Part 2 (1/2)

There's no need for that--yet. You mustn't go. Mr. Tertius----”

”Better not just yet, miss,” broke in the inspector. ”The doctor is still here. Afterwards, perhaps. If you would wait here while these gentlemen go with me.”

Peggie hesitated a moment; then she turned away and sat down.

”Very well,” she said.

The inspector silently motioned the two men to follow him; with his hand on the door Selwood turned again to Peggie.

”You will stay here?” he said. ”You won't follow us?”

”I shall stay here,” she answered. ”Stop a minute--there's one thing that should be thought of. My cousin Barthorpe----”

”Mr. Barthorpe Herapath has been sent for, miss--he'll be here presently,” replied the inspector. ”The caretaker's telephoned to him.

Now gentlemen.”

He led the way along a corridor to a room with which Selwood was familiar enough--an apartment of some size which Jacob Herapath used as a business office and kept sacred to himself and his secretary. When he was in it no one ever entered that room except at Herapath's bidding; now there were strangers in it who had come there unbidden, and Herapath lay in their midst, silent for ever. They had laid the lifeless body on a couch, and Selwood and Mr. Tertius bent over it for a moment before they turned to the other men in the room. The dead face was calm enough; there was no trace of sudden fear on it, no signs of surprise or anger or violent pa.s.sion.

”If you'll look here, gentlemen,” said the police-inspector, motioning them towards the broad hearthrug. ”This is how things were--nothing had been touched when we arrived. He was lying from there to here--he'd evidently slipped down and sideways out of that chair, and had fallen across the rug. The revolver was lying a few inches from his right hand.

Here it is.”

He pulled open a drawer as he spoke and produced a revolver which he carefully handled as he showed it to Selwood and Mr. Tertius.

”Have either of you gentlemen ever seen that before?” he asked. ”I mean--do you recognize it as having belonged to--him? You don't? Never seen it before, either of you? Well, of course he might have kept a revolver in his private desk or in his safe, and n.o.body would have known. We shall have to make an exhaustive search and see if we can find any cartridges or anything. However, that's what we found--and, as I said before, one chamber had been discharged. The doctor here says the revolver had been fired at close quarters.”

Mr. Tertius, who had watched and listened with marked attention, turned to the police surgeon.

”The wound may have been self-inflicted?” he asked.

”From the position of the body, and of the revolver, there is strong presumption that it was,” replied the doctor.

”Yet--it may not have been?” suggested Mr. Tertius, mildly.

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. It was easy to see what his own opinion was.

”It may not have been--as you say,” he answered. ”But if he was shot by some other person--murdered, that is--the murderer must have been standing either close at his side, or immediately behind him. Of this I am certain--he was sitting in that chair, at his desk, when the shot was fired.”

”And--what would the immediate effect be?” asked Mr. Tertius.

”He would probably start violently, make as if to rise, drop forward against the desk and gradually--but quickly--subside to the floor in the position in which he was found,” replied the doctor. ”As he fell he would relinquish his grip on the revolver--it is invariably a tight grip in these cases--and it would fall--just where it was found.”

”Still, there is nothing to disprove the theory that the revolver may have been placed--where it was found?” suggested Mr. Tertius.

”Oh, certainly it may have been placed there!” said the doctor, with another shrug of the shoulders. ”A cool and calculating murderer may have placed it there, of course.”

”Just so,” agreed Mr. Tertius. He remained silently gazing at the hearthrug for a while; then he turned to the doctor again. ”Now, how long do you think Mr. Herapath had been dead when you were called to the body?” he asked.

”Quite eight hours,” answered the doctor promptly.