The Sleeping Sphinx

The door creaked and squealed. Celia deliberately turned her back.

Now the beams of two electric torches were directed inside. They remained steady for perhaps two seconds, which seemed two minutes. Slowly they bepn to move. Down, up, across . . .

Inspector Crawford uttered a ringing expletive which burst out in that quiet place. The hand which held his torch was quite steady. But he had his left shoulder pressed to the side of the doorway as though he were trying to push the wall in. The red moustache bristled as he turned his head toward Dr. Fell.

'Those coffins have been moved,' he said. 'They've been moved.'

' 'Flung,'' said Dr. Fell, 'would be a more descriptive word. Flung as though by hands of such abnormal power that. . . Inspector!'

'Yes, sir?'

'When I locked and sealed that door, there were four coffins in the tomb. One was that of Mrs. Thorley Marsh. The other three had been brought down from the old vault to,' Dr. Fell cleared his throat, 'to keep her company. They were resting on the floor, in two piles, one on top of the other, in the middle of the vault Now look at them!'

Celia, shivering, an utter stranger, still kept her back turned. Holden came forward and looked past the others' shoulders.

The vault was not large. It was as bare as a stone jug except for an empty little niche in each side wall. Set perhaps four steps below ground level, it gaped at the lights with an evil sight

One coffin, of nineteenth century design, stood grotesquely and coquettishly half upright propped there, against the rear wall. Another—of very new gleaming wood over its lead casing and its inner shell of wood, which could only be Margot’s—lay pressed lengthways close against the left-hand wall The third, an old one, had been flung around so that it lay sideways to the door. Only the fourth, the oldest and most malignant looking of all, rested quiet

'And now,' said Dr. Fell, 'look at the floor.'

'It’s . . .'

'It is sand,' said Dr. Fell, rounding his syllables hollowly. 'A layer of fine white sand, spread on a stone floor and smoothed out in my presence, just before the tomb was sealed. Look man! Use your light!'

'I'm doing it sir.'

'The coffins,' said Dr. Fell 'have been lifted and thrown about. The sand has been disturbed. But there is not a single footprint in that sand.'

Their voices, speaking through the doorway, reverberated and were thrown back at them. Warm moist air breathed out of the vault. It had a sickening effect The propped, drunken-looking coffin against the back wall, Holden could have sworn, trembled as though precariously balanced.

'This ain't,' declared Crawford, and corrected himself instantly, 'this isn't possible!' He said it simply, as a reasonable man.

'Apparently not But there it is.'

'You and the young lady,' Crawford's eyes flashed round quickly, 'did this locking up and sealing up?'

'Yes.'

'Why did you do it, sir?'

'To see whether there might be any disturbance like this.' 'You mean,' Crawford hesitated, 'things that aren't alive?' 'Yes.'

'Somebody,' declared Crawford, 'has been up to jiggery-pokery in there!' 'How?'

That one word, like a knockout blow, sufficed. Yet Crawford, after a long pause, recovered doggedly. His keen eyes, over the bristling moustache, grew almost pleading.

'Dr. Fell, you're not fooling me?'

'On my word of honor, I have told you the literal truth.'

'But sir, do you know anything about how modern coffins are built? Do you know how much they weigh?'

'I have never,' said Dr. Fell, 'actually occupied one.'

'There's something funny about you,' Crawford studied him, the eyes moving. 'You look... by George,' he pounced on it 'you look actually relieved/ Why, sir? Did you expect something worse than this to happen?'

'Perhaps I did.'

Crawford shook his head violently, like a man coming up from under water.

'Besides,' he argued, 'what’s it got to do with you-know-what?' His glance was significant 'It's no concern of ours, I mean the police's, if coffins start dancing about in their tombs. That's God Almighty's concern. Or the devil's. But it's not ours.'

'True.'

'The superintendent,' persisted Crawford, 'tells me I'm to take orders from you. He tells me a little about this murdering swine who's been—' Here the Inspector's professional caution stopped him. 'Anyway, he tells me something about what you've got up your sleeve. We're after evidence. But look therel'

Straightening up, Crawford thrust his arm deep through the doorway. He sent the beam of the torch slowly playing over the grotesquely sprawled coffins and the sand.

'They're deaden,' he went on. 'Deaden are no good to us, unless it’s for a post-mortem. And that chap,' the light fastened on the most malignant-looking coffin, a sixteenth-century one of decaying scrollwork, 'that chap looks as though he'd be a good bit past any post-mortem.

'He was Justin Devereux,' said Dr. Fell. 'He died, in a sword-and-dagger duel at Barne Elms, more than three hundred yean before you were born.'

A physical chill, like the damp breath out of that tomb, seemed to touch their hearts again.

'Did he?' asked Inspector Crawford. 'He won't fight any more duels: that’ s certain. And that’ s what I mean. What am I doing here? Why did the super want me to come here? There's no—'

Suddenly Crawford stopped, drawing in his breath. His whole voice and manner changed. 'Look there, sir!'

'What is it?' Dr. Fell spoke sharply.

'I didn't see it before, because I was concentrating on the floor. But look over there! In that left-hand niche in the wall!'

Lying in the niche, dusty and dirty but sending back gleams under the Inspector's torch, was a small brown bottle. It was rounded in shape; it would contain about two ounces. They could just see the edge of a label inscribed in colors. And it was still corked.

'I may not have heard much about this case,' Inspector Crawford said grimly, 'but I know what that is.'

CHAPTER XIII

Holden turned round to find Celia.

She was now facing the tomb, but well back and to one side; she would not look into it All that sense of strangeness had gone.

'Celia dear ...'

'Can yon call me that?' asked Celia in a husky voice. 'Can you even care anything at all about me? After tonight?'

'What in the world are you talking about?'

'I'm a beast,' muttered Celia. 'Oh, I am a beast!'

'Don't talk nonsense!' He took her shoulders and, in the dense shadow of the cypress, he kissed her. It was the same, the same as last night; nothing had changed. 'But don't stay here!' he said. 'Don't watch this. Go back to the house. It’ll only be bad for you if you stay.'

'No!' urged Celia. 'No. Please. Don't send me away. I have a reason. I—want to look in there now. I have a reason.'

Both of them, then, became aware of an ominous silence.

Inspector Crawford and Dr. Fell still stood motionless on either side of the tomb door. Dr. Fell had stepped back, switching off his torch. The Inspector, though he still held the light steadily inside, stared at Dr. Fell with hard intensity. It was as though, curiously, they were duelists.

'Orders, sir?'