Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (687 page)

“Yes.”

“Well, sir, the cab went from Lombard Street to the Tower Wharf. The sailor with the black beard got out, and spoke to the steward of the Rotterdam steamboat, which was to start next morning. He asked if he could be allowed to go on board at once, and sleep in his berth over-night. The steward said, No. The cabins, and berths, and bedding were all to have a thorough cleaning that evening, and no passenger could be allowed to come on board, before the morning. The sailor turned round, and left the wharf. When he got into the street again, the boy noticed for the first time, a man dressed like a respectable mechanic, walking on the opposite side of the road, and apparently keeping the sailor in view. The sailor stopped at an eating-house in the neighbourhood, and went in. The boy — not being able to make up his mind, at the moment — hung about among some other boys, staring at the good things in the eating-house window. He noticed the mechanic waiting, as he himself was waiting — but still on the opposite side of the street. After a minute, a cab came by slowly, and stopped where the mechanic was standing. The boy could only see plainly one person in the cab, who leaned forward at the window to speak to the mechanic. He described that person, Mr. Blake, without any prompting from me, as having a dark face, like the face of an Indian.”

It was plain, by this time, that Mr. Bruff and I had made another mistake. The sailor with the black beard was clearly not a spy in the service of the Indian conspiracy. Was he, by any possibility, the man who had got the Diamond?

“After a little,” pursued the Sergeant, “the cab moved on slowly down the street. The mechanic crossed the road, and went into the eating-house. The boy waited outside till he was hungry and tired — and then went into the eating-house, in his turn. He had a shilling in his pocket; and he dined sumptuously, he tells me, on a black-pudding, an eel-pie, and a bottle of ginger-beer. What can a boy not digest? The substance in question has never been found yet.”

“What did he see in the eating-house?” I asked.

“Well, Mr. Blake, he saw the sailor reading the newspaper at one table, and the mechanic reading the newspaper at another. It was dusk before the sailor got up, and left the place. He looked about him suspiciously when he got out into the street. The boy — BEING a boy — passed unnoticed. The mechanic had not come out yet. The sailor walked on, looking about him, and apparently not very certain of where he was going next. The mechanic appeared once more, on the opposite side of the road. The sailor went on, till he got to Shore Lane, leading into Lower Thames Street. There he stopped before a public-house, under the sign of ‘The Wheel of Fortune,’ and, after examining the place outside, went in. Gooseberry went in too. There were a great many people, mostly of the decent sort, at the bar. ‘The Wheel of Fortune’ is a very respectable house, Mr. Blake; famous for its porter and pork-pies.”

The Sergeant’s digressions irritated me. He saw it; and confined himself more strictly to Gooseberry’s evidence when he went on.

“The sailor,” he resumed, “asked if he could have a bed. The landlord said ‘No; they were full.’ The barmaid corrected him, and said ‘Number Ten was empty.’ A waiter was sent for to show the sailor to Number Ten. Just before that, Gooseberry had noticed the mechanic among the people at the bar. Before the waiter had answered the call, the mechanic had vanished. The sailor was taken off to his room. Not knowing what to do next, Gooseberry had the wisdom to wait and see if anything happened. Something did happen. The landlord was called for. Angry voices were heard up-stairs. The mechanic suddenly made his appearance again, collared by the landlord, and exhibiting, to Gooseberry’s great surprise, all the signs and tokens of being drunk. The landlord thrust him out at the door, and threatened him with the police if he came back. From the altercation between them, while this was going on, it appeared that the man had been discovered in Number Ten, and had declared with drunken obstinacy that he had taken the room. Gooseberry was so struck by this sudden intoxication of a previously sober person, that he couldn’t resist running out after the mechanic into the street. As long as he was in sight of the public-house, the man reeled about in the most disgraceful manner. The moment he turned the corner of the street, he recovered his balance instantly, and became as sober a member of society as you could wish to see. Gooseberry went back to ‘The Wheel of Fortune’ in a very bewildered state of mind. He waited about again, on the chance of something happening. Nothing happened; and nothing more was to be heard, or seen, of the sailor. Gooseberry decided on going back to the office. Just as he came to this conclusion, who should appear, on the opposite side of the street as usual, but the mechanic again! He looked up at one particular window at the top of the public-house, which was the only one that had a light in it. The light seemed to relieve his mind. He left the place directly. The boy made his way back to Gray’s Inn — got your card and message — called — and failed to find you. There you have the state of the case, Mr. Blake, as it stands at the present time.”

“What is your own opinion of the case, Sergeant?”

“I think it’s serious, sir. Judging by what the boy saw, the Indians are in it, to begin with.”

“Yes. And the sailor is evidently the person to whom Mr. Luker passed the Diamond. It seems odd that Mr. Bruff, and I, and the man in Mr. Bruff’s employment, should all have been mistaken about who the person was.”

“Not at all, Mr. Blake. Considering the risk that person ran, it’s likely enough that Mr. Luker purposely misled you, by previous arrangement between them.”

“Do you understand the proceedings at the public-house?” I asked. “The man dressed like a mechanic was acting of course in the employment of the Indians. But I am as much puzzled to account for his sudden assumption of drunkenness as Gooseberry himself.”

