The Eight of Swords

sulkily and banged his mug down on the table. 'Tell 'ee 'tes nowt 'ow the Princess Mary was blowed up, and if the’ can't take the ward of a gunner in Is Majesty's Sarvice, look, then Gawd bless me, look! I’l1—' Bang! went the tankard again, and he glared at his opponent. A stout harassed barmaid hopped past with a tray of glasses; she seemed to be moving her head to avoid the layers of tobacco smoke, and giving an absent-minded smile to everybody. She said, 'Tcha, tcha!' to the contestants, who then appealed to the proprietor. This latter was a pacifying dignitary in shirt sleeves, with a wary eye out: he stood behind the bar in a wilderness of beer cases, his arms folded; but he would jerk to life the moment a hand was raised for more beer. He sprang forward as Donovan approached the bar.

Hugh changed his mind, said, 'Whisky and soda,' and fixed his eyes on a polished brass plate on a shelf beside him. Despite the smoke and blur, he could see the door to the passage and the other room reflected there. Spinelli was directly in line with it. The other room seemed to be a sort of parlor; and Spinelli slouched in a large tasselled chair, defiantly. Even Hugh could hear the whispers in the noise there—'that genlman,' 'dreffle murder,' 'Sh-shh!' drowned out by the bang of the piano. Subtly, the news was going all around. Even the three sages finished their beer all together, as at a drill order, and peered round…

Squirting soda into his glass and watching the brass plate from the corner of his eye, Hugh turned quickly towards plate and wall. Spinelli had got up. He strode out of the room, into the passage, and' through to the bar; he looked angry. People drifted out to follow him, obtrusively interested in their drinks. An insistent voice kept calling, 'Sing 'Old' John Wesley!' '

Spinelli strode up to the bar.

'Is it possible,' he said in a voice of freezing dignity which somehow reminded Hugh of Maw Standish, 'is it possible, my man, or isn't it, to get any service in this place?'

A part of the clamor had died down to a buzz; there were many people straining their ears. Spinelli's elaborate unconsciousness of everything, his airs and dignity, made a rather ludicrous spectacle. The proprietor sprang forward.

'I'm sorry zir! I'm sorry! Thought they do be and attended to 'ee, zir! Ysszir?'

“I’ll have brandy? said the other, aloofly fingering his tie. 'If you have any. Your best. Bring the bottle, and give me a glass of beer with it. Would you like a drink?'

'Ah! Thank 'eezir. Eh don't mind.'

If Spinelli got a good view of him, Hugh was thinking… He turned still farther away. But the American was not noticing. Pouring out a large dose of brandy, he swallowed it neat and followed it with a draught of beer. Then he poured another. The landlord, with a great carelessness of manner, was opening a bottle of home-brewed.

'Nice weather we'm 'aving, Mr. Travers,' he observed critically.

'Uh.'

'Ah! Bit waarm, though,' the landlord qualified with a judicial air. The bottle cap went Sss-t! and the landlord frowned still more judicially as he poured out his beer. 'Still, zir, the' get him much waarmer in the States, I expect?'

'Plenty. Fill up that glass again.'

'Ah! Fine country, the States! Did Eh tell 'ee, zir, Eh've a wife's cousin's step-brother that lives in Kansas City? — Ah, ay!' He nodded approvingly. 'Lived there fatty year’ now, 'e 'as. Gearge Loopey 'is name is. Maybe you've 'eard of him, zir; Gearge E. Loopey? 'E do run a big lumber yaard, I’ve 'eard. No! Ah, well; 'tes a big place… Your good 'ealth, zir!'

Never before had Hugh appreciated so thoroughly the restraint of the English people. Everybody in that house was exploding with curiosity as to what had been happening at The Grange; it must have been the chief topic of conversation all evening; and here was the chief actor — supposed to have been already under arrest — in their midst. Yet conversation, even though strained, went on as usual. Not a glance was obviously turned towards Spinelli. The landlord pattered on.

'The’ll be staying with us some time, now, I hope, Mr. Travers?' 'No,' said Spinelli. I’m leaving tonight.' 'Ah?'

