Call Mr. Fortune | Page 6

was a loosening of the road, as if a
heavy car had been brought up sharply or made a violent swerve. He
walked to and fro scanning the ground. Another of those foreign
matches.
He was just picking it up when a motor-car stopped a few yards away.
Two men jumped out and came towards him. One was middle-aged and
singularly without distinction. The other had a youthful and very jaunty
air, and it was only when he came near that Reggie saw the fellow was
old enough to be his father. An actor's face, with that look of calculated

expression, and an actor's way of dressing, a trifle too emphatic. His
present part was the gay young fellow.
"Dr. Fortune, I think? " He smiled all over his face.
"I am Dr. Fortune."
"Reconstructing the crime, eh? Oh, you needn't be discreet. I'm Lomas
- Stanley Lomas - Criminal Investigation Department, don't you know?
Sir Lawson Hunter came round to me last night. Patient's doing well, I
see. That's providential. Just a moment - just a moment." He skipped
away from Reggie to his companion, and they went over the ground.
But Reggie thought them very superficial. Lomas skipped back again.
"He didn't bleed, then. The other man did, though - the man you
found."
"In the middle of the road. And I found him dead in the gutter."
"It's quaint what the criminal don't think of. I'm surprised every time.
Did you find anything here?"
Reggie held out his match. "There were two more like that by the other
man."
Lomas turned it over. "Belgian make. You buy them all over the
Continent, don't you know."
"The Archduchess carries them."
"Now, that's very interesting. If you don't mind I'll walk up to the house
with you." Upon the way he praised the beauties of nature and the
quality of the morning air.
As they came to the door of Boldrewood a big car passed them with the
Archduchess driving alone. Lomas put up his eyeglass. "She's not
overcome with grief, what?"
"Not quite."

"Might be bravado, don't you know."
"I don't know."
"It takes some of them that way," Lomas said pensively. He turned on
the steps of the house and looked after the car as it wound in and out
among the beeches. " Striking woman. Yes. I'll come up to your room,
if you don't mind."
"I thought you wanted to say something," Reggie said.
Lomas did not answer till they were upstairs. "Well, no. Not to say
anything," he resumed, and lit a cigarette. " I want another opinion, as
you fellows say. Sir Lawson Hunter has made up his mind."
"Oh, he always does that."
Lomas lifted an eyebrow. "Well, look at it. Somebody in a car laid for
our Archduke. The other poor devil was cut down by mistake. And the
somebody had nerve enough to go on. That's striking. The Archduchess
comes of pretty wild stock. In love or out of love she wouldn't stick at a
trifle. You find her matches by each body. You find a hatpin in the
Archduke. That's a blunder, what? Yes, but it's a woman's blunder. She
finds he isn't quite dead after all her trouble, she is desperate, and -
wild." He made a gesture of stabbing.
"So you've made up your mind too, Mr. Lomas? "
Lomas blew smoke rings. "I'm wasting your time, doctor. I want to
know - has it occurred to you - the Archduchess and the Archduke
Leopold - working it together? If she's fallen in love with Leopold.
That straightens it out, don't you know."
"Guess again," Reggie said.
Lomas lit another cigarette. "Well, that's what I want to know. You saw
them together just after the crime." He lifted an eyebrow.
"Nothing doing," said Reggie.

"I'm afraid so. I'm afraid so. It's a disturbing case, doctor. Nothing
doing, as you say. If I had all the evidence in my hands, I expect there's
no one I could touch. You can't indict royalty. The Archduke's smash -
well, let's say it's all in the family. But this poor devil they killed!
Who's to pay for him? These royal dagoes come over and run amuck on
an English road, and I can't touch them. Disheartening, what? That's the
trouble, doctor."
Reggie nodded and, as his breakfast made its appearance, Lomas rose
to go. He would not have even coffee. "Better get busy, don't you know.
We must see if we can put the fear of God into them. If they'll go
scurrying back to Bohemia it's the best way out." He skipped off, his
jauntiness put on again like a coat.
Reggie was standing at the window with his after-breakfast pipe when
the Archduchess brought her car back. She was very pale in