The immediate suggestion was, of course, that Harkness had had the cask moved to some other place for safety, and this they set themselves to find out.

‘Get hold of the gang that were unloading this hold,’ said the Inspector.

Broughton darted off and brought up a stevedore’s foreman, from whom they learned that the forehold had been emptied some ten minutes earlier, the men having waited to complete it and then gone for dinner.

‘Where do they get their dinner? Can we get hold of them now?’ asked Mr. Avery.

‘Some of them, sir, I think. Most of them go out into the city, but some use the night watchman’s room where there is a fire.’

‘Let’s go and see,’ said the Inspector, and headed by the foreman they walked some hundred yards along the quay to a small brick building set apart from the warehouses, inside and in front of which sat a number of men, some eating from steaming cans, others smoking short pipes.

‘Any o’ you boys on the Bullfinch’s lower forehold?’ asked the foreman, ‘if so, boss wants you ’alf a sec.’

Three of the men got up slowly and came forward.

‘We want to know, men,’ said the managing director, ‘if you can tell us anything about Harkness and a damaged cask. He was to wait with it till we got down.’

‘Well, he’s gone with it,’ said one of the men, ‘lessn’ ’alf an hour ago.’

‘Gone with it?’

‘Yes. Some toff in blue clothes an’ a black beard came up an’ give ’im a paper, an’ when ’e’d read it ’e calls out an’ sez, sez ’e, ‘’Elp me swing out this ’ere cask,’ ’e says. We ’elps ’im, an’ ’e puts it on a ’orse dray—a four-wheeler. An’ then they all goes off, ’im an’ the cove in the blue togs walkin’ together after the dray.’

‘Any name on the dray?’ asked Mr. Avery.

‘There was,’ replied the spokesman, ‘but I’m blessed if I knows what it was. ’Ere Bill, you was talking about that there name. Where was it?’

Another man spoke.

‘It was Tottenham Court Road, it was. But I didn’t know the street, and I thought that a strange thing, for I’ve lived off the Tottenham Court Road all my life.’

‘Was it East John Street?’ asked Inspector Burnley.

‘Ay, it was something like that. East or West. West, I think. An’ it was something like John. Not John, but something like it.’

‘What colour was the dray?’

‘Blue, very fresh and clean.’

‘Any one notice the colour of the horse?’

But this was beyond them. The horse was out of their line. Its colour had not been observed.

‘Well,’ said Mr. Avery, as the Inspector signed that was all he wanted, ‘we are much obliged to you. Here’s something for you.’

Inspector Burnley beckoned to Broughton.

‘You might describe this man Harkness.’

‘He was a tall chap with a sandy moustache, very high cheek-bones, and a big jaw. He was dressed in brown dungarees and a cloth cap.’

‘You hear that,’ said the Inspector, turning to the plain-clothes men. ‘They have half an hour’s start. Try to get on their track. Try north and east first, as it is unlikely they’d go west for fear of meeting us. Report to headquarters.’

The men hurried away.

‘Now, a telephone,’ continued the Inspector. ‘Perhaps you’d let me use your quay office one.’

They walked to the office, and Mr. Avery arranged for him to get the private instrument in the manager’s room. He rejoined the others in a few minutes.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘that’s all we can do in the meantime. A description of the men and cart will be wired round to all the stations immediately, and every constable in London will be on the look-out for them before very much longer.’

‘Very good that,’ said the managing director.

The Inspector looked surprised.

‘Oh no,’ he said, ‘that’s the merest routine. But now I’m here I would like to make some other inquiries. Perhaps you would tell your people that I’m acting with your approval, as it might make them give their information more willingly.’

Mr. Avery called over Huston, the manager.

‘Huston, this is Inspector Burnley of Scotland Yard. He is making some inquiries about that cask you already heard of. I’ll be glad if you see that he is given every facility.’ He turned to the Inspector. ‘I suppose there’s nothing further I can do to help you? I should be glad to get back to the City again, if possible.’

‘Thank you, Mr. Avery, there’s nothing more. I’ll cruise round here a bit. I’ll let you know how things develop.’

‘Right. Good-bye then, in the meantime.’

