FREDERICK HOLDFAST MAKES THE DISCOVERY.

Frederick Holdfast slept until late in the morning. Awaking, he looked at his watch, which marked the hour of eleven. He did not begrudge the time spent in sleep. It had refreshed and strengthened him, and he knew it would not be prudent on his part to work during the day in any room in which he would run the risk of being observed by the neighbours. He had not been disturbed; when he awoke his revolver was in his hand, and perfect stillness reigned throughout the house.

In his state of mind inaction was a torture to him, and he could not content himself with sitting idly down. Imprisoned as it were, while daylight lasted, to the basement, into the rooms in which passers-by in the Square above could not peer, he resolved to examine carefully every inch of the floor and walls in the kitchen and passage. The shutters of the area-windows were closed, and darkness prevailed. His lantern, therefore, served him in as good stead by day as it had done by night; he trimmed the lamp carefully, and prepared for what he had no hope would be anything but a fruitless task. He only undertook it, indeed, for the purpose of occupying the time during which he was shut out from the upper part of the house, to the windows in which there were no shutters. It comforted him to think that his dear girl was within a short distance of him; a few inches of wall separated them, and they were thinking of each other, praying for each other.

He commenced in the passage, tracking the marks of his father’s dying steps upon the floor, and of his hands upon the walls. Inclined as he was to the closest examination, his attention was arrested by a slight scratch upon the wall, which he found repeated, both above and below, wherever his father had rested his hand for support in his descent to the kitchen. The scratch was very slight, and was not to be found upon any part of the wall which the dying man had not touched with his hand. The fading stains within which these scratches were observable appeared to have been made by a clenched hand; the marks of the knuckles could be traced. The inference Frederick Holdfast drew from these signs was that his father had a distinct motive in keeping his hand closed, and that the hand held something he wanted to deposit in safe keeping before life left his poor wounded body. It was for this reason, then, Frederick argued, following out the train of thought, as much as for any other, that the mortally-wounded man had, in his death-agony, made his way to the kitchen, where he believed the servant was asleep. In her hands he would place the treasure his clenched hand guarded, and, that supreme effort accomplished, he would then be content to die, comforted by the thought that he left behind him a clue by which the innocent might be saved and the guilty punished. What was this treasure which had been so carefully guarded by a man who had but a few moments to live? He had been unable to place it in the safe possession of a friend to justice. Had it been found by one whose interest it was to conceal it, or had it escaped all eyes, to be discovered by the son he had unwittingly wronged? This last surmise was scarcely needed by Frederick to prompt him to search in every unlikely nook and cranny in the passage and stairs; but when he raised the light to the kitchen door, and saw there the fatal hand-mark, and with it the almost imperceptible scratch repeated, he knew that he had wasted his time, and that whatever it was his father had held in his hand he had carried into the kitchen with him. To this room, therefore, he confined his search, and after being occupied in it for hours—until, indeed, he heard the church clock strike five—was about to give it up in despair, when his eyes fell upon what looked like a small piece of metal, firmly imbedded in a crevice of the floor. It had evidently been trodden into the crevice by heavy boots, and it was with difficulty Frederick dug it out. It proved to be a key, small enough for a drawer in a desk.

Frederick immediately went into the passage to ascertain whether he was right in his idea that the scratches had been produced by this key, and holding it between his knuckles, as his father might have done, and placing his hand upon the wall, he was satisfied of its probability. It was not strange that an object so small had escaped the notice of the police or the people in the house. As the dying man fell to the ground, the key may have been struck out of his hand by the shock, and being at some distance from the body, had been trodden down into the crevice by the policeman’s feet. After that, nothing but such a minute examination as Frederick had carried out could have brought it to light.

Quick as his eager thought would allow him, Frederick followed his train of argument in logical sequence. It was this key which his father wished to place in the servant’s hands before he died; it was this key which was to unravel the mystery of his life and death in No.119 Great Porter Square. The drawer of the desk which the key would unlock contained the record which would make all things clear. It had been in the house; the furniture had not been removed; it was still in the house. But not in the room occupied by his father. If it were there, Pelham would have been certain to have found it. In that room every lock had been forced, every scrap of paper examined. No!—The document had been placed in another room for safety. The murdered man, acquainted with the character of the persons who had brought disgrace upon him, had taken the precaution to secure his written thoughts and wishes from their prying eyes. Mr. Pelham was working on a wrong scent; his labour had been thrown away. Frederick knew, from the inquiries of the detective in his employ, that the adjoining room to that his father had occupied—the room from which he had, on the previous night, watched the proceedings of his father’s murderer (for upon that point now Frederick was morally convinced)—had, during the last four days of his father’s tenancy, been vacant. What more likely than that this very room contained a drawer which the key would fit?

