"I think I told you that great-aunt Adelaide had made me her executor.
There wasn't very much to be done in the way of legal matters, but I had
to go through her papers."
"That would be a fairly heavy task in itself. I should imagine there
were reams of family letters."
"Stacks of them, and most of them highly uninteresting. There was one
packet, however, which I thought might repay a careful perusal. It was a
bundle of correspondence from her brother Peter."
"The Canon of tragic memory," said Lulworth.
"Exactly, of tragic memory, as you say; a tragedy that has never been
fathomed."
"Probably the simplest explanation was the correct one," said Sir
Lulworth; "he slipped on the stone staircase and fractured his skull in
falling."
Egbert shook his head. "The medical evidence all went to prove that the
blow on the head was struck by some one coming up behind him. A wound
caused by violent contact with the steps could not possibly have been
inflicted at that angle of the skull. They experimented with a dummy
figure falling in every conceivable position."
"But the motive?" exclaimed Sir Lulworth; "no one had any interest in
doing away with him, and the number of people who destroy Canons of the
Established Church for the mere fun of killing must be extremely limited.
Of course there are individuals of weak mental balance who do that sort
of thing, but they seldom conceal their handiwork; they are more
generally inclined to parade it.
Pages:
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100