Invisible Weapons

by John Rhode

  ‘Still pretty foul down there,’ said Mr Sandling. ‘We’d better leave the door open for a few minutes before we take any risks. Was this cellar in constant use before Sir Godfrey’s death?’

  ‘It’s been used for the storage of wine ever since I can remember. When the house was modernised, Branstock insisted that the cellar should be left untouched. He said that we should never be able to build a room above ground which would keep wine so well.’

  ‘Sir Godfrey was the only person who entered it, you tell me. Did he ever complain of feeling ill effects after he had done so?’

  ‘Only once, to my knowledge. That was about a fortnight ago, when I was dining here; he told me almost jokingly that he thought he must be getting old, for when he had stooped down in the cellar to get a bottle of wine out of one of the bins, he had felt a sensation of giddiness and tightness in the chest. He said that the sensation had passed off very quickly, and as I knew that Dr Oldland had been treating him for high blood pressure, I thought that might have been one of the symptoms. The idea that the air in the cellar could be foul never occurred to me.’

  ‘There is nothing in the cellar but wine, I suppose? Nothing that could have fermented and caused an accumulation of carbon dioxide?’

  ‘That we shall discover for ourselves. So far as I know, Branstock only stored the best of his wine there. Lighter wines, beers, spirits and so forth, were kept in a smaller cellar upstairs.’

  All this time the surveyor had been swinging the cellar door backwards and forwards. ‘That ought to have fanned some of the stuff out,’ he said. ‘Let’s try the candle again.’

  At the second attempt the candle remained alight even when standing on the floor.

  ‘I think we can go down now, Mr Mayland,’ said Sandling. ‘But let me know immediately if you feel any oppressive symptoms.’

  The cellar was about twenty feet square and just over six feet high. On three of its sides the walls were occupied from floor to ceiling with wine bins. The fourth side, against which were the stone steps, was vacant.

  Mr Sandling tested the flags of the floor with his feet. ‘Everything seems to be sound enough,’ he remarked. ‘Of course, we can’t tell what may be behind those bins. We shall have to get them all shifted, I’m afraid. Hullo, what’s this?’ He pointed to a spot at the bottom of the unoccupied wall. ‘There’s a brick out there by the look of it,’ he said. ‘Do you happen to know what is beyond this wall, Mr Mayland.’

  ‘The cellar of No. 4, I fancy. The two houses were originally built upon the same plan. But this one has been modernised and the basement is no longer used except for storage purposes. But in the case of No. 4, the basement, and for all I know, the cellar too, was in use until a short time ago.’

  Upon examining the hole in the wall together, they soon came to the conclusion that it was not a question of a brick having been removed at any time. A nine inch wall separated the two houses and when this had been built, an orifice had purposely been left at the cellar floor.

  ‘There’s nothing very surprising about that,’ the surveyor commented. ‘At the time when these houses were built it was quite a common practice to have common drainage to two or even more cellars. It was then only necessary to fit a gully in one of them, for an orifice like this would enable water collecting in any of the others to flow to the gully. The gully is usually in the centre of the floor, which is made to slope down from the walls towards it. There’s nothing of the sort in this cellar. Perhaps there is in the one next door, Mr Mayland?’

  ‘I can’t tell you, off hand. I’ve been making a preliminary survey of No. 4 recently, with a view to having it modernised on the same lines as this house. But I didn’t penetrate into the cellar. No. 4 is empty, as of course you know, and the keys have been handed over to my stepfather. I think I could find them if you would like to explore the other cellar.’

  ‘Well, I don’t see any possible source of foul gas here,’ the surveyor replied. ‘On the other hand, it’s possible that the gas found its way in through that orifice at the foot of the wall. I think that if it’s convenient we ought to investigate the conditions in the cellar of No. 4.’

  It took Mayland a few minutes to find the keys of No. 4, but he eventually located them in a desk in Branstock’s study.

  ‘How long has this house been empty?’ asked the surveyor as they entered it.

  ‘Nearly a month now,’ Mayland replied. ‘I think it was on the 12th June that Mr Fransham was killed. He had a married couple living in the house. They stayed on for some weeks after his death and finally superintended the removal of the furniture.’

