“Not less than six hours,” I replied. “Probably more. I should say
that she died about two o’clock this morning.”
“And that is about all we can say,” said Foxton, “until the
post-mortem has been made. Everything looks quite straightforward. No
signs of a struggle or marks of violence. That blood on the mouth is
probably due to her biting her lip when she drank from the bottle.
Yes; here’s a little cut on the inside of the lip, corresponding to
the upper incisors. By the way, I wonder if there is anything left in
the bottle.”
As he spoke, he drew the small, unlabelled, green glass phial from the
closed hand--out of which it slipped quite easily--and held it up to
the light.
“Yes,” he exclaimed, “there’s more than a drachm left; quite enough
for an analysis. But I don’t recognize the smell. Do you?”
I sniffed at the bottle and was aware of a faint unfamiliar vegetable
odour.
“No,” I answered. “It appears to be a watery solution of some kind,
but I can’t give it a name. Where is the cork?”
“I haven’t seen it,” he replied. “Probably it is on the floor
somewhere.”
We both stooped to look for the missing cork and presently found it in
the shadow, under the little bedside table. But, in the course of that
brief search, I found something else, which had indeed been lying in
full view all the time--a wax match. Now a wax match is a perfectly
innocent and very commonplace object, but yet the presence of this one
gave me pause. In the first place, women do not, as a rule, use wax
matches, though there was not much in that. What was more to the point
was that the candlestick by the bedside contained a box of safety
matches, and that, as the burned remains of one lay in the tray, it
appeared to have been used to light the candle. Then why the wax
match?
While I was turning over this problem Foxton had corked the bottle,
wrapped it carefully in a piece of paper which he took from the
dressing table and bestowed it in his pocket.
“Well, Jervis,” said he, “I think we’ve seen everything. The analysis
and the post-mortem will complete the case. Shall we go down and hear
what Mrs. Beddingfield has to say?”
But that wax match, slight as was its significance, taken alone, had
presented itself to me as the last of a succession of phenomena each
of which was susceptible of a sinister interpretation, and the
cumulative effect of these slight suggestions began to impress me
somewhat strongly.
“One moment, Foxton,” said I. “Don’t let us take anything for granted.
We are here to collect evidence, and we must go warily. There is such
a thing as homicidal poisoning, you know.”
“Yes, of course,” he replied, “but there is nothing to suggest it in
this case; at least, I see nothing. Do you?”
“Nothing very positive,” said I; “but there are some facts that seem
to call for consideration. Let us go over what we have seen. In the
first place, there is a distinct discrepancy in the appearance of the
body. The general easy, symmetrical posture, like that of a figure on
a tomb, suggests the effect of a slow, painless poison. But look at
the face. There is nothing reposeful about that. It is very strongly
suggestive of pain or terror or both.”
“Yes,” said Foxton, “that is so. But you can’t draw any satisfactory
conclusions from the facial expression of dead bodies. Why, men who
have been hanged, or even stabbed, often look as peaceful as babes.”
“Still,” I urged, “it is a fact to be noted. Then there is that cut on
the lip. It may have been produced in the way you suggest; but it may
equally well be the result of pressure on the mouth.”
Foxton made no comment on this beyond a slight shrug of the shoulders,
and I continued:
“Then there is the state of the hand. It was closed, but it did not
really grasp the object it contained. You drew the bottle out without
any resistance. It simply lay in the closed hand. But that is not a
normal state of affairs. As you know, when a person dies grasping any
object, either the hand relaxes and lets it drop, or the muscular
action passes into cadaveric spasm and grasps the object firmly. And
lastly, there is this wax match. Where did it come from? The dead
woman apparently lit her candle with a safety match from the box. It
is a small matter, but it wants explaining.”
Foxton raised his eyebrows protestingly. “You’re like all specialists,
Jervis,” said he. “You see your specialty in everything. And while you
are straining these flimsy suggestions to turn a simple suicide into
murder, you ignore the really conclusive fact that the door was bolted
and had to be broken open before any one could get in.”
“You are not forgetting, I suppose,” said I, “that the window was wide
open and that there were house painters about and possibly a ladder
left standing against the house.”
“As to the ladder,” said Foxton, “that is a pure assumption; but we
can easily settle the question by asking that fellow out there if it
was or was not left standing last night.”
Simultaneously we moved towards the window; but half-way we both
stopped short. For the question of the ladder had in a moment become
negligible. Staring up at us from the dull red linoleum which covered
the floor were the impressions of a pair of bare feet, imprinted in
white paint with the distinctness of a woodcut. There was no need to
ask if they had been made by the dead woman: they were unmistakably
the feet of a man, and large feet at that. Nor could there be any
doubt as to whence those feet had come. Beginning with startling
distinctness under the window, the tracks diminished rapidly in
intensity until they reached the carpeted portion of the room, where
they vanished abruptly; and only by the closest scrutiny was it
possible to detect the faint traces of the retiring tracks.
Foxton and I stood for some moments gazing in silence at the sinister
white shapes; then we looked at one another.
“You’ve saved me from a most horrible blunder, Jervis,” said Foxton.
“Ladder or no ladder, that fellow came in at the window; and he came
in last night, for I saw them painting these window-sills yesterday
afternoon. Which side did he come from, I wonder?”
We moved to the window and looked out on the sill. A set of distinct,
though smeared impressions on the new paint gave unneeded confirmation
and showed that the intruder had approached from the left side, close
to which was a cast-iron stack-pipe, now covered with fresh green
paint.
“So,” said Foxton, “the presence or absence of the ladder is of no
significance. The man got into the window somehow, and that’s all that
matters.”
“On the contrary,” said I, “the point may be of considerable
importance in identification. It isn’t every one who could climb up a
stack-pipe, whereas most people could make shift to climb a ladder,
even if it were guarded by a plank. But the fact that the man took off
his boots and socks suggests that he came up by the pipe. If he had
merely aimed at silencing his foot-falls, he would probably have
removed his boots only.”
From the window we turned to examine more closely the footprints on
the floor, and, while I took a series of measurements with my spring
tape, Foxton entered them in my notebook.
“Doesn’t it strike you as rather odd, Jervis,” said he, “that neither
of the little toes has made any mark?”
“It does indeed,” I replied. “The appearances suggest that the little
toes were absent, but I have never met with such a condition. Have
you?”
“Never. Of course one is acquainted with the supernumerary toe
deformity, but I have never heard of congenitally deficient little
toes.”
Once more we scrutinized the footprints, and even examined those on
the window-sill, obscurely marked on the fresh paint; but, exquisitely
distinct as were those on the linoleum, showing every wrinkle and
minute skin-marking, not the faintest hint of a little toe was to be
seen on either foot.
“It’s very extraordinary,” said Foxton. “He has certainly lost his
little toes, if he ever had any. They couldn’t have failed to make
some mark. But it’s a queer affair. Quite a windfall for the police,
by the way; I mean for purposes of identification.”
“Yes,” I agreed, “and having regard to the importance of the
footprints, I think it would be wise to get a photograph of them.”
“Oh, the police will see to that,” said Foxton. “Besides, we haven’t
got a camera, unless you thought of using that little toy snapshotter
of yours.”
As Foxton was no photographer I did not trouble to explain that my
camera, though small, had been specially made for scientific purposes.
“Any photograph is better than none,” I said, and with this I opened
the tripod and set it over one of the most distinct of the footprints,
screwed the camera to the goose-neck, carefully framed the footprint
in the finder and adjusted the focus, finally making the exposure by
means of an Antinous release. This process I repeated four times,
twice on a right footprint and twice on a left.
“Well,” Foxton remarked, “with all those photographs the police ought
to be able to pick up the scent.”
“Yes, they’ve got something to go on; but they’ll have to catch their
hare before they can cook him. He won’t be walking about barefooted,
you know.”
“No. It’s a poor clue in that respect. And now we may as well be off
as we’ve seen all there is to see. I think we won’t have much to say
to Mrs. Beddingfield. This is a police case, and the less I’m mixed up
in it the better it will be for my practice.”
I was faintly amused at Foxton’s caution when considered by the light
of his utterances at the breakfast table. Apparently his appetite for
mystery and romance was easily satisfied. But that was no affair of
mine. I waited on the doorstep while he said a few--probably
evasive--words to the landlady and then, as we started off together in
the direction of the police station, I began to turn over in my mind
the salient features of the case. For some time we walked on in
silence, and must have been pursuing a parallel train of thought for,
when he at length spoke, he almost put my reflections into words.
“You know, Jervis,” said he, “there ought to be a clue in those
footprints. I realize that you can’t tell how many toes a man has by
looking at his booted feet. But those unusual footprints ought to give
an expert a hint as to what sort of man to look for. Don’t they convey
any hint to you?”
I felt that Foxton was right; that if my brilliant colleague,
Thorndyke, had been in my place, he would have extracted from those
footprints some leading fact that would have given the police a start
along some definite line of inquiry; and that belief, coupled with
Foxton’s challenge, put me on my mettle.
“They offer no particular suggestions to me at this moment,” said I,
“but I think that, if we consider them systematically, we may be able
to draw some useful deductions.”
“Very well,” said Foxton, “then let us consider them systematically.
Fire away. I should like to hear how you work these things out.”
Foxton’s frankly spectatorial attitude was a little disconcerting,
especially as it seemed to commit me to a result that I was by no
means confident of attaining. I therefore began a little diffidently.
“We are assuming that both the feet that made those prints were from
some cause devoid of little toes. That assumption--which is almost
certainly correct--we treat as a fact, and, taking it as our starting
point, the first step in the inquiry is to find some explanation of
it. Now there are three possibilities, and only three: deformity,
injury and disease. The toes may have been absent from birth, they may
have been lost as a result of mechanical injury, or they may have been
lost by disease. Let us take those possibilities in order.
“Deformity we exclude since such a malformation is unknown to us.
“Mechanical injury seems to be excluded by the fact that the two
little toes are on opposite sides of the body and could not
conceivably be affected by any violence which left the intervening
feet uninjured. This seems to narrow the possibilities down to
disease; and the question that arises is, What diseases are there
which might result in the loss of both little toes?”
I looked inquiringly at Foxton, but he merely nodded encouragingly.
His rôle was that of listener.
“Well,” I pursued, “the loss of both toes seems to exclude local
disease, just as it excluded local injury; and as to general diseases,
I can think only of three which might produce this
condition--Raynaud’s disease, ergotism, and frost-bite.”
