Chapter XXXI: Was It Murder?

Carsdale, arrested in his progress across Mrs. Walsingham’s drawing-room by the sight of the still figure which lay on the threshold of the inner door, knew with a sure prescience of coming evil that here was trouble--bad, black trouble. He stood staring around him, astonished, afraid. The whole place was so still, so very quiet, that he knew he was absolutely alone there with the thing which lay almost at his feet--the thing which he knew, from its attitude, its motionlessness, to be dead. His lips suddenly grew dry, his tongue parched, his fingers began to twitch aimlessly--Carsdale was badly upset and frightened; the exclamation that presently burst from him seemed to rattle in his mouth.

“My God!” he whispered. “What--what’s this?”

The room was dull and sombre in the fast-gathering twilight; although the dead man lay face upward, his hands clutching frenziedly at the top of his waistcoat, Carsdale could not distinguish his features from where he stood. But he presently crept nearer, holding by the edge of the table, and at last, getting close up to the body, he bent fearfully down and looked at the face, and recoiled as he recognized it.

“Sydney Werrick!” he said. “Sydney Werrick! God in Heaven!--he’s dead.”

Then he braced himself and stretched out a finger, and touched the dead man’s forehead and one of the clenched hands. And again he started back, for the flesh was still warm. And then Carsdale knew that he had arrived just too late to avert a tragedy. His bewildered mind began to clear; some dim realization of what had happened woke up in him. Mechanically he moved to the wall, and, pressing a switch, turned on the electric light. In its full glare he looked from where he stood at the dead man’s face. And he was thankful, then, to see that the eyelids were closed.

Carsdale turned back out of the drawing-room, went into the dining-room, and going to the cellaret in the sideboard, found brandy, and tossed off half a tumbler at a gulp. The spirit steadied his shaken nerves; his natural resourcefulness began to assert itself. He stood for a moment, thinking. The question was--what was to be done?

He realized by that time that a tragedy had happened of which he had never conceived the possibility. He knew very well that this was no case of suicide--Sydney Werrick was not the man to take his own life under any circumstances; he was much too fond of it, especially when he had money in his pocket and the prospect of more coming to him. He had been shot--possibly by accident, perhaps by intention. And who could have shot him but Sylvie? And where was Sylvie--and where was Sophie Guyner? And how had Werrick come there? But the last question was unimportant; the really pertinent fact was that Sydney Werrick was there--dead.

Carsdale took a hurried look around him. There was nothing in the appearance of the dining-room to show that there had been any struggle, any disturbance. He went back into the drawing-room; everything there was in order, too. And now, having got over his fright, he went up to the body and examined without touching it. Except for a slight frown which had puckered the forehead between the eyes and parted the lips a little, the face was calm; Carsdale judged from that that death had been instantaneous. The hands were gripping the clothing about the chest; looking more closely, Carsdale saw a single spot of blood that had oozed out through the under-clothing and the shirt to the fancy waistcoat and had spread a little over the light material. He knew then that Werrick had been shot through the heart, probably as he crossed the threshold between the two rooms, and that he must have spun around, clutching at his breast, and have fallen dead in the attitude in which he then lay.

Carsdale stepped carefully over the dead man and entered the bedroom. That, as it faced some high building at the rear of the flats, was in greater gloom than the drawing-room. He switched on the electric light and looked about him before going further. There were traces of recent occupancy there. On the bed were thrown a coat and skirt which he recognized as Sylvie’s; he had seen her in them only a day or two before, noticing them particularly because they were new. Near them, also on the bed, lay a hat which he knew as hers--it had evidently been thrown down in haste, as had also the walking costume. Carsdale argued a good deal from the appearance of these things; he knew Sylvie to be tidy, orderly, and careful of her clothes and hats to a fault, and he realized that she must have been in desperate haste to be gone when she flung her gown and hat aside in that fashion. If it were she who had shot Werrick, he said to himself, then she had changed her attire afterwards, hurrying to get away from the dead man, and the scene of his death.

Going further into the room, Carsdale saw that the small safe which Sylvie had had built into the wall, was open. He saw papers and books lying inside; one of the two drawers was pulled out and was left unshut and empty. Within the safe lay a satin-lined jewel case, also empty.

“Collected her money and her jewels and hurried off,” muttered Carsdale. “And she can’t have been gone many minutes when I came.”

He turned to the dressing-table, still prying and examining. And suddenly his eyes caught sight of the revolver, a toy weapon which he himself had given to Sylvie, a year or two before, when there had been burglars in the flats, and she had expressed a fear of them. It lay on the edge of the dressing-table, as if she had dropped it there as soon as the fatal shot was fired. He picked it up and examined it. One chamber had been discharged; the others were still loaded.

As Carsdale stood, handling the revolver, and wondering what he was to do next, he heard the outer door of the flat open, a light footstep in the hall, and then in the dining-room. He stood waiting; then, still unconsciously holding the revolver, stepped towards the door. He heard the footstep again; the next instant he found himself standing on one side of the dead body, and saw, confronting him from the other, Sophie Guyner.

It seemed to Carsdale a whole eternity before the maid spoke. Her eyes went from him to the dead man; from the dead man to him; back to the dead man. She leaned forward trembling violently; it seemed to him that the mere glare of her frightened eyes was potent enough to call life back to the lifeless limbs. Slowly she raised her head, shrank back, and stared at Carsdale.

“It’s--it’s Syd!” she gasped. “He’s--dead. You’ve killed him! Oh! Oh!”

Carsdale saw what was coming and made a half-step towards her.

