The Three Oak Mystery E-Book

Edgar Wallace

• Herausgeber: Edgar Wallace
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016

Beschreibung

"MURDER is neither an art nor a science, it is an accident," said Socrates Smith, and Lex Smith, his younger brother, his most devoted admirer and his dearest trial, grinned sardonically.
A greater contrast between the two men it would be difficult to imagine. "Soc" Smith, was nearing fifty and was a lean, tall, stooping man with a lined face—it seemed to be carved by careless hands from a block of seasoned teak. A tiny iron grey moustache lay above a firm mouth, set tight and straight.
Lex was twenty-five years his junior, and two inches shorter. But so straight was his back that most people thought the brothers were of the same height, and if they had had to say off-hand which was the taller, would, with little hesitation, have named the good-looking boy.

Leseprobe

Edgar Wallace

The Three Oak Mystery

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Table of contents

I. — INTRODUCING SOCRATES SMITH

II. — JOHN MANDLE'S STEP-DAUGHTER

III. — THE FEAR OF JOHN MANDLE

IV. — THE MAN ON THE TREE

V. — THE SHOE AND MR. JETHEROE

VI. — THE VANISHING OF MOLLY TEMPLETON

VII. — AT PRINCE'S PLACE

VIII. — A BIT OF FLUFF

IX. — WHO WAS JETHEROE?

X. — MOLLY TELLS HER STORY

XI. — FIRE!

XII. — WHAT GRITT HEARD

XIII. — A SHOT IN THE DARK

XIV. — THE DIARY

XV. — DON'T LEAVE MOLLY

XVI. — A MARBLE THRONE

XVII. — POOL-IN-THE-MOOR

XVIII. — MOLLY GOES AWAY

XIX. — THE STRANGLER

XX. — WHAT HAPPENED TO MOLLY

XXI. — IN THE HOUSE OF MYSTERY

XXII. — THE MAN IN THE ATTIC

XXIII. — THE STORY OF THE MURDER

XXIV. — THE SECRET OF POOL-IN-THE- MOOR

I. — INTRODUCING SOCRATES SMITH

"MURDER is neither an art nor a science, it is an accident," said Socrates Smith, and Lex Smith, his younger brother, his most devoted admirer and his dearest trial, grinned sardonically. A greater contrast between the two men it would be difficult to imagine. "Soc" Smith, was nearing fifty and was a lean, tall, stooping man with a lined face—it seemed to be carved by careless hands from a block of seasoned teak. A tiny iron grey moustache lay above a firm mouth, set tight and straight. Lex was twenty-five years his junior, and two inches shorter. But so straight was his back that most people thought the brothers were of the same height, and if they had had to say off-hand which was the taller, would, with little hesitation, have named the good-looking boy. "Lordy, Uncle Soc," said Lex Smith solemnly, "how you do aphorise!" "If you call that an aphorism you're a goop," said Soc. "Pass the marmalade." They were sitting at breakfast in the big dining-room overlooking Regent's Park. The brothers occupied the first and second floors of one of those big houses in the outer circle of Regent's Park. The house was the property of Socrates Smith and had been acquired by him when he was in his thirties. In those days he had vague ideas of matrimonial responsibility. But though he had secured the house he had never had time to fall in love, and expended what Lex described as his "maternal instincts" in the care of his baby brother. Life had been too full for Socrates Smith to allow room for the gentle distractions of courtship, and there were times when he blessed the Tollemarsh murder which had occupied his every thought at a period when his aunt, his one relative in the world save Lex, had planned an alliance and had made the most elaborate preparations for hurrying him into the blessed state. For the lady chosen had since been three times through the Divorce Court and had a London reputation. Soc had taken up the study of crime as a regular member of the constabulary. Probably there never was before or since a policeman who walked his beat by day and night and spent his leisure hours in one of London's most exclusive clubs. He had an income of six thousand a year but police work had been his passion, and as there was no other way, in those days, of securing admission to the books of the Criminal Investigation Department but through service in the uniformed branch, he had served his hard apprenticeship as a "cop." For four years he had been alternately office man and executive officer, with the rank of Sergeant—an amazingly rapid promotion, and then he had resigned from the force and had devoted himself to the examination of foreign police methods and the even more fascinating study of anthropology. Scotland Yard is a very jealous and a very loyal institution. It looks askance at the outsider and turns a freezing stare upon the enthusiastic amateur, but Soc had left the Yard with the good wishes of