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  Copyright & Information

  The House of the Bears

  First published in 1946

  Copyright: John Creasey Literary Management Ltd.; House of Stratus 1946-2010

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of John Creasey to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2010 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  EAN ISBN Edition

  0755117735 9780755117734 Print

  0755118669 9780755118663 Pdf

  0755125533 9780755125531 Epub

  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

  www.houseofstratus.com

  About the Author

  John Creasey – Master Storyteller - was born in Surrey, England in 1908 into a poor family in which there were nine children, John Creasey grew up to be a true master story teller and international sensation. His more than 600 crime, mystery and thriller titles have now sold 80 million copies in 25 languages. These include many popular series such as Gideon of Scotland Yard, The Toff, Dr Palfrey and The Baron.

  Creasy wrote under many pseudonyms, explaining that booksellers had complained he totally dominated the ‘C’ section in stores. They included:

  Gordon Ashe, M E Cooke, Norman Deane, Robert Caine Frazer, Patrick Gill, Michael Halliday, Charles Hogarth, Brian Hope, Colin Hughes, Kyle Hunt, Abel Mann, Peter Manton, J J Marric, Richard Martin, Rodney Mattheson, Anthony Morton and Jeremy York.

  Never one to sit still, Creasey had a strong social conscience, and stood for Parliament several times, along with founding the One Party Alliance which promoted the idea of government by a coalition of the best minds from across the political spectrum.

  He also founded the British Crime Writers’ Association, which to this day celebrates outstanding crime writing. The Mystery Writers of America bestowed upon him the Edgar Award for best novel and then in 1969 the ultimate Grand Master Award. John Creasey’s stories are as compelling today as ever.

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to express my warm thanks to Thomas B. Gill, Esq., Manager of Gough’s Caves, Cheddar, and to the management of the Theatre Royal, Bristol, for their freely given permission for me ‘to set some of the imaginary incidents of this story in Gough’s Caves and the Theatre Royal respectively.

  No person or persons depicted in this book are based on any persons connected with these two concerns, because all the characters are wholly fictitious.

  Book One

  THE HOUSE OF THE BEARS

  1: THE HOUSE OF MORNE

  Have we much further to go?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Only a mile or two,’ said the driver.

  ‘I’m not looking forward to the return journey,’ declared his wife. ‘How long will you be at the house?’

  ‘It depends on the patient,’ her husband told her, ‘and what Halsted has to talk about. But he’ll know the road and can lead us back.’

  ‘I hope so,’ said his wife, feelingly.

  Now the road sloped upwards and the hillocks became hills, some of which were wooded. The same melancholy bleakness reigned, the mist was thick in the deeper hollows, and some of the hill-tops were high enough to hide the sun. In their shadows the land and sky seemed the same dark purple.

  The driver switched on the headlamps. Great beams shot out and caught the mist, filling the air with garish light. ‘It’s better without them,’ said the driver, and switched them off. ‘Look out for an inn on the left, darling.’

  ‘An inn, out here?’

  ‘Halsted said so. It stands on its own at some cross-roads, where we turn right. It’s only half a mile from there, mostly through the grounds.’

  ‘What kind of place is it?’

  ‘I don’t know. Its owner impressed Halsted. England is still old England here. Feudal lords and ancient retainers – and the doctor little more than a courtier, or so I gather. The Mornes have lived in the same house for centuries.’

  Now the road was straight, but the driver went slowly.

  ‘There should be iron gates,’ he informed his wife.

  ‘Can the place be a moated castle?’

  ‘It would be in keeping.’ The driver slowed down to crawling pace, for a patch of thick mist covered the road and he could see nothing but its sluggish greyness. Even when it thinned, he did not quicken the pace, but leaned forward, hoping to catch a glimpse of the gates.

  Suddenly, frighteningly, something moved in front of them. It was a man, rising as if out of the hard road, arms outstretched, mouth wide open, an eerie figure and frightening. Glaring eyes shone in a pale face. The driver jammed on the brakes. His wife, exclaiming, was thrown forward. The figure stayed there, unmoving. The car went slowly on, brakes squealing like a wild banshee might; and then, when it seemed that they would run it down, the figure was swallowed up by the darkness.

  ‘Sorry,’ said the driver, breathlessly.

  ‘What – was it?’ His wife’s voice was hoarse.

  ‘A fool with a twisted sense of humour,’ said her husband.

  As he spoke, the lights shone upon a gateway, where great iron gates stood open. On either side of them was a wall, standing much higher than the car. As they passed through, men came running, some carrying weapons which looked like guns and might have been broomsticks. Silently the men split into two groups and ran silently past on either side. They ran in single file, all glancing towards the car but vanishing as they passed the headlamps. Shadows seemed to brush against the windows. Then they were gone, and only the faint mist and the straight road lay ahead.

  ‘Were they chasing the first man?’ the woman exclaimed.

