All his scruples forgotten Charles pressed his face up against the glass. "I can't quite - it looks like an arm. Yes, it is. Then someone must be standing there! But - damn this curtain!" He pressed closer, staring between the narrow gap in the curtain. The thing that was just discernible was unmistakably an arm in an old tweed sleeve, and below the edge of the frayed cuff a hand hung slackly. Charles stood still, trying to see more, but the gap was too small. But all the time he watched the hand never moved, and no sound broke the silence.
He turned. "There's something wrong here," he said. "We've got to get in. Try the door."
Peter put his hand on the latch. "Bound to be bolted - unless he's out."
But the latch lifted, and no bolt held the door in place. He pushed it cautiously open and peered in. Then a startled exclamation brought Charles up quickly to look over his shoulder. "Oh, my God," Peter cried on a note of horror.
For there, in the centre of the squalid little room was Louis Duval, quite dead, and hanging from one of the hooks in the beam that Charles had noticed.
Chapter Thirteen
The body hung horribly limply, and the face which was turned towards them was slightly discoloured as though death had resulted from strangulation rather than dislocation. The mouth hung open, and between lids that were almost shut the whites of the eyes gleamed in the lamplight.
Peter's hand fell from the latch of the door which he was still holding. He felt sick, but conquering the rising nausea he went up to that still figure, and touched one of the drooping hands. It felt chilly, and with a feeling of loathing he let it fall. The arm swung for a moment and then was still.
"Dead…' Charles said. "Poor chap!"
Peter was looking round the room; it was untidy, and a dirty plate with a knife and fork stood on the table, but there were no signs of any struggle having taken place. The only thing that seemed significant was a fallen chair, and from its position it looked as though Duval had kicked it from under his feet when the rope was round his neck. "Think the whole affair got on his nerves so badly that he - did himself in?" Peter said, instinctively lowering his voice.