The Plague Court Murders - John Carr

"I had a seat so that I was facing in his direction. What with only the firelight, our shadows cut him off. All I could see was the top of his head, resting easily against the back of a tall thin chair, and the firelight rising on the wall just behind him. Above him - I could see it well-was a big painting of a nude sprawled out in ghastly sharp angles, and painted green. That was all, wavering by the firelight.

"We were nervous in the circle. The old lady was moaning, and muttering about somebody named James. Presently it seemed to get colder in the room. I had a wild impulse to get up and shout, for I have attended a good many seances, but never one that made me feel like this. Then I saw Darworth's head shaking over the top of the chair.

"His pencil began to scratch, and still his head kept shaking. Everything was very quiet; only that horrible motion of his head, and the sound of the pencil now traveling in circles on the paper.

"It was twenty minutes - thirty - I don't know how long afterwards that Ted got up and put the lights on. It had got unbearable, and somebody had cried out. We looked over at Darworth; and when my eyes had got accustomed to the light I jumped towards him....

"The little table had been knocked over. Darworth sat back stiffly against the chair, with a paper in his hand; and his face was green.

"I tell you, sir, that charlatan's face was exactly the soupy color of the damned picture hung over his head. He had himself in hand in a second; but he was shaking. Both Featherton and I had come up to him, to see if we could give any assistance. When he saw us over him he crumpled up the paper in his hand. He got up, walked over stiffly, and threw the paper in the fire. You had to admire him for the way he controlled his voice. He said, 'Absolutely nothing, I regret to say. Only some nonsense on the Louis Playge matter. We shall have to try it again some other time'

"He was lying. There were distinct words on that pa per; I saw them, and I think Featherton did too. It was only a glance, and I couldn't catch the first part; but the last line read "

"Well?" Halliday demanded harshly.

"The last line read, 'Only seven more days are allowed.' "

After a pause, McDonnell dropped his glowing cigarette on the floor and ground it under his heel. Sharp through the house behind us, rising in a kind of sob, we heard a woman's voice crying, "Dean-Dean-!"

V THE PLAGUE-JOURNAL

EVERY flashlight snapped on; Masters was alert, and seized his subordinate's arm. "That's Miss Latimer. They're all here “

"I know," said McDonnell quickly; "Ted told me all about it. I watched them tonight."

"And she mustn't find you here. Stay in this room, and keep out of sight till I call you. No, wait! Mr. Halliday!"

Halliday was already stumbling out the door in the dark, but he turned round. I heard McDonnell give a faint start and a snap of his fingers as the name was pronounced. "We promised to be back in five minutes, damn it," snarled Halliday. "And here we are still. She must be nearly dead with fright. Give me a light, somebody. . .

"Hold on a bit," urged Masters, as I handed Halliday my own electric torch; "hold on, sir, and listen. You'd better go into the front room and stay with her; for a while, anyhow. Reassure her. But tell them I want that kid Joseph sent out to us, right here, immediately. If necessary, tell them I'm a police officer. This has got too serious for fooling."

Halliday nodded and bolted down the passage.

"I'm a practical man," Masters said to me, heavily,, "but I trust my instinct. And instinct said there was something wrong. I'm glad I heard this, Bert.... You understand, don't you? That wasn't any ghost-writing. One of those people in that room worked it on Darworth just as he was going to work it on them."

"Yes, I'd thought of that too," agreed McDonnell soberly. "And yet there's one great big thundering hole in it. Can you in any realm of sanity imagine Darworth being frightened by faked ghost-writing? It's incredible, sir. And, whatever else might have been a fake, that scare of his wasn't, I'll swear."

Masters grunted. He took a few steps up and down, bumped into something, and cursed. "Some light," he growled; "we want some light-I'm bound to tell you I don't like this. And this talking in the dark

"Just a moment," said McDonnell. He was gone a few seconds, his light flickering up the passage, and returned with a cardboard box containing three or four big candles. "Darworth was sitting in one of these rooms," he went on, 'resting' before he went out there. He called out to Ted and Major Featherton when they were coming back from lighting his fire - naturally he wouldn't light a fire-and they took him out there. ." He handed me a flashlight. "This is evidently Darworth's, sir. It was in the candle-box. You'd better take it."

