Читать книгу A Broken Memory - Fred M. White - Страница 8

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Evidently Garden had been as good as his word, for it still wanted a few minutes to 11 o'clock when a two seater car stopped outside the gate of the cottage and two men in uniform came up the path and knocked at the door.

"You are Miss Brooke, I think," the taller man of the two, with the black board, asked, as Gladys opened the door. "I am the inspector of police from Marwich, and have come over here, at once, in response to the telephone call from Dr. Carden. He tells me that your patient need not be disturbed, and there is no occasion for me to see him. But, if you don't mind, miss, I should like to examine the suit of clothes he was wearing and the contents of his kit-bag. We have already sent out a general call round the district, and that, for the present, is all I can do. May I see that wardrobe?"

Gladys came down to the dining-room with what was required, and the inspector made a thorough examination of the tweed lounge suit that the injured man had been wearing at the time of the outrage. But a careful search of the pockets revealed nothing beyond a plain gold cigarette case and a brown leather pocket book which contained a very large sum in Bank of England notes. The inspector shook his head gravely.

"Here, I think, miss, we have the motive for the assault," he said. "There is over £500 here. But not a sign of a letter so far as I can see. There is not even a tailor's name on the tab behind the collar of the coat. Yes, shirt and underclothing and soft collar are all practically new and none of it is marked. Soft collar has evidently been made to order, for it hasn't even the maker's name on it. But perhaps I shall find some identity mark on the suitcase."

There, again, he was disappointed. Beyond a railway label from Liverpool Street to Marwich, which had evidently been affixed quite recently, there was nothing likely to be of the slightest use. The suitcase contained further articles of clothing and enough linen and odds and ends of that kind to last the ordinary man for quite a long stay in the house which he had evidently intended to visit. Beyond that everything seemed to end in a sort of blind alley.

"The mystery deepens," the inspector murmured. "There is evidently a great deal more here than meets the eye. It is quite certain that the injured man came down from Liverpool Street to-day and got out at Marwich with the intention of seeing somebody in this neighbourhood. It is certain, moreover, that he meant to stay for a few days, at least, or he would not have brought all this stuff with him. Now, as you know miss, Marwich is at the end of a branch line which goes no further. So whoever your mysterious visitor wanted to see, it was someone within walking distance from Marwich station. I think, from what Dr. Carden said, your involuntary guest is a gentleman."

"Of that there is not the slightest doubt," Gladys agreed. "Unmistakably a gentleman of position, exceedingly nice-looking, with very attractive features."

"Ah, just as I was informed. Now, doesn't it strike you as rather strange that a man like that should come down here to stay with somebody who lives at least four miles from Marwich without either engaging a conveyance or having a car or something of that sort to meet him. He must have walked at least four miles, lugging that heavy bag."

"Yes, but he might have come down unexpectedly," Gladys pointed out. "Or there may have been some mistake about the time of the train."

"Yes, that is possible," the inspector agreed. "But it seems to me as if your guest didn't want anyone to know where he was going. At any rate, I feel pretty sure that the man who tried to murder him knew all about his movements. Otherwise, he would never have been attacked in the way he was in a lonely country lane. I haven't seen the blacksmith, Walton, but I understand he is prepared to swear that, almost directly the attack was made, he saw the assailant searching the body."

"That is perfectly true," Gladys said.

"Yes, and no doubt he was looking for these banknotes. However, we must put that possibility aside for the moment. What we have to do now is to circulate an account of this outrage in the hope that somebody in this locality will come forward and identify the poor fellow who is lying upstairs. Somebody is sure to be looking for him at the present moment."

The inspector went off a little later and Gladys repaired to the sick-room where, during the whole of the night, she shared her vigil with Marta. And then, for the next two days, the wounded man lay there, quite unconscious whilst the whole countryside was in a ferment of excitement regarding the crime which had taken place in its midst. But though the story was broadcast and appeared displayed in the press, strange to say, not a soul came forward who could throw light on the mystery. Nobody, even in the neighbourhood or anywhere else, for that matter, seemed to have lost a relative who had gone out from his home or his rooms or hotel with the object of spending a few days with friends in the vicinity of Marwich. The police were utterly baffled and the Marwich inspector, who came over to the cottage more than once in the hope of picking up some sort of a clue, confessed himself beaten.

