"Supposing the exposures are all alike?" I suggested.
Thorndyke laughed grimly. "Don’t be a wet blanket, Jervis," said he. "But I must admit that it would be something of an anticlimax and distinctly disappointing, though not entirely unexpected. For, if there are really visitors, it is quite possible that they do not go to the gallery at all. Their business, what ever it may be, is, quite conceivably, carried on in one of the rooms that open out of the gallery. So a negative result with the camera would not prove that no one had entered the gallery wing."
It was my turn to smile, and I did so. "It is my belief, Thorndyke," said I, "that you don’t mean anything to disprove it. You are not approaching the investigation with an open mind."
"Not very open," he admitted. "The housekeeper’s statement, together with all the other circumstances of the case, make a very strong suggestion of something abnormal, so strong that, as you say, I am not prepared to be easily satisfied with a negative result. And now, if we have finished, we had better go up to the laboratory and have a look at Polton’s masterpiece."
We rose, and were just moving towards the door when a firm tread became audible on the landing, and was followed by a familiar knock on the brass knocker of the inner door.
"Miller, by Jove!" I exclaimed. "How unfortunate! But I can entertain him while you go up to Polton."
"Let us hear what he has to say, first," replied Thorndyke; and he proceeded to throw open the door.
As the Superintendent entered, I was impressed by a certain curious mixture of jauntiness and anxiety in his manner. But the former predominated, especially as he made his triumphant announcement.
"Well, gentlemen, I thought you would be interested to hear that we have got our man."
"Dobey?" asked Thorndyke.
"Dobey it is," replied Miller. "We’ve got him, we’ve charged him, and he is committed for trial."
"Come and sit down," said Thorndyke, "and tell us all about it."
He deposited the Superintendent in a comfortable arm-chair, placed on the little table at his elbow the whisky decanter, the siphon, and the box of the specially favoured cigars, and while the tumbler was being charged and the cigar lighted, he filled his pipe and regarded his visitor with a slightly speculative eye.
"Where did you catch him?" he asked, when the preliminary formalities were disposed of.
Miller removed the cigar from his mouth in order the more conveniently to smile.
"It was a quaint affair," he chuckled. "We caught him in the act of picking the lock of his own front door. Rum position, wasn’t it? Of course, the key was at the police station at Maidstone. We had been keeping a watch on the flat, but it happened that day that one of our sergeants was going there with a search warrant to have another look over the premises in case anything should have been missed at the first search. When he got up to the landing, there was my nabs, angling at the keyhole with a piece of wire. He was mightily surprised when the sergeant introduced himself, and still more so when he was told what he was charged with."
"Was he charged with the murder or the house breaking?"
"Both. Of course, the usual caution was administered, but, Lord, you might as well have cautioned an oyster."
"Did he say nothing at all?"
"Oh, the usual thing. Expressed astonishment—that was real enough, beyond a doubt. Said he didn’t know what we were talking about, but was perfectly sure that he didn’t want to make any statement."
"I suppose he pleaded ‘not guilty’ at the police court?
"Yes. But he wouldn’t say anything in his defence, excepting that he knew nothing about the murder and had never heard of Inspector Badger, until he had got legal advice. So the magistrate adjourned the hearing for a couple of days, and Dobey got a lawyer to defend him—a chappie named Morris Coleman."
"Of Kennington Lane?"
"That’s the man. Solicitor and advocate. Hebrew, of course. Downy bird, too, but quite a good lawyer."
"Yes," said Thorndyke, "I have seen him in court. A cut above the ordinary police-court advocate. And what did he have to say?"
"Reserved his defence, of course. They always do if the case is going for trial. That’s the worst of these police-court solicitors. But it usually means that they haven’t got any defence, and of course that is what it means now, so it doesn’t matter. But it is a time-wasting plan when they have got a defence, and the judge usually has something to say about it. Still, you can’t cure them. They think they get an advantage by springing a defence on the court that nobody expected."
