The Yellow Claw
by
Sax Rohmer
Part 1 out of 7
This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, charlie@idirect.com.
The Yellow Claw
by Sax Rohmer
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I THE LADY OF THE CIVET FURS
II MIDNIGHT--AND MR. KING
III INSPECTOR DUNBAR TAKES CHARGE
IV A WINDOW IS OPENED
V DOCTORS DIFFER
VI AT SCOTLAND YARD
VII THE MAN IN THE LIMOUSINE
VIII CABMEN TWO
IX THE MAN IN BLACK
X THE GREAT UNDERSTANDING
XI PRESENTING M. GASTON MAX
XII MR. GIANAPOLIS
XIII THE DRAFT ON PARIS
XIV EAST 18642
XV CAVE OF THE GOLDEN DRAGON
XVI HO-PIN'S CATACOMBS
XVII KAN-SUH CONCESSIONS
XVIII THE WORLD ABOVE
XIX THE LIVING DEAD
XX ABRAHAM LEVINSKY BUTTS IN
XXI THE STUDIO IN SOHO
XXII M. MAX MOUNTS CAGLIOSTRO'S STAIRCASE
XXIII RAID IN THE RUE ST.-CLAUDE
XXIV OPIUM
XXV FATE'S SHUTTLECOCK
XXVI "OUR LADY OF THE POPPIES"
XXVII GROVE OF A MILLION APES
XXVIII THE OPIUM AGENT
XXIX M. MAX OF LONDON AND M. MAX OF PARIS
XXX MAHARA
XXXI MUSK AND ROSES
XXXII BLUE BLINDS
XXXIII LOGIC VS. INTUITION
XXXIV M. MAX REPORTS PROGRESS
XXXV TRACKER TRACKED
XXXVI IN DUNBAR'S ROOM
XXXVII THE WHISTLE
XXXVIII THE SECRET TRAPS
XXXIX THE LABYRINTH
XL DAWN AT THE NORE
XLI WESTMINSTER--MIDNIGHT
THE YELLOW CLAW
I
THE LADY OF THE CIVET FURS
Henry Leroux wrote busily on. The light of the table-lamp,
softened and enriched by its mosaic shade, gave an appearance of
added opulence to the already handsome appointments of the room.
The little table-clock ticked merrily from half-past eleven to a
quarter to twelve.
Into the cozy, bookish atmosphere of the novelist's study
penetrated the muffled chime of Big Ben; it chimed the three-
quarters. But, with his mind centered upon his work, Leroux wrote
on ceaselessly.
An odd figure of a man was this popular novelist, with patchy and
untidy hair which lessened the otherwise striking contour of his
brow. A neglected and unpicturesque figure, in a baggy, neutral-
colored dressing-gown; a figure more fitted to a garret than to
this spacious, luxurious workroom, with the soft light playing upon
rank after rank of rare and costly editions, deepening the tones in
the Persian carpet, making red morocco more red, purifying the
vellum and regilding the gold of the choice bindings, caressing
lovingly the busts and statuettes surmounting the book-shelves, and
twinkling upon the scantily-covered crown of Henry Leroux. The
door bell rang.
Leroux, heedless of external matters, pursued his work. But the
door bell rang again and continued to ring.
"Soames! Soames!" Leroux raised his voice irascibly, continuing
to write the while. "Where the devil are you! Can't you hear the
door bell?"
Soames did not reveal himself; and to the ringing of the bell was
added the unmistakable rattling of a letter-box.
"Soames!" Leroux put down his pen and stood up. "Damn it! he's
out! I have no memory!"
He retied the girdle of his dressing-gown, which had become
unfastened, and opened the study door. Opposite, across the
entrance lobby, was the outer door; and in the light from the lobby
lamp he perceived two laughing eyes peering in under the upraised
flap of the letter-box. The ringing ceased.
"Are you VERY angry with me for interrupting you?" cried a girl's
voice.
"My dear Miss Cumberly!" said Leroux without irritation; "on the
contrary--er--I am delighted to see you--or rather to hear you.
There is nobody at home, you know." . . .
"I DO know," replied the girl firmly, "and I know something else,
also. Father assures me that you simply STARVE yourself when Mrs.
Leroux is away! So I have brought down an omelette!"
"Omelette!" muttered Leroux, advancing toward the door; "you have--
er--brought an omelette! I understand--yes; you have brought an
omelette? Er--that is very good of you."
He hesitated when about to open the outer door, raising his hands
to his dishevelled hair and unshaven chin. The flap of the letter-
box dropped; and the girl outside could be heard stifling her
laughter.
"You must think me--er--very rude," began Leroux; "I mean--not to
open the door. But" . . .
"I quite understand," concluded the voice of the unseen one. "You
are a most untidy object! And I shall tell Mira DIRECTLY she
returns that she has no right to leave you alone like this! Now I
am going to hurry back upstairs; so you may appear safely. Don't
let the omelette get cold. Good night!"
"No, certainly I shall not!" cried Leroux. "So good of you--I--er--
do like omelette. . . . Good night!"
Calmly he returned to his writing-table, where, in the pursuit of
the elusive character whose exploits he was chronicling and who had
brought him fame and wealth, he forgot in the same moment Helen
Cumberly and the omelette.
The table-clock ticked merrily on; SCRATCH--SCRATCH--SPLUTTER--
SCRATCH--went Henry Leroux's pen; for this up-to-date litterateur,
essayist by inclination, creator of "Martin Zeda, Criminal
Scientist" by popular clamor, was yet old-fashioned enough, and
sufficient of an enthusiast, to pen his work, while lesser men
dictated.
So, amidst that classic company, smiling or frowning upon him from
the oaken shelves, where Petronius Arbiter, exquisite, rubbed
shoulders with Balzac, plebeian; where Omar Khayyam leaned
confidentially toward Philostratus; where Mark Twain, standing
squarely beside Thomas Carlyle, glared across the room at George
Meredith, Henry Leroux pursued the amazing career of "Martin Zeda."
It wanted but five minutes to the hour of midnight, when again the
door bell clamored in the silence.
Leroux wrote steadily on. The bell continued to ring, and,
furthermore, the ringer could be heard beating upon the outer door.
"Soames!" cried Leroux irritably, "Soames! Why the hell don't you
go to the door!"
Leroux stood up, dashing his pen upon the table.
"I shall have to sack that damned man!" he cried; "he takes too
many liberties--stopping out until this hour of the night!"
He pulled open the study door, crossed the hallway, and opened the
door beyond.
In, out of the darkness--for the stair lights had been
extinguished--staggered a woman; a woman whose pale face exhibited,
despite the ravages of sorrow or illness, signs of quite unusual
beauty. Her eyes were wide opened, and terror-stricken, the pupils
contracted almost to vanishing point. She wore a magnificent cloak
of civet fur wrapped tightly about her, and, as Leroux opened the
door, she tottered past him into the lobby, glancing back over her
shoulder.
With his upraised hands plunged pathetically into the mop of his
hair, Leroux turned and stared at the intruder. She groped as if a
darkness had descended, clutched at the sides of the study doorway,
and then, unsteadily, entered--and sank down upon the big
chesterfield in utter exhaustion.
Leroux, rubbing his chin, perplexedly, walked in after her. He
scarcely had his foot upon the study carpet, ere the woman started
up, tremulously, and shot out from the enveloping furs a bare arm
and a pointing, quivering finger.
"Close the door!" she cried hoarsely--"close the door! . . . He
has . . . followed me!" . . .
The disturbed novelist, as a man in a dream, turned, retraced his
steps, and closed the outer door of the flat. Then, rubbing his
chin more vigorously than ever and only desisting from this
exercise to fumble in his dishevelled hair, he walked back into the
study, whose Athenean calm had thus mysteriously been violated.
Two minutes to midnight; the most respectable flat in respectable
Westminster; a lonely and very abstracted novelist--and a pale-
faced, beautiful woman, enveloped in costly furs, sitting staring
with fearful eyes straight before her. This was such a scene as
his sense of the proprieties and of the probabilities could never
have permitted Henry Leroux to create.
His visitor kept moistening her dry lips and swallowing,
emotionally.
Standing at a discreet distance from her:--
"Madam," began Leroux, nervously.
She waved her hand, enjoining him to silence, and at the same time
intimating that she would explain herself directly speech became
possible. Whilst she sought to recover her composure, Leroux,
gradually forcing himself out of the dreamlike state, studied her
with a sort of anxious curiosity.
