Harper's Magazine/The Mysterious Envelope

by George A. Birmingham

The Mysterious Envelope

BY GEORGE A. BIRMINGHAM

COLONEL JOCELYN, D.S.O., is quite our most eminent relative. He is my wife's first cousin, which entitles her to speak of him as "Gilbert" and "dear old Gilbert," although I do not think she has actually seen him a dozen times in her life. She is particularly fond of talking about him to the Fulkingtons. They are inclined to pride themselves on their social position and to be very exclusive. It is good for them to be made to understand that we are quite as well connected as they are. When the Colonel won his D.S.O., young Fulkington, who is quite as snobbish as his wife, was visibly impressed. When, a little later on, the Colonel was appointed chief of the South Australian police force, my wife went over to the Fulkingtons' house on purpose to tell them the news. By way of emphasizing the relationship, she said that dear old Gilbert intended to pay us a short visit before sailing for Australia. He wanted, she said, to have a long talk about old times. She added that the Fulkingtons must dine with us to meet him when he came. Mrs. Fulkington, who probably expected the Colonel's visit quite as little as my wife did, said that we must spare an evening and bring him over to dine with them. My wife promised to do this, feeling quite safe because the Colonel has never shown the slightest wish to come near us. I do not blame him for this. We are not well off, and we live a very retired life in a village which would strike him as particularly dull.

Our surprise was great—I have no doubt that the Fulkingtons' was equally great—when the Colonel telegraphed to say that he was going to Scotland for the grouse-shooting, and would pay us a two days' visit on his way. The telegram arrived on Monday, August 7th, and told us that we might expect him on the following Wednesday. The time at our disposal was uncomfortably short, but we at once wrote to the Fulkingtons, claiming them as our guests on Wednesday night. They are, after all, the most presentable people in the neighborhood. Mrs. Fulkington replied, accepting the invitation, and proposing that we and the Colonel should dine with her on Thursday. Then we settled down to the work of preparation. Most of it fell to my wife's share, for I am singularly useless in a domestic crisis, and I find that my help has an irritating effect on the other workers. Therefore I kept out of the way—that is to say, out of the house—as much as possible, and made no inquiries about the details of the plans for the Colonel's entertainment.

On Wednesday morning I went into the garden, at my wife's request, to make final arrangements about something connected with our dinner—artichokes, I think. When I had settled about the artichokes I spent an hour with the gardener, discussing, pleasantly enough, the extraordinary wickedness of the judges at our local flower show, who had not given a prize to our carnations. Then I saw my wife hurrying toward us along the center path of the garden. I knew that something serious and unpleasant had happened, because she was flushed and had a wild look in her eyes.

"What am I to do?" she said, breathlessly. "The wine hasn't arrived! I sent James over to the station, and the case wasn't there."

"James," I said, "always was a fool. So is the station-master. What wine were you expecting?"

"I wrote on Monday for some champagne. I told them to send it down at once. It ought to have been here this morning."

Then my conscience smote me. I had taken that letter to the village on Monday afternoon in my pocket, and had forgotten to post it. It was addressed to Messrs. Jones, Wilkinson & Co., who are chiefly grocers, though they also sell wine. We deal with them for tea, sugar, soap, and all sorts of other things which can be had cheaper and better in London. Letters are continually going to them from my wife, and I had no idea that this one contained anything so important as an order for champagne. My face, I suppose, betrayed the fact that my conscience was uneasy.

"Are you quite sure you posted the letter?" said my wife.

"Quite," I said, firmly.

Jones and Wilkinson both lived in London; so, I presume, does the company associated with them. London is one hundred and fifty miles away from us. Jones & Wilkinson would therefore suffer very little from my wife's anger. I should suffer a great deal. It was better for them to bear the blame. Besides, I did post the letter—on Tuesday morning.

"There'll be nothing to drink at dinner," she said. I felt the difficulty and did my best to minimize it.

"There's whiskey," I said, "and sherry. Fulkington drinks whiskey, I know. You and Mrs. Fulkington can manage with the sherry."

"But Gilbert!"

"The Colonel," I said, "is an old campaigner. He'll rub along all right. I dare say he has often been glad enough to get water—in South Africa, you know."

