The First R. Austin Freeman MEGAPACK ®. R. Austin Freeman

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СКАЧАТЬ and ribbon and feather, spangled over freely with dark-blue sequins. In one part of the brim was a ragged hole, and from this the glittering sequins dropped off in little showers when the hat was moved.

      “This will have been worn tilted over on the left side,” said Thorndyke, “judging by the general shape and the position of the hole.”

      “Yes,” I agreed. “Like that of the Duchess of Devonshire in Gainsborough’s portrait.”

      “Exactly.”

      He shook a few of the sequins into the palm of his hand, and, replacing the hat on its peg, dropped the little discs into an envelope, on which he wrote, “From the hat,” and slipped it into his pocket. Then, stepping over to the table, he drew back the sheet reverently and even tenderly from the dead woman’s face, and looked down at it with grave pity. It was a comely face, white as marble, serene and peaceful in expression, with half-closed eyes, and framed with a mass of brassy, yellow hair; but its beauty was marred by a long linear wound, half cut, half bruise, running down the right cheek from the eye to the chin.

      “A handsome girl,” Thorndyke commented—“a dark-haired blonde. What a sin to have disfigured herself so with that horrible peroxide.” He smoothed the hair back from her forehead, and added: “She seems to have applied the stuff last about ten days ago. There is about a quarter of an inch of dark hair at the roots. What do you make of that wound on the cheek?”

      “It looks as if she had struck some sharp angle in falling, though, as the seats are padded in first-class carriages, I don’t see what she could have struck.”

      “No. And now let us look at the other wound. Will you note down the description?” He handed me his notebook, and I wrote down as he dictated: “A clean-punched circular hole in skull, an inch behind and above margin of left ear—diameter, an inch and seven-sixteenths; starred fracture of parietal bone; membranes perforated, and brain entered deeply; ragged scalp-wound, extending forward to margin of left orbit; fragments of gauze and sequins in edges of wound. That will do for the present. Dr. Morton will give us further details if we want them.”

      He pocketed his callipers and rule, drew from the bruised scalp one or two loose hairs, which he placed in the envelope with the sequins, and, having looked over the body for other wounds or bruises (of which there were none), replaced the sheet, and prepared to depart.

      As we walked away from the mortuary, Thorndyke was silent and deeply thoughtful, and I gathered that he was piecing together the facts that he had acquired. At length Mr. Stopford, who had several times looked at him curiously, said:

      “The post-mortem will take place at three, and it is now only half-past eleven. What would you like to do next?”

      Thorndyke, who, in spite of his mental preoccupation, had been looking about him in his usual keen, attentive way, halted suddenly.

      “Your reference to the post-mortem,” said he, “reminds me that I forgot to put the ox-gall into my case.”

      “Ox-gall!” I exclaimed, endeavouring vainly to connect this substance with the technique of the pathologist. “What were you going to do with—”

      But here I broke off, remembering my friend’s dislike of any discussion of his methods before strangers.

      “I suppose,” he continued, “there would hardly be an artist’s colourman in a place of this size?”

      “I should think not,” said Stopford. “But couldn’t you got the stuff from a butcher? There’s a shop just across the road.”

      “So there is,” agreed Thorndyke, who had already observed the shop. “The gall ought, of course, to be prepared, but we can filter it ourselves—that is, if the butcher has any. We will try him, at any rate.”

      He crossed the road towards the shop, over which the name “Felton” appeared in gilt lettering, and, addressing himself to the proprietor, who stood at the door, introduced himself and explained his wants.

      “Ox-gall?” said the butcher. “No, sir, I haven’t any just now; but I am having a beast killed this afternoon, and I can let you have some then. In fact,” he added, after a pause, “as the matter is of importance, I can have one killed at once if you wish it.”

      “That is very kind of you,” said Thorndyke, “and it would greatly oblige me. Is the beast perfectly healthy?”

      “They’re in splendid condition, sir. I picked them out of the herd myself. But you shall see them—ay, and choose the one that you’d like killed.”

      “You are really very good,” said Thorndyke warmly. “I will just run into the chemist’s next door, and get a suitable bottle, and then I will avail myself of your exceedingly kind offer.”

      He hurried into the chemist’s shop, from which he presently emerged, carrying a white paper parcel; and we then followed the butcher down a narrow lane by the side of his shop. It led to an enclosure containing a small pen, in which were confined three handsome steers, whose glossy, black coats contrasted in a very striking manner with their long, greyish-white, nearly straight horns.

      “These are certainly very fine beasts, Mr. Felton,” said Thorndyke, as we drew up beside the pen, “and in excellent condition, too.”

      He leaned over the pen and examined the beasts critically, especially as to their eyes and horns; then, approaching the nearest one, he raised his stick and bestowed a smart tap on the under-side of the right horn, following it by a similar tap on the left one, a proceeding that the beast viewed with stolid surprise.

      “The state of the horns,” explained Thorndyke, as he moved on to the next steer, “enables one to judge, to some extent, of the beast’s health.”

      “Lord bless you, sir,” laughed Mr. Felton, “they haven’t got no feeling in their horns, else what good ’ud their horns be to ’em?”

      Apparently he was right, for the second steer was as indifferent to a sounding rap on either horn as the first. Nevertheless, when Thorndyke approached the third steer, I unconsciously drew nearer to watch; and I noticed that, as the stick struck the horn, the beast drew back in evident alarm, and that when the blow was repeated, it became manifestly uneasy.

      “He don’t seem to like that,” said the butcher. “Seems as if—Hullo, that’s queer!”

      Thorndyke had just brought his stick up against the left horn, and immediately the beast had winced and started back, shaking his head and moaning. There was not, however, room for him to back out of reach, and Thorndyke, by leaning into the pen, was able to inspect the sensitive horn, which he did with the closest attention, while the butcher looked on with obvious perturbation.

      “You don’t think there’s anything wrong with this beast, sir, I hope,” said he.

      “I can’t say without a further examination,” replied Thorndyke. “It may be the horn only that is affected. If you will have it sawn off close to the head, and sent up to me at the hotel, I will look at it and tell you. And, by way of preventing any mistakes, I will mark it and cover it up, to protect it from injury in the slaughter-house.”

      He opened his parcel and produced from it a wide-mouthed bottle labelled “Ox-gall,” a sheet of gutta-percha tissue, a roller bandage, and a stick of sealing-wax. Handing the bottle to Mr. Felton, he encased the distal half of the horn in a covering by means СКАЧАТЬ