THE YORK MYSTERY


THE YORK MYSTERY
Baroness Orczy
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CHAPTER VII. THE YORK MYSTERY 
CHAPTER VIII. THE CAPITAL CHARGE 
CHAPTER IX. A BROKEN-HEARTED WOMAN 



CHAPTER VII. THE YORK MYSTERY
THE man in the corner looked quite cheerful that morning; he had had two glasses 
of milk and had even gone to the extravagance of an extra cheese-cake. Polly 
knew that he was itching to talk police and murders, for he east furtive glances 
at her from time to time, produced a bit of string, tied and untied it into 
scores of complicated knots, and finally, bringing out his pocket-book, he 
placed two or three photographs before her. 
"Do you know who that is?" he asked, pointing to one of these. 
The girl looked at the face on the picture. It was that of a woman, not exactly 
pretty, but very gentle and childlike, with a strange pathetic look in the large 
eyes which was wonderfully appealing. 
"That was Lady Arthur Skelmerton," he said, and in a flash there flitted before 
Polly's mind the weird and tragic history which had broken this loving woman's 
heart. Lady Arthur Skelmerton! That name recalled one of the most bewildering, 
most mysterious passages in the annals of undiscovered crimes. 
"Yes. It was sad, wasn't it?" he commented, in answer to Polly's thoughts. 
"Another case which but for idiotic blunders on the part of the police must have 
stood clear as daylight before the public and satisfied general anxiety. Would 
you object to my recapitulating its preliminary details?" 
She said nothing, so he continued without waiting further for a reply. 
"It all occurred during the York racing week, a time which brings to the quiet 
cathedral city its quota of shady characters, who congregate wherever money and 
wits happen to fly away from their owners. Lord Arthur Skelmerton, a very 
well-known figure in London society and in racing circles, had rented one of the 
fine houses which overlook the racecourse. He had entered Peppercorn, by St. 
Armand—Notre Dame, for the Great Ebor Handicap. Peppercorn was the winner of the 
Newmarket, and his chances for the Ebor were considered a practical certainty. 
"If you have ever been to York you will have noticed the fine houses which have 
their drive and front entrances in the road called 'The Mount,' and the gardens 
of which extend as far as the racecourse, commanding a lovely view over the 
entire track. It was one of these houses, called 'The Elms,' which Lord Arthur 
Skelmerton had rented for the summer. 
"Lady Arthur came down some little time before the racing week with her 
servants—she had no children; but she had many relatives and friends in York, 
since she was the daughter of old Sir John Etty, the cocoa manufacturer, a rigid 
Quaker, who, it was generally said, kept the tightest possible hold on his own 
purse-strings and looked with marked disfavour upon his aristocratic 
son-in-law's fondness for gaming tables and betting books. 
"As a matter of fact, Maud Etty had married the handsome young lieutenant in the 
—th Hussars, quite against her father's wishes. But she was an only child, and 
after a good deal of demur and grumbling, Sir John, who idolized his daughter, 
gave way to her whim, and a reluctant consent to the marriage was wrung from 
him. 
"But, as a Yorkshireman, he was far too shrewd a man of the world not to know 
that love played but a very small part in persuading a Duke's son to marry the 
daughter of a cocoa manufacturer, and as long as he lived he determined that 
since his daughter was being wed because of her wealth, that wealth should at 
least secure her own happiness. He refused to give Lady Arthur any capital, 
which, in spite of the most carefully worded settlements, would inevitably, 
sooner or later, have found its way into the pockets of Lord Arthur's racing 
friends. But he made his daughter a very handsome allowance, amounting to over 
£3000 a year, which enabled her to keep up an establishment befitting her new 
rank. 
"A great many of these facts, intimate enough as they are, leaked out, you see, 
during that period of intense excitement which followed the murder of Charles 
Lavender, and when the public eye was fixed searchingly upon Lord Arthur 
Skelmerton, probing all the inner details of his idle, useless life. 
"It soon became a matter of common gossip that poor little Lady Arthur continued 
to worship her handsome husband in spite of his obvious neglect, and not having 
as yet presented him with an heir, she settled herself down into a life of 
humble apology for her plebeian existence, atoning for it by condoning all his 
faults and forgiving all his vices, even to the extent of cloaking them before 
the prying eyes of Sir John, who was persuaded to look upon his son-in-law as a 
paragon of all the domestic virtues and a perfect model of a husband. 
