The Sign of the Stranger

by William Le Queux

Yet after hearing those cries I had certainly detected no movement. The murderer must have crept silently out of the grassy hollow, and struck straight across the park to the woods half a mile away. Had any other direction been taken, I must certainly have heard his footsteps.

But the woman who had screamed. What of her?

I had, at the moment, little time for reflection. Acting upon the innkeeper’s suggestion I went off to fetch Knight, the constable, and my friend Pink, the doctor, while he remained with his lantern beside the victim of the tragedy.

As soon as the doctor saw him he shook his head, declaring that the wound had proved fatal a few minutes after he had been struck, while the constable, alive to the importance of the occasion, commenced suggesting all sorts of wild theories regarding the dead stranger. Disregarding them all, however, we obtained a hurdle, and Warr and Knight carried the body down the dark avenue, a strange and weird procession, our way lit uncertainly by the swing lanterns, our voices awed and hushed in the presence of the unknown dead.

The men deposited their inanimate burden in an outhouse at the back of the village inn to await the inquest which Pink declared would be necessary, and then, with a better light and the door closed against any prying intruder, we examined the dead man’s pockets to see whether they contained anything that might throw light on the tragic affair or lead to his identification.

The constable, with the officiousness of his class, took out a ponderous note-book and with a stubby piece of pencil commenced to make an inventory of what we found—a pocket-knife, about three pounds ten in money, a gold French piece of twenty francs, a gun-metal watch and plated chain, a few loose cigarettes a box of matches, a pawn-ticket shewing that a lady’s necklet had been pledged in the name of Bond, with a pawnbroker in the Westminster Bridge Road, about a year ago. Beyond that there was no clue to the dead man’s name. We were all disappointed, for the mystery surrounding him was heightened by the absence of any letter in his pocket or name upon his underclothing. Men who go to a pawnshop do not usually give their real names, hence we knew that Bond was assumed. Indeed, in pawnbroking the name of the person offering the pledge is never even asked, the assistant filling up the voucher in any name that comes to him.

While the others were making careful examination of the maker’s name and number of the dead man’s watch, I chanced to hold his waistcoat in my hand, when between my fingers I felt something like a letter. In an instant I was prompted to take possession of it secretly, and this I managed to do, first crushing it into the palm of my hand, then transferring it to my pocket.

Was it possible that the crisp paper so cunningly concealed in the lining of the waistcoat contained a clue? My heart beat quickly, and I longed to escape from the place and examine it in secret. If Lolita had actually been present at the tragedy and had any connection with it, my duty was surely to conceal the fact. She had admitted that she was in deadly peril, and I had promised to assist her; therefore, by securing any clue and hiding it from the police, I was assuredly acting in her interest.

I had already managed to secure the ring surreptitiously from the dead man’s finger before the body had been removed from the spot where we had discovered it, and as neither Warr nor the others had noticed it, I held it as a probable clue which I intended should be my secret alone.

“He was evidently struck with a long thin knife,” remarked Pink, a muscular, clean-shaven man who was extremely popular in the district, a keen sportsman and something of an epicure. He had probed the wound and ascertained that its direction had been only too accurate. “Whoever did it,” he declared, “knew exactly where to strike. I daresay he fell without a cry. The knife was very sharp, too,” he went on, examining one of the black horn buttons of the young man’s jacket-cuff. “You see it grazed this as he raised his arm to ward off the blow and shaved off a tiny piece, just as a razor might. The coroner will want to see this. I’ll get Newman over, and we’ll make a proper post-mortem in the morning.”