"A grand, pairsonable body," she confided to
Stuart. "He'd look bonny in the kilt."
To an East-End mortuary the cab bore them, and they were led by a
constable in attendance to a stone-paved, ill-lighted apartment in
which a swathed form lay upon a long deal table. The spectacle
presented, when the covering was removed, was one to have shocked
less hardened nerves than those of Stuart and Dunbar; but the duties
of a police officer, like those of a medical man, not infrequently
necessitate such inspections. The two bent over the tragic flotsam of
the Thames unmoved and critical.
"H'm," said Stuart--"he's about the build, certainly. Hair iron-grey
and close cropped and he seems to have worn a beard. Now, let us see."
He bent, making a close inspection of the skull; then turned and
shook his head.
"No, Inspector," he said definitely. "This is not the cabman. There is
no wound corresponding to the one which I dressed."
"Right," answered Dunbar, covering up the ghastly face. "That's
settled."
"You were wrong, Inspector. It was not Gaston Max who left the
envelope with me."
"No," mused Dunbar, "so it seems."
"Your theory that Max, jealously working alone, had left particulars
of his inquiries, and clues, in my hands, knowing that they would
reach Scotland Yard in the event of his death, surely collapsed when
the envelope proved to contain nothing but a bit of cardboard?"
"Yes--I suppose it did. But it sounded so much like Max's round-about
methods.
Pages:
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58