Death at the President's Lodging by Michael Innes Read Free Book Online

“I’ve something of my own to show you in that alcove. It made me jump to your suggestion of a burglar at once. We didn’t ignore the nine thousand books altogether, you know.” He led the way back to the bay and paused, this time not before the revolving bookcase but before the solid shelves of closely packed books behind it. Putting his hand behind what appeared to be a normal row he gave a sharp pull – and the whole swung easily out upon a hinge. “Dodge they sometimes decorate library doors with – isn’t it? And look what’s behind the dummies.” What was behind, sunk in the wall of the room, was a somewhat unusual, drawer-shaped steel safe.
    “The sort of burglar who potters about with a candle,” remarked Appleby, “wouldn’t have much of a chance with that. Difficult to find too, unless he knew about it. Not that I expect you knew about it?”
    Dodd had not known. He had found the safe in the course of a thorough search. The thousands of books had not been moved from their shelves, but every one had been pressed back as far as it would go to ensure that no discarded weapon lay anywhere concealed on the shelving between books and wall. He was positive, however, that the searchers were not responsible for turning the smaller Athenaeus. He had examined its particular revolving bookcase himself – missing, he admitted, the candle-grease – and had found it unnecessary to take any of the books out. He had also himself inspected the whole bay and had come upon the concealed safe in the process.
    Appleby’s eye travelled once more along the endless rows of books, rapidly noting the character of the dead man’s library. But it was the physical appearance of hundreds of heavy folios on the lower shelves which prompted his next remark. “Lucky he was shot through the head, Dodd. Do you see what a job that has saved us?” And seeing his colleague’s puzzled look he went on: “Fancy it this way. Umpleby wants to commit suicide. For this reason or that – just out of devilment, perhaps – he decides to conceal the fact. Well, he takes any one of these books, probably a big one, perhaps quite a small one” – here Appleby tapped a stoutish crown octavo – “and he hollows out a little nest in it – large enough to hold an automatic. He holds it open with his left hand, close by its place on the shelf. Then he places the pistol just where a careful study of anatomy tells him, fires, slips the pistol in the book and the book in its place, staggers across the room and falls – just where you see him!”
    Following Appleby’s pointing finger, Dodd strode across the room to where the body lay. The small round hole, central in the forehead of the dead man, reassured him – but he glanced with new curiosity nevertheless at the vellum and buckram and morocco rows, gleaming, gilt-tooled, dull, polished, stained – the representative backs of perhaps four centuries of bookbinding. But Appleby, with a gesture as if he had been wasting time, had turned back to consider the concealed safe. “Fingerprints?” he asked.
    Dodd shook his head.
    “None at all?” pursued Appleby, interested.
    But this time Dodd nodded. “Yes,” he said, “I’m afraid so. Umpleby’s own. No one has been feeling the need of polishing up after himself. It looks as if the safe has been undisturbed. One thing’s queer about it all the same – and it’s this. Not a soul seems to know anything about it. I asked fishing questions of everyone the least likely – ‘Do you happen to know where the President kept his valuables?’ and that sort of thing. And then I asked outright. Slotwiner, the other servants, the Dean and the rest of the dons – none of them admitted to knowing of its existence. And there’s no key. It’s a combination lock and a combination lock only – not the kind where the combination opens to show a keyhole. Further than that I haven’t had time to follow the thing up.”
    At the mention of time, Appleby