isn't much in the business."

Which showed that, though good at games, I was no better prophet than I was scholar!

CHAPTER III
THE GREAT PRIZE IS OFFERED

The letter, so far as I can remember the wording of it, read something like this—

"DEAR SIR,"—(it ran)—"By desire of the late Mr. William Clutterbuck I have to invite you to be present at his burial, on Friday next, in the churchyard of St. Mary's, Norbury, and also at the subsequent reading of my late client's will on the same afternoon at Aston Villa, Lower Streatham."

The signature was that of some lawyer.

"By George! Peter, old chap," said my college chum, to whom I handed the letter after reading it, "you're in for a legacy, you lucky old rascal! Who is it?—an uncle? You won't have to enlist after all!"

"Uncle?" I repeated; "no! I haven't such a thing in the world; and as for legacy—there may be a fiver or so in it, but nothing more. It's an old fellow who carried all his fortune in a pocket-book and got it stolen;" and I told Henderson the whole story of my futile attempt to defend old Clutterbuck's property in Green Lane a month ago.

Henderson was immensely interested.

"Don't you make any mistake; that pocket-book never contained his entire fortune," he said. "The old boy was a miser on the face of him, any fool could see that; he may have got a hundred thousand hidden in a cellar, half eaten by the rats, and all left to you. Why, man, I have heard of huge fortunes left to fellows for far less."

And Henderson proceeded to tell me of how a man he had read or heard of was left fifty thousand for letting an old lady look over his hymnbook in church; and how another fellow got as much again for paying an old gentleman's omnibus fare when the conductor refused to give him change and threatened to be disagreeable; and many other choice examples of a similar character.

But I was firmly convinced that there was nothing romantic forthcoming as the result of my acquaintance with old Clutterbuck, at least nothing more romantic than a five- or ten-pound note, and I took the train to Paddington with the sense that the journey was an unmitigated nuisance, since it was unlikely to lead to anything seriously interesting, while it cut short an extremely pleasant visit in a circle of society from which I should perforce be excluded before long in my capacity of plain Tommy Atkins, the recipient of the Queen's shilling and wearer of the uniform of the humblest of her servants militant.

Steggins, the lawyer, was, however, decorously polite when I made my appearance at Aston Villa. There were three or four other persons present, expectant legatees like myself, I concluded; so that the contents of dead Mr. Clutterbuck's pocket-book were to be divided among five, at least, of us. There was nothing in the business—I was certain of it; I had been a fool to leave my comfortable quarters in the country upon such an errand; would that I had stayed!

Mr. Clutterbuck had died, I was told, of heart disease. He had never quite recovered the shock of the assault in Green Lane, and it was believed that he had encountered one of his assailants on the day of his death and recognised him, and that the excitement of the rencontre had proved fatal. My fellow-legatees were, it appeared, relatives of the deceased, and one and all of these looked askance at me as an interloper, several of them inquiring of Steggins, in my hearing, what I had had to do with the testator, and what claim I possessed upon the property.

Mr. Steggins replied that he believed I had performed some service to the deceased for which the testator was grateful.

"What's the figure, Steggins, old man?" asked one. "How does the old boy cut up?"

"That's what we are about to learn," said the man of law.

We did learn it a few minutes later; and a very remarkable lesson it was!

I suppose that Mr. Clutterbuck's testamentary dispositions were just about as surprising and unexpected as such dispositions can well be, unless indeed they had emanated from an absolute lunatic, and this Mr. Clutterbuck certainly was not. We who were present as expectant legatees were taken aback, one and all, and when I use this expression about my own feelings I am choosing an exceedingly mild one.

As a matter of fact, I was, to use a more serviceable word, "flabbergasted." For me alone of those present the large amount of money which the testator had to dispose of was an absolute surprise. I learned afterwards that all the rest were well aware that their relative had been possessed of considerable wealth, though perhaps none of them may have realised the real extent of his hoarded riches. At all events no one could possibly have guessed how the eccentric old man intended to dispose of his money. So that in this matter the surprise of the rest was as great as my own.