It now became apparent to him that his visitor was no more than
twenty-five or twenty-six years of age, but illness or trouble, or
both together, had seared and marred her beauty. Amid the auburn
masses of her hair, gleamed streaks, not of gray, but of purest
white. The low brow was faintly wrinkled, and the big--unnaturally
big--eyes were purple shaded; whilst two heavy lines traced their
way from the corner of the nostrils to the corner of the mouth--of
the drooping mouth with the bloodless lips.
Her pallor became more strange and interesting the longer he
studied it; for, underlying the skin was a yellow tinge which he
found inexplicable, but which he linked in his mind with the
contracted pupils of her eyes, seeking vainly for a common cause.
He had a hazy impression that his visitor, beneath her furs, was
most inadequately clothed; and seeking confirmation of this, his
gaze strayed downward to where one little slippered foot peeped out
from the civet furs.
Leroux suppressed a gasp. He had caught a glimpse of a bare ankle!
He crossed to his writing-table, and seated himself, glancing
sideways at this living mystery. Suddenly she began, in a voice
tremulous and scarcely audible:--
"Mr. Leroux, at a great--at a very great personal risk, I have come
to-night. What I have to ask of you--to entreat of you, will . . .
will" . . .
Two bare arms emerged from the fur, and she began clutching at her
throat and bosom as though choking--dying.
Leroux leapt up and would have run to her; but forcing a ghastly
smile, she waved him away again.
"It is all right," she muttered, swallowing noisily. But frightful
spasms of pain convulsed her, contorting her pale face.
"Some brandy--!" cried Leroux, anxiously.
"If you please," whispered the visitor.
She dropped her arms and fell back upon the chesterfield,
insensible.
II
MIDNIGHT AND MR. KING
Leroux clutched at the corner of the writing-table to steady
himself and stood there looking at the deathly face. Under the
most favorable circumstances, he was no man of action, although in
common with the rest of his kind he prided himself upon the
possession of that presence of mind which he lacked. It was a
situation which could not have alarmed "Martin Zeda," but it
alarmed, immeasurably, nay, struck inert with horror, Martin Zeda's
creator.
Then, in upon Leroux's mental turmoil, a sensible idea intruded
itself.
"Dr. Cumberly!" he muttered. "I hope to God he is in!"
Without touching the recumbent form upon the chesterfield, without
seeking to learn, without daring to learn, if she lived or had
died, Leroux, the tempo of his life changed to a breathless gallop,
rushed out of the study, across the entrance hail, and, throwing
wide the flat door, leapt up the stair to the flat above--that of
his old friend, Dr. Cumberly.
The patter of the slippered feet grew faint upon the stair; then,
as Leroux reached the landing above, became inaudible altogether.
In Leroux's study, the table-clock ticked merrily on, seeming to
hasten its ticking as the hand crept around closer and closer to
midnight. The mosaic shade of the lamp mingled reds and blues and
greens upon the white ceiling above and poured golden light upon
the pages of manuscript strewn about beneath it. This was a
typical work-room of a literary man having the ear of the public--
typical in every respect, save for the fur-clad figure outstretched
upon the settee.
And now the peeping light indiscreetly penetrated to the hem of a
silken garment revealed by some disarrangement of the civet fur.
To the eye of an experienced observer, had such an observer been
present in Henry Leroux's study, this billow of silk and lace
behind the sheltering fur must have proclaimed itself the edge of a
night-robe, just as the ankle beneath had proclaimed itself to
Henry Leroux's shocked susceptibilities to be innocent of stocking.
Thirty seconds were wanted to complete the cycle of the day, when
one of the listless hands thrown across the back of the
chesterfield opened and closed spasmodically. The fur at the bosom
of the midnight visitor began rapidly to rise and fall.
Then, with a choking cry, the woman struggled upright; her hair,
hastily dressed, burst free of its bindings and poured in gleaming
cascade down about her shoulders.
Clutching with one hand at her cloak in order to keep it wrapped
about her, and holding the other blindly before her, she rose, and
with that same odd, groping movement, began to approach the
writing-table. The pupils of her eyes were mere pin-points flow;
she shuddered convulsively, and her skin was dewed with
perspiration. Her breath came in agonized gasps.
"God!--I . . . am dying . . . and I cannot--tell him!" she
breathed.
Feverishly, weakly, she took up a pen, and upon a quarto page,
already half filled with Leroux's small, neat, illegible writing,
began to scrawl a message, bending down, one hand upon the table,
and with her whole body shaking.
Some three or four wavering lines she had written, when intimately,
for the flat of Henry Leroux in Palace Mansions lay within sight of
the clock-face--Big Ben began to chime midnight.
The writer started back and dropped a great blot of ink upon the
paper; then, realizing the cause of the disturbance, forced herself
to continue her task.
The chime being completed: ONE! boomed the clock; TWO! . . . THREE!
. . . FOUR! . . .
The light in the entrance-hall went out!
FIVE! boomed Big Ben;--SIX! . . . SEVEN! . . .
A hand, of old ivory hue, a long, yellow, clawish hand, with part
of a sinewy forearm, crept in from the black lobby through the
study doorway and touched the electric switch!
EIGHT! . . .
The study was plunged in darkness!
Uttering a sob--a cry of agony and horror that came from her very
soul--the woman stood upright and turned to face toward the door,
clutching the sheet of paper in one rigid hand.
Through the leaded panes of the window above the writing-table
swept a silvern beam of moonlight. It poured, searchingly, upon
the fur-clad figure swaying by the table; cutting through the
darkness of the room like some huge scimitar, to end in a pallid
pool about the woman's shadow on the center of the Persian carpet.
Coincident with her sobbing cry--NINE! boomed Big Ben; TEN! . . .
Two hands--with outstretched, crooked, clutching fingers--leapt
from the darkness into the light of the moonbeam.
"God! Oh, God!" came a frenzied, rasping shriek--"MR. KING!"
Straight at the bare throat leapt the yellow hands; a gurgling cry
rose--fell--and died away.
Gently, noiselessly, the lady of the civet fur sank upon the carpet
by the table; as she fell, a dim black figure bent over her. The
tearing of paper told of the note being snatched from her frozen
grip; but never for a moment did the face or the form of her
assailant encroach upon the moonbeam.
Batlike, this second and terrible visitant avoided the light.
The deed had occupied so brief a time that but one note of the
great bell had accompanied it.
TWELVE! rang out the final stroke from the clock-tower. A low,
eerie whistle, minor, rising in three irregular notes and falling
in weird, unusual cadence to silence again, came from somewhere
outside the room.
Then darkness--stillness--with the moon a witness of one more
ghastly crime.
Presently, confused and intermingled voices from above proclaimed
the return of Leroux with the doctor. They were talking in an
excited key, the voice of Leroux, especially, sounding almost
hysterical. They created such a disturbance that they attracted
the attention of Mr. John Exel, M. P., occupant of the flat below,
who at that very moment had returned from the House and was about
to insert the key in the lock of his door. He looked up the
stairway, but, all being in darkness, was unable to detect
anything. Therefore he called out:--
"Is that you, Leroux? Is anything the matter?"
"Matter, Exel!" cried Leroux; "there's a devil of a business! For
mercy's sake, come up!"
His curiosity greatly excited, Mr. Exel mounted the stairs,
entering the lobby of Leroux's flat immediately behind the owner
and Dr. Cumberly--who, like Leroux, was arrayed in a dressing-gown;
for he had been in bed when summoned by his friend.
"You are all in the dark, here," muttered Dr. Cumberly, fumbling
for the switch.
"Some one has turned the light out!" whispered Leroux, nervously;
"I left it on."
Dr. Cumberly pressed the switch, turning up the lobby light as Exel
entered from the landing. Then Leroux, entering the study first of
the three, switched on the light there, also.
One glance he threw about the room, then started back like a man
physically stricken.
"Cumberly!" he gasped, "Cumberly"--and he pointed to the furry heap
by the writing-table.
"You said she lay on the chesterfield," muttered Cumberly.
"I left her there." . . .
Dr. Cumberly crossed the room and dropped upon his knees. He
turned the white face toward the light, gently parted the civet
fur, and pressed his ear to the silken covering of the breast. He
started slightly and looked into the glazing eyes.
Replacing the fur which he had disarranged, the physician stood up
and fixed a keen gaze upon the face of Henry Leroux. The latter
swallowed noisily, moistening his parched lips.
"Is she" . . . he muttered; "is she" . . .
