Читать книгу The Seven Secrets - Le Queux William - Страница 5

The man’s amazing announcement held me speechless.

“Murdered!” I cried when I found tongue. “Impossible!”

“Ah! sir, it’s too true. He’s quite dead.”

“But surely he has died from natural causes – eh?”

“No, sir. My poor master has been foully murdered.”

“How do you know that?” I asked breathlessly. “Tell me all the facts.”

I saw by the man’s agitation, his white face, and the hurried manner in which he had evidently dressed to come in search of me, that something tragic had really occurred.

“We know nothing yet, sir,” was his quick response. “I entered his room at two o’clock, as usual, to see if he wanted anything, and saw that he was quite still, apparently asleep. The lamp was turned low, but as I looked over the bed I saw a small dark patch upon the sheet. This I discovered to be blood, and a moment later was horrified to discover a small wound close to the heart, and from it the blood was slowly oozing.”

“Then he’s been stabbed, you think?” I gasped, springing up and beginning to dress myself hastily.

“We think so, sir. It’s awful!”

“Terrible!” I said, utterly dumbfounded by the man’s amazing story. “After you made the discovery, how did you act?”

“I awoke the nurse, who slept in the room adjoining. And then we aroused Miss Mivart. The shock to her was terrible, poor young lady. When she saw the body of the old gentleman she burst into tears, and at once sent me to you. I didn’t find a cab till I’d walked almost to Hammersmith, and then I came straight on here.”

“But is there undoubtedly foul play, Short?”

“No doubt whatever, sir. I’m nothing of a doctor, but I could see the wound plainly, like a small clean cut just under the heart.”

“No weapon about?”

“I didn’t see anything, sir.”

“Have you called the police?”

“No, sir. Miss Mivart said she would wait until you arrived. She wants your opinion.”

“And Mrs. Courtenay. How does she bear the tragedy?”

“The poor lady doesn’t know yet.”

“Doesn’t know? Haven’t you told her?”

“No, sir. She’s not at home.”

“What? She hasn’t returned?”

“No, sir,” responded the man.

That fact was in itself peculiar. Yet there was, I felt sure, some strong reason if young Mrs. Courtenay remained the night with her friends, the Hennikers. Trains run to Kew after the theatres, but she had possibly missed the last, and had been induced by her friends to remain the night with them in town.

Yet the whole of the tragic affair was certainly very extraordinary. It was Short’s duty to rise at two o’clock each morning and go to his master’s room to ascertain if the invalid wanted anything. Generally, however, the old gentleman slept well, hence there had been no necessity for a night nurse.

When I entered the cab, and the man having taken a seat beside me, we had set out on our long night drive to Kew, I endeavoured to obtain more details regarding the Courtenay ménage. In an ordinary way I could scarcely have questioned a servant regarding his master and mistress, but on this drive I saw an occasion to obtain knowledge, and seized it.

Short, although a well-trained servant, was communicative. The shock he had sustained in discovering his master made him so.

After ten years’ service he was devoted to his master, but from the remarks he let drop during our drive I detected that he entertained a strong dislike of the old gentleman’s young wife. He was, of course, well aware of my affection for Ethelwynn, and carefully concealed his antipathy towards her, an antipathy which I somehow felt convinced existed. He regarded both sisters with equal mistrust.

“Does your mistress often remain in town with her friends at night?”

“Sometimes, when she goes to balls.”

“And is that often?”

“Not very often.”

“And didn’t the old gentleman know of his wife’s absence?”

“Sometimes. He used to ask me whether Mrs. Courtenay was at home, and then I was bound to tell the truth.”

By his own admission then, this man Short had informed the invalid of his wife’s frequent absences. He was an informer, and as such most probably the enemy of both Mary and Ethelwynn. I knew him to be the confidential servant of the old gentleman, but had not before suspected him of tale-telling. Without doubt Mrs. Courtenay’s recent neglect had sorely grieved the old gentleman. He doted upon her, indulged her in every whim and fancy and, like many an aged husband who has a smart young wife, dared not to differ from her or complain of any of her actions. There is a deal of truth in the adage, “There’s no fool like an old fool.”

But the mystery was increasing, and as we drove together down that long interminable high road through Hammersmith to Chiswick, wet, dark and silent at that hour, I reflected that the strange presage of insecurity which had so long oppressed me was actually being fulfilled. Ambler Jevons had laughed at it. But would he laugh now? To-morrow, without doubt, he would be working at the mystery in the interests of justice. To try to keep the affair out of the Press would, I knew too well, be impossible. Those men, in journalistic parlance called “liners,” are everywhere, hungry for copy, and always eager to seize upon anything tragic or mysterious.

From Short I gathered a few additional details. Not many, be it said, but sufficient to make it quite clear that he was intensely antagonistic towards his mistress. This struck me as curious, for as far as I had seen she had always treated him with the greatest kindness and consideration, had given him holidays, and to my knowledge had, a few months before, raised his wages of her own accord. Nevertheless, the ménage was a strange one, incongruous in every respect.

My chief thoughts were, however, with my love. The shock to her must, I knew, be terrible, especially as Mary was absent and she was alone with the nurse and servants.

