No. 17
J. Jefferson Farjeon
The first book featuring Ben, the lovable, humorous ex-sailor and down-at-heels rascal who can’t help running into trouble.Ben is back home from the Merchant Navy, penniless as usual and looking for digs in fog-bound London. Taking shelter in an abandoned old house, he stumbles across a dead body – and scarpers. Running into a detective, Gilbert Fordyce, the reluctant Ben is persuaded to return to the house and investigate the mystery of the corpse – which promptly disappears! The vacant No.17 is the rendezvous for a gang of villains, and the cowardly Ben finds himself in the thick of thieves with no way of escape.Ben’s first adventure, No.17, began life in the 1920s as an internationally successful stage play and was immortalised on film by the legendary Alfred Hitchcock. Its author, J. Jefferson Farjeon, wrote more than 60 crime thrillers, eight featuring Ben the tramp, his most popular character.
J. JEFFERSON FARJEON
No. 17
Copyright (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
COLLINS CRIME CLUB
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
First published in Great Britain by Hodder & Stoughton 1926
Copyright © Estate of J. Jefferson Farjeon 1926
Cover design by Mike Topping © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016
Cover background images © shutterstock.com (http://shutterstock.com)
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008155889
Ebook Edition © August 2016 ISBN: 9780008155896
Version: 2016-06-28
Table of Contents
Cover (#ub8fa45ca-a695-5dad-b4be-d5e02b3150f9)
Title Page (#ub3d5869f-d6ff-5cf8-ba1d-6f3368f8ee8d)
Copyright (#u5a568a4d-9ec1-562c-8a17-f166f063191c)
Foreword (#u392fed1e-41b8-5575-9a23-b60f2aaae5d2)
Chapter 1: Figures in the Fog (#u1b67444b-30ea-5504-8ea8-5a2eb5d7ad40)
Chapter 2: Enter No. 17 (#u147ffc99-b354-50dd-9ce7-57f0f7053d99)
Chapter 3: Ben Finds His Port (#u76698a1a-6813-577d-a05a-b5821816bb9c)
Chapter 4: The Empty House (#u77073dd5-333f-5cd8-b56a-c71ced55d200)
Chapter 5: Up and Down (#ucdd8d003-856d-59b7-9604-c1350deb2aa3)
Chapter 6: Under the Lamp-Post (#udefe1194-a921-53d3-85bf-8874a057479b)
Chapter 7: Ben Tells His Story (#u8788a692-491d-5e99-82bf-6d686793b930)
Chapter 8: On the Stairs (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9: The Corpse (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10: In the Cupboard (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11: Across the Roof (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12: The Girl Next Door (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13: The Telegram (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14: Half-Past Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15: The House-Hunters (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16: Cross-Examination (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17: Trapped! (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 18: The Unseen Figure (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19: Ben Enters the Cupboard (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20: The Man with the Crooked Shoulder (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 21: Smith (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 22: Through the Window (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 23: On the Stairs Again (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 24: The ‘Royal Cellars’ (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 25: Into the Tunnel (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 26: The Necklace Turns Up (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 27: Final Surprises (#litres_trial_promo)
Keep Reading … (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)
Also in This Series (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
(#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
Foreword (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
I usually avoid dedications because, if they are not bare statements, they are too apt to involve a grace of florid expression at variance with sincerity; but this novel seems to me to be insisting on a few words, since it is based on a play the success of which has formed one of the happiest and most important milestones of my career. At once, however, I find myself confounded. To whom shall I dedicate the book? To my wife, who shares with me the fruits of this success? To Mr Leon M. Lion, whose skill and experience materialised those fruits? To the actors and actresses, without whose co-operation all this good fortune could not have been achieved? Or to the original ‘Ben,’ who could never have been born in my mind had I not met him somewhere—but I cannot say where—on some uncharted, unrecorded journey?
The task of selection is beyond me. In joyous despair I dedicate this book to all!
J.J.F.
1 (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
Figures in the Fog (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
Fog had London by the throat. It blinded its eyes and muffled its ears. Such traffic as was not at a standstill groped its way with scarcely a sound through the jaundiced streets, and to cross a road was no longer a casual matter, but an adventure into the unknown. For this reason, the timid stayed indoors, while the more daring, and those who had no choice, groped gingerly along the pavements. The pickpockets were busy.
But it is not in the heart of London that our story commences. The fog had stretched its fingers far and wide, and a man who was approaching along one of the arteries that led Londonwards from the north-east paused for a few moments to rub his eyes, and then his stubby chin.
‘Gawd ’elp us!’ he muttered, staring into the great, gloomy smudge ahead of him. ‘If that ain’t the Yeller Peril, wot is?’
He had trudged out of a land of sunshine into a land of white mist, and now the white mist was becoming opaque orange. The prospect was so thoroughly unappetising that he even considered the idea of turning back. Had he known what awaited him in that gloomy smudge he would have acted very promptly on the idea, but the future itself is as impenetrable as a fog, and he decided to go on.
‘Arter all,’ he argued to himself, ‘one plice is as good as another, when you ain’t got nowhere helse!’
So he lit his best cigarette—barely more than half of it had been smoked by its previous owner—and resumed his way.
A figure suddenly loomed towards him, out of the mist.
‘Oi!’ exclaimed our traveller, and jumped. His nerves were never of the best, and hunger was beginning to tell on him. But he reacted quickly, and grinned as the figure stopped. ‘Why didn’t yer sound yer ’ooter?’
The figure grinned, too.
‘A bit thick, mate, isn’t it?’ said the stranger.
‘Thick as cheese. Cheese! Lummy, I wish I ’ad a bit o’ cheese!’
‘Hungry?’
‘Not ’arf! Yer ain’t got sich a thing as a leg o’ beef on yer, I s’pose?’
The other laughed.
‘There’s an inn a little way up the road.’
‘Ah! Well, jest run back and tell ’em to put dahn the red carpet, will yer? Ben, o’ the Merchant Service, is a-comin’. And ’e’s got fourpence to spend. Oi! Where yer goin’? Oi!’
The stranger had turned, and darted off. Ben, of the Merchant Service, stared after him.
‘Well, if that don’t tike the bloomin’ ticket!’ he murmured. ‘Seemed like as if ’e thort I meant it!’
Once more, an instinct rose in him to turn back. He was just entering the fringe of the thick fog belt, and its uncanniness depressed him. He recalled that the stranger had stood almost next to him, yet he had not seen his face. Out of the fog he had come, and back into the fog he had returned. A shadow with a voice—that was all.
But the glory of the Merchant Service, however humble your position in it, must be maintained. You could not let it down; not, at least, until you were sure you were going to get hurt! And, after all, what was a little bit of fog? So, deriding himself for his fears, the subtle source of which he was not fitted to understand, he again ignored the kindly warning, and resumed his onward trudge.
The thought of the inn a little way up the road certainly did something to dissipate the gloom. Fourpence wouldn’t go far, but a friendly innkeeper might make it go a little further. Then he might earn a few coppers by doing something. You never knew. Ben, of the Merchant Service—perhaps it should be explained, late of the Merchant Service—was not in love with work. The stomach, however, drives.
He came upon the inn abruptly. All meetings are abrupt in a fog. It loomed up, a vague, shadowy outline, on his right, and a feeble lamp burned over the door. Ben plunged his hand into his pocket, to corroborate his impression of his bank balance, found the impression correct, and entered.
If he hoped to escape the fog inside, he was disappointed. The bar parlour was full of it. A cough directed him to the counter, and he found a young woman peering at him with half-frowning eyes.
‘It’s orl right, miss,’ Ben assured her. ‘I ain’t no matinay idol, but then, on the hother ’and, I ain’t so bad as I looks. ’Ow far’ll fourpence go?’
The young woman smiled, glanced towards an inner room, and then turned back to Ben.
‘Fourpence don’t go far,’ she commented.
‘It ain’t so dusty, miss, with a bit o’ good nacher thrown hin,’ said Ben slyly.
‘How do you know I’ve got any good nature?’ she retorted.
‘It’s a guess, miss. But I reckon it’s a good ’un. Any’ow, I’ll see yer doesn’t lose by it. I’ll leave yer me di’mond studs in me will.’
Her smile grew more friendly, but once more she glanced towards the inner room. Ben began to grow vaguely uneasy.