"The will, gentlemen," said Mr. Steggins, preparing to read that document, "is very short, very clear as to its dispositions, though not worded in the customary legal phraseology" (I could not help laughing at the non sequitur involved in this explanation), "and exceedingly eccentric. It begins with the words, 'The Prize to the Swift,' which sentence heads the document as a kind of text, and it continues as follows:—

"'I wish to preface my testamentary dispositions with the remark that my personal estate amounts, at the time of writing, to exactly ninety-seven thousand eight hundred and ninety-two pounds three shillings and sixpence, free of legacy duty. The accumulation of this sum of money has occasioned me much hard labour, much thought, much disappointment, many dangers, much travel by land and sea. I have no intention that my heir should acquire that which has been gained by the sweat of my brow without corresponding labour and suffering on his own part.'

"That is the opening paragraph of the will itself," said Mr. Steggins; "this is how it proceeds:—

"'I have therefore decided that, as I have indicated in the initial sentence of this my will, the prize shall go to the swift. Let me explain my meaning. Those of my possible heirs who have known me long are aware that I have devoted considerable time during recent years to foreign travel. During one of my latest journeys I took the opportunity to bury a box containing treasure at a place indicated in the map of Bechuanaland which I have sketched.

"'I now bequeath to him who first succeeds in reaching that spot, and in finding the treasure, the entire fortune which I possess, and which I estimate to be the equivalent of the sum quoted above. Those whom I have authorised by name to compete in this race for wealth are advised that many qualities of mind and body will be called into requisition by the winner: such as energy, perseverance, pluck, judgment, acuteness. Without the determination to employ each and all of these qualities, it would be useless to undertake the search which must be the toilsome preliminary to enjoyment of my wealth.

"'The competitors who shall alone be legally competent to inherit from me are the following:—

"'William John Clutterbuck, nephew.

"'James Strong, nephew.

"'Charles Strong, nephew.

"'John Ellis, cousin.

"'Godfrey Bernard Hewetson, of 13 Enderby Terrace, Streatham, to whom I am indebted for a service rendered.'"

(This last name is my own.)

"'If none of these five persons shall have succeeded within three years of my death in finding the buried treasure, my lawyer, Mr. Steggins, shall have power to seek new instructions within the sealed letter which has been entrusted to him for that purpose.

"'Each competitor, as above enumerated, shall receive, immediately after the reading of this my will, one-fifth share of any money found upon my person or within my house at the time of my decease. To save trouble, I may add that any such money will be found within my pocket-book; there is none anywhere besides the notes and change therein contained. The house and garden will, of course, remain the property of the successful discoverer of the rest of my estate.'

"The will ends there," said Steggins; "but there is a postscript which I may read out, though it has no actual bearing upon the matter in hand:—

"'I should like to add' (writes the testator) 'that, since none of my relatives have ever shown me the slightest affection, or paid me any attention which was not obviously interested, I should be glad if the last-named among the competitors—Mr. Godfrey Bernard Hewetson, who has, at least on one occasion, done me a very signal service—should prove himself, as I fancy he is as likely as any to do, the successful competitor. My relatives are, so far as I know them, but poor specimens of humanity, and little likely to carry away the prize in a competition requiring such qualities as energy and courage. I have authorised them to compete, however, as a matter of family duty. Possibly the desire for gain may transform one or all of them into animated human beings.'"

The faces of those surrounding the table at which Steggins had sat and read this remarkable document were black enough when he had finished. One or two men swore audibly. Every one of them scowled at me, as though I were in some way to blame for the eccentric dispositions, which had evidently disappointed them.

As for me, I was so dumbfounded by the stupefying thoughts and considerations to which the recital of Mr. Clutterbuck's dispositions had given rise, that I think I must have made a poor show as I sat and blushed and helplessly blinked my eyes, while the others burst into a torrent of angry conversation.