“The eyes were wide open and the pupils widely dilated, the jaws tightly clenched…” Dr. Shaw droned on and on. Parish and Cubitt, who had remained in court, both looked rather sick. Legge eyed Dr. Shaw with a sort of mesmerized glare. Will Pomeroy held Decima’s hand, and old Abel stared at his boots. Mr. Nark, who had expected to be called, looked alternately huffy and sheepish. A large, bald man, who looked as if he ought to be in uniform, seemed to prick up his ears. He was Superintendent Harper of the Illington Police Force.

“You have performed an autopsy?” asked the coroner.

“Yes.”

“What did you find?”

“I found the blood much engorged and brilliant in colour. I found nothing unusual in the condition of the stomach. I sent the contents to be analyzed, however, and the report has reached me. Nothing unexpected has been found. I also sent a certain quantity of the blood to be analyzed.”

Dr. Shaw paused.

“N-n-yes?”

“In the case of the sample of blood, the analyst has found definite traces of hydrocyanic acid. These traces point to the presence of at least a grain and a half of the acid in the blood stream.”

“And the fatal dose?”

“One may safely say less than a grain.”

“Did you send the brandy bottle and the iodine bottle, which was found under the bench, to the analyst?”

“Yes.”

“What was the result, Dr. Shaw?”

“The test was negative. The analyst can find no trace of hydrocyanic acid in either bottle.”

“And the dart?”

“The dart was also tested for traces of hydrocyanic acid.” Dr. Shaw looked directly at the coroner and said crisply, “Two tests were used. The first was negative. The second positive. Indications of a very slight trace of hydrocyanic acid were found upon the dart.”

iii

There was only one other witness, a representative of the firm that made the darts. He stated with considerable emphasis that at no stage of their manufacture did they come in contact with any form of cyanide, and that no cyanic preparation was to be found in the entire factory.

The coroner summed up at considerable length and with commendable simplicity. His manner suggested that the jury as a whole was certifiable as mentally unsound, but that he knew his duty and would perform it in the teeth of stupidity. He surveyed the circumstances surrounding Watchman’s death. He pointed out that the only word spoken by the deceased, the word “poisoned,” overheard by one witness alone, should not weigh too heavily in the minds of the jury. In the first place the evidence might be regarded as hearsay, and therefore inadmissible at any other court. In the second, there was nothing to show why the deceased had uttered this word or whether his impression had been based on any actual knowledge. They might attach considerable importance to the point that the post-mortem analysis gave positive signs of the presence of some kind of cyanide in the blood. They might, while remembering the presence of a strong solution of hydrocyanic acid in the room, also note the assurance given by several of the witnesses that all reasonable precaution had been taken in the use and disposal of the bottle. They would very possibly consider that the use, for domestic purposes, of so dangerous a poison, was extremely ill-advised. He reminded them of Watchman’s idiosyncrasy for the acid. He delivered a short address on the forms in which this, the most deadly of the cerebral depressants, was usually found. He said that, since hydrogen cyanide is excessively volatile, the fact that none was found in the stomach did not preclude the possibility that the deceased had taken it by the mouth. He reminded them again of the expert evidence. No cyanide had been found in the brandy bottle or the iodine bottle. The fragments of the broken brandy glass had also given a negative result in the test for cyanide, but they might remember that as these fragments were extremely minute, the test, in this instance, could not be considered conclusive. They would of course note that the point of the dart had yielded a positive result in the second test made by the analyst. This dart was new, but had been handled by three persons before Mr. Legge used it. He wound up by saying that if the jury came to the conclusion that the deceased died of cyanide poisoning but that there was not enough evidence to say, positively, how he took the poison, they might return a verdict to this effect.

Upon this hint the jury retired for ten minutes and came back to deliver themselves, as well as they could remember them, in Dr. Mordant’s own words. They added a shocked and indignant remark on the subject of prussic acid in the home.

The inquest on Luke Watchman was ended and his cousin was free to bury his body.

Chapter VII

Complaint from a Publican

i

“Summer,” said Chief Detective-Inspector Alleyn moodily, “is acoming in and my temper is agoing out. Lhude sing cuccu. I find that the length of my patience, Fox, fluctuates in an inverse ratio with the length of the days.”

“Don’t you like the warm weather?” asked Detective-Inspector Fox.

“Yes, Fox, but not in London. Not in the Yard. Not in the streets, where one feels dirty half an hour after one has bathed. Not when one is obliged to breathe the fumes of petrol and the body-odour of those who come to make statements and remain to smell. That creature who has just left us stank abominably. However, the case is closed, which is a slight alleviation. But I don’t like summer in London.”

“Ah well,” said Fox, shifting his thirteen stone from one leg to the other, “chacun à son goût.”

“Your French improves.”

“It ought to, Mr. Alleyn. I’ve been sweating at it for two years now, but I can’t say I feel what you might call at home with it. Give me time and I can see my way with the stuff but that’s not good enough. Not nearly good enough.”

“Courage, Fox. Dogged as does it. What brought you up here?”

“There’s a chap came into the waiting-room an hour ago with rather a rum story, sir. They sent him along to me. I don’t know that there’s much in it but I thought you might be interested.”

“Why?” asked Alleyn apprehensively.

“I nearly sent him off,” continued Fox, who had his own way of imparting information. “I did tell him it was nothing to do with us and that he’d better go to the local Super which is, of course, what he’ll have to do anyway if there’s anything in it.”

“Fox,” said Alleyn, “am I a Tantalus that you should hold this beaker, however unpalatable, beyond my reach? What was this fellow’s story? What prevented you from following the admirable course you have outlined? And why have you come in here?”

“It’s about the Watchman business.”

“Oh?” Alleyn swung round in his chair. “What about it?”

“I remembered you’d taken an interest in it, Mr. Alleyn, and that deceased was a personal friend of yours.”

“Well — an acquaintance.”

“Yes. You mentioned that there were one or two points that were not brought out at the inquest.”

“Well?”

“Well, this chap’s talking about one of them. The handling of the darts.”

Alleyn hesitated. At last he said: “He must go to the local people.”

“I thought you might like to see him before we got rid of him.”

“Who is he?”

“The pub-keeper.”

“Has he come up from Devon to see us?”

“Yes, he has. He says the Super at Illington wouldn’t listen to him.”

“None of our game.”

“I thought you might like to see him,” Fox repeated.

“All right, blast you. Bring him up.”

“Very good, sir,” said Fox, and went out.

Alleyn put his papers together and shoved them into a drawer of his desk. He noticed with distaste that the papers felt gritty and that the handle of the drawer was sticky. He wished suddenly that something important might crop up somewhere in the country, somewhere, for preference, in the South of England; and his thoughts switched back to the death of Luke Watchman in Devon. He called to mind the report on the inquest. He had read it attentively.