CHAPTER XII. THE GOLDEN BULL
When Masters came to clear the tea, he found Sir Walter stillunconvinced.
"What do you think of Signor Mannetti, Masters?" asked Henry; and thebutler, who was a great reader of the newspapers, made answer.
"I think he's a bit of a freak, Mr. Henry. They tell me that old peoplecan have a slice of monkey slipped into 'em nowadays--to keep 'em goingand make 'em young and lively again. Well, I should say the gentlemanhad a whole monkey popped in somewhere. I never see such another. He'sgot a tongue like a rat-trap, and he leaves you guessing every time.He's amazing clever; so's his man. That Stephano knows a thing or two!He's got round Jane Bond something disgraceful. I never knew what was inJane--and her five and fifty if she's an hour."
"Would he be safe in the Grey Room?" said Sir Walter.
"He'd be safe anywhere. The question in my mind is whether our silver'ssafe; and a few other things. I catched him poking about in the silvertable only this morning. He knows what's what. He knows everything. Iwouldn't say he ain't one of the swell mob myself--made up to looklike an old man. I'll swear he's never seen eighty years for all hepretends."
Henry laughed.
"Don't you be frightened of him, Masters; he's all right."
"Let him go in the Grey Room by all means, Mr. Henry. He knows he'ssafe anywhere. Yes, Sir Walter, he knows he's safe enough. He's got themeasure of it."
"Prince is to go with him, Masters."
"Prince! Why, ma'am?"
"We don't know. He wishes it. He can't hurt poor old Prince anyway."
"Well, I sha'n't sleep no worse; and I hope none of you won't, if you'llexcuse me. Come what will, there's nothing in the Grey Room will catchthat man napping. Not that I'm against the gentleman in general, youunderstand. Only I wouldn't trust him a foot. He's play-acting, and he'sno more a foreigner than I am--else he couldn't talk so fine English asI do, if not finer."
"Masters is on our side, father," said Mary. "And he's right. The signoris play-acting. He loves to be in the centre of the stage. All oldpeople do, and one of the pathetic things in life is that they're seldomallowed to be. So he's making the most of his opportunity."
"And if you refuse, Uncle Walter, he'll only go away and say he cannothelp you, and accuse us of giving him all this trouble for nothing,"added Henry Lennox.
They had their wish at last, and when Signor Mannetti came down to anearly dinner in splendid spirits, Sir Walter conceded his desire.
"Good, my friend! And do not fear that a night of anxiety awaits you.Indeed, if I am not mistaken, it will be possible for us all to sleepvery soundly, though we may go to bed rather late. But I think we mustbe prepared not to retire till after two o'clock. I will enter upon mywatch at eight--in half an hour. The door shall be left open, as youwish. But I beg that none will approach the east end of the corridor.That is only fair. I will, however, permit Mr. Lennox to stationhimself on the top of the great staircase, and from time to time he maychallenge me. He shall say 'Is all well?' and be sure I shall answer'All is well.' Could anything be more satisfactory?"
Signor Mannetti ate sparingly, then he donned a big, fur, motor-coatand declared himself ready. They thought he had forgotten Prince, but heinsisted upon the company of the ancient spaniel. The dog had fed, andhe could sleep as well in one place as another.
"Fear not," said the Italian. "I shall be considerate to your ancientpet. I do not beg his aid without reason. He is on my side and will helpme if he can--infirm though he be. I have made friends with him. Set himat my feet. I will sit here under the electric light and read my Italianpapers."
Thus once again a solitary occupied the Grey Room and measured hisintelligence against the terrible forces therein concealed. SignorMannetti took leave of them cheerfully at eight o'clock, and while SirWalter and Mary descended to the library, Henry took up his station atthe head of the staircase. The corridor was lighted and the door of theGrey Room left open.
But in ten minutes the watcher looked out and cried to Lennox, who satsmoking about thirty-five yards from him.
"There is a great draught here," he said. "I will close the door, butleave it ajar that we may salute each other from time to time."
The hours crept on and since everybody at Chadlands knew what washappening, few retired to rest. It was understood that some time aftermidnight Signor Mannetti hoped to declare the result of his experiment.
