Having explained who I was, I followed the men in and assisted them in making a careful and minute examination of the place.
Search for the weapon with which the crime had been committed proved fruitless; hence it was plain that the murderer had carried it away. There were no signs whatever of a struggle, and nothing to indicate that the blow had been struck by any burglar with a motive of silencing the prostrate man.
The room was a large front one on the first floor, with two French windows opening upon a balcony formed by the big square portico. Both were found to be secured, not only by the latches, but also by long screws as an extra precaution against thieves, old Mr. Courtenay, like many other elderly people, being extremely nervous of midnight intruders. The bedroom itself was well furnished in genuine Sheraton, which he had brought up from his palatial home in Devonshire, for the old man denied himself no personal comfort. The easy chair in which he had sat when I had paid my visit was still in its place at the fireside, with the footstool just as he had left it; the drawers which we opened one after another showed no sign of having been rummaged, and the sum result of our investigations was absolutelynil.
“It looks very much as though someone in the house had done it,” whispered the inspector seriously to me, having first glanced at the door to ascertain that it was closed.
“Yes,” I admitted, “appearances certainly do point to that.”
“Who was the young lady who met us downstairs?” inquired the detective sergeant, producing a small note-book and pencil.
“Miss Ethelwynn Mivart, sister to Mrs. Courtenay.”
“And is Mrs. Courtenay at home?” he inquired, making a note of the name.
“No. We have sent for her. She’s staying with friends in London.”
“Hulloa! There’s an iron safe here!” exclaimed one of the men rummaging at the opposite side of the room. He had pulled away a chest of drawers from the wall, revealing what I had never noticed before, the door of a small fireproof safe built into the wall.
“Is it locked?” inquired the inspector.
The man, after trying the knob and examining the keyhole, replied in the affirmative.
“Keeps his deeds and jewellery there, I suppose,” remarked one of the other detectives. “He seems to have been very much afraid of burglars. I wonder whether he had any reason for that?”
“Like many old men he was a trifle eccentric,” I replied. “Thieves once broke into his country house years ago, I believe, and he therefore entertained a horror of them.”
We all examined the keyhole of the safe, but there was certainly no evidence to show that it had been tampered with. On the contrary, the little oval brass plate which closed the hole was rusty, and had not apparently been touched for weeks.
While they were searching in other parts of the room I directed my attention to the position and appearance of my late patient. He was lying on his right side with one arm slightly raised in quite a natural attitude for one sleeping. His features, although the pallor of death was upon them and they were relaxed, showed no sign of suffering. The blow had been unerring, and had no doubt penetrated to the heart. The crime had been committed swiftly, and the murderer had escaped unseen and unheard.
The eider-down quilt, a rich one of Gobelin blue satin, had scarcely been disturbed, and save for the small spot of blood upon the sheet, traces of a terrible crime were in no way apparent.
While, however, I stood at the bedside, at the same spot most probably where the murderer had stood, I suddenly felt something uneven between the sole of my boot and the carpet. So intent was I upon the examination I was making that at first my attention was not attracted by it, but on stepping on it a second time I looked down and saw something white, which I quickly picked up.
The instant I saw it I closed my hand and hid it from view.
Then I glanced furtively around, and seeing that my action had been unobserved I quickly transferredit to my vest pocket, covering the movement by taking out my watch to glance at it.
I confess that my heart beat quickly, and in all probability the colour at that moment had left my face, for I had, by sheer accident, discovered a clue.
To examine it there was impossible, for of such a character was it that I had no intention, as yet, to arouse the suspicions of the police. I intended at the earliest moment to apprise my friend, Ambler Jevons, of the facts and with him pursue an entirely independent inquiry.
Scarcely had I safely pocketed the little object I had picked up from where the murderer must have stood when the inspector went out upon the landing and called to the constable in the hall:
“Four-sixty-two, lock that door and come up here a moment.”
“Yes, sir,” answered a gruff voice from below, and in a few moments the constable entered, closing the door after him.
“How many times have you passed this house on your beat to-night, four-sixty-two?” inquired the inspector.
“About eight, sir. My beat’s along the Richmond Road, from the Lion Gate down to the museum, and then around the back streets.”
“Saw nothing?”
“I saw a man come out of this house hurriedly, soon after I came on duty. I was standing on the opposite side, under the wall of the Gardens. The ladywhat’s downstairs let him out and told him to fetch the doctor quickly.”
“Ah! Short, the servant,” I observed.
“Where is he?” asked the inspector, while the detective with the ready note-book scribbled down the name.
“He came to fetch me, and Miss Mivart has now sent him to fetch her sister. He was the first to make the discovery.”
“Oh, was he?” exclaimed the detective-sergeant, with some suspicion. “It’s rather a pity that he’s been sent out again. He might be able to tell us something.”
“He’ll be back in an hour, I should think.”
“Yes, but every hour is of consequence in a matter of this sort,” remarked the sergeant. “Look here, Davidson,” he added, turning to one of the plain-clothes men, “just go round to the station and send a wire to the Yard, asking for extra assistance. Give them a brief outline of the case. They’ll probably send down Franks or Moreland. If I’m not mistaken, there’s a good deal more in this mystery than meets the eye.”
The man addressed obeyed promptly, and left.
“What do you know of the servants here?” asked the inspector of the constable.
“Not much, sir. Six-forty-eight walks out with the cook, I’ve heard. She’s a respectable woman. Her father’s a lighterman at Kew Bridge. I know ’em all here by sight, of course. But there’s nothing against them, to my knowledge, and I’ve been a constable in this sub-division for eighteen years.”
“The man—what’s his name?—Short. Do you know him?”
“Yes, sir. I’ve often seen him in the ‘Star and Garter’ at Kew Bridge.”
“Drinks?”
“Not much, sir. He was fined over at Brentford six months ago for letting a dog go unmuzzled. His greatest friend is one of the gardeners at the Palace—a man named Burford, a most respectable fellow.”
