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THE HISTORY OF A MYSTERY

A REVIEW OF THE SOLUTIONS TO "EDWIN DROOD"

By GEORGE F. GADD

from The Dickensian (1905-nov)

CHAPTER V

"A GREAT MYSTERY SOLVED"

THE "authentic" solution of the Drood problem having thus proceeded in 1873 from the United States, there could be no possible reason why America should attempt to "go one better" in any spirit of patriotic rivalry. Accordingly, it need-not surprise us to find that, henceforward, the mania for constructing sequels to Dickens's work was permitted to die out of the New World.

  But Great Britain, hitherto silent--save in protest or commentary--becoming, evidently, too sceptical of the Brattleborough Spirit's claims to accept the situation, began in course of time to publish guesses at the secret on her own account; and, to her credit be it said, these efforts assumed in the main the reverent attitude of the analyst rather than the presumptuous arrogance of the "continuator."

  It was not, however, until the year 1878 that the new era actually commenced, though probably long before that date the midnight oil of preparation was burning. In the early autumn of the year named there appeared a three-volume conclusion entitled A Great Mystery Solved, written, under the curious pen-name of "Gillan Vase," by a lady of some literary reputation in the North of England. This pretentious work was, the preface informs us, the outcome of a desire to see the broken threads of the fragment gathered up and the story woven to its end. The authoress--ignorant of or ignoring the glorious productions of her literary cousins across the water--grew weary of waiting for a continuation, and at length began to solve the Mystery for herself; at first merely for her own amusement and the gratification of a few kindly interested friends, but afterwards in obedience to the dictates of a growing ambition. Indeed, she found, to her consternation, that she had "idly entered upon a road from which there is no turning back."

  "Gillan Vase" launched her book in fear and trembling, expecting her "audacious venture" to be punished, "either by having to run the gauntlet of sharpest criticism, or--a thousand times worse--being passed over in contemptuous silence." Fortunately, the milder fate befell the work; but it must be confessed that the criticism of the reviewer who noticed it in the columns of The Examiner on October 5th, 1878, was sharp indeed.

  "The head and front of 'Gillan Vase's' offending," said this remorseless penman, who might have mixed less vinegar with his ink had he guessed the sex of his victim, "is not that he has attempted to continue Dickens to the best of his ability and has failed, but that he has, with a great deal of perverted ingenuity, set seriously to work to mimic Dickens, and in a lamentable way may be said to have succeeded. It is the reverse of the old fairy tale when straw was spun into gold. Mr. Vase has, indeed, gathered up the broken threads of the story, but these threads of pure gold have magically and imperceptibly become transformed by his touch into common straw; and the worst of the matter is that it is extremely difficult to realize afterwards that they ever were threads of gold."

  No student of Dickens will be disposed to disagree with this judgment, nor with the rest of the review, which is sufficiently lengthy to have afforded Gillan Vase a gloomy kind of consolation; but we may perhaps be forgiven for assuming that the critic, if he had been doomed to plough through the earlier solutions, would have welcomed "A Great Mystery Solved"--which he prefers to call "A Great Work Spoiled"--with open arms and a thankful heart.

  Gillan Vase has, in fact, produced immeasurably the best of the story continuations--whatever that commendation may be worth--and has at least given us an Edwin Drood free from that unholy thirst for vengeance which, despite the assertions of her predecessors, cannot be fitted anyhow into the nature of our cherished author.

  The ingenuity of the work is not confined to its mimicry. There is something startling in the suggestion that the heap of lime in the mason's yard was destined to receive the body of the defunct Mrs. Sapsea, in order that room might be provided in the vault for Edwin without exciting the suspicions of stone-tapping Durdles. What better hiding-place than a coffin supposed to contain a legitimately buried corpse? What more natural result of Drood's unseen escape from the tomb than the confounding of Jasper by this same Durdles, who cries, in the words of his early demonstration to the scheming villain "Holloa! Hollow!"? The ring having been left in the coffin, Jasper's act is thus brought to light without the complicity of Edwin Drood. That stricken youth, changed by illness and grief almost beyond recognition, and further disguised by the aid of blue spectacles, takes service with Grewgious in succession to Bazzard, choosing to be considered as dead rather than bring punishment upon his erring relative. He is able, without disclosing his identity, to save Rosa from her persecutor's clutches, and incidentally from a watery grave; but he hesitates to clear the fame of poor Landless at Jasper's expense, and for this latter adherence to his principle he can scarcely be commended. John Jasper is, however, laid by the heels at last, and destroys himself in Cloisterham Gaol after horrifying Crisparkle with a detailed account of his criminal proceedings.

  The Datchery nut--always a particularly hard one to crack, and, it would seem, only to be properly broken in the door of the cupboard on which the buffer kept his cryptic score--is crushed shapeless under the heel of misconception. Mrs. Tope's lodger is revealed as a detective in the employ of Mr. Grewgious, and we are left to wonder why in the world he should have imperilled his secret and inconvenienced his person, parading before all Cloisterham in that aggressive white wig.

  

CHAPTER VI

SOLUTION BY INFERENCE

FOR the sake of clearness, we have disposed of the "Gillan Vase" conclusion a trifle out of the correct chronological order; insomuch that, in June of the same year, 1878, there appeared in the Belgravia magazine a clever article--signed "Thomas Foster"--by a writer whose brain was more usually devoted to the elucidation of abstruse scientific problems. The mystery of "Edwin Drood" appears to have possessed a remarkable power of attraction for this learned mathematician. An anonymous contribution to The Cornhill Magazine for March, 1884 ("Suggestions for a Conclusion"), attempting to explain the mystery on the lines laid down by Forster in the Dickens biography, immediately produced from the enthusiastic "Belgravian" the first of a long series of articles in the analytical vein--"Dickens's Story Left Half Told"-- which appeared in the pages of the scientific periodical Knowledge, founded by Richard A. Proctor.