Henry Lennox challenged half-hourly, always receiving a brisk reply.But a little after half-past one his "All well, signor?" received noresponse. He raised his voice, but still no answer came. He went to thedoor, therefore, and looked into the Grey Room. The watcher had slippeddown in the armchair they had set for him under the electric light,and was lying motionless, but in an easy position. He still wore hisfur-coat. Prince Henry did not see. The room was silent and cold. Theelectric light burned brightly, and both windows were open. Young Lennoxhastened downstairs. His thoughts concentrated on his uncle, and hisdesire was to spare him any needless shock. For a moment he believedthat Signor Mannetti had succumbed in the Grey Room, as others beforehim, but he could not be certain. A bare half-hour had elapsed since thewatcher had uttered a cheerful answer to the last summons, and told themhis vigil was nearly ended. Lennox sought Masters, therefore, told himthat the worst was to be feared, yet explained that the old man who hadwatched in the Grey Room might not be dead but sunk in sleep.
Masters was sanguine that it might be so.
"Be sure he is so. I'll fetch the liqueur brandy," and, armed with hispanacea, he followed Henry upstairs. Signor Mannetti had not moved, butas they approached him, to their infinite relief he did so, opened hiseyes, stared wildly about him, and then realized the situation.
"Alas! Now I have frightened you out of your senses," he said, lookingat their anxious faces. "All is well. In less than another hour I shouldhave summoned Sir Walter. But just that last half-hour overcame me, andI sank into sleep. What is the time?"
"A quarter to two, signor."
"Good! Then let your uncle be summoned. I have found out the secret."
"A thimbleful of old cognac, signor?" asked Masters.
"Willingly, my friend, willingly. I see how wise you both were. Iapprove and thank you. You thought that I had followed the others intothe shades, yet meant to restore me if you could without frightening SirWalter. To go to sleep was unpardonable."
Abraham Masters and Henry descended with the good news, while the oldman drank.
"I shall detain you half an hour or so," he said, when they all returnedto him. "But I have no fear that anybody will want to fall asleep."
Sir Walter spoke.
"Thank Heaven, signor, thank Heaven! All is well with you?"
"All is absolutely well with me, but then I have slept refreshingly forsome time. You, I fear, have not closed your eyes."
"Would you have any objection to Masters hearing what you may haveto tell us? By so doing a true and ungarbled report will get out toChadlands."
"My report will go out to the whole world, Sir Walter. All isaccomplished and established on certain proofs. Your good spaniel hasplayed his part also. I salute him--the old Prince."
Henry now observed that the dog was stretched on the floor at SignorMannetti's feet.
"Still asleep?"
Mary knelt to pat the spaniel and started back.
"How horribly cold he is!"
"For ever asleep--a martyr to science. He was to die on Friday,remember. He has received euthanasia a little sooner, and nothing in hislife has become him like the leaving of it. The last victim of the GreyRoom. Mourn him not, he passed without a pang--as did his betters."
"But, but--you spoke of crime and criminals!" gasped Sir Walter.
"And truly. Great crimes have been committed in this room and greatcriminals committed them. Is a crime any less a crime because thedoers have mouldered in their dishonored graves for nearly five hundredyears?"
"Your handling of speech is not ours, and you use words differ
ently. Theold dog did not suffer, you say? How did he come to die--in his sleep?"
"Even so. Without a sigh, the last venerable victim of this murderingshadow."
"You saw him die, and yet were safe yourself, sir?" asked Lennox.
"That is what happened. Now sit down all of you, father Abraham also,and in five minutes all will be as clear as day."
They obeyed him silently.
"Yes, a master criminal, one whose name has rung down the ages and willfrom to-morrow win a further resonance. Would that we could bring him toaccount; but he has already gone to it, if justice lies at the rootof things, as all men pray, and you and I believe, Sir Walter. Aninteresting reflection: How many suffer, if they do not actually perish,from the sins of the dead? Not only the sins of our father are visitedupon us, but, if we could trace the infliction, the crimes of countlessdead men accomplished long before we were born into this sufferingworld. I speak in a parable, but this is literal, actual. Dead mencommitted these murders, and left this legacy of woe."
Signor Mannetti stroked the lifeless spaniel.
"When we were left alone I picked him up and set him on the bed. He didnot waken, and I knew that he would never waken again. Now let us lookat this noble bed, if you please. Here is the link, you see, withoutwhich so much that I told you yesterday must have sounded no more thanthe idle chatter of an old man. Come and use your eyes. Ah, if onlypeople had used their eyes sooner!"
They followed him, and he pointed to a framework of carved wood thatconnected the four posts.
"What is this on the frieze running above the capitals of the littleIonic pillars?"
"The papal crown and keys," said Mary.
"Good! Now regard the other side."
