The Mystery of 31 New Inn by R. Austin Freeman (best fiction novels txt) π
It struck me as a little odd that, considering his anxiety and theapparent urgency of the case, Mr. Weiss should not have been waiting toreceive me. And when several minutes elapsed without his appearing, theoddness of the circumstance impressed me still more. Having no desire,after the journey in the carriage, to sit down, I whiled away the timeby an inspection of the room. And a very curious room it was; bare,dirty, neglected and, apparently, unused. A faded carpet had been flunguntidily on the floor. A small, shabby table stood in the middle of theroom; and beyond this, three horsehair-covered chairs and a chest ofdrawers formed the entire set of furniture. No pictures hung on themouldy walls, no curtains covered the shuttered windows, and the darkdrapery of cobwebs that hung from the ceiling to commemorate
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"Well, of course, we raced down the stairs like acrobats, but by the time we got to the bottom the cab was off with a fine start. We ran out into Victoria Street, and there we could see it half-way down the street and going like a chariot race. We managed to pick up another hansom and told the cabby to keep the other one in sight, and away we went like the very deuce; along Victoria Street and Broad Sanctuary, across Parliament Square, over Westminster Bridge and along York Road; we kept the other beggar in sight, but we couldn't gain an inch on him. Then we turned into Waterloo Station, and, as we were driving up the slope we met another hansom coming down; and when the cabby kissed his hand and smiled at us, we guessed that he was the sportsman we had been following.
"But there was no time to ask questions. It is an awkward station with a lot of different exits, and it looked a good deal as if our quarry had got away. However, I took a chance. I remembered that the Southampton express was due to start about this time, and I took a short cut across the lines and made for the platform that it starts from. Just as Badger and I got to the end, about thirty yards from the rear of the train, we saw a man and a woman running in front of us. Then the guard blew his whistle and the train began to move. The man and the woman managed to scramble into one of the rear compartments and Badger and I raced up the platform like mad. A porter tried to head us off, but Badger capsized him and we both sprinted harder than ever, and just hopped on the foot-board of the guard's van as the train began to get up speed. The guard couldn't risk putting us off, so he had to let us into his van, which suited us exactly, as we could watch the train on both sides from the look-out. And we did watch, I can tell you; for our friend in front had seen us. His head was out of the window as we climbed on to the foot-board.
"However, nothing happened until we stopped at Southampton West. There, I need not say, we lost no time in hopping out, for we naturally expected our friends to make a rush for the exit. But they didn't. Badger watched the platform, and I kept a look-out to see that they didn't slip away across the line from the off-side. But still there was no sign of them. Then I walked up the train to the compartment which I had seen them enter. And there they were, apparently fast asleep in the corner by the off-side window, the man leaning back with his mouth open and the woman resting against him with her head on his shoulder. She gave me quite a turn when I went in to look at them, for she had her eyes half-closed and seemed to be looking round at me with a most horrible expression; but I found afterwards that the peculiar appearance of looking round was due to the cast in her eye."
"They were dead, I suppose?" said Thorndyke.
"Yes, sir. Stone dead; and I found these on the floor of the carriage."
He held up two tiny yellow glass tubes, each labelled "Hypodermic tabloids. Aconitine Nitrate gr. 1/640."
"Ha!" exclaimed Thorndyke, "this fellow was well up in alkaloidal poisons, it seems; and they appear to have gone about prepared for emergencies. These tubes each contained twenty tabloids, a thirty-second of a grain altogether, so we may assume that about twelve times the medicinal dose was swallowed. Death must have occurred in a few minutes, and a merciful death too."
"A more merciful death than they deserved," exclaimed Stephen, "when one thinks of the misery and suffering that they inflicted on poor old uncle Jeffrey. I would sooner have had them hanged."
"It's better as it is, sir," said Miller. "There is no need, now, to raise any questions in detail at the inquest. The publicity of a trial for murder would have been very unpleasant for you. I wish Dr. Jervis had given the tip to me instead of to that confounded, over-cautiousβbut there, I mustn't run down my brother officers: and it's easy to be wise after the event.
"Good night, gentlemen. I suppose this accident disposes of your business as far as the will is concerned?"
"I suppose it does," agreed Mr. Winwood. "But I shall enter a caveat, all the same."
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