The Seven Secrets

by William Le Queux

  CHAPTER IX.

  SHADOWS.

  The revelation held me utterly dumfounded.

  Already I had, by placing my hand in contact with the shawl,ascertained its exact texture, and saw that both its tint and itsfabric were unquestionably the same as the knotted fragment I held inmy hand. Chenille shawls, as every woman knows, must be handledcarefully or the lightly-made fringe will come asunder; for the kindof cord of floss silk is generally made upon a single thread, whichwill break with the slightest strain.

  By some means the shawl in question had accidentally becomeentangled--or perhaps been strained by the sudden uplifting of the armof the wearer. In any case the little innocent-looking fragment hadsnapped, and dropped at the bedside of the murdered man.

  The grave suspicions of Ethelwynn which I had held on the previousnight when she endeavoured to justify her sister's neglect againcrowded upon me, and Sir Bernard's hint at the secret of her pastthrust the iron deeply into my heart.

  My eyes were fixed upon the little object in my palm--the silent butdamning evidence--and my mind became filled by bitterest regrets. Isaw how cleverly I had been duped--I recognised that this woman, whomI thought an angel, was only a cunning assassin.

  No, believe me: I was not prejudging her! The thought had alreadyoccurred to me that she might have entered the room wearing that shawlperhaps to wish the invalid good-night. She had, however, in answer tomy question, declared that she had retired to bed without seeinghim--for Nurse Kate had told her that he was sleeping. She hadtherefore not disturbed him.

  Then, yet another thought had occurred to me. She might have worn theshawl when she entered after the raising of the alarm. In order toclear up that point I had questioned the servants, one by one, and allhad told me the same story, namely, that Miss Ethelwynn had notentered the room at all. She had only come to the door and glanced in,then turned away in horror and shut herself in her own room. As far asanyone knew, she had not summoned sufficient courage to go in and lookupon the dead man's face. She declared herself horrified, and darednot to enter the death chamber.

  In the light of my discovery all these facts as related to me made thetruth only too apparent. She had entered there unknown to anyone, andthat her presence had been with a fell purpose I could no longerdoubt.

  If I gave the clue into Ambler Jevons' hands he would, I knew, quicklyfollow it, gathering up the threads of the tangled skein one by one,until he could openly charge her with the crime. I stood undecidedhow to act. Should I leave my friend to make his own investigationsindependently and unbiassed, or should I frankly tell him of my ownstartling discovery?

  I carefully went through the whole of the circumstances, weighingpoint after point, and decided at last to still retain the knowledge Ihad gained. The point which outbalanced my intention was that curiousadmission of Short regarding the possession of the knife. So Iresolved to say nothing to my friend until after the inquest.

  As may be imagined, the London papers that afternoon were full of themystery. Nothing like a first-class "sensation," sub-editors will tellyou. There is art in alliterative headlines and startling"cross-heads." The inevitable interview with "a member of thefamily"--who is generally anonymous, be it said--is sure to be eagerlydevoured by the public. The world may sneer at sensational journalism,but after all it loves to have its curiosity excited over the tragicdenouement of some domestic secret. As soon as the first informationreached the Central News and Press Association, therefore, reporterscrowded upon us. Representatives, not only of the metropolitan press,but those of the local newspapers, the "Richmond and TwickenhamTimes," the "Independent," over at Brentford, the "MiddlesexChronicle" at Hounslow, and the "Middlesex Mercury," of Isleworth, allvied with each other in obtaining the most accurate information.

  "Say nothing," Jevons urged. "Be civil, but keep your mouth closedtight. There are one or two friends of mine among the crowd. I'll seethem and give them something that will carry the story further.Remember, you mustn't make any statement whatsoever."

  I obeyed him, and although the reporters followed me about all themorning, and outside the house the police had difficulty in preventinga crowd assembling, I refused to express any opinion or describeanything I had witnessed.

  At eleven o'clock I received a wire from Sir Bernard at Hove asfollows:--

  "Much shocked at news. Unfortunately very unwell, but shall endeavourto be with you later in the day."

  At mid-day I called at the neighbour's house close to Kew GardensStation, where the widow and her sister had taken refuge. Mrs.Courtenay was utterly broken down, for Ethelwynn had told her theterrible truth that her husband had been murdered, and both womenpounced upon me eagerly to ascertain what theory the police now held.

