“You shan’t!” she broke in, her voice rising in an infuriated crescendo. “You shan’t put your foot in that room! Not for twelve years has anyone passed the threshold, and no policeman now shall desecrate the place where my husband spent the last years of his life.”
“I appreciate the sentiment that actuates your refusal,” replied Markham; “but graver considerations have intervened. The room will have to be searched.”
“Not if you kill me!” she cried. “How dare you force your way into my house—?”
Markham held up his hand authoritatively.
“I am not here to argue the matter. I came to you merely to ask for the key. Of course, if you prefer to have us break down the door. …” He drew a sheaf of papers from his pocket. “I have secured a search-warrant for that room; and it would cause me deep regret to have to serve it on you.” (I was amazed at his aggressive daring, for I knew he had no warrant.)
Mrs. Greene broke forth with imprecations. Her anger became almost insensate, and she was changed into a creature at once repulsive and pitiful. Markham waited calmly for her paroxysm of fury to pass; and when, her vituperation spent, she beheld his quiet, inexorable bearing, she knew that she had lost. She sank back, white and exhausted.
“Take the key,” she capitulated bitterly, “and save me the final infamy of having my house torn down by ruffians. … It’s in the ivory jewel-case in the top drawer of that cabinet.” She pointed weakly to the lacquered highboy.
Vance crossed the room and secured the key—a long, old-fashioned instrument with a double bit and a filigreed bow.
“Have you always kept the key in this jewel-case, Mrs. Greene?” he asked, as he closed the drawer.
“For twelve years,” she whined. “And now, after all that time, it is to be taken from me by force—and by the police, the very people who should be protecting an old, helpless paralytic like me. It’s infamy! But what can I expect? Everyone takes delight in torturing me.”
Markham, his object gained, became contrite, and endeavored to pacify her by explaining the seriousness of the situation. But in this he failed; and a few moments later he joined us in the hall.
“I don’t like this sort of thing, Vance,” he said.
“You did remarkably well, however. If I hadn’t been with you since lunch I’d have believed you really had a search-warrant. You are a veritable Machiavelli. Te saluto!”
“Get on with your business, now that you have the key,” ordered Markham irritably. And we descended to the main hall.
Vance looked about him cautiously to make sure we were not observed, and led the way to the library.
“The lock works rather easily, considering its twelve years of desuetude,” he remarked, as he turned the key and gently pushed open the massive oak door. “And the hinges don’t even creak. Astonishin’.”
Blackness confronted us, and Vance struck a match.
“Please don’t touch anything,” he admonished, and, holding the match high before him, he crossed to the heavy velour draperies of the east window. As he drew them apart a cloud of dust filled the air.
“These curtains, at least, have not been touched for years,” he said.
The gray light of mid-afternoon suffused the room, revealing an astonishing retreat. The walls were lined with open bookshelves which reached from the floor nearly to the ceiling, leaving only space enough for a row of marble busts and squat bronze vases. At the southern end of the room was a massive flat-topped desk, and in the centre stood a long carved table laden with curious and outlandish ornaments. Beneath the windows and in the corners were piles of pamphlets and portfolios; and along the moulding of the bookcases hung gargoyles and old prints yellow with age. Two enormous Persian lamps of perforated brass depended from the ceiling, and beside the centre-table stood a Chinese sconce eight feet high. The floor was covered with overlapping Oriental rugs laid at all angles; and at each end of the fireplace was a hideous, painted totem-pole reaching to the beams. A thick coating of dust overlay everything.
Vance returned to the door and, striking another match, closely examined the inner knob.
“Someone,” he announced, “has been here recently. There’s no sign of dust on this knob.”
“We might get the fingerprints,” suggested Heath.
Vance shook his head.
“Not even worth trying. The person we’re dealing with knows better than to leave sign manuals.”
He closed the door softly and threw the bolt. Then he looked about him. Presently he pointed beneath a huge geographical globe beside the desk.
“There are your galoshes, Sergeant. I thought they’d be here.”
Heath almost threw himself upon them, and carried them to the window.
“They’re the ones, all right,” he declared.
Markham gave Vance one of his annoyed, calculating stares.
“You’ve got some theory,” he asserted, in an accusing tone.
“Nothing more than I’ve already told you. The finding of the galoshes was wholly incidental. I’m interested in other things—just what, I don’t know.”
He stood near the centre-table and let his eyes roam over the objects of the room. Presently his gaze came to rest on a low wicker reading-chair the right arm of which was shaped into a book-rest. It stood within a few feet of the wall opposite to the fireplace, facing a narrow section of bookshelves that was surmounted by a replica of the Capitoline Museum bust of Vespasian.
“Most untidy,” he murmured. “I’m sure that chair wasn’t left in that position twelve years ago.”
He moved forward, and stood looking down at it musingly. Instinctively Markham and Heath followed him; and then they saw the thing that he had been contemplating. On the table-arm of the chair was a deep saucer in which stood the thick stub of a candle. The saucer was almost filled with smoky wax drippings.
“It took many candles to fill that dish,” commented Vance; “and I doubt if the departed Tobias did his reading by candlelight.” He touched the seat and the back of the