"Among Lord Arthur Skelmerton's many expensive tastes there was certainly that 
for horseflesh and cards. After some successful betting at the beginning of his 
married life, he had started a racing-stable which it was generally believed—as 
he was very lucky—was a regular source of income to him. 
"Peppercorn, however, after his brilliant performances at Newmarket did not 
continue to fulfil his master's expectations. His collapse at York was 
attributed to the hardness of the course and to various other causes, but its 
immediate effect was to put Lord Arthur Skelmerton in what is popularly called a 
tight place, for he had backed his horse for all he was worth, and must have 
stood to lose considerably over £5000 on that one day. 
"The collapse of the favourite and the grand victory of King Cole, a rank 
outsider, on the other hand, had proved a golden harvest for the bookmakers, and 
all the York hotels were busy with dinners and suppers given by the 
confraternity of the Turf to celebrate the happy occasion. The next day was 
Friday, one of few important racing events, after which the brilliant and the 
shady throng which had flocked into the venerable city for the week would fly to 
more congenial climes, and leave it, with its fine old Minster and its ancient 
walls, as sleepy, as quiet as before. 
"Lord Arthur Skelmerton also intended to leave York on the Saturday, and on the 
Friday night he gave a farewell bachelor dinner party at 'The Elms,' at which 
Lady Arthur did not appear. After dinner the gentlemen settled down to bridge, 
with pretty stiff points, you may be sure. It had just struck eleven at the 
Minster Tower, when constables McNaught and Murphy, who were patrolling the 
racecourse, were startled by loud cries of 'murder' and 'police.' 
"Quickly ascertaining whence these cries proceeded, they hurried on at a gallop, 
and came up—quite close to the boundary of Lord Arthur Skelmerton's grounds—upon 
a group of three men, two of whom seemed to be wrestling vigorously with one 
another, whilst the third was lying face downwards on the ground. As soon as the 
constables drew near, one of the wrestlers shouted more vigorously, and with a 
certain tone of authority: 
"'Here, you fellows, hurry up, sharp; the brute is giving me the slip!' 
"But the brute did not seem inclined to do anything of the sort; he certainly 
extricated himself with a violent jerk from his assailant's grasp, but made no 
attempt to run away. The constables had quickly dismounted, whilst he who had 
shouted for help originally added more quietly: 
"'My name is Skelmerton. This is the boundary of my property. I was smoking a 
cigar at the pavilion over there with a friend when I heard loud voices, 
followed by a cry and a groan. I hurried down the steps, and saw this poor 
fellow lying on the ground, with a knife sticking between his shoulder-blades, 
and his murderer,' he added, pointing to the man who stood quietly by with 
Constable McNaught's firm grip upon his shoulder, 'still stooping over the body 
of his victim. I was too late, I fear, to save the latter, but just in time to 
grapple with the assassin——" 
"'It's a lie!' here interrupted the man hoarsely. 'I didn't do it, constable; I 
swear I didn't do it. I saw him fall—I was coming along a couple of hundred 
yards away, and I tried to see if the poor fellow was dead. I swear I didn't do 
it.' 
"'You'll have to explain that to the inspector presently, my man,' was Constable 
McNaught's quiet comment, and, still vigorously protesting his innocence, the 
accused allowed himself to be led away, and the body was conveyed to the 
station, pending fuller identification. 
"The next morning the papers were full of the tragedy; a column and a half of 
the York Herald was devoted to an account of Lord Arthur Skelmerton's plucky 
capture of the assassin The latter had continued to declare his innocence but 
had remarked, it appears, with grim humour, that he quite saw he was in a tight 
place, out of which, however, he would find it easy to extricate himself. He had 
stated to the police that the deceased's name was Charles Lavender, a well-known 
bookmaker, which fact was soon verified, for many of the murdered man's 'pals' 
were still in the city. 
"So far the most pushing of newspaper reporters had been unable to glean further 
information from the police; no one doubted, however, but that the man in 
charge, who gave his name as George Higgins, had killed the bookmaker for 
purposes of robbery. The inquest had been fixed for the Tuesday after the 
murder. 
