The Studio Crime

by Ianthe Jerrold

  The philanthropist finished the sentence with a lift of the eyebrows and a shake of the head. Before Newtree could think of an adequate rejoinder (and, indeed, there was none) brisk footsteps sounded on the gravel, and after a moment or two John Christmas entered, carrying a bundle of papers under his arm and looking both grave and tired.

  “Ah, Sir Marion!” he said as the great financier greeted him with a sympathetic smile. “I half expected I should find you here. I knew your interest in Merewether’s fortunes, and guessed that it would bring you here for news. Oh, Lord! I’m tired! Get me a drink, Laurence, there’s a good chap.”

  He took a long draught from the glass Laurence handed him and dropped into a chair with a sigh.

  “The last four days must have been very crowded ones for you,” said Sir Marion sympathetically. “Especially if, as Newtree tells me, you have collected sufficient evidence to vindicate Merewether’s innocence of this dreadful charge.”

  “It has been rather a crowded hour of life,” replied Christmas. “I won’t say ‘glorious life.’ For though it is pleasant to feel that one holds the power to vindicate a friend, it is not pleasant to have to do so at the expense of someone else.”

  “Do I understand then,” asked Sir Marion, leaning forward with a look of keen interest on his fine, gentle features, “that you not only hold proofs of Merewether’s innocence, but also of the real murderer’s complicity?”

  “Yes, Sir Marion. I do not say that my case is sufficiently strong as it stands to convince a jury. But I think that by to-morrow it will be strong enough to procure Merewether’s discharge and to turn Hembrow’s attention towards establishing the real identity of the man I have in mind.”

  “But this sounds almost too good to be true,” said Sir Marion. “I suppose my curiosity must remain unsatisfied until to-morrow. But I cannot refrain from asking you now whether the solution has anything to do with the mysterious Turk who spoke to me in Greentree Road?”

  John looked dreamily across the wide studio.

  “That is not altogether an easy question to answer, Sir Marion,” he replied gravely. “He figures in the solution. He appears in the story as that lay figure over there appears in an artist’s pictures.”

  And he pointed to the featureless wooden figure draped in a mandarin’s robe which, with its arms bent stiffly under the wide sleeves and its gleaming bald head bent, appeared to be listening earnestly to the conversation.

  “In one of Laurence’s pictures that wooden figure might appear as a Chinese priest. In another, as a woman dressed in the height of fashion. In another, as a—let us say as a man in a fez. But apart from Laurence’s pictures it has no life. It is only a lay figure.”

  There was a pause. Sir Marion, who had been listening attentively to this exposition, continued to gaze contemplatively at John’s grave face for a moment, then, coming to himself with a start, exchanged a rather puzzled glance with Newtree.

  “You might just tell us where you’ve been this evening,” said Laurence, hoping to draw his friend from the realm of fancy to that of fact. “And what those two papers are you’re nursing so carefully on your knee.”

  “Certainly,” replied John with a smile. “I have been to Fleet Street, Covent Garden and Bloomsbury. And these two papers are copies of last month’s Collector.” Laurence took one up and began idly to look through it.

  “You could have got a copy of this at a bookstall without chasing down to Fleet Street,” he remarked.

  “Until I had chased down to Fleet Street, my dear Laurence, and looked through the files of this and several other similar publications, I did not know what paper it was I wanted. I only knew that I wanted one in which a certain photograph had appeared. Ah, I see,” he added, as Newtree uttered an exclamation, “that you have discovered the photograph in question.”

  “Good Lord!” ejaculated Laurence. “Is this the man who passed you on the night of the murder, Sir Marion? It seems to answer exactly to his description.” Sir Marion put on his glasses and took the magazine from Laurence. The photograph showed the intellectual and rather melancholy face of a middle-aged Greek wearing a fez and having a slight cast in his left eye. He was looking at a small ivory carving which he was holding up against the light, and his lips were parted in a pensive smile. A gold-crowned tooth, showing dark in the white row, had not been touched out by the art of the photographer. Underneath were written the lines:

  “Mr. Oscar Lascarides, whose shop in Ainslie Street is much frequented by collectors of fine Oriental works of art, examining a newly-acquired treasure.”

  “I can save Sir Marion the trouble of answering your question, Laurence,” said John quietly, as the financier was about to speak. “It is not the man. It is the model. I have seen the man and this is a very good photograph of him, though flattering. It is carefully taken to minimize the effect of the truly appalling squint from which he suffers.”

  “You are very uncommunicative, John,” complained Laurence, laying the paper on the table with a last fascinated glance at the interesting face of Mr. Lascarides. “At least you are very mysterious in your communications.”

  “On the contrary,” said John gravely, “I am being very communicative and not in the least mysterious. And to prove it I will show you this, which I found waiting for me at my flat in Bloomsbury.”

  He drew from his pocket a small cardboard box and took from it a tiny object wrapped in tissue paper, which he unwrapped and laid upon the table.

  “Why,” exclaimed Newtree, “it’s the little piece of metal old Brett the crossing-sweeper gave you the other day! You don’t mean to say that you found out anything from that?”

  “I took it to a chemical analyst who is an old friend of mine,” said John with a sigh, “and this is his report upon it: ‘The object is a thin piece of eighteen carat gold and is engraved on one side with an elaborate floral pattern such as is frequently found on old-fashioned lockets and watch-cases. The edges have been cut with a strong pair of scissors or clippers. The fragment shows traces of mud and road-dust, and there is a minute trace of human blood upon one of the roughened edges.’”

  John sighed as he replaced the lid of the little box and put it in his pocket.

  “And what did you find in Covent Garden?” asked Laurence, with a puzzled but hopeful air. “Though I can’t make head or tail of your discoveries at present!”

  “In Covent Garden,” said John rather wearily, “I obtained an interesting piece of information at the premises of Messrs. Ryebody and Pratt, theatrical costumiers. And as I walked back here along Greentree Road I noticed, not for the first time, that there is a long, narrow passage about ten yards the other side of Shipman’s Mews, which leads through into the recreation ground. And now,” he added, disregarding his friend’s exclamation of bewilderment, “do you think you could persuade Greenaway to produce some food? I haven’t had a meal since breakfast.”

  “I’ll leave you to your rest and refreshment,” said Sir Marion, rising, “with many thanks for bearing with my curiosity so long. I am afraid I have fatigued you a good deal... I suppose you do not happen to know the address of Dr. Merewether’s solicitor?” he added, turning to Newtree. “You do? I should be glad to have it. For, should our friend Christmas by some evil chance be unable to convince the police of Merewether’s innocence, I shall make it my business to procure him a good defence.”

  Chapter XIX

  Exit

  John, who had stayed the night at Madox Court on the feeble pretext that he had an objection to going home in the dark, came to breakfast the next morning looking so heavy-eyed and pale that Laurence exclaimed in concern at the sight of him.

  “You don’t look exactly brilliant yourself,” remarked John, drawing up a chair.

  “To tell you the truth,” replied Laurence, looking somewhat ashamed of himself, “I hardly slept all night, thinking of poor Merewether.”

  “I didn’t sleep much either,” confessed John, looking with an unfavourable eye a
t his eggs and bacon and pouring himself out some strong black coffee. “But I wasn’t thinking of Merewether.”

  His eye strayed speculatively to the newspapers that still lay folded in a pile upon the floor. Newtree subscribed to all the daily papers, under the impression that this catholicity was likely to give him good ideas for cartoons. But he rarely opened more than one or two, and the long-suffering Greenaway struggled in vain to find domestic uses for the never-ceasing accumulation of news-print.

  “I haven’t had the pluck to open the beastly things yet,” said Laurence, picking up one or two with a wry smile. “I suppose we shall find Merewether’s name sprawled all over them. Which one shall I open first?”

  “The Times,” said John, “if you want the news broken gently. The Daily Wire, if you want to get the shock over quickly.”