"I'll telegraph to Jones & Wilkinson," said my wife.

"That 'll be no use now."

"It will let them know what I think of them," she said, vindictively. This made me uneasy, but not seriously uneasy. Jones & Wilkinson would probably make some attempt to defend their reputation for promptitude in business by asserting that they did not receive the letter till Wednesday morning, but I could, in the last resort, lay the blame on the post-office.

Our dinner went off very well in spite of the want of champagne. The Colonel frequently addressed my wife as Susannah, which impressed the Fulkingtons; I have always dropped the last syllable of her name. He was evidently greatly pleased with his new appointment, and talked a good deal during dinner about the prevention and the detection of crime. After the ladies left us he explained a scheme he had devised for training the South Australian detective force. Fulkington and I listened, pretending that we took an interest in the investigation of murders and robberies. The Colonel showed himself tremendously enthusiastic about his new duties.

Next morning at breakfast I opened the post-bag as usual and, with some slight misgiving, handed my wife a letter from Messrs. Jones, Wilkinson & Co. The Colonel was helping himself to fish when she opened it and had his back turned to us. My wife read the letter, glanced at an inclosure which it contained, and then made an exclamation.

"This isn't my envelope!" she said.

The Colonel turned at once. Some instinct must have led him to expect a mysterious crime. His face wore that look of keen determination which is proper to an eminent detective. I glanced through the letter of Jones & Wilkinson. It was, as I anticipated, an apology and an excuse. They had not, so they said, received the order until Wednesday morning, and therefore had been unable to despatch the champagne on Tuesday. As a proof of their statement they referred my wife to the post-mark on the envelope which they inclosed.

"It's not my envelope at all," said my wife, "and it's not my writing."

I glanced at the envelope and satisfied myself that it was blue, whereas all our envelopes are white. This puzzled me a good deal. I understood very well how it happened that Jones & Wilkinson had not received the letter until Wednesday morning. I did not understand how it came to arrive in a blue envelope. I certainly had posted it in a white one. Besides, a single glance at the writing showed me that it was not my wife's. I had no time for more than a single glance, because the Colonel, with the promptitude which is characteristic of all great criminal investigators, pounced on it and carried it over to the window. There he made a very careful examination of it, both inside and out. He studied the handwriting minutely with the help of a small magnifying-glass which he took out of his pocket. From time to time he gave us the results of his investigations in a series of jerky sentences:

"Posted here August 8th. Received, London, August 9th. Envelope, azure vellum. Albert size. Educated female handwriting. Stephens's Blue-Black Ink. Hurriedly written. Water-mark, crown surmounted by cross. Slightly scented. Soft pen used."

Then he turned to my wife and questioned her. She did not want to tell the story about the hurried order for champagne; but she told it. The Colonel examined and cross-examined her with the utmost ferocity, as if she were in a witness-box and suspected of committing perjury. When he had got all he could out of her he attacked me.

I stuck firmly to my original statement that I had posted the letter on Monday afternoon. I saw nothing to be gained by confessing that I had forgotten all about it until Tuesday morning. My forgetfulness would not explain the fact that the letter had changed its envelope on the way to London; whereas a confession would certainly involve me in unpleasantness. The Colonel looked at me so sternly that I began to feel quite nervous. I corroborated my statement by way of increasing his confidence in my truthfulness.

"I recollect the circumstances perfectly," I said, "because Fulkington's brown dog was standing near the post-office at the time and barked at me."

"A brown dog!" said the Colonel, with the air of a man who has come upon something of real importance.

"Yes, an Irish terrier."

"You're certain it was Fulkington's?"

I was, of course, quite certain that it was not; although Fulkington really has an Irish terrier.

"Yes," I said, "it was Fulkington's. I know it because it has only one ear. The other got bitten off in a fight with a sheep-dog. Besides, no one else in the neighborhood has an Irish terrier."

The Colonel sat down to his breakfast and finished it without speaking. Then he paced the gravel outside the hall door and smoked a cigar. I could see that he was thinking deeply. I ventured after a while to ask him if he had got any clue to the mystery. He said that he had several, and intended to follow them all out until he placed the criminal in the dock.

At eleven o'clock he took his hat and walked down toward the village. At half-past twelve he came back, looking keener and more determined than ever. He summoned me into my own study, and when he got me inside he locked the door.

