"Very odd," Thorndyke commented, "particularly as the modern woman seems to be so far from squeamish in such matters. Did the verbal endearments extend to written communications? How did she address you in writing?"
"She never did, and I am glad she didn’t; for if her handwriting was at all like her drawing, it would have taken some deciphering. But she never wrote to me, and I gather that she never wrote to Vanderpuye. It almost looks as if she avoided putting any of her nonsense down in black and white, though there was nothing very incriminating in it."
"Not incriminating," said Thorndyke, "but, after all, she was a married woman, and compromising letters are apt to be dangerous things if there happens to be an unfriendly husband in the back ground."
"I don’t think her husband was unfriendly. The position seemed to be that they had separated by mutual agreement and gone their respective ways, simply ignoring the marriage. On the few occasions when she referred to him, she did so without the slightest trace of animosity."
"Apparently she was not very communicative about him."
"No; he was rather a shadowy figure. All I learned from her was that his name was Carl, that by profession he was a sort of travelling wine merchant, that he was, in a sense, domiciled somewhere in Germany, but spent most of his time rambling about the Continent with occasional visits to this country and the United States. That is all that she let drop. Of course, I never asked any questions."
This apparently exhausted Pedley’s store of reminiscences, for the conversation now drifted in the direction of his work and mode of life; and when he had shown us some of his paintings and taken us on a personally conducted tour of his premises, including the very pleasant little cubicle bedroom that he had built in a corner of the studio, we felt that we had stayed long enough.
"It is most kind of you, Mr. Pedley," said Thorndyke, "to have let us take up so much of your time and to give us so much help in our inquiry."
"I am glad to hear that I have been helpful," replied Pedley, as he escorted us along the paved passage. "It seemed to me that I was ladling out some rather small beer. But I enjoyed doing it. To a solitary man a real good chin-wag comes as a refreshing novelty."
With this exchange of courtesies and a hearty handshake we took our departure, and, crossing the Hampstead Road, set a course for the Temple by way of the less-frequented back streets. For some time we walked on in silence; but presently, according to custom, I ventured to put out a cautious feeler.
"Pedley’s estimate of the conversation was rather like my own, and we are probably both wrong; but, apart from the description and the portrait (the value of which is not obvious to me), I don’t see that we have learned anything very significant."
"That," replied Thorndyke, "must be because you have not got the issues in this case clear in your mind."
"But I think I have. The simple issue is whether or not Lotta Schiller is presumably dead."
"Yes, but put it another way. Either the woman is dead and her body concealed in some unknown place, or she is alive and keeping out of sight. The issue is between the alternatives of a concealed dead body or a concealed living person."
"She would be mightily well concealed to keep out of sight for two years with the police on the look-out for her all the time. I should have thought it practically impossible considering all the modern means and facilities at their disposal."
"Still," said he, "the possibility of her being alive is the one that concerns us, and the value of the information that we have got from Pedley is in its bearing on that question. What I recommend you to do is this: when you get home, while the matter is fresh in your memory, take a sheet of paper and write down a full report of our conversation with Pedley. Then read it over and extract from it any facts, explicitly stated or implied, without regard to their significance, and write them down on another sheet. Finally, consider those facts, separately and together, in relation to the two alternatives that I mentioned. I think you will find Mister Pedley’s small beer more nourishing than it appeared at the time."
XIII. THORNDYKE BECOMES SECRETIVE
Thorndyke’s suggested procedure for extracting the nourishment from Mr. Pedley’s "small beer"—which I duly put into practice—proved highly effective. But yet it was not effective enough. For while it brought into view several facts which might be important in certain circumstances, it threw no light on their application to our present problem; wherefore, and because the reader, quicker in the uptake than I, has no doubt already noted them, I shall make no further reference to them. But if not very enlightening, my study had the effect of stimulating my curiosity as to what was in Thorndyke’s mind. That he had a definite theory concerning Lotta Schiller’s disappearance, and that his theory was strictly relevant to the main problem, I had no doubt, and since I could make no guess as to the nature of that theory, I could only seek enlightenment by observing his proceedings and trying to deduce their object. This, however, turned out a complete failure, for the more I saw of his methods, the more bewildered I became, and the less able to connect them in any way with Mr. Penfield’s case. I shall therefore put my observations briefly and baldly on record without unnecessary comments.
A few days after our visit to Pedley, Thorndyke, when he came in to lunch, took from an inner pocket a couple of documents and deposited them in the cabinet in which such things were usually kept; and I noticed that they went into the drawer which contained Mr. Penfield’s papers.
"You have been to Somerset House," said I, having recognized the official copies.
"Yes," he replied. "An unnecessary visit, perhaps, but one never knows what unexpected questions may arise during the hearing; so I have provided myself with certified copies of two of the wills concerned in Penfield’s case. We have a copy of the third, Lotta Schiller’s."
"Whose are the other two?" I asked.
"One is that of Barbara Dalton who left the twenty thousand pounds to Lotta. The other is that of a Mr. Charles Montagu, which contains, among many other legacies, the bequest of twenty thousand pounds to Barbara. Would you like to look over them?"