“Then there’s no suspicion of anyone as yet?” remarked the inspector, with an air of dissatisfaction. In criminal mysteries the police often bungle from the outset, and to me it appeared as though, having no clue, they were bent on manufacturing one.
I felt in my vest pocket and touched the little object with a feeling of secret satisfaction. How I longed to be alone for five minutes in order to investigate it!
The inspector, having dismissed the constable and sent him back to his post to unlock the door for the detective to pass out, next turned his attention to the servants and the remainder of the house. With that object we all descended to the dining-room.
Ethelwynn met us at the foot of the stairs, still wearing the shawl about her head and shoulders. She placed a trembling hand upon my arm as I passed, asking in a low anxious voice:
“Have you found anything, Ralph? Tell me.”
“No, nothing,” I replied, and then passed into the dining-room, where the nurse and domestics had been assembled.
The nurse, a plain matter-of-fact woman, was the first person to be questioned. She explained to us how she had given her patient his last dose of medicine at half-past eleven, just after Miss Mivart had wished her good-night and retired to her room. Previously she had been down in the drawing-room chatting with the young lady. The man Short was then upstairs with his master.
“Was the deceased gentleman aware of his wife’s absence?” the inspector asked presently.
“Yes. He remarked to me that it was time she returned. I presume that Short had told him.”
“What time was this?”
“Oh! about half-past ten, I should think,” replied Nurse Kate. “He said something about it being a bad night to go out to a theatre, and hoped she would not take cold.”
“He was not angry?”
“Not in the least. He was never angry when she went to town. He used to say to me, ‘My wife’s a young woman, nurse. She wants a little amusement sometimes, and I’m sure I don’t begrudge it to her.’”
This puzzled me quite as much as it puzzled the detective. I had certainly been under the impression that husband and wife had quarrelled over the latter’s frequent absences from home. Indeed, in a household where the wife is young and the husband elderly, quarrels of that character are almost sure to occur sooner or later. As a doctor I knew the causes of domestic infelicity in a good many homes. Men in my profession see a good deal, and hear more. Everydoctor could unfold strange tales of queer households if he were not debarred by the bond of professional secrecy.
“You heard no noise during the night?” inquired the inspector.
“None. I’m a light sleeper as a rule, and wake at the slightest sound,” the woman replied. “But I heard absolutely nothing.”
“Anyone, in order to enter the dead man’s room, must have passed your door, I think?”
“Yes, and what’s more, the light was burning and my door was ajar. I always kept it so in order to hear if my patient wanted anything.”
“Then the murderer could see you as he stood on the landing?”
“No. There’s a screen at the end of my bed. He could not see far into the room. But I shudder to think that to-night I’ve had an assassin a dozen feet from me while I slept,” she added.
Finding that she could throw no light upon the mysterious affair, the officer turned his attention to the four frightened domestics, each in turn.
All, save one, declared that they heard not a single sound. The one exception was Alice, the under housemaid, a young fair-haired girl, who stated that during the night she had distinctly heard a sound like the low creaking of light shoes on the landing below where they slept.
This first aroused our interest, but on full reflection it seemed so utterly improbable that an assassin would wear a pair of creaky boots when on such an errandthat we were inclined to disregard the girl’s statement as a piece of imagination. The feminine mind is much given to fiction on occasions of tragic events.
But the girl over and over again asserted that she had heard it. She slept alone in a small room at the top of the second flight of stairs and had heard the sound quite distinctly.
“When you heard it what did you do?”
“I lay and listened.”
“For how long?”
“Oh, quite a quarter of an hour, I should think. It was just before half-past one when I heard the noise, for the church clock struck almost immediately afterwards. The sound of the movement was such as I had never before heard at night, and at first I felt frightened. But I always lock my door, therefore I felt secure. The noise was just like someone creeping along very slowly, with one boot creaking.”
“But if it was so loud that you could hear it with your door closed, it is strange that no one else heard it,” the detective-sergeant remarked dubiously.
“I don’t care what anybody else heard, I heard it quite plainly,” the girl asserted.
“How long did it continue?” asked the detective.
“Oh, only just as though someone was stealing along the corridor. We often hear movements at nights, because Short is always astir at two o’clock, giving the master his medicine. If it hadn’t ha’ been for the creaking I should not have taken notice of it. But I lay quite wide awake for over half an hour—until Short came banging at our doors,telling us to get up at once, as we were wanted downstairs.”
“Well,” exclaimed the inspector, “now, I want to ask all of you a very simple question, and wish to obtain an honest and truthful reply. Was any door or window left unfastened when you went to bed?”
“No, sir,” the cook replied promptly. “I always go round myself, and see that everything is fastened.”
“The front door, for example?”
“I bolted it at Miss Ethelwynn’s orders.”
“At what time?”
“One o’clock. She told me to wait up till then, and if mistress did not return I was to lock up and go to bed.”
“Then the tragedy must have been enacted about half an hour later?”
“I think so, sir.”
“You haven’t examined the doors and windows to see if any have been forced?”
“As far as I can see, they are just as I left them when I went to bed, sir.”
“That’s strange—very strange,” remarked the inspector, turning to us. “We must make an examination and satisfy ourselves.”
The point was one that was most important in the conduct of the inquiry. If all doors and windows were still locked, then the assassin was one of that strange household.
Led by the cook, the officers began a round of the lower premises. One of the detectives borrowed the constable’s bull’s-eye and, accompanied by a secondofficer, went outside to make an examination of the window sashes, while we remained inside assisting them in their search for any marks.
Ethelwynn had been called aside by one of the detectives, and was answering some questions addressed to her, therefore for an instant I found myself alone. It was the moment I had been waiting for, to secretly examine the clue I had obtained.
I was near the door of the morning room, and for a second slipped inside and switched on the electric light.
Then I took from my vest pocket the tiny little object I had found and carefully examined it.
My heart stood still. My eyes riveted themselves upon it. The mystery was solved.
I alone knew the truth!
A light footstep sounded behind me, and scarcely had I time to thrust the little object hastily back into my pocket when my well-beloved entered in search of me.