"God's mercy, Leroux!" whispered Mr. Exel--"what does this mean?"
"The woman is dead," said Dr. Cumberly.
In common with all medical men, Dr. Cumberly was a physiognomist;
he was a great physician and a proportionately great physiognomist.
Therefore, when he looked into Henry Leroux's eyes, he saw there,
and recognized, horror and consternation. With no further evidence
than that furnished by his own powers of perception, he knew that
the mystery of this woman's death was as inexplicable to Henry
Leroux as it was inexplicable to himself.
He was a masterful man, with the gray eyes of a diplomat, and he
knew Leroux as did few men. He laid both hands upon the novelist's
shoulders.
"Brace up, old chap!" he said; "you will want all your wits about
you."
"I left her," began Leroux, hesitatingly--"I left" . . .
"We know all about where you left her, Leroux," interrupted
Cumberly; "but what we want to get at is this: what occurred
between the time you left her, and the time of our return?"
Exel, who had walked across to the table, and with a horror-
stricken face was gingerly examining the victim, now exclaimed:--
"Why! Leroux! she is--she is . . . UNDRESSED!"
Leroux clutched at his dishevelled hair with both hands.
"My dear Exel!" he cried--"my dear, good man! Why do you use that
tone? You say 'she is undressed!' as though I were responsible for
the poor soul's condition!"
"On the contrary, Leroux!" retorted Exel, standing very upright,
and staring through his monocle; "on the contrary, YOU misconstrue
ME! I did not intend to imply--to insinuate--"
"My dear Exel!" broke in Dr. Cumberly--"Leroux is perfectly well
aware that you intended nothing unkindly. But the poor chap, quite
naturally, is distraught at the moment. You MUST understand that,
man!"
"I understand; and I am sorry," said Exel, casting a sidelong
glance at the body. "Of course, it is a delicate subject. No
doubt Leroux can explain." . . .
"Damn your explanation!" shrieked Leroux hysterically. "I CANNOT
explain! If I could explain, I" . . .
"Leroux!" said Cumberly, placing his arm paternally about the
shaking man--"you are such a nervous subject. DO make an effort,
old fellow. Pull yourself together. Exel does not know the
circumstances--"
"I am curious to learn them," said the M. P. icily.
Leroux was about to launch some angry retort, but Cumberly forced
him into the chesterfield, and crossing to a bureau, poured out a
stiff peg of brandy from a decanter which stood there. Leroux sank
upon the chesterfield, rubbing his fingers up and down his palms
with a curious nervous movement and glancing at the dead woman, and
at Exel, alternately, in a mechanical, regular fashion, pathetic to
behold.
Mr. Exel, tapping his boot with the head of his inverted cane, was
staring fixedly at the doctor.
"Here you are, Leroux," said Cumberly; "drink this up, and let us
arrange our facts in decent order before we--"
"Phone for the police?" concluded Exel, his gaze upon the last
speaker.
Leroux drank the brandy at a gulp and put down the glass upon a
little persian coffee table with a hand which he had somehow
contrived to steady.
"You are keen on the official forms, Exel?" he said, with a wry
smile. "Please accept my apology for my recent--er--outburst, but
picture this thing happening in your place!"
"I cannot," declared Exel, bluntly.
"You lack imagination," said Cumberly. "Take a whisky and soda,
and help me to search the flat."
"Search the flat!"
The physician raised a forefinger, forensically.
"Since you, Exel, if not actually in the building, must certainly
have been within sight of the street entrance at the moment of the
crime, and since Leroux and I descended the stair and met you on
the landing, it is reasonable to suppose that the assassin can only
be in one place: HERE!"
"HERE!" cried Exel and Leroux, together.
"Did you see anyone leave the lower hall as you entered?"
"No one; emphatically, there was no one there!"
"Then I am right."
"Good God!" whispered Exel, glancing about him, with a new, and
keen apprehensiveness.
"Take your drink," concluded Cumberly, "and join me in my search."
"Thanks," replied Exel, nervously proffering a cigar-case; "but I
won't drink."
"As you wish," said the doctor, who thus, in his masterful way,
acted the host; "and I won't smoke. But do you light up."
"Later," muttered Exel; "later. Let us search, first."
Leroux stood up; Cumberly forced him back.
"Stay where you are, Leroux; it is elementary strategy to operate
from a fixed base. This study shall be the base. Ready, Exel?"
Exel nodded, and the search commenced. Leroux sat rigidly upon the
settee, his hands resting upon his knees, watching and listening.
Save for the merry ticking of the table-clock, and the movements of
the searchers from room to room, nothing disturbed the silence.
From the table, and that which lay near to it, he kept his gaze
obstinately averted.
Five or six minutes passed in this fashion, Leroux expecting each
to bring a sudden outcry. He was disappointed. The searchers
returned, Exel noticeably holding himself aloof and Cumberly very
stern.
Exel, a cigar between his teeth, walked to the writing-table,
carefully circling around the dreadful obstacle which lay in his
path, to help himself to a match. As he stooped to do so, he
perceived that in the closed right hand of the dead woman was a
torn scrap of paper.
"Leroux! Cumberly!" he exclaimed; "come here!"
He pointed with the match as Cumberly hurriedly crossed to his
side. Leroux, inert, remained where he sat, but watched with
haggard eyes. Dr. Cumberly bent down and sought to detach the
paper from the grip of the poor cold fingers, without tearing it.
Finally he contrived to release the fragment, and, perceiving it to
bear some written words, he spread it out beneath the lamp, on the
table, and eagerly scanned it, lowering his massive gray head close
to the writing.
He inhaled, sibilantly.
"Do you see, Exel?" he jerked--for Exel was bending over his
shoulder.
"I do--but I don't understand."
"What is it?" came hollowly from Leroux.
"It is the bottom part of an unfinished note," said Cumberly,
slowly. "It is written shakily in a woman's hand, and it reads:--
'Your wife'" . . .
Leroux sprang to his feet and crossed the room in three strides.
"Wife!" he muttered. His voice seemed to be choked in his throat;
"my wife! It says something about my wife?"
"It says," resumed the doctor, quietly, "'your wife.' Then there's
a piece torn out, and the two words 'Mr. King.' No stop follows,
and the line is evidently incomplete."
"My wife!" mumbled Leroux, staring unseeingly at the fragment of
paper. "MY WIFE! MR. KING! Oh! God! I shall go mad!"
"Sit down!" snapped Dr. Cumberly, turning to him; "damn it, Leroux,
you are worse than a woman!"
In a manner almost childlike, the novelist obeyed the will of the
stronger man, throwing himself into an armchair, and burying his
face in his hands.
"My wife!" he kept muttering--"my wife!" . . .
Exel and the doctor stood staring at one another; when suddenly,
from outside the flat, came a metallic clattering, followed by a
little suppressed cry. Helen Cumberly, in daintiest deshabille,
appeared in the lobby, carrying, in one hand, a chafing-dish, and,
in the other, the lid. As she advanced toward the study, from
whence she had heard her father's voice:--
"Why, Mr. Leroux!" she cried, "I shall CERTAINLY report you to
Mira, now! You have not even touched the omelette!"
"Good God! Cumberly! stop her!" muttered Exel, uneasily. "The
door was not latched!" . . .
But it was too late. Even as the physician turned to intercept his
daughter, she crossed the threshold of the study. She stopped
short at perceiving Exel; then, with a woman's unerring intuition,
divined a tragedy, and, in the instant of divination, sought for,
and found, the hub of the tragic wheel.
One swift glance she cast at the fur-clad form, prostrate.
The chafing-dish fell from her hand, and the omelette rolled, a
grotesque mass, upon the carpet. She swayed, dizzily, raising one
hand to her brow, but had recovered herself even as Leroux sprang
forward to support her.
"All right, Leroux!" cried Cumberly; "I will take her upstairs
again. Wait for me, Exel."
Exel nodded, lighted his cigar, and sat down in a chair, remote
from the writing-table.
"Mira--my wife!" muttered Leroux, standing, looking after Dr.
Cumberly and his daughter as they crossed the lobby. "She will
report to--my wife." . . .
In the outer doorway, Helen Cumberly looked back over her shoulder,
and her glance met that of Leroux. Hers was a healing glance and a
strengthening glance; it braced him up as nothing else could have
done. He turned to Exel.
"For Heaven's sake, Exel!" he said, evenly, "give me your advice--
give me your help; I am going to 'phone for the police."
Exel looked up with an odd expression.