“You don’t call frost-bite a general disease, do you?” objected
Foxton.
“For our present purpose, I do. The effects are local, but the
cause--low external temperature--affects the whole body and is a
general cause. Well, now, taking the diseases in order, I think we can
exclude Raynaud’s disease. It does, it is true, occasionally cause the
fingers or toes to die and drop off, and the little toes would be
especially liable to be affected as being most remote from the heart.
But in such a severe case the other toes would be affected. They would
be shrivelled and tapered, whereas, if you remember, the toes of these
feet were quite plump and full, to judge by the large impressions they
made. So I think we may safely reject Raynaud’s disease. There remain
ergotism and frost-bite; and the choice between them is just a
question of relative frequency. Frost-bite is more common; therefore
frost-bite is more probable.”
“Do they tend equally to affect the little toes?” asked Foxton.
“As a matter of probability, yes. The poison of ergot acting from
within, and intense cold acting from without, contract the small
blood-vessels and arrest the circulation. The feet, being the most
distant parts of the body from the heart, are the first to feel the
effects; and the little toes, which are the most distant parts of the
feet, are the most susceptible of all.”
Foxton reflected awhile, and then remarked:
“This is all very well, Jervis, but I don’t see that you are much
forrarder. This man has lost both his little toes, and on your
showing, the probabilities are that the loss was due either to chronic
ergot poisoning or to frost-bite, with a balance of probability in
favour of frost-bite. That’s all. No proof, no verification. Just the
law of probability applied to a particular case, which is always
unsatisfactory. He may have lost his toes in some totally different
way. But even if the probabilities work out correctly, I don’t see
what use your conclusions would be to the police. They wouldn’t tell
them what sort of man to look for.”
There was a good deal of truth in Foxton’s objection. A man who has
suffered from ergotism or frost-bite is not externally different from
any other man. Still, we had not exhausted the case, as I ventured to
point out.
“Don’t be premature, Foxton,” said I. “Let us pursue our argument a
little farther. We have established a probability that this unknown
man has suffered either from ergotism or frost-bite. That, as you say,
is of no use by itself; but supposing we can show that these
conditions tend to affect a particular class of persons, we shall have
established a fact that will indicate a line of investigation. And I
think we can. Let us take the case of ergotism first.
“Now how is chronic ergot poisoning caused? Not by the medicinal use
of the drug, but by the consumption of the diseased rye in which ergot
occurs. It is therefore peculiar to countries in which rye is used
extensively as food. Those countries, broadly speaking, are the
countries of North Eastern Europe, and especially Russia and Poland.
“Then take the case of frost-bite. Obviously the most likely person to
get frost-bitten is the inhabitant of a country with a cold climate.
The most rigorous climates inhabited by white people are North America
and North Eastern Europe, especially Russia and Poland. So you see,
the areas associated with ergotism and frost-bite overlap to some
extent. In fact they do more than overlap; for a person even slightly
affected by ergot would be specially liable to frost-bite, owing to
the impaired circulation. The conclusion is that, racially, in both
ergotism and frost-bite, the balance of probability is in favour of a
Russian, a Pole, or a Scandinavian.
“Then in the case of frost-bite there is the occupation factor. What
class of men tend most to become frost-bitten? Well, beyond all doubt,
the greatest sufferers from frost-bite are sailors, especially those
on sailing ships, and, naturally, on ships trading to arctic and
sub-arctic countries. But the bulk of such sailing ships are those
engaged in the Baltic and Archangel trade; and the crews of those
ships are almost exclusively Scandinavians, Finns, Russians and Poles.
So that, again, the probabilities point to a native of North Eastern
Europe, and, taken as a whole, by the overlapping of factors, to a
Russian, a Pole, or a Scandinavian.”
Foxton smiled sardonically. “Very ingenious, Jervis,” said he. “Most
ingenious. As an academic statement of probabilities, quite excellent.
But for practical purposes absolutely useless. However, here we are at
the police station. I’ll just run in and give them the facts and then
go on to the coroner’s office.”
“I suppose I’d better not come in with you?” I said.
“Well, no,” he replied. “You see, you have no official connection with
the case, and they mightn’t like it. You’d better go and amuse
yourself while I get the morning’s visits done. We can talk things
over at lunch.”
With this he disappeared into the police station, and I turned away
with a smile of grim amusement. Experience is apt to make us a trifle
uncharitable, and experience had taught me that those who are the most
scornful of academic reasoning are often not above retailing it with
some reticence as to its original authorship. I had a shrewd suspicion
that Foxton was at this very moment disgorging my despised “academic
statement of probabilities” to an admiring police-inspector.
My way towards the sea lay through Ethelred Road, and I had traversed
about half its length and was approaching the house of the tragedy
when I observed Mrs. Beddingfield at the bay window. Evidently she
recognized me, for a few moments later she appeared in outdoor clothes
on the doorstep and advanced to meet me.
“Have you seen the police?” she asked as we met. I replied that Dr.
Foxton was even now at the police station.
“Ah!” she said, “it’s a dreadful affair; most unfortunate, too, just
at the beginning of the season. A scandal is absolute ruin to a
boarding-house. What do you think of the case? Will it be possible to
hush it up? Dr. Foxton said you were a lawyer, I think, Dr. Jervis?”
“Yes, I am a lawyer, but really I know nothing of the circumstances of
this case. Did I understand that there had been something in the
nature of a love affair?”
“Yes--at least--well, perhaps I oughtn’t to have said that. But hadn’t
I better tell you the whole story?--that is, if I am not taking up too
much of your time.”
“I should be interested to hear what led to the disaster,” said I.
“Then,” she said, “I will tell you all about it. Will you come
indoors, or shall I walk a little way with you?”
As I suspected that the police were at that moment on their way to the
house, I chose the latter alternative and led her away seawards at a
pretty brisk pace.
“Was this poor lady a widow?” I asked as we started up the street.
“No, she wasn’t,” replied Mrs. Beddingfield, “and that was the
trouble. Her husband was abroad--at least, he had been, and he was
just coming home. A pretty home-coming it will be for him, poor man.
He is an officer in the civil police at Sierra Leone, but he hasn’t
been there long. He went there for his health.”
“What! To Sierra Leone!” I exclaimed, for the “White Man’s Grave”
seemed a queer health resort.
“Yes. You see, Mr. Toussaint is a French Canadian, and it seems that
he has always been somewhat of a rolling stone. For some time he was
in the Klondike, but he suffered so much from the cold that he had to
come away. It injured his health very severely; I don’t quite know in
what way, but I do know that he was quite a cripple for a time. When
he got better he looked out for a post in a warm climate and
eventually obtained the appointment of Inspector of Civil Police at
Sierra Leone. That was about ten months ago, and when he sailed for
Africa his wife came to stay with me, and has been here ever since.”
“And this love affair that you spoke of?”
“Yes, but I oughtn’t to have called it that. Let me explain what
happened. About three months ago a Swedish gentleman--a Mr.
Bergson--came to stay here, and he seemed to be very much smitten with
Mrs. Toussaint.”
“And she?”
“Oh, she liked him well enough. He is a tall, good-looking man--though
for that matter he is no taller than her husband, nor any better
looking. Both men are over six feet. But there was no harm so far as
she was concerned, excepting that she didn’t see the position quite
soon enough. She wasn’t very discreet, in fact I thought it necessary
to give her a little advice. However, Mr. Bergson left here and went
to live at Ramsgate to superintend the unloading of the ice ships (he
came from Sweden in one), and I thought the trouble was at an end. But
it wasn’t, for he took to coming over to see Mrs. Toussaint, and of
course I couldn’t have that. So at last I had to tell him that he
mustn’t come to the house again. It was very unfortunate, for on that
occasion I think he had been ‘tasting,’ as they say in Scotland. He
wasn’t drunk, but he was excitable and noisy, and when I told him he
mustn’t come again he made such a disturbance that two of the
gentlemen boarders--Mr. Wardale and Mr. Macauley--had to interfere.
And then he was most insulting to them, especially to Mr. Macauley,
who is a coloured gentleman; called him a ‘buck nigger’ and all sorts
of offensive names.”
“And how did the coloured gentleman take it?”
“Not very well, I am sorry to say, considering that he is a
gentleman--a law student with chambers in the Temple. In fact, his
language was so objectionable that Mr. Wardale insisted on my giving
him notice on the spot. But I managed to get him taken in next door
but one; you see, Mr. Wardale had been a Commissioner at Sierra
Leone--it was through him that Mr. Toussaint got his appointment--so I
suppose he was rather on his dignity with coloured people.”
“And was that the last you heard of Mr. Bergson?”
“He never came here again, but he wrote several times to Mrs.
Toussaint, asking her to meet him. At last, only a few days ago, she
wrote to him and told him that the acquaintance must cease.”
“And has it ceased?”
“As far as I know, it has.”
“Then, Mrs. Beddingfield,” said I, “what makes you connect the affair
with--with what has happened?”
“Well, you see,” she explained, “there is the husband. He was coming
home, and is probably in England already.”
“Indeed!” said I.
“Yes,” she continued. “He went up into the bush to arrest some natives
belonging to one of these gangs of murderers--Leopard Societies, I
think they are called--and he got seriously wounded. He wrote to his
wife from hospital, saying that he would be sent home as soon as he
was fit to travel, and about ten days ago she got a letter from him
saying that he was coming by the next ship.
“I noticed that she seemed very nervous and upset when she got the
letters from hospital, and still more so when the last letter came. Of
course, I don’t know what he said to her in those letters. It may be
that he had heard something about Mr. Bergson, and threatened to take
some action. Of course, I can’t say. I only know that she was very
nervous and restless, and when we saw in the paper four days ago that
the ship he would be coming by had arrived in Liverpool, she seemed
dreadfully upset. And she got worse and worse until--well, until last
night.”
“Has anything been heard of the husband since the ship arrived?” I
asked.
“Nothing whatever,” replied Mrs. Beddingfield, with a meaning look at
me which I had no difficulty in interpreting. “No letter, no telegram,
not a word. And you see, if he hadn’t come by that ship he would
almost certainly have sent a letter by her. He must have arrived in
England, but why hasn’t he turned up, or at least sent a wire? What is
he doing? Why is he staying away? Can he have heard something? And
what does he mean to do? That’s what kept the poor thing on wires, and
that, I feel certain, is what drove her to make away with herself.”
