However, all readers - sooner or later - find for themselves a literary genre that is fundamentally different from all others. The Darrow Enigma by Melvin L. Severy (best fiction novels of all time TXT) 📖
- Author: Melvin L. Severy
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and no one else sought to break the silence.
Maitland, as if Gwen’s last remark had given rise to a sudden
determination, glided to the body. He examined the throat, raised
the right hand and looked at the fingers: then he stepped back a
little and wrote something in his notebook. This done, he tried
the folding doors and found them locked on the inside; then the two
windows on the south side of the room, which he also found fastened.
He opened the hall door slightly and the hinges creaked noisily, of
all of which he made a note. Then taking a rule from his pocket he
went to the east window, and measured the opening, and then the
distance between this window and the chair in which the old gentleman
had sat, recording his results as before. His next act astonished
me not a little and had the effect of recalling me to my senses.
With his penknife he cut a circle in the carpet around each leg of
the chair on which the body rested. He continued his examinations
with quiet thoroughness, but I ceased now to follow him closely,
since I had begun to feel the necessity of convincing Gwen of her
error, and was casting about for the best way to do so.
“My dear Miss Darrow,” I said at length; “you attach too much
importance to the last words of your father, who, it is clear, was
not in his right mind. You must know that he has, for some months,
had periods of temporary aberration, and that all his delusions
have been of a sanguinary nature. Try to think calmly,” I said,
perceiving from her expression that I had not shaken her conviction
in the least. “Your father said he had been stabbed. You must see
that such a thing is physically impossible. Had all the doors and
windows been open, no object so large as a man could possibly have
entered or left the room without our observing him; but the windows
were closed and fastened, with the exception of the east window,
which, as you may see for yourself, is open some six inches or so,
in which position it is secured by the spring fastening. The folding
doors are locked on the inside and the only possible means of
entrance, therefore, would have been by the hall door. Directly in
front of that, between it and your father, sat Mr. Maitland and
myself. You see by my chair that I was less than two feet from the
door. It is inconceivable that, in that half-light, anyone could
have used that entrance and escaped observation. Do you not see
how untenable your idea is? Had your father been stabbed he would
have bled, but I am as certain as though I had made a thorough
examination that there is not so much as a scratch anywhere upon his
body.” Gwen heard me through in silence and then said wearily, in
a voice which had now neither intensity nor elasticity, “I understand
fully the apparent absurdity of my position, yet I know my father
was murdered. The wound which caused his death has escaped your
notice, but - “
“My dear Miss Darrow,” I interrupted, “there is no wound, you may
be sure of that!” For the first time since Darrow’s death Maitland
spoke. “If you will look at the throat a little more closely, you
will see what may be a wound,” he said, and went on quietly with his
examinations. He was right; there was a minute abrasion visible.
The girl’s quick observation had detected what had escaped me,
convinced as I was that there was nothing to be found by a scrutiny
however close.
Gwen now transferred her attention to Maitland, and asked: “Had not
one of us better go for an officer?” Maitland, whose power of
concentration is so remarkable as on some occasions to render him
utterly oblivious of his surroundings, did not notice the question
and Browne replied to it for him. “I should be only too happy to
fetch an officer for you, if you wish,” he said. Have you ever
noticed how acute the mind is for trifles and slight incongruities
when under the severe tension of such a shock as we had experienced?
Such attacks, threatening to invade and forever subjugate our
happiness, seem to have the effect of so completely manning the
ramparts of our intellect the nothing, however trivial, escapes
observation. Gwen’s father, her only near relative, lay cold before
her, - his death, from her standpoint, the most painful of mysteries,
- and yet the incongruity of Browne’s “only too happy ” did not
escape her, as was evident by the quick glance and sudden relaxation
of the mouth into the faintest semblance of a smile. All this was
momentary and, I doubt not, half unconscious. She replied gravely:
“I would indeed be obliged if you would do so.”
Maitland, who had now finished his examination, noticed that Browne
was about to depart. When the artist would have passed him on his
way to the hall door, he placed his hand upon that gentleman’s
shoulder, saying: “Pardon me, sir, but I would strongly urge that
you do not leave the room!”
Browne paused. Both men stood like excited animals at gaze.
Nothing is so full of possibilities as the seemingly impossible.
Maitland’s request that Browne should not leave the room seemed to
us all a veritable thunderbolt. It impressed me at the time as
being a thinly veneered command, and I remember fearing lest the
artist should be injudicious enough to disregard it. If he could
have seen his own face for the next few moments, he would have had
a lesson in expression which years of portrait work may fail to
teach him. At length the rapidly changing kaleidoscope of his mind
seemed to settle, to group its varied imaginings about a definite
idea, - the idea that he had been all but openly accused, in the
presence of Miss Darrow, of being instrumental in her father’s death.
