Quincannon rubbed his gloved hands together in anticipation, watching the shadow’s progress toward the rear of the house. Pause, drift, pause again at the rear end of the porch. Up and over the railing there, briefly silhouetted: the same small figure dressed in dark cap and clothing. Across to the door, and at work there for just a few seconds. The door opened, closed again behind the burglar.
Quincannon spent several seconds readying his dark lantern, just in case. When one of the wind-herded clouds blotted the moon, he stepped out of the shed and hurried laterally to the bole of a tree a dozen rods from the house. He was about to give the signal whistle when a low ululation came from the front yard.
What the devil? He answered in kind, paused and whistled again. In a matter of moments he spied Holmes approaching. The Englishman seemed to have an uncanny sense of direction in the dark; he came in an unerring line straight to where Quincannon stood.
“Why did you whistle?” Quincannon demanded in a fierce whisper. “You couldn’t have seen-”
“Andrew Costain is here.”
“What?”
“Arrived not three minutes ago, alone in a trap.”
“Blasted fool! He couldn’t have chosen a worse time. You didn’t stop him from going inside?”
“He seemed in a great hurry and I saw no purpose in revealing myself. The pannyman is also here, I presume?”
“Already inside through the rear door, not four minutes ago.”
“Inside with us, too, Quincannon!” Holmes said urgently. “We’ve not a moment to lose!”
But it was already too late. In that instant a sharp report came from the house, muffled but unmistakable.
Holmes said, “Pistol shot.”
Quincannon said, “Hell and damn!”
Both men broke into a run.
17
QUINCANNON
Quincannon had no need to order the Englishman to cover the front door; Holmes immediately veered off in that direction. The Navy Colt and the dark lantern were both at the ready when Quincannon reached the rear porch. Somewhere inside, another door slammed. He ran up the steps to the rear entrance, thumbed open the lantern’s bull’s-eye lens, and shouldered his way through.
The thin beam showed him a utility porch, then an opening into a broad kitchen. His foot struck something as he started ahead; the light revealed it to be a wooden wedge, of the sort used to prop open doors. He shut the door and toed the wedge tightly between the bottom and the frame-a safeguard against swift escape that took only a clutch of seconds.
Two or three additional sounds reached his ears as he plunged ahead, none distinguishable or close by. The beam picked out an electric switch on the kitchen wall; he turned it to flood the room with light. Empty. Likewise an adjoining dining room.
His twitching nose picked up the acrid tang of burnt gunpowder. The odor led him into a central hallway, which he flooded with more electric light. Then he eased past two closed doors to a third at the far end, where another hallway intersected this one. The powder smell was strongest there.
Quincannon paused to listen.
Thick, crackling silence.
He moved ahead to where he could see along the intersecting hall, found it deserted, and stepped to the third door to try the latch. Locked from within. There was no key on this side.
He rapped sharply on the panel, called out, “Mr. Costain?”
No response.
“John Quincannon here. It’s safe for you to come out now.”
Again, no response.
More sounds came from the front of the house-a heavy dragging noise, as of a piece of furniture being moved.
“Costain?” Louder this time.
Silence from behind the door.
Movement at the corner of his eye swung Quincannon around and brought the Navy to bear on the intersecting hallway. The Englishman was but a short distance away, approaching as noiselessly as a cat stalking prey.
Quincannon lowered his weapon and extinguished the lantern. “A sign of either man?” he said as Holmes hurried up.
“None.”
“One or both must be on the other side of this door. It’s locked on the inside.”
“If the intruder is elsewhere and attempts to leave by the front door, he’ll first have to move a heavy oak chair. We’ll hear him.”
“I wedged the rear door shut for the same reason.”
Quincannon holstered the Navy, then backed off two steps and flung the full weight of his body against the door panel. This rash action succeeded only in bruising flesh, jarring bone and teeth. Holmes, who was standing with his head cocked in a listening attitude, made no remark. If he had, he would have gotten his ears blistered.
Grumbling to himself, Quincannon again backed off and then drove the flat of his booted foot against the panel above the latch. Two more kicks were necessary to splinter the wood, tear the locking mechanism loose, and send the door wobbling inward.
Only a few scant inches inward, however, before it bound up against something bulky and inert on the floor.
Quincannon shoved hard against the panel until he was able to widen the opening enough to wedge his body through. The room was dark except for faint patches that marked uncurtained windows at the far end. He swept his hand along the wall, located a switch, turned it. The pale burst of electric light revealed what lay on the floor just inside the door-Andrew Costain in a facedown sprawl, both arms outflung, the one visible eye staring blankly.
Dead, and no mistake. Blood stained the back of his cheviot coat, the sleeve of his left forearm. Scorch marks blackened the sleeve as well.
The room, evidently the lawyer’s study, was otherwise empty. Two drawers in a rolltop desk stood open; another had been yanked out and upended on the desktop. Papers littered the surface and the floor around the desk. Also on the floor, between the dead man and the desk, were two other items: a new-looking revolver, and a brassbound valuables case that appeared to have been pried open and was now plainly empty.
Holmes crowded in and swept the room with a keen gaze while Quincannon crossed to examine the windows. Both were of the casement type, with hook latches firmly in place; Dodger Brown hadn’t gotten out that way. Still hiding somewhere in the house, upstairs or down. Or possibly gone by now through another window.
When Quincannon turned, he found himself looking at the bughouse Sherlock down on one knee, hunched over the corpse and peering through a large magnifying glass at the wound in Costain’s back. Under the ridiculous cap, his lean hawk’s face was darkly flushed, his brows warped into two hard black lines. A small smile appeared as he lifted his head. His eyes showed a glitter that was steely, mad, or both.
“Interesting,” he said. “Quite.”
“What is?”
“Andrew Costain was stabbed to death.”
“Stabbed?”
“He was also shot.”
“What!”
“Two separate and distinct wounds,” Holmes said. “The superficial one in his forearm was made by a bullet. The fatal wound was the result of a single thrust with an instrument at least eight inches in length and quite sharp. A stiletto, I should say. The blow was struck by a right-handed person approximately five and a half feet tall, at an upward angle of perhaps fifteen degrees.”
Quincannon gawped at him. “How the devil can you judge that from one quick study?”
The Englishman flashed his enigmatic smile and said nothing.
It took only a few seconds to locate the lead pellet that had passed through Costain’s arm; it was in the cushion of an armchair near the desk. While Holmes commenced studying it through his blasted glass, Quincannon picked up the revolver. It was a Forehand amp; Wadsworth.38 caliber, its nickel-plated finish and wooden grips free of marks of any kind. He sniffed the barrel to confirm that it had been recently fired, then opened the breech for a squint inside. All of the chambers were empty. A few seconds after he returned the weapon to the place where it had lain, Holmes was down on his knees examining it under magnification as he had the bullet.