Now, could he have anything up his sleeve on the present occasion? Was there something that he had seen and the rest of us had overlooked? Naturally, I could not be sure, but there had been so little to see that it seemed hardly possible. His examination of the body could not have yielded any fact that he had not disclosed. It was quite unlike him to withhold any observed fact when he made a report. As I turned over the events of the day, I could recall only two that seemed to involve any obscurity or uncertainty. Thorndyke had taken the dead man’s finger-prints. I did not see why. But it was a simple and reasonable proceeding and Thorndyke’s explanation had seemed adequate. But was it possible that he had something more definite in his mind?
Again, he had picked up a half-smoked cigar in the tunnel. That I could make nothing of. I could imagine no possible bearing that it could have on the case. The subsequent taking of the finger-prints suggested a suspicion that the cigar had been smoked by Badger. But supposing it had? What light could that fact conceivably throw on the crime? I could perceive no relevancy at all. Nevertheless, the more I reflected on these two incidents, the more strongly did I suspect that they were connected with something definite in Thorndyke’s mind; something connected with Badger’s finger-prints, or even with those of the other man—which would, indeed, furnish highly relevant and important evidence.
That suspicion deepened when, on our arrival at our chambers, he made his way straight up to the laboratory with an air of evident purpose. There we found our laboratory assistant, Polton, apparently engaged in a post-mortem examination of the dismembered remains of a clock. He greeted us with a crinkly smile of welcome, and, scenting some more alluring activity, abandoned the autopsy and slipped off his stool.
"Is there anything that you are wanting, sir?" he asked, as Thorndyke ran a seeking eye along the shelves.
"Haven’t we a holder for objects that are to be photographed?" Thorndyke enquired.
"Yes, sir. The stand forceps," was the reply; and, opening a cupboard, Polton produced an appliance somewhat like an enlarged edition of the stage forceps of a naturalist’s microscope—a spring holder supported on a heavy foot and furnished with a universal joint. As Polton set the appliance down on the bench, Thorndyke opened his research case, and, taking from it the envelope containing the cigar, extracted the latter with a pair of forceps and fixed it in the jaws of the bolder, which grasped it near the pointed end. Anticipating the next move, I repaired to the cupboard and brought forth an insufflator, or powder spray, and a wide-mouthed bottle filled with a fine, white powder, both of which I placed on the bench without remark. Thorndyke acknowledged the attention with a smile, enquiring:
"What are the odds that we draw a blank?"
"You are gambling on the chance of finding Badger’s finger-prints?" I suggested.
"It is hardly a gamble, as we don’t stand to lose anything," he replied. "But I thought it worthwhile to try. There is at least a possibility."
"Undoubtedly," I agreed. "And the probability is not so very remote. What I don’t see is the relevancy of their presence or absence. Does it matter to us or to anybody else whether Badger was or was not smoking a cigar when he met his death?"
"That question," he replied," we may leave until we see what luck we have. The might-have-beens certainly do not concern us."
As he was speaking, he filled the container of the spray with the white powder, and, starting the bellows, blew a jet of powder on to the cigar, turning the latter round by degrees until every part of it was covered with a white film. Then, swinging up the arm of the holder until the cigar was upright, he took a little box-wood mallet that Polton had picked out of a rack and handed to him, and began rapidly and lightly to tap the foot of the holder. As the slight concussions were transmitted to the cigar, the film of powder on its surface crept gradually downward, uncovering the dark body by degrees, but leaving a number of light-coloured patches where the powder had adhered more closely. Slowly, as the tapping continued, the loose powder became detached until only the lightest dusting remained; and meanwhile the light patches grew more distinct and defined, and began to show faintly the characteristic linear patterns of finger-prints. Finally, Thorndyke blew gently on the cigar, rotating it as before by means of the universal joint. And now, as the last vestiges of the loose powder were blown away, the finger-prints—or at least some of them—grew suddenly quite clear and distinct.