‘Wotcher got in there, miss?’ he asked. ‘A hogre?’
The woman shook her head, as though impatient with herself.
‘No—just another customer,’ she replied.
‘Then wotcher keep on—’
‘Nothing! What do yer want for your fourpence?’
‘Soup, fish, cut orf the joint, and a couple o’ veg.,’ grinned Ben cheekily.
‘Go on—you don’t want much, do you?’ laughed the woman. ‘Well, I must say, you look as if you could do with it. I’ll see what I can manage. Get in there.’
‘Eh? Wot’s that?’ jerked Ben.
He glanced towards the door of the inner room, at which she was pointing.
‘What’s the matter?’ she demanded. ‘He won’t eat you!’
‘’Oo sed ’e would?’ retorted Ben, and shuffled towards the door.
The door was closed, and he opened it slowly and cautiously. Whatever the young woman might say, something was disturbing her, and that something was in the inner room. All right, then. No one was afraid. Just the same, it didn’t harm to be careful, did it?
When he had opened the door a little more than a crack, he paused. Two seconds of inaction went by. Then he whispered over his shoulder, to the young woman.
‘Ain’t yer givin’ us a light?’
‘Don’t be silly,’ replied the woman. ‘Isn’t a lamp good enough?’
‘There ain’t no lamp, miss!’
‘No lamp? Here, you do want something to eat. Open the door a bit wider, then you’ll see.’
‘I tells yer, there ain’t no light!’ whispered Ben. ‘And I ain’t goin’—’
He stopped abruptly. The woman stared at him, now frankly uneasy. Her mouth remained half open, while five more inactive seconds went by. Then, suddenly, a violent shiver revivified the statuesque figure of Ben, and he swiftly and silently closed the door.
‘Goodness, what’s that?’ asked the woman, with her hand at her heart.
Ben slithered to a seat, and, sitting down abruptly, blinked at her.
‘What is it, what is it?’ repeated the woman, in a low voice.
‘I ain’t goin’ in there,’ muttered Ben.
‘For goodness’ sake—’
‘I’ll tell yer, miss. Jest a minit. Sorter took me in the wind, like … There wasn’t no light, see? Wot I ses. If you’ve give ’im one, ’e’s put it aht. And orl I sees, miss, when I looks in that there room, was nothin’ … nothin’ …’
‘All right, I heard you the first time,’ interposed the woman. ‘Don’t give me the creeps! Oh, dear, I wish father was home, that I do. Well—what made you shut the door so quick?’
Ben looked at her, slightly injured.
‘Ain’t I tellin’ yer?’ he demanded. ‘Orl right, then. I sees nothin’, as I ses. But then, sudden like, I sees—somethin’. It’s a figger. Your customer, I reckons, miss. But ’e ain’t sittin’ at the table. ’E ain’t doin’ that.’
‘What’s he doing, then?’
‘’E seems to be listenin’, miss,’ said Ben sepulchrally. ‘Standin’ by the wall, ’e is, listenin’, miss … listenin’ …’
‘Oh, hark to the man!’ gasped the young woman, with her eyes on the door. ‘Now he’s off again!’
‘Yus, but that ain’t orl,’ he went on. ‘I sees the winder. Lummy, I sees the winder. And orl of a suddin, another figger outside pops up agin’ it, and shoves ’is fice agin’ the glass.’ The woman stifled a little shriek, while Ben took out a large red handkerchief and mopped his brow. ‘So, arter that,’ he concluded, ‘I closes the door, and comes away. And so’d anyone.’
There was a short pause. The young woman appeared undecided what to do.
‘What did he look like—the man at the window?’ she asked.
‘Nothin’. Yer couldn’t see,’ replied Ben. ‘Jest shadders, both on ’em. Wot do they call them black things? Sillyhetts, don’t they? Well, that’s what they was. A couple o’ sillyhetts. But—I dunno,’ he added reflectively. ‘I did seem ter reckernise that chap at the winder—in a kind ’f a way. Seemed like a feller I met up the road. Some’ow. I dunno.’ A practical streak entered into him. ‘Wotcher goin’ ter do, miss? Go in and light ’is lamp for ’im agin?’
‘Not me!’ she retorted.
‘’Corse not,’ agreed Ben. ‘And no more ain’t I goin’ in there to heat my Carlton lunch!’
‘You can eat it in here, if you like.’
‘Yus, I do like. Though, mind yer, miss—if it wasn’t fer you, I’d ’ook it.’
The young woman looked at Ben a little more intently after this frank statement, and a new light came into her eye.
‘You haven’t got no call to stay here for me,’ she said, watching him.
‘Yus, I ’ave,’ he responded. ‘The call o’ the Merchant Service.’
‘Oh! Are you in the Merchant Service, then?’
‘Well, speakin’ strict, miss,’ answered Ben carefully, ‘I ’ave bin. And ’opes ter be agin. But, jest nah … get me?’
‘I see,’ she nodded. ‘You’re out of a job.’
‘That’s right. Man o’ lesher.’
‘Well, I’ve got a brother in the Merchant Service, and you can keep your fourpence,’ said the young woman. ‘I ain’t going to charge you for your Carlton lunch, as you call it. You stay here till my father returns, that’s all I ask.’
‘And yer doesn’t hask in vain,’ exclaimed Ben roundly. ‘I’ll proteck yer. Oh, my Gawd, wot’s that?’
The door of the inner room flew open, a figure darted across the floor, and vanished through the porch.
2 (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
Enter No. 17 (#u7ca16c01-447c-5b16-8b79-1883a958847f)
Ben stared at the street door, now open wide, and then at the young woman, whose hands were clasped in fright. Ben’s own heart was beating somewhat rapidly.
‘Was that yer customer, miss?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ she gasped. ‘Oh, dear! What’s it all mean?’
Ben had a theory, but, before expounding it, he played for security. Both the street door and the door to the inner room were open. They required closing.
He walked to the street door first. He peered cautiously out into the wall of yellow, coughed, drew his head in again, and closed the door. Then, even more cautiously, he shuffled across to the inner room, a small portion of which was dimly discernible through the aperture.
‘Is anybody in there?’ whispered the woman.
‘If there is, ’e can blinkin’ well stay!’ Ben whispered back, as he whipped the door to and locked it. ‘The on’y chap it’d be is that chap wot was at the winder, and if ’e come hin at the winder, then ’e can go hout o’ the winder. I reckon that’s fair, ain’t it?’
‘Yes,’ murmured the woman. ‘Why do you suppose he ran out like that?’
‘’Cos ’e was runnin’ away from somebody,’ answered Ben obviously, ‘and the somebody was the chap at the winder. Pline as a pikestaff, ain’t it? ’Ide and seek in the fog. Yus, and you thort somethin’ was hup afore I come along, didn’t yer?’
‘Yes,’ she nodded. ‘He acted so peculiar.’
‘’Ow—peckyewlier?’
‘Well, he put his head in first, and had a quick look round. Then he went out again, and then he came in again. “Say, give me something to eat,” he says, “and I’ve no time to waste.” One of those Yanks. I never did like them. And in he goes to that room just as if the whole place belonged to him.’
‘That’s a Yank,’ said Ben.
‘And once, when my back was turned,’ she went on, ‘he came out of the room quietly, and gave me such a turn. He went to have a look out of the front door, and I said, “Isn’t the fog awful?” just to make conversation, and he grinned and replied, “I like it.” “I like it,” he said, and then went back to the room sudden, as if it was a joke, Of course, I thought I was just silly,’ she concluded, ‘thinking that way about him. But, you see, I wasn’t!’
‘No, you wasn’t,’ agreed Ben. ‘’E’s a wrong ’un.’
He glanced uneasily at the door of the inner room, and the young woman followed his glance.
‘I say,’ she said quietly. ‘Suppose there is somebody in there?’
‘That’s why I locked it,’ replied Ben.
‘Yes—but oughtn’t we to go in and have a look round?’
‘Not till I’ve got somethin’ in me stummick. Wot abart that Carlton lunch, miss?’
‘Yes—in a minute,’ she answered, her eyes still glued on the door. ‘I think we ought to have that look round first, though.’
‘Wrong order, miss,’ Ben assured her. ‘Eat fust, ’eroism arterwards. It’s a motter in the Merchant Service.’