  I looked at the woman who had held me so long beneath her spell. Wasit possible that one so open-faced and pure could be the author of sodastardly and cowardly a crime? Her face was white and anxious, butthe countenance had now reassumed its normal innocence of expression,and in her eyes I saw the genuine love-look of old. She had arrangedher hair and dress, and no longer wore the shawl.

  "It's terrible--terrible, Ralph," she cried. "Poor Mary! The blow hasutterly crushed her."

  "I am to blame--it is my own fault!" exclaimed the young widow,hoarsely. "But I had no idea that his end was so near. I tried to be adutiful wife, but oh--only Ethelwynn knows how hard it was, and how Isuffered. His malady made him unbearable, and instead of quarrelling Ithought the better plan was to go out and leave him with the nurse.What people have always said, was, alas! too true. Owing to thedifference of our ages our marriage was a ghastly failure. And now ithas ended in a tragedy."

  I responded in words as sympathetic as I could find tongue to utter.Her eyes were red with crying, and her pretty face was swollen andugly. I knew that she now felt a genuine regret at the loss of herhusband, even though her life had been so dull and unhappy.

  While she sat in a big armchair bowed in silence, I turned toEthelwynn and discussed the situation with her. Their friends weremost kind, she said. The husband was churchwarden at Kew Church, andhis wife was an ardent church worker, hence they had long ago becomeexcellent friends.

  "You have your friend, Mr. Jevons, with you, I hear. Nurse has justreturned and told me so."

  "Yes," I responded. "He is making an independent inquiry."

  "And what has he found?" she inquired breathlessly.

  "Nothing."

  Then, as I watched her closely, I saw that she breathed again morefreely. By the manner in which she uttered Ambler's name I detectedthat she was not at all well-disposed towards him. Indeed, she spokeas though she feared that he might discover the truth.

  After half-an-hour I left, and more puzzled than ever, returned to thehouse in Richmond Road. Sometimes I felt entirely convinced that mylove was authoress of the foul deed; yet at others there seemedsomething wanting in the confirmation of my suspicions. Regarding thelatter I could not overlook the fact that Short had told a story whichwas false on the face of it, while the utter absence of any motive onmy love's part in murdering the old gentleman seemed to point in anentirely opposite direction.

  Dr. Diplock, the coroner, had fixed the inquest for eleven o'clock onthe morrow; therefore I assisted Dr. Farmer, of Kew, the policesurgeon, to make the post-mortem.

  We made the examination in the afternoon, before the light faded, andif the circumstances of the crime were mysterious, the means by whichthe unfortunate man was murdered were, we found, doubly so.

  Outwardly, the wound was an ordinary one, one inch in breadth,inflicted by a blow delivered from left to right. The weapon hadentered between the fourth and fifth ribs, and the heart had beencompletely transfixed by some sharp cutting instrument. The injurieswe discovered within, however, increased the mystery ten-fold, for wefound two extraordinary lateral incisions, which almost completelydivided the heart from side to side, the only remaining attachment ofthe upper portion to the lower being a small portion of the anteriorwall of the heart behind
the sternum.

  Such a wound was absolutely beyond explanation.

  The instrument with which the crime had been committed by strikingbetween the ribs had penetrated to the heart with an unerringprecision, making a terrible wound eight times the size within, ascompared with the exterior puncture. And yet the weapon had beenwithdrawn, and was missing!

  For fully an hour we measured and discussed the strange discovery,hoping all the time that Sir Bernard would arrive. The knife which theman Short confessed he had taken down in self-defence we compared withthe exterior wound and found, as we anticipated, that just such awound could be caused by it. But the fact that the exterior cut wascleanly done, while the internal injuries were jagged and the tissuestorn in a most terrible manner, caused a doubt to arise whether theIndian knife, which was double-edged, had actually been used. To beabsolutely clear upon this point it would be necessary to examine itmicroscopically, for the corpuscles of human blood are easilydistinguished beneath the lens.

  We were about to conclude our examination in despair, utterly unableto account for the extraordinary wound, when the door opened and SirBernard entered.

