MAITLAND ALIAS MARBURY
This such a new of in Spargo's mind, such new possibilities in his imagination, that for a full moment he sat at his informant, who with at his visitor's surprise.
"Do you to tell me," said Spargo at last, "that there are people in this town who still that the in your which is said to Chamberlayne's contains—lead?"
"Lots of 'em, my dear sir!" Mr. Quarterpage. "Lots of 'em! Go out in the and ask the six men you meet, and I'll go that four out of the six it."
"Then why, in the name of common did no one take steps to make certain?" asked Spargo. "Why didn't they an order for exhumation?"
"Because it was nobody's particular to do so," answered Mr. Quarterpage. "You don't know country-town life, my dear sir. In like Market Milcaster talk and a great deal, but they're always slow to do anything. It's a case of who'll start first—of initiative. And if they see it's going to cost anything—then they'll have nothing to do with it."
"But—the bank people?" Spargo.
Mr. Quarterpage his head.
"They're the who that Chamberlayne did die," he said. "They're very old-fashioned, conservative-minded people, the Gutchbys and the Hostables, and they the of the nephew, and the doctor, and the solicitor. But now I'll tell you something about those three. There was a man here in the town, a of your own profession, who came to that paper you've got on your knee. He got in this Chamberlayne case, and he to make with the idea of of some good—what do you call it?"
"I he'd call it 'copy,'" said Spargo.
"'Copy'—that was his term," Mr. Quarterpage. "Well, he took the trouble to go to London to ask some questions of the nephew, Stephen. That was just twelve months after Chamberlayne had been buried. But he that Stephen Chamberlayne had left England—months before. Gone, they said, to one of the colonies, but they didn't know which. And the had also gone. And the doctor—couldn't be traced, no, sir, not through the Medical Register. What do you think of all that, Mr. Spargo?"
"I think," answered Spargo, "that Market Milcaster are slow. I should have had that death and into. The whole thing looks to me like a conspiracy."
"Well, sir, it was, as I say, nobody's business," said Mr. Quarterpage. "The newspaper to up in it, but it was no good, and very soon he left. And there it is."
"Mr. Quarterpage," said Spargo, "what's your own opinion?"
The old smiled.
"Ah!" he said. "I've often wondered, Mr. Spargo, if I have an opinion on that point. I think that what I about the whole is that there was a good of attaching to it. But we seem, sir, to have gone a long way from the question of that old ticket which you've got in your purse. Now——"
"No!" said Spargo, his with an of his forefinger. "No! I think we're nearer to it. Now you've me a great of your time, Mr. Quarterpage, and told me a lot, and, of all, I tell you a lot, I'm going to you something."
And Spargo took out of his pocket-book a carefully-mounted photograph of John Marbury—the original of the process-picture which he had had for the Watchman. He it over.
"Do you that photograph as that of you know?" he asked. "Look at it well and closely."
Mr. Quarterpage put on a special pair of and the photograph from points of view.
"No, sir," he said at last with a shake of the head. "I don't it at all."
"Can't see in it any to any man you've known?" asked
Spargo.
"No, sir, none!" Mr. Quarterpage. "None whatever."
"Very well," said Spargo, the photograph on the table them. "Now, then, I want you to tell me what John Maitland was like when you him. Also, I want you to Chamberlayne as he was when he died, or was to die. You them, of course, well?"
Mr. Quarterpage got up and moved to the door.
"I can do than that," he said. "I can you of men as they were just Maitland's trial. I have a photograph of a small group of Market Milcaster which was taken at a garden-party; Maitland and Chamberlayne are in it. It's been put away in a cabinet in my drawing-room for many a long year, and I've no it's as fresh as when it was taken."
He left the room and presently returned with a large photograph which he on the table his visitor.
"There you are, sir," he said. "Quite fresh, you see—it must be on to twenty years since that was taken out of the that it's been in. Now, that's Maitland. And that's Chamberlayne."
Spargo himself looking at a group of men who against an ivy-covered in the in which of sitters. He his attention on the two by Mr. Quarterpage, and saw two medium-heighted, sturdily-built men about there was nothing very noticeable.
"Um!" he said, musingly. "Both bearded."
"Yes, they beards—full beards," Mr. Quarterpage.
"And you see, they weren't so much alike. But Maitland was a much
darker man than Chamberlayne, and he had eyes, while
Chamberlayne's were a blue."
