[COPYRIGHT STORY.] THE CASE OF MRS. CRIDLAN

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XL, Issue 1, 4 January 1908, Page 35

[COPYRIGHT STORY.] THE CASE OF MRS. CRIDLAN

By

CHAPTER L 80 you are going to marry that charming Mrs. Cridlan,” said the Doctor, leaning both elbows on Hie table, and regarding me thoughtfully, “and you have fixed your wedding for Christmas eve? Dear me! . . . I wonder if she realises that the coming festive occasion will be the fifth anniversary of the most terrible event of her life . . . . an event which —1 may say it without conceit—would have deprived you of your charming, future wife but for my happy intervention. “Five years seem a long time! ’ he mused after a slight pause, “and perhaps it is a little strange that I have never spoken to you before of my intimate connection with the tragedy of Mrs. Cridlan’s earlier married life. It was in the summer of 1902 that I took on that locum tenens work at a place called Oakham. ‘The Priory’ was on the outskirts of the little town, and 1 had not been long.’ in tl;e place before local ■gossip apprised-me of the unenviable reputation for eccentricity which the old house enjoyed. Mr. Cridlan was renting it from, the Squire of Oakham, and had filled it with native' Indian servants, the only kind of domestics he would ever have about him. He had spent all his life in India, you see, and I suppose he had got used to their ugly dark skins and stealthy footsteps; but, of course, the neighbouring servants and the tradespeople round about .could not abide these ‘niggers,’ as they were popularly called; and as Mr. Cridlan did not care for his own neighbours, there was mot much social intercourse between ‘The Priory’ and the adjoining country Beats and houses, either upstairs or below. ' . “I was told that Mr. Cridlan, in spite of his eccentricities, was still a young man, and that about a year and a half ago he had married a young wife, whom, however, he promptly left to bore herself alone in that old-fashioned and dreary house, whilst he himself went back to his beloved India, where he had a business house in Bombay. “Very soon the gossfft got about that young Mrs. Cridlan was a confirmed invalid, and that since her husband’s absence she had scarcely ever left the house. Strange rumours also were afloat as to the state of desolation and neglect 'which prevailed in the fine old house and grounds. The dusky servants with an absent master and a siek mistress having it seemingly all their own way. “It had struck me as odd that though I was the nearest medical man to ‘The Priory,’ I had never been called in to see the invalid, but one afternoon—it was on the 22nd of December—l had a visit from a pompous but pleasant looking gentleman, who introduced himself to me as General Hector U. Shee, of the 'United States Army, uncle of Mrs. Cridlan, of ‘The Prjdry.’ He told me that he was over in Europe on a pleasure trip, and had paid a visit to his niece, Mrs, Cridlan, at ‘The Priory.’ Mrs. Cridlan was the only daughter of his late brother Town Councillor Shee, and the gallant General had been horrified beyond measure at seeing the havoc ■wrought in his niece’s health by 18 months of European life. In fact, her apathy and general look of wretchedness positively alarms me, doctor,’ added the gafla 71 General;