Polton and I pored eagerly over the curious markings (though it had been almost a foregone conclusion that some finger-prints must appear, since somebody had held the cigar in his fingers) while Thorndyke once more opened his research case and took from it a couple of cards, each bearing five finger-prints and each scribed with the name of Inspector Badger. Laying the two cards on the bench beside the holder, he took a magnifying glass down from a nail on the wall and carefully scanned through it first the prints on the card and then those on the cigar. After several prolonged comparisons he seemed to have reached a conclusion, though he made no remark but silently handed me the glass.
I began with a thorough inspection of the prints on the cards. They were beautifully distinct, having been skilfully executed with finger-print ink, and showed, with the sharpness of an engraving, not only the ridge-pattern but the rows of tiny white dots on the black lines which represented the mouths of the sweat glands. When I had to some extent memorized the patterns, I turned my attention to the cigar, selecting first a rather large print which looked like that of a thumb. It was slightly blurred as if the thumb had been damp, but it was quite legible; and when I compared it with the two thumb prints on the card, I recognized it pretty confidently as that of the left hand.
Having reached a positive result, I felt no further examination was worthwhile. But before giving my decision, I handed the glass to Polton, who took it from me with a crinkle of satisfaction and bent eagerly over the cards. But I think he had already made his observations with the naked eye, for, after a very brief inspection, he delivered his verdict.
"It’s a true bill, sir." He pointed at the large print with a pencil and added:
"That is Mr. Badger’s left thumb."
"That was my opinion, too," I said in confirmation.
"Yes," Thorndyke agreed, "I think there is no doubt of it, though it will have to be verified by a detailed comparison of the separate characters. But it establishes a prima facie case. There are a number of other, less distinct prints, but we need not examine them now. The important thing is to secure a permanent record which can be safely handled. How many photographs shall we want, Polton?"
"You will want to show every part of every finger-print free from distortion," said Polton, stating the problem and slowly rotating the cigar as he spoke. "Six photographs would do it at a pinch, but if it is important, I should do twelve and make it safe. That would give you about four views of each finger-print."
"Very well, Polton," said Thorndyke, "we will make twelve exposures. And if you have the plates ready, we will get them done at once."
As the making of twelve exposures promised to be a tedious business and my assistance was not required, I took one or two sheets of paper from the rack, and, laying them on the work-bench, proceeded to occupy myself usefully in drawing up a summary of the day’s experiences and the facts, such as they were, which had transpired during our investigations. But they were few and apparently not very significant, so that I was not long in coming to the end of my summary; when I laid down my pen and transferred my attention to Thorndyke’s proceedings.
It was evident that the discovery of Badger’s thumb-print had not exhausted his interest in the derelict cigar, for, as each negative was developed and washed, he brought it to the bench, and, holding it over a sheet of white paper under the lamp, scrutinized it through his lens and compared it with the prints on the cards. I did not quite understand the object of this detailed comparison, for the identification of the one print had established the fact that the cigar had been smoked by Badger, whatever the significanc
e of that fact might be. The identification of further prints seemed rather like flogging a dead horse. Eventually I was moved to make a remark to that effect.
"That is true enough," said he, "but we have to get all the information that our material will yield. As a matter of fact, I am not looking for the remainder of Badger’s prints; I am looking to see if there are any prints which are not his."
"And are there?"
"Yes, there is at least one and a problematical second one, but that is practically obliterated by the heat from the burnt end. The other is a fairly clear print, apparently a thumb; and it is certainly not either of Badger’s thumbs."
"From which, I presume, you infer that the cigar was given to Badger by someone else?"
"That is the reasonable inference; and as he was alone with another man in the carriage, the further inference is admissible that the giver of the cigar was that other man. That, however, is only a probability which will have to be considered in relation to the other facts."
"Yes," I agreed. "It might have been given to him at Maidstone to smoke in the train. I don’t see how you are to prove either view, or that you would be much forrarder if you did."