  Subsequently (1887) the whole of the writer's work on this subject, including contributions to Leisure Readings (of the Knowledge Library Series) was collected, revised, and republished in the form of a volume, bearing the extremely unscientific title Watched by the Dead: a loving study of Dickens's half-told tale. This book, as we shall see, essayed to prove that Drood: had not met his death at Jasper's hands; that he had already reappeared upon the scene, and that, in fact, he was none other than the mysterious buffer Datchery himself. The same book indubitably proved that Thomas Foster, writer of the scattered articles, and Richard Proctor, astronomer and editor, were one and the same person. So did it come about that Watched by the Dead took its place amongst volumes of able discourses concerning other worlds than ours.

  A considerable portion of the; argument is concerned with the methods adopted by Jasper in preparing for his crime, and many of the unrevealed details are convincingly deduced with admirable skill.

  Jasper's peculiar action of clinking the stonemason's keys together during the interview at Sapsea's has been noted by various solutionists, with equally various results. The Brattleborough Spirit asserts that Jasper's object was to so dent the wards of the vault key that he might readily recognize it by sight. Mr. Proctor is more artistic in his perception. He argues truly that a trained musician like Jasper would but need to hear the tone of the key to distinguish it from others, in light or darkness. Durdles, on this occasion, cries--"You can't make a pitch-pipe of 'em, Mr. Jasper." And: again, in a later scene--"You pitch your note, don't you? So I sound for mine." The theorist is on solid ground of his own when he takes up the question of the moonlight; and it is not a little instructive to note how conclusively he shows that the night of the murder was necessarily a dark one--notwithstanding "Gillan Vase," who makes our satellite a fitful but evident witness of the crime.

  Proctor's case for the reappearance of Drood is a very elaborate one, based mainly upon three grounds: the significant heading to chapter XIV. "When shall these three meet again?"; the general demeanour of Mr. Datchery, and the strange conduct of Grewgious after the disappearance. The last-named certainly forms a strong support for the theory.

  The lawyer is more than suspicious. But why should he suspect? The average reader has become so certain of Jasper's guilt that the importance of this question is overlooked. Grewgious has not the knowledge which the reader possesses. He has not accompanied Jasper and Durdles on those strange nocturnal expeditions; he has not seen the stern, knitted face as the murderous hand unwound the black scarf from its owner's throat he has not observed the choirmaster's elation at Edwin's disposition to quarrel with Landless, nor noted how that quarrel was deliberately encouraged. Whence does he derive his knowledge? From Drood, answers Mr. Proctor triumphantly. From the only one--save Jasper himself--who could tell the story of that night of villainy.

  As to the Datchery-Drood argument--for which the solutionist reserves his greatest enthusiasm, and which he attempts to force home with a degree of impatience, we are offered a comparison, in considerable detail, of the various passages in which the two characters are referred to. Notably attention is drawn to the interviews with the opium woman. That unpleasant old person, telling Datchery of her previous meeting with Drood, instinctively feels--at least Proctor says so--that he is the same person, and asks for the same sum. "He changes countenance when he learns it is for opium, but does not recognise the full significance of the fact." Neither does the solutionist. It has always seemed to the present writer that this part of Mr. Proctor's evidence is amply sufficient to disprove his pet theory. Neither the solutionist nor his supporters appear to have noticed the fact that Drood was fully aware this woman smoked opium. He had asked her the question point-blank. Datchery may have forgotten the information, but its repetition would certainly not startle him.

  The rescue of Drood by Durdles of course dispenses with Forster's explanation of the betrothal ring and the destructive lime. Proctor, however, evades this difficulty with characteristic ingenuity. The ring is speedily restored to its former owner, and "so soon as Drood and Grewgious knew that Jasper's main idea in removing the watch and pin was that they might not afford evidence against him, the power to inflict a terrible punishment would be manifest. They would force on Jasper the completion of his main purpose. What horror to find he has unwittingly left a fatal witness within the tomb!" Mr. Proctor' pictures the wretch creeping down the crypt steps (a strange mistake as to the location of Sapsea's vault), holding up his lantern, and shuddering at the thought of what it may reveal. He sees Drood sternly confronting him, and flies up the winding staircase of the tower, pursued by Landless, Tartar, Drood, and Crisparkle. There is struggle at the top, and Neville is killed. Jasper is captured and cast into prison, but not until he has been made to feel how, while he supposed himself safe, every movement had been watched by one whom he had thought dead.

  This conclusion, though apparently confirmed by one of the original cover illustrations, which the theorist reproduces, has, nevertheless, serious defects. Its weakness is not so much that it presents Edwin as burrowing about in search of clues leading to already familiar facts for, as a supporter has recently suggested on his own account, perhaps Drood was not sure that Jasper was his assailant. Nor is it altogether the old objection of empty vengeance on the part of characters better disposed by nature, though in this respect Mr. Proctor is decidedly inferior to "Gillan Vase." It is rather the insuperable difficulty that an innocent man must be mentally tortured to the verge of the grave in order to create a dramatic situation, and for this reason, if for no other, the solution should be rejected.

(To be continued.)