"A coat of arms--a golden bull on a red ground--why, father, that waswhat puzzled you at Florence!"
"Surely it was. The thing stuck in my memory, yet I could not rememberwhere I had seen it before."
Signor Mannetti prepared for his effect, then made it.
"The arms of the Borgia! The arms of the Spanish Pope, Alexander VI. ofunholy memory. So all is told, and we will soon go to bed. Having markedthem this morning, you will see how readily I was led into the heart ofthe secret. It only needed some such certain sign. And everything thathad happened was consonant with this explanation. The first to sufferpuzzled me; but I solved that problem, too. You shall hear how eachwoman and each man was slain. Look at this mattress upholstered insatin--there lies the unsleeping thing that brings sleep so quickly toothers! I guessed it this morning; I proved it to-night. At seventeenminutes past eight Prince was dead; but not until I awoke, near twoo'clock, did I dare approach him. For how did he die? The moment theheat of his ancient body penetrated the mattress under him, it releasedits awful venom. He stretched himself, curled up again, and, as theexhalation rose, with scarcely a tremor he passed from sleep into death.Needless to tell you that I kept far from him, for I guessed that notuntil the poor fellow was cold would the demon in the mattress sink downand disappear, as the effret into his bottle. Then mattress and dog werealike harmless, as they are now. I gave him only five hours, for he wasa small, thin beast, and the heat soon left his body."
"But, signor--"
"I shall anticipate all your objections if you will listen a littlelonger, dear Mrs. May. Let us sit again, and question me after I havespoken, if any doubts remain unanswered. Another liqueur, Masters."
He sipped, and preserved silence for a few moments, while none spoke.Then from his armchair he traversed the story of the Grey Room, andproved amazingly familiar with the smallest detail of it. Indeed, whenat last he had finished, none could find any questions to ask. "Thereare two very interesting preliminary facts to note, my friends," beganthe signor. He beamed upon them, and enjoyed his own exposition withunconcealed gusto. "The first is that a room, already suffering fromsinister traditions, and held to be haunted, should have been preciselythat into which this infernal engine of destruction was introduced. Yetwhat more natural? You have the furniture, and, for the time being,do not know what to do with it. The house is already full of beautifulthings, and these surplus treasures you store here, to be safe and outof the way, in a room which is not put to its proper use. You are notcollectors or experts. Sir Walter's father did not share his father'senthusiasm, neither did Sir Walter care for old furniture. So the piecestake their place in this room, and are, more or less, forgotten.
"That is the first interesting fact, and the second seems to me tobe this: that those who perished here in living memory all died atdifferent places in the room, and so died that their deaths could notbe immediately and undeviatingly traced to the bed. Hardcastle, forexample, as you have related his conversation, did not associate thedeath of poor Captain May with that of the lady of the hospital elevenyears before; and Sir Walter himself saw no reason to connect the stillearlier death of his aged aunt, which took place when he was a boy, withthe disaster that followed.
"Let us now examine for a moment the amazing fact that none of thestigmata of death was found in those who perished here.
"Death has three modes--the pale horseman strikes us down by asphyxia,by coma, and by syncope. In asphyxia he stabs the lungs; in coma hislance is aimed at the brain; in syncope, at the heart.
"When a man dies by asphyxia, it means that the action of the musclesby which he breathes is stopped, or the work of his lungs preventedby injury, or the free passage of air arrested, as in drowning, orstrangulation. It may also mean that embolism has taken place, and thepulmonary artery is blocked, withholding blood from the lungs. But itwas not thus that any died in this chamber.
"Coma occurs through an apoplexy, or concussion; by the use of certainnarcotic or mineral poisons; and in various other ways, all of which areruled out for us.
"There remains syncope. A heart ceases to beat from haemorrhage, orstarvation, from exhaustion, or the depressing influence of certaindrugs. They who died here died from syncope; but why? No autopsy cantell us why. They passed with only their Maker to sustain them, and noneleaves behind an explanation of what overtook him, or her. Yet we knowfull well, even in the case of Peter Hardcastle, concerning whom thepolice felt doubt, that he was quite dead before Mr. Lennox discoveredhim and picked him up. We know that the phenomena of rigor mortis hadalready set in before his body reached London.
