The Grave-digger of Monks Arden E-Book

Arthur Gask

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Tall, lithe and of great strength was Daunt, the grave-digger of the ancient church of St. Benedict, in the little village of Monks Arden, about three miles from Saffron Walden. His head was big and bullet-shaped and his hair was closely cropped, as if he had just come out of prison. He had dark and deeply sunken eyes, and, as if to hide their expression, he kept them nearly always half closed. His shoulders were broad, but his loins were narrow and his figure tapered down to bony legs and very long feet.
His general appearance was certainly not a pleasing one, and holding himself, as he always did, with his shoulders hunched and his head bent forward, he gave to many who encountered him in the country lanes at night the suggestion of a prowling beast of prey.

Leseprobe

The Grave-digger of Monks Arden

By

Arthur Gask

(1938)

© 2022 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782383832744

Contents

Chapter I.—The Quick and the Dead

Chapter II.—The Vaults of the Rodings

Chapter III.—The Death Mask

Chapter IV.—An Asylum for the Insane

Chapter V.—The Escape from the Asylum

Chapter VI.—The Secret Chamber

Chapter VII.—The Resource of Larose

Chapter VIII.—Larose in Danger Again

Chapter IX.—The Living and the Dead

Chapter X.—The Trail of Murder

Chapter XI.—Setting the Trap

Chapter XII.—A Narrow Escape

Chapter XIII.—Justice

Chapter XIV.—Guile

Chapter I.—The Quick and the Dead

Tall, lithe and of great strength was Daunt, the grave-digger of the ancient church of St. Benedict, in the little village of Monks Arden, about three miles from Saffron Walden. His head was big and bullet-shaped and his hair was closely cropped, as if he had just come out of prison. He had dark and deeply sunken eyes, and, as if to hide their expression, he kept them nearly always half closed. His shoulders were broad, but his loins were narrow and his figure tapered down to bony legs and very long feet.

His general appearance was certainly not a pleasing one, and holding himself, as he always did, with his shoulders hunched and his head bent forward, he gave to many who encountered him in the country lanes at night the suggestion of a prowling beast of prey.

A single man in the late thirties, he was of a most reserved disposition and taciturn and short of speech. It was rumoured that he must be both an atheist and an anarchist, for, upon one of the very rare occasions that he had visited the village public-house, his tongue had become loosened and he had been heard to state that the Vicar of St. Benedict's was an old fool, and that the House of Lords ought to be abolished. At any rate, it was held that, by the expressing of such opinions, he must be a man of most extreme and violent views.

He lived by himself in a small stone house that was built against one of the churchyard walls. His great hobby was carving, and, a fine craftsman and very artistic, he was always able to obtain good prices for his work. He knew all the old churches for miles around and had copied many of the carvings in them. He possessed an old motor-bicycle and sidecar outfit and often drove about late at night. Incidentally, it was reputed he must be a poacher, but no one had any certain evidence of that.

In addition to being the grave-digger, he was the gardener of the churchyard, attending to the shrubs and flowers and keeping the paths clean and tidy. Also, he acted as handyman about the church, and being both a good carpenter and a good mason, was able to carry out all sorts of small repairs.

The church of St, Benedict's was very old, its outer walls being part of a monastery that had been destroyed by fire in the fifteenth century. But during the reign of Henry VIII the church itself had been rebuilt and, although it now served a very small congregation, it was associated in history with many of the old county families in the district. In consequence, not a few notabilities, who rarely visited the church during life, were laid to rest in its churchyard at death.

One cold and stormy afternoon in late November, the body of the beautiful young wife of Captain the Honourable Arthur Haverhill was being interred in the churchyard. She had been barely twenty-three and had been killed in the hunting field. Before her marriage, less than two years previously, as Esther Rayleigh, she had been hailed as a great musical genius and, upon her presentation at Court, had been regarded as one of the most lovely girls of the season.

And now all that remained of her was being lowered into the cold, dead earth and it was in the minds of those about the graveside that no eyes would gaze upon her loveliness again until the resurrection morn.

The grave-digger stood back behind the mourners with a face as expressionless as that of a mask. Grief and tears were as nothing to him and it might have been imagined that all his thoughts were concentrated upon how soon the service would be ended, so that he would be able to start filling in the grave.

But in this particular interment, for some reason, he was more than usually interested and nothing of what was taking place escaped him.

He had taken good note of the coffin as it was being lowered from the bearers' shoulders on to the ground, and he had counted the number of screws in the lid. Also, he had many times looked up at the quickly darkening sky to see how long it was likely the rain would hold off, and, with a calculating eye, he had determined who among the crowd were just idle spectators. He was not pleased there were so many wreaths, for he knew how the curious often lingered long afterwards by the graveside to read the names upon the cards attached to them.

“In the midst of life we are in death,” droned the old vicar in his mournful, solemn tones, and the undertaker's men began to get ready to lower the coffin into the grave. “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes,” he went on, and big drops of rain impinged upon the coffin as well as the handfuls of earth.

The remaining prayers were hurried through and, just as the benediction had been pronounced, down came the rain in torrents. The mourners scuttled to their cars, the undertaker's men hastened to pack off with their trappings and the vicar hurried into the church for shelter; in a few moments the grave-digger was left alone.

With no waiting, for he was evidently no more minded than anybody else to remain longer than he could help in the pouring rain, the grave-digger pulled back on to the open grave the big, heavy tarpaulin that had been covering it all the morning. Then, running over to the church wall for shelter, he took up a position at one of the corners and, craning his head forward, for a long time peered stealthily all round the churchyard.