The Inspector, left to his own devices, called Broughton and, going on board the Bullfinch, had the clerk’s story repeated in great detail, the actual place where each incident happened being pointed out. He made a search for any object that might have been dropped, but without success, visited the wharf and other points from which the work at the cask might have been overlooked, and generally made himself thoroughly familiar with the circumstances. By the time this was done the other men who had been unloading the forehold had returned from dinner, and he interviewed them, questioning each individually. No additional information was received.

The Inspector then returned to the quay office.

‘I want you,’ he asked Mr. Huston, ‘to be so good as to show me all the papers you have referring to that cask, waybills, forward notes, everything.’

Mr. Huston disappeared, returning in a few seconds with some papers which he handed to Burnley. The latter examined them and then said:—

‘These seem to show that the cask was handed over to the French State Railway at their Rue Cardinet Goods Station, near the Gare St. Lazare, in Paris, by MM. Dupierre et Cie., carriage being paid forward. They ran it by rail to Rouen, where it was loaded on to your Bullfinch.’

‘That is so.’

‘I suppose you cannot say whether the Paris collection was made by a railway vehicle?’

‘No, but I should think not, as otherwise the cartage charges would probably show.’

‘I think I am right in saying that these papers are complete and correct in every detail?’

‘Oh yes, they are perfectly in order.’

‘How do you account for the cask being passed through by the Customs officials without examination?’

‘There was nothing suspicious about it. It bore the label of a well-known and reputable firm, and was invoiced as well as stencilled, ‘Statuary only.’ It was a receptacle obviously suitable for transporting such goods, and its weight was also in accordance. Unless in the event of some suspicious circumstance, cases of this kind are seldom opened.’

‘Thank you, Mr. Huston, that is all I want at present. Now, can I see the captain of the Bullfinch?’

‘Certainly. Come over and I’ll introduce you.’

Captain M’Nabb was a big, rawboned Ulsterman, with a hooked nose and sandy hair. He was engaged in writing up some notes in his cabin.

‘Come in, sir, come in,’ he said, as Huston made the Inspector known. ‘What can I do for you?’

Burnley explained his business. He had only a couple of questions to ask.

‘How is the trans-shipment done from the railway to your boat at Rouen?’

‘The wagons come down on the wharf right alongside. The Rouen stevedores load them, either with the harbour travelling crane or our own winches.’

‘Would it be at all possible for a barrel to be tampered with after it was once aboard?’

‘How do you mean tampered with? A barrel of wine might be tapped, but that’s all could be done.’

‘Could a barrel be changed, or completely emptied and filled with something else?’

‘It could not. The thing’s altogether impossible.’

‘I’m much obliged to you, captain. Good-day.’

Inspector Burnley was nothing if not thorough. He questioned in turn the winch drivers, the engineers, even the cook, and before six o’clock had interviewed every man that had sailed on the Bullfinch from Rouen. The results were unfortunately entirely negative. No information about the cask was forthcoming. No question had been raised about it. Nothing had happened to call attention to it, or that was in any way out of the common.

Puzzled but not disheartened, Inspector Burnley drove back to Scotland Yard, his mind full of the mysterious happenings, and his pocket-book stored with all kinds of facts about the Bullfinch, her cargo, and crew.

Two messages were waiting for him. The first was from Ralston, the plain-clothes man that he had sent from the docks in a northerly direction. It read:—

‘Traced parties as far as north end of Leman Street. Trail lost there.’

The second was from a police station in Upper Head Street:—

‘Parties seen turning from Great Eastern Street into Curtain Road about 1.20 p.m.’

‘H’m, going north-west, are they?’ mused the Inspector taking down a large scale map of the district. ‘Let’s see. Here’s Leman Street. That is, say, due north from St. Katherine’s Docks, and half a mile or more away. Now, what’s the other one?’—he referred to the wire—‘Curtain Road should be somewhere here. Yes, here it is. Just a continuation of the same line, only more west, say, a mile and a half from the docks. So they’re going straight, are they, and using the main streets. H’m. H’m. Now I wonder where they’re heading to. Let’s see.’

