Jasper County Democrat, Volume 10, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 August 1907 — Martin Hewitt, Investigator. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Martin Hewitt, Investigator.

The Loss of Sammy Crockett.

By ARTHUR MORRISON.

Published by Arrangement With Harper & Hrothers.

J 'i-'IT was, of course, always a part I I I of Martin Hewitt’s business to I I [ be tbordUKhly at home amouK LiJ any and every class of people and to be able to Interest himself Intelligently, or to appear to do so, In their various pursuits. In one of the most important cases ever placed In his hands he could, have gone but a abort way toward success had he not displayed some knowledge of the more aordid aspects of professional sport. The great case Itself had nothing to do with sport and, Indeed, from a narrative point of view was somewhat uninteresting, but the man who alone held the one piece of Information wanted was a keeper, backer or ‘‘gaffer” of professional pedestrians, and It was through the medium of his pecuniary interest In such matters that Hewitt was enabled to strike a burgain with him. The man'nvas a publican on the out skirts of Padfield, a northern town pretty famous for Its sporting tastes, and to Padfield therefore Hewitt betook himself, and, arrayed In a way to Indicate some inclination of his own toward si>ort, he began to frequent tie bar of the Hare and Hounds. Kentish, the landlord, was a stout, bull necked man of no great communicativeness at first, but after a little acquaintance he opened out wonderfully, became quite a jolly (and rather Intelligent) companion and came out with innumerable anecdotes of his sporting adventures. Good terms with Mr. Kentish was Hewitt’s great desire, for the Information he wanted was of a sort that could never be extracted by casual questioning, but must be a matter of open communication by the publican. “Look here,” said Kentish one day, “I’ll put you on to a good thing, my boy—a real good thing. Of bourse you know all ftl>out the Padfield 136 yards handicap being run off now.” “Well, I huven’t looked Into It much,” Hewitt replied. “Ran the first round of heats last Saturday and Monday, didn’t they?” “They did. Well”—Kentish spoke In a stage whisper as he leaned over and rapped the table—“l’ve got the final winner In this bouse.” He nodded his head, took a puff at his cigar and added In his ordinary voice, “Don’t say nothing.” “No, of course not. Got something on, of course.” “Rather! What do you think? Got any price I liked. Been saving him up for this. Why, he could win runnin’ back’ards. He won his heat on Monday like—like—like that!” The gaffer Bnapped his fingers In default of a better Illustration and went on: “Yott take my tip—back him for his heat next Saturday In the second round and for the final. You’ll get a good price for the final If you pop it down at once. But don’t go makln’ a song of It, will you, now?”

“Thanks very much. It’s awfully good of you. I’ll do what you advise. But Isn’t there a dark horse anywhere else?” 1 'INot dark to me, my boy; not dark to me. I know every man runnin’ like a book. Old Taylor—him over at the Cop—he’s got a very good lad, and he's a tryer this time, I know, but, bless you, my lad could beat him without trying. You back him.” "I shall if you’re as sure as that. But who is lie?” “Oh, Crockett's his name—Sammy Crockett. He’s quite a new lad. I've got young Steggles looking after him. Sticks to him like wax. Takes his little breathers in my bit o’ ground at the back here. I’ve got a cinder sprint path there over behind the trees. I don’t let him out o’ sight much, I can tell you. He’s a straight lad, and he knows it ’ll be worth his while to stick to me, but there's some ’ud poison him If they thought he’d spoil their books.” Boon afterward the two strolled toward the taproom. “I expect Sammy *ll be there,” the landlord said, "with Steggles. I don’t hide him too much —they’d think I’d got something extra on if I did.” In the taproom sat a lean, wire drawn looking youth with sloping shoulders aud a thin face, and by his aide was a rather short, thick set man who hit 1 an odd air, no matter what he did, of proprietorship and surveillance of the lean youth. Several other men sat übout, and there was loud laughter, under which the lean youth looked sheepishly angry. “ ’Tarn’t no good, Sammy, lad,”, soipe one was saying, “you a-maktu' after Nancy Webb. She’ll ha’ nowt to do with ’ee.” “What about Nancy W T ebb?” asked Kentish, pushing open the door. “Sammy’s all right, anyway. You keep fit, my lad, an’ go on improving, and some day you'll have as good a house as me. Never mind the lasses. Come out now.” He nodded to Steggles, who rose and marched Sammy Crockett away for exercise. On the following afternoon (It was as Hewitt and Kentish chatted In the landlord’s own snuggery Steggles burst into the room in a great state of agitation and spluttered oat “He—he’s bolted; gone away!” “What?" "Sammy—gone 1 Hooked itl I can’t And him.” The landlord stared blankly at the trainer, who stood with a sweater dangling from his hand and stared blankly back. “What d'ye mean?”

