Benjamin Greene

“ Greene,” interposed Vance, “was your sister Julia in the habit of leaving her door unlocked at night?”
Greene’s jaw dropped a little, and his eyes opened wider.
“By Jove—no! Now that you mention it . . . she always locked herself in.”
Vance nodded absently, and we passed out into the hall. A thin, swinging baize door hid the servants’ stair-well at the rear, and Markham pushed it open.
“Nothing much here to deaden the sound,” he observed.
“No,” agreed Greene. “And old Sproot’s room is right at the head of the steps. He’s got good ears, too—too damned good sometimes.” ”

“ Greene thinks, there is another explanation of last night’s crime, then it’s essential to acquaint ourselves with the conditions existing here. And it’s equally essential not to rouse the suspicions of the servants. Hence, my apparent irrelevancies. I’m trying to size up the various human factors we have to deal with; and I think I’ve done uncommonly well. Several rather interesting possibilities have developed.”
Before Markham could reply Sproot passed the archway and opened the front door to some one whom he greeted respectfully. Greene immediately went into the hall. ”

“ Heath sat staring at the polished table-top with futile consternation.
“Morphine and strychnine! There’s no use looking for the stuff. There’s a hundred places in the house where it could be hid; and we might search a month and not find it. Anyway, I’ll go out there to-night and tell O’Brien to watch for it. If she’s on the lookout she maybe can spot any attempt to use it.”
“What astounds me,” remarked the Inspector, “is the security felt by the thief. Within an hour of the time Rex Greene is shot the poison disappears from the upper hall. Good Gad! That’s cold-bloodedness for you! ”

“ Bend up your bows, and see your strings be tight,
The arrows keen, and everything be ready,
And each of you a good bat on his neck,
Able to lay a good man on the ground.
Scar. I will have Friar Tuck's.
Much. I will have Little John's.
Rob. I will have one made of an ashen plank,
Able to bear a bout or two.—
Then come on, Marian, let us go;
For before the sun doth show the morning day,
I will be at Wakefield to see this Pinner, George-a-Greene.
[Exeunt.
SCENE III.—At Bradford.
A Shoemaker discovered at work: enter Jenkin, carrying a staff. [313]
Jen. ”

“ Greene’s will makes the five children equal beneficiaries. In event of death of any of them the survivors share alike; and if all should die the estate goes to their families, if any.
7. The sleeping-rooms of the Greenes are arranged thus: Julia’s and Rex’s face each other at the front of the house; Chester’s and Ada’s face each other in the centre of the house; and Sibella’s and Mrs. Greene’s face each other at the rear. No two rooms intercommunicate, with the exception of Ada’s and Mrs. Greene’s; and these two rooms also give on the same balcony.
8. The library of Tobias Greene, which Mrs. ”

“ His father—old Doctor Veranus Von Blon—brought all the later Greenes into the world; family physician, spiritual adviser, and all that sort of thing, from time immemorial. When Von Blon, senior, died we embraced the son as a matter of course. And young Arthur’s a shrewd lad, too. Knows his pharmacopœia. Trained by the old man, and topped off his medical education in Germany.”
Vance nodded negligently.
“While we’re waiting for Doctor Von Blon, suppose we have a chat with Miss Sibella and Mr. Rex. Your brother first, let us say.”
Greene looked to Markham for confirmation; then rang for Sproot. ”

“ And the burden of being a celebrity is quite overwhelming. I really have become a celebrity, you know. In fact, all the Greenes are quite famous now. I never imagined a mere murder or two could give a family such positively irrational prominence. ”

“ The girl was genuinely frightened, and, after Sibella and Sproot had been consulted, she was paid her wages and told she could pack her things. In less than half an hour she had turned in her key and departed with her luggage. Such information as she left behind her was largely a substantiation of Hemming’s outpourings. She, though, did not regard the two murders as the acts of an outraged God. Hers was a more practical and mundane view.
“There’s something awful funny going on here,” she had said, forgetting for the moment the urge of her coquettish spirits. “The Greenes are queer people. ”

