The Simpkins Plot Page 4

  CHAPTER IV.

  Major Kent, like most men who lead an open-air life, had a healthyappetite at breakfast-time. His table was always well supplied witheggs, bacon, and, when possible, fish. In honour of Meldon's visit, hehad a cold ham on the sideboard, and a large dish of oatmeal porridge.He was a man of primitive hospitality, and he surveyed the feast withan air of proud satisfaction while he waited for his guest. He had towait for a quarter of an hour, and his glow of pleasure was beginningto give way to a feeling of irritation when Meldon burst into the room.

  "This place," he said, by way of apology for his unpunctuality, "iscertainly the sleepiest in the world. I had forgotten how sleepy itis. I didn't so much as turn round in bed for nine solid hours, and Iassure you I never felt less inclined to get up in my life. I daresayI'll get over it in a day or two; but just at present I feel that thenight wasn't long enough."

  "Have some breakfast," said the Major, "and then you can go to sleepagain."

  Meldon helped himself to porridge and milk.

  "No, I can't," he said. "I've too much to do."

  He worked through a helping of bacon and eggs. Then he attacked thecold ham.

  "There's nothing," he said, "like a good breakfast when you have a hardday's work before you. I expect to be pretty busy, and I'll hardly bein for lunch. I suppose you've no objection to my making myself a fewsandwiches before I start? I may pick up a meal somewhere in thecourse of the day, but I may not. It's always well to be on the safeside."

  "What are you going to do?"

  "I'm going to marry Simpkins to Miss King, of course. I thought wesettled that last night."

  "Don't keep up that joke, J. J. It was all very well pulling my leglast night, and I didn't mind it a bit; but a thing like that gets tobe stale the next morning."

  "There's no joke that I can see," said Meldon. "If you read the paperswith any sort of attention lately, you'd understand that Mrs. Lorimeris the last woman in the world who can be regarded as comic."

  "We weren't talking about Mrs. Lorimer."

  "Yes, we were. We were talking about Miss King, and she is Mrs.Lorimer; although at present she prefers to be called Miss King. Ithink she's quite right. It would be extremely bad taste to go onusing poor Lorimer's name after what she did to him. He wouldn't likeit. You wouldn't like it yourself, Major, if she'd killed you."

  "I don't know that she did kill him," said the Major. "Even supposingthat you're right in identifying the two women--which of course you'renot--you'd still have no earthly right to assume that Mrs. Lorimer is amurderess. The jury found her innocent."

  "Of course it did. Any jury would. She's a most attractive-lookingwoman. You'd have found her innocent yourself if you'd been on thatjury."

  "I would not."

  "Yes, you would. I've seen her, remember. You haven't, so you can'tpossibly tell what you'd have done."

  "I don't see," said the Major, "that her being good-looking proves thatshe murdered her husband."

  "No, it doesn't, but it accounts for the jury letting her off. Theevidence was amply sufficient for a conviction, and the judge summed updead against her. And any way it doesn't matter to us about theevidence, for she owned up to me in the train. I told her I'd keep hersecret for her, and I don't intend to tell anybody except you. Apartfrom her feelings altogether it wouldn't suit us for the story to getout in Ballymoy. Simpkins would be choked off at once if he knew it.Men have such a ridiculous prejudice against marrying a woman with anysort of past."

  "I don't think Simpkins would mind," said the Major, "if he thought shehad any money. That's the kind of beast he is."

  "She has plenty," said Meldon, "Lorimer's, I daresay. At least shelooks as if she had plenty, and that's the same thing in this case. IfSimpkins marries her, it's extremely unlikely that he'll live longenough to find out whether she really has a large fortune, or is simplyspending her capital."

  After breakfast Major Kent returned to the subject of Miss King.

  "I suppose," he said, "that you're absolutely certain that you've got ahold of the right woman? You couldn't be making any sort of mistake?"

  "I told you last night that I was certain, and I gave you my reasons;pretty convincing ones I imagine--the sort of reasons that would beconclusive to any man at all accustomed to criminal investigation. Idon't myself see how you can get behind the portrait and the lady's ownconfession."

  "You couldn't possibly have mistaken about that, could you? I mean shecouldn't have been confessing anything else which you could have takenup to mean murder?"

  "No, she couldn't. In the first place, it isn't at all likely thatthere would be two attractive-looking lady criminals, travelling aboutin trains at the same time, both wanting to confess what they had done.In the second place, her crime must have been pretty serious, for shewas particularly anxious to find out whether it was likely to shockyou."

  "Me?"