  The same thought struck me,’ said the driver; ‘Or perhaps they like running about the moor in this weather!’ His flippancy struck a false note, and he drove in silence for a few hundred yards until the beams of the headlamps shone upon a fountain in the centre of a great courtyard. The arcs of falling water glinted silver in the headlights. Here the road divided, and the driver took the left-hand fork. Soon they saw the front of the house. It was dark, built of great stone slabs, with long, narrow windows – all of them unlighted.

  The road swung right. The headlights showed the great porch, with colonnades and steps leading to a massive door. The driver pulled up outside it, and he and his wife sat back in silence. The only light came from the car. Now that the engine was silent, there was no sound.

  ‘I don’t think I could stay out here alone,’ said the woman, slowly. ‘I don’t think I’ve got the nerve.’

  ‘You’re not going to stay out here,’ said her husband. He got out, opened the door for her and helped her out. They walked up the steps, the man counting: ‘. . . five, six, seven, eight.’ Their footsteps sounded very loud. The man took out a torch and shone it on the door. They saw the great iron studs, the tiny slit for a letter-box, the old iron handle and chain of the bell, and the great knocker, which was the shape of a bear. The iron studs were shaped like the heads of bears, their ugly snouts thrust f
orward and eye sockets empty, giving a ghoulish effect.

  ‘Here goes,’ said the driver.

  He pulled the hanging bell, and as he released it a clanging din broke upon them, startling them both, echoing and re-echoing inside the house. It continued for a long time, gradually growing fainter. The woman clutched her husband’s arm, then drew her hand away and called herself a fool. The man continued to shine his torch, even when he heard sharp, ringing footsteps. The door opened, but no more than a foot. A dim light shone inside, and against it was the outline of a woman, her hair drawn tight over her head.

  The man shone the torch straight into her face. Long, narrow, pale as death, it was in keeping with this eerie place. She blinked large, gleaming eyes, moved her head to one side, then turned and looked into the hall.

  ‘No!’ she called. Her voice echoed.

  A man’s voice sounded deep and clear, but as if from a long way off.

  ‘Then send them away. Send them away! I want no one else here tonight.’

  The woman turned and looked at the driver, who had lowered his torch so that it shone upon her black-clad bosom.

  ‘I am sorry. Sir Rufus is not at home.’

  ‘Send them away!’ called the man. ‘Send them away!’

  The door began to close. The driver of the car put forward a foot to stop it. The woman repeated: ‘I am sorry, Sir Rufus is out.’

  ‘I think there is some mistake,’ said the driver. ‘I have an appointment here with Dr. Halsted.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Dr. Palfrey, from London.’

  ‘Doctor Palfrey?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The woman turned her head again and called: ‘It is a doctor.’ She opened the door without waiting for a response, and Dr. Palfrey and his wife stepped into the hall. There was no light on; the glow came from a doorway in one corner and seemed a long way off. The hall seemed to have no ceiling and no sides; all those were lost in darkness, except the wall near the lighted door. A tall, heavily-built man with a great mane of hair appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Do you say it is Halsted?’

  ‘No, another doctor,’ said the woman. ‘Come this way, please.’ She walked across the hall, her footsteps echoing on stone flags or muffled as she trod on carpets and rugs. The callers followed, Mrs. Palfrey still touching her husband’s arm. As they drew nearer the doorway, they saw that the man’s hair was red; it caught the light, and was like a halo of fire.

  He backed away and waited for them in a smaller room, but one which was large by ordinary standards. A blazing chandelier hung from the high ceiling. Heavy furniture stood against the walls and about the room; in a great stone fireplace a mass of wood embers glowed red, and the rich, warm scent of wood smoke lay heavy on the air. The man was standing near the door with his back to the fire; the light from the chandelier fell upon his heavy, handsome face and strange amber eyes.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Dr. Halsted asked me to meet him here for a consultation at half past five,’ said Palfrey. ‘I am Dr. Palfrey.’ He gave the man his card. ‘Are you Sir Rufus Morne?’

  ‘Yes. I am glad to see you, Doctor. There has been – there has been-’ His voice broke, and he turned away.

  ‘A serious accident,’ interjected the woman. She was tall and very thin, and her black dress was unrelieved by any touch of colour. Her hands and face seemed parchment white.

  ‘You must do something!’ cried Morne. ‘She’s dying – oh, God, she’s dying!’

  Palfrey glanced at his wife with quick reassurance, and nodded towards an arm-chair which was drawn up close to the fire. On a table near it was a decanter, glasses, a syphon and a box of cigarettes. Morne turned towards another door and led the way, Palfrey and the woman followed. They went along a wide stone passage and then entered a room as large as the hall. It had dark panelled walls, a polished wood floor strewn with rugs, and another fireplace with leaping flames. At one side a grand piano was open, with music on the rest and more music on the floor, as if scattered by a gust of wind,

  A group of three people stood a few yards from the piano, and a man knelt by the side of a girl who lay on the floor with a cushion under her head. Her face was deathly white, and her lack-lustre eyes stared upwards. Slowly, agonizingly, she turned her head from side to side, moaning with each movement. The sound floated through the big room and seemed to gather volume, and the echoes clashed with each other, making a regular sough of torment. The girl was brightly clad in green, and her auburn hair spread over the cushion like a canopy.

