“There’s the mark,” Colonel Lockwood said. “Right under his hair, as
you see.” They were standing, late in the evening of the same day,
in the dark little mortuary, whose only light was an oil lamp, which
shed a sickly greenish ray on the face of the corpse. Neither Wilson
nor Michael, however, was enough of a novice to be moved in any way
by their physical surroundings; and the latter coolly got out his
electric torch and bent to survey the bruise.
Whatever charm it was that Wilson had employed on the
Colonel--perhaps only the disclosure of his own identity--it had
worked a considerable change in the latter’s manner to Michael. It
was a very worried and perplexed, but not a truculent soldier, who
came to the inn after dinner to conduct them to the mortuary; and his
one desire appeared to be that Michael should have all the facilities
he required. Dr. Kershaw, Michael noted with pleasure, either had not
been invited to be present, or had decided not to come.
“It’s hardly serious enough to cause death, Kershaw says,” the
Colonel remarked to Wilson; “but it’s quite sufficient to cause him
to break his neck, if he was falling at all hard. Well, doctor, what
d’you make of it?”
Michael made no answer, but motioned to Wilson to take his place. His
brow was puckered with perplexity. Wilson, in his turn, bent over the
corpse and examined the head closely, opening the mouth, feeling
the cut under the hair, and passing his hands around the skin of the
neck. When, after three or four minutes, he too straightened himself,
the light fell for a moment full on his face, and Michael read in it
a confirmation of his own opinion.
“Is it all serene, doctor?” the Colonel asked again.
“I’m afraid _not_,” Michael said gravely.
“Why? What’s the matter?”
“There _is_ a contusion,” Michael said; “and it might have been
sufficient to break his neck, if he had been alive when it was made.
But it was made after death.”
“After death! What do you mean? You can’t know that.”
“Pardon me. If you look at the skin now----” Michael drew him to the
body, and gave a brief technical explanation. “That wound was made
after death,” he ended, “and some considerable time after death, too.”
“Then--he didn’t hit his head as he fell in. He must have hit
something while he was in the water.... Of course, he struck the
barge, or the barge struck him.... But, in that case, how did he
break his neck?”
“Precisely,” said Michael. “How did he break his neck?”
“I suppose,” the Colonel pursued his agitated reflections, “that must
have been the barge too--or something else he hit up against while
he was in the water. He _could_ have broken his neck after death,
couldn’t he, doctor?”
“In that case, Colonel Lockwood, what did he die of?”
“Good God! I see what you mean. In that case, he _must_ have been
drowned.”
“Well, you’ve had the post-mortem, haven’t you? What did the doctors
say?”
“I think they disagreed, at first. But finally they both reported
that death could not possibly have been due to drowning.”
“But the man is dead.”
“Not much doubt of that, poor fellow,” said the Colonel. “But I don’t
quite follow you, doctor. What are you suggesting?”
“What _did_ the doctors find to be the cause of death?”
“A broken neck, they suggest, consequent upon his hitting his head in
a fall.”
“Well, he didn’t. Not in that place, anyway--though I can’t think how
I came to miss it yesterday,” said Michael.
“If you made a mistake yesterday,” said Colonel Lockwood hopefully,
“don’t you think it may be possible that you’re making another
to-day?”
“I’m afraid not. You see, I’ve had plenty of time to-night.”
“Then what in hell _did_ the man die of?”
“I think I can answer that,” said Wilson, who had been standing
silently by. He went back to the corpse. “Look at that, Michael,”
he said. Michael bent down, and gave a horrified exclamation. “Good
God!” he said.
“You agree?” said Wilson.
“What is it?” the Colonel asked.
“He’s been strangled,” said Michael slowly.
“_What?_ What’s that?” said the Colonel, now thoroughly alarmed.
“What fairy-tale is this, sir?”
“Look for yourself,” said Michael. “Take my torch and the lens. Do
you see that mark? It goes right round the neck--here--and here;
that’s the mark of a rope--a very fine rope----”
“Probably a silk rope,” said Wilson. “I think there’s a silk fibre
there.” He took it off as he spoke, and held it out for Michael and
the Colonel to see.
“You’re right,” said Michael. “You see, Colonel, the superficial
marks have been nearly obliterated by the water; but they’re quite
plain when you’ve noticed them. And that explains some things that
had puzzled me about his face. I thought he didn’t look like a
drowned man.”
“But, good God,” the Colonel said again, “I can’t believe it! You say
the poor devil was strangled. That means, as far as I can see, that
it wasn’t accident--or suicide.”
“The case,” said Michael grimly, “is one of murder.”
“Is that your view too, Mr. Wilson?” asked the Colonel. Wilson
nodded. The three stood still for a moment, facing the fact, in the
dark, half-lighted room.
“He was strangled,” the Colonel repeated. “Strangled! But how?”
“With a silk rope,” said Michael.
“And in a rather peculiar way,” Wilson added. “Did you notice the
position of the marks, Michael?” He illustrated on his own neck,
while the Colonel shuddered in horror. “Do you remember, they come
close up under his chin, and then slope up at the back of his head?
