The Cardinal Moth. White Fred Merrick

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СКАЧАТЬ had seen that everything necessary was laid out in the smoking-room.

      "Always send the servants to bed as soon as possible," Frobisher explained. "What with the spread of modern journalism, I find it necessary. You never know nowadays how far one's butler is interested in the same stock that you are deeply dipped in. And a long-eared footman has changed the course of diplomacy before now."

      "If everybody pursued the same policy, George," Baron Jessop murmured, "I and my learned friends of the Bench would have more or less of a sinecure."

      "And Lord Saltaur, yonder would not have lost a beautiful wife," Lefroy said loudly.

      A sudden hush seemed to smite the table. Lord Saltaur whitened to his lips under his tan; his long, lean hands gripped the edge of the table passionately. His own domestic scandal had been so new, so painful, that the whole party stood aghast at the brutality of the insult.

      "Frobisher," Saltaur said, hoarsely. "It is not pleasant to be insulted by a blackguard – "

      "What was that word?" Lefroy asked quite sweetly. "My hearing may be a trifle deficient, but I fancied his lordship said something about a blackguard."

      Frobisher interfered as in duty bound. As a matter of fact he was enjoying the situation. Lefroy had drunk deeply, but then he had seen Lefroy's amazing prowess in that direction too many times for any fears as to his ultimate equilibrium. No, Lefroy was playing some deep game. As yet only the first card had been laid upon the table.

      "I think that the apology lies with you, Count," Frobisher said tentatively.

      "A mere jest," Lefroy said, airily. "A jeu d'esprit. Lord Saltaur's wife."

      "You hound!" Saltaur cried passionately. "Whatever I have been, you might leave the name of a pure woman out of your filthy conversation. If you don't apologise at once, I'll thrust your words down your throat for you."

      A contemptuous reply came from Lefroy. There was a flash of crystal and a glass shattered on the Count's dark face, leaving a star-shaped wound on his cheek. A moment later and he and Saltaur were struggling together like wild animals. Frobisher had so far forgotten himself as to lean back in his chair as if this were a mere exhibition got up for his entertainment.

      "Is this part of the evening's amusement, Sir Clement?" the judge asked coldly.

      Frobisher realised his responsibilities with a sigh for his interrupted pleasure. His civilisation was the thinnest possible veneer, a shoddy thing like Tottenham Court Road furniture.

      "Come, you chaps must drop it," he cried. "I can't have you fighting over my Smyrna carpet. Saltaur, you shall have your apology. Lefroy, do you hear me?"

      Strong arms interfered, and the two men were dragged apart. Lefroy's teeth glistened in a ghastly grin; there was a speck of blood on his white shirt front. Saltaur's laboured breathing could be heard all over the room.

      "I take you all to witness that it was no seeking of mine," he cried. "I was foully insulted. In a few days all the world will know that I have been made the victim of a discharged servant's perjury. Frobisher, I am still waiting for my apology."

      Lefroy paused and passed his handkerchief across his face. He seemed to have wiped the leering expression from it. He looked a perfect picture of puzzled bewilderment.

      "What have I done?" he asked. "What on earth have I said?"

      "Beautiful," Frobisher murmured. "Artistic to a fault. What is he driving at?"

      Baron Jessop explained clearly and judiciously. He was glad to have an opportunity of doing so. Viewing the thing dispassionately, he was bound to say that Count Lefroy had been guilty of a grave breach of good taste. But he was quite sure that under the circumstances —

      "On my honour, I haven't the slightest recollection of it," Lefroy cried. "If there is one lady of my acquaintance I honour and respect it is Lady – the charming woman whom Lord Saltaur calls his wife. A sudden fit of mental aberration, my lord. An old wound in the head followed by a spell in the sunshine. This is the third time the thing has happened. The last time in Serbia nearly cost me my life. My dear Saltaur, I am sorry from the bottom of my heart."

      "Funniest case I ever heard of," the puzzled Saltaur murmured. "All the same, I'm deuced sorry I threw that wine glass at you."

      "Oh, so you chucked a wine glass at me! Laid my cheek open, too. Well, I should have done exactly the same thing under the same circumstances. From this night I touch nothing stronger than claret. If I'd stuck to that, this wouldn't have happened."

      The good-humoured Saltaur muttered something in reply, the threads of the dropped conversation were taken up again. Hafid, who had watched the sudden quarrel with Oriental indifference, had gone off to the conservatory for hot water to bathe Lefroy's damaged face. There was just a lull for a moment in the conversation, a sudden silence, and then the smash of a crystal vessel on a tiled floor and a strangled cry of terror from Hafid. He came headlong into the room, his eyes starting, his whole frame quivering with an ungovernable terror.

      "Mr. Manfred," he yelled. "Lying on the floor in the conservatory, dead. Take it and burn it, and destroy it. Take it and burn it, and destroy it. Take it – "

      Frobisher pounced upon the wailing speaker and clutched him by the throat. As the first hoarse words came from Hafid the rest of the party had rushed headlong into the orchid-house. Frobisher shook his servant like a reed is shaken by a storm.

      "Silence, you fool!" he whispered. "You didn't kill the man, and I didn't kill the man. If he is dead he has not been murdered. And it is no fault of yours."

      "Allah knows better," Hafid muttered, sulkily. "You didn't kill him, and I didn't kill him, but he is dead, and Allah will punish the guilty. Take it and burn it, and – "

      "Idiot! Son of a pig, be silent. And mind, you are to know nothing. You went to get the hot water from the orchid-house and saw Mr. Manfred lying there. As soon as you did so you rushed in to tell us. Now come along."

      The limp body of Manfred had been partly raised, and his head rested on Sir James Brownsmith's knee. The others stood waiting for the verdict.

      "The fellow is dead," the great doctor said. "Murdered, I should say, undoubtedly. He has been strangled by a coarse cloth twisted about his throat – precisely the same way as that poor fellow was murdered at Streatham the night before last."

      A solemn silence fell upon the group. Hafid stood behind, his lips moving in silent speech:

      "Take it and burn it, and destroy it. Take it and burn it, and destroy it, for there is blood upon it now and ever."

      The drama was none the less moving because of its decorous silence. The great surgeon knelt on the white marble floor of the orchid-house with Manfred's head on his knee. Though Sir James Brownsmith's hand was quite steady, his face was white as his own hair, or the face of the dead man staring dumbly up to the tangle of ropes and blossoms overhead. There the Cardinal Moth was dancing and quivering as if exulting over the crime. A long trail of it had broken away, and one tiny cloud of blossom danced near the surgeon's ear, as if trying to tell him the tragedy and its story.

      "A ghastly business," the judge murmured. "How did the murderer get in here?"

      "How did he get out?" Frobisher suggested. "There is no exit from here at all. All the servants have been in bed long ago, and the front door is generally secured, at least the latch is always down."

      "But what brought СКАЧАТЬ