"There are two film holders," Polton explained, "each taking six yards of kinematograph film, and each enclosed in a light-tight case with a dark-slide, so that it can be taken out and another put in its place. So I can go down and bring away one film for development and leave the other to carry on. I have set the clock to make an exposure every six hours, beginning at twelve o’clock, noon."
"And what about the shutter?" asked Thorndyke. "Does it make much of a click?"
"It doesn’t make any sound at all," replied Polton, "because it moves quite slowly. It is just a disc with a hole in it. ‘When the clock makes the circuit, the disc moves so that the hole is opposite the lens; and stays there until the circuit is broken. Then it moves round and closes the lens, and, at the same time, the roller makes a turn and winds on a fresh piece of film. I’ll make an exposure now."
He turned the hand of the clock until it came to six, while Thorndyke and I listened with our heads close to the camera. But no sound could be heard; and it was only by repeating the proceeding with our ears actually applied to the camera that it was possible to detect faint sounds of movement as the shutter-disc revolved.
"I suppose," said Thorndyke, "you focus on the film?"
"Yes," replied Polton; "there’s plenty to spare, so I use a piece as a focusing screen and waste it. And the barrel of the lens can be turned so as to get the prism pointing at the right spot. I think it will do, sir."
"I am sure it will," Thorndyke agreed, heartily; "and I only hope that all your trouble and ingenuity and skill will not have been expended in vain."
"That can hardly be, sir," was the cheerful response. "The photographs are bound to show something, though it may not be exactly what you want. At any rate, it’s ready; and, with your permission, I will pop down with it to-morrow, as soon as I have finished with the breakfasts."
"Excellent!" said Thorndyke. "Then, if Mrs. Gibbins’s belief is well founded, the ‘watcher’ will be installed in time for the Wednesday-night visit."
XIII. REX V. DOBEY
During the next day or two, I was sensible of a certain tension and unrest that seemed to affect the atmosphere of our chambers in King’s Bench Walk. Polton, having successfully installed his apparatus in the corridor at Hartsden Manor House, was in a fever of impatience to harvest the results. I believe that he would have liked to sit down beside his camera and change the film after each exposure. As it was, he had fixed it on Tuesday morning, and, as no result could be expected until Thursday, at the earliest, circumstances condemned him to two whole days of suspense.
But Polton was not the only sufferer. My long association with Thorndyke enabled me to detect changes in his emotional states that were hidden from the eye of the casual observer by his habitually cairn and impassive exterior; and, in these days, a certain gravity and preoccupation in his manner conveyed to me the impression that something was weighing on his mind. At first, I was disposed to connect his preoccupation with the affairs of Hartsden Manor; but I soon dismissed this idea. For in those affairs there was nothing that could reasonably cause him any anxiety. And Thorndyke was by no means addicted to fussing unnecessarily.
The explanation came on the Wednesday evening, when we had finished dinner and taken our armchairs, and were preparing the post-prandial pipes.
"I suppose," said he, pushing the tobacco jar to my side of the little table, "you will turn up at the Old Bailey to hear how Dobey fares?"
"When is the trial?" I asked.
"To-morrow," he replied. "I thought you knew."
"No," said I. "Miller didn’t mention any date, and I have heard nothing since. I think it would be interesting to hear the evidence, though we know pretty well what it will be."
"Yes, we know the case for the prosecution. But we don’t know what Dobey may have to say in reply. That is what interests me. I am not at all happy about the case. I don’t much like the attitude of the prosecution—if Miller has represented it fairly—particularly the dragging in of the house affair."
"No," I agreed, "that seems quite irrelevant."
"It is," said be. "And it is a flagrant instance of the old forensic dodge of proving the wrong conclusion. The identification of Dobey by these women is evidently expected to convey to the jury in a vague sort of way that the station-master’s refusal to swear to the identity of the Strood man is of no consequence."
"It is quite possible that the judge may refuse to allow the house affair to be introduced at all."
"Quite," he agreed, "especially if the defence objects. But, still, I am not happy about the case. The intention of the prosecution to introduce this irrelevant matter to prejudice the jury and their suppression of the evidence regarding the poisoned cigar—which really is highly relevant—suggests a very determined effort to obtain a conviction."
