The Mystery of the Moor

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 445, 29 August 1928, Page 5

The Mystery of the Moor

By

J. S. Fletcher

CHAPTER XXIII. —WHO WAS THE WOMAN? Crole nodded, and turned to Manners. _ , “I think you should tell Dr. Eccleshare that/* he remarked. “Well—it was Cowie,” said Manners. “The old man who lives in the cottage near Reiver’s Den. He saw you—both.” • “What did he see?” asked Eccieshare. “He saw you there, and heard you —talking. Then he saw you go away together—toward Mr. Courtbope s place, High Cap Lodge.” Eccleshare nodded. He was looking from one to the other of us, and for a moment dr two he remained silent, evidently thinking. “Look here!” he said, suddenly. “Am I—or is Parslave —or are the two of us suspected of the murder of Mazaroff ?” No one answered. Manners moved uneasily in his chair; the man from New Scotland Yard preserved a gran-ite-like countenance; Maythorne showed what seemed to be indifference; Crole and myself looked on. There was a brief silence —broken by Manners. “I should like to know what Parslave there has to say about his movements that night!” he said. “A rare lot of trouble he’s given us!” “I’m quite sure that Parslave hasn t the slightest notion that he gave you any trouble,” remarked Eccleshare. “You forget, I think, that Parslave can’t read —so he hasn’t learned anything from the newspapers. But —Parslave, tell Sergeant Manners what you did that evening you left Marrasdale.” Parslave, thus bidden, screwed up his face to the feat of remembrance. An idea suddenly came to him. He brightened. “Cloughthwaite Fair day that was!” said. “I’d been there —took some sheep there, belonging to Mr. Robinson. Come away from there end o’ tho afternoon. Then I went home, and according to orders —doctor’s orders there—changed into my best clothes. Cause why? I was to go to London that night. Got my supper then, and after that, walked along to the WoodCOc fc* i went in there and had a pint the strange gentleman as was stopPmg there, he come into the room where there was a reg’lar crowd of lit' rove rs and shepherds and suche - He stood treat all round — Q nnks and smokes. Gen’rous, he I? 8 * Talked to us affable, like, too. hen he went away. I stopped a bit jonger, then I went off. To meet the octor there—by arrangement. I met ? 11 ?- That’s all as I did that night—before leaving.” Lid you ever mention to anybody

that you were going to London?” asked Maythorne. “No, master, I never did,” replied Parslave.” “Hadn’t no cause O- I’m a lone man—neither kith nor kin, nobody to leave. Paid up, I did, where I lodged—and just went off. My way, that was. Didn’t want no talk about it. Twarn’t no concern o’ nobody’s but my own, as I knew of.” “Where did you meet Dr. Eccleshare?” asked Manners. , "Where it had been arranged,” replied Parslave, promptly. “Near Reiver's Den. He was to be there and give me my orders and my travelling money. And there he was! Eccleshare suddenly came from the hearth and joined us at the table. “Just so!” he said. “There X was! —and I think I’d better tell you, as things are, precisely wbat happened. Possibly, I ought to have told all this before. But I had reasons —for silence.”

I think that each of the men sitting round the table felt that at last there wae going to be some revelation as to the murder of Mazaroff which, up to then, had never been made. I realised it myself, anyway, and I began to feel a curiously sickening sense of apprehension, not unconnected with the events of the previous evening. Eccleshare knew something. So, too, probably, did ParslaVe. But —what

“I say I had reasons for keeping silence,” continued Eccleshare, settling down to talk to us. “I had; strong enough for me. Perhaps I’ve been wrong. Perhaps in these cases — murder —nobody should keep silent, under any circumstances. And yet, you’ll see, as men, that I had reasons. and weighty ones. Now I’ll tell you, as it seems absolutely necessary, precisely what happened to Parslave and myself on the night on which Mazaroff met his death. Let me begin at the beginning. Before I went up North to Marrasdale to shoot with Courthope, who’s a fellow club-member of mine, as' Arinintrade also is, I’d decided to sell my practice-had sold it, in fact and to leave England for South America and a quite different life —prospecting, shooting, hunting, and that sort of thing. I wanted to take with me a man who’d be useful to me; preferably a countryman. A gamekeeper, used to outdoor life, was the sort of man I had in mind. At Marrasdale I came across Parslave. As you can see for yourselves, he’s just the wiry, muscular sort of chap that was wanted. He is. as he’s said just now, a lone man; nothing to tie him to England. He’s thoroughly up in woodcraft and that sort of thing. In short, he was the very man I was looking for. I broached the matter to him, and we