the administration and had contributed to the sum of official knowledge. When the fingerprint system was installed, he was called in and worked with an official status, and it was usual to consult him in cases where especial difficulties confronted the patient investigators. So that Socrates knew something of fame. He was an acknowledged authority upon finger-prints and blood-stains, and was the first man to standardise the spectrum and guaiacum tests for the discovery of blood upon clothing. "What train are we catching?" asked Lexington. "Two o'clock from Waterloo," said his brother, rolling his serviette. "Am I going to be bored?" demanded Lex. "Yes," replied the other, with a twinkle in his eye, "but it will be good for your soul. Boredom is the only discipline which youth cannot reject." Lex laughed. "You're full of wise sayings this morning," he said. "Prophetically were you named Socrates!" Socrates Smith had long since forgiven his parents for his eccentric name. His father had been a wealthy iron-founder with a taste for the classics, and it had only been the strenuous opposition of their mother which had prevented Lex from being named "Aristophanes." "If a child's birth name is Smith, my dear," Smith senior said with truth, "he should have something striking and distinguishing before it." They had compromised on "Lexington," for it was in Lexington Lodge, Regent's Park, that the boy had been born. "I'm full of wise sayings, am I?" repeated Soc Smith, showing his small white teeth in a smile, "well, here's another. Propinquity is more dangerous than beauty." Lex stared at him. "Meaning, how?" he asked. "Mandle's daughter is reputedly lovely, and you're going to spend three days in the same house—verbum sapienti." "Bosh!" said the younger man inelegantly, "I don't fall in love with every girl I meet." "You haven't met many," was the answer. Later in the morning Lex interrupted his packing to stroll into his brother's room. At that moment Socrates was cursing with great calmness the inadequacy of his one battered suitcase which refused to accommodate all the personal belongings he wished to take with him on his visit. "Why not shoot out the impedimenta of your noxious craft?" asked Lex, pointing to a small brown box which he knew contained his brother's microscope, "you aren't likely to light upon a murder at Hindhead." "You never know," replied Socrates hopefully. "If I didn't take it something would happen—packing it ensures a quiet and peaceable week-end." "What sort of a fellow is Mandle?" demanded the youth, remembering why he had come into the room. "He was a very good officer and a brilliant detective," said Socrates. "He's not an easy man to get on with by any means, but when he left the police at the height of his career, the force lost a good man. He and Stone left together. Stone lives within—well, within a stone's throw." He chuckled. "A feeble jest," said his critical brother. "Stone was an inspector of the C.I.D. also?" "Sergeant," said Socrates, "they were bosom friends and when Mandle began speculating on the Stock Exchange, Stone followed him and they made pots of money. Mandle was quite frank about it. He saw the Chief Commissioner and told him that he couldn't keep his mind on two things, and do both properly, and so he had decided to chuck the police. "He was a disappointed man, too; he had set his heart upon capturing Deveroux, the man who robbed the Lyons Bank and got away to South America, and the fellow slipped through his fingers. That and one or two other happenings brought an unofficial reprimand from the chief. Still, the old man was quite upset when Mandle got out. "Stone was a clever chap, too, so the Yard lost two really good men at a time when they couldn't spare one." "Three, you old fossil," said Lex, slapping his brother on the back. "You got out about the same time." "Oh yes," said the indifferent Socrates, "but I didn't count."

II. — JOHN MANDLE'S STEP-DAUGHTER

"THE WOODLANDS," John Mandle's home, was delightfully sited on the slope of a hill. Four acres of pine and gorseland surrounded it, and the house itself was invisible from the road.

It stood a mile away from Hindhead and from its sloping lawns John Mandle could command a view over miles of pleasant country.

He sat in his drawing-room, a thick rug over his knees, gazing gloomily through the French windows at the pleasant countryside. A grim grey man with a strong face, and a heavy jaw, he communicated some of his own gloom to his surroundings.

A girl who came in with his letters stood meekly by whilst he glanced through them.

"No wire from Smith," he growled.

"No, father," said the girl quietly.

