The dream detective: being some account of the methods of Moris Klaw

by Sax Rohmer; Internet Archive

  SEVENTH EPISODE

  CASE OF THE CHORD IN G

  IT HAS been suggested to me more than once that the extraordinary crime which became known throughout the press as the Chelsea studio murder was the Waterloo of my eccentric friend, Moris Klaw; to which I reply that, on the contrary, it was his Austerlitz. This prince of criminologists, some of whose triumphs it has been my privilege to chronicle, never more dramatically established his theory of what he termed "Odic negatives" than in his solution of the mystery of the death of Pyke Webley, the portrait painter.

  His singular power, which I can only term post-telepathy, of recovering thought-forms from the atmosphere, earned him the derision of the ignorant, as I have shown, but the grateful appreciation of the better informed—not least among these, Detective-Inspector Grimsby, of New Scotland Yard.

  I cannot doubt that the recent experiments of Professor Gilbert Murray were based upon that law of "psychic angles" laid down by the strange genius of Wapping Old Stairs.

  During lunch, I had been reading an account of the Chelsea tragedy in an early edition of the Evening idardy and on returning to my chambers I found Inspector Grimsby waiting for me. A preamble was unnecessary. Simple deduction told me why he had come.

  He was in charge of the Chelsea mystery—and out of his depth.

  By several years the youngest detective inspector in the Service, Grimsby is a man earmarked by nature for constant promotion. He possesses a gift more precious than genius—the art of using genius; allied to which he has that knack indispensable to any man who would succeed—the knack of finding the limelight. Although he may have done no more than stand in the wings throughout the performance, Detective-Inspector Grimsby invariably takes the last curtain.

  This is as it should be, and I accord him my respectful admiration. Therefore, on seeing him:

  "The murder of Pyke Webley?" I said, interrogatively.

  "Well, that's wonderful!" he declared, trying to look surprised. "I shall begin to think you are Moris Klaw's only rival if you spring things like this on me."

  "I see," said I, tossing my paper on the table. "The case is not so simple as it appears."

  "Simple!" cried Grimsby. He threw the stump

  of a vicious-looking cheroot into my hearth. " Simple ? It's too simple. By which I mean that there is nothing to work upon—nothing / can see."

  He stood, his back to the hearth, looking at me appealingly; and:

  "Have you 'phoned to Wapping?" I asked.

  Grimsby nodded.

  "I could get no reply," he answered gloomily.

  "Then what do you suggest?"

  "Well"—he hesitated—"I know your time is of value, Mr. Searles, but I was wondering—I have a taxi outside—if you had time to run down to Moris Klaw's place with me for a chat?"

  "Why not go alone?"

  "Ah!" He selected a fresh cheroot and made it crackle between ringer and thumb. "His daughter is the snag. She thinks I waste his time. I doubt if she'd let me see him."

  "Your own fault," I said. "She's a charming girl. You don't handle her properly."

  "Ah!" he repeated, and became silent, fumbling for matches. Finally, taking pity upon him:

  "Very well," I agreed, "I have a couple of hours to spare, and if Klaw takes up the case my time will not be wasted."

  11

  "You see," said Grimsby, plaintively, as the cab threaded dingy highways, "there is absolutely no

  motive. Pyke Webley seems to have been a decent, clean-living man, with absolutely no vices as far as I can gather. Of course, I have tried to find a woman in the case, but the only women I've found are heartbroken about his death. A most popular chap. Revenge is out of the question; robbery is out of the question; and I'd take my oath that jealousy is out of the question. So what am I to make of it? ,:

  "He was strangled?"

  "Yes." Grimsby nodded. "By a very powerful man. His face is horrible to see, and there are blue weals on his neck where the strangled fingers bit into the flesh."

  "Who saw him last, alive?"

  "The door-keeper of the Ham Bone Club," came the answer, promptly. "He dined there, stayed an hour talking to friends and then went out, saying that he had work to do at his studio. The studio is separated from the house by a small garden and can be entered direct from a side entrance. There are only two servants—he was a bachelor—a cook general and a man who has been with him for years. Neither of them heard him come into the house, so that we presume he went straight into the studio. Early this morning a charwoman, who comes daily, finding the studio door locked (I mean the one that opens on the garden) reported this to Parker (that's the man's name) and he came down with the key."