"You say you are proceeding on both the charges. Why are you bringing in the house-breaking?"
"Well, of course," replied Miller, "it is the murder that he will actually be tried for. But we shall have to prove the facts of the house-breaking to explain how the stolen paper came to be found."
As he gave this explanation, the Superintendent stole a slightly furtive glance at Thorndyke, which I understood when the latter remarked, dryly:
"True. And the evidence of the witnesses to the house-breaking may serve to supply the deficiencies of the station-master at Strood. I take it that they will be able to identify Dobey."
"They have. Picked him out instantly from a crowd of thirty other men. And as to that station-master, it’s just a silly excess of caution and over-conscientiousness. He didn’t look at the man particularly, and so he won’t swear to him. But, as his description of the man agrees with that of the witnesses to the house breaking, and they are ready to swear to Dobey, it will, as you say, help matters a bit. But, of course, the finding of the paper in his possession is the really crucial piece of evidence."
"It is more than that," said Thorndyke. "It is the whole of the evidence in regard to the murder. Without it your bill would never get past the Grand Jury. And, as to the house-breaking, as it can’t be included in the indictment, I doubt whether the court will allow any reference to it. That, however, remains to be seen."
"Well," rejoined Miller, "it doesn’t matter a great deal. The paper fixes the crime on him."
With this, he dipped his nose into his glass and resumed his cigar with the air of having disposed of the subject; and I took the opportunity to raise another point.
"Did you say that Dobey was found picking his lock with a piece of wire?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered with a chuckle. "Quaint situation, wasn’t it?"
"It strikes me as more than quaint," I replied. "It is most extraordinary that he should not have provided himself with a key of some sort."
"It is," Miller agreed. "But it was a simple latch, and I expect he was pretty handy with the wire. And I don’t suppose he often went to the flat. Still, as you say, he must have been a fool not to get a key."
"He must," said I. "It is a striking example of the criminal mentality."
"Yes," agreed Miller, "they are not a very bright lot." He paused reflectively for a few moments, puffing at his cigar reflectively, and then resumed in a meditative tone: "And yet it doesn’t do to rate them too low. We say to ourselves that they are all fools. So they are, or they wouldn’t be crooks. Crime is never a really sound economic proposition. But there is one thing that we must bear in mind: there are two kinds of crooks—those that get caught, and those that don’t. And a crook that doesn’t get caught may never come into sight at all. If he manages well enough, his existence may never be even suspected. I have just heard of a case in which the existence of a man of this class has been disclosed by a mere chance. But we don’t know who he is, and we are not very likely to find out. I’ll tell you about the case. It’s a queer affair.
"Just recently, one of our men who specializes in note forgeries and knows a good deal about money of all kinds, had to spend a week or two on the Continent. When he was about to return, he changed his foreign money into English and got one or two sovereigns. Now, when he got home and had a look at those sovereigns, he thought there seemed to be something queer about one of them. So he got a chemist to weigh it, but the
weight was apparently all right—it was only an ordinary shop scale, you know, but it weighed within a fraction of a grain. Then he measured it; but all the dimensions seemed to be correct. But, still, to his expert eye, it didn’t look right; and it didn’t sound right when he rang it. So he took it to an assayist whom he knew, and the assayist tried its specific gravity and tested it so far as was possible without damaging the coin, and he reported that it was undoubtedly gold of about the correct fineness. But still our man wasn’t satisfied. So he took it to the Mint, and showed it to one of the chief officials. And then the murder was out. It wasn’t a milled coin at all. It was a casting. An uncommonly good casting and very neatly finished off at the edge, but an undoubted casting to the skilled eye. So they passed it on to the assay department and made a regular assay of it. The result was very quaint. It was gold right enough, and just about 22 carat; but it was not exactly the composition of a sovereign. There was a slight difference in the alloy. That was all. There was no fraud. The proper amount of gold was there. Yet it was a counterfeit coin. Now, what do you make of that?"
"Nothing," I answered, "unless it was a practical joke."