  ‘That was an amazing affair!’ exclaimed Mr Sandling. ‘I knew Mr Fransham slightly and, of course, I followed the case in the papers very carefully at the time. I can’t think why the police haven’t taken action long before this. There doesn’t seem to be the slightest doubt who did it.’

  Mayland smiled. ‘I don’t suppose there is very much doubt,’ he replied. ‘But the police are much too cautious to make an arrest until they’re absolutely certain. The guilty man might be acquitted and then even if conclusive evidence against him turned up later, he couldn’t be tried again. Superintendent Hanslet of the Yard was with me when you arrived just now. He wanted a few particulars about this very house we’re in. That shows they’re still on the scent, I take it.’

  No. 4 presented the usual forlorn appearance of a house which has been empty even for a short time. They descended to the basement, which was littered with unconsidered trifles, wisps of straw, torn fragments of newspaper and so forth. ‘It wasn’t worth while having the place cleared up,’ Mayland explained. ‘You know for yourself what a mess builders make about a place. My stepfather was anxious to get the alteration work done as soon as possible. He meant to throw out a new set of kitchen premises on the ground floor, as he did in the case of No. 3 a little time ago. The same plans and specifications would have done with slight alterations. In fact, I hoped to get them prepared this week and submit them to your office for approval.’

  ‘What will become of the premises now?’ Sandling asked.

  ‘That’s more than I can tell you,’ Mayland replied grimly. ‘Nobody knows yet who they belong to. Technically, I suppose I’m trespassing. The arrangement of this basement is exactly the same as at No. 3, only of course the other way about. Here’s the cellar door and the key’s in the lock.’

  He turned the key, which grated rustily, and the door opened with a reluctant creaking.

  ‘It doesn’t seem to have been opened for some time,’ he remarked. ‘Hullo, seems a bit queer down there, doesn’t it?’

  The surveyor approached the doorway and sniffed. ‘Sulphuretted hydrogen!’ he exclaimed. ‘I thought I detected a faint trace of it in the cellar next door, but I wasn’t sure. I shouldn’t wonder if that was the clue. We’d better try to get this cellar ventilated like we did the other one.’

  ‘There’s no electric light in this one, I see,’ said Mayland. ‘We’ll have to use the candle in any case. But we’d better give the atmosphere a chance to clear before we go down. The coroner’s guess was a pretty shrewd one, it seems to me.’

  ‘Yes, that smell of sulphuretted hydrogen certainly suggests the presence of sewer gas,’ the surveyor replied. ‘It would naturally be more noticeable here than at No. 3 since this door has been closed for a longer time. You have no idea when it was last opened, I suppose?’

  Mayland shook his head. ‘I don’t know whether the cellar was used in Mr Fransham’s time. But in any case, it’s very improbable that this door has been opened since the Stowells left. The keys of the house were handed over to my stepfather by Stowell himself when he left. And they are not likely to have been out of his possession since then, except on the day when he handed them over to me to examine the premises. I certainly didn’t open this door then. So I think we may safely assume that it hasn’t been opened for at least a month.’

  They waited for a few minutes longer and then, having lig
hted the candle, descended into the cellar. It was similar in size to the one which they had already inspected. But it contained no wine bins, and was empty but for a few mouldering crates, all of which proved to be empty. And in the middle of the floor was a gully towards which the floor sloped on all sides.

  The surveyor pointed to this triumphantly. ‘There you are!’ he exclaimed. ‘That’s just exactly what I expected. That gully was originally intended to drain both cellars, hence the aperture in the foot of the wall dividing them. No doubt the gully has become defective through want of attention, and now allows gas to escape from the sewer.’

  ‘I thought all sewers were so well ventilated nowadays that no accumulation of gas could occur?’

  ‘Main sewers are, certainly. But in old premises like these, you will often find household drains which don’t conform to modern requirements. And with a defective gully like this, there’s always the danger of an infiltration of sewer gas from them. Sewer gas usually contains more or less sulphuretted hydrogen, by which its presence may be detected. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that that particular gas should be present. Carbon dioxide alone or mixed with nitrogen would be equally fatal if sufficiently concentrated. Any sulphuretted hydrogen present would tend to rise, which accounts for our detecting it when we opened this door. But the carbon dioxide, if undisturbed by ventilation, would collect at the bottom of the cellar.’

