The Pariah

Roy Glashan's Library
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BERTRAM ATKEY

THE PARIAH

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Illustrated by Frank Hoban

First published in The Grand Magazine, November 1916,

Reprinted in The Blue Book Magazine, August 1928,
(this version)

This e-book edition: Roy Glashan's Library, 2024
Version Date: 2024-07-01

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The Blue Book Magazine, August 1928,
with "The Pariah"

A thrilling adventure of the extraordinary Merlin O'Moore and his strange friends—by the author of "The Easy Street Experts."

THEY were just concluding a little friendly game of poker in the sitting-room which Henri, head waiter of the Medieval Hall at the Astoritz, shared with a few others of the more important functionaries of the huge hotel; and Fin MacBatt, the valet and personal attendant of Mr. Merlin O'Moore, was there.

He was, indeed, very much to the fore, being desperately engaged in promoting a very tolerable jackpot which he sincerely believed he, with the powerful aid of four queens, would very shortly be shoveling into his pocket. It was passing many a moon since Mr. MacBatt had held four queens, or four of any kind, and very naturally he wanted to make the most of it. Only his friend Henri remained in the betting, and the couple had raised each other the limit—half a crown, five times. Henri was looking nervous, but Mr. MacBatt (save for a poniard-like glitter in his eyes, his clenched teeth, and a slight unconscious twitching of his ears) gave no sign that he expected momentarily to cannibalize that jackpot.

It was Henri's bet, but after a swift uncertain glance at the grim face of MacBatt, Henri's nerve failed him. Instead of raising the bet, he added the requisite chips to the pot and "saw" Mr. MacBatt.

"All right, Honroy," said the valet. "Here you are—four little queens!" He spread the cards out on the table and reached for the jackpot. But—!

"Halte-là!" said Honroy, with something like a sob of relief. "Voilà, my old! Tree kings and joker! Four kings, huh?" And he surrounded the jackpot lovingly.

"Pretty hot, that!" said MacBatt with a pale glare and an iron smile. "Your money, Honroy! Gimme a drink. And then we'd better be moving. I've got to get Marlin ready for dinner, and you've got to get dinner ready for Merlin."

"Perfectly, my old!" said Honroy, and clinked glasses with the cleaned-out Mac-Batt....

MR. O'MOORE was giving a little dinner to a few friends that evening in the Medieval Hall, the party comprising Miss Blackberry Brown, the famous and attractive white-black comedienne who was Merlin's best friend; Mr. Fitz-Percy, the ancient Deadhead, protégé of Mr. O'Moore, who claimed to be the pretty Blackberry's "guardian" (though upon what abstruse and complicated grounds he claimed that privilege no man knew); Miss Brown's recently married friend—once Miss Clover Sweeting, but now Mrs. Jack Mallandan— and Clover's husband.

These were the guests, and the dinner was by way of celebrating the successful conclusion of the couple's first month of married life. That, at least, was the ostensible reason, but, as Miss Brown had more than once vaguely hinted there might be more behind the celebration than met the eye.

"Well, Double B," Merlin had suggested, guessing that the delightful Blackberry had left something unsaid, when she first hinted that there might be developments, "if there is anything I can do for you or your little friend—or her husband—let me know."

"Dear Merlin!" said Miss Brown. "I know you will.... We shall see." And she proceeded to turn the subject by asking Molossus, the deadly-looking dogue de Bordeaux who was Mr. O'Moore's inseparable companion, to have a chocolate—which Molo, with the slightly sheepish smile of a jollied man-eater, accepted.

SOMEWHAT to Merlin O'Moore's surprise, his dinner was not entirely a success. There seemed to be a shadow upon things. Exactly what was wrong he could not trace. Because he delighted to please Miss Blackberry Brown, he exerted himself to the utmost to amuse her friend Clover—a little, fair, golden-haired lady, with very perfect and daintily-chiseled features. But Clover seemed subdued, and so did her practically brand-new husband.

Even the Fitz-Percy, expanding over a dinner that touched his heart, cooing witticisms, telling quaint little anecdotes, emitting brilliant whimsicalities, did not succeed in dispelling the shadow.