  He looked upon the body of his old friend, not a pleasing spectacleindeed, and then grasped my hand without a word.

  "I read the evening paper on my way up," he said at last in a voicetrembling with emotion. "The affair seems very mysterious. PoorCourtenay! Poor fellow!"

  "It is sad--very sad," I remarked. "We have just concluded thepost-mortem;" and then I introduced the police surgeon to the manwhose name was a household word throughout the medical profession.

  I showed my chief the wound, explained its extraordinary features, andasked his opinion. He removed his coat, turned up his shirt-cuffs,adjusted his big spectacles, and, bending beside the board upon whichthe body lay, made a long and careful inspection of the injury.

  "Extraordinary!" he ejaculated. "I've never known of such a woundbefore. One would almost suspect an explosive bullet, if it were notfor the clean incised wound on the exterior. The ribs seem grazed, yetthe manner in which such a hurt has been inflicted is utterlyunaccountable."

  "We have been unable to solve the enigma," Dr. Farmer observed. "I wasan army surgeon before I entered private practice, but I have neverseen a similar case."

  "Nor have I," responded Sir Bernard. "It is most puzzling."

  "Do you think that this knife could have been used?" I asked, handingmy chief the weapon.

  He looked at it, raised it in his hand as though to strike, felt itsedge, and then shook his head, saying: "No, I think not. Theinstrument used was only sharp on one edge. This has both edgessharpened."

  It was a point we had overlooked, but at once we agreed with him, andabandoned our half-formed theory that the Indian dagger had caused thewound.

  With Sir Bernard we made an examination of the tongue and otherorgans, in order to ascertain the progress of the disease from whichthe deceased had been suffering, but a detailed account of ourdiscoveries can have no interest for the lay reader.

  In a word, our conclusions were that the murdered man could easilyhave lived another year or more. The disease was not so advanced as wehad believed. Sir Bernard had a patient to see in Grosvenor Square;therefore he left at about four o'clock, regretting that he had nottime to call round at the neighbour's and express his sympathy withthe widow.

  "Give her all my sympathies, poor young lady," he said to me. "Andtell her that I will call upon her to-morrow." Then, after promisingto attend the inquest and give evidence regarding the post-mortem, heshook hands with us both and left.

  At eight o'clock that evening I was back in my own rooms in HarleyPlace, eating my dinner alone, when Ambler Jevons entered.

  He was not as cheery as usual. He did not exclaim, as was his habit,"Well, my boy, how goes it? Whom have you killed to-day?" or some suchgrim pleasantry.

  On the contrary, he came in with scarcely a word, threw his hat upon aside table, and sank into his usual arm chair with scarcely a word,save the question uttered in almost a growl:

  "May I smoke?"

  "Of course," I said, continuing my meal. "Where have you been?"

  "I left while you were cutting up the body," he said. "I've been abouta lot since then, and I'm a bit tired."

  "You look it. Have a drink?"

  "No," he responded, shaking his head. "I don't drink when I'mbothered. This case is an absolute mystery." And striking a match helit his foul pipe and puffed away vigorously, staring straight intothe fire the while.

  "Well," I asked, after a long silence. "What's your opinion now?"

  "I've none," he answered, gloomily. "What's yours?"

  "Mine is that the mystery increases hourly."

  "What did you find at the cutting-up?"

  In a few words I explained the unaccountable nature of the wound,drawing for him a rough diagram on the back of an old envelope, whichI tossed over to where he sat.

  He looked at it for a long time without speaking, then observed:

  "H'm! Just as I thought. The police theory regarding that fellow Shortand the knife is all a confounded myth. Depend upon it, Boyd, oldchap, that gentleman is no fool. He's tricked Thorpe finely--and witha motive, too."

  "What motive do you suspect?" I inquired, eagerly, for this was anentirely fresh theory.

  "One that you'd call absurd if I were to tell it to you now. I'llexplain later on, when my suspicions are confirmed--as I feel surethey will be before long."

  "You're mysterious, Ambler," I said, surprised. "Why?"

  "I have a reason, my dear chap," was all the reply he vouchsafed. Thenhe puffed again vigorously at his pipe, and filled the room withclouds of choking smoke of a not particularly good brand of tobacco.