Major Vigoureux

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"Murdered! The Lord Proprietor!" echoed the Commandant, laying down his
glasses and rising to his feet in blankest amaze.

"Yes, sir; shot with his own gun, and, they say, by Eli Tregarthen! The
two men have pulled across from Inniscaw for help, and to fetch the
constable.... I had the news from Sam Leggo hisself, as he raced off to
knock up Mr. Pope."

The Commandant sank back in his chair. Dreadful though the news was, he
saw in a flash that it was not incredible. Eli Tregarthen owed the Lord
Proprietor a grudge, and a bitter one. Eli Tregarthen was a man capable
of brooding over his wrongs and exacting wild justice for them. The
Commandant's thoughts flew to Vashti.

But even as he passed a hand over his eyes, another footstep invaded
the outer passage, and Mr. Pope himself rushed in, mopping his brow.

"My dear friend--" Not in his life before had Mr. Pope addressed the
Commandant as "my dear friend." He glanced from one scared face to the
other. "You have heard? Oh, but it is terrible!... And what on earth
are we to do?"

"I beg your pardon," answered the Commandant, recovering his presence
of mind. "'We,' did you say?"

"Naturally I came first to you.... You being a magistrate, and--if this
dreadful news be true--the chief magistrate left on the Islands."

"True," said the Commandant, yet more quietly. He had regained his
self-possession. "I had forgotten. To be sure, I had renounced the
office--as I supposed--at the Lord Proprietor's own wish; but doubtless
it reverts to me, and, in any case, this is no time to discuss
proprieties. Will you tell me what has happened and what has already
been done?"

"Done? I have done nothing except send for the constable, with word
that he was to follow me here to the Barracks and take your orders."

"But where is the body?"

"The body?" Mr. Pope shivered. "God knows. That, my dear Commandant, is
the cruellest part of the mystery--at least, according to Sam Leggo. It
appears that Sir Caesar, Leggo and Eli Tregarthen were at North Inniscaw
this afternoon, taking stock of the farm, which Sir Caesar was
persuading Tregarthen to rent. Tregarthen was sullen--you may have
heard that he resents being given notice to quit his holding on Saaron.
In the end, on some chance word of Sir Caesar's he blazed up, completely
lost control of himself, and used threats of personal violence. Leggo
will swear to this; but it is immaterial, for I myself have heard him
indulge in similar threats, and so has Abe, the gardener. Well,
Tregarthen swung off in a huff, took his way down across Pare Coppa--it
was there, just under the Cam, that the outbreak occurred--apparently
for the landing-quay by the school, where his boat lay. He left Sir
Caesar and Sam Leggo standing there."

"At what time?"

"The time, according to Leggo, was close upon sunset. Sir Caesar--as his
habit is--carried a gun under his arm; but whether or not the gun was
loaded Leggo is unable to say. After expressing surprise at
Tregarthen's display of temper, Sir Caesar turned the conversation upon
an old adit which lies under the seaward face of the Cam, and leads (I
am assured) down to Ogo Vean. Its existence is known to very few--and
Leggo was surprised to hear him mention it; but it now appears that he
had learnt of it this very afternoon, in casual talk with old Abe. He
desired then and there to explore it, and--having examined the
entrance--either because the adit itself is dark, or as a precaution in
the gathering dusk, he sent Leggo back to the farmhouse to fetch a
lantern. Leggo declares that it took him less than fifteen minutes to
reach the farm, find the lantern, and return with it to the lower gate
of Parc Coppa; also that he used his best speed because the dusk was
gathering. As he reached the gate he heard a shot from somewhere on the
edge of the cliffs. This did not perturb him, for he supposed that the
Lord Proprietor was potting at a stray rabbit. As he climbed the field,
however, towards the Carn, on the summit of which he had left Sir Caesar
seated, he saw three small children running along the cliffs to his
left, making for the slope towards the landing-quay, and recognised
them for Tregarthen's three children. He called to them to stop, for
they seemed to be running in a panic. If they heard, they did not obey,
but ran down the hill out of sight. By this--and because he could not
see Sir Caesar on the summit of the Carn--he began to grow alarmed, lit
the candle within his lantern (for it was now nearly dark), and
shouted. He received no answer. He ran to the edge of the Carn, climbed
down thence to the mouth of the adit, and--finding no trace of his
master--began to hunt, still shouting, along the cliffs to the left, in
the direction where he had first spied the children. To cut his story
short," resumed Mr. Pope, after taking breath, "his search led him to
the edge of the cliffs over Piper's Hole, and there, in a tangle of
brambles, his lantern shone on something bright, which proved, when at
no small risk he climbed down to it, to be the barrel of Sir Caesar's
gun. Below the brambles (he says) the ground breaks away very
precipitately to a sheer fall of rock over the entrance of Piper's
Hole. He could not trust himself here, but declares that the earth
below the brambles--so much his lantern showed him--had evidently been
disturbed, and quite recently; as also that the slide was bare and
smooth, with no trace of a body between it and the last ledge over
which a falling body would plunge into the water; and the tide, as he
says--and as, indeed, we know--was almost at full flood. Having
satisfied himself of this, he ran back, down the hill and past the
school to carry the alarm to the house; and from the quay beside the
school he saw Tregarthen's boat crossing to Saaron, and Tregarthen in
it with his three children. Sam called to him, and his call brought out
the schoolmistress, who no sooner heard the story than she fell to
screaming. Tregarthen, though he must have heard the noise they made,
did not respond, but continued pulling calmly towards Saaron.

