Читать книгу Dr. Morelle Meets Murder - Ernest Dudley - Страница 6
ОглавлениеDR. MORELLE MEETS MURDER
There is no doubt that Doctor Morelle would have laughed to scorn any suggestion that Miss Frayle was in any way necessary to him in order to carry on his activities in a satisfactory way. Yet the fact remained that since she had left his employ nothing seemed to have gone right at the famous house in Harley Street. As for his present secretary, Miss Grimshaw, she was as disappointing as all the others who had filled the post since Miss Frayle’s unfortunate departure.
The work fell behind, he found himself often stumbling for words, and as a result it was necessary to ask Miss Grimshaw to stay late in order that he would be able to deliver the thesis on which he was engaged, with her assistance, for publication in The International Medical Journal at the agreed date.
On two nights she had agreed to remain after the hours which had been specified for her; on the third night, however, Miss Grimshaw jibbed.
“If you think that I’m going to stop till all hours of the night, every night of the week,” she declared, with a petulant toss of the head, “you’ve got another thing coming, Doctor Morelle. Look at the time! Twenty past ten, and I’ve been slaving away since nine o’clock this morning—”
“In point of fact,” he interrupted her suavely, “you arrived five minutes late.”
She ignored his thrust.
“No wonder,” she retorted, “that I’m the umpteenth secretary you’ve had since Miss Frayle left you. And more fool she to stick the job as long as she did! The others wouldn’t and I’m not either.”
Doctor Morelle was unable to resist observing:
“Your syntax is becoming somewhat involved.”
“Listen to you!” the other burst out. “Always ready with some nasty, sneering sarcasm. You’re not human, that’s your trouble. You’re a machine and you expect other people to act like machines, too. Well, I’m not made of clockwork, and I’m sick of being treated as if I were. So goodnight, Doctor Morelle, and goodbye!”
The door slammed loudly and Doctor Morelle sighed.
He lit an inevitable Le Sphinx while he pondered the situation. He had got used to the idiosyncrasies of feminine nature since the departure of Miss Frayle, but this was probably the worst outburst of temper that he had had to endure. With another sigh he unearthed the first batch of notes that needed his attention. Then the bell rang.
“Ah!” he murmured with an air of quiet satisfaction, “that will be Miss Grimshaw returning to offer me her abject apologies. I suppose under the circumstances I shall have to accede to the plea for reinstatement which she will doubtless be making.”
He did not look up as the study door was pushed open slowly.
“So you have changed your mind in this little matter of your departure, Miss Grimshaw,” he remarked icily.
“Hello, Doctor Morelle.”
He started up in considerable surprise. This was the last person he had expected.
“Miss Frayle!” he exclaimed.
“Did you think it was someone else?” she asked in what she imagined to be her most appealing manner.
“I—er—I—”
For the first time Miss Frayle could remember, the Doctor was at a loss for a reply. Then he recovered his familiar poise. “I was expecting Miss Grimshaw, returning to finish her work.”
“I’m so glad you’ve found someone else who doesn’t mind working late hours.”
The Doctor, however, decided to ignore this, and continued:
“I am eager to know to what I owe this unexpected pleasure, Miss Frayle. Sit down.”
Miss Frayle sat down, but offered no explanation of the object of her visit. She had retained a key to the Doctor’s front door and, after ringing the bell, had realised suddenly that she could enter. She found it slightly amusing to be giving him a surprise.
“I was under the impression,” Doctor Morelle was observing, “that you were happily occupied in your new situation at Bournemouth.”
Miss Frayle tittered lightly.
“I’ve left Mrs. Padmore, the lady I went to when I left you. She’s gone to live in Dorset with a widowed sister who has just arrived from Australia.”
Doctor Morelle at once seized, with his customary quick wittedness, on what to him represented the important part of this statement. “You mean,” he said, “you’ve come to ask if you can have your old post back?”
Miss Frayle shook her head firmly. “Oh, no, no, Doctor!” she exclaimed. “I’m sure your—Miss Grimshaw, did you say her name was?—I’m sure she’s taking care of you very well indeed. No. As a matter of fact I’ve come to consult you on behalf of a Colonel Vane.”
The Doctor eyed her sharply. “Proceed, Miss Frayle.”
