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Page 32
"In relation to the attitude of Sir Marcus. Jealousy makes men (and
women) do strange and desperate things. The character of Eric Coverly,
the new baronet, is a very odd one."
"He is headstrong and in some respects weak," I admitted. "But
otherwise he is an ordinary English gentleman, with the traditions of
an old name and a public school to back him up. I tell you, Gatton,
it's nonsense. His army career alone shows him to be a sound man."
"Yes," murmured Gatton; "he was awarded a decoration for distinguished
service in Egypt."
That seemingly simple remark struck me with all the force of a
physical blow. Gatton began quietly to load his pipe, without even
glancing in my direction; but the covert significance of his words was
all too apparent:
"Gatton," I said--"what the devil are you driving at?"
He slightly shrugged his shoulders.
"What you may term the hocus-pocus side of the case," he replied,
"turns on matters Egyptian, doesn't it? Very well. Who else, that we
know about, is associated, or ever has been associated with Egypt?"
"But--the woman?"
"Ah!" said Gatton. "Now you are getting down to the depths. But
assuming that the extraordinary characteristics of this visitor of
yours can be explained in some way, by deliberate trickery, for
example, might she not be a woman whom Eric Coverly met in Egypt?"
I stared silently a while, and then:
"In short, a rival of Miss Merlin's?" I suggested.
"Precisely. The trick with the photograph was just of the kind one
would expect from a madly jealous woman. Everything planned with
supreme cunning, but the scene at which the hated rival enters the
scheme badly overdone."
"And you believe Coverly's silence to be due to the fact that he is
shielding some one?"
"Well, that or shielding himself. What else can it mean? A man
suspected of murder doesn't hesitate to establish an alibi unless he
is in a desperately tight corner. The exact position of your
strange-eyed acquaintance in the case is not apparent to me at the
moment, I'll admit, but I seem to have heard that there have been rare
instances of human beings with luminous eyes."
"Quite right, Inspector," I agreed; "I hope very shortly to have some
further particulars for you bearing upon this point. I am endeavoring
to obtain a work by Saint-Hilaire dealing with teratology."
"As to her extraordinary activity and agility," Gatton continued, "we
must remember that a privet hedge is not like a stone wall. I mean she
may not have actually cleared the whole six feet, and after all, this
is the age of the athletic girl. There are women athletes who can
perform some extraordinary feats of high-jumping. Of course, there are
still a number of witnesses to be discovered and examined, but I know
by now exactly what to expect. It's an ingenious idea, although not
entirely new to me.
"The whole thing has been managed by means of the telephone--a
powerful ally of the modern criminal. Briefly what happened was this:
The Red House--selected because of its lonely position, but also
because it was fairly accessible--was leased by our missing assassin
without any personal interview taking place. We have to look then in
the first instance for some one possessing considerable financial
resources. It was by the effective substitution of a year's rent--in
cash--for the more usual references, that our man--or woman--whom I
will call 'A' secured possession of the keys and right of entry to the
premises. A limited amount of furniture was obtained in the same
manner. We haven't found the firm who supplied it, but I don't doubt
that the business was done over the telephone, cash being paid as
before. Duplicate keys must have been made for some of the doors, I
think--a simple matter. We shall find that the furnishing people as
well as the caterer who later on supplied the supper were admitted to
the Red House by a district messenger or else had the keys posted to
them for the purpose.
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