"I take it that you do not entertain the possibility that Dobey may have committed the murder?"
"No, I don’t think I do. As you say, we know the case for the prosecution and we know that it is a bad case. There is a total lack of positive evidence. But, still, there is the chance that they may get a conviction. That would be a disaster; and it would, at once, raise the question as to what we should have to do. Obviously, we couldn’t let an innocent man go to the gallows. But it would be a very difficult position."
"What are the chances of a conviction, so far as you can see?"
"That depends on what Dobey has to say. The case for the prosecution rests on the finding of the stolen document in his flat. There is no denying that that is a highly incriminating circumstance, and, if he can produce nothing more than a mere denial of having taken it, the chances will be decidedly against him."
"It is difficult to see what answer he can give," said I. "The document was certainly taken from Badger, before or after his death; it was certainly found in Dobey’s flat; and, apparently, Dobey was the sole occupant of that flat. I don’t see how he is going to escape from those facts."
"Neither do I," said Thorndyke. "But we shall hear what he has to say to-morrow; and if he is found guilty, we shall have to consider very seriously what our next move is to be."
With this, the subject dropped. But, at intervals during the evening, my thoughts went back to it, and I found myself wondering whether Thorndyke had not perhaps allowed himself to undervalue the evidence against Dobey. The finding of that document in his rooms would take a great deal of explaining.
My intention to hear the case from the beginning was frustrated by a troublesome solicitor, who first failed to keep an appointment, and then detained me inordinately, so that when, at last, I arrived at the Central Criminal Court and, having hurriedly donned my wig and gown, slipped into the counsels’ seats beside Thorndyke, the case for the prosecution was nearly concluded. But by the fact that the finger-print expert was then giving evidence, I knew that the prosecution had succeeded in introducing the house breaking incident. As I listened to the evidence, I looked quickly round the court to identify the various dramatis personae and, naturally, looked first at the dock, where the prisoner stood "on his deliverance," listening with stolid calm to the apparently indestructible evidence of the expert.
As I looked him over critically, I was not surprised at the eagerness with which the police had fastened on his salient peculiarities. He was quite a striking figure. Dull and commonplace enough in face and feature, the combination of a rather untidy mop of dark-red hair with a noticeably red nose set in a large pale face made him an ideal subject for identification. From the prisoner I turned to his defending solicitor, Mr. Coleman, who sat at the solicitors’ table, listening with sphinx-like impassiveness to the expert’s authoritative pronouncements. Equally unmoved was the prisoner’s counsel, a good-looking Jew named Lyon, who specialized in criminal practice. The counsel for the prosecution, a Mr. Barnes, was on his feet at the moment, and his junior, Mr. Callow, was industriously taking notes of the evidence.
"Have the defence objected to this evidence?" I asked Thorndyke in a whisper, as the
leader for the Crown put what seemed to be his final question.
"No," was the reply. "The judge questioned the relevance of it; but, as the defence did not seem interested, he gave no ruling."
It seemed to me that Mr. Dobey’s case was being rather mismanaged; and I was confirmed in this opinion when his counsel rose to cross-examine:
"You have stated that the marks on this window glass are the prints of the prisoner’s fingers. Are you quite certain that those marks were not made by the fingers of some other person?"
"The chances against their having been made by the fingers of any person other than the prisoner are several thousand millions."
"But is it not possible that you may have made some mistake in the comparison? You don’t, I suppose, claim to be infallible?"
"I claim that the method employed at the Bureau is infallible. It does not depend on personal judgment, but on comparison, detail by detail, of the questioned finger-print with the one which is known. I have made the comparison with the greatest care, and I am certain that I have made no mistake."
"And do you swear, positively, of your certain knowledge, that the marks on this window-glass were made by the fingers of the prisoner?"
"I do," was the reply; whereupon, having thus unnecessarily piled up the evidence against his client, Mr. Lyon sat down with an air of calm satisfaction. I was astonished at the apparent stupidity of the proceeding. It is seldom worthwhile to cross-examine finger-print experts at all closely, for the more they are pressed, the more do they affirm their absolute certainty. And I noticed that my surprise seemed to be shared by the judge, who glanced with a sort of impatient perplexity from the counsel to the sphinx-like solicitor who was instructing him. It must be an exasperating experience for a judge—who knows all the ropes—to have to watch a counsel making a hopeless muddle of a case.
The next witness was a middle-aged woman who gave the name of Martha Bunsbury, and who was examined by Mr. Barnes in the plain, straightforward fashion proper to a prosecuting counsel.
"Kindly look at the prisoner and tell us whether you recognise him."
The witness bestowed a disdainful stare on the prisoner, and replied, promptly: "Yes. I picked him out of a whole crowd at Brixton Prison."
"Where and when had you seen him before that?"
"I saw him on the second of August, breaking into a house in Sudbury Park. I happened to be at the window at the back of my house when I heard the sound of glass being broken. So I looked out, and then I saw the prisoner getting into the back window of the house in Sudbury Park that is just opposite mine. So I opened the window and called out. Then I ran down to the garden and gave the alarm to two men who were coming along the towing-path of the canal."
"And what happened next?"
"The lady next door to me came out into her garden and she began to call out too. Then the two men started to run along the tow-path towards the bridge, but the prisoner, who had heard us giving the alarm, backed out of the window and ran across the garden with his coat on his arm. When he came to the wall, he laid the coat on the top of it, because the wall has broken glass all along the top, and climbed over. But, as he dropped down outside, the coat dropped down inside. He turned round, and was going to climb back to get it, but, by that time, the two men were running over the bridge. So he left the coat and made off up a side lane between two houses. And that is the last I saw of him."
"Yes. A very excellent description," said Mr. Barnes. "But now I want you to be extremely careful. Look again at the prisoner, and see if you are quite certain that he is really the man whom you saw in the garden of that house. It is most important that there should be no possibility of a mistake."
"There isn’t," was the immediate and confident reply. "I am perfectly certain that he is the man."
On this, Mr. Barnes sat down and Mr. Lyon rose to cross-examine.
"You have said that you saw the housebreaker from the back window of your house, breaking a back window of a house opposite. How far would that window be from yours?"
"I really couldn’t say. A fair distance. Not so very far."
"You spoke of a canal. Is the opposite house on the same side of the canal as your house?"
"No, of course it isn’t. How could it be? It is on the opposite side."
And how long is your garden?"
"Oh, a moderate length. You know what London gardens are."
"Should I be right in saying that, at the time that you saw this man, you were separated from him by the length of two gardens and the width of the canal?"
"Yes. That is what I said."
"And you say that, having seen this total stranger at that very considerable distance, you are quite certain that you are able to recognize and remember him?"
"Yes, I am quite certain."
"Can you tell us how you are able to identify him with such certainty?"
"Well," said the witness, "there’s his nose, you see. I could see that."
"Quite so. You looked upon the nose when it was red."
"I should think it is always red," said Mrs. Bunsbury. "At any rate, it was red then, and it is red now. And then there is his hair."
"Very true. There is his hair. But he is not the only man in the world with a red nose and red hair."
"I don’t know anything about that," replied the witness, doggedly. "But I do know that he is the man. I’d swear to him among ten thousand."
This apparently finished Mr. Lyon, for, having again prejudiced his client’s case to the best of his ability, he sat down with unimpaired complacency.
The next witness, Miss Doris Gray, gave evidence to the same effect, though with somewhat less emphasis; and, when she had been cross-examined and finally vacated the witness-box, Mr. Barnes rose and announced that "that was his case." As soon as he sat down, Mr. Lyon rose and made his announcement.
"I call witnesses, my lord."
"Now," Thorndyke said to me in a low tone, "we are going to see whether there is really a case for the defence."
"They haven’t made much of it up to the present," I remarked.
"Exactly," he replied. "That is what makes me a little hopeful. They have certainly given the prosecution plenty of rope."
