The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet | Page 8

impatiently, "keep your second-hand
epigrams for the Record. What we want are facts."
Godfrey flushed a little at the words and laid down the watch.

"There is one fact which you have apparently overlooked," he said
quietly, "but it proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that this fellow
didn't drift in here by accident. He came here of intention, and the
intention wasn't to kill himself, either."
"How do you know that?" demanded Goldberger, incredulously.
Godfrey picked up the purse, opened it, and took out one of the cards.
"By this," he said, and held it up. "You have already seen what is
written on the back of it--Mr. Vantine's name and the number of this
house. That proves, doesn't it, that this fellow came to New York
expressly to see Mr. Vantine?"
"Perhaps you think Mr. Vantine killed him," suggested Goldberger,
sarcastically.
"No," said Godfrey; "he didn't have time. You understand, Mr.
Vantine," he added, smiling at that gentleman, who was listening to all
this with perplexed countenance, "we are simply talking now about
possibilities. You couldn't possibly have killed this fellow because
Lester has testified that he was with you constantly from the moment
this man entered the house until his body was found, with the exception
of the few seconds which elapsed between the time you entered this
room and the time he joined you here, summoned by your cry. So you
are out of the running."
"Thanks," said Vantine, drily.
"I suppose, then, you think it was Parks," said Goldberger.
"It may quite possibly have been Parks," agreed Godfrey, gravely.
"Nonsense!" broke in Vantine, impatiently. "Parks is as straight as a
string--he's been with me for eight years."
"Of course it's nonsense," assented Goldberger. "It's nonsense to say
that he was killed by anybody. He killed himself. We'll learn the cause

when we identify him--jealousy maybe, or maybe just hard luck --he
doesn't look affluent."
"I'll cable to Paris," said Simmonds. "If he belongs there, we'll soon
find out who he is."
"You'd better call an ambulance and have him taken to the morgue,"
went on Goldberger. "Somebody may identify him there. There'll be a
crowd to-morrow, for, of course, the papers will be full of this affair--"
"The _Record_, at least, will have a very full account," Godfrey
assured him.
"And I'll call the inquest for the day after," Goldberger continued. "I'll
send my physician down to make a post-mortem right away. If there's
any poison in this fellow's stomach, we'll find it."
Godfrey did not speak; but I knew what was in his mind. He was
thinking that, if such poison existed, the vessel which had contained it
had not yet been found. The same thought, no doubt, occurred to
Simmonds, for, after ordering the policeman in the hall to call the
ambulance, he returned and began a careful search of the room, using
his electric torch to illumine every shadowed corner. Godfrey devoted
himself to a similar search; but both were without result. Then Godfrey
made a minute inspection of the injured hand, while Goldberger looked
on with ill-concealed impatience; and finally he moved toward the
door.
"I think I'll be going," he said. "But I'm interested in what your
physician will find, Mr. Coroner."
"He'll find poison, all right," asserted Goldberger, with decision.
"Perhaps he will," admitted Godfrey. "Strange things happen in this
world. Will you be at home to-night, Lester?"
"Yes, I expect to be," I answered.

"You're still at the Marathon?"
"Yes," I said; "suite fourteen."
"Perhaps I'll drop around to see you," he said, and a moment later we
heard the door close behind him as Parks let him out.
"Godfrey's a good man," said Goldberger, "but he's too romantic. He
looks for a mystery in every crime, whereas most crimes are merely
plain, downright brutalities. Take this case. Here's a man kills himself,
and Godfrey wants us to believe that death resulted from a scratch on
the hand. Why, there's no poison on earth would kill a man as quick as
that--for he must have dropped dead before he could get out of the
room to summon help. If it was prussic acid, he swallowed it.
Remember, he wasn't in this room more than fifteen or twenty minutes,
and he was quite dead when Mr. Vantine found him. Men don't die as
easily as all that--not from a scratch on the hand. They don't die easily
at all. It's astonishing how much it takes to kill a man --how the spirit,
or whatever you choose to call it, clings to life."
"How do you explain the address on the card, Mr. Goldberger?" I
asked.
"My theory is that this fellow really had some business with Mr.
Vantine; probably he wanted to borrow some money, or ask for help;
and then,