“His room is next to mine in the private hotel where I’m staying. I’ve only been there a few days, and every night I’ve been awakened by the Colonel crying out suddenly in alarm and then shouting as if he were terrified. Last night his attack seemed to be worse than usual, and I got up. As I opened my bedroom door the noise got less and there, standing very still outside the Colonel’s door, was his servant, an Indian called Shan Gopay. He saw me and I asked him what was the matter.”
“This appeals to me considerably, my dear Miss Frayle,” the Doctor said. “Pray proceed.”
“Shan Gopay looked at me and said he was afraid the Colonel had been disturbing me. I asked if he were ill. He explained it was what he called a ‘mind-sickness’, which had been troubling the Colonel, bringing on recurrent nightmares and causing him to cry out in the middle of the night.”
“And did you ascertain anything of further interest?”
“As I was talking to the Indian, the Colonel shouted again. It sounded to me like: ‘The ruby! My ruby!’ And then his voice died away in a moan.”
“Did you question the Indian servant as to the precise significance of the reference to a jewel?” Doctor Morelle asked.
“I said that it sounded as if he were saying something about a ruby, but the Indian replied that ever since Colonel Vane had come back from India a strange shadow had lain over his mind.”
“And why, my dear Miss Frayle, have you formed the opinion that I can do something to help the unfortunate officer?”
“I asked his servant if he could not see a doctor, but Shan Gopay said that nothing could be done. I told him that I knew a very famous doctor—you, Doctor Morelle—who would be able to put him right. The Indian said that he did not think there was any cure for what was preying on his master’s mind.”
“Simple case of anxiety neurosis, my dear Miss Frayle,” the Doctor observed. “It may possibly be linked with the acquisition of the precious stone which he mentioned. As to that, we can ascertain the facts when we have had an opportunity of some conversation with the gentleman concerned. And when do you suggest would be a propitious moment for my seeing him?”
Miss Frayle clasped her hands together in delight. “Tonight, Doctor? Before he goes to bed. I’m sure that you can stop him from having another of those dreadful nightmares.”
Doctor Morelle was quite accustomed to some measure of admiration, but he was somewhat surprised to learn that Miss Frayle had such touching faith in his medical abilities.
“You are too flattering, Miss Frayle,” he said smoothly. “However, since it appears to be a fact that your own slumber is jeopardised by Colonel Vane’s sufferings, I am naturally all the more anxious to give due consideration to the case forthwith.”
“Oh, Doctor Morelle! I’ve been all day wondering if I dared to bother you—”
“Let us proceed at once upon our double errand of mercy,” the Doctor continued, completely ignoring her remarks. “We will endeavour to obtain a taxi.”
The taxi secured, Miss Frayle gave the necessary instructions, and it was only a few minutes before they arrived at the Clevedon Private Hotel.
“It’s only quite a small hotel, of course,” Miss Frayle said apologetically, as she fumbled in her handbag for the key. “And they lock up rather early. I left my key behind once, and I had a fearful job banging away at the door before Mrs. Holt, the proprietor’s wife, let me in.”
Doctor Morelle stood by with ill-concealed impatience while Miss Frayle laughed and chatted. She produced the key and succeeded in opening the door.
As the door opened, however, the Doctor suddenly gripped Miss Frayle’s arm.
“Miss Frayle,” he murmured. “Can you hear anything?”
An agitated female voice was exclaiming: “Who’s that? Who’s there?”
“A lady in a state of considerable psychological agitation,” the Doctor went on. “Can you give me any clue as to her identity, Miss Frayle?”
“That is Mrs. Holt, the proprietor’s wife,” Miss Frayle said in some surprise, and then shouted: “It’s me—I mean ‘I’ Mrs. Holt—Miss Frayle.”
Mrs. Holt, a middle-aged woman with greying hair, who had once been pretty but who had now lost all pretence to good looks, came into the hall where Doctor Morelle and Miss Frayle were standing. Her face was a study of acute anxiety.
“Oh, my husband! My husband!” she exclaimed.
Miss Frayle looked considerably alarmed. “Mr. Holt?” she asked. “What has happened?”
“He’s dead!” Mrs. Holt exclaimed. “Murdered!”
