The dossier of solar pon.., p.17
The Dossier of Solar Pons, page 17
"The guests are retiring for the night, Parker. I fancy we shall soon hear something."
He glanced at his watch as the gruff voice of Colonel d'Arcy sounded in the corridor outside.
"But I predict it will be an hour or more before they settle. I suggest we make ourselves comfortable, and I have taken the precaution of abstracting a whiskey bottle and some glasses from the dining room so that we shall not find the period of waiting too tiresome."
So saying he reseated himself in a wing chair near the fireplace as the door of Colonel d'Arcy's room quietly closed and footsteps began to the away down the corridors of the great house.
8
More than an hour had passed and the lights had long been extinguished. I eased my position in the chair and waved my hand to dispel the heavy waves of blue smoke from Pons's pipe.
"Patience, Parker," he said softly. "I fancy the time is at hand. If he is to strike it must be done soon because he knows we are on the ground."
We had only a bedside lamp burning in the room and all the time we had been here Pons had been alert, listening for every footfall in the corridor. Half a dozen times he had darted to the room door, opening it a crack, surveying the corridor outside and then returning to his seat. There were two wall sconces still burning in the passage outside, leaving long stretches of shadow, and I understood from Pons that it was Colonel d'Arcy's habit to leave lights on all night whenever he had house guests.
Twice had the surly figure of Vickers been seen by Pons passing along the corridor during that time, but Pons had only smiled at my fulminations and had bidden me to be patient. Now there had been a deep silence for some while though my companion assured me that lights still shone beneath some doors, including that of Colonel d'Arcy.
I had risen from my chair and was taking a turn about the room when Pons jumped swiftly to his feet, holding his finger to his lips. At almost the same instant a terrible scream reechoed throughout the house. It was a woman's voice, hoarse and resonant with terror and it seemed to come from next door. Pons had already flung open the door, revolver in hand.
"As quickly as you can, Parker. It is life and death!"
I was swiftly at his heels, revolver drawn, as Pons flung himself at the door of Colonel d'Arcy's room. He hurled it open without ceremony. I shall never forget the sight that greeted us. The room was lit only be one solitary bedside lamp which threw a subdued glow across the apartment.
The bed coverlets had been thrown back but our attention was riveted on the end of the bed where the figure of a beautiful girl crouched, a look of absolute terror on her chalk-white face. The body of Miss Claire Mortimer was rigid with shock and horror. She was clad only in a dressing gown and her dark hair was awry and falling across her face.
"There, Parker, there!" said Solar Pons, his iron grip at my wrist.
I wrenched my glance from the frozen figure of the girl up toward the pillow. At first I could see nothing, then, from the tumbled white sheets, flickered the greenish coils' of a snake. Its tongue darted from its mouth and a sibilant hissing noise filled the chamber. My throat was dry and my hand unsteady, but Pons's voice brought me to myself.
"A green mamba, Parker. The most deadly snake in all Africa! Your shot, I think."
I raised my revolver, hardly conscious of what I was doing. Yet I was myself again, my nerves calmed by Pons's reassuring presence. He moved closer to the girl, inch by inch, his derringer at the ready.
The crack of my pistol, the acrid sting of powder and the flash were followed by a rain of feathers from the bed, and the bullet cut a vicious gouge in the planking of the floor beyond. Splinters flew in the air as the snake writhed for an instant and then was still.
"Well done, Parker!" said Pons, supporting the fainting girl and dragging her from the bed. I ran to his side and helped him move her to a chair.
"See to that thing, Parker. Make sure it is dead."
Perspiration was running down my cheeks, but my nerves were steady now as I cautiously approached the bed.
"My aim was true, Pons," I said, unable to keep the pride from my voice. Footsteps were sounding in the corridor now, and the room seemed full of people. I was only vaguely aware of Bradshaw, Tolliver, Mrs. Mortimer, and the dark visage of Vickers.