On three sides this was surrounded by high and crumbling walls, but on the fourth, which faced the main road, the wall was of much later construction and less than four feet in height. In the middle of it were the two big iron gates.

There was not a soul in sight and the rain continued to fall heavily.

After a few minutes, seeing the vicar leave the church and hurry away under the shelter of an umbrella, the grave-digger, apparently at last satisfied that everyone had left the churchyard, ran over to the big gates himself. There, pushing them to, he placed a number of small stones underneath, in such positions that he would be able to see at once if anyone had opened the gates again to come in.

Then he hastened over to his small house, and shutting himself in, took off his mackintosh and proceeded to warm himself before the fire. It was then half-past three and under the lowering sky the short winter day was drawing rapidly to a close.

The grave-digger's house consisted of only two rooms. One was kitchen, living-room and bedroom all combined. The other was fitted up as a workshop and contained a serviceable and good-sized bench. Round the walls were racks of tools, and in one corner was a large cupboard. Upon a shelf were a number of books and a few road maps, the latter, from their soiled covers, having evidently been purchased some time ago.

An hour passed, and it had become quite dark.

With a quick glance through the window, the grave-digger rose to his feet and lifting up the mattress of the bed, pulled out a small sugar-bag, lined neatly with a piece of a mackintosh groundsheet. Then proceeding into his workshop, he selected a few tools from the rack, and from the cupboard a small electric lamp and a length of stout whipcord. All these he placed in the sugar-bag, and donning a dark mackintosh and carrying the bag under his arm, let himself out of the house. For a long while he stood motionless by the wall.

It was still raining, but now only a steady drizzle. Then, as if released from a spring, the grave-digger suddenly ran forward, and placing his bag behind a tombstone, made his way quickly along the sodden pathway and examined the stones he had placed under the gate about an hour previously.

They had not been, disturbed, and if his movements had been quick before, they became like lightning now. He darted over and retrieved his bag from behind the tombstone, and then, proceeding at a run to the side of the newly dug grave, lifted up the edge of the tarpaulin and slipped underneath. The wriggling of his body could have been followed until his head heaved up the tarpaulin in the middle. Then the tarpaulin settled down again and everything became as it had been before.

For some minutes there was deep silence, followed by muffled sounds coming from the bottom of the grave, beginning with the gentle sliding off of the coffin lid.

Another silence followed, and then came sounds as of wood striking wood again. Not a minute later and just as the worker in the grave was preparing to climb out, his eyes opened wide in consternation, his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth and a clammy sweat burst upon his forehead.

He had heard movements upon the tarpaulin above.

Then, for minute after minute, he crouched in the inky blackness below and alternately he held his breath and moistened over his dry lips with his tongue. His heart was beating violently.

All at once he cursed deeply, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the damp sleeve of his mackintosh, and then—he smiled. His ears had caught the whimpering of a dog and he recognised it as coming from the vicar's little fox terrier, who often kept him company when he was working in the churchyard.

“Shut up, will you, you little fool,” he called out sibilantly. “Keep quiet, you brute,” and with one end of the length of whipcord in his hand he began to work his way quickly up the sides of the grave.

Gaining the top, he wriggled himself under the tarpaulin, all the time vehemently urging the dog to be quiet. Finally, clear of the tarpaulin, but still upon his hands and knees, he stretched out and grabbed at the little animal, who all the time had been keeping up his whimpering.

In his fury, the grave-digger had seized the terrier by the scruff of the neck, with the full intention of throttling him and throwing him into the grave. He now gripped him by the throat with the other hand and, holding his face up close, glared into his eyes.

“Blast you, to frighten me like that!” he snarled viciously. “Now you'll——” but the little beast put out his tongue and licked the grave-digger's face. A moment's hesitation and then, with all his fury gone, Daunt was snuggling up the dog and affectionately stroking him.

But he quickly put him back on to the ground and with a sharp but not unfriendly kick booted him away. “Hop it, you. Get away quick,” and the frightened dog bolted off at the unexpected violence of his friend.

The grave-digger pulled quickly upon the whipcord and up came the sugar-bag, heavier now than when he had taken it down into the grave with him. Tucking it under his arm he ran quickly back to his house, and then for a good five minutes there were no movements in the churchyard save for those caused by the wind and driving rain.

Then the grave-digger reappeared and, pulling away the tarpaulin, began with great speed to fill in the grave. He plied his spade energetically, with wide sweeping movements, and as if to encourage him the rain stopped and the stars came out. In less than an hour he had finished everything and tidied up all round. With a sigh of satisfaction, he returned to his house and for the first time that evening pulled down the blind and lit the lamp. The sack, with its contents, had now disappeared.

The day was a Wednesday and at eight o'clock the usual mid-weekly choral evensong would be sung. So the grave-digger was not startled when, a few minutes before that hour, he heard footsteps outside and then a knock upon his door. Opening the door with no delay, he saw the old vicar standing outside.

“Good evening, Daunt,” said the latter pleasantly. “Terrible afternoon, wasn't it? Well, Mrs. Joles came and saw me yesterday to complain that someone has stolen one of the flower vases from her husband's grave. Can you think of anyone, now, who is likely to have done it?”

“No, I can't,” replied the grave-digger bluntly. He spoke as if he were considering the theft a reflection upon him, personally. “But she's never had any vases on her grave,” he went on. “They're just milk bottles and they belong to the Saffron Walden Milk Company. There's the firm's name on them and I've often noticed it.”

“Dear me! dear me!” smiled the vicar. “Then I'll look at them myself to-morrow and speak to her about it. That isn't quite the thing.” Then just as he was turning away, he added: “By the by, our little friend's been fighting again with some other dog. When he came home to-night, from the stains upon his throat and neck, my wife quite thought he must have been badly bitten somewhere. But she washed him and couldn't find any wound.” He nodded. “Little animals are always pugnacious, Daunt, and it's a good thing you and I are tall.”

