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twg_000000051000 | sort of love affair bringing the poor fellow down to this place; but that he should come up here and do this thing, even if it went wrong, is more than I can conceive. Taking the man as we knew him it is out of all reason." "Yes," Gifford assented. "But we don't know yet that it is a case | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051001 | of suicide." "What else?" Kelson returned. "How otherwise could the door have been locked. Unless--" He glanced sharply at the deep recess, or inner chamber, formed by the bartizan, hesitated a moment, and then going quickly to it, looked in. "No, nothing there," he announced with a breath of relief. "I had for the moment an idea it might have | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051002 | been a double tragedy," he added with a shudder. "So we are forced back to the suicide theory," Gifford remarked. He had gone to the landing outside the door. "Yes," Kelson replied as he joined him. "But as to the woman in the case, who could she possibly have been? I knew most of the girls who were at the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051003 | dance, and the idea of a tragedy with any one of them seems inconceivable." "One would think so," Gifford responded. "And yet--" "You think it possible?" Kelson demanded incredulously. "Possible, if far from probable," the other answered with conviction. "There are women who can be as secret as the grave, at any rate so far as appearances to the outer | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051004 | world are concerned. I wonder whom he danced with. Do you remember?" "No. I seem to recollect him with a girl in a light green dress, but that does not take us far." Footsteps on the stairway announced their host's return. "The police will be here, directly," he reported, "and, I hope, a doctor. I have done my best to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051005 | keep it from the ladies, and I don't think that, so far, any of them has an exact idea of what made me turn them back. Just as well the horror should be kept dark as long as possible. It is such an awful blow to me that I can scarcely realize it yet." "Miss Morriston does not know?" Kelson | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051006 | asked. "No. And I only hope it won't give her a dislike to the house when she does. For I am hoping to have her here a good deal with me, even if she marries." A police inspector accompanied by a detective and a constable now arrived. Morriston took them into the room of death. Gifford grasped Kelson's arm. "I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051007 | don't think there is any use in our staying here," he suggested. "Let us go down." The other man nodded, and they began to descend. "You are not going, Kelson?" Morriston cried, hurrying to the door. "We thought we could be of no use and might be in the way," Gifford replied. "Oh, I wish you would stay," Morriston urged, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051008 | going down a few steps to them. "I know it is not pleasant; on the contrary it's a ghastly affair; but I should like to have you with me till this police business is over. I won't ask you to stay up here, but if you don't mind waiting downstairs I should be so grateful. I might want your advice. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051009 | You'll find the rest of the party in the drawing-room." The two could do no less than promise, and, with a word of thanks, Morriston went back to the officials. As the two men crossed the hall the drawing-room door opened and Miss Morriston came out. "Is my brother coming?" she asked. "He will be down soon," Gifford answered in | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051010 | as casual a tone as he could assume. The girl seemed struck by the gravity of their faces as she glanced from one to the other. "I hope nothing is wrong," she observed, with just a shade of apprehension. There was a momentary pause as each man, hesitating between a direct falsehood, the truth, and a plausible excuse, rather waited | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051011 | for the other to speak. Gifford answered. "No, nothing that you need worry about, Miss Morriston. Your brother will tell you later on." But the hesitation seemed to have aroused the girl's suspicions. "Do tell me now," she said, with just a tremor of anxiety underlying the characteristic coldness of her tone. "Unless," she added, "it is something not exactly | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051012 | proper for me to hear." Kelson quickly availed himself of the loophole she gave him. "You had better wait and hear it from Dick," he said, suggesting a move towards the drawing-room. "In the meantime there is nothing you need be alarmed about." "It all sounds very mysterious," Miss Morriston returned, her apprehension scarcely hidden by a forced smile. "I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051013 | must go and ask Dick--" As she turned towards the passage leading to the tower Kelson sprang forward and intercepted her. "No, no, Miss Morriston," he remonstrated with a prohibiting gesture, "don't go up there now. Take my word for it you had better not. Dick will be down directly to explain what is wrong." For a few moments her | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051014 | eyes rested on him searchingly. "Very well," she said at length. "If you say I ought not to go, I won't. But you don't lessen my anxiety to know what has happened." "There is no particular cause for anxiety on your part," Kelson said reassuringly. She had turned