Light flooded the room from a ceiling fixture, and at the same instant I managed to cover the remains of the snake with the bedding. Pons shot me a glance of approval. The bearded face of Colonel d'Arcy appeared. He elbowed his way through without ceremony.
"Good God, Mr. Pons! Claire! What on earth has happened?"
"The lady has had a nightmare," said Pons gently. "All is well now. But I think it would be best if she spent the remainder of the night with her mother. And I should keep this room locked if I were you."
The colonel instantly grasped the situation.
"It is nothing, ladies and gentlemen. Would you please return to your rooms. I very much regret the disturbance."
The sobbing girl, soothed by her mother, was led from the room, and the remaining guests, with curious glances, shortly followed. Our host hurried away, leaving Pons and me alone in that suddenly sinister room.
"I don't understand, Pons," I said.
Solar Pons ran a finger along his jaw, which was grimly set
"I am not entirely clear myself, Parker," he said. "But we shall no doubt learn more in a moment"
Indeed, our host returned almost at once and faced us somberly, locking the door behind him.
cannot thank you enough, gentlemen. If anything had happened to Claire... What was it?"
I pulled back the bedding. Colonel d'Arcy surveyed the mamba with sick loathing on his face. He clenched his fists and his features began to suffuse with blood.
"By God, Mr. Pons, we must discover the wicked mind behind this ..."
"It is almost over, Colonel," said Pons quietly. "Though I do not know how Miss Mortimer came to be here."
"She complained of a draft in her room," said our host "Mine was the more comfortable so I gave it to her. The fireplace has more heat, for one thing."
Pons nodded.
"Evidently, he could not have known that," he murmured. "I am afraid Parker and I have made a mess of your floor .. ."
Colonel d'Arcy stared at us in amazement. He came forward and wrung my hand, then turned to Pons.
"I am not an emotional man, gentlemen, but Miss Mortimer means more to me than anything in the world."
"I understand that, Colonel," said Pons, frowning down at the thing that still lay in bloody tatters on the bed. "But it will not stop here. Our man knows we are on him. The shot alone would have warned him. He will act quickly. We must act more quickly still."
Colonel d'Arcy looked bewildered. "I am in your hands, Mr. Pons. What do you want me to do?"
"I think this evil man will strike again before the night is out. This time at you, Colonel. I want you to go to my room or Parker's and spend the night there. No one but the three of us must know of this."
"Anything you say, Mr. Pons. What do you intend to do?"
Pons went to stand by the fireplace, holding out his thin hands to the glowing embers. His lean, feral face had seldom looked more grim.
"First, I would like the disposition of the guests this evening and the exact location of their rooms."
"That is easily done," said the colonel.
Pons listened attentively as he gave us the information. He nodded with satisfaction.
"Ironic is it not, Parker?"
"I do not understand, Pons."
"No matter. You will in due time."
He turned briskly to the colonel.
"We must spend the rest of the night in your room, Colonel. I fancy a revolver or a stick will be adequate protection against the menace of the Ipi idol." He looked at me, his eyes alight with excitement "Come, Parker. The game's afoot!"
9
It was three A.M. The night was dark and silent, though a little light came in through a chink in the window curtains. Fog still swirled heavily at the panes. It was cold in the room and my thoughts were leaden. Pons sat opposite me in a wing chair, his face in shadow. The room door was facing me so that I could keep it under observation; Pons's chair faced a locked door which communicated with an adjoining dressing room, which was now being used as a guest bedroom.
It was over two hours since we had come there and I had begun to doubt whether even Pons's rapier like mind had drawn the right conclusions from the situation. I myself thought it unlikely that the murderous brain threatening the household of The Briars would strike again so soon, but Pons was obviously in possession of a great deal more information which had passed me by.
Three o'clock had chimed from a church clock somewhere faraway, and I found myself drifting off into sleep when I was arrested by a hand on my arm and Solar Pons's voice whispering in my ear.
"Hold yourself in readiness, my dear fellow. I think something is about to happen."