The Inspector pondered. ‘Ah, well,’ he murmured at last, ‘we must wait till to-morrow,’ and, sending instructions recalling his two plain-clothes assistants, he went home.

But his day’s work was not done. Hardly had he finished his meal and lit one of the strong, black cigars he favoured, when he was summoned back to Scotland Yard. There waiting for him was Broughton, and with him the tall, heavy-jawed foreman, Harkness.

The Inspector pulled forward two chairs.

‘Sit down, gentlemen,’ he said, when the clerk had introduced his companion, ‘and let me hear your story.’

‘You’ll be surprised to see me so soon again, Mr. Burnley,’ answered Broughton, ‘but, after leaving you, I went back to the office to see if there were any instructions for me, and found our friend here had just turned up. He was asking for the chief, Mr. Avery, but he had gone home. Then he told me his adventures, and as I felt sure Mr. Avery would have sent him to you, I thought my best plan was to bring him along without delay.’

‘And right you were, Mr. Broughton. Now, Mr. Harkness, I would be obliged if you would tell me what happened to you.’

The foreman settled himself comfortably in his chair.

‘Well, sir,’ he began, ‘I think you’re listening to the biggest fool between this and St. Paul’s. I ’ave been done this afternoon, fairly diddled, an’ not once only, but two separate times. ’Owever, I’d better tell you from the beginning.

‘When Mr. Broughton an’ Felix left, I stayed an’ kept an eye on the cask. I got some bits of ’oop iron by way o’ mending it, so that none o’ the boys would wonder why I was ’anging around. I waited the best part of an hour, an’ then Felix came back.

‘“Mr. ’Arkness, I believe?” ’e said.

‘“That’s my name, sir,” I answered.

‘“I ’ave a letter for you from Mr. Avery. P’raps you would kindly read it now,” ’e said.

‘It was a note from the ’ead office, signed by Mr. Avery, an’ it said that ’e ’ad seen Mr. Broughton an’ that it was all right about the cask, an’ for me to give it up to Felix at once. It said too that we ’ad to deliver the cask at the address that was on it, an’ for me to go there along with it and Felix, an’ to report if it was safely delivered.

‘“That’s all right, sir,” said I, an’ I called to some o’ the boys, an’ we got the cask swung ashore an’ on to a four-wheeled dray Felix ’ad waiting. ’E ’ad two men with it, a big, strong fellow with red ’air an’ a smaller dark chap that drove. We turned east at the dock gates, an’ then went up Leman Street an’ on into a part o’ the city I didn’t know.

‘When we ’ad gone a mile or more, the red-’aired man said ’e could do with a drink. Felix wanted ’im to carry on at first, but ’e gave in after a bit an’ we stopped in front o’ a bar. The small man’s name was Watty, an’ Felix asked ’im could ’e leave the ’orse, but Watty, said “No,” an’ then Felix told ’im to mind it while the rest of us went in, an’ ’e would come out soon an’ look after it, so’s Watty could go in ’an get ’is drink. So Felix an’ I an’ Ginger went in, an’ Felix ordered four bottles o’ beer an’ paid for them. Felix drank ’is off, an’ then ’e told us to wait till ’e would send Watty in for ’is, an’ went out. As soon as ’e ’ad gone Ginger leant over an’ whispered to me, “Say, mate, wot’s ’is game with the blooming cask? I lay you five to one ’e ’as something crooked on.”

‘“Why,” said I, “I don’t know about that.” You see, sir, I ’ad thought the same myself, but then Mr. Avery wouldn’t ’ave written wot it was all right if it wasn’t.

‘“Well, see ’ere,” said Ginger, “maybe if you an’ I was to keep our eyes skinned, it might put a few quid in our pockets.”

‘“’Ow’s that?” said I.

‘“’Ow’s it yourself?” said ’e. “If ’e ’as some game on wi’ the cask ’e’ll not be wanting for to let any outsiders in. If you an’ me was to offer for to let them in for ’im, ’e’d maybe think we was worth something.”

‘Well, gentlemen, I thought over that, an’ first I wondered if this chap knew there was a body in the cask, an’ I was going to see if I couldn’t find out without giving myself away. Then I thought maybe ’e was on the same lay, an’ was pumping me. So I thought I would pass it off a while, an’ I said:—

‘“Would Watty come in?”

‘Ginger said “No,” that three was too many for a job o’ that kind, an’ we talked on a while. Then I ’appened to look at Watty’s beer standing there, an’ I wondered ’e ’hadn’t been in for it.

‘“That beer won’t keep,” I said. “If that blighter wants it ’e’d better come an’ get it.”

‘Ginger sat up when ’e ’eard that.

‘“Wots wrong with ’im?” ’e said. “I’ll drop out an’ see.”

‘I don’t know why, gentlemen, but I got a kind o’ notion there was something in the air, an’ I followed ’im out. The dray was gone. We looked up an’ down the street, but there wasn’t a sign of it nor Felix nor Watty.

‘“Blow me, if they ’aven’t given us the slip,” shouted Ginger. “Get a move on. You go that way an’ I’ll go this, an’ one of us is bound to see them at the corner.”

‘I guessed I was on to the game then. These three were wrong ’uns, an’ they were out to get rid o’ the body, an’ they didn’t want me around to see the grave. All that about the drinks was a plan to get me away from the dray, an’ Ginger’s talk was only to keep me quiet till the others got clear. Well, two o’ them ’ad got quit o’ me right enough, but I was blessed if the third would.

‘“No, you don’t, ol’ pal,” I said. “I guess you an’ me’ll stay together.” I took ’is arm an’ ’urried ’im on the way ’e ’ad wanted to go ’imself. But when we got to the corner there wasn’t sign o’ the dray. They ’ad given us the slip about proper.

‘Ginger cursed an’ raved, an’ wanted to know ’oo was going to pay ’im for ’is day. I tried to get out of ’im ’oo ’e was an’ ’oo ’ad ’ired ’im, but ’e wasn’t giving anything away. I kept close beside ’im, for I knew ’e’d ’ave to go ’ome some time, an’ I thought if I saw where ’e lived it would be easy to find out where ’e worked, an’ so likely get ’old o’ Felix. ’E tried different times to juke away from me, an’ ’e got real mad when ’e found ’e couldn’t.

‘We walked about for more than three hours till it was near five o’clock, an’ then we ’ad some more beer, an’ when we came out o’ the bar we stood at the corner o’ two streets an’ thought wot we’d do next. An’ then suddenly Ginger lurched up against me, an’ I drove fair into an old woman that was passing, an’ nearly knocked ’er over. I caught ’er to keep ’er from falling—I couldn’t do no less—but when I looked round, I’m blessed if Ginger wasn’t gone. I ran down one street first, an’ then down the other, an’ then I went back into the bar, but never a sight of ’im did I get. I cursed myself for every kind of a fool, an’ then I thought I’d better go back an’ tell Mr. Avery anyway. So I went to Fenchurch Street, an’ Mr. Broughton brought me along ’ere.’

There was silence when the foreman ceased speaking, while Inspector Burnley, in his painstaking way, considered the statement he had heard, as well as that made by Broughton earlier in the day. He reviewed the chain of events in detail, endeavouring to separate out the undoubted facts from what might be only the narrator’s opinions. If the two men were to be believed, and Burnley had no reason for doubting either, the facts about the discovery and removal of the cask were clear, with one exception. There seemed to be no adequate proof that the cask really did contain a corpse.

‘Mr. Broughton tells me he thought there was a body in the cask. Do you agree with that, Mr. Harkness?’

‘Yes, sir, there’s no doubt of it. We both saw a woman’s hand.’

‘But might it not have been a statue? The cask was labelled ‘Statuary,’ I understand.’

‘No, sir, it wasn’t no statue. Mr. Broughton thought that at first, but when ’e looked at it again ’e gave in I was right. It was a body, sure enough.’

Further questions showed that both men were convinced the hand was real, though neither could advance any grounds for their belief other than that he ‘knew from the look of it.’ The Inspector was not satisfied that their opinion was correct, though he thought it probable. He also noted the possibility of the cask containing a hand only or perhaps an arm, and it passed through his mind that such a thing might be backed by a medical student as a somewhat gruesome practical joke. Then he turned to Harkness again.

