“What’s that?” asked Spargo.

Mr. Quarterpage leaned forward and tapped his guest on the arm.

“That Chamberlayne never did die, and that that coffin was weighted with lead!” he answered.

CHAPTER TWENTY

MAITLAND ALIAS MARBURY

This remarkable declaration awoke such a new conception of matters in Spargo’s mind, aroused such infinitely new possibilities in his imagination, that for a full moment he sat silently staring at his informant, who chuckled with quiet enjoyment at his visitor’s surprise.

“Do you mean to tell me,” said Spargo at last, “that there are people in this town who still believe that the coffin in your cemetery which is said to contain Chamberlayne’s body contains—­lead?”

“Lots of ’em, my dear sir!” replied Mr. Quarterpage.  “Lots of ’em!  Go out in the street and asked the first six men you meet, and I’ll go bail that four out of the six believe it.”

“Then why, in the sacred name of common sense did no one ever take steps to make certain?” asked Spargo.  “Why didn’t they get an order for exhumation?”

“Because it was nobody’s particular business to do so,” answered Mr. Quarterpage.  “You don’t know country-town life, my dear sir.  In towns like Market Milcaster folks talk and gossip a great deal, but they’re always slow to do anything.  It’s a case of who’ll start first—­of initiative.  And if they see it’s going to cost anything—­then they’ll have nothing to do with it.”

“But—­the bank people?” suggested Spargo.

Mr. Quarterpage shook his head.

“They’re amongst the lot who believe that Chamberlayne did die,” he said.  “They’re very old-fashioned, conservative-minded people, the Gutchbys and the Hostables, and they accepted the version of the nephew, and the doctor, and the solicitor.  But now I’ll tell you something about those three.  There was a man here in the town, a gentleman of your own profession, who came to edit that paper you’ve got on your knee.  He got interested in this Chamberlayne case, and he began to make enquiries with the idea of getting hold of some good—­what do you call it?”

“I suppose he’d call it ‘copy,’” said Spargo.

“’Copy’—­that was his term,” agreed Mr. Quarterpage.  “Well, he took the trouble to go to London to ask some quiet questions of the nephew, Stephen.  That was just twelve months after Chamberlayne had been buried.  But he found that Stephen Chamberlayne had left England—­months before.  Gone, they said, to one of the colonies, but they didn’t know which.  And the solicitor had also gone.  And the doctor—­couldn’t be traced, no, sir, not even through the Medical Register.  What do you think of all that, Mr. Spargo?”

“I think,” answered Spargo, “that Market Milcaster folk are considerably slow.  I should have had that death and burial enquired into.  The whole thing looks to me like a conspiracy.”