When I sprang from the cab and entered the house she met me in the hall. She had dressed hastily and wore a light shawl over her head, probably to conceal her disordered hair, but her face was blanched to the lips.

“Oh, Ralph!” she cried in a trembling voice. “I thought you were never coming. It’s terrible – terrible!”

“Come in here,” I said, leading her into the dining room. “Tell me all you know of the affair.”

“Short discovered him just after two o’clock. He was then quite still.”

“But there may be life,” I exclaimed suddenly, and leaving her I rushed up the stairs and into the room where the old man had chatted to me so merrily not many hours before.

The instant my gaze fell upon him I knew the truth. Cadaveric rigidity had supervened, and he had long been beyond hope of human aid. His furrowed face was as white as ivory, and his lower jaw had dropped in that manner that unmistakably betrays the presence of death.

As the man had described, the sheet was stained with blood. But there was not much, and I was some moments before I discovered the wound. It was just beneath the heart, cleanly cut, and about three-quarters of an inch long, evidently inflicted by some sharp instrument. He had no doubt been struck in his sleep, and with such precision that he had died without being able to raise the alarm.

The murderer, whoever he was, had carried the weapon away.

I turned and saw Ethelwynn, a pale wan figure in her light gown and shawl, standing on the threshold, watching me intently. She stood there white and trembling, as though fearing to enter the presence of the dead.

I made a hasty tour of the room, examining the window and finding it fastened. As far as I could discover, nothing whatever was disturbed.

Then I went out to her and, closing the door behind me, said —

“Short must go along to the police station. We must report it.”

“But is it really necessary?” she asked anxiously. “Think of the awful exposure in the papers. Can’t we hush it up? Do, Ralph – for my sake,” she implored.

“But I can’t give a death certificate when a person has been murdered,” I explained. “Before burial there must be a post-mortem and an inquest.”

“Then you think he has actually been murdered?”

“Of course, without a doubt. It certainly isn’t suicide.”

The discovery had caused her to become rigid, almost statuesque. Sudden terror often acts thus upon women of her highly nervous temperament. She allowed me to lead her downstairs and back to the dining room. On the way I met Short in the hall, and ordered him to go at once to the police station.

“Now, dearest,” I said, taking her hand tenderly in mine when we were alone together with the door closed, “tell me calmly all you know of this awful affair.”

“I – I know nothing,” she declared. “Nothing except what you already know. Short knocked at my door and I dressed hastily, only to discover that the poor old gentleman was dead.”

“Was the house still locked up?”

“I believe so. The servants could, I suppose, tell that.”

“But is it not strange that Mary is still absent?” I remarked, perplexed.

“No, not very. Sometimes she has missed her last train and has stopped the night with the Penn-Pagets or the Hennikers. It is difficult, she says, to go to supper after the theatre and catch the last train. It leaves Charing Cross so early.”

Again there seemed a distinct inclination on her part to shield her sister.

“The whole thing is a most profound mystery,” she went on. “I must have slept quite lightly, for I heard the church clock strike each quarter until one o’clock, yet not an unusual sound reached me. Neither did nurse hear anything.”

Nurse Kate was an excellent woman whom I had known at Guy’s through several years. Both Sir Bernard and myself had every confidence in her, and she had been the invalid’s attendant for the past two years.

“It certainly is a mystery – one which we must leave to the police to investigate. In the meantime, however, we must send Short to Redcliffe Square to find Mary. He must not tell her the truth, but merely say that her husband is much worse. To tell her of the tragedy at once would probably prove too great a blow.”

“She ought never to have gone to town and left him,” declared my well-beloved in sudden condemnation of her sister’s conduct. “She will never forgive herself.”

“Regrets will not bring the poor fellow to life again,” I said with a sigh. “We must act, and act promptly, in order to discover the identity of the murderer and the motive of the crime. That there is a motive is certain; yet it is indeed strange that anyone should actually kill a man suffering from a disease which, in a few months at most, must prove fatal. The motive was therefore his immediate decease, and that fact will probably greatly assist the police in their investigations.”

“But who could have killed him?”

“Ah! that’s the mystery. If, as you believe, the house was found to be still secured when the alarm was raised, then it would appear that someone who slept beneath this roof was guilty.”

“Oh! Impossible! Remember there are only myself and the servants. You surely don’t suspect either of them?”

“I have no suspicion of anyone at present,” I answered. “Let the police search the place, and they may discover something which will furnish them with a clue.”

I noticed some telegraph-forms in the stationery rack on a small writing-table, and taking one scribbled a couple of lines to Sir Bernard, at Hove, informing him of the mysterious affair. This I folded and placed in my pocket in readiness for the re-opening of the telegraph office at eight o’clock.

Shortly afterwards we heard the wheels of the cab outside, and a few minutes later were joined by a police inspector in uniform and an officer in plain clothes.

In a few brief sentences I explained to them the tragic circumstances, and then led them upstairs to the dead man’s room.

After a cursory glance around, they went forth again out upon the landing in order to await the arrival of two other plain-clothes officers who had come round on foot, one of them the sergeant of the Criminal Investigation Department attached to the Kew station. Then, after giving orders to the constable on the beat to station himself at the door and allow no one to enter or leave without permission, the three detectives and the inspector entered the room where the dead man lay.