“Murdered?” Miss Frayle repeated the word in a hushed whisper, which was a sufficient indication of her alarm.
“In here,” gulped Mrs. Holt in a voice that was not far removed from hysteria. “In the office. And they’ve robbed the safe.” Her voice trailed away.
“Perhaps if I might intrude,” Doctor Morelle said. He had listened to Mrs. Holt’s remarks with close attention and now brought himself to her notice.
“Oh yes,” said Miss Frayle, suddenly remembering his presence which the rush of events had completely driven out of her mind. “This is Doctor Morelle. He was coming to see Colonel—”
Mrs. Holt broke in. “A doctor? Thank heavens! Will you come in here at once, Doctor, though I’m afraid there is nothing much you can do.”
She led the way into the little office off the hotel lobby and the Doctor followed her, Miss Frayle on his heels. “Try to calm yourself,” he said. “I’ll endeavour to ascertain the extent of your husband’s injuries.”
He saw at once, however, that the man’s wife had not been mistaken. The base of the skull was shattered. Clearly he had been struck a heavy blow with some massive object.
“No doubt,” he said to Mrs. Holt, “your husband was struck down with this heavy brass candlestick on the desk?”
“Yes, Doctor,” she agreed. “I kicked against it when I came into the room.”
Dr. Morelle glanced at her sharply. “When did you discover your husband?” he asked
“No more than five minutes ago.” Mrs. Holt was wringing her hands in despair. “Oh, it was horrible, horrible!”
The Doctor was never impressed by exhibitions of emotion. He brought the conversation right back to earth. “Where were you when your husband was attacked?”
“He and I were playing cards in our sitting room. He said that he could hear someone in the office. I thought it was one of the guests and didn’t realise anything was wrong until about ten minutes had passed and he didn’t come back.”
“No one else,” Doctor Morelle queried, “was here when you entered?”
Mrs. Holt shook her head. “I came straight in, the light was on—and saw him. I didn’t know what to do—”
Her voice petered away into a shuddering moan.
“Then Miss Frayle and I arrived, is it not so?”
“Yes. I was just going to phone for a doctor.”
Doctor Morelle, during the latter part of this conversation, had been looking around him with keen interest, studying everything that was in the room.
“You say,” he remarked quietly, “that the safe had been disturbed?”
“Yes. There should be money in it, and some valuables belonging to some of the guests.”
The Doctor walked across to the safe. “Obviously,” he murmured to himself, “the safe has been opened by use of the combination. It has not been forced. The thief or thieves entered and escaped by this window. The lower half is open.”
The Doctor had been speaking his thoughts aloud. Mrs. Holt overheard at least the latter part of them,
“The window must have been forced,” she said. “My husband was always especially careful to lock it up at night.”
Miss Frayle now showed signs of distinct agitation. She moved to Doctor Morelle’s side and gripped his arm tightly.
“Do you wish to attract my attention, Miss Frayle?” he asked acidly.
“Listen!” she hissed. “Someone is coming.”
Footsteps approached. Then the door opened quietly and a dark-skinned man entered noiselessly.
Miss Frayle said, in a voice that was almost a scream: “Mr. Gopay!”
The Indian looked around him, saying:
“I am so sorry if I am intruding.” He broke off suddenly with a gasp, and added: “Mr. Holt! Whatever has happened to the poor gentleman?”
Doctor Morelle, looking carefully at the Indian’s face, replied:
“He’s dead.” Then, sharply turning to Miss Frayle, he added: “Quick, Miss Frayle! I think Mrs. Holt is fainting.”
Indeed, Mrs. Holt seemed to be in a bad way. She was swaying on her feet and appeared likely at any moment to collapse in a heap on the floor.
“I think that it would be as well to take her to the sitting room. Place her in a recumbent position and administer a little water. That should be sufficient to produce satisfactory results.”
Miss Frayle led the fainting woman from the room and Doctor Morelle, dismissing the matter from his mind, turned to the Indian.
“You are the Doctor, yes?” the coloured man said.
“I am Doctor Morelle. You, I presume, are Shan Gopay, Colonel Vane’s servant?”
“That is correct.” The Indian looked at the Doctor with interest. “That candlestick which you are examining,” he said, “did that kill the unfortunate gentleman?”