'Kentish said at last. “Don’t be a fool! He’s la the place somewhere. Find himSr ' -' .?■ But this Steggles defied anybody to do, He had looked already. He had left Crockett at the cinder path behind the trees in his running gear, with the addition of the long overcoat and cup he used In going between the path and the house to guard against chill. "‘Baggy,’ ses he, it’s blawln’ a bit chilly. I think I’ll ha’ a sweater. There’s one on my box, ain’t there?’ So in I coomes for the sweater, and It weren’t on his box, and when I found It and got back he weren’t there. They’d see nowt o’ him In t’ house, and he weren’t nowhere.” Hewitt and the landlord, now thor ouglily startled, searched everywhere, but to no purpose. “What should he go off the place for?” asked Kentish in a sweat of apprehension. "’Talni chilly a bit. It’s warm. He didn’t want no sweater; never wore one be fore. It was a piece of kid to be able to clear out. Nice thing, this Is. I stand to win two years’ takings over him. Here, you’ll have to find him.” “Ah, but bow?” exclaimed the disconcerted trainer, dancing about distractedly. “I’ve got all I could scrape on him myself. Where can I look?” Here was Hewitt’s opportunity. He took Kentish asl tip and whispered. What he said startled the landlord considerably. “Yes, I’ll tell you all about that,” he said, “if that’s all you want. It’s no good or harm to me whether I tell or no. But can you find him?” “That I can’t promise, of course. But you know who I am now and what I’m here for. If you like to give me the Information I want, I’ll go into the case for you, and of course I shan’t charge any fee. I may have luck, you know, but I can’t promise, of course. The landlord looked in Hewitt’s face for a moment. Then he said: “Done! It’s a deal.” “Very good,” Hewitt replied. “Get together the one or two papers you have, and we’U go Into my business in the evening. As to Crockett, don’t say a word to anybody. I’m afraid it must get out, since they all know about it In the bouse, but there’s no use In making any unnecessary noise. Don’t make hedging bets or do anything tbnt will attract notice. Now we’ll go over to the back and look at this cinder path of yours.” Here Steggles, who was still standing near, was struck with an Idea. “How about old Taylor, at the Cop, guv’nor, eh?” be said meaningly. “Hie lad's good enough to win with Sammy put, and Taylor is backing him plenty. Think he knows anything o’ this?” “That’s likely,” Hewitt observed before Kentish could reply. “Yes. Look here. Suppose Steggles goes and keeps his eye on the Cop for kb hour or two in case there’s anything to be heard of. Don’t show yourself, of course.” Kentish agreed, and the trainer went. When Hewitt and Kentish arrived at the path behind the trees, Hewitt at once began examining the ground. One or two rather large holes In the cinders were made, as the publican explained, by Crockett, in practicing getting off his mark. Behind these were several fresh tracks of spiked shoes. The tracks led up to within a couple of yards of the high fence bounding the ground, and there stopped abruptly and entirely. In the fence, a little to the right of where the tracks stopped, there was a stout door. This Hewitt tried and found ajar. “That’s always kept bolted," Kentish said. “He’s gone out that way—he couldn’t have gone any other without cornin’ through the house.”