Socrates Smith had not exaggerated when he described her as lovely. Ordinarily, loveliness is a little inhuman, but this girl radiated humanity. In the presence of her step-father she was chilled, repressed, and as near to being colourless as it was possible for her to be. She feared the man—that was apparent; hated him a little, probably, remembering the hardness of her dead mother's lot and the tyranny which she had inherited.

Mandle had no children of his own and never seemed to feel the need for them. His attitude to the girl was that of a master to a superior servant, and in all the days of their acquaintance he had never once shown her the least tenderness or regard.

His caprice had taken her from a good boarding-school and the pleasant associations of children of her own class and age, and had brought her to the strained atmosphere of "The Woodlands," to the society of a nerve-racked wife and a glowering unreasonable man, who would go for days without speaking a word. She felt that he had cheated her—cheated her of the happiness which her school had brought to her, cheated her of the means by which she could have secured a livelihood and independence, cheated her of all of her faith in men and much of her faith in God.

"Are the two rooms ready?" he barked.

"Yes, father," she replied.

"You have got to do your best to make them comfortable," he ordered. "Socrates Smith is an old friend of mine—I haven't met his brother."

A faint smile played about the corner of the girl's mouth.

"It's a curious name he has," she said.

"If it's good enough for him, it's good enough for you" said John Mandle.

The girl was silent.

"I haven't seen Socrates for ten years," John Mandle went on, and she felt that he was really thinking aloud, for he would not trouble to take the girl into his confidence. "Ten years! A clever fellow—a wonderful fellow!"

She made another attempt to enter into conversation.

"He is a great detective, isn't he?" she asked, and expected to be snapped up, but to her surprise he nodded.

"The greatest and the cleverest in the world—at any rate in England," he said "and from what I hear, his brother is likely to follow in his footsteps."

"Is the brother young?"

John Mandle looked up under his shaggy brows and eyed her coldly.

"He is twenty-five," he said. "Now understand once and for all that I'll have no philandering, Molly."

Molly's lovely face flushed red and her round chin rose with a jerk.

"I am not in the habit of philandering with your guests," she said, her voice trembling with anger. "Why do you say such beastly things to me?"

"That will do," he said, with a jerk of his head.

"It will do for you, but not for me," said the girl hotly. "I have endured your tyranny ever since poor mother's death, and I have come to the end of my patience. You have made this beautiful place a living hell for me, and I will endure it no longer."

"If you don't like it, you can get out," he said, without turning his head.

"That is precisely what I intend doing," she replied more quietly. "I will wait till your guests have gone, and then I will go to London and earn my own living."

"And a nice job you'll make of it," he sneered. "What can you do?"

"Thanks to you I can do nothing," she said. "If you had left me at school I should at least have had an education which would have fitted me for a teacher."

"A teacher," he laughed harshly. "What rubbish you talk, Molly. You understand that if you leave me in the lurch you get not a penny of my money when I die."

"I don't want your money—I have never wanted your money," she cried passionately. "My mother left me a few trinkets—"

"Which I bought her," growled the other. "She had no right to leave my property to you."

"At any rate I haven't seen much of them," replied the girl.

She was turning to leave the room when he called her back.

"Molly," he said, in a softer tone than she had ever heard him use, so unexpectedly gentle that she stopped, "you've got to make allowances for me—I'm a very sick man."

She softened at this.

"I'm sorry, father," she replied. "I ought to have remembered that—are your knees very bad?"

"So bad that I can't stand," he growled. "It is damned annoying this rheumatism coming on when I've invited my old friend down to see me. This means that I shall be in bed for a week. Send the men here and tell them to bring the wheeled chair; I want to go into my study to work."

With the assistance of the gardener and his valet, John Mandle was trundled into a big airy room which he had built at the side of the house on the ground floor level, a room which served as study and bedroom whenever he felt disinclined to mount the stairs to his own room, for he was subject to these rheumatic attacks.

The girl, after seeing him comfortably placed at his table, went about her household duties.

Mandle's chair was on the lawn before the house when Socrates Smith and his brother drove up that afternoon.

"Hullo," said Soc, surprised, "what's the matter with you, John?"

"This infernal rheumatism," snarled the other. "I'm glad to see you, Socrates, you look just about the same."

"This is my brother," said Socrates, and the younger man shook hands.

