"Far from it. The only evidence against him, just as it has been all along, is circ.u.mstantial. They have yet to prove anything, and I don't believe they can. Cheer up! I'll get him off yet!"

"Are you sure, Colonel?" and her eyes were bright with unshed tears.

"Sure? Why, of course I am!"

And yet the colonel had to force himself a bit to make that sound natural. Perhaps it was because he had said it so often and was tired.

Or did it have anything to do with the strange wires that led to the work table of James Darcy?

CHAPTER X

THE DEATH WATCH

Doctor Warren, the county physician, stopping in at police headquarters, as he often did on returning from his round of private visits, to see if there were any official calls for him, encountered Detective Carroll.

"h.e.l.lo, Doc!" was the genial greeting, for Doctor Warren was more than a physician. He was a politician, and politics and the police were no more divorced in Colchester than elsewhere. "Seen that colonel guy to-day?" asked Carroll.

"The colonel guy?" The doctor's voice showed his puzzlement.

"Yes, the chap that's working with Kenneth on the Darcy case."

"Seen him? No, I haven't."

"He was here looking for you a little while ago. Seemed quite anxious about meeting you. Here he is now. Say, if he lets out anything we can use against Darcy--you know, legitimate stuff--pa.s.s it on to me and Thong, will you? You know we've got to go on the stand, and, between you and me, our case ain't any too strong."

"That's right. I'll let you know what I hear," and the two ended their half-whispered talk as Colonel Ashley entered police headquarters.

It was his third visit to headquarters that day in search of Doctor Warren, and he would state the object of his seeking to none other.

Now he smiled at the man he had been looking for. They had met previously.

"Ah, good afternoon, Doctor Warren. I've been looking for you," was the colonel's greeting. "If you're not busy, sir, I'd like just a few minutes of your time--officially, of course."

"Always ready for duty, Colonel. I guess you military men know that we doctors are in a sort of cla.s.s with yourselves when it comes to that."

"You're right. Now I won't be much more than a minute, and what I want to ask you, I can propound right here as well as anywhere. You know I'm working to save Darcy?"

"So I've heard."

"Well, you examined Mrs. Darcy soon after she was found dead. You may, or you may not, have formed an opinion as to _who_ killed her, but I judge you are positive as to _how_ she was killed--I mean the nature of the wound."

"There were two wounds you know--a fracture of the skull just back of the right ear, and a stab wound in the left side which punctured the heart. Either would have caused death."

"Can you tell which killed her?"

"I should say the stab wound, but I can not be positive. You understand, Colonel, that I am to go on the stand for the prosecution and tell all I know about this case."

"Oh, yes, I realize that, of course. You are practically a witness against Darcy. And I don't, for one moment, wish you to think that I am trying to get advance information to use in his favor. This is simply in the matter of justice, the ends of which I know you wish to serve, as I do myself. So if I ask anything improper please stop me.

But since you will testify about these wounds, and since you have already pretty well described them to the newspaper reporters, it can do no harm to repeat the details to me."

"None in the least, Colonel."

"Then you feel sure the stab wound killed her?"

"Reasonably so. Of course, as I said, either blow could have caused death, but blows on the head, even when the skull is badly fractured, as in this case, do not invariably cause death instantly. In fact the victim usually lingers for several hours in an unconscious state. Not so, however, in the case of a stab wound in or near the heart. That is almost always fatal within a short s.p.a.ce of time--a minute or two. So, while it is possible that Mrs. Darcy was first stunned by a blow on the head, which eventually would have killed her, I think death almost at once followed the stab wound."

"Could both have been delivered by the same person?"

"Of course. First the blow on the head, followed by the stab wound."

"And there were no other injuries on the body?"

"None, except minor bruises caused by the fall to the floor. But they were superficial."

"Nothing else?"

"No--um let me see--no, I think not."

"Are you _sure_, Dr. Warren?"

The colonel's voice had a strange ring in it.

"Why, yes, I am sure. I was about to say that there was a slight abrasion in the palm of the left hand, a sort of scratch or puncture, as though from a pin, but as she was in the jewelry business and, as I understand it, often made slight repairs herself to brooches and pins brought in, this could easily be accounted for."

"A slight abrasion in the left hand you say?"

"Yes. But I don't attach any importance to that. It was so slight that I and my a.s.sistant only gave it a pa.s.sing glance. It hardly penetrated the skin."

"I see. In the left hand. This is the hand in which the ticking watch was found, was it not?"

"I believe so. The watch belonging to an Indian named Singa Phut. By the way what became of him?" the doctor asked of Detective Carroll, who had strolled out of the detectives' private room and was listening to the conversation.

"Oh, that gink? He made a big howl about getting back his watch, and as he had a perfectly good _alibi_, and we could fasten nothing on him, we give it back to him and told him to beat it. He did, I guess."

"No, he is still in town," said Colonel Ashley. "I pa.s.sed his place a while ago. He has a pair of beautiful Benares candlesticks, in the form of hooded cobra snakes, that I want to get. Singa Phut is still in town."

"Does that answer all your questions, Colonel?" inquired Dr. Warren.

"I'll tell you all I can, in reason, but if--"

"Thank you! You've told me all I cared to know. I have some theories I want to work on, and I'm not sure how they'll turn out."

"I s'pose you think Darcy didn't do this job," cut in Carroll, rather sneeringly.

"I'm positive he didn't, sir!" and the colonel drew himself up and looked uncompromisingly at the headquarters detective. "If I thought he had done it, I would not be a.s.sociated with his case."

"You're going to have a sweet job proving he didn't do it," laughed the officer.