The Jacob Street Mystery

On a pleasant, sunny afternoon near the end of May, when the late spring
was just merging into early summer, Mr. Thomas Pedley (Tom Pedley to his
friends, or more usually plain Tom) was seated on a substantial sketching
stool before a light bamboo easel on which was fixed an upright canvas
measuring eighteen inches by twelve. To an expert eye, his appearance,
his simple, workmanlike outfit, the leisurely ease with which he handled
his brush, and the picture which was growing into shape on the canvas,
would all have suggested a competent and experienced landscape painter.

And such, in fact, was Tom Pedley. From his early boyhood, some forty-odd
years ago, drawing and painting had been his one absorbing passion,
coupled with that love of the countryside that marks the born landscape
artist. To him that countryside, largely unspoiled in his early days, was
an inexhaustible source of delight and a subject of endless study and
meditation. In his daily rambles through meadow or woodland, by farmyards
or quiet hamlets, every journey was a voyage of exploration yielding
fresh discoveries; new truths of characteristic form and subtle,
unexpected colour to be added to his growing store of knowledge of those
less obvious aspects of nature which it is the landscape painter's
mission to reveal. And as the years passed and the countryside faded away
under the withering touch of mechanical transport, that knowledge grew
more and more precious. Now, the dwindling remnants had to be sought and
found with considered judgment and their scanty material eked out with
detail brought forth from the stores of the remembered past.

The picture which was shaping itself on the canvas was an example of this
application of knowledge gained by experience. On the wall of a gallery
it would have suggested to the spectator an open glade in some vast
woodland. In fact, the place was no more than a scrubby little copse, the
last surviving oasis in the squalid desert of a "developing"
neighbourhood. From his "pitch," ensconced in a clump of bushes, Tom
could hear, faint and far away, the strident hoots of motor cars, the
rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of lorries; and but a hundred yards
distant was the path by which he had come, a rutted track that led from a
half-built street at one end to a dismantled farmyard at the other.

Nevertheless, apart from the traffic noises, the place was strangely
peaceful and quiet, its silence accentuated by the natural sounds that
pervaded it. Somewhere in the foliage hard by, a thrush sang joyously,
and on a branch just overhead a chaffinch repeated again and again his
pleasant little monotonous song. And the solitude was as perfect as the
quiet. The rough path seemed to be untrodden by the foot of man, for,
during the two hours that Tom had been at work, not a soul had passed
along it.

At length, as he paused to fill his pipe and take a thoughtful survey of
his picture, the sound of voices was followed by the appearance of two
men walking slowly along the path, conversing earnestly though in low
tones. Tom could not hear what they were saying, though the impression
conveyed to him was that their manner was rather the reverse of amicable.
But in fact he gave them little attention beyond noting the effect of the
dark, sharply defined shapes against the in definite background; and even
this interested him but little as his subject required no figures, and
certainly not one in a bowler hat. So he continued filling his pipe and
appraising his afternoon's work as they walked by without noticing him--
actually, he was almost invisible from the path--and as they passed out
of sight he produced his matchbox and was about to strike a light when a
third figure, that of a woman, made its appearance, moving in the same
direction as the others.

This time Tom's attention was definitely aroused, and he sat motionless
with the unlighted match in his hand, peering out through the chinks in
the bushes which concealed him. The woman's behaviour was very peculiar.
She was advancing rather more quickly than the two men, but with a
silent, stealthy tread; and from her movements she seemed to be listening
and trying to keep the men in sight while keeping out of sight, herself