“Yes, it is,” agreed the grave-digger gruffly, and the old vicar ambled off to take the evening service.

Later on, although the night was chilly, the grave-digger opened his door to listen to the music of the organ, Chopin's ‘Funeral March’ was being played, as it always was when there had been a burial, and it was his favourite melody.

Notwithstanding his gruesome occupation and his general surly demeanour, he was artistic from his toes to his finger-tips.

~~~~

One afternoon in the following week, Professor Panther of Cambridge was giving a small and select tea-party in his big house in Milton Road. There were four pretty girls present, old Canon Wenthall and a retired army officer, Colonel Plum.

The professor, well over sixty years of age, was a small man with a large forehead and big eyes. His complexion was as clear as that of a young girl. He had a happy smiling face, and, quick and active in his movements, he gave one the impression that he was still full of energy. For many years before his retirement he had been Professor of Anatomy at Cambridge University and, specialising in the surgery of the brain, had won for himself a reputation all over the world.

A bachelor of means, he was now entertaining his guests in a beautifully furnished room with many lovely objects d'art scattered about, and some almost priceless engravings upon the walls.

“Oh, what beautiful things you have, Professor!” sighed Mary Wenthall, the vivacious daughter of the old canon. “You make me break the Tenth Commandment every time I come into the room.”

“Well, my dear young lady,” laughed the professor, “I must have beauty in some form or other to comfort me. As a dry old bachelor, the beauty of your delightful sex is not mine to bring solace and consolation, so I have to make up for it in the beauty of inanimate things.”

“But you should have taken a wife long ago,” retorted Mary sternly. “It is such men as you who can't be brought up to scratch who make life so worrying for us poor girls. For example, here am I, in the very heyday of my charms, chasing round everywhere for a rich husband, and I can't get one anyhow.” She regarded the assembled company defiantly, and then looked back at the professor. “Now, why don't you propose to me at once? This carpet would just go with the shade of my new frock, and I'd say yes with no blushes.”

The expression upon the professor's face was one of great distress. “A-ah, how you tempt me!” he exclaimed wistfully. He shook his head. “But no, I must resist you, for it will be a nurse I shall be wanting soon, and not a sweetheart.”

“But I've taken a course of first aid,” went on Mary briskly, “and know all the antidotes for poisons and how to treat scalds and burns. So it happens I am just the right woman for you and——”

“No, Mary,” broke in pretty Ida Plum with great decision. “If anyone here is going to marry the professor it will be me. I'm an excellent cook and I've always had a preference for short men. You're short yourself and so must marry someone tall to equalise the height of the children. Besides——”

But the light badinage was interrupted by the arrival of another guest. Tall and spare, with a keen intellectual face and wearing small pince-nez, he was a smartly dressed man in the middle forties. He was Dr. Joseph Benmichael and he ran a large private asylum for well-to-do patients, about two miles out of Cambridge.

“Oh, welcome, welcome, Doctor,” cried the professor, as if in great relief. “You've come just in time to separate these young ladies who are fighting tooth and nail for my heart and hand.”

The doctor shook hands with the professor, and then bowed smilingly round at the other guests, with all of whom he was apparently acquainted.

“Fie, fie, Professor,” he said reprovingly, “to see a man of your advanced age trifling with the fair sex! I am astonished at your being so reckless.” He raised his eyebrows. “Why, I quite thought that, apart from the grey matter of our brains, your only hobby in life was orchids.” He looked very stern. “And now I find you dallying with pretty girls.”

“And what is more natural,” laughed the professor gaily, “for are not pretty girls like orchids—as seductive and delightful to look upon and as difficult to obtain?” He threw out his hands. “Does not our pursuit of them, too, at once suggest to us the same dangerous forms of adventure as we undertake in our quest of that rare flower—the perils of the tropical forest, the miasmal swamp and the dizzy precipice side? Why, I believe——”

“Oh, Professor, I think you are really horrid,” broke in Ida Plum protestingly, “I'm sure I'm not tropical and I'm certainly not an evil miasmal swamp.”

“Heaven forbid!” exclaimed the professor instantly. “You are sweet as a rose in June.” He bowed as if in apology. “No, I was only referring to the perils we risk to bask in your smiles—the anguish of a broken heart, the discomforts of impaired digestion and the poverty of the emptied pocket,” and he chuckled in great amusement at his own humour.

“You are dead right about the emptied pockets,” grunted Colonel Plum, whose face of violent hue suggested he was upon the verge of a fit of apoplexy. “With three daughters for ever clamouring for new frocks, I have to stint myself in everything and smoke the cheapest of cheap cigars. I never have an odd sixpence to call my own.”

“But oh, Father, you like us to look nice, now don't you?” remonstrated his daughter, pretending to be distressed. “You wouldn't like me to look a frump and have no boys coming to take me out. Now, would you?”

“You'd never look a frump, whatever you wore, with those eyes of yours, Miss Plum,” commented the professor gallantly. “Why, I notice the frigid doctor here has been looking at you ever since he came into the room.” He turned to Dr. Benmichael. “But tell us, Doctor, how are all those mad patients of yours?”

“As sane as you, Professor,” replied the doctor coldly, evidently not too pleased with the professor's remark about his looking at Ida Plum, “and perhaps even saner.” He smiled a grim smile. “Yes, thank you, all my guests are quite well.”

“But are you really willing to admit,” asked Myra Girdlestone, an athletic and healthy-looking blonde who rode to hounds twice a week and smoked forty cigarettes a day, “that you are detaining people who are in their right minds?”

“Certainly,” laughed the doctor. “Four-fifths of my patients are perfectly well as long as they remain with me. It is only when they are brought in contact with the responsibilities of the everyday world that the nervous systems of some of them break down.”

“How terrible!” exclaimed Miss Girdlestone. “They must feel their position most keenly.”