"Lord Arthur had been obliged to stay in York a few days, as his evidence would 
be needed. That fact gave the case, perhaps, a certain amount of interest as far 
as York and London 'society' were concerned. Charles Lavender, moreover, was 
well known on the turf; but no bombshell exploding beneath the walls of the 
ancient cathedral city could more have astonished its inhabitants than the news 
which, at about five in the afternoon on the day of the inquest, spread like 
wildfire throughout the town. That news was that the inquest had concluded at 
three o'clock with a verdict of 'Wilful murder against some person or persons 
unknown,' and that two hours later the police had arrested Lord Arthur 
Skelmerton at his private residence, 'The Elms,' and charged him on a warrant 
with the murder of Charles Lavender, the bookmaker." 
CHAPTER VIII. THE CAPITAL CHARGE
THE police, it appears, instinctively feeling that some mystery lurked round the 
death of the bookmaker and his supposed murderer's quiet protestations of 
innocence, had taken a very considerable amount of trouble in collecting all the 
evidence they could for the inquest which might throw some light upon Charles 
Lavender's life, previous to his tragic end. Thus it was that a very large array 
of witnesses was brought before the coroner, chief among whom was, of course, 
Lord Arthur Skelmerton. 
"The first witnesses called were the two constables, who deposed that, just as 
the church clocks in the neighbourhood were striking eleven, they had heard the 
cries for help, had ridden to the spot whence the sounds proceeded, and had 
found the prisoner in the tight grasp of Lord Arthur Skelmerton, who at once 
accused the man of murder, and gave him in charge. Both constables gave the same 
version of the incident, and both were positive as to the time when it occurred. 

"Medical evidence went to prove that the deceased had been stabbed from behind 
between the shoulder-blades whilst he was walking, that the wound was inflicted 
by a large hunting knife, which was produced, and which had been left sticking 
in the wound. 
"Lord Arthur Skelmerton was then called and substantially repeated what he had 
already told the constables. He stated, namely, that on the night in question he 
had some gentlemen friends to dinner, and afterwards bridge was played. He 
himself was not playing much, and at a few minutes before eleven he strolled out 
with a cigar as far as the pavilion at the end of his garden; he then heard the 
voices, the cry and the groan previously described by him, and managed to hold 
the murderer down until the arrival of the constables. 
"At this point the police proposed to call a witness, James Terry by name and a 
bookmaker by profession, who had been chiefly instrumental in identifying the 
deceased, a 'pal ' of his. It was his evidence which first introduced that 
element of sensation into the case which culminated in the wildly exciting 
arrest of a Duke's son upon a capital charge. 
"It appears that on the evening after the Ebor, Terry and Lavender were in the 
bar of the Black Swan Hotel having drinks. 
"'I had done pretty well over Peppercorn's fiasco,' he explained, 'but poor old 
Lavender was very much down in the dumps; he had held only a few very small bets 
against the favourite, and the rest of the day had been a poor one with him. I 
asked him if he had any bets with the owner of Peppercorn, and he told me that 
he only held one for less than £500. 
"'I laughed and said that if he held one for £6000 it would make no difference, 
as from what I had heard from the other fellows, Lord Arthur Skelmerton must be 
about stumped. Lavender seemed terribly put out at this, and swore he would get 
that £500 out of Lord Arthur, if no one else got another penny from him. 
"'It's the only money I've made to-day,' he says to me. 'I mean to get it.' 
"'You won't,' I says. 
"'I will,' he says. 
"'You will have to look pretty sharp about it then,' I says, 'for every one will 
be wanting to get something, and first come first served.' 
"'Oh! He'll serve me right enough, never you mind!' says Lavender to me with a 
laugh. 'If he don't pay up willingly, I've got that in my pocket which will make 
him sit up and open my lady's eyes and Sir John Etty's too about their precious 
noble lord.' 
"'Then he seemed to think he had gone too far, and wouldn't say anything more to 
me about that affair. I saw him on the course the next day. I asked him if he 
had got his £500. He said: "No, but I shall get it to-day."' 