"Clover has one of her quiet moods," said Miss Brown playfully, but Clover denied it. Whether his wife was in a quiet mood or not, certainly Mr. Jack Mallandan was in a thirsty mood. He inflicted very heavy punishment upon Merlin's incomparable wines, but it added to the gayety of the evening not at all.

AT last Miss Brown could not endure the restraint any longer. "Brrr!" she went. "It's like flirting with a vegetarian in the porch of an unlighted and empty church on a wet November evening! Merlin, you are thinking that my little Clover-girl is a cold and glum and gloomy girl—and that her husband-man is a dullard-person! And they're not. They're awfully lively folk, really, but they're worried. The poor things are so worried that they can't forget their troubles even for just dinner-time. So please be kind, Merlin, and let us have coffee upstairs, and Clover and Jack will tell you all about it. Really, you know, that's why I wanted you to meet them. There's something very awkward for them going on—and I know that you and I and Mr. Fitz-Percy and Molossus and that extraordinary MacBatt can put it right—"

"There is nothing in all this wonderful world, dear ladies, that such a combination cannot put right," said the silvery-haired old Deadhead in his deepest, most resonant voice.

They started to rise; at that moment, conclusive proof arrived that decidedly there was something connected with the Mallandans which needed putting right. For through the open top of the deep windows under which the party had sat, came an object which looked like a very small half-inflated football. It dropped soggily upon the table, upsetting some wineglasses.

Clover Mallandan paled, giving a startled little cry, staring and clutching at Merlin's arm. Mr. Mallandan swore briefly in a disconcerted voice.

Henri, hovering near, threw up his hands in horror at this desecration of his paradise, the Medieval Hall, and sent an underling at once to have men issue forth and capture the miscreant.

Merlin and the Deadhead were leaning over examining the object. The Fitz-Percy, who was nearest, picked it up. It was a half-inflated football—child's size. Tied to it was a label on which was printed in roughly formed letters:

"If this were a bomb, wouldn't it be awkward for little Clover and her dear Jack, not to mention all their nice new friends!

It was Mallandan who read it—with a queer savage note in his voice; and Blackberry Brown caught Clover as she swayed, half-fainting, against the table.

Malladan read the label—a queer savage note in his voice.

"Now you see," said the girl weakly, "why we were so glum! They keep on coming!"

Then in the momentary silence which fell upon the uneasily staring people, a clean, crisp smack was heard. It came from under the window outside, and was followed by a voice—the voice of none other than Mr. Fin MacBatt.

Mr. MacBatt's lecture broke off abruptly, punctuated, as it were, with a dull, wooden sound, as of a truncheon against a head—both thick. Followed a scuffling patter of feet, and a short silence, swiftly broken by the rushing sound of reinforcements hurrying out of the hotel.

But all that the reinforcements discovered was Mr. MacBatt, semi-conscious, sitting on the pavement, swearing feebly like a tired parrot, with a passer-by trying rather confusedly to unbutton his collar, in order, presumably, to give him more air. Of the thrower of the football that might have been a bomb, there was no sign.

Leaving Merlin O'Moore to accompany his guests up to his suite, the Fitz-Percy promptly took charge of the "bonneted" MacBatt, whom very shortly he succeeded in leading to where "a cognac or so awaits us, my good MacBatt!"

THE following hour was devoted mainly to explanations—on the whole, lucid. Long before Merlin O'Moore called upon MacBatt for some account of his participation in the flurry of that evening, he and his friend the Deadhead perceived that the Mallandans' lack of high spirits was not at all unnatural.

For they were haunted—in effect. Not "haunted of ghosts," but by something which, although exceedingly elusive, was by no means as intangible as a ghost. Like Blackberry-Brown, Miss Clover Sweeting, in the days not long past, when she was a musical comedy favorite, had possessed many admirers, known and unknown. Of all these none had been more enthusiastic than a gentleman who never appeared in person to afflict her, but whose output of love-letters seemed to be unlimited. He had written by practically every post, frequently telegraphed, and quite often telephoned. But he had never called. He signed himself invariably "the Pariah." Why he was a pariah did not appear....

This man had never wearied of informing Miss Sweating that he adored her so much that he could not dream of marrying her. (Nothing was ever said about his chance of doing so—which in any case was so slender as to be nonexistent). "The Pariah" had explained dozens of times that he regarded Clover as the Perfect Woman, and that she was enshrined in his heart and permanently fixed before his gaze, as an Object of Adoration. He requested her to refrain from marriage until she met the Perfect Man—which, added the Pariah, would never happen.

