Evelyn did not heed the concluding remark; but one word had caught her attention.
“Friend! He was no friend of mine,” she declared. “I never saw the man before.”
Penfield bent forward eagerly. “What’s this—a stranger, you say? Are you quite sure, Miss Preston? People’s appearance sometimes alters after death. Please look at him closely.”
Evelyn hesitated and glanced at Hayden who signed to her to approach. Obediently she stepped forward and studied the motionless figure which had been pushed back by Penfield into much the same position it had occupied when Evelyn first discovered it. She judged the man to have been about thirty-six or forty years of age, and noted particularly the brilliant blue of his eyes against the pallor of his skin. He was clean shaven, and his under jaw was thrust forward at an obstinate angle, but whether that was its natural position or the jaw had dropped forward after death Evelyn was incapable of knowing.
“I never saw the man before,” she stated finally.
“Ah! Then how came it that he was admitted to your library?” asked Penfield before Hayden could speak.
“I really don’t know.” Evelyn looked puzzled. “I presume he got in like any other burglar.”
“Burglar!” Penfield started and turning, stared again at the dead man. “Burglars don’t as a rule dress so well; besides, his hands——” He leaned over and held up the man’s limp right hand, turning it over so that all could see the long tapering fingers and well cared for nails.
Maynard studied the hand intently; he had seen its type when traveling among the silent and secretive peoples of the Orient and occasionally met the same type among the deep thinkers and analytical men and women of Europe who rarely forget an injury but are patient with the patience of power conveyed by knowledge and mysticism.
“His finger-prints may give us some clue to his identity,” added Coroner Penfield, laying down the hand. “In the meantime——”