The Just Men of Cordova · Chapter 1 (2/2)

The doctor twisted his face nervously, then⁠—“Have you ever heard of the ‘Four Just Men’?” he asked.

There was a little silence.

“Yes,” said Manfred calmly, “I have heard of them.”

“Are they in Spain?”

The question was put sharply.

“I have no exact knowledge,” said Manfred. “Why do you ask?”

“Because⁠—” The doctor hesitated. “Oh, well⁠—I am interested. It is said that they unearth villainy that the law does not punish; they⁠—they kill⁠—eh?” His voice was sharper, his eyelids narrowed till he peered from one to the other through slits.

“Such an organization is known to exist,” said Manfred, “and one knows that they do happen upon unpunished crime⁠—and punish.”

“Even to⁠—to killing?”

“They even kill,” said Manfred gravely.

“And they go free!”⁠—the doctor leapt to his feet with a snarl and flung out his hands in protest⁠—“they go free! All the laws of all nations cannot trap them! A self-appointed tribunal⁠—who are they to judge and condemn? Who gave them the right to sit in judgment? There is a law, if a man cheats it⁠—”

He checked himself suddenly, shook his shoulders and sank heavily into the chair again.

“So far as I can secure information upon the subject,” he said roughly, “these men are no longer an active force⁠—they are outlawed⁠—there are warrants for them in every country.”

Manfred nodded.

“That is very true,” he said gently; “but whether they are an active force, time must reveal.”

“There were three?”⁠—the doctor looked up quickly⁠—“and they usually find a fourth⁠—an influential fourth.”

Manfred nodded again.

“So I understand.”

Dr. Essley twisted uncomfortably in his chair. It was evident that the information or assurance he expected to receive from this expert in crime was not entirely satisfactory to him.

“And they are in Spain?” he asked.

“So it is said.”

“They are not in France; they are not in Italy; they are not in Russia; nor in any of the German States,” said the doctor resentfully. “They must be in Spain.”

He brooded awhile in silence.

“Pardon me,” said Poiccart, who had been a silent listener, “but you seem very interested in these men. Would it be offensive to you if I asked you to satisfy my curiosity as to why you should be anxious to discover their whereabouts?”

“Curiosity also,” said the other quickly; “in a sense I am a modest student of crime, as our friend de la Monte is.”

“An enthusiastic student,” said Manfred quietly.

“I hoped that you would be able to give me some help,” Essley went on, unmindful of the significant emphasis of the other’s tones; “beyond the fact that they may be in Spain, which, after all, is conjectural, I have learnt nothing.”

“They may not even be in Spain,” said Manfred, as he accompanied his visitor to the door; “they may not even be in existence⁠—your fears may be entirely groundless.”

The doctor whipped round, white to the lips. “Fears?” he said, breathing quickly. “Did you say fears?”

“I am sorry,” laughed Manfred easily; “my English is perhaps not good.”

“Why should I fear them?” demanded the doctor aggressively. “Why should I? Your words are chosen very unwisely, sir. I have nothing to fear from the ‘Four Just Men’⁠—or from any other source.”

He stood panting in the doorway like a man who is suddenly deprived of breath. With an effort he collected himself, hesitated a moment, and then with a stiff little bow left the room.

He went down the stairs, out to the street, and turned into the Passeo. There was a beggar at the corner who raised a languid hand.

“Por deos⁠—” he whined.

With an oath, Essley struck at the hand with his cane, only to miss it, for the beggar was singularly quick and, for all the discomforts he was prepared to face, Gonsalez had no desire to endure a hand seamed and wealed⁠—those sensitive hands of his were assets to Gonsalez.

The doctor pursued a savage way to his hotel.

Reaching his room, he locked the door and threw himself into a chair to think. He cursed his own folly⁠—it was madness to have lost his temper even before so insignificant a person as a Spanish dilettante in science.

There was the first half of his mission finished⁠—and it was a failure. He took from the pocket of his overcoat, hanging behind the door, a Spanish Baedeker. He turned the leaves till he came to a map of Cordova. Attached to this was a smaller plan, evidently made by somebody who knew the topography of the place better than he understood the rules of cartography.

He had heard of Dr. Cajalos first from a Spanish anarchist he had met in some of his curious nocturnal prowlings in London. Under the influence of good wine this bold fellow had invested the wizard of Cordova with something approaching miraculous powers⁠—he had also said things which had aroused the doctor’s interest to an extraordinary degree. A correspondence had followed: the visit was the result.

Essley looked at his watch. It was nearly seven o’clock. He would dine, then go to his room and change.

He made a hasty ablution in the growing darkness of the room⁠—curiously enough he did not switch on the light; then he went to dinner.

