The Wedding Chest Mystery (Musaicum Vintage Mysteries). Dorothy Fielding

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СКАЧАТЬ where she stood in a dead faint. One of the coolies nearly dropped the lid again at the thud of her fail.

      Schofild had hold of it before it quite closed. In another second a dozen hands took it from him and fastened it open. Inside the great chest lay a man at full length. He was quite dead. The face was distorted in a half grin, but it was the face of Boyd Armstrong. An ugly, powerful face. The face of a man of strong passions.

      Her brother carried Mrs. Armstrong out. The slender figure in its clinging draperies looked like a child in his arms. Way was made for him in a silence of quite unusual quality, then came what was practically a hubbub.

      Schofild lowered the lid after touching Armstrong's cheek. "Until the police come," he murmured to Mr. Buck, then he took a step forward and raised his voice. "If there is any doctor here, will he be kind enough—?" No one stirred, so Schofild continued, "There's been an accident to Mr. Armstrong. No one should leave the house for the time being. But any one can leave these rooms, of course. In fact, I think every one should do so except you, Mr. Buck, and your assistants. I'll telephone to Scotland Yard."

      "Wait a moment," came in Percy Callard's languid yet metallic voice—he had just re-entered the suite—"not quite so fast, please. It may be a case for a doctor. A fit, you know, or a stroke...or drugged. I don't know who you are," he fixed a supercilious stare on Schofild, "to be talking of bringing in the police."

      Schofild mentioned his name and that he was here to keep an appointment with the man who now lay dead inside the great red chest.

      "And it's not a fit, nor drugging, I'm sorry to say," Schofild went on. "Mr. Armstrong's dead. Been dead some hours, I fancy. That's why I don't want to lift the lid again."

      "I see." Callard spoke more civilly. "Then will you go now and telephone? And you needn't wait, Buck, nor your friends either in this ghastly room. I'll stay here until the police come."

      "No thanks—eh—Callard, isn't it?—I'll wait here." Buck had caught Schofild's eye and gave the latter a reassuring nod. The actor as well as the inquiry agent knew Percy Callard by reputation, or the lack of it, and quite patently had no intention of leaving the grim chest in his sole charge, though the rest of the white-faced visitors were glad enough to avail themselves of Schofild's suggestion, and broke back for the stairs in a body. Soft sibilants and hisses came from the Chinese musicians. They could not see into the suite unless they peered through the key-hole, but evidently this was just what they had done, and evidently too they could hear what went on beside them as clearly as their music had reached the visitors. After further quick cluckings and dickings they swept from the room in a body, like a flock of black crows. Passing down the back stairs, they were out of the tradesmen's entrance before the servants had even noticed their passing.

      Upstairs in the Chinese suite no one spoke for a few minutes. Then the actors drew together and spoke in low whispers. Callard sat in a ceremonial chair, his eyes unwinkingly fastened on the chest.

      Within a remarkably short space of time a young man, tall, erect, and bronzed of face, walked quickly into the suite. Schofild was beside him. Behind them came four other men from the Yard. Schofild introduced his companion to Callard as Chief Inspector Pointer. Percy got up languidly, but there was nothing languid in the glance he gave the officer. Buck came forward at the same time. He knew Pointer, and, in common, with all who were acquainted with that typical specimen of the Yard, liked him. Now together, now in bits, the account of what had just happened was given. The lid of the chest was lifted again, and this time remained open.

      "You definitely recognize the dead man as Mr. Boyd Armstrong?" Pointer asked. He himself knew the face by sight, and from photographs.

      "Definitely," came from Buck.

      "Positively," from Callard.

      "Unmistakably," from Schofild.

      "And which of you gentlemen last saw Mr. Armstrong alive?"

      "I suppose I did," Callard said doubtfully, as Buck murmured something about some days ago. "Last night. My sister and I went to the Bat, after dining with some friends, and Armstrong joined us there. But I heard him about the house this morning at some unearthly hour. He's an early-rising fanatic. They rarely come to a good end, in my experience."

      Callard spoke with the air of a virtuous man condemning vice.

      "Look here, chief inspector, we've got to get away," Buck said in a pleading tone, "will you take my deposition, or whatever it's called, about the chest now? I know all about it. Or rather—good God, no!—not as much as that! But I know a good deal about it. I'm in a fearful rush."

      "Sorry, Mr. Buck, but I must first find out when Mr. Armstrong was last seen in the house."

      Pointer had a brief preliminary interview with the dead man's butler and valet. He was told that Mr. Armstrong had left the house this morning around nine, and had said that he would be away until the evening, mentioning eight as the earliest possible hour of his return. What suit was he wearing? What hat? What gloves? The information duly noted, Pointer telephoned a question, a guarded one, to Mr. Armstrong's office. Mr. Armstrong had left around eleven, he was told. No, he would not be back at all today. He had said that he was going out of town for the afternoon. "Did he leave his hat and gloves there?" Pointer went on, "this is Charles Street speaking." A miracle, which seemed to cause no astonishment to the office. No, Mr. Armstrong had only rushed in at eleven for a minute, going into his private room and hurrying out again at once. He had not taken his hat off, and his gloves had been still in his hand when he left.

      Pointer gave very strict injunctions to his men to let no one leave the house until it was absolutely certain that the missing articles were not in his possession. For, though the suit in which the corpse was clothed seemed to be the same one that Armstrong, according to all accounts, had worn when, he left the house, there was neither hat nor gloves in the chest upstairs. A woman detective, who had accompanied Pointer to the house on the chance that she might be wanted, would attend to the women guests. This was only routine, the chief inspector had no expectation of finding Armstrong's missing articles of clothing among Armstrong's guests of that afternoon, so that he bore with fortitude the news that the Chinese musicians had gone before he had arrived at the house, though it was a pity. Pointer asked where Armstrong's bedroom and study were, and promptly placed them in charge of one of his men. After, which he returned to the impatient Mr. Buck, who ran quickly over the facts that accounted for his presence and those of the other "coolies" today. He had been dining with the Armstrongs three nights ago, and Mrs. Armstrong had told him of a Chinese wedding-chest that Bob Hardy—all London called Major Hardy "Bob"—was giving them. Mrs. Armstrong had spoken of her intention of distributing gifts from it to her guests. These were to be birch trees from Szechuan, stunted to a size not, so far, seen in England.

      "I suggested coolies to carry the chest in," Buck went on, "and we discussed it as giving an amusing note. As the weight of the trees and the chest might have been a bit too much, it was finally decided only to seem to drag it, on a little trolley table, from the side of the room to the center. I sent up the trolley yesterday. Bits of teak carving were nailed to it, as you see, to hide the rubber wheels. We ourselves all got here at a quarter to five, had a cocktail or two, and a chat with Mrs. Armstrong, and took up our positions in a little sewing-room that's behind those." He pointed to the carved lacquer doors in the side wall near them. "The Chinese musicians were already in there. At a few minutes past five we marched in through the big doors at the other end of this suite, and picking up the gilt staves of the chest which was waiting behind a curtain there, trundled it along to the middle of the wall. As for the rest, well, we've just told you it."

      "Where was Mrs. Armstrong standing when the chest was opened?" was Pointer's next question. That, too, was promptly settled. She had stood СКАЧАТЬ