Gimblet

“ Gimblet, you can prove till you're black in the face that he murdered every soul in the house, it won't make any difference to me."
"Who do you think did do it, Lady Ruth?" Gimblet asked.
"What do I know? An escaped lunatic, one of the keepers, the under housemaid, anyone you like. What does it matter? It wasn't David, even though his namesake did kill Goliath, and I always disliked the name, having suffered from a Biblical one myself. I said to his mother when he was born. 'For goodness' sake give the poor child a name he won't be expected to live up to. ”

“ That letter which came for Uncle Douglas—the letter from Paris—I guessed it meant something of the sort."
"There is a foreigner staying at Crianan," said Gimblet, "whom I have every reason to suspect. More than that, there has been a Russian in your very midst who, I am afraid, you will be shocked to hear, is hand in glove with him."
"Whom do you mean?" exclaimed Mark, "not—not Julia Romaninov?" It seemed to the detective that he winced as he uttered the name of the girl. Silently Gimblet bowed his head, and for a minute the two men stood without a word. ”

“ She would push it through the hole, she thought, if she heard any sound of voices above the clamour of the burn. After that there remained nothing more to do, and the hours seemed to creep along more and more slowly, till each second seemed like a minute and each minute an hour. She tried to divert herself by repeating poetry, and doing imaginary sums; and it was about eleven o'clock, when she was in the middle of the dates of the Kings of England, that she heard Gimblet's voice hailing her in a shout from below. ”

“ Gimblet!” cried Sir Gregory. “What do you mean?”
“Yes, Sir Gregory,” said the detective. “I am very much more—uneasy about your friend than I have yet been. I fear that, when I am in a position to give you news of her, it may be very bad. You may have to stand a shock. ”

“ In the detective’s ears was echoing a sentence heard above the murmur of the crowd: “I’m pretty desperate, I can tell you. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to get the money.”
A second later Sidney turned; and, coming back to where Gimblet sat impassively waiting, drew up a chair upon which he sat himself down with an air of resolution.
“I did see my aunt on Monday, Mr. Gimblet, and to tell you the truth I don’t like telling you what she said to me then. One doesn’t care about confiding one’s private family affairs to strangers. ”

“ Brother Hawkyard then said, in a livelier strain, 'You must know, George, that Brother Gimblet and I are going to make our two businesses one. We are going into partnership. We are settling it now. Brother Gimblet is to take one clear half of the profits (O, yes! he shall have it; he shall have it to the last farthing) .'
'D.V.!' said Brother Gimblet, with his right fist firmly clinched on his right leg. ”

“ Business is very slack, Mr. Gimblet. I daresay, now, yours keeps your nose to the grindstone, at one season as much as another?”
“Well, yes,” said Gimblet. “I’m afraid the criminal classes aren’t very regular in their holiday-making. It’s very inconsiderate of them, but I’m afraid they’re a selfish lot.”
The house agent’s ever-present smile broadened, and at that moment young Tremmels made his reappearance with the inventory. ”

“ In a moment Gimblet knew what it was, and where he had seen her before. He had caught sight, in her hand, of a little bag of striped black satin with purple pansies embroidered at intervals upon it. Just such a bag had lain upon the table of his flat in Whitehall a few weeks ago, on the day when its owner had stolen the envelope entrusted to him by Lord Ashiel.
"It is she," breathed the detective, "the widow!" ”

“ Gimblet did not reply, but after a few moments walked over to the writing-table and spread out a piece of notepaper. He kept his back turned towards the young man, who seemed thankful for an opportunity to recover his composure.
His face was still working nervously, however, when at length the detective turned and held out a pen towards him.
"Will you not write at once to General Tenby?" he suggested.
Mark sat down before the blotting-pad.
"He will be at home," he said mechanically. "This weather will have driven them in early if they have been shooting." ”

