A COMPLETE MYSTERY
It was Mrs. Bolstreath who carried Lillian upstairs in her stout arms,
for when Penn made his brusque announcement the girl fainted straight
away, which was very natural considering the horror of the
information. Dan remained behind to tell the secretary that he was
several kinds of fool, since no one but a superfine ass would blurt
out so terrible a story to a delicate girl. Not that Penn had told his
story, for Lillian had become unconscious the moment her bewildered
brain grasped that the father she had left a few hours earlier in good
health and spirits was now a corpse. But he told it to Dan, and
mentioned that Mr. Durwin was in the library wherein the death had
taken place.
"Mr. Durwin? Who is Mr. Durwin?" asked Dan trying to collect his
senses, which had been scattered by the dreadful news.
"An official from Scotland Yard; I told you so after dinner," said
Penn in an injured tone, "he came to see Sir Charles by appointment at
nine o'clock and found him a corpse."
"Sir Charles was alive when we left shortly after eight," remarked Dan
sharply; "at a quarter-past eight to be precise. What took place in
the meantime?"
"Obviously the violent death of Sir Charles," faltered the secretary.
"What evidence have you to show that he died by violence?" asked
Halliday.
"Mr. Durwin called in a doctor, and he says that Sir Charles had been
poisoned," blurted out Penn uneasily. "I believe that woman--Mrs.
Brown she called herself--poisoned him. She left the house at a
quarter to nine, so the footman says, for he let her out, and----"
"It is impossible that a complete stranger should poison Sir Charles,"
interrupted Dan impatiently, "she would not have the chance."
"She was alone with Sir Charles for thirty minutes, more or less,"
said Penn tartly; "she had every chance and she took it."
"But how could she induce Sir Charles to drink poison?"
"She didn't induce him to drink anything. The doctor says that the
scratch at the back of the dead man's neck----"
"Here!" Dan roughly pushed the secretary aside, becoming impatient of
the scrappy way in which he detailed what had happened. "Let me go to
the library for myself and see what has happened. Sir Charles can't be
dead."
"It's twelve o'clock now," retorted Penn stepping aside, "and he's
been dead quite three hours, as the doctor will tell you."
Before the man finished his sentence, Dan, scarcely grasping the
situation, so rapidly had it evolved, ran through the hall, towards
the back of the spacious house, where the library was situated. He
dashed into the large and luxuriously furnished room and collided with
a police officer, who promptly took him by the shoulder. There were
three other men in the room, who turned from the corpse at which they
were looking, when they heard the noise of Halliday's abrupt entrance.
The foremost man, and the one who spoke first, was short and stout and
arrayed in uniform, with cold gray eyes, and a hard mouth.
"What's this--what's this?" he demanded in a raucous voice. "Who are
you?"
"My name is Halliday," said Dan hurriedly. "I am engaged to Miss Moon
and we have just returned from the theatre to hear--to hear----" He
caught sight of Moon's body seated in the desk-chair and drooping
limply over the table. "Oh, it is true, then! He is dead. Good
heavens! who murdered him?"
"How do you know that Sir Charles has been murdered?" asked the
officer sternly.
"Mr. Penn, the secretary, told me just now in the hall," said Dan,
shaking himself free of the policeman. "He blurted it out like a fool,
and Miss Moon has fainted. Mrs. Bolstreath has taken her upstairs. But
how did it come about? Who found the body, and----"
"I found the body," interrupted one of the other men, who was tall and
calm-faced, with a bald head and a heavy iron-gray moustache,
perfectly clothed in fashionable evening-dress, and somewhat imperious
in his manner of speaking. "I had an appointment with Sir Charles at
nine o'clock and came here to find him, as you now see him"--he waved
his hand toward the desk--"the doctor will tell you how he died."
"By poison," said the third man, who was dark, young, unobtrusive and
retiring in manner. "You see this deep scratch on the back of the
neck. In that way the poison was administered. I take it that Sir
Charles was bending over his desk and the person who committed the
crime scratched him with some very sharp instrument impregnated with
poison."
"Mrs. Brown!" gasped Dan, staring at the heavy, swollen body of his
late guardian, whom he had dined with in perfect health.
