Walter Brooklyn

“ Walter Brooklyn’s manner seemed to the inspector quite extraordinarily violent. But he noticed something else while Brooklyn was speaking—the man’s amazing physical strength. He could not be less than sixty; but as he stood there, in a half-threatening attitude—with difficulty, it seemed, holding himself in—Inspector Blaikie could not help thinking that here was the very figure of a man to have struck the blows on both the dead men’s skulls. Here, moreover, was a man, obviously passionate and lacking in self-control—just the sort of person to resort to violence if his will were crossed. ”

“ Inspector Blaikie, when he left the Byron Club, was quite convinced that Walter Brooklyn was the murderer. Not merely one of the murderers, but the murderer of both men. The evidence against Prinsep he was more than ever inclined to discount in face of the impression which Walter Brooklyn had made upon him. Not only the man’s manner, but even more his physique, had convinced the inspector of his guilt. Here at least was a man who combined great physical strength with an obviously ungovernable temper—just the combination of qualities which seemed most clearly to fit the case. ”

“ The inspector nodded.
“But Walter Brooklyn, who rang up his club from Prinsep’s rooms at 11.30, was back at his club before midnight. That leaves very little time. If the theory you advance is true, how do you fit in the times? George Brooklyn could hardly have got back into the garden and got himself killed, before a quarter to twelve. It would take Walter Brooklyn five minutes to get out of the house and back to his club. That leaves less than ten minutes for Prinsep to go up to his room and for Walter Brooklyn to murder him.” ”

“ Which is just what you have done. He is a clever scoundrel. He meant us to hang Walter Brooklyn.”
“He’s too clever for me, if that’s so. But, supposing you’re right, I don’t see that we are much nearer to finding out who he is.”
The superintendent assumed the air of one instructing a little child, and, as he spoke, ticked off the points on his fingers. “My dear Blaikie, we have to trace the murderer through the false clues which he left. Point number one. Walter Brooklyn’s stick was found in Prinsep’s room. If Walter Brooklyn did not put it there, who did?” ”

“ They may still be used to point to the real murderer. Yes, I begin to see light already. If Walter Brooklyn did not send that telephone message, who did? Not much help there, I’m afraid, except that it was a very daring criminal indeed, and probably one who knew intimately both Walter Brooklyn and Liskeard House. Ringing up Brooklyn’s club shows that—he knew the man’s habits. There is something to go upon at all events. But there’s the walking-stick too—yes, that may be the point on which the whole case turns. ”

“ Raising the Wind
Walter Brooklyn’s release was arranged more quickly than any one had expected, and, while Ellery and Joan were still engaged in the conversation just reported, he came out of Brixton Jail a free man. At the gate he said good-bye to Thomas, and, hailing a taxi, ordered the man to drive to his Club. The porter at the Byron met him as he entered with an incredulous stare ”

“ Walter Brooklyn was out of it; for his alibi had been not merely accepted, but tested beyond possible doubt. Ellery could hardly suspect himself, though he admitted that any one else, following out his line of thought, might still suspect him. His alibi was not conclusive: it depended on the word of one man. But he could rule himself out: he could say positively that he had not done the thing. Then who remained? Only Harry Lucas, Carter Woodman, and the two servants, Winter and Morgan. Among these, if he was right, the real murderer must be found. ”

“ So it happened that, although the inquest was for the most part a purely formal affair, Walter Brooklyn was among those who were called upon to give evidence. With most of its proceedings we need not concern ourselves: we know well enough already almost all that the coroner’s jury was allowed to know. Indeed, we know a good deal more; for Inspector Blaikie, in his evidence, said not a word either of Walter Brooklyn’s walking-stick, or of the telephone message which he had sent from Liskeard House. ”

“ But there might be two different murderers. Joan was inclined to regard it as quite possible that Prinsep might have killed George Brooklyn; but it was utterly inconceivable that George should have killed anybody. Far more clearly than her stepfather, he was not that kind of man. So that the best line of inquiry seemed to be to search for the murderer of John Prinsep. But, she remembered, it was in this case that the police had their strongest evidence against Walter Brooklyn. ”

