The Third R. Austin Freeman Megapack

by R. Austin Freeman

  I looked round as I unfastened the research case and handed out the tape. There was not a human creature in sight. Piper’s Row might as well have been in the midst of the Sahara.

  Taking advantage of the solitude, we went out on to the road and made the three measurements at our ease; and as I held one end of the tape while Thorndyke stretched it and took the reading, I speculated vaguely as to the object of the proceeding.

  “The tyres are one inch and a half wide,” he reported as he put away his notebook, “the width between the outside edges of the tyre-marks is fifty-seven inches and the circumference of the wheels is thirteen feet ten inches. That makes the diameter about four feet seven and a half, that is fifty-five and a half inches.

  “Yes,” I agreed without much enthusiasm, “that will be about right. But why are we taking all this trouble? Is there anything particularly interesting about this cart?

  “The interest attaching to this cart,” he replied, “lies in the fact that it stopped at number five Piper’s Row.”

  “The deuce it did!” I exclaimed. “That is rather remarkable, seeing that Number Five is an empty house.”

  “Very remarkable,” he agreed. “It was quite a short halt,” he continued, “unless the horse was more than usually patient. But there is no doubt about it. You can see where the tracks swerve in slightly towards the house. Then there is the spot where the ruts lose their regularity and broaden out somewhat, and there is quite plainly the re-duplication of the hoof-marks where the horse has trodden two or three times in nearly the same place. That could have happened only when the cart was stationary.”

  I was still looking down at the impressions to verify his statements when I was aroused by the slamming of a door. I looked up quickly and saw that a gust of wind had caught the door of Number Five and shut us out.

  “Well, Thorndyke,” I remarked with a faint grin, “that seems to put the stopper on that further point that you were going to elucidate.”

  “Not at all,” he retorted. “I would say rather that it introduces it in a particularly opportune way. Do you mind opening the research case?”

  I did so; and when he had replaced the tape in its compartment, he took out the box of keys which had so stimulated my curiosity. Opening it, he extracted the bunch of skeleton keys, and, glancing from them to the keyhole, he deliberately selected one and inserted it. It entered quite easily and when he gave it a turn and a slight push, the door opened and we walked in.

  “You see, Jervis,” he said, withdrawing it from the keyhole and holding it out to me, “here is a perfectly elementary skeleton key, made by simply cutting away the whole of the bit excepting the top and the bolt edge. I selected it with Constable Marshall’s key in my mind.”

  “That was a ward key, I think?”

  “Yes, it had three vertical slits in the bit, which ostensibly corresponded to three concentric wards in the lock.”

  “Why ‘ostensibly’?”

  “Because I suspect that they are not there. But in selecting the skeleton key I assumed that they were there, and you saw the result. Also you see the weakness of a ward lock. The wards are obstructions placed in the path of the key. The key which fits a particular lock has slits corresponding to the wards, so that it can turn and let the wards pass through. But it isn’t necessary for the slits to fit the wards. All that is necessary is a hole in the key-bit large enough to let it pass the wards. The simplest plan is, as in this key, to cut out the whole of the bit excepting the distal edge—which enters the notch, or ‘talon’ of the bolt and moves it—and the top edge which joins it to the key stem. I am speaking, of course, of comparatively simple locks.”

  “And you think that this lock hasn’t any wards at all?”

  “It is a mere guess based on the generally shoddy appearance of the fittings. But we can easily settle the question.”

  Once more he opened the key box and this time took out a locksmith’s ‘blank,’ which he compared with the skeleton key. Finding their bits about the same width, he tried the blank in the lock. It entered as easily as the skeleton had, and when he turned it, it made its circuit in the same manner and duly drew in the bolt.

  “That,” said Thorndyke, “makes it perfectly clear. This blank could not possibly have passed a ward. It follows that this lock contains nothing but a spring bolt. Consequently it could be opened by practically any key that would enter the keyhole and that was long enough in the bit to reach the notch of the bolt.”

  “By the way,” said I, “if there are no wards, what is the function of those slits that you described in the key?”

  “Their function, I take it, is purely commercial—a matter of salesmanship; to produce a certain moral effect on the purchaser. He sees a somewhat intricate key and naturally infers a corresponding intricacy in the lock. The ethics of commerce are sometimes a little difficult for the uncommercial mind to follow.”

  “Yes, by Jove,” said I. “That dummy key does seem uncommonly like a fraud. But with regard to this lock: it is all very curious and interesting but I don’t quite see the purpose of these experiments. Obviously they have some bearing since you took the trouble to bring that collection of keys.”

  “Yes,” he replied as he returned the box to the green canvas case and fastened the latter, “they have a bearing. We can discuss it as we walk back to the town; and I propose that we follow the tracks of the cart and see where it went to. It is bound to go our way, as this area of marsh is enclosed on the other three sides by the creeks.”

  We went out of the dismal little house, slamming the door behind us, and set forth along the rough footway in the direction in which the cart had gone. We walked a short distance in silence; then Thorndyke returned to my question.

  “The bearing of what we have ascertained about that lock is this; we are invited to believe that entrance was effected into the house by the window because the door was shut and locked. But the fact, which we have established, that the lock is one which can be opened with almost any key—or even with a piece of stiff wire—makes any such supposition unnecessary. The house was accessible to anybody by way of the door.”

  “As far as Sir Edward was concerned,” said I, “you remember that he had no keys on him at all.”

  “Yes. And that fact may have influenced the Superintendent. But it doesn’t influence us. If Sir Edward went into that house of his own free will it is of no concern to us whether he got in at the window or climbed down the chimney. But if we assume—as I take it we both do, without prejudice as to what may transpire at the inquest—that he was taken into that house forcibly, or in a state of unconsciousness, or actually dead, then the facility of access becomes a material fact. For the proceedings would necessarily be hurried. There would be no time for the manipulation of windows or picking of locks. Entry would have to be effected at once.”

  “That means,” said I, “that the person or persons who entered knew what sort of lock was on the door.”

  “Undoubtedly,” he agreed. “The house must have been known to at least one of the parties, and would, presumably, have been visited and explored. The plan must have been arranged and prepared in advance to enable it to be carried out quickly.”

  “What do you suppose to have been the actual modus operandi?” I asked.

  “From what we have seen, I should reconstruct events somewhat thus: First, a scout would come to the place, try the lock and ascertain that a particular key would open it, explore the house and select the place where the victim could be most conveniently hanged. Then, at the appointed time, the victim—who must almost necessarily have been either dead or insensible—would be put in the cart and covered up; the three men—possibly two, but much more probably three—would mount to the seat and the cart would be driven to the house pretty late at night, so as to secure complete darkness.

  “On arriving at Number Five, one man would jump down and open the door. The victim and the rope would then be handed down and carried in and the door shut. The cart w
ould then be driven off, possibly to wait at some rendezvous outside the immediate neighbourhood. The two men, having concluded the business, would come out and walk to the rendezvous and the whole party would then return whence they came.”

  “Yes,” I said, “that sounds very complete and consistent. But aren’t we taking rather a lot for granted? I admit that the stopping of that cart opposite Number Five is a highly suspicious circumstance—and here we are, back at Abbey Lane and here are the cart-tracks back with us. So the cart must have made the round expressly to call at Number Five, which strongly supports your theory. But still, we are assuming that the cart made that very suspicious call on that particular night. Of course, it is extremely probable that it did; and if it did, it almost certainly conveyed Sir Edward, alive or dead. The fatal flaw in the evidence is that we can’t fix the date on which the cart called at the house.”

  “But I think we can, Jervis. One doesn’t like to use the word certainty, but I think I can fix the date with the very highest degree of probability.”

  “Then,” said I, “if you can do that, I accept your hypothetical reconstruction as almost certainly representing what actually happened. But I should like to hear the evidence.”

  “The evidence,” he replied, “is based on two factors; one is the state of the road when the tracks were made; the other is the time at which the road could have been in that particular state. Let us consider factor one.

  “You saw the ruts and the hoof-prints. They were deep and sharp but by no means dead sharp. There was a slight blurring of the edges of the impressions. The soil of the road was an impure clayey loam. Now, since the impressions were deep, the road must have been quite soft; but since the impressions were fairly sharp, the mud could not have been liquid or diffluent, for liquid or semi-liquid mud does not retain impressions. It could not have been raining when the impressions were made, for in the soft state of the road, rain would have largely obliterated them. For the same reason, no appreciable rain could have fallen after they were made.

  “On the other hand, the road could not have dried enough to become plastic or semi-solid, or—on soil of this kind—the impressions would have been dead sharp. So it comes to this: the ruts were made after heavy rain—heavy enough to swamp the road. But there was an interval after the rain, long enough to allow the semi-liquid stage to pass off but not long enough to allow the mud to pass into the plastic or semi-solid stage.

  “Now let us take the second factor—the time factor. I need not remind you of the long drought that has prevailed this summer. It began, as you probably remember, at the very end of May, and it still continues. In that drought there has been up to the present only a single break—a single, dramatic break. On Sunday, the twenty-first June, a tremendous storm burst over the London area, and for more than an hour the rain fell in torrents. The storm clouds came up quite suddenly about half-past four in the afternoon and the rain ceased and the clouds rolled away with almost equal suddenness about six o’clock. And forthwith the drought resumed its sway. A hot, dry easterly wind followed the storm and the pavements dried up as if the water on them had been spirit.

  “Now, during that heavy rain, these roads across the marshes must have been flooded. For the time being, their surfaces must have been just liquid mud. But we must remember that under that liquid mud, only a few inches down, was soil baked dry by weeks of drought. Before midnight the surface water would have soaked in, bringing the soil to the consistency shown by these ruts. By the following morning, or at least by noon, the plastic stage would have been reached, while by evening, after a day’s hot sunshine and dry wind, the surface would have become too firm to yield deep impressions like these with their surrounding ridges. As I say, one doesn’t like to use the word certainty; but I submit that we are justified in assuming with considerable confidence that these ruts were made on the night of Sunday, the twenty-first of June, probably after ten o’clock.”

