The Secret of Lonesome Cove Part 13

"Search me! Everybody was shut out by the sheriff and the doc. They had that body to theirselves nigh twenty minutes."

At this moment the sheriff entered the hall, followed by Doctor Breed, who escorted the coffin to its supporting sawhorses. The meager physician was visibly at the f.a.g end of his self-control. Even the burly sheriff looked like a sick man, as he lifted aside the coffin lid and spoke.

"There was reasons, neighbors," said he, "why the corpse wasn't suitable to be looked at. n.o.body had seen it since last night. We've fixed it up as good as we could, and you'll now please pa.s.s by as quick as possible."

In the line that formed Kent got a place behind Elder Dennett, who had decided to take another look for good measure, as he said. The look was a productive one. No sooner had it fallen on the face of the dead than Dennett jabbed an indicatory finger in that direction and addressed the sheriff:

"Hey, Len! What's this?"

"What's what?" growled Schlager.

"Why, there's a cut on the lady's right cheek. It wasn't there when I seen the corpse last night."

"Ah, what's the matter with your eyes?" demanded the sheriff savagely.

"You want to hog the lime-light, that's your trouble!"

This was evidently a shrewd lash at a recognized weakness, and the Elder moved on amid jeering comments. But Sedgwick, whose eyes had been fixed upon Kent, saw a curious expression flicker and fade across the long-jawed face. It was exactly the expression of a dog that p.r.i.c.ks up its ears. The next moment a t.i.tter ran through the crowd as a b.u.mpkin in a rear seat called out:

"The dude's eyes ain't mates!"

Chester Kent, already conspicuous in his spotless white flannels, had made himself doubly so by drawing out a monocle and deftly fixing it in his right eye. He leaned over the body to look into the face, and his head jerked back the merest trifle. Bending lower, he scrutinized the unmanacled right wrist. When he pa.s.sed on his lips were pursed in the manner of one who whistles noiselessly.

He resumed his seat beside Sedgwick. His eyes grew dull and melancholy.

One would have thought him sunk in a daze, or a doze, while the procession filed past the unknown dead. His monocle, which had dropped from his eye as he turned from the coffin, dangled against his hand.

Chancing to look down at it, Sedgwick started and stared. Kent's knuckle, as seen through the gla.s.s, stood forth, monstrous and distorted, every line of the bronzed skin showing like a furrow.

The monocle was a powerful magnifying lens.

The sheriff's heavy voice rose. "Any one here present recognize or identify the deceased?" he droned, and, without waiting for a reply, set the lid in place and signaled to the medical officer.

"Feller citizens," began the still shaking physician, "we don't need any jury to find that this unknown drowned woman-"

"The deceased was not drowned." Emerging from his reverie, Chester Kent had leisurely risen in his place and made his statement.

"N-n-not drowned!" gasped the medical man.

"Certainly not! As you must know, if you made an autopsy."

"No autopsy was necessary," replied the other quickly. "There's plenty of testimony without that. We've heard the witnesses that saw the drowned body on the grating it washed ash.o.r.e on."

"The body never washed ash.o.r.e on that grating."

A murmur ran through the crowd. "How do you figure that?" called a voice.

"On the under side of the grating I found a coc.o.o.n of a common moth.

Half an hour in the water would have soaked the coc.o.o.n through and killed the insect inhabitant. The insect was alive."

"How'd the grating get there, then?"

"Dragged down from the high-water mark on the beach. It was an old half-rotted affair such as no ship would carry. Ask Sailor Smith."

"That's true," said the old seaman with conviction.

"You're an expert, Mr. Smith. Now, was that grating large enough to float a full grown human body?"

"Why, as to that, a body ain't but a mite heavier than the water. I should say it'd just barely float it, maybe."

"Exactly; but plus several pounds of clothing, and some dead metal extra?"

"No."

"The clothes would have been soaked, and handcuffs weigh something,"

said Kent calmly.

"There might have been extra spars under the grating, that got pounded loose on the beach and washed away," propounded the medical officer desperately.

"Look at the face," said Kent with finality. "This is a bad coast. Most of you have seen drowned bodies. Did any one ever see an expression of such terror and agony on the face of one who came to death by drowning?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Murder! echoed a voice from the doorway._]

"No, by thunder!" shouted somebody. "He's right."

Others took up the cry. Clamor rose and spread in the room. The sheriff silenced it with a stentorian voice. "What are you trying to get at?" he demanded, facing Kent.

"The truth. What are you?"

Schlager's eyelids flickered; but he ignored the counter-stroke. "Look out it don't lead you where you won't want to follow," he returned, with a significant look at Sedgwick.

"This is as far as it has led me," said Kent, in his clear even voice.

"The body, already dead, was dragged down and soaked in the sea, and then lashed to the grating by a man who probably is or has been a sailor."

"Then the deceased met death on sh.o.r.e, and presumably by violence," said Lawyer Bain.

"It's murder!" cried a woman shrilly. "b.l.o.o.d.y murder! That's what it is!"

"Murder!" echoed a voice from the doorway. Gansett Jim, his half-Indian, half-negro face alight with fury, stood there pointing with stiffened hand at Sedgwick. "Dah de murderer!"

CHAPTER VI-THE RETREAT IN ORDER

No one moved in the court room for appreciable seconds after that p.r.o.nouncement. As a flash-light photograph fixes an a.s.semblage poised, with eyes staring in one direction, thus the half-breed's words had cast a spell of immobility over all. It was a stillness fraught with danger.

No man could say in what violent form it might break.

First to recover from the surprise was the sheriff. "You, Jim, set down!" he shouted. "If there's to be any accusin' done here, I'll do it."

"I do it," persisted the half-breed. "Blood is on his han'. I see it."