"No, thanks," I replied. "They don’t interest me, unless they contain something unexpected or curious. Do they?"
"No, they are quite simple and straightforward, and, of course, they are not disputed."
"Then I think we can leave them to Penfield, if they come into the case at all."
Thus the matter was dismissed, leaving me with a faint feeling of surprise that even Thorndyke should have concerned himself with such remote antecedents. But apparently it was only another instance of his almost fanatical insistence on knowing all the facts.
The next proceeding of his that attracted my attention had, at least, some connection with Penfield’s case, though I failed utterly to discover any relevancy. It took the form of an exhaustive interrogation of Vanderpuye, of whom we now saw a good deal as the Long Vacation had brought him back from his travels on the South-eastern Circuit. It was not, of course, a formal interrogation, which would have been quite alien to Thorndyke’s usual methods. But Vanderpuye was perfectly willing to talk about his liaison with Lotta Schiller—it had been the great adventure of his life—and a little skilful guidance of the conversation brought out all the details. But of these conversations, which seemed to elicit nothing that was new even to me, I shall record only one; and that one chiefly because it led to further activities on Thorndyke’s part. We had been discussing Pedley’s portrait of Vanderpuye and the incidents connected with the painting of it, when my colleague led off in a new direction with the remark:
"It was a very successful portrait; a faithful likeness and an extremely becoming one, too. I am rather surprised that you did not get Pedley to paint one of Lotta. I should have thought that you would have liked to have a portrait of her."
"I should," Vanderpuye replied emphatically, "and I begged her to let him paint one of her, but she refused flatly. It was at the time when the lockets were being made, and I wanted him to paint her
portrait so that I could have the original to hang beside my own and a little photograph of it to carry about with me in my locket. But she was most obstinate and perverse. She insisted on painting the portrait herself, and she wouldn’t even agree to letting Polton take a photograph of her for the locket. It was really very awkward. I had seen her work and I knew that she couldn’t paint a portrait. But she stuck to her decision and I had to accept her self-portrait. But I was very annoyed."
"Then I infer that it was not a very good likeness?" Thorndyke suggested.
"Bah!" exclaimed Vanderpuye. "It was not a likeness at all. But you can see for yourself"; and, as he spoke, he unshackled the locket from his watch-guard and handed it to Thorndyke, who carefully prised it open and looked curiously at the little portrait.
"I was going to remark," said he, "that as I have never seen the lady, I could hardly judge the likeness. But I see that I was wrong. This drawing only faintly resembles a human being and certainly could not be a recognizable likeness of any particular person. By the way, did she give you the original drawing?"
"No, she never offered it to me, and I should not have accepted it if she had."
"I ask," said Thorndyke, "because her work as an artist may have some bearing on the case that is pending and I should have liked to produce a specimen. But this is rather small, particularly if the judge’s eyesight should happen to be at all defective. What do you think, Jervis?"
I took the locket from him and gazed in astonishment at the incredibly crude and childish drawing—though Pedley’s description had prepared me for something abnormal—which, small as it was (about the size of a shilling) offered evidence enough of the artist’s incompetence. But I couldn’t understand Thorndyke’s difficulty, and said so.
"I don’t see that the size matters. It would be quite simple to make an enlarged photograph; that is, if Vanderpuye would give his permission."
"But of course," protested Vanderpuye. "I should be delighted to help in any way. By all means take the locket and let me have it back when you have done with it."
Thereupon, having thanked the owner warmly, Thorndyke slipped the little bauble into an envelope and folded it up securely; but I noticed that instead of locking it up in the cabinet according to his usual custom, he stowed it carefully in an inner pocket. It was a small matter but it attracted my attention; and when, on reflection, I realized how adroitly Thorndyke had managed to obtain possession of the trinket without asking for the loan, I began to suspect that there was more in the transaction than met the eye. Accordingly, I followed the fortunes of the locket closely to see whether any ulterior purpose should come into view. But apparently there was none. On the following day Thorndyke handed the locket to Polton, who gazed at it fondly and then returned it.
"I don’t want the locket, sir," said he. "You are forgetting that I did the miniature. I have the original negative that I made from the drawing, which will be much better for doing the enlargement as it is a good size already."
"Of course," said Thorndyke. "My wits must have been woolgathering. Why didn’t you remind me, Jervis?"
I replied that my wits were probably on the same quest, as I had suggested the borrowing of the locket, but protested that no harm had been done.
"No," he agreed, turning the locket over in his hand; "and I am glad to have seen the little bauble again. It is a charming specimen of goldsmith’s work and it does Mr. Pedley and his executant very great credit. How on earth did you manage, Polton, to work the hair into that beautifully regular spiral? Hair isn’t a very kindly material, is it?"
"It’s all right, sir, if you know how to manage it. I just soaked two of the hairs from the little tress that I had cut off and wound each of them tightly on a thin steel spindle. Then I carefully heated the spindle, and, when it was cool, the hair slipped off in a little close cylinder like a cylindrical spring. After that, it was quite easy to work it into a flat spiral on the card."
"So you used only two of the hairs. What did you do with the remainder of the tress? Did you throw it away?"
Polton crinkled slyly. "No, sir," said he, "I’ve got the regular craftsman’s vice. I never throw anything away. You see, even a hair comes in handy, if it’s long enough, to string a small bow for use on the turns. Would you like to see what’s left of it?"
Without waiting for an answer he went to one of his innumerable cabinets, and, from a labelled drawer produced a seed envelope inscribed in pencil "Mrs. Schiller’s hair," which he handed to Thorndyke; who drew out of it a little tress of pale brown or dull flaxen hair neatly tied up with bands of thread.
"I don’t see anything unusual in it," said I, as Thorndyke held it at arm’s length in the light of the window.
"No," he agreed, "but we haven’t Pedley’s trained colour sense; and probably the peculiarity that he described would be noticeable only in large masses. But it couldn’t have been very conspicuous even then, as nobody else seems to have observed it."
He pulled the tress out taut, and, having measured it against a two-foot rule on the bench, wrote the length (nine and a half inches) on the envelope. Then he re-coiled the tress and slipped it back into its receptacle.
"I am going to rob you, Polton," said he. "This specimen had better go with the rest of the possible exhibits; and on the remote chance of its having to be produced in court, you may as well sign your name on the envelope under the description."
This ceremony was duly performed, and, when Thorndyke had declined my derisive offer to witness the signature, he put the envelope in his wallet and we then reverted to the enlargement of the portrait.
I make no comment on these proceedings, having already said that I found myself utterly unable to connect any of them with Mr. Penfleld’s problem. Nor shall I, for obvious reasons, say anything about certain other activities which Thorndyke carried on in his private laboratory with the door locked; which from experience I judged to be experiments connected with his inferences from the facts known to me. No doubt they would have been highly revealing if I had known what they were; but, in accordance with the queer convention that existed between us, by which Thorndyke gave me every opportunity to observe the facts but refused to disclose his inferences or hypotheses until the case was concluded, I was left in the dark; and even Polton, bursting with curiosity, could only gaze wistfully at the locked door.
Of what went on, then, in the private laboratory, I had no knowledge at all; but in two other instances I was permitted, so to speak, to inspect the backs of the cards. Thus, on a certain day, returning at lunch time I perceived my colleague pacing up and down the lower end of King’s Bench Walk in earnest conversation with one Mr. Snuper. Now, Mr. Snuper was a very remarkable man. Originally a private inquiry agent, he had been employed by Thorndyke on one or two occasions to collect information or to keep certain persons under observation; but he had proved so ingenious, resourceful, and dependable, that Thorndyke had engaged him permanently; and a very valuable member of our staff he had proved in making inquiries and observations where it was undesirable for us to appear.
But what could this meeting portend? Usually, Mr. Snuper’s appearance foreshadowed some more or less sensational developments. But at present the Schiller case was the only one that we had on hand in which sensational developments were possible; but of that case we seemed to be in possession of all the relevant facts. Our problem was concerned with the application of those facts and seemed to offer no opening for Mr. Snuper’s activities.
But my bewilderment reached a climax that very evening when, entering our sitting-room, I found Polton placing an easy-chair before the fireplace and setting beside it a little table on which were a whisky decanter and a box of cigars. I watched him with growing suspicion, and when he added an awl, borrowed from the workshop, suspicion grew into certainty.
"Expecting the superintendent?" I asked.
"Yes, sir," he replied. "Mr. Miller is coming by appointment at half-past eight."
"You don’t know what abou
t, I suppose?"
"No, sir, I do not. I suspect it is that Schiller case, but that is only a guess; and I don’t mind telling you, sir, that I am fairly eaten up with curiosity. I can see that there is something in the wind, and that somebody is going to get a surprise."
"What makes you say that?"
"Oh, I know the symptoms of old, sir. The Doctor is in one of his exasperating moods; as secret as an oyster and as busy as a bee. He has been locked in his laboratory doing all sorts of things that are really my job; developing photographs, mounting specimens for the microscope, making micro-photographs, and the Lord knows what else. I know that much, because I’ve done the clearing up after him."
I laughed at his undisguised inquisitiveness, but not without sympathy.
"It seems to me," I remarked, "that you have been doing Snuper’s job; keeping what the plain-clothes men call ‘obbo’ on the Doctor."
"Well, sir, there’s no harm in keeping him under observation when his actions seem to invite it; and I believe he likes to be watched. It’s part of the game. Why, only this morning I saw him colloguing with Mr. Snuper on the Walk. He knew I could see him from the window. And now there’s Mr. Miller coming, and he isn’t giving much away. And what do you make of that?"
He produced from his pocket a little slip of mahogany about four inches by two in which was a shallow, elongated cavity about two and a half inches by one, with straight sides and rounded ends, and a little round hole about a sixteenth of an inch wide, just outside the middle of the cavity.
"I made it from the Doctor’s own full-scale drawing," Polton continued, "and, as he said nothing about its purpose, I suspect it is part of the surprise packet."
"It looks rather like some sort of a microscope slide," I suggested; but at this moment, as a quick footstep became audible ascending the stair, Polton picked up the slide and returned it to his pocket, smiling guiltily as the door opened and Thorndyke entered.
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