  "But," I interrupted, "Parker must surely have

  known before this that his master was not in the house ?"

  "No!" Grimsby shook his head emphatically. "Mr. Webley often worked late and Parker had orders never to disturb him until his bell rang."

  "I see," said I. "So they unlocked the studio "

  "Yes," Grimsby went on, "and found him there—■ lying strangled on the floor."

  "How long had he been dead?"

  "Well, the police surgeon says several hours. Everything points to the fact that it happened shortly after he entered the place."

  "Someone may have been concealed there," I suggested.

  "God knows!" Grimsby muttered. "I can't find a thing to work upon. And in a case like this the first twelve hours are important. But here we are/ 1 he added, nervously.

  At the head of that blind alley which shelters the all-but-indescribable establishment of Moris Klaw, we directed the taxi man to wait. This was a foggy afternoon and only dimly could we discern the lights in front of the shop. A chill in the atmosphere told of the nearness of old Father Thames, and as we approached that stacked-up lumber which represented the visible stock-in-trade of the proprietor, a singular piece of human flotsam was revealed propped against the door-post, a fragment of cigarette adhering to the corner of his mouth and

  threatening at any moment to ignite the stained and walrus-like moustache which distinguished William, Moris Klaw's salesman.

  "Good afternoon," I said; "will you tell Mr. Moris Klaw that I have called?"

  "Certainly, sir," wheezed the inebriate. "Great pleasure, sir, I'm sure, sir."

  William paused, turned, and looked back.

  "Do you mind a-waitin' outside?" he added. "There's a boy with red 'air 'angin' about somewhere as 'as got 'is eye on this 'ere golf club"—indicating a dilapidated niblick. "If we all goes in 'e'll nip Drf with it."

  Accordingly we lingered, and:

  "Moris Klaw! Moris Klaw! The devil's come For you!" screeched the parrot who mounted guard within.

  Presently came Klaw's unmistakable deep, rumbling voice from the interior gloom:

  "Ah! Good afternoon, Mr. Searles! Is it Detective-Inspector Grimsby you have with you ? Good afternoon, Mr. Grimsby."

  He advanced through the odorous shadows, a strange, a striking figure and—

  "Behold!" he said, "I have my hat and you have ^our cab. It is to Chelsea you take me? Yes?"

  From the lining of the flat-topped hat he took out [lis cylindrical scent spray and played its contents jpon his high, bald crown.

  "Verbena," he rumbled. "My guinea-pigs, they detest it, but I find it so refreshing/' He replaced the spray in the hat, the hat on his crown. "I have recently bought a fine pair of armadillos," he explained, "and they have an odour peculiar which, to me, is objectionable."

  He regarded William, who was glancing suspiciously up and down the narrow alley.

  ''William," he admonished, "cease to dwdl upon the youth with red hair. He becomes with you an obsession. Give the sheldrake some fresh seaweed, and if the hedgehogs continue to refuse apples, they may have each a small piece of raw steak."

  He approached the waiting taxi cab, and on the step he paused.

  "Mr. Searles, I shall buy no more hedgehogs. They are not only delicate in ca
ptivity but one was in my bed last night."

  We all entered the cab; and:

  "Now, Mr. Grimsby," Moris Klaw continued, "tell me all about this poor fellow who is murdered. I am expecting you. I see it is not simple. I say, 'The old fool from Wapping is wanted here."

  in

  "You are squeamish, Mr. Searles," said Moris Klaw, wagging a long finger at me. "You squeam. You are not yet recovered from the blue face of the murdered. Ah, well! it is horrible."

  The body had been removed and we had been to view it. Now we stood in the studio where the crime had taken place, and although some time had elapsed since we had left the mortuary, I confess that I was not entirely myself. Dusk was come and we had turned up the studio lights. A faint mist hung in the place, for the fog had grown denser.

  I looked about me at half-completed pictures: groups; studies for magazine jackets; portraits of children and of women—and the ghastly face seemed to rise up before me, the distorted face of the man whose hand would never touch again the brushes of his craft.

  "It isn't the first time Tve seen a strangling case," said Grimsby, "but it's the first time I've seen marks like that."