and now led the way to the drawing-room. As they entered they | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051015 | were received by expectant looks. "Well, is the mystery solved?" young Tredworth inquired. Kelson gave him a silencing look. "You'll hear all about it in good time," he replied between lightness and gravity. Piercy rose to take his leave. "Oh, you must not go yet," Miss Morriston protested. "They are just bringing tea." "But I fear I may be in | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051016 | the way if there is anything--" he urged. "Oh, no," his hostess insisted. "I don't know of anything wrong. At least neither Captain Kelson nor Mr. Gifford will admit anything. You must have tea before your long drive." The subject of the mystery in the tower was tacitly dropped, perhaps from a vague feeling that it was best not alluded | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051017 | to, at any rate by the ladies, and the conversation flowed, with more or less effort, on ordinary local topics. Tea over, Piercy took his leave. "You must come again, Mr. Piercy, while you are in this part of the county," Miss Morriston said graciously, "when you shall have no episodes of lost keys to hinder your researches. My brother | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051018 | shall write to you." Kelson took the departing visitor out into the hall to see him off. "You'll see it all in the papers to-morrow, I expect," he said in a confidential tone, "so there is no harm in telling you there has been a most gruesome discovery in that locked room. A man who was here at the Hunt | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051019 | Ball, has been found dead; suicide no doubt. The police are here now." "Good heavens! A mercy the ladies did not see it." "Yes; they'll have to know sooner or later. The later the better." "Yes, indeed. Any idea of the cause of the sad business?" "None, as yet. A complete mystery." "Probably a woman in it." "Not unlikely. Good-bye." | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051020 | As Kelson turned from the door, Morriston and another man appeared at the farther end of the hall and called to him. "You know Dr. Page," he said as Kelson joined them. "A terrible business this, doctor," Kelson observed as they shook hands. The medico drew in a breath. "And at first sight in the highest degree mysterious," he said | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051021 | gravely. "Dr. Page," said Morriston, "has made a cursory examination of the body. The autopsy will take place elsewhere. The police are making notes of everything important, and after dark will remove the body quietly by the tower door. So I hope the ladies will know nothing of the tragedy just yet." As they were speaking a footman had opened | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051022 | the hall-door and now approached with a card on a salver. "Can you see this gentleman, sir?" he said. Morriston took the card, and as he glanced at it an expression of pain crossed his face. He handed it silently to Kelson, who gave it back with a grave nod. It was the card of "Mr. Gervase Henshaw, II Stone | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051023 | Court, Temple, E.G." THE INCREDULITY OF GERVASE HENSHAW "Show Mr. Henshaw into the library," Morriston said to the footman. "This is horribly tragic," he added in a low tone to Kelson, "but it has to be gone through, and perhaps the sooner the better. His brother?" "Yes; he mentioned him on our way from the station the other evening. At | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051024 | any rate he will be able to see the situation for himself." "You will come with me?" Morriston suggested. "You might fetch your friend, Gifford." Kelson nodded, opened the drawing-room door and called Gifford out, while Morriston waited in the hall. "The brother has turned up," he said as the two men joined him. "No doubt to make inquiries. What | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051025 | are we to say to him?" "There is nothing to be said but the bare, inevitable truth," Gifford answered. "You can't now break it to him by degrees." Morriston led the way to the library. By the fire stood a keen-featured, sharp-eyed man of middle height and lithe figure, whose manner and first movements as the door opened showed alertness | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051026 | and energy of character. There was a certain likeness to his brother in the features and dark complexion as well as in a suggestion of unpleasant aggressiveness in the expression of his face, but where the dead man's personality had suggested determination overlaid with an easy-going, indulgent spirit of hedonism this man seemed to bristle with a restless mental activity, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051027 | to be all brain; one whose pleasures lay manifestly on the intellectual side. One thing Gifford quickly noted, as he looked at the man with a painful curiosity, was that the face before him lacked much of the suggestion of evil which in the brother he had found so repellent. This man could surely be hard enough on occasion, the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051028 | strong jaw and a certain hardness in the eyes told that, but except perhaps for an uncomfortable excess of sharpness, there was none of his brother's rather brutally scoffing cast of expression. Henshaw seemed to regard the two men following Morriston into the room with a certain apprehensive surprise. "I hope you will pardon my troubling you like this," he | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051029 | said to