But she hardly listened to him. In spite of her fear, a sense of duty was reasserting itself within her, and Ben noted this transition with inward misgivings.
‘You wait a minute,’ murmured the young woman, coming away from the counter. ‘I’m going to open that door!’
Ben protested.
‘Wait a minit yerself,’ he said. ‘Ye’r’ actin’ silly.’
‘No, I’m not! Unless you mean I’m acting silly standing here, doing nothing.’
‘’Ere! ’Arf a mo’!’ gasped Ben, as she made another movement towards the locked door. ‘I’ll show yer ye’r’ silly, if yer like.’
‘Go on, then,’ she answered, pausing. ‘But be quick about it.’
‘It don’t tike two ticks. Fust, s’pose there ain’t nothin’ in that there room?’
‘I don’t suppose there will be.’
‘Orl right, then. Wot’s the use o’ wastin’ yer time, goin’ hin?’
‘But there might be something.’
‘Ah, then you’d be an idjit to go hin,’ exclaimed Ben, triumphantly crowning his point. ‘Get me?’
‘I get you that you’ve no pluck,’ she retorted, frowning.
‘Ah, you orter seed me in the war, miss. I was blowed up by a mine once, and come dahn singin’.’
‘Go on with you!’ she said, trying to remain severe, and finding it rather difficult. He was a queer card. ‘If that’s true, go in there singing!’
She took hold of his arm, but he backed hastily away.
‘That’s dif’rent,’ he frowned. ‘We was orl together in the war like. But—wot’s ter say there ain’t a corpse in there?’
‘Here—enough of that!’ cried the woman.
‘Lummy!’ muttered Ben, following his new train of thought.
‘I’ll bet that’s wot it is. A blinkin’ corpse. That feller at the winder got in arter that Yank, the Yank murders ’im, and ’ops it.’ Gentle perspiration moistened the theorist’s brow as he added, ‘Nah, miss—’oo’s goin’ ter hopen that door?’
‘I am,’ responded the woman breathlessly.
Ben’s theory terrified her, but it also decided her. The man in there might not be dead; he might be merely hurt, and require their aid. The utter silence of the inner room lent colour to these notions. Yes, yes—clearly, the door must be unlocked and opened without any more delay.
‘Orl right—yer will ’ave it!’ chattered Ben, as she turned the key. He looked round for a missile or weapon of some sort. A wooden chair was nearest, and he seized that. The door was flung open, and the woman entered.
Some breathless moments went by. She did not reappear.
‘Oi!’ shouted Ben, in a sudden frenzy. ‘Oi!’
Raising his chair high, he approached the door, but sprang back as the woman suddenly reappeared.
‘Lor’ luvvaduck!’ he gasped. ‘Wotcher wanter spring at a feller like that for?’
‘I wasn’t springing—you did the spring,’ she retorted, ‘and if you’re a specimen of the Merchant Service, then I’d sooner trust myself in a train!’
‘Yer carn’t do nothin’ when ye’r’ ’ungry,’ growled Ben. ‘Wotcher find in there?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Wot! Nothin’ at all?’
‘Nothing at all.’
Ben drank in this reassuring news. It put a new angle on things. He lowered his chair, and straightened his back—straightened it as far as it would straighten, that is. Then he said, impressively:
‘You was too quick, you was, miss. You didn’t give me no time, see? I’m a-goin’ hin!’
He marched to the door, but even though he knew the room was empty, he hesitated for an instant on the brink. Almost pitch-dark, for the light that should have entered the window was practically fogged out, it looked a gloomy hole. He could just discern the outline of the table in the middle of the room, and of a chair that seemed to have been hastily shoved aside. Yes, a very gloomy hole—yet a palace of delight to another Ben was soon to enter.
‘I thought you were going “hin”?’ observed a sarcastic voice behind him.
‘So I am goin’ hin,’ retorted Ben, ‘but I ain’t no hexpress trine!’
He entered cautiously. She had said the room was empty, but, after all, there might be somebody under the table, or behind that big arm-chair in the corner. He groped about, and suddenly, like a child anxious to get a nasty business over, he bent down and lifted an edge of the table-cloth. That he saw nothing was, at first, no proof that there was nothing to see, because in his terror lest he should see a pair of eyes staring out at him, he had instinctively closed his own eyes. But when he opened them, they met blankness, and he breathed again.
‘Thank Gawd!’ he murmured. ‘This is a narsty bizziness, s’elp me it is!’
His mind relieved, he now proceeded to examine the room with elaborate thoroughness. If the Merchant Service had lagged behind a little, it would at least prove that, when it once tackled a job, it tackled it properly. Ben examined the table, noting the half-finished meal (which in other circumstances he would very promptly have finished), and then he looked behind all the chairs—yes, even the big ones with the backs you couldn’t see round. He did take one curtain for granted, but he prodded the other one, and, as he did so, something slipped off the bottom of it.
‘’Allo—wot’s this?’ he queried.
He stooped and picked up the object. In the gloom he could hardly distinguish what it was, but it appeared to be a small cardboard ticket or badge. He struck a match. The light flared abruptly upon a number, written large upon the cardboard’s surface.
‘Seventeen,’ muttered Ben, staring at it. ‘Wot the ’ell’s that mean? Number Seventeen!’
He dropped the match suddenly. Someone had entered the bar parlour from the road. He could hear the steps. Lummy!
Then he smiled.
‘Idjut!’ he thought. ‘’Er father come ’ome, o’ course!’
He strode out of the room, making a brave show, and nearly fell into the arms of a policeman.
‘Hallo!’ exclaimed the policeman. ‘Wot’s this?’
For a moment, Ben was wordless—he never did feel really comfortable with policemen—and the woman explained.
‘Oh, he’s all right,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry about him. But I’m glad you’ve come—there’s been funny goings on here, I can tell you.’
‘Yes, that’s why I’ve come,’ answered the constable. ‘This is pickpockets’ weather, and I’ve seen some funny characters round about here.’ He looked at Ben suspiciously. ‘I ain’t too sure this isn’t one of ’em!’
‘’Oo? Me?’ expostulated Ben indignantly. ‘Well, if that ain’t sorse! ’Ere I stays, ter proteck a gal, and now you comes along—’
‘Steady, steady!’ interposed the constable. ‘There’s funny people about, I tell you, and I’ve seen some of them about this place. One ran out of this inn just now, but I couldn’t catch him.’
‘Yes, there was something funny about him,’ agreed the woman. ‘He left in a hurry, without even finishing his meal.’
‘And I expect this man would have left in a hurry too,’ observed the constable, ironically. ‘Open your hand! What have you got there?’
‘Wot, this?’ answered Ben. ‘Picked it up in that room there jest now. ’Ere—don’t snatch!’
The constable whipped the piece of cardboard out of Ben’s hand.
‘Hallo!’ he exclaimed. ‘What’s this?’
‘My age,’ replied Ben.
‘Now, then, don’t be funny,’ frowned the constable.
‘Well, ’ow do I know wot it is,’ retorted Ben. ‘You ain’t give me time to look yet. Got it off the floor—’
‘Yes, so you say,’ interposed the constable, and turned to the woman. ‘Have you seen this before?’
‘No, never.’
‘He says he picked it off the floor in the next room.’
‘Well, he may have done so.’
‘Were you in the next room before him?’
‘Yes, I was.’
‘And you didn’t see anything on the floor?’
‘No. But it was dark. I didn’t look everywhere. I expect it belonged to that other man.’
‘Oh, you do? Well, that’s got to be proved, and meanwhile it’s on this man—’
‘Yes, but what is it, anyway?’ asked the woman, trying to get a peep at it.
‘Something—mighty queer,’ replied the constable darkly. ‘Don’t ask no questions, and you won’t be told no lies. But I dare say our friend here—’
He turned to Ben. But Ben was gone. He had decided to forgo his Carlton luncheon.
3 (#ulink_d67bd7ab-047a-51b7-8eab-99b108a5d8f8)
Ben Finds His Port (#ulink_d67bd7ab-047a-51b7-8eab-99b108a5d8f8)
Swallowed completely by the fog, for the first time Ben appreciated it. Perhaps he had left the inn more hurriedly than wisely, and the sacrifice of a good square meal certainly rankled in his hungry breast. But Ben liked a quiet life—he had only chosen the sea because it took him away from the land—and it had seemed to him that he had been caught up in a network of uncomfortable matters which were no concern of his, and for which he was in no way responsible. That being so, he argued that the best thing he could do was to cut quite clear of them, and to begin, so to speak, afresh.