I was, in fact, rather puzzled by the intense interest that Thorndyke displayed in this cigar. For, surely, nothing could be less distinctive or more hopeless for purposes of identification than a commodity which is manufactured in thousands of identical replicas. But as Thorndyke must necessarily realize this, I could only suppose that there was some point the significance of which I had overlooked; and with this probability in my mind, I followed my colleague’s proceedings closely in the hope that the point which I had missed would presently emerge.
When the last of the negatives had been developed and examined, Thorndyke took the cigar out of the holder and wiped it clean of all traces of the powder.
"That," he remarked, "is the advantage of carrying out these investigations ourselves. If Miller had seen those finger-prints, he would have insisted on annexing the cigar to produce as an ‘exhibit’ at the trial—if there ever is one. Whereas our photographs, properly attested, are equally good evidence, and the cigar is at our disposal for further examination."
The advantage was not very obvious to me, but I discreetly abstained from comment, and he continued:
"It is a rather unusual cigar; considerably above the ordinary dimensions. The part which remains is five inches and an eighth long. Judging by the thickness—a full three-quarters of an inch—the complete cigar was probably well over six inches in length. How much over we can’t say. There are some enormously long cigars made for civic banquets and similar functions."
"No doubt," said I, "a cigar merchant could identify the type and give us the actual dimensions."
"Probably," he agreed. "But it is enough for us to note that it was an exceptionally large cigar and pretty certainly an expensive one. And then, as if the size were not enough, there is the strength of the tobacco. The appearance of the leaf tells us that it is an uncommonly strong weed. Taking the size and the strength together, it would be rather more than enough for an ordinary smoker."
All of this was doubtless true, but it seemed to have no bearing on the question as to how Inspector Badger had met with his death. I was still puzzling over Thorndyke’s apparently irrelevant proceedings when I received a sudden enlightenment. Having finished his examination of its exterior, Thorndyke laid the cigar on the bench and with a long thin knife, cut it cleanly lengthwise down the middle. The action set a chord of memory vibrating, and incidentally engendered in me a desire to kick myself. For, years ago, I had seen Thorndyke cut open another cigar.
"Ha!" I exclaimed. "You are thinking of that poisoned cheroot that Walter Hornby sent you."
"That we inferred to have been sent by him," Thorndyke corrected. "We were pretty certainly right, but we had no actual proof. Yes, it seemed possible that this might be a similar case."
I looked closely at the cut surfaces of the two halves. In the case of the cheroot, the section had shown a whitish patch where the alkaloid—it was aconitine, I remembered—had dried out of the solution. But nothing of the kind was visible in these sections.
"I don’t see any signs of the cigar having been tampered with," said I. "There doesn’t seem to be any trace of a hypodermic needle, as there was in the cheroot, or any crystals or foreign matter of any kind."
"As to the needle," said Thorndyke, "the heat and the steam from the burning end would probably obliterate any traces. But I am not so sure of the absence of foreign matter. There is certainly no solid material, but the whole of the inside has a greasy, sodden appearance which doesn’t seem quite natural, and the smell is not like that of a normal cigar."
I picked up one of the halves and cautiously sniffed at it.
"I don’t make out anything abnormal," said I. "It is devilish strong and rather unpleasant, but I can’t distinguish any smell other than that of virulently rank tobacco."
"Well," said Thorndyke, "there is no use in guessing. We had better ascertain definitely. And as the foreign matter, if there is any, appears to be a liquid, we will begin by making an attempt to isolate it."
He glanced at Polton, who, having put the negatives to drain, had now reappeared and was casting wistful glances at the divided cigar.
"Will you want any apparatus prepared, sir, or any reagents?" he asked.
"A fairly wide-mouthed ten-ounce stoppered bottle and some sulphuric ether will do for the start," replied Thorndyke; and as Polton went to the chemical side of the laboratory in search of these he laid a sheet of paper on the bench, and, placing on it one of the halves of the cigar, proceeded to cut it up into fine shreds. I took possession of the other half and operated on it in a similar manner; and when the whole cigar had been reduced to a heap of dark-brown, clammy "fine-cut" tobacco, we shot it into the bottle, which Thorndyke then half-filled with ether.
