The Sleeping Sphinx

Author:John Dickson Carr [Carr, John Dickson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780425019542
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Corp.
Published: 2010-05-24T12:29:41+00:00

It had been built between two cypresses; they did not shade it, but they threw shadows straight ahead on either side. It was square, of heavy gray stone, squat, with a little pillar on each side of a paneled iron door.

"Is that"—Holden's voice seemed to burst out, against thick silence, before he lowered it to a mutter—''is that.. .?"

"The new vault? Yes." Dr. Fell breathed ponderously; either from quick walking or from some emotion. "The old one," he added, "is up on that hill there."

"What exactly are we going to do?"

"As soon as my excellent friend Crawford gets here, we are going to unlock and unseal the door."

"Unseal it?"

"Yes. Merely to take one brief look inside. We shall do no more."

"But Mr. Reid! The old vicar! Will he like this?"

"The vicarage," returned Dr. Fell, "is on the other side of that hill. He will not know. As for one Mr. Windlesham, who is supposed to look after these premises, I have every reason to hope that he is now too full of beer to interfere."

"What do you expect to see in the vault?"

Dr. Fell did not answer this.

"Hear now," he said, "my story."

The crooked little alley leading up to the tomb, with its raised graves on either side, was paved with tiny pebbles. Dr. Fell's canes rattled among the pebbles as he sat down on the big flat stone of one of the raised graves. It was just inside the shadow thrown by the cypress on the right-hand side of the vault.

"I am the sport of fates and devilry," observed Dr. Fell, removing his shovel hat and putting it beside him. "At Christmas (yes, last Christmas) I was the guest of Professor Westbury at Chippenham. Two days after Christmas it occurred to me to go over and pay a call on Mrs. Andrew Devereux."

"On . . . ?"

"Yes. On Mammy Two, who had been dead for several years. That," said Dr. Fell bitterly, "is how we kept in touch with our friends during wartime. Unless they had been blitzed or otherwise hurt by some Satan's toy, we imagined them still as healthy as ever.

"With my customary careful presence of mind, I even neglected to send a telegram or any message. I merely hired a car and was driven the few miles to Caswall. In front of the house, among other motorcars, I saw a hearse."

Dr. Fell paused, putting up his hands to his eyes.

"My dear Holden, I didn't know what to do. My arrival on a social call seemed a little out of place. I was telling the driver of the car to turn round, when someone ran over the bridge and motioned to me. It was—"

"Celia?"

"Yes."

Again for a moment Dr. Fell pondered in silence.

"Now that girl was in a badly disturbed state of mind. One moment! I don't mean what you are thinking. I merely mean that she was not herself; and it worried me badly.

"She asked me if I would please come inside for a few minutes, on a matter of very vital importance.

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