“Why bother telling me all this?”
“Come off it, Hagee. You know why I’m here. You want me to pay you off to keep your two cents to yourself. I have a better idea. Why don’t I load you down with money, and you finish the job you fucked up?” I look at him in disbelief, smiling. Fighting back a laugh, I asked:
“You want me to kill your candidate for you?”
“Why not? No one would suspect you. No one! You’re the man who damn near died saving his fucking life. Why would you turn around and kill him? How could anyone ever begin to think you had something to do with it?”
“B-Because,” came Hubert’s voice from the doorway, “the w-walls have ears, Morrie.”
Hubert came into my inner office, followed by several detectives and a Captain Trenkel, head of the local precinct. It took some words and some doing to get Wortzman out of the room, but he finally left…half under his own power, half with the help of others. Trenkel thanked me for my cooperation and let me know he didn’t mind P.I.s in his jurisdiction who played their cards right. I acted suitably grateful and sat by while his boys got their electronic taping hardware out of my office. Trenkel’d told me earlier that due to my injuries I could come down to the station house the next day. Banged up as I was, I could’ve begged off for a week.
As he left, Trenkel eyed Hubert and then looked over to me as if he wanted to say something. He didn’t bother, though, and I didn’t ask. Once he was gone, Hubert sat down and started another line of prattle.
“You know, there was once a p-politician no one could get a straight answer out of. He was a pip—no matter what, he never gave anyone a straight answer. So, at this one press conference, this smart guy gets an idea. He goes, ‘Sir, we’re all gettin’ a bit tired of your refusal to be pinned down on a subject. I was thinkin’, maybe the questions are too hard. So, I ask you, sir, what is your favorite color?’ And the politician replies, ‘Plaid.’”
Hubert began laughing, hissing his cartoon duck noises about my office. I half chuckled, half groaned. Then, before either of us could say anything else, a voice called from the outer office. I directed its owner inside.
“This isn’t such a bad place,” she said.
“Well. Well…wellwellwell;” cackled Hubert. “What dainty little morsel is t-this?”
“Can it, you mutant. I’d introduce you except that A, if I did, the lady would never speak to me again, and B, I don’t know her name.”
She had changed into a pair of tan jeans and a yellow sweater, but she didn’t look any the worse for it. Laughing, she extended her arm to Hubert.
“Hello,” she told him, “I’m Marianne Kennedy. Don’t listen to this guy; I’m very pleased to meet you.”
“You’ll be sorry,” I warned her with a laugh.
“You hush up,” growled Hu at me over his shoulder. “Call me Hubert,” he told Marianne, kissing her hand. “Charmed to death, I’m sure. But, much as it p-pains me to leave you trapped here with this low class operator, I must be on my way. Got a date on Staten Island with a guy who thinks he understands the ins and outs of real estate. See ya in the f-funny papers.”
Dropping his hat onto the back of his head, Hubert headed for the door, reminding us as he disappeared, “Don’t take any wooden nickels.”
And, after he had finally left, I asked, “So, you here as a reporter who wants to finish up the story of the century, or as a woman who doesn’t know when she’s better off?”
“Still strutting the glib words, eh? Surprising you don’t have them lined up around the block with sweet talk like that.”
“Yeah, well, what can I tell you?”
“A few things, I suppose.”
“Like what?”
“Well, I was down at the morgue earlier…”
“Couldn’t get a date there so you thought you’d try here, huh?”
“Can’t help myself. Slumming is my nature.”
I looked into her eyes and read what she wanted.
“It’s time for me to shut up and listen, isn’t it?”
The eyes didn’t change.
“Okay, that puts me in my place,” I admitted, pulling my Gilbey’s bottle out of its hiding place in the big drawer of my desk. “So, what was so fascinating at the icebox?”
I tilted the bottle in her direction, asking. She accepted. While I poured us both a couple of fingers worth, she said, “One of those little men who doesn’t get out much was in charge. You know the type, love to try and make all the girls screech by showing them something awful, or telling them some disgusting story about what he’s seen in the past. Anyway, he had a story to tell me. About the Stone, that hit man you turned into a waffle.”