“What do the police think, Ralph?” she asked eagerly. “Have they any clue? Do tell me.”
“They have no clue,” I answered, in a voice which I fear sounded hard and somewhat abrupt.
Then I turned from her, as though fully occupied with the investigations at which I was assisting, and went past her, leaving her standing alone.
The police were busy examining the doors and windows of the back premises, kitchens, scullery, and pantry, but could find no evidence of any lock or fastening having been tampered with. The house, I must explain, was a large detached red brick one, standing in a lawn that was quite spacious for a suburban house, and around it ran an asphalte path which diverged from the right hand corner of the building and ran in two parts to the road, one a semi-circular drive which came up to the portico from the road, and the other, a tradesmen’s path, that ran to the opposite extremity of the property.
From the back kitchen a door led out upon this asphalted tradesmen’s path, and as I rejoined thesearchers some discussion was in progress as to whether the door in question had been secured. The detective-sergeant had found it unbolted and unlocked, but the cook most positively asserted that she had both locked and bolted it at half-past ten, when the under housemaid had come in from her “evening out.” None of the servants, however, recollected having undone the door either before the alarm or after. Perhaps Short had done so, but he was absent, in search of the dead man’s widow.
The police certainly spared no pains in their search. They turned the whole place upside down. One man on his hands and knees, and carrying a candle, carefully examined the blue stair-carpet to see if he could find the marks of unusual feet. It was wet outside, and if an intruder had been there, there would probably remain marks of muddy feet. He found many, but they were those of the constable and detectives. Hence the point was beyond solution.
The drawing-room, the dining-room, the morning-room, and the big conservatory were all closely inspected, but without any satisfactory result. My love followed us everywhere, white-faced and nervous, with the cream chenille shawl still over her shoulders. She had hastily put up her wealth of dark hair, and now wore the shawl wrapped lightly about her.
That shawl attracted me. I managed to speak with her alone for a moment, asking her quite an unimportant question, but nevertheless with a distinct object. As we stood there I placed my hand upon her shoulder—and upon the shawl. It was for that veryreason—in order to feel the texture of the silk—that I returned to her.
The contact of my hand with the silk was convincing. I turned from her once again, and rejoined the shrewd men whose object it was to fasten the guilt upon the assassin.
Presently we heard the welcome sound of cab wheels outside, and a few minutes later young Mrs. Courtenay, wild eyed and breathless, rushed into the hall and dashed headlong up the stairs. I, however, barred her passage.
“Let me pass!” she cried wildly. “Short has told me he is worse and has asked for me. Let me pass!”
“No, Mary, not so quickly. Let me tell you something,” I answered gravely, placing my hand firmly upon her arm. The police were again re-examining the back premises below, and only Ethelwynn was present at the top of the stairs, where I arrested her progress to the dead man’s room.
“But is there danger?” she demanded anxiously. “Tell me.”
“The crisis is over,” I responded ambiguously. “But is not your absence to-night rather unusual?”
“It was entirely my own fault,” she admitted. “I shall never forgive myself for this neglect. After the theatre we had supper at the Savoy, and I lost my last train. Dolly Henniker, of course, asked me to stay, and I could not refuse.” Then glancing from my face to that of her sister she asked: “Why do you both look so strange? Tell me,” she shrieked. “Tell me the worst. Is he—is hedead?”
I nodded in the affirmative.
For a second she stood dumb, then gave vent to a long wail, and would have fallen senseless if I had not caught her in my arms and laid her back upon the long settee placed in an alcove on the landing. She, like all the others, had dressed hurriedly. Her hair was dishevelled beneath her hat, but her disordered dress was concealed by her long ulster heavily lined with silver fox, a magnificent garment which her doting husband had purchased through a friend at Moscow, and presented to her as a birthday gift.
From her manner it was only too plain that she was filled with remorse. I really pitied her, for she was a light-hearted, flighty, little woman who loved gaiety, and, without an evil thought, had no doubt allowed her friends to draw her into that round of amusement. They sympathised with her—as every woman who marries an old man is sympathised with—and they gave her what pleasures they could. Alas! that such a clanship between women so often proves fatal to domestic happiness. Judged from a logical point of view it was merely natural that young Mrs. Courtenay should, after a year or two with an invalid husband, aged and eccentric, beat her wings against the bars. She was a pretty woman, almost as pretty as her sister, but two years older, with fair hair, blue eyes, and a pink and white, almost doll-like complexion. Indeed, I knew quite well that she had long had a host of admirers, and that just prior to her marriage with Courtenay ithad been rumoured that she was to marry the heir to an earldom, a rather rakish young cavalry officer up at York.
To restore her to consciousness was not a difficult matter, but after she had requested me to tell her the whole of the ghastly truth she sat speechless, as though turned to stone.
Her manner was unaccountable. She spoke at last, and to me it seemed as though the fainting fit had caused her an utter loss of memory. She uttered words at random, allowing her tongue to ramble on in strange disjointed sentences, of which I could make nothing.
“My head! Oh! my head!” she kept on exclaiming, passing her hand across her brow as though to clear her brain.
“Does it pain you?” I inquired.
“It seems as though a band of iron were round it. I can’t think. I—I can’t remember!” And she glanced about her helplessly, her eyes with a wild strange look in them, her face so haggard and drawn that it gave her a look of premature age.
“Oh! Mary, dear!” cried Ethelwynn, taking both her cold hands. “Why, what’s the matter? Calm yourself, dear.” Then turning to me she asked, “Can nothing be done, Ralph? See—she’s not herself. The shock has unbalanced her brain.”
“Ralph! Ethelwynn!” gasped the unfortunate woman, looking at us with an expression of sudden wonder. “What has happened? Did I understand you aright? Poor Henry is dead?”
“Unfortunately that is the truth.” I was compelled to reply. “It is a sad affair, Mary, and you have all our sympathy. But recollect he was an invalid, and for a long time his life has been despaired of.”