‘she seems to have no friends, and I don’t half like those beastly niggers about the place.’ “ ‘But what do you wish me to do, General?’ I asked. It is scarcely correct for a medical man to call on a patient who probably doesn’t want him.’ “‘That’s just it,’ he said; ‘I think she wants a doctor all right enough, but seems too apathetic even to send for one. Now if you will call to-morrow morning at about ten o’clock, I can introduce you to Mrs. Cridlan, and she won’t refuse to see you, if only to please her old uncle.’ “I confess that I was deeply interested in my unfortunate neighbour, and the strange air of mystery which had always surrounded her seclusion at ‘The Priory.’ I therefore pronounced myself quite willing to call the next day at 10 o’clock, and to leave the matter of my 'possible welcome in the hands of the gallant General. “The next morning found me sharp to time outside the closed gates of ‘The Priory.’ I had to wait some considerable time in the cold before a dusky and white-clad figure shambled down the illkept gravel drive, and, after casting very suspicious glances at me, finally made up its mind to allow me to pass. I asked for General Shee, and the ‘digger,’ with an unceremonious backward jerk of the thumb, indicated the direction of the house. “The grounds of ‘The Priory’ were far larger than I had had any idea of, and must at one time have been very, beautiful. “The house itself was an ugly, oldfashioned one, built on to the ruins of the old Oakham Priory, bits of the cloisters of which are still extant. The whole property, with these interesting relics and the fine grounds, would have made an exquisite and artistic home if properly kept up; in its present state it looked mournful and wretched in the extreme. “1 boldly rang the front bell, and was ushered by another ‘nigger’ into a cheerless and vast living room, where the gallant U.S. warrior received me with much dignified cordiality. After the usual preliminaries he took me to see the patient. “Mrs. Cridlan at that time was a young woman, scarcely more than a girl, whom her mysterious troubles had worn down to a sliadow. She lay like a wax image in the great old-fashioned fourpost bedstead, the dark panelling of the room making her and the white bedclothes appear almost ghost-like. “Well, I don’t suppose that you wouldl caye .to .hear nuj enter into a long a,jp count of how I arrived at my diagnosis. General Shee had left me- alone with my patient, who seemed neither pleased nor annoyed at seeing me; and who was ready enough, in a dull apathetic way, to reply to my questions. Suffice it to say that within twenty minutes I had realised that my patient was dying—and that she was dying because—slowly but surely—she was being poisoned with arsenic. “Strangely enough,” continued the Doctor, as soon ■ as he had ascertained that attention had in no way flagged, “strangely enough my terrible discovery did not astonish me in the least. A. medical man, when face to face with such terrible problems, is exactly like a general before he takes the field; he has to locate his enemy, and to lay his plans; mine were complete in less time than it now takes me to fell you.' “Unfortunately my patient was too ill

BARONESS OREZY,

Author of “The Scarlet Pimpernel,” Etc.

at present to be moved. Without in any way alarming her I asked her searching * questions as to her entourage. A rapid survey of the room had already assured me that all traces of the fatal drug had been obliterated. “Mrs. Cridlan told me that her household consisted of three native Indian servants only; two men, who did duty as gardener and cook; and one woman, who acted as maid to her. “A kind and faithful creature,” she added in her apathetic voice, “and seems devoted to me.” “Have you had her long?” I asked. “About six months,” she replied. “My husband sent for her from Bombay, and sue arrived about a week after he went away. “As my duty would be henceforth to suspect and watch everybody. I sincerely hoped that poor Mrs. Cridlan’s description of her Indian maid was a correct one, that indeed, I would have in her a faithful and devoted ally. I would, of course, be obliged to return home in order to get certain ipedicanients which 1 wanted, and also to give a few orders to my housekeeper against my absence, for I hail firmly resolved to spend my Christmas at ‘the Priory’ and remain there until the trained nurse, for whom I intended telegraphing, had arrived. “My patient now was too weary to be plied with further questions, and 1 wished to consult General Shee over many matters; but I was loth to leave her; the whole atmosphere of this great panelled room filled me with distrust. However, I looked in vain for a bell, and had perforce to seek General Hector U. Shee myself. “As I opened the heavy oak bedroom door with a sudden jerk, and stepped out into the gloomy passage, it seemed to me that a figure swathed in yellow draperies quickly vanished down the corridor. It struck me it might be the Indian maid, and I called to her, but the figure had already disappeared; then with sudden determination 1 turned the key of the bedroom door, and put it in my pocket—locking my patient in. Then with a feeling of momentary security, I went downstairs. "General Hector U. Shee could throw but little light upon the horrible tragedy which threatened the life of his niece. He, like most Americans, had the most confound contempt, for- everything that pertained to the ‘nigger’; against that, he and I both agreed that the native servants at ‘The Priory’ could have no possible motive for cruelly murdering a mistress who had never done them any wrong, and paid them good wages for very little work, nor could they find the means of procuring the poison themselves. They were never seen outside the precincts of ‘The Priory,’ and I am sure that Brown, the only druggist in the neighbourhood, wood never have supplied the ‘niggers’ with so deadly a drug, without specific orders from a medical man. “ridlan must of course be sent for at “ ‘Cridlan must of course be sent for at once,’ was the General's firm comment, ‘he is a—hem—blackguard,—the way he has treated Sadie, and after she quarrelled with all her family in order to marry' him too. Hut after the telegram we’ll send him, ho can’t in all decency refuse to return at once. Mrs. Cridlan hail a letter from him from Bombay only yesterday. He is in business there nt 10 Hummum Street. Will you send the