"I am entirely at your service, Leroux," he said. "I can quite
understand how this ghastly affair has shaken you up."
"It was so sudden," said the other, plaintively. "It is incredible
that so much emotion can be crowded into so short a period of a
man's life." . . .
Big Ben chimed the quarter after midnight. Leroux, eyes averted,
walked to the writing-table, and took up the telephone.
III
INSPECTOR DUNBAR TAKES CHARGE
Detective-Inspector Dunbar was admitted by Dr. Cumberly. He was a
man of notable height, large-boned, and built gauntly and squarely.
His clothes fitted him ill, and through them one seemed to perceive
the massive scaffolding of his frame. He had gray hair retiring
above a high brow, but worn long and untidily at the back; a wire-
like straight-cut mustache, also streaked with gray, which served
to accentuate the grimness of his mouth and slightly undershot jaw.
A massive head, with tawny, leonine eyes; indeed, altogether a
leonine face, and a frame indicative of tremendous nervous energy.
In the entrance lobby he stood for a moment.
"My name is Cumberly," said the doctor, glancing at the card which
the Scotland Yard man had proffered. "I occupy the flat above."
"Glad to know you, Dr. Cumberly," replied the detective in a light
and not unpleasant voice--and the fierce eyes momentarily grew
kindly.
"This--" continued Cumberly, drawing Dunbar forward into the study,
"is my friend, Leroux--Henry Leroux, whose name you will know?"
"I have not that pleasure," replied Dunbar.
"Well," added Cumberly, "he is a famous novelist, and his flat,
unfortunately, has been made the scene of a crime. This is
Detective-Inspector Dunbar, who has come to solve our difficulties,
Leroux." He turned to where Exel stood upon the hearth-rug--toying
with his monocle. "Mr. John Exel, M. P."
"Glad to know you, gentlemen," said Dunbar.
Leroux rose from the armchair in which he had been sitting and
stared, drearily, at the newcomer. Exel screwed the monocle into
his right eye, and likewise surveyed the detective. Cumberly,
taking a tumbler from the bureau, said:--
"A scotch-and-soda, Inspector?"
"It is a suggestion," said Dunbar, "that, coming from a medical
man, appeals."
Whilst the doctor poured out the whisky and squirted the soda into
the glass, Inspector Dunbar, standing squarely in the middle of the
room, fixed his eyes upon the still form lying in the shadow of the
writing-table.
"You will have been called in, doctor," he said, taking the
proffered tumbler, "at the time of the crime?"
"Exactly!" replied Cumberly. "Mr. Leroux ran up to my fiat and
summoned me to see the woman."
"What time would that be?"
"Big Ben had just struck the final stroke of twelve when I came out
on to the landing."
"Mr. Leroux would be waiting there for you?"
"He stood in my entrance-lobby whilst I slipped on my dressing-
gown, and we came down together."
"I was entering from the street," interrupted Exel, "as they were
descending from above" . . .
"You can enter from the street, sir, in a moment," said Dunbar,
holding up his hand. "One witness at a time, if you please."
Exel shrugged his shoulders and turned slightly, leaning his elbow
upon the mantelpiece and flicking off the ash from his cigar.
"I take it you were in bed?" questioned Dunbar, turning again to
the doctor.
"I had been in bed about a quarter of an hour when I was aroused by
the ringing of the door-bell. This ringing struck me as so urgent
that I ran out in my pajamas, and found there Mr. Leroux, in a very
disturbed state--"
"What did he say? Give his own words as nearly as you remember
them."
Leroux, who had been standing, sank slowly back into the armchair,
with his eyes upon Dr. Cumberly as the latter replied:--
"He said 'Cumberly! Cumberly! For God's sake, come down at once;
there is a strange woman in my flat, apparently in a dying
condition!'"
"What did you do?"
"I ran into my bedroom and slipped on my dressing-gown, leaving Mr.
Leroux in the entrance-hall. Then, with the clock chiming the last
stroke of midnight, we came out together and I closed my door
behind me. There was no light on the stair; but our conversation--
Mr. Leroux was speaking in a very high-pitched voice" . . .
"What was he saying?"
"He was explaining to me how some woman, unknown to him, had
interrupted his work a few minutes before by ringing his door-
bell." . . .
Inspector Dunbar held up his hand.
"I won't ask you to repeat what he said, doctor; Mr. Leroux,
presently, can give me his own words."
"We had descended to this floor, then," resumed Cumberly, "when Mr.
Exel, entering below, called up to us, asking if anything was the
matter. Leroux replied, 'Matter, Exel! There's a devil of a
business! For mercy's sake, come up!'"
"Well?"
"Mr. Exel thereupon joined us at the door of this flat."
"Was it open?"
"Yes. Mr. Leroux had rushed up to me, leaving the door open behind
him. The light was out, both in the lobby and in the study, a fact
upon which I commented at the time. It was all the more curious as
Mr. Leroux had left both lights on!" . . .
"Did he say so?"
"He did. The circumstances surprised him to a marked degree. We
came in and I turned up the light in the lobby. Then Leroux,
entering the study, turned up the light there, too. I entered
next, followed by Mr. Exel--and we saw the body lying where you see
it now."
"Who saw it first?"
"Mr. Leroux; he drew my attention to it, saying that he had left
her lying on the chesterfield and NOT upon the floor."
"You examined her?"
"I did. She was dead, but still warm. She exhibited signs of
recent illness, and of being addicted to some drug habit; probably
morphine. This, beyond doubt, contributed to her death, but the
direct cause was asphyxiation. She had been strangled!"
"My God!" groaned Leroux, dropping his face into his hands.
"You found marks on her throat?"
"The marks were very slight. No great pressure was required in her
weak condition."
"You did not move the body?"
"Certainly not; a more complete examination must be made, of
course. But I extracted a piece of torn paper from her clenched
right hand."
Inspector Dunbar lowered his tufted brows.
"I'm not glad to know you did that," he said. "It should have been
left."
"It was done on the spur of the moment, but without altering the
position of the hand or arm. The paper lies upon the table,
yonder."
Inspector Dunbar took a long drink. Thus far he had made no
attempt to examine the victim. Pulling out a bulging note-case
from the inside pocket of his blue serge coat, he unscrewed a
fountain-pen, carefully tested the nib upon his thumb nail, and
made three or four brief entries. Then, stretching out one long
arm, he laid the wallet and the pen beside his glass upon the top
of a bookcase, without otherwise changing his position, and
glancing aside at Exel, said:--
"Now, Mr. Exel, what help can you give us?"
"I have little to add to Dr. Cumberly's account," answered Exel,
offhandedly. "The whole thing seemed to me" . . .
"What it seemed," interrupted Dunbar, " does not interest Scotland
Yard, Mr. Exel, and won't interest the jury."
Leroux glanced up for a moment, then set his teeth hard, so that
his jaw muscles stood out prominently under the pallid skin.
"What do you want to know, then?" asked Exel.
"I will be wanting to know," said Dunbar, "where you were coming
from, to-night?"
"From the House of Commons."
"You came direct?"
"I left Sir Brian Malpas at the corner of Victoria Street at four
minutes to twelve by Big Ben, and walked straight home, actually
entering here, from the street, as the clock was chiming the last
stroke of midnight."
"Then you would have walked up the street from an easterly
direction?"
"Certainly."
"Did you meet any one or anything?"
"A taxi-cab, empty--for the hood was lowered--passed me as I turned
the corner. There was no other vehicle in the street, and no
person."
"You don't know from which door the cab came?"
"As I turned the corner," replied Exel, "I heard the man starting
his engine, although when I actually saw the cab, it was in motion;
but judging by the sound to which I refer, the cab had been
stationary, if not at the door of Palace Mansions, certainly at
that of the next block--St. Andrew's Mansions."
"Did you hear, or see anything else?"
"I saw nothing whatever. But just as I approached the street door,
I heard a peculiar whistle, apparently proceeding from the gardens
in the center of the square. I attached no importance to it at the
time."
"What kind of whistle?"
"I have forgotten the actual notes, but the effect was very odd in
some way."
"In what way?"
"An impression of this sort is not entirely reliable, Inspector;
but it struck me as Oriental."
"Ah!" said Dunbar, and reached out the long arm for his notebook.
"Can I be of any further assistance?" said Exel, glancing at his
watch.
"You had entered the hall-way and were about to enter your own flat
when the voices of Dr. Cumberly and Mr. Leroux attracted your
attention?"
