"Of course not," Lechmere said with fine contempt. "Did you suppose for a moment that it was? The thing was planned and accomplished by Mazaroff. Who his confederates were does not matter for the moment. At any rate he managed it. It would never do to let the king reach Asturia. But there was one thing they did not reckon on—the disappearance."
"The luck that ever follows the foolish," Maxgregor growled. "The only man uninjured. He takes the first opportunity to get away from his gaolers. In his callous way, heedless of the fact that they are badly hurt, he takes a carriage and goes to Paris. He has no money, but the King of Asturia can always raise that in the French capital. Am I right?"
"No, you are quite wrong," Lechmere said gravely. "The king is dead. I have his body with me at the present moment. Mind you, nobody knows anything about it. But perhaps I had better explain to you how we managed to keep the tragic affair a secret."
Maxgregor listened eagerly to Lechmere's story. His grave face was tinged with deep melancholy.
"That is very sad," he said. "It will be a dreadful blow to the queen. After all she has gone through and suffered it will break her heart to know that Asturia will fall to Russia in spite of everything."
"Asturia is not going to fall into the hands of Russia," Lechmere said drily. "Cunning as those people are, we are going to be one too many for them. After all said and done, nobody outside our little circle knows that the king is dead. I will explain presently. Meanwhile the king must be buried. We must get a certificate without delay. When the time comes the story can be made public."
"It will be difficult to get a certificate from an ordinary doctor," said Maxgregor.
"I grant your point, my friend. But we can get a certificate from Dr. Varney, who attended the king on and off for years during the time he visited London. And Varney often warned the king that any shock might be his end. I should say that he died of the shock. Any way we'll get Varney in and ask his opinion. Have you a room that you can spare? If so we will complete my gruesome task and lock the body carefully away. Get your man off the premises."
The whole thing was managed at length, and a little later and then Varney came in. He made a long and careful examination of the body before he gave his verdict.
"There is nothing broken," he said. "The cause of death has nothing to do with violence. Of that I am certain. This sudden fright acting on a heart all to pieces and nerves like brown paper did the mischief. The shock stopped the heart and the King of Asturia died. There is nothing to prevent my saying that I was called in here to see the body of the King of Asturia and that I certified that shock was the cause of death. I am so sure of it that even had the patient been a common man, I should have certified that there was no cause for an inquest."