Morriston, speaking in a quick, decided tone, "but I have been rather anxious as to what has become of my brother, of whom I can get no news. He came down to the Cumberbatch Hunt Ball, which I understand was held in this house, and from that evening seems to have mysteriously disappeared. He had an important business | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051030 | engagement for the next day, Wednesday, which he failed to keep, and this may mean a considerable loss to him. Can you throw any light on his movements down here?" Morriston, dreading to break the news abruptly, had not interrupted his questions. "I am sorry to say I can," he now answered in a subdued tone. "Sorry?" Henshaw caught up | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051031 | the word quickly. "What do you mean? Has he met with an accident?" "Worse than that," Morriston answered sympathetically. Henshaw with a start fell back a step. "Worse," he repeated. "You don't mean to say--" "He is dead." "Dead!" Surprise and shock raised the word almost to a shout. "You--" "We have," Morriston said quietly, "only discovered the terrible truth | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051032 | within the last hour or so." "But dead?" Henshaw protested incredulously. "How--how can he be dead? How did he die? An accident?" "I am afraid it looks as though by his own hand," Morriston answered in a hushed voice. The expression of incredulity on Henshaw's face manifestly deepened. "By his own hand?" he echoed. "Suicide? Clement commit suicide? Impossible! Inconceivable!" | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051033 | "One would think so indeed," Morriston replied with sympathy. "May I tell you the facts, so far as we know them?" "If you please," The words were rapped out almost peremptorily. Morriston pointed to a chair, but his visitor, in his preoccupation, seemed to take no notice of the gesture, continuing to stand restlessly, in an attitude of strained attention. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051034 | The other three men had seated themselves. Morriston without further preface related the story of the locked door in the tower and of the subsequent discovery when it had been opened. Henshaw heard him to the end in what seemed a mood of hardly restrained, somewhat resentful impatience. "I don't understand it at all," he said when the story was | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051035 | finished. "Nor do any of us," Morriston returned promptly. "The whole affair is as mysterious as it is lamentable. Still it appears to be clearly a case of suicide." "Suicide!" Henshaw echoed with a certain scornful incredulity. "Why suicide? In connexion with my brother the idea seems utterly preposterous." "The door locked on the inside," Morriston suggested. "That, I grant | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051036 | you, is at first sight mysterious enough," Henshaw returned, his keen eyes fixed on Morriston. "But even that does not reconcile me to the monstrous improbability of my brother, Clement, taking his own life. I knew him too well to admit that." "Unfortunately," Morriston replied, sympathetically restraining any approach to an argumentative tone, "your brother was practically a stranger to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051037 | me, and to us all. My friends here, Captain Kelson and Mr. Gifford, met him casually at the railway station and drove with him to the _Golden Lion_ in the town, where they all put up." Henshaw's sharp scrutiny was immediately transferred from Morriston to his companions. "Can you, gentlemen, throw any light on the matter?" he asked sharply. "None | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051038 | at all, I am sorry to say," Kelson answered readily. "I may as well tell you how our very slight acquaintance with him came about." "If you please," Henshaw responded, in a tone more of command than request. Kelson, naturally ignoring his questioner's slightly offensive manner, thereupon related the circumstances of the encounter at the station-yard and of the subsequent | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051039 | drive to the town, merely softening the detail of their preliminary altercation. Henshaw listened alertly intent, it seemed, to seize upon any point which did not satisfy him. "That was all you saw of my unfortunate brother?" he demanded at the end. "We saw him for a few moments in the hall of the hotel just as we were starting," | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051040 | Kelson answered. "You drove here together? No?" "No; your brother took an hotel carriage, and I drove in my own trap." "With Mr. ----?" he indicated Gifford, who up to this point had not spoken. "No," Gifford answered. "I came on later. A suit-case with my evening things had gone astray--been carried on in the train, and I had to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051041 | wait till it was returned." Henshaw stared at him for a moment sharply as though the statement had about it something vaguely suspicious, seemed about to put another question, checked himself, and turned about with a gesture of perplexity. "I don't understand it at all," he muttered. Then suddenly facing round again he said sharply to Gifford, "Have you anything | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051042 | to add, sir, to what your friend has told me?" "I can say nothing more," Gifford answered. Henshaw turned away again, and seemed as though but half satisfied. "The facts," he said in a lawyer-like tone, "don't appear to lead us far. But when ascertained facts stop short they may be supplemented. Apart from what is actually