I dared not yet tell her the terrible truth that he had been the victim of foul play.
“It is my fault!” she cried. “My place was here—at home. But—but why was I not here?” she added with a blank look. “Where did I go?”
“Don’t you remember that you went to London with the Hennikers?” I said.
“Ah! of course!” she exclaimed. “How very stupid of me to forget. But do you know, I’ve never experienced such a strange sensation before. My memory is a perfect blank. How did I return here?”
“Short fetched you in a cab.”
“Short? I—I don’t recollect seeing him. Somebody knocked at my door and said I was wanted, because my husband had been taken worse, so I dressed and went down. But after that I don’t recollect anything.”
“Her mind is a trifle affected by the shock,” I whispered to my love. “Best take her downstairs into one of the rooms and lock the door. Don’t let her see the police. She didn’t notice the constable at the door. She’ll be better presently.”
I uttered these words mechanically, but, truth to tell, these extraordinary symptoms alarmed and puzzled me. She had fainted at hearing of the death of her husband, just as many other wives might havefainted; but to me there seemed no reason whatsoever why the swoon should be followed by that curious lapse of memory. The question she had put to me showed her mind to be a blank. I could discern nothing to account for the symptoms, and the only remedy I could suggest was perfect quiet. I intended that, as soon as daylight came, both women should be removed to the house of some friend in the vicinity.
The scene of the tragedy was no place for two delicate women.
Notwithstanding Mrs. Courtenay’s determination to enter her husband’s room I managed at last to get them both into the morning-room and called the nurse and cook to go in and assist in calming her, for her lapse of memory had suddenly been followed by a fit of violence.
“I must see him!” she shrieked. “I will see him! You can’t prevent me. I am his wife. My place is at his side!”
My love exchanged looks with me. Her sister’s extraordinary manner utterly confounded us.
“You shall see him later,” I promised, endeavouring to calm her. “At present remain quiet. No good can possibly be done by this wild conduct.”
“Where is Sir Bernard?” she inquired suddenly. “Have you telegraphed for him? I must see him.”
“As soon as the office is open I shall wire.”
“Yes, telegraph at the earliest moment. Tell him of the awful blow that has fallen upon us.”
Presently, by dint of much persuasion, we managed to quiet her. The nurse removed her hat, helped her out of her fur-lined coat, and she sat huddled up in a big “grandfather” chair, her handsome evening gown crushed and tumbled, the flowers she had worn in her corsage on the previous night drooping and withered.
For some time she sat motionless, her chin sunk upon her breast, the picture of dejection, until, of a sudden, she roused herself, and before we were aware of her intention she had torn off her marriage ring and cast it across the room, crying wildly:
“It is finished. He is dead—dead!”
And she sank back again, among the cushions, as though exhausted by the effort.
What was passing through her brain at that moment I wondered. Why should a repulsion of the marriage bond seize her so suddenly, and cause her to tear off the golden fetter under which she had so long chafed? There was some reason, without a doubt; but at present all was an enigma—all save one single point.
When I returned to the police to urge them not to disturb Mrs. Courtenay, I found them assembled in the conservatory discussing an open window, by which anyone might easily have entered and left. The mystery of the kitchen door had been cleared up by Short, who admitted that after the discovery he had unlocked and unbolted it, in order to go round the outside of the house and see whether anyone was lurking in the garden.
When I was told this story I remarked that he had displayed some bravery in acting in such a manner. No man cares to face an assassin unarmed.
The man looked across at me with a curious apprehensive glance, and replied:
“I was armed, sir. I took down one of the old Indian daggers from the hall.”
“Where is it now?” inquired the inspector, quickly, for at such a moment the admission that he had had a knife in his possession was sufficient to arouse a strong suspicion.
“I hung it up again, sir, before going out to call the doctor,” he replied quite calmly.
“Show me which it was,” I said; and he accompanied me out to the hall and pointed to a long thin knife which formed part of a trophy of antique Indian weapons.
In an instant I saw that such a knife had undoubtedly inflicted the wound in the dead man’s breast.
“So you armed yourself with this?” I remarked, taking down the knife with affected carelessness, and examining it.
“Yes, doctor. It was the first thing that came to hand. It’s sharp, for I cut myself once when cleaning it.”
I tried its edge, and found it almost as keen as a razor. It was about ten inches long, and not more than half an inch broad, with a hilt of carved ivory, yellow with age, and inlaid with fine lines of silver. Certainly a very dangerous weapon. The sheath was of purple velvet, very worn and faded.
I walked back to where the detectives were standing, and examined the blade beneath the light. It was bright, and had apparently been recently cleaned. It might have been cleaned and oil smeared upon it after the commission of the crime. Yet as far as I could discern with the naked eye there was no evidence that it had recently been used.
It was the man’s curious apprehensive glance that had first aroused my suspicion, and the admissions that he had opened the back door, and that he had been armed, both increased my mistrust. The detectives, too, were interested in the weapon, but were soon satisfied that, although a dangerous knife, it bore no stain of blood.
So I put it back in its case and replaced it. But I experienced some difficulty in getting the loop of wire back upon the brass-headed nail from which it was suspended; and it then occurred to me that Short, in the excitement of the discovery, and ordered by Ethelwynn to go at once in search of me, would not without some motive remain there, striving to return the knife to its place. Such action was unnatural. He would probably have cast it aside and dashed out in search of a cab. Indeed, the constable on the beat had seen him rush forth hurriedly and, urged by Ethelwynn, run in the direction of Kew Bridge.
No. Somehow I could not rid myself of the suspicion that the man was lying. To my professional eye the weapon with which the wound had been inflicted was the one which he admitted had been in his possession.
The story that he had unlocked the door and gone in search of the assassin struck the inspector, as it did myself, as a distinctly lame tale.
I longed for the opening of the telegraph office, so that I might summon my friend Jevons to my aid. He revelled in mysteries, and if the present one admitted of solution I felt confident that he would solve it.
People were about me the whole time. Hence I had no opportunity of re-examining the little object I had picked up from the spot where the murderer must have stood.