The constable may have been talking through his hat, of course. He may have been saying more than he meant. But, contrariwise, he may have meant more than he said, and Ben did not see why he should take any chances. Particularly with a nice, comfortable, all-concealing fog just outside.
So into the fog he had slipped, and through it he now ran, in the innocent belief that his troubles were over. He managed to steer an uninterrupted course for a full ten minutes, and then the person he bumped into was nothing more alarming than an elderly gentleman with a bad corn.
‘Where are you going to?’ barked the elderly gentleman.
‘Sime spot as you was,’ replied Ben, hunger and the fog rendering him something of a daredevil.
As he hurried on, he recalled the gleam of the elderly gentleman’s gold watch-chain, and he wondered how many square meals that could have been converted into.
‘It’s a lucky thing fer gold watches,’ he reflected, ‘that me mother taught me ter say me prayers reg’lar!’
Presently, feeling secure, he slackened his pace; and indeed this was necessary, for although he could not see London, he felt it beginning to envelop him. Houses loomed up, when he hit one side of the road or the other. People became more frequent, and meetings ceased to be events, or bumpings to surprise. Traffic groped and hooted along the road, lamp-posts dawned—a mile away one moment and upon you the next—and, every now and again, voices were suddenly raised in warning, or anxiety, or irony.
The fog entered Ben’s brain, as well as his eyes. Soon, he was walking in a sort of a trance. If you had stopped him and asked where he was walking, he could not have told you, and he might have had difficulty, also, in telling you why he walked—until, at any rate, he had had several seconds to consider the matter. He was travelling very much like a rudderless ship, borne by the tide into whatever port, or on to whatever rocks, that tide decreed.
But, at last, Ben’s dormant will did assert itself for a brief instant, though even here Fate selected the particular restaurant into which he turned, to add another link to the strange chain that was binding him. It was, of course, a cheap restaurant, for an out-of-work seaman can patronise no other, and it was nearly empty. Ben shuffled to a pew-like seat with a high back, sat down, and ordered a cup of tea and as much bread-and-butter as would be covered by fourpence. Then he settled himself to his simple meal, comparing it regretfully with the more lavish repast he had missed earlier in the day.
He was seated near the end of the long, narrow room, and only one table lay beyond—a table completely hidden by the high back of his bench. He had vaguely imagined this end table to be unoccupied, but suddenly a word fell upon his ears, and he paused in the act of conveying a substantial piece of bread-and-butter to his mouth. For the word he had heard was ‘Seventeen.’
‘That’s rum,’ he thought. ‘Seems as if I can’t git away from the blinkin’ number terday!’
He cocked his ears. Soon, another voice made a remark—a girl’s voice this time. The first voice had been a man’s.
‘Isn’t there any other way?’ asked the girl’s voice.
It was sullen and dissatisfied, and the man’s voice replied somewhat tartly:
‘What other way do you suggest?’
Apparently the girl made no response, for the man repeated his question, as though nervous and irritated.
‘Oh, I don’t care,’ said the girl’s voice, in accents suggesting the accompaniment of a shrug. ‘It’s all the same in the end.’
‘That’s where you’re a fool!’ rasped the man’s voice. It was kept low, but Ben had no difficulty in hearing the words. ‘It’s not the same in the end. There’s a hell of a difference!’
‘To you, I dare say.’
‘And to you, to. Why—’ The remark was interrupted by the dull sound of a train. Evidently, there was a line running past the back of the shop. ‘That’s a bit funny, isn’t it?’ exclaimed the man’s voice.
‘What’s funny?’ demanded the girl’s voice.
‘Why—that train.’
‘I can’t see where the fun comes in.’
‘’Ear, ’ear,’ thought Ben. ‘Wot’s funny in a trine—hexcep’ when it’s on time?’
The voices ceased, and the piece of bread-and-butter completed its postponed journey to Ben’s mouth. While it was followed by another, and another, Ben tried to visualise the owners of the voices. It may be mentioned that he visualised them all wrong. The man developed in his mind like Charlie Peace, and the girl like Princess Mary.
He began to fall into a reverie, but all at once he cocked his ears again. The conversation behind him was being resumed.
‘Well, well, we needn’t decide this minute,’ muttered the man, ‘but the only thing I can see is Number Seventeen.’
‘Blimy, and it’s the on’y thing I can ’ear,’ thought Ben.
‘I’ll tell you what it is,’ retorted the girl. ‘You’re getting nervy.’
‘Nervy, is it?’
‘Yes. Nothing’s happened to worry about yet. Why, we’ve only just—’
‘Quiet!’ whispered the man fiercely. ‘Haven’t you got any sense at all?’
After a short silence, the girl’s voice remarked, with irony:
‘I haven’t had much up till now. But it’s coming.’
‘A bit cryptic, aren’t you, my girl?’ observed the man.
‘Then here’s something else cryptic,’ she answered. ‘Why will some people persist in wearing blinkers?’
‘Now we’re goin’ ter ’ave a little dust-up,’ thought Ben. ‘Two ter one on the gal!’
The dust-up did not materialise, however. Instead, a bulky form materialised, walking up the shop. It was the bulky form of a policeman, and the policeman entered Ben’s pew, and sat down opposite him.
‘Well, I’m blowed!’ thought Ben. ‘This is my lucky dye! Thank Gawd, the bobbies don’t turn hup in seventeens!’
The policeman looked at Ben, and nodded.
‘Pretty thick outside there, isn’t it?’ he remarked.
‘Yus,’ answered Ben.
‘Worst fog I ever remember,’ continued the policeman. ‘Looks as if it’s going to last a week.’
‘Yus,’ said Ben.
The policeman smiled. ‘Putting something warm inside you, eh?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Well, tea’s better than beer.’
‘No. I means, yus.’
‘How would you like another cup?’
Ben began to grow suspicious. People were not usually kind to him unless they had some ulterior motive.
‘No, thanks, guv’nor,’ he mumbled, rising abruptly. ‘I got an appointment.’
The policeman looked at him rather hard.
‘Where are you going to sleep tonight?’ he asked.
Out of the corner of his eye, Ben saw the waitress approaching.
‘’Aven’t reely decided yet,’ he answered. ‘Is the Ritz any good?’
‘Fourpence,’ said the waitress.
While Ben forked out, the policeman seemed to be looking at him rather harder. In fact, he was so interested in Ben’s pockets, that Ben turned them inside out.
‘No deception, guv’nor,’ he remarked. ‘There goes the end of it.’
‘Then it don’t look much like the Ritz for you,’ observed the policeman. ‘But, of course, if you’d done a little post-office robbery today, now, you’d keep your notes in some other pocket, wouldn’t you?’ Ben stared at him, and the policeman laughed. ‘Your face tells your story, mate, as well as your pockets,’ he said. ‘Here’s a shilling for that bed at the Ritz.’
Ben began to readjust his ideas about the police force.
‘Wot’s this?’ he asked. ‘A catch?’
‘That depends on you,’ smiled the policeman, and tossed him the coin.
Ben caught it. It occurred to him that, if he stayed any longer, he might grow sentimental, or the policeman might want his shilling back. Both events would be pitiable. So, slipping the coin into his pocket, he murmured, ‘Toff, guv’nor, yer are—stright!’ and shuffled out of the shop.
Through the fog once more Ben resumed his strange way, drawing nearer and nearer every moment to the unseen port that was waiting for him. Warmed by the tea, and cheered by his unexpected affluence, he groped his way along while the short day began to slip unnoticed into evening. The death of the day was not marked by gathering darkness, but by a change in the texture of a darkness already present.
‘Wunner wot it’s orl abart?’ reflected Ben. ‘Fust that there ticket I picked up in that there pub—Number Seventeen—and then that there tork in that there restrong—Number Seventeen agin. And then them bobbies. And then that feller leavin’ in the middle of ’is meal like that. And then that fice at the winder—Gawd, that give me the creeps, stright! And then those two quarrellin’ quiet-like, and then that bobby torkin’ ter me abart a post-orfice robbery, and then givin’ me a shillin’ becos’ o’ me angel-fice … It’s rum, ’owever yer looks at it … ’Allo. Steady, there!’