“Undoubtedly. Traces of blood and several hairs adhering to the base of the candlestick indubitably indicate where it struck against the skull. There are, however, no fingerprints whatever, which seems to suggest gloves, or that the candlestick was carefully cleaned after the crime had been committed.”
The Indian stood by, impassive, while the Doctor described his own theory of what had happened. Now, however, Doctor Morelle turned to him.
“What attracted you downstairs?”
“I heard Mrs. Holt crying out. I thought that something might perhaps be wrong.”
“Who else,” the Doctor next asked, “apart from yourself, Colonel Vane, and Miss Frayle at present resides in this hotel?”
The Indian showed white teeth in a sudden smile. “One person only,” he said. “He is a gentleman named Foster. He went out just after dinner and I have not heard him return.”
Then it seemed that the Indian suddenly caught sight of the safe. He held up his expressive hands in horror.
“Doctor!” he exclaimed. “The safe, it is open! It has been robbed! My master’s dreadful dream has come true! His ruby, it has gone! It was in the safe.”
Doctor Morelle looked remarkably sceptical—a not unusual expression for him—but at this moment much more obviously so than was generally the case.
“You are suggesting,” he said, “that Colonel Vane dreamed that tonight’s tragedy might be about to happen?”
The Indian looked thoughtful. “He has had bad nightmares lately,” he said. “He often cried aloud about the jewel—that something terrible would happen in connection with it. Though when he wakes he usually cannot remember exactly what it is that has disturbed his sleep.”
There was a cry from some room on the floor above.
“Listen! That is the Colonel now! He went early to his room in order to rest. He must have fallen asleep. I must go to him and see if I can help.”
Doctor Morelle eyed the other for a moment. “You would be well advised,” he said, “not to acquaint him with what has occurred here. By tomorrow it is possible that the precious jewel of which he thinks so much may well have been recovered.”
The Indian glanced sharply at the Doctor. It was as if he found it difficult to believe that Doctor Morelle could possibly promise anything so inherently unlikely as the recovery of the Colonel’s ruby. Then he said, turning back in the doorway:
“Very well, Doctor. I will preserve silence on the matter. As you say, the gods may yet prove kind and restore his ruby to him.”
Doctor Morelle smiled grimly to himself. “You mean, he murmured quietly, “that I shall be able to perform that particular trick.”
It was still possible to hear incoherent cries from Colonel Vane, and the Doctor strode swiftly to the door, calling after the Indian: “I will come up to him presently and administer a sedative which will ensure him a peaceful sleep.”
Then he turned his attention back to the more immediately urgent problem of Mr. and Mrs. Holt. “Curious,” he mused, “that the Colonel should exhibit in dreams a foreknowledge of tonight’s events. Extremely interesting.”
He glanced swiftly around the room as if to photograph its every detail in his retentive mind. Then he stepped silently into the sitting room where he saw Mrs. Holt, now in full possession of her sense once more, on a couch. Beside her was the still somewhat anxious Miss Frayle.
“Ah, Mrs. Holt,” the Doctor said, “I am pleased to note that you appear considerably better.”
“She is a little better,” Miss Frayle said.
The Doctor appeared pleased at this. “In that event, Mrs. Holt,” he said, “perhaps you would try to answer one or two questions which I should like to put to you.”
“I’ll do my best,” she promised.
“Are you aware of the combination which opens the safe in the office?”
“Yes.”
“Does anyone else possess this knowledge, apart from your husband and yourself?” was the next question posed by the Doctor. The answer was what he had anticipated.
“Definitely no one else,” Mrs. Holt said. “My husband would never have dreamed of giving it away. It was known only to him and to myself—and he changed it very often. It was never written down. We used to memorise it.”
“You are sure it could have been known to no third party at all?”
“Quite certain.”
“And did you know anything about the valuables which were kept in the safe—valuables, for the most part, deposited by the guests of the hotel?”
Mrs. Holt looked puzzled at the line of questioning which Doctor Morelle had taken.
“I knew something of what was hidden in the safe, yes,” she agreed. “But not necessarily the details, or the particular items which might be left there by particular guests.”