They did not see the girl until Lexington had wheeled the chair into the drawing-room for tea, and the sight of her took the young man's breath away.

"She's wonderful, Socrates," he said enthusiastically when they were alone after the meal.

"She's divine! Did you ever see such eyes, and the skin—my heavens! it's as pure and as speckless as a rose-leaf: and did you notice her wonderful carriage—"

"Oh, Lex, you make me tired," said Socrates wearily, "to think that I should have brought you down here and undone the work of years. After having kept you sheltered from the wiles of females—"

"Oh, shut up," said Lexington. "You know jolly well she's beautiful."

"She isn't bad," admitted the cautious Socrates; "to me she's just a girl."

"You're a heathen and a Philistine," snapped his brother.

"I can't be both," said the philosophical Soc. "What I did notice—" He stopped, out of loyalty to his friend.

"What was that?" asked Lexington, expectantly. "The way he treated her?"

Socrates nodded.

"He's a bully," said Lex, emphatically; "and a man who can be so lost to a sense of decency that he talks to a girl like that, as if she were a dog, is beyond my understanding. Did you hear him snarl at her about the sugar?"

"I think he hates her," said Socrates, thoughtfully, "and I'm pretty certain that she hates him. It is an interesting household, because John Mandle is scared."

"Scared?"

Soc Smith nodded, for he had seen the fear of death in John Mandle's eyes.

III. — THE FEAR OF JOHN MANDLE

"SCARED of what?" Lexington's eyebrows rose.

"I'd like to know," repeated Socrates quietly. "Did you see the wire alarm near the gate? Did you notice the study door has an electrical lock? You wouldn't, of course, because you're a cub at the game. Did you see the revolver at his hand, both in his bedroom and in his study, and the triple mirror over his writing table, so that he can look up and see all that is happening behind him and on either side? He is scared—scared to death, I tell you. He has the fear of fears in his eyes!"

Lexington could only look at his brother open-mouthed.

"That is partly the reason he is such a grump, so you'll have to make allowances for him—And here is Bob Stone," he said suddenly, and walked across the lawn to meet the man who was striding up the drive. A bluff, broad-shouldered man with a good-humoured face, the new-comer bellowed his greeting to his old comrade in a voice that could be heard for miles.

"Soc, you're skinnier than ever," he shouted. "By gad, you are just bones held together by parchment! Don't you ever eat?"

Socrates Smith grinned as he took the other's huge paw in his and shook it.

"You're as noisy as ever, Bob," he said, and looked round for John Mandle.

"He is groaning in the hands of a masseur," said Lexington.

"This is your brother—I don't remember him. A good looker, Socrates, a real good looker. Don't you think so, Miss Templeton?"

The girl's eyes danced at the evidence of Lexington's embarrassment.

"I am no judge of male beauty," she said demurely. "I see nobody but father and you."

Bob Stone roared at the malicious thrust and slapped his knee, an operation which reminded him of his friend's misfortune.

"Poor John has a very bad time with his legs," he said, "a shocking bad time. What he wants is a little faith and a little more religion in his system."

Socrates looked at him sharply.

"That's a new note in you, Bob," he said.

"What, religion? Yes, I suppose it is, but I'm rather inclined that way lately. It's a pity you can't stay over for our big revival meeting at Godalming. Evans, the Welsh evangelist, is coming down—it will be interesting. I'm going to talk."

"You!" said Socrates in surprise.

Bob Stone nodded. His big face was preternaturally solemn.

"Yes, I'm going to address the meeting. Heaven knows what I'm going to say," he said, "but the words will come into my mouth, and I shan't make a fool of myself. Hullo, John."

John Mandle was propelling himself toward them on his chair, and nodded glumly to his old comrade.

"A revival meeting, did I hear you say? Your voice is like an angel's whisper, Bob."

Bob chuckled.

"Yes, next week there's a meeting in Godalming which I'm going to address. Why don't you come along, John, and get your rheumatism cured?"

John muttered something uncomplimentary to faith healing in general, and the Welsh evangelist in particular, and Stone seemed to treat his wrath as a huge joke.

It was a pleasant day in early summer and they lingered out of doors till the very last moment.

The girl, in some trepidation, had intruded herself into the circle, had even ventured a few comments, and had been surprised that she had not been rudely interrupted by her boorish step-father. For his forbearance she had probably to thank Lexington Smith, though she dreaded the caustic comments which would follow as a matter of course when she and the tyrant were alone.

