The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet Part 18

I went over the whole affair with Mr. Royce, as soon as he reached the office, and spent the rest of the day arranging the papers relating to Vantine's affairs and getting them ready to probate.

Parks called me up once or twice for instructions as to various details, and Vantine's nearest relative, a third or fourth cousin, wired from somewhere in the west that he was starting for New York at once. And then, toward the middle of the afternoon, came the cablegram from Paris which I had almost forgotten to expect:

"Royce & Lester, New York.

"Regret mistake in s.h.i.+pment exceedingly. Our representative will call to explain.

"Armand et Fils."

So there was an end of the romance G.o.dfrey had woven, and which I had been almost ready to believe--the romance of design, of a carefully laid plot, and all that. It had been merely accident, after all. And I smiled a little sarcastically at myself for my credulity. No doubt my own romance of a secret drawer and a poisoned mechanism would prove equally fabulous. In my over-wrought state of the night before, it had seemed reasonable enough; but here, in the cold light of day, it seemed preposterous. How Grady and Goldberger would have laughed at it!

I put the whole thing impatiently away from me, and turned to other work; but I found I could not conquer a certain deep-seated nervousness; so at last I locked my desk, told the boy I would not be back, and took a cab for a long drive through the park. The fresh air, the smell of the trees, the sight of the children playing along the paths, did me good, and I was able to greet G.o.dfrey with a smile when he called for me at seven o'clock.

"I've engaged a table at a little place around the corner," he said.

"It is managed by a friend of mine, and I think you'll like it."

I did. Indeed, the dinner was so good that it demanded undivided attention, and not until the coffee was on the table and the cigars lighted did we speak of the business which had brought us together.

"Anything new?" I asked, as we pushed back our chairs.

"No, nothing of any importance. The man at the morgue has not been identified. In the first place, the Paris police have never taken his Bertillon measurements."

"Then he's not a criminal?"

"He has never been arrested," G.o.dfrey qualified. "More peculiar is the fact that he hasn't been recognised here. Two million people, probably, saw his photograph in the papers this morning. Some of them thought they knew him and went around to the morgue to see his body, but nothing came of it. The police have no report of any such man missing."

"That _is_ peculiar, isn't it!" I commented.

"It's very peculiar. It means one of two things--either the fellow's friends are keeping dark purposely, or he didn't have any friends, here in New York, at least. But even then, one would think that whoever rented him a room would wonder what had become of him, and would make some inquiries."

"Perhaps he hadn't rented a room," I suggested. "Perhaps he had just reached New York, and went direct to Vantine's."

G.o.dfrey's face lighted up.

"From the steamer, of course! I ought to have guessed as much from the cut of his hair. He hasn't been out of France more than ten days or so. Excuse me a moment."

He hurried away, and five minutes pa.s.sed before he came back.

"I 'phoned the office to send some men around to the boats which came in yesterday. If he was a pa.s.senger, some one of the stewards will recognise his photograph. There were three boats he might have come on--the _Adriatic_ and _Cecelie_ from Cherbourg, and _La Touraine_ from Havre. There is nothing else that I know of," he added thoughtfully, "except that Freylinghuisen thinks he has discovered the nature of the poison. He says it is some very powerful variant of prussic acid."

"Yes," I said, "I heard him say something of the sort last night."

"I had a talk with him this afternoon about it, and he was quite learned," G.o.dfrey went on. "This is a great chance for him to get before the public, and he's making the most of it. I gathered from what he said that ordinary prussic acid, which is deadly enough, heaven knows, contains only two per cent. of the poison; while the strongest solution yet obtained contains only four per cent.

Freylinghuisen says that whoever concocted this particular poison has evidently discovered a new way of doing it--or rediscovered an old way--so that it is at least fifty per cent. effective. In other words, if you can get a fraction of a drop of it in a man's blood, you kill him by paralysis quicker than if you put a bullet through his heart."

"Nothing can save a man, then?" I questioned.

"Nothing on earth. Oh, I don't say that if somebody had an axe handy and chopped your arm off at the shoulder an instant after you were struck on the hand, you mightn't have a chance to live; but it would take mighty quick work, and even then, it would be nip and tuck.

Freylinghuisen thinks it is a new discovery. I don't. I think some one has dug up one of the old Medici formulae. Maybe it was placed in the secret drawer, so that there would never be any lack of ammunition for the mechanism."

"G.o.dfrey," I said, "are you still bent on fooling with that thing?"

"More than ever; I'm going to find that secret drawer. And if the fangs strike--well, I'm ready for them. See here what I had made today."

He drew from his pocket something that looked like a steel gauntlet, such as one sees on suits of old armour. He slipped it over his right hand.

"You see it covers the back of the hand completely," he said, "half way down the first joint of the fingers. It is made of the toughest steel and would turn a bullet. And do you see how it is depressed in the middle, Lester?"

"Yes," I said, "I was wondering why you had it made in that shape."

"I want to get a sample of that poison. My theory is that when the fangs strike the hand, the shock drives out a drop or two of the poison. I don't want those drops to get away; I want them to roll into this depression, and I shall very carefully bottle them. Think what they are, Lester--the poison of the Medici!"

I sat for a moment looking at him, half in amus.e.m.e.nt, half in sorrow.

It seemed a pity that his theory must come tumbling down, it was so picturesque, and he was so interested and enthusiastic over it. And it would make such a good story! He caught my glance, and put the gauntlet back into his pocket.

"Well, what is it?" he asked quietly.

For answer, I got out the cablegram and pa.s.sed it across to him. He read it with brows contracted.

"That seems to put a puncture in our little romance, doesn't it?" I asked, at last.

He nodded thoughtfully.

"Yes, it does," and he read the message again, word by word.

"Armand's man hasn't called yet?"

"No, I didn't get the message till about three o'clock. I suppose he'll be around to-morrow."

"You will have to turn the cabinet over to him, of course?"

"Why, yes, it belongs to him. At least, it doesn't belong to Vantine."

He slipped the message into its envelope and handed it back to me. I could see that he was perplexed and upset.

"Well, in spite of this," he said finally, "I am still interested in that cabinet, Lester, and I wish you would keep possession of it as long as you can. At least, I wouldn't give it up until he delivered to you the other cabinet which Vantine really bought."

"Oh, I'll make him do that," I agreed quickly. "That will no doubt take a few days--longer than that if Vantine's cabinet is in Paris."

G.o.dfrey raised a finger to the waiter, asked for the check, and paid it.

"And now let us go down and have a look at this one," he said, "as we intended doing. You will think me foolish, Lester, but even that cablegram hasn't shaken my belief in the existence of that secret drawer."

"And all the rest?" I asked.

"Yes," he answered slowly, "and all the rest." He said nothing more until we stopped before the Vantine house, but I could see, from his puckered brows, how desperately he was trying to untangle this quirk in the mystery.

"The siege seems to have been lifted," I remarked, as we alighted.

"The siege?"