The Price of Murder by Bruce Alexander Read Free Book Online Page A

bits and pieces of paper scattered here and there round the place. Most of them were of no importance. Mistress Tiddle, it seemed, was in the habit of pulling the labels from all sorts of bottles—chemist’s, whiskey bottles, even French wine bottles (though how and where she had found that last I have no idea). I collected them all, assuring myself that if they had significance of any sort, I would more likely discover it through careful study at Number 4 Bow Street. Yet it may well have been that the labels had no significance at all.
    The pile of numbered tickets and stubs I found in the single drawer of her bedside table was another matter entirely. Could Katy Tiddle read or write? Not likely. Did she know numbers beyond the ten digits she found upon her hands? These, I was sure, were more interesting and of much greater significance—if I could but determine what that significance might be.
    Interesting as these might be—and they did, in the end, prove so—they were not the “considerable surprise” to which I referred a few lines back. That came, as I said, a little over an hour after my arrival. By that time, I had looked near everywhere—through her clothes, under the bed, et cetera. As I remember, I was standing in the middle of the room, checking the corners, looking about for new places to search, when I heard a noise from the front of the room. I had closed the door after me when I came in to search the place, and, at first, I thought what I had heard was someone unknown to me trying a key in the lock. But no, a moment later the tumbler turned, and I understood that it was not the door to Tiddle’s, but rather the one to Alice Plummer’s, that had just been unlocked. When it swang open, creaking and complaining, I was sure of it. Could it be Plummer come back?
    There were firm steps upon the floor of the room just beyond the south wall. The door had been left open. That meant, perhaps, that whoever had entered had no intent to stay long. If I wished to detain and question that person I had best act quickly and decisively. I tiptoed quickly to Tiddle’s door and opened it. Stepping out into the daylight, I was immediately aware that all my efforts at quiet had been quite unnecessary, for the person in the next room was making a great racket on his own. It was a man. I was near certain of it. Only a man would throw things around and stamp about in such a way. I was in no wise prepared for this sort of interruption and would have liked the opportunity to think through my course of action, but, of course, there was no time for that. If I were to act, I should have to do so immediately.
    I drew the pistol from my pocket and pulled back the hammer. Taking a deep breath, I counted to three and threw myself through the half-open door and then took a couple of running steps into the room. I came to a halt just as quickly when I saw who—or what—it was awaited me.
    One could have called him a dwarf, I suppose, yet there was naught misshapen about him. Leave it that he was a small man, quite small, no more than child-size, yet fully a man. There could be no doubt of it, for, in defiance of custom, he wore a short beard, and, when he spoke, his words came out of him in a growling, rasping baritone.
    “Who the Goddamned bloody hell are you?” he demanded.
    He threw the bedclothes he had jerked from the bed down upon the floor. Then did he stand, hands upon hips, glaring up at me. Behind him, and to the right and left of him, was the chaos he had created in about two minutes time. Drawers had been pulled from a bureau, and clothing was scattered across the floor. In one corner, there was a jumble of toys, crudely carved dolls and the like, all of them Maggie’s, which, I was quite sure, had not been touched.
    “Must I repeat myself?” he shouted out louder than before. “Who the Goddamned bloody hell are you?”
    I fear that I stared at him, so far was he from what I had expected.
    “I was about to ask you