For a moment, as he faced Maitland, whom he instinctively felt to be
a rival, he looked so dark and sinister that one could easily have
believed him capable of almost any crime.
Gwen was no less surprised than the rest of us at Maitland’s
interference, but she did not permit it to show in her voice as she
said quietly: “Mr. Browne has consented to go for an officer.” As
I felt sure she must have thought Maitland already knew this, as
anyone else must have heard what had passed, I looked upon her
remark as a polite way of saying:
“I am mistress here.”
Maitland apparently so regarded it, for he replied quickly: “I hope
you will not think me officious, or unmindful of your right to
dictate in a matter so peculiarly your own affair. My only desire
is to help you. Mr. Browne’s departure would still further
complicate a case already far to difficult of solution. My legal
training has given me some little experience in these matters, and
I only wish that you may have the benefit thereof. It is now nearly
three-quarters of an hour since your father’s death, and, I assure
you, time at this particular juncture may be of the utmost
importance. Not a moment should be wasted in needless discussion.
If you will consent to despatch a servant to the police station
I will, in due time, explain to you why I have taken the liberty of
being so insistent on this point.”
He had hardly ceased speaking before Gwen rang for a servant. She
hurriedly told him what had transpired and sent him to the nearest
police station. As this was but a few rods away and the messenger
was fleet of foot, an officer was soon upon the scene. “We were
able,” he said to us generally as he entered the room, “to catch
Medical Examiner Ferris by ‘phone at his home in F-Street, and
he will be here directly. In the meantime I have been sent along
merely to see that the body is not moved before his examination and
that everything in the room remains exactly as it was at the time
of the old gentleman’s death. Did I not understand,” he said to
Maitland in an undertone, “that there is a suspicion of foul play?”
“Yes,” replied George, “that is one explanation which certainly will
have to be considered.”
“I thought I heard the Cap’n say ‘murder’ when he ‘phoned in town
for some specials. They’re for detective work on this case, I reckon.
Hello! That sounds like the Doctor’s rig.”
A moment later the bell rang and Dr. Ferris entered the room.
“Ah, Doctor,” he said extending his hand to me, “what have we here?”
Before I could answer he had noticed Maitland and advanced to shake
hands with him.
“Is this indeed so serious as I have been told?” he asked, after
his greeting.
“It seems to me likely,” replied Maitland slowly, “to develop into
the darkest mystery I have ever known.”
“Hum!” replied the Examiner. “Has the body been moved or the
disposition of its members altered?”
“Not since I arrived,” replied Officer Barker.
“And before?” queried Dr. Ferris, turning to Maitland.
“Everything is absolutely intact. I have made a few notes and
measurements, but I have disturbed nothing,” replied Maitland.
“Good,” said the Examiner. “May I see those notes before I go?
You were on that Parker case and you have, you know, something of a
reputation for thoroughness. Perhaps you may have noted something
that would escape me.”
“The notes, Doctor, are at your service,” George replied.
Dr. Ferris’ examination of the body was very thorough, yet, since
it was made with the rapid precision which comes from extended
practice, it was soon over. Short as it was, however, it was still
an ordeal under which Gwen suffered keenly, to judge from her manner.
The Examiner then took Maitland aside, looked at his notes, and
conversed earnestly with him in an undertone for several minutes. I
do not know what passed between them. When he left, a few moments
later, Officer Barker accompanied him.
As soon as the door closed behind them Gwen turned to Maitland.
“Did he give you his opinion?” she asked with a degree of interest
which surprised me.
“He will report death as having resulted from causes at present
unknown,” rejoined Maitland.
Gwen seemed greatly relieved by this answer, though I confess I was
utterly at a loss to see why she should be.
Observing this change in her manner Maitland approached her, saying:
“Will you now permit me to explain my seeming rudeness in interfering
with your plan to make Mr. Browne your messenger, and at the same
time allow me to justify myself in the making of yet another request?”
Gwen bowed assent and he proceeded to state the following case as
coolly and accurately as if it were a problem in geometry.
“Mr. Darrow,” he began, “has just died under peculiar circumstances.
Three possible views of the case at once suggest themselves. First:
his death may have been due to natural causes and his last expressions
the result of an hallucination under which he was labouring. Second:
he may have committed suicide, as the result, perhaps, of a mania
which in that case would also serve to explain his last words and
acts; or, - you will pardon me, Miss Darrow, - these last appearances
may have been intentionally assumed with a view to deceiving us. The
officers you have summoned will not be slow in looking for motives
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