The Second R. Austin Freeman Megapack

by R. Austin Freeman

  The laboratory and its methods were characteristic of Thorndyke. Everything was ready and all procedure was prearranged. As we entered, the assistant, Polton, put down the work on which he was engaged, and at a word, took up the present task without either hesitation or hurry. While Thorndyke fixed the pieces of glass in the copying frame of the great standing camera, Polton arranged the light and the condensers and produced a dark-slide loaded with bromide paper. In less than a minute the exposure was made; in another three minutes the print had been developed, roughly fixed, rinsed, squeegeed, soaked in spirit, cut in two, and trimmed with scissors, and the damp but rapidly drying halves attached with drawing pins to a small hinged board specially designed for carrying wet prints in the pocket.

  “Now,” said Thorndyke, slipping the folded board into his pocket and taking from a shelf a powerful electric inspection lamp, “I think we are ready to start. These few minutes have not been wasted.”

  We returned to the lower room, where Thorndyke, having bestowed the lamp in the canvas-covered “research-case,” put on his hat and overcoat and took up the case, and we all set forth, walking quickly and in silence up Inner Temple Lane to the gate, and taking our seats in the waiting car when Drayton had given a few laconic instructions to the driver.

  Up to this point Thorndyke had asked not a single question about the crime. Now, as the car started, he said to Drayton: “We had better be ready to begin the investigation as soon as we arrive. Could you give me a short account of what has happened?”

  “Anstey knows more about it than I do,” was the reply. “He was there within a few minutes of the murder.”

  The question being thus referred to me, I gave an account of all that I had seen and heard, to which Thorndyke listened with deep attention, interrupting me only once or twice to elucidate some point that was not quite clear.

  “I understand,” said he when I had finished, “that there is no catalogue or record of the collection and no written description of the specimens?”

  “No,” replied Drayton. “But I have looked over the cabinets a good many times, and taken the pieces out to examine them, so I think I shall be able to tell roughly what is missing, and give a working description of the pieces. And I could certainly identify most of them if they should be produced.”

  “They are not very likely to be traced,” said Thorndyke. “It is highly improbable that the murderer will attempt to dispose of things stolen in such circumstances. Still, the possibility of identifying them may be of the greatest importance, for the folly of criminals is often beyond belief.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Thorndyke Takes Up the Inquiry

  The outer door of the house was shut, although the lower rooms were all lighted up, but at the first sound of the bell it was opened by a uniformed constable who regarded us stolidly and inquired as to our business. Before there was time to answer, however, a man whom I at once recognised as Inspector Badger of the Criminal Investigation Department came out into the hall and asked sharply: “Who is that, Martin?”

  “It is Sir Lawrence Drayton, Dr Thorndyke, and Mr. Anstey,” I replied; and as the constable backed out of the way we all entered.

  “This is a terrible catastrophe, Sir Lawrence,” said Badger “Dreadful, dreadful. If sincere sympathy would be any consolation—”

  “It wouldn’t,” interrupted Drayton, “though I thank you all the same. The only thing that would console me—and that little enough—would be the sight of the ruffian who did it dangling at the end of a rope. The local officer told you, I suppose, that I was asking Dr Thorndyke to lend his valuable aid in investigating the crime?”

  “Yes, Sir Lawrence,” replied Badger, “but I don’t know that I am in a position to authorise any unofficial—”

  “Tut, tut, man!” Drayton broke in impatiently, “I am not asking you to authorise anything. I am the murdered man’s sole executor and his only brother. In the one capacity his entire estate is vested in me until it has been disposed of in accordance with the will; in the other capacity, the duty devolves on me of seeing that his murderer is brought to account. I give you every liberty and facility to examine these premises, but I am not going to surrender possession of them. Has any discovery been made?”

  “No, sir.” Badger replied a little sulkily. “We have only been here a few minutes. I was taking some particulars from the housekeeper.”

  “Possibly I can give you some information while Dr Thorndyke is making his inspection of my poor brother’s body,” said Drayton. “When he has finished and the body has been laid decently in his bedroom, I will come with you to the museum and we will see if anything is missing.”

  Badger assented, with evident unwillingness, to this arrangement. He and Drayton entered the drawing-room, from which the inspector had just come, while I conducted Thorndyke to the museum.

  The room was just as I had seen it last, excepting that the open drawer had been closed. The stark, rigid figure still lay on the floor, the set, white face still stared with stern fixity at the ceiling. As I looked, the events of the interval faded from my mind and all the horror of the sudden tragedy came back.

  Just inside the door Thorndyke halted and slowly ran his eye round the room, taking in its arrangement, and no doubt fixing it in his memory. Presently he stepped over to where the body lay, and stood a while looking down on the dead man. Then he stopped and closely examined a spot on the right breast.

  “Isn’t there more bleeding than is usual in the case of a bullet-wound?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he replied, “but that blood hasn’t come from the wound in front. There must be another at the back, possibly a wound of exit.” As he spoke, he stood up and again looked searchingly round the room, more especially at the side in which the door opened. Suddenly his glance became fixed and he strode quickly across to a cabinet that stood beside the door; and as I followed him, I perceived a ragged hole in the front of one of the drawers.

