The Mummy

4. The Mummy Travels

4

The Mummy Travels

The night was so dark that I could see little of the road as we went, once we had passed beyond the lamps of the suburbs.

I began to get dismal.

First I speculated idly upon the reason which had induced people to send for me in particular as a consultant—I having no delusions (I think) about my small reputation. I am indolent, and seldom write to the medical journals, being ready to assume that what comes under my observation has been already noticed and probably recorded by others. But I wondered whether any one of my few contributions had led to this journey. Then I remembered that I must be passing in the darkness through many places which had been familiar to me as a boy. I grinned at the memory of the great things which at that time I had expected to do in life. I must have been a fool at fifteen. But having a strong suspicion that I continue to be a fool at fifty, I couldn’t congratulate myself. There’s no fool like an old fool.

The hour’s journey was lengthened almost to three by fog, and was sufficiently dreary. I was far enough from the cheery frame of mind proper to the consultant, when we stopped before the great gates opening on to a carriage- drive. A rough calculation suggested that we passed through an avenue of about a mile, before we stopped again in front of a large pile of buildings which stretched into the darkness on either hand.

I was received by the stoutest butler I have ever seen. A huge man, shaking like a jelly with grief. A ridiculous sight, had it not been for the conditions of my visit; but from his appearance I formed the worst possible prognosis of the case I had come to see.

I said nothing to him about that, of course, nor he to me. He directed a footman to take charge of my bag, and led me himself across a large hall, where a wood-fire blazed, to a room where the table was laid for a meal. Here he pressed me to take food, and asked me to excuse him, as there were things to attend to. A groom, he said, had driven to fetch the doctor who was to meet me, but they could not be back for half-an-hour. He left me, and I munched a biscuit and sipped a glass of very fine port, sitting in an easy-chair by the fire.

The house was perfectly still, and no one else, rather to my indignation, came near me. I remained quite alone until my confrère’s arrival.

Dr. Thorne was a smallish, dry, hard-bitten man of forty or so, with a tanned face and slightly bowed legs. His eyes were a flinty blue, his general appearance was distinctly horsey, though I learnt afterwards that he was a great deal more than a mere horsey man.

He said politely that he was delighted to make my acquaintance, and absent- mindedly helping himself to port, he sniffed it, shaking his head at the fire, standing with one elbow on the mantelpiece.

“A sad case!” he said, showing real trouble. “A sad case, isn’t it? A charming fellow, I assure you, and I have known him from the time he went into knickerbockers.”

“I’ve heard nothing whatever of the case,” I said; “I’ve seen no one but servants since I came. Is there anything you think I should be told before we chat with your patient?”

The blue-eyed man, who was staring moodily into the fire, moved so abruptly that he knocked his wine-glass off the mantelpiece and it smashed on the fender.

“Patient!” he said. “God bless my soul, sir! he’s dead. Was dead for some hours before we sent for you.”

“Why did you send, then?”

“Well, the case is a curious one. Very sad, very sad! And the hounds to meet here in two days’ time. One of the best days of the season generally. Not certain if they’ll be out again at all. Respect for the dead, you know, and all that sort of thing. A most charming young fellow. Rode straight, and family of course greatly respected. Hope they won’t miss a day’s hunting for me, though, all the same, when my hour comes.”

“Why did you send for me?” I asked again, rapping on the table, and the other man started.

“Yes, yes,” he muttered. “There I go, rioting as usual till I’m whipped off.

Disgrace to my profession. A mere hunting man.”

He sat silent for a minute or so while I waited, and then he began to speak quietly of the case.

“The boy,” he said, “is a D’Aurelle. You know the family, of course. His father is one of the richest commoners in England, and has refused a peerage, as more than one of his forefathers did. The boy was the only son—about twenty- two, and in every way a manly fellow. Lady Hélène d’Aurelle, his mother, was ill last autumn, and has wintered abroad with her husband. Hugh, the young

fellow, has spent a good deal of time in town this winter—they say there was some special attraction—but he hunted here regularly. He came down about a week ago, and, when I met him, told me that he would be here for about a fortnight. Two days ago he was riding hard to hounds, with a couple of friends. He had three visitors, I think, if not four, down with him. Yesterday afternoon the butler found him lying dead in a sort of salle d’armes, where apparently he had been using Indian clubs. He had not been at lunch, but it was an understood thing that he and his guests acted independently of each other till dinner-time. They supposed he was lunching at a neighbour’s house some few miles away.”