It was not my business to contest Mrs. Beddingfield’s erroneous
deductions. I was seeking information--it seemed that I had nearly
exhausted the present source. But one point required amplifying.
“To return to Mr. Bergson, Mrs. Beddingfield,” said I. “Do I
understand that he is a seafaring man?”
“He was,” she replied. “At present he is settled at Ramsgate as
manager of a company in the ice trade, but formerly he was a sailor. I
have heard him say that he was one of the crew of an exploring ship
that went in search of the North Pole and that he was locked up in the
ice for months and months. I should have thought he would have had
enough of ice after that.”
With this view I expressed warm agreement, and having now obtained all
the information that appeared to be available, I proceeded to bring
the interview to an end.
“Well, Mrs. Beddingfield,” I said, “it is a rather mysterious affair.
Perhaps more light may be thrown on it at the inquest. Meanwhile, I
should think that it will be wise of you to keep your own counsel as
far as outsiders are concerned.”
The remainder of the morning I spent pacing the smooth stretch of sand
that lies to the east of the jetty, and reflecting on the evidence
that I had acquired in respect of this singular crime. Evidently there
was no lack of clues in this case. On the contrary, there were two
quite obvious lines of inquiry, for both the Swede and the missing
husband presented the characters of the hypothetical murderer. Both
had been exposed to the conditions which tend to produce frost-bite;
one of them had probably been a consumer of rye meal, and both might
be said to have a motive--though, to be sure, it was a very
insufficient one--for committing the crime. Still, in both cases the
evidence was merely speculative; it suggested a line of investigation,
but it did nothing more.
When I met Foxton at lunch I was sensible of a curious change in his
manner. His previous expansiveness had given place to marked reticence
and a certain official secretiveness.
“I don’t think, you know, Jervis,” he said, when I opened the subject,
“that we had better discuss this affair. You see, I am the principal
witness, and while the case is _sub judice_--well, in fact the police
don’t want the case talked about.”
“But surely I am a witness, too, and an expert witness, moreover----”
“That isn’t the view of the police. They look on you as more or less
of an amateur, and as you have no official connection with the case, I
don’t think they propose to subpœna you. Superintendent Platt, who is
in charge of the case, wasn’t very pleased at my having taken you to
the house. Said it was quite irregular. Oh, and by the way, he says
you must hand over those photographs.”
“But isn’t Platt going to have the footprints photographed on his own
account?” I objected.
“Of course he is. He is going to have a set of proper photographs
taken by an expert photographer;--he was mightily amused when he heard
about your little snapshot affair. Oh, you can trust Platt. He is a
great man. He has had a course of instruction at the Finger Print
Department in London.”
“I don’t see how that is going to help him, as there aren’t any finger
prints in this case.” This was a mere fly-cast on my part, but Foxton
rose at once at the rather clumsy bait.
“Oh, aren’t there?” he exclaimed. “You didn’t happen to spot them, but
they were there. Platt has got the prints of a complete right hand.
This is in strict confidence, you know,” he added, with somewhat
belated caution.
Foxton’s sudden reticence restrained me from uttering the obvious
comment on the superintendent’s achievement. I returned to the subject
of the photographs.
“Supposing I decline to hand over my film?” said I.
“But I hope you won’t--and in fact you mustn’t. I am officially
connected with the case, and I’ve got to live with these people. As
the police-surgeon, I am responsible for the medical evidence, and
Platt expects me to get those photographs from you. Obviously you
can’t keep them. It would be most irregular.”
It was useless to argue. Evidently the police did not want me to be
introduced into the case, and after all, the superintendent was within
his rights, if he chose to regard me as a private individual and to
demand the surrender of the film.
Nevertheless I was loath to give up the photographs, at least, until I
had carefully studied them. The case was within my own specialty of
practice, and was a strange and interesting one. Moreover, it appeared
to be in unskilful hands, judging from the finger-print episode, and
then experience had taught me to treasure up small scraps of chance
evidence, since one never knew when one might be drawn into a case in
a professional capacity. In effect, I decided not to give up the
photographs, though that decision committed me to a ruse that I was
not very willing to adopt. I would rather have acted quite
straightforwardly.
“Well, if you insist, Foxton,” I said, “I will hand over the film or,
if you like, I will destroy it in your presence.”
“I think Platt would rather have the film uninjured,” said Foxton.
“Then he’ll know, you know,” he added, with a sly grin.
In my heart, I thanked Foxton for that grin. It made my own guileful
proceedings so much easier; for a suspicious man invites you to get
the better of him if you can.
After lunch I went up to my room, locked the door and took the little
camera from my pocket. Having fully wound up the film, I extracted it,
wrapped it up carefully and bestowed it in my inside breast-pocket.
Then I inserted a fresh film, and going to the open window, took four
successive snapshots of the sky. This done, I closed the camera,
slipped it into my pocket, and went downstairs. Foxton was in the
hall, brushing his hat, as I descended, and at once renewed his
demand.
“About those photographs, Jervis,” said he, “I shall be looking in at
the police station presently, so if you wouldn’t mind----”
“To be sure,” said I. “I will give you the film now, if you like.”
Taking the camera from my pocket, I solemnly wound up the remainder of
the film, extracted it, stuck down the loose end with ostentatious
care, and handed it to him.
“Better not expose it to the light,” I said, going the whole hog of
deception, “or you may fog the exposures.”
Foxton took the spool from me as if it were hot--he was not a
photographer--and thrust it into his hand-bag. He was still thanking
me quite profusely when the front-door bell rang.
The visitor who stood revealed when Foxton opened the door was a
small, spare gentleman with a complexion of the peculiar brown-papery
quality that suggests long residence in the Tropics. He stepped in
briskly and introduced himself and his business without preamble.
“My name is Wardale--boarder at Beddingfield’s. I’ve called with
reference to the tragic event which----”
Here Foxton interposed in his frostiest official tone. “I am afraid,
Mr. Wardale, I can’t give you any information about the case at
present.”
“I saw you two gentlemen at the house this morning,” Mr. Wardale
continued, but Foxton again cut him short.
“You did. We were there--or at least, I was--as the representative of
the Law, and while the case is _sub judice_----”
“It isn’t yet,” interrupted Wardale.
“Well, I can’t enter into any discussion of it----”
“I am not asking you to,” said Wardale, a little impatiently. “But I
understand that one of you is Dr. Jervis.”
“I am,” said I.
“I must really warn you,” Foxton began again; but Mr. Wardale
interrupted testily:
“My dear sir, I am a lawyer and a magistrate and understand perfectly
well what is and what is not permissible. I have come simply to make a
professional engagement with Dr. Jervis.”
“In what way can I be of service to you?” I asked.
“I will tell you,” said Mr. Wardale. “This poor lady, whose death has
occurred in so mysterious a manner, was the wife of a man who was,
like myself, a servant of the Government of Sierra Leone. I was the
friend of both of them; and in the absence of the husband, I should
like to have the inquiry into the circumstances of this lady’s death
watched by a competent lawyer with the necessary special knowledge of
medical evidence. Will you or your colleague, Dr. Thorndyke, undertake
to watch the case for me?”
Of course I was willing to undertake the case and said so.
“Then,” said Mr. Wardale, “I will instruct my solicitor to write to
you and formally retain you in the case. Here is my card. You will
find my name in the Colonial Office List, and you know my address
here.”
He handed me his card, wished us both good afternoon, and then, with a
stiff little bow, turned and took his departure.
“I think I had better run up to town and confer with Thorndyke,” said
I. “How do the trains run?”
“There is a good train in about three-quarters of an hour,” replied
Foxton.
“Then I will go by it, but I shall come down again to-morrow or the
next day, and probably Thorndyke will come down with me.”
“Very well,” said Foxton. “Bring him in to lunch or dinner, but I
can’t put him up, I am afraid.”
“It would be better not,” said I. “Your friend, Platt, wouldn’t like
it. He won’t want Thorndyke--or me either for that matter. And what
about those photographs? Thorndyke will want them, you know.”
“He can’t have them,” said Foxton doggedly, “unless Platt is willing
to hand them back; which I don’t suppose he will be.”
I had private reasons for thinking otherwise, but I kept them to
myself; and as Foxton went forth on his afternoon round, I returned
upstairs to pack my suit-case and write the telegram to Thorndyke
informing him of my movements.
It was only a quarter past five when I let myself into our chambers in
King’s Bench Walk. To my relief I found my colleague at home and our
laboratory assistant, Polton, in the act of laying tea for two.
“I gather,” said Thorndyke, as we shook hands, “that my learned
brother brings grist to the mill?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Nominally a watching brief, but I think you will
agree with me that it is a case for independent investigation.”
“Will there be anything in my line, sir?” inquired Polton, who was
always agog at the word “investigation.”
“There is a film to be developed. Four exposures of white footprints
on a dark ground.”
“Ah!” said Polton, “you’ll want good strong negatives and they ought
to be enlarged if they are from the little camera. Can you give me the
dimensions?”
I wrote out the measurements from my notebook and handed him the paper
together with the spool of film, with which he retired gleefully to
the laboratory.
“And now, Jervis,” said Thorndyke, “while Polton is operating on the
film and we are discussing our tea, let us have a sketch of the case.”
I gave him more than a sketch, for the events were recent and I had
carefully sorted out the facts during my journey to town, making rough
notes which I now consulted. To my rather lengthy recital he listened
in his usual attentive manner, without any comment, excepting in
regard to my manœuvre to retain possession of the exposed film.
“It’s almost a pity you didn’t refuse,” said he. “They could hardly
have enforced their demand, and my feeling is that it is more
convenient as well as more dignified to avoid direct deception unless
one is driven to it. But perhaps you considered that you were.”
As a matter of fact I had at the time, but I had since come to
Thorndyke’s opinion. My little manœuvre was going to be a source of
inconvenience presently.
“Well,” said Thorndyke, when I had finished my recital, “I think we
may take it that the police theory is, in the main, your own theory
derived from Foxton.”
“I think so, excepting that I learned from Foxton that Superintendent
Platt has obtained the complete finger-prints of a right hand.”
Thorndyke raised his eyebrows. “Finger-prints!” he exclaimed. “Why the
fellow must be a mere simpleton. But there,” he added,
“everybody--police, lawyers, judges, even Galton himself--seems to
lose every vestige of common sense as soon as the subject of
finger-prints is raised. But it would be interesting to know how he
got them and what they are like. We must try to find that out.
However, to return to your case, since your theory and the police
theory are probably the same, we may as well consider the value of
your inferences.
“At present we are dealing with the case in the abstract. Our data are
largely assumptions, and our inferences are largely derived from an
application of the mathematical laws of probability. Thus we assume
that a murder has been committed, whereas it may turn out to have been
suicide. We assume the murder to have been committed by the person who
made the footprints, and we assume that that person has no little
toes, whereas he may have retracted little toes which do not touch the
ground and so leave no impression. Assuming the little toes to be
absent, we account for their absence by considering known causes in
the order of their probability. Excluding--quite properly, I
think--Raynaud’s disease, we arrive at frost-bite and ergotism. But
two persons, both of whom are of a stature corresponding to the size
of the footprints, may have had a motive--though a very inadequate
one--for committing the crime, and both have been exposed to the
conditions which tend to produce frost-bite, while one of them has
probably been exposed to the conditions which tend to produce
ergotism. The laws of probability point to both of these two men; and
the chances in favour of the Swede being the murderer rather than the
Canadian would be represented by the common
factor--frost-bite--multiplied by the additional factor, ergotism. But
this is purely speculative at present. There is no evidence that
either man has ever been frost-bitten or has ever eaten spurred rye.
Nevertheless, it is a perfectly sound method at this stage. It
indicates a line of investigation. If it should transpire that either
man has suffered from frost-bite or ergotism, a definite advance would
have been made. But here is Polton with a couple of finished prints.
How on earth did you manage it in the time, Polton?”
“Why, you see, sir, I just dried the film with spirit,” replied
Polton. “It saves a lot of time. I will let you have a pair of
enlargements in about a quarter of an hour.”
Handing us the two wet prints, each stuck on a glass plate, he retired
to the laboratory, and Thorndyke and I proceeded to scrutinize the
photographs with the aid of our pocket lenses. The promised
enlargements were really hardly necessary excepting for the purpose of
comparative measurements, for the image of the white footprint, fully
two inches long, was so microscopically sharp that, with the
assistance of the lens, the minutest detail could be clearly seen.
“There is certainly not a vestige of little toe,” remarked Thorndyke,
“and the plump appearance of the other toes supports your rejection of
Raynaud’s disease. Does the character of the footprint convey any
other suggestion to you, Jervis?”
“It gives me the impression that the man had been accustomed to go
bare-footed in early life and had only taken to boots comparatively
recently. The position of the great toe suggests this, and the
presence of a number of small scars on the toes and ball of the foot
seems to confirm it. A person walking barefoot would sustain
innumerable small wounds from treading on small, sharp objects.”
Thorndyke looked dissatisfied. “I agree with you,” he said, “as to the
suggestion offered by the undeformed state of the great toes; but
those little pits do not convey to me the impression of scars
produced, as you suggest. Still, you may be right.”
Here our conversation was interrupted by a knock on the outer oak.
Thorndyke stepped out through the lobby and I heard him open the door.
A moment or two later he re-entered, accompanied by a short,
brown-faced gentleman whom I instantly recognized as Mr. Wardale.
“I must have come up by the same train as you,” he remarked, as we
shook hands, “and to a certain extent, I suspect, on the same errand.
I thought I would like to put our arrangement on a business footing,
as I am a stranger to both of you.”
“What do you want us to do?” asked Thorndyke.
“I want you to watch the case, and, if necessary, to look into the
facts independently.”
“Can you give us any information that may help us?”
Mr. Wardale reflected. “I don’t think I can,” he said at length. “I
have no facts that you have not, and any surmises of mine might be
misleading. I had rather you kept an open mind. But perhaps we might
go into the question of costs.”
This, of course, was somewhat difficult, but Thorndyke contrived to
indicate the probable liabilities involved to Mr. Wardale’s
satisfaction.
“There is one other little matter,” said Wardale as he rose to depart.
“I have got a suit-case here which Mrs. Beddingfield lent me to bring
some things up to town. It is one that Mr. Macauley left behind when
he went away from the boarding-house. Mrs. Beddingfield suggested that
I might leave it at his chambers when I had finished with it; but I
don’t know his address, excepting that it is somewhere in the Temple,
and I don’t want to meet the fellow if he should happen to have come
up to town.”
“Is it empty?” asked Thorndyke.
“Excepting for a suit of pyjamas and a pair of shocking old slippers.”
He opened the suit-case as he spoke and exhibited its contents with a
grin.
“Characteristic of a negro, isn’t it? Pink silk pyjamas and slippers
about three sizes too small.”
“Very well,” said Thorndyke. “I will get my man to find out the
address and leave it there.”
As Mr. Wardale went out, Polton entered with the enlarged photographs,
which showed the footprints the natural size. Thorndyke handed them to
me, and as I sat down to examine them he followed his assistant to the
laboratory. He returned in a few minutes, and after a brief inspection
of the photographs, remarked:
“They show us nothing more than we have seen, though they may be
useful later. So your stock of facts is all we have to go on at
present. Are you going home to-night?”
“Yes, I shall go back to Margate to-morrow.”
“Then, as I have to call at Scotland Yard, we may as well walk to
Charing Cross together.”
As we walked down the Strand we gossiped on general topics, but before
we separated at Charing Cross, Thorndyke reverted to the case.
“Let me know the date of the inquest,” said he, “and try to find out
what the poison was--if it was really a poison.”
“The liquid that was left in the bottle seemed to be a watery solution
of some kind,” said I, “as I think I mentioned.”
“Yes,” said Thorndyke. “Possibly a watery infusion of strophanthus.”
“Why strophanthus?” I asked.
“Why not?” demanded Thorndyke. And with this and an inscrutable smile,
he turned and walked down Whitehall.
Three days later I found myself at Margate sitting beside Thorndyke in
a room adjoining the Town Hall, in which the inquest on the death of
Mrs. Toussaint was to be held. Already the coroner was in his chair,
the jury were in their seats and the witnesses assembled in a group of
chairs apart. These included Foxton, a stranger who sat by
him--presumably the other medical witness--Mrs. Beddingfield, Mr.
Wardale, the police superintendent and a well-dressed coloured man,
whom I correctly assumed to be Mr. Macauley.
As I sat by my rather sphinx-like colleague my mind recurred for the
hundredth time to his extraordinary powers of mental synthesis. That
parting remark of his as to the possible nature of the poison had
brought home to me in a flash the fact that he already had a definite
theory of this crime, and that his theory was not mine nor that of the
police. True, the poison might not be strophanthus, after all, but
that would not alter the position. He had a theory of the crime, but
yet he was in possession of no facts excepting those with which I had
supplied him. Therefore those facts contained the material for a
theory, whereas I had deduced from them nothing but the bald,
ambiguous mathematical probabilities.
The first witness called was naturally Dr. Foxton, who described the
circumstances already known to me. He further stated that he had been
present at the autopsy, that he had found on the throat and limbs of
the deceased, bruises that suggested a struggle and violent restraint.
The immediate cause of death was heart failure, but whether that
failure was due to shock, terror, or the action of a poison he could
not positively say.
The next witness was a Dr. Prescott, an expert pathologist and
toxicologist. He had made the autopsy and agreed with Dr. Foxton as to
the cause of death. He had examined the liquid contained in the bottle
taken from the hand of the deceased and found it to be a watery
infusion or decoction of strophanthus seeds. He had analyzed the fluid
contained in the stomach and found it to consist largely of the same
infusion.
“Is infusion of strophanthus seeds used in medicine?” the coroner
asked.
“No,” was the reply. “The tincture is the form in which strophanthus
is administered unless it is given in the form of strophanthin.”
“Do you consider that the strophanthus caused, or contributed to
death?”
“It is difficult to say,” replied Dr. Prescott. “Strophanthus is a
heart poison, and there was a very large poisonous dose. But very
little had been absorbed, and the appearances were not inconsistent
with death from shock.”
“Could death have been self-produced by the voluntary taking of the
poison?” asked the coroner.
“I should say, decidedly not. Dr. Foxton’s evidence shows that the
bottle was almost certainly placed in the hands of the deceased after
death, and this is in complete agreement with the enormous dose and
small absorption.”
“Would you say that appearances point to suicidal or homicidal
poisoning?”
“I should say that they point to homicidal poisoning, but that death
was probably due mainly to shock.”
This concluded the expert’s evidence. It was followed by that of Mrs.
Beddingfield, which brought out nothing new to me but the fact that a
trunk had been broken open and a small attaché case belonging to the
deceased abstracted and taken away.
“Do you know what the deceased kept in that case?” the coroner asked.
“I have seen her put her husband’s letters into it. She had quite a
number of them. I don’t know what else she kept in it except, of
course, her cheque book.”
“Had she any considerable balance at the bank?”
“I believe she had. Her husband used to send most of his pay home and
she used to pay it in and leave it with the bank. She might have two
or three hundred pounds to her credit.”
As Mrs. Beddingfield concluded, Mr. Wardale was called, and he was
followed by Mr. Macauley. The evidence of both was quite brief and
concerned entirely with the disturbance made by Bergson, whose absence
from the court I had already noted.
The last witness was the police superintendent, and he, as I had
expected, was decidedly reticent. He did refer to the footprints but,
like Foxton--who presumably had his instructions--he abstained from
describing their peculiarities. Nor did he say anything about
finger-prints. As to the identity of the criminal, that had to be
further inquired into. Suspicion had at first fastened upon Bergson,
but it had since transpired that the Swede sailed from Ramsgate on an
ice-ship two days before the occurrence of the tragedy. Then suspicion
had pointed to the husband, who was known to have landed at Liverpool
four days before the death of his wife and who had mysteriously
disappeared. But he (the superintendent) had only that morning
received a telegram from the Liverpool police informing him that the
body of Toussaint had been found floating in the Mersey, and that it
bore a number of wounds of an apparently homicidal character.
Apparently he had been murdered and his corpse thrown into the river.
“This is very terrible,” said the coroner. “Does this second murder
throw any light on the case which we are investigating?”
“I think it does,” replied the officer, without any great conviction,
however, “but it is not advisable to go into details.”
“Quite so,” agreed the coroner. “Most inexpedient. But are we to
understand that you have a clue to the perpetrator of this
crime--assuming a crime to have been committed?”
“Yes,” replied Platt. “We have several important clues.”
“And do they point to any particular individual?”
The superintendent hesitated. “Well--” he began, with some
embarrassment, but the coroner interrupted him.