  “More probably in the small hours of the morning,” I suggested.

  “The state of the road would admit of that view,” he replied, “but other considerations suggest an earlier hour—say from eleven to half-past. A party of men with a dead or insensible man in a cart would not wish to attract notice or run the risk of being stopped and questioned. Up to midnight they would be pretty safe, but in the small hours a cart prowling round an unfrequented neighbourhood or travelling along a road that leads nowhere might excite the curiosity of an alert and enterprising policeman. However, that is mere surmise and not at present of special interest to us. The important point is the date and the approximate time.”

  “By the way, Thorndyke,” I asked, “how do you manage to remember all these details? I recollect the storm, of course, and now that you mention it, I think I can corroborate the date and the time. But it is a mystery to me how you keep these dates and times in your memory, ready to be produced at a moment’s notice.”

  “The solution of that mystery,” he replied, “is quite simple. I don’t. I keep a diary; a highly condensed affair, but I note in it everything that may need to be recalled. And I always enter the state of the weather, having learned from experience that it is often a vitally important means of fixing the time of other happenings, as in the present case. I looked it up last night, principally in connection with the possibility of finding muddy footprints in the house.”

  “After reading me a lecture on the impropriety of discussing the case in advance,” I said with a grin; “and now you have built up a complete reconstruction of the events before we have even seen what the post mortem has to tell, to say nothing of the inquest.”

  He smiled deprecatingly. “We had no choice, Jervis. We could only observe the facts in the order in which they were presented. But, still, I hope we shall approach the inquest without prejudice; and it is possible that we may get a surprise from the evidence of Brodribb or Weeks, but especially Brodribb. I suspect that he has something in his mind that he has not disclosed to us.”

  “The deuce!” I exclaimed. “You think there may have been reasons for anticipating the possibility of suicide? It will be a bit of an anti-climax if evidence of that kind is given, for it will knock the bottom out of your elaborate reconstruction.”

  “Not necessarily,” he replied; “opinions and expectations are no answer to observed facts; and you must not forget, Jervis, that a known intention or tendency to commit suicide makes things uncommonly easy for a murderer. But it is time that we turned our attention to the subject of food. We are due at the mortuary at two o’clock, and it will not be amiss if we get there a few minutes before our time. How will this place do?”

  He halted opposite a restaurant of somewhat fly-blown aspect, the fascia of which bore an Italian name. In the window, a ‘set piece’ (consisting of two glass dishes of tomatoes flanking the head of a calf, who appeared from his complexion to have died of pernicious anaemia) was exhibited to whet the appetites of passers-by, while through the open doorway an unctuous odour suggestive of thick soup stole forth to mingle with the aroma from an adjacent soap-boiler’s.

  “Well,” I said, “the soup inside smells better than the soap outside. Let us go in.” Accordingly we went in.

  CHAPTER VIII

  SIR EDWARD HARDCASTLE, BART., DECEASED

  (Dr. Jervis’s Narrative)

  Thorndyke’s reasons for wishing to arrive at the mortuary a few minutes before the appointed time were not difficult to guess at. But they became crystal clear as soon as the constable, deputed by the Superintendent, had admitted us and retired. As soon as the door shut behind the officer, he stepped quickly across to the long shelf on which the clothing had been deposited, and, picking up the shoes, turned them over, took a single glance at the soles, and then, without comment, held them out for my inspection.

  No comment was needed. The soles were, relatively speaking, perfectly clean. There was not a trace of mud or any sign whatever of their having been damp. On the contrary, there still clung to them a certain amount of
light dust, and this was still more evident on the welts and uppers. The condition of those shoes proved with absolute certainty that however and whenever Sir Edward Hardcastle had got into that empty house, he had not walked there on the night of Sunday, the twenty-first of June.

  There was no time, however, to dwell on this striking confirmation of our previous conclusions. Thorndyke already had the research case open and had taken out the little fingerprint box and produced from it the ready-inked copper plate, a piece of soft rag and a couple of smooth cards. The latter he handed to me, and together we moved over to the great table and uncovered the hands of the corpse.

  “We shan’t get normal prints,” he remarked, as he wiped the fingertips one after the other and then touched them with the inked plate, “but they will be clear enough to compare with our photographs of those of the chair-back.”

  They were certainly not normal prints, for the fingertips were shrunken and almost mummified. But, distorted as they were, the ridge-patterns were fairly distinct and quite decipherable, as I could see by the quick glance that I took at each print after pressing the inked fingertip on the card.

  “Yes,” I agreed, “there will be no difficulty about these. I only wish the photographs were half as clear.”

  I handed them to him and he immediately slipped them into the grooved receptacle with which the box was provided. Then he closed the latter and replaced it in the research case.

  “I am glad we were able to get that done unobserved,” said he. “Now we can make our observations at our ease.”

  He took out of the research case a pair of rubber gloves and a case of post-mortem instruments which he placed on a vacant spot on the great table. Then he brought out the tape and carefully measured the length of the corpse.

  “Sixty-five inches,” he reported. “Five feet five. You remember the height of that beam. Now we will have another look at those shoes.”