known--I ask this | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051043 | as the dead man's only brother--have either of you gentlemen formed any idea as to how he came by his death?" He was looking at Morriston, his cross-examining manner now softened by the human touch. "It has not occurred to me to look beyond what seems the obvious explanation of suicide," Morriston answered frankly. Henshaw turned to Kelson. "And you, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051044 | sir; have you any idea beyond the known facts?" "None," was the answer, "except that he took his own life. The door locked on--" Henshaw interrupted him sharply. "Now you are getting back to the facts, Captain Kelson. I tell you the idea of my brother Clement taking his own life is to me absolutely inconceivable. Have you any idea, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051045 | however far-fetched, as to what really may have happened?" Kelson shook his head. "None. Except I must say he looked to me the last man who would do such an act." "I should think so," Henshaw returned decidedly. Then he addressed himself to Gifford. "I must ask you, sir, the same question." "And I can give you no more satisfactory | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051046 | answer," Gifford said. "As a man with knowledge of the world as I take you to be?" Henshaw urged keenly. "No." "At least you agree with your friend here, that my poor brother did not strike one as being a man liable to make away with himself?" "Certainly. But one can never tell. I knew nothing of him or his | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051047 | affairs." "But I did," Henshaw retorted vehemently. "And I tell you, gentlemen, the thing is utterly impossible. But we shall see. The body--is it here?" "The police have charge of it in the room where he was found. It is to be removed at nightfall. You will wish to see it?" Morriston answered. "Yes." Morriston led the way to the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051048 | tower, explaining as he went the arrangements on the night of the ball. Henshaw spoke little, his mood seemed dissatisfied and resentful, but his sharp eyes seemed to take everything in. Once he asked, "Did my brother dance much?" "He was introduced to a partner," Morriston replied. "But after that no one seems to have noticed him in the ball-room." | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051049 | "You mean he disappeared quite early in the evening?" "Yes; so far as we have been able to ascertain," Morriston answered. "Naturally, before this awful discovery we had been much exercised by his mysterious disappearance and failure to return to the hotel." "All the same," Henshaw returned sourly, "one can hardly accept the inference that he came down here for | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051050 | the express purpose of making away with himself in your house." "No, I cannot understand it," Morriston replied, as he turned and began to ascend the winding stairway. On the threshold of the topmost floor he paused. "This is the door we found locked on the inside," he observed quietly. Henshaw gave a keen look round, and nodded. Morriston pushed | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051051 | open the door and they entered. The body of Clement Henshaw still lay on the floor in charge of the detective and the inspector, the third man having been despatched to the town to make arrangements for its removal. With a nod to the officials, Henshaw advanced to the body and bent over it. "Poor Clement!" he murmured. After a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051052 | few moments' scrutiny, Henshaw turned to the officers. "I am the brother of the deceased," he said, addressing more particularly the detective. "What do you make of this?" The question was put in the same sharp, business-like tone which had characterized his utterances in the library. "Judging by the door being locked on the inside," the detective answered sympathetically, "it | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051053 | can only be a case of suicide." Henshaw frowned. "It will take a good deal to persuade me of that," he retorted. "Mr. ----" "Detective-Sergeant Finch." "Mr. Finch. Did the doctor say suicide?" "I did not hear him express a definite opinion. Did you, inspector?" "No, Mr. Finch. I rather presumed the doctor took it for granted." "Took it for | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051054 | granted!" Henshaw echoed contemptuously. "I'm not going to take it for granted, I can tell you. Did the doctor examine the body?" "He made a cursory examination. He is arranging to meet the police surgeon for an autopsy to-morrow morning." On the table lay a narrow-bladed chisel, the lower portion of the bright steel discoloured with the dark stain of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051055 | blood. The inspector pointed to it. "That is the instrument with which the wound must have been made," he remarked in a subdued tone. "It was found lying beside the body." Henshaw took it up and ran his eyes over it. "How could he have got this?" he demanded, looking round with what seemed a distrustful glance. "I can only | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051056 | suggest," Morriston answered, "that one of my men must have left it when some work was done here a few days ago." "That is so apparently, Mr. Morriston," the detective corroborated. "It has been identified by Haynes, the estate carpenter." Henshaw put down the chisel and for some moments kept silence, tightening his thin lips as though in strenuous thought. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051057 | Then suddenly he demanded, "Beyond the fact that the door was found locked from within, what reason have you for your conclusion?" Mr. Finch shrugged. "We don't see how it could be otherwise, sir," he replied with quiet conviction. "Clearly the deceased gentleman must have been alone in the room when he died." "Might he not have locked the door | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051058 | after the wound was given?" Henshaw suggested in a tone of cross-examination. "Dr. Page was of opinion that death, or at any rate unconsciousness, must have been almost instantaneous," Finch rejoined respectfully. "Even supposing the autopsy bears out that view I shall not be satisfied," Henshaw declared. The inspector took up the argument. "You see, sir, taking into consideration the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051059 | position of the room it would be impossible for any second party who may have been here with the deceased to leave it undiscovered except by the door. To drop from this window, which is the only one large enough to admit of an adult body passing through, would mean pretty certain death. Anyhow the party would have been so | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051060 | injured that getting clear away would be out of the question. Will you see for yourself, sir?" He threw back the window and invited Henshaw to look down. The argument seemed conclusive. "Was the window found open or shut?" "It was found unlatched, sir," Finch answered. "But the servants think that it was opened that morning and owing to the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051061 | extra work in the house that day its fastening in the evening was overlooked." "Even if a second person had let himself down from the window," the inspector argued, "the rope would have been here." Henshaw kept silence, seemingly indifferent to the officials' arguments. "I can only tell you I am far from satisfied with the suicide theory," he said | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051062 | at length. "My brother was not that sort of man. He had nerves of iron; he was in love with life and all it meant to him, and he made it a rule never to let anything worry him. Let the other fellow worry, was his motto. Well, we shall see." He turned towards the door, and as he did | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051063 | so he caught sight of a cardboard box in which was a collection of various articles, jewellery, a watch and chain, money, a pocket-handkerchief, a letter, and a dance programme. "The contents of deceased's pockets," the inspector observed, answering Henshaw's glance of curiosity. "We have collected and made a list of them, and they will in due course be handed | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051064 | to you, or to his heir, on the coroner's order." "Is that a letter? May I see it?" As the official hesitated, Henshaw had snatched the paper, a folded note, and rapidly ran his eye through its contents. Then he gave a curious laugh, as he turned over the paper as though seeking an address, and laid it back in | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051065 | the box. "A note from my brother to an anonymous lady," he observed quietly. "Perhaps if we could find out whom it was meant for she would throw some light on the mystery." KELSON'S PERPLEXITY "What do you think of Mr. Gervase Henshaw?" Kelson said, as, late in the afternoon, he and Gifford walked towards the town together. Henshaw had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051066 | left Wynford Place half an hour previously, having kept to the end his attitude of resentful incredulity. "A nailer," Gifford answered shortly. "Yes," Kelson agreed. "He gives one the idea of a man who will make trouble if he can. As offensive as his brother was, I should say, although in a different line. I did not detect one sign | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051067 | of any consideration for the Morristons in their horribly unpleasant position." "No," Gifford agreed. "I was very sorry for Morriston. He behaved extremely well, considering the irritatingly antagonistic line the man chose to take up." "Brainy man, Henshaw; unpleasantly sharp, eh?" "Yes," Gifford replied. "Added to his legal training he is by way of being an expert in criminology." "I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051068 | do hope," Kelson remarked thoughtfully, "he is not going to make himself unpleasant down here. The scandal will be quite enough without that. Horribly rough luck on the Morristons as new-comers here to have an affair like this happening in their house. I can't think what brought the man down here." "No; he came with a purpose, that's certain." "A | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051069 | woman in it, no doubt. One can quite sympathize with the brother's incredulity as to the suicide theory, though hardly with his manner of showing it. The dead man was not that sort. The idea is simply staggering." Gifford made no response, and for a while they walked on in silence. Presently he asked, "How did you get on to-day--I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051070 | mean with Colonel Tredworth?" "Oh, everything went off beautifully," Kelson answered, his tone brightening with the change of subject. "The old boy gave me his consent and his blessing. I've scarcely been able as yet to appreciate my luck, with this affair at Wynford Place intervening." "No," Gifford responded mechanically. "It is calculated to drive everything else out of one's | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051071 | head." "It is suggested," said Kelson, "that