Christopher Quarles: College Professor and Master Detective

"I shall be glad to know your fee," said Bryant.

For a moment I thought that Quarles was going to lose his temper.

"I charge no fee," he said quietly, after a momentary pause; "but if the money is found through me, you must give ten per cent. for the benefit of imbeciles according to the wish of the deceased, and you must pay me ten per cent. That will leave eighty per cent. for you to divide."

"Preposterous!" Bryant exclaimed.

"As you like. Those are my conditions, and I must receive with the permission to visit the house a properly witnessed document, showing that the three of you agree to my terms."

"I am afraid you will wait in vain."

"It is your affair," said Quarles, with a shrug of his shoulders. "Remember I can find the money, and I believe I am the only man who can."

On our way back to town I asked Quarles whether he expected to get the permission.

"Certainly I do. George Bryant is too greedy for money to miss such a chance."

"And do you really mean that you can find the money?"

"At any rate, I mean the Bryants to pay heavily for it if I do."

Quarles was right. Three days later the permit and the required document arrived, and we went to Norbiton.

As I had visited the house already, I was prepared to act as guide to the professor, but he showed only a feeble interest in the house itself. The only room he examined with any minuteness was the bedroom Mr. Ottershaw had used, and he seemed mainly to be proving to his own satisfaction that certain possibilities which had occurred to him were not probabilities.

"There's a ten per cent. reward hanging to this, Wigan," he chuckled. "We're out to make money on this occasion. Bryant seems to have spoken the truth. The place appears to be much as Mr. Ottershaw left it."

He had opened a cupboard in the bedroom, and took up two or three pairs of boots to look at.

"Large feet, hadn't he? Went in for comfort rather than elegance. I never saw uglier boots. But they are well made, nothing cheap about them."

"You don't expect to find the money in his boots, do you?"

"Never heard of hollow heels, Wigan?" he asked.

"You couldn't hide much money if every boot in the house had a hollow heel."

"No, true. I wasn't thinking of hollow heels particularly."

Then he took up a stout walking-stick which was standing in the corner of the cupboard, felt its weight, and walked across the room with it to try it.

"Nothing hollow about this, at any rate," he said, after examining the ferrule closely.

When we returned to the hall he was interested in the sticks in the stand.

"He was fond of stout ones, Wigan," laughed Quarles. "Well, I don't think there is much to interest us here."

Our inspection of the house had been of the most casual kind. We hadn't even looked into some of the rooms, and the odd corners and fireplaces to which I had given considerable attention on my former visit hardly received a passing glance from Quarles.

"Have you looked at everything you want to see?" I asked in astonishment.

"I think so. You said the cellars had been dug up, so they are of no interest, and I warrant the Bryants have already searched in every likely and unlikely place. What is the use of going over the same ground, or in examining cabinets and drawers for false backs and false bottoms, when others have done it for us?"

"What is your next move, then?"

"I think we may as well go back to Chelsea and talk about it."

I must admit that, in spite of my knowledge of Quarles, I thought he was beaten this time, and that he was using bluff to hide his disappointment. I thought he had gone to Norbiton with a fixed idea in his mind, only to discover that he had made a mistake. He would not discuss the affair on our way back to Chelsea; but when we reached the house, he called for Zena, and the three of us retired to the empty room.

"Well, dear, is the ten per cent. reward to make us rich beyond the dreams of avarice?" asked Zena.

"It is impossible to say."

"Then you haven't found the money?"

"We haven't counted it yet," was the answer. "Let as consider the points. The first is this: Nine years before his death Mr. Ottershaw made his will, frankly expressing a wish that he could take his money with him. Therefore, I think we may assume that he was not in love with his relatives, and was not delighted that his death should profit them. The next sentence in the will seems to express a doubt as to whether the treasure could be taken or not, and I suggest that something occurred about that time to make it appear feasible. So we get a riddle, and if it is to be read literally, as I believe it is meant to be, there can apparently be only one possible hiding-place – somewhere in the ground underneath the house. This is so obvious that one would hardly expect it to be the solution, and so there is particular significance in his statement that he didn't send it out of the house. He hid it, he says, when he was alone in one of the rooms. Let us suppose it was his bedroom. From there he certainly could not bury his treasure in the ground. We have decided that the hiding-place could not be in any part of the brickwork or in the woodwork, therefore we are driven to the conclusion that it was placed in some piece of furniture or some receptacle made for the purpose. Since I believe he thought it possible to take his wealth with him, the latter supposition seems to me the more probable."

"In banknotes a large sum would only occupy a small space," I said.

"I don't think the treasure was in money," said Quarles. "The fact that a diamond was given to Sims and not money suggests that the treasure was in precious stones. If he spent everything he could in this way, giving hard cash for a gem, and thus doing away with the necessity for inquiry and references, the lack of evidence regarding his wealth is partly explained. Great wealth can be sunk in a very small parcel of gems, and if he hoped to take his wealth with him it must be small in bulk."

