Heath coughed uneasily.
Chester’s bedroom.
“Well,” he admitted, “something surprised them, and that’s a fact.”
“Surprised them! Sergeant, you should thank your Maker that you are not cursed with an imagination. The whole truth of this fiendish business lies in those bulbous eyes and that gaping mouth. Unlike Ada, both Julia and Chester saw the thing that menaced them; and it left them stunned and aghast.”
“Well, we can’t get any information outa them.” Heath’s practicality as usual was uppermost.
“Not oral information, certainly. But, as Hamlet put it, murder, though it have no tongue, will speak with most miraculous organ.”
“Come, come, Vance. Be tangible.” Markham spoke with acerbity. “What’s in your mind?”
“ ’Pon my word, I don’t know. It’s too vague.” He leaned over and picked up a small book from the floor just beneath where the dead man’s hand hung over the arm of the chair. “Chester apparently was immersed in literature at the time of his taking off.” He opened the book casually. “ ‘Hydrotherapy and Constipation.’ Yes, Chester was just the kind to worry about his colon. Some one probably told him that intestinal stasis interfered with the proper stance. He’s no doubt clearing the asphodel from the Elysian fields at the present moment preparat’ry to laying out a golf-course.”
He became suddenly serious.