The Leavenworth Case | Page 3

detective, was not the thin,
wiry individual with the piercing eye you are doubtless expecting to see.
On the contrary, Mr. Gryce was a portly, comfortable personage with
an eye that never pierced, that did not even rest on you. If it rested
anywhere, it was always on some insignificant object in the vicinity,
some vase, inkstand, book, or button. These things he would seem to
take into his confidence, make the repositories of his conclusions; but
as for you--you might as well be the steeple on Trinity Church, for all
connection you ever appeared to have with him or his thoughts. At
present, then, Mr. Gryce was, as I have already suggested, on intimate
terms with the door-knob.
"A dreadful look," I repeated.
His eye shifted to the button on my sleeve.
"Come," he said, "the coast is clear at last."
Leading the way, he mounted the stairs, but stopped on the upper
landing. "Mr. Raymond," said he, "I am not in the habit of talking
much about the secrets of my profession, but in this case everything
depends upon getting the right clue at the start. We have no common
villainy to deal with here; genius has been at work. Now sometimes an
absolutely uninitiated mind will intuitively catch at something which

the most highly trained intellect will miss. If such a thing should occur,
remember that I am your man. Don't go round talking, but come to me.
For this is going to be a great case, mind you, a great case. Now, come
on."
"But the ladies?"
"They are in the rooms above; in grief, of course, but tolerably
composed for all that, I hear." And advancing to a door, he pushed it
open and beckoned me in.
All was dark for a moment, but presently, my eyes becoming
accustomed to the place, I saw that we were in the library.
"It was here he was found," said he; "in this room and upon this very
spot." And advancing, he laid his hand on the end of a large
baize-covered table that, together with its attendant chairs, occupied the
centre of the room. "You see for yourself that it is directly opposite this
door," and, crossing the floor, he paused in front of the threshold of a
narrow passageway, opening into a room beyond. "As the murdered
man was discovered sitting in this chair, and consequently with his
back towards the passageway, the assassin must have advanced through
the doorway to deliver his shot, pausing, let us say, about here." And
Mr. Gryce planted his feet firmly upon a certain spot in the carpet,
about a foot from the threshold before mentioned.
"But--" I hastened to interpose.
"There is no room for 'but,'" he cried. "We have studied the situation."
And without deigning to dilate upon the subject, he turned immediately
about and, stepping swiftly before me, led the way into the passage
named. "Wine closet, clothes closet, washing apparatus, towel-rack," he
explained, waving his hand from side to side as we hurried through,
finishing with "Mr. Leavenworth's private apartment," as that room of
comfortable aspect opened upon us.
Mr. Leavenworth's private apartment! It was here then that it ought to
be, the horrible, blood-curdling it that yesterday was a living, breathing

man. Advancing to the bed that was hung with heavy curtains, I raised
my hand to put them back, when Mr. Gryce, drawing them from my
clasp, disclosed lying upon the pillow a cold, calm face looking so
natural I involuntarily started.
"His death was too sudden to distort the features," he remarked, turning
the head to one side in a way to make visible a ghastly wound in the
back of the cranium. "Such a hole as that sends a man out of the world
without much notice. The surgeon will convince you it could never
have been inflicted by himself. It is a case of deliberate murder."
Horrified, I drew hastily back, when my glance fell upon a door
situated directly opposite me in the side of the wall towards the hall. It
appeared to be the only outlet from the room, with the exception of the
passage through which we had entered, and I could not help wondering
if it was through this door the assassin had entered on his roundabout
course to the library. But Mr. Gryce, seemingly observant of my glance,
though his own was fixed upon the chandelier, made haste to remark,
as if in reply to the inquiry in my face:
"Found locked on the inside; may have come that way and may not; we
don't pretend to say."
Observing now that the bed was undisturbed in its arrangement, I
remarked, "He had not retired, then?"
"No; the tragedy must be ten hours old. Time for the murderer to