reply paid wire. Doctor? And mind you put it strongly.’ And, while I am gone, may I rely On your not leaving my patient alone for a moment?” 1 added earnestly. ‘Here is the key of her room. I locked her in, you understand? If you must leave her’ lock the door and put the key in your pocket. I’ll be back in less’ than an hour.’ “In my little house, I made a few arrangements for my proposed absence, and collected what medicaments i knew I Should require. Then I walked quicklv to the post office, sent the two wire’s reply paid,’ ascertained when 1 could have the reply from Bombay, and then turned my steps once more towards the gloomy and mysterious ‘Priory.’ “I had been gone but a little over an hour, but as soon as I had gained admittance, 1 hastened to my patient’s room, whore General Heetor U. Shee greeted me with much effusion. I then went to the great four-poster, and had a look at my patient. One glance was sufficient, t She was worse, very much worse than when I had left her an hour ago, locked up in her room. The skin was of a more livid hue, the eyelids showed more deeply purple, round the mouth there was a curious convulsive twitch. My eyes wandered from her waxlike face to the fine, massive oak table by her side: on it there had stood when 1 left, some bottles, a few knieknaeks, and a handkerchief, also a dean glass and a small c.iraffe full of water. “The caraffe was now halt empty and the glass here the faintest possible trace of moisture. 1 turned fiercely towards the General. ‘ “Who has been in this room, besides yourself?’ 1 asked peremptorily. “ ‘No one,’ he replied. “Wou either lie, General Heetor U. Shee,’ I retorted, ‘or else . . .’ « r S avc Mrs Cridlan to drink?’ ‘I d d. She complained of being thirsty. There was a glass full of water on the table. I gave it her, and she drank it. Now then. Sir, what is the—hemmeaning— ?’ “ ‘Anything you like. General Hector U. Shee,’ 1 replied with sudden calm: ‘but in my absence, and while no one had access to your niece’s room but yourself, she Ims been given another dose ol the poison.’ Now that 1 look buck on that short but animated conversation,” continued the Doctor as he slowly sipped his wine. “I am bound to confess that General Hector U. Shee acted with marvellous decorum and presence of niird. He reiterated his plain but straightforward explanation at the time, in deference, ho said, to my position as medical adviser; and it was not until after the arrival of the nurse, and when we knew that tho patient was well looked after and could spare us for half an hour, that he called me to account for having called him a liar. “And then he did it with on absence ol passion ami ill-feeling, which pleased mo very much, I remember—though I did suffer in other respects. He told me that he merely did it on a matter of principle, ami bore me no ill-will —but then, I boro the marks for quite a considerable time afterwards. In the meanwhile the gallant General and I remained the best of friends; after tho first moment of doubt, I was compelled to accept his explanation: so would you, if you had seen him. A more per-