"Well, it wasn’t. The Mint people asked us to look into the matter, and we did. The result was that we found one or two more specimens of this queer, unofficial money—you couldn’t call it base coin—in France, Belgium, and Holland. Evidently, there is a regular manufacture."
"But what on earth can be the meaning of it?" I demanded.
Miller chuckled. "We can only guess," said he, "but we can take it that the sportsman who makes those sovereigns doesn’t do it for fun. And, if he makes a profit on them, he doesn’t buy his gold from the bullion dealers, and he doesn’t pay the market price for it. On the other hand, he probably sells it for export at considerably above its nominal value, now that gold is so difficult to get. So, if he steals his gold, or gets it cheap from the thieves, and sells it at a premium, he doesn’t do so badly. And he will be mighty hard to catch. For the coins are genuine golden sovereigns, and only a fairly expert person would be able to spot them. And experts are pretty rare, nowadays. Once, every little shopkeeper was an expert; but now there are plenty of people who have never seen a sovereign."
"It is a clever dodge," I remarked, "if the gold is really stolen."
"Clever!" repeated Miller, enthusiastically. "It’s a stroke of genius. You see, it avoids all the crook’s ordinary difficulties. He can get rid of the stones pretty easily, as they can’t be identified separately. But the gold is less easy to dispose of at a decent price. For, if a bullion dealer is willing to buy it—which he probably isn’t, if he is a respectable man—the transaction is known, and the vendor has left dangerous tracks; and the ordinary fence will only give a knock down price. He must make a big profit to set off the risk that he takes.
"But there is another case that has just come to light—probably the same man. You know that, for some time past, the Mint has been calling in all real silver money. Now, since this sovereign incident, it occurred to the people there to look over the silver coins that came in; and, at the first cast, they came on a half-crown that turned out to be a casting. But it was silver. Further search brought one or two more to light. Someone was making silver half-crowns.
"Now, here was a paradoxical situation! The coiner was making good silver coin while the Mint was issuing base money. Of course, coining is illegal. But this coiner could not be charged with uttering base coin. It would be hard to prove to a jury that it was counterfeit.
"Here you see the difference between the stupid crook and the clever crook. The fool tries to grab the whole—and doesn’t do it. He makes his coin of pewter and probably steals that. They generally used to. If he got half a crown for his pewter snide, it would be all profit. But he doesn’t, because it is a duffer. So he has to sell it cheap to the snide man. And he gets caught. But this sportsman puts, say, a shilling’s worth of silver into his half-crown, and he doesn’t have to pay the snide man. He can pass it quite safely himself. And he doesn’t get caught."
"He runs the risk of getting caught if he passes it himself," I objected.
"Not at all," said Miller. "How should he? What you’re overlooking is that the coins are good coins. They pass freely, and they will bear assay. Only an expert can spot them, and then only after close examination. But he must make a big profit. He could easily get rid of a hundred a day. There’s seven pounds ten shillings profit, even if he buys the silver at the market price, which he probably does not. That silver is most likely burglars’ loot—silver tea-pots and candlesticks melted down; stuff that he would have to sell to a fence at about the price of brass. I tell you, Dr. Jervis, that coiner is a brainy customer. He’ll want a lot of salt sprinkled on his tail before he’ll get caught."
"I think you are rather over-estimating his profits," said I. "He has not only to pass the coins; he has got to make them. Good workmanship like that means time and labour. And there is the gold. Most trade jewellery is made of a lower-grade gold than 22 carat. He would either have to buy fine gold from the bullion dealers to bring his low-grade gold up to standard or to do a good deal of conversion himself."
While Miller was considering this difficulty, the door opened, and Polton’s head became visible, his eyes riveted on the Superintendent’s back with an expression of consternation. I think he would have withdrawn, but that Miller, in some occult manner, became aware of his presence and addressed him.
"Good evening, Mr. Polton. We were just discussing a little problem that is rather in your line. Perhaps you would give us your opinion on it."
