The Closed Book: Concerning the Secret of the Borgias - William Le Queux

Lord Glenelg has, as you know, recently returned to public life; but the secret inquiries instituted by the commissioner of police revealed the extraordinary fact that in no fewer than eight well-proved cases where there had been inquests regarding sudden death during the period of Selby’s residence in Harpur Street, the deceased was known to have visited that house of mystery immediately prior to his or her death. And if these eight cases have been satisfactorily proved, how many others may there not have been?

After a long search, Mrs Pickard, the wizened old woman whom Selby had engaged as housekeeper, was found, and from a statement made by her to the police it seemed that the poisoner had an accomplice named Brewer—evidently the fair-bearded man who had assisted him in the assault on the valet Thompson, but who never came to the house. It was his duty to watch outside for the sign of the bear cub in the window, and then follow home persons who had been decoyed there, to ascertain that death really overtook them, and that they could not return and make an accusation.

The sign of the bear cub was the signal that some person had been secretly envenomed, and that a watch was necessary—a startling fact of which certain officials at Scotland Yard are now aware.

Happily for the personal safety of society, the formula for the manufacture of the venom has died with its discoverer, Graniani, and his accomplice; while the fact that the little crystal bottle of Lucrezia Borgia was found by the police empty in the grate of the front attic at Harpur Street, together with the poison-ring—now also in the British Museum, by the way—is sufficient evidence that the few drops of the fatal compound of the Borgias which we recovered are now also lost forever. The missing folio, which, however, contains nothing of great interest, I have since discovered in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin.

And of Judith—my heart’s love—now my wife? She is not a woman of fulsome words. She has proved her love for me by deeds. Today she is seated beside me as, in the quiet of our country home, I conclude this strange chronicle. Here, as I write, the sun shines across the old-world lawn, where the high box hedges cast their long shadows, the mist has vanished, and the day, like all our days, is one of cloudless happiness and blissful hope.