Buldog Drummond At Bay

  Copyright & Information

  Bulldog Drummond At Bay

  First published in 1935

  © Trustees of the Estate of H.C. McNeile; House of Stratus 1935-2010

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of H.C. McNeile (Sapper) to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2010 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore St., Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  EAN ISBN Edition

  1842325442 9781842325445 Print

  0755122852 9780755122851 Pdf

  0755123042 9780755123049 Mobi

  0755123220 9780755123223 Epub

  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

  www.houseofstratus.com

  About the Author

  Herman Cyril McNeile, who wrote under the pseudonym Sapper, was born in Bodmin, Cornwall, on 28 September 1888 to Captain Malcolm McNeile RN and his wife, Christiana Mary. He was educated at Cheltenham College, and then went on to the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, before joining the Royal Engineers in 1907, from which he derived his pseudonym – ‘sappers’ being the nickname of the Engineers.

  During World War One he served first as a Captain, seeing action at both the First and the Second Battle of Ypres, and won the Military Cross before retiring from the army as a Lieutenant-Colonel in 1919. Prior to this, in 1914 he met and married Violet Baird, daughter of a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Cameron Highlanders. They eventually had two sons.

  Somewhat remarkably, he managed to publish a number of books during the war and whilst still serving, (serving officers were not permitted to publish under their own names – hence the need for a pseudonym), commencing with The Lieutenant and Others and Sergeant Michael Cassidy, R.E. in 1915. Lord Northcliff, the owner of the Daily Mail, was so impressed by this writing that he attempted, but failed, to have McNeile released from the army so he could work as a war correspondent.

  McNeile’s first full length novel, Mufti, was published in 1919, but it was in 1920 that his greatest hit Bulldog Drummond, was published. This concerned the exploits of a demobilised officer, Captain Hugh ‘Bulldog’ Drummond, ‘who found peace dull’. This was an immediate and enduring success and has been filmed and performed on stage both in the UK and USA. Further Drummond adventures were to follow, along with other novels, notably those featuring the private detective Ronald Standish.

  Much of his writing is based upon the atmosphere, rather than experiences, he absorbed from public school and London Gentleman’s Clubs. His heroes are most decidedly ‘English’ in character and ‘do the right thing’, whilst his villains are foreign and ‘do not play by the rules’. Ian Fleming once noted that his own hero James Bond was ‘Sapper’ from the waist up.

  McNeile died in 1937 at his home in Sussex, having lived a relatively quiet and content life, in sharp contrast to the characters in his books. His friend Gerard Fairlie, thought to be the model for Drummond, went on to write seven more adventures. Many of his books are collections of short stories, with most having a twist in the tail, usually surprising the reader by totally flawing anticipations with regard to their ending within the last few sentences. They are as popular today as ever and eagerly adopted by succeeding generations as amongst the best of their genre.

  House of Stratus was pleased to gain the right to publish from McNeile’s estate in 1999 and has since continually held his major works in print.

  Chapter 1

  The mist was low-lying. Above it the tops of the telegraph poles stuck out into the starlit night, marking the line of the road which wound over the desolate fen country. A few isolated houses stood like scattered islands in a sea of white cloud – houses in which the lights had long been extinguished, for it was nearing midnight, and the marsh folk do not sit up late.

  One house only proved the exception. In size and shape it was just as the others – a typical fenman’s cottage. But from one side of it a diffused white glow shone faintly towards the line of telegraph posts. Above the mist the top room showed black and clear-cut. No light came from that window: the illumination came from the sitting-room below.

  In it was seated a very large young man. Between his knees he held a gun, whilst on the table in front of him lay the usual cleaning materials, flanked on the left by a large hunk of bread and cheese, and on the right by a tankard of ale. Behind him, on the hearth-rug, a spaniel lay curled up asleep. In front of him, and close to the door which communicated with the kitchen, a bulldog in a basket snored majestically: also in front of him, and close to the door which led into the diminutive hall, a wire-haired terrier hunted ecstatically in his dreams.

  The blind was up: the window, regardless of the mist which drifted sluggishly in, was open top and bottom. On the table a lamp was burning, and by its light the contents of the room stood revealed. And when those contents were compared with the living occupant the result was somewhat incongruous.

  Over the mantelpiece hung several illuminated texts. They were of a depressing character, which a tasteful colour scheme of yellow beads round red letters was powerless to mitigate. Even a wedding group of the early ’sixties, which filled the place of honour in the centre, seemed unable to give that snap to the wall which the proud owner had doubtless intended. And the rest of the room was in keeping. A horsehair sofa covered with a red counterpane in which were sewn large, round pieces of coloured glass, adorned one wall: a table, complete with cloth to match the counterpane, and a stuffed weasel under a glass dome, adorned another. And in the window, on a small three-legged stool, reposed a Bible of colossal dimensions.