  "Yes, you. She mentioned you by name, and asked particularly whetheryou'd be likely to be shocked, when you found out who she was. Now, ifshe had simply been slipping trifling articles off shop counters intoher muff, she wouldn't have expected you to be shocked. That's whatmakes me say her crime was a serious one."

  "Still," said the Major, "even supposing she really was afraid ofshocking me; though I can't see how she came to consider me at all--"

  "She did. You may take that for certain."

  "There are other things besides murder that I should stronglydisapprove of."

  "You're thinking of divorce court proceedings now. But she's not thatsort of woman at all. I had every opportunity of studying hercharacter in the train, and I'm certain that she wouldn't mix herselfup with anything of a disreputable kind. Whatever poor Lorimer mayhave had to complain of--and I don't in the least deny that he had agrievance--he'd have been the last man to accuse her of anything of_that_ sort. I never met a woman who impressed me more strongly asbeing thoroughly respectable."

  "Come now, J. J. Murder! Surely murder--"

  "Not when treated as an art. De Quincey wrote an essay on the subject.If you'd read it, you'd know better than to mix up artistic murder withthe commonplace assassinations of the ordinary burglar. You might justas well say that Beethoven is the same sort of person as the Italianorgan-grinder who plays abominable tunes under your window, in the hopeof your giving him twopence to go away."

  "Nothing you've said so far," said the Major, "convinces me in theleast that your identification of the lady is certain, or even likelyto be right."

  "I knew you'd be sceptical. You always are sceptical about anythingthe least out of the common; so while I was shaving this morning Iarranged the evidence in such a way that you can't possibly escape fromit. In the first place, there are the portraits. I don't dwell onthem because you haven't seen Miss King, and so they won't--for thepresent--carry much weight with you. In the second place, there is herconfession. You choose to consider that I was mistaken about that, andthat Miss King was really confessing something of quite a differentkind. I say nothing about the improbability of my being mistaken in aperfectly simple matter. I simply leave the confession on one side,and offer you corroborative evidence of a quite unmistakabledescription. Here's a copy of a Dublin paper. I put it in my pocketon purpose to show it to you. I suppose you'll believe what you seeprinted in a newspaper?"

  "It depends very much what it is. I don't believe everything I see inpapers."

  "That, if you'll excuse my saying so, seems to me to be carrying yourhabit of scepticism to the verge of actual mania. I don't think youought to adopt that kind of attitude, Major. If you had been trainedin theology, or even secular metaphysics, it might be excusable; thoughthen, of course, you wouldn't do it. But in a simple and almostentirely uneducated country gentleman like you, it's simply grotesque."

  "Go on about the newspaper, J. J."

  "Here it is for you; but I don't see that it's much use giving it toyou if your mind is made up beforehand to disbe
lieve every word that'sin it."

  He took a newspaper from his pocket and handed it to Major Kent,indicating with his thumb a column on the middle page.

  "The Lorimer Case. Judge's Charge to the Jury. Acquittal.

  "Scene outside the Court. Enthusiasm of the Crowd. A Demonstration."

  The Major read aloud the heavily-leaded lines which filled half thecolumn.

  "Skip that part," said Meldon. "The cheers don't matter to us, thoughI daresay Miss King enjoyed them at the time. Go on to the bottom ofthe next column where you see the words 'An Interview' in large print."

  "Our representative," read the Major, "called this evening at Mrs.Lorimer's hotel. He was at once shown up to her sitting-room, where hefound her--"

  "Go on," said Meldon; "that part about her being cool andunembarrassed, and the next bit about her wearing a well-cut greytravelling-dress, isn't important; though, as a matter of fact, herdress was grey."

  The Major skipped a paragraph, and then began to read again.

  "'I always felt quite certain,' said Mrs. Lorimer, in reply to aquestion asked by our representative, 'about what the jury's verdictwould be. I have perfect confidence in the commonsense and justice ofEnglishmen. In fact, I had all my arrangements made, through mysolicitors, for my movements after the trial. I have taken a house ina very quiet neighbourhood, where I shall be free from all inquisitivepublicity.'"

  "There," said Meldon, "those are almost the exact words Miss King usedto me in the train."

  The Major went on, reading aloud.

  "'May I ask,' said our representative, 'in what part of the country--?''No,' said Mrs. Lorimer, smiling. 'You may not ask that; or, if youdo, I shall not answer you. But you may do this for me, if you like.You may tell the hall porter to order a cab for me, a four-wheeler. Ihave a good deal of luggage.'"

  "She had," said Meldon; "I saw it when we got out at Dunbeg station,and it wasn't all there, for one of her trunks had got lost on the way."

