THE MYSTERY OF ANGELINA FROOD BY R. AUSTIN FREEMAN Author of “The Singing Bone,” “The Blue Scarab,” “The Red Thumb Mark,” etc. NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1925 [COPYRIGHT] Copyright, 1925, By DR. R. AUSTIN FREEMAN CONTENTS I. The Doper’s Wife II. Re-enter “Mr. Johnson” III. Angelina Frood IV. Deals with Charity and Archæology V. John Thorndyke VI. The Shadows Deepen VII. Mrs. Gillow Sounds the Alarm VIII. Sergeant Cobbledick Takes a Hand IX. Jetsam X. Which Deals with Ancient Monuments and a Blue Boar XI. The Man with the Mole XII. The Prints of a Vanished Hand XIII. The Discovery in Black Boy-Lane XIV. Sergeant Cobbledick is Enlightened XV. The End of the Trail XVI. The Inquiry and a Surprise XVII. Thorndyke Puts Down His Piece XVIII. The Uncontrite Penitent XIX. Explanations THE MYSTERY OF ANGELINA FROOD CHAPTER I. THE DOPER’S WIFE It takes a good deal to surprise a really seasoned medical practitioner, and still more to arouse in him an abiding curiosity. But at the time when I took charge of Dr. Pumphrey’s practice in Osnaburgh-street, Regent’s Park, I was far from being a seasoned practitioner, having, in fact, been qualified little more than a year, in which short period I had not yet developed the professional immunity from either of the above mental states. Hence the singular experience which I am about to relate not only made a deep impression on me at the time, but remained with me for long after as a matter of curious speculation. It was close upon midnight, indeed an adjacent church clock had already struck the third quarter, when I laid aside my book and yawned profoundly, without prejudice to the author who had kept me so long from my bed. Then I rose and stretched myself, and was in the act of knocking the long-extinct ashes out of my pipe when the bell rang. As the servants had gone to bed, I went out to the door, congratulating myself on having stayed up beyond my usual bedtime, but wishing the visitor at the devil all the same. The opening of the door gave me a view of a wet street with a drizzle of rain falling, a large closed car by the kerb, and a tallish man on the doorstep, apparently about to renew his attack on the bell. “Dr. Pumphrey?” he asked; and by that token I gathered that he was a stranger. “No,” I answered; “he is out of town, but I am looking after his practice.” “Very well,” he said, somewhat brusquely. “I want you to come and see a lady who has been suddenly taken ill. She has had a rather severe shock.” “Do you mean a mental or a physical shock?” I asked. “Well, I should say mental,” he replied, but so inconclusively that I pressed him for more definite particulars. “Has she sustained any injuries?” I inquired. “No,” he answered, but still indecisively. “No; that is, so far as I know. I think not.” “No wound, for instance?”