feet type of straightforward, honest, plucky soldier, it would be impossible to meet with. After some discussion he and I arrived at the conclusion that the bedroom key which I had so carefully put in my pocket had evidently a duplicate which was in the possession of poor Mrs Cridlan’s dastardly and secret enemy. In my heart of hearts, I at once fastened my suspicions on the figure in the yellow drapery, Mrs Cridlan’s Indian maid, whom she trusted, and whom I had only dimly seen gliding with stealthy footsteps along the corridors. A desire seized me to see her now, at once, and make up my mind, by the study of her dusky face, exactly how far I need suspect her. “The General undertook to have her found, and to send her up to her mistress’ room on some errand or other, so that I might gratify my curiosity. “Three minutes later she came in, quiet, silent, very respectful: swathed from head to foot in her yellow draperies. She was very dark eomplexioned indeed, rather taller than the average Hindoo, with ugly bony hands, and long thin feet thrust into felt slippers, and of the usual Sharp, thin featured type we are all familiar with. But my scrutiny of her revealed nothing new. I suspected her vaguely, just rs much as ever, and L found myself wondering how in the world she eould have managed to buy the virulent poison in sufficient quantity to do the horrible damage she had already done. “ Unceasing watchfulness was, of course, just as much a part of my duty as the medical treatment which I had mapped out for my patient: another dose or two, such as she had had that morning, and she would be beyond the reach of human skill. It was therefore agreed between the General and myself that until the arrival of the nurse one of us at least would always be in the room. “T had had a reply the same afternoon from the nurse, who, however, eould not be at ‘The Priory’ until Christmas morning, which meant two nights and one day of unceasing, unremitting watchfulness. “The General was an able and faithful ally, and the first night and the next day passed quietly enough. During that day the reply hail come from Bombay.

Mr. Cridlan had telegraphed, ‘Very anxious, sail home by first possible steamer.’ “My patient on the second evening seemed perhaps a trifie easier and even inclined to sleep. “That second night was bitterly cold —regular Christmas weather some jovial people would have called it—but there was nothing festive in our hearts, as you may well imagine; however, a cheerful blaze brought a thought of cosiness to the place. The General had had his nap, and a couple of hours on the sofa had made a new man of him. I had spent those two hours cogitating on this strange mystery which surrounded me, trying to find some plhusible solution to the tragedy which was threatening that poor young woman, who looked so frail and so helpless in the great four-poster. But I was tired, out; the night before I had not closed my eyes, and when the General took possession of the big armchair by the fire, and vacated the sofa, I was glad enough to stretch myself upon it. I remember the last glimpse I had of the room just before I dropped off to sleep. My patient was dozing fairly quietly, with only an occasional, faint moan from her feverish lips, the bed and she herself were in complete darkness. In front of the fire the General sat in the big Queen Anne chair, with the “Times” spread out before him, and a shaded reading lamp lighting up his pleasant, rather pompous face and 'the white newspaper. Then all was oblivion. . . Suddenly I woke. Something had aroused me —something—I could not tell what—had happened in that room, a second ago, and had caused me to wake, not because I had had enough sleep, but because I was roused quite suddenly. “I looked about me, the General was still reading his paper —he. evidently, had heard nothing. Then I looked at my patient. She was awake. I could just see her in the distant gloom of the great room, as she raised herself on her elbow, and reached out her hand for the glass of barley water I myself had prepared for her. “That certain something which had

roused me from my sleep, had done it most effectually and had cleared my faculties as suddenly as it had ehased away my sleep. It was one of those faculties, terribly on the alert, which in spite of the apparently unaltered condition of the room caused me to spring almost at a bound to my patient’s bedside and to snatch the glass from her hand, at the very moment that she already conveyed it to her lips. She uttered a faint scream of fright. In her weakened condition my sudden action had terrified her, her cheeks became even more livid than formerly, and she sank unconscious on her pillow. “Care for her took up some little time, then only could I reply to the General’s anxious query: “ ‘Some one has been in this room •while I was asleep,’ I said. “ ‘lmpossible. I sat facing the door, and was futly awake the whole time.’ “ ‘And yet there is arsenic in this barley water, which I myself mixed, tasted, and placed on this table, just before I lay down on that sofa.’ “The General said nothing for a moment, but I saw that look creep into his eyes, which sometimes comes in the eyes of brave men, when the fear of the supernatural first takes hold of their nerves. Even I could not repress a shudder. I took up the glass again. There certainly was • nothing supernatural in the virulent poison which lay within it. It was there, tangible enough both to smell and taste, and strong enough this time to have ended with one stroke the feeble life that still flickered —but oh! so feebiy. “Impatient at the slowness of the results, or afraid of our watchfulness the next day, when the nurse would arrive, the murderer had wished to end it all now, to-night, at once. Again I shuddered—then I went to the door, and peered out. into the passage; it was dark and solitary. I knew now which was the Hindoo woman’s room. Leaving the General in charge. I went to her door, very euietly, and listened; it seemed to me that I heard the sound of regular breathing—then I tried the handle