“Hold your tongue!” he said in a fierce whisper. “Don’t you see----”

Sophie backed away from him; suddenly all control went out of her. She turned and darted through the door and the corridor rang with her shrieks. “Help! Murder! Help!”

“Come back, you hell cat!” shouted Carsdale, leaping after and trying to clutch her. “Come back! You’ll have the whole----”

But already doors were opening on either side, and a uniformed official was running towards Sophie from the head of the stairs, while the lift, just then passing, came to a sudden stop, and excited faces looked out of its barred door. The ugly cry seemed to be taken up all round--the very walls seemed to echo it.

Carsdale uttered a hearty and fervent curse, and, re-entering the flat, swallowed some more brandy. Then he suddenly remembered that he was holding the revolver in his left hand, and he went back and laid it on the dressing-table, just where he had found it. As he stepped over the dead man again, Sophie Guyner and a porter in uniform, and a lift-boy, and a couple of policemen came pouring in, and beyond them, at the outer door, Carsdale saw a crowd of eager and excited faces.

Sophie stretched out an accusing finger.

“That’s him!” she shouted. “I found him standing over him with the revolver, smoking in his hand. Oh, see if he’s really dead!”

One policeman stooped and examined the dead body; the other looked at Carsdale. And Carsdale shook his head.

“Take no notice of what that woman says,” he said. “She knows nothing about it. I came in here a few minutes ago, and found this man lying dead here. I was just coming out to raise an alarm when she came in.”

“There’ll be an inspector and a doctor here in a minute,” said the policeman. “You’d better tell the inspector. Is he dead, Jim?”

The second policeman got up and straightened himself.

“Been dead half an hour, I should say,” he answered laconically. “So I don’t think you saw any smoking revolver,” he added grimly, turning to Sophie. “Keep quiet, now; no row. Move away from there, ladies and gentlemen, if you please.”

Carsdale leaned against the edge of the table and waited in silence until the inspector and the police-surgeon came hurrying in. The policemen, having turned everybody else out, also waited in silence, watching Carsdale. As for Sophie Guyner, she had sunk into a chair near the dead man, and was sobbing and moaning inarticulately. And Carsdale, watching her, began to form an idea that there might be matters connected with this death of Werrick of which he as yet knew nothing.

The police-surgeon said exactly what the policeman had said--that Werrick must have been dead half an hour, at least; the inspector, having heard, in silence, what his men had to say, turned to Carsdale, looking him over inquiringly and noting his appearance.

“What do you know about this, sir?” he asked. “I understand you were here when this was discovered. You needn’t say more than you wish to say, you know.”

“I’ll say all that I know, readily,” answered Carsdale. He had been thinking everything over, and had made up his mind to tell the whole plain truth, for his own sake. He knew by that time that all his plans were broken in upon, if not destroyed; he would have to reconstruct everything, and he was not going to be incriminated, even for Sylvie’s sake. “It’s a simple story, so far as I am concerned.”

“You’ve shot him--you know you’ve shot him!” cried Sophie, suddenly waking into vicious energy. “One of you’ve shot him, at any rate.”

“Be quiet!” said the inspector. “Now sir--what is it?”

“I’ll tell you the plain facts,” answered Carsdale. “This flat is tenanted by a lady who is my cousin and my secretary--there’s my card, inspector. The lady’s name is Mrs. Walsingham. That woman, Sophie Guyner, is her maid. I have a key to the flat--here it is. I came here about twenty or twenty-five minutes ago to call on my cousin, and I let myself in. I heard nothing and saw no one in the hall or the dining-room, so I stepped in here. The electric light wasn’t on then. I found this body lying where you see it--it hasn’t been touched. The man was dead, then. I looked round the place--in the bedroom, there, I found a revolver, of which one chamber had been discharged--it’s in there now. I was examining it when this woman came in and at once went off screaming murder. That’s all I know.”

“Do you know the man?” asked the inspector.

“I do,” replied Carsdale promptly. “He is Sydney Werrick, and he has been living with me at my rooms in Jermyn Street for several days. And he is, in fact, the husband of my cousin. She goes under the name of Mrs. Walsingham, but she is, in fact, Mrs. Werrick.”

“Yes, and she and him,” exclaimed Sophie Guyner, excitedly, “she and him have always been against Sydney, and I can see what it is--they’ve got him here and shot him, and----”

“Will you keep quiet, now?” said the inspector. He stepped into the bedroom, looked around him, and came back with the revolver. “This cousin of yours,” he asked, turning to Carsdale, “where is she?”

“I don’t know,” replied Carsdale, firmly. “I have not seen her to-day at all. I came here, expecting to find her in. There was no one in.”

The inspector turned to Sophie.

“Do you know where your mistress is?” he asked.

But Sophie shook her head and again pointed viciously at Carsdale.

“Ask him!” she said loudly. “I tell you it’s all a plant. I expect they got him here and shot him--I know they wanted to get rid of him. She got me out of the way--she sent me off to the theatre, and I only happened to come back because I wasn’t well. Shot him?--of course they’ve done it! I tell you they wanted to get rid of him--he’s been dangerous to them ever since they ran away from New York and left him to go to prison for what they did. I can tell you a lot about the whole thing, I’ll warrant you.”

“That,” said the inspector dryly, “seems very evident. However, you must tell it at the station, for you’ll have to go round there. And you, too,” he continued, turning to Carsdale.

“You don’t mean to say that you attach any importance to what this foolish woman says?” said Carsdale. “Surely you must see----”

“I see that we shall want to know a good deal more before we can let either of you out of our sight,” answered the inspector. “It’s no good arguing--you’ll have to come along.”

And so the watchers outside saw Carsdale taken off by the police, and presently the tidings of the murder spread out to them and to the world at large.