  "'Our representative,' read the Major, 'shook hands with Mrs. Lorimeras she entered the cab. The order given to the driver was Eustonstation. Thus a lady of great personal charm, whose terribleexperience has for some weeks focussed the attention of the civilisedworld upon the affairs of her private life passes--'"

  "You needn't go on," said Meldon. "The rest of the article is merepiffle. The essential part is what you've read out, and I imagine itought to pretty well clinch the matter. She drove to Euston, intendingto travel from that station to some very quiet neighbourhood in whichshe had taken a house beforehand. Now where could you possibly find aquieter neighbourhood than this?"

  "I don't see that you've proved your point, J. J. There are a lot ofother places for which you might start from Euston."

  "Not so many quiet neighbourhoods. Think of where the London andNorth-Western Railway runs. Lancashire! You wouldn't call Bolton aquiet neighbourhood, I suppose. North Wales! You know what it is atthis season of the year, thick with holiday people. No. You may takeit for certain that if she left Euston she came to Ireland. Now allEnglish people head straight for the west as soon as they land in thiscountry, especially those who have any kind of a past that they areanxious to keep dark. Dublin and Wicklow are just as thick with peopleas England is. Nobody ever stops half-way across the country.Besides, there wasn't another woman in the train with me who couldpossibly have been Mrs. Lorimer."

  Major Kent rose from his chair and knocked the ashes out of his pipe.

  "I don't suppose, J. J., that it's any use telling you that you'regoing to make an ass of yourself."

  "Not a bit, because it isn't true. I'm going to proceed in the mostcircumspect and cautious manner. Not that I'm the least afraid ofmaking an ass of myself. I should never do that under anycircumstances. But because I have a conscience and I am afraid ofdoing a grave injustice, I am going to convince myself first of allthat this fellow Simpkins really deserves to be killed. I admit theforce of all you said about him last night, especially that part aboutthe heating of the church; but it's a serious thing to condemn a man todeath. It's a thing that you can't undo again once you've done it. Imust see the man myself before I take any further steps."

  "You can't have him here, J. J. He's a horrid little cad, and I won'thave him inside this house."

  "I'm not asking you to, at present. Later on if it becomes necessaryin the interests of justice to patch up some appearance of areconciliation between you and him I shall, of course, ask him here;but in the meanwhile--"

  "You may entertain him yourself, if you do."

  "I may. But that won't deter me from doing my duty. You haven't hadthe education in philosophy and literature, Major, that you ought tohave had; but the years that you spent in the army ought to have taughtyou that no amount of unpleasantness should prevent a man doing hisduty. I thought that was one of the things which military lifeimpressed on me. Suppose now that it was your duty to stand in a poolof water on a wintry night looking out for the approaching army of apowerful enemy. You wouldn't like doing it because you'd know thatyou'd have a cold in your head next day which would probably last youfor the rest of that particular campaign. But would you allow thatfact to interfere with your duty? I'll give you credit, Major, for noteven considering your own comfort in the matter. You'd stand in thepool. You wouldn't so much as splash about, and when your feet got wetyou'd bear it without grumbling. Why can't you admit that I amactuated by the same sort of motives in doing my duty?"

  "But is it your duty? I can't see, really, that there's any need foryou to mix yourself up in it at all."

  "It is my duty," said Meldon, "for several reasons. In the first placeyou are my friend, and you've always been kind to me; so it's plainlymy duty to do you a good turn when I can. Next, I liked what I saw ofMiss King. I'm convinced that she's in earnest about her art, and isreally working at it simply for art's sake and not from any selfishmotives. Therefore, as an educated man, it's my duty to help her if Ican, without outraging my own conscience or acting in any wayunsuitable for a clergyman. Assuming Simpkins to be the kind of manyou describe, it is a public duty, the duty of every good citizen, toput him out of the world altogether. He's nothing but a nuisance here,and he can't be really happy. I imagine that even for his own sakehe'd be a great deal better dead. He may not see that himself, butit's very likely to be true. What's the use of his dragging out amiserable existence in a place where he is getting more and moreunpopular every year? He can't like it. Where does he live?"

  "He lives," said Major Kent, "in that little house just beyond thepolice barrack."

  "That won't save him," said Meldon. "Miss King would laugh at ourpolice after slipping through the fingers of the Scotland Yardauthorities, and any way he'd have to go and live with her once they'remarried. I'll call there."

  "At this time of day," said the Major, "he'll probably be in hisoffice, next to Doyle's hotel."

  "I'll leave a card at his house first," said Meldon. "It's only civil.Then I'll go on to the office. I suppose you can send me in, Major?I'll walk back. I wouldn't like to keep your horse in town all day. Ishall probably be a long time. I can't scamp the business, you know.I must thoroughly investigate Simpkins. After that, I'll look in andhave a chat with Doyle."