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Page 81
Bryce paused awhile, as if marshalling his facts.
"Now, after that," he continued presently, "I began to
investigate matters myself--for my own satisfaction. And very
soon I found out certain things--which I'll summarize,
briefly, because some of my facts are doubtless known to you
already. First of all--the man who came here as John Braden
was, in reality, one John Brake. He was at one time manager
of a branch of a well-known London banking company. He
appropriated money from them under apparently mysterious
circumstances of which I, as yet, knew nothing; he was
prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to ten years' penal
servitude. And those two wards of Ransford's, Mary and
Richard Bewery, as they are called, are, in reality, Mary and
Richard Brake--his children."
"You've established that as a fact?" asked Jettison, who was
listening with close attention. "It's not a surmise on your
part?"
Bryce hesitated before replying to this question. After all,
he reflected, it was a surmise. He could not positively prove
his assertion.
"Well," he answered after a moment's thought, "I'll qualify
that by saying that from the evidence I have, and from what I
know, I believe it to be an indisputable fact. What I do know
of fact, hard, positive fact, is this:--John Brake married a
Mary Bewery at the parish church of Braden Medworth, near
Barthorpe, in Leicestershire: I've seen the entry in the
register with my own eyes. His best man, who signed the
register as a witness, was Mark Ransford. Brake and Ransford,
as young men, had been in the habit of going to Braden
Medworth to fish; Mary Bewery was governess at the vicarage
there. It was always supposed she would marry Ransford;
instead, she married Brake, who, of course, took her off to
London. Of their married life, I know nothing. But within a
few years, Brake was in trouble, for the reason I have told
you. He was arrested--and Harker was the man who arrested
him."
"Dear me!" exclaimed Mitchington. "Now, if I'd only known--"
"You'll know a lot before I'm through," said Bryce. "Now,
Harker, of course, can tell a lot--yet it's unsatisfying.
Brake could make no defence--but his counsel threw out
strange hints and suggestions--all to the effect that Brake
had been cruelly and wickedly deceived--in fact, as it were,
trapped into doing what he did. And--by a man whom he'd
trusted as a close friend. So much came to Harker's ears--but
no more, and on that particular point I've no light. Go on
from that to Brake's private affairs. At the time of his
arrest he had a wife and two very young children. Either just
before, or at, or immediately after his arrest they completely
disappeared--and Brake himself utterly refused to say one
single word about them. Harker asked if he could do anything
--Brake's answer was that no one was to concern himself. He
preserved an obstinate silence on that point. The clergyman
in whose family Mrs. Brake had been governess saw Brake, after
his conviction--Brake would say nothing to him. Of Mrs.
Brake, nothing more is known--to me at any rate. What was
known at the time is this--Brake communicated to all who came
in contact with him, just then, the idea of a man who has been
cruelly wronged and deceived, who takes refuge in sullen
silence, and who is already planning and cherishing--revenge!"
"Aye, aye!" muttered Mitchington. "Revenge?--just So!"
"Brake, then," continued Bryce, "goes off to his term of penal
servitude, and so disappears--until he reappears here in
Wrychester. Leave him for a moment, and go back. And--it's a
going back, no doubt, to supposition and to theory--but
there's reason in what I shall advance. We know--beyond
doubt--that Brake had been tricked and deceived, in some money
matter, by some man--some mysterious man--whom he referred to
as having been his closest friend. We know, too, that there
was extraordinary mystery in the disappearance of his wife and
children. Now, from all that has been found out, who was
Brake's closest friend? Ransford! And of Ransford, at that
time, there's no trace. He, too, disappeared--that's a fact
which I've established. Years later, he reappears--here at
Wrychester, where he's bought a practice. Eventually he has
two young people, who are represented as his wards, come to
live with him. Their name is Bewery. The name of the young
woman whom John Brake married was Bewery. What's the
inference? That their mother's dead--that they're known under
her maiden name: that they, without a shadow of doubt, are
John Brake's children. And that leads up to my theory--which
I'll now tell you in confidence--if you wish for it."
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