“He’s in his study,” the maid directed.
On stepping down into the anteroom, Marc was surprised to discover that Lardner Bostwick was not there to greet them. “What happened to the lieutenant?” Marc said.
Shad muttered, “Gone off somewheres.” And good riddance was the clear implication. “I been made the zookeeper,” he grumbled, rubbing his lopsided nose self-consciously.
“Do you propose to beat back the escaping prisoner with your clothes brush?” Marc said, with a wink at Billy, who had grown strangely quiet and tense.
Shad found no humour in this quip. “When the visitors come this mornin’, I called one of them Highlanders down here to help me open and close the door.”
Marc showed Billy where to sign in. As he scrawled his own signature, Marc noticed the two morning visitors: Boynton Tierney, the Orange alderman, and a Mrs. Jones.
“I see Mr. Tierney has been here again,” Marc said to Shad, who was peering up the stairs. “It’s all right, that’s a police constable up there, and his chief is in your master’s study. You may open the door.”
Shad actually smiled, weakly. “Mr. Tierney’s been here four times that I know of,” he said, extracting a large key from his pocket. “He’s fond of arguin’, he is.”
“He and Mr. Coltrane have heated discussions, do they?”
“Go on fer an hour or more, they do.”
“Who was this Mrs. Jones who came in after eleven?”
Shad looked confused for a moment, then said with elaborate casualness, “Oh, her. Some lady from Streetsville, I think, who brung him a book or somethin’. She didn’t stay long.” He essayed a smile as he added, “And I didn’t feel the need to call in one of them Highlanders on the porch.”
“A young lady?”
“Why’re you so interested?” Shad said with sudden alertness.
“I’m trying to get to understand Mr. Coltrane, that’s all.”
“Why bother? He’ll be stone cold in a month.”
Billy was to go in alone. Marc would sit in the anteroom and wait, in case there should be any trouble. Shad reluctantly agreed to leave the chamber door slightly ajar. Even more reluctantly he was persuaded to go upstairs and tend to his butlering until needed again.
“You’re sure you’re all right with this?” Marc said to Billy when they were alone.
Billy was pale, but there was a willed determination in his eye, the kind the sergeant had no doubt called upon more than once down in Essex. “I’ve got to do this,” he said. “For Dolly.”
Billy then vanished behind the big, iron-reinforced door. Marc heard Coltrane’s hearty “Hello!” and little else. The two men, so recently adversaries in war and a life-threatening duel, were apparently sitting across from each other and having a civil conversation. Billy carried with him an affidavit drawn up by Robert and Magistrate Thorpe, the document Coltrane would sign if all went as planned. The murmur of their voices was a satisfying music in Marc’s ears. He felt justifiably proud of what had been achieved in the past twenty-four hours. He was happy for Billy and, for himself, was now more certain than ever that he had at last chosen the right profession.
Suddenly Coltrane’s voice rose in anger, then Billy’s in heated response. Marc moved towards the door, but just as he was about to throw it open, the voices died down. Seconds later came a roaring chortle from Coltrane. Marc sat again. Ten minutes passed. Marc yawned.
A strangled cry from the cell brought Marc upright in an instant. It was a sustained, gurgling half scream, as if a man were being inexpertly throttled. Before Marc could reach the door, it was flung open and Billy, whey-faced, shouted at him, “For God’s sake, get a doctor!”
Marc grabbed Billy by the shoulders. “What’s going on?”
“Coltrane’s havin’ a fit!”
Marc let Billy go and dashed into the prisoner’s room. Coltrane had staggered up and away from his desk and was now crouched on the floor, teetering upon one knee. Both hands tore at his throat and face as if trying to rip them off his body. His hawk’s features were contorted in pain, his eyes bulged grotesquely, blood gushed from both nostrils, and a snarling gargle shot out of his twisted lips. By the time Marc reached him, he had toppled onto the carpet. A final breath, like a sigh of surrender, eased into the waiting air.
Caleb Coltrane was dead.
Much of what happened next remained a blur for Marc until he was compelled later on to recall and sort out the precise coherence of events. When he raced back into the anteroom-there was nothing he could do for Coltrane-it was empty. He could hear Billy’s voice, strident and terrified, shouting and pleading above him. Footsteps came pounding down the hall. Women’s voices mingled with men’s, none of the words distinguishable. The front door was opened and slammed shut. Finally Wilfrid Sturges appeared on the stairs, meeting Marc on his way up.
“What’s happened?” he said to Marc.
“Coltrane’s dead.”
“Jesus, did the kid shoot ’im?”
“No. He’s had some kind of seizure, apoplexy, I’d guess. I don’t see how Billy had anything to do with it.”
“Christ, man, I hope not. All hell’s going to break loose when Sir George gets wind of this.”
“Well, you’d better come and have a look.”
“Right. I’ve got Cobb up there holdin’ off the colonel and his women. Billy’s given ’em quite a fright.”
The two men reentered the cell. Sturges knelt beside the rapidly cooling body. He whistled through his teeth. “This wasn’t no conniption fit,” he said.
“Shouldn’t we get Doc Withers to tell us that?”
“Oh, we’ll do that all right. But it’s pretty obvious. I seen two or three of these back in London when I was on the force there.”
“Two or three of what?”
“Poisonings. Strychnine, by the look of it. It boils a man’s throat out. The ghastliest way to die I can think of. You wouldn’t wish it on a rat.”
While his heart beat wildly, Marc forced himself to remain calm enough to think. If it was strychnine, then Coltrane had been murdered. Moreover, he had been murdered in the sole presence of a man who had engaged him in a duel and subsequently threatened his life before witnesses. But how could it have been done?
“We’ve gotta keep everybody outta here,” Sturges said, “till the doctor can be fetched. You stay with the body, Marc, while I go up to tell the Stanhopes.”
“I won’t touch anything,” Marc said. “But we have to find out how the man was induced to pour strychnine down his own throat.”
“Well, there are easier ways to kill yerself.”
Sturges went back into the anteroom, and Marc heard him call up the stairwell, “Constable Cobb’s just doin’ his job. Now get back, all of ya!”
Next came a woman’s piercing shriek. Patricia’s, no doubt, on her hearing the news.
Marc cast about in search of the source of the poison. It didn’t take him long to find it. Evident upon Coltrane’s shrunken left hand, now seized about his throat, was a dusting of snuff. Marc recalled that Coltrane snorted it like a horse with the heaves. He went over to the desk. Two snuff boxes of ornate silver and some pedigree sat next to the leather-bound Bible where they had been yesterday. One of them was wide open. Marc leaned over and very cautiously gave its contents a sniff. No odour beyond that of the ground tobacco registered. He held the box up so that the window light illuminated its contents. He couldn’t be sure, of course, but the snuff there seemed to be mixed with a number of paler, more sinister-looking grains, like pollen. If Coltrane had been paying close attention, he would have noticed, or even felt, the alien presence. But he was a man of supreme confidence and histrionic gesture. It was during this thought that Marc spotted Dolly’s kerchief on the desk. Beside it lay the magistrate’s document. It was signed. The major had done one good deed before taking a snort of snuff to celebrate his magnanimity.