These two murders happened within three months of each other. Then for over a year Peg-Leg was not heard from again. His next appearance was in London where on Hempstead Heath he stabbed Professor Thomas Belding, the noted authority on Eastern religions.
Now I come to the last of Peg-Leg’s activities. His final murder occurred here in Camberwell and robbed me of one of my dearest friends.
The Reverend Frank Parkington was a bachelor, and with young Harry Fellows, his curate, lived in the old stone vicarage just behind the church of St. Annes. He was in all particulars the finest man I have ever known, a brilliant preacher, a good friend, an ardent worker in his chosen field.
His home was a rendezvous for a few of us who over a convivial pipe liked to discuss those matters of the day that interested us. On the night of his death we had gathered at his request to meet Captain Charles Wonderly, the Indian explorer who was his guest. We found this fellow Wonderly a very interesting talker. He had traveled far and seen much and knew how to picture in words what he had seen. With his descriptions and anecdotes he held us interested until well toward midnight.
I remember that I arrived home at about twelve-fifteen. I retired immediately. But I did not go to sleep at once as my mind was still full of the Captain Wonderly’s stories. Just as I was dozing off I heard the church clock strike two and at the same instant there came a violent ringing at my door-bell.
I found Harry Fellows awaiting me on my door-step.
“Come! Come quickly!” he said in a voice hoarse from excitement. “Dr. Parkington is dead — murdered!”
“Murdered! Good heavens, man, are you mad!” I shouted, staring into his face that showed pale and haggard in the feeble light of my hall lamp.
For answer he reached out and shook me roughly by the shoulder.
“Will you come,” he said fiercely, “or shall I have to carry you?”
Had I not immediately shown signs of obeying his demand, I really believe the young giant would have picked me up and carried me just as I was in pajamas and slippers. His love for Parkington who had been more than a father to him was a strong thing, and at that moment his grief made him less than reasonable.
In less than ten minutes we were on the road to the vicarage. As we hurried through the still night, Fellows briefly told me what had happened.
II
After his guests had left, Parkington and Captain Wonderly, who was staying for the night, went to their rooms. Because he had some work to finish, Fellows had remained down stairs. At about one-fifteen he was just finishing his writing when he was startled and frightened by the sound of a blood-curdling moan followed by the sound of someone choking. As soon as he had pulled himself together, he ran upstairs and instinct guided him to Parkington’s room. He knocked at the door and when there was no answer he pushed it open and entered the bedroom.
There on his knees beside the bed he found Parkington dead. A knife or some long, sharp instrument had been driven into his back.
“What did you do then?” I asked.
“Called Rodgers, the servant, and sent him off for the police.”
“You didn’t rouse Wonderly?”
“No. In the excitement I forgot all about the fellow.”
We entered the vicarage and raced up the stairs to Parkington’s room. There we found Chief Constable Smithers in charge, and with him a quiet looking man whom he introduced as Inspector Grant of Scotland Yard, “down for a bit of a holiday, sir, and stopping with me.”
But for the moment I paid but little attention to Smithers and his friend. I was too greatly upset by the sight of the body I could make out lying beside the bed. My natural sorrow at Parkington’s death was added to by the awfulness of the way in which he had been taken from us. I went over and stood beside his body and looking down on it swore that I would find his murderer and see that he paid for his crime.
Then I turned to Smithers for his report.
“Squire,” he began gravely, “what I have to tell you will probably surprise you. You have heard of the notorious Peg-Leg. Well, sir, there is every indication that this is another of his fiendish crimes.”
Both Fellows and myself stared in amazement. Smithers continued.
“Yes, sir, I know that it sounds impossible but nevertheless it seems to be a fact. Inspector Grant here who worked on both the Bascom case and that of Professor Belding, will bear me out when I say that all the clues we have been able to find point in that direction.”
Inspector Grant nodded his head.
Smithers crossed the room and stood midway between the bed and an open window that looked out on poor Parkington’s lawn.
He pointed downward at the carpet.
“See here, sir. Those little round marks — and here — and here — leading right to the window, sir. And plenty more of them on the ground below accompanied by the print of one shoe which does not show on this carpet.”
“And those marks—” I began.
“They’re from a wooden leg,” Smithers finished.
“But see here,” Fellows cried from beside the window. “How did the beggar get in the house. No man with a wooden leg could climb up here.”
Smithers shook his head.
“No good, sir. It’s really a very easy job. You have the hooks that hold the drain pipe all the way. Both Grant and I tried it and had no trouble at all.”
“Have you tried to follow the trail?” I asked.
“Lor’ bless you, yes, sir. We did that at once. But it leads nowhere. The prints are lost on the stone road less than a hundred feet down the highway.”
We were all bending over those horrible indentations in the carpet when a sound at our backs caused us to look up. In the doorway clad in his pajamas was Captain Wonderly rubbing his eyes and yawning.
“I say, you chaps,” he said, “what’s up?”
Then he caught sight of Parkington’s body and started forward.
“Good heavens! Parkington!” he exclaimed. “What’s wrong with him? Is he hurt?”
“Dead,” I answered briefly.
In a dazed sort of way Wonderly turned his eyes from one to another of us. At last they rested on Smithers, and guided by the constable’s uniform, addressed him as the officer of the law.
“Have you got the man that did this?”
“Not yet,” Smithers replied. “And now, sir, I’ll trouble you to tell me who you are and what you know of this business.”
Wonderly indicated Fellows and me.
“These gentlemen know me,” he said. “My name’s Wonderly. I was a friend of Dr. Parkington. As for what I know of this business — unfortunately I can’t help you a bit.”
“You were staying in the house?”
Wonderly looked down significantly at his night clothes.
“I certainly was,” he answered, “in that room across the hall.”
“And you heard nothing? No sound?”
An expression of sorrow — almost of shame passed over Wonderly’s face.
“If I only had,” he replied quietly, “I’ll wager Parkington would be alive now. You see, gentlemen, some years ago I lost the hearing in my right ear. This deficiency doesn’t bother me ordinarily but if I happen to go to sleep on my left ear as I did tonight, I’m as deaf as a post.”
At my suggestion we went downstairs and seated ourselves in the library, leaving the murder chamber and its ghastly inhabitant untouched to await the offices of the coroner. But hardly had we taken our chairs when Fellows jumped to his feet, exclaiming:
“This sitting around when Dr. Parkington’s murderer is making good his escape is too much for me. I’m going to have a look around.”
I put out my hand to stop him but at a signal from Smithers let it fall.
“Let him go,” he said after Fellows had left the room. “It won’t do any good but it won’t do any harm and it may ease the poor lad to be doing something.”