 Who's Body, CHAPTER V Mr. Parker was a bachelor and occupied a Georgian but inconvenient flat at number twelve great Ormond Street, for which he paid a pound a week. His exertions in the cause of civilization were rewarded not by the gift of diamond rings from empresses or munificent cheques from grateful prime ministers, but by a modest though sufficient salary, drawn from the pockets of the British taxpayer. He awoke after a long day of arduous and inconclusive labour to the smell of burnt porridge. Through his bedroom window, hygienically open top and bottom, a raw fog was rolling slowly in, and the sight of a pair of winter pants flung hastily over a chair the previous night, fretted him with a sense of the sordid absurdity of the human form. The telephone bell rang, and he crawled wretchedly out of bed and into the sitting-room, where Mrs. Muns, who did for him by the day, was laying the table, sneezing as she went. Mr. Bunter was speaking. His lordship says he'd be very glad, sir, if you could make it convenient to step round to breakfast. If the odour of kidneys and bacon had been wafted along the wire, Mr. Parker could not have experienced a more vivid sense of consolation. Tell his lordship I'll be with him in half an hour," he said, thankfully, and plunging into the bathroom, which was also the kitchen, he informed Mrs. Muns, who was just making tea from a kettle which had gone off the boil, that he should be out to breakfast. You can take the porridge home for the family. He added viciously and flung off his dressing-gown with such determination that Mrs. Muns could only scuddle away with a snort. A nineteen bus deposited him in Piccadilly, maybe fifteen minutes later than his rather sanguine impulse had prompted him to suggest, and Mr. Bunter served him with glorious food, incomparable coffee, and the daily mail before a blazing fire of wooden coal. A distant voice singing the et iterum venturis est, from Bach's Mass in B Minor, proclaimed that for the owner of the flat, cleanliness and godliness met at least once a day, and presently, Lord Peter roamed in, moist and verbina scented, in a bathrobe cheerfully patterned with unnaturally variegated peacocks. Morning, old dear," said that gentleman, beast of a day, ain't it? Very good of you to trundle out in it, but I had a letter I wanted you to see, and I hadn't the energy to come round to your place. Bunter and I have been making a night of it. What's the letter? asked Parker. Never talk business with your mouthful, said Lord Peter reprovingly. Have some Oxford marmalade, and then I'll show you my Dante. They brought it round last night. What haught I to read this morning, Bunter? Lord Aerith's collection is going to be sold, my lord. There is a column about it in the morning post. I think your lordship should look at this review of Sir Julian Frecky's new book on the psychological basis of the conscience in the Times Literary Supplement. Then there is a very singular little burglary in the Chronicle, my lord, and an attack on titled Families in the Herald. Rather ill-written, if I may say so, but not without unconscious humour which your lordship will appreciate. All right, give me that in the burglary, said his lordship. I have looked over the other papers, pursued Mr. Bunter indicating a formidable pile, and mocked your lordship's after-breakfast reading. Oh, pray don't allude to it, said Lord Peter. You take my appetite away. There was silence, but for the crunching of toast and the crackling of paper. I see they adjourned the inquest, said Parker presently. Nothing else to do, said Lord Peter, but Lady Levy arrived last night, and will have to go and fail to identify the body this morning for Sugg's benefit. Time, too, said Mr. Parker shortly. Silence fell again. I don't think much of your burglary, Bunter, said Lord Peter. Competent, of course, but no imagination. I want imagination in a criminal. Where's the morning post? After a further silence, Lord Peter said, you might send for the catalogue, Bunter. That Apollonius Rodeus might be worth looking at. No, I am damned if I'm going to stodge through that review, but you can stick the book on the library list, if you like. His book on crime was entertaining enough as far as it went, but the fellow's got a bee in his bonnet, thinks God's a secretion of the liver. All right, once, in a way, but there's no need to keep on about it. There's nothing you can't prove if your outlook is only sufficiently limited. Look at Sugg. I beg your pardon, said Parker. I wasn't attending. Argentines are steadying a little, I see. Milligan, said Lord Peter. Oil's in a bad way. Levi's made a difference there. That funny little boom in Peruvians that came on just before he disappeared has died away again. I wonder if he was concerned in it. Do you know it all? I'll find out, said Lord Peter. What was it? Oh, an absolutely dud enterprise that hadn't been heard of for years. It suddenly took a little lease of life last week. I happened to notice it because my mother got let in for a couple