“Not at all,” said the doctor. “They live most happy lives. They golf, they play tennis, they enjoy indoor games and at night they are always squabbling at the six or seven tables of bridge.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I have a few, of course, whose misfortune is apparent to everyone, but happily very few.”

The conversation became general and then, tea being over, the professor took them all to see his orchids. The girls were most enthusiastic, but the colonel and the doctor appeared rather bored, and the canon had got indigestion from the three chocolate eclairs he had eaten.

Presently Ida Plum pleaded. “And now, Professor, be a dear and take us into your laboratory.” She turned with enthusiasm to the other girls. “He's got the most beautiful specimens of people's brains in glass boxes, and you can look into them and see exactly how the inside of your head appears.”

Mary Wenthall shuddered but the ether girls backed up Ida in her request and, after a few moments, apparently with some reluctance, the professor led the way through the garden to a small building that stood quite by itself, about twenty yards or so from the back of the house. He took a bundle of keys from his pocket and unlocked the door. Then, as the short afternoon was beginning to draw in, he switched on the lights.

There were only two rooms in the building, one long low chamber and a smaller one that led directly out of it at the farther end. The walls of the long chamber were lined all round with shelves upon which stood a great number of bottles and big jars. Down the middle of the room and along almost its entire length stretched a long narrow table upon which was a double row of what Ida Plum had aptly described as glass boxes. They were shallow and filled to the brim with spirit, and in each one reposed a human brain in some aspect of dissection. Every box was labelled with a numbered red seal.

“And every one of these brains,” announced the professor proudly, “belonged in life to some man or woman who was outstanding in his or her achievements or calling.” He indicated the boxes, one by one. “This came from a great painter, this from a divine singer, this from a man whose scientific discoveries were the admiration of the whole civilised world, this from an orator who has thrilled millions with the magic of his words, this from a great general whose genius enabled him to deal out death to hundreds of thousands of his fellow creatures, this from a man who murdered seven wives, and this from a Corsican brigand whose cruelty was of so high an order that he tortured his only son to extract certain information from him.” He waved his arm round smilingly. “And so on and so on.”

Some of his guests shivered, but Colonel Plum appeared most interested. That touch about the general who had killed hundreds of thousands appealed to his professional instincts, and he nodded with great approval.

“But what have you collected them all for?” asked the athletic Myra Girdlestone wonderingly.

“A-ah!” exclaimed the professor with great animation, “I am a humble worker among that vast multitude of scientific men who are for ever delving into Nature's hidden secrets.” He raised his hand emphatically. “One day we shall know everything about the grey matter of our cerebra, how it became convoluted and how——”

“Tut, tut,” broke in Dr. Benmichael impatiently, “you are becoming too technical for these ladies, Professor. Pass on now and show them the casts made from your death-masks. Those will please them, I am sure.”

“But one moment!” exclaimed the Girdlestone girl, before the professor could speak again. “Where did you get all these brains from? That's what is puzzling me.”

The professor nodded solemnly. “From all over the world, Miss Girdlestone. I have friends and confreres in all the big cities”—he shrugged his shoulders—“and because of my one-time humble activities in the surgery of the brain, they are always mindful of me when they can procure a specimen which they think I would like.” He turned frowningly to Dr. Benmichael. “No? Doctor, I never show anyone the casts from my death-masks now. Some of them have been lately given to me upon the express condition that they are not to be exhibited to the public gaze, and so I regard their possession as a sacred trust.” He inclined his head solemnly. “When I die they will all be destroyed.”

“But where do you keep them?” asked Ida Plum. She pointed to the door at the end of the long chamber. “In there?”

“Yes, in there,” nodded the professor, and as the girl walked towards it, he smiled. “But the door is always locked.”

“Mean old thing!” pouted Ida, retracing her steps. “We shouldn't tell anyone we'd seen them.”

“But a trust, Miss Plum!” exclaimed the professor reprovingly. “Surely you would not have me——”

But at that moment one of the professor's maids came in to announce that he was wanted urgently on the phone. “It's a trunk call from London, sir,” she added, “and the gentleman seems in a great hurry.”

“Excuse me, everyone, please,” said the professor, “but this call is very important. I shan't be a minute,” and he hurried out of the room.

Colonel Plum took out and lit a cigarette. “I don't know whether it's allowed,” he said, looking guiltily at the doctor, “but I'll chance it. The smell of this darned place makes me feel sick. My stomach isn't feeling too good after those buns.”

Everyone walked round, looking at the contents of the bottles upon the shelf, until Ida found herself opposite a small cupboard, and she idly pulled the knob. Rather to her astonishment, the door came open and, upon peering inside, she gave a startled exclamation of great surprise.

“Oh-oh, come and look here,” she cried out quickly, and then she half pushed to the cupboard door again. “No, no, not you, Mary. You'd be scared out of your life.” She laughed in a great thrill. “Only strong-minded people must see this. Come on, quick, before the professor comes back. I'm sure he'll be furious.”

They all crowded round the cupboard, even including the half-shrinking Mary, and there were gasps of delicious horror from the girls. Colonel Plum was unperturbed as became one who had fought in the Great War, but Dr. Benmichael, after one quick glance inside, snatched off his pince-nez, and after a few rubs upon his pocket handkerchief, replaced them hastily and craned his head forward above that of Ida Plum's.

The cupboard was about shoulder-high of the shortest of those standing before it, and it contained one single large glass jar filled with very clear spirit. The glass was very clear also. In the jar was the head of a woman, roughly and unevenly severed about mid-way down the neck. The young and waxen face was oval in shape, and now in death, even as it must have been in life, was one of extreme beauty. The features were finely chiselled, the eyes long-lashed and the mouth was a perfect Cupid's bow. The lips were those a lover would have longed to press.

