THE MYSTERY OF 31 NEW INN

BY R. AUSTIN FREEMAN

Author of "The Red Thumb Mark," "The Eye of Osiris," etc.

TO MY FRIEND

BERNARD E. BISHOP

Preface

Commenting upon one of my earlier novels, in respect of which I had claimed to have been careful to adhere to common probabilities and to have made use only of really practicable methods of investigation, a critic remarked that this was of no consequence whatever, so long as the story was amusing.

Few people, I imagine, will agree with him. To most readers, and certainly to the kind of reader for whom an author is willing to take trouble, complete realism in respect of incidents and methods is an essential factor in maintaining the interest of a detective story. Hence it may be worth while to mention that Thorndyke's method of producing the track chart, described in Chapters II and III, has been actually used in practice. It is a modification of one devised by me many years ago when I was crossing Ashanti to the city of Bontuku, the whereabouts of which in the far interior was then only vaguely known. My instructions were to fix the positions of all towns, villages, rivers and mountains as accurately as possible; but finding ordinary methods of surveying impracticable in the dense forest which covers the whole region, I adopted this simple and apparently rude method, checking the distances whenever possible by astronomical observation.

The resulting route-map was surprisingly accurate, as shown by the agreement of the outward and homeward tracks, It was published by the Royal Geographical Society, and incorporated in the map of this region compiled by the Intelligence Branch of the War Office, and it formed the basis of the map which accompanied my volume of Travels in Ashanti and Jaman. So that Thorndyke's plan must be taken as quite a practicable one.

New Inn, the background of this story, and one of the last surviving inns of Chancery, has recently passed away after upwards of four centuries of newness. Even now, however, a few of the old, dismantled houses (including perhaps, the mysterious 31) may be seen from the Strand peeping over the iron roof of the skating rink which has displaced the picturesque hall, the pension-room and the garden. The postern gate, too, in Houghton Street still remains, though the arch is bricked up inside. Passing it lately, I made the rough sketch which appears on next page, and which shows all that is left of this pleasant old London backwater.

Contents

CHAPTER I—THE MYSTERIOUS PATIENT

CHAPTER II—THORNDYKE DEVISES A SCHEME

CHAPTER III—"A CHIEL'S AMANG YE TAKIN' NOTES"

CHAPTER IV—THE OFFICIAL VIEW

CHAPTER V—JEFFREY BLACKMORE'S WILL

CHAPTER VI—JEFFREY BLACKMORE, DECEASED

CHAPTER VII—THE CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTION

CHAPTER VIII—THE TRACK CHART

CHAPTER IX—THE HOUSE OF MYSTERY

CHAPTER X—THE HUNTER HUNTED

CHAPTER XI—THE BLACKMORE CASE REVIEWED

CHAPTER XII—THE PORTRAIT

CHAPTER XIII—THE STATEMENT OF SAMUEL WILKINS

CHAPTER XIV—THORNDYKE LAYS THE MINE

CHAPTER XV—THORNDYKE EXPLODES THE MINE

CHAPTER XVI—AN EXPOSITION AND A TRAGEDY

Illustrations

1. New inn

2. The inverted inscription

3. The Track Chart, Showing the Route Followed by Weiss's Carriage

Chapter I

The Mysterious Patient

As I look back through the years of my association with John Thorndyke, I am able to recall a wealth of adventures and strange experiences such as falls to the lot of very few men who pass their lives within hearing of Big Ben. Many of these experiences I have already placed on record; but it now occurs to me that I have hitherto left unrecorded one that is, perhaps, the most astonishing and incredible of the whole series; an adventure, too, that has for me the added interest that it inaugurated my permanent association with my learned and talented friend, and marked the close of a rather unhappy and unprosperous period of my life.

Memory, retracing the journey through the passing years to the starting-point of those strange events, lands me in a shabby little ground-floor room in a house near the