When morning dawned two detectives from Scotland Yard arrived, made notes of the circumstances, examined the open window in the conservatory, hazarded a few wise remarks, and closely scrutinised the dagger in the hall.
Ethelwynn had taken her sister to a friend in the vicinity, accompanied by the nurse and the cook. The house was now in the possession of the police, and it had already become known in the neighbourhood that old Mr. Courtenay was dead. In all probability early passers-by, men on their way to work, had noticed a constable in uniform enter or leave, and that had excited public curiosity. I hoped that Ambler Jevons would not delay, for I intended that he should be first in the field. If ever he had had a good mystery before him this certainly was one. I knew how keen was his scent for clues, and how carefully and ingeniously he worked when assisting the police to get at the bottom of any such affair.
He came a little after nine in hot haste, having driven from Hammersmith in a hansom. I wasupstairs when I heard his deep cheery voice crying to the inspector from Scotland Yard:
“Hulloa, Thorpe. What’s occurred? My friend Doctor Boyd has just wired to me.”
“Murder,” responded the inspector. “You’ll find the doctor somewhere about. He’ll explain it all to you. Queer case—very queer case, sir, it seems.”
“Is that you, Ambler?” I called over the banisters. “Come up here.”
He came up breathlessly, two steps at a time, and gripping my hand, asked:
“Who’s been murdered?”
“Old Mr. Courtenay.”
“The devil!” he ejaculated.
“A most mysterious affair,” I went on. “They called me soon after three, and I came down here, only to find the poor old gentleman stone dead—stabbed to the heart.”
“Let me see him,” my friend said in a sharp business-like tone, which showed that he intended to lose no time in sifting the matter. He had his own peculiar methods of getting at the bottom of a mystery. He worked independently, and although he assisted the police and was therefore always welcomed by them, his efforts were always apart, and generally marked by cunning ingenuity and swift logical reasoning that were alike remarkable and marvellous.
I gave him a brief terse outline of the tragedy, and then, unlocking the door of the room where the dead man still lay in the same position as when discovered, allowed him in.
The place was in darkness, so I drew up the Venetian blinds, letting in the grey depressing light of the wintry morning.
He advanced to the bed, stood in the exact spot where I had stood, and where without doubt the murderer had stood, and folding his arms gazed straight and long upon the dead man’s features.
Then he gave vent to a kind of dissatisfied grunt, and turned down the coverlet in order to examine the wound, while I stood by his side in silence.
Suddenly he swung round on his heel, and measured the paces between the bed and the door. Then he went to the window and looked out; afterwards making a tour of the room slowly, his dark eyes searching everywhere. He did not open his lips in the presence of the dead. He only examined everything, swiftly and yet carefully, opening the door slowly and closing it just as slowly, in order to see whether it creaked or not.
It creaked when closed very slowly. The creaking was evidently what the under-housemaid had heard and believed to be the creaking of boots. The murderer, finding that it creaked, had probably closed it by degrees; hence it gave a series of creaks, which to the girl had sounded in the silence of the night like those of new boots.
Ambler Jevons had, almost at the opening of his inquiry, cleared up one point which had puzzled us.
When he had concluded his examination of the room and re-covered the dead face with the sheet,we emerged into the corridor. Then I told him of the servant’s statement.
“Boots!” he echoed in a tone of impatience. “Would a murderer wear creaking boots? It was the door, of course. It opens noiselessly, but when closed quietly it creaks. Curious, however, that he should have risked the creaking and the awakening of the household in order to close it. He had some strong motive in doing so.”
“He evidently had a motive in the crime,” I remarked. “If we could only discover it, we might perhaps fix upon the assassin.”
“Yes,” he exclaimed, thoughtfully. “But to tell the truth, Ralph, old chap, the fact which is puzzling me most of all at this moment is that extraordinary foreboding of evil which you confessed to me the day before yesterday. You had your suspicions aroused, somehow. Cudgel your brains, and think what induced that very curious presage of evil.”
“I’ve tried and tried over again, but I can fix on nothing. Only yesterday afternoon, when Sir Bernard incidentally mentioned old Mr. Courtenay, it suddenly occurred to me that the curious excitement within me had some connection with him. Of course he was a patient, and I may have studied his case and given a lot of thought to it, but that wouldn’t account for such an oppression as that from which I’ve been suffering.”
“You certainly did have the blues badly the night before last,” he said frankly. “And by some unaccountable manner your curious feeling was anintuition of this tragic occurrence. Very odd and mysterious, to say the least.”
“Uncanny, I call it,” I declared.
“Yes, I agree with you,” he answered. “It is an uncanny affair altogether. Tell me about the ladies. Where are they?”
I explained how Mrs. Courtenay had been absent, and how she had been prostrated by the news of his death.
He stroked his moustache slowly, deeply reflecting.
“Then at present she doesn’t know that he’s been murdered? She thinks that he was taken ill, and expired suddenly?”
“Exactly.”
And I went on to describe the wild scene which followed my admission that her husband was dead. I explained it to him in detail, for I saw that his thoughts were following in the same channel as my own. We both pitied the unfortunate woman. My friend knew her well, for he had often accompanied me there and had spent the evening with us. Ethelwynn liked him for his careless Bohemianism, and for the fund of stories always at his command. Sometimes he used to entertain us for hours together, relating details of mysteries upon which he had at one time or another been engaged. Women are always fond of mysteries, and he often held both of them breathless by his vivid narratives.
Thorpe, the detective from Scotland Yard, a big, sturdily-built, middle-aged man, whose hair was tinged with grey, and whose round, rosy face made himappear the picture of good health, joined us a moment later. In a low, mysterious tone he explained to my friend the circumstance of Short having admitted possession of the knife hanging in the hall.
In it Ambler Jevons at once scented a clue.
“I never liked that fellow!” he exclaimed, turning to me. “My impression has always been that he was a sneak, and told old Courtenay everything that went on, either in drawing-room or kitchen.”
