The Riddle of the Purple Emperor

It was like a thunderbolt in the quiet room. Cleek snatched up his hat and ran over to where Mr. Narkom stood.

"You've got to close this inquiry before it goes any further," he whispered, hurriedly. "We've got to make more investigations before that nigger's assertion is allowed to carry any weight with the evidence. We've got to close this inquiry at once, my friend!"

Mr. Narkom nodded, then crossed over to the Coroner and spoke to him in a low, hurried voice.

That gentleman seemed to acquiesce in whatever statement the Superintendent made, and shortly afterward declared the case postponed.

Slowly the people began to file out of the room in twos and threes, but even as they did so came the sound of a terrible moaning, the sound that Cleek had heard so many times before, but from whence it issued, was impossible to tell. Long drawn out and wailing as a dog's death-howl, it floated over the room, striking fear into every heart by its very ghastliness. What was it? What could it be?

Horrified, the listeners looked at one another in blank dismay. Even Mr. Narkom's usually ruddy countenance had undergone a change as the sound came to his ears. Supernatural or not it acted like a charm, for in another minute the room was cleared and Cleek, Mr. Narkom and the Coroner stood alone.

"Strange thing, isn't it?" said that gentleman, as he fetched his hat and moved over toward the door in the act of following upon the heels of his jury-men.

Mr. Narkom nodded.

"Very. Coming along, Headland?"

"No, not just for a moment or two. I want to look round for myself if you don't mind. Just an odd fancy, don't you know! But don't wait for me, Mr. Narkom. I'll see you later on."

Even as they left, once again there sounded that uncanny wail, seeming to come from the very depths of the earth. Cleek felt that he was alone in a haunted house.

CHAPTER XX

A TWISTED CLUE

Before another quarter of an hour had passed Cleek was the sole inmate of Cheyne Court. He sat with shoulders hunched up and head thrust forward, seeking to pierce the cloud that hung over the heads of the two young people to both of whom he had been undeniably attracted.

He was as anxious to restore Lady Margaret to the arms of her lover as Sir Edgar himself and it was only because he felt that the discovery of the Purple Emperor would be bound up in some inexplicable manner with the girl herself that he had striven to elucidate the puzzle.

He had contrived to get the inquest postponed for a week, for he felt instinctively that had the case been left to take its course, a verdict against Sir Edgar Brenton of wilful murder would have been the result. Like a flash had come back to him the words of Ailsa Lorne about Sir Edgar's purchase of prussic acid to poison an old dog. And after all, it had never been used; at least not for that purpose! Had it then been only a blind? Had the desperate lover conceived the plot to murder the woman whom he believed to stand in the way of his marriage with Lady Margaret? Impossible! Yet love is a strange madness. And what had he been doing with the revolver in his pocket on that first night? Where, too, did Miss Jennifer and her idiot of a brother come into the puzzle, and Lady Brenton? Cleek pinched up his chin and stood a moment looking out of the window across the stretch of straggling, unkempt lawn that lay beyond it. He was seated in the wide window seat of the ballroom that had been the scene of the dual tragedy. All at once his trained ears caught the sound of a footfall on the path outside the window. Not a man's foot, either! What woman was it that would remain behind in this place of ill omen? Noiselessly he raised his head and looked out of the window, but he was unable to see any one. He listened intently, then, of a sudden, twitched up his head with a jerk, and crouched forward.

For the woman's footfalls had ceased, brought to a stop by others heavier, yet light in themselves, padding swiftly along the path. No sooner had they got within hailing distance of the woman than the eager, frightened voice of Lady Brenton sounded across the silence of the deserted place.

"Mr. Dall," said that enlightening voice, with the catch of a half-sob in it. "Thank Heaven you have not gone! This is the only place where we can meet with safety. Why – oh, why did you mention about those lace scarves? You don't know how they will gossip now, all the narrow-minded, evil-thinking folk in the neighbourhood. Why did you want to see me here like this? Tell me quickly, for I am frightened to death of this place."

"Are you?" the Hindoo's voice was smooth, almost sneering. "My dear lady, why be more frightened by day than by night? You were not frightened when you fluttered in by that window barely a month ago. Did you kill the old lady? I wonder – why were you not honest with me?"

"Kill? Kill whom, Mr. Dall? My God, what are you talking about?"

The sneer in the Hindoo's voice was less veiled than ever.

"Why, the real Miss Cheyne, of course. Why didn't you leave that to me? I should have done it far better, believe me."

Cleek caught the sound of a strangled breath and his pulses drummed.