"Leggo could not say precisely, but admits that the boat was already
nearing Saaron, and that the man, if he heard, possibly did not
understand--that is, if one can suppose him innocent."

"We will suppose him innocent," said the Commandant, "until we have
better evidence that he is guilty. What was Leggo's next step?"

"He ran on smoking-hot to the house, the schoolmistress after him; up
through the gardens to the terrace, where they met old Abe returning
home from work. The schoolmistress went on to alarm the servants, while
the two men made for the private landing, unmoored the Lord
Proprietor's boat, and pulled across for Garland Town to break the news
to me. But on the quay and along the streets they told it to a score of
people, and it is spreading through the town like wildfire."

"Naturally." The Commandant had fetched and slipped on his great-coat,
and stood buttoning it. He glanced at his watch. "If the constable does
not turn up in a minute or so, we must start without him. Archelaus,
run you down and call up Mr. Rogers. Ask him, with my compliments, to
call out the coastguard----"

"Pardon me," Mr. Pope interrupted, "but that is unnecessary. Mr. Rogers
has already started for Inniscaw in the jolly-boat, taking Leggo with
him. They are to search the shore around Piper's Hole."

"Thank you," said the Commandant. "That was obviously the first step to
take, and I am obliged to you for having thought of it so promptly."

Mr. Pope coughed apologetically. He had grown of a sudden very red in
the face. "In point of fact," he confessed, "Mr. Rogers was at my house
when the news came. We were--er--indulging in a quiet rubber."

The Commandant understood. Had the occasion been less serious, he might
have smiled. Not since the night which brought Vashti to the Islands
had he received an invitation to Mrs. Pope's parties.

"Ah, to be sure!" said he, quietly, reaching for his forage-cap; "I had
forgotten that this was your whist-evening."

Mr. Pope coughed again awkwardly, and was about to make matters worse
by further apology, but a rat-tat on the door prevented this, and
Archelaus, hurrying out, admitted Dr. Bonaday, the physician of Garland
Town, followed by John Ward, the constable, and old Abe.

Of these three old men you would have found it difficult at first sight
to decide which was the eldest: and you have not made Dr. Bonaday's
acquaintance until now; because it was unnecessary. As the saying went
in the Islands, "the old doctor troubled about nobody, and nobody
troubled about he"--that is, unless an Islander needed to be helped
into the world or out of it. He was a bachelor, a recluse, and (albeit
his neighbours were ignorant of this) a European authority on lichens
and mosses. A small private income allowed him to indulge a habit of
forgetting to charge for his professional services; and, on the
strength of it, the Islanders forgave one who never remembered a face,
and who, when summoned to a sick-bed, had to be guided thither by a
messenger, lest he should knock at half a dozen doors in error by the
way. There was a tradition in St. Hugh's that once, running from his
surgery with a hot poultice, he had clapped it on the harbour-master,
who was politely intercepting him to point out that another two strides
would take him over the quay's edge into deep water. In person, Dr.
Bonaday was remarkable for a completely bald head, a hooked nose, and a
pair of vague, impercipient eyes, as of an owl astray and blinking in
the sunlight.

If Dr. Bonaday was an authority on lichens and mosses, Constable Ward
was an authority on nothing at all, even in his own house, where his
youngest grand-daughter attended to his wants. Amid a population which
seldom broke the law and never resisted it, he had sunk of late years
into a peaceful decay of all his faculties. He carried his emblem of
office, a small mace, attached to his wrist by a string, and his hand
shook pitiably as he fumbled for it, but less with excitement than from
shock at having been aroused and dragged from his bed into the night
air.