“Perhaps the question is indiscreet. We mustn’t hamper the police,
gentlemen, and the point is not really material to our inquiry. You
would rather we waived that question, Superintendent?”
“If you please, sir,” was the emphatic reply.
“Have any cheques from the deceased woman’s cheque-book been presented
at the bank?”
“Not since her death. I inquired at the bank only this morning.”
This concluded the evidence, and after a brief but capable summing-up
by the coroner, the jury returned a verdict of “wilful murder against
some person unknown.”
As the proceedings terminated, Thorndyke rose and turned round, and
then to my surprise I perceived Superintendent Miller, of the Criminal
Investigation Department, who had come in unperceived by me and was
sitting immediately behind us.
“I have followed your instructions, sir,” said he, addressing
Thorndyke, “but before we take any definite action I should like to
have a few words with you.”
He led the way to an adjoining room and, as we entered, we were
followed by Superintendent Platt and Dr. Foxton.
“Now, Doctor,” said Miller, carefully closing the door, “I have
carried out your suggestions. Mr. Macauley is being detained, but
before we commit ourselves to an arrest, we must have something to go
upon. I shall want you to make out a prima facie case.”
“Very well,” said Thorndyke, laying upon the table the small, green
suit-case that was his almost invariable companion.
“I’ve seen that prima facie case before,” Miller remarked with a grin,
as Thorndyke unlocked it and drew out a large envelope. “Now, what
have you got there?”
As Thorndyke extracted from the envelope Polton’s enlargements of my
small photographs, Platt’s eyes appeared to bulge, while Foxton gave
me a quick glance of reproach.
“These,” said Thorndyke, “are the full-sized photographs of the
footprints of the suspected murderer. Superintendent Platt can
probably verify them.”
Rather reluctantly Platt produced from his pocket a pair of
whole-plate photographs, which he laid beside the enlargements.
“Yes,” said Miller, after comparing them, “they are the same
footprints. But you say, Doctor, that they are Macauley’s footprints.
Now, what evidence have you?”
Thorndyke again had recourse to the green case, from which he produced
two copper plates mounted on wood and coated with printing ink.
“I propose,” said he, lifting the plates out of their protecting
frame, “that we take prints of Macauley’s feet and compare them with
the photographs.”
“Yes,” said Platt. “And then there are the finger-prints that we’ve
got. We can test those, too.”
“You don’t want finger-prints if you’ve got a set of toe-prints,”
objected Miller.
“With regard to those finger-prints,” said Thorndyke. “May I ask if
they were obtained from the bottle?”
“They were,” Platt admitted.
“And were there any other finger-prints?”
“No,” replied Platt. “These were the only ones.”
As he spoke he laid on the table a photograph showing the prints of
the thumb and fingers of a right hand.
Thorndyke glanced at the photograph and, turning to Miller, said:
“I suggest that those are Dr. Foxton’s finger-prints.”
“Impossible!” exclaimed Platt, and then suddenly fell silent.
“We can soon see,” said Thorndyke, producing from the case a pad of
white paper. “If Dr. Foxton will lay the finger-tips of his right hand
first on this inked plate and then on the paper, we can compare the
prints with the photograph.”
Foxton placed his fingers on the blackened plate and then pressed them
on the paper pad, leaving on the latter four beautifully clear, black
finger-prints. These Superintendent Platt scrutinized eagerly, and as
his glance travelled from the prints to the photographs, he broke into
a sheepish grin.
“Sold again!” he muttered. “They are the same prints.”
“Well,” said Miller in a tone of disgust, “you must have been a mug
not to have thought of that when you knew that Dr. Foxton had handled
the bottle.”
“The fact, however, is important,” said Thorndyke. “The absence of any
finger-prints but Dr. Foxton’s not only suggests that the murderer
took the precaution to wear gloves, but especially it proves that the
bottle was not handled by the deceased during life. A suicide’s hands
will usually be pretty moist and would leave conspicuous, if not very
clear, impressions.”
“Yes,” agreed Miller, “that is quite true. But with regard to these
footprints. We can’t compel this man to let us examine his feet
without arresting him. Don’t think, Dr. Thorndyke, that I suspect you
of guessing. I’ve known you too long for that. You’ve got your facts
all right, I don’t doubt, but you must let us have enough to justify
our arrest.”
Thorndyke’s answer was to plunge once more into the inexhaustible
green case, from which he now produced two objects wrapped in tissue
paper. The paper being removed, there was revealed what looked like a
model of an excessively shabby pair of brown shoes.
“These,” said Thorndyke, exhibiting the “models” to Superintendent
Miller--who viewed them with an undisguised grin--“are plaster casts
of the interiors of a pair of slippers--very old and much too
tight--belonging to Mr. Macauley. His name was written inside them.
The casts have been waxed and painted with raw umber, which has been
lightly rubbed off, thus accentuating the prominences and depressions.
You will notice that the impressions of the toes on the soles and of
the ‘knuckles’ on the uppers appear as prominences; in fact we have in
these casts a sketchy reproduction of the actual feet.
“Now, first as to dimensions. Dr. Jervis’s measurements of the
footprints give us ten inches and three-quarters as the extreme length
and four inches and five-eighths as the extreme width at the heads of
the metatarsus. On these casts, as you see, the extreme length is ten
inches and five-eighths--the loss of one-eighth being accounted for by
the curve of the sole--and the extreme width is four inches and a
quarter--three-eighths being accounted for by the lateral compression
of a tight slipper. The agreement of the dimensions is remarkable,
considering the unusual size. And now as to the peculiarities of the
feet. You notice that each toe has made a perfectly distinct
impression on the sole, excepting the little toe, of which there is no
trace in either cast. And, turning to the uppers, you notice that the
knuckles of the toes appear quite distinct and prominent--again
excepting the little toes, which have made no impression at all. Thus
it is not a case of retracted little toes, for they would appear as an
extra prominence. Then, looking at the feet as a whole, it is evident
that the little toes are absent; there is a distinct hollow where
there should be a prominence.”
“M’yes,” said Miller dubiously, “it’s all very neat. But isn’t it just
a bit speculative?”
“Oh, come, Miller,” protested Thorndyke; “just consider the facts.
Here is a suspected murderer known to have feet of an unusual size and
presenting a very rare deformity; and here are a pair of feet of that
same unusual size and presenting that same rare deformity; and they
are the feet of a man who had actually lived in the same house as the
murdered woman and who, at the date of the crime, was living only two
doors away. What more would you have?”
“Well, there is the question of motive,” objected Miller.
“That hardly belongs to a prima facie case,” said Thorndyke. “But even
if it did, is there not ample matter for suspicion? Remember who the
murdered woman was, what her husband was, and who this Sierra Leone
gentleman is.”
“Yes, yes; that’s true,” said Miller somewhat hastily, either
perceiving the drift of Thorndyke’s argument (which I did not), or
being unwilling to admit that he was still in the dark. “Yes, we’ll
have the fellow in and get his actual footprints.”
He went to the door and, putting his head out, made some sign, which
was almost immediately followed by a trampling of feet, and Macauley
entered the room, followed by two large plain-clothes policemen. The
negro was evidently alarmed, for he looked about him with the wild
expression of a hunted animal. But his manner was aggressive and
truculent.
“Why am I being interfered with in this impertinent manner?” he
demanded in the deep, buzzing voice characteristic of the male negro.
“We want to have a look at your feet, Mr. Macauley,” said Miller.
“Will you kindly take off your shoes and socks?”
“No,” roared Macauley. “I’ll see you damned first.”
“Then,” said Miller, “I arrest you on a charge of having murdered----”
The rest of the sentence was drowned in a sudden uproar. The tall,
powerful negro, bellowing like an angry bull, had whipped out a large,
strangely shaped knife and charged furiously at the Superintendent.
But the two plain-clothes men had been watching him from behind and
now sprang upon him, each seizing an arm. Two sharp, metallic clicks
in quick succession, a thunderous crash and an ear-splitting yell, and
the formidable barbarian lay prostrate on the floor with one massive
constable sitting astride his chest and the other seated on his knees.
“Now’s your chance, Doctor,” said Miller. “I’ll get his shoes and
socks off.”
As Thorndyke re-inked his plates, Miller and the local superintendent
expertly removed the smart patent shoes and the green silk socks from
the feet of the writhing, bellowing negro. Then Thorndyke rapidly and
skilfully applied the inked plates to the soles of the feet--which I
steadied for the purpose--and followed up with a dexterous pressure of
the paper pad, first to one foot and then--having torn off the printed
sheet--to the other. In spite of the difficulties occasioned by
Macauley’s struggles, each sheet presented a perfectly clear and sharp
print of the sole of the foot, even the ridge-patterns of the toes and
ball of the foot being quite distinct. Thorndyke laid each of the new
prints on the table beside the corresponding large photograph, and
invited the two superintendents to compare them.
“Yes,” said Miller--and Superintendent Platt nodded his
acquiescence--“there can’t be a shadow of a doubt. The ink-prints and
the photographs are identical, to every line and skin-marking. You’ve
made out your case, Doctor, as you always do.”
“So you see,” said Thorndyke, as we smoked our evening pipes on the
old stone pier, “your method was a perfectly sound one, only you
didn’t apply it properly. Like too many mathematicians, you started on
your calculations before you had secured your data. If you had applied
the simple laws of probability to the real data, they would have
pointed straight to Macauley.”
“How do you suppose he lost his little toes?” I asked.
“I don’t suppose at all. Obviously it was a case of double ainhum.”
“Ainhum!” I exclaimed with a sudden flash of recollection.
“Yes; that was what you overlooked. You compared the probabilities of
three diseases either of which only very rarely causes the loss of
even one little toe and infinitely rarely causes the loss of both, and
none of which conditions is confined to any definite class of persons;
and you ignored ainhum, a disease which attacks almost exclusively the
little toe, causing it to drop off, and quite commonly destroys both
little toes--a disease, moreover, which is confined to the
black-skinned races. In European practice ainhum is unknown, but in
Africa, and to a less extent, in India, it is quite common. If you
were to assemble all the men in the world who have lost both little
toes, more than nine-tenths of them would be suffering from ainhum; so
that, by the laws of probability, your footprints were, by nine
chances to one, those of a man who had suffered from ainhum, and
therefore a black-skinned man. But as soon as you had established a
black man as the probable criminal, you opened up a new field of
corroborative evidence. There was a black man on the spot. That man
was a native of Sierra Leone and almost certainly a man of importance
there. But the victim’s husband had deadly enemies in the native
secret societies of Sierra Leone. The letters of the husband to the
wife probably contained matter incriminating certain natives of Sierra
Leone. The evidence became cumulative, you see. Taken as a whole, it
pointed plainly to Macauley, apart from the new fact of the murder of
Toussaint in Liverpool, a city with a considerable floating population
of West Africans.”