"Doesn't it remind you of a meeting of the 'Three Musketeers,' Miss Templeton?" asked Lex, and she smiled.

"Talking over their dirty work of other days, and revelling in the recollection of the poor devils they had sent to penal servitude, to the gallows—" Lex went on.

"Mostly of people we failed to send to penal servitude," interrupted Socrates. "Failures are much more interesting than successes, as food for reminiscence, Lex. You will have plenty to talk about in your old and middle age."

"I thank you for the compliment," said Lexington, politely.

"I think your brother is rather wonderful," said the girl, lowering her voice. "What extraordinary eyes he has."

"I'm supposed to have rather good eyes," said the shameless youth, and she bubbled with laughter.

"No, Socrates is really remarkable," he went on more seriously. "He is the soundest all-round man at the game, and he is a constant wonder to me. We were talking about your father—"

"My step-father," she corrected quietly.

"I beg your pardon—your step-father." It was rude of him to apologise within the hearing of John Mandle, but Mr. Mandle was at that moment engrossed in the recital of an early experience, and did not hear it.

"Soc was telling me that Mr. Mandle and Mr. Stone were the greatest strategists that ever worked at Scotland Yard. They were people who could work out a plan of campaign to the minutest detail, and it was this quality which brought them their success."

They tarried till the dinner gong sounded, and then went into the house, and the meal was a fairly pleasant one. Bob Stone was the type of man who dominated all conversation; he had a fund of stories which seemed inexhaustible, and even Mandle smiled—sourly, it is true—once or twice in the course of the meal.

Lexington wheeled him into the drawing-room, to the bridge table, but to the youth's delight Stone refused to play.

"That is one of the frivolities which I am giving up," he said.

"You're getting sanctimonious in your old age, Bob," sneered Mandle, but the big man only smiled.

He took his leave about an hour later, and John Mandle discussed his new development in his old-time friend with great frankness and acrimony.

"Anything for a sensation, that's Bob's weakness," he said, as he chewed an unlit cigar. "It's the one bad quality which I've tried to drill out of him. Anything for a sensation! Why—he'd ruin himself to get a little applause."

"Maybe he has genuinely got religion," said Socrates. "Such things have happened."

"Not he," said John Mandle contemptuously.

"Is he married yet?"

For about the third time that evening Mandle smiled—his eyes looked across the room to where the girl was sitting with Lexington.

"No—not married," he said quietly, "though he has ambitions in that direction."

"I see," said Socrates, quietly.

The words carried to Lexington and he gasped.

"Not you," he said in a low voice to the girl, and she nodded.

"And you?"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I like him; of course, he's a dear, but not in that way; it is hopelessly ridiculous, and I told him so."

"What does your father think?"

She did not reply for a moment.

"I think my father lost all interest when he found that I did not favour the match," she said, a little bitterly. "If he had thought I was going to get any happiness out of it there would have been trouble."

Lex said nothing. The fascination of the girl was on him; and it was not because women were an unusual factor in his life.

The two hours which followed passed like minutes to two of the party, and Lexington was surprised, and a little disgusted, when his brother rose.

"I think I'll go to bed," said Socrates. "The country air has made me sleepy. Are you coming up, Lex?"

Lex hesitated.

"Yes," he said, for he had noted the signal in his brother's eye.

"Coming into my room?" said the elder man when they reached the landing above. "I suppose you know you've made John Mandle as sore as a scalded cat?" he said when he had closed the door.

"I have?" replied Lexington, in surprise.

"Listen," said Socrates, and bent his head.

Their room was situated above the drawing-room, and from below came a murmur of angry voices.

"I was afraid he'd rag her," said Socrates quietly.

"But why?"

"The Lord knows," said Socrates, taking off his coat. "But apparently he hates any attention being paid to the girl, and really, Lex, when you were not, as the novelists say, devouring her with your eyes, you were glued to her side."

"Is that an offence?" asked Lexington sarcastically. "Is it unnatural?"

"Very natural, indeed, Lex," said Socrates smiling. "I don't like John's way of conducting his household. An average man would be proud to have such a daughter, even though she's only his step-daughter; but the man's fear has unbalanced him."

