I
The room was the typical bedroom of the typical boarding-house,
furnished, insofar as it could be said to be furnished at all, with a
severe simplicity. It contained two beds, a pine chest of drawers, a
strip of faded carpet, and a wash basin. But there was that on the
floor which set this room apart from a thousand rooms of the same kind.
Flat on his back, with his hands tightly clenched and one leg twisted
oddly under him and with his teeth gleaming through his grey beard in a
horrible grin, Captain John Gunner stared up at the ceiling with eyes
that saw nothing.
Until a moment before, he had had the little room all to himself. But
now two people were standing just inside the door, looking down at him.
One was a large policeman, who twisted his helmet nervously in his
hands. The other was a tall, gaunt old woman in a rusty black dress,
who gazed with pale eyes at the dead man. Her face was quite
expressionless.
The woman was Mrs. Pickett, owner of the Excelsior Boarding-House. The
policeman's name was Grogan. He was a genial giant, a terror to the
riotous element of the waterfront, but obviously ill at ease in the
presence of death. He drew in his breath, wiped his forehead, and
whispered: "Look at his eyes, ma'am!"
Mrs. Pickett had not spoken a word since she had brought the policeman
into the room, and she did not do so now. Constable Grogan looked at
her quickly. He was afraid of Mother Pickett, as was everybody else
along the waterfront. Her silence, her pale eyes, and the quiet
decisiveness of her personality cowed even the tough old salts who
patronized the Excelsior. She was a formidable influence in that little
community of sailormen.
"That's just how I found him," said Mrs. Pickett. She did not speak
loudly, but her voice made the policeman start.
He wiped his forehead again. "It might have been apoplexy," he
hazarded.
Mrs. Pickett said nothing. There was a sound of footsteps outside, and
a young man entered, carrying a black bag.
"Good morning, Mrs. Pickett. I was told that--Good Lord!" The young
doctor dropped to his knees beside the body and raised one of the arms.
After a moment he lowered it gently to the floor, and shook his head in
grim resignation.
"He's been dead for hours," he announced. "When did you find him?"
"Twenty minutes back," replied the old woman. "I guess he died last
night. He never would be called in the morning. Said he liked to sleep
on. Well, he's got his wish."
"What did he die of, sir?" asked the policeman.
"It's impossible to say without an examination," the doctor answered.
"It looks like a stroke, but I'm pretty sure it isn't. It might be a
coronary attack, but I happen to know his blood pressure was normal,
and his heart sound. He called in to see me only a week ago, and I
examined him thoroughly. But sometimes you can be deceived. The inquest
will tell us." He eyed the body almost resentfully. "I can't understand
it. The man had no right to drop dead like this. He was a tough old
sailor who ought to have been good for another twenty years. If you
want my honest opinion--though I can't possibly be certain until after
the inquest--I should say he had been poisoned."
"How would he be poisoned?" asked Mrs. Pickett quietly.
"That's more than I can tell you. There's no glass about that he could
have drunk it from. He might have got it in capsule form. But why
should he have done it? He was always a pretty cheerful sort of old
man, wasn't he?"
"Yes, sir," said the Constable. "He had the name of being a joker in
these parts. Kind of sarcastic, they tell me, though he never tried it
on me."
"He must have died quite early last night," said the doctor. He turned
to Mrs. Pickett. "What's become of Captain Muller? If he shares this
room he ought to be able to tell us something about it."
"Captain Muller spent the night with some friends at Portsmouth," said
Mrs. Pickett. "He left right after supper, and hasn't returned."
The doctor stared thoughtfully about the room, frowning.
"I don't like it. I can't understand it. If this had happened in India
I should have said the man had died from some form of snakebite. I was
out there two years, and I've seen a hundred cases of it. The poor
devils all looked just like this. But the thing's ridiculous. How could
a man be bitten by a snake in a Southampton waterfront boarding-house?
Was the door locked when you found him, Mrs. Pickett?"
Mrs. Pickett nodded. "I opened it with my own key. I had been calling
to him and he didn't answer, so I guessed something was wrong."
The Constable spoke: "You ain't touched anything, ma'am? They're always
very particular about that. If the doctor's right, and there's been
anything up, that's the first thing they'll ask."
"Everything's just as I found it."
"What's that on the floor beside him?" the doctor asked.
"Only his harmonica. He liked to play it of an evening in his room.
I've had some complaints about it from some of the gentlemen, but I
never saw any harm, so long as he didn't play it too late."
"Seems as if he was playing it when--it happened," Constable Grogan
said. "That don't look much like suicide, sir."
"I didn't say it was suicide."