“And I gather from your reference to the African poison, strophanthus,
that you fixed on Macauley at once when I gave you my sketch of the
case?”
“Yes; especially when I saw your photographs of the footprints with
the absent little toes and those characteristic chigger-scars on the
toes that remained. But it was sheer luck that enabled me to fit the
key-stone into its place and turn mere probability into virtual
certainty. I could have embraced the magician Wardale when he brought
us the magic slippers. Still, it isn’t an absolute certainty, even
now, though I expect it will be by to-morrow.”
And Thorndyke was right. That very evening the police entered
Macauley’s chambers in Tanfield Court, where they discovered the dead
woman’s attaché case. It still contained Toussaint’s letters to his
wife, and one of those letters mentioned by name, as members of a
dangerous secret society, several prominent Sierra Leone men,
including the accused David Macauley.
III.
THE NEW JERSEY SPHINX
“A rather curious neighbourhood this, Jervis,” my friend Thorndyke
remarked as we turned into Upper Bedford Place; “a sort of temporary
aviary for cosmopolitan birds of passage, especially those of the
Oriental variety. The Asiatic and African faces that one sees at the
windows of these Bloomsbury boarding-houses almost suggest an overflow
from the ethnographical galleries of the adjacent British Museum.”
“Yes,” I agreed, “there must be quite a considerable population of
Africans, Japanese and Hindus in Bloomsbury; particularly Hindus.”
As I spoke, and as if in illustration of my statement, a dark-skinned
man rushed out of one of the houses farther down the street and began
to advance towards us in a rapid, bewildered fashion, stopping to look
at each street door as he came to it. His hatless condition--though he
was exceedingly well dressed--and his agitated manner immediately
attracted my attention, and Thorndyke’s too, for the latter remarked,
“Our friend seems to be in trouble. An accident, perhaps, or a case of
sudden illness.”
Here the stranger, observing our approach, ran forward to meet us and
asked in an agitated tone, “Can you tell me, please, where I can find
a doctor?”
“I am a medical man,” replied Thorndyke, “and so is my friend.”
Our acquaintance grasped Thorndyke’s sleeve and exclaimed eagerly:
“Come with me, then, quickly if you please. A most dreadful thing has
happened.”
He hurried us along at something between a trot and a quick walk, and
as we proceeded he continued excitedly, “I am quite confused and
terrified; it is all so strange and sudden and terrible.”
“Try,” said Thorndyke, “to calm yourself a little and tell us what has
happened.”
“I will,” was the agitated reply. “It is my cousin, Dinanath
Byramji--his surname is the same as mine. Just now I went to his room
and was horrified to find him lying on the floor, staring at the
ceiling and blowing--like this,” and he puffed out his cheeks with a
soft blowing noise. “I spoke to him and shook his hand, but he was
like a dead man. This is the house.”
He darted up the steps to an open door at which a rather scared
page-boy was on guard, and running along the hall, rapidly ascended
the stairs. Following him closely, we reached a rather dark
first-floor landing where, at a half-open door, a servant-maid stood
listening with an expression of awe to a rhythmical snoring sound that
issued from the room.
The unconscious man lay as Mr. Byramji had said, staring fixedly at
the ceiling with wide-open, glazy eyes, puffing out his cheeks
slightly at each breath. But the breathing was shallow and slow, and
it grew perceptibly slower, with lengthening pauses. And even as I was
timing it with my watch while Thorndyke examined the pupils with the
aid of a wax match, it stopped. I laid my finger on the wrist and
caught one or two slow, flickering beats. Then the pulse stopped too.
“He is gone,” said I. “He must have burst one of the large arteries.”
“Apparently,” said Thorndyke, “though one would not have expected it
at his age. But wait! What is this?”
He pointed to the right ear, in the hollow of which a few drops of
blood had collected, and as he spoke he drew his hand gently over the
dead man’s head and moved it slightly from side to side.
“There is a fracture of the base of the skull,” said he, “and quite
distinct signs of contusion of the scalp.” He turned to Mr. Byramji,
who stood wringing his hands and gazing incredulously at the dead man,
and asked:
“Can you throw any light on this?”
The Indian looked at him vacantly. The sudden tragedy seemed to have
paralyzed his brain. “I don’t understand,” said he. “What does it
mean?”
“It means,” replied Thorndyke, “that he has received a heavy blow on
the head.”
For a few moments Mr. Byramji continued to stare vacantly at my
colleague. Then he seemed suddenly to realize the import of
Thorndyke’s reply, for he started up excitedly and turned to the door,
outside which the two servants were hovering.
“Where is the person gone who came in with my cousin?” he demanded.
“You saw him go out, Albert,” said the maid. “Tell Mr. Byramji where
he went to.”
The page tiptoed into the room with a fearful eye fixed on the corpse,
and replied falteringly, “I only see the back of him as he went out,
and all I know is that he turned to the left. P’raps he’s gone for a
doctor.”
“Can you give us any description of him?” asked Thorndyke.
“I only see the back of him,” repeated the page. “He was a shortish
gentleman and he had on a dark suit of clothes and a hard felt hat.
That’s all I know.”
“Thank you,” said Thorndyke. “We may want to ask you some more
questions presently,” and having conducted the page to the door, he
shut it and turned to Mr. Byramji.
“Have you any idea who it was that was with your cousin?” he asked.
“None at all,” was the reply. “I was sitting in my room opposite,
writing, when I heard my cousin come up the stairs with another
person, to whom he was talking. I could not hear what he was saying.
They went into his room--this room--and I could occasionally catch the
sound of their voices. In about a quarter of an hour I heard the door
open and shut, and then some one went downstairs, softly and rather
quickly. I finished the letter that I was writing, and when I had
addressed it I came in here to ask my cousin who the visitor was. I
thought it might be some one who had come to negotiate for the ruby.”
“The ruby!” exclaimed Thorndyke. “What ruby do you refer to?”
“The great ruby,” replied Byramji. “But of course you have not----” He
broke off suddenly and stood for a few moments staring at Thorndyke
with parted lips and wide-open eyes; then abruptly he turned, and
kneeling beside the dead man he began, in a curious, caressing,
half-apologetic manner, first to pass his hand gently over the body at
the waist and then to unfasten the clothes. This brought into view a
handsome, soft leather belt, evidently of native workmanship, worn
next to the skin and furnished with three pockets. Mr. Byramji
unbuttoned and explored them in quick succession, and it was evident
that they were all empty.
“It is gone!” he exclaimed in low, intense tones. “Gone! Ah! But how
little would it signify! But thou, dear Dinanath, my brother, my
friend, thou art gone, too!”
He lifted the dead man’s hand and pressed it to his cheek, murmuring
endearments in his own tongue. Presently he laid it down reverently,
and sprang up, and I was startled at the change in his aspect. The
delicate, gentle, refined face had suddenly become the face of a
Fury--fierce, sinister, vindictive.
“This wretch must die!” he exclaimed huskily. “This sordid brute who,
without compunction, has crushed out a precious life as one would
carelessly crush a fly, for the sake of a paltry crystal--he must die,
if I have to follow him and strangle him with my own hands!”
Thorndyke laid his hand on Byramji’s shoulder. “I sympathize with you
most cordially,” said he. “If it is as you think, and appearances
suggest, that your cousin has been murdered as a mere incident of
robbery, the murderer’s life is forfeit, and Justice cries aloud for
retribution. The fact of murder will be determined, for or against, by
a proper inquiry. Meanwhile we have to ascertain who this unknown man
is and what happened while he was with your cousin.”
Byramji made a gesture of despair. “But the man has disappeared, and
nobody has seen him! What can we do?”
“Let us look around us,” replied Thorndyke, “and see if we can judge
what has happened in this room. What, for instance, is this?”
He picked up from a corner near the door a small leather object, which
he handed to Mr. Byramji. The Indian seized it eagerly, exclaiming:
“Ah! It is the little bag in which my cousin used to carry the ruby.
So he had taken it from his belt.”
“It hasn’t been dropped, by any chance?” I suggested.
In an instant Mr. Byramji was down on his knees, peering and groping
about the floor, and Thorndyke and I joined in the search. But, as
might have been expected, there was no sign of the ruby, nor, indeed,
of anything else, excepting a hat which I picked up from under the
table.
“No,” said Mr. Byramji, rising with a dejected air. “It is gone--of
course it is gone, and the murderous villain----”
Here his glance fell on the hat, which I had laid on the table, and he
bent forward to look at it.
“Whose hat is this?” he demanded, glancing at the chair on which
Thorndyke’s hat and mine had been placed.
“Is it not your cousin’s?” asked Thorndyke.
“No, certainly not. His hat was like mine--we bought them both
together. It had a white silk lining with his initials, D.B., in gold.
This has no lining and is a much older hat. It must be the murderer’s
hat.”
“If it is,” said Thorndyke, “that is a most important fact--important
in two respects. Could you let us see your hat?”
“Certainly,” replied Byramji, walking quickly, but with a soft tread,
to the door. As he went out, shutting the door silently behind him,
Thorndyke picked up the derelict hat and swiftly tried it on the head
of the dead man. As far as I could judge, it appeared to fit, and this
Thorndyke confirmed as he replaced it on the table.
“As you see,” said he, “it is at least a practicable fit, which is a
fact of some significance.”
Here Mr. Byramji returned with his own hat, which he placed on the
table by the side of the other, and thus placed, crown uppermost, the
two hats were closely similar. Both were black, hard felts of the
prevalent “bowler” shape, and of good quality, and the difference in
their age and state of preservation was not striking; but when Byramji
turned them over and exhibited their interiors it was seen that
whereas the strange hat was unlined save for the leather headband,
Byramji’s had a white silk lining and bore the owner’s initials in
embossed gilt letters.
“What happened,” said Thorndyke, when he had carefully compared the
two hats, “seems fairly obvious. The two men, on entering, placed
their hats crown upwards on the table. In some way--perhaps during a
struggle--the visitor’s hat was knocked down and rolled under the
table. Then the stranger, on leaving, picked up the only visible
hat--almost identically similar to his own--and put it on.”
“Is it not rather singular,” I asked, “that he should not have noticed
the different feel of a strange hat?”
“I think not,” Thorndyke replied. “If he noticed anything unusual he
would probably assume that he had put it on the wrong way round.
Remember that he would be extremely hurried and agitated. And when
once he had left the house he would not dare to take the risk of
returning, though he would doubtless realize the gravity of the
mistake. And now,” he continued, “would you mind giving us a few
particulars? You have spoken of a great ruby, which your cousin had,
and which seems to be missing.”
“Yes. You shall come to my room and I will tell you about it; but
first let us lay my poor cousin decently on his bed.”
“I think,” said Thorndyke, “the body ought not to be moved until the
police have seen it.”
“Perhaps you are right,” Byramji agreed reluctantly, “though it seems
callous to leave him lying there.” With a sigh he turned to the door,
and Thorndyke followed, carrying the two hats.
“My cousin and I,” said our host, when we were seated in his own large
bed-sitting room, “were both interested in gem-stones. I deal in all
kinds of stones that are found in the East, but Dinanath dealt almost
exclusively in rubies. He was a very fine judge of those beautiful
gems, and he used to make periodical tours in Burma in search of uncut
rubies of unusual size or quality. About four months ago he acquired
at Mogok, in Upper Burma, a magnificent specimen over twenty-eight
carats in weight, perfectly flawless and of the most gorgeous colour.
It had been roughly cut, but my cousin was intending to have it recut
unless he should receive an advantageous offer for it in the
meantime.”
“What would be the value of such a stone?” I asked.
“It is impossible to say. A really fine large ruby of perfect colour
is far, far more valuable than the finest diamond of the same size. It
is the most precious of all gems, with the possible exception of the
emerald. A fine ruby of five carats is worth about three thousand
pounds, but, of course, the value rises out of all proportion with
increasing size. Fifty thousand pounds would be a moderate price for
Dinanath’s ruby.”
During this recital I noticed that Thorndyke, while listening
attentively, was turning the stranger’s hat over in his hands,
narrowly scrutinizing it both inside and outside. As Byramji
concluded, he remarked:
“We shall have to let the police know what has happened, but, as my
friend and I will be called as witnesses, I should like to examine
this hat a little more closely before you hand it over to them. Could
you let me have a small, hard brush? A dry nail-brush would do.”
Our host complied readily--in fact eagerly. Thorndyke’s authoritative,
purposeful manner had clearly impressed him, for he said as he handed
my colleague a new nail-brush: “I thank you for your help and value
it. We must not depend on the police only.”
Accustomed as I was to Thorndyke’s methods, his procedure was not
unexpected, but Mr. Byramji watched him with breathless interest and
no little surprise as, laying a sheet of note-paper on the table, he
brought the hat close to it and brushed firmly but slowly, so that the
dust dislodged should fall on it. As it was not a very well-kept hat,
the yield was considerable, especially when the brush was drawn under
the curl of the brim, and very soon the paper held quite a little
heap. Then Thorndyke folded the paper into a small packet and having
written “outside” on it, put it in his pocket-book.
“Why do you do that?” Mr. Byramji asked. “What will the dust tell
you?”
“Probably nothing,” Thorndyke replied. “But this hat is our only
direct clue to the identity of the man who was with your cousin, and
we must make the most of it. Dust, you know, is only a mass of
fragments detached from surrounding objects. If the objects are
unusual the dust may be quite distinctive. You could easily identify
the hat of a miller or a cement worker.” As he was speaking he
reversed the hat and turned down the leather head-lining, whereupon a
number of strips of folded paper fell down into the crown.
“Ah!” exclaimed Byramji, “perhaps we shall learn something now.”
He picked out the folded slips and began eagerly to open them out, and
we examined them systematically, one by one. But they were singularly
disappointing and uninforming. Mostly they consisted of strips of
newspaper, with one or two circulars, a leaf from a price list of gas
stoves, a portion of a large envelope on which were the remains of an
address which read “--n--don, W.C.,” and a piece of paper, evidently
cut down vertically and bearing the right-hand half of some kind of
list. This read:
“--el 3 oz. 5 dwts.
--eep 9½ oz.”
“Can you make anything of this?” I asked, handing the paper to
Thorndyke.
He looked at it reflectively, and answered, as he copied it into his
notebook: “It has, at least, some character. If we consider it with
the other data we should get some sort of hint from it. But these
scraps of paper don’t tell us much. Perhaps their most suggestive
feature is their quantity and the way in which, as you have no doubt
noticed, they were arranged at the sides of the hat. We had better
replace them as we found them for the benefit of the police.”
The nature of the suggestion to which he referred was not very obvious
to me, but the presence of Mr. Byramji rendered discussion
inadvisable; nor was there any opportunity, for we had hardly
reconstituted the hat when we became aware of a number of persons
ascending the stairs, and then we heard the sound of rather peremptory
rapping at the door of the dead man’s room.
Mr. Byramji opened the door and went out on to the landing, where
several persons had collected, including the two servants and a
constable.
“I understand,” said the policeman, “that there is something wrong
here. Is that so?”
“A very terrible thing has happened,” replied Byramji. “But the
doctors can tell you better than I can.” Here he looked appealingly at
Thorndyke, and we both went out and joined him.
“A gentleman--Mr. Dinanath Byramji--has met with his death under
somewhat suspicious circumstances,” said Thorndyke, and, glancing at
the knot of naturally curious persons on the landing, he continued:
“If you will come into the room where the death occurred, I will give
you the facts so far as they are known to us.”
With this he opened the door and entered the room with Mr. Byramji,
the constable, and me. As the door opened, the bystanders craned
forward and a middle-aged woman uttered a cry of horror and followed
us into the room.
“This is dreadful!” she exclaimed, with a shuddering glance at the
corpse. “The servants told me about it when I came in just now and I
sent Albert for the police at once. But what does it mean? You don’t
think poor Mr. Dinanath has been murdered?”
“We had better get the facts, ma’am,” said the constable, drawing out
a large black notebook and laying his helmet on the table. He turned
to Mr. Byramji, who had sunk into a chair and sat, the picture of
grief, gazing at his dead cousin. “Would you kindly tell me what you
know about how it happened?”
Byramji repeated the substance of what he had told us, and when the
constable had taken down his statement, Thorndyke and I gave the few
medical particulars that we could furnish and handed the constable our
cards. Then, having helped to lay the corpse on the bed and cover it
with a sheet, we turned to take our leave.
“You have been very kind,” Mr. Byramji said as he shook our hands
warmly. “I am more than grateful. Perhaps I may be permitted to call
on you and hear if--if you have learned anything fresh,” he concluded
discreetly.
“We shall be pleased to see you,” Thorndyke replied, “and to give you
any help that we can”; and with this we took our departure, watched
inquisitively down the stairs by the boarders and the servants who
still lurked in the vicinity of the chamber of death.
“If the police have no more information than we have,” I remarked as
we walked homeward, “they won’t have much to go on.”
“No,” said Thorndyke. “But you must remember that this crime--as we
are justified in assuming it to be--is not an isolated one. It is the
fourth of practically the same kind within the last six months. I
understand that the police have some kind of information respecting
the presumed criminal, though it can’t be worth much, seeing that no
arrest has been made. But there is some new evidence this time. The
exchange of hats may help the police considerably.”
“In what way? What evidence does it furnish?”
“In the first place it suggests a hurried departure, which seems to
connect the missing man with the crime. Then, he is wearing the dead
man’s hat, and though he is not likely to continue wearing it, it may
be seen and furnish a clue. We know that that hat fits him fairly and
we know its size, so that we know the size of his head. Finally, we
have the man’s own hat.”
“I don’t fancy the police will get much information from that,” said
I.
“Probably not,” he agreed. “Yet it offered one or two interesting
suggestions, as you probably observed.”
“It made no suggestions whatever to me,” said I.
“Then,” said Thorndyke, “I can only recommend you to recall our simple
inspection and consider the significance of what we found.”
This I had to accept as closing the discussion for the time being, and
as I had to make a call at my bookseller’s concerning some reports
that I had left to be bound, I parted from Thorndyke at the corner of
Chichester Rents and left him to pursue his way alone.
My business with the bookseller took me longer than I had expected,
for I had to wait while the lettering on the backs was completed, and
when I arrived at our chambers in King’s Bench Walk, I found Thorndyke
apparently at the final stage of some experiment evidently connected
with our late adventure. The microscope stood on the table with one
slide on the stage and a second one beside it; but Thorndyke had
apparently finished his microscopical researches, for as I entered he
held in his hand a test-tube filled with a smoky-coloured fluid.
“I see that you have been examining the dust from the hat,” said I.
“Does it throw any fresh light on the case?”
“Very little,” he replied. “It is just common dust--assorted fibres
and miscellaneous organic and mineral particles. But there are a
couple of hairs from the inside of the hat--both lightish brown, and
one of the atrophic, note-of-exclamation type that one finds at the
margin of bald patches; and the outside dust shows minute traces of
lead, apparently in the form of oxide. What do you make of that?”
“Perhaps the man is a plumber or a painter,” I suggested.
“Either is possible and worth considering,” he replied; but his tone
made clear to me that this was not his own inference; and a row of
five consecutive Post Office Directories, which I had already noticed
ranged along the end of the table, told me that he had not only formed
a hypothesis on the subject, but had probably either confirmed or
disproved it. For the Post Office Directory was one of Thorndyke’s
favourite books of reference; and the amount of curious and recondite
information that he succeeded in extracting from its matter-of-fact
pages would have surprised no one more than it would the compilers of
the work.
At this moment the sound of footsteps ascending our stairs became
audible. It was late for business callers, but we were not
unaccustomed to late visitors; and a familiar rat-tat of our little
brass knocker seemed to explain the untimely visit.
“That sounds like Superintendent Miller’s knock,” said Thorndyke, as
he strode across the room to open the door. And the Superintendent it
turned out to be. But not alone.
As the door opened, the officer entered with two gentlemen, both
natives of India, and one of whom was our friend Mr. Byramji.
“Perhaps,” said Miller, “I had better look in a little later.”
“Not on my account,” said Byramji. “I have only a few words to say and
there is nothing secret about my business. May I introduce my kinsman,
Mr. Khambata, a student of the Inner Temple?”