"Why not call in Scotland Yard?" Gladys asked.

"Well, you see, we don't quite like to do that, miss," the inspector explained. "And the Yard doesn't like it either. Of course, if we can't get hold of something within a few days, our chief constable might think it his duty to ask advice and help from headquarters and only then if some relative comes forward and desires additional aid. By that I mean somebody who has lost a relative and goes straight to the Yard about it. All we can do is to wait and hope that the injured man will come round and tell us all about it."

It was two days later, however, before the man lying upstairs in the spare room showed the slightest signs of life. Then, one afternoon, he opened his eyes and gazed dreamily round him. They were very pleasant, frank-looking eyes, which held a strong attraction for Gladys, who happened to be on duty at the moment. She moved anxiously forward.

"Yes?" she asked. "Yes? What is it you want?"

The man lying on the bed stared at her blankly, as if he had just come out of another world, which, probably he had.

"I don't know you," he whispered.

"Quite naturally," Gladys smiled. "You met with an accident. You were going along the road here in the dark and something struck you on the back of the head. I know that, because I was almost near enough to hear it. But please don't talk unless you want to. There is plenty of time."

The eyes closed rather wearily and then, after the interval of a few minutes, opened again in the blank, helpless way that reminded Gladys of those of a child.

"I don't know you," he repeated. "I don't know who you are or how I got here...... pretty girl, very pretty girl. Reminds me of someone I used to know.... I don't know. I want to go to sleep. Let me go to sleep, pretty girl."

Still, it was not sleep so much as torpor that seemed to overcome the patient, because, presently, the heavy fit passed and he was, once more, looking into Gladys' face.

"Tell me your name," she asked gently.

"My name," the sufferer echoed. "I haven't got a name. I must have had one once, but I forget what it was. Forget everything, just as if I had been born yesterday. What's the matter with me? Why am I lying here when I am quite all right? Why, why did—oh, I've forgotten again."

This time the eyes seemed to close finally, and, once more, the patient slept in earnest. Gladys slipped out of the room and hurried from the cottage into the road.

"I am going to fetch the doctor," she explained to Marta. "That poor fellow has spoken, and I think Dr. Carden ought to know. You go upstairs, Marta, and take my place."

"That's all right, miss," Marta said cheerfully. "That sick room wants a bit of tidying up, and it's about time that suit of clothes the poor gentleman was wearing were brushed and folded. Why, I haven't even unpacked the things out of the suitcase. Nor hung them up as I ought to have done. You go your way, Miss Gladys, and leave it all to me."

It was some time before Gladys returned. The doctor was on his way to a pressing case, for she met him at his gate, but he promised to come along in the course of an hour or so.

"That's good news you've brought," he said. "I was beginning to get a bit frightened. Still, now that consciousness has come back, the odds are all in favour of a recovery."

"But his memory seems to have gone," Gladys said.

"Um, that is not too satisfactory. This might be a long job. Now, you go into the house and ask Joan to give you a cup of tea. You look absolutely fagged out."

So Gladys entered the doctor's house, where his wife gave her the needed cup of tea, and it was over an hour before she got back to the cottage again. There she found Marta in a state of what might be called mild excitement.

"I think I have found something, miss," the old servant exclaimed. "Leastwise, I might have done so. When I was brushing that poor gentleman's trousers, I felt something hard like a bit of metal inside the turn-up of the leg. So I took the liberty of unpicking it and I found this."

Marta held up a bright piece of steel which might have passed for a Yale latch-key, stamped on it on a lozenge-shaped shield were the figures 255, K.R. Co. C.T.

"But it doesn't tell us much, Marta. Still it's something, at any rate."