"I think it right," he said, "to place you in possession of the facts so far as I have arrived at them."

"I wish you would," I said. "I'm tremendously interested."

"In the first place, then, the envelope in which that letter arrived in London was not bought here. I went round to every shop in the village and made sure that no such envelopes are kept for sale. The inference from that is obvious."

"Quite," I said. "It was bought somewhere else."

The Colonel frowned. "The inference I am inclined to draw," he said, "is that the person who opened and readdressed the letter does not obtain stationery at the local shops."

"That," I said, "seems a sound deduction."

"It narrows the field of inquiry."

"Your idea," I said, "is that some one got hold of my wife's letter after it was posted, opened it, put it into another envelope, and then posted it again."

"That is plain enough."

"But why should—?"

"The motive is perfectly obvious."

"Is it?"

"To me or to any one who has made a study of criminal investigation—quite obvious. The letter was addressed to a shop, and might be supposed to contain a postal order."

This did not seem to me perfectly satisfactory. The Colonel's criminal, having successfully captured and opened the letter, ran a wholly unnecessary risk in forwarding it to Jones & Wilkinson. Any sensible thief would have burned it. I found it difficult to believe that a man capable of trying to steal a postal order would have such a respect for our convenience as to repost the letter afterward, particularly as he would be in a bad temper after opening it, for there was no postal order inside. I wanted to represent all this to the Colonel, but he would not let me.

"Don't you think—?" I began.

"No, I don't," said the Colonel. "There is no greater mistake than thinking. I collect facts. Once the facts are before us they will do their own thinking."

"Of course they will; but still—"

The Colonel waved his hand at me and said that he knew a great deal more about the criminal classes than I did. This was true. I had never been really intimate with a criminal. I at once gave up my attempt to argue.

"I called at the post-office," the Colonel went on, "and discovered that the ink used there is not Stephens's Blue-Black Ink, the kind with which the envelope was addressed. I also, without exciting suspicion about my motive, succeeded in seeing the handwriting of the postmaster and his assistant. Neither of them bears any resemblance whatever to that on the envelope. These facts point necessarily to certain conclusions."

"I suppose they do. They seem to me to make the whole thing rather more confused; but then I'm not a detective."

"I am."

"Would you mind telling me—?"

"The letter," said the Colonel, "was evidently taken out of the post-office on Monday evening, opened, and readdressed at some time during Monday night, and posted again on Tuesday morning, by some person who used blue-black ink, bought stationery at a distance, and wrote the hand of an educated lady. You follow me so far?"

I followed him perfectly, although I knew that the letter had been in the pocket of my coat all Monday night, and that the first part of the Colonel's statement was entirely wrong. I did not, however, attempt to correct him. We should not have been any nearer knowing who opened the letter if I, at that eleventh hour, had confessed my share in the crime.

"Don't keep me in suspense," I said. "Tell me who it is that you suspect."

"I don't suspect any one," he said. "I never allow myself to entertain suspicions. Before evening I shall know."

There was a tap at the study door. I opened it, and the parlor-maid handed me a letter, explaining that it had just been brought by Mr. Fulkington's stable-boy. Before I could open it the Colonel took it out of my hand. He looked at it carefully and then smiled grimly.

"This," he said, "helps me materially."

"I don't see how it can. That letter comes from Fulkington."

The Colonel took the other envelope, the one which Messrs. Jones & Wilkinson had sent us, from his pocket and laid it on the table. He put Fulkington's beside it. He pointed to them silently. I was forced to admit that they were very much alike. Then the Colonel opened Fulkington's and examined the water-mark.

"A crown surmounted by a cross," he said, "and addressed in blue-black ink with a soft pen."

"The two handwritings," I said, "are entirely different."

The Colonel took no notice of this remark. "These two envelopes," he said, tapping them turn about with his fore-finger, "came from the same house. We have not very far to go now to find the criminal. What you told me this morning about Fulkington's brown dog fits in exactly with the evidence afforded by the envelopes themselves."

I was sorry then that I had mentioned the brown dog. It seemed to me at the time to be a harmless piece of corroborative evidence. If I had thought it would still further confuse a troublesome inquiry I should not have said anything about it.

