Volume 105, December 30, 1893.

_edited by Sir Francis Burnand_

* * * * *

* * * * *

THE ADVENTURES OF PICKLOCK HOLES.

(_By Cunnin Toil._)

No. VII.--THE STOLEN MARCH.

(_Continued._)

As soon as we entered the drawing-room all the little GUMPSHONS clapped their hands with delight, and surrounded their Uncle PICKLOCK, each of them attempting to infer from the expression on the great detective's countenance what it was that he carried in his left coat-tail pocket. "I know what it is," said EDGAR ALLAN POE GUMPSHON, a boy of fifteen; "it's plum-cake. I know it must be, because I never seed it, so it ain't seed-cake." GABORIAU GUMPSHON, aged thirteen, opined it was a packet of bull's-eyes, "'cos that's what detectives always carry on dark nights," whilst ANN RADCLIFFE GUMPSHON declared with certainty that it must be nuts, for she had just heard a cracker explode in the street. "Children," said PICKLOCK HOLES, "you are nearly right. Your powers have much improved. I am delighted to see that you are kept up to the mark;" and, speaking thus, he produced from his pocket an apple, which he presented to EDGAR, a pocket-knife which he handed to the jubilant GABORIAU, and a pincushion, which was immediately clasped and carried off in the chubby hand of little ANN RADCLIFFE. "A year ago," said PICKLOCK, turning to me, "these children could not have reasoned inductively with one half of their present approximate accuracy; but my dear sister, Heaven bless her! is a wonderful teacher, the best and cleverest of us all. Indeed, indeed you are, PHILIPPA," he continued, warmly embracing Mrs. GUMPSHON. "I am a mere bungler compared to you. But come, let us to business." At a signal from Lady HOLES the happy children trooped off to bed, and we elders were left alone.

Sir AMINADAB opened the conversation. "I sent for you, my dear boy," he said, "because I have just received from one of my agents in the North information of an important case which demands immediate investigation. Neither HAYLOFT nor SKAIRKROW can go, having business that keeps them in London. I look, therefore, to you to cover the family name with new lustre by solving this extraordinary mystery." Here the old man paused, as though overcome by emotion. PICKLOCK encouraged him with an expressive look, and he continued:--

"This morning," he said, "I received from my agent this letter." He drew a sheet of paper from his breast-pocket, and read, in tremulous tones, as follows:--

"'_Tochtachie Castle, Daffshire._

"'SIR,--Lord TOCHTACHIE has been robbed. I overheard him last night conversing with the Hon. IAN STRUNACHAR, his eldest son, who used the following words: "Not a doubt of it. They have stolen a march----" More I could not hear at the moment. The case is of immense importance, and I trust you will lose no time in sending a competent investigator. I have, of course, concealed both my presence here and my knowledge of the theft from his lordship.

"'Yours faithfully, 'DAVID MCPHIZZLE.'"

"There, my boy, is the case. Will you go and help a Scotch representative peer to recover his own? Think how terrible it must be to lose the march or boundary that separates your ancestral domain from that of a neighbour whose whole course of life may be antipathetic to you. Will you go?"

A wave of emotion passed over my friend's face. I could see that a struggle of no ordinary kind was raging in his breast. Finally, however, he looked at me, and his mind, I knew, was made up. In another ten minutes we had bidden adieu to his family, and were speeding northwards in the Scotch express.

