Who? Part 31

"It's no use beating about the bush, my lord, I know everything."

"Well then, out with it," cried Cyril impatiently. "What are you hesitating for? Have you found her Ladyship or have you not?"

"I have, my lord."

"You have! Then why on earth didn't you tell me at once? Where is she?"

cried Cyril.

There was a pause during which the detective regarded Cyril through narrowed lids.

"She is at present at the nursing home of Dr. Stuart-Smith," he said at last.

"Nonsense!" exclaimed Cyril, sinking back into his chair and negligently lighting another cigarette. "I thought you had discovered something. You mean my wife, Lady Wilmersley----"

"Pardon me for interrupting you, my lord. I don't make mistakes like that. I repeat, the Dowager Lady Wilmersley is under the care of Dr.

Smith."

The man's tone was so a.s.sured that Cyril was staggered for a moment.

"It isn't true," he a.s.serted angrily.

"Is it possible that you really do not know who the lady is that you rescued that day from the police?" exclaimed the detective, startled out of his habitual impa.s.sivity.

"I confess that I do not. But of one thing I am sure, and that is that she is not the person you suppose."

"Well, my lord, I must say that you have surprised me. Yet I ought to have guessed it. It was stupid of me, very."

"I tell you that you are on the wrong track. Lady Wilmersley has golden hair. Well, this lady's hair is black."

"She has dyed it."

"She has not, for it has turned completely white," exclaimed Cyril, triumphantly.

"Did she tell you so?"

"Yes."

"Her Ladyship is cleverer than I supposed," remarked the detective with a pitying smile.

"I am not such a fool as you seem to think," retorted Cyril. "And I can a.s.sure you that the lady in question is incapable of deception."

"All I can say is, my lord, that I am absolutely sure of her Ladyship's ident.i.ty and that you yourself gave me the clue to her whereabouts."

"I--how?"

"I of course noticed that when you heard her Ladyship had golden hair, you were not only extremely surprised but also very much relieved. I at once asked myself why such an apparently trivial matter should have so great and so peculiar an effect on you. As you had never seen her Ladyship, I argued that you must that very day have met some one you had reason to suppose to be Lady Wilmersley and that this person had dark hair. By following your movements from the time you landed I found that the only woman with whom you had come in contact was a young lady who had joined you in Newhaven, and that she answered to the description of Lady Wilmersley in every particular, with the sole exception that she had dark hair! I was, however, told that you had said that she was your wife and had produced a pa.s.sport to prove it. Now I had heard from your valet that her Ladyship was still in France, so you can hardly blame me for doubting the correctness of your statement. But in order to make a.s.surance doubly sure, I sent one of my men to the continent. He reported that her Ladyship had for some months been a patient at Charleroi, but had recently escaped from there, and that you are still employing detectives to find her."

"I did not engage you to pry into my affairs," exclaimed Cyril savagely.

"Nor have I exceeded my duty as I conceive it," retorted the detective.

"As your Lordship refused to honour me with your confidence, I had to find out the facts by other means; and you must surely realise that without facts it is impossible for me to construct a theory, and till I can do that my work is practically valueless."

"But my wife has nothing to do with the case."

"Quite so, my lord, but a lady who claimed to be her Ladyship is intimately concerned with it."

"I repeat that is all nonsense."

"If your Lordship will listen to me, I think I can prove to you that as far as the lady's ident.i.ty is concerned, I have made no mistake. But to do this convincingly, I must reconstruct the tragedy as I conceive that it happened."

"Go ahead; I don't mind hearing your theory."

"First, I must ask you to take it for granted that I am right in believing that Prentice was ignorant of her Ladyship's flight."

"I will admit that much," agreed Cyril.

"Thank you, my lord. Now let us try and imagine exactly what was her Ladyship's position on the night of the murder. Her first care must have been to devise some means of eluding his Lordship's vigilance. This was a difficult problem, for Mustapha tells me that his Lordship was not only a very light sleeper but that he suffered from chronic insomnia.

You may or may not know that his Lordship had long been addicted to the opium habit and would sometimes for days together lie in a stupor. Large quant.i.ties of the drug were found in his room and that explains how her Ladyship managed to get hold of the opium with which she doctored his Lordship's coffee."

"This is, however, mere supposition on your part," objected Cyril.

"Not at all, my lord. I had the sediment of the two cups a.n.a.lysed and the chemist found that one of them contained a small quant.i.ty of opium.

Her Ladyship, being practically ignorant as to the exact nature of the drug and of the effect it would have on a man who was saturated with it, gave his Lordship too small a dose. Nevertheless, he became immediately stupefied."

"Now, how on earth can you know that?"

"Very easily, my lord. If his Lordship had not been rendered at once unconscious, he would--knowing that an attempt had been made to drug him--have sounded the alarm and deputed Mustapha to guard her Ladyship, which was what he always did when he knew that he was not equal to the task."

"Well, that sounds plausible, at all events," acknowledged Cyril.

"As soon as her Ladyship knew that she was no longer watched," continued the detective, "she at once set to work to disguise herself. As we know, she had provided herself with clothes, but I fancy her hair, her most noticeable feature, must have caused her some anxious moments."

"She may have worn a wig," suggested Cyril, hoping that Judson would accept this explanation of the difficulty, in which case he would be able triumphantly to demolish the latter's theory of the girl's ident.i.ty, by stating that he could positively swear that her hair was her own.

"No, my lord. After carefully investigating the matter I have come to the conclusion that she did not. And my reasons are, first, that no hairdresser in Newhaven has lately sold a dark wig to any one, and, secondly, that no parcel arrived, addressed either to her Ladyship or to Prentice, which could have contained such an article. On the other hand, as his Lordship had for years dyed his hair and beard, her Ladyship had only to go into his dressing-room to procure a very simple means of transforming herself."

"But doesn't it take ages to dye hair?" asked Cyril.

"If it is done properly, yes; but the sort of stain his Lordship used can be very quickly applied. I do not believe it took her Ladyship more than half an hour to dye enough of her hair to escape notice, but in all probability she had no time to do it very thoroughly and that which escaped may have turned white. I don't know anything about that."

This was a possibility which had not occurred to Cyril; but still he refused to be convinced.

"Very well, my lord. Let me continue my story: Before her Ladyship had completed her preparations, his Lordship awoke from his stupor."

"What makes you think that?"

"Because, if his Lordship had not tried to prevent her escape, she would have had no reason for killing him. Probably they had a struggle, her hand fell on the pistol, and the deed was done----"

"But what about the ruined picture?"