Part 16 (2/2)
The Archduke looked around. ”Adolph is dead,” he said. ”His body was found behind the hedge under the King's library windows three days after Frederick's demise.”
”But his return to France?” Dehra exclaimed.
”A fiction of your police, doubtless,” said Courtney dryly; ”they are very clever.... He was-killed, of course?”
”In the Park, the night the King died; a dagger wound in the heart,” the Archduke explained.
”Do you know that to be the fact; or is it the police theory?”
”I don't know anything-indeed, it was only yesterday I learned of it and sent for the papers in the case.”
”And the-killer, I a.s.sume, has not been apprehended.”
”Naturally not,” said Armand; and proceeded to explain the matter as the police viewed it.
”What do you think, now?” Dehra demanded, at the end.
A bit of a smile crept into Courtney's face.
”I think,” he said, ”that the only circ.u.mstance which relieves the police from utter imbecility is their not knowing that the valet had lied to the Royal Council as to the Book.”
The Princess' finger tips began to tap the table, and the little wrinkle showed between her eyes.
”Don't, my dear, don't,” laughed Armand; ”you can't give the entire Bureau a grade in rank-and besides, they are not to blame. I called the Chief down hard yesterday, only to have him tell me it was the ancient and rigid custom never, except by special order, to investigate a crime that touched the royal household, nor to follow any clue which led inside the Palace. And I apologized-and instantly abolished the custom.”
”They were specially ordered to search for the Book of Laws,” the Princess insisted; ”wouldn't that lead them to Adolph?”
”Under their theory Adolph had nothing to do with the Book,” said Courtney.
”Just so,” the Archduke remarked; ”and between their rotten theories and customs the business has been sadly bungled.”
”Their fatal fallacy,” said Courtney, ”was, it seems to me, in a.s.suming that no one but His Majesty and Her Highness could open the vault.-I have no doubt the valet had discovered the combination.”
”But the box,” Dehra objected; ”it was locked when I got it, and Adolph could not have had the key.”
”He might have had a duplicate.”
”I think not,” said Armand; ”it is a trick lock with a most complicated arrangement, and to make a duplicate would have required the original key.”
”Well, however that may be is not essential,” said Courtney; ”the fact remains that, between eleven o'clock of one night and ten o'clock of the second day thereafter, the Book disappeared; and the last time it was seen, to our knowledge, it was lying under the King's own hand, on the table in his library, with the open box beside it; and that the latter was found, closed and locked and empty, in its place in the vault, while the most thorough search for the Book has been ineffectual except, it seems, to prove that it is not in the Palace. We can safely a.s.sume that His Majesty did not hide it; hence he returned it to its place; and whoever took it, got it out of a locked box in a locked vault. For this, Adolph had the best opportunity.”
”But what possible motive?” the Princess exclaimed.
Courtney smiled. ”If I could tell you that, we would be far toward finding the Book; yet he had a motive-his lie to the Council proves it.”
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