"You stick to that theory?" said Lexington.

Socrates nodded.

"Did you see his valet come in? Well, that fellow has had instructions to make the round of the grounds and fix the wires and contraptions with which Mandle guards his house."

"Did you ask him about it?"

Socrates shook his head.

"It is not wise to ask a man about his fears," he said. "It is a subject on which he never grows very voluble."

They heard the quick step of the girl as she passed their room, and presently the heavy tread of the two servants carrying Mr. Mandle to bed.

"Good-night, John," Soc called as he passed.

"Good-night," with a grunt, he replied.

"Good-night, Mr. Mandle," said Lexington, but there was no answer.

"You have what is colloquially known as 'the bird,'" said Soc with a chuckle.

It was a beautiful moonlight night and they sat by the open casement window smoking until the household was silent and the last rumble of servants' heavy feet had ceased to shake the ceiling.

They talked in soft tones of people, of the beauty of the country on such a night as this, and Lexington was rising with a yawn when his brother asked:

"What house is that?"

He pointed across the valley to a big white house clearly visible in the moonlight.

"It's rum you should ask that, for it's the only house in the neighbourhood I know," said Lexington. "I saw it when I was strolling on the lawn this afternoon, and asked one of the gardeners. It belongs to a Mr. Jetheroe, a philanthropist and recluse, and a friend of Molly Templeton's, though I should imagine that her father does not know. She—" He did not finish his sentence.

From one of the big windows of the white house flashed a light. Rather would it be more exact to say, the window lit up with an unearthly glow, which died away instantly.

"What was that?" asked Lexington.

Again the window glowed, and then was dark. And then it lit in a rapid succession of flashes.

"Somebody's signalling; that is the Morse code," said Socrates, and spelt—"C—O—M—E." He could not catch the next, and it was some time before he picked up the thread of the message. "REE OAKS," he read, and interpreted the letters as "THREE OAKS."

"I wonder who the dickens is carrying out this clandestine correspondence," he asked.

"I'll give you three guesses," said Lexington with a smile, as he rose; "but if we said it was a demobilised soldier servant who had taught his lady-love the art and method of signalling, we should probably be near the mark."

"Look!" whispered Socrates, excitedly for him.

A slim, almost ghostly, figure was moving stealthily along the edge of the lawn in the shadow of a bush hedge.

Lex looked, and his eyes went round. It was Molly Templeton and she carried a small bag in her hand.

Presently she disappeared and the two men looked at one another.

"There is no reason why she should not take a midnight stroll," said Socrates, and Lex nodded.

"Good-night, Soc, old bird, sleep well," he said as he rose; "and call me in the morning when you go for your threatened stroll. I suppose when you said you were going to get up early and go for a walk, it wasn't swank on your part?"

"You'll know all about it," said Socrates grimly.

IV. — THE MAN ON THE TREE

LEXINGTON "knew all about it." A wet sponge was pushed into his face and he sat up in bed blinking and gasping. This awakening had interrupted a dream in which John Mandle and the cloaked figure of Molly creeping across the lawn were inextricably mixed.

"Time to get up, my boy," said Socrates softly.

He was already dressed, the window was open, and the land lay shrouded in the morning mist, through which the sun was glowing.

"What time is it?" asked Lexington drowsily, as he reached for his slippers.

"Half-past six, and you've seven miles to walk before you must think of breakfast."

An hour later they let themselves out of the house. It was a late-rising household. John Mandle had warned them as to this. He himself did not put in an appearance until noon, and he had hinted that it was very probable that he would spend the day in bed.

They had to pick their way over almost invisible threads which connected alarm guns, and in one case an ingenious magnesian flare, before they came to the road.

"I'm puzzled about that signal last night," said Socrates, as they swung down the hill side by side. "If you remember, we only saw half of the white house; the rest of it was cut off by the angle of the wall. There it is now," he pointed with his stick. The house looked like a white jewel in the early morning sunlight, for the mist was clearing. Behind, and a little to the right, they saw the red gables of Prince's Place, which was Mr. Bob Stone's demesne.

"I don't think I should worry my head about it, Soc," said Lexington cheerfully. "What a horrible old detective you are. You must be looking for mysteries, even in this pleasant place."

He himself was puzzled about the girl, but he hesitated to put his speculations into words.