"Lord Arthur Skelmerton, after having given his own evidence, had left the 
court; it was therefore impossible to know how he would take this account, which 
threw so serious a light upon an association with the dead man, of which he 
himself had said nothing. 
"Nothing could shake James Terry's account of the facts he had placed before the 
jury, and when the police informed the coroner that they proposed to place 
George Higgins himself in the witness-box, as his evidence would prove, as it 
were, a complement and corollary of that of Terry, the jury very eagerly 
assented. 
"If James Terry, the bookmaker, loud, florid, vulgar,was an unprepossessing 
individual, certainly George Higgins, who was still under the accusation of 
murder, was ten thousand times more so. 
"None too clean, slouchy, obsequious yet insolent, he was the very 
personification of the cad who haunts the racecourse and who lives not so much 
by his own wits as by the lack of them in others. He described himself as a turf 
commission agent, whatever that may be. 
"He stated that at about six o'clock on the Friday afternoon, when the 
racecourse was still full of people, all hurrying after the day's excitements, 
he himself happened to be standing close the hedge which marks the boundary of 
Lord Arthur Skelmerton's grounds. There is a pavilion there at the end of the 
garden, he explained, on slightly elevated ground, and he could hear and see a 
group of ladies and gentlemen having tea. Some steps lead down a little to the 
left of the garden on to the course, and presently he noticed at the bottom of 
these steps Lord Arthur Skelmerton and Charles Lavender standing talking 
together. He knew both gentlemen by sight, but he could not see them very well 
as they were both partly hidden by the hedge. He was quite sure that the 
gentlemen had not seen him, and he could not help overhearing some of their 
conversation. 
"'That's my last word, Lavender,' Lord Arthur was saying very quietly. 'I 
haven't got the money and I can't pay you now. You'll have to wait.' 
"'Wait? I can't wait,' said old Lavender in reply. 'I've got my engagements to 
meet, same as you. I'm not going to risk being posted up as a defaulter while 
you hold £500 of my money, You'd better give it me now or——' 
"But Lord Arthur interrupted him very quietly, and said: 
"'Yes, my good man .... or?' 
"'Or I'll let Sir John have a good look at that little bill I had of yours a 
couple of years ago. If you'll remember, my lord, it has got at the bottom of it 
Sir John's signature in your handwriting. Perhaps Sir John, or perhaps my lady, 
would pay me something for that little bill. If not the police can have a squint 
at it. I've held my tongue long enough, and——' "' Look here, Lavender,' said 
Lord Arthur, 'do you know what this little game of yours is called in law?' 
"'Yes, and I don't care,' says Lavender. 'If I don't have that £500 I am a 
ruined man. If you ruin me I'll do for you, and we shall be quits. That's my 
last word.' 
"He was talking very loudly, and I thought some of Lord Arlhur's friends up in 
the pavilion must have heard. He thought so too, I think, for he said quickly: 
"'If you don't hold your confounded tongue, I'll give you in charge for 
blackmail this instant.' 
"'You wouldn't dare,' says Lavender, and he began to laugh. But just then a lady 
from the top of the steps said: 'Your tea is getting cold,' and Lord Arthur 
turned to go; but just before he went, Lavender says to him: 'I'll come back 
to-night. You'll have the money then.' 
"George Higgins, it appears, after he had heard this interesting conversation, 
pondered as to whether he could not turn what he knew into some sort of profit. 
Being a gentleman who lives entirely by his wits, this type of knowledge forms 
his chief source of income. As a preliminary to future moves he decided not to 
lose sight of Lavender for the rest of the day. 
"'He went and had dinner at The Black Swan,' he explained, 'and I, after I had 
had a bite myself, waited outside till I saw him come out. At about ten o'clock 
I was rewarded for my trouble. He told the hall porter to get him a fly and he 
jumped into it. I could not hear what direction he gave the driver, but the fly 
certainly drove off towards the racecourse. 
"'Now, I was interested in this little affair,' continued the witness, 'and I 
couldn't afford a fly. I started to run. Of course I couldn't keep up with it, 
but I thought I knew which way my gentleman had gone. I made straight for the 
racecourse, and for the hedge at the bottom of Lord Arthur Skelmerton's grounds. 