The three men glanced at one another as he said the name, and even the
policeman on guard at the door looked interested. The individual in
uniform spoke with his cold eyes on Dan's agitated face. "What do you
know of Mrs. Brown, Mr. Halliday?" he demanded abruptly.
"Don't you know that a woman of that name called here?"
"Yes. The secretary, Mr. Penn, told us that Miss Moon induced her
father to see a certain Mrs. Brown, who claimed that her son had been
drowned while working on one of the steamers owned by Sir Charles. You
saw her also, I believe?"
"I was in the hall when Miss Moon went to induce her father to see the
poor woman. That was about a quarter-past eight o'clock."
"And Mrs. Brown--as we have found from inquiry--left the house at a
quarter to nine. Do you think she is guilty?"
"I can't say. Didn't the footman see the body--that is if Mrs. Brown
committed the crime--when he came to show her out? Sir Charles would
naturally ring his bell when the interview was over, and the footman
would come to conduct her to the door."
"Sir Charles never rang his bell!" said the officer, drily. "Mrs.
Brown passed through the entrance hall at a quarter to nine o'clock,
and mentioned to the footman--quite unnecessarily, I think--that Sir
Charles had given her money. He let her out of the house. Naturally,
the footman not hearing any bell did not enter this room, nor--so far
as any one else is concerned--did a single person. Only when Mr.
Durwin----"
"I came at nine o'clock," interrupted the baldheaded man imperiously,
"to keep my appointment. The footman told Mr. Penn, who took me to Sir
Charles. He knocked but there was no answer, so he opened the door and
we saw this." He again waved his hands towards the body.
"Does Mr. Penn know nothing?" asked Halliday, doubtfully.
"No," answered the other. "Inspector Tenson has questioned him
carefully in my presence. Mr. Penn says that he brought Sir Charles
his spectacles from the dining-room before you left for the theatre
with the two ladies, and then was sent to his own room by his employer
to write the usual letters. He remained there until nine o'clock when
he was called out to receive me, and we know that Mr. Penn speaks
truly, for the typewriting girl who was typing Sir Charles's letters
to Mr. Penn's dictation, says that he did not leave the room all the
time.
"May I look at the body?" asked Dan approaching the desk, and, on
receiving an affirmative reply from Durwin, bent over the dead.
The corpse was much swollen, the face indeed being greatly bloated,
while the deep scratch on the nape of the neck looked venomous and
angry. Yet it was a slight wound to bring about so great a
catastrophe, and the poison must have been very deadly and swift;
deadly because apparently Sir Charles had no time to move before it
did its work, and swift because he could not even have called for
assistance, which he surely would have done had he been able to keep
his senses. Dan mentioned this to the watchful doctor, who nodded.
"I can't say for certain," he remarked cautiously, "but I fancy that
snake-poison has been used. That will be seen to, when the post-mortem
is made."
"And this fly?" Halliday pointed to an insect which was just behind
the left ear of the dead man.
"Fly!" echoed Inspector Tenson in surprise, and hastily advancing to
look. "A fly in November. Impossible! Yet it is a fly, and dead. If
not," he swept the neck of the corpse with his curved hand, "it would
get away. H'm! Now I wonder what this means? Get me a magnifying
glass."
There was not much difficulty in procuring one, as such an article lay
on the desk itself, being used, no doubt, by Sir Charles to aid his
failing sight when he examined important documents. Tenson inspected
the fly and removed it--took it to a near electric light and examined
it. Then he came back and examined the place behind the left ear
whence he had removed it.
"It's been gummed on," he declared in surprise--a surprise which was
also visible in the faces of the other men; "you can see the
glistening spot on the skin, and the fly's legs are sticky." He
balanced the fly on his little finger as he spoke. "I am sure they are
sticky, although it is hard to say with such a small insect. However,"
he carefully put away the fly in a silver matchbox, "we'll have this
examined under a more powerful glass. You are all witnesses,
gentlemen, that a fly was found near the wound which caused Sir
Charles Moon's death."
"And the scent? What about the scent?" Dan sniffed as he spoke and
then bent his nose to the dead man. "It seems to come from his
clothes."
"Scent!" echoed Durwin sharply and sniffed. "Yes, I observed that
scent. But I did not take any notice of it."
"Nor did I," said the doctor. "I noticed it also."
"And I," followed on the Inspector, "and why should we take notice of
it, Mr. Halliday? Many men use scent."
