Death on a Pale Horse - By Donald Thomas Page 0,67
first opportunity, sure that it could not be the cause of Andreis Reuter’s death. On the evidence available, the tribunal was persuaded otherwise. Worse still, she had made a foolish attempt to incriminate a British officer of honourable rank and name who was not present to defend himself. As it happened, Moran was less concerned with honour and rank than with the discovery that Andreis Reuter was smarter than he had supposed: the account which held their working capital had been largely drawn upon by the young man who had felt the first doubts about his elder partner as a prize among men.
For Seraphina there could be no hope. Her local judges presumed that she had acted in revenge against a man who had seduced her. An example must be made of such domestic “petit treason,” as the law called it. Crimes and executions were sufficiently commonplace in these primitive settlements not to cause much comment. Seraphina was convicted and sentenced to be hanged. Being pregnant, however, she was respited until the child should be born, so that she need not be hanged until after its birth.
Major Putney-Wilson told his tale and looked at the horror on all our faces. It was not the facts which convinced us, so much as the manner in which he gave his account.
“Be assured, gentlemen, Colonel Moran does not hate the young woman. He might not even desire her death in other circumstances. However, it became necessary to his scheme that she should die—that scheme could not work otherwise. Therefore it must be so. There is no anger in him on this occasion—just a cold and bitter self-interest.”
For the only time in my acquaintanceship with him, I saw Holmes pause in asking a question because he feared the answer.
“And has she died at their hands?”
“No, sir. Not yet.”
“Then she must not and shall not! Brother Mycroft shall answer for that.”
10
All that remained was to elicit from Major Putney-Wilson the evidence of the Prince Imperial’s murder. But Holmes looked at me with a hard and direct stare. In other words, as I had decided for myself, in the presence of Lestrade any such explanation must be postponed, nor did the major offer it. Better still, in the case of Joshua Sellon, the inspector seemed easily convinced of Putney-Wilson’s innocence. It would require only proof of the witness’s address and personal details before dismissing him from the case. All the same, Lestrade could not resist a brief reprimand.
“Let this be a lesson to you, sir, how you go about to deceive. Good-hearted and brave you may be. All the same, certain things are best left to those of us whose business is to deal with the world’s wickedness.”
Before Lestrade could develop this homily any further, Sir Melville Macnaghten, Commissioner of the Detective Division at Scotland Yard, arrived at Carlyle Mansions in a plain black carriage, a rolled umbrella in his hand. He entered the room upright as a guardsman. Indeed, he had far more the air of a brigadier than of a police commissioner. Neither Holmes nor I had ever met him before and, in any case, he was the last person to confide in a pair of private detectives.
Two uniformed constables and a sergeant had accompanied Sir Melville to attend to the evidence. First the body must be moved. In a moment more, Captain Joshua Sellon lay on his back, staring up open-eyed from the black leather day-bed with a stretcher underneath him. Having read the police surgeon’s report, the Westminster coroner had now released the body to the nearby pathology department of St. Thomas’s Hospital. Sir Melville’s carriage had been accompanied by a hearse from the public mortuary.
While the commissioner and his officers made a survey of the rooms, Holmes addressed our Scotland Yard friend for Sir Melville’s benefit.
“We are grateful to you, Mr. Lestrade, for your hospitality, but I doubt that anything further will be found here. We must look elsewhere.”
As he addressed Lestrade, he still looked purposefully at Major Putney-Wilson. Direct conversation with our client was impossible just then, and that evening he was to be dismissed from the case. Before he left, in the company of Sergeant Haskins, he drew from his pocket a visiting card. It bore upon it the legend of the Ravenswood Hotel in Southampton Row.
“Should you wish to speak to me again, Mr. Holmes, you will find me here. I will give you the number of my room as well.”