the last cheque

The three elderly gentlemen, seated in Mr. Halfpenny’s private room, listened with intense, if silent, interest to Selwood’s account of the interview with Barthorpe. It was a small bundle of news that he had brought back and two of his hearers showed by their faces that they attached little importance to it. But Professor Cox-Raythwaite caught eagerly at the mere scrap of suggestion.

“Tertius!—Halfpenny!” he exclaimed. “That must be followed up—we must follow it up at once. That bank-note may be a most valuable and effective clue.”

Mr. Halfpenny showed a decided incredulity and dissent.

“I don’t see it,” he answered. “Don’t see it at all, Cox-Raythwaite. What is there in it? What clue can there be in the fact that Barthorpe picked up a hundred pound bank-note from his uncle’s writing-desk? Lord bless me!—why, every one of us four men knows very well that hundred pound notes were as common to Jacob Herapath as half-crowns are to any of us! He was a man who carried money in large amounts on him always—I’ve expostulated with him about it. Don’t you know—no, I dare say you don’t though, because you never had business dealings with him, and perhaps Tertius doesn’t, either, because he, like you, only knew him as a friend—you don’t know that Jacob had a peculiarity. Perhaps Mr. Selwood knows of it, though, as he was his secretary.”

“What peculiarity?” asked the Professor. “I know he had several fads, which one might call peculiarities.”

“He had a business peculiarity,” replied Mr. Halfpenny, “and it was well known to people in his line of business. You know that Jacob Herapath had extensive, unusually extensive, dealings in real property—land and houses. Quite apart from the Herapath Flats, he dealt on wide lines with real estate; he was always buying and selling. And his peculiarity was that all his transactions in this way were done by cash—bank-notes or gold—instead of by cheque. It didn’t matter if he was buying a hundred thousand pounds’ worth of property, or selling two hundred thousand pounds’ worth—the affairs had to be completed by payment in that fashion. I’ve scolded him about it scores of times; he only laughed at me; he said that had been the custom when he went into the business, and he’d stuck to it, and wasn’t going to give it up. God bless me!” concluded Mr. Halfpenny, with emphasis. “I ought to know, for Jacob Herapath has concluded many an operation in this very room, and at this very table—I’ve seen him handle many a hundred thousand pounds’ worth of notes in my time, paying or receiving! And, as I said, the mere picking up of a hundred pound note from his desk is—why, it’s no more than if I picked up a few of those coppers that are lying there on my chimney-piece!”

“Just so, just so!” observed Mr. Tertius mildly. “Jacob was a very wealthy man—the money evidence was everywhere.”

But Professor Cox-Raythwaite only laughed and smote the table with his big fist.

“My dear Halfpenny!” he exclaimed. “Why, you’ve just given us the very best proof of what I’ve been saying! You’re not looking deeply enough into things. The very fact to which you bear testimony proves to me that a certain theory which is assuming shape in my mind may possibly have a great deal in it. That theory, briefly, is this—on the day of his death, Jacob Herapath may have had upon his person a large amount of money in bank-notes. He may have had them paid to him. He may have drawn them from his bank, to pay to somebody else. Some evil person may have been aware of his possession of those notes and have tracked him to the estate offices, or gained entrance, or—mark this!—have been lurking—lurking!—there, in order to rob him. Don’t forget two points, my friend—one, that Barthorpe (if he’s speaking the truth, and I, personally, believe he is) tells us that the doors of the offices and the private room were open when he called at twelve o’clock; and, too, that, according to Mountain, the coachman, Jacob Herapath had been in those offices since twenty-five minutes to twelve—plenty of time for murder and robbery to take place. I repeat—Jacob may have had a considerable sum of money on him that night, some one may have known it, and the motive of his murder may have been—probably was—sheer robbery. And we ought to go on that, if we want to save the family honour.”

Mr. Tertius nodded and murmured assent, and Mr. Halfpenny stirred uneasily in his chair.

“Family honour!” he said. “Yes, yes, that’s right, of course. It would be a dreadful thing to see a nephew hanged for the murder of his uncle—quite right!”

“A much more dreadful thing to stand by and see an innocent man hanged, without moving heaven and earth to clear him,” commented the Professor. “Come now, I helped to establish the fact that Barthorpe visited Portman Square that night—Tertius there helped too, by his quickness in seeing that the half-eaten sandwich had been bitten into by a man who had lost two front teeth, which, of course, was Barthorpe’s case—so the least we can do is to bestir ourselves now that we believe him to have told the truth in that statement.”

“But how exactly are we to bestir ourselves?” asked Mr. Halfpenny.

“I suggest a visit to Jacob Herapath’s bankers, first of all,” answered the Professor. “I haven’t heard that any particular inquiry has been made. Did you make any, Halfpenny?”

“Jacob’s bankers are Bittleston, Stocks and Bittleston,” replied the old lawyer. “I did make it in my way to drop in there and to see Mr. Playbourne, the manager of their West End branch, in Piccadilly. He assured me that there was nothing whatever out of the common in Jacob Herapath’s transactions with them just before his death, and nothing at all in their particulars of his banking account which could throw any possible light on his murder.”

“In his opinion,” said the Professor, caustically, “in his opinion, Halfpenny! But—you don’t know what our opinion might be. Now, I suggest that we all go at once to see this Mr. Playbourne; there’s ample time before the bank closes for the day.”

“Very well,” assented Mr. Halfpenny. “All the same, I’m afraid Playbourne will only say just what he said before.”

Mr. Playbourne, a good typical specimen of the somewhat old-fashioned bank manager, receiving this formidable deputation of four gentlemen in his private room, said precisely what he had said before, and seemed astonished to think that any light upon such an unpleasant thing as a murder could possibly be derived from so highly respectable a quarter as that in which he moved during the greater part of the day.