“ Though most of the productions of Greene were written to supply the wants of the passing hour, yet the poetical effusions scattered through his works betray few marks of haste or slovenliness, and many of them, indeed, may be classed among the most polished and elegant of their day. To much warmth and fertility of fancy, they add a noble strain of feeling and enthusiasm, together with many exquisite touches of the pathetic, and so many impressive lessons of morality, as, in a great measure, to atone for the licentiousness of several of his prose tracts. ”

“ Then they sat down on the rude bench together, with the roughly hewn pillar of coal at their backs, blind Bennie and Jack Rennie, the giant, and while one told the story of his blindness, and his blessings, and his hopes, the other listened with tender earnestness, almost with tears.
Bennie told first about Tom, his brother, who was fourteen years old, two years older than himself. Tom was so good to him; and Tom could see, could see as well as anybody. “Why,” he exclaimed, “Tom can see every thing!” ”

“ And I’m much too young for wrinkles.”
“Like Ninon de L’Enclos, you’ll always be too young for wrinkles,” rejoined Vance, holding a match to her cigarette. “But perhaps you can suggest, without becoming too serious, some one who might have had a reason for wanting to kill your two sisters.”
“Oh, as for that, I’d say we’d all come under suspicion. We’re not an ideal home circle, by any means. In fact, the Greenes are a queer collection. We don’t love one another the way a perfectly nice and proper family should. ”

“ This struggle between the forces of good and evil is exceedingly well depicted in Greene's Repentances, under his own or fictitious names; of all the heroes of his tales he is himself the most interesting and the most deeply studied. As a novel writer and an observer of human nature, his own portrait is perhaps his masterpiece. ”

“ But, sir, I am glad to see how conformable you are to the statute.—I warrant you, he's as yeomanly a man as you shall see: mark you, masters, here's a plain, honest man, without welt or guard. [234] —But I pray you, sir, do you come lately from hell?
Dev. Ay, marry: how then?
Miles. Faith, 'tis a place I have desired long to see: have you not good tippling-houses there? may not a man have a lusty fire there, a pot of good ale, a pair [235] of cards, a swinging piece of chalk, and a brown toast that will clap a white waistcoat on a cup of good drink? ”

“ He passed down the airway, and out by the entrance where blind Bennie lay, still sleeping, and stopped [141] and looked tenderly down upon him, as men look, for the last time in life, on those whom they love.
He bent over, holding his heavy beard back against his breast, and touched the tangled hair on the child’s forehead with his lips; and then, weak, staggering, with the shadow of his fate upon him, he passed out on the heading, and up into the new chambers, where the poisoned air was heavy with the deadly gas, and the lamp-flame scarcely left the wick ”

“ Society of the times in which Greene lived was not ready to treat either a playwright or an actor as a good citizen. And a son of a nobleman, entering the ranks of the pioneers, would have given his life as a sacrifice just as did Marlowe and Greene. Lodge was the son of a Lord Mayor, Peele's father was a man of some education, and Lyly had influential connections at court; yet the only man of the entire school [Pg xv] of "university wits" who escaped a life of misery and a death of want was Lodge, and he in 1596 deserted literature for medicine. ”

“ He creates his best effects by the simplest means; and he is indisputably one of the most attractive of early English dramatic authors.
Greene’s dramatic works and poems were edited by Alexander Dyce in 1831 with a life of the author. This edition was reissued in one volume in 1858. His complete works were edited for the Huth Library by A. B. Grosart. ”

“ He was seeking free play for his gladiatorial instincts, and his claim to intervene solely as Greene's champion cannot be accepted quite literally. In the second edition of his ‘Pierce,’ issued within a month of Greene's death, he had himself denounced Greene's ‘Groatsworth of Wit,’ his friend's dying utterance, as ‘a scald trivial lying pamphlet.’ His new tract was entitled ‘Strange Newes of the Intercepting certaine Letters and a Conuoy of Verses as they were going priuilie to victuall the Low Countries,’ i.e. to be applied to very undignified purposes, London, by John Danter, 1593. ”

“ Attempting a bare outline of Greene's life one would feel safe in assuming that he was born not earlier than 1558; that he took his bachelor's degree at St John's College, Cambridge, in [Pg xxv] 1578; thereafter toured the continent, probably after the 3rd of October 1580, at which date the first part of Mamillia was registered; that returning he took his M.A. at Clare Hall in 1583, and immediately began the composition of love pamphlets and comedies, the latter being now lost ”

