“I’m glad you’re here, Chief Inspector,” said Sergeant Coleman, deferentially, although I noticed he looked askance at the new arrival’s pipe, which gave off a particularly noxious odor. “I’ve begun interviewing the suspects, sir.”
“Good man, good man,” said the new arrival. “I’ll just have a look around, and we’ll soon know what’s what.” He walked over to the sofa where the body lay, knelt down, and grasped it by the chin to turn the face toward him. He looked intently at the wound. “This man’s been shot,” he said, accusingly.
“Yes, sir, so we believe,” said Sergeant Coleman.
“Well, then, where’s the gun?” asked the chief inspector, standing up and peering round the room. “I can’t say I’ve ever yet seen a man shot without a gun, and I am no spring chicken.”
“We haven’t found the weapon yet,” Coleman replied.
“Well, then, either it’s hidden or it’s been spirited away,” said the chief inspector. “Where have you looked?”
“Well, sir, I’d just arrived, and I thought it better to get the suspects’ names and—”
“Aye, so you told me. Well, you go ahead with that business.” He stopped and looked at the rest of us for the first time. “Here now, I know that face,” he said, staring at my employer. “Haven’t I seen you before?”
“I reckon you might have,” said Mr. Clemens. “I’ve been to London a couple of times before, and sometimes they put my picture in the newspapers and magazines.”
“Do they, now? And what have you done to merit that?” asked the chief inspector. He was still wearing his coat and hat, and his pipe was filling the room with fumes even stronger than those coming from the other gentlemen’s pipes.
“Oh, a couple of things,” said Mr. Clemens. “Told the truth about kings and queens, and stood up against injustice, and took some people down a peg when I thought they needed it. Nothing anybody else couldn’t have done, if they took a mind to.”
“Now I’ve got it,” said the chief inspector, brightly. “I did see you in one of the magazines. You’re that American writer fellow, Train, Twain, something like that. Pleased to meet you—Lestrade’s the name, Chief Inspector Lestrade.” He pronounced it to rhyme with played.
“Always a pleasure to meet an admirer,” said Mr. Clemens, shaking Lestrade’s proffered hand. Then his expression turned serious as he continued: “But tell me, Inspector; my wife and daughter and some other ladies—including that poor fellow’s widow—are in the next room, there. I reckon they’d be a lot better off in their own homes. How soon do you think they’ll be able to go?”
“Ladies, eh?” said Lestrade, following Mr. Clemens’s gesture toward the closed door. “Well, we certainly don’t want to keep them here any longer than we need to, Mr. Train. This is an ugly bit of business, and no doubt about it. No place for a lady at all, really. But you see, we’ve got a murder on our hands.”
“Yes, I’d noticed that,” said my employer. “That’s why we sent for a policeman. We didn’t have much need for one before that.”
“Good, I’m glad you understand, then,” said Lestrade. “What we’ll have to do is get everyone’s name, along with a domicile or place of lodging, and statements from anyone who was present when this fellow was shot . . .”
“Well, that lets me clean off, sure as fire,” said McPhee. “I wasn’t in this here room at all when the hammer fell, and there’s a dozen witnesses can swear to that.”
“A dozen witnesses?” Lestrade’s eyebrows rose. “What, were there that many of you in the place?”
“An even dozen including the dead man, yes—though he won’t be much good as a witness,” said Mr. Clemens. “In fact, it was dark enough that none of us really counts for much as a witness.”
“Dark, you say?” asked Lestrade. He took off his hat and fanned himself with it. “Do you mean to tell me this fellow was shot while the lights were out?”
“Maybe we ought to begin at the beginning,” said Sergeant Coleman, timidly.
“Yes, I think we had best do that,” said Lestrade. He tossed his hat onto the table, and began to unbutton his overcoat. “This is a rum business,” he said. “As much as I’d like to let the ladies go, I’m afraid we’ve got to get some answers before we can let anyone leave the scene. Now, I’m going to have Coleman take your statements out in that room while I have a look around for clues in here.”
“Yes, sir,” said the younger detective. He turned and pointed to Mr. Clemens. “I’d just begun talking to this gentleman, and I think we’ll just continue with him. Come along, please.”
Mr. Clemens and I began to follow Coleman into the anteroom when Lestrade turned and said to me, “Hello, young fellow, where do you think you’re going?”
“I am Mr. Clemens’s secretary,” I said. “He may need my assistance.”
“I’m terribly sorry, but that’s just the kind of thing we can’t allow in the midst of a murder investigation,” said Lestrade. “The sergeant will interview you one at a time, and I’ll ask the rest of you to wait in the room with the ladies. Constable, will you see to it?”
“Yes, Chief Inspector,” said Constable Wilkins. “Gentlemen, if you’ll be so kind? You, too, ma’am.”
Politely but very efficiently, the constable herded us into the room with Mrs. Clemens, Susy, and the three other ladies, to wait our turn. Noting her husband’s absence, Mrs. Clemens turned a searching look toward me. “Where is Samuel?” she asked.
“They’re taking his statement,” I said. “I don’t think he’s in any trouble; they’re going to ask us all to give statements.”
“Well, I can give you my statement right now,” said McPhee. “I wasn’t even in the room, and