Unfortunately, Miss Clover had already met the Perfect Man—according to her—namely, Mr. Jack Mallandan, and some two months after the that Pariah had begun to pour out his ink in her praise, she had married Mr. Mallandan—thus showing her good taste, for Mallandan was good to look upon, a gentleman, not unreasonable selfish, extraordinarily rich, and he worshipped the charming Miss Sweeting almost idolatrously. She showed him some of the weirder of the Pariah's letters, and with a passing careless comment on the "cold-drawn cheek of the lout," Jack Mallandan had forgotten him. Clover had destroyed the correspondence and forgotten the writer also.

But he had recalled himself very abruptly is their minds on the second morning after their arrival at Mr. Mallandan's ancestral home. They were breakfasting by an open window in the sunshine when on the lawn just outside had fallen a half-inflated child's football, bearing one of those labels which had now become verry familiar to them.

It was a message from the Pariah, who was frightfully annoyed about Clover's marriage. It had destroyed an Ideal, he said, and thereafter he purposed punishing them both. He wound up by pointing out to them how excessively awkward it would have been for them had the football been a bomb—which was obvious. He added that some day it would be the genuine article. Meantime he intended to keep them well supplied with "warnings."

MALLANDAN, a rather silent, bull-doggy young man who had spent his youth in the Navy, which he had only left on the death of his father, in order properly to administer his rather unwieldily large inheritance, was completely without fear on his own behalf, though naturally enough any unseen danger to his wife would send him into a well-concealed frenzy of anxiety, and he had taken up this matter of the Pariah eagerly.

"The fellow sounds like a maniac, and he probably is one," said Jack. "I am afraid that leather ball might change for the worse some day. Y'see, he hangs about—unseen. He's elusive; he's here today, there tomorrow. Always throws his infernal label when we're in an impossible place. Like tonight, for instance. I've had Longlands—our place—swarming with spies, detectives and things. No good. I've lain out for him at nights. No good. Tried bloodhounds. No good. Everything—haven't I, dear? But he's—like an eel. I've never seen him. No idea what he's like. It's worrying Clover. Me too. To tell the truth, I'm not an idea-merchant outside my own line, and when Miss Brown told Clover of some of your queer moonlight jaunts, we decided that you could help us—you and Mr. Fitz-Percy—"

"And, of course, Blackberry!" chimed in Clover, who was brightening up a little.

"Let's get things clear, don't you think?" he said, very pleasantly but decisively. "I—we—shall be very grateful for an idea how to catch the Pariah person; but when he's caught, he's mine."

"Oh, that is quite understood," said Merlin readily, who could see how Mr. Mallandan felt about it.

"Naturally!" boomed the Fitz-Percy. "That goes without saying—yes, indeed." And he assisted himself to another green chartreuse with his accustomed dexterity and grace.

"Well, since MacBatt has been the only one to see him, we may as well have him in," said Merlin. "Ring the bell, Molo!"

The fighting dog pressed his fearsome bead on the bell-push and the valet entered, his eyes glittering with a steely glitter inspired by baffled fury, several swift cognacs and a desperate hunger for instant revenge upon the person who had felled him.

"It rings like a bell, thank you, sir," he said politely, but with a vibration in his voice that made Molossus look interested. "The blackguard had a club up his sleeve —a genuine cocobolo, sir!"

"Describe him, sir?" responded the valet with a bitter smile. "I've photographed him on my mind for life! He was passing as a negro, sir—dark tint, a sort of pale black, if you understand, sir. But the trouble is, his color comes off." He extended his big right hand, palm downward, exhibiting his knuckles.

"I've got his general build and the shape of his face in my mind, safe enough, sir. But he's not a genuine darky, and I suppose it was a sort of disguise, sir."

Merlin and Company readily agreed, and having carefully cross-examined MacBatt as to the more salient points of the mysterious man with the imitation "livery of the sun," they dismissed him, and drew together, as it were, seriously to map out and arrange a plan of campaign.

TWO days later the Mallandans' delightful old Elizabethan home was transformed into what was not so much a home as a mousetrap, though few would have suspected it.