"I actually had the key in my hand," replied Exel.
"Did you actually have the key in the lock?"
"Let me think," mused Exel, and he took out a bunch of keys and
dangled them, reflectively, before his eyes. "No! I was fumbling
for the right key when I heard the voices above me."
"But were you facing your door?"
"No," averred Exel, perceiving the drift of the inspector's
inquiries; "I was facing the stairway the whole time, and although
it was in darkness, there is a street lamp immediately outside on
the pavement, and I can swear, positively, that no one descended;
that there was no one in the hall nor on the stair, except Mr.
Leroux and Dr. Cumberly."
"Ah!" said Dunbar again, and made further entries in his book.
"I need not trouble you further, sir. Good night!"
Exel, despite his earlier attitude of boredom, now ignored this
official dismissal, and, tossing the stump of his cigar into the
grate, lighted a cigarette, and with both hands thrust deep in his
pockets, stood leaning back against the mantlepiece. The detective
turned to Leroux.
"Have a brandy-and-soda?" suggested Dr. Cumberly, his eyes turned
upon the pathetic face of the novelist.
But Leroux shook his head, wearily.
"Go ahead, Inspector!" he said. "I am anxious to tell you all I
know. God knows I am anxious to tell you."
A sound was heard of a key being inserted in the lock of a door.
Four pairs of curious eyes were turned toward the entrance lobby,
when the door opened, and a sleek man of medium height, clean
shaven, but with his hair cut low upon the cheek bones, so as to
give the impression of short side-whiskers, entered in a manner at
once furtive and servile.
He wore a black overcoat and a bowler hat. Reclosing the door, he
turned, perceived the group in the study, and fell back as though
someone had struck him a fierce blow.
Abject terror was written upon his features, and, for a moment, the
idea of flight appeared to suggest itself urgently to him; but
finally, he took a step forward toward the study.
"Who's this?" snapped Dunbar, without removing his leonine eyes
from the newcomer.
"It is Soames," came the weary voice of Leroux.
"Butler?"
"Yes."
"Where's he been?"
"I don't know. He remained out without my permission."
"He did, eh?"
Inspector Dunbar thrust forth a long finger at the shrinking form
in the doorway.
"Mr. Soames," he said, "you will be going to your own room and
waiting there until I ring for you."
"Yes, sir," said Soames, holding his hat in both bands, and
speaking huskily. "Yes, sir: certainly, sir."
He crossed the lobby and disappeared.
"There is no other way out, is there?" inquired the detective,
glancing at Dr. Cumberly.
"There is no other way," was the reply; "but surely you don't
suspect" . . .
"I would suspect the Archbishop of Westminster," snapped Dunbar,
"if he came in like that! Now, sir,"--he turned to Leroux--"you
were alone, here, to-night?"
"Quite alone, Inspector. The truth is, I fear, that my servants
take liberties in the absence of my wife."
"In the absence of your wife? Where is your wife?"
"She is in Paris."
"Is she a Frenchwoman?"
"No! oh, no! But my wife is a painter, you understand, and--er--I
met her in Paris--er--. . . Must you insist upon these--domestic
particulars, Inspector?"
"If Mr. Exel is anxious to turn in," replied the inspector, "after
his no doubt exhausting duties at the House, and if Dr. Cumberly--"
"I have no secrets from Cumberly!" interjected Leroux. "The doctor
has known me almost from boyhood, but--er--" turning to the
politician--"don't you know, Exel--no offense, no offense" . . .
"My dear Leroux," responded Exel hastily, "I am the offender!
Permit me to wish you all good night."
He crossed the study, and, at the door, paused and turned.
"Rely upon me, Leroux," he said, "to help in any way within my
power."
He crossed the lobby, opened the outer door, and departed.
"Now, Mr. Leroux," resumed Dunbar, "about this matter of your
wife's absence."
IV
A WINDOW IS OPENED
Whilst Henry Leroux collected his thoughts, Dr. Cumberly glanced
across at the writing-table where lay the fragment of paper which
had been clutched in the dead woman's hand, then turned his head
again toward the inspector, staring at him curiously. Since Dunbar
had not yet attempted even to glance at the strange message, he
wondered what had prompted the present line of inquiry.
"My wife," began Leroux, "shared a studio in Paris, at the time
that I met her, with an American lady a very talented portrait
painter--er--a Miss Denise Ryland. You may know her name?--but of
course, you don't, no! Well, my wife is, herself, quite clever
with her brush; in fact she has exhibited more than once at the
Paris Salon. We agreed at--er--the time of our--of our--
engagement, that she should be free to visit her old artistic
friends in Paris at any time. You understand? There was to be no
let or hindrance. . . . Is this really necessary, Inspector?"
"Pray go on, Mr. Leroux."
"Well, you understand, it was a give-and-take arrangement; because
I am afraid that I, myself, demand certain--sacrifices from my
wife--and--er--I did not feel entitled to--interfere" . . .
"You see, Inspector," interrupted Dr. Cumberly, "they are a
Bohemian pair, and Bohemians, inevitably, bore one another at
times! This little arrangement was intended as a safety-valve.
Whenever ennui attacked Mrs. Leroux, she was at liberty to depart
for a week to her own friends in Paris, leaving Leroux to the
bachelor's existence which is really his proper state; to go
unshaven and unshorn, to dine upon bread and cheese and onions, to
work until all hours of the morning, and generally to enjoy
himself!"
"Does she usually stay long?" inquired Dunbar.
"Not more than a week, as a rule," answered Leroux.
"You must excuse me," continued the detective, "if I seem to pry
into intimate matters; but on these occasions, how does Mrs. Leroux
get on for money?"
"I have opened a credit for her," explained the novelist, wearily,
"at the Credit Lyonnais, in Paris."
Dunbar scribbled busily in his notebook.
"Does she take her maid with her?" he jerked, suddenly.
"She has no maid at the moment," replied Leroux; "she has been
without one for twelve months or more, now."
"When did you last hear from her?"
"Three days ago."
"Did you answer the letter?"
"Yes; my answer was amongst the mail which Soames took to the post,
to-night."
"You said, though, if I remember rightly, that he was out without
permission?"
Leroux ran his fingers through his hair.
"I meant that he should only have been absent five minutes or so;
whilst he remained out for more than an hour."
Inspector Dunbar nodded, comprehendingly, tapping his teeth with
the head of the fountain-pen.
"And the other servants?"
"There are only two: a cook and a maid. I released them for the
evening--glad to get rid of them--wanted to work."
"They are late?"
"They take liberties, damnable liberties, because I am easy-going."
"I see," said Dunbar. "So that you were quite alone this evening,
when"--he nodded in the direction of the writing-table--"your
visitor came?"
"Quite alone."
"Was her arrival the first interruption?"
"No--er--not exactly. Miss Cumberly . . ."
"My daughter," explained Dr. Cumberly, knowing that Mr. Leroux, at
these times, was very neglectful in regard to meals, prepared him
an omelette, and brought it down in a chafing-dish."
"How long did she remain?" asked the inspector of Leroux.
"I--er--did not exactly open the door. We chatted, through--er--
through the letter-box, and she left the omelette outside on the
landing."
"What time would that be?"
"It was a quarter to twelve," declared Cumberly. "I had been
supping with some friends, and returned to find Helen, my daughter,
engaged in preparing the omelette. I congratulated her upon the
happy thought, knowing that Leroux was probably starving himself."
"I see. The omelette, though, seems to be upset here on the
floor?" said the inspector.
Cumberly briefly explained how it came to be there, Leroux
punctuating his friend's story with affirmative nods.
"Then the door of the flat was open all the time?" cried Dunbar.
"Yes," replied Cumberly; "but whilst Exel and I searched the other
rooms--and our search was exhaustive--Mr. Leroux remained here in
the study, and in full view of the lobby--as you see for yourself."
"No living thing," said Leroux, monotonously, "left this flat from
the time that the three of us, Exel, Cumberly, and I, entered, up
to the time that Miss Cumberly came, and, with the doctor, went out
again."
"H'm!" said the inspector, making notes; "it appears so, certainly.
I will ask you then, for your own account, Mr. Leroux, of the
arrival of the woman in the civet furs. Pay special attention"--he
pointed with his fountain-pen--"to the TIME at which the various
incidents occurred."
Leroux, growing calmer as he proceeded with the strange story,
complied with the inspector's request. He had practically
completed his account when the door-bell rang.
"It's the servants," said Dr. Cumberly. "Soames will open the
door."