"'It was rather a dark night and there was a slight drizzle. I couldn't see more 
than about a hundred yards before me. All at once it seemed to me as if I heard 
Lavender's voice talking loudly in the distance. I hurried forward, and suddenly 
saw a group of two figures—mere blurs in the darkness—for one instant, at a 
distance of about fifty yards from where I was. 
"'The next moment, one figure had fallen forward and the other had disappeared. 
I ran to the spot, only to find the body of the murdered man lying on the 
ground. I stooped to see if I could be of any use to him, and immediately I was 
collared from behind by Lord Arthur himself.' 
"You may imagine," said the man in the corner, "how keen was the excitement of 
that moment in court. Coroner and jury alike literally hung breathless on every 
word that shabby, vulgar individual uttered. You see, by itself his evidence 
would have been worth very little, but coming on the top of that given by James 
Terry, its significance—more, its truth—had become glaringly apparent. Closely 
cross-examined, he adhered strictly to his statement; and having finished his 
evidence, George Higgins remained in charge of the constables, and the next 
witness of importance was called up. 
"This was Mr. Chipps, the senior footman in the employment of Lord Arthur 
Skelmerton. He deposed that at about 10.30 on the Friday evening a 'party' drove 
up to 'The Elms' in a fly, and asked to see Lord Arthur. On being told that his 
lordship had company he seemed terribly put out. 
"'I hasked the party to give me 'is card,' continued Mr. Chipps, 'as I didn't 
know, perhaps, that 'is lordship might wish to see 'im, but I kept 'im standing 
at the 'all door, as I didn't altogether like his looks. I took the card in. His 
lordship and the gentlemen was playin' cards in the smoking-room, and as soon as 
I could do so without disturbing 'is lordship, I give him the party's card.' 
"'What name was there on the card?' here interrupted the coroner. 
"'I couldn't say now, sir,' replied Mr. Chipps; 'I don't really remember. It was 
a name I had never seen before. But I see so many visiting cards one way and the 
other in 'is lordship's 'all that I can't remember all the names.' 
"'Then, after a few minutes' waiting, you gave his lordship the card? What 
happened then?' 
"''Is lordship didn't seem at all pleased,' said Mr. Chipps with much guarded 
dignity; 'but finally he said: "Show him into the library, Chipps, I'll see 
him," and he got up from the card table, saying to the gentlemen: "Go on without 
me; I'll be back in a minute or two." 
"'I was about to open the door for 'is lordship when my lady came into the room, 
and then his lordship suddenly changed his mind like, and said to me: "Tell that 
man I'm busy and can't see him," and 'e sat down again at the card table. I went 
back to the 'all, and told the party 'is lordship wouldn't see 'im. 'E said: 
"Oh! it doesn't matter," and went away quite quiet like.' 
"'Do you recollect at all at what time that was?' asked one of the jury. 
"'Yes, sir, while I was waiting to speak to 'is lordship I looked at the clock, 
sir; it was twenty past ten, sir.' 
"There was one more significant fact in connection with the case, which tended 
still more to excite the curiosity of the public at the time, and still further 
to bewilder the police later on, and that fact was mentioned by Chipps in his 
evidence. The knife, namely, with which Charles Lavender had been stabbed, and 
which, remember, had been left in the wound, was now produced in court. After a 
little hesitation Chipps identified it as the property of his master, Lord 
Arthur Skelmerton. 
"Can you wonder, then, that the jury absolutely refused to bring in a verdict 
against George Higgins? There was really, beyond Lord Arthur Skelmerton's 
testimony, not one particle of evidence against him, whilst, as the day wore on 
and witness after witness was called up, suspicion ripened in the minds of all 
those present that the murderer could be no other than Lord Arthur Skelmerton 
himself. 
"The knife was, of course, the strongest piece of circumstantial evidence, and 
no doubt the police hoped to collect a great deal more now that they held a clue 
in their hands. Directly after the verdict, therefore, which was guardedly 
directed against some person unknown, the police obtained a warrant and later on 
arrested Lord Arthur in his own house." 