He had swerved against a parapet, and as he collected himself and began to swerve away again, a faint, muffled sound rushed by on the other side of the wall.
‘Trine,’ thought Ben, and his mind harped back to the reference to the train in the restaurant. ‘Wot’s funny abart a trine?’
He swerved a little too far from the wall, and got off the pavement. A bus-driver shouted at him. He shouted back, and returned to the pavement. Progress grew more difficult. Instinctively, he groped about for some quiet district, where the traffic would be less and the expectation of life greater. He walked mechanically for ten minutes, or an hour, or two hours—he couldn’t say which. And then, abruptly, a practical sense entered into him, he realised that he was tired, and that he needed a plan.
‘This ain’t no night fer the Embankment,’ he pondered. ‘Besides, ’ow’d one find the blinkin’ Embankment?’
It would be a pity, too, to waste precious coppers in an apology for a bed—even if he could find that, either. Maybe, if he set seriously to work, he could discover some odd corner to curl into for the night, a corner that would cost him nothing and would allow him to wake up no poorer than he had been when he went to sleep. Somewhere round about here, perhaps. It was quiet enough. Not a sound came to him, not a movement. Even the fog itself hung heavy and static.
‘Yus, I’ll ’ave a look rahnd,’ thought Ben, and suddenly stopped dead.
He was standing by a lamp-post, the light of which revealed dimly the lower portion of an empty house. The door of the house was ajar, and upon it was the number ‘Seventeen.’
4 (#ulink_dc3625e6-fc1b-58ff-9b14-13caecfcb4f7)
The Empty House (#ulink_dc3625e6-fc1b-58ff-9b14-13caecfcb4f7)
Ben stared at the number, closed his eyes, opened them again, and then emitted a simple but expressive exclamation.
‘Well, I’ll be blowed!’ he gasped. ‘There ain’t no gettin’ away from it!’
A queer sensation passed through him as he stood on the narrow strip of pavement that divided the lamp-post from the railings, and blinked at the number that had dogged him ever since he had entered the arena of fog. But, after all—why should he get away from it? The number had not hurt him yet. There were hundreds of houses numbered ‘Seventeen.’ And this house was an empty house, with the door ajar!
‘Come in!’ the door seemed to say. ‘Here’s your free lodging. I’ve been waiting for you!’
Ben hesitated, annoyed with himself for his hesitation. This was the very thing he had been looking for. A gift from the gods! Just because …
‘G’arn!’ he muttered to himself, and walked to the front steps.
Now he was on them—there were only four—and the half-open door was two feet in front of his nose. He turned his head, and glanced back into the fog. It was so thick that he could not see the railings he had passed through. The dim light from the lamp-post sent its feeble rays above them, appearing to have no object in the world but to tell a wayfaring seaman that this house was No. 17, and that he must not pass it by. It would hardly have surprised Ben if the lamp-post had suddenly gone out now, its mission done. It appeared to be waning from where he stood.
Satisfied that nobody was immediately behind him, Ben turned to the door again, crept up to it, and gave it a careful, gentle push. It yielded rather more easily than he had expected, and he prepared to spring back. But nothing jumped out at him. A dark, narrow passage was revealed, and the beginning of an ascending staircase.
Rounding upon himself once more for his fears, he entered; and as soon as he entered, his fears returned.
‘’Ow do I know there ain’t nobody be’ind that door?’ he thought.
Anxiously, he peeped. Nobody was hiding behind the door. The house was as silent as a tomb.
‘Well, we’ll keep the fog aht, any’ow,’ muttered Ben, and closed the front door quickly.
That was better! Now no one could leap in from the street. To ensure further against this unpleasant possibility, Ben bolted the door, and then turned to other places where leaping creatures might lurk. It will have been noted, long before now, that Ben was not a man of iron; but even a man made of sterner stuff than Ben might be forgiven for a few qualms in a strange, empty house, with a thick fog outside, and no illumination inside.
To remedy the latter evil—temporarily—Ben struck a match.
‘Oi!’ he shouted, as something rose and jumped at him.
He dropped the match, and it went out. He lunged, and hit nothing. Whatever had jumped at him had not repeated the attack.
Trembling, he struck another match, holding it behind him ready to hurl at the oncomer. Something stood against the wall … His shadow.
‘Oh, my Gawd!’ chattered Ben, and gave himself ten seconds to recover.
A thought came to him. Until he was quite certain that the house was unoccupied, was it wise, after all, to have the front door bolted? A bolted door would militate against his speed if, by chance, he desired a sudden exit. Napoleon, working out the tactics of Waterloo, was no more earnestly absorbed than was Ben, working out the tactics of a bolted door.
‘Yus, I better hunbolt it, I reckons,’ he concluded, at last. ‘Yus—that’s the idea. Hunbolt it.’
So he unbolted the front door, suppressing a shiver as he did so, and then, striking another match, surveyed the passage in detail.
On his right was a door. A little farther along on the right, where the hall narrowed to accommodate the rickety stairway that ascended by the left wall, was another door. And opposite the second door was a gap, presumably leading down to the basement.
He approached the first door. ‘Wot’s wrong with knockin’?’ he thought. He knocked. There was no response. Opening the door slowly, he inserted his head, holding his match about him. An empty, furnitureless room greeted his eyes. The match flickered out.
‘’Andsome dining-room,’ he commented, ‘with ceiling comin’ dahn.’
Closing the door, he proceeded to the second door, farther along the passage, and repeated the operation. The result was similar, only this time it was a ‘’andsome drawing-room, with piper peelin’ orf.’ Having closed the drawing-room door, he turned and peered into the inky gap that led down to the basement.
‘Oh, well—’ere goes!’ he murmured. ‘Sailors was made ter go dahn!’
He descended into the unpleasant abyss, and spent five more matches on it. They revealed the usual rooms one finds in a basement, bare and tenantless; but there was one door he could not open. It was a stout door, evidently locked, though his match went out before he could find the keyhole. Deciding not to waste any more matches—for they were growing precious—he felt about in the darkness, even running his fingers along the bottom of the door.
‘Cupboard, I hexpeck,’ he muttered. ‘But it’s got a ’ell of a draught!’
The next moment, he bounded back. Something was happening beneath him. The floor was vibrating, and a faint, rhythmic clack came to his ears. Then, suddenly, the vibration increased, a dull roar grew out of the bowels of the earth, and something rushed beneath him. Ben wiped his damp forehead.
‘If I ’ad the bloke ’ere,’ he thought, ‘wot hinvented trines, I’d give ’im somethin’.’
He ascended from the basement to the ground floor. He walked to the foot of the stairs leading to the upper floors. He raised his eyes, and peered, and listened.
And, as he listened, it began to dawn upon Ben that he had done about as much exploring as his nerves would stand. Why go over the entire house? He wasn’t bringing a whole family in! One floor was sufficient for him, and the drawing-room with the paper peeling off was quite good enough for his unfastidious taste.
So he sent his voice upstairs, instead of his person.
‘Oi!’ he shouted. ‘Oi! Hennybody hup there?’
Apparently not. Still, he tried again.
‘If hennybody’s hup there,’ he called, ‘this is ter let ’em know as I’m dahn ’ere!’
Again no response. Ben sighed with relief.
‘Well, it ain’t so bad,’ he observed, to the unheeding walls. ‘I reckons this is a little bit of orl right! I’m a bloomin’ ’ouse-holder. And nah, wot abart goin’ aht and gettin’ a bit o’ food?’
He went to the front door, and opened it. Fog poured in. ‘Lummy!’ he thought. ‘It’s gettin’ wuss!’ Wedging a piece of wood, of which there was plenty about, under the door to keep it open, he walked down the steps and into the street again. And, just as he reached the pavement, the door of the adjoining house opened, and a figure emerged.
‘Don’t be long, father!’ cried someone, evidently standing in the hall.
‘I’ll be as quick as I can, my dear,’ the figure answered. ‘Run in, or you’ll catch your death of cold.’
The door closed with a muffled bang, and Ben drew himself close against the railings. The figure reached him abruptly, and paused in passing.
‘Hallo—where did you spring from?’ asked the figure.
