A Christmas Mystery by Maud Van Buren

THE STORY OF THREE WISE MEN / _William J. Locke_

I cannot tell how the truth may be; / I say the tale as 'twas said to me.

Three men who had gained great fame and honor throughout the world met / unexpectedly in front of the bookstall at Paddington Station. Like most / of the great ones of the earth they were personally acquainted, and / they exchanged surprised greetings.[13]

Sir Angus McCurdie, the eminent physicist, scowled at the two others / beneath his heavy black eyebrows.

"I'm going to a God-forsaken place in Cornwall called Trehenna," said / he.

"That's odd; so am I," croaked Professor Biggleswade. He was a little, / untidy man with round spectacles, a fringe of grayish beard and a weak, / rasping voice, and he knew more of Assyriology than any man, living / or dead. A flippant pupil once remarked that the Professor's face was / furnished with a Babylonic cuneiform in lieu of features.

"People called Deverill, at Foullis Castle? " asked Sir Angus.

"Yes," replied Professor Biggleswade.

"How curious! I am going to the Deverills, too," said the third man.

This man was the Right Honorable Viscount Boyne, the renowned Empire / Builder and Administrator, around whose solitary and remote life / popular imagination had woven many legends. He looked at the world / through tired gray eyes, and the heavy drooping blonde mustache seemed / tired, too, and had dragged down the tired face into deep furrows. He / was smoking a long black cigar.

"I suppose we may as well travel down together," said Sir Angus, not / very cordially.

Lord Boyne said courteously: "I have a reserved carriage. The railway / company is always good enough to place one at my disposal. It would / give me great pleasure if you would share it."

The invitation was accepted, and the three men crossed the busy, / crowded platform to take their seats in the great express train. A / porter laden with an incredible load of paraphernalia, trying to make / his way through the press, happened to jostle Sir Angus McCurdie. He / rubbed his shoulder fretfully.

"Why the whole land should be turned into a bear garden on account of / this exploded superstition of Christmas is one of the anomalies of / modern civilization. Look at this insensate welter of fools traveling / in wild herds to disgusting places merely because it's Christmas!"

"You seem to be traveling yourself, McCurdie," said Lord Boyne.

"Yes-and why the devil I'm doing it, I've not the faintest notion," / replied Sir Angus.

"It's going to be a beast of a journey," he remarked some moments / later, as the train carried them slowly out of the station. "The whole / country is under snow-and as far as I can understand we have to change / twice and wind up with a twenty-mile motor drive."

He was an iron-faced, beetle-browed, stern man, and this morning he did / not seem to be in the best of tempers. Finding his companions inclined / to be sympathetic, he continued his lamentation.

"And merely because it's Christmas I've had to shut up my laboratory / and give my young fools a holiday-just when I was in the midst of a / most important series of experiments."

Professor Biggleswade, who had heard vaguely of and rather looked / down upon such new-fangled toys as radium and thorium and helium / and argon-for the latest astonishing developments in the theory of / radio-activity had brought Sir Angus McCurdie his worldwide fame-said / somewhat ironically: