"The assassin stole the mummy," said Archie, as the four men entered the
museum, "and substituted the body of the murdered man."
"That is all A B C," snapped Braddock, issuing into the vast room, "but
we want to know the name of the assassin, if we are to revenge Bolton
and get back my mummy. Oh, what a loss!--what a loss! I have lost nine
hundred pounds, or say one thousand, considering the cost of bringing
Inca Caxas to England."
Archie forebore to remind the Professor as to who had really lost
the money, as the scientist was not in a fit state to be talked to
reasonably, and seemed much more concerned because his Peruvian relic of
humanity had been lost than for the terrible death of Sidney Bolton.
But by this time Painter--a fair-haired young constable of small
intelligence--was examining the packing case and surveying the dead. Dr.
Robinson also looked with a professional eye, and Braddock, wiping
his purple face and gasping with exhaustion, sat down on a stone
sarcophagus. Archie, folding his arms, leaned against the wall and
waited quietly to hear what the experts in crime and medicine would say.
The packing case was deep and wide and long, made of tough teak and
banded at intervals with iron bands. Within this was a case of tin,
which, when it held the mummy, had been soldered up; impervious to
air and water. But the unknown person who had extracted the mummy, to
replace it by a murdered man's body, had cut open the tin casing with
some sharp instrument. There was straw round the tin casing and straw
within, amongst which the body of the unfortunate young man was placed.
Rigor mortis had set in, and the corpse, with straight legs and hands
placed stiffly by its side, lay against the back of the tin casing
surrounded more or less by the straw packing, or at least by so much as
the Professor had not torn away. The face looked dark, and the eyes were
wide open and staring. Robinson stepped forward and ran his hand round
the neck. Uttering an ejaculation, he removed the woollen scarf which
the dead man had probably worn to keep himself from catching cold, and
those who looked on saw that a red-colored window cord was tightly bound
about the throat of the dead.
"The poor devil has been strangled," said the doctor quietly. "See: the
assassin has left the bow-string on, and had the courage to place over
it this scarf, which belonged to Bolton."
"How do you know that, sir?" asked Painter heavily.
"Because Widow Anne knitted that scarf for Bolton before he went
to Malta. He showed it to me, laughingly, remarking that his mother
evidently thought that he was going to Lapland."