Murder of a Lady
Page 26
“No, she wasn’t. She’d gone into the pantry…”
“Was she in the nursery when Dundas was killed? You were there then, if you remember, awaiting my coming to see Hamish?”
Oonagh started; fear dawned in her eyes.
“She was going back and forwards to the pantry that night too,” she said.
The eyeglass fell. Dr. Hailey sat down and took out his snuff-box.
“In each of these wounds, as you know, one or more herring scales have been found. Throughout this investigation, therefore, efforts have been made to find a weapon likely to bear such scales. They have been unsuccessful. No weapon was found in Miss Gregor’s room; none in Dundas’s room; none near Barley’s body, though the wardress in the car says she saw the gleam of steel.” He addressed Eoghan. “You say you saw the gleam of steel when your father was struck down?”
“I’m certain I saw it.”
“Yet there was no weapon in that case either?”
The young man shook his head.
“No.”
“Your aunt’s wound was of a terribly severe nature but it was not mortal. In these circumstances one would have expected very severe bleeding. In fact there was very little bleeding. Only two explanations are possible; either she died of shock the moment she was wounded or the weapon remained impacted in the wound. She did not die the moment she was wounded because there is a trail of blood from the window to the bed. Nobody escaped from her room. That is certain, not only because your wife and McDonald were in the room below when the windows were shut and had a clear view of the only place to which an escaping murderer could descend but also because the windows were bolted on the inside. We arrive at the apparently absurd conclusion that the weapon which killed your aunt vanished away as soon as that lady’s heart had stopped beating, that is to say as soon as her blood had ceased to flow.”
He took a pinch of snuff.
“In each case the weapon vanished after the blow had been struck. Come back to the murder of the lady. You, Mrs. Gregor, were the last person who saw her alive. She was then stricken with panic. I imagine that her first impulse was to return to bed and hide there. But soon the open windows attracted her notice. What if an attack was made from that direction? Panic does not reason; it acts. She jumped up and shut one of the windows. She was about to shut the other when she heard, far away, the sound of Captain Gregor’s motor-boat. That sound, with its promise of safety and triumph, reassured her. She leaned out of the window the better to hear it. As she leaned there was a crash above her and she was wounded. She staggered back, shocked and panic-stricken. One arm was helpless but she managed to close and bolt the window with the other. She staggered across to her bed and sank down…Her heart stopped…”
The doctor leaned forward.
“You all know how much importance Barley attached to that spike in the wall above Miss Gregor’s window. He observed, from the pantry on the top floor, that the rust on the spike had been rubbed away at one place and concluded that a rope had been used. There is another explanation. The weapon which struck Miss Gregor as she leaned out of the window may have struck the spike in the course of its descent. And that, in fact, is what happened.”
He rose and resumed his place in front of the fire.
“When Miss Gregor leaned out of her window, Christina, in the pantry above, saw her. The sound of the motor-boat reached Christina’s ears also. That faithful, superstitious woman heard in the sound the doom of all those she loved, of you Captain Gregor, of you Mrs. Gregor, of your child. Of Duchlan himself. In a few minutes Miss Gregor’s evil influence would be exerted to blast your marriage as it had been exerted to blast your father’s marriage, as it was being exerted to destroy your son’s health.”
Dr. Hailey paused and then added in quiet tones.
“At the moment when she heard the sound of the motor-boat, Christina was engaged in chipping ice from a large block to refill the ice-bag on Hamish’s brow.”
Chapter XL
The End
The silence in the room was broken by the first clear notes of a blackbird. A moment later the chorus of the birds, that immemorial song of the dawn, broke on their ears. A look of great gentleness appeared on Dr. Hailey’s face.
“Christina in that moment,” he said, “heard the call of her gods to action. She seized the block of ice and dropped it out of the window. It struck the spike and was shattered into several jagged daggers. One of these struck Miss Gregor and was wedged firmly into the wound it had inflicted. In this hot weather it soon melted; she was dead before that occurred.
“The effect on Christina was exactly what might have been foreseen. Those who feel themselves called by Heaven to take action against the powers of evil, and who are greatly successful, develop immediately a spiritual pride that is nearly, if not quite, insanity. Christina constituted herself the protector of the Gregor family. When she heard that Dundas suspected you, Captain Gregor, she marked him down for destruction. The room above his, as you know, is empty. All she had to do was to wait there till he leaned out of his window and he did that no doubt at very frequent intervals on account of the heat. She knew that McDonald and I were coming upstairs; she heard Dundas wish us good night. He appeared below her. The block of ice was not shattered in this instance, for there is no spike above Dundas’s room. It rolled down the bank and went splashing into the burn. The current carried it out into the loch. The procedure was the same in Barley’s case except that a bait was necessary to induce him to walk under the window. It was supplied by the dropping of a preliminary block of ice, the resulting thud and splash, heard at the moment when he was about to arrest you, Mrs. Gregor, naturally excited his liveliest interest.”
He stopped and bowed his head.
“I planned, to-night,” he said in tones of deep regret, “to excite Christina’s fears and direct her hostility against myself. That was the object of my visit to the nursery and of the directions I gave. I succeeded too well. I had arranged my hat in such a way that, when I pulled on a thread, it would swing out from the french-window. If Christina was guilty I felt sure she would strike again. Then, as I coughed to give the signal, Duchlan appeared. As you know, I shouted, but it was too late.”
He drew a long deep breath.
“The knowledge that she had killed her master was sentence of death to the woman at the window,” he added. “Her fall did not kill her; as soon as she knew herself alive she rushed headlong down the bank to the water.”
The chorus of the birds filled all the spaces of morning. McDonald rose stiffly, dragging his leg.
“I believe,” he said, “that the ice comes from the Ardmore fish-monger. There are herring scales on every square inch of his walls and doors.”
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