"We may presume," said the Colonel, "that the dog did not walk to the post-office by itself. It was led there by some one—by some one whom you did not see."

"It's perfectly absurd," I said, "to suppose, as you apparently do, that Fulkington would hide behind the post-office door when he saw me coming in order to purloin a letter for the sake of a paltry postal order. I've known him for twenty years and more, and, though he has his faults, he wouldn't do a thing like that. Besides, there wasn't a postal order in the letter. We deal regularly with Jones & Wilkinson and have an account there. Your suspicions—"

The Colonel smiled in a very lofty and superior way. "I suspect no one," he said, speaking in a tone which made me feel that Fulkington would be lucky if he got off with five years' penal servitude.

Still smiling at me, the Colonel took his hat and went out. He walked in the direction of the village, intending, I suppose, to collect more facts. I wondered whether he would find out that Fulkington's brown dog was at home in its kennel on Monday afternoon.

After watching him off the premises, I went to look for my wife. I found her very busy over the bodice of a dress which she had not worn for a long time. She explained to me that it was absolutely necessary to make some alterations in the garment in order to meet the requirements of the present fashion. She intended to wear it that night at the Fulkingtons' dinner-party.

"I can't go," she said, "in the same gown that I wore last night."

"It's very doubtful," I said, "whether you'll go to the Fulkingtons' at all."

"What on earth do you mean? We've promised to go."

"The Colonel," I said, "has gone out to arrest poor Fulkington on the charge of stealing that letter of yours."

"Do try to talk sense. The letter wasn't stolen."

"It was opened and put into another envelope—an envelope of a most uncommon kind not procurable in this neighborhood and only used by Fulkington."

"I wish," said my wife, "that you'd all stop fussing about that letter. The champagne arrived this morning. They only sent three bottles instead of six, and it was a different kind, not what I ordered; but that doesn't matter now. Gilbert is going away to-morrow morning, so we sha'n't want it."

"He may or may not go," I said. "If he arrests Fulkington this afternoon, he will. But if Fulkington is out when he calls, he'll have to wait till to-morrow. He'll hardly put handcuffs on him at his own dinner-table."

My wife failed altogether to realize the critical position of poor Fulkington. She refused to discuss the matter further, and insisted on my leaving the room. She said that she had little enough time for bringing the dress up to date, and that if I interrupted her work any more she would not be able to get it done.

The Colonel returned from his second expedition about five o'clock. He seemed to be very well satisfied with himself, and I was most anxious to hear what he had done. He had been out at luncheon- time and was evidently very hungry, so I waited until he had drunk three cups of tea and eaten nearly half of a cake. Then I asked him whether he had collected much fresh evidence.

"I have," he said, "entirely satisfied myself, and I have no doubt that I shall be able to satisfy any reasonable jury."

"Then you haven't actually arrested—"

"No. Not yet. We are, as I understand, to dine with the Fulkingtons to-night. I shall do nothing until after that, and I must request you not to ask me questions until then. The case is more complicated than I supposed, and I wish to say nothing until I have had a talk with Fulkington."

My wife had evidently been impressed by what I said to her during the afternoon, although she had pretended at the time to think that I was talking nonsense. She told the Colonel respectfully but quite plainly that she did not believe that Fulkington himself could possibly be guilty. The Colonel merely smiled. He did not even remind her that he knew more about the criminal classes than she did.

The Fulkingtons gave us a good dinner—a better dinner than I ever ate in their house on any other occasion. They had champagne. This, I could see, vexed my wife; but the excellence of the dinner saved her from actually losing her temper. The unusual splendor was a tribute to the eminence of the Colonel, and nothing pleases her more than an appreciation of the greatness of her family.

After dinner the Colonel opened the subject of the mysterious envelope. He did so in an oblique way which at first greatly puzzled me.

"You have in your service," he said to Fulkington, "a young woman called Long—Annie Long."

Fulkington seemed a little surprised at this statement. He admitted that his housemaid was called Annie, but said he would have to inquire from Mrs. Fulkington whether her surname was Long.

"It is Long," said the Colonel, decisively, "and she is engaged to be married to a young man called George Crab."