Thorpe, continuing, explained how the back door had been found unfastened, and how Short had admitted unfastening it in order to go forth to seek the assassin.
“A ridiculous story—utterly absurd!” declared Jevons. “A man doesn’t rush out to shed blood for blood like that!”
“Of course not,” agreed the detective. “To my mind appearances are entirely against this fellow. Yet, we have one fact to bear in mind, namely, that being sent to town twice he was afforded every opportunity for escape.”
“He was artful,” I remarked. “He knew that his safest plan was to remain and face it. If, as seems very probable, the crime was planned, it was certainly carried out at a most propitious moment.”
“It certainly was,” observed my friend, carefully scrutinising the knife, which Thorpe had brought to him. “This,” he said, “must be examined microscopically. You can do that, Boyd. It will be easy to see if there are any traces of blood upon it. To all appearances it has been recently cleaned and oiled.”
“Short admits cleaning it, but he says he did so three days ago,” I exclaimed.
He gave vent to another low grunt, from which I knew that the explanation was unsatisfactory, and replaced the knife in its faded velvet sheath.
Save for the man upon whom suspicion had thus fallen, the servants had all gone to the house where their mistress was lodged, after being cautioned by the police to say nothing of the matter, and to keep their mouths closed to all the reporters who would no doubt very soon be swarming into the district eager for every scrap of information. Their evidence would be required at the inquest, and the police forbade them, until then, to make any comment, or to give any explanation of the mysterious affair. The tongues of domestics wag quickly and wildly in such cases, and have many times been the means of defeating the ends of justice by giving away important clues to the Press.
Ambler Jevons, however, was a practised hand at mysteries. He sat down in the library, and with his crabbed handwriting covered two sheets of paper with notes upon the case. I watched as his pencil went swiftly to work, and when he had finished I saw him underline certain words he had written.
“Thorpe appears to suspect that fellow Short,” he remarked, when I met him again in the library a quarter of an hour later. “I’ve just been chatting with him, and to me his demeanour is not that of a guilty man. He’s actually been upstairs with the coroner’s officer in the dead man’s room. A murderergenerally excuses himself from entering the presence of his victim.”
“Well,” I exclaimed, after a pause, “you know the whole circumstances now. Can you see any clue which may throw light on the affair?”
He slowly twisted his moustache again; then twisted his plain gold ring slowly round the little finger on the left hand—a habit of his when perplexed.
“No, Ralph, old chap; can’t say I do,” he answered. “There’s an unfathomable mystery somewhere, but in what direction I’m utterly at a loss to distinguish.”
“But do you think that the assassin is a member of the household? That seems to me our first point to clear up.”
“That’s just where we’re perplexed. Thorpe suspects Short; but the police so often rush to conclusions on a single suspicion. Before condemning him it is necessary to watch him narrowly, and note his demeanour and his movements. If he is guilty he’ll betray himself sooner or later. Thorpe was foolish to take down that knife a second time. The fellow might have seen him and had his suspicions aroused thereby. That’s the worst of police inquiries. They display so little ingenuity. It is all method—method—method. Everything must be done by rule. They appear to overlook the fact that a window in the conservatory was undoubtedly left open,” he added.
“Well?” I asked, noticing that he was gazing at me strangely, full in the face.
“Well, has it not occurred to you that that window might have been purposely left open?”
“You mean that the assassin entered and left by that window?”
“I mean to suggest that the murder might have been connived at by one of the household, if the man we suspect were not the actual assassin himself.”
The theory was a curious one, but I saw that there were considerable grounds for it. As in many suburban houses, the conservatory joined the drawing-room, an unlocked glass door being between them. The window that had been left unfastened was situated at the further end, and being low down was in such a position that any intruder might easily have entered and left. Therefore the suggestion appeared a sound one—more especially so because the cook had most solemnly declared that she had fastened it securely before going up to bed.
In that case someone must have crept down and unfastened it after the woman had retired, and done so with the object of assisting the assassin.
But Ambler Jevons was not a man to remain idle for a single moment when once he became interested in a mystery. To his keen perception and calm logical reasoning had been due the solution of “The Mornington Crescent Mystery,” which, as all readers of this narrative will remember, for six months utterly perplexed Scotland Yard; while in a dozen other notable cases his discoveries had placed the police on the scent of the guilty person. Somehow he seemed to possess a peculiar facility in the solving of enigmas.At ordinary times he struck one as a rather careless, easy-going man, who drifted on through life, tasting and dealing in tea, with regular attendance at Mark Lane each day. Sometimes he wore a pair of cheap pince-nez, the frames of which were rusty, but these he seldom assumed unless he was what he termed “at work.” He was at work now, and therefore had stuck the pince-nez on the bridge of his nose, giving him a keener and rather more intelligent appearance.
“Excuse me,” he exclaimed, suddenly twisting his ring again round his finger. “I’ve just thought of something else. I won’t be a moment,” and he rushed from the library and ran upstairs to the floor above.
His absence gave me an opportunity to re-examine the little object which I had picked up from the floor at the earlier stages of the inquiry; and advancing to the window I took it from my pocket and looked again at it, utterly confounded.
Its appearance presented nothing extraordinary, for it was merely a soft piece of hard-knotted cream-coloured chenille about half-an-inch long. But sight of it lying in the palm of my hand held me spellbound in horror.
It told me the awful truth. It was nothing less than a portion of the fringe of the cream shawl which my love had been wearing, and just as chenille fringes will come to pieces, it had become detached and fallen where she had stood at that spot beside the victim’s bed.
There was a smear of blood upon it.
I recollected her strangely nervous manner, her anxiety to ascertain what clue we had discovered and to know the opinion of the police. Yes, if guilt were ever written upon a woman’s face, it was upon hers.
Should I show the tiny fragment to my friend? Should I put it into his hands and tell him the bitter truth—the truth that I believed my love to be a murderess?
The revelation held me utterly dumfounded.
