A CASE FOR THE POLICE
After that first horrible moment it was perhaps Anna who was the more self-possessed. She dropped on her knees by his side, and gently unbuttoned his waistcoat. Then she looked up at Brendon.
“You must fetch a doctor,” she said. “I do not think that he is quite dead.”
“And leave you here alone?” he asked, in a hoarse whisper. “Come with me.”
“I am not afraid,” she answered. “Please hurry.”
He reeled out of the room. Anna was afterwards astonished at her own self-possession. She bound a scarf tightly round the place where the blood seemed to be coming from. Then she stood up and looked around the room.
There were no evidences of any struggle, no overturned chairs or disarranged furniture. The grate was full of fluttering ashes of burnt paper, and the easy chair near the fire had evidently been used. On the floor was a handkerchief, a little morsel of lace. Anna saw it, and for the first time found herself trembling.
She moved towards it slowly and picked it up, holding it out in front of her whilst the familiar perfume seemed to assert itself with damning insistence. It was Annabel’s. The lace was family lace, easily recognizable. The perfume was the only one she ever used. Annabel had been here then. It was she who had come out from the flat only a few minutes before. It was she——
Anna’s nerves were not easily shaken, but she found herself suddenly clutching at the table for support. The room was reeling, or was it that she was going to faint? She recovered herself with a supreme effort. There were the burnt papers still in the grate. She took up the poker and stirred the fire vigorously. Almost at the same moment the door opened and Brendon entered, followed by the doctor.
Anna turned round with a start, which was almost of guilt, the poker still in her hand. She met the keen grey eyes of a clean-shaven man, between forty and fifty, quietly dressed in professional attire. Before he even glanced at the man on the floor he stepped over to her side and took the poker from her.