LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1364, 28 June 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

TEE MARINE BINOCULAR. ['•Be!gravia."l Concluded. ' I hope, sir, you will excuse this intrusion. lam a member of the detective force of London. I saw your name as one of the witnesses on a iate inquest. I have been trying to find a clue to the criminal; but up to this am unsuccessful. The reward is, as you no doubt are aware, considerable. I have in a way staked my reputation on clearing up the case, and in the hope that you may be aMe to give me ever ho slight a piece of information outside your evidence I have presumed to oall on you. I hope you will excuse the liberty ' I told him that thfre was no need for apology ; that I myself felt a great desire that the history of the night should be laid bare ; and that if there were any aid in my power, I should be only too happy to give it; but that I was without a particle of fact beyond what he had seen in my evidence. He begged me to tell him the whole circumstances over again. When I had finished, he shook his head, saying that the report had been complete. In rising to leave he handed me his card With his address printed on it. As I took the card I asked, 'Have you found out nothing at all about the old man or the lad?'

' Nothing of any use, but still a little. It appears that the old man kept a dingy marine store down in Wapping. The people around the Btore did not know where he lived. He was suspected of having had small smuggling transactions with sailors, and there was a belief that he hoarded money.' With these words he bowed, apologised again, and retired. For a It' tie while the matter I had been writing about remained in my mind, blocking the way ugainst new thought. Gradually I fell to musing over the visit of the detective. My eyes rested on the window through which I had bo often watched the ill-treat-ment of the boy. Suddenly an idea struck me with great clearness ani force. The more I examined it, the more worthy it seemed of attention. At last I made up my mind, sat down, and wrote a note to Detective Bracken asking him to call the next day. Early in the afternoon Bracken was with me. It was no part of my design to take him into my counsel. I concluded from his great desire to discover a clue that ha Would gladly lend himself to any plan offering the faintest hope of light. When we were alone I informed him that since I had seen him an idea had occurred to me which might lead to a clue. I warned him that a more fanciful idea had never entered the mind of man. But I was willingtoput it to the test and bear the expense if it turned out idle. If discovery followed, he Bhould pay, aud all the public portion was to be his. He joyfully accepted. 'ln the first place,' I asked, 'are those rooms still unoccupied ?' • Yes.' ' Very good. Go over and take them for a month.'

' Anything further ?' * Y 68. Examine the floor in the centre cf the old man's room. When you have done so, lock the door on the stairs and come to me. Stop I there is another thing. Buy some newspapers on your way there, and blind up the window before you begin your search.' In less than an hour he returned.

'I have,'he said, 'done all you told me. la the centre of the room one piece of plank, eightoeu inches long and nine wide, ia loose, for all the nail-heads are in it.'

' Did you find anything under the loose piece of plank ?' 'No, the placo was quite empty, and there were no cobwebs in it; they are generally found between flooring and ceiling. * Bracken, we have made our first discovery.' ' Yes ; the place where he hid his money.' 'And we've made our second discovery at the same time.'

' What's that V he asked, with a slight expression of surprise. ' The motive of the double murder. Now, Bracken, let us see if we can get any further with what we h»ve in hand. The word chloroform was not mentioned by the doctors at the inquest-, but it explains all the peculiar symptoms in the lad's case He was heavily chloioformised first, the old maa was then strangled, the money stolen and the body of the lad thrown through the windows to make it Beem like murder and suicide of the boy's doing. Now, the murdered people hsd had no intercourse whatever with the people in that hou e or ■ hat court, and the old man's store at Wapping was far enough off to destroy his trail, as you told me the people around the store had no notion whatever of where the old man lived. As we know from the evidence, he had no friends and never a visitor once. At the court everyone thought him very poor. At Wapping he was supposed to be a miser, but no one at Wapping b new where he lived. Do you see your way to anything now, Bracken ?' ' Yes. It wasn't anyone from the court or from Wapping that did the job.' 'Precisely. But still it must have been some one within a short radius of the court. It is not likely that the lad knew of his hoardings, and it is not likely that the old man toid any one in the neighborhood that he kept a large sum under a loose plank in his bedroom. How, therefore, did the murderer know where the money was hidden ! We need not bother with thinking that anyone on the first floor had anything to do with it, for he was never home until the office wai shut, and then there was no <ne below to hear any noises between floor and ceiling V e t it must have been by accident that the place of concealment wss iii=covered, lam now sure of how the accidental discovery was madt<. All wc have to do is to try and select the person who made it Have you got the latch key of the front door ?' ' I have.'

' Yt ry T am now going to you to do an extraordinary and. repulsive thing. Upon your comp'ianoe all depends.' ' You may count on me.' • Well, you must go at once to some theatrical costumier and get the means of making yourself up as exactly as possible like the old man You must have a wig with a bald purple crown, and so on. If you flinch, it's all over and I give it up.' 'But '

' 1 assure you tbera isn't the least use in saying a word. If you don't consent, I bid good bye to the whole thing. Are you satisfied to go on }' * \i there's nothing for it, I am.' ' Come in a cab the night to-morrow and bring the disguise ¥ou can dress here, and I'll paiut your face.' At the time appointed he came, bringing with him the materials for making the counterfeit of the murdered man. Bracken was about the right height, but much more slender than the deceased. This deficiency of bulk had been compensated for by padding the coat. Whilst I assisted him to dress, I said : 'At the time of the inquest it did not occur to me to mention a habit which I had observed in the deceased. After the lad left the r om, and while the lamp, still burned on the tabic, he would go to the middle of the room, and sitting d <wn with his back to the windo.vv so remain ral minutes. At the inquest no qaif jj weiwi asked me except these relating to Ja nitiht of the murder and to the fteqtfjjnt quarrels. When you called on me the other evening, owing to preoccupation, i did not eutor very actively into the subject of your visit. Later on I connected the thougot of the secret store of money with this h..bit of sitting on the no >r. At the same momeat another idea flashed into my mind. We have tested ono of those ideas, and found substance behind it To-night I am going to try the othar. I have to discover the man who took the money out of that hole on the fatal you shall put your hand on him the night

after to-morrow, or rather early the next morning.' ' At twelve,' I continued, 'we shall both go over to onr new rooms with this paraffins lamp | it is like the one broken the night of the murder. Before lighting if;, you will tike down the newspapers fix 3d against the window. At about half-past twelve you will light the lamp, and move about the room for a little while, keeping pretty near the window. Then you will for about ten minutes sit at the tab'e with your face to the lamp. v\ hen you get up, move to the centre of the room, sit down on the floor with your back to the window and take up the loose board. You will rem .in so until you hear me knock on the floor of the next room. Then yon will rise suddenly, faoe round, and, with your full front to the window, shake your band, as though in a threatening rage, at the window, pointing at the same time to the empty hole. Then, leaving the lamp lighted, you will rejoin me in the other room.' (To bfi oontinvfid.)