Philip Van Doren Stern (ed) (248 page)

I
have
shot
myself
with
the
same
revolver
with which
I
murdered
Captain
Brayton.

The
statement
created
some
stir
when
it
was
read
out
in
the
billiard room,
where
the
coroner
held
his
inquest.
But
the
coroner
who
presided
now
was
the
man
who
had
held
the
court
when
Captain
Brayton
had
been
shot.
He
was
quite
clear
in
his
recollection
of
that
case.

"Mr.
Cranfield's
alibi
on
that
occasion,"
he
said,
"was
incontrovertible.
Mr.
Cranfield
was
with
two
friends
in
this
very
room
when
Captain
Brayton
shot
himself
in
his
bedroom.
There
can
be
no
doubt
of that."
And
under
his
direction
the
jury
returned
a
verdict
of
"suicide while
of
unsound
mind."

Mr.
Twiss
attended
the
inquest
and
the
funeral.
But
though
he welcomed
the
verdict,
at
the
bottom
of
his
mind
he
was
uneasy.
He remembered
vividly
that
extraordinary
moment
when
he
had
seen Cranfield
creep
into
the
billiard
room,
lift
the
little
clock
in
its
case
of satinwood
high
above
his
head,
and
dash
it
down
upon
the
hearth
in
a wild
gust
of
fury.
He
recollected
how
the
fury
had
given
way
to
despair—if
it
were
despair
and
not
remorse.
He
saw
again
Archie
Cranfield
dropping
into
the
chair,
holding
his
head
and
rocking
his
body
in a
paroxysm
of
sobs.
The
sound
of
his
wailing
rang
horribly
once
more in
the
ears
of
Mr.
Twiss.
He
was
not
satisfied.

"What
should
take
Cranfield
back
to
that
deserted
house,
there
to end
his
life,
if
not
remorse,"
he
asked
himself—"remorse
for
some
evil done
there?"

Over
that
question
for
some
days
he
shook
his
head,
finding
it
waiting
for
him
at
his
fireside
and
lurking
for
him
at
the
comer
of
the roads,
as
he
took
his
daily
walk
between
Hampstead
and
his
office.
It began
to
poison
his
life,
a
life
of
sane
and
customary
ways,
with
eerie suggestions.
There
was
an
oppression
upon
his
heart
of
which
he
could not
rid
it.
On
the
outskirts
of
his
pleasant
world
dim
horrors
loomed; he
seemed
to
walk
upon
a
frail
crust,
fearful
of
what
lay
beneath.
The sly
smile,
the
furtive
triumph,
the
apparent
consciousness
of
secret power—did
they
point
to
some
corruption
of
the
soul
in
Cranfield,
of which
none
knew
but
he
himself?

"At
all
events,
he
paid
for
it,"
Mr.
Twiss
would
insist,
and
from that
reflection
drew,
after
all,
but
little
comfort.
The
riddle
began even
to
invade
his
business
hours,
and
take
a
seat
within
his
private office,
silently
clamouring
for
his
attention.
So
that
it
was
with
a veritable
relief
that
he
heard
one
morning
from
his
clerk
that
a
man called
Humphreys
wished
particularly
to
see
him.