But Soames did not appear.
The ringing being repeated:--
"I told him to remain in his room," said Dunbar, "until I rang for
him, I remember--"
"I will open the door," said Cumberly.
"And tell the servants to stay in the kitchen," snapped Dunbar.
Dr. Cumberly opened the door, admitting the cook and housemaid.
"There has been an unfortunate accident," he said--"but not to your
master; you need not be afraid. But be good enough to remain in
the kitchen for the present."
Peeping in furtively as they passed, the two women crossed the
lobby and went to their own quarters.
"Mr. Soames next," muttered Dunbar, and, glancing at Cumberly as he
returned from the lobby:--"Will you ring for him?" he requested.
Dr. Cumberly nodded, and pressed a bell beside the mantelpiece. An
interval followed, in which the inspector made notes and Cumberly
stood looking at Leroux, who was beating his palms upon his knees,
and staring unseeingly before him.
Cumberly rang again; and in response to the second ring, the
housemaid appeared at the door.
"I rang for Soames," said Dr. Cumberly.
"He is not in, sir," answered the girl.
Inspector Dunbar started as though he had been bitten.
"What!" he cried; "not in?"
"No, sir," said the girl, with wide-open, frightened eyes.
Dunbar turned to Cumberly.
"You said there was no other way out!"
"There IS no other way, to my knowledge."
"Where's his room?"
Cumberly led the way to a room at the end of a short corridor, and
Inspector Dunbar, entering, and turning up the light, glanced about
the little apartment. It was a very neat servants' bedroom; with
comfortable, quite simple, furniture; but the chest-of-drawers had
been hastily ransacked, and the contents of a trunk--or some of its
contents--lay strewn about the floor.
"He has packed his grip!" came Leroux's voice from the doorway.
"It's gone!"
The window was wide open. Dunbar sprang forward and leaned out
over the ledge, looking to right and left, above and below.
A sort of square courtyard was beneath, and for the convenience of
tradesmen, a hand-lift was constructed outside the kitchens of the
three flats comprising the house; i. e.:--Mr. Exel's, ground floor,
Henry Leroux's second floor, and Dr. Cumberly's, top. It worked in
a skeleton shaft which passed close to the left of Soames' window.
For an active man, this was a good enough ladder, and the inspector
withdrew his head shrugging his square shoulders, irritably.
"My fault entirely!" he muttered, biting his wiry mustache. "I
should have come and seen for myself if there was another way out."
Leroux, in a new flutter of excitement, now craned from the window.
"It might be possible to climb down the shaft," he cried, after a
brief survey "but not if one were carrying a heavy grip, such as
that which he has taken!"
"H'm!" said Dunbar. "You are a writing gentleman, I understand,
and yet it does not occur to you that he could have lowered the bag
on a cord, if he wanted to avoid the noise of dropping it!"
"Yes--er--of course!" muttered Leroux. "But really--but really--
oh, good God! I am bewildered! What in Heaven's name does it all
mean!"
"It means trouble," replied Dunbar, grimly; "bad trouble."
They returned to the study, and Inspector Dunbar, for the first
time since his arrival, walked across and examined the fragmentary
message, raising his eyebrows when he discovered that it was
written upon the same paper as Leroux's MSS. He glanced, too, at
the pen lying on a page of "Martin Zeda" near the lamp and at the
inky splash which told how hastily the pen had been dropped.
Then--his brows drawn together--he stooped to the body of the
murdered woman. Partially raising the fur cloak, he suppressed a
gasp of astonishment.
"Why! she only wears a silk night-dress, and a pair of suede
slippers!"
He glanced back over his shoulder.
"I had noted that," said Cumberly. "The whole business is utterly
extraordinary."
"Extraordinary is no word for it!" growled the inspector, pursuing
his examination. . . . "Marks of pressure at the throat--yes; and
generally unhealthy appearance."
"Due to the drug habit," interjected Dr. Cumberly.
"What drug?"
"I should not like to say out of hand; possibly morphine."
"No jewelry," continued the detective, musingly; "wedding ring--not
a new one. Finger nails well cared for, but recently neglected.
Hair dyed to hide gray patches; dye wanted renewing. Shoes,
French. Night-robe, silk; good lace; probably French, also. Faint
perfume--don't know what it is--apparently proceeding from civet
fur. Furs, magnificent; very costly." . . .
He slightly moved the table-lamp in order to direct its light upon
the white face. The bloodless lips were parted and the detective
bent, closely peering at the teeth thus revealed.
"Her teeth were oddly discolored, doctor," he said, taking out a
magnifying glass and examining them closely. "They had been
recently scaled, too; so that she was not in the habit of
neglecting them."
Dr. Cumberly nodded.
"The drug habit, again," he said guardedly; "a proper examination
will establish the full facts."
The inspector added brief notes to those already made, ere he rose
from beside the body. Then:--
"You are absolutely certain," he said, deliberately, facing Leroux,
"that you had never set eyes on this woman prior to her coming
here, to-night?"
"I can swear it!" said Leroux.
"Good!" replied the detective, and closed his notebook with a snap.
"Usual formalities will have to be gone through, but I don't think
I need trouble you, gentlemen, any further, to-night."
V
DOCTORS DIFFER
Dr. Cumberly walked slowly upstairs to his own flat, a picture
etched indelibly upon his mind, of Henry Leroux, with a face of
despair, sitting below in his dining-room and listening to the
ominous sounds proceeding from the study, where the police were now
busily engaged. In the lobby he met his daughter Helen, who was
waiting for him in a state of nervous suspense.
"Father!" she began, whilst rebuke died upon the doctor's lips--
"tell me quickly what has happened."
Perceiving that an explanation was unavoidable, Dr. Cumberly
outlined the story of the night's gruesome happenings, whilst Big
Ben began to chime the hour of one.
Helen, eager-eyed, and with her charming face rather pale, hung
upon every word of the narrative.
"And now," concluded her father, "you must go to bed. I insist."
"But father!" cried the girl--"there is some thing" . . .
She hesitated, uneasily.
"Well, Helen, go on," said the doctor.
"I am afraid you will refuse."
"At least give me the opportunity."
"Well--in the glimpse, the half-glimpse, which I had of her, I
seemed" . . .
Dr. Cumberly rested his hands upon his daughter's shoulders
characteristically, looking into the troubled gray eyes.
"You don't mean," he began . . .
"I thought I recognized her!" whispered the girl.
"Good God! can it be possible?"
"I have been trying, ever since, to recall where we had met, but
without result. It might mean so much" . . .
Dr. Cumberly regarded her, fixedly.
"It might mean so much to--Mr. Leroux. But I suppose you will say
it is impossible?"
"It IS impossible," said Dr. Cumberly firmly; "dismiss the idea,
Helen."
"But father," pleaded the girl, placing her hands over his own,
"consider what is at stake" . . .
"I am anxious that you should not become involved in this morbid
business."
"But you surely know me better than to expect me to faint or become
hysterical, or anything silly like that! I was certainly shocked
when I came down to-night, because--well, it was all so frightfully
unexpected" . . .
Dr. Cumberly shook his head. Helen put her arms about his neck and
raised her eyes to his.
"You have no right to refuse," she said, softly: "don't you see
that?"
Dr. Cumberly frowned. Then:--
"You are right, Helen," he agreed. "I should know your pluck well
enough. But if Inspector Dunbar is gone, the police may refuse to
admit us" . . .
"Then let us hurry!" cried Helen. "I am afraid they will take
away" . . .
Side by side they descended to Henry Leroux's flat, ringing the
bell, which, an hour earlier, the lady of the civet furs had rung.
A sergeant in uniform opened the door.
"Is Detective-Inspector Dunbar here?" inquired the physician.
"Yes, sir."
"Say that Dr. Cumberly wishes to speak to him. And"--as the man
was about to depart--"request him not to arouse Mr. Leroux."
Almost immediately the inspector appeared, a look of surprise upon
his face, which increased on perceiving the girl beside her father.
"This is my daughter, Inspector," explained Cumberly; "she is a
contributor to the Planet, and to various magazines, and in this
journalistic capacity, meets many people in many walks of life.
She thinks she may be of use to you in preparing your case."
Dunbar bowed rather awkwardly.
"Glad to meet you, Miss Cumberly," came the inevitable formula.
"Entirely at your service."
"I had an idea, Inspector," said the girl, laying her hand
confidentially upon Dunbar's arm, "that I recognized, when I
entered Mr. Leroux's study, tonight"--Dunbar nodded--"that I
recognized--the--the victim!"