—the door was locked, but a voiee from within whispered very softly in Hindoo? stanee: “‘Who goes there?’ “And thus ended our Christmas eve,'* added the Doctor grimly. “I don’t think that any human being ever welcomed another quite so effusively as I welcomed the nurse when she came on that memorable Christinas morning. “Big, chubby, fresh and rather loud, Nurse Dawson brought an air of Christmas festivity with her. Though not an ideal nurse in an ordinary sick room, she was just the right sort of person to dispel the atmosphere of weird superstition which had begun to envelop us both. “As briefly as possible I put Nurse Lawson au fait of all the events which had happened since first I had charge of the case, and she entered into my plans, which I had formulated during the small hours of the morning, with energy and enthusiasm. “By now, my mind was made up. It was the Hindoo woman, I felt sure, acting for some motive I could not now fathom, who was slowly poisoning her mistress. It was she who last night had daringly outwitted us and—who knows? —had perhaps with her cat-like step actually dared to enter and cross the room unperceived by the General. “There was a certain hour in the evening, about nine o’clock, when I had, both evenings previously, noticed the Hindoo woman taking a stroll in the garden. On this I had based my plan. Chance favoured me, she made no exception on this Christinas night. There was moonlight, and soon after nine I saw her in her yellow draperies walking slowly along the paths. “The two men were at that hour busy in the kitchen; the General having insisted on some semblance qf Christmas cheer we three faithful attendants had a clear field in the house. Quickly and dexterously Nurse Dawson wrapped the patient in a blanket, then, aided by the General, together they carried her to Nurse’s room. “Dawson remained to watch beside her, whilst the General and I returned to the big bedroom. In two minutes I had un-

dressed and slipped between the sheets in the big four-poster, wrapping my head and as much of my face as possible with a lace shawl. Then the General took the big chair by the fire and began reading his paper—by the light of the reading lamp, whilst the rest of the room, including the sofa, and of course the big fourposter with myself in it, remained wrapped in complete darkness. “I have spent many anxious moments in my life,” added the Doctor quietly, “but I doubt if my nerves have ever been at so terrible a tension as they were during those long hours of that cold Christmas night, when I lay in ths great fourposter, waiting for I knew not what. “Hour after hour slipped by, with no sound in that room save the occasional rustle of the General’s paper as he turned over the pages. I think it must have been just past two o’clock when my nerves, so vividly on the alert, first became conscious that something had happened—a slight noise only, probably, different from that which my ears had been accustomed to. I dared not move, for fear of displacing the lace shawl, but my eyes sought the door, the polished brass handle of which stood out fairly distinctly against the dark panelling; but neither the door, nor the handle were being moved, and yet, the consciousness became stronger and ever stronger upon me, that there was some one else in the mom besides the General and myself, ‘some one’ who was looking at me. I dared not move .... Behind me the heavy damask curtains of the four-poster rested against the oak panelling, and next to me was the table, also placed against the panelling, and on which was a glass filled with barley water. “A moment or two elapsed—The General had evidently seen and heard nothing, for he had not even looked up from his paper; then I saw a hand thrust forward from behind me —from the wall itself—only a hand, which I distinguished vaguely in the gloom; the fingers were closed over the palm, then they opened, and something white fell into the glass. “One instant, I had been paralysed — the next I had jumped up, and clutched that hand with all my might; the Whole think took fewer seconds than it now takes minutes to describe; that hand and arm were thrust through a square aperture in the oak panelling, immediately above the table beside the Leu. The aperture was less than four inches square, and my position half in and half out of bed was awkward and difficult to maintain. With a sudden wrench the hand was almost jerked out of my grasp, but I managed, by an almost superhuman effort, to retain possession of the thumb. “I clung to it for a moment, then with a wrench I dislocated that thumb, clean out of its socket, nearly smashing the joint as I wrenched. “There w-as a cry—an agonised cry—for that sort of thing is very painful, and the hand escaped me. 1 tell you, the whole episode had barely taken 00 seconds, and it was that cry, half smothered, which roused the General’s attention. He was by my side in a moment, but it was too late. The aperture in the panelling was there to testify to the truth of what I then quickly, described to him; but when we peered into it, there was nothing to be seen only impenetrable darkness. “It was useless to do anything how, that night, though the General and I did go out into the grounds and scoured the outskirts of the house at the point where we calculated the secret passage must be which ended just behind the panelling of the bedroom. “On my way down, I had tried the door of the Indian woman’s room. It was locked, and no voice answered to my knock from within. The whole thing seemed stranger than ever. Who was this woman? And what motive could she have for poisoning a young mistress, who until six months ago had been a perfect stranger to her? Her knowledge of the secret passageunknown to Mrs. Cridlan herself —pointed to the fact that she was a tool in the hands of soni cunning rascal. But ■what a strange tool to use, and how dangerous to have a tool at all! And again, why should the woman have been the tool of a murderer? “Why? Why? Why? “The next day, the General sent for the police. A clever detective came down from Scotland Yard, and he it was who — exploring the ruined Priory Churchcamo across the entrance of an underground passage in what must have lieen the sacristy; I was with him at the time, and lighting a couple of bull’s eye lanterns, we embarked into tliat passage.

