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Page 11
Gwen now transferred her attention to Maitland, and asked: "Had not
one of us better go for an officer?" Maitland, whose power of
concentration is so remarkable as on some occasions to render him
utterly oblivious of his surroundings, did not notice the question
and Browne replied to it for him. "I should be only too happy to
fetch an officer for you, if you wish," he said. Have you ever
noticed how acute the mind is for trifles and slight incongruities
when under the severe tension of such a shock as we had experienced?
Such attacks, threatening to invade and forever subjugate our
happiness, seem to have the effect of so completely manning the
ramparts of our intellect the nothing, however trivial, escapes
observation. Gwen's father, her only near relative, lay cold before
her,--his death, from her standpoint, the most painful of mysteries,
--and yet the incongruity of Browne's "only too happy " did not
escape her, as was evident by the quick glance and sudden relaxation
of the mouth into the faintest semblance of a smile. All this was
momentary and, I doubt not, half unconscious. She replied gravely:
"I would indeed be obliged if you would do so."
Maitland, who had now finished his examination, noticed that Browne
was about to depart. When the artist would have passed him on his
way to the hall door, he placed his hand upon that gentleman's
shoulder, saying: "Pardon me, sir, but I would strongly urge that
you do not leave the room!"
Browne paused. Both men stood like excited animals at gaze.
CHAPTER III
Nothing is so full of possibilities as the seemingly impossible.
Maitland's request that Browne should not leave the room seemed to
us all a veritable thunderbolt. It impressed me at the time as
being a thinly veneered command, and I remember fearing lest the
artist should be injudicious enough to disregard it. If he could
have seen his own face for the next few moments, he would have had
a lesson in expression which years of portrait work may fail to
teach him. At length the rapidly changing kaleidoscope of his mind
seemed to settle, to group its varied imaginings about a definite
idea,--the idea that he had been all but openly accused, in the
presence of Miss Darrow, of being instrumental in her father's death.
For a moment, as he faced Maitland, whom he instinctively felt to be
a rival, he looked so dark and sinister that one could easily have
believed him capable of almost any crime.
Gwen was no less surprised than the rest of us at Maitland's
interference, but she did not permit it to show in her voice as she
said quietly: "Mr. Browne has consented to go for an officer." As
I felt sure she must have thought Maitland already knew this, as
anyone else must have heard what had passed, I looked upon her
remark as a polite way of saying:
"I am mistress here."
Maitland apparently so regarded it, for he replied quickly: "I hope
you will not think me officious, or unmindful of your right to
dictate in a matter so peculiarly your own affair. My only desire
is to help you. Mr. Browne's departure would still further
complicate a case already far to difficult of solution. My legal
training has given me some little experience in these matters, and
I only wish that you may have the benefit thereof. It is now nearly
three-quarters of an hour since your father's death, and, I assure
you, time at this particular juncture may be of the utmost
importance. Not a moment should be wasted in needless discussion.
If you will consent to despatch a servant to the police station
I will, in due time, explain to you why I have taken the liberty of
being so insistent on this point."
He had hardly ceased speaking before Gwen rang for a servant. She
hurriedly told him what had transpired and sent him to the nearest
police station. As this was but a few rods away and the messenger
was fleet of foot, an officer was soon upon the scene. "We were
able," he said to us generally as he entered the room, "to catch
Medical Examiner Ferris by 'phone at his home in F-- Street, and
he will be here directly. In the meantime I have been sent along
merely to see that the body is not moved before his examination and
that everything in the room remains exactly as it was at the time
of the old gentleman's death. Did I not understand," he said to
Maitland in an undertone, "that there is a suspicion of foul play?"
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