4 - The Iron Tongue of Midnight by Beverle Graves Myers Page A

recently.”
    “Let’s have a good look.” Gussie brought his light and we all clustered round the object on my outstretched palm.
    “A costly item, that,” Ernesto said. “I can’t say I’ve ever seen a piece quite like it. Look how the lock sits atop the frame instead of sticking out from the side.”
    “A clever design,” Gussie added. “Makes the pistol much less likely to catch on clothing when it’s needed in a hurry.”
    Santini nodded. A rumbled “Hmm” escaped his lips. Did the man never speak?
    I ran my finger over the inlaid scrollwork of gold wire that ornamented the handle. “It’s certainly not of Italian make,” I observed.
    “What’s that image outlined there? A bird?” Gussie reached for the pistol and scrutinized it through narrowed eyelids. “A two-headed eagle with a crown. I’ve seen this crest before—the Imperial Russian eagle.”
    I looked down at the stranger. His still form mocked us with its anonymity. “Then our man is a long way from home.”
    Gussie shrugged. “Just because he carries a Russian pistol doesn’t mean he’s from Russia.”
    My brother-in-law was right, of course. I was getting ahead of myself.
    “Maybe there’s something else we missed,” I said. I started to bend over again, but Ernesto had reached his limit.
    The steward swiped the pistol out of Gussie’s hand and fell to his knees with a thump. “Signor Dolfini will want to see this. I’ll give it to the master once we’ve seen to the body.”
    Ernesto and his helper made short work of trussing the corpse into its canvas cocoon. With a few grunts, they hoisted the bulky burden and started toward the rear of the hall. The steward halted at the top of the enclosed staircase. “Please Signori, tell me that I can assure Signor Dolfini that all the guests are in their proper places up here.”
    There was really no reason to make Ernesto’s job more difficult. “Don’t worry, we’ll go straight back to our room,” I assured him.
    Gussie nodded in agreement. “We’ll pull our covers over our heads and you won’t hear a peep out of us until morning.”

Chapter Four
    I’m generally quite a reliable fellow, and there’s no one more trustworthy than my brother-in-law. We were doing just as we’d promised; the door to our room was actually giving beneath my hand when a flash of metal caught my eye. It was the pendulum that had felled our mysterious friend, glinting in the rays of Gussie’s candle. Someone had propped it up beside the timepiece that had supplied it.
    Gussie cocked an eyebrow. I knew what he was thinking. Ernesto and Santini had disappeared down the stairwell; Vincenzo and the footmen were in distant parts of the house; our fellow guests remained behind closed doors. We sprinted across the hall.
    “This makes a curious weapon,” I whispered, after contemplating the bloodied disk for a moment.
    “But a very effective one.” Gussie shuddered a bit.
    “If you were going to kill someone in this hall, is this the weapon you would choose?”
    He looked around. “There isn’t much here. If someone was forced to defend himself, the pendulum might have been the only possibility.”
    “Defend against what? The pistol was in the stranger’s waistband. And see here…” I ran my palm over the polished surface of the clock’s case, then moved the door back and forth on its hinges. “This is solid oak, not glass. It’s not as if the killer could have caught sight of the pendulum and thought, ‘here’s my salvation.’ No, the killer must have removed the pendulum and been lying in wait.”
    “You’re talking about planned murder.”
    “It makes more sense than a chance meeting.”
    “Then Jean-Louis must be on the right track. There was an assignation of some sort. Someone was expecting the stranger to be here at midnight.”
    “But it makes no sense. If you intended to do murder, you’d furnish yourself with a stiletto or a garrote.”
    Gussie drummed a finger on his lips.