"The sensation, of course, was tremendous. Hours before he was brought up before 
the magistrate the approach to the court was thronged. His friends, mostly 
ladies, were all eager, you see, to watch the dashing society man in so terrible 
a position. There was universal sympathy for Lady Arthur, who was in a very 
precarious state of health. Her worship of her worthless husband was well known; 
small wonder that his final and awful misdeed had practically broken her heart. 
The latest bulletin issued just after his arrest stated that her ladyship was 
not expected to live. She was then in a comatose condition, and all hope had 
perforce to be abandoned. 
"At last the prisoner was brought in. He looked very pale, perhaps, but 
otherwise kept up the bearing of a high-bred gentleman. He was accompanied by 
his solicitor, Sir Marmaduke Ingersoll, who was evidently talking to him in 
quiet, reassuring tones. 
"Mr. Buchanan prosecuted for the Treasury, and certainly his indictment was 
terrific. According to him but one decision could be arrived at, namely, that 
the accused in the dock had, in a moment of passion, and perhaps of fear, killed 
the blackmailer who threatened him with disclosures which might for ever have 
ruined him socially, and, having committed the deed and fearing its 
consequences, probably realizing that the patrolling constables might catch 
sight of his retreating figure, he had availed himself of George Higgins's 
presence on the spot to loudly accuse him of the murder. 
"Having concluded his able speech, Mr. Buchanan called his witnesses, and the 
evidence, which on second hearing seemed more damning than ever, was all gone 
through again. 
"Sir Marmaduke had no question to ask of the witnesses for the prosecution; he 
stared at them placidly through his gold-rimmed spectacles. Then he was ready to 
call his own for the defence. Colonel McIntosh, R.A., was the first. He was 
present at the bachelors' party given by Lord Arthur the night of the murder. 
His evidence tended at first to corroborate that of Chipps the footman with 
regard to Lord Arthur's orders to show the visitor into the library, and his 
counter-order as soon as his wife came into the room. 
"'Did you not think it strange, Colonel?' asked Mr. Buchanan, 'that Lord Arthur 
should so suddenly have changed his mind about seeing his visitor?' 
"'Well, not exactly strange,' said the Colonel, a fine, manly, soldierly figure 
who looked curiously out of his element in the witness-box. 'I don't think that 
it is a very rare occurrence for racing men to have certain acquaintances whom 
they would not wish their wives to know anything about.' 
"'Then it did not strike you that Lord Arthur Skelmerton had some reason for not 
wishing his wife to know of that particular visitor's presence in his house?' 
"'I don't think that I gave the matter the slightest serious consideration,' was 
the Colonel's guarded reply. 
"Mr. Buchanan did not press the point, and allowed the witness to conclude his 
statements. 
"'I had finished my turn at bridge,' he said, 'and went out into the garden to 
smoke a cigar. Lord Arthur Skelmerton joined me a few minutes later, and we were 
sitting in the pavilion when I heard a loud and, as I thought, threatening voice 
from the other side of the hedge. 
"'I did not catch the words, but Lord Arthur said to me: "There seems to be a 
row down there. I'll go and have a look and see what it is." I tried to dissuade 
him, and certainly made no attempt to follow him, but not more than half a 
minute could have elapsed before I heard a cry and a groan, then Lord Arthur's 
footsteps hurrying down the wooden stairs which lead on to the racecourse.' 
"You may imagine," said the man in the corner, "what severe cross-examination 
the gallant Colonel had to undergo in order that his assertions might in some 
way be shaken by the prosecution, but with military precision and frigid calm he 
repeated his important statements amidst a general silence, through which you 
could have heard the proverbial pin. 
"He had heard the threatening voice while sitting with Lord Arthur Skelmerton; 
then came the cry and groan, and, after that, Lord Arthur's steps down the 
stairs. He himself thought of following to see what had happened, but it was a 
very dark night and he did not know the grounds very well. While trying to find 
his way to the garden steps he heard Lord Arthur's cry for help, the tramp of 
the patrolling constables' horses, and subsequently the whole scene between Lord 
Arthur, the man Higgins, and the constables. When he finally found his way to 
the stairs, Lord Arthur was returning in order to send a groom for police 
assistance. 
"The witness stuck to his points as he had to his guns at Beckfontein a year 
ago; nothing could shake him, and Sir Marmaduke looked triumphantly across at 
his opposing colleague. 