  "Ah! really!" Moris Klaw rumbled, turning to him. "Never before, eh, like that? You interest me, my friend; you begin to notice. Your intellect it expands like a sunflower in the sun. What is it that you see different in those marks?"

  Grimsby stared hard, painfully uncertain whether to regard the words as a compliment or a joke, but finally:

  "The pressure was greater," he replied. "The murderer must have had amazing strength."

  "Ah, yes!" Moris Klaw removed his hat and stared reflectively into the crown thereof. "Amazing strength? And the surgeon, what does he think?'

  "He thinks the same."

  "Ah! but no more, eh? Amazing strength only?"

  Grimsby figuratively pricked up his ears.

  "I don't quite follow you, Mr. Klaw," he said. "Did you notice something else?"

  Moris Klaw placed his hat upon a little table.

  "I did take notice of some other thing, Mr. Grimsby," he replied, "and for a moment I had dreams that you synchronize with me. It is a complimentary mistake which I make. Please forgive me. This ashtray"—he took up an ashtray from the table beside his hat—"is of great interest. You are agreeable, Mr. Searles"—turning to me—"that it is of great interest?"

  I stared rather helplessly. It was a common brass ashtray containing match sticks and cigarette ends. I could see nothing unusual about it, and so presently I shook my head.

  "Ah!"

  Moris Klaw inserted two long yellow fingers gingerly and plucked out a cigarette stump. He replaced the tray and held up the stump.

  "Behold!" he said, "what I find!"

  Grimsby now was frankly amazed and not a little angry. As for myself, familiar though I was with Klaw's peculiar methods, I could not divine at what he was driving.

  "My friends," he continued, looking from one to the other of us, and holding up the cigarette stump

  as a lecturer holds up a specimen, "the cigarette, a vice which has killed many men. I have known a woman to hang because of a hairpin, but men and women, too, many of them, because of a ciga-rette.

  He opened a bulging pocket-case and tenderly deposited the stump inside. As he was about to close the case:

  "One moment, Mr. Klaw!" said Grimsby. "If that is evidence—though I can't for the life of me see how it can be . . ."

  "But / see!" cried Moris Klaw—"I, the old foolish from Wapping, behold in this the hangman's rope!

  He closed the case.

  "But " Grimsby began again.

  "But me no buts!" Moris Klaw implored. "In my hands it is the evidence, in your hands it is the cigarette stump. But listen!" A bell rang. "It is Isis. I had arranged with her to meet me here. Perhaps, Mr. Grimsby, you would be so good as to open the door?"

  Grimsby obeying with alacrity, the beautiful Isis presently entered, exquisitely gowned. She gave me smiling greeting, this lovely daughter of a singular father, and whilst Grimsby deferentially held the door wide open, managed to introduce into the studio, without brushing it against the sides of the door, a large brown paper bag.

  "Ah!" Moris Klaw exclaimed, "it is my odically sterilized cushion. Place it here, my child." He indicated a spot upon the floor. "My other engagements do not allow of my sleeping here for more than two hours, but, in that time, I shall hope to recapture the etheric storm in the mind of the slayer or the last great emotion in the brain of the slain. Something, certainly, I shall get, for this was no common crime."

  From its paper wrappings Isis Klaw took a red silk cushion and placed it upon the spot where the dead man had been found.

  I turned aside, shuddering. That any human being, having seen what we had seen that day, could lie down and, above all, could sleep upon that haunted spot, was almost more than I could believe. Yet such was Moris Klaw's intention, and that he would carry it out I did not doubt.

  "Isis, my child," he said, "awake me in two hours."

  Removing his caped coat and revealing the shabby tweed suit which he wore beneath it, he spread the garment on the carpet, stretched his gaunt shape upon it, and rested his head on the red cushion.

  "Gentlemen," he said in his queer, rumbling tones, "leave me to my slumber. When I awake, I perhaps shall know something more about the man who smoked"—he tapped long fingers upon his breast pocket—"this cigarette."

  We went out of the studio through the door leading to the garden. Isis was last to leave and I heard her father's voice:

  "Isis, my child, be pleased to extinguish the lights."