Ben made no reply. He did not see why he should. A fellow didn’t have to explain himself to every passer-by, did he, even if he had just been exploring an empty house that wasn’t his! The figure looked at him suspiciously, and barked:
‘Be off!’
And then, without waiting to find out whether this somewhat peremptory order was obeyed, went off himself.
A few seconds later, the front door of the next house again opened. Quickly, this time, as though on urgent business.
‘Father!’ called the voice he had heard before. ‘Father! I want you to …’
There was no response, and the voice trailed off.
‘Like me ter go arter ’im, miss?’ asked Ben. ‘Oi!’
The girl started at Ben’s voice, and he slipped after the vanished figure. The fog beat him, however. He returned a minute later to report failure.
‘Sorry, miss,’ he said. ‘’E was too quick fer me. It’s a reg’ler needle in a ’aystack in this fog, ain’t it?’
‘Never mind,’ replied the girl. ‘Thanks very much. It doesn’t matter.’
She was a pretty girl, with nothing swanky about her. Quite a good sort, Ben concluded. Ripe for a little human intercourse, he attempted to prolong the conversation.
‘Anythin’ I can do for yer, miss?’ he asked.
She peered down at him, and shook her head.
‘No, thank you,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t important—only a letter.’
‘Like me ter post it?’
‘No—but thank you very much.’
The door began to close. Ben felt as though a glint of sunlight had suddenly appeared, and were now vanishing.
‘Shockin’ dye, ain’t it!’ he called. The door, however, was now shut. ‘Well, that’s orl there is abart that!’ he mumbled. ‘That’s the larst I’ll see of ’er!’
An extraordinarily poor prediction, as subsequent events proved. And had Ben realised the conditions of their next meeting, he would have sat down very promptly in the middle of the road.
Alone once more, he took careful bearings, and felt his way along the street, his idea being to keep a straight line until he hit a shop. He did not hit a shop until he had crossed three roads, and then it was not much of a shop. True, it called itself an Emporium, in virtue of the fact that the old lady who kept it had blossomed out from sweets to postcards and a small selection of tinned foods; but the sweets and the post-cards were of modest quality, while the tinned foods were reduced to the single selection of pork and beans.
‘’Ow much?’ demanded Ben, taking up the single selection.
‘One-and-two, or one-and-three, I think,’ replied the old lady. ‘Dear me, I must get some more.’
‘Let it go fer a shillin’, ma?’ asked Ben.
‘We’ll say one-and-two, then.’
‘But I ain’t got one-and-two. I got a shillin’.’
She looked at him, over her glasses. He was very shabby. And it was very foggy. And she was very old. Details don’t matter quite so much when you are old.
‘All right, then—a shilling,’ she said; and the bargain was struck.
He groped his way back to the empty house, noted with satisfaction that the door was as he had left it, and slipped in with his precious packet. This time, he bolted the front door behind him and, after depositing his parcel in the back reception-room, he descended to the basement to make certain that the back door was bolted also. This settled, he returned to the back reception-room, and prepared to make himself comfortable.
He tested the floor by sitting down in a corner of it. Not at all bad. Quite decent, in fact. So decent, that he had no immediate impulse to get up again. Of course, he’d get up soon. He’d find some wood and make a fire. Then, a little later, he would heat the pork and beans on the fire … that would be good … but not just yet … a little later …
He began to nod. His head drooped forward. Ben had walked a good many miles that day. A clock outside chimed six.
Ben did not hear it—he was fast asleep.
He awoke suddenly, with a start. The clock was striking again—midnight. But that had not awakened him. Someone was walking in the basement below.
5 (#ulink_a2509fd1-f2ec-5ea6-8d12-a9d3e549dedb)
Up and Down (#ulink_a2509fd1-f2ec-5ea6-8d12-a9d3e549dedb)
‘G’arn—I’m dreamin’,’ thought Ben. ‘Orl them doors is bolted!’
He stayed quite still, listening, and hoping to be awakened from the dream. But the footsteps continued, and grew louder, and all at once Ben realised that this was no dream, but stark reality. The knowledge produced a frank sweat.
The moment when the dream theory fails is always a nasty one.
‘S’elp me, there’s a bloke dahn there,’ gasped Ben, and clambered clumsily to his feet.
Then he stood motionless, and listened again. Now he heard no sound. The footsteps had stopped. Was the producer of the footsteps also listening, standing somewhere below as motionless as he?
Ben crept to the door, and softly opened it. As he did so, a dull clank-clank in the distance grew nearer and louder. A goods train, obviously. It rattled under the house, shaking it, and under cover of the noise Ben left the room and stepped out into the passage.
‘P’r’aps it was the trine, orl the time,’ thought Ben, as the rattle and clank decreased.
But this hope was soon dissipated. Even before the sound of the train had dwindled away, the footsteps below recommenced—less heavily, this time more stealthily.
‘’Ere, I’ve ’ad enuff o’ this!’ reflected the seaman, and tiptoed quickly along the passage.
Should he dash out of the house? This would mean unbolting the front door—a noisy operation—and it would also mean the rest of the night in the fog. A speedier, and probably better, sanctuary was suggested by the staircase. Almost before he realised it, he was ascending the stairs, and he did not pause in his ascent until he had reached the top of the house.
He found himself now on a small landing with a skylight above him, and a door on his right. There was only one door, leading assumedly to an attic.
Before entering the door, he turned and peered down the stairs up which he had come. All was quiet. He waited, so it seemed to him, five minutes, but probably it was only one. Then he turned to the attic door again, and regarded it.
Risking the sound, he struck a match. A key was in the door, and this immediately suggested his plan. He stretched his hand forward, and turned the key. The door was now locked, with the initiative on his side, and he was free to negotiate.
‘Oi!’ he whispered, through the keyhole. ‘Hennybody there?’
No answer came. He repeated the inquiry, a little more loudly, but not too loudly, lest the thing below stairs should hear. Then, as again no answer came, and as he heard neither breathing nor snoring, he felt free to turn the key, and open the door.
Another match revealed the chamber, and proved that, although less pretentious from the architect’s point of view, it had certain advantages over the lower rooms he had already sampled. The first advantage was a half-used candle, sticking upright in a pool of its own grease on the mantelpiece across the floor. Ben made for the candle promptly, and by its comparatively brilliant glare noted the other advantages of the attic.
An old chair, battered but still serviceable, was near the fireplace. Three or four packing-cases, which could be used as tables or firewood, stood about. And the key in the door was another advantage, for it offered security.
But before Ben could finally approve of the room, two other doors had to be investigated.
One door, by the fireplace, led to an inner room somewhat similar to the outer room. Rendered courageous by his candle, he made a thorough examination of this inner chamber, discovering that it possessed no other entrance, and that it contained a fair-sized cupboard.
The other door of the outer room, at right angles to the passage door, and close to it, refused to open. It was locked—as the door down in the basement had been—and there was no key.
‘This is a better pitch,’ thought Ben. ‘I’ll stay ’ere till the mornin’, any’ow, and the feller dahnstairs can ’ave the bottom ’arf. Sort o’ maisonette.’
Some packing-cases stood under a rather high window. He climbed on to them, and peered out. Fog still as thick as ever. Climbing down again, he selected the most dilapidated case, and split it up.
‘Might as well ’ave a bit o’ cheer,’ he muttered. ‘And it’s time, I reckons, fer them pork an’ beans.’
Fortunately, there were some odd scraps of paper in the packing-case, and these served to start the fire. Throwing some wood on top, he soon had a good blaze, and the warmth welled into him, making life good once more, and dispelling some of his tremors. Thus many another has enjoyed the calm before the storm, smiling for a short period in the false assurance of a temporary security.
His good humour increased when he opened the packet which contained the tin of pork and beans. The old proprietress of the Emporium had added a chunk of bread and a slice of cheese. Best bob’s-worth he’d ever known. This was a bit of all right!
‘Me own mother wouldn’t ’ave done more fer me,’ thought Ben. ‘Wot it is ter ’ave a ’andsome fice!’
But, although he made light of it, the old woman’s kindliness warmed that bare, uncomfortable room almost as much as did the crackling blaze. In the midst of all this uncouthness and uncanniness, of fearful possibilities and tremulous thoughts, a peaceful, human smile lurked somewhere. It stood for the tiny gleam that no blackness can ever totally extinguish, though often enough we seem to lose it in our groping, and forget that it is there. Yet, however faintly it burns, it never flickers out, for it is independent of material substance.