  ‘I see,’ said Mayland thoughtfully. ‘Now I come to think of it my stepfather had a very feeble sense of smell. He could not, for instance, detect the scent of flowers unless they were very powerful. I don’t believe he noticed the particularly revolting perfumes which some of his friends used. Even if there had been any sulphuretted hydrogen about when he went down to the cellar the other night, I don’t think he’d have been aware of it. And the door had been left open for some little while before anybody else arrived upon the scene.’

  ‘If he had smelt the sulphuretted hydrogen he might have been alive now,’ said Mr Sandling gloomily. ‘Well, Mr Mayland, I’m very glad that you were able to give me your assistance. As an architect yourself, you will appreciate the position, of course. I shall have to make a report to the local authorities. They, I expect, will serve a notice upon the owner of the premises to the effect that this gully must be repaired or abolished altogether. Personally, I should favour the latter course. Both these cellars seem to be perfectly dry and no real need for drainage exists.’

  ‘Yes, I fully appreciate that,’ said Mayland. ‘Do you know, I can’t help feeling responsible in a way for what happened. If I had opened this cellar door that day when I was looking over the house, I should have noticed that something was wrong and had immediate steps taken to put it right.’

  ‘I don’t think you can blame yourself for that, Mr Mayland. I expect that the gas has been accumulating here for a considerable time. Judging by the appearance of this cellar it was not regularly used in Mr Fransham’s time. The door may not have been opened for months, in which case the cellar would have remained unventilated all that time. The symptoms mentioned by Sir Godfrey on the previous occasion suggest that there was no sudden influx of gas.’

  ‘No, he didn’t realise what the trouble was, and nobody with a keener sense of smell had the chance of enlightening him. His cellar was one of his pet fads. He never would let anybody else go down there. It wasn’t that he was afraid they might steal a bottle of wine, but thought that they might disturb one of his favourite vintages. Even when his wine merchants delivered a fresh consignment, he always insisted upon being present himself, to see that they put each bottle in exactly the right place. And I don’t suppose that happened more than once in a couple of years, for he always bought in large quantities. Is there anything else you would like to see while you’re here, Mr Sandling?’

  The surveyor expressed himself satisfied and they returned to No. 3.

  CHAPTER IV

  Ten days later, on the morning of Thursday, August 19, Harold Merefield was shown into Hanslet’s room at Scotland Yard.

  The superintendent, with whom the appointment had been made by telephone on the previous evening, looked up as his visitor entered. ‘Come in, Mr Merefield,’ he said. ‘Sit down and make yourself comfortable. It would be pretty safe to guess that you’ve come to see me on behalf of the professor, I suppose?’

  Harold laughed. ‘I’d hardly venture to intrude upon my own account,’ he replied. ‘My old man has been pretty busy with his own affairs lately, but yesterday he knocked off and began talking about that Adderminster business. It’s been at the back of his mind all the time, I know that perfectly well.’

  ‘I’m jolly glad to hear it,’ said Hanslet warmly. ‘He hasn’t by any chance found out how Mr Fransham was killed, has he?’

  ‘If he has, he hasn’t told me. Yesterday he was concerned with that elusive fellow Alfie Prince. He made me look up my notes about him and settled upon those cigarette ends that Jimmy found in the corner of the field.’

  Hanslet sighed. ‘I thought I’d made that point pretty clear to the professor when I last saw him. They must have come from the box which we know to have been in Dr Thornborough’s house at the time. I’m quite satisfied with the evidence that nobody else in Adderminster possessed any of Black’s Russian Blend.’

  ‘Well, my old man’s got it into his head that those cigarettes might provide a valuable clue. He wants you to find out for certain whether or not Mr Fransham sent them to Mrs Thornborough.’

  ‘Oh he does, does he? He’s forgotten, I suppose, that Mr Fransham was buried a couple of months ago, and that dead men tell no tales.’

