Free Puzzle of the Silver Persian by Stuart Palmer

unlocked?” he demanded.
    Waite shook his head. “I must have been a bit flustered,” he admitted. “What with everything that happened last evening. Usually I—”
    “Not always?”
    “Always I keep it locked,” insisted Dr. Waite without conviction.
    Cannon nodded. “All the same, Peter Noel got in here somehow and stole enough poison to kill everybody on shipboard. Was he in here, to your knowledge, within the last few days?”
    “Since the death of the Fraser girl?” added Sergeant Secker softly.
    Dr. Waite denied this. Then he added to his testimony. “The only time Noel was in my office was for a little while on the night that the Fraser girl went overboard,” he declared. “Four or five of us were shooting craps in here…”
    “Craps?” inquired the chief inspector doubtfully.
    “A dice game popularized by the American negro,” the sergeant informed him.
    “Gambling, eh?” Cannon seemed satisfied. “Well, that’s it. Noel took advantage of your interest in the throw of the dice and stole the poison, substituting the nearest thing he could lay his hands on so that the cyanide would not be missed. Thank you, doctor.”
    But Doctor Waite was not satisfied. “Why, he couldn’t have done that without my seeing him…”
    “May I ask a question?” said the sergeant. “Doctor, was Noel in your office before or after the hue and cry resulting from the Fraser girls going overboard?”
    Dr. Waite was positive. “Before,” he insisted.
    The sergeant looked at Cannon. “Then he couldn’t have taken it then, sir, unless, as you say, he knew beforehand…”
    The chief inspector grunted. “Or,” added the younger man, “unless he stole it, not for himself, but to use in getting rid of the girl. And then changed his mind.”
    They went out of the surgery, leaving Dr. Waite shivering alone. He rubbed his shiny poll thoughtfully and then went over to his desk. A prescription of three fingers of brandy was indicated, he decided. From the top drawer he took a tall bottle and poured his much needed drink into a glass.
    As he raised the glass to his lips, the outer door of the surgery was thrown suddenly open, and the pale thoughtful face of Sergeant John Secker appeared—so suddenly that the startled medico let glass and all go crashing to the floor.
    “Sorry,” said the sergeant. “But the chief said to tell you that the inquest will be tomorrow afternoon, and your presence is requested. In fact,” the young man added as an afterthought, “your presence is jolly well demanded.” The door closed.
    Dr. Waite had planned upon utilizing his precious four days in London otherwise—a plan which included several bottles of brandy and a not-too-married lady who lived in Maida Vale. A thwarted and unhappy man, he put the bottle away and went disconsolately to his bunk.
    Out on the promenade deck Chief Inspector Cannon was pacing back and forth, his heavy tread unmuffled for the benefit of any of the passengers who might be sleeping. Sergeant Secker paced beside him.
    It was full morning now, and the river was coming alive. A string of coal barges went past, with a small dingy dog barking vigorously from the roof of a shanty. A rusty red freighter bearing the name Inchcliffe Castle steamed seaward, bound out on the tide for Africa, and a madly sculling fat man went upstream on a high-pooped dory which looked like a floating leaf. On either shore the city was arousing itself, but Chief Inspector Cannon did not pause to admire the scene.
    Rapidly he ran over the case, as he knew it, more to refresh his own point of view than from hope of getting any help out of the young man who trotted along beside him.
    “That’s the story,” Cannon finished. “Noel was sick to death of the girl. She was pleading with him, maybe threatening him, to marry her. He threw her overboard and then funked out.”
    “But you say the school teacher person was certain that the Fraser girl was alone at the rail? How could Noel