That girl,’ the canon said vaguely. ‘She has been talking to you, has she? She will go on talking for ever, if you let her. Please sit down, gentlemen. About the Vereys—ah yes! But surely there was nothing wrong about the Vereys? Mrs Verey was quite a nice, well-bred person, and they left the place in perfectly good order. They paid me in advance, too, because they live in New Zealand, as she explained, and know nobody in London. They were on a visit to England, and they wanted a temporary home in the heart of the country, because that is the real England, as she said. That was so sensible of them, I thought—instead of flying to the grime and turmoil of London, as most of our friends from overseas do. In a way, I was quite touched by it, and I was glad to let them have the vicarage.’
The superintendent shook his head. ‘People as clever as they are make things very difficult for us, sir. And the lady never mentioned that her husband was a clergyman, I understand.
‘No, and that puzzled me when I heard of it,’ the canon said. ‘But it didn’t matter, and no doubt there was a reason.’
‘The reason was, I think,’ Mr Owen said, ‘that if she had mentioned it, you might have been too much interested, and asked questions which would have been all right for a genuine parson’s wife, but which she couldn’t answer without putting her foot in it. Her husband could do a vicar well enough to pass with laymen, especially if they were not English laymen. I am sorry to say, Canon, that your tenants were impostors. Their name was certainly not Verey, to begin with. I don’t know who they are—I wish I did—they are new to us and they have invented a new method. But I can tell you what they are. They are thieves and swindlers.’
The canon fell back in his chair. ‘Thieves and swindlers!’ he gasped.
‘And very talented performers too,’ Trent assured him. ‘Why, they have had in this house of yours part of the loot of several country-house burglaries which took place last year, and which puzzled the police because it seemed impossible that some of the things taken could ever be turned into cash. One of them was a herald’s tabard, which Superintendent Owen tells me had been worn by the father of Sir Andrew Ritchie. He was Maltravers Herald in his day. It was taken when Sir Andrew’s place in Lincolnshire was broken into, and a lot of very valuable jewellery was stolen. It was dangerous to try to sell the tabard in the open market, and it was worth little, anyhow, apart from any associations it might have. What they did was to fake up a story about the tabard which might appeal to an American purchaser, and, having found a victim, to induce him to buy it. I believe he parted with quite a large sum.’
‘The poor simp!’ growled Langley.
Canon Maberley held up a shaking hand. ‘I fear I do not understand,’ he said. ‘What had their taking my house to do with all this?’
‘It was a vital part of the plan. We know exactly how they went to work about the tabard; and no doubt the other things were got rid of in very much the same way. There were four of them in the gang. Besides your tenants, there was an agreeable and cultured person—I should think a man with real knowledge of antiquities and objects of art—whose job was to make the acquaintance of wealthy people visiting London, gain their confidence, take them about to places of interest, exchange hospitality with them, and finally get them down to this vicarage. In this case it was made to appear as if the proposal to look over your church came from the visitors themselves. They could not suspect anything. They were attracted by the romantic name of the place on a signpost up there at the corner of the main road.’
The canon shook his head helplessly. ‘But there is no signpost at that corner.’
‘No, but there was one at the time when they were due to be passing that corner in the confederate’s car. It was a false signpost, you see, with a false name on it—so that if anything went wrong, the place where the swindle was worked would be difficult to trace. Then, when they entered the churchyard their attention was attracted by a certain gravestone with an inscription that interested them. I won’t waste your time by giving the whole story—the point is that the gravestone, or rather the top layer which had been fitted onto it, was false too. The sham inscription on it was meant to lead up to the swindle, and so it did.’
The canon drew himself up in his chair. ‘It was an abominable act of sacrilege!’ he exclaimed. ‘The man calling himself Verey—’
‘I don’t think,’ Trent said, ‘it was the man calling himself Verey who actually did the abominable act. We believe it was the fourth member of the gang, who masqueraded as the Vereys’ chauffeur—a very interesting character. Superintendent Owen can tell you about him.’
Mr Owen twisted his moustache thoughtfully. ‘Yes; he is the only one of them that we can place. Alfred Coveney, his name is; a man of some education and any amount of talent. He used to be a stage-carpenter and property-maker—a regular artist, he was. Give him a tub of papier-mâché, and there was nothing he couldn’t model and colour to look exactly like the real thing. That was how the false top to the gravestone was made, I’ve no doubt. It may have been made to fit on like a lid, to be slipped on and off as required. The inscription was a bit above Alf, though—I expect it was Gifford who drafted that for him, and he copied the lettering from other old stones in the churchyard. Of course the fake sign-post was Alf’s work too—stuck up when required, and taken down when the show was over.
‘Well, Alf got into bad company. They found how clever he was with his hands, and he became an expert burglar. He has served two terms of imprisonment. He is one of a few who have always been under suspicion for the job at Sir Andrew Ritchie’s place, and the other two when the Chalice was lifted from Eynsham Park and the Psalter from Lord Swanbourne’s house. With what they collected in this house and the jewellery that was taken in all three burglaries, they must have done very well indeed for themselves; and by this time they are going to be hard to catch.’
Canon Maberley, who had now recovered himself somewhat, looked at the others with the beginnings of a smile. ‘It is a new experience for me,’ he said, ‘to be made use of by a gang of criminals. But it is highly interesting. I suppose that when these confiding strangers had been got down here, my tenant appeared in the character of the parson, and invited them into the house, where you tell me they were induced to make a purchase of stolen property. I do not see, I must confess, how anything could have been better designed to prevent any possibility of suspicion arising. The vicar of a parish, at home in his own vicarage! Who could imagine anything being wrong? I only hope, for the credit of my cloth, that the deception was well carried out.’
‘As far as I know,’ Trent said, ‘he made only one mistake. It was a small one; but the moment I heard of it I knew that he must have been a fraud. You see, he was asked about the oar you have hanging up in the hall. I didn’t go to Oxford myself, but I believe when a man is given his oar it means that he rowed in an eight that did something unusually good.’
A light came into the canon’s spectacled eyes. ‘In the year I got my colours the Wadham boat went up five places on the river. It was the happiest week of my life.’
‘Yet you had other triumphs,’ Trent suggested. ‘For instance, didn’t you get a Fellowship at All Souls, after leaving Wadham?’
‘Yes, and that did please me, naturally,’ the canon said. ‘But that is a different sort of happiness, my dear sir, and, believe me, nothing like so keen. And by the way, how did you know about that?’
‘I thought it might be so, because of the little mistake your tenant made. When he was asked about the oar, he said he had rowed for All Souls.’
Canon Maberley burst out laughing, while Langley and the superintendent stared at him blankly.
‘I think I see what happened,’