For a long minute an awed and breathless hush fell upon those standing before the cupboard, and then the colonel exclaimed hoarsely, “Gad! she must have been a lovely girl!” His eyes seemed to bulge out of his head. “But where the blazes did he get it from?”

“Quick, let's shut the cupboard,” exclaimed his daughter peremptorily, taking command of the situation. “He'll be awfully cross if he knows.”

But they were too late, for as they all moved away to let the cupboard door close, the professor bustled into the room.

“I'm so sorry——” he began, all smiles, but then, as in a lightning flash, the whole expression of his face altered, at first to one of intense chagrin and then to that of intense anger. He got furiously red and clenched his bands together viciously.

“Which of my guests was it,” he shouted, as he darted over and banged to the cupboard door, “who was so dead to all sense of decency as to pry into my private affairs?”

“It was I, Professor,” admitted Ida Plum, looking very frightened. “I am so sorry, but I just tried the door carelessly and finding it unlocked, I——”

The professor swallowed hard, and then his anger appeared to subside as quickly as it had risen. His face broke into a sickly and apologetic smile, “Well, well!” he exclaimed, trying hard to appear as if he were amused, “of course it is all my own fault. I might have anticipated the natural curiosity of your charming sex and made sure that the cupboard was locked before I left the room.” He looked rather spiteful and his voice dropped to very solemn tones. “But I would have preferred that everyone had kept away from that jar, because the woman whose head is in it died of bubonic plague in one of the Baltic ports.” He nodded ominously. “And you can never be certain how long some germs take to die.”

The girls were horrified and even Colonel Plum's face lost something of its violent hue. The old canon made a quick move towards the chamber door.

“But what was she,” scowled the colonel, “when she was alive?”

The professor bowed his head in reverence. “A nun. She died nursing some sick sailors and contracted the disease from them.”

“But how long ago?” asked Myra Girdlestone, who had now recovered her equanimity. She puckered up her brows into a puzzled frown. “Somehow or other her face seems quite familiar to me.”

“It would,” nodded the professor instantly, “for it's an exact type—the devotional type. She was one of those noble women who dedicate everything to their fellow creatures.”

“But I'm sure now I've seen her somewhere,” went on Myra thoughtfully, “or at any rate some recent picture of her in some paper. I remember her mouth and——”

“My dear young lady,” laughed the professor, “she died before you were born. That specimen was given me by one of the officers of a cargo boat, nearly thirty years ago.” He moved over to the chamber door and held it open wide. “But come on, now,” he said briskly, “I am sure you have all seen enough and so we'll go back into the house and get warm.” He raised a warning hand. “One favour, however, I want to beg of you all, I put you upon your honour not to talk outside about anything you've just seen here. There are such a lot of cranky people in the country, and I may be bombarded with angry letters if they come to learn what this room contains.”

Some half an hour later, everyone, except Dr. Benmichael, had left. The professor was a little bit surprised that the doctor had outstayed the others, because, as a general rule, the latter never allowed himself long absences from his large establishment.

But if the professor was surprised his friend was not in his usual hurry to get away, he was certainly considerably startled to be addressed in a very stern tone of voice when they were at length by themselves.

“See here, Panther,” said the doctor eyeing him from under very scowling brows, “I want some explanation from you.” He paused a moment and then rapped out sharply: “How did you come to get hold of that girl's head in there?”

The professor glanced furtively at him and drew in a deep breath. “I won't attempt to deceive you,” he said at once, with an uneasy laugh. “I bought it from a London undertaker some time ago. He managed to get hold of it somehow, and I didn't ask him any questions.”

“That's a falsehood,” said the doctor instantly. He spoke scornfully, “You got it from no undertaker, because for one thing it was hacked off much too clumsily, and as for ‘some time ago’ that's a lie, too.” His eyes glinted angrily. “You obtained it last week, or, to be exact, on last Thursday or Friday.”

The professor's face had gone an ashen grey and he was now moistening his dry lips with his tongue. “H-how do you know that,” he gasped, “and what is it to do with you?”

“How do I know and what has it to do with me?” asked the doctor, almost threateningly. He dropped his voice to quiet and measured tones. “I know because I was at her funeral in Monks Arden last Wednesday, and it has to do with me”—he looked him straight in the eyes—“because it happens Esther Haverhill was my cousin.”

“Good God!” exclaimed the professor hoarsely, and he sank back limply into his chair.

“Yes, and if you dare to deny it,” went on Dr. Benmichael accusingly, “take me back into that room and lift up her upper lip. Her left lateral incisor is a porcelain crown.”

But the professor made no attempt at denials. He shook his head weakly and then covered his face with his hands. It seemed almost as if he were going to break into tears.

A long silence followed and then the doctor went on: “So you must realise I have a right to know everything.” He stirred fidgetingly in his chair. “But there, there, man, don't get the wind up. I'm not going to shout it on the house-tops.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I'm not squeamish, as you ought to know, and a corpse is only just a corpse to me, whoever it may have been. The fetish of the reverence for the dead never runs in a dissecting room.” His voice hardened. “Still, I insist upon learning how the head of my cousin comes to be in your possession now.”

“The undertaker——” began the professor weakly, when Dr. Benmichael's face darkened and he spoke with anger again.

“No, no, I'll have no more falsehoods, Panther, and don't you try them on.” He shook his head. “The undertaker, last week, never had the opportunity to do any dirty tricks, for I saw the body just before the coffin was screwed down and then, not three minutes later, it was being carried out to the hearse. Come now, tell me everything at once and get it over. I assure you I'm not going to do anything to you, and you may retain”—he smiled very sarcastically—“the specimen given to you nearly thirty years ago.”