“I can’t think of anything in our transactions with the late Mr. Herapath that gives any clue, any idea, anything at all,” he said, somewhat querulously. “Mr. Herapath’s transactions with us, right up to the day of his death, were just what they had been for years. Of course, I’m willing to tell you anything, show you anything. You’re acting for Miss Wynne, aren’t you, Mr. Halfpenny?”

“I have a power of attorney from Miss Wynne, for that matter,” answered Mr. Halfpenny. “Everything of that sort’s in my hands.”

“I’ll tell you what, then,” said the bank manager, laying his hand on a bell at his side. “You’d better see Jacob Herapath’s pass-book. I recently had it posted up to the day of his death, and of course we’ve retained it until you demanded it. You can’t have a better index to his affairs with us than you’ll find in it. Sellars,” he went on, as a clerk appeared, “bring me the late Mr. Herapath’s pass-book—Mr. Ravensdale has it.”

The visitors presently gathered round the desk on which Mr. Playbourne laid the parchment-bound book—one of a corresponding thickness with the dead man’s transactions. The manager turned to the pages last filled in.

“You’re aware, of course, some of you at any rate,” he said, “you, Mr. Halfpenny, and you, Mr. Selwood, that the late Jacob Herapath dealt in big sums. He always had a very large balance at this branch of our bank; he was continually paying in and drawing out amounts which, to men of less means, must needs seem tremendous. Now, you can see for yourselves what his transactions with us were during the last few days of his life; I, as I have said, see nothing out of the way in them—you, of course,” he continued, with a sniff, “may see a good deal!”

Professor Cox-Raythwaite ran his eye over the neatly-written pages, passing rapidly on to the important date—November 12th. And he suddenly thrust out his arm and put the tip of a big yellow finger on one particular entry.

“There!” he exclaimed. “Look at that. ‘Self, £5,000.’ Paid out, you see, on November 12th. Do you see?”

Mr. Playbourne laughed cynically.

“My dear sir!” he said. “Do you mean to say that you attach any importance to an entry like that? Jacob Herapath constantly drew cheques to self for five, ten, twenty, thirty—aye, fifty thousand pounds! He dealt in tens of thousands—he was always buying or selling. Five thousand pounds!—a fleabite!”

“All the same, if you please,” said the Professor quietly, “I should like to know if Jacob Herapath presented that self cheque himself, and if so, how he took the money it represents.”

“Oh, very well!” said the manager resignedly. He touched his bell again, and looked wearily at the clerk who answered it. “Find out if the late Mr. Herapath himself presented a cheque for five thousand on November 12th, and if so, how he took it,” he said. “Well,” he continued, turning to his visitors. “Do you see anything with any further possible mystery attached to it?”

“There’s an entry there—the last,” observed Mr. Halfpenny. “That. ‘Dimambro: three thousand guineas.’ That’s the same date.”

Mr. Playbourne suddenly showed some interest and animation. His eyes brightened; he sat up erect.

“Ah!” he said. “Well, now, that is somewhat remarkable, that entry!—though of course there’s nothing out of the common in it. But that cheque was most certainly the very last ever drawn by Jacob Herapath, and according to strict law, it never ought to have been paid out by us.”

“Why?” asked Professor Cox-Raythwaite.

“Because Jacob Herapath, the drawer, was dead before it was presented,” replied the manager. “But of course we didn’t know that. The cheque, you see, was drawn on November 12th, and it was presented here as soon as ever the doors were opened next morning and before any of us knew of what had happened during the night, and it was accordingly honoured in the usual way.”

“The payee, of course, was known?” observed Mr. Halfpenny.

“No, he was not known, but he endorsed the cheque with name and address, and there can be no reason whatever to doubt that it had come to him in the ordinary way of business,” replied the manager. “Quite a usual transaction, but, as I say, noteworthy, because, as you know, a cheque is no good after its drawer’s demise.”

Professor Cox-Raythwaite, who appeared to have fallen into a brown study for a moment, suddenly looked up.

“Now I wonder if we might be permitted to see that cheque—as a curiosity?” he said. “Can we be favoured so far?”

“Oh, certainly, certainly,” answered Mr. Playbourne. “No trouble. I’ll—ah, here’s your information about the other cheque—the self cheque for five thousand.”

He took a slip of paper from the clerk who just then entered, and read it aloud.

“Here you are,” he said. “‘Mr. Herapath cashed cheque for £5,000 himself, at three o’clock; the money in fifty notes of £100 each, numbered as follows’—you can take this slip, if you like,” he continued, handing the paper to Professor Cox-Raythwaite, as the obviously most interested man of his party. “There are the numbers of the notes. Of course, I can’t see how all this throws any light on the mystery of Herapath’s murder, but perhaps you can. Sellers,” he continued, turning to the clerk, and beckoning him to look at the pass-book, “find me the cheque referred to there, and bring it here.”

The clerk returned in a few minutes with the cheque, which Mr. Playbourne at once exhibited to his visitors.

“There you are, gentlemen,” he said. “Quite a curiosity!—certainly the last cheque ever drawn by our poor friend. There, you see, is his well-known signature with his secret little mark which you wouldn’t detect—secret between him and us, eh!—big, bold handwriting, wasn’t it? Sad to think that that was—very likely—the last time he used a pen!”

Professor Cox-Raythwaite in his turn handled the cheque. Its face gave him small concern; what he was most interested in was the endorsement on the back. Without saying anything to his companions, he memorized that endorsement, and he was still murmuring it to himself when, a few minutes later, he walked out of the bank.

“Luigi Dimambro, Hotel Ravenna, Soho.”

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