He trembled with eagerness, feeling that he was on the brink of discovery, and the shock of these mental revelations, which a few minutes would see verified, was so great that a faintness stole over his senses. Then he remembered that he had partaken of but little food during the day. He knew not what was before him in the night to come; he needed all his strength.

He sat down resolutely, curbing his impatience, and ate and drank his fill. When he had finished his meal, he felt that he had acted well and with prudence. He was ready now for any emergency, equal to any effort.

It was by this time dark, and he could move into the upper part of the house with comparative safety. All day long the rain had been plashing into the area with a dismal sound; the dreariness of the weather and the dreariness of the house would have daunted any man who had not a serious purpose to sustain him. Frederick had held no further communication with the detective; during the day it was impracticable. But it had been arranged between them that when night came, the detective, if he had anything of importance to communicate, should drop a letter into the area, of course at such time and in such a way as should afford no chance of detection. Before going upstairs with his precious key, Frederick cautiously opened the door which led into the area, and saw that a small packet of brown paper had been dropped during the day. He picked it up and opened it; there was a stone inside, and round the stone a sheet of note paper, on which was written, in the detective’s handwriting:

Not being in want of help at present, Frederick destroyed the letter, and went upstairs to the first floor. Opening the door of the room his father had occupied, he saw that no person had entered it during the day; everything was as Pelham had left it early in the morning. Frederick, by the light of his lantern, looked around for drawer or desk. A chest of drawers was there, unlocked and empty; a desk also, which had been broken open, and which the key he had found would not fit. As he left the room he saw, lying in a corner of the wall, a large key. It was the key of his father’s room. He put it in the lock, and it turned easily.

“Pelham would be astonished to-night,” he thought, “if, when he came, he found the door locked against him. But that would be putting him on his guard. I will open the trap for him instead of closing it. Murderer! Your hour is approaching!”

He unlocked the door, and put the key in his pocket, with no distinct intention, but with an idea that it might in some way prove useful. When in his thought the unspoken words came to his mind, “I will open the trap for him instead of closing it,” he had not the dimmest comprehension of their awful significance, or of the fearful manner in which they were to be verified.

He entered the adjoining room in which he had kept his long and painful watch on the previous night. In the room was a sideboard, and to this he first directed his attention. The key he had found in the kitchen was too small for either of the sideboards, and as they were locked, he forced them open. There was nothing inside but some mouldy biscuits and a couple of old-fashioned decanters, with dregs of wine in them. He felt about for secret drawers, but found none. A cupboard next attracted his attention, and he searched it carefully. It contained plates and wine glasses, a shell box and a shell caddy, with views of Margate on them. Both were open, and he discovered nothing on the shelves which was likely to bring his search to a successful issue. Before proceeding further he thought—in case Pelham should take it into his head to commence his work early on this which he declared should be his last night in No.119—it would be well to replace the table which had fallen over when he stepped from it. He raised it carefully and replaced it on its carved feet. It was a round table of Spanish mahogany, and was a contrast to the other furniture in the room, being old-fashioned and of ancient make. As he raised it, one of the lower surfaces upon which he placed his hand shifted slightly, and the thought flashed through his mind that there might be a drawer beneath. He stooped and looked upward, and saw that his impression was a correct one. A drawer was there, evidently intended as a secret drawer; it was locked. With trembling hands he tried the key. It fitted the lock, turned, and the drawer was open—and there, beneath his eyes, were some sheets of folio paper, upon which he recognised his dead father’s handwriting.

He drew forth the sheets and rapidly scanned them. They were in the form of a diary, and contained the record of his father’s last days, or perhaps his last hours. Tears filled his eyes as he gazed at the beloved memorial of a dear one, from whose heart he had been torn by the foulest treachery. He dashed the tears away. No time now for grief; a sterner duty than that of mourning for the dead was before him. In his hands he held the vindication of his good name, and, he hoped, the means of bringing the guilty to punishment. He must to work at once, and read the words the dead had written for him. He went down to the kitchen, and, setting the door open so that no sound made in the house should escape his ears, commenced the perusal of his murdered father’s diary.