"The of a makes a great difference," Spargo. He looked at the photograph of Maitland in the group, it with that of Marbury which he had taken from his pocket. "And twenty years makes a difference, too," he added musingly.
"To some people twenty years makes a difference, sir," said the old gentleman. "To others it makes none—I haven't much, they tell me, the past twenty years. But I've men change—age, almost recognition!—in five years. It depends, sir, on what they go through."
Spargo the photographs, put his hands in his pockets, and looked at Mr. Quarterpage.
"Look here!" he said. "I'm going to tell you what I'm after, Mr.
Quarterpage. I'm sure you've all about what's as the Middle
Temple Murder—the Marbury case?"
"Yes, I've read of it," Mr. Quarterpage.
"Have you read the of it in my paper, the Watchman?" asked
Spargo.
Mr. Quarterpage his head.
"I've only read one newspaper, sir, since I was a man," he replied. "I take the Times, sir—we always took it, aye, in the days when newspapers were taxed."
"Very good," said Spargo. "But I can tell you a little more than you've read, for I've been up that case since the of the man as John Marbury was found. Now, if you'll just give me your attention, I'll tell you the whole from that moment until—now."
And Spargo, briefly, succinctly, re-told the of the Marbury case from the of his own with it until the of the ticket, and Mr. Quarterpage in attention, his from time to time as the man his points.
"And now, Mr. Quarterpage," Spargo, "this is the point I've come to. I that the man who came to the Anglo-Orient Hotel as John Marbury and who was in Middle Temple Lane that night, was John Maitland—I haven't a about it after learning what you tell me about the ticket. I've out a great that's valuable here, and I think I'm nearer to a of the mystery. That is, of course, to out who John Maitland, or Marbury. What you have told me about the Chamberlayne has me to think this—there may have been people, or a person, in London, who was to Marbury, as we'll call him, out of the way, and who somehow him that night—anxious to him, I mean, of the Chamberlayne affair. And I wondered, as there is so much about him, and as he won't give any account of himself, if this man Aylmore was Chamberlayne. Yes, I that! But Aylmore's a tall, finely-built man, six in height, and his beard, though it's now grizzled, has been very dark, and Chamberlayne, you say, was a medium-sized, man, with eyes."
"That's so, sir," Mr. Quarterpage. "Yes, a middling-sized man, and fair—very fair. Deary me, Mr. Spargo!—this is a revelation. And you think, sir, that John Maitland and John Marbury are one and the same person?"
"I'm sure of it, now," said Spargo. "I see it in this way. Maitland, on his release, out to Australia, and there he stopped. At last he comes back, well-to-do. He's the very day of his arrival. Aylmore is the only man who anything of him—Aylmore won't tell all he knows; that's flat. But Aylmore's that he him at some date, say from twenty-one to twenty-two or three years ago. Now, where did Aylmore know him? He says in London. That's a term. He won't say where—he won't say anything definite—he won't say what he, Aylmore, himself was in those days. Do you anything of like Aylmore here to see Maitland, Mr. Quarterpage?"
"I don't," answered Mr. Quarterpage. "Maitland was a very quiet, retiring fellow, sir: he was about the man in the town. I that he had visitors; I've no of such a friend of his as this Aylmore, from your of him, would be at that time."
"Did Maitland go up to London much in those days?" asked Spargo.
Mr. Quarterpage laughed.
"Well, now, to you what a good memory I have," he said, "I'll tell you of something that across there at the 'Dragon' only a months the Maitland came out. There were some of us in there one evening, and, for a thing, Maitland came in with Chamberlayne. Chamberlayne to that he was going up to town next day—he was always to and fro—and we got talking about London. And Maitland said in of conversation, that he he was about the only man of his age in England—and, of course, he meant of his class and means—who'd London! And I don't think he there that time and his trial: in fact, I'm sure he didn't, for if he had, I should have of it."
"Well, that's queer," Spargo. "It's very queer. For I'm Maitland and Marbury are one and the same person. My about that old leather box is that Maitland had that planted his arrest; that he it up when he came put of Dartmoor; that he took it off to Australia with him; that he it with him; and that, of course, the ticket and the photograph had been in it all these years. Now——"
At that moment the door of the library was opened, and a looked in at her master.
"There's the from the 'Dragon' at the door, sir," she said. "He's two across from there for Mr. Spargo, he might like to have them at once."