"This is going to be a long job," I remarked, looking a little anxiously at my watch. "This stuff ought to macerate for two or three hours at least."
"We need not complete the examination to-night," Thorndyke replied, reassuringly, as he gave the bottle a shake. "If we can decide whether there is or is not any foreign substance present, that will be enough for our immediate purposes; and we ought to be able to settle that in half an hour."
Thorndyke’s estimate seemed to me rather optimistic, unless—as I was disposed to suspect—he had already decided that some foreign substance was present and had formed some opinion as to its nature. But I made no comment, contenting myself with an occasional turn at shaking the bottle or prodding the mass of sodden tobacco with a glass rod.
At the end of half an hour, Thorndyke decanted off the ether—now stained a brownish yellow—into a beaker which he stood in a pan of warm water to hasten the evaporation, while Polton opened the windows and door to let the vapour escape.
"It’s an awful waste of material, sir," he remarked, disapprovingly. "We ought to have done this in a retort and recovered the ether."
"I suppose we ought," Thorndyke admitted, "but this is the quicker way, and time is more precious than ether. Dr. Jervis wants to get done and go to bed."
As he was speaking, we all watched the beaker, in which the liquid dwindled in bulk from minute to minute, growing darker in colour as it grew less in volume. At length it was reduced to a thin layer at the bottom of the beaker—less than half a teaspoonful—and as this remained unchanged in volume, and the odour of ether became rapidly less intense, it was evident that evaporation had now ceased. Thorndyke took up the beaker, and, having smelled the contents, turned it from side to side to test the fluidity of the liquid; which flowed backwards and forwards somewhat sluggishly like a thinnish oil.
"What do you say it is, Jervis?" he asked, handing the beaker to me.
"Probably a mixture," I replied. "But it smells like nicotine and it looks like nicotine, excepting as to the colour; and as it has been extracted from a cigar, I should say that it is nicotine,
stained with colouring matter."
"I think you are right," he said, "but we may as well confirm our opinions. The colour test will not answer very well owing to the staining, but it will probably work well enough to differentiate it from coniine, which it resembles in consistency, though not very much in smell. Can we have a white tile, Polton, or the cover of a porcelain capsule?"
From the inexhaustible cupboard Polton produced a small white, enamelled tile which he laid on the bench, while Thorndyke picked up a glass rod which he dipped into the liquid in the beaker and then touched the middle of the tile, leaving a drop on the white surface.
"I have rather forgotten this test," said I, leaning over the tile, "but it seems to me that this drop shows quite a distinct green tint in spite of the staining. Is that what you expected?"
Yes," he replied. "The green tint is characteristic of nicotine. Coniine would have given a pink colour. But we had better try Roussin’s test and settle the question quite definitely. We shall want two test tubes and some iodine."
While Polton was supplying this requisition, Thorndyke took up a clean filter paper and laid it on the drop of liquid on the tile, which it immediately soaked up, producing an oily spot of a distinct green colour.
"That," said he, "further supports the suggestion of nicotine. But it is not conclusive in the way that a chemical test is."
Once more I had the feeling that he was flogging a dead horse, for there seemed to be no reason whatever for doubting that the liquid was nicotine. However, I kept this view to myself, taking the opportunity to refresh my memory as to the procedure of Roussin’s test, while Polton followed the experiment with breathless interest.
It was quite a simple test. Into one test tube Thorndyke dropped a few particles of iodine and poured on them a small quantity of ether. While the iodine was dissolving, he poured a little ether into the other test tube, and, with a pipette, dropped into it a few minims of the liquid from the beaker. When the iodine was dissolved, he poured the solution into the other tube. Almost immediately a brownish-red precipitate separated out and began to settle at the bottom of the tube.
Dr. Thorndyke Omnibus Vol 6 Page 9