  To the expert the solution was obvious on the spot. This was the parlour; that mysterious, unused room which is found in every similar house; that room which, when the door is suddenly opened on the unwary visitor, exudes a strange and musty smell strongly reminiscent of a not too recent death behind the wainscot: that room which is utterly wasted on the altar of lower-class respectability.

  On the night when the mist was drifting just ceiling high the room was proving false to its traditions. Gone was the stale smell of ancient bones: even “Prepare to meet thy God” hung at a more rakish angle. The first was due to the open window: the second to the fact that a disreputable cap was slung on one end of the text. But the effect was all to the good. And since the large young man who at the moment was engaged in filling his pipe was presumably responsible for both acts of vandalism, it might be well to turn from the room to its occupant.

  His clothes were quite incredibly ancient. Grey flannel trousers: a sweater that had once been white, and an old shooting-coat padded with leather over the shoulders comprised the outer layer. Underneath, grey socks and brown brogues, with a shirt that was open at the neck completed the picture, whilst a collar, made of the same material as the shirt, had been flung carelessly into the coal scuttle with a tie inside it.

  After a while he rose and stretched himself, and it was not until he stood up that it was possible to realise how very large he was. He stood at least six feet in height, and being broad in proportion he seem
ed almost to fill the room. Only the spaniel noticed his movement and opened one liquid brown eye – an eye which followed him as he sauntered over to the window and peered out. Then he returned to the table and, picking up his empty tankard, he made his way past the snorer to the kitchen. A final pint was indicated before turning in.

  It was while he was drawing it that the terrier gave a sudden, sharp, staccato bark, and the large young man returned to the parlour to find that the kennels were awake. The spaniel was sitting up contemplating the window; the bulldog, though still breathing hard, had emerged from his basket, whilst the terrier was following up his one bark with a steady stream of bad language under his breath.

  “What is it, fellers?” said the large young man genially. “Does some varlet approach our domain?”

  Holding his beer in his hand he again went to the window.

  “Shut up, Jock, you ass!” he cried. “How can I hear anything if you’re making that damn fool noise?”

  The terrier made a valiant effort which was partially successful; and then the strain proved too great. And this time his master heard it too. From somewhere, not very far away, there came a muffled shout, and Jock proclaimed the fact in no uncertain voice – no just reason, he reflected, for being temporarily winded with a shooting-boot.

  The large young man stood motionless, listening intently. The sound was not repeated, but it seemed to him that it had not been so much a cry for help as a call from one man to another indicating that he had found something. But who could be looking for anything at midnight in the fens, with a ground mist lying thick?

  The shout had come, so far as he could judge, from the road which passed his own front gate ten yards away. And he was on the point of strolling down the little garden path to investigate further, when a development occurred which was so completely unexpected that for a few moments he could only stare foolishly round the room; whilst even Jock, by this time recovered, forgot to bark. There came a crash of breaking glass, followed by a further crash of still more breaking glass, and the stuffed weasel subsided with a thud on to the carpet.

  The large young man had been getting his cap when it happened, otherwise the stone which he now perceived was the cause of the outrage would have spared the weasel and taken him in the pit of the stomach. For the first crash of breaking glass had been the window, which, having been open top and bottom, now had both upper and lower panes smashed. Thence the missile, missing the lamp by a few inches, had smitten the glass dome of the weasel hip and thigh, and ricocheting off the wall had finished up by the bulldog’s basket.

  “Hi!” shouted the large young man, when he had recovered himself, “what the devil do you think you’re doing?”

  His momentary amazement had given way to anger: someone had deliberately thrown a stone through the window from the road, and it did not strike him as being in the slightest degree funny. Some tramp presumably, or a belated drunk: in any case, whoever it turned out to be, he was going to be thanked in suitable terms in the near future. Indubitably the large young man was not amused.

  “Heel! The lot of you.”

  He strode down the garden path, and flinging open the little gate stepped into the road.

  “Where’s the lousy swine who bunged that brick through my window?” he called out.

  There was no answer, and for a moment or two he stood undecided, with the two dogs at his heels. He could hear no sound save the cry of a distant night bird, and gradually the difficulty of the position came home to him. The mist, if anything, was thicker; he could see the light from the room he had just left like a dull yellow square in the surrounding whiteness. But the trouble was he had no means of telling which way the stone-thrower had gone after he had done the deed. The fog had swallowed him up completely.

  Again he listened intently, and, as he stood there motionless, subconsciously he became aware of the strange silence of the three dogs. He glanced down at them: in the dim light he could see their heads close together over something in the road. He spoke to them and they looked up at him. Between them, in the dust, was a dark patch.

  The large young man lit a match and bent down to examine it. And after a while he gave a low whistle. For the patch was still wet, and it was red – that unmistakable red which can only be one thing. It was blood, and why should a tramp or a belated drunk be bleeding?