"With the gallant Colonel's statements the edifice of the prosecution certainly 
began to collapse. You see, there was not a particle of evidence to show that 
the accused had met and spoken to the deceased after the latter's visit at the 
front door of 'The Elms.' He told Chipps that he wouldn't see the visitor, and 
Chipps went into the hall directly and showed Lavender out the way he came. No 
assignation could have been made, no hint could have been given by the murdered 
man to Lord Arthur that he would go round to the back entrance and wished to see 
him there. 
"Two other guests of Lord Arthur's swore positively that after Chipps had 
announced the visitor, their host stayed at the card-table until a quarter to 
eleven, when evidently he went out to join Colonel McIntosh in the garden. Sir 
Marmaduke's speech was clever in the extreme. Bit by bit he demolished that 
tower of strength, the case against the accused, basing his defence entirely 
upon the evidence of Lord Arthur Skelmerton's guests that night. 
"Until 10.46 Lord Arthur was playing cards; a quarter of an hour later the 
police were on the scene, and the murder had been committed. In the meanwhile 
Colonel McIntosh's evidence proved conclusively that the accused had been 
sitting with him, smoking a cigar. It was obvious, therefore, clear as daylight, 
concluded the great lawyer, that his client was entitled to a full discharge; 
nay, more, he thought that the police should have been more careful before they 
harrowed up public feeling by arresting a high-born gentleman on such 
insufficient evidence as they had brought forward. 
"The question of the knife remained certainly, but Sir Marmaduke passed over it 
with guarded eloquence, placing that strange question in the category of those 
inexplicable coincidences which tend to puzzle the ablest detective, and cause 
them to commit such unpardonable blunders as the present one had been. After 
all, the footman may have been mistaken. The pattern of that knife was not an 
exclusive one, and he, on behalf of his client, flatly denied that it had ever 
belonged to him. 
"Well," continued the man in the corner, with the chuckle peculiar to him in 
moments of excitement, "the noble prisoner was discharged. Perhaps it would be 
invidious to say that he left the court without a stain on his character, for I 
daresay you know from experience that the crime known as the York Mystery has 
never been satisfactorily cleared up. 
"Many people shook their heads dubiously when they remembered that, after all, 
Charles Lavender was killed with a knife which one witness had sworn belonged to 
Lord Arthur; others, again, reverted to the original theory that George Higgins 
was the murderer, that he and James Terry had concocted the story of Lavender's 
attempt at blackmail on Lord Arthur, and that the murder had been committed for 
the sole purpose of robbery. 
"Be that as it may, the police have not so far been able to collect sufficient 
evidence against Higgins or Terry, and the crime has been classed by press and 
public alike in the category of so-called impenetrable mysteries." 
CHAPTER IX. A BROKEN-HEARTED WOMAN 
THE man in the corner called for another glass of milk, and drank it down slowly 
before he resumed: 
"Now Lord Arthur lives mostly abroad," he said. "His poor, suffering wife died 
the day after he was liberated by the magistrate. She never recovered 
consciousness even sufficiently to hear the joyful news that the man she loved 
so well was innocent after all.! 
"Mystery!" he added as if in answer to Polly's own thoughts. "The murder of that 
man was never a mystery to me. I cannot understand how the police could have 
been so blind when every one of the witnesses, both for the prosecution and 
defence, practically pointed all the time to the one guilty person. What do you 
think of it all yourself?" 
"I think the whole case so bewildering," she replied "that I do not see one 
single clear point in it." 
"You don't?" he said excitedly, while the bony fingers fidgeted again with that 
inevitable bit of string. "You don't see that there is one point clear which to 
me was the key of the whole thing? 
"Lavender was murdered, wasn't he? Lord Arthur did not kill him. He had, at 
least, in Colonel McIntosh an unimpeachable witness to prove that he could not 
have committed that murder—and yet," he added with slow, excited emphasis, 
marking each sentence with a knot, "and yet he deliberately tries to throw the 
guilt upon a man who obviously was also innocent. Now why?" 
"He may have thought him guilty." 
"Or wished to shield or cover the retreat of one he knew to be guilty." 
"I don't understand." 