  “Do you mean, Thorndyke,” I exclaimed, “that the bullet passed right through him?”

  “That is what it looks like,” he replied. “But we shall be able to judge better when we get the drawer open—which we can’t do until Badger comes. But there is one thing that we had better do at once.” Stepping over to the table on which he had placed the research-case, he opened the latter, and taking from it a stick of blackboard chalk, went back to the body. “We must assume,” said he, “that he fell where he was standing when he was struck, and if that is so he would have been standing here.” He marked on the carpet two-rough outlines to indicate the position of the feet when the murdered man fell, and having put the chalk back in the case, continued: “The next thing is to verify the existence of the wound at the back. Will you help me to turn him over?”

  We turned the body gently on to its right side, and immediately there came into view a large, blood-stained patch under the left shoulder, and at the centre of it a ragged burst in the fabric of the coat.

  “That will do,” said Thorndyke. “It is an unmistakable exit wound. The bullet probably missed the ribs both in entering and emerging, and passed through the heart or the great vessels. The appearances suggest almost instantaneous death. The face is set, the eyes wide open, and both the hands tightly clenched in a cadaveric spasm. And the right hand seems to be grasping something, but we had better leave that until Badger has seen it.”

  At this moment footsteps became audible coming along the corridor, and Badger entered the room accompanied by the local inspector. The two officers looked inquiringly at Thorndyke, who proceeded at once to give them a brief statement of the facts that he had observed.

  “There can’t be much doubt,” said Badger when he had examined the hole in the drawer front, “that this was made by a spent bullet. But we may as well settle the question now. We shall want the keys in any case.”

  He passed his hand over the dead man’s clothes, and having located the pocket which contained the keys, drew out a good-sized bunch, with which h
e went over to the cabinet. A few trials with likely-looking keys resulted in the discovery of the right one, and when this had been turned and the hinged batten swung back, all the drawers of the cabinet were released. The inspector pulled out the one with the damaged front and looked in inquisitively. Its contents consisted principally of latten and pewter spoons, now evidently disarranged and mingled with a litter of splinters of wood; and in the bowl of a spoon near the back of the drawer lay a distorted bullet, which Badger picked up and examined critically.

  “Browning automatic, I should say,” was his comment, “and if so we ought to find the cartridge case somewhere on the floor. We must look for it presently, but we’d better get the body moved first, if you have finished your inspection, Doctor.”

  “There is something grasped in the right hand,” said Thorndyke. “It looks like a wisp of hair. Perhaps we had better look at that before the body is moved, in case it should fall out.”

  We returned to the body, and the two officers stooped and watched eagerly as Thorndyke, with some difficulty, opened the rigid hand sufficiently to draw from it a small tuft of hair.

  “The spasm is very marked,” he observed as he scrutinised the hair and felt in his pocket for a lens; and when, with the aid of the latter, he had made a further examination, he continued: “The state of the root-bulbs shows that the hair was actually plucked out—which, of course, is what we should expect.”

  “Can you form any opinion as to what sort of man he was?” Badger asked.

  “No,” replied Thorndyke, “excepting that he was not a recently released convict. But the appearance of the hair agrees with Miss Blake’s description of the man who stabbed her. I understand that she described him as a having rather short but bushy hair. This hair is rather short, though we can’t say whether it was bushy or not. Perhaps more complete examination of it may tell us something further.”

  “Possibly,” Badger agreed. “I will have it thoroughly examined, and get a report on it. Shall I take charge of it?” he added, holding out his hand.

  “Yes, you had better,” replied Thorndyke, “but I will take a small sample for further examination, if you don’t mind.”

  “There is no need for that,” protested Badger. “You can always have access to what we’ve got if you want to refer to it.”

  “I know,” said Thorndyke, “and it is very good of you to offer. Still this will save time and trouble.” And without more ado he separated a third of the tuft and handed the remainder to the inspector, who wrapped it in a sheet of note-paper that he had taken from his pocket and sourly watched Thorndyke bestow his portion in a seed-envelope from his pocket-book, and after writing on it a brief description, return it to the latter receptacle.

  “You were saying,” said Badger, “that this hair agrees with Miss Blake’s description. But it was suggested that it was the other man who really committed the murder. Isn’t that rather a contradiction?”

  “I don’t think so,” replied Thorndyke. “The probabilities seem to me to point to the other man as the murderer.”

  “But how can that be?” objected Badger. “You say that this hair agrees with Miss Blake’s description of the man. But this hair is obviously the hair of the murderer. And that man was left-handed and the wound is on the right breast, suggesting that the murderer held his pistol in his left hand.”

  “Not at all,” said Thorndyke. “I submit that this hair is obviously not the hair of the murderer. Look at those chalk marks that I have made on the floor. They mark the spot on which the deceased was standing when the bullet struck him. Now go back to the cabinet and look at the chalk marks and see what is in a direct line with them.”

  The inspector did so. “I see,” said he. “You mean the window.”