  So, leaving the eccentric investigator to his dark and ghastly vigil, we went up to the house; and, taking pity upon Grimsby, whose anxiety to talk to Isis was almost pathetic, I sought out Parker, the dead artist's manservant, and endeavoured to obtain from him some useful information. In this, however, I was wholly unsuccessful.

  "He hadn't an enemy in the world, sir," the man declared emotionally. "He was the best employer I've ever had or am ever likely to have. I don't deny that he had his little affairs, sir, but there was nothing that left a nasty taste behind. Believe me, there was no woman in it, like the Scotland Yard men tried to make out."

  And indeed, the more I considered the facts of the case, the more inexplicable these became.

  For instance, there were no signs of a struggle. If one had taken place the murderer had removed all traces of it before leaving. Upon the fingerprint evidence which Scotland Yard hoped to obtain, I based little hope of result. But the astute perceptions of Moris Klaw had undoubtedly enabled him to pick up a clue where no one else had found one; and strange though his behaviour appeared to be, I had

  good reason to know that his subconscious mind, termed by him "the astral negative," rarely failed to obtain some record under conditions such as those which, he maintained, prevail upon the scene of a crime of violence.

  When at the appointed time we returned to the studio, we found it to be brightly lighted, and entering, discovered Moris Klaw engaged in squirting verbena upon his high, bald forehead. He stooped and picked up the caped coat.

  "Ah, my friends," he said, "there are many laws governing the functions of mind which have yet to be classified. I think so; yes. Why is it that some emotions register"—he waved his long hands in the air—"indelibly; others, impermanently, and some, not at all? I ask myself the question, and no one replies. We are, then, ignorant, and stupid. Tonight"—he lowered his voice—"I do murder with my bare hands! Yes! I am the assassin! My motive "

  "Yes, yes!" cried Grimsby, eagerly.

  "No, no!" Moris Klaw frowned at him. "My motive beats in my brain, my second brain, my subconscious brain. Myself I do not see, nor my victim; but I hear, I hear. I hear a sound!' 9

  "A sound," Isis whispered "Do you mean a horrible sound—his death cry?"

  "No, no!" her father assured her. "I hear a beautiful sound."

  IV

  Time passed an
d no arrest was made. Other matters engaged public attention, and the Chelsea studio murder gradually dropped out of sight, occupying less and less space in the press and presently disappearing altogether.

  Between Inspector Grimsby and Moris Klaw a definite breach occurred.

  "He's either blurring or else hiding something," the Inspector declared to me. "Why did he keep that cigarette? What the devil was the sound he heard, or thought he heard, or pretended he heard? All I know is that I've made a fool of myself. There's not a ghost of a clue."

  I was not without sympathy for Grimsby. He had grown so used to finding his difficulties resolved by the genius of Wapping Old Stairs, that beyond doubt in the Chelsea case he had promised more than he had been able to perform, optimistically trusting Klaw to provide light in the darkness; and the great man had proved to be fallible.

  It was a dreadful blow to Detective-Inspector Grimsby, and, I must confess, a surprise to me. Although I had no definite evidence, I nevertheless had certain reasons to suppose that Moris Klaw was not entirely inactive during this time. Twice I met him, accompanied by the dazzling Isis, in the neighbour-

  CASE OF THE CHORD IN G 205

  hood of Queen's Hall, and on the second occasion as he entered a car which was waiting for him:

  "Mr. Searles," he said, "tell him, that Detective Inspector, that all work and no play makes of Jean a dull fellow. Recommend to him music. Tell him he should sometimes steal an afternoon and at a concert relax himself."

  I reported the conversation to Grimsby in due course and had never seen him more angry.

  "He's pulling my leg!" he said. "It'll be a long time before I ask him to help me again. Concerts! What time have / got for concerts?"

  Such, then, was the state of affairs at the time that Len Hassett, a black-and-white artist of my acquaintance whose work was beginning to attract attention, leased the house and studio of ill-fame where poor Pyke Webley had met his death.

  Hassett was ultra-modern and very morbid, but although he professed to have taken the place because its murderous atmosphere appealed to him, I had more than a suspicion that the low rental, consequent upon its evil reputation, had done much more to influence his decision. However, in due course I received an invitation to the house-warming, and on the same day a telephone message from Moris Klaw.