“What do you suppose to be the cause of death?” I asked. “There is some uncertainty?”

“None whatever!” the blue-eyed man answered briskly. “There’s not a shadow of doubt about it. He overtaxed his heart two years ago. He was in the Oxford boat. The run of two days ago was unusually stiff. Are you a hunting man?”

“No.”

“Ah, well, you’ve missed one of the great pleasures of life; given a good scenting day, a good mount, and a country you know like a book. The first whimper of a trustworthy hound in covert—I know all their voices——” He broke off abruptly. “Poor fellow! He’ll never hear them again. Well, well! As I said, it was a hard day, and he rode hard, and we killed some fifteen miles from home. He spoke of stiffness next morning, and, undoubtedly, to try and work it off with heavy clubs was a fatal mistake.”

“And why am I called in?”

“In the absence of his people, and to avoid any source of error or of gossip, an independent opinion seemed advisable. It gives me the pleasure of making your acquaintance,” and he bowed pleasantly to me across the fire.

I muttered something banal about the pleasure being mutual, and after a word or two more we went upstairs. I was inclined to repeat my question of why I was called in—with special emphasis on the personal pronoun. But I was tired of ringing the changes on that query, and the point seemed of no particular importance, except to myself.

Passing along one of the upper corridors we found the big butler evidently on guard at a bedroom door. He drew himself up to attention as we neared him, and stayed where he stood, making no move to enter the room with us. There were candles in a candelabrum, and they flickered in the draught. This made his huge shadow go through strange changes; and indeed I think his fat body still shook with grief, though he made no sound, even when Thorne said a friendly word in passing. Thorne told me that the man had served in the Guards, had saved the elder D’Aurelle’s life in the Egyptian war, and had been the dead man’s first teacher in boxing, fencing and many other things.

The boy (he looked no more than a thoroughly manly boy) had been strikingly handsome. His clean-shaven face had a set look, as though he were making an effort with clenched teeth—and something of a frown. There seemed no reason for doubting Thorne’s decision about the cause of death. I examined the body; and returning to the corridor asked the butler a few questions about the finding of it, and also chatted a little longer with Thorne, who was ready to give all possible information—being anxious, he acknowledged, to avoid a post-mortem in the parents’ absence, if he honestly could.

I finally said that I was quite prepared to sign a joint certificate, giving heart- failure, due to over-exertion, as the cause of death, and this was agreed upon.

It was then between five and six, and chilly, as it always seems to one who has been up all night. A bedroom was ready for me, and I am sure that the servants, of a somewhat old-fashioned type, would have offered me every attention. But I took an unreasoning dislike to the place, and felt, also, that I must be a burden on the distressed house.

I also declined Thorne’s pressing offer of a bed at his place, and asked Mott, the butler, privately, whether he thought that I could arrange with the chauffeur to take me back into town at once. It ended in my getting a breakfast while sundry preparations were being made; for Mott seemed to brighten up quite visibly at my suggestion. Indeed, until he conducted me himself to the car, I was rather puzzled at his hurried way of speeding things.

Passing down the steps from the big hall door to the carriage-drive in the grey morning light I talked to him, trying to remove some vague uncertainty that he seemed to feel, about the cause of the boy’s death. He didn’t express it openly. Indeed, he wouldn’t acknowledge it, and I decided that he merely felt special responsibility because his master and mistress were away.

The flight of steps was high, and in going down I looked on the top of the car.

My bag was there, and also a long, pretty broad, sinister-looking object, partly muffled in rugs.

“I brought nothing but a bag,” I said, staring down on it.

The man Mott looked down too, stammered, and then the guardsman in him seemed suddenly to get the upper hand of the butler.

“ ’Twas an order I got from him,” he said. “The d——d thing was to go to town this morning, anyway. Twice this week he said, ‘Remember, Mott, as I might forget, or be away, that the Thing’s to go back on the twenty-fifth.’ It’s me that’s glad to be quit of it. Though if you ask me I say it’s too late.”

“What is it?” I asked, but really I already knew. “A blasted Mummy,” said Mott.