It was still gloomy when the candles were lighted, but at least we could see each other's faces, and -the load of darkness was less terrifying. We heard the rats then. McDonnell found a long, battered table, rather like a carpenter's work-bench, and set the candles up on it. The only seat he could find was a decrepit packing-case, which he shoved towards Masters. We stood on a gritty brick floor, blinking at each other in a dreary furnace of a kitchen whose walls had once been whitewashed. McDonnell was fully revealed as a lean, gawky young man going slightly bald. He had a long nose, and a habit of pinching out his underlip between thumb and,; forefinger. His intensely serious expression was lightened by a somewhat satirical droop of the lids over the greenish eyes. It was a face of whiplash intelligence.

I still did not like the atmosphere, and twice I looked over my shoulder. It was this damnable waiting....

Masters appeared ruffled, but he proceeded methodically. He picked up the packing-case, shook it, and crushed with his foot a spider that scuttled out. Then he sat down at the work-bench with his notebook.

"Now, then, Bert. We'll assemble, and we'll consider. Eh? We'll take the business of this faked ghost-writing."

"Very good, sir."

"Well!" said Masters, and rapped a pencil on the table as though he expected to conjure up something. "And what de we have? We have a group of four neurotic people." He seemed to relish the word, like a slight surprise. "Four neurotic people, Bert; or let's except the old major, and say three. We have young Latimer, Miss Latimer, and old Lady Benning. Queer cases, Bert. Now, the trick could have been worked in a number of ways. The paper with the writing could have been prepared beforehand, and shuffled into Dalworth's papers when they were handed him before the lights went out. Who gave him the papers?"

"As a matter of fact, it was old Featherton," McDonnell answered with great gravity. "He just ripped 'em out of a tablet and handed 'em over. Besides, sir (excuse me) Darworth would have known all about an ancient dodge like that. He'd have jolly well known he didn't write it."

"It was dark," pursued Masters. "No difficulty for one of those people to have left the circle, with a prepared paper; tipped over the little table - you said it was tipped over - shoved the writing on top, and come back."

"Ye-es," said McDonnell, pinching his under-lip and shifting; "yes, possible, sir. But the same objection holds. If Darworth is a fake, he'd know this is a fake; and why in God's name, I repeat, should it scare the living wits out of him?"

"Can you," I put in, "can you remember anything else that was on that paper besides `Only seven more days are allowed'?"

"That's what I've been trying to think for a week," McDonnell answered, a sort of spasm going over his face. "I could swear I did, and yet - no. I only saw it in a flash, and it was because the last line was rather larger than the rest, in a big sprawly sort of writing, that I caught it. All I can hazard is this: that there was a name written on the paper, because I seem to remember the capital letters. Also, somewhere, the word buried. But I couldn't swear to it. I should question Major Featherton, if I were you"

"A name," I repeated, "and the word buried." There were rather horrible ideas in my mind, because I was wondering what one of those four,- or three, neurotic devotees would do if he suddenly discovered Darworth to be an impostor and a charlatan....”

"And Darworth," I also said, without mentioning that shapeless notion, "Darworth, considerably knocked endways, said it was something to do with the Louis Playge matter. By which we assume he blurted out something that was in his mind. Is anything or anybody buried hereabouts, by the way?"

Masters' big jowls shook with quiet mirth. He glanced at me out of a bland eye. "Only Louis Playge himself, sir."

I think I was rightly exasperated, and explained in somewhat heated terms that everybody seemed to know all about what had gone on here; everybody made leering hints, but nobody had given any information.

"Why, there's a chapter about it," Masters said, "in a book at the British Museum. H'm. Didn't Mr. Halliday give you some books, or a parcel, or the like?" He saw my hand go to my pocket, where was the brown-paper package I had forgotten. "H'm. Just so. You'll have time enough to read it tonight, sir, I dare say. You'll've guessed that `Plague Court' is only a corruption of the name `Playge'; it was the popular name for it, and it stuck, after all the lad's antics. Eh, he was a spanker,, he was!" said Masters with some admiration, and no whit impressed. "But let's get to facts, Bert. What happened here tonight?"

McDonnell spoke rapidly and concisely while I drew out the brown-paper parcel and weighed it in my hand. Following out the information he had gained from Ted Latimer, McDonnell had posted himself in the yard-the gate was open - on what he guiltily thought might be the most erratic of wild goose chases. At ten-thirty the six of them: Darworth, Joseph, Lady Benning, Ted Latimer, his sister, and the major, had come in. After being some time in the house (McDonnell had not been able to get a look inside), Ted and Major Featherton opened the back door and set about preparations for making the stone house habitable.

"That bell?" suggested Masters. "The one hung in the passage?"

