The Vanished MessengerOppenheim, E. Phillips (Edward Phillips)
General
The Vanished Messenger
Oppenheim, E. Phillips (Edward Phillips)
Detective and mystery stories; Fiction
Mr. Fentolin started his chair and beckoned the inspector to follow him.
Meekins, who was waiting inside the hall, escorted them by means of the
lift to the second floor. They made their way to Mr. Dunster’s room. Mr.
Fentolin knocked softly at the door. It was opened by the nurse.
“How is the patient?” Mr. Fentolin enquired.
Doctor Sarson appeared from the interior of the room.
“Still unconscious,” he reported. “Otherwise, the symptoms are
favourable. He is quite unfit,” the doctor added, looking steadily at
the inspector, “to be removed or questioned.”
“There is no idea of anything of the sort,” Mr. Fentolin explained. “It
is Inspector Yardley’s duty to satisfy himself that Mr. Dunster is here.
It is necessary for the inspector to see your patient, so that he can
make his report at headquarters.”
Doctor Sarson bowed.
“That is quite simple, sir,” he said. “Please step in.”
They all entered the room, which was large and handsomely furnished.
Through the open windows came a gentle current of fresh air. Mr. Dunster
lay in the midst of all the luxury of fine linen sheets and embroidered
pillow-cases. The inspector looked at him stolidly.
“Is he asleep?” he asked.
The doctor shook his head.
“It is the third day of his concussion,” he whispered. “He is still
unconscious. He will remain in the same condition for another two days.
After that he will begin to recover.”
Mr. Fentolin touched the inspector on the arm.
“You see his clothing at the foot of the bed,” he pointed out. “His
linen is marked with his name. That is his dressing-case with his name
painted on it.”
“I am quite satisfied, sir,” the inspector announced. “I will not
intrude any further.”
They left the room. Mr. Fentolin himself escorted the inspector into the
library and ordered whisky and cigars.
“I don’t know whether I am unreasonably curious,” Mr. Fentolin remarked,
“but is it really true that you have had enquiries from Scotland Yard
about the poor fellow up-stairs?”
“We had a very important enquiry indeed, sir,” the inspector replied.
“I have instructions to telegraph all I have been able to discover,
immediately.”
“Pardon my putting it plainly,” Mr. Fentolin asked, “but is our friend a
criminal?”
“I wouldn’t go so far as that, sir,” the inspector answered. “I know
of no charge against him. I don’t know that I have the right to say so
much,” he added, sipping his whisky and soda, “but putting two and two
together, I should rather come to the conclusion that he was a person of
some political importance.”
“Not a criminal at all?”
“Not as I know of,” the inspector assented. “That isn’t the way I read
the enquiries at all.”
“You relieve me,” Mr. Fentolin declared. “Now what about his
possessions?”
“There’s a man coming down shortly from Scotland Yard,” the inspector
announced, a little gloomily. “My orders were to touch nothing, but to
locate him.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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