“But he Isn’t In the habit of making a step three yards long, Is he?” Hewitt asked, pointing at the last footmark and then at the door, which was quite that distance away from it. “Besides,” he added, opening the door, “there’s no footprint here nor outside.” The door opened on a lane, with another fence aud a thick plantation of trees at the other side. Kentish looked at the footmarks, then at the door, then down the lane, and finally back toward the house. “That's a licker!” he said. “This Is a quiet sort of lane,” was Hewitt’s next remark. “No houses in sight. Where does it leSad?” “That way It goes to the,Old Kilns—disused. This way down to a turning off the Padfield and Catton road.” Hewitt returned to the cinder path again aud once more examined the footmarks. He traced them back over the grass toward the house. “Certainly,” he said, “he hasn’t gone back to the house. Here is the double line of tracks, side by side, from the house— Steggles’ ordinary boots with iron tips, and Crockett’s running pumps. Thus they came out. Ifere is Steggles’ track in the opposite direction alone, made When he went back for the sweater. Crockett remained. You see various prints in those loose cinders at the end of the path where he moved this way and that, and then two or three paces toward the fence—not directly toward the door, you notice—and there they stop dead, and there are no more, either back or forward.” Kentish stared gloomily at the tracks and said nothing. “However,” Hewitt resumed, “I think I’ll take a little walk now and think over it. You go into the house and show yourself at the bar. If anybody wants to know how Crockett is, he’s jpretty well, thank you. By the bye, can I get to the Cop—this place of Taylor’s—by this back lane?” “Yes, down to the end leading to the Catton road, turn to the left and then first on the right. Any one ’ll show you the Cpj),” and Kentish shut the door Ibehim} the 1 detective, who straightway walked—toward the Old Kilns. \ In little more than an hour he was back. It was now becoming dusk, and the landlord looked out papers from a box near the side window of the snuggery for the sake of the extra light. *Tve got these papers together for you,” he said, as Hewitt entered. “Any newer

“Nothing very great. Here’* a bit of handwriting I want you to recognise, If you can. Get a light.” Kentish lit a lamp, und Hewitt laid upon the table half a dozen small pieces of torn paper, evidently fragments of a letter which had been torn up. ;

The landlord turned the scraps over, regarding them dubiously. “These aren’t much to recognize anyhow. I don’t know the writing. Where did you find ’em?” “They were lying In the lane at the back, a little way down. Plainly they are the pieces of a note addressed to some one called Sammy or something very like it. See the first piece, with Its ‘mmy?’ That Is clearly from the beginning of the note, because there is no line between it and the smooth, straight edge of the paper above; also, nothing follows on the same line. Some one writes to Crockett—presuming it to be a letter addressed to him, as I do for other reasons—as Sammy. It is a pity that there is no more of the letter to be found than these pieces. I expect the person who tore It up put the rest In his pocket and dropped these by accident.”

Kentish, who had been picking up and examining each piece in turn, now dolorously broke out: “Oh, It’s plain he’s sold us—bolted and done us. Me as took him out o’ the gutter too! Look here—‘throw them over.' That’s plain enough. Can’t mean anything else. Means throw me over and my friends—me after what I’ve done for him! Then ‘right away’— go right away, I s’pose, as he has done. Then”—he was fiddling with the scraps and finally fitted two together—“why, look here! This.one with ‘lane’ on it fits over the one about throwing over, and it says ‘poor • f where it’s torn. That means “poor fool,’ I s’pose—me—or ‘fathead’ or something like that That’s nice! Why, I’d twist his neck If I could get hold of him, and I will!” Hewitt smiled. “Perhaps It’s not quite so uncomplimentary, after all,’’ he said. “If you can’t recognize the writing, never mind. But If he’s gone away to Sell you It Isn’t much use finding him, is it? He won’t win if he doesn’t want to.” “Why, he wouldn’t dare to rope under my very eyes. I’d—l’d” “Well, well, perhaps awe’ll get him to run, after all, and as well as he can. One thing is certain—he left this place of his own will. Further, I think he is In Padfield now. He went toward the town, I believe. And I don’t think he means to sell you.” “Well, he shouldn’t I’ve made It worth his while to stick to me. I’ve put a fifty on for him out of my own pocket and told him so, and if he won that would bring him a lump more than he’d probably get by going crooked, besides the prize money and anything I might give him over. But it seems to me he’s putting me In the cart altogether.” “That we shall see. Meantime don’t mention anything I’ve told you to any one, not even Steggles. By the bye, Steggles Is indoors, isn’t he? Very well, keep him In. Don’t let him be seen hunting about this evening. I’ll stay here tonight, and we’ll proceed with Crockett’s business in the morning. And now we’ll settle my business. please.”