Already I had, by placing my hand in contact with the shawl, ascertained its exact texture, and saw that both its tint and its fabric were unquestionably the same as the knotted fragment I held in my hand. Chenille shawls, as every woman knows, must be handled carefully or the lightly-made fringe will come asunder; for the kind of cord of floss silk is generally made upon a single thread, which will break with the slightest strain.
By some means the shawl in question had accidentally become entangled—or perhaps been strained by the sudden uplifting of the arm of the wearer. In any case the little innocent-looking fragment had snapped, and dropped at the bedside of the murdered man.
The grave suspicions of Ethelwynn which I had held on the previous night when she endeavoured to justify her sister’s neglect again crowded upon me, and Sir Bernard’s hint at the secret of her past thrust the iron deeply into my heart.
My eyes were fixed upon the little object in my palm—the silent but damning evidence—and my mind became filled by bitterest regrets. I saw how cleverly I had been duped—I recognised that this woman,whom I thought an angel, was only a cunning assassin.
No, believe me: I was not prejudging her! The thought had already occurred to me that she might have entered the room wearing that shawl perhaps to wish the invalid good-night. She had, however, in answer to my question, declared that she had retired to bed without seeing him—for Nurse Kate had told her that he was sleeping. She had therefore not disturbed him.
Then, yet another thought had occurred to me. She might have worn the shawl when she entered after the raising of the alarm. In order to clear up that point I had questioned the servants, one by one, and all had told me the same story, namely, that Miss Ethelwynn had not entered the room at all. She had only come to the door and glanced in, then turned away in horror and shut herself in her own room. As far as anyone knew, she had not summoned sufficient courage to go in and look upon the dead man’s face. She declared herself horrified, and dared not to enter the death chamber.
In the light of my discovery all these facts as related to me made the truth only too apparent. She had entered there unknown to anyone, and that her presence had been with a fell purpose I could no longer doubt.
If I gave the clue into Ambler Jevons’ hands he would, I knew, quickly follow it, gathering up the threads of the tangled skein one by one, until hecould openly charge her with the crime. I stood undecided how to act. Should I leave my friend to make his own investigations independently and unbiassed, or should I frankly tell him of my own startling discovery?
I carefully went through the whole of the circumstances, weighing point after point, and decided at last to still retain the knowledge I had gained. The point which outbalanced my intention was that curious admission of Short regarding the possession of the knife. So I resolved to say nothing to my friend until after the inquest.
As may be imagined, the London papers that afternoon were full of the mystery. Nothing like a first-class “sensation,” sub-editors will tell you. There is art in alliterative headlines and startling “cross-heads.” The inevitable interview with “a member of the family”—who is generally anonymous, be it said—is sure to be eagerly devoured by the public. The world may sneer at sensational journalism, but after all it loves to have its curiosity excited over the tragic dénouement of some domestic secret. As soon as the first information reached the Central News and Press Association, therefore, reporters crowded upon us. Representatives, not only of the metropolitan press, but those of the local newspapers, the “Richmond and Twickenham Times,” the “Independent,” over at Brentford, the “Middlesex Chronicle” at Hounslow, and the “Middlesex Mercury,” of Isleworth, all vied with each other in obtaining the most accurate information.
“Say nothing,” Jevons urged. “Be civil, but keep your mouth closed tight. There are one or two friends of mine among the crowd. I’ll see them and give them something that will carry the story further. Remember, you mustn’t make any statement whatsoever.”
I obeyed him, and although the reporters followed me about all the morning, and outside the house the police had difficulty in preventing a crowd assembling, I refused to express any opinion or describe anything I had witnessed.
At eleven o’clock I received a wire from Sir Bernard at Hove as follows:—
“Much shocked at news. Unfortunately very unwell, but shall endeavour to be with you later in the day.”
At mid-day I called at the neighbour’s house close to Kew Gardens Station, where the widow and her sister had taken refuge. Mrs. Courtenay was utterly broken down, for Ethelwynn had told her the terrible truth that her husband had been murdered, and both women pounced upon me eagerly to ascertain what theory the police now held.
I looked at the woman who had held me so long beneath her spell. Was it possible that one so open-faced and pure could be the author of so dastardly and cowardly a crime? Her face was white and anxious, but the countenance had now reassumed its normal innocence of expression, and in her eyes I saw the genuine love-look of old. She had arranged her hair and dress, and no longer wore the shawl.
“It’s terrible—terrible, Ralph,” she cried. “Poor Mary! The blow has utterly crushed her.”
“I am to blame—it is my own fault!” exclaimed the young widow, hoarsely. “But I had no idea that his end was so near. I tried to be a dutiful wife, but oh—only Ethelwynn knows how hard it was, and how I suffered. His malady made him unbearable, and instead of quarrelling I thought the better plan was to go out and leave him with the nurse. What people have always said, was, alas! too true. Owing to the difference of our ages our marriage was a ghastly failure. And now it has ended in a tragedy.”
I responded in words as sympathetic as I could find tongue to utter. Her eyes were red with crying, and her pretty face was swollen and ugly. I knew that she now felt a genuine regret at the loss of her husband, even though her life had been so dull and unhappy.
While she sat in a big armchair bowed in silence, I turned to Ethelwynn and discussed the situation with her. Their friends were most kind, she said. The husband was churchwarden at Kew Church, and his wife was an ardent church worker, hence they had long ago become excellent friends.
“You have your friend, Mr. Jevons, with you, I hear. Nurse has just returned and told me so.”
“Yes,” I responded. “He is making an independent inquiry.”
“And what has he found?” she inquired breathlessly.
“Nothing.”
Then, as I watched her closely, I saw that she breathed again more freely. By the manner in which she uttered Ambler’s name I detected that she was not at all well-disposed towards him. Indeed, she spoke as though she feared that he might discover the truth.
After half-an-hour I left, and more puzzled than ever, returned to the house in Richmond Road. Sometimes I felt entirely convinced that my love was authoress of the foul deed; yet at others there seemed something wanting in the confirmation of my suspicions. Regarding the latter I could not overlook the fact that Short had told a story which was false on the face of it, while the utter absence of any motive on my love’s part in murdering the old gentleman seemed to point in an entirely opposite direction.