They were all there—the Mallandans, Miss Brown, and Merlin; the Fitz-Percy, Molossus and MacBatt—all there.

The servants at Longlands privately were a little puzzled by the queer mannerisms of some of the party. There was Mr. MacBatt, that queer valet of Mr. Merlin O'Moore, for instance. Why was he so fond of strolling mysteriously about the grounds of the place? Why was his favorite walking-stick so much like an Indian club—though somewhat heavier, on account of the lead with which it was loaded? Why was that dear old gentleman Mr. Fitz-Percy so extremely interested in that motor-bicycle track which had mysteriously appeared near the gates of the carriage drive on the evening after the house-party arrived, and why did he try unsuccessfully—as the lodge-keeper averred—to follow it up along the main road? It was all very puzzling—to the servants.

The Pariah gave no sign during the first two days of the stay of Merlin and Company at Longlands. Probably he was recuperating from the effects of the jolt administered to him by MacBatt. Certainly that was the valet's opinion. And the joint commanders of the mousetrap—namely, Messrs. O'Moore and Mallandan—appeared to share it and to be agreed that for a little a waiting game was the best policy.

Not so, however, the Deadhead. Very rarely did that astute old student of the times, as he occasionally described himself, differ from his patron; but apparently he did so now—tactfully, of course. It seemed that he had discovered what might prove to be a clue.

HE explained this to Messrs. O'Moore and Mallandan in the billiard-room on the evening of their third day there.

"I beg of you, dear lads, leave to follow up a little notion of my own.... A straw, laddies, shows sometimes which way the wind blows—but there are also occasions when it breaks the camel's back. I think, dear boys, that I have found a straw—it remains for me to test it." He paused for a moment to test, also, the whisky and soda which he held. He was always a very fine tester.

"How say you, then, Merlin mine? What are your views, Jack, my boy? Have I leave to plow my solitary furrow?" the old man asked.

His striving took him abroad in company with the dogue (by permission of Merlin) on the following morning, and since his straw ultimately proved to have considerable bearing on the matter, it may be as well to follow him. Certainly his clue was of the slenderest—being merely that he had gleaned by sheer chance, when gossiping at the village inn (for his own purposes), the news that a Mr. Bellamy Bethune, said to be an artist who lived near the village, had brought back from a short trip to town, a few days before, a pair of singularly perfect black eyes. There was nothing very remarkable in this—a pair of black eyes is a commodity which many men acquire at some period or other of their lives if they ask for it long and persistently enough, but the experienced Fitz-Percy (struck by the facts that Bethune had acquired his black eyes in town at about the same time as MacBatt had undoubtedly presented some one with a pair, and further, that Mr. Bethune lived fairly near the attractive Mrs. Mallandan, as one might expect her jealous adorer to do) had experienced a certain curiosity to discover whether the motorcycle which Bethune was said to possess wore the same kind of tires as those which had left their imprint at the entrance to the Mallandan carriage drive.

"Personally, Molossus, my young friend, I do not expect to find that the tires match. It would be altogether too fortunate, would it not? But tactful and intelligent inquiry can lose us nothing and may gain for us a great deal," said the ancient as he and Molossus strolled toward the abode of Bellamy Bethune.

Fortune—as usual—favored him; for when about two miles from Longlands, he approached the Bethune bungalow—a small, untidy-looking place, with a last-year's garden—he saw that a motorcycle was standing outside, its back end raised upon two spidery legs, so that it looked as if it were going to lash out like a vicious horse at any moment. The Fitz-Percy needed only a glance at the tires to see that their non-slip rubber pattern matched the imprint on the carriage drive perfectly.

"Good, Molossus—excellent," said the Deadhead. "We will now endeavor to get a glimpse of Mr. Bethune himself."

SOON this was achieved; for even as he looked up the Fitz-Percy saw coming down the path a man who possessed a pair of eyes that were not merely black but also yellow, blue, green and bloodshot. Obviously Mr. Bellamy Bethune—a big but singularly plain person, with a face like that of a soured cab-horse.

"I beg that you will forgive the curiosity which impelled me to stare at your motor-bicycle, sir," he said suavely. "I belong, I fear, to an era prior to the advent of these amazing inventions, and I have never had an opportunity to examine one closely."