we should be married quite soon. The Tredworths are going abroad next month and don't propose to hurry back. So it means that if the wedding does not take place before they leave it must be postponed till probably the autumn." "I should think the latter would be the best plan." Kelson turned | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051072 | quickly to his companion. "To postpone it?" he exclaimed in a rather hurt tone. "Why on earth should we? We have nothing to wait for, I mean money or anything of that sort." "No; but settlements take a long time to draw up." "Not if the lawyers are told to hurry up with them." "Then you will have to find | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051073 | a house, and get furniture. And there is the trousseau," Gifford urged. "Oh," Kelson returned with a show of impatience, "all these details can be got over in two or three weeks if we set ourselves to do it. I don't believe in waiting once the thing is settled." "I don't believe in rushing matters," Gifford rejoined. "Least of all | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051074 | matrimony." Kelson stopped dead. "Why, Hugh," he said in an expostulatory tone, "what is the matter with you? You are most confoundedly unsympathetic. Any one would think you did not want me to marry the girl." "I certainly don't want you to be in too great a hurry," Gifford returned calmly. "But why? Why?" "I feel it is a mistake." | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051075 | Kelson laughed. "You are not going to suggest we don't know our own minds." "Hardly. But why not wait till the family returns? Of course it is no business of mine." "No," Kelson replied with a laugh of annoyance; "and you can't be expected to enter into my feelings on the subject. But I think you might be a little | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051076 | less grudging of your sympathy." "You quite mistake me, Harry," Gifford replied warmly. "It is only in your own interest that I counsel you not to be in a hurry." "But why? What, in heaven's name, do you mean?" Kelson demanded, vaguely apprehensive. "It is a mistake to rush things, that is all," was the unsatisfactory answer. "If I saw | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051077 | the slightest chance of danger I would not hesitate to take your advice," Kelson said. "But I don't. Nor do you. Since when have you become so cautious?" Gifford forced a laugh. "It is coming on with age." Kelson clapped him on the shoulder. "Don't encourage it, my dear Hugh. It will spoil all the enjoyment in your life, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051078 | in other people's too, if you force the note. I promise you I won't hurry on the wedding more than is absolutely necessary." "Very well," Gifford responded, and the subject dropped. They had finished dinner, at which the absorbing subject of the tragedy at Wynford Place was the main topic of their conversation, when the landlord came in to say | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051079 | that Mr. Gervase Henshaw, who was staying at the hotel, would like to see them if they were disengaged. Kelson looked across at his friend. "Shall we see him?" Gifford nodded. "We had better hear what he has to say. We don't want him worrying Morriston." "Ask Mr. Henshaw up," Kelson said to the landlord, and in a minute he | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051080 | was ushered in. With a quick, decisive movement Henshaw took the seat to which Kelson invited him. "I trust you won't think me intrusive, gentlemen," he began in his sharp mode of speaking, "but you will understand I am very much upset and horribly perplexed by the terrible fate which has overtaken my poor brother. I am setting myself to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051081 | search for a clue, if ever so slight, to the mystery, the double mystery, I may say, and it occurred to me that perhaps a talk with you gentlemen who are, so far, the last known persons who spoke with him, might possibly give me a hint." "I'm afraid there is very little we can tell you," Gifford replied. "But | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051082 | we are at your service." "Thank you." It seemed the first civil word of acknowledgment they had heard him utter. "First of all," he proceeded, falling back to his dry, lawyer-like tone, "I have been to see the medical man who was summoned to look at the body, Dr. Page. He tells me that, so far as his cursory examination | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051083 | went, the position of the wound hardly suggests that it was self-inflicted." "Is he sure of it?" Kelson asked. "He won't be positive till he has made the autopsy," Henshaw answered. "He merely suggests that it was a very awkward and altogether unlikely place for a man to wound himself. Anyhow that guarded opinion is enough to strengthen my inclination | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051084 | to scout the idea of suicide." "Then," said Kelson, "we are faced by the difficulty of the locked door." Henshaw made a gesture of indifference. "That at first sight presents a problem, I admit," he said, "but not so complete as to look absolutely insoluble. I have, as you may be aware, made a study of criminology, and in my | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051085 | researches, which have included criminality, have come across incidents which to the smartest detective brains were at the outset quite as baffling. Clement's tragic end is a great blow to me, and I am not going quietly to accept the easy, obvious conclusion of suicide. I knew and appreciated my brother