Jarrod laughed, but without mirth.
“The safe’s empty,” Slade pointed out.
The other’s frown returned. “Yes—true. And—er—Tadman says the woman was carrying an attaché-case; a larger one than yours. Still, if it’s suicide—”
“That may have been because he had been robbed.”
Jarrod shook his head vigorously. “No. See that card? Well, Heylyn let her in. If she’d been up to anything shady she wouldn’t have left that card where I found it—on this table.”
Slade was silent for a few moments. “Let’s have Tadman in,” he said at last.
But he got nothing else out of the constable. At about half-past nine on the previous evening, as he was strolling past No. 37 on his beat, the gate had opened and a woman had come out, carrying a large attaché-case. The moon had been bright, and he had turned to look at her, but her back was towards him. She crossed the road, and hastened along in the opposite direction. She had been dressed in a dark brown fur coat, with a small dark hat. Asked by Slade, he said no, there had been no light shining in the front of the house.
When Tadman had left Slade turned to Jarrod and remarked, “I don’t think we need keep Hepple hanging about any longer; if he goes now he can get his report in early this afternoon.”
“I’ll go and tell him,” said the other.
Left alone, Slade began to pace the room, his hands thrust deep into his trousers pockets. His keen, sharp-cut features were settled in a frown. Here was a puzzle with one or two loose threads. He stopped to glance at the dead man again. It would be a waste of time, he knew, testing the butt of the automatic for fingerprints. If any prints were on it they would be those of the dead man. Suddenly a fresh thought crossed his mind. He stood still, pondering, and when, a moment later, Jarrod returned he said, “It’d be as well if you got through to the station and asked them to look up the number and make of the gun registered in Heylyn’s name.”
Jarrod’s mouth twisted, and his chin sank on to the stiff serge collar of his inspector’s jacket.
“What’s the idea, Slade?” he demanded, a shade suspiciously.
“Get me those facts and I’ll tell you, Jarrod,” replied the Yard man quietly.
Jarrod grunted. “As close as ever, Slade. Well”—he turned to the door again—“I reckon I’ll know my way to that telephone by the time you’ve run out of ideas.”
When he came back Slade was sitting on the edge of the table, looking down at the automatic.
“Well?” asked the C.I.D. man, smiling, for he saw the frown on the other’s face.
“All right,” growled Jarrod, “you win. The gun registered to him was a revolver, Colt pattern, number”—here he consulted a slip of paper in his hand—“M 8962. An old-type gun, not made any longer.”
“D’you see this?” Slade pointed to the upper side of the automatic. Jarrod bent over it. “The number of this has been filed off. Begins to look, Jarrod, as though some one’s been having ideas—and very bright ideas, too.”
Jarrod straightened his back and fingered his jaw, which seemed on the point of being dislocated.
“He may have got a new gun, of course,” he ventured, but his tone was timid; it was a manifest quibble.
Slade’s head shook. “A man who’s been in the habit of owning a gun lawfully, Jarrod, doesn’t suddenly get a new one and keep it secret. If that”—he pointed to the automatic—“was Heylyn’s automatic it would be registered. And the old gun is still registered under his name—he paid his licence when it was last due?”
“That’s so,” admitted the other reluctantly.
“Then that Colt should still be here, unless—”
“Unless what?” asked Jarrod, taking care to avoid Slade’s glance.
“Unless the person who shot Heylyn took it away!”
Jarrod spun round on his heel.
“Then you mean, Slade, you think this”—he thrust out an arm in the direction of the dead man—“is murder!”
Slade shrugged and slid from the table.
“My eyes tell me it’s suicide, Jarrod, but my reason says no, it’s murder.”
But the other was not relinquishing the stand he had taken without a final attempt to retain it.
“But do you mean to tell me, Slade, that any man in his right senses would let some one ram a gun into his mouth and blow a hole through his head? Why, it’s damned silly! If your reason tells you that, then it’s a—”
“Quite. But my reason doesn’t tell me anything of the sort.”
“Why, what are you driving at, man?”