“ Then, taking the will and his copy of the agreement, Woodman bade Walter Brooklyn good-night, receiving a not very cordial response. His first business on the morrow would be to use the two documents and the joint expectation of the two men under Sir Vernon’s will, as a means of raising at once, not merely the £20,000 for Walter Brooklyn, but the much larger sum of which he himself stood immediately in need. He thought he knew a man who would let him have the money. ”

“ A man’s life may depend on it, and I wanted your help.”
The old man peered up at him again, and a little gleam of excitement came into his eyes; but he only nodded to Ellery to go on.
Ellery handed him a photograph of Walter Brooklyn. “On Tuesday night, at about half-past ten, that man stopped for some minutes on the island in the middle of the Circus here. He is accused of having been somewhere else, and his life may depend on our finding some one who saw him here. ”

“ He went out of the office with his hand tingling.
“Certainly a man who impresses himself upon one,” said he, laughing softly to himself. “And what he had to say was most enlightening.”
Chapter VII.
The Case Against Walter Brooklyn
Inspector Blaikie left Carter Woodman’s office with the feeling that a new and unexpected light had been thrown on the tragedy, and that he had at least found a quite sufficient motive for both crimes. If Walter Brooklyn had committed the murders, he stood to gain directly a considerable slice of Sir Vernon’s huge fortune. ”

“ He may have been present at both murders, and yet committed neither.”
“I see now what you are driving at. You mean that there may be a fourth man involved?”
“That may be so; but I was not quite sure on that point. What the evidence seems to me to establish beyond reasonable doubt is that some meeting of the three men—Prinsep and George and Walter Brooklyn—took place at Liskeard House that night. That meeting was followed by—probably resulted in—the death of two of the three. There may have been others present. That is for you to find out. ”

“ Ellery,” she said, “how late you are. There’s a person in your room been waiting for you more than an hour. I wouldn’t go to bed with him there—not for worlds, I wouldn’t. He said he must see you, and would wait.”
“What sort of a man?”
“Oh, not a nice man. He looks to me more like a tramp, sir, than anything else. I was afraid he might steal something if I left him.”
Ellery opened the door and went in. He at once recognised the man who had followed Walter Brooklyn on Tuesday from Trafalgar Square to Jermyn Street—one of the witnesses whom “the Spaniard” had found. ”

“ This was more than satisfactory, and Ellery at once went to meet the two men and hear their stories. They fully bore out what “the Spaniard” had said, and Ellery took their names and addresses, and then arranged to see them again on the following morning at the same place, and to take them, with the other witnesses he and Joan had collected, to Thomas’s office, where they would be able to consider the steps that had best be taken towards securing Walter Brooklyn’s absolution. ”

“ The only doubt in my mind is whether Prinsep was a powerful enough man to strike such a blow. But I suppose we must take it that he was. It was a terrific blow, I understand from the medical evidence.”
“Yes, but a man not unusually strong can, by using his opportunities, get in a very big blow. I do not think there is much in that.”
“Quite so. Then I take it you agree that, in face of the evidence, it would be quite impossible to arrest Walter Brooklyn on the charge of having murdered George Brooklyn?”
The inspector sighed. “Yes,” he said, “you are right. ”

“ But it’s a hundred to one against any of them having noticed your man. Adams is on duty here, and the other two will be along at the station. You can have a word with Adams now, and I’ll take you along to the station myself in a few minutes. They’re just finishing up there.” He jerked a thumb in the direction of the plinth.
Adams, a tall, fat policeman, who kept patting himself on the stomach while he talked, had seen nothing of Walter Brooklyn, whose photograph Ellery showed him. ”