The professor wiped over his forehead with his handkerchief and heaved a sigh of great relief.

“W-ell,” he began hesitatingly, “it was the grave-digger who got it for me and——”

“I thought so,” commented the doctor sharply, “I saw him standing behind us; a most repellent personality, with the face of a ghoul.” He clicked his tongue. “How much did you pay him?”

“Five pounds. That's all he asks when it's quite a simple matter.”

“Asks?” queried the doctor, elevating his eyebrows in great surprise. “Then do you employ him regularly on jobs like this?”

“W-ell,” was the hesitating reply, “he's executed several little similar commissions for me,” and then as the doctor threw back his head and burst into a cynically amused laugh, he added with a grin, “in fact, Monks Arden is in the way of soon possessing an almost headless churchyard.”

Dr. Benmichael at once became grave again. “But you're running a great risk, Professor,” he said, “and this man is sure to be caught sooner or later. Then he'll tell everything, and you just think of the punishment you'll get,” He frowned. “Think, too, of the disgrace that will come upon the profession.”

“But he is very careful,” urged the professor, “and for difficult commissions I have provided him with most suitable appliances.”

“What on earth do you mean?” asked the doctor. The professor became as gleeful as a little child, and a note of boastful triumph now ran in his tones. “Goodness gracious!” he exclaimed, “you don't imagine that Monks Arden is the only place from which I get my specimens! Why, he travels all over the countryside for me. He has a black, light-proof tent that he rigs up over newly-dug graves and just-opened vaults and, in the night time, is able to work in perfect security.” He lowered his voice darkly. “It will surprise you that two of those glasses in there contain the cerebra of Lord Barney and the famous baritone, Conelli, both of which he has recently obtained for me.”

The doctor gasped. “Barney, the late Lord Chief Justice!”

“Exactly! I am always on the look-out for the decease of prominent people and, if their places of interment are within reasonable striking distance, this man goes after them.” He spoke with great pride. “I am getting together quite a unique collection of cerebra of famous people.”

“But the danger, Panther!” exclaimed Dr. Benmichael. “The risk of discovery and the punishment and awful disgrace that would follow!”

The professor rubbed his hands together cheerfully. “We risk them all, my dear friend; my exhumer for adequate remuneration, and I”—he bowed his head—“in the sacred cause of my work of research.” He went on with animation. “And this man, Daunt is his name, is most capable and quite an artist in his way. It is he who takes the death-masks for me and later delivers the plaster casts.” He nodded significantly. “That is why I would not let any of those chatterers into that other room, just now. I was fearful they would recognise Lord Barney, his face is so well known.” He shook his head frowningly. “As it is, I am not too easy in my mind about that Girdlestone girl, for when she thinks it over she may remember of whom that face reminded her.” He opened his eyes very wide. “But what a most wonderful coincidence that it should turn out you are her cousin!”

“You ought not to have kept that cupboard unlocked,” said the doctor sharply, “It was most careless of you.”

“It was,” agreed the professor instantly, “I admit it.”

“Yes,” nodded Dr. Benmichael, “and any time another such act of carelessness may be your ruin. That ghoulish colleague of yours will not always go uncaught and then you will both be in the dock together.” He made a gesture of great disgust. “Think of it, Panther. Your safety always hanging on the razor edge, and you, a man of culture and great attainments, at the mercy of a common oaf like that.”

“But he's not a common oaf,” laughed the professor. “He's a very intelligent and artistic man, with a most marked cranial development. Although you may hardly credit it, he has a great enthusiasm for his work. He is of most determined character, too, and if he were caught, I am sure he would not give me away. We have discussed all that, and in the event of any term of imprisonment, I have promised to provide for him when he comes out.”

The doctor rose to his feet. “Well, good luck to you, Panther,” he said drily, “I'll reserve a room for you at my place and it will be ready any time when you are certified.”

“And I may want it,” said the professor seriously, as he opened the door for his friend to go out. “My mother's brother was mental, and of late I've occasionally heard voices speaking in my head.”

“A very bad sign indeed,” nodded the doctor, and he passed out to his waiting car.

That night the professor worked until very late in his laboratory and, in the early hours of the morning, all the unwanted parts of his latest acquisition were immersed in a bath of fuming nitric acid. Dr. Benmichaels warning had disturbed him.

Chapter II.—The Vaults of the Rodings

The young baronet Sir Eric Roding, of Roding Hall, near the little village of Ashleigh St. Mary in Suffolk, was dead.

He had died suddenly of heart failure, in what had seemed to everyone a mild attack of influenza. He had only been confined to his bed for three days and had been attended by the kindly old doctor from the village, who had brought him into the world eight and twenty years before.

He had appeared to be getting on quite well, so much so, indeed, that some guests who were staying at the Hall for the racing of the Newmarket July Meeting had been persuaded by him and Lady Roding on no account to terminate their visit as it was thought he would soon be about again and able to resume his duties as host.

But towards night upon the fourth day of his illness, to everyone's horror it was suddenly realised that he was lapsing into unconsciousness, and the doctor being hurriedly summoned from the village, it was found his heart was failing rapidly. Prompt measures were at once taken to tide him over the crisis and a call was quickly put through to a great specialist in London, but although the latter started at once upon his journey, he was too late to be of any service, as a few minutes before he arrived Sir Eric had passed away.

“But I am not so very greatly surprised,” sighed the old doctor afterwards to the weeping young widow, “for the dreadful privations he underwent in Afghanistan, and those bouts of fever he contracted there, must inevitably have taken their toll of him. You must realise that there comes a time to the very strongest constitution when it begins to get undermined.”