very soon came to terms. There were certain things that he could do for me here in London, so I arranged that, he should come up in advance of me and stay at my house until my return. We arranged further that on the night after Cloughthwaite Fair, which he had to attend on business, he was to meet me, and I was then to give him money and some final instructions, and he was to leave for Newcastle and London.” “Why by Newcastle?” asked Maythorne. “It’s a detail, but why not l>y Black Gill Junction and Carlisle, the more usual western route?” “I’ll tell you,” answered Eccleshare. “Parslave has some interest in a bit of cottage property in Newcastle. As he was leaving England he wanted to see a’ solicitor in Newcastle who manages that property, and to give him some instructions about it. So we arranged that after seeing me, he was to cross the moor to that little branch line that runs east of Marrasdale, catch the last train to Newcastle, stay the night there, see his solicitor in the morning, and then go on to King’s Cross. All of which, he will tell you himself, he did.” "Very well, and your meeting that night?” asked Maythorne.

“I'm coming to that now,” continued Eccleshare. “I had told Parslave to meet me on the path between High Cap Lodge and the Woodcock about 8 o’clock. I strolled out to meet him, as soon as dinner was over at Courthope’s. That would be about ten minutes to eight. We met a little to the further side, the side nearest the Woodcock, of Reiver’s Den. As far as I can recollect, * it would then he just after eight o’clock. We stood a few minutes, talking. Then ”

“A moment, if you please,” interrupted Maythorne. He produced a memorandum book, and laying it open on the table before him, drew Eccleshare’s attention to a rough diagram pencilled on Qne of the pages. “Here’s a sketch that I made the day of my arrival at the Woodcock,” he said. “A sketch of the paths across the moor. Now, there are two paths that lead from the direction of High Cap Lodge and go toward the Woodcock. One leads directly across the front of Reiver’s Den, at the very foot of the rocks. We’ll call that the higher one. The .other is some 15 or 20 yards lower down. among the heather. We’ll call that the lower one. Which path were you ’and Parslave on?” Eccleshare bent over the diagram for a moment, twisting it round so as to get a clear idea of its geography. He put his finger on a spot. "We were about there,” he said, “on the lower one. But I don’t know if you’ve made it quite plain—those two

paths—one, the lower One, is a mere sheep track—almost meet on the west side, the High Cap Lodge side of Reiver’s Den, near Cowie’s cottage. They are only separated there by a yard or two. Then the lower one goe3 away through the heather to the top side of High Cap Lodge. The other one passes High Cap Lodge on the lower side at fifty or sixty yards’ distance, and breaks into the moorland road to Cloughthwaite.” “Well,” Maythorne said, “anyway, you, and Parslave were on the lower one?”

“We were on the lower one, perhaps a hundred yards from Reiver’s Den, and,” continued Eccleshare, “as I was saying, we stood there a few minutes, talking. It was then quite dark, but a clear starlit night. We were just moving away, in the High Cap Lodge direction, when we heard a shot fired. It seemed, as far as we could make out, to be in Reiver’s Den, or just beyond it. I think it must have been in Reiver’s Den, because there was a distinct echo from the rocks. We heard nothing follow —no cry, scream, anything of that sort. Neither of us took any particular notice —I think we each had the same idea, that it was a gamekeeper who was after something. In fact, we heeded it so little that we went on talking about our own business for a minute or two after the shot was fired. Then, because it was time for Parslave to be getting on to, catch his train, we moved, coming over to the other path because it leads directly to the moorland road. We had just got on it when we heard steps coming along from the direction of Reiver’s Den. There was some high, thick bushes close by, and —I really don’t know why we did it, but we did—we sort of instinctively moved into their shadow, where it was quite dark. And then, a minute later, walking very swiftly, a woman passed us.” “A woman!” It was Manners who let out this sharp exclamation. Like all the rest of us, he had been following Eccleshare closely; now he showed signs of excitement. Clearly some notion had | suddenly come to him. “A woman,” repeated Eccleshare quietly. “A woman,' tall, slender, walking very quickly indeed —we heard her breathing sharply. -She was past and gone like a flash.” “In which direction?” asked Maythorne. “Toward Marrasdale,” replied Eccleshare. “And then?” suggested Maythorne after a brief pause. “Then Parslave and I went on again —he was getting pressed for time. We neither heard nor saw anything there. We passed Cowie’3 cottage. You say Cowie saw us together—probable, but we never saw him. We walked quickly across the moor, struck the high road, and parted. I went into High Cap Lodge, and Parslave — but let Parslave himself tell you what he did.” (To be Continued)