"Nothing, however, is new under the sun. Many journals related the factthat these people had passed away without a cause, as though it werean event without a parallel. It is not. Your Dr. Templeman, in 1893,describes two examples of sudden death with absolute absence of anypathological condition in any part of the bodies to account for it.He describes the case of a man of forty-three, and calls it 'emotionalinhibition of the heart.' The heart was arrested in diastole, insteadof systole, as is usually the case; the mode of death was syncope; thecause of death, undiscoverable.
"A layman may be permitted, I suppose, to describe 'emotional inhibitionof the heart' as 'shock'; but we know, in our cases, that if a shock,it was not a painful one--perhaps not even an unpleasant one. Since allother emotions can be pleasant or unpleasant, why must we assume thatthe supreme emotion of death may not be pleasant also, did we know howto make it so? Perhaps the Borgia, among their secrets, had discoveredthis. At least the familiar signs of death were wholly absent fromthe countenances of the dead. The jaws were not set; the familiar,expressions were not changed, as usually happens from rigidity of facialmuscles; their faces were not sallow; their temples were not sunk; theirbrows were not contracted.
"We will now take the victims, one by one, and show how death happenedto each of them, yet left no sign that it had happened. Frankly,the first case alone presented any difficulties to me. For a time Idespaired of proving how the bed had destroyed Sir Walter's ancestor,because she had not entered it. But the difficulty becomes clear to onepossessing our present knowledge, for once prove the properties of thebed, and the rest follows. You will say that they were not proved, onlyguessed. That was true, until Prince died. His dea
th crowned myedifice of theory and converted it to fact. As to why the bed has theseproperties, that is for science to find out presently.
"To return, then, to the old lady, the ancient woman of your race, whocame unexpectedly to the Christmas re-union and was put to sleep in theGrey Room at her own wish. She was found dead next morning on the floor.She had not entered the bed. The exact facts have long disappearedfrom human knowledge, and it is only possible to re-construct them byinference and the support of those straightforward events that followed.I conceive, then, that though the old lady did not create the warmththat liberated the evil spirit of the bed and so destroyed her, thatwarmth was nevertheless artificially created. What must have happened,think you? The bed is made up in haste and the fire lighted. But thefire is a long way from the bed, and would have no effect to create thenecessary temperature. There is, however, a hot-water bottle in the bed,or a hot brick wrapped in flannel. The old lady is about to enter herbed. She has extinguished her candle, but the flame of the fire giveslight. She has prayed; she throws off her dressing-gown and flings backthe covering of the bed, to fall an instant victim to the miasma. Shedrops backward and is found dead next morning, by which time the bottleand bed are also cold.
"Taken alone, I grant this explanation may fail to win your sympathy;but consider the cumulative evidence in store. The old lady may, ofcourse, have died a natural death. She may not have turned down the bed.There is nobody living to tell us. All that Sir Walter can recollect isthat she was found on the floor of the room dead. Exactly where, hedoes not remember. But for my own part I have no doubt whatever that herdeath took place in that way.
"We are on safer ground with the other tragic happenings, though, savein the case of Nurse Forrester, there is nothing on the surface ofevents to connect their deaths with the accursed bed. You will see,however, that it is very easy to do so. In the lady's case all is clearenough. She goes to bed tired and she sleeps peacefully into deathwithout waking. She is probably asleep within ten minutes, before herown warmth has penetrated through sheet and blanket to the mattressbeneath and so destroyed her. Suppose that she is dead in half an hour.She retired to rest at ten o'clock; she is called at seven; the room ispresently broken into and she is then not only dead, but cold. The demonhas gone to sleep again under its lifeless burden. Now had she beenstout and well covered, there had hardly been time for her to grow cold,and those who came to her assistance might even have perished, too.But she is a little, thin thing, and the heat has gone out of her. Thisassured the safety of those who came to the bedside. One can make nolaws as to the time necessary for a dead body to grow as cold as itssurroundings. The bodies of the old and the young cool more quickly thanthose of adult persons. If the conditions are favorable a body may coolin six to eight hours. Prince took but five, poor little bag of bones.