Over the details of the journey it is not necessary to linger. Suffice it to say that on the following morning we arrived at Tochtachie, and took up our quarters in a deserted barn situated in the very centre of the estate. From this point we pursued our investigations. Our first proceeding was to interview the local constabulary, but we found them as obtuse and as foolishly incredulous as policemen are all the world over. One of them, indeed, went so far as to hint that HOLES was "havering," which I understand to be an ancient Gaelic word signifying metaphysical talk, but a look from the great detective chilled him into silence. Day by day we worked, and not even the night gave us a rest from our self-sacrificing labours. We mapped out the whole district into square yards; we gathered the life-history of every single inhabitant on the estate; we left no clue untracked, no loophole unblocked, no single piece of evidence unexamined, no footstep unmeasured. We collected every scrap of torn letter, every crumpled telegram-form. The very heather of the moor, and the trees growing in the policies of the Castle were compelled by HOLES' marvellous inductive powers to yield to us their secrets, until after weeks of patient toil we at last judged ourselves to be in possession not only of the stolen march, but also of evidence that would bring conviction home to the guilty party. We had paused, I remember, by a heap of granite at the roadside. HOLES seemed strangely excited. "A march," I heard him muttering, "is performed by footsteps; steps are often made of stone. Can this be it? It must be! It is!" Then, with a shout of triumph, he gave orders to have the heap loaded on to a country cart, which was to follow us to the Castle.

We arrived in the great courtyard at about seven o'clock in the evening. HOLES slipped from my side, entered the house, and after a few moments returned to my side. We then clanged the bell, and demanded to see his lordship. In a few moments Lord TOCHTACHIE appeared, surrounded by kilted retainers, bearing torches, and intoning in unison the mournful sporan of the clan. It was a weird and awful sight. But HOLES, unemotional as ever, advanced at once to the haughty Scotchman, before whose eye half a county was accustomed to tremble, and, without any ado, addressed him thus: "My Lord, your march has been stolen. Nay, do not interrupt me. Your guards are careless, but not criminal--of that I can assure you. Here is the stolen property; I restore it to you without cost." At this moment the cart rumbled up, and ere the peer had time to utter a word, it had discharged its contents into the middle of the yard. HOLES went on, but in a lower voice, so as to be heard only by Lord TOCHTACHIE: "The guilty party, my Lord, is your honoured father-in-law. He dare not, he cannot, deny it. He is, I know, blind and deaf and dumb. These qualities do not, however, exclude the possibility of crime. I have just found these pieces of granite in his morning-room. The proof is complete."

At this moment a shot was heard in the Castle, and directly afterwards a frightened butler rushed up to his lordship and whispered to him. "Ha! say you so?" almost screamed Lord TOCHTACHIE. "That amounts to a confession. Mr. HOLES," he continued, "you have indeed rendered me a service. My unfortunate, but guilty father-in-law has shot and missed himself through the head. But in any ease the honour of the house is, I know, safe in your hands."

I need hardly say that HOLES has never violated his lordship's confidence, and the Daffshire peasants still speculate amongst themselves upon the tortuous mystery of the march which was stolen and restored.

NOTE.--There is no proof positive given by any eye-witness whose veracity is unimpeachable of the death of the great amateur detective as it has been described in the _Strand Magazine_ for this month. _Where is the merry Swiss boy who delivered the note and disappeared?_ What was the symbolic meaning of the alpenstock with the hook at the end, left on the rock? Why, that he had _not_ "taken his hook." PICKLOCK HOLES has disappeared, but so have a great many other people. That he will turn up again no student of detective history and of the annals of crime can possibly doubt. Is it not probable that he has only dropped out of the _Strand Magazine_? And is it not equally probable that under some alias he will re-appear elsewhere?

_Verb. sap._--ED.

* * * * *

FATHER CHRISTMAS leaves his cards on everybody about this time, as he is here only for one day, and off the next. He has employed Messrs. MARCUS WARD & CO. to do them, and excellent they are all round.

* * * * *

* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

EXTRACTED FROM THE DIARY OF TOBY, M.P.

_House of Commons, Friday, December 22._--House adjourned for Christmas Recess; pleased to find that it will include the whole of Christmas Day. Some talk of being satisfied with the Sunday, spending Christmas Day in further pursuit of Parish Councils Bill. But after deliberation decided to have a real good holiday on Christmas Day. Came across SQUIRE OF MALWOOD just now. Was chalking up on door "Back in ten minutes."

"It's a little more than that, of course, TOBY," he said. "But that has business-like look. Am told it's what they do in the City before going out for hasty luncheon."