There was a faint glow in the room, I saw as I struggled up in the chair. A light had been switched on in the room communicating with ours. There was a gap beneath the door and the radiance spilled across the carpet so that I could make out Pons's set face and the long, slim cane he held in his right hand. I got up from the chair and would have crossed to the door had not Pons gently pulled me back. He put his fingers to his lips, enjoining absolute silence.
I crouched in the semidarkness, a pulse throbbing in my throat, conscious of the chill of the revolver I had drawn from my pocket and which now rested in my right hand. A dark shadow passed across the other side of the connecting door. Someone was standing there. Then there came a faint scratching noise. A long silence ensued. I felt Pons's hand on my arm again. A shadow was growing as something passed beneath the door. There was a minute, rustling noise which set my nerves on edge. I was suddenly conscious that Pons had left my side and I felt a moment of panic
Then the room was a blaze of light, momentarily dazzling me.
"Look, Parker!"
I followed Pons's outstretched hand and felt my throat constrict with nausea. The giant spider scuttled across the carpet toward us. The obscene, bloated thing was covered with hair, and metallic eyes regarded us with alien intelligence.
"A tarantula, Parker! For God's sake, take care. There, you brute!"
Pons advanced, cutting at the carpet with the cane. With a sibilant, hissing noise the thing scuttled back the way it had come. Pons followed it, aiming blows rapidly, but the creature was too quick. It squeezed beneath the door with incredible speed. A shadow moved across the light and then came an agonizing scream that I can recall even to this day, despite the gap of years. Even Pons's nerve almost broke.
He hesitated and then unlocked the door and threw it wide. The sight that met us was one of bizarre horror. A man in a dressing gown was sprawled against the wall where he had been sitting, his hands clawed in agony. Beside him was a felt-lined box, with air holes, from which the spider had evidently come. The distorted features, the glazed eyes, the disheveled hair made the face almost unrecognizable. Then something stirred in the whitening hair and the tarantula sprang to the floor.
"One side, Parker!"
Pons jumped by me and hacked madly at the thing which scuttled between the paralyzed man's legs. He cut and slashed and stamped with a savagery I would not have suspected in him, until nothing but a quivering pulp remained. I felt sick but forced myself back to normality.
"What a vile brute, Pons," I said. "Did you know this?"
"I suspected something of it, Parker," said my companion quietly, throwing down the cane.
"Your department, I think."
I approached the curiously rigid body and was astonished to recognize for the first time solicitor Chadburn Bradshaw.
"Pons! I am astonished. But you knew?"
Solar Pons nodded.
"Almost from the beginning. The facts were fairly clear- cut. But we have no time for that now. Is he still alive?"
I examined the lawyer carefully.
"We shall need to get him to the hospital immediately, Pons. We had better arouse the household. He has been bitten on the forehead, certainly, but it looks to me as though he has all the symptoms of a stroke."
Solar Pons stood looking down at the recumbent, vacant-eyed figure.
"Poetic justice, Parker," he said softly. "I do not think we need waste too much sympathy."
10
"Mr. Pons, I am immeasurably in your debt. I can never repay you enough."
Colonel d'Arcy's strong, bearded face flashed beaming approval as he looked first at my companion, then at me and finally rested upon Miss Claire Mortimer.
Solar Pons smiled.
"On the contrary, I should thank you, Colonel. I have had one of the most fascinating cases I can recall working on and have tracked down one of the most damnable villains who ever forged a signature."
A cloud passed across our host's face.
"I am afraid Bradshaw's machinations have cost me dear, Mr. Pons. From what the Essex police have been able to tell me in the past week, it looks as though he made away with a third of the estate."
Miss Claire Mortimer squeezed her fiancée's hand across the table.
"Nothing has been lost," she said softy. "I have property of my own and we can sell off some of the acreage."
Colonel d'Arcy flushed.
"Do not think it is the money alone, Claire," he said heatedly. "When I think of the cold-blooded horror of that devil's schemes and the danger to which I exposed you ..."
