J. S. Fletcher - The Collected Works of J. S. Fletcher - 17 Novels & 28 Short Stories (Illustrated Edition)

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This carefully edited collection has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices.
Novels
Perris of the Cherry Trees
The Middle Temple Murder
Dead Men's Money
The Talleyrand Maxim
The Paradise Mystery
The Borough Treasurer
The Chestermarke Instinct
The Herapath Property
The Orange-Yellow Diamond
The Root of All Evil
In The Mayor's Parlour
The Middle of Things
Ravensdene Court
The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation
Scarhaven Keep
In the Days of Drake
Where Highways Cross
Short Stories
Paul Campenhaye – Specialist in Criminology
The French Maid
The Yorkshire Manufacturer
The Covent Garden Fruit Shop
The Irish Mail
The Tobacco-Box
Mrs. Duquesne
The House on Hardress Head
The Champagne Bottle
The Settling Day
The Magician of Cannon Street
Mr. Poskitt's Nightcaps (Stories of a Yorkshire Farmer)
The Guardian of High Elms Farm
A Stranger in Arcady
The Man Who Was Nobody
Little Miss Partridge
The Marriage of Mr. Jarvis
Bread Cast upon the Waters
William Henry and the Dairymaid
The Spoils to the Victor
An Arcadian Courtship
The Way of the Comet
Brothers in Affliction
A Man or a Mouse
A Deal in Odd Volumes
The Chief Magistrate
Other Stories
The Ivory God
The Other Sense
The New Sun
The Lighthouse on Shivering Sand
Historical Works
Mistress Spitfire
Baden-Powell of Mafeking
Joseph Smith Fletcher (1863-1933) was an English author, one of the leading writers of detective fiction in the Golden Age.

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Pippany Webster kept his knowledge of the love affairs of Mr. Taffendale and Mrs. Perris to himself during the summer that followed his summary dismissal from Perris's employment. He had got another regular job; he could always add a half-sovereign to his week's wages by his transactions with the itinerant fish-vendor, and there seemed to be no immediate reason for turning his knowledge to account. At that time, indeed, being in full feather as regards money, he had no idea of profiting pecuniarly by that knowledge: his great idea was to revenge himself on Rhoda. He became an adept in tracking her; many a night when she went away from the choir-practice he followed her to lonely parts of the adjacent woods, and was witness to her meetings with Taffendale, and he chuckled to himself as he thought of the time when he would expose her treachery to Perris and let the small world around them know what manner of woman she was.

"It'll be a nice come-down for mi lady, will that theer!" he mused. "An' a bonny come-up for t' Methodisses to hear 'at their fine leadin' singer i' t' choyer-pen's carryin' on wi' Taffendale same as if shoo wor one o' them leet wimmen 'at they talk about. Nobbut wait a bit, mi lass, and I'll mak' ye as ye'll repent takkin' that bit o' brass out o' my pocket—I will so!"

Although he told her nothing in return, Pippany extracted all the news that he could get from Tibby Graddige. He heard of the altered condition of things at Cherry-trees; of the reformation of Perris himself; of the growing prosperity which was manifesting itself in various ways. And his ferret-like wits began to put two and two together; he suddenly saw where the help had come from, and he developed long fits of thinking and scheming, all with a view to Mrs. Perris's discomfiture. But he would bide his time—yon there Taffendale, he reminded himself, had said, when he counselled Perris to kick him out: that he, Pippany, couldn't get far away—no, and neither could Taffendale nor Mrs. Perris get far away. He would wait—but he would be down on them when the right time came.

It was Tibby Graddige who brought Pippany news which made him think that possibly the right time had come. Entering his cottage one evening towards the end of that summer, in order to put things to rights, and incidentally to partake of the drop of rum to which its lord and master was always ready to treat her, she revealed a countenance suggestive of important tidings.

"It wodn't surprise me to hear 'at Mestur Perris is goin' to come into a bit o' money," she observed.

"Wodn't it?" said Pippany. "Aw! An' wheer might it be comin' fro', like?"

Mrs. Graddige wiped her lips with the edge of her apron, and Pippany pushed the rum bottle over to her, and motioned her to the cracked tea-cup out of which she usually took her refreshment.

"This afternoon as ever were," said Mrs. Graddige, having tasted her drink and made a face over it, me and Mistress Perris bein' engaged in hingin' out the clothes i' that theer orchard wheer you come by your accident—and a rare mercy it were as you didn't meet wi' yer death, as I've remarked many a time and oft, and shall agen—theer come a tallygrapht, which I never remember nowt o' t' sort ever comin' theer afore while I've known that place, and of course gev' me t' spasms i' mi insides. Mestur Perris, he were down t' little field t'other side o' t' orchard, a-talkin' to Mestur Taffendale over t' hedge top, so Mistress Perris, she oppened it.—Mercy on us V she says, just like that beer. "Mercy on us, Mestur Perris's 'Uncle George is dead!'"