“Yeah,” I asked after a swallow. “What about him?”
“Seems you did a real job on him. Mashed him up pretty good.”
“You asked if I was a tough guy.”
“So I did. Well,” she smiled, “he told me that there is something going on, and nobody knows what to make of it. Seems a piece of the Stone is ‘missing.’ Most of him is still there…not in good shape…but still accounted for. But, our little ghoul told me, a piece of the Stone’s heart is missing.”
“Do tell?” I said.
“Yes;” she confirmed. “And, interestingly enough, he told us it wasn’t cut out, either. It was ripped out, as if some animal had done it.”
“Well,” I answered, pouring myself a few extra knuckles, “maybe one did.”
She smiled again, and all my bruises hurt a little less. I smiled back at her, happy she’d come, happy for the company, happy for the chance to smile. Then, a thought ran across the far recesses of my brain; wouldn’t it be nice if her underwear was black and white? I puzzled at what the back of my mind could’ve meant by that, but decided not to question it. Relaxing, I smiled back at her and lifted my glass in mock salute, deciding to finally start trusting the little voice.
“A toast,” she said, clinking my hoisted glass with hers, “All’s well that ends well.”
“Yeah.” I half laughed. “I’ll drink to that.”
THE RED THUMB MARK, by R. Austin Freeman
PREFACE
In writing the following story, the author has had in view no purpose other than that of affording entertainment to such readers as are interested in problems of crime and their solutions; and the story itself differs in no respect from others of its class, excepting in that an effort has been made to keep within the probabilities of ordinary life, both in the characters and in the incidents.
Nevertheless it may happen that the book may serve a useful purpose in drawing attention to certain popular misapprehensions on the subject of finger-prints and their evidential value; misapprehensions the extent of which may be judged when we learn from the newspapers that several Continental commercial houses have actually substituted finger-prints for signed initials.
The facts and figures contained in Mr. Singleton’s evidence, including the very liberal estimate of the population of the globe, are, of course, taken from Mr. Galton’s great and important work on finger-prints; to which the reader who is interested in the subject is referred for much curious and valuable information.
In conclusion, the author desires to express his thanks to his friend Mr. Bernard E. Bishop for the assistance rendered to him in certain photographic experiments, and to those officers of the Central Criminal Court who very kindly furnished him with details of the procedure in criminal trials.
CHAPTER I
MY LEARNED BROTHER
“Conflagratam An° 1677. Fabricatam An° 1698. Richardo Powell Armiger Thesaurar.” The words, set in four panels, which formed a frieze beneath the pediment of a fine brick portico, summarised the history of one of the tall houses at the upper end of King’s Bench Walk and as I, somewhat absently, read over the inscription, my attention was divided between admiration of the exquisitely finished carved brickwork and the quiet dignity of the building, and an effort to reconstitute the dead and gone Richard Powell, and th
e stirring times in which he played his part.
I was about to turn away when the empty frame of the portico became occupied by a figure, and one so appropriate, in its wig and obsolete habiliments, to the old-world surroundings that it seemed to complete the picture, and I lingered idly to look at it. The barrister had halted in the doorway to turn over a sheaf of papers that he held in his hand, and, as he replaced the red tape which bound them together, he looked up and our eyes met. For a moment we regarded one another with the incurious gaze that casual strangers bestow on one another; then there was a flash of mutual recognition; the impassive and rather severe face of the lawyer softened into a genial smile, and the figure, detaching itself from its frame, came down the steps with a hand extended in cordial greeting.
“My dear Jervis,” he exclaimed, as we clasped hands warmly, “this is a great and delightful surprise. How often have I thought of my old comrade and wondered if I should ever see him again, and lo! here he is, thrown up on the sounding beach of the Inner Temple, like the proverbial bread cast upon the waters.”