  Laurence chose the latter, and having finished his breakfast, leant back in his chair, lit a cigarette and stoically unfolded the paper. At his sudden stifled exclamation, which seemed to hold even more of surprise than horror, John looked up quickly. Laurence’s face looked at him over the print, as white as the paper itself.

  “My God, John! Look at this!”

  John jumped up and went round to his friend’s chair. The headline stared gigantic across the page. “SUDDEN DEATH OF MILLIONAIRE-PHILANTHROPIST.” And crossing three columns below in letters which seemed small only by comparison: “SIR MARION STEEN FOUND DEAD IN HIS STUDY.”

  John straightened himself with a sigh.

  “I couldn’t tell from his parting remarks last night whether he intended to kill himself or me,” he said. “I am glad, not only for personal reasons, that he was wise enough to choose himself.”

  Laurence, scarcely listening, went on to read :

  “Sir Marion Steen, the millionaire, was discovered lying dead in the library of his house in Mary Street, Mayfair, at eleven o’clock last night. The cause of death is thought to have been strychnine poisoning, and the circumstances point strongly to suicide. The dead financier’s butler states that Sir Marion arrived at his house at about eight o’clock last night, apparently in good health and spirits, and retired to his library. About an hour afterwards he rang the bell and gave the footman who answered it an envelope which he required him to take by hand immediately to the office of Mr. Henry Marchant, a solicitor in Bedford Row. He gave orders that a tray of refreshments should be brought to him in the library at eleven o’clock, as he intended to work late. On entering the library at the stated hour, the butler was horrified to perceive the body of his master extended upon the floor. Death appeared to have taken place an hour or two previously. The dead millionaire is stated to have been a man of cheerful disposition, and to have suffered no nervous derangement or illness which might account for this tragic occurrence. A self-made man, he was well known for his charitable activities, and the Steen Homes of Rest now number upwards of thirty.”

  Laurence laid the paper on his knees and looked up at John with a sad and puzzled face.

  “What an extraordinary thing!” he remarked. “You take it very calmly, I must say, John! Why, the man was perfectly sane and cheerful when he left here last night, and yet within three hours—”

  “Oh, he had courage,” said John, with a sigh. “He knew how to make the best of a bad business.”

  “Just listen to this,” said Laurence with disgust, taking up the paper again. “‘A tragic feature of this sad affair is that the dead man was to have opened to-morrow the new Steen Home of Rest near Primrose Hill, which will now be inaugurated under such sad conditions.’ The way these people write! That’s what they call a tragic feature, is it?”

  “Well,” replied John quietly, “as it happens there were elements of tragedy in that fact, for Sir Marion Steen... There’s Hembrow walking past the window. I thought we should see him here this morning.”

  “This is an extraordinary affair, Mr. Christmas,” began Hembrow as soon as he had entered and briefly greeted Newtree. “Ah, I see you’ve read your paper! I hardly know what to make of this affair!”

  He sat down on the edge of the model’s throne and frowned in a perplexed and disgruntled way.

  “The whole thing seems impossible,” he said irritably. “I thought the case against Merewether and Mrs. Frew quite good enough to justify an arrest, although perhaps I shouldn’t have been in such a hurry if they hadn’t forced my hand by trying to leave the country. But now!” He ran his hand through his hair and looked from Laurence to John. “Would you say there was a possibility that Sir Marion Steen was insane? I can’t find any support for the idea, but it seems he must have been!”

  “He was perfectly sane when he left here last night at about half-past seven,” replied John.

  Hembrow’s eyebrows drew together in a gloomy frown. “Well, he must have gone suddenly off his head almost immediately afterwards. I had a solicitor, a Mr. Marchant, round at Scotland Yard first thing this morning, fairly frothing with excitement and demanding Merewether’s immediate release on the grounds that he had received a confession of murder from Sir Marion Steen. Found it in his letter-box when he arrived at his office this morning. I thought it was a hoax at first. But, damn it, it’s perfectly genuine, as I found out when I rang up Sir Marion’s household. And then to go and do away with himself like that! He must have been insane. What other explanation can there be, except—”

  “Except that he was the murderer of Gordon Frew,” finished John quietly, “and wished to save himself the unpleasantness of a trial and conviction. Newtree will tell you that he was here yesterday evening, and that I presented him with one or two clues to the identity of the murderer.”