“I think I can give a guess at what it means, sir,” said the Sergeant. “If you will reflect, you will see that the man must have had some pretty strict instructions from the Indians. They were far too noticeable themselves to risk being seen at the bank, or in the public-house — they were obliged to trust everything to their deputy. Very good. Their deputy hears a certain number named in the public-house, as the number of the room which the sailor is to have for the night — that being also the room (unless our notion is all wrong) which the Diamond is to have for the night, too. Under those circumstances, the Indians, you may rely on it, would insist on having a description of the room — of its position in the house, of its capability of being approached from the outside, and so on. What was the man to do, with such orders as these? Just what he did! He ran up-stairs to get a look at the room, before the sailor was taken into it. He was found there, making his observations — and he shammed drunk, as the easiest way of getting out of the difficulty. That’s how I read the riddle. After he was turned out of the public-house, he probably went with his report to the place where his employers were waiting for him. And his employers, no doubt, sent him back to make sure that the sailor was really settled at the public-house till the next morning. As for what happened at ‘The Wheel of Fortune,’ after the boy left — we ought to have discovered that last night. It’s eleven in the morning, now. We must hope for the best, and find out what we can.”

In a quarter of an hour more, the cab stopped in Shore Lane, and Gooseberry opened the door for us to get out.

“All right?” asked the Sergeant.

“All right,” answered the boy.

The moment we entered “The Wheel of Fortune” it was plain even to my inexperienced eyes that there was something wrong in the house.

The only person behind the counter at which the liquors were served, was a bewildered servant girl, perfectly ignorant of the business. One or two customers, waiting for their morning drink, were tapping impatiently on the counter with their money. The bar-maid appeared from the inner regions of the parlour, excited and preoccupied. She answered Sergeant Cuff’s inquiry for the landlord, by telling him sharply that her master was up-stairs, and was not to be bothered by anybody.

“Come along with me, sir,” said Sergeant Cuff, coolly leading the way up-stairs, and beckoning to the boy to follow him.

The barmaid called to her master, and warned him that strangers were intruding themselves into the house. On the first floor we were encountered by the Landlord, hurrying down, in a highly irritated state, to see what was the matter.

“Who the devil are you? and what do you want here?” he asked.

“Keep your temper,” said the Sergeant, quietly. “I’ll tell you who I am to begin with. I am Sergeant Cuff.”

The illustrious name instantly produced its effect. The angry landlord threw open the door of a sitting-room, and asked the Sergeant’s pardon.

“I am annoyed and out of sorts, sir — that’s the truth,” he said. “Something unpleasant has happened in the house this morning. A man in my way of business has a deal to upset his temper, Sergeant Cuff.”

“Not a doubt of it,” said the Sergeant. “I’ll come at once, if you will allow me, to what brings us here. This gentleman and I want to trouble you with a few inquiries, on a matter of some interest to both of us.”

“Relating to what, sir?” asked the landlord.

“Relating to a dark man, dressed like a sailor, who slept here last night.”

“Good God! that’s the man who is upsetting the whole house at this moment!” exclaimed the landlord. “Do you, or does this gentleman know anything about him?”

“We can’t be certain till we see him,” answered the Sergeant.

“See him?” echoed the landlord. “That’s the one thing that nobody has been able to do since seven o’clock this morning. That was the time when he left word, last night, that he was to be called. He WAS called — and there was no getting an answer from him, and no opening his door to see what was the matter. They tried again at eight, and they tried again at nine. No use! There was the door still locked — and not a sound to be heard in the room! I have been out this morning — and I only got back a quarter of an hour ago. I have hammered at the door myself — and all to no purpose. The potboy has gone to fetch a carpenter. If you can wait a few minutes, gentlemen, we will have the door opened, and see what it means.”

“Was the man drunk last night?” asked Sergeant Cuff.

“Perfectly sober, sir — or I would never have let him sleep in my house.”

“Did he pay for his bed beforehand?”

“No.”

“Could he leave the room in any way, without going out by the door?”

“The room is a garret,” said the landlord. “But there’s a trap-door in the ceiling, leading out on to the roof — and a little lower down the street, there’s an empty house under repair. Do you think, Sergeant, the blackguard has got off in that way, without paying?”

“A sailor,” said Sergeant Cuff, “might have done it — early in the morning, before the street was astir. He would be used to climbing, and his head wouldn’t fail him on the roofs of the houses.”

As he spoke, the arrival of the carpenter was announced. We all went up-stairs, at once, to the top story. I noticed that the Sergeant was unusually grave, even for him. It also struck me as odd that he told the boy (after having previously encouraged him to follow us), to wait in the room below till we came down again.

The carpenter’s hammer and chisel disposed of the resistance of the door in a few minutes. But some article of furniture had been placed against it inside, as a barricade. By pushing at the door, we thrust this obstacle aside, and so got admission to the room. The landlord entered first; the Sergeant second; and I third. The other persons present followed us.

We all looked towards the bed, and all started.

The man had not left the room. He lay, dressed, on the bed — with a white pillow over his face, which completely hid it from view.

“What does that mean?” said the landlord, pointing to the pillow.

Sergeant Cuff led the way to the bed, without answering, and removed the pillow.

The man’s swarthy face was placid and still; his black hair and beard were slightly, very slightly, discomposed. His eyes stared wide-open, glassy and vacant, at the ceiling. The filmy look and the fixed expression of them horrified me. I turned away, and went to the open window. The rest of them remained, where Sergeant Cuff remained, at the bed.

“He’s in a fit!” I heard the landlord say.