'Tonight. And damned glad to get away. Listen…'

He finished his third brandy with a swaggering gesture, and leaned against the bar. Whether it was the brandy, or some deliberate purpose, or merely a love of being in the limelight — for, as he spoke, a rustling quiet settled down, and his voice rang loud against it — Hugh never knew. But Spinelli was aware that he was talking to the house. And three double-brandies, on top of his nervous strain, did things to his tongue. He cleared his throat. His spiteful little eyes rolled round at the assembly with some satisfaction, but he turned back to the landlord.

'Come on, admit it! Don't stand there lapping up that beer and trying to be polite. I know what you're thinking about. The murder. Yeah. And wondering, in your charitable way, why they haven't got me in the can for it right now. Eh?'

The landlord tried to play his part by also seeming unconscious of all the others. He assumed a look of diffidence.

'Well, zir, now that you do mention it —! Of carse, us've 'eard all about it, and what a 'orrible business he was,' he polished the bar vigorously, 'and, ah, ah, we do feel sorry for the poor genlman…'

'Push that bottle over here. Horrible business, nuts! They tried to hook me in on it. And couldn't. Tell that to your friends. Because I didn't happen to have anything to do with it, and I proved it.'

The landlord beamed. 'Why, Eh'm sure Eh do congratulate you, Mr. Travers! Us thought nothing against 'ee, mind, zir! Only 'twas said 'ereabouts — you know what gossip is! — ' he lowered his voice, 'only that you'd paid poor Mr. Depping a visit, and a lot of dimp people—'

'You're telling me? Listen.' He drained his glass, set it down with a thump, and poked the proprietor in the chest. 'I was never inside his house. The man they thought was me was old Nick Depping himself, got up into a fancy disguise so nobody would recognize him. Tell that to your friends, and your dumb flatfeet too'

'Zir?'

'It was Depping, I tell you! Trying to tell me I'm a liar?'

The landlord was so obviously puzzled that even Spinelli did not press it. He grew confidential, almost paternal.

'Listen. I’ll tell you how it was. Old Nick Depping wanted to get out of his house; see? Never mind why. I’m not telling that. But he wanted to get out of his house; see? All right. He goes up to London and buys a make-up box at a theatrical outfitter's, and he goes to a ready-made clothes store and buys a suit there. All right; you can do all that without anybody being suspicious of you. But Nick was an artist, see? — a real artist; I’ll give him credit for that. And, if he left any footprints anywhere, he didn't want the footprints traced to him. He even wanted to have the shoes a different size from his own. All right! But you can't go into a shoe store and ask for a pair of shoes three or four sizes too large. That's nutty; and they're going to remember it in the store, and, if there's any trouble afterwards, maybe the dicks can trace you; see?'

Spinelli leaned across the bar and thrust a flushed countenance within an inch of the landlord's. He went on rather hoarsely:

'So what does Nick do? He goes up to that big place they call The Grange; the one with the lousy furniture in it, and pictures I wouldn't put in my coal cellar. Well, he goes up one afternoon with a satchel that's supposed to have books in it; get me? He goes back to a room where they store a lot of junk, and swipes an old pair of somebody's shoes to wear; and then if he does happen to make any footprints anywhere, why, it's going to be just too bad for the bird who owns the shoes. See? That's what Nick does, and all because he wants too get out of his house and. ”

Hugh did not hear the last part of the sentence. He was so startled that he almost faced round and spoke to Spinelli. He remained motionless, his empty glass to his lips, staring at a placard behind the bar whereon a high- stepping figure of Johnny Walker grinned back with a rather sardonic leer. Down came one of the props of the case, shattering every hypothesis built on it; a clue blown up, shot to pieces; ashes and smoke: viz., the mysterious shoes that belonged to Morley Standish. All sorts of explanations had been, and might be, propounded. The simplest explanation of all — that Depping himself had used them for his masquerade — had been overlooked or at least not mentioned. What became now of his father's fantastic picture of Henry Morgan playing poltergeist in order to steal the shoes?

He risked a short sideways glance at Spinelli. The latter was too preoccupied; too malicious, too full of new alcoholic courage, to greedy of the limelight, even to turn his head or lower his voice. Spinelli laughed. His foot