“Stand aside, please. Let us have all the air we can.”
The doctor bent over the man on the floor, but one look was sufficient. He touched the wrist, laid his hand over the heart. Then he stood up quickly.
“There is nothing to be done here. He has been dead, I should say, an hour or more. We must ring up the police, at once. You will understand that nothing is to be moved until their arrival.”
“Police!” echoed John Walls with shaking lips.
“Yes, police!” the doctor said impatiently. “My good man, can't you see that this is no natural death? Mr. Bechcombe has been murdered—strangled!”
Chapter IV
The first floor of 21 Crow's Inn was entirely in the hands of the police. Two plain-clothes men guarded the entrance of the corridor, others were stationed farther along. Both the big waiting-rooms were filled, one with indignant clients anxious to go home, the other with the clerks and employés of the firm.
Two men came slowly down the passage. Inspector Furnival of Scotland Yard was a man of middle height with a keen, foxy-looking face, at present clean-shaven, and sharp grey eyes whose clearness of vision had earned him in the Force the sobriquet of “The Ferret.” His companion, Dr. Hackett, carried his occupation writ plain on his large-featured face and his strictly professional attire.
Both men were looking grave and preoccupied as they entered the smaller office which had been little used since Mr. Bechcombe's partner retired. Inspector Furnival took the revolving chair and drew it up to the office table in the middle of the room. Then he produced a notebook.
“Now, Dr. Hackett, will you give me the details of this affair as far as you know them?”