"Sir Charles never did," said Dan emphatically, "he hated scents of
all kinds even when women used them. He certainly would never have
used them himself. I'll swear to that."
"Then this scent assumes importance." Durwin sniffed again, and held
his aquiline nose high. "It is fainter now. But I smelt it very
strongly when I first came in and looked at the body. A strange
perfume it is."
The three men tried to realize the peculiar odor of the scent, and
became aware that it was rich and heavy and sickly, and somewhat
drowsy in its suggestion.
"A kind of thing to render a man sleepy," said Dan, musingly.
"Or insensible," said Inspector Tenson hastily, and put his nose to
the dead man's chin and mouth. He shook his head as he straightened
himself. "I fancied from your observation, Mr. Halliday, that the
scent might have been used as a kind of chloroform, but there's no
smell about the face. It comes from the clothes," he sniffed again,
"yes, it certainly comes from the clothes. Did you smell this scent on
Mrs. Brown?" he demanded suddenly.
"No, I did not," admitted Halliday promptly, "otherwise I should
certainly have noted it. I have a keen sense of smell. Mrs. Bolstreath
and Lil--I mean Miss Moon--might have noticed it, however."
At that moment, as if in answer to her name, the door opened suddenly
and Lillian brushed past the policeman in a headlong entrance into the
library. Her fair hair was in disorder, her face was bloodless, and
her eyes were staring and wild. Behind her came Mrs. Bolstreath
hurriedly, evidently trying to restrain her. But the girl would not be
restrained, and rushed forward scattering the small group round the
dead, to fling herself on the body.
"Oh, father, father!" she sobbed, burying her face on the shoulder of
her dearly-loved parent. "How awful it is. Oh, my heart will break.
How shall I ever get over it. Father! father! father!"
She wept and wailed so violently that the four men were touched by her
great grief. Both Mr. Durwin and Inspector Tenson had daughters of
their own, while the young doctor was engaged. They could feel for her
thoroughly, and no one made any attempt to remove her from the body
until Mrs. Bolstreath stepped forward. "Lillian, darling. Lillian, my
child," she said soothingly, and tried to lead the poor girl away.
But Lillian only clung closer to her beloved dead. "No! No! Let me
alone. I can't leave him. Poor, dear father--oh, I shall die!"
"Dear," said Mrs. Bolstreath, raising her firmly but kindly, "your
father is not there but in Heaven! Only the clay remains."
"It is all I have. And father was so good, so kind,--oh, who can have
killed him in this cruel way?" She looked round with streaming eyes.
"We think that a Mrs. Brown--" began the Inspector, only to be
answered by a loud cry from the distraught girl.
"Mrs. Brown! Then I have killed father! I have killed him! I persuaded
him to see the woman, because she was in trouble. And she killed
him--oh, the wretch--the--the--oh--oh! What had I done to her that she
should rob me of my dear, kind father?" and she cried bitterly in her
old friend's tender arms.
"Had you ever seen Mrs. Brown before?" asked Durwin in his imperious
voice, although he lowered it in deference to her grief.
Lillian winced at the harsh sound. "No, No! I never saw her before.
How could I have seen her before. She said that her son had been
drowned, and that she was poor. I asked father to help her, and he
told me he would. It's my fault that she saw my father and now"--her
voice leaped an octave--"he's dead. Oh--oh! my father--my father!" and
she tried to break from Mrs. Bolstreath's arms to fling herself on the
dead once more.
"Lillian darling, don't cry," said Dan, placing his hand on her
shoulder.
"You have not lost the dearest and best of fathers!" she sobbed
violently.
"Your loss is my loss," said Halliday in a voice of pain, "but we must
be brave, both you and I." He associated himself with her so as to
calm her grief. "It's not your fault that your dear father is dead."
"I persuaded him to see Mrs. Brown. And she--she--she----"
"We can't say if this woman is guilty, as yet," said Durwin hastily,
"so do not blame yourself, Miss Moon. But did you smell any scent on
this Mrs. Brown?"
Lillian looked at him vacantly and shook her head. Then she burst once
more into hard and painful sobbing, trying again to embrace the dead
man.