"I see no reason for taking the constable with us," the Commandant
decided, after a compassionate glance at the old man.

"In case of an arrest--" began Mr. Pope.

"First let us be certain that a crime has been committed."

"To my thinking, all the circumstances point to murder, and to nothing
else."

"And, if they do, we can accuse no one until we have found the body....
Constable, you can go back to bed."

"I thank you, sir." Constable Ward, for the instant plainly relieved,
checked himself, and stood trembling, irresolute. "You mustn't think,
gentlemen, that I'd shirk doing my duty."

"No, no, Ward: I quite understand," the Commandant assured him.

"The Governor," said Mr. Pope, slipping back to the old form of
address, disused for years--"The Governor rather doubts that you are
equal to it."

"For God's sake, gentlemen, don't put it in that way! This affair'll
get into the newspapers, over on the main, and if 'tis said that
Constable Ward was too old for his duty, whatever'll become of me?"

Mr. Pope turned away with a sniff of disgust. "People of a certain
class," said he half-audibly, "can see nothing but as it affects
themselves. Of his duty this old dotard thinks nothing at all, nor of
the scandal of his continuing to draw public pay: yet, mark you, how
keenly he scents a danger of losing it!"

The Commandant winced, and shot a glance at the aged, unheroic figure.
"And there," thought he, "but for God's grace and a woman's word,
stands Narcisse Vigoureux! Even so, a few days since, did I consent to
be incompetent and dread only to be detected."

Aloud he said: "Mr. Pope is too hasty, Ward, in suggesting that I don't
mean to use you. To-morrow, after a night's rest, there may be work
enough for you. Come, we are to pass your door, and will see you home.
You, Doctor, will accompany us, I hope? We may need you."

They set forth down the dark road towards the quay, Abe and Archelaus
walking ahead with lanterns, and guiding. Having restored Constable
Ward to his youngest grand-daughter, they pushed forward more briskly,
hailing the boat which (according to Mr. Pope) would be standing by for
them on Mr. Rogers' instructions. Sure enough, voices answered their
hail, and under the shadow of the quay steps they found the six-oared
Service gig, with her crew seated ready at their oars: also on the quay
itself the whole town gathered, canvassing the dreadful news.

At their approach the confused voices dropped to silence. In silence
the town watched its men of authority as they stepped down to the boat
and took their seats. And, amid silence, the coxswain called his order,
"Give way!"

CHAPTER XXVI

THE SEARCH

Ahead of them, across the Roads, and up the narrow length of Cromwell's
Sound, many lights twinkled: for already two-score boats had put out
from St. Lide's Quay and were hurrying to the search, with lanterns and
hurricane lamps. The windows of the Great House on Inniscaw fairly
blazed with light. The upland farmsteads, too, were awake, here and in
Brefar, and the cottages around Inniscaw schoolhouse and Brefar Church.
Only Saaron, as they passed it, showed no sign of life, no glimmering
ray from the windows of Eli Tregarthen's house, dark upon the dark
hillside. Mr. Pope called the Commandant's attention to this.

"Patience," said the Commandant. "We will land and question him on our
way home."

"You will admit that it looks suspicious."

The Commandant did not answer.

"If Leggo's story be true," said Dr. Bonaday, addressing the coxswain
abruptly, as though awakened of a sudden from a brown study, "the
accident must have happened just upon high-water; in which case Mr.
Rogers will do best to start searching to westward along the north
shore of Brefar, following the set of the ebb."

"I reckon he'll take that line, sir, if he finds nothing at Piper's
Hole," the coxswain answered. "But his plan, as he told it to me, was
to land Leggo, with two of our men, by the schoolhouse, and send them
up the hill with ropes and lanterns, while he pulled round and searched
Piper's Hole from seaward."

The Doctor appeared to digest this plan for a full minute. "Pope," he
said, abruptly as before, "do you happen to know if the Lord Proprietor
had made his will?"

"Good Lord!" answered Mr. Pope, testily, "I am not his lawyer."

"He has relatives?"

"Some distant cousins, I believe; none nearer. Why do you ask?"

"Because," answered the Doctor, imperturably, "it occurred to me as a
natural question under the circumstances. Then it would appear, my
friend, that Sir Caesar's decease (if we suppose it) is a very serious
affair indeed for you?"

"Man alive!" snapped Mr. Pope. "Of what else do you suppose I have been
thinking, ever since I heard this news?"