"Good Heavens, man!" came Lady Brenton's voice again, "are you mad to accuse me of such a thing? Why should I murder her, poor creature? And how?"

Came a cackle of harsh laughter like a shot on a tin roof.

"Well acted, my lady, but it won't work. Don't forget, I saw you in that very room, when, according to our old friend, Constable Roberts, Miss Cheyne was dead. Well, who killed her, I say? You did not know I saw you but I caught sight of your golden scarf as you bent over the body – "

Cleek sucked in his breath hard and a brighter sparkle shone in his half-shut eyes. So Lady Brenton was there, was she? If this were true, then Sir Edgar knew more than he professed, and he was shielding someone other than Lady Margaret – and that someone was his own mother!

Lady Brenton had remained perfectly still, as though dumbfounded at the charge made against her. Either that was it, or she was striving how best to free herself from the power of this man who held her guilty secret.

Then she spoke suddenly.

"You really mean that you think I killed that poor defenceless old woman?"

Cleek could fairly see the cynical smile that crept over the man's features, for the tones of his voice betrayed it.

"Dear lady," he answered, "it is what anybody would say if they had seen you, as I saw you, emerge from that room with a gold lace scarf round your face. I watched you cross that lawn and vanish in the darkness."

"That is not the truth," she flung back with a sudden awakening from the kind of stupor which up till now had overcome her. "I never wore that gold scarf for the simple reason I did not possess one at that time. I was never near Cheyne Court. If you say you saw me, you are saying what is absolutely untrue. And there is another thing, since you are so sure that I was responsible for that horrible deed, what were you doing at Cheyne Court that night at all?"

Gunga Dall's answer to Lady Brenton's question was given so quickly, even as Cleek himself echoed the thought in his own mind, that he might well have been forgiven in believing that it had been prepared beforehand.

"I followed you, my dear lady – "

"Followed me?" she repeated. "From where, pray? Oh, this is intolerable!"

"I saw you as I turned into the lane and I rather wondered, as was only natural, what you were doing at that unearthly hour and place."

"So I should think," responded Lady Brenton with a little sniff of disdain; "the same might apply to you, Mr. Dall."

That gentleman laughed softly.

"I came to see if I could speak to Lady Margaret Cheyne," he replied, "you must remember I had met her previously in Paris."

"I do remember, only too plainly, and how you gave me no peace till I had introduced you, but that is no reason why you should call upon her at night, after she had had a long journey. Besides, how did you know she was expected home? I hardly knew myself till quite late and by a chance word overheard from Miss Cheyne herself in the post office. How did you come to hear of it?"

That very idea was already formulating itself in Cleek's own mind at the same time. How, indeed? But Gunga Dall was evidently prepared for the question.

"In the same way as yourself, my dear lady," he returned, glibly, "the young lady at the office was busy talking about Lady Margaret's return and I made up my mind then to pay her a visit, but I had not intended to call at that hour. I just took a little walk and my steps led me by accident – or what you English people call Providence – past the house. Then I saw you, and you beckoned to me, so naturally I followed in your wake. I saw you enter the house, the front door was open, and I waited and waited, and at last out of curiosity I, too, went through the door, and closed it behind me.

"I tell you when I stood in that ballroom, and lit a match for a cigarette and saw that old woman dead, and you bending over her – "

"It is a lie!" threw in Lady Brenton, vehemently. "I was never there! Never!"

"But you were!" he repeated, emphatically. "What is the use of denying what we both know? At sight of you there I was staggered – is not that your word? – and turning on my heel I ran right out of the house. Then I remembered you were still in the place, and to try and help you, dear lady, I went back, and peered through that window. I could not have gone into it – no, not for a thousand rupees! The horror of it all was so strong! But fortunately you were gone, and so I have bided my time to tell you what I want, both from you and your interesting son Edgar."

All this time Lady Brenton had remained as if stupefied by this web that was being woven round her, but the sound of her beloved son's name aroused her.

"Edgar!" she cried in a high, shrill voice. "What has he got to do with it?"

"Everything, dear lady," was the smooth reply, "for when I came out of the grounds I walked nearly up against him, and he was in such a state of agitation that he never even noticed me till I spoke to him!"

"Edgar?" echoed Lady Brenton again, a note of fear as well as surprise in her voice. "Edgar in the grounds of Cheyne Court on that night?" and Cleek could have blessed her for the note of doubt which her tone held, for this was assuredly one of the points which he himself desired to have explained satisfactorily. "But what was Edgar doing at such an hour and in such a place? Why, he was at a public dinner, now I remember, so it is impossible!"