"Don't ask her any questions, sir," said Halliday, in a low voice to
Mr. Durwin, "you see she is not in a fit state to reply. Lillian," he
raised her up from her knees and gently but firmly detached her arms
from the dead. "My darling, your father is past all earthly aid. We
can do nothing but avenge him. Go with Mrs. Bolstreath and lie down.
We must be firm."
"Firm! Firm!--and father dead!" wailed Lillian. "Oh, what a wretch
that Mrs. Brown must be to kill him. Kill her, Dan--oh, make her
suffer. My good, kind father, who--who--oh"--she flung herself on
Dan's neck--"take me away; take me away!" and her lover promptly
carried her to the door.
Mrs. Bolstreath, who had been talking hurriedly to Inspector Tenson,
came after the pair and took the girl from Dan. "She must lie down and
have a sleeping-draught," she said softly. "If the doctor will
come----"
The doctor was only too glad to come. He was a young man beginning to
practise medicine in the neighborhood, and had been hurriedly summoned
in default of an older physician. The chance of gaining a new and
wealthy patient was too good to lose, so he quickly followed Mrs.
Bolstreath as she led the half-unconscious girl up the stairs. Dan
closed the door and returned to the Inspector and the official from
Scotland Yard. The former was speaking.
"Mrs. Bolstreath did not smell any perfume on Mrs. Brown," he was
saying, "and ladies are very quick to notice such things. Miss Moon
also shook her head."
"I don't think Miss Moon was in a state of mind to understand what you
were saying, Mr. Inspector," said Halliday, drily. "However, I am
quite sure from my own observation that Mrs. Brown did not use the
perfume. I would have noticed it at once, for I spotted it the moment
I examined the body."
"So did I," said Durwin once more; "but I thought Sir Charles might
have used it. You say he did not, therefore the scent is a clue."
"It does not lead to the indictment of Mrs. Brown, however, sir," said
Tenson thoughtfully, "since she had no perfume of that sort about her.
But she must have killed Sir Charles, for she was the last person who
saw him alive."
"She may come forward and exonerate herself," suggested Dan after a
pause, "or she may have left her address with Sir Charles."
"I have glanced through the papers on the desk and can find no
address," was the Inspector's reply; "yet, if she gave it to him, it
would be there."
Durwin meditated, then looked up. "As she was the mother of the man in
Sir Charles's employment who was drowned," he said in his harsh voice,
and now very official in his manner, "in the offices of the company
who own the steamers--Sir Charles was a director and chief
shareholder, I understand from his secretary, Mr. Penn--will be found
the drowned man's address, which will be that of his mother."
"But I can't see what motive Mrs. Brown had to murder Sir Charles,"
remarked Dan in a puzzled tone.
"We'll learn the motive when we find Mrs. Brown," said Tenson, who had
made a note of Durwin's suggestion. "Many people think they have
grievances against the rich, and we know that the late Sir Charles was
a millionaire. He doubtless had enemies--dangerous enemies."
"Dangerous!" The word recalled to Dan what Moon had said at the
dinner-table when Lillian had playfully offered him a penny for his
thoughts. "Sir Charles at dinner said something about dangerous
people."
"What did he say?" asked the Inspector and again opened his note-book.
Dan reported the conversation, which was not very satisfactory as Moon
had only spoken generally. Tenson noted down the few remarks, but did
not appear to think them important. Durwin, however, was struck by
what had been said.
"Sir Charles asked me here to explain about a certain gang he believed
was in existence," he remarked.
"What's that, sir?" asked the Inspector alertly. "Did he tell you
anything?"
"Of course he didn't. How could he when he was dead when I arrived,"
retorted Durwin with a frown. "He simply said that he wished to see me
in my official capacity about some gang, but gave me no details. Those
were to be left until I called here. He preferred to see me here
instead of at my office for reasons which he declared he would state
when we met in this room."
"Then you think that a gang----"
"Mr. Inspector," interrupted Durwin, stiffly, "I have told you all
that was said by the deceased. Whether the gang is dangerous, or what
the members do, or where they are, I cannot say. Have you examined
those windows?" he asked suddenly, pointing to three French-windows at
the side of the room.
"Yes," said Tenson promptly, "as soon as I entered the apartment I did
so. They are all locked."
"And if they were not, no one would enter there," put in Dan quickly.