I should have liked to have this observation elucidated somewhat—and so, probably, would Superintendent Miller, who, at this moment, came forth from some inconspicuous corner and took his place at the solicitors’ table; for there was more than a shade of anxiety on his face as he looked expectantly at the witness-box. But there was no opportunity for explanations. Even as Miller took his seat, the first witness for the defence was called, and appeared in the person of a pleasant-looking middle-aged lady wearing the uniform of a trained nurse, and bearing, it transpired, the name of Helen Royden. In reply to a question from Mr. Lyon, she deposed that she was the matron of the cottage hospital at Hook Green, near Biddenden in Kent.
"Will you kindly look at the prisoner and tell us if you recognize him?"
The witness turned her head and cast a smiling glance at the accused (whereupon Mr. Dobey’s rather saturnine countenance relaxed into a friendly grin), "Yes," she replied, "I recognize him as Mr. Charles Dobey, lately a patient at my hospital."
"When did you last see him?"
"On the first of October, when he was discharged from hospital."
"What were the date and the circumstances of his admission?"
"He was brought to the hospital on the thirtieth of July by Dr. Wale, the medical officer of the hospital, suffering from a compound fracture of the left tibia. I understand that the doctor found him lying in the road."
"Do you remember the exact time at which he was brought in?"
"It was a little before eleven in the forenoon." As the dates were mentioned, I observed the judge and the two prosecuting counsel hurriedly turn over their notes with an expression of astonishment and incredulity, and the jury very visibly "sat up and took notice."
"Did you communicate with any of the patient’s relatives?
"
"Yes. At the patient’s request, I wrote to his wife, who lives at East Malling in Kent, informing her of his admission, and inviting her to come and see him."
"And did she come?"
"Yes. She came the next day, and I allowed her to stay the night at the hospital. After that, she came to see him usually twice a week."
"Have you any doubt that the prisoner is the man whom you have described as your patient, Charles Dobey?"
"No. I couldn’t very well be mistaken. He was in the hospital just over two months, and I saw him several times every day, and often had quite long talks with him. Ours is a small hospital, and the patients are rather like a family."
"Did you learn what his occupation was?"
"Yes. He described himself as a plumber and gas-fitter."
"Had you any reason to doubt that that was his real occupation?"
"None whatever. In fact, we had evidence that it was; for, when he was convalescent and able to get about, he repaired all the taps in the hospital, and did a number of odd jobs. He seemed to be quite a clever workman."
"Do you keep a record of admissions and discharges?"
"Yes. I have brought the register with me." Here she produced from a business-like hand-bag a rather chubby quarto volume which she opened at a marked place and handed to the usher, who conveyed it to the counsel. When the latter had examined it and verified the dates, he passed it up to the judge, who scanned it curiously and compared it with his notes. Finally, it was handed to the prosecuting counsel, who appeared to gaze on it with stupefaction, and returned it to Mr. Lyon, who handed it back to the usher for transmission to the witness. This concluded the examination-in-chief, and Mr. Lyon accordingly thanked the witness and sat down. I waited curiously for the cross-examination, but neither of the Crown counsel made any sign. The judge glanced at them enquiringly, and, after a short pause, the witness was dismissed and her place taken by her successor. The new witness was a shrewd-looking, clean-shaved man, in whom I seemed to recognize a professional brother. And a doctor he turned out to be; one Egbert Wale by name, and the medical officer of the Hook Green Cottage Hospital. Having given the usual particulars, and been asked the inevitable question, he deposed as follows: "On the thirtieth of last July, at about twenty minutes to eleven in the forenoon, I was driving down a by-road between Headcorn and Biddenden when I saw a man lying in the road. I stopped my car and got out to examine him, when I found that he had sustained a compound fracture of the left leg below the knee. I accordingly dressed the wound, put on a temporary splint, lifted him into my car, and drove him to the Hook Green Cottage Hospital, of which I am a visiting medical officer. He gave the name of Charles Dobey, and explained that he had broken his leg in dropping from a motor-lorry on which he had taken a free lift without the knowledge of the driver. I detained him in the hospital for two months, and discharged him as convalescent on the first of October."
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