Part 4

image: img_017 caption: Thorndyke’s tracing of the impression of the Scarab

enlargement of the seal--ten by eight, mounted--and three unmounted prints of Dr. Jervis’s.”

Thorndyke looked at my photographs critically. “They’re excellent, Jervis,” said he. “The finger-prints are perfectly legible, though faint. I only hope some of them are the right ones. That is my left thumb. I don’t see yours. The small one is presumably Miss Blowgrave’s. We must take her finger-prints to-morrow, and her father’s, too. Then we shall know if we have got any of the robber’s.” He ran his eye over my report and nodded approvingly. “There is plenty there to enable us to identify the typewriter if we can get hold of it, and the paper is very distinctive. What do you think of the seal?” he added, laying the enlarged photograph before me.

“It is magnificent,” I replied, with a grin. “Perfectly monumental.”

“What are you grinning at?” he demanded.

“I was thinking that you seem to be counting your chickens in pretty good time,” said I. “You are making elaborate preparations to identify the scarab, but you are rather disregarding the classical advice of the prudent Mrs. Glasse.”

“I have a presentiment that we shall get that scarab,” said he. “At any rate we ought to be in a position to identify it instantly and certainly if we are able to get a sight of it.”

“We are not likely to,” said I. “Still, there is no harm in providing for the improbable.”

This was evidently Thorndyke’s view, and he certainly made ample provision for this most improbable contingency; for, having furnished himself with a drawing-board and a sheet of tracing-paper, he pinned the latter over the photograph on the board and proceeded, with a fine pen and hectograph ink, to make a careful and minute tracing of the intricate and bewildering hieroglyphic inscription on the seal. When he had finished it he transferred it to a clay duplicator and took off half a dozen copies, one of which he handed to me. I looked at it dubiously and remarked: “You have said that the medical jurist must make all knowledge his province. Has he got to be an Egyptologist, too?”

“He will be the better medical jurist if he is,” was the reply, of which I made a mental note for my future guidance. But meanwhile Thorndyke’s proceedings were, to me, perfectly incomprehensible. What was his object in making this minute tracing? The seal itself was sufficient for identification. I lingered awhile hoping that some fresh development might throw a light on the mystery. But his next proceeding was like to have reduced me to stupefaction. I saw him go to the bookshelves and take down a book. As he laid it on the table I glanced at the title, and when I saw that it was Raper’s “Navigation Tables” I stole softly out into the lobby, put on my hat and went for a walk.

When I returned the investigation was apparently concluded, for Thorndyke was seated in his easy chair, placidly reading “The Compleat Angler.” On the table lay a large circular protractor, a straight-edge, an architect’s scale and a sheet of tracing-paper on which was a tracing in hectograph ink of Shawstead Manor.

“Why did you make this tracing?” I asked. “Why not take the map itself?”

“We don’t want the whole of it,” he replied, “and I dislike cutting up maps.”

By taking an informal lunch in the train, we arrived at Shawstead Manor by half-past two. Our approach up the drive had evidently been observed, for Blowgrave and his daughter were waiting at the porch to receive us. The former came forward with outstretched hand, but a distinctly woebegone expression, and exclaimed: “It is most kind of you to come down; but alas! you are too late.”

“Too late for what?” demanded Thorndyke.

“I will show you,” replied Blowgrave, and seizing my colleague by the arm, he strode off excitedly to a little wicket at the side of the house, and, passing through it, hurried along a narrow alley that skirted the garden wall and ended in a large meadow, at one end of which stood a dilapidated windmill. Across this meadow he bustled, dragging my colleague with him, until he reached a heap of freshly-turned earth, where he halted and pointed tragically to a spot where the turf had evidently been raised and untidily replaced.

“There!” he exclaimed, stooping to pull up the loose turfs and thereby exposing what was evidently a large hole, recently and hastily filled in. “That was done last night or early this morning, for I walked over this meadow only yesterday evening and there was no sign of disturbed ground then.”

Thorndyke stood looking down at the hole with a faint smile. “And what do you infer from that?” he asked.

“Infer!” shrieked Blowgrave. “Why, I infer that whoever dug this hole was searching for Uncle Reuben and the lost jewels!”

“I am inclined to agree with you,” Thorndyke said calmly. “He happened to search in the wrong place, but that is his affair.”

“The wrong place!” Blowgrave and his daughter exclaimed in unison. “How do you know it is the wrong place?”

“Because,” replied Thorndyke, “I believe I know the right place, and this is not it. But we can put the matter to the test, and we had better do so. Can you get a couple of men with picks and shovels? Or shall we handle the tools ourselves?”

“I think that would be better,” said Blowgrave, who was quivering with excitement. “We don’t want to take any one into our confidence if we can help it.”

“No,” Thorndyke agreed. “Then I suggest that you fetch the tools while I locate the spot.”

Blowgrave assented eagerly and went off at a brisk trot, while the young lady remained with us and watched Thorndyke with intense curiosity.

“I mustn’t interrupt you with questions,” said she, “but I can’t imagine how you found out where Uncle Reuben was buried.”

“We will go into that later,” he replied; “but first we have got to find Uncle Reuben.” He laid his research-case down on the ground, and opening it, took out three sheets of paper, each bearing a duplicate of his tracing of the map; and on each was marked a spot on this meadow from which a number of lines radiated like the spokes of a wheel.

“You see, Jervis,” he said, exhibiting them to me, “the advantage of a map. I have been able to rule off these sets of bearings regardless of obstructions, such as those young trees, which have arisen since Silas’s day, and mark the spot in its correct place. If the recent obstructions prevent us from taking the bearings, we can still find the spot by measurements with the land-chain or tape.”