"I beg that you will forgive the curiosity which impelled me
to stare at your motor-bicycle, sir," said the Fitz-Percy suavely.
"I have never had an opportunity to examine one closely."

"Well, now you have, and much good may it do you. It's a damned poor grid, anyway!" responded Mr. Bethune very ungraciously, and kicked the machine sharply in the ribs, causing it to burst into a terrifying roar. Then he mounted it and rode away.

"'Tis but a churlish fellow, I fear, Molossus," he said musingly. "Let us examine his lair. Perhaps his wife—if he has one—or his housekeeper may prove more garrulous, to a—a what, little dog? Let us reflect. What would Mr. Sherlock Holmes claim to be to the wife or housekeeper of an artist concerning whom he desires to glean information? A buyer of pictures? Obviously. Very good—a buyer of pictures."

And the Fitz-Percy, who had probably never bought a picture of any kind in his life, except an occasional postage stamp, proceeded leisurely up to the bungalow. Ten minutes of fruitless knocking revealed to him the extremely gratifying knowledge that the house was empty.

"It would seem, Molossus mine, that like many another artist, the good Mr. Bethune 'does for himself,'" mused the Deadhead. "We will go further into the matter." He proceeded to go further into it—via a side window, carelessly left unlatched—and much to the interest of a tall, lantern-jawed, bulbous-browed gentleman who chanced to stroll past at that moment— just in time to see the Fitz-Percy's heels and Molossus' tail vanish into the house. The stroller was none other than Fin MacBatt, en route to the village inn.

"We will go further into the matter, Molossus" He proceeded to
go further into it—via a side window, carelessly left unlatched.

"Now, what is Grandpa after in there—the old housebreaker!" he said. "He'll be getting himself into jail if he doesn't look out."

He reflected for a moment, then followed in the track of the Deadhead, whom he found examining a writing-desk in an untidy, belittered part-studio, part living-room, part pigsty, facing the road.

"A curious piece of property for a man who lives alone and, presumably, has no children, Fin, my good fellow!" said the Deadhead, after greetings. "Let us explore further."

They did so. They found many things which bore not at all upon their affair—and one which did: an old cork from a whisky bottle, one end of which, charred and burnt, was half rubbed away.

When, presently, they came out, having left everything exactly as they found it—the Fitz-Percy was nodding little contented nods to himself, Mr. MacBatt's eyes were glittering oddly with a fell and fighting intent, and even Molossus appeared to wear a toothy grin as of anticipation.

"Sherlock himself couldn't have done it neater, sir," said MacBatt a little huskily.

"No, sir—not a flatterer, sir," replied the blue-jowled one, with an avid and anticipatory glare back at the bungalow. "More of a flattener, sir—as I hope you'll see when I get hold of the blaggard—if he's the man that blackjacked me!"

THE shades of night were mobilizing before Mr. Bellamy Bethune's "grid" came once again to a stop outside the bungalow, and its black-eyed owner unstraddled himself from off it, and pushed it up the weedy path, and into its den—a small shed at the side of the house.

It was practically dark in the hall-living-room, but he had not advanced two steps, fumbling for matches, before he stopped, stiffening slightly, glaring round, like an animal or a man who senses that something is wrong. His hand flew to a side pocket of the Norfolk coat he was wearing—an odd instinctive movement—and then he stepped back sharply toward the door, still facing the room.

"No, you don't, my man," said a swift, crisp voice, and Mr. Mallandan sprang out of the shadows at him. Bethune gasped, but struck like a snake as he gasped. He was a big, powerful man, and Mallandan reeled back, nearly upsetting Merlin O'Moore, who was moving up swiftly at Mallandan's side.

Bethune wrenched open the door and plunged out into the twilight—straight into the arms of the dour, and now dangerous MacBatt, who apparently had crept round from the side of the house to block any possible exit

MacBatt, ever eager, swung a punch at the man that would have almost fractured his skull, but the artist ducked skillfully, and brought his elbow with savage force against the jaw of the valet, staggering him for a fraction of a moment. Then, with a crazy yell, Bethune darted down the path to the gate—even as the door opened again and Messrs. O'Moore and Mallandan shot out.

"Look out, Molo!" shouted Merlin, as MacBatt wheeled to pursue the flying Bethune.