Their walk brought them nearer to the White House. It was a plain, square building, with huge windows that glistened in the sunlight.

"That fellow likes a lot of light," said Socrates. "Do you notice those windows on the ground floor, and the unusual size of those on the upper?"

"Proceed with your deductions, oh great man," said Lexington. "I will be your Doctor Watson."

"Don't be a fool," growled Socrates, who was rather sensitive on one point. "There's a path here down into the valley. We'll follow that and get a nearer view of the White House."

The path was a narrow one, and they had not been walking for five minutes before Socrates stopped.

"Three Oaks!" he said, and pointed.

Just ahead of them were three large oak trees, and the path followed a course which would bring them under their spreading branches.

"That's what it was—Three Oaks."

"There are always Three Oaks in a place like this, just as there's always a One Tree Hill and a Three Bridges," said Lexington. "Speaking for myself, I am not sufficiently romantic to be interested in a lover's tryst. I wonder if Mr. Mandle takes this walk—it is delightful."

Soc smiled.

"Poor old John would be glad to be able to walk two yards," he said. "He hasn't left his grounds on his own feet for months."

They had to pass through an avenue of bushes and momentarily lost sight of the trees. The path turned abruptly to the left and brought them to within a dozen feet of the nearest tree. And suddenly Lexington felt his arm gripped.

"Great God!" said Socrates Smith, and pointed.

A thick branch from the nearest tree overhung the path and laying flat along that branch, tied there securely with a rope, was a man, his hands hung helplessly down above the path, his face turned toward them, and between his eyes was a purple mark where a bullet had struck him.

Socrates raced to the tree and looked up. There was no room for doubt in his mind. It was John Mandle, dead—murdered!

V. — THE SHOE AND MR. JETHEROE

THEY stood, as if petrified, looking up at the ghastly object and Lexington was the first to move. His foot was raised to take an impetuous step forward, when Soc, who had not released his grip of the boy's arm, pulled him back.

"Stay where you are," he said sternly.

"It's Mandle!" whispered Lex, and Soc nodded.

"It's Mandle all right," he said grimly, and dropped his eyes from the bough to the ground beneath. "The earth is a little too hard to leave any impression," he said regretfully. "Go ahead carefully, but don't put your foot down on anything that looks like a print."

Presently he stood under the branch and by reaching up and standing on tiptoe could just touch the dead man's hand.

"Look carefully round, Lex, and see what you can find. I am going up that tree."

With extraordinary agility he scrambled up the gnarled trunk and found it a comparatively easy matter, for it was inclined at an angle. Some other climber had been there, and recently. In several places the bark was torn and there was an impress of a man's nailed boots. It was an easy matter to reach the branch where the murdered man lay, and Lexington, watching his brother, saw that he paid little or no attention to the body, save to take a long scrutiny of its feet. He seemed more interested in the branches above, and peered up in his short-sighted way, a mannerism of his, for the eyesight of Socrates Smith was remarkably good.

Presently he came back and dropped lightly to the ground.

"Yes," he said.

"Yes what?" asked Lexington curiously, but Soc offered no explanation.

Evidently he had seen something which he had expected to see.

"Did you find anything?" he asked.

"This," said Lex, and handed him a little brass cylinder.

Soc looked at the cartridge case and nodded.

"A 35 automatic," he said. "I knew that it was a nickel-jacketed bullet by the wound it made. Anything else?"

Lex shook his head.

"It's horrible, isn't it?" he said in a whisper, looking up at that terrible face staring down upon them with its blank eyes.

"Fairly horrible," said his brother quietly, "but remarkably interesting."

Lexington Smith was not sufficiently experienced to take a detached interest in the crime as an artistic performance. To him the limp, inanimate figure was that of his host, a man who had been alive and well, and with whom he had been talking on the previous evening.

What a terrible shock for the girl! He remembered her suddenly.

"How could they have done it?" he asked. "There must have been more than one in this. They must have come into the house while we were sleeping, Soc; that's the horrible thought."

"How many people do you think?" asked Socrates quietly.

"At least three," replied his brother. "They must have taken him out of bed, and yet we heard nothing. Do you think they drugged him?"

"I think lots of things," said his brother evasively. "Now, Lex, just tell me what you think ha [...]