“I understand, Mrs. Holt. Did you—if I may be so bold as to cite a particular example—know that the safe contained a precious stone which Colonel Vane had entrusted for safety to the care of your husband?”
There was a slight look of confusion in Mrs. Holt’s face as if she were still not at all sure whither this cross-examination was leading.
“Yes,” she said at length. “I knew that there was something important of the colonel’s there. But I did not know exactly what it was, or that it was in any special way valuable.”
Suddenly Doctor Morelle grasped Miss Frayle’s arm. A tipsy voice was heard in the entrance hall of the hotel. A man was loudly singing some quite incomprehensible ditty, which was brought to a sudden stop by a loud hiccough. Miss Frayle felt an almost irresistible desire to giggle, which, however, she managed to suppress by a great effort of will.
The man’s footsteps passed the door of the sitting room in which they were situated and then unsteadily made their way to the main staircase of the hotel.
“Is that another of your guests, Mrs. Holt?” Doctor Morelle enquired.
Mrs. Holt nodded. “Mr. Foster,” she said.
“He certainly sounds a little—er—well—” Miss Frayle searched vainly for the word that would express in sufficiently polite terms the precise state of inebriation in which Foster had apparently come home.
“Just so, my dear Miss Frayle,” said the Doctor in irritable tones. “And now I think that it is time for the police to take over the case. Miss Frayle, perhaps you would be so kind as to get into telephonic communication with Scotland Yard. I daresay that you can still recollect the number?”
“Whitehall 1212,” Miss Frayle said proudly and promptly.
“What an excellent memory you possess,” Doctor Morelle said. “Yes, I fancy that I shall, as usual, be able to offer them the information which will lead them directly to the apprehension of the criminal responsible.”
“Doctor Morelle!” Miss Frayle exclaimed, “do you mean you know who murdered Mr. Holt?”
Doctor Morelle looked at her with that mixture of dislike and irritation that she knew so well from past days.
“I mean,” he said slowly, “that I know a certain person is withholding the real truth about the murder—doubtless in order to shield either themselves or someone else. Moreover—and this is no doubt what will most interest the gentlemen from Scotland Yard—I know who that certain person is!”
* * * *
About an hour later Doctor Morelle, and a somewhat chastened Miss Frayle, were seated in the study. As he smoked an inevitable Le Sphinx, the Doctor was airing his views on the case that he had so neatly elucidated, while Miss Frayle sipped a cup of tea and listened to what he had to say.
“I don’t know how you do it, Doctor Morelle. It astonishes me more every time I think of it,” she said.
He smiled sardonically. “Of course,” he said, “certain important aspects of the crime immediately presented themselves to me as soon as I entered the hotel. My mental processes will possibly be well known to you by now, Miss Frayle, and were I in the position of dictating a further chapter for inclusion in a future edition of my casebook....”
He paused and glanced at Miss Frayle. She pushed her glasses back on to her nose and looked meekly at him.
“There’s a notebook here, Doctor,” she said with a hint of a suppressed giggle. “If you are sure the efficient Miss Grimshaw wouldn’t mind, I’d be only too delighted to jot down a few notes for you while the case is fresh in your mind. I know how much importance you attach to not waiting too long before you commit the facts to paper—especially when it has been a difficult and complicated case like this one.”
“This case has been neither difficult nor complicated,” he said in irritated tones. “On the contrary, it has been extremely simple and straightforward from the start. However, I am inclined to accept your kind offer, since I feel that this is a case which deserves to be put on record if only because it exemplifies the fact that the average criminal invariably neglects to remember some quite vital point—a point which the alert investigator, if he uses his mental powers to the utmost, can invariably notice.”
Miss Frayle was sitting, pencil poised above the notebook, regarding him intently.
“You don’t want all this included in your notes of the case, do you, Doctor?” she queried.
Doctor Morelle looked at her suspiciously. Did he detect a note of sarcasm in her voice? Then he said:
“No. Begin here, Miss Frayle: It was immediately apparent to me that, if the safe had been opened by someone without any prior knowledge of the combination, it must have yielded only to the most delicate manipulation of the sensitive mechanism—a feat that only an expert safe-breaker could have performed—or would, for that matter, have attempted. Alternatively, however—” He broke off suddenly. “I trust that I am not going too rapidly for you, Miss Frayle?”