Dr. Diplock, the coroner, had fixed the inquest for eleven o’clock on the morrow; therefore I assisted Dr. Farmer, of Kew, the police surgeon, to make the post-mortem.
We made the examination in the afternoon, before the light faded, and if the circumstances of the crime were mysterious, the means by which the unfortunate man was murdered were, we found, doubly so.
Outwardly, the wound was an ordinary one, one inch in breadth, inflicted by a blow delivered from left to right. The weapon had entered between the fourth and fifth ribs, and the heart had been completely transfixed by some sharp cutting instrument. The injuries we discovered within, however, increased the mystery ten-fold, for we found two extraordinarylateral incisions, which almost completely divided the heart from side to side, the only remaining attachment of the upper portion to the lower being a small portion of the anterior wall of the heart behind the sternum.
Such a wound was absolutely beyond explanation.
The instrument with which the crime had been committed by striking between the ribs had penetrated to the heart with an unerring precision, making a terrible wound eight times the size within, as compared with the exterior puncture. And yet the weapon had been withdrawn, and was missing!
For fully an hour we measured and discussed the strange discovery, hoping all the time that Sir Bernard would arrive. The knife which the man Short confessed he had taken down in self-defence we compared with the exterior wound and found, as we anticipated, that just such a wound could be caused by it. But the fact that the exterior cut was cleanly done, while the internal injuries were jagged and the tissues torn in a most terrible manner, caused a doubt to arise whether the Indian knife, which was double-edged, had actually been used. To be absolutely clear upon this point it would be necessary to examine it microscopically, for the corpuscles of human blood are easily distinguished beneath the lens.
We were about to conclude our examination in despair, utterly unable to account for the extraordinary wound, when the door opened and Sir Bernard entered.
He looked upon the body of his old friend, not a pleasing spectacle indeed, and then grasped my hand without a word.
“I read the evening paper on my way up,” he said at last in a voice trembling with emotion. “The affair seems very mysterious. Poor Courtenay! Poor fellow!”
“It is sad—very sad,” I remarked. “We have just concluded the post-mortem;” and then I introduced the police surgeon to the man whose name was a household word throughout the medical profession.
I showed my chief the wound, explained its extraordinary features, and asked his opinion. He removed his coat, turned up his shirt-cuffs, adjusted his big spectacles, and, bending beside the board upon which the body lay, made a long and careful inspection of the injury.
“Extraordinary!” he ejaculated. “I’ve never known of such a wound before. One would almost suspect an explosive bullet, if it were not for the clean incised wound on the exterior. The ribs seem grazed, yet the manner in which such a hurt has been inflicted is utterly unaccountable.”
“We have been unable to solve the enigma,” Dr. Farmer observed. “I was an army surgeon before I entered private practice, but I have never seen a similar case.”
“Nor have I,” responded Sir Bernard. “It is most puzzling.”
“Do you think that this knife could have been used?” I asked, handing my chief the weapon.
He looked at it, raised it in his hand as though to strike, felt its edge, and then shook his head, saying: “No, I think not. The instrument used wasonly sharp on one edge. This has both edges sharpened.”
It was a point we had overlooked, but at once we agreed with him, and abandoned our half-formed theory that the Indian dagger had caused the wound.
With Sir Bernard we made an examination of the tongue and other organs, in order to ascertain the progress of the disease from which the deceased had been suffering, but a detailed account of our discoveries can have no interest for the lay reader.
In a word, our conclusions were that the murdered man could easily have lived another year or more. The disease was not so advanced as we had believed. Sir Bernard had a patient to see in Grosvenor Square; therefore he left at about four o’clock, regretting that he had not time to call round at the neighbour’s and express his sympathy with the widow.
“Give her all my sympathies, poor young lady,” he said to me. “And tell her that I will call upon her to-morrow.” Then, after promising to attend the inquest and give evidence regarding the post-mortem, he shook hands with us both and left.
At eight o’clock that evening I was back in my own rooms in Harley Place, eating my dinner alone, when Ambler Jevons entered.
He was not as cheery as usual. He did not exclaim, as was his habit, “Well, my boy, how goes it? Whom have you killed to-day?” or some such grim pleasantry.
On the contrary, he came in with scarcely a word, threw his hat upon a side table, and sank into his usual armchair with scarcely a word, save the question uttered in almost a growl:
“May I smoke?”
“Of course,” I said, continuing my meal. “Where have you been?”
“I left while you were cutting up the body,” he said. “I’ve been about a lot since then, and I’m a bit tired.”
“You look it. Have a drink?”
“No,” he responded, shaking his head. “I don’t drink when I’m bothered. This case is an absolute mystery.” And striking a match he lit his foul pipe and puffed away vigorously, staring straight into the fire the while.
“Well,” I asked, after a long silence. “What’s your opinion now?”
“I’ve none,” he answered, gloomily. “What’s yours?”
“Mine is that the mystery increases hourly.”
“What did you find at the cutting-up?”
In a few words I explained the unaccountable nature of the wound, drawing for him a rough diagram on the back of an old envelope, which I tossed over to where he sat.
He looked at it for a long time without speaking, then observed:
“H’m! Just as I thought. The police theory regarding that fellow Short and the knife is all a confounded myth. Depend upon it, Boyd, old chap,that gentleman is no fool. He’s tricked Thorpe finely—and with a motive, too.”
“What motive do you suspect?” I inquired, eagerly, for this was an entirely fresh theory.
“One that you’d call absurd if I were to tell it to you now. I’ll explain later on, when my suspicions are confirmed—as I feel sure they will be before long.”
“You’re mysterious, Ambler,” I said, surprised. “Why?”
“I have a reason, my dear chap,” was all the reply he vouchsafed. Then he puffed again vigorously at his pipe, and filled the room with clouds of choking smoke of a not particularly good brand of tobacco.