The Mystery of Lincoln's Inn Part 17

Gilbert, meanwhile, had moved his father from off the dead body of Morris Thornton on to the floor, and sought to bring him to by unfastening his collar and tie and opening his shirt. The son felt that his first concern was with his father, not with Morris Thornton--with the living rather than the dead. And now, as he tried to bring back to the inanimate frame the spark of life, he noticed, as he had not done before, how changed, how shrunken were the face and figure of his father. He knew his father had been ailing for some time, but he had not realised how far the mischief had gone. And on the top of this illness had come, first the death of Silwood, and now the discovery of Morris Thornton lying dead in Silwood's chambers! Small wonder was it, he thought, that the shock of this last circ.u.mstance, combined with all that had preceded it, had proved too much for his father.

For some minutes he continued his efforts to re-animate Francis Eversleigh, but without avail. The porter and the locksmith gave him what a.s.sistance they could; finally the former suggested that a doctor should be sent for.

"Yes," agreed Gilbert; "go round to King's College Hospital. I know one or two of the doctors there; take my card, and get one of them if you can. Say the case is urgent."

But the porter, who by this time was swelling with the importance of the affair--an importance in which he saw himself included--had another suggestion to make.

"After I get a doctor," he said to Gilbert, whom he knew to be Francis Eversleigh's son, "don't you think it would be well if I fetched a policeman? There's the dead body," he added significantly, "and of course there will have to be an inquest."

"Quite right," replied Gilbert; "but get the doctor first."

And the porter withdrew, more important than ever.

"Shall I stay, sir?" asked the locksmith.

"Yes, please, until the police come; they will want your evidence."

"Very well, sir."

While he was trying to resuscitate his father, Gilbert's mind had been in a whirl; now that he had desisted from the attempt his thoughts shaped themselves more clearly. Here, before him, lay Kitty's father dead--Kitty's father, that was his first thought--and his heart bled for her. He knew that, though she had said and felt that Morris Thornton was no more, she would still suffer terribly on hearing positively that he was dead.

Then the strangeness of the thing--the body being found in Silwood's room, and Silwood his own father's partner!--took hold of him. Silwood dead! Morris Thornton dead! What did this conjunction indicate? That there was something extraordinary about it did not admit of any doubt whatever when it was coupled with the fact that Thornton's body had been found in Silwood's chambers. How had Morris Thornton come to be there at all? And in what way had he met his death? What connection was there between that death and Cooper Silwood? What had Silwood to do with it?

Had he anything to do with it? For what reason? With what end in view?

Had Thornton been murdered? If so, it could not have been by Silwood, for what motive could he have had for killing Thornton?--Silwood, a member of one of the most respectable firms in London. And yet there must be some connection and some explanation. What was it? What could it be?

As these questionings flashed through Gilbert's mind, he stood gazing upon the dead man's face, as if from its sightless eyes and from its dumb lips there might come some solution of the mystery.

And then his thoughts took a fresh turn. Still gazing at the face of Morris Thornton, he wondered if the man had come to his death by being shot, if upon the body would be found the marks of the lethal weapon that had slain him, if the murderer had left behind him some sign which in the end would lead to his detection and conviction. But this was to presume Thornton had been murdered, and there was no certainty as to that.

While he was thus musing, his father showed some indications of reviving. His eyelids fluttered and his lips worked slightly. Gilbert bent down and raised his father's head. With a deep sigh, Francis Eversleigh opened his eyes and stared at his son as at some stranger.

But reviving still more, a light of recognition came into his face, and he moved his head.

"Are you better, father?" asked Gilbert.

Eversleigh made an effort to speak, but it failed; then he looked piteously at his son.

"I wish I had some brandy to give you," said Gilbert. "A doctor will be here in a few minutes."

At the mention of the word "doctor," Francis Eversleigh struggled to raise himself, and, with Gilbert's help, managed to get into a sitting position. Glancing about him in a weak and uncertain way, his eyes fell upon the body of Thornton; a frightful spasm seemed to shake him to pieces; then his eyes all at once blazed with light and life, but in an instant they became clouded and overcast.

"Morris Thornton--I remember," he said, speaking with great slowness, as though speech were exceedingly difficult to him.

He shut his eyes, as if he would shut out the sight of the dead man, while Gilbert watched him anxiously and supported him with his strong young arms.

Presently he opened his eyes again, looked at the body, and then at Gilbert. On his face was a great solemn interrogation which his son could scarcely fail to understand. Eversleigh was asking what did it all portend, but Gilbert did not speak; he himself could see no way out of the darkness surrounding the scene.

"What has happened?" asked the older man, but even as he spoke Gilbert felt his father's form was beginning to press more heavily on him.

"I do not know," the son replied.

Francis Eversleigh now fixed his gaze on Thornton's body once more.

"Murder!" he suddenly cried in a piercing voice, and dropped back unconscious again.

"Murder!"

Gilbert told himself that he could follow the mind of his father perfectly. His father thought Morris Thornton had been murdered. It was to all intents what was in his own mind.

But if Thornton had been murdered, who, then, was the murderer?

The piercing cry of "Murder!" which Francis Eversleigh had raised before swooning again had not been heard by Gilbert only. The locksmith, who was still in the room, heard it for one, and it filled him with fresh excitement. He had been endeavouring to puzzle out the thing in his own way, and was not exactly surprised to find the idea of murder imported into it. That cry of "Murder!" was the echo of his own thoughts, and from that moment he was so convinced that Thornton had been murdered that nothing would disabuse him of the notion.

The cry was heard by three others, who were only a few steps away from the door of Silwood's chambers when Francis Eversleigh gave utterance to it. They were the doctor from King's College Hospital, a policeman from Lincoln's Inn Fields, and the Inn porter, all arriving together. On hearing it, they ran forward into the room.

The porter had already told both the doctor and the policeman his own version of the finding of the body of Thornton and of the fainting fit of Mr. Eversleigh.

"What was that cry I heard?" demanded the policeman, who was the first to speak.

As he spoke he threw searching glances about and around the room. But Gilbert paid no heed to his question. He knew the doctor, thanked him for coming so promptly, and asked him to try to revive his father.

"It is the second time he has fainted," said Gilbert.

It was the locksmith that answered the policeman's query.

"The sick gentleman," said he, "him that's in the swound, called out loud 'Murder!'--he'd been looking at the body--and then he dropped off again. That was the second time he swounded."

"Oh, it was he," said the policeman. Then he advanced to Gilbert, having been prompted thereto by the porter, who whispered to him, "He's young Mr. Eversleigh," and said, "Will you tell me from the beginning the whole story, sir?"

By this time his father was in the capable hands of the doctor, so that Gilbert was able to give his whole attention to the policeman. As succinctly as possible, he narrated the circ.u.mstances which had led to his father and himself going to Silwood's chambers, how the door was broken open, and the body of Thornton found lying on the floor. Next the policeman listened to what the porter and the locksmith had seen, and by the time he had heard what they had to tell him, Francis Eversleigh had come to himself, though he looked shattered and frightfully ill. Him, too, the policeman questioned.

"Mr. Thornton was a client of yours, I believe?" remarked the policeman, after many other queries.

"Yes, an old schoolfellow, and one of my greatest friends," replied Eversleigh. "His daughter is engaged to marry my son Gilbert, here."

"This gentleman?" asked the policeman, pointing to Gilbert.

"Yes."

"And these are the private apartments of your partner, Mr. Cooper Silwood?"

"Yes."

"And the dead body of Mr. Thornton, your friend, is found in the private apartments of your partner, Mr. Silwood?"

"Yes."

"And Mr. Silwood is dead?"