Dr. Bonaday did not reply in words; but the Commandant--who happened to
be gazing just then towards North Island, where the great sea-light
seemed to search the outer tides with its monstrous eye--heard, or
fancied that he heard, a sound as of a quiet chuckle. Suddenly he
remembered Mr. Pope's scornful criticism of old Constable Ward:
remembered it, and glanced at the Doctor. But the Doctor was an uncanny
fellow, and inscrutable.

Though the coastguardsmen, pulling with a will, overtook and passed at
least a dozen boats on their way, it cost them close upon an hour to
reach the upper end of Cromwell's Sound and open the coast along the
north side of Inniscaw. They had no need to search for Mr. Rogers and
the jolly-boat. Flares were burning and torches waving in and around
the entrance to Piper's Hole, and as the gig drew closer the Commandant
discerned the figures of half-a-dozen searchers, roped and moving
cautiously with lanterns from ledge to ledge of the dizzy cliff. The
jolly-boat lay beached on a bank of fine shingle left by the receding
tide at the entrance of the cave, and beside it stood Mr. Rogers
shouting orders.

He hailed the newcomers as soon as he caught sight of them. Leggo and
his two men had found Sir Caesar's gun, and recovered it from the bushes
overhanging the cave. But of Sir Caesar himself no trace could be found.
It was clear to his mind that the body had rolled down the cliff into
deep water, and had been carried out to sea. His fellows up yonder had
examined every foot of the descent, and were risking their necks to no
purpose. He would give them another ten minutes to make a clean job of
the search, and would then call them off and seek along shore to the
westward.

Had the cave itself been searched? This was the Commandant's first
question as he stepped out upon the shingle.

Yes; they had begun by searching the cave. They had followed it for
fifty yards, and come to a ridge of rock, heaped with ore-weed, beyond
which (it was certain) no ordinary tide ever penetrated. The floor of
the cave shelved pretty steeply up to this ridge, and beyond it lay a
pool of fresh water, about twenty yards long. It was impossible that a
human body could have been swept over the ridge into this pool.
Nevertheless they had explored it. But would the Commandant care to
satisfy himself?

Mr. Rogers, without waiting for an answer, picked up a lantern and led
the way under the great arch. The Commandant followed, his feet at
every step sinking ankle-deep in the fine shingle. He found himself in
a passage nine or ten feet wide, the walls of which rose about twenty
feet above him, and vaulted themselves in darkness. At first this
passage appeared to him to end, some fifteen paces from the entrance,
in a barrier of solid rock, but Mr. Rogers, stepping forward with the
lantern, revealed a low archway to the left and a second passage,
partially choked with ore-weed. Through this they squeezed themselves,
crouching and stooping their heads--for the roof in places was less
than five feet high--and after a couple of zig-zags drew breath at the
entrance of the second chamber, at least as lofty as the first and a
full twenty feet wide. Across the entrance the floor sloped up to the
rocky ridge, of which Mr. Rogers had spoken; and beyond the ridge lay
the pool.

"Taste it," said Mr. Rogers, and the Commandant, kneeling by the edge
of the pool, scooped up a palmful of water to his lips. It was fresh
water, undoubtedly; very cold, and not in the least brackish.

"Look down," said Mr. Rogers, holding his lantern so that the
Commandant could peer into the depths. "You can see every stone at the
bottom, and my men have searched it all." He lifted the light above his
head and gazed into the mysterious darkness beyond the pool. "I must
explore this place to the end, one of these days. The chief boatman
waded through, and reported yet another passage beyond; but of course I
wouldn't let my men waste time in exploring it. What a place for seals,
hey?"

"Seals?" queried the Commandant.

"Leggo gave me a sort of description of the place on our way here. He
tells me that this cave and the next are a favourite haunt of the seals
when they visit the Islands. In fact, he used to hunt them here with
his father. But of late years, for some reason, they have given the
Islands the go-by."

"You think it possible," suggested the Commandant, "Sir Caesar may have
seen one, and taken a shot at it?"

"That's not likely; and anyway it doesn't help us. It won't account for
his gun being found in the bushes, half-way down the cliff, nor for his
disappearing. Among a deal that's mysterious, this much is clear: Leggo
left him on the cliff above us; within twenty minutes Sir Caesar's gun
went off, whether fired by himself or by someone else; and whether
wounded or not, he slid down the cliff and over the ledge above the
cave. His body is not in the cave; therefore, presumably, it was sucked
out to sea by the time, and presumably has been carried somewhere to
the westward. Shall we turn back?"

The Commandant nodded. "You will have plenty of folk to help your
search," said he, "to judge from the number of boats we passed on our
way. By spreading your forces, in less than two hours you can have the
whole shore examined, from here to the west of Brefar. By the way, who
has possession of Sir Caesar's gun?"