“I’m only trying to tell you my reason won’t admit of a sane man allowing some one to push a gun into his mouth and stand quiet while he pulls the trigger.”
“Then what is it? D’you think he was doped, and then—”
“No. Hepple would have stumbled across that, unless the drug had been administered subcutaneously, and his hands and head are free of any needle puncture. I’ve looked. They were the only parts of the body exposed, and a needle stabbing through the thick texture of that jacket would most likely break.”
Jarrod was heavily sarcastic. Not that Slade minded; he realised that for the most part Jarrod’s manner was pose.
“You’re keeping up the Yard tradition, Slade. This is all very subtle, but you’re letting your reason contradict itself. First it tells you it’s murder; then it tells you that it couldn’t have been. That’s too bad!”
The Yard man grinned at the other’s scowling face.
“I admit it looks that way, Jarrod. But the contradiction is not a deliberate one—”
“Look here, Slade, if you’re raising your reason on to an ethical plane, I’m climbing down to the practical. We can’t have this corpse here all day. I’ll ring up the hospital. They’ll have to send an ambulance to take it along to the mortuary.”
“Don’t forget Bell’s coming. He may be able to help us.”
“Doubt it. But we can wait till he’s been. I’ll get through now.”
Jarrod left, and once more Slade was left on his own. No sooner had the door shut on the other than the smile left his face, replaced by a puzzled frown. He picked up the visiting-card, but finally put it down, shaking his head. With his handkerchief he unfastened the clip of the magazine in the automatic, but that was in order. One particularly harassing question was troubling him, clamouring for an answer. If this was murder, why hadn’t Heylyn been shot with his own gun? The only logical explanation to this seemed to be that the Colt had been locked up somewhere, and that the murderer had not been able to get it until the keys had been taken from the dead man’s pocket.
The revolver would not have been kept in the safe. In that room there remained the bureau. As likely a place as any. But where was the gun now? To take the revolver away would have been risking something, and from appearances the element of risk in this case had been reduced to the lowest possible. Presumably the murderer knew the safe was in that room, and the revolver was found in the bureau; so that to have gone upstairs to hide it would have been illogical. The chances were that it was hidden, then, either in this room or that next to it.
Slade looked round the room searchingly. Then all at once he got down on his knees by the grate. There was no ash in the bottom, so there had been no fire, presumably, for some days. That was a point, anyway, that Mrs Carter could settle satisfactorily. But on one or two of the bars were some particles of soot. Of course, the wind might have—
Slade stood up, took his jacket off, and rolled up his right shirt-sleeve. He stepped inside the fender and groped up the chimney with his hand. At first he felt nothing save stone wall. But when he stood on tiptoe his fingers curved over a ledge. Holding the mantelpiece with his left hand, he stepped on to the bars of the grate. The extra lift allowed his fingers to close over something cold and familiar in shape. He stepped dow
n, and stared with narrowed eyes at the soot-smeared Colt in his hand. His head jerked, and his gaze travelled to the still face of the corpse. What was the secret of that room?
His brain worked fast, and he had to make a rapid decision. Characteristically, he made it. Stepping into the fender, he replaced the gun on the shelf in the chimney where he had found it; then, dropping to his knees again, he carefully blew the soot his hand had deposited between the bars, removing any trace of his movements. Quickly he hastened out of the room and made his way into the kitchen at the rear, where he washed his hands. Fortunately Jarrod had gone into the other room to speak to Waites, and so he was not seen. When he returned to the drawing-room he slipped on his jacket and turned his attention to the bureau.
The drawers and pigeon-holes he had already scrutinised, without discovering anything of interest. He went through their contents again, but the notes and old letters he sorted over offered nothing in the nature of a clue to what had taken place on the previous night. There was nothing in the bureau to show that Jacob Heylyn had known Mrs W. N. Kemp—which was peculiar. From Mrs Carter’s story he had gathered that Heylyn had been a lonely man, a man with, perhaps, an odd idea regarding the safety of his possessions: “eccentric” had been Jarrod’s description, “miser” had been Mrs Carter’s.
But who could Mrs Kemp be? Her card was left on the table by the body; she had almost run into a policeman when leaving the house—yet Heylyn customarily never received visitors. Was she a relation?…She had left with a large attaché-case. Had she come to rob the old man of his wealth? Had she murdered him? But, if the latter, how had she contrived to get the automatic so far into his mouth?
A score of such questions trickled through Slade’s mind as he pored over the contents of that bureau; but at last he had to desist, his questions unanswered, his quest unrewarded.
Jacob Heylyn had been murdered, he told himself. The evidence of the two guns established so much. Yes, he was on safe ground there. But why—The money and securities in the safe…yes, but how be sure that there were any there?
He couldn’t, and that was a snag.
He stared at the blotter that was fixed to the inside of the bureau leaf. He took out the sheets and turned them over. They were all clean save one in the centre, on which faint markings appeared in the bottom right-hand corner. For a full moment he stared at those faint, blurred tracings of blue ink, wondering.
He got rapidly to his feet and went to the next room, where Jarrod was discussing something with Waites, much to the obvious curiosity of the wide-eyed Mrs Carter.
“Well, Slade, what is it?” asked Jarrod, glancing round at the other’s entry.
“I thought I remembered seeing a bottle of ink on that old writing-desk,” said the Yard man, pointing to a far corner of the room. “Ah, yes, and here are a couple of pens,” he continued, bending over the article of furniture. Suddenly he swung about. “Do you know if Mr Heylyn ever used a fountain-pen, Mrs Carter?”
The little woman shook her head.
“No, sir. Whenever he signed anything for the tradesmen he allus comed in ’ere and did it at that there desk and with one o’ those pens as you ’ave in your ’ands.”
“I see. Is there any other ink in the house, do you know?”
“Not as I knows of, sir, and I don’t think it’s likely there is. You see, I got that bottle meself, from the stationer’s next to the Underground.”
“Thanks, Mrs Carter, that’s what I wanted to know.”
Jarrod followed Slade into the hall. “What is it now?” he asked. “Is that reason of yours working any better?”
Despite the almost surly tone there was a twinkle in his pale brown eyes, which Slade caught.
“No, about the same, Jarrod. As a matter of fact, it works better when quiet. You know, without any disturbing influence around, or—”
“Oh, I know! You want me to keep my nose on my face for a little while. Well, to tell the truth, I don’t blame you, my boy.” Jarrod’s hand smote Slade’s shoulder with more heartiness than the latter deemed necessary. “Just let me know when that owl of a reason of yours wants to crow—I’ll be along.”
Slade grinned. “Owls don’t crow—they hoot,” he pointed out.
Back in the drawing-room, with only the dead man as onlooker, Slade took a powerful folding-lens from his case and seated himself at the bureau. The ink in the other room had been the common blue-black variety—that is, it wrote blue but dried black. The ink that had soaked into that single sheet of the blotter, however, had been blue—that is, it both wrote blue and dried out blue…And there was only that bottle of blue-black ink in the house…
Carefully Slade began to trace the formation of those blotted characters on the sheet of blotting-paper through his lens. After a couple of minutes’ close scrutiny he had made out the following: “rose H—d—ein.” Of the small blots below these letters he could make out nothing legible.
For several moments he sat still, a new thought surging through his mind and slowly clarifying. He was brought to himself by the ringing of the front-door bell. Quickly he replaced the blotter as he had found it, and closed the leaf of the bureau. He went out into the hall to see Jarrod speaking to two men who bore a stretcher between them.
Even as Jarrod saw Slade another figure appeared in the open doorway, and both turned to regard the new-comer, a tall smartly dressed figure, with what was obviously a portable medicine-case in his hand.
The new-comer paused, for a moment at a loss. He glanced at the stretcher and then at Jarrod inquiringly.
“Excuse me, gentlemen, but I’m afraid I don’t understand. I’ve come to see my patient, Mr Heylyn, by appointment—”
“Mr Heylyn’s dead,” said Jarrod in his brusquest manner. “I take it you’re Dr Bell?”
“I’m Henry Bell—yes. But what is this? Heylyn dead? I don’t quite follow. He was run down, out of sorts, but his health wasn’t in any real danger—”
“I’m afraid Mr Heylyn’s death was rather violent, doctor,” said Jarrod crisply. “He was shot through the mouth.”
Dr Bell’s brows lifted, and he whistled softly.
“So that’s it! Through the mouth—eh? Suicide!” He took a deep breath, and his broad shoulders slumped. “Poor old man! I warned him against depression, but never thought—didn’t dream—”
“Doubtless you’d like to see the body, doctor?” put in Slade.
“Well, yes, though I see you’re ready to carry him off. Will you gentlemen require a certificate from me?”
Dr Bell’s interest had turned into channels purely professional.
“Divisional-Surgeon Hepple will see you about that, doctor. The body’s in the drawing-room. Come this way.” Jarrod glanced at the two hospital men. “You’d better come along.”
When they had passed into the drawing-room Slade picked up the telephone directory and turned to section H. In a few seconds he had found the name he wanted, “Hardstein, Ambrose, Money-lender, 64 Bradbury Chambers, W. 1.” He dialled the number, and a few seconds later was speaking in an authoritative voice to Mr Hardstein himself; and there was something in what he said that made that silky-voiced financier wince. But Mr Hardstein did as he was told—he hurried. A few moments after replacing the receiver Slade was speaking to an assistant at a well-known public library, who was sent to look up an entry in a directory. The reply, when it came, was every whit as satisfying as Mr Hardstein’s had been.
Slade made his way to the drawing-room, where the hospital men were securing the body to the stretcher. At last the gruesome task was done, and they bore out the remains of Jacob Heylyn. Slade turned to Jarrod.
“I want you to fix something with Mrs Carter for me, Jarrod. There’s soot in that grate. I want to know when this chimney was last cleaned.” Jarrod looked stupefied, but Slade caught him by the arm. “Come on, man, we haven’t got all day. I’m
sure Dr Bell will excuse us for a few minutes, won’t you, doctor? There are just one or two things I want to ask you.”
Dr Bell placed his medicine-case on the table, and sat down on the single hard chair.
“Just go ahead, gentlemen.” He waved a hand. “My time’s yours. This is all very upsetting. Dear me! Fancy—that Heylyn, that little mouse of a man, should go and do a thing like—It’s well-nigh incredible!”
He seemed genuinely bewildered by the tragedy into which he had stepped.
“And to think I specially put off seeing him yesterday, to come today and find—this!”
He shook his head sadly, and Slade hastened Jarrod out of the room. As soon as they were in the hall Jarrod turned round, and his protest was bitter.
“Here, what’s this tomfoolery about knowing when the sweep last came? Are you imagining the sweep pulled this trick?”
Slade placed a warning finger on his lips, at which Jarrod’s scowl deepened; and when Slade placed his ear to the keyhole of the drawing-room door he looked about to explode. But before he could say anything Slade had quietly turned the handle and was opening the door. The next thing that Jarrod knew was Slade’s leaping vault across the room. Standing on the hearth was Dr Bell, his back to the door. As the Yard man leaped he whirled round. There was a moment of surprised hesitation before he raised a blackened hand; and that moment undoubtedly saved the C.I.D. man’s life. As the doctor pressed the trigger of the Colt Slade’s fist caught his wrist, and the bullet tore a hole through the plaster of the ceiling.
A couple of minutes later Sergeant Waites snapped his handcuffs on the wrists of Jacob Heylyn’s murderer.
***
Ninety minutes after Dr Henry Bell had been driven off in a taxicab in the custody of two plain-clothes men Slade lit his pipe and settled himself in the most comfortable chair in Divisional-Inspector Jarrod’s office.
“But I can’t see how you came to suspect Bell in the first place.” Jarrod was still marvelling at the result of the morning’s investigation. His scowl had temporarily lifted.
The Long Arm of the Law Page 10