"Good!" said the inspector, rubbing his palms briskly together.
His tawny eyes sparkled. "And you would wish to see her again
before we take her away. Very plucky of you, Miss Cumberly! But
then, you are a doctor's daughter."
They entered, and the inspector closed the door behind them.
"Don't arouse poor Leroux," whispered Cumberly to the detective.
"I left him on a couch in the dining-room." . . .
"He is still there," replied Dunbar; "poor chap! It is" . . .
He met Helen's glance, and broke off shortly.
In the study two uniformed constables, and an officer in plain
clothes, were apparently engaged in making an inventory--or such
was the impression conveyed. The clock ticked merrily on; its
ticking a desecration, where all else was hushed in deference to
the grim visitor. The body of the murdered woman had been laid
upon the chesterfield, and a little, dark, bearded man was
conducting an elaborate examination; when, seeing the trio enter,
he hastily threw the coat of civet fur over the body, and stood up,
facing the intruders.
"It's all right, doctor," said the inspector; "and we shan't detain
you a moment." He glanced over his shoulder. "Mr. Hilton, M. R.
C. S." he said, indicating the dark man--"Dr. Cumberly and Miss
Cumberly."
The divisional surgeon bowed to Helen and eagerly grasped the hand
of the celebrated physician.
"I am fortunate in being able to ask your opinion," he began. . . .
Dr. Cumberly nodded shortly, and with upraised hand, cut him short.
"I shall willingly give you any assistance in my power," he said;
"but my daughter has voluntarily committed herself to a rather
painful ordeal, and I am anxious to get it over."
He stooped and raised the fur from the ghastly face.
Helen, her hand resting upon her father's shoulder, ventured one
rapid glance and then looked away, shuddering slightly. Dr.
Cumberly replaced the coat and gazed anxiously at his daughter.
But Helen, with admirable courage, having closed her eyes for a
moment, reopened them, and smiled at her father's anxiety. She was
pale, but perfectly composed.
"Well, Miss Cumberly?" inquired the inspector, eagerly; whilst all
in the room watched this slim girl in her charming deshabille, this
dainty figure so utterly out of place in that scene of morbid
crime.
She raised her gray eyes to the detective.
"I still believe that I have seen the face, somewhere, before. But
I shall have to reflect a while--I meet so many folks, you know, in
a casual way--before I can commit myself to any statement."
In the leonine eyes looking into hers gleamed the light of
admiration and approval. The canny Scotsman admired this girl for
her beauty, as a matter of course, for her courage, because courage
was a quality standing high in his estimation, but, above all, for
her admirable discretion.
"Very proper, Miss Cumberly," he said; "very proper and wise on
your part. I don't wish to hurry you in any way, but"--he
hesitated, glancing at the man in plain clothes, who had now
resumed a careful perusal of a newspaper--"but her name doesn't
happen to be Vernon--"
"Vernon!" cried the girl, her eyes lighting up at sound of the
name. "Mrs. Vernon! it is! it is! She was pointed out to me at
the last Arts Ball--where she appeared in a most monstrous Chinese
costume--"
"Chinese?" inquired Dunbar, producing the bulky notebook.
"Yes. Oh! poor, poor soul!"
"You know nothing further about her, Miss Cumberly?"
"Nothing, Inspector. She was merely pointed out to me as one of
the strangest figures in the hall. Her husband, I understand, is
an art expert--"
"He WAS!" said Dunbar, closing the book sharply. "He died this
afternoon; and a paragraph announcing his death appears in the
newspaper which we found in the victim's fur coat!"
"But how--"
"It was the only paragraph on the half-page folded outwards which
was in any sense PERSONAL. I am greatly indebted to you, Miss
Cumberly; every hour wasted on a case like this means a fresh plait
in the rope around the neck of the wrong man!"
Helen Cumberly grew slowly quite pallid.
"Good night," she said; and bowing to the detective and to the
surgeon, she prepared to depart.
Mr. Hilton touched Dr. Cumberly's arm, as he, too, was about to
retire.
"May I hope," he whispered, "that you will return and give me the
benefit of your opinion in making out my report?"
Dr. Cumberly glanced at his daughter; and seeing her to be
perfectly composed:--"For the moment, I have formed no opinion,
Mr. Hilton," he said, quietly, "not having had an opportunity to
conduct a proper examination."
Hilton bent and whispered, confidentially, in the other's ear:--
"She was drugged!"
The innuendo underlying the words struck Dr. Cumberly forcibly, and
he started back with his brows drawn together in a frown.
"Do you mean that she was addicted to the use of drugs?" he asked,
sharply; "or that the drugging took place to-night."
"The drugging DID take place to-night!" whispered the other. "An
injection was made in the left shoulder with a hypodermic syringe;
the mark is quite fresh."
Dr. Cumberly glared at his fellow practitioner, angrily.
"Are there no other marks of injection?" he asked.
"On the left forearm, yes. Obviously self-administered. Oh, I
don't deny the habit! But my point is this: the injection in the
shoulder was NOT self-administered."
"Come, Helen," said Cumberly, taking his daughter's arm; for she
had drawn near, during the colloquy--"you must get to bed."
His face was very stern when he turned again to Mr. Hilton.
"I shall return in a few minutes," he said, and escorted his
daughter from the room.
VI
AT SCOTLAND YARD
Matters of vital importance to some people whom already we have
met, and to others whom thus far we have not met, were transacted
in a lofty and rather bleak looking room at Scotland Yard between
the hours of nine and ten A. M.; that is, later in the morning of
the fateful day whose advent we have heard acclaimed from the Tower
of Westminster.
The room, which was lighted by a large French window opening upon a
balcony, commanded an excellent view of the Thames Embankment. The
floor was polished to a degree of brightness, almost painful. The
distempered walls, save for a severe and solitary etching of a
former Commissioner, were nude in all their unloveliness. A heavy
deal table (upon which rested a blotting-pad, a pewter ink-pot,
several newspapers and two pens) together with three deal chairs,
built rather as monuments of durability than as examples of art,
constituted the only furniture, if we except an electric lamp with
a green glass shade, above the table.
This was the room of Detective-Inspector Dunbar; and Detective-
Inspector Dunbar, at the hour of our entrance, will be found seated
in the chair, placed behind the table, his elbows resting upon the
blotting-pad.
At ten minutes past nine, exactly, the door opened, and a thick-
set, florid man, buttoned up in a fawn colored raincoat and wearing
a bowler hat of obsolete build, entered. He possessed a black
mustache, a breezy, bustling manner, and humorous blue eyes;
furthermore, when he took off his hat, he revealed the possession
of a head of very bristly, upstanding, black hair. This was
Detective-Sergeant Sowerby, and the same who was engaged in
examining a newspaper in the study of Henry Leroux when Dr.
Cumberly and his daughter had paid their second visit to that scene
of an unhappy soul's dismissal.
"Well?" said Dunbar, glancing up at his subordinate, inquiringly.
"I have done all the cab depots," reported Sergeant Sowerby, "and a
good many of the private owners; but so far the man seen by Mr.
Exel has not turned up."
"The word will be passed round now, though," said Dunbar, "and we
shall probably have him here during the day."
"I hope so," said the other good-humoredly, seating himself upon
one of the two chairs ranged beside the wall. "If he doesn't show
up." . . .
"Well?" jerked Dunbar--"if he doesn't?"
"It will look very black against Leroux."
Dunbar drummed upon the blotting-pad with the fingers of his left
hand.
"It beats anything of the kind that has ever come my way," he
confessed. "You get pretty cautious at weighing people up, in this
business; but I certainly don't think--mind you, I go no further--
but I certainly don't think Mr. Henry Leroux would willingly kill a
fly; yet there is circumstantial evidence enough to hang him."
Sergeant Sowerby nodded, gazing speculatively at the floor.
"I wonder," he said, slowly, "why the girl--Miss Cumberly--
hesitated about telling us the woman's name?"
"I am not wondering about that at all," replied Dunbar, bluntly.
"She must meet thousands in the same way. The wonder to me is that
she remembered at all. I am open to bet half-a-crown that YOU
couldn't remember the name of every woman you happened to have
pointed out to you at an Arts Ball?"
"Maybe not," agreed Sowerby; "she's a smart girl, I'll allow. I
see you have last night's papers there?"
"I have," replied Dunbar; "and I'm wondering" . . .
"If there's any connection?"