"In the case of Captain May the conditions are altogether different.Let me speak with all tenderness and spare you pain. Be sure that hesuffered no more than the others. The bed is now no longer made; themattress is bare. That matters not to him. Clad in his pyjamas, with arailway rug to cover him and his dressing-gown for a pillow, he flingshimself down, and from his powerful and sanguine frame warmth isinstantly communicated to the mattress that supports him. Probably buta few minutes were sufficient to liberate the poison. He is not asleep,but on the edge of sleep when he becomes suddenly conscious of physicalsensations beyond his experience. He had breathed death, but yet he isnot dead. His brain works, and can send a message to his limbs, whichare still able to obey. But his hour has come. He leaps from the bed inno suffering, but conscious, perhaps of an oppression, or an unfamiliarodor--we cannot say what. We only know that he feels intense surprise,not pain for in that dying moment his emotions are fixed for ever bythe muscles of his face. He needs air and seeks it. He hurries to therecess, kneels on the cushion, and throws open the window. Or the windowmay have been already open--we cannot tell. To reach it is his lastconscious act, and in another moment he is dead. The bed is notsuspected. Why should it be? Who could prove that he had even laid downupon it? Indeed it was believed and reported at the inquest that he hadnot done so. Yet that is what unquestionably happened. Otherwise hiscandle would have burned to the socket. He had blown it out and settledto rest, be sure.
"We have now to deal with the detective, and here again there wasnothing to associate his death with the bed of the Borgia. Yet you willsee without my aid how easily he came by his death. Peter Hardcastledesires to be alone, that he may study the Grey Room and everything init. He is left as he wishes, walks here and there, sketches a groundplan of the room and exhausts its more obvious peculiarities. Wouldthat he had known the meaning of the golden bull! Presently he strikesa train of thought and sits down to develop it. Or he may not havefinished with the room and have taken a seat from which he could surveyeverything around him. He sits at the foot of the bed--there on theright side. He makes his notes, then his last thoughts enter hismind--abstract reflection on the subject of his trade. For a moment heforgets the matter immediately in hand and writes his ideas in his book.He has been sitting on the bed now for some while--how long we know not,but long enough to create the heightened temperature which is all thewatchful fiend within the mattress requires to summon him. Then ascendsthe spirit of death, and Hardcastle, surprised as Captain May wassurprised, leaps to his feet. He takes two or three steps forward; hisbook and pen fall from his hand and he drops upon his face--a dead man.He is, of course, still warm when Mr. Lennox finds him; but the bed heleaped from is cold again and harmless--its work done.
"There remains the priest, the Rev. Septimus May. He neither lay on thebed, nor sat upon it. But what did he do? He clearly knelt beside it along time, engaged in prayer. Nothing more natural than that he shouldstretch his arms over the mattress; bury his face in his hands, and soremain in commune with the Almighty, uttering petition after petitionfor the being he conceived as existing in the Grey Room, without powerto escape from it. Thus leaning upon the bed with his arms stretchedupon it and his head perhaps sunk between them, he presently createsthat heightened temperature sufficient to arouse the destroyer. Itenters into him--how, we know not yet--and he sinks unconscious to thefloor, while the bed is quickly cold again.
"As to the four detectives--Inspector Frith and his men--pure chancesaved the life of at least one of them, and by so doing, chance alsoprevented them from discovering that the bed in their midst was the seatof all the trouble. Had one among them taken up his watch upon it, hewould certainly have died in the presence of his collaborators; butthe men sat on chairs in the corners of the room, and the chairs wereharmless. Whether their gas masks would indeed have saved them remains,of course, to be proved. I doubt it.
"Such, my friends, were the masterpieces of the Borgia, for whom theprofoundest chemists worked willingly enough and by doing so doubtlessmade their fortunes. Their poisons were so designed to act that, bytheir very operation, the secrets of them were concealed, and all cluesobliterated. Chemistry knows nothing of the supernatural, yet can, as inthis case, achieve results that may well appear to be black magic.
"And if we, of this day, fail to find them out, it is easy to guess thatin their own times, much that they caused to be done was set down to theoperations of Heaven alone.
"Science will be deeply interested in your Borgia mattress, Sir Walter.Science, I doubt not, will carefully unpick it and make a series of veryremarkable experiments; yet I make bold to believe that science maybe baffled by the cunning and forgotten knowledge of men long dust. Weshall see as to that."
He rose and bade Masters call Stephano. Then, with a few words, theyparted, and each shook the old man's hand and expressed a deep andgenuine gratitude before they did so.
"A little remains to add," said Signor Mannetti. "You shall hear what itis to-morrow. For the moment, 'Good-night!' It has been a crowning joyto my long life that I was able to do this service to new and valuedfriends."
In the servants' hall next morning Masters related what he h
ad heard.
"And if you ask me," he concluded, "I draw back what I thought about himbeing younger than he pretends. He's older--old as the hills--older thanthat horror in the Grey Boom. He's a demon; and he's killed the old dog;and I believe he's a Borge himself if the truth was known."