He had a table to himself and buried himself in an English magazine he had brought with him. Now and again as he read he would make notes in a little book which lay on the table by the side of his plate.

They had no reference to the article he read; they had little association with medical science. On the whole, they dealt with certain financial aspects of a certain problem which came into his mind.

He finished his dinner, taking his coffee at the table. Then he rose, put the little notebook in his pocket, the magazine under his arm, and made his way back to his room. He turned on the light, pulled down the blinds, and drew a light dressing-table beneath the lamp. He produced his notebook again and, with the aid of a number of closely-written sheets of paper taken from his valise, he compiled a little table. He was completely engrossed for a couple of hours. As if some invisible and unheard alarm clock warned him of his engagement, he closed the book, locked his memoranda in the valise, and struggled into his coat. With a soft felt hat pulled down over his eyes, he left the hotel and without hesitation took the path which led down to the Calahorra Bridge. The streets through which he passed were deserted, but he had no hesitation, knowing well the lawful character of these unprepossessing little Spanish suburbs.

He plunged into a labyrinth of narrow streets⁠—he had studied his plan to some purpose⁠—and only hesitated when he reached a cul-de-sac which was more spacious than the street from which it opened. One oil lamp at the farther end added rather to the gloom. Tall, windowless houses rose on either side, and each was pierced by a door. On the left door the doctor, after a moment’s hesitation, knocked twice.

Instantly it opened noiselessly. He hesitated.

“Enter,” said a voice in Spanish; “the señor need not fear.”

He stepped into the black void and the door closed behind him.

“Come this way,” said the voice. In the pitch darkness he could make out the indistinct figure of a little man.

The doctor stepped inside and surreptitiously wiped the sweat from his forehead. The old man lit a lamp, and Essley took stock of him. He was very little, scarcely more than four feet in height. He had a rough white beard and head as bald as an egg. His face and hands were alike grimy, and his whole appearance bore evidence of his aversion to water.

A pair of black twinkling eyes were set deeply in his head, and the puckering lines about them revealed him as a man who found humour in life. This was Dr. Cajalos, a famous man in Spain, though he had no social standing.

“Sit down,” said Cajalos; “we will talk quietly, for I have a señora of high quality to see me touching a matter of lost affection.”

Essley took the chair offered to him and the doctor seated himself on a high stool by the table. A curious figure he made, with his dangling little legs, his old, old face and his shining bald pate.

“I wrote to you on the subject of certain occult demonstrations,” began the doctor, but the old man stopped him with a quick jerk of the hand.

“You came to see me, señor, because of a drug I have prepared,” he said, “a preparation of ⸻”2

Essley sprang to his feet.

“I⁠—I did not tell you so,” he stammered.

“The green devil told me,” said the other seriously. “I have many talks with the foot-draggers, and they speak very truly.”

“I thought⁠—”

“Look!” said the old man. He leapt down from his high perch with agility. In the dark corner of one of the rooms were some boxes, to which he went. Essley heard a scuffling, and by and by the old man came back, holding by the ears a wriggling rabbit.

With his disengaged hand he unstoppered a little green bottle on the table. He picked a feather from the table, dipped the point gingerly into the bottle. Then very carefully he lightly touched the nose of the rabbit with the end of the feather⁠—so lightly, indeed, that the feather hardly brushed the muzzle of the animal.

Instantly, with no struggle, the rabbit went limp, as though the life essence had been withdrawn from the body. Cajalos replaced the stopper and thrust the feather into a little charcoal fire that burnt dully in the centre of the room.

“P⁠⸺⁠e,” he said briefly; “but my preparation.” He laid the dead animal on the floor at the feet of the other. “Señor,” he said proudly, “you shall take that animal and examine it; you shall submit it to tests beyond patience; yet you shall not discover the alkaloid that killed it.”

“That is not so,” said Essley, “for there will be a contraction of the pupil which is an invariable sign.”

“Search also for that,” said the old man triumphantly.

Essley made the superficial tests. There was not even this invariable symptom.

A dark figure, pressed close to the wall outside, listened. He was standing by the shuttered window. He held to his ear a little ebonite tube with a microphonic receiver, and the rubber which covered the bell-like end was pressed against the shutter.

For half an hour he stood thus, almost motionless, then he withdrew silently and disappeared into the shadows of the orange grove that grew in the centre of the long garden.

As he did so, the door of the house opened and, with lantern in hand, Cajalos showed his visitor into the street.

“The devils are greener than ever,” chuckled the old man. “Hey! there will be happenings, my brother!”

Essley said nothing. He wanted to be in the street again. He stood quivering with nervous impatience as the old man unfastened the heavy door, and when it swung open he almost leapt into the street outside.

“Goodbye,” he said.

“Go with God,” said the old man, and the door closed noiselessly.