It was stone paved, and stone walled, like a long cellar. We had walked silently and cautiously for about a bundled yards, when we saw something yellow, lying in a heap on the ground, at the foot of a narrow stone staircase wnich led upwards into the darkness. It was the Hindoo woman. She lay in a pool of blood with a fractured skull. Dizzy, no doubt, with the pain of her dislocated thumb, she had fallen the whole length of the stone stairs; when we found her she had been dead some hours. Before we carried her away we finished exploring the underground construction. “What its original uses could have been I cannot conjecture, for the stone stairs ended in a little narrow- chamber —which—of course —was immediately behinfl the bedroom, for there was the small window or aperture still open, overlooking the table by the bedside. “Then the detective and I went back to the body, which we carried out. Already as I carried it, my suspicions had been aroused; as soon as we had laid it in one of the disused rooms these suspicions were confirmed. The body, swathed in the yellow draperies of a woman, was that of a man—and the dark complexion, the jet black eyebrows, and bits of hair protruding beneath the sari, washed off, with the first application of warm water. When I had finished wasmng off the last vestige of the various dyes that went to complete the most masterly disguise I had ever seen, I called General Hector U. Shee to have a look at the body. He identified it witnout a moment’s hesitancy as that of John Cridlan, the husband of my patient. ***** “It was only after I had succeeded in restoring Mrs. Cridlan to health, that a somewhat softened version of the real facts were put before her, by her own American relatives. It appears that the unfortunate young bride had been induced in the earliest period of her married life to make a will by which al! her money, of which she had a great deal, was to have gone to her husband unconditionally. Hence the motive for this attempted murder, unparalleled almost in its brutality and cunning. “As far as the public was concerned, the whole matter was, of course, hushed up; the criminal had been indicted by the Supreme and Higuest Court, and the confederate at Bombay, who received and answered all John Cridlan’s letters and telegrams, was never found, in spite of the most strenuous efforts on the part of the English and Indian police. “It was ascertained that a native, who seemed well-furnished with money, had had a room at 10, Hummum-street, Bombay, at that time, and whilst lodging there had han letters and telegrams from England. He had given some sort o. name, paid for his room very regularly, and thus satisfied his landlord, who made no further inquiries One day he had a reply paid telegram: the next, he went out, and no one had seen or heard of him since. But you may well imagine,” concluded the Doctor thoughtfully, “that I am not likely to forget that Christmas and its grim memories for some considerable time to come.”