And his neck was broken. Doesn’t that suggest anything to you?”
“Good God!” said Michael, as Wilson’s meaning came gradually home to
him. “It’s not possible. You don’t mean----?”
Wilson nodded, and Michael took hold of the bench for support. He was
feeling slightly sick.
“Mean what?” asked the Colonel. “You’re talking in riddles. _How_ was
he strangled?”
“He was hanged,” said Michael in a low voice. The brutality of
the crime appalled him, but “appalled” is no word to describe the
Colonel’s appearance.
“_Hanged!_” he said in a stupefied voice. “_Hanged!_ But what do you
mean? _Hanged?_”
“Hanged by the neck until he was dead,” Wilson said slowly. The
meaning of his words began gradually to dawn on the Colonel.
“Hanged!” he said at last. “But--who on earth would hang him?”
“That, I imagine,” said Wilson, “is what has now to be discovered.”
For a minute or two the soldier paced up and down the mortuary,
with a look of desperate perplexity on his face. Then it suddenly
lightened a trifle, and he turned to Wilson.
“But, surely,” he said, “what you’ve just said is compatible with
suicide at least. A man may hang himself.”
“A man may hang himself,” Wilson replied, “but he certainly can’t
cut himself down and throw away the rope. If it was suicide, all
the circumstances go to show that some one else is pretty deeply
implicated. And I don’t need to tell you, Colonel, that complicity in
suicide is murder in the eyes of the law.”
The Colonel looked up at him with a face from which all hope had
fled. “What am I to do now?” he said piteously. “I never had a murder
to handle before, much less--this sort of murder.”
“Do you want me to help?” Wilson asked. “I’ve no business here, you
know, unless you call me in. This is your show.”
“Do you think I want it?” the Colonel groaned. “I’m a plain man,
Mr. Wilson, and I know when waters are too deep for me. Here’s a
man brutally murdered, and I haven’t the ghost of a notion how or
why--the murderer may be my own butcher, for all I know! Will you
help me, Mr. Wilson? Or do you want an official letter?”
“Your word will do, I think,” said Wilson, smiling a little in
spite of the situation. “But you realise we may be in for rather an
unpleasant time?”
“I do,” said the Colonel, with emphasis. “But if you’ll help me--I’ll
put myself entirely in your hands.”
“I’ll do the best I can,” said Wilson. “Let’s consider the inquest,
then; that’s the first question. When is it?”
“Two-thirty to-morrow.”
“Who is the coroner?”
“Dr. Evershed, from Malton.”
“A good man?”
“I think so. But he’s a friend of mine,” said the Colonel, who had
apparently come to the conclusion that suspicion must immediately
rest on every one of his acquaintance.
“Well, I think you’d better prime him to take no more than the
absolutely necessary evidence to-morrow--identification, of course,
and the bargees, and the sergeant, and Dr. Kershaw--and then
adjourn, if necessary. Above all, see that he doesn’t call Dr.
Prendergast, or let out a hint of our discoveries to-night. And keep
my presence dark--if you can,” said Wilson, remembering the garrulous
Brandreth.
“But why all this secrecy?”
“Well, we don’t want to give the murderers full warning, do we?”
said Wilson, with what Michael considered remarkable patience. “If
I dared, I would like the coroner’s jury to bring in a verdict of
misadventure. But it’s not safe; there’s been too much talk, and
some juryman or other would be sure to ask awkward questions. So Dr.
Evershed will just have to keep it as brief as he can. I’d better
have a word with him myself, perhaps, if you don’t mind.”
“We’ll have to let Kershaw know,” the Colonel said, “or he’ll be
giving misleading evidence.”
“So much the better for us,” said Wilson. “No, seriously, Colonel,
I must insist that not a soul beyond ourselves knows what has taken
place in this room to-night. If Kershaw’s got his diagnosis wrong,
I’m afraid it’s his funeral.”
“It’s hardly cricket, to let him down,” the Colonel objected.
“Nor was it cricket to hang Meston. I’m sorry, Colonel, but we can’t
afford to be gentlemanly in this business. We’re agents of justice at
the moment--not of the M.C.C.”
The Colonel sighed, but agreed. He was obviously too far out of his
depth to think of combating anything that Wilson laid down; and after
a few more brief interchanges, they parted.
“I think that’s the most diabolical crime I’ve ever seen,” Michael
said, as they regained their room.
“I’m not sure you’re not right,” was the reply.
“And I’m really prepared to swear that mark on the head wasn’t there
when I saw the body yesterday.”
“As long as you don’t swear it at the inquest, well and good.”
“Then you don’t think I’m mad?”
“Of course I don’t. I never did. Besides, that was a fresh mark--I
could see for myself.”
“Then how the devil did it get there?”
“That, perhaps, we shall discover in due course. I have only noted
who found it.” Michael stared.
“Harry! Do you mean to suggest that _Kershaw_ murdered the man, and
then tried to cover up the traces?”
“We can’t go as far as that, yet,” said Wilson. “But you observe
there is a pretty good reason for not interfering with Dr. Kershaw’s
evidence.”