The Monkey God | Page 8

second shot? D'ye reckon both parties could
have fired at once, so the two reports sounded like one?"
"U'm; that's possible," Forrester agreed, "but you'll remember that five
of the six witnesses to the tragedy fail to recall seeing anything
resembling a man at the window when Milsted died, and they'd not
have been apt to miss seeing a pistol flash. No, I don't think-- here, wait
a minute! How long can you postpone the inquest?"
"Well, there's no limit prescribed by law, but the jury has to be sworn
super visum corporis--on viewing the body, you know--and we can't
keep poor old Milsted above ground indefinitely, waiting to swear in
the jury. Tell you what I'll do, if you say. I'll impanel a jury, swear 'em
in over the body, and then continue the inquest subject to call. I can get
away with that, all right. What were you going to suggest?"
"Take that bullet you found in the brain down to Roach's sporting
goods store and have one of their arms experts look at it. I noticed an
English air-pistol on display in their window the other day, and it
strikes me an air-gun might be the explanation to the whole affair. If
the murder had been committed with one of those weapons we'd have
about the same amount of mystery we have here, for the thing would
probably shoot with practically no sound and would make no flash.
These guns are comparatively new in this country, but I daresay they're
fairly well known in the British possessions."
"You think the murderer was an Englishman, then?"
"Not exactly that, but I've got what you'd probably call a 'hunch,'
Nesbit."
"Good enough. We'll play it through. I'll see what Roach's man has to
say and report later. We can hold the inquest up a week or so if
necessary, while we gumshoe around for more dope."
"I don't think we'll need wait that long," the Professor told him, as he
hung up the 'phone and resumed marking a pile of examination papers.

"MISSIE like buy ve'y pretty fancy work?" a round-faced young man
with somnolent eyes, clad in a threadbare overcoat and rather decrepit
fez, demanded the following afternoon, when Rosalie answered the
ringing of the front doorbell.
"No, I--" the Professor's pretty ward began, then checked her refusal,
half spoken, as her large, topaz eyes suddenly narrowed the tiniest
fraction of an inch. "Come in," she invited. "I won't promise to buy
anything; but I'll look."
"Missie like my t'ings ve'y much," the peddler announced confidently,
as he followed her down the hall and into the living-room. "See--" he
opened an imitation alligator-hide suitcase and displayed the usual
stock in trade of the itinerant Armenian huckster-- "ve'y pretty, ve'y
cheap, Missie. I t'ink you like buy some, mebbe so."
Attracted by the voices, Professor Forrester put down his book and
strolled into the living- room, leaving the study door open behind him.
"Shopping again?" he asked with a twinkle in his eye.
Rosalie had spent almost a year in occidental freedom since the
Professor rescued her from the entourage of a certain villainous
half-caste from Singapore, and the avidity with which she conformed to
the Western custom of permitting women to buy their own finery had
caused the Professor more than a little amusement.
"Yes, Uncle Harvey," she returned, throwing him a radiant smile. "This
gentleman says he's from Armenia, and he has some of the loveliest
things."
Forrester looked with astonishment from the girl to the mass of
miscellaneous horrors spread on the floor. Even a layman could see
these alleged Madeira and Normandy scarfs and Egyptian table covers
were of the home-brewed variety, the sort which are stamped out,
thousands at a time, by machinery in New Jersey, and foisted on a
credulous public by smooth-spoken knaves from the Levant.

The Professor, who knew the home industries of every people in the
world as well as he understood their dialects, could recognize the
counterfeits with one eye closed, and Rosalie, who had spent ten years
of her life in the heart of the East should certainly have been the last
one to be deceived by such crude forgeries. Yet there she stood,
apparently enraptured, and begged the vendor to display more of his
atrocities.
"This ve'y ni-ce piece work," that worthy commended, throwing a
cotton cloth thickly encrusted with machine embroidery over his right
arm so that it swathed him from shoulder to wrist. "This made
'specially for ladies who like ni-ce t'ings."
His stock patter swept rapidly on, detailing the manifold perfections of
the luncheon cloth, but his sleepy eyes traveled round the room,
glanced through the open door of the study, and rested on a tiny brass
paper weight which stood on the Professor's desk. The