"Well," continued the inspector, "it looks on the face of it as
though the news of her husband's death had something to do with
Mrs. Vernon's presence at Leroux's flat. It's not a natural thing
for a woman, on the evening of her husband's death, to rush
straight away to another man's place" . . .
"It's strange we couldn't find her clothes" . . .
"It's not strange at all! You're simply obsessed with the idea
that this was a love intrigue! Think, man! the most abandoned
woman wouldn't run to keep an appointment with a lover at a time
like that! And remember she had the news in her pocket! She came
to that flat dressed--or undressed--just as we found her; I'm sure
of it. And a point like that sometimes means the difference
between hanging and acquittal."
Sergeant Sowerby digested these words, composing his jovial
countenance in an expression of unnatural profundity. Then:--
"THE point to my mind," he said, "is the one raised by Mr. Hilton.
By gum! didn't Dr. Cumberly tell him off!"
"Dr. Cumberly," replied Dunbar, "is entitled to his opinion, that
the injection in the woman's shoulder was at least eight hours old;
whilst Mr. Hilton is equally entitled to maintain that it was less
than ONE hour old. Neither of them can hope to prove his case."
"If either of them could?" . . .
"It might make a difference to the evidence--but I'm not sure."
"What time is your appointment?"
"Ten o'clock," replied Dunbar. "I am meeting Mr. Debnam--the late
Mr. Vernon's solicitor. There is something in it. Damme! I am
sure of it!"
"Something in what?"
"The fact that Mr. Vernon died yesterday evening, and that his wife
was murdered at midnight."
"What have you told the press?"
"As little as possible, but you will see that the early editions
will all be screaming for the arrest of Soames."
"I shouldn't wonder. He would be a useful man to have; but he's
probably out of London now."
"I think not. He's more likely to wait for instructions from his
principal."
"His principal?"
"Certainly. You don't think Soames did the murder, do you?"
"No; but he's obviously an accessory."
"I'm not so sure even of that."
"Then why did he bolt?"
"Because he had a guilty conscience."
"Yes," agreed Sowerby; "it does turn out that way sometimes. At
any rate, Stringer is after him, but he's got next to nothing to go
upon. Has any reply been received from Mrs. Leroux in Paris?"
"No," answered Dunbar, frowning thoughtfully. "Her husband's wire
would reach her first thing this morning; I am expecting to hear of
a reply at any moment."
"They're a funny couple, altogether," said Sowerby. "I can't
imagine myself standing for Mrs. Sowerby spending her week-ends in
Paris. Asking for trouble, I call it!"
"It does seem a daft arrangement," agreed Dunbar; "but then, as you
say, they're a funny couple."
"I never saw such a bundle of nerves in all my life!" . . .
"Leroux?"
Sowerby nodded.
"I suppose," he said, "it's the artistic temperament! If Mrs.
Leroux has got it, too, I don't wonder that they get fed up with
one another's company."
"That's about the secret of it. And now, I shall be glad, Sowerby,
if you will be after that taxi-man again. Report at one o'clock.
I shall be here."
With his hand on the door-knob: "By the way," said Sowerby, "who
the blazes is Mr. King?"
Inspector Dunbar looked up.
"Mr. King," he replied slowly, "is the solution of the mystery."
VII
THE MAN IN THE LIMOUSINE
The house of the late Horace Vernon was a modern villa of
prosperous appearance; but, on this sunny September morning, a
palpable atmosphere of gloom seemed to overlie it. This made
itself perceptible even to the toughened and unimpressionable
nerves of Inspector Dunbar. As he mounted the five steps leading
up to the door, glancing meanwhile at the lowered blinds at the
windows, he wondered if, failing these evidences and his own
private knowledge of the facts, he should have recognized that the
hand of tragedy had placed its mark upon this house. But when the
door was opened by a white-faced servant, he told himself that he
should, for a veritable miasma of death seemed to come out to meet
him, to envelop him.
Within, proceeded a subdued activity: somber figures moved upon the
staircase; and Inspector Dunbar, having presented his card,
presently found himself in a well-appointed library.
At the table, whereon were spread a number of documents, sat a
lean, clean-shaven, sallow-faced man, wearing gold-rimmed pince-
nez; a man whose demeanor of business-like gloom was most admirably
adapted to that place and occasion. This was Mr. Debnam, the
solicitor. He gravely waved the detective to an armchair, adjusted
his pince-nez, and coughed, introductorily.
"Your communication, Inspector," he began (he had the kind of voice
which seems to be buried in sawdust packing), "was brought to me
this morning, and has disturbed me immeasurably, unspeakably."
"You have been to view the body, sir?"
"One of my clerks, who knew Mrs. Vernon, has just returned to this
house to report that he has identified her."
"I should have preferred you to have gone yourself, sir," began
Dunbar, taking out his notebook.
"My state of health, Inspector," said the solicitor, "renders it
undesirable that I should submit myself to an ordeal so
unnecessary--so wholly unnecessary."
"Very good!" muttered Dunbar, making an entry in his book; "your
clerk, then, whom I can see in a moment, identifies the murdered
woman as Mrs. Vernon. What was her Christian name?"
"Iris--Iris Mary Vernon."
Inspector Dunbar made a note of the fact.
"And now," he said, "you will have read the copy of that portion of
my report which I submitted to you this morning--acting upon
information supplied by Miss Helen Cumberly?"
"Yes, yes, Inspector, I have read it--but, by the way, I do not
know Miss Cumberly."
"Miss Cumberly," explained the detective, "is the daughter of Dr.
Cumberly, the Harley Street physician. She lives with her father
in the flat above that of Mr. Leroux. She saw the body by
accident--and recognized it as that of a lady who had been named to
her at the last Arts Ball."
"Ah!" said Debnam, "yes--I see--at the Arts Ball, Inspector. This
is a mysterious and a very ghastly case."
"It is indeed, sir," agreed Dunbar. "Can you throw any light upon
the presence of Mrs. Vernon at Mr. Leroux's flat on the very night
of her husband's death?"
"I can--and I cannot," answered the solicitor, leaning back in the
chair and again adjusting his pince-nez, in the manner of a man
having important matters--and gloomy, very gloomy, matters--to
communicate.
"Good!" said the inspector, and prepared to listen.
"You see," continued Debnam, "the late Mrs. Vernon was not actually
residing with her husband at the date of his death."
"Indeed!"
"Ostensibly"--the solicitor shook a lean forefinger at his vis-a-
vis--"ostensibly, Inspector, she was visiting her sister in
Scotland."
Inspector Dunbar sat up very straight, his brows drawn down over
the tawny eyes.
"These visits were of frequent occurrence, and usually of about a
week's duration. Mr. Vernon, my late client, a man--I'll not deny
it--of inconstant affections (you understand me, Inspector?), did
not greatly concern himself with his wife's movements. She
belonged to a smart Bohemian set, and--to use a popular figure of
speech--burnt the candle at both ends; late dances, night clubs,
bridge parties, and other feverish pursuits, possibly taken up as a
result of the--shall I say cooling?--of her husband's affections" . . .
"There was another woman in the case?"
"I fear so, Inspector; in fact, I am sure of it: but to return to
Mrs. Vernon. My client provided her with ample funds; and I,
myself, have expressed to him astonishment respecting her
expenditures in Scotland. I understand that her sister was in
comparatively poor circumstances, and I went so far as to point out
to Mr. Vernon that one hundred pounds was--shall I say an
excessive?--outlay upon a week's sojourn in Auchterander, Perth."
"A hundred pounds!"
"One hundred pounds!"
"Was it queried by Mr. Vernon?"
"Not at all."
"Was Mr. Vernon personally acquainted with this sister in Perth?"
"He was not, Inspector. Mrs. Vernon, at the time of her marriage,
did not enjoy that social status to which my late client elevated
her. For many years she held no open communication with any member
of her family, but latterly, as I have explained, she acquired the
habit of recuperating--recuperating from the effects of her febrile
pleasures--at this obscure place in Scotland. And Mr. Vernon, his
interest in her movements having considerably--shall I say abated?--
offered no objection: even suffered it gladly, counting the cost
but little against" . . .
"Freedom?" suggested Dunbar, scribbling in his notebook.
"Rather crudely expressed, perhaps," said the solicitor, peering
over the top of his glasses, "but you have the idea. I come now to
my client's awakening. Four days ago, he learned the truth; he
learned that he was being deceived!"
"Deceived!"
Back to Full Books
|