Dictator's Way by E.R. Punshon Read Free Book Online Page B

one a red stain that looked to him very much as though it had been caused by blood freshly spilt.
    He knelt down to examine them more closely, and then to his extreme annoyance, and by a piece of unforeseen bad luck, a tiny drop of blood from his own cut lip that had now started bleeding afresh fell on another of the notes. Just the sort of thing cross-examining counsel would make play with, if it ever came into court. [‘You were I believe, Sergeant, yourself bleeding freely at the time from a wound received in honourable combat?’ (loud and prolonged laughter.)] If this affair had any sequence, that was the sort of thing he would have to expect, not to mention all the pointed remarks his superiors would address to him on the necessity of at least keeping irrelevant bloodstains (bloodstains!) off exhibits in criminal cases.
    He could only hope the whole wretched business would prove to be without significance and that nothing much would need to be done about it.
    One had to make sure, though. He produced his pocket book, copied in it the numbers of the notes, made an accurate sketch of their position with exact measurements and intersecting lines to show precisely where they lay, and reflected that it was all a lot of red tape, but then the Yard was like that. There was no wind and the spot was sheltered, but to make sure they did not blow away he found and placed a small stone on each. Then he made a closer search of the vicinity. The paving of the courtyard held no footprints, he found no trace of any recent visitor, no sign of any unusual happening till inside one of the overturned dustbins he discovered a few ashes as if paper had been burnt there, very thoroughly burnt, too, for the ashes had been crushed together and crumbled so as to make any reconstruction evidently impossible. Yet close by lay other charred fragments that seemed to show it was only a copy of the morning’s Daily Announcer that had been destroyed.
    â€œI wonder,” said Bobby, looking at them thoughtfully, and that red stain upon the pound note by the back door of the house began to seem to him more ominous still.
    He made a note, too, of the position of the dustbin – one has to be ready to answer all the questions – and then went across to the back door. Gingerly, there might be finger-prints on it, he tried the handle. To his surprise, the door opened at once. He crossed the threshold and listened. It was all perfectly still within, still and silent with such stillness and such silence as are only in places whence has departed the noise and bustle of healthy normal human activity.
    He was standing in the entrance to a wide passage, where now lay heavily the shadows of the coming night. The windows that once had admitted the day were now barred and shuttered so that no light entered. Bobby bent down and examined the floor. It was of boarding, covered with linoleum, and the dust on it did not appear to be sufficiently thick to show footprints. Keeping as close as he could to the wall, walking carefully so that his own should not interfere with any marks that might in fact be there, Bobby moved forward. On his right was an open door, by which some light entered, though already his eyes were growing accustomed to the gloom. He saw a spacious apartment that evidently had formerly been the kitchen but now was empty of any furnishing. At the further end were two closed doors, admitting probably to pantry or scullery, and there was an enormous, built-in cooking range, now red with rust. Further on were other doors, but all closed and Bobby did not open them. To search thoroughly a house of this size would take time and indeed could not be done effectively by one person. Besides, his first care must be to find out if there was anyone within. If so, some simple explanation might at once be offered. If there was no one to be found, then Bobby felt that the sooner he got on the telephone, reported, and asked for instructions, the