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Page 12
For a moment I considered. These were odd actions, surely; but was
it my place to interfere? I remembered the cold stare in the eyes
of Captain Fraser-Freer when I presented that letter. I saw him
standing motionless in his murky study, as amiable as a statue.
Would he welcome an intrusion from me now?
Finally I made up my mind to forget these things and went down to
find Walters. He and his wife were eating their dinner in the
basement. I told him what had happened. He said he had let no
visitor in to see the captain, and was inclined to view my
misgivings with a cold British eye. However, I persuaded him to
go with me to the captain's rooms.
The captain's door was open. Remembering that in England the way
of the intruder is hard, I ordered Walters to go first. He stepped
into the room, where the gas flickered feebly in an aged chandelier.
"My God, sir!" said Walters, a servant even now.
And at last I write that sentence: Captain Fraser-Freer of the
Indian Army lay dead on the floor, a smile that was almost a sneer
on his handsome English face!
The horror of it is strong with me now as I sit in the silent
morning in this room of mine which is so like the one in which the
captain died. He had been stabbed just over the heart, and my
first thought was of that odd Indian knife which I had seen lying
on his study table. I turned quickly to seek it, but it was gone.
And as I looked at the table it came to me that here in this dusty
room there must be finger prints--many finger prints.
The room was quite in order, despite those sounds of struggle. One
or two odd matters met my eye. On the table stood a box from a
florist in Bond Street. The lid had been removed and I saw that
the box contained a number of white asters. Beside the box lay a
scarf-pin--an emerald scarab. And not far from the captain's body
lay what is known--owing to the German city where it is made--as
a Homburg hat.
I recalled that it is most important at such times that nothing be
disturbed, and I turned to old Walters. His face was like this
paper on which I write; his knees trembled beneath him.
"Walters," said I, "we must leave things just as they are until the
police arrive. Come with me while I notify Scotland Yard."
"Very good, sir," said Walters.
We went down then to the telephone in the lower hall, and I called
up the Yard. I was told that an inspector would come at once and
I went back to my room to wait for him.
You can well imagine the feelings that were mine as I waited.
Before this mystery should be solved, I foresaw that I might be
involved to a degree that was unpleasant if not dangerous. Walters
would remember that I first came here as one acquainted with the
captain. He had noted, I felt sure, the lack of intimacy between
the captain and myself, once the former arrived from India. He
would no doubt testify that I had been most anxious to obtain
lodgings in the same house with Fraser-Freer. Then there was the
matter of my letter from Archie. I must keep that secret, I felt
sure. Lastly, there was not a living soul to back me up in my story
of the quarrel that preceded the captain's death, of the man who
escaped by way of the garden.
Alas, thought I, even the most stupid policeman can not fail to look
upon me with the eye of suspicion!
In about twenty minutes three men arrived from Scotland Yard. By
that time I had worked myself up into a state of absurd nervousness.
I heard Walters let them in; heard them climb the stairs and walk
about in the room overhead. In a short time Walters knocked at my
door and told me that Chief Inspector Bray desired to speak to me.
As I preceded the servant up the stairs I felt toward him as an
accused murderer must feel toward the witness who has it in his
power to swear his life away.
He was a big active man--Bray; blond as are so many Englishmen.
His every move spoke efficiency. Trying to act as unconcerned as
an innocent man should--but failing miserably, I fear--I related
to him my story of the voices, the struggle, and the heavy man who
had got by me in the hall and later climbed our gate. He listened
without comment. At the end he said:
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