The Mansion of Mystery Part 6

DETECTIVE AND DOCTOR

As already intimated, Adam Adams, in his career as an investigator and detective, had solved many difficult criminal problems, yet this somewhat remarkable individual realized that the mystery before him was as difficult of solution as any he had yet encountered.

The most tantalizing thing about the whole affair was its simplicity.

Two people had been murdered in their own home in broad daylight. No one had been seen around the place, and even the manner in which the foul deed had been committed was a secret.

A score of possibilities presented themselves to his mind when he left Margaret Langmore and Raymond Case to begin the task he had set before himself--to clear the fair name of the beautiful girl who had placed her faith in him and his ability.

"I'll take a look around the house first," he reasoned. "Then I'll find out a little more about these dead folks and their connections."

Thinking that he must be some noted lawyer from New York, Mrs. Morse was very gracious to him, and readily consented to show him around.

"Here is the spot where Mrs. Langmore's body was found," said the woman, leading the way to a bend in the upper hallway. "The servant girl tripped over it in her hurry, and went sprawling. She was about scared out of her wits."

"Naturally enough. Do you know how the body was lying?"

"At full length, they say, face downward, and with the fists clenched."

"Was that window open?"

"Yes, but not the blinds."

"Where does that door lead to?"

"Mrs. Langmore's dressing room. The door was open when they found her--as if she had come out and was trying to get downstairs."

"Humph!" The detective pushed the blinds of the window open and began to examine the carpet on the floor.

"We've looked around, but we couldn't see a thing," pursued the woman.

"We? Who?"

"The coroner and the police officers."

"Oh! You say the body was lying right here?"

"Yes--the head there, and the feet there. I suppose you are going to try to clear Miss Langmore, aren't you?" went on Mrs. Morse curiously.

"I am--if she is innocent."

"You'll have a task doing it. Everybody around here thinks her guilty."

To this Adam Adams did not reply. He was down on his hands and knees, close to where the head of the murdered woman had rested. He placed his nose to the carpet and drew in a long breath. His olfactory nerves were sensitive, and detected a certain pungent, stinging odor, of a sort not easily forgotten.

"You must be pretty short-sighted," was the woman's comment. The sight of the man on his hands and knees amused her.

"Well, I might have a better pair of eyes, I admit."

From his examination of the carpet, the detective turned to the window.

Outside was the roof to the side piazza of the mansion. On the tin roof were some dried-up spots of mud. He looked them over carefully, and came to the conclusion that they were footprints, but how old was a question.

"When did it rain last around here?" he asked.

"We haven't had a real storm for ten days or two weeks. We have had several showers, though."

He took a glance into Mrs. Langmore's dressing room. Everything was in perfect order, even to the powder-box and the cologne bottles on the dresser.

"That is all I wish to see up here," he said, and pa.s.sed below, where he encountered the policeman in charge. Like the woman, this officer had taken him to be a lawyer, and he readily consented to let the detective inspect the library.

"Mr. Langmore was found in that chair," said he. "He looked as if he had suffered great pain before he died. I think he was strangled, although he didn't show the marks of it."

The library was a richly-furnished apartment. Along two walls were rows of costly volumes, many relating to modern inventions. On the walls hung some rare steel engravings, including one of Fulton and his first steamboat. There was a large library table, with a student's lamp, a mahogany roller-top desk, half a dozen comfortable chairs, and a small, but well-built safe, which, as said before, was closed and locked.

"The coroner locked and sealed the desk, and put all the loose papers in it," said the policeman.

There were two windows to the library, and one was close to the side porch, the roof of which the detective had examined from above. A person dropping from above could easily have entered the library by the window, thus saving himself the trouble of walking through the halls and down the stairs. Adam Adams looked outside, and saw on the ground a number of footprints, some running to a gravel path but a few feet away.

"Where are the bodies?" he asked, as he continued his examination of the room.

"At Camboin's morgue. The doctors have been looking for poison, but they can't find any."

The detective got down in front of the safe and examined it critically.

Had it been opened after the murder and then closed again? That was an important question, but he was unable to answer it.

More by instinct than anything else, he got down and peered under the safe. A crumpled-up bit of paper caught his eye, and he picked it up and slipped it into his pocket without the policeman being the wiser.

"Has anybody else been here?" he asked. "I mean any outsiders."

"A good many folks from the village."

"Anybody else?"

"Yes, a detective from Brooklyn. He thought there might be a job for him, but there wasn't, so he went away," and the policeman smiled grimly.

"What was his name?"

"I think he said it was Peterson."

"Is that the Bardon house yonder?" And Adam Adams pointed through the window and across the side lawn.

"Yes. Doctor Bardon was the first to come over--he and his mother."

"So I heard. I think I'll step over and speak to them a moment."

"So you are working for Miss Langmore?"

"Yes, in a way."

"You'll have an uphill job clearing her. The coroner thinks he has a clear case against her."