Miss Frayle laughed. “Oh, not at all. This is really great fun. Just like old times!”
The Doctor resumed.
“Alternatively, however,” he went on, “Holt or his wife could have imparted the secret of the safe combination to someone else. But this seemed a totally impossible suggestion, unless she herself had robbed the safe, or passed on the secret of the combination to some accomplice whom her husband had later surprised in the act of the robbery.”
“Quite so,” Miss Frayle agreed.
“I wish you would not interrupt my train of thought, Miss Frayle!” the Doctor exclaimed. “Resume your shorthand hieroglyphics, please: Considering the extreme force with which the man had been struck down, I was inclined to take the latter view and to consider that some male accomplice of Mrs. Holt had robbed the safe and, being surprised in the act by Holt, had struck him with the brass candlestick which he saw on the table in the office.”
He paused, as if collecting his thoughts for a final paragraph, which would place the whole matter in perspective.
“As we are now aware,” he went on, “my theory proved correct. The wife implicated Foster, the man whom we heard simulating inebriety as he returned to the hotel....”
During the latter part of this piece of dictation, Miss Frayle had shown signs of increasing excitement. She had dropped her pencil, much to Doctor Morelle’s irritation since he had to stop dictation while she hunted on the floor for it. Now she burst in with the query that had been hovering at the back of her mind for some minutes past.
“But how,” she asked, “did Mrs. Holt give herself away to you in the first case?”
Doctor Morelle frowned portentously. “That, my dear Miss Frayle, I should have thought was obvious enough to the meanest intelligence,” he said.
“Perhaps you will explain?”” Miss Frayle asked in her sweetest tones.
“Very well.” With a sigh of resignation Doctor Morelle went on. “And it might perhaps be as well to include this also in your shorthand notes of the case,” he said. “You will recall my reference to the heavy candlestick, which was on the desk in the hotel office?”
Miss Frayle nodded quickly.
“Mrs. Holt declared that she had kicked her foot against it when she had entered the office,” the Doctor continued. “It had therefore presumably been on the floor. She also stated that no other person had been present between her finding her husband and our arrival on the scene. Therefore she must have picked up the candlestick and placed it on the desk herself. I trust that you can follow the line of my argument up to this point, Miss Frayle?”
“Perfectly,” Miss Frayle remarked with considerable satisfaction.
“Good. You will also recall that when I subsequently examined it to confirm that it was the actual weapon with which the crime had been committed, I found that it bore no fingerprints whatsoever. Mrs. Holt was not, of course, wearing gloves—she had not been out of doors the whole evening—and the only question to be settled was who had cleaned the fingerprints off the candlestick, and why?”
“I think I see,” Miss Frayle murmured.
“Pray let me finish my logical construction!” Doctor Morelle snapped. “The answer was obvious enough. Mrs. Holt or someone else must have removed the fingerprints—because the candlestick bore the imprint of that other person’s fingers as well as her own! That other person was, in fact, the murderer. When once I had reached that point, the remainder was abundantly clear.”
Miss Frayle sat up in her chair, eyes wide open with admiration. Her spectacles slipped forward on her nose and she pushed them back with a gesture that Doctor Morelle found irritatingly familiar.
“How perfectly marvellous of you to have worked all that out!” she exclaimed. “I am quite sure that if I had thought about it for an age, I should never—”
The Doctor held up a commanding hand.
“Purely a ratiocinative process,” he snapped. “When once the central fact had been grasped, the remainder followed logically and inevitably. And,” he added, “do refrain from goggling at me through your spectacles in that way! You know how irritating I have always found your astigmatic—” He broke off suddenly. He had forgotten that Miss Frayle was by way of being merely a volunteer on this occasion. “I—I beg your pardon, my dear Miss Frayle,” he said. “For a moment I thought that you—er—were back—”
Miss Frayle laughed outright.
“Doctor Morelle, it was wonderful!” she exclaimed. “Just like old times! And when Miss Grimshaw comes back—well, I shall feel quite lost to be away from this study!”
“Miss Grimshaw—er Miss Grimshaw—” And for the first time in his long career, Doctor Morelle seemed completely at a loss for words.