Enjoyed my holiday reading HERBERT MAXWELL'S life of OLD MORALITY just published by BLACKWOOD. A difficult task; much easier to make attractive book out of life of NAPOLEON BONAPARTE than with WILLIAM HENRY SMITH as subject. That MAXWELL has succeeded appears from fact that one leaves these volumes with warmer esteem and sincerer liking for OLD MORALITY even than was born of close observation through many Parliamentary sessions. MAXWELL has had full access to his correspondence and journals. Uses them with great discretion; they bring into mellow, clear light the capable, unselfish, courageous man, ever following the loadstar of Duty. House of Commons used to smile when OLD MORALITY, faced by any difficulty or dilemma, talked about his "duty to his QUEEN and country." In his private letters he does not put it in that oratorical form. But they are full of references to the calls of duty. Stricken with a painful malady, worn in body and wounded in spirit, OLD MORALITY still sturdily trod the narrow path. There is little doubt that had he, two years before the end came, retired from the Leadership of the House of Commons his genial presence might have been with us to-day. But he was wanted at his post, and he stuck to it.

Writing on the 17th March, 1889, he says: "We have trouble in politics, and I am very weary. But I must go on doing my daily work as best I can, looking for guidance and wisdom where alone it can be had until my rest comes." This cry for rest was always sounding, through day and night. A few weeks earlier he wrote to another friend: "I can say God help me. He will take me out of my work when I am no longer required, and then will come rest."

His last appearance in a semi-official capacity was in July, 1891, when he went to Hatfield to meet the German Emperor. In the last letter written to his wife he says, "Observing I looked tired last night, Lady SALISBURY urged me to go to bed early: which I did." One of his colleagues in the Cabinet, a fellow-guest at Hatfield on this occasion, tells me he had occasion to know that OLD MORALITY was in such pain he could not rest in his bed, spending the long night walking about the room, with occasional rest in an arm-chair. Not a word of this is written in the letter to Mrs. SMITH, in which he reports that "everything has gone off wonderfully well to-day, which must be very satisfactory to the Salisburys." Under his bourgeois habit and unassuming manner W. H. SMITH modestly hid a chivalrous mind and a noble nature. He had a kindly heart, too. But everyone knew that, since he wore it on his sleeve.

_Business done._--Adjourned for so-called Christmas holidays. Think I'll go and call on Lobengula. "Back in ten minutes," as the SQUIRE says.

* * * * *

EDEPOL!

SIR,--"I'm all the way from Westminster," and the work I have to do is to let you know about the Latin play performed there. PLAUTUS, in truth, is not a wildly exciting writer, and there is in the _Trinummus_ a tameness which, extending, as it does, through five acts, becomes almost oppressive at the end. The young actors looked well and enunciated clearly, and one of them, Mr. J. F. WATERS, showed considerable ability as an actor. But we don't go to the College of St. Peter at Westminster merely to see the play. There are other interests. It is pleasant to watch the Old Westminsters rubbing recollections with one another between the acts, and endeavouring gallantly during the performance to keep their rusty Latin abreast of the various situations. Laughter in a Latin play straggles. It is like a dropping fire of musketry. A Westminster master probably leads it off; various intelligent veterans take it up dutifully, and the ladies, bless their unlatinised minds, follow faintly towards the end. If a London manager wants applause in his theatre let him hire a contingent of small Westminster boys. They have attained to absolute perfection in the arts of the _claque_. At no Paris Theatre is it better done. The epilogue showed a pretty wit and a high degree of skill in the management of hexameter and pentameter. No one could have believed that the Kodak advertisement, "you press the button, we do the rest," would have made so good a Latin line. Much pleased, and so to bed.

Yours, A VAGRANT.

* * * * *

"A MERE QUESTION OF TIME."--_Example:_ "What o'clock is it?"

* * * * *

* * * * *

NEW YEAR'S EVE AT LATTERDAY HALL.

(_An Incident._)