He had some difficulty in opening the tin, and might have been reduced to stamping upon it but for a nail which he wrenched from one of the packing-cases. Putting the tin carefully on the fire, he watched its congealed contents soften and warm, munching bread and cheese to assuage his impatience. He had no spoon, so he stirred the pork and beans with his finger, to help them on their way, and also for the pleasure of sucking his finger afterwards. The operation was so successful that he stirred the pork and beans several times, until they got too hot for the process. Then, to ensure peace with his meal, he tiptoed out on to the landing once more, and listened.
A blessed silence greeted him.
A faint noise in the room he had just left, however, disturbed the blessedness. His mind instantly flashed to the locked door, and he visualised it slowly opening, and heaven knows what coming out! Had he stopped to think, he might have fled downstairs, but the two things he loved best in all the world were in that room—the pork and beans and the candle—and they were worth some risk in this house of risks. He returned to the room rapidly, and disturbed a little mouse enjoying a crumb of cheese.
‘’Ere—wotcher mean, pretendin’ ter be a ghost?’ demanded Ben indignantly.
The mouse, like Ben, became divided against itself. This great, hulking thing was a terror; but the cheese was wonderfully succulent. Two reproachful eyes peered up at Ben from the boards.
‘Oh, go hon—don’t mind me!’ jeered Ben. ‘But, look ’ere, Charlie, you was ’ere while I was gorn—didjer see that there door a-movin’ jest nah?’
He jerked his thumb towards the locked door. The mouse, still eyeing him solemnly, refused to commit itself.
‘Boo!’ cried Ben.
A frenzied flash, and the mouse was gone. Ben felt no animosity against the mouse, but it gave him a sort of satisfactory feeling to frighten something. Moreover, it suggested a pleasant theory. If he could scare a mouse, without any desire to harm the mouse, why could not something scare Ben, without any desire to harm Ben?
This thought was rudely disturbed by a new emotion. The tin on the fire slipped, and began to pour itself out.
‘Oi!’ gasped Ben. ‘’Arf a mo’!’
He rushed across, and rescued the tin, nearly scalding his hand in the process. Luckily, not more than a penn’orth had flowed away.
Many strange things were destined to happen in this room within the next twenty-four hours, and while Ben is busy with his pork and beans, it may be as well for us to examine the room a little more closely. Its walls and ceiling were in a most dilapidated condition. The paper was yellow with age, and in some places had peeled right off. In others, it was peeling. Here and there, bits of the ceiling had come down, and the vibration caused by the trains that ran under the house suggested one cause of this. The trains could still be heard from the attic, though the sound was naturally fainter and more muffled than it had been down in the basement.
Facing the door by which Ben had entered the room, and with our back to the opposite blank wall, we note two or three packing-cases that lined the left-hand wall, ceasing at the locked door which Ben had not been able to open. This locked door was near the corner of the room, and round the corner came the door to the passage—a small passage containing, in addition to the attic door, nothing more notable than the head of the descending staircase, and above, in the low roof, the skylight. Inside the room again, to the right of the passage door as one turned and faced it, were more packing-cases. By climbing upon them one could reach a small, high window, which Ben had noted with satisfaction was closed. Then, round the corner to the next right-hand wall, came a bare space, the door leading to the inner chamber, the fireplace, and the single, battered chair.
Such was the configuration and furnishing of this room of destiny, where an out-of-work seaman sat dispatching pork and beans.
His simple meal over, Ben smiled contentedly, and prepared once more to make himself comfortable for the night—or, for the rest of the night. Towards this end, he poked his head into the inner chamber, assuring himself again that it was empty, and made one last effort to get the locked door on the opposite wall open. Failure, of course, greeted this effort. Finally, he stepped out on to the little landing …
‘Ah, not this time, lovey!’ he chuckled, as a soft sound came to him—not from below. ‘I ain’t feared o’ mice no more!’
The soft sound continued, and he tiptoed back to the room to give his little friend another surprise. But no small eyes greeted him this time. Nor was there any flashing scurry. His grin froze on his face, as he realised that, this time, a mouse was not responsible.
Ben had not gained a reputation for speed in the Merchant Service, but there were times when he acted quickly. This new soft sound was worse than anything he had heard—he could not define it, or place it. But it was up here—somewhere—which meant that Ben must get down there, anywhere, He scampered down the stairs like a frightened rat.
But, even in that mad scamper, he stopped dead at the head of the stairs that led down to the ground floor. Someone was below, with footsteps as hurrying as Ben’s.
And the footsteps were coming up.
6 (#ulink_30b447c0-62f5-5087-aaf2-94243421a307)
Under the Lamp-Post (#ulink_30b447c0-62f5-5087-aaf2-94243421a307)
The fog did not lift through the night. London awoke to another day of yellowness, the optimists rubbing their eyes, the pessimists croaking. More blind groping, more wheezing and coughing, and more traffic strangulation. Only the companies that profited by artificial illumination, and the children who profited by the absence of their governess, smiled as they greeted the opaque morning. The rest of the world saw small joy in the adventure.
All day long, the ineffective lamp-post outside the house of strange happenings flickered intermittently upon the number, ‘17,’ Often, the number could not be read at all, despite the nearness of the light, but sometimes the fog thinned a little, and then the number grew out and vaguely beckoned. But few of the few people who passed along that unfrequented road troubled to notice it. Why should they? And, certainly, no one thought of answering its grim invitation.
A fog is bad enough. Who wants an empty house thrown in?
Between three and four in the afternoon, however, a passer-by might have paused. The house was dark and silent, saving for a very faint flicker in the top room. This flicker suddenly disappeared, to reappear a few seconds afterwards behind a window on the lower floor. Then, again, it vanished, and then again it appeared on the ground floor. After that, it vanished completely.
And then a passer-by did indeed come along, and appear to respond to the house’s grim invitation. He was a man with a crooked shoulder, and he paused outside the house and looked at it. As though to ensure his interest, the fog thinned momentarily, allowing the street lamp to shine more clearly on the number ‘17,’ and even revealing, for an instant, the front door.
The front door was ajar.
The man with the crooked shoulder looked at the door; then, turning his head, he glanced up and down the street. His eyes, of course, met nothing, since another man could have been standing five feet off without being seen. When he turned his head back to the front door, the fog had thickened again and he could no longer see the door. But he knew the door was ajar, and the knowledge fascinated him.
He stood there, perhaps, twenty seconds. Then, suddenly, he slipped into the house, and the door closed behind him.
And now it really seemed as though that silent street of ghosts and whisperings began to wake up and enter the arena of more normal, commonplace matters. A new figure groped its way along the pavement, a figure, this time unsinister and fashionable.
‘Hey! W-where are you?’ it stammered. ‘Where the d-dickens—’
It turned, and looked back—or tried to look back—along the way it had come. A well-dressed young man, with a good-natured, pleasant face, was revealed by the lamp-light. The lamp-post itself was revealed to the young man only when he backed into it.
‘Hallo! So there you are!’ he cried, in a voice of relief. ‘Where the devil did you g-get to, old chap? I—’
He stopped abruptly, as he turned to the lamp-post. Good-humoured annoyance shone on his features.
‘Oh! It’s you, is it?’ he exclaimed. ‘Well, h-haven’t you got something b-better to do than to stand there pretending to be a h-h-human being?’
He brushed himself, then raised his voice and called into the callous mist.
‘Fordyce! FORDYCE! Where the devil are you?’ He strained his ears for a reply, but none came. ‘Oh, all right—I don’t care!’ he ran on. ‘But just tell me this. W-what’s the b-bally use of a f-feller who meets a f-feller and can’t stick to a f-feller in a f-fog?’
No one answered the question. He veered round, shook his fist at the lamp-post, and then leaned against it. In his depressing circumstances, no little bit of comfort the street offered could be neglected.
‘What weather!’ he muttered. ‘Lovely! Sunshine in L-London, thirteen hours decimal eight. I don’t think. Je ne pense pas. Ich glaube nicht. And in all the other b-bally languages!… I s’pose this is London? Upon my soul, it m-might be Timbuctoo for all one can s-see of it.’
He waited a minute, then raised his voice and called again.