On this, Polton advanced with a slightly suspicious eye on the Superintendent, and Miller proceeded to put his case. "The problem is, how to make sovereigns—castings, you know—out of jewellery composed of low-grade gold. Supposing you had got a lot of rings, for instance, of 18-carat gold. Now, how would you go about turning them into 22-carat sovereigns?"
Polton crinkled at him reproachfully. "I am surprised at you, Mr. Miller—an officer of the law, too—suggesting such a thing. Of course, I wouldn’t do anything of the sort."
"No, no," chuckled Miller, "we know that. It’s just a question of method that we want explained. Because somebody has done it, and we would like to know how he managed it."
"Well, sir," said Polton, "there is no particular difficulty about it. He would weigh up the 18-carat gold and take part of it, say a little more than half, flatten it out on the stake or in a rolling mill, if he had one, break it up quite small, and boil it up in nitric acid. That would dissolve out the alloy—the copper and silver—and leave him pure gold. Then he would melt that down with the proper proportion of the 18-carat stuff, and that would give him 22-carat gold."
"And as to making the coins? Would that be much of a job? How many do you think he could make in a day?"
"A man who knew his job," said Polton, "wouldn’t make any trouble about it. He would make his mould in a casting flask that would cast, say, twenty at a time, and he would use a matrix that would dry hard and give a good many repeats. There would be a bit of finishing work to do on each coin—cutting off the sprue, where the metal ran in, and making good the edge. But that is not a big job. They make a special edge tool for the purpose."
"Oh, do they?" said Miller, with a sly grin. "You seem to know a good deal about it, Mr. Polton."
"Of course I do," was the indignant response, "seeing that I have been dealing with tool-makers in the metal trade since I was a boy. Not that the respectable makers in Clerkenwell have anything to do with burglars’ and coiners’ tools. But, naturally, they get to know what is made."
"Yes, I know," said Miller. "Our people get some useful tips from them, now and again. And I shall know where to send them if they want some more, eh, Mr. Polton? Technical tips, I mean, of course."
Polton crinkled indulgently at the Superintendent, and when the latter, having glanced at his watch, suddenly emptied his glass and rose, his expression became positively affectionate
.
"I am afraid I have wasted a lot of your time with my gossip," said Miller, apologetically, as he drew on his gloves, "but I thought you would like to have the news. Probably you will look in at the Old Bailey and see how the case goes. The sessions are just beginning now, and I expect the case will come on in the course of a few days."
"We shall certainly drop in if we can," said Thorndyke, "and see what comes of your efforts. Won’t you throw away that stump and take a fresh cigar?" he added, holding out the box as the Superintendent essayed to strike a match.
"Seems a waste," replied Miller, turning a thrifty eye on the stump. But he succumbed, nevertheless; and when he had selected a fresh cigar and amputated its point with anxious care, he lit it (with a match that Polton had struck in readiness), shook hands, and took his leave.
As the door closed on the sound of his retiring foot steps, Polton fell to, in his noiseless, dexterous fashion, on the dismantling of the dinner-table; and, as he prepared a tray for transport to the upper regions, he announced:
"The camera is finished, sir, and all ready for inspection, if you have time to come up and have a look at it."
"Then let us go up at once," said Thorndyke; "and perhaps we can take some of the debris with us and save another journey."
He loaded a second tray and followed Polton up the stairs, while I brought up the rear with an empty claret jug and a couple of dish covers.
The "automatic watcher," which its creator exhibited with justifiable complacency, was a singularly ingenious appliance. The clock was enclosed in a small box, on the front of which was a miniature dial; and the almost inaudible tick was further muffled by a pad of felt between its back and the wall. The camera, to which it was connected by an insulated wire, was another small box, fitted with mirror plates to fasten it to the door. From its front projected a brass tube, five inches long, and half an inch thick, at the end of which was an enclosed prism with a circular opening facing at right angles to the axis of the tube.
Dr. Thorndyke Omnibus Vol 6 Page 19