“ In spite of his hurt Danny was getting interested. He crept up on the outer edge of the group and listened, wide-eyed, as the other boys eagerly accepted their several commissions.
"Roger and Ed," their leader was continuing, "bear south till you get below the drop of the cliff, and then separate and work that [Pg 22] territory between you"—with a sweeping gesture. "Alex and Biddie—let me see—you two go over the mountain to the right of Elsie—No, there's the Death Head trail—" He paused a moment in thoughtful survey of them, and the boys looked at each other apprehensively. ”

“ Vance got up.
“Thank you very much, Miss Greene. We’re sorry we had to trouble you. Do you mind remaining in your room for a while?”
“Mind? On the contrary. It’s about the only place I feel safe.” She walked to the archway. “If you do find out anything you’ll let me know—won’t you? There’s no use pretending any longer. I’m dreadfully scared.” Then, as if ashamed of her admission, she went quickly down the hall.
Just then Sproot admitted the two finger-print experts—Dubois and Bellamy—and the official photographer. Heath joined them in the hall and took them up-stairs, returning immediately. ”

“ And then think of those six ill-sorted, restless, unhealthy beings compelled to live there in daily contact for a quarter of a century—such was old Tobias Greene’s perverted idealism. And they’ve lived there, day in and day out, in that mouldy miasma of antiquity—unfit to meet the conditions of any alternative, too weak or too cowardly to strike out alone; held by an undermining security and a corrupting ease; growing to hate the very sight of one another, becoming bitter, spiteful, jealous, vicious; wearing down each other’s nerves to the raw ”

“ Vance shook his head slowly.
“A spy in the house would be useless. Isn’t every one there a spy now, watching all the others, and watching them with fear and suspicion? And as for dispersing the family: not only would you find old Mrs. Greene, who holds the purse-strings, an adamantine obstacle, but you’d meet all manner of legal complications as a result of Tobias’s will. No one gets a dollar, I understand, who doesn’t remain in the mansion until the worms have ravaged his carcass for a full quarter of a century. ”

“ Wily. Alas, sir, it is Hebrew unto me,
To tell me of George-a-Greene or any other!
Search me, good sir, and if you find a letter
About me, let me have the punishment that's due.
Grime. Why are you muffled? I like you the worse for that.
Wily. I am not, sir, asham'd to show my face;
Yet loth I am my cheeks should take the air:
Not that I'm chary of my beauty's hue,
But that I'm troubled with the toothache sore.
[Unmuffles.
Grime. [aside] . A pretty wench, of smiling countenance!
Old men can like, although they cannot love ”

“ Geo. Tell me, sweet love, what good fortune brought thee hither?
For one it was that favour'd George-a-Greene.
Bet. Both love and fortune brought me to my George,
In whose sweet sight is all my heart's content.
Geo. Tell me, sweet love, how cam'st thou from thy father's?
Bet. A willing mind hath many slips in love:
It was not I, but Wily, thy sweet boy.
Geo. And where is Wily now?
Bet. In my apparel, in my chamber still.
Geo. Jenkin, come hither: go to Bradford,
And listen out your fellow Wily.—
Come, Bettris, let us in,
And in my cottage we will sit and talk. ”

“ His greatest intellectual enthusiasm was art, and he fortunately had an income sufficient to indulge his passion for collecting. It was, however, his interest in psychology and his application of it to individual behaviorism that first turned his attention to the criminal problems which came under Markham’s jurisdiction.
The first case in which he participated was, as I have recorded elsewhere, the murder of Alvin Benson.2 The second was the seemingly insoluble strangling of the famous Broadway beauty, Margaret Odell.3 And in the late fall of the same year came the Greene tragedy. ”

“ He was always cautious, conservative, slow to act unless the emergency called for action.
"No," replied Pen. "I won't wait. It's a fair offer, and you'll take it now or let it alone."
"Then," said Aleck, doggedly, "I'll take it, and you'll be sorry you ever made it."
Lest active hostilities should break out at once, Miss Grey interrupted:
"Now, boys, I don't approve of it. I don't approve of it at all. I think young men like you should be in better business than pelting each other, even with snowballs. ”