better than that. I mean to probe this business | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051086 | to the bottom." "You will be justified," Kelson murmured. "I think so--by the result," was the quick rejoinder. Gifford spoke. "What do you think was the real object in your brother coming down here?" Henshaw looked at his questioner keenly before he answered. "It is my opinion, my conviction, there was a lady in the case. May I ask what | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051087 | prompted you to ask the question?" Gifford shrugged. "Some idea of the sort was in my own mind," he replied, with a reserve which could scarcely be satisfying to Henshaw. "Perhaps," he said keenly, "you have also an idea who the lady was." Gifford shook his head. "Not at all," he returned promptly. "Then why should the idea have suggested | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051088 | itself to you," came the cross-examining rejoinder. "Your brother was not a member of the Hunt, and it seemed to us--curious." Henshaw took him up quickly. "That he should come to the ball? No doubt. I will be perfectly frank with you, as I expect you to be with me. It is perhaps not quite seemly to discuss my brother's | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051089 | failings at this time, but we want to get at the truth about his death. He had, I fear, rather irregular methods in his treatment of women. One can hardly blame him, poor fellow. His was a fascinating personality, at any rate so far as women were concerned. They ran after him, and one can scarcely blame him if he | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051090 | acquired a derogatory opinion of them. After all, he held them no cheaper than they made themselves in his eyes. That note I looked at which came from his pocket was written by him to make an assignation." "Was it addressed?" Gifford put the question quickly, almost eagerly. "No," Henshaw answered. "I wish it had been. In that case we | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051091 | should be near the end of the mystery." Kelson was staring at the glib speaker with astounded eyes. "Do you suppose a woman killed your brother?" he almost gasped. "Such things have been known," Henshaw returned with the flicker of an enigmatical smile. "But no, I don't suggest that--yet. At present I have got no farther than the conviction that | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051092 | Clement did not kill himself. I mean to find out for whom that note of his was intended." "Not an easy task," Gifford remarked, with his eye furtively on Kelson, who had become strangely interested. "It may or may not be easy," Henshaw returned. "But it is to be done. The woman who, intentionally or otherwise, drew my brother down | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051093 | here has to be found, and I mean to find her." Kelson was now staring almost stupidly at Gifford. "Neither of you gentlemen saw my brother dancing?" Henshaw demanded sharply. "I saw nothing of him at all in the ballroom," Gifford answered, "as I did not arrive till about midnight. Did you see him, Harry?" he asked, as though with | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051094 | the design of rousing Kelson from his rather suspicious attitude. Kelson seemed to pull himself together by an effort. "No--yes; I caught a glimpse of him, I think, with a girl in green." "You know who she was?" Henshaw demanded. "I've not the vaguest idea," Kelson answered mechanically. "I did not see her face." Henshaw rose. Perhaps from Kelson's manner | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051095 | he gathered that the men were tired, and had had enough of him. He shook hands, with a word of thanks and an apology. "We may know more after the inquest to-morrow afternoon," he remarked, "although I doubt it. You will let me consult you again, if necessary? Thanks. Goodnight." As the door closed on Henshaw, Kelson turned quickly to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051096 | Gifford with a scared face. "Hugh!" he cried hoarsely, in a voice subdued by fear. "The blood stain on my cuff that night. How did it come there? Was it--?" Gifford forced a smile. "My dear Harry, how absurd! What could that have had to do with it?" Kelson gave an uncomfortable laugh. "It is a grim coincidence," he said. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051097 | THE CLOAK OF NIGHT At the inquest which was held next day nothing was elicited which could offer any solution of the mystery of Clement Henshaw's death. It seemed to be pretty generally accepted to be a case of suicide, although that view was opposed in evidence, not only by Gervase Henshaw on general grounds, but also by the medical | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051098 | witnesses, who had grave doubts whether the mortal wound had been self-inflicted. "Just possible but decidedly improbable, both from the position of the wound and the direction of the blow," was Dr. Page's opinion. It was a downward, oblique stab in the throat which had pierced the larynx and penetrated the jugular vein. The deceased would have been unable to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000051099 | cry out and would probably have quickly become insensible from asphyxiation. Unless he was left-handed the stab could scarcely have been self-given. The police authorities committed themselves to no definite theory at that stage, and at their request the inquiry was adjourned for a month. Morriston, leaving the hall with Kelson and Gifford, asked them to walk back with him | 60 | gutenberg |
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