Transcriber's Note: Page scan source: https://books.google.com/books?id=fUk2AQAAMAAJ the University of Wisconsin--Madison Bell's Indian and Colonial Library __________________________________ THE WOODEN HAND THE WOODEN HAND A DETECTIVE STORY BY FERGUS HUME AUTHOR OF "THE MYSTERY OF A HANSOM CAB," "THE GUILTY HOUSE," "THE SILVER BULLET," "THE LONELY CHURCH," "THE WHITE ROOM," ETC. ETC. ETC. LONDON GEORGE BELL AND SONS 1905 _This Edition is issued for circulation in India and the Colonies only_. CONTENTS CHAP. I. MISERY CASTLE II. LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM III. THE NE'ER-DO-WEEL IV. MYSTERY V. A STRANGE LOSS VI. THE WARNING VII. THE INQUEST VIII. A NEW LIFE IX. THE MYSTERIOUS PARCEL X. MRS. HILL EXPLAINS XI. ALLEN AS A DETECTIVE XII. LORD SALTARS XIII. THE OTHER WOMAN XIV. SIGNOR ANTONIO XV. AN UNEXPECTED MEETING XVI. MR. HILL'S STORY XVII. A FRIEND IN NEED XVIII. THE FINDING OF BUTSEY xxx. MRS. MERRY'S VISITORS XX. AN AMAZING CONFESSION XXI. THE DIAMONDS XXII. BUTSEY'S STORY XXIII. MISS LORRY'S LAST APPEARANCE XXIV. THE WINDING OF THE SKEIN THE WOODEN HAND CHAPTER I MISERY CASTLE "Ah well, Miss Eva, I 'spose your pa'ull come home to spile things as he allays have done. It ain't no wonder, I ses, as you sits moping by the winder, looking double your age, and you only twenty, as has no right to look forty, whatever you may say, though I took my dying alfred-david on its blessed truth." This slightly incoherent and decidedly pessimistic speech was moaned, rather than spoken, by a lean-bodied, hard-faced, staring-eyed woman to a pretty girl, who did not look at the speaker. And small wonder. Mrs. Merry--inappropriate name--was unattractive to the eye. She was angular, grey-skinned, grey-eyed, grey-haired, and had thin, drooping lips almost as grey as the rest of her. In her black stuff gown--she invariably wore the most funereal dresses--with uneasy hands folded under a coarse apron, she stood before Eva Strode, uttering lamentations worthy of Jeremiah at his worst. But such dumpishness was characteristic of the woman. She delighted in looking on the black side of things, and the blacker they were, the more she relished them. Out of wrong-doing, and grief and things awry, she extracted a queer sort of pleasure, and felt never so happy as when the worst came to the worst. It seemed unfit that such a walking pageant of woe should be called Merry. Eva, already depressed by the voice and sentiment of this lamentable dame, continued to look at the gaudy hollyhocks, even while she answered calmly, "I expect my father is the same as he was when he went to South Africa five years ago. I don't hope to find him an angel. I am certain he has not changed." "If you're thinking of black angels," said the lively Merry, "you can have satisfactions from thinking him Beelzebub, for him he are." "Don't call my father names. It does no good, Mrs. Merry."