“Your surprise, Thorndyke, is nothing to mine,” I replied, “for your bread has at least returned as bread; whereas I am in the position of a man who, having cast his bread upon the waters, sees it return in the form of a buttered muffin or a Bath bun. I left a respectable medical practitioner and I find him transformed into a bewigged and begowned limb of the law.”
Thorndyke laughed at the comparison.
“Liken not your old friend unto a Bath bun,” said he. “Say, rather, that you left him a chrysalis and come back to find him a butterfly. But the change is not so great as you think. Hippocrates is only hiding under the gown of Solon, as you will understand when I explain my metamorphosis; and that I will do this very evening, if you have no engagement.”
“I am one of the unemployed at present,” I said, “and quite at your service.”
“Then come round to my chambers at seven,” said Thorndyke, “and we will have a chop and a pint of claret together and exchange autobiographies. I am due in court in a few minutes.”
“Do you reside within that noble old portico?” I asked.
“No,” replied Thorndyke. “I often wish I did. It would add several inches to one’s stature to feel that the mouth of one’s burrow was graced with a Latin inscription for admiring strangers to ponder over. No; my chambers are some doors further down—number 6A”—and he turned to point out the house as we crossed towards Crown Office Row.
At the top of Middle Temple Lane we parted, Thorndyke taking his way with fluttering gown towards the Law Courts, while I directed my steps westward towards Adam Street, the chosen haunt of the medical agent.
The soft-voiced bell of the Temple clock was telling out the hour of seven in muffled accents (as though it apologised for breaking the studious silence) as I emerged from the archway of Mitre Court and turned into King’s Bench Walk.
The paved footway was empty save for a single figure, pacing slowly before the doorway of number 6A, in which, though the wig had now given place to a felt hat and the gown to a jacket, I had no difficulty in recognising my friend.
“Punctual to the moment, as of old,” said he, meeting me half-way. “What a blessed virtue is punctuality, even in small things. I have just been taking the air in Fountain Court, and will now introduce you to my chambers. Here is my humble retreat.”
We passed in through the common entrance and ascended the stone stairs to the first floor, where we were confronted by a massive door, above which my friend’s name was written in white letters.
“Rather a forbidding exterior,” remarked Thorndyke, as he inserted the latchkey, “but it is homely enough inside.”
The heavy door swung outwards and disclosed a baize-covered inner door, which Thorndyke pushed open and held for me to pass in.
“You will find my chambers an odd mixture,” said Thorndyke, “for they combine the attractions of an office, a museum, a laboratory and a workshop.”
“And a restaurant,” added a small, elderly man, who was decanting a bottle of claret by means of a glass syphon: “you forgot that, sir.”
“Yes, I forgot that, Polton,” said Thorndyke, “but I see you have not.” He glanced towards a small table that had been placed near the fire and set out with the requisites for our meal.
“Tell me,” said Thorndyke, as we made the initial onslaught on the products of Polton’s culinary experiments, “what has been happening to you since you left the hospital six years ago?”
“My story is soon told,” I answered, somewhat bitterly. “It is not an uncommon one. My funds ran out, as you know, rather unexpectedly. When I had paid my examination and registration fees the coffer was absolutely empty, and though, no doubt, a medical diploma contains—to use Johnson’s phrase—the potentiality of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, there is a vast difference in practice between the potential and the actual. I have, in fact, been earning a subsistence, sometimes as an assistant, sometimes as a locum tenens. Just now I’ve got no work to do, and so have entered my name on Turcival’s list of eligibles.”
Thorndyke pursed up his lips and frowned.
“It’s a wicked shame, Jervis,” said he presently, “that a man of your abilities and scientific acquirements should be frittering away his time on odd jobs like some half-qualified wastrel.”
“It is,” I agreed. “My merits are grossly undervalued by a stiff-necked and obtuse generation. But what would you have, my learned brother? If poverty steps behind you and claps the occulting bushel over your thirty thousand candle-power luminary, your brilliancy is apt to be obscured.”