"So that it could be placed in his coffin, you mean," said Zena.

"Sims declares nothing was placed in his coffin," said Quarles; "he is most definite upon the point."

"And I have already pointed out that since he wished to be cremated Mr. Ottershaw would hardly make any such arrangement," I said.

"He may have wished to be cremated, but he may not have expected to be," said Quarles. "As a matter of fact, he left certain instructions which point to a doubt. Sims was to lay him out and see that he was decently cared for. So anxious was Mr. Ottershaw about this that he left a letter for Sims to show to the Bryants. This is a most significant fact."

"Then you suspect the man Sims," said Zena.

"We will go a step further before I answer that question. To-day, Wigan, we have made a curious discovery. All Mr. Ottershaw's walking-sticks were very stout ones, and that he really used them, not merely carried them, the condition of the ferrules proves. Moreover, there was a curious fact about his boots. They were large, the right one being a little larger than the other, and the right boot in every pair was the least trodden down – indeed, showed little wear either inside or out. I wonder if Sims could explain this?"

Zena was leaning forward, her eyes fixed upon the professor, and I was thinking of a boot with a hollow heel.

"Let's go back to the will for a moment," said Quarles. "Although Mr. Ottershaw desired to be cremated, he did not put it in the form of a condition, as he might reasonably have done. He even mentions the expense, and, in fact, gives his relatives quite a good excuse for not doing as he desires. It seems to me he didn't care much one way or the other, and that his object was to make the relatives suffer for their greed, and suffer all the more because he didn't actually leave the money away from them. It was Zena's absurd question, Wigan, and her anger that the Bryants had not carried out the old man's wish, which gave me the germ of a theory. I believe if they had had him cremated they would have found the treasure. He gave them a chance which they lost by burying him."

"Then you believe Sims carried out his master's wishes?" I said.

"I do."

"And managed to have the treasure buried with him?"

"I do not believe Sims knows anything about a treasure," said Quarles; "and I think he speaks the truth when he says that nothing but the body was buried. But Sims knew more about his master than anyone else. He could tell us something about their doings in Switzerland and Germany, for instance. He was very fond of his master, and was trusted by him."

"We want to know what happened just after Mr. Ottershaw's death," I said. "To know what occurred abroad will not help us much."

"I think it will," Quarles returned. "Supposing Mr. Ottershaw had an accident abroad which necessitated the amputation of his right leg, and supposing, in Germany perhaps, he got the very best artificial limb money could purchase?"

"A wooden leg!" I exclaimed.

"Yes, not of the old sort, but the very best the instrument makers could devise. Mr. Ottershaw became proud of that leg and told no one about it. Only his man knew. His right boot showed less sign of wear, because he helped that leg with a stout stick. The wooden foot would not stain the inside of a boot with moisture as a real foot does. When the Bryants went to see him he complained of gout, an excuse for not walking, and so giving them a chance of discovering the leg. Then came the idea of secreting the treasure, and I suggest that it consists of gems concealed in that wooden leg. He didn't want the leg removed after his death, so Sims laid him out. Probably the leg is fitted with a steel, fire-resisting receptacle which would have been found among the débris had the body been cremated."

"Then the treasure is buried with him," said Zena. "Will they open the grave?"

"I am not sure whether the old man succeeded in carrying his wealth with him after all," said Quarles. "Sims was fond of and sentimental about his master, and as we talked to him, Wigan, it seemed to me there was something he had no intention of telling us. He was particularly insistent that nothing but the body had been buried, and appeared almost morbidly anxious to tell nothing but the exact truth. To-morrow we will go to Fulham and ask him whether he removed the wooden leg before the coffin was screwed down."

Quarles's conjecture proved to be right. Sims had been sentimental about the leg because his master was so proud of it, and the night before the coffin was fastened down had crept silently into the room and taken it off, placing a thick shawl rolled up under the shroud, so that the corpse would appear as it was before. It had not occurred to him at the time that his master was so anxious that the leg should be buried with him, but since that night he had wondered whether he had done wrong. The wooden leg was hidden in his bedroom. When he was told that it probably contained the treasure, his fear and amazement were almost painful to witness. He was evidently quite innocent of any idea of robbery.

Ingeniously concealed in the top part of the leg we found a steel cylinder, full of gems. Mr. Ottershaw must have made a lot of money while he was in India, for Quarles's ten per cent. of the value obtained for the jewels came to over twelve thousand pounds.

"Half of it goes to Zena as a wedding present," he said on the day he banked the money. "I shouldn't wait long if I were you, Wigan."

"But, grandfather, I – "

"My dear, I'm not always thinking only of myself. You have your life before you and I want you to be happy. My only condition is that there shall always be a place at your fireside for me."

The tears were in Zena's eyes as she kissed him, but she looked at me and I knew my waiting time was nearly over.

"Now I shall rest on my laurels, Wigan, and trouble no more about mysteries," said Quarles.

He meant it, but I very much doubt whether a ruling passion is so easily controlled. We shall see.