  “Yes, it was open, since the robber evidently came in by it, and the sill is barely five feet from the ground. I suggest—but merely as a probability, since the bullet may have been deflected—that the other man was keeping guard outside, and that when he heard a noise from this room he looked in through the window and saw his confederate on the point of being captured by the deceased, that he then fired, and when he saw deceased fall, he made his escape. That would account for the man who was seen by Miss Blake making his appearance after the other man had gone. He may have had to extricate himself from the dead man’s grasp, and then he had to climb out of the window. But the position of the empty cartridge-case—if we find it—will settle the question. If the pistol was fired into the room through the window, the cartridge-case will be on the ground outside.”

  He opened his research-case, and taking from it the electric lamp, walked slowly to the window, throwing the bright light on the floor as he went. The two officers followed, and all scrutinised the floor closely, but in vain. Then Thorndyke leaned out of the window and threw the light of his lamp on the ground outside, moving the bright beam slowly to and fro while the inspector craned forward eagerly. Suddenly Badger uttered an exclamation.

  “There it is, Doctor! Don’t move the light. Keep it there while I go out and pick the case up.”

  “One moment, Badger,” said Thorndyke. “We mustn’t be impetuous. There are some other things out there more important than the cartridge-case. I can see two distinct sets of footprints, and it is above all things necessary that they should not be confused by being trodden into. Let us get the body moved first. Then we can take some mats out and examine the footprints systematically and recover the cartridge-case at the same time. If we are careful we can leave the ground in such a condition that it will be possible to go over it again by daylight.”

  The wisdom of this suggestion was obvious, and the inspector proceeded at once to act on it. The sergeant and the constable were sent for, and by them the body of the murdered man was carried, under the inspector’s supervision, to the bedroom above. Then a couple of large mats were procured from Mrs. Benham and we all issued from the front door into the garden. Here, however, a halt was called, and at Thorndyke’s suggestion, the party was separated into two, he and Badger to explore the grounds inside the fence, while the local inspector and the others endeavoured to follow the tracks outside.

  I did not join either party, nor did Sir Lawrence. We both realised the futility of any attempt to trace the fugitives, and recognised that the suggestion was made by Thorndyke merely to get rid of the unwanted supernumeraries. Accordingly we took up a position outside the fence, which we could just look over, and watched the proceedings of Thorndyke and Inspector Badger, as they passed slowly along the side of the house, each with the light of his lantern thrown full on the ground.

  They had gone but a few paces when they picked up on the soft, loamy path the fairly clear impressions of two pairs of feet going towards the back of the house. Both the investigators paused and stooped to examine them, and Badger remarked: “So they came in at the front gate-naturally, as it was the easiest way. But they must have been pretty sure that there was no one in the house to see them. And that suggests that they knew the ways of the household and that they had lurked about to watch Mr. Drayton and Mrs. Benham off the premises.”

  “Is it possible to distinguish one man from the other?” Drayton asked.

  “Yes, quite easily,” Badger replied. “One of them is a biggish man—close on six feet, I should say—while the other is quite a small man. That will be the one that Miss Blake saw.”

  They followed the tracks to the back of the house, and as we followed on our side of the fence Thorndyke called out: “Be careful, Anstey, not to tread in the tracks where they came over the fence. We ought to get specially clear prints of their feet where they jumped down. Could you get a light?”

  “I’ll go and get one of the acetylene lamps from the car,” said Drayton. “You stay where you are until I come back.”

  He was but a short time absent, and when he returned he was provided with a powerful lamp and a couple of small mats. “I have brought these,” he explained “to lay on any particularly clear footprints to protect
them from chance injury. We mustn’t lose the faintest shadow of a clue.”

  With the aid of the brilliant light Drayton and I explored the ground at the foot of the fence. Suddenly Sir Lawrence exclaimed:

  “Why, these look like a woman’s footprints!” and he pointed to a set of rather indistinct impressions running parallel to the fence.

  “They will be Miss Blake’s,” said I. “She ran round this way. Yes, here is the place where the man came over. What extraordinarily clear impressions this ground takes. It shows the very brads in the heels.”

  “Yes,” he agreed; “this is the Hampstead sand, you know; one of the finest foundry-sands in the country.”

  He laid one of the mats carefully on the pair of footprints, and we continued our explorations towards the back of the house. Here we saw Thorndyke and the inspector, each kneeling on a mat, examining a confused mass of footprints on the ground between the museum window and the fence.

  “Have you found the cartridge-case?” I asked.

  “Yes,” replied Thorndyke. “Badger has it. It is a “Baby Browning.” And I think we have seen all there is to see here by this light. Can you see where the big man came down from the fence? He went over where I am throwing the light.”

  We approached the spot cautiously, and at the place indicated perceived the very clear and deep impression of a large right foot with a much less distinct print of a left foot, both having the heels towards the fence; and a short distance in front of them the soft, loamy earth bore a clear impression of a left hand with the fingers spread out, and a fainter print of a right hand.

  I reported these facts to Thorndyke, who at once decided to come over and examine the prints. Handing his lamp over a few paces farther along the fence, he climbed up and dropped lightly by my side, followed almost immediately by Inspector Badger.