The Nine of Hearts: A Novel

by B. L. Farjeon

"Give this to the telegraph boy," he said, "and pay his cab fare to the telegraph office, in order that there shall be no delay."

When the servant had departed, the lawyer rose from his chair and paced the room slowly in deep thought, and it was during the intervals in his reflections that the conversation between him and Dr. Daincourt was carried on.

"Is it not very strange," said the lawyer, "that I am advised in this cable message to seek information from the one juryman who pronounced Layton innocent, and whose address I have not obtained?"

"Yes, it is, indeed," replied Dr. Daincourt, "very strange."

"Of course I shall find him; there will not be the least difficulty in that respect. Tell me, doctor. It was proved at the trial that Mrs. Layton's death was caused by an overdose of morphia, taken in the form of effervescing lozenges. It was established that she was occasionally in the habit of taking one of these lozenges at night to produce sleep, and her maid swore that her mistress never took more than one, being aware of the danger of an overdose. The usual mode of administering these noxious opiates is by placing one in the mouth and allowing it to dissolve; but they will dissolve in water, and the medical evidence proved that at least eight or ten of the poisonous lozenges must have been administered in this way, in one dose, to the unfortunate lady. The glass from which the liquid was drunk was round, not by her bedside, but on the mantle-shelf, which is at some distance from the bed. It is a natural inference, if the unfortunate woman had administered the dose to herself, that the glass would have been found on the table by her bedside. It was not so found, and the maid declares that her mistress was too weak to get out of bed and return to it unaided. These facts, if they be facts, circumstantially prove that the cause of death lay outside the actions of the invalid herself. The maid states that when she left her mistress the bottle containing about a dozen lozenges was on the table by her mistress's bedside, and also a glass, and a decanter of water; and that when she visited her mistress at between six and seven o'clock in the morning there were no lozenges left in the bottle, and the glass from which they were supposed to be taken, dissolved in water, was on the mantle-shelf. Now, in my view, this circumstance is in favor of the prisoner."

"I cannot see that," observed Dr. Daincourt.

"Yet it is very simple," said the lawyer. "Let us suppose, in illustration, that I am this lady's husband. For reasons into which it is not necessary here to enter, I resolve to make away with my wife by administering to her an overdose of these poisonous narcotics, and naturally I resolve that her death shall be accomplished in such a manner as to avert, to some reasonable extent, suspicion from myself. I go into her bedroom at midnight. Our relations, as has been proved, are not of the most amiable kind. We are not in love with each other--quite the reverse--and have been living, from the first day of our marriage, an unhappy life. Indeed, my unhappy life, in relation to the lady, commenced when I was engaged to her. Well, I go into her room at midnight, resolved to bring about her death. She complains that she cannot sleep, and she asks me to give her a morphia lozenge from the bottle. I suggest that it may more readily produce sleep if, instead of allowing it to dissolve slowly in her mouth, she will drink it off at once, dissolved in water. She consents. I take from the table the bottle, the decanter of water, and the glass I empty secretly into the glass the eight or ten or dozen lozenges which the bottle contains; I pour the water from the decanter into the glass, and I tell my wife to drink it off immediately. She does so, and sinks into slumber, overpowered by a sleep from which she will never awake. Perhaps she struggles against the effects of the terrible dose I have administered to her, but her struggles are vain. She lies before me in sure approaching death, and both she and I have escaped from the life which has been a continual source of misery to us. The deed being accomplished, what do I, the murderer, do? There are no evidences of a struggle; there have been no cries to alarm the house; what has been accomplished has been well and skilfully accomplished, and I am the only actual living witness against myself. What then, I repeat, is my course of action? Before I killed her I removed the bottle, the glass, and the decanter from the table by the bedside. I wish it to be understood that she herself, in a fit of delirium, caused her own death. This theory would be utterly destroyed if I allowed the glass from which the poison was taken to be found at some distance from the unfortunate lady's bedside. Very carefully, therefore, I place not only that, but the decanter which contained the water, and the bottle which contained the lozenges, within reach of her living hand. To omit that precaution would be suicidal, and, to my mind, absolutely untenable in rational action under such circumstances. Do you see, now, why the circumstance of the glass being found on the mantle-shelf is a proof of my innocence?"

"Yes," replied Dr. Daincourt, "I recognize the strength of your theory--unless, indeed, you had in your mind the idea that it would be better to throw suspicion upon a third person; say, for the sake of argument, upon the maid."

"That view," said the lawyer, "demolishes itself, for what I would naturally do to divert suspicion from myself, a third person would naturally do to avert suspicion from him or herself."

"True," said Dr. Daincourt; "you seize vital points more readily than I. Have you any theory about the strange lady who accompanied Layton home from Prevost's Restaurant?"