“ Fulton Street was widened, boats appeared on the South Ferry, and the boom in real estate indicated the growing popularity of the village.
The movement for the incorporation of Brooklyn as a city met the determined opposition of a large proportion of New York's inhabitants, who maintained that the propriety of natural growth demanded that Brooklyn and New York should become one city. From the earliest days of their common existence New York had grudged Brooklyn an independent life. The "water-rights" quarrels occupy much space in the early records. ”

“ Another, a lovely letter of thanks from a poor woman in the most ghastly distress, and lastly an offer of a two years' engagement in America. There was a simple coming in for one woman acting at Brooklyn on her birthday!
Brooklyn is as sure a laugh in New York as the mother-in-law in a London music hall. "All cities begin by being lonesome," a comedian explained, "and Brooklyn has never gotten over it."
My only complaint against Brooklyn was that they would not take Fussie in at the hotel there. Fussie, during these early American tours, was still my dog. Later on he became Henry's. ”

“ Early in the spring of 1868 we removed to Brooklyn Heights near the Ferry, much nearer my husband's office in Liberty Street. New York had not then stretched an arm across East River and taken into its bosom Brooklyn—already the third city in the Union. The two cities, now one in name, were practically one in interest as early as 1867. A great multitude of the dwellers of Brooklyn crossed the ferry every morning on their way to their daily work in New York. Brooklyn was a huge, overgrown village; a city of churches, a city of homes, and of children innumerable. ”

“ Brooklyn is the shire-town of King’s County, and by this time, probably, is second in population only to New York. Land there, has risen in value to an enormous extent within the last few years; and it has become the fashion for business-men of New York to build and live on the fine and healthy heights above the river, where they are nearer their business, and much better situated than in the outskirts of the city itself. The town of Brooklyn is built on the summit and sides of an elevation springing directly from the bank of the river, and commanding some of the finest views in America. ”

“ This town is situated in Kings County, on the west end of Long-Island, in the State of New-York. It is bounded north by the City and County of New-York; east by the township of Bushwick; south by the township of Flatbush and New Utrecht; and west by New-York Bay; and contains the village of Brooklyn, which is about a mile square. This town formerly composed part of a powerful Indian Sachemdom ”

“ Loyal to Brooklyn have been Grout, Swanstrom and Littleton, and thus inspired, has Brooklyn proved loyal to herself and faithful to her traditions.
"Brooklyn is a gigantic borough. She is three times as large as Buffalo, the home of the Pan-American Exposition. She is twice as large as St. Louis, the home of the present Exposition. Brooklyn territorially is large enough and properly adapted to hold a population of 7,000,000, and still remain less congested than the present borough of Manhattan. Brooklyn is devoid of many of the characteristics that mark other great cities. ”

“ A few heavy wagons and heat-oppressed horses are almost the only other passengers. [60] Not far away from the ferry, on the Brooklyn side, are the three charmingly named streets—Cranberry, Orange, and Pineapple—which are also so lastingly associated with Walt Whitman's life. It strikes us as odd, incidentally, that Walt, who loved Brooklyn so much, should have written a phrase so capable of humorous interpretation as the following: "Human appearances and manners—endless humanity in all its phases—Brooklyn also." ”

“ Lieutenant Anberry, in a letter from New-York, to a friend in England, dated October 30th, 1781, says, “on crossing the East River from New-York, you land at Brooklyn, which is a scattered village, consisting of a few houses. At this place is an excellent{55} Tavern, where parties are made to go and eat fish; the landlord of which has saved an immense fortune this war.” The public house referred to in the above advertisements, and letter, was the same house, which after the Revolution, and in the Compiler’s recollection, was called the “Corporation House.” ”

“ At the southern end of this strait, near the point of its junction with New York Bay, is the narrowest part of its course, and it is here that it is crossed by the magnificent suspension bridge, known indifferently as the East River Bridge, or Brooklyn Bridge, which provides land communication between New York, with its population of two millions, and Brooklyn, the fourth city of the States in point of size, with inhabitants numbering about one million. Brooklyn is largely a residential place for persons whose daily business is in New York. ”