The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet Part 9

Hughes sat down heavily on the couch near the window, and mopped his face again, with a shaking hand. Death he was accustomed to--but death met decently in bed and resulting from some understood cause.

Death in this horrible and mysterious form shook him; he could not understand it, and his failure to understand appalled him. He was a physician; it was his business to understand; and yet here was death in a form as mysterious to him as to the veriest layman. It compelled him to pause and take stock of himself--always a disconcerting process to the best of us!

That was a trying half hour. Hughes sat on the couch, breathing heavily, staring at the floor, perhaps pa.s.sing his own ignorance in review, perhaps wondering if he had always been right in prescribing this or that. As for me, I was thinking of my dead friend. I remembered Philip Vantine as I had always known him--a kindly, witty, Christian gentleman. I could see his pleasant eyes looking at me in friends.h.i.+p, as they had looked a few hours before; I could hear his voice, could feel the clasp of his hand. That such a man should be killed like this, struck down by a mysterious a.s.sa.s.sin, armed with a poisoned weapon....

A woman! Always my mind came back to that. A woman! Poison was a woman's weapon. But who was she? How had she escaped? Where had she concealed herself? How was she able to strike so surely? Above all, why should she have chosen Philip Vantine, of all men, for her victim--Philip Vantine, who had never injured any woman--and then I paused. For I realised that I knew nothing of Vantine, except what he had chosen to tell me. Parks would know. And then I shrank from the thought. Must we probe that secret? Must we compel a man to betray his master?

My face was burning. No, we could not do that--that would be abominable....

The door opened and G.o.dfrey came in. This time, he was not alone.

Simmonds and Goldberger followed him, and their faces showed that they were as shaken and nonplussed as I. There was a third man with them whom I did not know; but I soon found out that it was Freylinghuisen, the coroner's physician.

They all looked at the body, and Freylinghuisen knelt beside it and examined the injured hand; then he sat down by Dr. Hughes, and they were soon deep in a low-toned conversation, whose subject I could guess. I could also guess what Simmonds and G.o.dfrey were talking about in the farther corner; but I could not guess why Goldberger, instead of getting to work, should be walking up and down, pulling impatiently at his moustache and glancing at his watch now and then.

He seemed to be waiting for some one, but not until twenty minutes later did I suspect who it was. Then the door opened again to admit a short, heavy-set man, with florid face, stubbly black moustache, and little, close-set eyes, preternaturally bright. He glanced about the room, nodded to Goldberger, and then looked inquiringly at me.

"This is Mr. Lester, Commissioner Grady," said Goldberger, and I realised that the chief of the detective bureau had come up from headquarters to take personal charge of the case.

"Mr. Lester is Mr. Vantine's attorney," the coroner added, in explanation.

"Glad to know you, Mr. Lester," said Grady, shortly.

"And now, I guess, we're ready to begin," went on the coroner.

"Not quite," said Grady, grimly. "We'll excuse all reporters, first,"

and he looked across at G.o.dfrey, his face darkening.

I felt my own face flus.h.i.+ng, and started to protest, but G.o.dfrey silenced me with a little gesture.

"It's all right, Lester," he said. "Mr. Grady is quite within his rights. I'll withdraw--until he sends for me."

"You'll have a long wait, then!" retorted Grady, with a sarcastic laugh.

"The longer I wait, the worse it will be for you, Mr. Grady," said G.o.dfrey quietly, opened the door and closed it behind him.

Grady stared after him for a moment in crimson amazement. Then, mastering himself with an effort, he turned to the coroner.

"All right, Goldberger," he said, and sat down to watch the proceedings.

A very few minutes sufficed for Hughes and Freylinghuisen and I to tell all we knew of this tragedy and of the one which had preceded it. Grady seemed already acquainted with the details of d'Aurelle's death, for he listened without interrupting, only nodding from time to time.

"You've got a list of the servants here, of course, Simmonds," he said, when we had finished the story.

"Yes, sir," and Simmonds handed it to him. "H-m," said Grady, as he glanced it over. "Five of 'em. Know anything about 'em?"

"They've all been with Mr. Vantine a long time, sir," replied Simmonds. "So far as I've been able to judge, they're all right."

"Which one of 'em found Vantine's body?"

"Parks, I think," I said. "It was he who called me."

"Better have him in," said Grady, and doubled up the list and slipped it into his pocket.

Parks came in looking decidedly shaky; but answered Grady's questions clearly and concisely. He told first of the events of the afternoon, and then pa.s.sed on to the evening.

"Mr. Vantine had dinner at home, sir," he said. "It was served, I think, at seven o'clock. He must have finished a little after seven-thirty. I didn't see him, for I was straightening things around up in his room and putting his clothes away. But he told Rogers--"

"Never mind what he told Rogers," broke in Grady. "Just tell us what you know."

"Very well, sir," said Parks, submissively. "I had a lot of work to do--we just got back from Europe yesterday, you know--and I kept on, putting things in their places and straightening around, and it must have been half-past eight when I heard Rogers yelling for me. I thought the house was on fire, and I come down in a hurry. Rogers was standing out there in the hall, looking like he'd seen a ghost. He kind of gasped and pointed to this room, and I looked in and saw Mr.

Vantine laying there--"

His voice choked at the words, but he managed to go on, after a moment.

"Then I telephoned for Mr. Lester," he added, "and that's all I know."

"Very well," said Grady. "That's all for the present. Send Rogers in."

Rogers's face, as he entered the room, gave me a kind of shock, for it was that of a man on the verge of hysteria. He was a man of about fifty, with iron-grey hair, and a smooth-shaven face, ordinarily ruddy with health. But now his face was livid, his cheeks lined and shrunken, his eyes blood-shot and staring. He reeled rather than walked into the room, one hand clutching at his throat, as though he were choking.

"Get him a chair," said Grady, and Simmonds brought one forward and remained standing beside it. "Now, my man," Grady continued, "you'll have to brace up. What's the matter with you, anyhow? Didn't you ever see a dead man before?"

"It ain't that," gasped Rogers. "It ain't that--though I never saw a murdered man before."

"What?" demanded Grady, sharply. "Didn't you see that fellow this afternoon?"

"That was different," Rogers moaned. "I didn't know him. Besides, I thought he'd killed himself. We all thought so."

"And you don't think Vantine did?"

"I know he didn't," and Rogers's voice rose to a shrill scream. "It was that woman done it! d.a.m.n her! She done it! I knowed she was up to some crooked work when I let her in!"

CHAPTER VI

THE WOMAN IN THE CASE

It was coming now; the secret, however sordid, however ugly, was to be unveiled. I saw Grady's face set in hard lines; I could hear the stir of interest with which the others leaned forward....

Grady took a flask from his pocket and opened it.

"Take a drink of this," he said, and placed it in Rogers's hand.

I could hear the mouth of the flask clattering against his teeth, as he put it eagerly to his mouth and took three or four long swallows.

"Thank you, sir," he said, more steadily, and handed the flask back to its owner. A little colour crept into his face; but I fancied there was a new look in his eyes--for, as the horror faded, fear took its place.

Grady screwed the cap on the flask with great deliberation, and returned it to his pocket. And all the time Rogers was watching him furtively, wiping his mouth mechanically with a trembling hand.