Sir Eric had succeeded to the title but a little less than a year before, and the sadness of his death was beyond all measure. In the very heyday of his manhood, he had seemed to be enjoying all the happiness that life could give. He was possessed of ample means and the owner of broad lands that stretched for miles about his home, and he had been married only six months to a beautiful and sweetly dispositioned young girl.

All through his life there had been romance.

As a young subaltern, upon active service on the North-West Frontier of India, he had received the Victoria Cross for conspicuous bravery; he had come into the baronetcy through the unexpected decease of an uncle and two cousins who had stood between him and the title; and his marriage had come about in circumstances that would have delighted the recorder of the most romantic tales.

His bride had been one of a large family and the eldest daughter of a poor country doctor in Sussex. He had met her at a Hunt Ball and had fallen instantly in love with her. His wooing had been swift and ardent and, in less than three months from the day when he had first set eyes upon her, she had been installed as the proud distress of Roding Hall.

And now she was in the depths of sorrow and bereft of all hope that she would ever know any happiness again.

With the death of Sir Eric the baronetcy had become extinct, and in four days the last of the Rodings would be lowered into the family vault, beneath the lady chapel of the village church where for hundreds of years the bodies of the line had been laid to rest.

On the day but one before the interment the grave-digger of Monks Arden was engaged in weeding the paths of the churchyard when, hearing footsteps approaching, he looked up to see Professor Panther coming towards him and at once gave the nearest approach to a warm smile of which he was capable.

The acquaintanceship, which had matured into a real friendship, between the two men had begun some three years back. The professor had happened to admire one of Daunt's carved panels in a friend's house and, learning where he had obtained it, had promptly sought out the grave-digger and given him a commission for a pair of similar ones. Then he had just been turning away when he had noticed an ugly sore upon the palm of one of the man's hands.

“But what's that you've got there?” he asked, his professional instincts being instantly aroused.

“Eczema,” growled the grave-digger, by no means pleased at the professor's interest in him.

The professor reached out and took hold of the hand. “How long have you had it?” he asked frowningly.

“Years and years,” was the surly reply, “I've got it on my body too. The doctor can't cure it.”

“Show me the other places,” ordered the professor. “I'm a doctor myself.”

A brief examination followed, with Daunt baring a hairy leg and exposing his chest. Then the professor announced emphatically: “It's not eczema at all. It's caused by a fungus and is a sort of ring-worm. I'll send you something that will cure it in three weeks.” He regarded him curiously. “But, good God, man, doesn't it worry you?”

“Makes my life miserable,” scowled Daunt. “I get hardly any sleep at all.”

The professor was as good as his word and, beyond that, even took the trouble to motor over and make sure his patient was cured. The grave-digger said little, but he was profoundly grateful, and deep down in his usually unresponsive heart he conceived an almost dog-like devotion for his benefactor. His gratitude was accentuated, too, when upon observing the crude tools with which he had been working, the professor presented him with a complete carving outfit, as well as some technical books upon the subject. Daunt just barely expressed his thanks, but the professor fully understood his feelings and, being of a most kind-hearted disposition, was delighted to have been of service to the man.

Then, one day, when as a special favour Daunt had been taken into the professor's laboratory and shown the letter's anatomical specimens, he remarked gruffly, “I could get you some of those if you wanted them. We have a burial at Monks Arden every now and then and I am in sole charge of the graveyard there.”

At the time the professor had declined smilingly, but the idea put into his mind gradually took possession of him, and so within a few weeks the ghoulish partnership between them had commenced. All his life an enthusiastic student of anatomy, corpses were just corpses to the professor, and Daunt, who until he had met the professor had not had any feelings of respect for any person living, certainly had not for anyone dead.

The professor now tripped gaily up the path, his face all smiles and enthusiasm.

“Another little commission for you, my friend,” he said cheerfully. “Now do you happen to know the church in Ashleigh St. Mary—St. Cuthbert's it is called?”

“Never been inside,” replied Daunt, “but I've passed it. There are yew trees in the churchyard.”

“That's it,” nodded the professor, “and at two o'clock the day after to-morrow Sir Eric Roding is being buried in the family vault. He died on Monday, and I want you to get the usual specimen. He was a man of dauntless courage and his brain should be most interesting.”

“But burial in the vault under the church,” frowned the grave-digger. He shook his head. “It will be difficult.”

“No, no,” laughed the professor, “not difficult at all, as the masons are not going to brick in the coffin until next week. They are engaged to do some repairs to the church then, and as they come all the way from Norwich, it has been arranged that the bricking-in shall wait until then.” He went on briskly. “Now listen. I have just come from having a look over the church, and by a wonderful piece of good luck when I went in the cleaner was there. She was dusting the pews, but I got her to leave off and show me round. Of course, she was full of the burial on Thursday and pointed out the flags that would have to be raised to lower the coffin into the vault.”

“Heavy ones?” asked Daunt instantly.

“That doesn't matter at all,” replied the professor, “for she told me the masons will get into the vault from the outside of the church. She took me into the churchyard and showed me some narrow steps leading down to a small door, under the east church wall and at least eight feet below the level of the ground. She said that door opens into a passage which runs under the altar and straight into the vaults.”

“But locked, of course?” queried Daunt.

The professor nodded. “Yes, but both the door and lock are very old and, as they constitute something of curiosity, she went and got the key out of the vestry to show me. Naturally I showed a very keen interest, and she allowed me to make a tracing of it upon a piece of paper. Here it is, and it seems to me the lock must be so simple that a piece of bent iron will open it.”