  ‘No, he hasn’t forgotten that. You ought to know by this time that there isn’t much that he does forget. According to Mrs Thornborough, as you told him, the cigarettes appear to have sent to her straight from the shop. Jimmy said that these particular cigarettes could only be obtained from one of Black’s branches. He set me to work to look up the addresses of these branches. The nearest one to Cheveley Street is in Knightsbridge. Got it?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve got it. Make inquiries at the shop. But I can’t see that it matters a damn whether the cigarettes were sent by Mr Fransham or by someone else.’

  ‘No more can I, between ourselves,’ Harold replied. ‘But there you are, that’s what I was to suggest to you. And I was to add that if you care to come to dinner tonight at Westbourne Terrace, the old man will be delighted to see you.’

  Hanslet grunted. ‘Give him my best thanks and tell him that I’ll come, by all means. And between now and then I’ll make an opportunity of inquiring about his confounded cigarettes.’

  The superintendent was as good as his word. That afternoon he went to Black’s Branch in Knightsbridge and asked to see the manager. From him he learnt that Mr Fransham had been a very good customer.

  ‘He bought practically all his cigars and cigarettes from us,’ the manager said. ‘The cigarettes were for his friends, I suppose, for he never touched them himself. He always smoked cigars, and a very particular brand of them at that.’

  ‘Did he ever ask you to send cigarettes direct to his friends by post?’

  ‘Yes, occasionally. Always to the same address, if I remember right; a lady in the country whom he told me once was his niece, I believe. I can’t remember the name for the moment.’

  ‘Was it Thornborough?’

  ‘Why, yes, of course it was. It was while he was visiting her that Mr Fransham was killed.’

  ‘Can you tell me if you sent Mrs Thornborough a box of cigarettes sometime at the end of May or the beginning of June last?’

  ‘I dare say I can if I look in the order book,’ the manager replied. He produced the volume and turned over the pages. ‘Yes, here you are,’ he continued. ‘On May 31, we posted a box of a hundred of our Russian Blend to Mrs Thornborough, Epidaurus, Adderminster. I remember the incident now, and being slightly surprised at the time.’

  ‘Why surprised?’ Hanslet asked.

  ‘At the particular br
and which Mr Fransham had ordered. He had told me once that smoking Virginia cigarettes was a very bad habit, but that smoking anything stronger was tantamount to suicide.’

  ‘Did he order the cigarettes in person?’

  ‘No, the order came on a postcard, if I remember right.’

  ‘Is that postcard still in existence?’

  ‘I’m not sure that it is,’ the manager replied doubtfully. ‘It would have been kept as our authority for supplying the goods until the account had been settled. Mr Fransham had a quarterly account with us, and he always settled regularly. The last account was settled by his executors about a month ago, and it is quite likely that the postcard was destroyed then. It may still be in the files, though. I’ll have a look.’

  In spite of the manager’s fears the search proved successful. ‘Here it is,’ he said. ‘You’re welcome to it, if it’s any use to you.’

  Hanslet took the card and examined it closely. It was an ordinary stamped postcard, upon which a communication had been typed. This communication bore no address and was in the third person.

  ‘Mr Robert Fransham would be obliged if Messrs. Black would post immediately one hundred of their Russian Blend cigarettes to the following address, and charge the same to his account: Mrs Thornborough, Epidaurus, Adderminster.’

  On the reverse side of the card was typed the name and address of the firm. The postmark, creditably distinct, was, Adderminster, May 29.

  That evening, in Dr Priestley’s study after dinner, Hanslet repeated the story of his visit to the shop.

  ‘Immediately I saw that postcard I had my suspicions,’ he said. ‘I took it back to the Yard and got the experts to have a look at it. They compared it with the letter found in Mr Fransham’s pocket after his death. As usual, they won’t swear to anything definite. But from what they tell me I think there’s very little doubt that the two were typed upon the same machine. And there’s that postmark, Adderminster, plain enough for all the world to see. There’s not a shadow of doubt that it was the doctor who sent the postcard. But what he did it for, I’m blest if I can make out.’