“ What could he want with a loose chintz sofa cover?” asked Sidney, as the detective paused.
“I asked myself these questions,” continued Gimblet, “and I saw that there were only two explanations which met all the facts. It might be that the chintz bore traces of his crime that at all costs must be destroyed; it might be, for instance, stained with blood. But in that case he would probably have tried to burn it; that would be a difficult job, and there was no sign of a fire having been lighted lately in any [208] of the grates. No coal in the cellar and no firewood. ”

“ He went thoughtfully away and sought out Mark in the smoking-room, where he found him surrounded by packets of papers, which lay in heaps upon the floor and tables.
"There's a frightful lot to look through," said the young man despondently, looking up from his self-imposed task. "I haven't found anything interesting yet. How did you get on? Do you think those footmarks can possibly be anyone's but David's?"
"The boot you gave me fits them too well to admit of doubt, I'm afraid," said Gimblet. ”

“ CHAPTER XII Juliet failed to extract much comfort from Gimblet when, about six o'clock, she met him coming up through the garden to Inverashiel Cottage.
All the afternoon she had possessed her soul in what patience she could muster, which was not a great deal. Still, by dint of repeating to herself that she must give the detective time to study the facts, and opportunity to verify them at his leisure and in his own way, she had managed to get through the long inactive hours, and to force herself not to dwell upon the vision of David in prison, which, do as she would, was ever before her eyes. ”

“ I was afraid he would be terribly unhappy, poor boy, so soon after the funeral, and Juliet Byrne having refused him, and everything. Though of course he can't be pitied for inheriting Inverashiel, such a lovely place, is it not? And quantities of property in the coal district, you know, besides. He is really a very lucky young man."
"It is indeed a most beautiful country," Gimblet observed, as Lady Ruth's breath gave out completely, and she stopped by the roadside to regain it. ”

“ Juliet paused; she was out of breath; they had been walking fast and were within sight of the castle gates. The way led along the side of Loch Ashiel, and the castle rose in front of them on a tall rocky promontory, which jutted far into the water.
"Let us rest here a few minutes," said Gimblet. "It is too much to ask you to talk while we are walking up that hill, and I don't want you to leave out any details, however unimportant they may appear to you." ”

“ But the rifle was found to have been fired again since he had cleaned it. His only explanation was to contradict what he had previously said to Miss Byrne. Do those facts appear to you to leave any possible loophole of doubt as to his guilt?"
Mark struck a match and lighted his cigarette before he answered. When at length he did so his reluctance was very plain, and his voice full of regret.
"Poor old chap," he said. "I'm afraid he must have done it in some fit of madness. As you say, there is no other imaginable alternative."
Gimblet nodded philosophically. ”

“ It was surprising to see how large was the muster; for the most part a company of tall, thin men, with lean faces and drooping wisps of moustache.
To a mournful dirge on the pipes, Ashiel was laid in his rocky grave, and the throng of black-garmented people was ferried back the way it had come. Gimblet, wrapped to the ears in a thick overcoat, and with a silk scarf wound high round his neck, shivered in the cold air, for the wind had veered to the north, and the first breath of the Arctic winter was already carried on it. The waters of the loch had turned a slaty black ”

“ Mark admitted. "But I shan't feel easy in my mind till I've looked through everything, and I'm getting a very useful idea of the estate accounts in the meantime. It is rather a long business, but I'm getting on with it, slow but sure. There are such a fearful lot."
"Are all these cupboards full of papers?" Gimblet asked, looking round him at the numerous little doors in the panelling. ”

“ After you have finished, will you come to Lady Ruth Worsfold's house, and tell me what you think? It is just past the station turning; you will easily find your way, though the house is hidden by the trees. Your luggage will be there already, as Lady Ruth is going to put you up."
Mr. Mark McConachan, or rather Lord Ashiel, as he had now become, was in the act of ending a solitary meal, when Gimblet was announced. He went to meet the detective, forcing to his trouble-lined face a smile of welcome that lit up the large melancholy eyes with an expression few people could resist. ”

