The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [5298]
I had turned again, when the man had referred to his discovery; and now, glancing at Harley, I saw that his face had grown suddenly very stern.
"Show me your evidence, Inspector?" he asked, shortly.
"There can be no objection," returned the Inspector.
Opening the bag, he took out a rifle!
Paul Harley's hands were thrust in his coat pockets, By the movement of the cloth I could see that he had clenched his fists. Here was confirmation of my theory!
"A Service rifle," said the Inspector, triumphantly, holding up the weapon. "A Lee-Enfield charger-loader. It contains four cartridges, three undischarged, and one discharged. He had not even troubled to eject it."
The Inspector dropped the weapon into the bag with a dramatic movement.
"Fancy theories about bat wings and Voodoos," he said, scornfully, "may satisfy you, Mr. Harley, but I think this rifle will prove more satisfactory to the Coroner."
He picked up the bag and walked out of the library.
Harley stood posed in a curiously rigid way, looking after him. Even when the door had closed he did not change his position at once. Then, turning slowly, he walked to an armchair and sat down.
"Harley," I said, hesitatingly, "has this discovery surprised you?"
"Surprised me?" he returned in a low voice. "It has appalled me."
"Then, although you seemed to regard my theory as sound," I continued rather resentfully, "all the time you continued to believe Colin Camber to be innocent?"
"I believe so still."
"What?"
"I thought we had determined, Knox," he said, wearily, "that a man of Camber's genius, having decided upon murder, must have arranged for an unassailable alibi. Very well. Are we now to leap to the other end of the scale, and to credit him with such utter stupidity as to place hanging evidence where it could not fail to be discovered by the most idiotic policeman? Preserve your balance, Knox. Theories are wild horses. They run away with us. I know that of old, for which very reason I always avoid speculation until I have a solid foundation of fact upon which to erect it."
"But, my dear fellow," I cried, "was Camber to foresee that the floor of the hut would be taken up?"
Harley sighed, and leaned back in his chair.
"Do you recollect your first meeting with this man, Knox?"
"Perfectly."
"What occurred?"
"He was slightly drunk."
"Yes, but what was the nature of his conversation?"
"He suggested that I had recognized his resemblance to Edgar Allan Poe."
"Quite. What had led him to make this suggestion?"
"The manner in which I had looked at him, I suppose."
"Exactly. Although not quite sober, from a mere glance he was able to detect what you were thinking. Do you wish me to believe, Knox, that this same man had not foreseen what the police would think when Colonel Menendez was found shot within a hundred yards of the garden of the Guest House?"
I was somewhat taken aback, for Harley's argument was strictly logical, and:
"It is certainly very puzzling," I admitted.
"Puzzling!" he exclaimed; "it is maddening. This case is like a Syrian village-mound. Stratum lies under stratum, and in each we meet with evidence of more refined activity than in the last. It seems we have yet to go deeper."
He took out his pipe and began to fill it.
"Tell me about the interview with Madame de Staemer," he directed.
I took a seat facing him, and he did not once interrupt me throughout my account of Inspector Aylesbury's examination of Madame.
"Good," he commented, when I had told how the Inspector was dismissed. "But at least, Knox, he has a working theory, to which he sticks like an express to the main line, whereas I find myself constantly called upon to readjust my perspective. Directly I can enjoy freedom of movement, however, I shall know whether my hypothesis is a house of cards or a serviceable structure."
"Your hypothesis?" I said. "Then you really have a theory which is entirely different from mine?"
"Not entirely different,