Read Online The Dark Volume by Gordon Dahlquist - Free Book Online

Temple asked with sympathy, “the morning boy at the stables?”
    “How did you know that?” asked Franck.
    “She's just come from the stables,” said Olsteen with a shrewd smile. “No doubt this Willem's death was all the other lad could speak of.”
    “You are correct, sir.” Miss Temple nodded severely. “People will peck at another person's tragedy like daws at a mislaid seed cake.”
    Elöise reached out for Miss Temple's hand.
    “But the groom did not say who had done the murders,” added Miss Temple, a touch too hopefully.
    “I shouldn't expect he did,” said Mrs. Daube.
    “Shall we retire for a moment to our room?” Elöise asked Miss Temple.
    “Of course.” Miss Temple smiled at Olsteen and Franck. “I am obliged to both of you for your kindness, however unnecessary.”
    Elöise dipped her knee to Mr. Olsteen, gently turned Miss Temple toward the stairs, and then respectfully addressed their hostess.
    “Mrs. Daube, if it would be no trouble for us to dine in some twenty minutes?”
    “Of course not, my dear,” answered the innkeeper evenly. “I shall just be carving the joint.”

    THE WOMEN sat side by side on their bed, door latched, whispering closely.
    “It is Chang's,” exclaimed Miss Temple, holding out the bloodstained book. “I found it in the other room.”
    “I'm sure it must be. And here …” Elöise dug in the pocket of her dress and came out with a small smooth purple stone and a cigarette butt. She snatched the stone away with her other hand and held out the cigarette butt to Miss Temple. “… is evidence of Doctor Svenson.”
    Miss Temple studied the butt-end without success for crimping. “Are you sure it must be his?”
    “It was crushed to the floor just here.”
    “But perhaps Mr. Olsteen, or one of his fellows—may they not have been in this very room?”
    “As I'm certain many men read poetry.”
    Miss Temple did not see the comparison at all.
    “I have seen Chang with this very book,” she explained. “The consumption of tobacco is as common as cholera in Venice.”
    “Doctor Svenson purchased a quantity of Danish cigarettes from a fisherman,” answered Elöise. “You will see the maker's mark.”
    She turned the foul thing in her hand until Miss Temple could indeed discern a small gold-inked bird.
    “Well, then,” Miss Temple said, “perhaps it tells us more. I found another such remnant —though I do not know if it bore this mark—in the abandoned house I examined on my way back from the livery. If the Doctor had also been inside it—”
    “You went into an abandoned house? Alone? In the midst of these murders ?”
    “I did not know I was in the midst of anything,” began Miss Temple.
    “And you just brazenly lied to us all downstairs!”
    “What ought I have said? I do not know those people, I do not know what involvement they might have had—”
    “Involvement?” cried Elöise. “Why should they have any involvement —they were trying to help you!”
    “But why?”
    “Kindness, Celeste! Plain decency—”
    “O Elöise! The hair, the bootprints—and now there have been murders here! That empty house belonged to the most recent victims.”
    Elöise threw the cigarette butt to the floor. “We went looking for you, Celeste—as soon as I learned what had happened, we went the length of the road to the stables! We should have seen you on our way! But you had vanished! I was quite disturbed and frightened!”
    “O you had your burly fellows,” said Miss Temple.
    “I was frightened for you!”
    “But I have discovered—”
    “We have discovered we are in great danger! We have discovered the Doctor and Cardinal were both here—but we do not know if they survived to leave!”
    IT WAS not a thought that had occurred to Miss Temple. So happy had she been to find Chang's book that the notion of its somehow being a token of his peril seemed too cruel a contradiction. It was then, looking up at Elöise—whose gaze had fallen to the