“ Scotland Yard officials were never too proud to call upon him for help, and many a difficulty he had helped them out of, though he refused an offer of a regular post in the Criminal Investigation Department, preferring to be at liberty to choose what cases he would take up. Above all things he loved the strange and inexplicable. Gimblet had not always been a detective. Indeed, he often smiled to himself when he thought of the extraordinary confidence which the public now elected to repose in him.
No one was more conscious than himself that he was far from being infallible ”

“ Of course I see now that some one else may have found the key in that drawer, but at first it did look as if David must, for some reason, have taken it, and been in the library, after I'd gone to bed."
"It seems very unlikely that anyone else would have hit on the place where you had put it," said Gimblet reflectively. "And if they had done so, would they have recognized the key? Is the library key peculiar in any way?"
"It is rather an uncommon pattern," said Mark. "It is very old and strong. I think anyone who knew the key would have recognized it all right." ”

“ Such extraordinary things happen every day that anything short of a miracle hardly attracts attention, but surely it would be a strain on the long arm of coincidence to suppose that, having strayed on to the scene of a murder owing to the mistaken idea that he was on the track of Mrs. Vanderstein, he should then find that not only did the dead woman resemble that lady and wear similar clothes but that she even used the same uncommon perfume! Gimblet’s whole soul revolted at such an impossibility. ”

“ It will be wisest if you let it appear that even you can hardly continue to cling to the idea of his innocence. You can be trusted to act a part where such great issues are involved, can you not? More may depend on it than you think."
"I'll be silent as the grave," she cried. "As the grave," she repeated more soberly, and turned away, reproaching herself silently, since in her anxiety for David her sorrow for her father had been a moment forgotten.
When Gimblet came down again, clean and refreshed, he found no one but his hostess, Lady Ruth Worsfold. ”

“ Lord Ashiel could not have lived all his life encircled by a cordon of police and detectives; and, without such precautions, a man condemned by Nihilist societies is practically sure to fall a victim to their excellent organization and disregard for the lives of their own members.
Still Gimblet had liked the dead peer, and could not get the pale aristocratic face and tired, feverish blue eyes out of his head. Surely he might have found some way of preventing this catastrophe. ”

“ A glimpse of the truth presented itself to Stephen Gimlet's mind; and though he said nothing, he clenched one hand tight, so tight that the print of the nails remained in the palm; but then his thoughts turned to other things, and rising up out of the chair in which Doctor Miles had placed him, he turned to Sir John Slingsby, and said, "Oh, Sir, I wish I could say how much I thank you!"
"There, there, Stephen," replied the baronet, waving his hand kindly, "no more about it. You have lost one house and you have got another; you have given up one trade and taken a better. ”

“ All round the Queen of the Woods was a storm of sobbing and sorrow.
But no, she would not weep.
THE HOARD OF THE GIBBELINS The Gibbelins eat, as is well known, nothing less good than man. Their evil tower is joined to Terra Cognita, to the lands we know, by a bridge. Their hoard is beyond reason; avarice has no use for it; they have a separate cellar for emeralds and a separate cellar for sapphires; they have filled a hole with gold and dig it up when they need it. And the only use that is known for their ridiculous wealth is to attract to their larder a continual supply of food. ”

“ The gentleman who has got the little lone cottage on the edge of Chandliegh Heath, gives me half-a-crown a week to bring up his letters and newspapers, and I take the time when all the folks are at dinner in our house."
"And get no dinner yourself, poor Bill," said Stephen Gimlet; "cut him a slice of the cold bacon, mother, and a hunch of bread. He can eat it as he goes. I'll run and draw him a draught of beer. It won't keep you a minute, Bill, and help you on too." ”

“ The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when Stephen Gimlet aimed a straight blow at him with his right hand, which was immediately parried; for the young vagabond was not unskilful in the science of defence; but, the next instant, the gamekeeper's left told with stunning effect in the midst of his face, and he fell prostrate, with his head out of the doorway and his feet within. Stephen Gimlet looked at him for a moment, then, stooping down, lifted him in his strong arms, pitched him headlong out, and shut the door. ”