He broke off for a moment, looked at the girl, and smiled.
"As you say, the money can be made good. I am the last person to wish anyone dead, Mr. Pons, but I am glad Chadburn Bradshaw has gone to his Maker."
Pons turned to me.
"That was a curious aspect, Parker. Died in the ambulance on his way to the hospital, you said?"
I nodded.
"The shock seems to have brought on a stroke, Pons, as much as the bite. It is a most unmedical conclusion to come to, but one might almost have said that fright killed him as much as anything since he might have recovered from the poisonous wound that creature gave him if we could have given him immediate treatment."
"Things are well as they are," said Solar Pons. "I had my suspicions of Bradshaw almost as soon as I arrived here."
"You cannot mean it, Pons."
"I do mean it, Parker. From what Colonel d'Arcy had told me, I knew that money had to be at the bottom of it. It is at the bottom of most crime, and who is better placed to mismanage the funds than the family solicitor. We have already discussed the nonsense of the Ipi idol and the deaths of Silas Renfrew and his nephew."
Solar Pons shifted in his chair and tamped fresh tobacco into his pipe at Miss Mortimer's smiling invitation to smoke.
"It was ludicrous in the extreme to imagine that a West African secret society would be active in Essex many years after Renfrew's return from those parts. I have no doubt old Renfrew had things in his past of which to be ashamed, and Bradshaw might have hoped that the receipt of the idol would hasten his death because of his advanced heart condition. The police finding a document signed by Renfrew making his solicitor the beneficiary of his estate provides adequate motive."
"But could not Bradshaw have forged that, Pons?" I asked.
Pons shook his head.
"That particular document has been authenticated and provided Bradshaw with the perfect way out. I submit that old Renfrew's condition was such that he did not always know what he was signing. But first Bradshaw had to strike at anyone who came between him and the fortune. He was successful in both the case of Renfrew and the nephew. We cannot know what means he used to kill young Adrian Renfrew except that it was most likely a poisonous tropical insect He could have obtained such a specimen from a zoological garden or from one of the more esoteric London animal supply shops."
Pons puffed at his pipe, the flames of the burning tobacco making little stipples of light on his strong, ascetic face.
"So much is surmise. Now as to fact It must have been a considerable shock to him when the old man made you the sole beneficiary, Colonel, after the death of his SON Bradshaw had already made large inroads into the estate money and was desperate for funds. He resolved to strike at you, and he found a ready-made instrument at hand in another distant relative, Tolliver, who quite by chance had come to live some miles off.
"He was also a client of Bradshaw's, which made the whole thing much easier. More to the point, he kept strange pets, among whom were such dangerous specimens as tarantulas and snakes. The police have discovered a heated room at Bradshaw's house, where the specimens he stole from Tolliver were kept at the right temperature until needed. A padded basket kept the insect or reptile warm while being transferred even in this bitter January weather.
"Since Bradshaw was a frequent visitor at both Tolliver's house and your own home, Colonel, he was able to lay his plans with care. Unfortunately for him you escaped his first serious attempt and worse still, were on the alert He had to move quickly, for your pending marriage to Miss Mortimer would put the fortune even farther beyond his reach."
"But how did you come to suspect him, Pons?" I said.
Solar Pons put his pipe down on the table in front of him and tented his fingers.
"Elementary, my dear Parker. And by the same simple process which made you suspect Vickers of deep-dyed villainy."
I flushed, aware of Colonel d'Arcy's amused glance. "How was I to know that he was devoted to the colonel's service and watched over him day and night, Pons? Even to the extent of testing his colonel's liquor supply for poison."
"You must admit, Parker, that I drew your attention to Vickers's behavior, but unfortunately you drew the wrong conclusions from it. A man who has been in the service of a person like Colonel d'Arcy for so many years is surely to be trusted. I put more credence in the colonel's character reading than in village gossip. Vickers's manner was unfortunate, I agree, but his spying was in a good cause. To protect his master."
