“I can only suggest,” said Urquhart, with a ghastly face but a strictly professional manner, “that you should be careful before you communicate this ludicrous theory to anybody. What you and the police—whom, frankly, I believe to be capable of anything—have been planting on my premises I do not know, but to give out that I am addicted to drug taking habits is slander and criminal. It is quite true that I have for some time been taking a medicine which contains slight traces of arsenic—Dr. Grainger can furnish the prescription—and that may very likely have left a deposit in my skin and hair, but further than that, there is no foundation for this monstrous accusation.”
“None?”
“None.”
“Then how is it,” asked Wimsey, coolly, but with something menacing in his rigidly controlled voice, “how is it that you have this evening consumed, without apparent effect, a dose of arsenic sufficient to kill two or three ordinary people? That disgusting sweetmeat on which you have been gorging yourself in, I may say, a manner wholly unsuited to your age and position, is smothered in white arsenic. You ate it, God forgive you, an hour and a half ago. If arsenic can harm you, you should have been rolling about in agonies for the last hour.”
“You devil!”
“Couldn’t you try to get up a few symptoms?” said Wimsey, sarcastically. “Shall I bring you a basin? Or fetch the doctor? Does your throat burn? Is your inside convulsed with agony? It is rather late in the day, but with a little goodwill you could surely produce some display of feeling, even now.”
“You are lying. You wouldn’t dare to do such a thing! It would be murder.”
“Not in this case, I fancy. But I am willing to wait and see.”
Urquhart stared at him. Wimsey got out of his chair in a single swift movement and stood over him.
“I wouldn’t use violence if I were you. Let the poisoner stick to his bottle. Besides, I am armed. Pardon the melodrama. Are you going to be sick or not?”
“You’re mad.”
“Don’t say that Come, man—pull yourself together. Have a shot at it. Shall I show you the bathroom?”
“I’m ill.”
“Of course; but your tone is not convincing. Through the door, along the passage, and third on the left.”
The lawyer stumbled out. Wimsey returned to the library and rang the bell.
“I think, Bunter, Mr. Parker may require some assistance in the bathroom.”
“Very good, my lord.”
Bunter departed and Wimsey waited. Presently there were sounds of a scuffle in the distance. A group appeared at the door. Urquhart, very white, his hair and clothes disordered, flanked by Parker and Bunter, who held him firmly by the arms.
“Was he sick?” asked Wimsey, with interest.
“No, he wasn’t,” said Parker, grimly, snapping the handcuffs on his prey. “He cursed you fluently for five minutes, then tried to get out of the window, saw it was a three story drop, charged in through the dressing room door and ran straight into me. Now don’t struggle, my lad, you’ll only hurt yourself.”
“And he still doesn’t know whether he’s poisoned or not?”
“He doesn’t seem to think he is. At any rate, he made no effort about it. His one idea was to hop it.”
“That’s feeble,” said Wimsey, “if I wanted people to think I’d been poisoned I’d put up a better show than that.”
“Stop talking, for God’s sake,” said the prisoner. “You’ve got me, by a vile, damnable trick. Isn’t that enough? You can shut up about it.”
“Oh,” said Parker, “we’ve got you, have we? Well, I warned you not to talk, and if you will do it, it’s not my fault. By the way, Peter, I don’t suppose you did actually poison him, did you? It doesn’t seem to have hurt him, but it’ll affect the doctor’s report.”
“No, I didn’t, as a matter of fact,” said Wimsey. “I only wanted to see how he’d react to the suggestion. Well, cheerio! I can leave it to you now.”
“We’ll look after him,” said Parker. “But you might let Bunter ring up a taxi.”
When the prisoner and his escort had departed, Wimsey turned thoughtfully to Bunter, glass in hand.
“Mithridates he died old, says the poet. But I doubt it, Bunter. In this case I very much doubt it.”
XXIII
There were golden chrysanthemums on the judge’s bench; they looked like burning banners.
The prisoner, too, had a look in her eyes that was a challenge to the crowded court, as the clerk read the indictment. The judge, a plump, elderly man with an eighteenth century face, looked expectantly at the Attorney General.
“My lord—I am instructed that the Crown offers no evidence against this prisoner.”
The gasp that went round the room sounded like the rustle of trees in a rising wind.
“Do I understand that the charge against the prisoner is withdrawn?”
“Those are my instructions, my lord.”
“In that case,” said the judge, impassively, turning to the jury, “there is nothing left for you but to return a verdict of ‘Not Guilty.’ Usher, keep those people quiet in the gallery.”
“One moment, my lord.” Sir Impey Biggs rose up, large and majestic.
“On my client’s behalf—on Miss Vane’s behalf, my lord, I beg your lordship’s indulgence for a few words. A charge has been brought against her, my lord, the very awful charge of murder, and I should like it to be made clear, my lord, that my client leaves this court without a stain upon her character. As I am informed, my lord, this is not a case of the charge being withdrawn in default of evidence. I understand, my lord, that further information has come to the police which definitely proves the entire innocence of my client. I also understand, my lord, that a further arrest has been made and that