Byramji’s companion bowed ceremoniously. “Byramji came to my chambers
just now,” he explained, “to consult me about this dreadful affair,
and he chanced to show me your card. He had not heard of you, but
supposed you to be an ordinary medical practitioner. He did not
realize that he had entertained an angel unawares. But I, who knew of
your great reputation, advised him to put his affairs in your
hands--without prejudice to the official investigations,” Mr. Khambata
added hastily, bowing to the Superintendent.
“And I,” said Mr. Byramji, “instantly decided to act on my kinsman’s
advice. I have come to beg you to leave no stone unturned to secure
the punishment of my cousin’s murderer. Spare no expense. I am a rich
man and my poor cousin’s property will come to me. As to the ruby,
recover it if you can, but it is of no consequence. Vengeance--justice
is what I seek. Deliver this wretch into my hands, or into the hands
of justice, and I give you the ruby or its value, freely--gladly.”
“There is no need,” said Thorndyke, “of such extraordinary inducement.
If you wish me to investigate this case, I will do so and will use
every means at my disposal, without prejudice, as your friend says, to
the proper claims of the officers of the law. But you understand that
I can make no promises. I cannot guarantee success.”
“We understand that,” said Mr. Khambata. “But we know that if you
undertake the case, everything that is possible will be done. And now
we must leave you to your consultation.”
As soon as our clients had gone, Miller rose from his chair with his
hand in his breast pocket. “I dare say, Doctor,” said he, “you can
guess what I have come about. I was sent for to look into this Byramji
case, and I heard from Mr. Byramji that you had been there and that
you had made a minute examination of the missing man’s hat. So have I;
and I don’t mind telling you that I could learn nothing from it.”
“I haven’t learnt much myself,” said Thorndyke.
“But you’ve picked up something,” urged Miller, “if it is only a hint;
and we have just a little clue. There is very small doubt that this is
the same man--‘The New Jersey Sphinx,’ as the papers call him--that
committed those other robberies; and a very difficult type of criminal
he is to get hold of. He is bold, he is wary, he plays a lone hand,
and he sticks at nothing. He has no confederates, and he kills every
time. The American police never got near him but once; and that once
gives us the only clues we have.”
“Finger-prints?” inquired Thorndyke.
“Yes, and very poor ones, too. So rough that you can hardly make out
the pattern. And even those are not absolutely guaranteed to be his;
but in any case, finger-prints are not much use until you’ve got the
man. And there is a photograph of the fellow himself. But it is only a
snapshot, and a poor one at that. All it shows is that he has a mop of
hair and a pointed beard--or at least he had when the photograph was
taken. But for identification purposes it is practically worthless.
Still, there it is; and what I propose is this: we want this man and
so do you; we’ve worked together before and can trust one another. I
am going to lay my cards on the table and ask you to do the same.”
“But, my dear Miller,” said Thorndyke, “I haven’t any cards. I haven’t
a single solid fact.”
The detective was visibly disappointed. Nevertheless, he laid two
photographs on the table and pushed them towards Thorndyke, who
inspected them through his lens and passed them to me.
“The pattern is very indistinct and broken up,” he remarked.
“Yes,” said Miller; “the prints must have been made on a very rough
surface, though you get prints something like those from fitters or
other men who use files and handle rough metal. And now, Doctor, can’t
you give us a lead of any kind?”
Thorndyke reflected a few moments. “I really have not a single real
fact,” said he, “and I am unwilling to make merely speculative
suggestions.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” Miller replied cheerfully. “Give us a start. I
shan’t complain if it comes to nothing.”
“Well,” Thorndyke said reluctantly, “I was thinking of getting a few
particulars as to the various tenants of No. 51, Clifford’s Inn.
Perhaps you could do it more easily and it might be worth your while.”
“Good!” Miller exclaimed gleefully. “He ‘gives to airy nothing a local
habitation and a name.’”
“It is probably the wrong name,” Thorndyke reminded him.
“I don’t care,” said Miller. “But why shouldn’t we go together? It’s
too late to-night, and I can’t manage to-morrow morning. But say
to-morrow afternoon. Two heads are better than one, you know,
especially when the second one is yours. Or perhaps,” he added, with a
glance at me, “three would be better still.”
Thorndyke considered for a moment or two and then looked at me.
“What do you say, Jervis?” he asked.
As my afternoon was unoccupied, I agreed with enthusiasm, being as
curious as the Superintendent to know how Thorndyke had connected this
particular locality with the vanished criminal; and Miller departed in
high spirits with an appointment for the morrow at three o’clock in
the afternoon.
For some time after the Superintendent’s departure I sat wrapped in
profound meditation. In some mysterious way the address, 51,
Clifford’s Inn, had emerged from the formless data yielded by the
derelict hat. But what had been the connection? Apparently the
fragment of the addressed envelope had furnished the clue. But how had
Thorndyke extended “----n” into “51, Clifford’s Inn”? It was to me a
complete mystery.
Meanwhile, Thorndyke had seated himself at the writing table, and I
noticed that of the two letters which he wrote, one was written on our
headed paper and the other on ordinary plain notepaper. I was
speculating on the reason for this when he rose, and as he stuck on
the stamps, said to me, “I am just going out to post these two
letters. Do you care for a short stroll through the leafy shades of
Fleet Street? The evening is still young.”
“The rural solitudes of Fleet Street attract me at all hours,” I
replied, fetching my hat from the adjoining office; and we accordingly
sallied forth together, strolling up King’s Bench Walk and emerging
into Fleet Street by way of Mitre Court. When Thorndyke had dropped
his letters into the post office box he stood awhile gazing up at the
tower of St. Dunstan’s Church.
“Have you ever been in Clifford’s Inn, Jervis?” he inquired.
“Never,” I replied (we passed through it together on an average a
dozen times a week), “but it is not too late for an exploratory
visit.”
We crossed the road, and entering Clifford’s Inn Passage, passed
through the still half-open gate, crossed the outer court and threaded
the tunnel-like entry by the hall to the inner court, near the middle
of which Thorndyke halted, and looking up at one of the ancient
houses, remarked, “No. 51.”
“So that is where our friend hangs out his flag,” said I.
“Oh, come, Jervis,” he protested, “I am surprised at you; you are as
bad as Miller. I have merely suggested a possible connection between
these premises and the hat that was left at Bedford Place. As to the
nature of that connection I have no idea, and there may be no
connection at all. I assure you, Jervis, that I am on the thinnest
possible ice. I am working on a hypothesis which is in the highest
degree speculative, and I should not have given Miller a hint, but
that he was so eager and so willing to help--and also that I wanted
his finger-prints. But we are really only at the beginning, and may
never get any farther.”
I looked up at the old house. It was all in darkness excepting the top
floor, where a couple of lighted windows showed the shadow of a man
moving rapidly about the room. We crossed to the entry and inspected
the names painted on the door-posts. The ground floor was occupied by
a firm of photoengravers, the first floor by a Mr. Carrington, whose
name stood out conspicuously on its oblong of comparatively fresh
white paint, while the tenants of the second floor--old residents, to
judge by the faded and discoloured paint in which their names were
announced--were Messrs. Burt & Highley, metallurgists.
“Burt has departed,” said Thorndyke, as I read out the names; and he
pointed to two red lines of erasure which I had not noticed in the dim
light, “so the active gentleman above is presumably Mr. Highley, and
we may take it that he has residential as well as business premises. I
wonder who and what Mr. Carrington is--but I dare say we shall find
out to-morrow.”
With this he dismissed the professional aspects of Clifford’s Inn, and
changing the subject to its history and associations, chatted in his
inimitable, picturesque manner until our leisurely perambulations
brought us at length to the Inner Temple Gate.
On the following morning we bustled through our work in order to leave
the afternoon free, making several joint visits to solicitors from
whom we were taking instructions. Returning from the last of these--a
City lawyer--Thorndyke turned into St. Helen’s Place and halted at a
doorway bearing the brass plate of a firm of assayists and refiners. I
followed him into the outer office where, on his mentioning his name,
an elderly man came to the counter.
“Mr. Grayson has put out some specimens for you, sir,” said he. “They
are about thirty grains to the ton--you said that the content was of
no importance--and I am to tell you that you need not return them.
They are not worth treating.” He went to a large safe from which he
took a canvas bag, and returning to the counter, turned out on it the
contents of the bag, consisting of about a dozen good-sized lumps of
quartz and a glittering yellow fragment, which Thorndyke picked out
and dropped in his pocket.
“Will that collection do?” our friend inquired.
“It will answer my purpose perfectly,” Thorndyke replied, and when the
specimens had been replaced in the bag, and the latter deposited in
Thorndyke’s handbag, my colleague thanked the assistant and we went on
our way.
“We extend our activities into the domain of mineralogy,” I remarked.
Thorndyke smiled an inscrutable smile. “We also employ the suction
pump as an instrument of research,” he observed. “However, the
strategic uses of chunks of quartz--otherwise than as missiles--will
develop themselves in due course, and the interval may be used for
reflection.”
It was. But my reflections brought no solution. I noticed, however,
that when at three o’clock we set forth in company with the
Superintendent, the bag went with us; and having offered to carry it
and having had my offer accepted with a sly twinkle, its weight
assured me that the quartz was still inside.
“Chambers and Offices to let,” Thorndyke read aloud as we approached
the porter’s lodge. “That lets us in, I think. And the porter knows
Dr. Jervis and me by sight, so he will talk more freely.”
“He doesn’t know me,” said the Superintendent, “but I’ll keep in the
background, all the same.”
A pull at the bell brought out a clerical-looking man in a tall hat
and a frock coat, who regarded Thorndyke and me through his spectacles
with an amiable air of recognition.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Larkin,” said Thorndyke. “I am asked to get
particulars of vacant chambers. What have you got to let?”
Mr. Larkin reflected. “Let me see. There’s a ground floor at No.
5--rather dark--and a small second-pair set at No. 12. And then there
is--oh, yes, there is a good first floor set at No. 51. They wouldn’t
have been vacant until Michaelmas, but Mr. Carrington, the tenant, has
had to go abroad suddenly. I had a letter from him this morning,
enclosing the key. Funny letter, too.” He dived into his pocket, and
hauling out a bundle of letters, selected one and handed it to
Thorndyke with a broad smile.
Thorndyke glanced at the postmark (“London, E.”), and having taken out
the key, extracted the letter, which he opened and held so that Miller
and I could see it. The paper bore the printed heading, “Baltic
Shipping Company, Wapping,” and the further written heading, “S.S.
_Gothenburg_,” and the letter was brief and to the point: