The Paddington Mystery

by John Rhode

  ‘What happens to the shop in his absence?’ asked the Professor.

  ‘It isn’t exactly a shop in the sense that people come and buy things at it,’ replied Harold. ‘It’s more a sort of a warehouse. Now and then a van comes and either brings or takes away a lot of stuff. I don’t know where it comes from or whom it goes to.’

  ‘I should like to meet Mr Boost,’ said the Professor reflectively. ‘Now, I do not think we need remain here. Perhaps you will lead the way upstairs into your own rooms.’

  Harold took him upstairs, through the sitting-room, at which he cast but a cursory glance, and into the bedroom.

  ‘Nothing has been moved since the events of the other night?’ asked the Professor. ‘The bed, and so forth, occupy the same relative positions?’

  ‘Exactly the same,’ replied Harold.

  ‘Very well,’ said the Professor. ‘Now describe to me exactly how you found the body.’

  Harold complied with this request as well as he was able. When he had finished, the Professor walked to the window, and stood looking out of it in silence.

  It was not a very cheerful prospect. Immediately below the window sill was a sloping corrugated-iron roof, terminating in a drop of about six feet into a paved courtyard. This courtyard was even more unkempt than the front garden, ankle deep in sodden straw and littered with packing cases of all shapes and sizes. It was bounded on three sides by a five-foot brick wall, the fourth being the back of the house. Beyond the wall on the side furthest from the house was a waste patch of land, about a quarter of an acre in extent, and beyond this again a small patch of garden belonging to a public house, which had a door opening on to this garden. Beyond the wall on the left side of the courtyard was the canal, its filthy water lapping the wall itself, since the towing-path was on the further bank. Beyond the wall on the right was the exactly similar courtyard of Number 14, Riverside Gardens. Looking straight out of the window, the most conspicuous object was an ugly massive-looking bridge, by which Great Western Road crossed the canal, about a hundred yards distant.

  The Professor turned from the window after a prolonged inspection. ‘I see, I see, most interesting,’ he muttered. ‘Now, abandoning facts for the moment, let us return to the discoveries of the police on their arrival.

  ‘The first thing they noticed, I understand, was that this window had been forced. I notice that the hasp is still loose. I infer that nothing has been done to it since that night?’

  ‘Nothing whatever, sir,’ replied Harold. ‘Everything has been left exactly as it was found.’

  The Professor put on his glasses, and gazed at the hasp as though it were a term in some indeterminate equation. Two screws still held it loosely to the window-frame, and with these he played absently while he continued his interrogation.

  ‘Excellent,’ he commented. ‘And outside the window the police found marks showing how the window had been forced?’

  Harold lifted the lower half of the window and pointed to slight indentations on the bottom of the sash and on the window-frame. ‘You can see the marks where he inserted the tyre-lever, in order to force the window up from the outside,’ he said. ‘The lever found in his pocket exactly fitted these marks, and fragments of paint from the window-frame were found on the end of it.’

  ‘So I understand,’ said the Professor. ‘The next clue was a track of regular footprints leading from a point on the canal bank about the middle of that waste land to the foot of the wall at the end of the courtyard. The police having removed the boots found on the corpse, discovered that they exactly fitted those footprints, and that the length of the stride was such as might have been expected from a man of the deceased’s stature.’

  ‘That’s right, sir,’ put in Harold, imagining from the Professor’s silence that he expected some reply. ‘Inspector Hanslet was highly delighted—’

  But the Professor waved him to silence. ‘Inspector Hanslet has, naturally, no doubt as to the sequence of events,’ he said. ‘There were, I understand, footsteps on the opposite bank of the canal, which appear to indicate that the deceased gained access to the towing-path from Great Western Road. We will walk round and look at the place where these were found later. For the present I think we are in possession of all the facts discovered by the police?’

  ‘So far as I know, we are,’ agreed Harold.

  ‘Very well then. You know my methods. Recognise facts when you see them, and construct your hypotheses only from their aid. What is your theory regarding the movements of the man during the twelve hours preceding your discovery of his body?’

  Harold hesitated. It seemed to him that all this was a waste of time, that Professor Priestley, with his love of facts, his passion for logical deduction, must see the official story was the only possible one. At all events, Harold, for his part, had no alternative to offer.

  ‘It seems simple enough,’ he replied, ‘although I admit it is very strange that the man should choose a place like this to break into. Perhaps he meant to ransack Boost’s shop below.’

  ‘Never mind the motive,’ said the Professor sharply. ‘Tell me what you think happened that night.’

  ‘Well, I imagine that this man, whoever he was, set out with the intention of breaking in somewhere. Unless he had completely lost himself in the fog, and mistook this house for an entirely different one, we must assume that this was his objective, since his tracks led straight here. He forced an entry with a tool he carried for the purpose, and then, overcome by his efforts, and by his soaking on a cold night—for both his tracks and the state of his clothes show that he swam the canal—he found his heart failing him and just lay down on the bed and died.’

  ‘A most inconsiderate thing to do in a total stranger’s house,’ commented the Professor drily. And then his tone changed suddenly, and he looked fixedly at Harold from behind his glasses.

  ‘If you want my help in this, my boy, you must tell me the whole truth,’ he said quietly. ‘Is it a fact that this man was a complete stranger to you? Can you think of no one answering to his description who would have any reason for entering your rooms for any purpose?’

  ‘I assure you, sir, that I haven’t the remotest idea who he could be,’ replied Harold frankly. ‘Heaven knows I’ve been cudgelling my brains ever since to find some motive for the fellow breaking in here. There’s nothing of value that he could take away.’

  ‘I gather from your evidence that you missed nothing?’ enquired the Professor.

  ‘Nothing at all, sir. The police made me go over everything two or three times.’

  The Professor smiled rather grimly. ‘I rather sympathise with Inspector Hanslet,’ he said. ‘The case appealed to him, I know, and since the verdict deprived him of the excuse of murder or even manslaughter, he tried hard to find burglary to justify the continuance of his investigations. Well, my boy, I believe you as to the man being a total stranger to you. That is a fact which at present seems to indicate that we must approach the solution of the mystery from other directions than that of motive.’

  ‘Surely, sir, the easiest line of investigation is through the man’s identity,’ ventured Harold. ‘We know he died in these rooms about eight o’clock on that evening—’

  ‘How do we know that?’ interrupted the Professor sharply.

  ‘It cannot have been later, according to the doctors, and it cannot have been much earlier, or he would surely have been seen as he swam the canal and crossed the waste land, even on a foggy evening. There’s always somebody about quite as late as that. It seems very odd that he wasn’t seen, as it is.’

  ‘Well, postulating for the moment that the man died in these rooms about eight o’clock that evening, what then?’

  ‘Why, sir, he must have come from somewhere, must have friends or acquaintances of some sort. It amazes me that after all the publicity the case has had, the body lying in the mortuary, and all that, somebody hasn’t come forward who knew him. He must have been missing from somewhere for a week now. Sooner or later
, it will be discovered that somebody answering his description is missing, and then we shall know who he was. Once we know that, the mystery will be solved.’

  ‘I wonder!’ said the Professor, with the ghost of a smile. ‘I cannot allow that your reasoning is logical. You infer that knowledge of his identity would result in discovery of the reasons why you found him here. This is not necessarily so. But you touch upon one very interesting matter, the question of disappearance without attracting attention. I have frequently speculated upon this very point. It is one of the results of civilisation that every unit of mankind is to a greater or less extent involved with his fellow units, and cannot vanish without the knowledge of others. It is, as you suggest, curious that any human being should disappear from his accustomed environment, as you assume that this man has done, and that, in spite of the widest publicity, of the publication of photographs and descriptions, there should exist no one who could associate the disappearance with the discovery. In this case particularly, of a decently-dressed man with money in his pocket the possibility is even more remote.’

  ‘That is exactly what I cannot understand, sir,’ replied Harold eagerly. ‘It seems to me that it must be possible to find someone who knew him.’

  ‘But how?’ interrupted the Professor swiftly. ‘If he or she has not yet been found, do you think your efforts are likely to be successful? Look at the facts. They point to one thing, to collusion. When you find out who this man was, you will also discover that someone knew of his disappearance. Nor should I be surprised if that someone knew that the corpse was here long before even you did. No, my boy, the line upon which to seek the solution of the mystery lies in another direction from the question of identity. To my mind, the first thing to discover is how the corpse reached the position in which you found it.’

  ‘But surely, sir, that’s obvious!’ exclaimed Harold. ‘The tracks across the waste land, made beyond question by the dead man, the forced window—’

  The Professor rose abruptly from his chair. ‘Of course, of course!’ he said. ‘Facts are incontrovertible, the only thing needful is to recognise them when you see them. Now, before it gets dark, I should like to see the place where the footmarks were found on the other side of the canal.’

  The two left the house, and in a few minutes were standing on the bridge crossing the canal. A steady stream of vehicles and foot-passengers passed them as they leaned over the parapet, a barge laden with timber floated lazily eastwards, drawn by a sleepy-looking horse, its passage producing oily-looking ripples in the black water.

  From where they stood, the backs of Numbers 2 to 16, Riverside Gardens were clearly visible in the last of the daylight. The public-house was not yet open, but a group of children were playing at one end of the waste land, and at the other an elderly man was digging hopefully, as though he proposed to convert its barrenness into an allotment. It was perfectly obvious that nobody could perform the feat of swimming the canal and climbing up to Harold’s window during the hours of daylight without attracting attention.

  ‘You see how public the place is, sir,’ said Harold. ‘Even after dark, at all events until closing time, the windows of that public-house shine right over the waste land. Yet the fellow must have broken in before ten o’clock. It was only the fog that prevented his being seen.’

  The Professor made no reply. He walked slowly to the northern end of the bridge, until he stood directly over the towing-path. On his right was a brick wall, against which, some ten yards from the bridge, stood a telegraph pole, its base buried in the side of the towing-path nearest to the wall.

  ‘His footmarks were found at the bottom of that pole,’ volunteered Harold. ‘It seems pretty obvious what happened. There are no means of getting on to the towing-path from the road, except through a door in that wall, which is always kept locked. It seems that the man tried this door first; there happens to be a sand-heap close to it on the outside, and Inspector Hanslet found an impression of his boot there too. Then, as he couldn’t open it, he must have come back to where we’re standing, waited till there was no one about, then clambered along the top of the wall till he reached the telegraph pole. All he had to do then was to swarm down it—you see there are brackets on it part of the way down—and he was on the towing-path. Then he swam across, landed on the opposite bank—the footsteps on the waste land began about opposite the telegraph pole—and the rest was easy.’

  The Professor nodded, and Harold was emboldened to continue.

  ‘If he’d waited till after ten, he would have saved himself a lot of trouble. He could have climbed over the opposite end of the bridge into the garden of the public-house. He would have run just as little danger of being seen with the fog as thick as it was. I can’t think why he didn’t.’

  But the Professor appeared to be paying no attention to him. He was staring at the window of Harold’s room with a frown on his face, as though he suspected it of responsibility in the matter. Suddenly he took his watch from his pocket and glanced at it impatiently.

  ‘Dear me!’ he exclaimed. ‘It is later than I thought. I have spent a most interesting afternoon.’

  Then suddenly he put his hand on Harold’s shoulder. ‘Do not allow yourself to take this matter too much to heart, my boy,’ he said kindly. ‘Come and see me again in a day or two. I must have time to think. Where can I find a taxi-cab to take me home?’

  CHAPTER V

  ON the following afternoon Harold, true to his promise made to Mr Boost, set out to interview Mr Samuels. During his tedious journey to Camberwell he had plenty of time for thought. His fit of despondency was by no means at an end; he still felt the crushing burden of the unsolved mystery in which he had become entangled, and, writhe as he might, could find no means of divesting himself of it. Professor Priestley had indeed put out a hand to lighten it, but his efforts had not been crowned with any very conspicuous success. He felt himself an outcast in the ways of the noisy city which clamoured about him; friendless, furtive, dreading to see a look of recognition in every face that glanced at him, dreading to overhear the hoarse whisper, ‘Look, mate, that’s the bloke whose house they found the corpse in!’

  Friendless, yes. All that gay crowd who knew him as ‘Merry Devil’ at the Naxos, they, most of them, sailed too near the wind themselves to care for the contact of one upon whom the shadow of suspicion still rested. Besides, that wretched business of the raiding of the place was scarcely calculated to increase his popularity. Not that he cared; they could go. The shock he had experienced had determined him to keep clear of that crowd in future. To his not over-logical reasoning the thing that had happened to him appeared as a judgment on his habits. If he hadn’t been in the habit of going out all night, of coming home drunk, he might—oh, damn!

  No, all that crowd could go for all he cared. Yet—it was queer that Vere had made no sign all this time. He had last seen her about a couple of days before that fatal evening, and they had arranged to meet at the Naxos as usual. Since then, ten days ago now, he had heard no word of her. Why had she not turned up as she had promised? That question still puzzled him. As for the reason of her silence since, that had been plain enough. Vere, whose days were spent in the lap of respectability as the principal clerk of the Women’s Social League, was far too careful to take any step which would openly endanger her reputation. She was one more friend gone, that was all. Still, Vere, after all that had happened between them—

  Of the rest, whom could he count upon? There were one or two fellows he had known, but they had somehow drifted out of his life, and he scarcely knew their whereabouts, even had he felt inclined to inflict himself upon them. After all, very few people exactly welcome a visit from the man who has furnished notorious copy for the sensation-loving Press. Apart from these, there remained only Professor Priestley and his daughter, and Evan Denbigh. The Professor had behaved like a brick, but he had not suggested that Harold and April should meet again. As for Denbigh—well, the last time he had come to see him his reception h
ad not been so cordial as to encourage a further advance on his part. No, it was not to be expected that Denbigh would seek him out.

  Harold found himself comparing himself with this man, about his own age, but his very opposite in character and attainments. He was the son of poor parents, born somewhere in Wales, by his own account, in a little village with an unpronounceable name. He had come to town to try his fortune, and through sheer hard work had secured a medical degree. In the course of his training he had attracted the attention of Sir Alured Faversham, the world-renowned pathologist, and had been adopted by him as his principal assistant. As Denbigh himself said modestly, it was not an extraordinarily remunerative job, but it gave him more than enough to live on, and opened up all sorts of possibilities. A young man so closely associated with Sir Alured was not likely to want opportunities.

  Professor Priestley had met this promising scholar at Sir Alured’s house, and had been greatly taken by him. It may be supposed that his mind, working always upon logical lines, had determined that here was a desirable husband for April, Harold having so obviously failed to develop along the lines of his early promise. April, on her part, had thrown no obstacles in the path. She was, as she herself expressed it, fed up with Harold and his methods. Not that she was shocked—such an attitude would have been impossible to a girl of her generation. But—well, there are limits, and Harold had clearly overstepped them. Besides, he seemed to prefer other company to her own, and, so long as that was the case, she could hardly have been expected to trouble her head about him. Evan, on the other hand, was good-looking, attentive, devoted, always eager to take her out to dinner, dance or show. The alluring intimacy of the returning taxi never tempted him beyond the bounds of propriety. They were not engaged; nothing of the kind had even been suggested. But it would not occasion any widespread surprise if they were to become so. Harold, contemplating the possibility, felt a much keener stab than his don’t-care attitude, his entanglement with Vere, gave him any right to expect.