  “Yes,” agreed Laurence. “That is so. But, good God, John, you don’t mean to say—”

  “He took the hint, like a sensible man,” said John. “There is no doubt that he was a sensible man. For consider how admirably sensible his behaviour has been ever since the murder, how natural and detached his interest in the affair has seemed. Yes, the murder itself was the only foolish thing he did. And what an unnecessary piece of folly!” John sighed and smiled. “When a man becomes obsessed by the morbid craving for respectability, there is no knowing to what lengths he will go! He might have known that he was safe, if only his vanity had not destroyed his sense of proportion. Gordon Frew would never really have given him away. For he had the same obsession, and the same stake, as it were, in silence. But I suppose the uncertainty became unbearable. And Gordon Frew was a cruel devil. Suffering amused him.”

  “My dear John!” and “Mr. Christmas!” began Laurence and Hembrow simultaneously. “Will you please explain what this is all about?”

  John looked at the two rueful faces and laughed.

  “Didn’t Sir Marion explain it all,” he asked, “in the letter he sent to Mr. Marchant, Solicitor?”

  “No, he didn’t,” returned Hembrow. “It was quite a short statement. I’ve got it here. At least, old Marchant wouldn’t leave me the original”—a slight bitterness in the Inspector’s tone seemed to imply that his feelings had been somewhat ruffled during his interview with Merewether’s solicitor—“but I’ve got a copy.”

  He unfolded a sheet of paper and cleared his throat, and began to read in a rather sceptical tone:

  “I understand that your client Dr. George Merewether has been arrested on a charge of being concerned in the murder of Gordon Frew at Madox Court, St. John’s Wood, on November 24. As I shall in a few hours’ time be out of reach of the law, and as I see no reason why Dr. Merewether should be inconvenienced by my affairs, I wish to make the following statement:

  “I myself, and no one else, am responsible for the death of my objectionable relation Gordon Frew. For reasons which I do not feel inclined to enlarge on here, I stabbed him in the back as he sat at his writing-table at eight o’clock precisely on the evening of November 24, and I do not in the least regret the action itself, although I regret the consequences. If details are required, no doubt Mr. John Christmas will be delighted to
supply you with them.

  “I may say that I had no intention of incriminating Dr. Merewether, but had provided as a scapegoat a man whom I well knew to be a pest to society, although I had no personal animosity against him. I should very much like to know (1) what made Dr. Merewether tell that thundering lie about having seen Frew alive at nine o’clock, and (2) what happened to the remarkably beautiful woman who arrived in Frew’s studio about five minutes before his death and went into an inner room to await my departure. However, I am afraid that my curiosity will have to go unsatisfied.

  “Marion Steen.”

  Hembrow folded the paper up with a grim look on his face and put it into his pocket.

  “He says you can supply the details, Mr. Christmas,” he remarked. “And perhaps you wouldn’t mind doing so. Have I really made a mistake in arresting Mrs. Frew and Dr. Merewether?”

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to let them go again, Hembrow. I was hoping very much that the arrest could be staved off until this morning, when it need never have taken place. But of course in the circumstances you had no alternative. Better luck next time, Hembrow. Anyway, you’re a bit young for promotion yet, aren’t you?

  Hembrow grinned philosophically.

  “Well, let’s have these details, Mr. Christmas, if you don’t mind. How did Sir Marion Steen manage to go up to Frew’s flat and get down again without being seen? Why, he overtook Dr. Merewether in Greentree Road at about twenty-five minutes past eight! He couldn’t possibly have got round the block in the time, so unless he flew over the houses, he must have passed Dr. Merewether face to face before he could turn and overtake him. To say nothing of the cabmen on the rank and the crossing-sweeper at Shipman’s Mews. Yet none of these people saw him going down the road away from here.”