‘Have you the letter Felix gave you on the Bullfinch?’

‘Yes, sir,’ replied the foreman, handing it over.

It was written in what looked like a junior clerk’s handwriting on a small-sized sheet of business letter paper. It bore the I. and C.’s ordinary printed heading, and read:—

5th April, 1912.

‘MR. HARKNESS,

on s.s. Bullfinch,

St. Katherine’s Docks.

‘Re Mr. Broughton’s conversation with you about cask for Mr. Felix.

‘I have seen Mr. Broughton and Mr. Felix on this matter, and am satisfied the cask is for Mr. Felix and should be delivered immediately.

‘On receipt of this letter please hand it over to Mr. Felix without further delay.

‘As the Company is liable for its delivery at the address it bears, please accompany it as the representative of the Company, and report to me of its safe arrival in due course.

‘For the I. and C. S. N. Co., Ltd.,

‘X. Avery,

‘per X. X.,

‘Managing Director.’

The initials shown ‘X’ were undecipherable and were apparently written by a person in authority, though curiously the word ‘Avery’ in the same hand was quite clear.

‘It’s written on your Company’s paper anyway,’ said the Inspector to Broughton. ‘I suppose that heading is yours and not a fake?’

‘It’s ours right enough,’ returned the clerk, ‘but I’m certain the letter’s a forgery for all that.’

‘I should imagine so, but just how do you know?’

‘For several reasons, sir. Firstly, we do not use that quality of paper for writing our own servants; we have a cheaper form of memorandum for that. Secondly, all our stuff is typewritten; and thirdly, that is not the signature of any of our clerks.’

‘Pretty conclusive. It is evident that the forger did not know either your managing director’s or your clerks’ initials. His knowledge was confined to the name Avery, and from your statement we can conceive Felix having just that amount of information.’

‘But how on earth did he get our paper?’

Burnley smiled.

‘Oh, well, that’s not so difficult. Didn’t your head clerk give it to him?’

‘By Jove! sir, I see it now. He got a sheet of paper and an envelope to write to Mr. Avery. He left the envelope and vanished with the sheet.’

‘Of course. It occurred to me when Mr. Avery told me of the empty envelope. I guessed what he was going to do, and therefore I hurried to the docks in the hope of being before him. And now about that label on the cask. You might describe it again as fully as you can.’

‘It was a card about six inches long by four high, fastened on by tacks all round the edge. Along the top was Dupierre’s name and advertisement, and in the bottom right-hand corner was a space about three inches by two for the address. There was a thick, black line round this space, and the card had been cut along this line so as to remove the enclosed portion and leave a hole three inches by two. The hole had been filled by pasting a sheet of paper or card behind the label. Felix’s address was therefore written on this paper, and not on the original card.’

‘A curious arrangement. How do you explain it?’

‘I thought perhaps Dupierre’s people had temporarily run out of labels and were making an old one do again.’

Burnley replied absently, as he turned the matter over in his mind. The clerk’s suggestion was of course possible, in fact, if the cask really contained a statue, it was the likely one. On the other hand, if it held a body, he imagined the reason was further to seek. In this case he thought it improbable that the cask had come from Dupierre’s at all and, if not, what had happened? A possible explanation occurred to him. Suppose some unknown person had received a statue from Dupierre’s in the cask and, before returning the latter, had committed a murder. Suppose he wanted to get rid of the body by sending it somewhere in the cask. What would he do with the label? Why, what had been done. He would wish to retain Dupierre’s printed matter in order to facilitate the passage of the cask through the Customs, but he would have to change the written address. The Inspector could think of no better way of doing this than by the alteration that had been made. He turned again to his visitors. ‘Well gentlemen, I’m greatly obliged to you for your prompt call and information, and if you will give me your addresses, I think that is all we can do to-night.’

Inspector Burnley again made his way home. But it was not his lucky night. About half-past nine he was again sent for from the Yard. Some one wanted to speak to him urgently on the telephone.

CHAPTER III