Читать книгу The Leopard's Spots - Fred M. White - Страница 9

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So swift a development on the very fringe of the mystery was not in the least surprising to Montagu Stagg. From what he had seen of the woman with the black eyes, he had naturally regarded her as capable of prompt decisions and coolness in the face of danger, and she had not belied that estimate. There was just a chance, therefore, that Stagg would hear of her no more. There was no reason, on the face of it, why she should be looked for; she had made quite a commonplace exit, she had settled all her liabilities, and everybody connected with the house in Porchester-place was therefore to the good. Besides, there was nothing very extraordinary in people's plans being changed at the last moment, and therefore no questions were likely to be asked. That was always provided that the woman had contrived in some way to get rid of the body of the man she called her husband, though Stagg was convinced that he was nothing of the kind.

There was nothing for it now except to call upon Everard Stokes, and advance the business in hand a further stage. But apparently the proprietor of the 'Searchlight' was not ready to go on. He appeared to be moody and preoccupied, and without any trace of that sardonic humour that Stagg had noticed on the night before.

"I shall have to put you off for a day or two," he said. "Something has happened since last night that ties me up. It is rather a troublesome piece of business, and worries me a great deal. I will write to you, but I don't suppose I shall be able to say anything definite within a week."

"And meanwhile?" Stagg asked.

"Oh, that's all right. Meanwhile, 'Frank Fair' can go on his prosperous way without any interference from me."

With which Stokes curtly dismissed his visitor, who went on his way with a tranquil mind. At any rate, he had gained a few days in which to turn round, and something might turn up meanwhile. Like all men of his class, Stagg was an enthusiastic admirer of the school of philosophy whose ritual is that sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof, and his thoughts began to wander pleasantly in the direction of the Minchin golf links. He would get down there in time for luncheon at the Club House, and play an afternoon round. He armed himself with a sheaf of daily papers, none of which he had yet seen.

There was just the chance that there might be some allusion to the mystery of Porchester-place, and if there was Stagg determined not to overlook it. It was early yet for anything in the shape of publicity, and a most careful search failed to produce any result. Stagg put the whole thing from his mind; he lunched discreetly, after which he spent the afternoon in the open air, returning to tea presently, having achieved a victory that gave him particular satisfaction. There were only a few letters awaiting him which called for attention, and when those were despatched Stagg spent a quiet evening playing bezique with his niece Stella. Very likely there would be something in the papers to-morrow.

But there wasn't, and indeed it was the third day before anything transpired to throw light on Stagg's recent adventure. He was glancing through the 'Times' at breakfast, whilst at the other end of the table Stella was poring over the 'Mail.' She looked up presently with an eager glance.

"What an extraordinary thing!" she said. "I suppose there is something in the old saying that murder will out."

"Well, that all depends, my dear," Stagg replied. "I have a shrewd idea that many crimes of that sort never come to light at all. But why this philosophy?"

"Just listen to this," Stella said. "Last night a most remarkable thing happened at Seymour-street Station. I will give it you in my own words. Just about midnight there was a small explosion of gas in the cloakroom. It doesn't seem to have been very much; an escape under the floor boards that caught fire from a lighted match. But it blew up part of the flooring and scattered a good deal of heavy luggage about. One box was thrown on to the platform with such force that the top came off. What do you think they found inside?"

"Let me guess." Stagg said, "Now, by any chance did it contain a dead body?"

"You really are a wonderful man," Stella cried. "That is just what it did contain. The body of a man, dark and clean-shaven, apparently about 50 years of age. It says here that the man had been undoubtedly murdered. There was a wound in the region of the heart sufficient to kill a dozen people. The packing case was a long wooden affair which the police say was of foreign manufacture."

"Go on," Stagg said eagerly. "Go on."

"Oh, there isn't much more," Stella explained. "When the police came to make inquiries they found that the packing case had been left about 7 o'clock in the morning three days ago by a lady who was dressed in black and who wore a heavy veil. And so far that is all that is known. So there, you see, how impossible it is to keep these sort of things quiet. It looks to me like a direct intervention of Providence."

"Or a most extraordinary accident," Stagg said. "If I were a novelist I would make a good story out of this. But then I don't happen to be a novelist, and therefore I am probably as much in the dark as the police. Is that all that there is to the story, Stella?"

"I think, so," the girl said. "Yes, it is. Except that the body was taken to Seymour-street police station close by, and deposited in the mortuary there."

"There to lie until it is buried, I suppose. It looks to me like a case which the police will have great difficulty in bringing home to anybody. You said just now that murder will out. Well, of course, murder always will out; but it does not follow inevitably that the culprit will be discovered."

With which Stagg went on quietly with his breakfast. He had shown nothing besides a little mild interest in the paragraph that Stella had been discussing, and that healthy appetite of his was in no way impaired, but, at the same time, he knew perfectly well that here was another development of the mystery into which he had accidentally blundered.

For the man he had seen lying dead there in bed was dark and clean-shaven, and, moreover, must have been somewhere in the neighbourhood of fifty years of ago. And again, the unfortunate victim had died of a deep stab immediately under the heart. In addition to all this, the description of the woman given by the clerk in charge of the luggage office tallied more or less exactly with the woman with the black eyes. She also was tall and slender, and Stagg could imagine how she would look in a plain black dress and veil.

He said nothing more, however, till he had finished his breakfast, after which he retired to the library with a handful of morning papers, all of which he took and went through scrupulously with an eye to business.

Every one of those papers contained something about the Seymour-street mystery, as they called it, and here was one of them at length that had gone a little further than its contemporaries. The 'Daily Record' man had interviewed the clerk in the station office, and had evidently pressed him closely on the subject of the woman who had deposited the box there. The clerk had described her as elegantly and fashionably dressed, very tall and stylish, evidently a lady, and, moreover, he had gone on to say that he had been struck with those dark eyes of hers, which the veil she had been wearing did not entirely conceal. He was under the impression that she was a foreigner, for though she spoke quite good English there had been a slurring of certain letters and a hesitation over a word here and there.

"That's the woman for a million," Stagg told himself, "I think I will go as far as Seymour-street police station and make some excuse to look at the body."