“No. She declared that she did not know of anyone who would have killed the poor devil.”
“Was there any evidence on the part of the doctor, or Mother Slaig, or those seamen in the house to show who murdered the man?” asked Fuller.
“Not the slightest. The house was open morn, noon and night, and those who lived there came and went at their will without being watched. It’s a rowdy locality and a rowdy house, but Mother Slaig keeps fairly good order as she’s a formidable old hag resembling Vautrin’s aunt in Balzac’s story.”
“Madame Nourrisau; I remember,” said Fuller, nodding. “Then I take it that no one in the house heard any struggle, or cry for help?”
“No. Besides, as I have told you, death must have been instantaneous. No one, so far as Mother Slaig or others in the house knew, visited Grison on that night, or indeed on any other occasion—so they say—since the man was more or less of a hermit. He went to bed at ten and at the same hour next morning he was found dead with his room all upside down.”
“Was anything missed?”
“There was nothing to miss,” said Latimer quickly. “I saw the room, which only contained a small bed, a small table and two chairs. The man had but one, suit of ragged clothes, which he concealed under a fairly good overcoat his sister declared she sent to him last Christmas. He was desperately poor and never seemed to do anything but smoke opium.”
“What kind of a man was he to look at?”
“Something like the sister. Small and fair-haired, with blue eyes. Of course, owing to the black smoke, he was a wreck morally and physically and mentally, according to Mother Slaig, and the boys used to throw stones at him in the streets. However, to make a long story short, nothing could be found to show how the poor wretch had come by his death, so an open verdict was brought in—the sole thing which could be done. To-morrow his sister, who seems to have loved him in spite of his degradation, is taking away the corpse for burial.”
“Where is it to be buried?”