“God bless you!” he said; “God bless you, sir, for that! But there is worse to follow—something infinitely more horrible and distressing.”
His listener’s brow darkened a little.
“Some later crime?” he asked softly.
“I will not—I must not say another word,” answered the visitor in agony, “until you have gone through this also. It is dated only three days later.”
Half dreading what was to come, Gilead accepted a second newspaper cutting from his hand, and, bending with compressed lips, read it out as he had the former:—
“It is our painful duty to record the death—whether by his own hand or that of another it remains to prove—of the well-known artist and sculptor Mr Auguste Lerroux. Mr Lerroux occupied a maisonette and studio in Edwards Square off the Kensington Road, and, upon entering the latter apartment at seven o’clock yesterday morning to light the fire, the maid servant discovered to her horror her master lying dead upon the floor with a bullet wound through his head. The weapon, an air-pistol, with which the injury had been inflicted lay beside the body, and the shot from it had apparently penetrated the brain through the right eye. No adequate cause can be assigned for the unfortunate gentleman’s suicide, and at present the affair remains a mystery. The police, who were summoned at once, are very reticent in the matter; but it is hinted that they are in possession of a certain clue which in some mysterious way associates the crime, if crime it be, with an attempted theft of Japanese prints from the B ... Free Library, as reported in our columns some days ago.”
Gilead looked up from his perusal of the paper without a word.
“No, sir,” cried the young man—“before God I am guiltless. You must believe it, or there is an end of all hope for me.”
“I believe it, Mr Dobell,” said the soft clear voice of Miss Halifax.
Gilead smiled.