‘Fordyce! Fordyce! Gilbert Fordyce! Fordyce Gilbert! B-biggest ass that ever was, is, or w-will be, where are you?’ He began to cough suddenly. ‘There, that’s done it! Broken my beastly larynx now. Well, I’ll say this for you, old m-man. You may be a damned fool and s-stutter—yes, some p-people say you d-do stutter—but you’ve got the temper of a bally saint. H-haven’t I, my long friend?’ He gave the lamp-post a friendly, familiar slap. ‘I say, you don’t mind my talking to you, do you, old chap? Thanks, very much. Most awfully obliged. Even a lamp-post’s company—when there ain’t n-nobody else.’
As though in response, and to show what good company it could be, the light made an extra effort, and illuminated the number on the door-post. The young man stared at the number, and blinked. ‘No. 17, eh? Sweet seventeen! Made a lot of m-money on you once at dear old Monte Carlo. Good old seventeen—hallo! W-who …’
The front door swung open suddenly, and a figure hurried out. It was the figure of a man with a crooked shoulder. He seemed in a considerable hurry, for he blundered down the steps and was into the young man before he knew it. The young man fell back against the lamp-post.
‘What the hell—!’ muttered the blunderer.
‘Eh? Oh, don’t mention!’ replied the young man. ‘I like it!’
The next moment he was alone again. The other had vanished. The young man stared into the void.
‘Hi! W-wait a minute!’ he cried, waking up. suddenly. ‘W-what’s the hurry? I’m not c-contagious! Hi!’
He ran after him, and the road was empty once more. And, almost as though it had waited until there were no observers, the light in the house which had descended from the top now reappeared, and began to ascend again. It flickered dimly behind windows of the ground floor and first floor. Soon, it reached the top floor. Then, all at once, it went out …
‘Eddie!’ called a voice, along the street. ‘Eddie! Where are you?’
A tall, strong-limbed young man felt his way up to the lamp-post. He had come from the same direction as the stutterer, and was in the same predicament. But he did not expend his emotion upon the unresponsive lamp-post. Instead, he paused when he came to it, muttered, ‘Damn!’ and lit a cigarette.
And as he did so, the door of ‘No. 17’ burst open, and a terrified figure came flying out.
‘Hello—what’s all the excitement?’ exclaimed Gilbert Fordyce, catching hold of the flying man’s collar.
‘Gawd!’ choked the terrified figure, and hung limp in his captor’s grasp.
7 (#ulink_2b3db536-2d31-5390-81f8-2bb47fcda693)
Ben Tells His Story (#ulink_2b3db536-2d31-5390-81f8-2bb47fcda693)
Fordyce regarded with sympathy the sorry specimen of humanity hanging limply on his arm, but he did not allow that sympathy to affect his actions or his judgment. Here was some matter, clearly, which required careful investigation, so he tightened his grasp—for many a rascal ‘acts floppy’ before a frantic attempt to escape—and shook his captive gently.
‘Now, then,’ he repeated, ‘what’s all the excitement? Come along!’
His captive made no movement, and Fordyce concluded that he was not shamming. Still, he did not loosen his grip.
‘Pull yourself together!’ he urged, with another shake. ‘Wake up!’ He called again more sharply, ‘Wake up!’
‘’Elp!’ bellowed the man, suddenly obeying his captor’s injunction, and waking up. He woke up so effectively that he began to struggle.
‘Whoa! Steady!’ reproved Fordyce. ‘Don’t be a fool! What’s the matter?’
‘Lemme go!’
‘Certainly—when you’ve explained your hurry.’
‘’Urry,’ chattered the limp figure. ‘Gawd! You’d be in a ’urry if yer’d seed a corpse!’
Fordyce frowned, and studied the man a little more intently.
‘Corpse, eh?’ he said seriously. ‘So you’ve seen a corpse?’
‘Yes,’ whined the man. ‘Lemme go, guv’nor. I ain’t done it! I ain’t done it.’
‘By Jove, this is serious. I—whoa! Whoa!’ For the man had begun to struggle again. ‘Steady, there! One mustn’t run away from corpses, you know—it looks suspicious. Tell me some more about this corpse.’ The man stopped struggling, and stared stupidly. Fordyce realised that whatever story lay behind the fellow’s terror could only be elicited by patient cross-examination. ‘Do you live in that house?’ he asked quietly.
The man shivered.
‘Wot—me? Live there?’ he answered. ‘Live there? Lummy, no!’
‘Ah. You don’t?’
‘Nah!’
‘Sort of—lodger, eh?’
The man shook his head.
‘It’s a hempty ’ouse, guv’nor, see? Hempty ’ouse.’
‘Oh, empty?’
‘Yus.’
‘Well, then,’ proceeded Fordyce, ‘if it’s empty, what were you doing there? Come along! What were you doing in this empty house?’
‘No ’arm, guv’nor, s’elp me!’ mumbled the man.
‘I didn’t say—’
‘Got in yesterday, guv’nor, ter git a bit o’ shelter, see? Didn’t mean no ’arm, guv’nor. Out o’ work, see?’
Fordyce nodded, and now he let the man go, but he watched him narrowly for tricks.
‘I see,’ he said gently. ‘Poor devil!’
‘That’s right, sir,’ exclaimed the man eagerly, somewhat reassured by the other’s attitude. ‘Poor’s right. Lorst me ship, guv’nor, and no fault o’ me own. Ain’t got no money. Ah, but I never murdered ’im! No, sir, I ain’t that sort, s’elp me, I ain’t!’
‘Who says you murdered him?’ retorted Fordyce, frowning. ‘If you say that any more I’ll begin to think you really have! Let’s get on with this. You’re an out-of-work sailor, I take it—’
‘That’s right. Merchant Service.’
‘Good. It’s noted. And you say that house is empty?’
‘That’s right. Hempty as my grave.’
‘Charming simile!’
‘Wot’s that?’
‘Never mind. Who’s in there now?’
‘Nah?’ said the seaman, staring stupidly. ‘Wot—nah?’
‘Yes, now,’ replied Fordyce sharply. ‘At this moment.’
‘Only—’im,’ muttered the seaman, with a shudder.
‘’Im? Oh, the corpse.’ An idea suddenly occurred to Fordyce. ‘Tell me, do you drink?’
‘Yus. No!’
‘Quite a Parliamentarian,’ observed Fordyce dryly. ‘What does that mean, exactly?’
‘Ain’t ’ad a drop,’ answered the seaman.
‘Honour bright?’
‘Ain’t ’ad a charnce!’
‘All right, I’ll take your word for it,’ smiled Fordyce. ‘Like a drop now?’
The sailor’s eyes popped. He eagerly seized the flask that was held out to him, and put it to his lips. When he judged the right moment had come, Fordyce took the flask away from him gently but firmly, and then proceeded with the cross-examination.
‘Now get on with your story, and be quick about it,’ he said. ‘Then we’ll have a look round—’
‘Wot—go hin?’ exclaimed the seaman, pausing in the act of wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
‘Yes, of course.’
The seaman shook his head very decidedly.
‘I ain’t goin’ back into that ’ouse, guv’nor,’ he observed, ‘and doncher think it!’
‘I’m afraid you’ll have to,’ returned Fordyce grimly, and seized the man’s collar again swiftly. He was only just in time. ‘Now, understand me once and for all, old son,’ he remarked, with quiet assurance. ‘It isn’t likely that I’m going to pass this house, after what you’ve told me, without going in. And it isn’t likely that I’ll relieve myself of your company until I have gone in. Struggling’s no use. No earthly. Have you got that? Don’t be a fool, and act like a criminal before anyone accuses you!’
‘I tells yer, stright, I ain’t goin’ back inter that ’ouse,’ muttered the seaman miserably. ‘It’s give me the fair creeps, it ’as.’
‘Creeps, eh? Well, of course, a corpse isn’t exactly lively company.’
‘Ah, but it wasn’t the corpse wot started it,’ explained the seaman sepulchrally. ‘I got the creeps afore that. When fust I gits in the ’ouse, sir, there ain’t nobody helse in the blinkin’ plice, see? S’elp me, there wasn’t. I goes hover the ’ole plice—leastwise, most of it—and there ain’t nobody. But, afterwards—I ’eard things. Gawd, I ’eard things!’
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