"Right! Sorry, sir Yes, I was a good deal puzzled when I saw them working on it. Ted attached a wire to the bell, under Darworth's directions, then unreeled it across the yard, and climbed on a box and shoved one end through the window. Darworth went back to one of the rooms along here, to rest or something; and the others fussed about in the stone house, lighting fires and candles, and moving furniture or something - I couldn't see inside -and swearing generally. I gathered that the bell is for an alarm, in case Darworth thinks he needs help." McDonnell smiled sourly. "Presently they came in again, and Darworth told them he was ready. He didn't seem nervous at all. Whatever he's afraid of, it's not that. The rest you know."

Masters considered a moment. Then he got up. "Come along. Our Halliday seems to be having a bit of trouble. I'll get that medium away from 'em. Yes. And ask a few discreet questions; eh, Bert? You come with me, but I'll keep you back out of sight. . . ." He glanced at me.

I said: "If you don't mind, Masters, I'll stay right here for a few minutes and see what's inside this parcel. Give me a call if you need me." I got out my knife and cut the string, while Masters watched curiously.

"What," he said, sharply, "what's on your mind, if I may ask? The last time you got a hunch like this, we were able to arrest ----“

I denied, not quite truthfully, that I had any idea to play with. Masters said nothing, since he didn't believe me, and jerked his head to McDonnell. When they had gone I turned up the collar of my coat, sat down on the packing-case Masters had vacated, and put the parcel before me. Instead of opening it, I lit my pipe.

There were two ideas; both obvious, and they conflicted. If Darworth had not been terrified by any faked ghostwriting, it followed that he had been terrified by some genuine, everyday, human thing, say a threat or a revelation of knowledge. This might have been supernatural (although I was not, as yet, prepared to accept it as that), or it might have been managed in some such sleight-of-hand fashion as Masters described. In any event, it was something of devastating power and import; and derived added force from having been presented in that manner. On the other hand, it probably had no connection with this house or the events that were now going on here.

This was sheer theorizing, yet it seemed to me that, if Darworth were so panic-stricken by a threat having to do with this house, he would scarcely have acted in the way he did tonight. He alone was calm and sure. He alone enjoyed working his marionettes, and sitting by himself in dark places. Had the writing on that paper really concerned Plague Court, he would in all likelihood have shown it to the others. He mentioned Plague Court because it was a bogey to the others, but not to him.

In that supposition, you perceive, lay the conflict. All the nebulous terrors of Darworth's acolytes centered round this house. They believed that here existed a deadly earthbound which must be exorcised, lest it take possession of a human soul. Now there had been so much nonsense in what Lady Benning had told us, that spiritualism seemed to violate its own rules; and presumably Darworth had only confused them with vague, Delphic hints. He could make vagueness even more terrifying. Yet, though it did not at all alarm Darworth the mystic, it had struck with ill-controlled panic Halliday the hard-headed and practical man.

I watched the pipe-smoke slide round the candle flames, and the whole room whispered with unpleasant suggestions. After glancing sharply over my shoulder, I pulled the wrapping paper off the parcel. It was a heavy cardboard letter-file opening like a book, and it rattled with papers.

Inside were three things: a large folded sheet, flimsy and brownish-mottled with age; a short newspaper-cutting; and a bundle of foolscap letter pages, as old as the first. On the last, the writing was so faded as to be indecipherable under the yellow blotches, but there was a newer copy in longhand folded and wedged under the tape.

The large sheet-which I did not entirely open because I feared to tear it was a deed. At the commencement the spidery script was so large that I could make out the parties to the sale: Thomas Frederick Halliday, Gent., had bought this house from Lionel Richard Maulden, Lord Seagrave of Seagrave, as attested on March 23, 1711.

From the newspaper-cutting, the headline leapt up: "PROMINENT CITY MAN A SUICIDE," accompanied by a pale photograph showing a rather goggle-eyed man in a high collar, who seemed afraid of the camera. In the picture of James Halliday, Esq., there was a horrible resemblance to Doctor Crippen. There were the same double-lensed spectacles, the same drooping mustaches, the same rabbit-like stare. The cutting told briefly of his connections; that he had shot himself at the home of his aunt, Lady Anne Benning; that he had been worried and depressed for some weeks, "seeming' always to search for something about the house"; that it was all very mysterious, and that Lady Benning twice broke down at the inquest.

I pushed it away, untied the tape, and drew out the other documents. The copy of those creased, faded, decaying sheets was headed: "Letters. Lord Seagrave to George Playge, the Steward and Manager o f his Estates, Together ,with Reply. Transcribed. J. G. Halliday, Nov. 7, 1878."