"Outside is a walled garden, and the wall is very high with broken
bottles on top. I suppose, Mr. Durwin, you are thinking that some one
may have come in to kill Sir Charles between the time of Mrs. Brown's
departure and your coming?"
"Yes," assented the other sharply, "if the perfume is a clue, Mrs.
Brown must be innocent. Penn, as we know from the statement of the
typewriter girl, was in his room all the time, and the servants have
fully accounted for themselves. We examined them all--the Inspector
and I did, that is--when you were at the theatre," he waved his hand
with a shrug. "Who can say who is guilty?"
"Well," said Tenson, snapping the elastic band round his note-book and
putting it into his pocket, "we have the evidence of the fly and of
the perfume."
"What do you think about the fly?" asked Dan, staring.
"I don't know what to think. It is an artificial fly, exquisitely made
and has been gummed on the dead man's neck behind the left ear. The
assassin must have placed it there, since a man would scarcely do such
a silly thing himself. Why, it was placed there I can't say, any more
than I can guess why Sir Charles was murdered, or who murdered him.
The affair is a complete mystery, as you must admit."
Before the inquest and after the inquest, more people than the three
men who had held the discussion in the presence of the dead, admitted
that the affair was a mystery. In fact the evidence at the inquest
only plunged the matter into deeper gloom. Tenson, acting on Durwin's
advice, sought the office of the tramp-steamer company--The Universal
Carrier Line--in which the late Sir Charles was chief shareholder and
director, to learn without any difficulty the whereabouts of Mrs.
Brown, the mother of the drowned man. She proved to be an entirely
different person to the woman who had given the name on the fatal
night, being lean instead of stout, comparatively young instead of
old, and rather handsome in an elderly way in place of being wrinkled
and worn with grief. She declared that she had never been near Moon's
house on the night of the murder, or on any other night. Mrs.
Bolstreath, Lillian, the footman, and Dan all swore that she was not
the Mrs. Brown who had sought the interview with Sir Charles.
Therefore it was argued by every one that Mrs. Brown, taking a false
name and telling a false story, must have come to see Moon with the
deliberate intention of murdering him. Search was made for her, but
she could not be found. From the moment she passed out of the front
door she had vanished, and although a description was published of her
appearance, and a reward was offered for her apprehension no one came
forward to claim it. Guilty or innocent, she was invisible.
Inspector Tenson did not speak at the inquest of the gang about which
Sir Charles had intended to converse with Mr. Durwin, as it did not
seem to have any bearing on the case. Also, as Durwin suggested, if it
had any bearing it was best to keep the matter quiet until more
evidence was forthcoming to show that such a gang--whatever its
business was--existed. Then the strange episode of the fly was
suppressed for the same reason. Privately, Tenson informed Dan that he
would not be surprised to learn that there was a gang of murderers in
existence whose sign-manual was a fly, real or artificial, and
instanced another gang, which had been broken up some years
previously, who always impressed the figure of a purple fern on their
victim. But the whole idea, said Tenson, was so vague that he thought
it best to suppress the fact of the artificial fly on the dead man's
neck. "If there's anything in it," finished the Inspector, "there's
sure to be other murders committed, and the fly placed on the victim.
We'll wait and see, and if a second case occurs we'll be sure that
such a gang exists and will collar the beasts. Best to say nothing,
Mr. Halliday."
So he said nothing, and Dan said nothing, and Durwin, who approved of
the necessary secrecy, held his tongue. Of course there was a lot of
talk and many theories as to who had murdered the millionaire, and why
he had been murdered in so ingenious a manner. The postmortem
examination proved that Moon had died of snake-poison administered
through the scratch on the neck, and the circumstantial evidence at
the inquest went to show that he must have been taken unawares, while
bending over his desk. Some people thought that Mrs. Brown was
innocent because of the absence of the perfume; others declared she
must be guilty on account of her false name and false story, and the
fact that Moon was found dead a quarter of an hour after she left the
house. No doubt the circumstantial evidence was very strong, but it
could not be said positively that the woman was guilty, even though
she did not appear to defend her character.
So the jury thought, for they brought in the only possible verdict
twelve good and lawful men could bring in: "Wilful murder against some
person or persons unknown," and there the matter ended for sheer want
of further evidence. The affair was a mystery and a mystery it
remained.
"And will until the Day of Judgment!" said Tenson, finally.