CHAPTER I MR. BATHURST AS AN AID TO MEMORYSeeing Bathurst this evening, after a lapse of eight years, has given mea most insistent inclination to set down, for the first time, the realfacts of that _cause célèbre_, that was called by the Press at the time, the "Billiard Room Mystery." Considering the length of the interval, andregarding the whole affair from every possible point of view, it issufficiently plain to me that an authentic history of the case can harmnobody and can prejudice no interests. I therefore succumb to thetemptation, serenely confident that, no matter what shortcomings theremay be in the telling, the affair itself as a whole, is entitled to rankas one of the most baffling in the annals of criminology.Inasmuch as I was a member of the audience to-night at a privatetheatrical performance and Anthony Bathurst was playing lead for thecompany (amateur of course) that was entertaining us, I had noopportunity for conversation with him, but I am certain that had I hadthis opportunity, I should have found that his brain had lost none ofits cunning and that his uncanny gifts for deduction, inference, andintuition, were unimpaired. These powers allied to a masterly memory fordetail and to an unusual athleticism of body, separated him from themajority-wherever he was, he always counted-one acknowledgedinstinctively his mental supremacy-he was a personality always andeverywhere. A tall, lithe body with that poised balance of movement thatbetrays the able player of all ball games, his clean-cut, clean-shavenface carried a mobile, sensitive mouth and grey eyes. Remarkable eyesthat seemed to apprehend and absorb at a sweep every detail about youthat was worth apprehending. A man's man, and, at the same time, aladies' man. For when he chose, he was hard to resist, I assure you.Such, eight years ago, was Anthony Lotherington Bathurst, and such hadhe promised to be from comparative immaturity, for he had been with meat Uppingham, and afterwards at Oxford.Which latter fact goes to the prime reason of my being at ConsidineManor in the last week of July of the year of the tragedy.At Oxford we had both grown very pally with Jack Considine, eldest sonof Sir Charles Considine, of Considine Manor, Sussex, and althoughBathurst had to a certain extent fallen away from the closest relationsof the friendship, Jack and I were bosom companions, and it became mycustom each year, when the 'Varsity came down, to spend a week atConsidine Manor, and to take part in Sir Charles' Cricket Week. For Iwas a fairly useful member, and had been on the fringe of the 'VarsityEleven; indeed many excellent judges were of the opinion that Prescott, who had been given the last place, was an inferior man. But of that, more later.Bathurst never took his 'Varsity cricket seriously enough. Had he doneso he would probably have skippered England-he's the kind thatdistinguishes whatever he sets his hand to-but it was cricket that tookme to Considine Manor, and it was cricket that took both Prescott andBathurst-but not in the same direction.Sir Charles that year was particularly anxious to have a good team-whichgot Prescott his invitation. An invitation that he had certainly notlingered over accepting. For he had met Mary Considine at Twickenham theprevious autumn, and had improved upon that acquaintanceship at Lords'in the first week of July. Mary was the third and youngest child, Jackcoming between her and her sister, Helen, who had married a CaptainArkwright-a big, bluff Dragoon. Now whatever Prescott's feelings mayhave been towards Mary, I had no idea then, what hers were to him.Decidedly, I have no idea now; I can only surmise. But Mary Considinewith her birth, her breeding and her beauty was a peach of peaches. Shehad grace, she had charm, and a pair of heavy-lashed,