Daunt studied the tracing for a few moments. “Yes, I can manage it,” he said. He looked up at the professor. “But that end of the church doesn't face the road, does it?”

“No, it happens to be the side farthest away from the road and it's quite secluded. There's a small plantation, too, not a hundred yards beyond the churchyard, and I thought you could run your motor-bicycle among the trees, with no likelihood of it being seen by anyone. Then there would be only a low wall for you to climb over.”

“If I remember,” commented Daunt meditatively, “the church is at the end of the village.”

“At the very end,” said the professor, “and from what the cleaner told me, the door is never locked. So you had better go and look it over, if you can, this evening.”

So at five o'clock Daunt left his work and, tidying himself up and putting on a dark jacket, set off for the little village of Ashleigh St. Mary. It was about thirty miles from Monks Arden and lay midway between Bury St. Edmunds and Sudbury. Reaching the village, he had a glass of beer at the inn and then, leaving his motor-bicycle and sidecar in the stable there, went off, as he mentioned casually to satisfy the rather curious innkeeper, for a stroll to stretch his legs. He was annoyed when he noticed that the innkeeper came to the inn door and watched which way he went.

The church was only a couple of hundred yards or so away, and like that at Monks Arden and so many others scattered about in the little villages of East Anglia, was of great antiquity and much historical association. The door was open, and proceeding inside, Daunt very quickly checked the information that the professor had given him concerning the Roding family vault.

Then he went outside and examined the little narrow door at the bottom of the flight of steps, and was at once glad he had done so; for if the lock were old, it was nevertheless of most massive construction and would need, he saw, a very stout piece of iron to pick it.

He examined it minutely and then, emboldened by the silence and perfect solitude of the churchyard, went back into the church and tiptoed into the vestry to get a look at the key itself, if he could find it.

But no long search was needed for the key, as it was hanging upon the wall just inside the door.

He snatched it down quickly and, an idea striking him, after a moments hesitation returned with all speed to the narrow door. Inserting the key in the lock, with a great heave he turned it round.

“Oil, oil,” he murmured frowningly, “I shall never get this open if it isn't oiled.” Then, symptomatic of his methodical nature, with only just one glance into the dark passage that now lay open before him, he ran back into the church to obtain some lubricant.

The church had only oil lamps and he smiled a grim smile as he picked up a lantern from off the vestry floor. He had found both a lubricant and an illuminant at the same time.

The lock oiled as best he could and the key turned many times, he lit the lantern and proceeded to explore the passage. It was very short and led into a sort of long low cellar, extending down the whole length of the church and lined all its way along with innumerable slate-bottomed shelves. Many of the shelves had evidently received their coffins, as they were bricked up, but there were many still open and unoccupied. Holding his lantern high, he could make out the two flagstones above that would be lifted to let the next coffin down, and he formed a good idea as to which shelf it would be placed on.

Satisfied at length that he had learnt all he could, he relocked the door and returned into the vestry to replace both lantern and key. Then, upon a piece of paper, which he abstracted from a desk, he made a much more elaborate tracing of the key. Finally, he left the church very well pleased with his evening's work.

But he was not so pleased when, upon returning to his motor-bicycle, he discovered one of the tyres was flat, and he was more disgusted still when he found his headlight was not functioning properly. These troubles delayed him a good half-hour, and the whole time he had an audience of the landlord of the inn and three of his cronies, who all appeared to be greatly interested in the proceedings. He swore under his breath, for intending as he was to be present at the burial on Friday, publicity was the last thing he was desiring.

He got away at last. Anxious to reach home before dark, as he was still not too confident about his lights, he accelerated immediately, to be pulled up, however, when not a mile from the village by a police patrol, for speeding. Particulars were jotted down about his outfit and he had to produce his driving licence. He was most annoyed, for cautious in all he did, he realised there was now an official record that he had been in the neighbourhood of the village.

The day fixed for the interment was beautifully warm and sunny, and, having hidden his motor-bicycle in a disused quarry a good mile from the village, half an hour before the funeral party was due to arrive Daunt took a seat in the church in such a position that he would be able to get a good view of the coffin and yet at the same time not attract, so he hoped, any undue attention of the villagers, whom he was sure would be attending the burial in good numbers.

But here again good fortune did not attend him, for just before the burial party arrived, the landlord of the inn came in and plumped himself down right beside him. The man remembered him at once, too, and gave him a smiling but rather curious look. Worse still, after the coffin had been carried into the church and the service had commenced, another man arrived and seated himself next to the landlord. To Daunt's mortification he recognised the second man as being a press photographer from Cambridge who had recently been taking photographs of the church at Monks Arden, and he saw at once that the photographer had recognised him. Then the photographer and the innkeeper had a few whispers together and, from their glances in his direction, Daunt had no doubt they were exchanging confidences about him.

Having noted all he could about the coffin, Daunt slipped out of the church before the service was concluded, being sure the inquisitive innkeeper would want to talk to him if he got the opportunity. He made his way back to where he had left his motor-bicycle, and there, lying back in the hot sun, dozed away the afternoon and evening until it had become quite dark.

Intending to lose no time, at half-past ten he set out again for the church, but when about a quarter of a mile from the village, he stopped the engine and started to push the machine and sidecar, so that the noise of its approach should not be heard.