Who Did It?

About half a mile from the village of Poaktown, facing the high road to Balston, and separated from the river Poak by a small garden and a belt of trees, is a long, low cottage, known in the neighborhood as “The Building.” It originally consisted of two cottages, and went by the name of “Marwood’s Buildings;” but who Marwood was, and what had led him to build such awkward cottages, had escaped the memory of the oldest inhabitant.

Mr. Joseph Vance, who was a spare-built, clean-shaven man of about forty, with gray hair and no whiskers, and with nothing remarkable about him, except a deep cut over his right eyebrow, had now been occupying the building for a little over a year. When he first came into the neighborhood the gossip of Poaktown had speculated a great deal as to who and what he was, but without any basis for their conjectures. He never himself volunteered any information as to his previous life, except that on one occasion he had been heard to say something, which led to the inference that he had been a sea captain. People, too, who had been inside “the building” since Vance’s tenancy, had noticed the drawing of a ship, and some shells lying about the room. This was considered enough to confirm his statement, and on the strength of it the village called him the Captain.

Nothing more was known of the Captain, and curiosity about him had nearly died out, when Sarah Epps, on her return from Stokemouth, where she had been on a visit to her sister, who had married a pilot at that flourishing sea port, brought news about him, which set the village cars tingling for some time. The pilot, her brother-in-law, remembered the Captain when he was in the China trade, and Sarah was full of stories of smuggling, and even piracy, in which the Captain had taken a leading part. But then all knew that Sarah was an incorrigible gossip, and that any story under her management would grow… Read More