"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 231 - Garden of Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

Looking at Cranston, Weston caught a slight negative headshake; then, tactfully, the commissioner
suggested:

"Later, Miss Bendleton. It would be better if you rested first."

Dr. Williams nodded his appreciation. He helped the girl to a couch, insisting that she lie down. He sent
for a glass of water, and gave Fay two pills to swallow. Within a few minutes, the girl was resting
comfortably. The doctor approached the others.

"We must thank Professor Malbray," he undertoned. "Those pills are a moderate dose of Somnotone.
You can observe the quieting effect on Miss Bendleton." He turned to Commissioner Weston. "Suppose
you take Professor Malbray to the study. I shall remain with the girl."

On the way upstairs, The Shadow had a good chance to observe Professor Theophilus Malbray, a man
of whom he had heard much, but had seen nothing. Malbray was known as a habitual recluse, and he
looked the part.

He was elderly, with wrinkled features, but his stride was spry and his eyes clear. White hair added to his
benign appearance, and his face took on an expression of deep sorrow when he saw the body of his
dead friend, Richard Bendleton.

Some persons would have classed Malbray as eccentric; others would have termed his actions to be the
marks of genius. From the moment that he finished viewing the body, Malbray seemed to enter an
absent-minded world of his own.

Stoop-shouldered, his clothes hanging baggily, he paced across the room, his chin deep in his hand. His
lips moved, as though he were talking to himself. When he sat down near the desk, he looked from face
to face with a curious, quizzical expression.

Commissioner Weston was explaining all that happened. At moments, Malbray nodded; at other
intervals, he seemed not to hear. Though he had been at Bendleton's previously, he viewed the room as
though he had never seen it. At times, he glanced at papers lying on the desk; once, he reached for the
telephone, only to withdraw his hand, a dour smile on his face.
He saw the weather doll, the one that The Shadow had substituted for the blackened one; picking up the
object, Malbray glanced at it curiously and laid it aside.

By then, Weston had finished his harangue without a verbal response from Malbray. A bit irked, the
commissioner suddenly demanded:

"Have you been listening, Professor Malbray?"

"Oh, yes," returned Malbray, in a dry tone. "Very intently, commissioner. So you believe that Bendleton's
death was accidental?"

"The evidence points that way."

"Evidence! Bah!" A gleam came to Malbray's eyes. "Nothing is accidental, commissioner; this case, least
of all. Richard Bendleton was murdered!"