Part 19 (1/2)

”I never dreamed of thinking that it was!”

”You are quite right, Mr. Scarth. It doesn't bear thinking about. Of course, any murderer ingenious enough to concoct such a thing would have been far too clever to drop out _two_ noughts; he would have been content to change the milligrams into centigrams, and risk a recovery.

No sane chemist would have dispensed the pills in decimals. But we are getting off the facts, and I promised to meet Doctor Alt on his last round. If I may tell him, in vague terms, that you at least think there may have been some mistake, other than the culpable one that has been laid at his door, I shall go away less uneasy about my unwarrantable intrusion than I can a.s.sure you I was in making it.”

It was strange how the balance of personality had s.h.i.+fted during an interview which Scarth himself was now eager to extend. He had no longer the mesmeric martinet who had tamed an unruly audience at sight; the last of Mr. Jingle's snap had long been in abeyance. And yet there was just one more suggestion of that immortal, in the rather dilapidated trunk from which the swarthy exquisite now produced a bottle of whisky, very properly locked up out of Laverick's reach. And weakness of will could not be imputed to the young man who induced John Dollar to cement their acquaintance with a thimbleful.

III

It was early morning in the same week; the crime doctor lay brooding over the most complicated case that had yet come his way. More precisely it was two cases, but so closely related that it took a strong mind to consider them apart, a stronger will to confine each to the solitary brain-cell that it deserved. Yet the case of young Laverick was not only much the simpler of the two, but infinitely the more congenial to John Dollar, and not the one most on his nerves.

It was too simple altogether. A year ago the boy had been all right, wild only as a tobogganer, lucky to have got off with a few st.i.tches in his ear. Dollar heard all about that business from Doctor Alt, and only too much about Jack Laverick's subsequent record from other informants.

It was worthy of the Welbeck Street confessional. His career at Oxford had come to a sudden ignominious end. He had forfeited his motoring license for habitually driving to the public danger, and on the last occasion had barely escaped imprisonment for his condition at the wheel.

He had caused his own mother to say advisedly that she would ”sooner see him in his coffin than going on in this dreadful way”; in writing she had said it, for Scarth had shown the letter addressed to him as her ”last and only hope” for Jack; and yet even Scarth was powerless to prevent that son of Belial from getting ”flown with insolence and wine”

more nights than not. Even last night it had happened, at the masked ball, on the eve of this morning's races! Whose fault would it be if he killed himself on the ice-run after all?

Dollar writhed as he thought upon this case; yet it was not the case that had brought him out from England, not the reason of his staying out longer than he had dreamed of doing when Alt's telegram arrived. It was not, indeed, about Jack Laverick that poor Alt had telegraphed at all.

And yet between them what a job they could have made of the unfortunate youth!

It was Dollar's own case over again--yet he had not been called in--neither of them had!

Nevertheless, when all was said that could be said to himself, or even to Alt--who did not quite agree--Laverick's was much the less serious matter; and John Dollar had turned upon the other side, and was grappling afresh with the other case, when his door opened violently without a knock, and an agitated voice spoke his name.

”It's me--Edenborough,” it continued in a hurried whisper. ”I want you to get into some clothes and come up to the ice-run as quick as possible!”

”Why? What has happened?” asked the doctor, jumping out of bed as Edenborough drew the curtains.

”Nothing yet. I hope nothing will----”

”But something has!” interrupted the doctor. ”What's the matter with your eye?”

”I'll tell you as you dress, only be as quick as you can. Did you forget it was the toboggan races this morning? They're having them at eight instead of nine, because of the sun, and it's ten to eight now. Couldn't you get into some knickerbockers and stick a sweater over all the rest?

That's what I've done--wish I'd come to you first. They'll _want_ a doctor if we don't make haste!”

”I wish you'd tell me about your eye,” said Dollar, already in his stockings.

”My eye's all right,” returned Edenborough, going to the gla.s.s. ”No, by jove, it's blacker than I thought, and my head's still singing like a kettle. I shouldn't have thought Laverick could hit so hard--drunk _or_ sober.”

”That madman?” cried Dollar, looking up from his laces. ”I thought he turned in early for once in a way?”

”He was up early, anyhow,” said Edenborough, grimly; ”but I'll tell you the whole thing as we go up to the run, and I don't much mind who hears me. He's a worse hat even than we thought. I caught him tampering with the toboggans at five o'clock this morning!”

”Which toboggans?”

”One of the lot they keep in a shed just under our window, at the back of the hotel. I was lying awake and I heard something. It was like a sort of filing, as if somebody was breaking in somewhere. I got up and looked out, and thought I saw a light. Lucy was fast asleep; she is still, by the way, and doesn't know a thing.”

”I'm ready,” said Dollar. ”Go on when we get outside.”

It was a very pale blue morning, not a scintilla of sunlight in the valley, neither s.h.i.+ne nor shadow upon clambering forest or overhanging rocks. Somewhere behind their jagged peaks the sun must have risen, but as yet no snowy facet winked the news to Winterwald, and the softer summits lost all character against a sky only less white than themselves.