  The man kneeling by her was trying to put his right arm beneath her shoulders.

  ‘Don’t move her, please,’ said Palfrey, crisply. He opened his bag as the kneeling man looked round in surprise. He took out a hypodermic syringe and a small phial, broke the top of the phial and filled the syringe. ‘Take your arm away from her,’ he ordered.

  The man obeyed, and stood up’ He was short, thick-set and dark.

  Morne moved as Palfrey stepped forward.

  ‘What is in that? What are you going to do?’

  ‘Send her to sleep,’ said Palfrey. ‘This is morphia.’ He shook off Morne’s detaining hand and bent down.

  The girl had fallen from a great height. Her right arm was bent at an odd angle; so was her left leg. There was a dark bruise on her forehead, but none of these things worried Palfrey so much as the wooden stool near her; it looked as if she had fallen upon the stool, striking it with her back.

  He stood up, still looking down at her.

  ‘How long has she been like this?’

  ‘About a quarter of an hour,’ said a youth. He was good looking in an effeminate, sallow way and his yellow hair was overlong and swept back from his forehead. ‘I was playing. Loretta was leaning over the gallery, and-’

  He broke off with a catch in his voice. Palfrey glanced up. Immediately above him was the rail of a minstrel gallery. A piece about a yard long was hanging over the edge. He noticed that the woodwork was heavy and magnificently carved.

  ‘She just fell,’ continued the youth, whose name was Gerry. ‘It was dreadful!’

  ‘I wonder if one of you will fetch my wife, who is in the next room?’ asked Palfrey, and then added, abruptly: ‘No. I will. I think it would be better if everyone else left the room. Get a drink,’ he said, and reached the doorway.’ ‘Silla, will you lend me a hand? There’s been a nasty accident.’

  The girl had a strong likeness to Rufus Morne. Her face, now in repose, was very beautiful.

  Palfrey made a rapid examination.

  There were compound fractures of the arm and leg, and he did not spend much time over them. He examined her head; there was no serious injury. He felt her back, prodding the ribs gently. His lips tightened, and he shot a quick, bleak look at the stool. She had undoubtedly fallen across it, smashing her ribs. Only an X-ray could tell the full extent of her injuries, but she could not be moved except by ambulance, and it would take three-quarters of an hour for an ambulance to come from Corbin, the nearest town he knew in that bleak Corshire county. It would take three-quarters of an hour or more to come, over an hour to get back; it would be too long; he must find a way of getting her to hospital more quickly than that. There might be one nearer.

  He asked the manservant.

  ‘There’s the sanatorium, sir. On the other side of Wenlock Hill, about five miles off.’

  ‘Do you know if they have an operating theatre?’

  ‘I don’t know that, sir.’

  ‘See if one of the others can tell you,’ said Palfrey.

  The man hurried off. Palfrey finished his examination and stood up. Voices came from the next room, and the short man came in with firm and heavy tread.

  ‘There is an operating theatre at the sanatorium, Doctor.’

  ‘Good! Will you telephone for an ambulance at once? Tell them to expect the case immediately and prepare first for an X-ray and then for setting compound fractures.
’ He did not want to cause too much alarm.

  While he waited for the message to be sent, Palfrey stood looking up at the minstrel gallery and the hanging wood. He could picture the girl leaning over and calling down – laughing, perhaps. He pictured her as laughing freely, a gay, vivacious spirit, laughing and unaware of coming disaster.

  Had age so worn the wooden post and rail that, at the pressure of her body, they had broken? The posts were thick, the rail was thicker; he could see that the carving was of bears, rampant and couchant, the bears of the House of Morne. Or, perhaps, soon more aptly, the house of mourning.

  The great front door opened as Palfrey went inside for the second time that night. A footman stood aside, and Sir Rufus Morne came hurrying from the inner room.

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘You mustn’t expect too much yet,’ Palfrey told him. ‘She is comfortable, the operation gave little trouble, and there is a good chance that things will go well.’

  ‘Tell me the worst,’ Morne demanded, abruptly.

  Palfrey said: ‘The spinal column is damaged, but the surgeon at the sanatorium does not think irretrievably. I have telephoned to Anstruthers, who is quite the best man, and he has promised to come from London early in the morning.’

  ‘I see,’ said Morne. ‘You have been very good.’

  ‘I’m glad I arrived when I did,’ said Palfrey.

  ‘I have remembered that Halsted told me that he was consulting someone else,’ said Morne. He ran his hand over his mane of red hair and turned towards the inner room. ‘I cannot understand why he allowed you to make the journey, but, as it happened, it was timely.’ Morne was speaking slowly, without looking at Palfrey. ‘A friend of my daughter’s was taken ill while staying here. The illness puzzled Halsted. Unnecessarily, I think. At least, the patient left this morning. Halsted was telephoned; I’m sure that he was telephoned.’ He looked at Palfrey, and glanced away. ‘He would have been here himself had he not been warned.’