“Yes, I suppose that is so,” grunted Thorndyke, and he remained for a time in deep thought.
“And now,” said I, “let us have your promised explanation. I am positively frizzling with curiosity to know what chain of circumstances has converted John Evelyn Thorndyke from a medical practitioner into a luminary of the law.”
Thorndyke smiled indulgently.
“The fact is,” said he, “that no such transformation has occurred. John Evelyn Thorndyke is still a medical practitioner.”
“What, in a wig and gown!” I exclaimed.
“Yes, a mere sheep in wolf’s clothing,” he replied. “I will tell you how it has come about. After you left the hospital, six years ago, I stayed on, taking up any small appointments that were going—assistant demonstrator—or curatorships and such like—hung about the chemical and physical laboratories, the museum and post mortem room, and meanwhile took my M.D. and D.Sc. Then I got called to the bar in the hope of getting a coronership, but soon after this, old Stedman retired unexpectedly—you remember Stedman, the lecturer on medical jurisprudence—and I put in for the vacant post. Rather to my surprise, I was appointed lecturer, whereupon I dismissed the coronership from my mind, took my present chambers and sat down to wait for anything that might come.”
“And what has come?” I asked.
“Why, a very curious assortment of miscellaneous practice,” he replied. “At first I only got an occasional analysis in a doubtful poisoning case, but, by degrees, my sphere of influence has extended until it now includes all cases in which a special knowledge of medicine or physical science can be brought to bear upon law.”
“But you plead in court, I observe,” said I.
“Very seldom,” he replied. “More usually I appear in the character of that bête noir of judges and counsel—the scientific witness. But in most instances I do not appear at all; I merely direct investigations, arrange and analyse the results, and prime the counsel with facts and suggestions for cross-examination.”
“A good deal more interesting than acting as understudy for an absent g.p.,” said I, a little enviously. “But you deserve to succeed, for you were always a deuce of a worker, to say nothing of your capabilities.”
“Yes, I worked hard,” replied Thorndyke, “and I work hard still; but I have my hours of labour and my hours of leisure, unlike you poor devils of gene
ral practitioners, who are liable to be dragged away from the dinner table or roused out of your first sleep by—confound it all! who can that be?”
For at this moment, as a sort of commentary on his self-congratulation, there came a smart rapping at the outer door.
“Must see who it is, I suppose,” he continued, “though one expects people to accept the hint of a closed oak.”
He strode across the room and flung open the door with an air of by no means gracious inquiry.
“It’s rather late for a business call,” said an apologetic voice outside, “but my client was anxious to see you without delay.”
“Come in, Mr. Lawley,” said Thorndyke, rather stiffly, and, as he held the door open, the two visitors entered. They were both men—one middle-aged, rather foxy in appearance and of a typically legal aspect, and the other a fine, handsome young fellow of very prepossessing exterior, though at present rather pale and wild-looking, and evidently in a state of profound agitation.
“I am afraid,” said the latter, with a glance at me and the dinner table, “that our visit—for which I am alone responsible—is a most unseasonable one. If we are really inconveniencing you, Dr. Thorndyke, pray tell us, and my business must wait.”
Thorndyke had cast a keen and curious glance at the young man, and he now replied in a much more genial tone—
“I take it that your business is of a kind that will not wait, and as to inconveniencing us, why, my friend and I are both doctors, and, as you are aware, no doctor expects to call any part of the twenty-four hours his own unreservedly.”
I had risen on the entrance of the two strangers, and now proposed to take a walk on the Embankment and return later, but the young man interrupted me.
“Pray don’t go away on my account,” he said. “The facts that I am about to lay before Dr. Thorndyke will be known to all the world by this time tomorrow, so there is no occasion for any show of secrecy.”
“In that case,” said Thorndyke, “let us draw our chairs up to the fire and fall to business forthwith. We had just finished our dinner and were waiting for the coffee, which I hear my man bringing down at this moment.”
The Detective Megapack Page 26