"Who's his Uncle George?" asked Pippany.

"His Uncle George were a draper, at Fenford. away there i' t' low country, and had money, bi what I heard," answered Tibby Graddige. "I've heerd speyk of him afore. Howsomiver, he were dead, accordin' to t' tallygrapht, and Mistress Perris she waved t' paper to Mestur Perris to come, and Mestur Taffendale, he rode his horse up t' hedgeside wi' him. Yer Uncle George is dead, and they want you to go at once,' says Mistress Perris. Ye'd better change yer things and set off,' she says. 'An' you won't lose no time,' she says, ''cause there's none so many trains that way, and it's gettin' on for five now, and the station's four mile off.' Here, I'll tell you what,' says Mestur Taffendale, friendly like, 'I'll lend yer my horse, Perris, and ye can leave him at t' inn at Somerleigh station, and I'll send one o' my men over for him to-night.' 'Why, thankin' you kindly, Mestur Taffendale,' says Mestur Perris."

"'Aye,' he says, 'I'd best go,' he says. 'I shouldn't wonder if mi Uncle George hes left me a bit o' money,' he says.—He allus promised 'at he wod,' he says.

"'Why, then, be off and see after it,' says Mestur Taffendale, and he rode t' horse into t' orchard, and gat off it, and they all then went into t' house. An' i' less than a quarter of an hour Mestur Perris rode off on Mestur Taffendale's horse, to go and fetch his fortune."

"Did it say owt about t' fortune i' t' tallygrapht?" inquired Pippany.

"Why, no, not as Mistress Perris read it out," replied Mrs. Graddige. "But, of course, theer's allus a fortune or summat o' that sort when folks sends tallygraphts. An' varry lucky it were, as I said to Mistress Perris, 'at Mestur Taffendale happened to be theer to gi' t' poor man a lift on his horse. It 'ud ha' been dowly wark, walkin' four mile to t' station wi' a load o' grief on yer back, and wonderin' all t' way how much money t' dead man had left yer."

"Aye, it wod so!" agreed Pippany. "He'd feel t' matter less when he wor mounted on hossback. An' so Mestur Taffendale 'ud hey to walk home on his own feet, like?"

"Why, it's none so far fro' t' Cherry-trees to t' Limepits," observed Tibby Graddige. "Aye, he went his ways when Mestur Perris had ridden off. 'I hope yer husband 'll hey' some good news, Mrs Perris,' he says, when he went away. 'An' bring home a handsome fortun',' he says, laughin'—that's what he said, did Mestur Taffendale."

"He'll hev' to stop till t' buryin's over," said Pippany. "They niver part wi' a dead man's brass till t' corpse is i' t' grave—that's t' law, so they tell me. Them 'at's appointed to look after t' corpse's money niver pays it out until all's overed and done wi'—t' way o' buryin'."

"Eh, an' I wonder what t' reason o' that is?" inquired Tibby Graddige. "Theer mun be a reason, of course."

"It's so 'at t' dead body can't hear what t' relations says about it when they hev' t' brass 'livered up to 'em," replied Pippany. "Theer's allus some on 'em 'at isn't satisfied wi' what they receive, an' then they say foul things about t' dead corpse, and, of course, it wodn't be reight for it to hear owt said agean it, so they allus mak' away wi' it afore sham' t' brass out—that's t' law, as they call it. So Mestur Perris 'll be away for a day or two, like?"

"Aye, and she'll be left alone all by hersen i' that lonely house," answered Mrs. Graddige. "I made offer to go and stop wi' her, but she said she were none afraid."

"Shoo's afraid o' nowt, isn't that theer," observed Pippany. "Shoo's as strong as onny man, shoo is. And I reckon theer's nowt 'at's worth steylin' t' place now, whativer there may be when Mr. Perris brings his Uncle George's fortune back wi' him."

But whether there was anything that was worth stealing or not at Cherry-trees, Pippany Webster could not refrain from visiting the little farmstead that night. He sat by his own fireside for a long time after Mrs. Graddige had finished her charing work, drunk her second drop of comfort, and gone away with a present of a couple of rabbits, and when he at last turned out his lights, damped his fire, and locked up the front door it was only to let himself out at a back window and to slink away in the darkness. By various quiet and devious ways he made his way up the hillside, and to the outbuildings at Cherry-trees. The clock in the church tower was striking ten when he looked cautiously round the corner of the barn and saw that a light was still burning in the house: he saw, also, that it did not proceed from the house-place, but from the parlour, a room which, according to his experience of them, the Perrises scarcely ever used.

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