"It was passed up to Sam Leggo, on the cliff. But if you wish to take
charge of it----"

"It will probably be wanted for evidence."

"Come, then." Mr. Rogers led the way back to the entrance, and called
up an order to have the gun lowered by a shore-line; which was done,
the coast guardsmen on the cliffs fending the line clear of the bushes,
and so passing it from one to another until it dangled over the ledge
within grasp. The Commandant, as the taller, reached up for the gun,
took it, and examined it by the light of the lantern which Mr. Rogers
held for him.

The gun was undoubtedly the Lord Proprietor's; a breechloader of
curiously fine workmanship, bearing the name of a famous St. James'
Street maker. Of the hammers, one was down, the other at half-cock;
and, pulling open the breech, the Commandant drew forth two cartridges,
the one empty, the other unused. He pocketed these and examined the
barrels. Clearly, one shot--and one only--had been fired since the gun
was last cleaned.

He invited Mr. Rogers to verify these simple observations; and then,
turning the gun over, was aware of a trace of earth on the
trigger-guard and another on the point of the butt. These were easily
accounted for. The weapon, no doubt, had slid for some distance down
the cliff--probably from the very top--before lodging in the bushes
where Leggo had found it.

Half an hour's exploration of the cave, the cove, the cliff-face, had
yielded no further clue. Mr. Rogers drew off his men, and, embarking
them, started to search the shore to the westward.

By this time some thirty boats had gathered, and through the long
night, in every creek and cranny of the shore, from the extreme east of
Inniscaw to the extreme west of Brefar, the search went on. The wind,
chopping to the north-west, rose to a stiff breeze, and not only blew
bitterly cold, with squalls of rain and sleet, but raised a sea that
made it dangerous to explore the rocks closely. Nevertheless, not a
single boat put back, and not a few took incredible risks.

Day broke--a dull smurr of gray in an interval between two sleet-laden
squalls. In the cheerless light of it the Commandant, who, albeit numb
with cold, had had not yet found time to feel fatigue, caught sight of
Dr. Bonaday's face, and was smitten with sudden compunction. The old
Doctor had sat through six distressful hours like the stoic he was; but
his face showed like that of a corpse, and the usually plump and florid
cheeks of Mr. Pope hung flaccid, blue with the pinch of the cold and
yellow for lack of sleep. The Commandant spoke to the coxswain, and,
running up the gig alongside the jolly-boat, suggested to the
indomitable Mr. Rogers that the men were almost dead-beat, to which,
indeed, the faces of all bore witness in the broadening daylight.

"We must not exhaust ourselves utterly," suggested Mr. Pope. "It is
already day, and the Council of Twelve ought to meet before noon."

"Indeed? Why?" asked the Commandant, absently.

"Why, to advertise the Lord Proprietor's disappearance, with a printed
description of him!"

"Is that necessary? Surely by this time everyone in the Islands has
heard the news; and, as for describing him----"

"It is the proper course to pursue," insisted Mr. Pope, who was
something of a formalist; "in such--er--crises one should proceed
regularly. Doubtless the Council, when called, will proclaim a reward."

"For what?" asked Doctor Bonaday.

Mr. Pope turned on him impatiently; but the Doctor's eyes, like the
simpleton's in Scripture, were fixed on the ends of the earth. "Why,
for the discovery of the body," said Mr. Pope.

"You might offer twenty rewards," said the Commandant. "You cannot make
men work harder than they have worked to-night. Still, if you desire to
summon the Council----"

"I am suggesting that you should do so."

"But I am no longer a member."

"On the contrary, as Governor, you are now its President."

The Commandant reflected for a moment. "True," he murmured, "I keep
forgetting." Pulling himself together, with a shake of the shoulders,
he turned again to Mr. Rogers.

"Mr. Rogers," said he, "you know better than I of how much fatigue your
men are capable. For my part, I am returning to summon the Council of
the Islands to meet me in the Court House at twelve o'clock noon, to
summon volunteers and organize a general search. Your presence and
advice will be of the greatest service to us; and as I see some fresh
boats coming up the Sound, I submit that you leave them your
instructions and draw off your tired crews to take what rest they need"

Mr. Rogers looked up sharply, surprised by the new ring of authority in
the Commandant's voice. "Very well, sir," he answered, after a pause.
"I shall be happy to attend the Council and concert measures with you.
It occurs to me that the body may just possibly have been carried
towards North Island on a back eddy, and with your leave I will tell
the new-coming boats to seek in that direction."

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