"Think of someone," he said excitedly, "someone whose desire would be as great 
as that of Lord Arthur to silence a scandal round that gentleman's name. Someone 
who, unknown perhaps to Lord Arthur, had overheard the same conversation which 
George Higgins related to the police and the magistrate, someone who, whilst 
Chipps was taking Lavender's card in to his master, had a few minutes' time 
wherein to make an assignation with Lavender, promising him money, no doubt, in 
exchange for the compromising bills." 
"Surely you don't mean——" gasped Polly. 
"Point number one," he interrupted quietly, "utterly missed by the police. 
George Higgins in his deposition stated that at the most animated stage of 
Lavender's conversation with Lord Arthur, and when the bookmaker's tone of voice 
became loud and threatening, a voice from the top of the steps interrupted that 
conversation, saying: 'Your tea is getting cold.'" 
"Yes—but——" she argued. 
"Wait a moment, for there is point number two. That voice was a lady's voice. 
Now, I did exactly what the police should have done, but did not do. I went to 
have a look from the racecourse side at those garden steps which to my mind are 
such important factors in the discovery of this crime. I found only about a 
dozen rather low steps; anyone standing on the top must have heard every word 
Charles Lavender uttered the moment he raised his voice." 
"Even then——' 
"Very well, you grant that," he said excitedly. "Then there was the great, the 
all-important point which, oddly enough, the prosecution never for a moment took 
into consideration. When Chipps, the footman, first told Lavender that Lord 
Arthur could not see him the bookmaker was terribly put out; Chipps then goes to 
speak to his master; a few minutes elapse, and when the footman once again tells 
Lavender that his lordship won't see him. the latter says 'Very well,' and seems 
to treat the matter with complete indifference. 
"Obviously, therefore, something must have happened in between to alter the 
bookmaker's frame of mind. Well! What had happened? Think over all the evidence, 
and you will see that one thing only had occurred in the interval, namely, Lady 
Arthur's advent into the room. 
"In order to go into the smoking-room she must have crossed the hall; she must 
have seen Lavender. In that brief interval she must have realized that the man 
was persistent, and therefore a living danger to her husband. Remember, women 
have done strange things; they are a far greater puzzle to the student of human 
nature than the sterner, less complex sex has ever been. As I argued before—as 
the police should have argued all along—why did Lord Arthur deliberately accuse 
an innocent man of murder if not to shield the guilty one? 
"Remember, Lady Arthur may have been discovered; the man, George Higgins, may 
have caught sight of her before she had time to make good her retreat. His 
attention, as well as that of the constables, had to be diverted. Lord Arthur 
acted on the blind impulse of saving his wife at any cost." 
"She may have been met by Colonel McIntosh," argued Polly. 
"Perhaps she was," he said. "Who knows? The gallant colonel had to swear to his 
friend's innocence. He could do that in all conscience—after that his duty was 
accomplished. No innocent man was suffering for the guilty. The knife which had 
belonged to Lord Arthur would always save George Higgins. For a time it had 
pointed to the husband; fortunately never to the wife. Poor thing, she died 
probably of a broken heart, but women when they love, think only of one object 
on earth—the one who is beloved. 
"To me the whole thing was clear from the very first. When I read the account of 
the murder—the knife! stabbing!—bah! Don't I know enough of English crime not to 
be certain at once that no Englishman, be he ruffian from the gutter or be he 
Duke's son, ever stabs his victim in the back. Italians, French, Spaniards do 
it, if you will, and women of most nations. An Englishman's instinct is to 
strike and not to stab. George Higgins or Lord Arthur Skelmerton would have 
knocked their victim down; the woman only would lie in wait till the enemy's 
back was turned. She knows her weakness, and she does not mean to miss. 
"Think it over. There is not one flaw in my argument, but the police never 
thought the matter out—perhaps in this case it was as well." He had gone and 
left Miss Polly Burton still staring at the photograph of a pretty, 
gentle-looking woman, with a decided, wilful curve round the mouth, and a 
strange, unaccountable look in the large pathetic eyes; and the little 
journalist felt quite thankful that in this case the murder of Charles Lavender 
the bookmaker—cowardly, wicked as it was—had remained a mystery to the police 
and the public.