Part 6

“Is she”... he muttered; “is she”...

“God's mercy, Leroux!” whispered Mr. Exel--“what does this mean?”

“The woman is dead,” said Dr. Cumberly.

In common with all medical men, Dr. Cumberly was a physiognomist; he was a great physician and a proportionately great physiognomist. Therefore, when he looked into Henry Leroux's eyes, he saw there, and recognized, horror and consternation. With no further evidence than that furnished by his own powers of perception, he knew that the mystery of this woman's death was as inexplicable to Henry Leroux as it was inexplicable to himself.

He was a masterful man, with the gray eyes of a diplomat, and he knew Leroux as did few men. He laid both hands upon the novelist's shoulders.

“Brace up, old chap!” he said; “you will want all your wits about you.”

“I left her,” began Leroux, hesitatingly--“I left”...

“We know all about where you left her, Leroux,” interrupted Cumberly; “but what we want to get at is this: what occurred between the time you left her, and the time of our return?”

Exel, who had walked across to the table, and with a horror-stricken face was gingerly examining the victim, now exclaimed:--

“Why! Leroux! she is--she is... UNDRESSED!”

Leroux clutched at his dishevelled hair with both hands.

“My dear Exel!” he cried--“my dear, good man! Why do you use that tone? You say 'she is undressed!' as though I were responsible for the poor soul's condition!”

“On the contrary, Leroux!” retorted Exel, standing very upright, and staring through his monocle; “on the contrary, YOU misconstrue ME! I did not intend to imply--to insinuate--”

“My dear Exel!” broke in Dr. Cumberly--“Leroux is perfectly well aware that you intended nothing unkindly. But the poor chap, quite naturally, is distraught at the moment. You MUST understand that, man!”

“I understand; and I am sorry,” said Exel, casting a sidelong glance at the body. “Of course, it is a delicate subject. No doubt Leroux can explain.”...

“Damn your explanation!” shrieked Leroux hysterically. “I CANNOT explain! If I could explain, I”...

“Leroux!” said Cumberly, placing his arm paternally about the shaking man--“you are such a nervous subject. DO make an effort, old fellow. Pull yourself together. Exel does not know the circumstances--”

“I am curious to learn them,” said the M. P. icily.

Leroux was about to launch some angry retort, but Cumberly forced him into the chesterfield, and crossing to a bureau, poured out a stiff peg of brandy from a decanter which stood there. Leroux sank upon the chesterfield, rubbing his fingers up and down his palms with a curious nervous movement and glancing at the dead woman, and at Exel, alternately, in a mechanical, regular fashion, pathetic to behold.

Mr. Exel, tapping his boot with the head of his inverted cane, was staring fixedly at the doctor.

“Here you are, Leroux,” said Cumberly; “drink this up, and let us arrange our facts in decent order before we--”

“Phone for the police?” concluded Exel, his gaze upon the last speaker.

Leroux drank the brandy at a gulp and put down the glass upon a little persian coffee table with a hand which he had somehow contrived to steady.

“You are keen on the official forms, Exel?” he said, with a wry smile. “Please accept my apology for my recent--er--outburst, but picture this thing happening in your place!”

“I cannot,” declared Exel, bluntly.

“You lack imagination,” said Cumberly. “Take a whisky and soda, and help me to search the flat.”

“Search the flat!”

The physician raised a forefinger, forensically.