"I have never heard of him before," said Fulkington, "but it's no affair of mine if she is. I suppose she'll give us the usual month's notice."

"George Crab," said the Colonel, "is the assistant in the local post-office. Will you be so good as to allow me to see a specimen of Annie Long's handwriting?"

This request not unnaturally irritated Fulkington. He said he had never seen Annie Long's handwriting in his life and did not want to. I tried to soothe him.

"The Colonel," I said, "doesn't mean to suggest that you are carrying on a clandestine correspondence with your own housemaid behind the backs of George Crab and Mrs. Fulkington. He knows you're not that kind of man. You'll find out, if you're patient, that he has some quite different reason for wanting to see the girl's writing."

"Anyhow, I haven't got any of her writing," said Fulkington.

"Annie Long," said the Colonel, "would naturally have access to your stationery?"

"I don't know what you mean," said Fulkington. I intervened again in the interests of peace.

"What the Colonel means," I said, "is that she could take one of your envelopes if she wanted to send a letter—say, to George Crab. She is sure to write frequently to George Crab."

"Of course she could take an envelope. So could any one else in the house."

"The case against the girl Long and her associate," said the Colonel, "is perfectly plain. On the evening of Monday last, August 7th, a letter addressed to a business firm, and therefore likely to contain a postal order, was taken out of the letter-box in the local post-office. It was opened, clumsily we may presume, perhaps hurriedly, through fear of detection. It was afterward inclosed in a fresh envelope, readdressed, and posted again on Tuesday, August 8th. Only two persons had access to the letters in the post-office—the postmaster and George Crab. Neither of them addressed the envelope in which the letter was ultimately placed, for the writing in that envelope is a woman's, and the ink is not that used in the post-office. The envelope is of a kind not obtainable in the locality, but used in your house and accessible to your servants. It seems to me obvious that the letter was taken and opened by George Crab, who, intending to marry Annie Long, was naturally anxious to secure some little money for the expenses of his wedding. Finding himself unable to close the original envelope, he brought the letter out of the office and induced Annie Long to address one of your envelopes to the London firm. In it he inclosed the letter and posted it on Tuesday morning. I made careful inquiries in the village this afternoon, and there is unfortunately no doubt that the prisoner—I mean to say George Crab—is on terms of closest intimacy with Annie Long."

"Bless my soul!" said Fulkington, "what an extraordinary story!"

"An instance," said the Colonel, "quite a simple instance, of the way we detectives go to work."

"But—but—"

"Perhaps," said the Colonel, "you'd like to inspect the envelope and judge for yourself."

He produced the incriminating paper from his coat pocket and handed it to Fulkington, who stared at it for a minute in silence. Then a look of bewilderment passed over his face.

"That's my wife's envelope," he said at last.

"Quite so. Yours or your wife's. It's the same thing."

"But she addressed it," said Fulkington. "It's her writing."

"A clever imitation perhaps."

"Imitation be hanged! I posted it myself on Tuesday afternoon. The fact is," Fulkington went on addressing me, "that when we knew the Colonel was to dine here to-night we wrote to Jones & Wilkinson to send down some champagne. By the way, they sent the wrong brand, and six bottles instead of three."

The Colonel is a determined man. He was not prepared to allow the structure he had reared with such pains to crumble before his eyes.

"You'll find," he said, "that I'm right. How else are we to explain the changed envelope of the other letter?"

Next morning the explanation he wished for, or more probably did not wish for, offered itself. Jones, Wilkinson & Co. wrote a long and very apologetic letter to my wife. They explained that the two letters, arriving as they did from the same neighborhood and by the same post, and being both orders for champagne, had got mixed by their clerk. He had sent Mrs. Fulkington's envelope to my wife. The firm sincerely hoped that no inconvenience had been caused.

No inconvenience had been caused to any one except the Colonel. George Crab and Annie Long had a narrow escape from penal servitude. My own share in the mystery never came to light. The mistake of Jones, Wilkinson & Co.'s clerk drew away attention from the fact, in itself suspicious, that my wife's letter did not arrive in London until Wednesday morning. This was very fortunate for me. The Colonel's temper was so bad when he found out that he had been wasting his time and talents that I am sure he would have indicted me for criminal conspiracy if he had found out that I forgot to post that letter.