  He straightened up and lit a cigarette: the mystery was becoming stranger and stranger. That the blood was recent was obvious, otherwise it would have dried in the dust. And it therefore seemed fairly conclusive to him that it had come from the man who had thrown the stone. But why should an injured man, who was so badly hurt that he was bleeding, do what he had done? Why hadn’t he come up to the cottage and asked for help?

  Suddenly Jock began to growl under his breath, though his master could hear nothing suspicious. Until, a few moments later, he heard very faintly in the distance the unmistakable hum of an engine. A motorcar was coming along the road, and the driver had evidently got into a low gear.

  The large young man hesitated; then, with a quick order to his dogs, he stepped back on to the garden path, and, closing the gate, he stood leaning over it. He felt instinctively that this car, nosing its way through the fog, was connected in some way with the unknown stone-thrower who had come out of the night and disappeared into it again, leaving only the ominous red patch to mark his passing.

  Gradually the noise of the car grew louder, until with unexpected suddenness two headlights loomed up out of the mist. They came abreast the gate, and then they halted; the driver had stopped the car. Voices sounded over the noise of the engine: then one of the doors opened and shut, and footsteps approached the gate.

  The man who had got out had his hand actually on the latch, when the glow of a cigarette within a few inches of his face caused him to start violently.

  “Good evening,” said the large young man pleasantly. “Can I be of any assistance?”

  He drew hard at his cigarette, and in the glow he got a quick glimpse of the newcomer. The man wore no hat, and his hair was cropped short, whilst his features had that square-cut, Teutonic look which branded him at once as a German, even without the muttered “Gott in Himmel’’ that he ejaculated under his breath at the shock of finding the gate occupied.

  “Have you seen a man?” he began, when once again a door in the car opened and shut, and further footsteps approached the gate. But this time the visitor carried an electric torch which he flashed on to the large young man’s face. From there it travelled downwards, pausing for a moment on oil-stained hands, and finishing up with the incredibly dirty trousers.

  “Have you been here long, my man?” said the new arrival curtly, and in the darkness the large young man smiled. Evidently by his clothes he had been judged.

  “Nigh on thirty year coom next cherry-picking,” he answered, hoping fervently that his attempt at dialect would pass muster. What dialect it was supposed to be he had no idea, but to his profound relief it seemed to go down.

  “I don’t mean that,” snapped the other. “Have you been standing by this gate for long?”

  “Maybe five minutes – maybe more,” said the large young man. “Why do ’ee ask?”

  “Have you seen a man come along the road?”

  “Old Gaffer Sheepshank, he coom along round about seven. He wor drunk.”

  The other swore under his breath.

  “Just recently, I mean. Within the last few minutes.”

  “Noa. I ain’t seen no one. What sort of a man do ’ee mean?”

  But a sudden exclamation from the road interrupted their conversation.

  “Emil,” called out a harsh voice, “come here at once! Bring your torch.”

  The large young man thoughtfully ground out with his heel the cigarette he was smoking, and wondered what was going to happen next. For the gentleman who had called for Emil was now examining with keen interest the patch of blood that had happened to show up clearly in the headlights of the car. And then, aft
er a few moments’ earnest conversation, Emil returned to the gate.

  “Now, look here, my man,” he said quietly, “I take it this is your cottage.”

  “’Tis my fayther’s.”

  “Is your father here?”

  “Not tonight. He be in Norwich.”

  “So you’re all alone in the house?”

  “That’s right, mister.”

  “Are you quite sure?” A sinister note had crept into the speaker’s voice.

  “Course I’m sure. Do ’ee think I’m daft?”

  The torch flashed on again, and by its light the large young man saw that he was covered by a revolver.

  “Get indoors,” snapped the other. “And get a move on, I’m in a hurry. Now,” he continued, when they were both standing in the parlour, “what have you done with the man who came along this road a few minutes ago?”

  “I tell ’ee I ain’t seen no man,” was the stubborn answer. “And I reckons you’d better put that there toy away or it might go off. A pretty thing this – in a man’s own house.”

  The large young man sat down in an armchair by the hearth- rug ostensibly to pat the spaniel, but in reality to smuggle his Free Forester tie from the coal scuttle into his trousers pocket. This man Emil defeated him. His English was perfect, without the suspicion of an accent: to look at he might have been an Englishman. And yet there was something intangible about him that placed him as a foreigner. His clothes were faultless – perhaps a shade too faultless for the country. And on one finger of his left hand he wore a ring with a peculiar blue stone in it.

  The tie smuggled successfully into his pocket the young man rose, the picture of aggrieved, bucolic indignation.

  “Look ’ee ’ere, mister,” he said angrily, “I’m tired of thy fooling. Search the house if it gives thee any satisfaction, and then get thee gone. I’m fair sick of the sight of thy ugly fiz, and if I knew who it was I’d have the law on ’ee tomorrow.”