The big, fawnish body of the fighting dog flashed down the path, and seemed to run into the fugitive exactly at the gate. There was a wild, snarling flurry, a sharp cry from Bethune as the big dog pinned him just above the back of the knee, and they saw his hand go up, throwing something backward. It fell with a thud at Mallandan's feet, just as Molossus pulled the man down, only to be beaten off by Merlin, who knew what would happen if the fighting dog was not "steadied" at once.

There was a wild, snarling flurry, a sharp cry from back
Bethune as the big dog pinned him just above the of the knee.

MacBatt and Mallandan attended to Bethune, who, lamed by Molossus, gave in almost at once

Two minutes later they were all once more in the bungalow where they purposed examining Bethune.

To them, as MacBatt lit the lamp, came Mr. Fitz-Percy, carrying something which he set gingerly—very gingerly—down upon the table in the lamplight.

It was a round object, rather larger than a cricket ball, made of roughly finished metal with a number of spiky projections upon it.

"That, my young friends," said the Deadhead, in his calm, pleasant voice, "is a bomb! Originally meant for you, Jack, and your wife, but later intended by its charming and impartial proprietor to blow us one and all permanently across the Styx. Fortunately he does not appear to be quite so expert with real bombs as with the football cases which he has used hitherto. He threw it just as Molossus snatched him —and it fell at your very feet, Jack, my friend Luckily for you, something was wrong with its works—but I should not touch it, MacBatt, if I were you. These things are very fidgety, I understand. Let sleeping bombs lie—until the police arrive," he concluded, for the valet had given signs of being about to pick it up and listen to it—though what he expected to hear it is impossible to say.

BUT they made no examination, for as they turned to the would-be murderer, the man began to laugh and they realized that it would need a greater expert than any one of them to examine with any success a man who could laugh like that, for it was the dreadful, blood-freezing laughter of a man of completely unbalanced mind. Still, it explained everything. They no longer wished to examine him nor hurt him—they were merely sorry for him. In the midst of that frightful mirth the horn of a car sounded outside, and the Deadhead hurried out.

It had been a part of their original plan that Mrs. Mallandan should come on with Blackberry Brown, when the Pariah was trapped, to see if she could identify the admirer who had become her persecutor. But that was impossible now. Briefly and tactfully the Fitz-Percy explained, and went in the car to the town, some three miles away, to get the right people to deal with the man, while the ladies, escorted by Molossus, returned to Longlands.

From the capture of the Pariah to his departure with those who would know how to deal with him, the man said no word which would shed any further light on the strange affair.

AND they were glad enough to let him go unquestioned—even the vengeful Mac-Batt—for as the Deadhead modestly put it after dinner that evening at Longlands: "What, after all, my dear young people, remains to be cleared up? The man was a stranger of ill-balanced mind who retained sufficient sanity to succumb, like many others, to the charms of Miss Clover Sweeting, but failed to retain sufficient will to keep his wild jealousy of Mrs. Mallandan within the orthodox limits. Why he called himself the Pariah we shall never know—probably because he was a pariah. Nobody—as yet—seems to know anything at all about him, except that the statement that he was an artist was untrue, and that he had merely rented the bungalow on a furnished tenancy—and, incidentally, regularly refrained from paying any rent. He will be looked after—we may be sure of that. And I have no doubt that the football season is past. How say you, Merlin mine?"

"You have all been so kind as to elevate me into the position of hero of this affair," he continued. "But that, my dear people, is more characteristic of your generosity than your logic. What I did was to make a wild shot in the dark—or, in other words, to consume several pints of quite surprisingly good ale with a number of village gossips at the inn. But the man to whom your thanks are really due is the dour MacBatt, who deposited upon the countenance of Mr. Bethune the black eyes which aroused my curiosity. But for that I should never have examined his motorcycle tire, searched his house and found, in the scullery, the used burnt cork with which (unnecessarily, to my mind) he disguised himself when following you to town. And now,"—reaching with his usual stately grace for the green chartreuse close by—"let us forget all about the matter, and devote ourselves whole-heartedly to studying the bright side of things—as I am sure our grim collaborator, MacBatt, is doing in the servants' hall. My children,"—he raised his glass—"may you, and everyone else, be forever happy!"

THE END