of hundred shares a long time ago. It never paid a dividend. Now it's petered out again. Whimsy pushed his plate aside and lit a pipe. Having finished, I don't mind doing some work. He said, How did you get on yesterday? I didn't, replied Parker. I sleuthed up and down those flats in my own bodily shape and two different disguises. I was a gas-meter man and a collector for a home of lost doggies. I didn't get a thing to go on, except a servant in the top flat at the Battersea Bridge road end of the row, who said she thought she'd heard a bump on the roof one night. Asked which night she couldn't rightly say. Asked if it was Monday night, she thought it very likely. Asked if it mightn't have been in that high wind on Saturday night that blew the chimney part off. She couldn't say but what it might have been. Asked if she was sure it was on the roof and not inside the flat. Said to be sure they did not find a picture tumbled down next morning. Very suggestible girl. I saw your friends, Mr. and Mrs. Appledore, who received me coldly, but could make no definite complaint about Thipps except that his mother dropped her h's, and that he once called on them uninvited, armed with a pamphlet about anti-vivisection. The Indian Colonel on the first floor was loud, but unexpectedly friendly. He gave me Indian curry for supper and some very good whiskey, but he's a sort of hermit, and all he could tell me was that he couldn't stand, Mrs. Appledore. Did you get nothing at the house? Only Levy's private diary. I brought it away with me. Here it is. It doesn't tell one much, though. It's full of entries like Tom and Annie to dinner, and my dear wife's birthday gave her an old opal ring. Mr. Arbuthnot dropped into tea. He wants to marry Rachel, but I should like someone steadier for my treasure. Still, I thought it would show who came to the house and so on. He evidently wrote it up at night. There's no entry for Monday. I expect it'll be useful, said Lord Peter, turning over the pages. Poor old buffer! I say, I'm not so certain now he was done away with. He detailed to Mr. Parker his day's work. Arbuthnot? said Parker. Is that the Arbuthnot of the diary? I suppose so. I hunted him up because I knew he was fond of fooling around the stock exchange. As for Milligan, he looks all right, but I believe he's pretty ruthless in business, and you never can tell. Then there's the red-head secretary, lightning-calculator man with a face like a fish, keeps on saying nothing, got the tar baby in his family, I should think. Milligan's got a jolly good motive for, at any rate, suspend in Levy for a few days. Then there's the new man. What new man? Ah, that's the letter I mentioned to you. Where did I put it? Here we are. Good parchment paper, printed address of Solicitor's office in Salisbury, and postmarked to Correspond. Very precisely written, with a fine nib by an elderly businessman of old-fashioned habits. Parker took the letter in red. Salisbury, Solicitor's, Milford Hill Salisbury, 17 November, 1920, Blank. Sir, with reference to your advertisement today in the personal column of the Times, I am disposed to believe that the eyeglasses and chain in question may be those I lost on the LB and SC Electric Railway while visiting London last Monday. I left Victoria by the 545 train and did not notice my loss till I arrived at Balum. This indication and the optician's specification of the glasses which I enclose should suffice at once as an identification and a guarantee of my bona fides. If the glasses should prove to be mine, I should greatly oblige you if you would kindly forward them to me by registered post, as the chain was a present for my daughter and is one of my dearest possessions. Thank you in advance for this kindness and regretting the trouble which I shall be putting you to, I am, yours very truly, Thomas Cripplesham. Lord Peter Wimsey, 110, Piccadilly West, Enclosure. Dear me, said Parker, this is what you might call unexpected. Either it is some extraordinary misunderstanding, said Lord Peter, or Mr. Cripplesham is a very bold and cunning villain, or possibly, of course, they are the wrong glasses. We may as well get a ruling on that point at once. I suppose the glasses are at the yard. I wish you'd just ring them up and ask him to send round an optician's description of them at once. You might ask at the same time whether it's a very common prescription. Right you are, said Parker, and took the receiver off its hook. And now, said his friend, when the message was delivered, just come into the library for a moment. On the library table Lord Peter had spread out a series of bromide prints, some dry, some damp, and some but half washed. These little ones are the originals of the photos we've been taking, said Lord Peter, and these big ones are enlargements all made to precisely the same scale. This one here is the footmark on the linoleum. We'll put that by itself at present. Now, these fingerprints can be divided into five lots. I've numbered them on the prints, see, and made a list. A. The fingerprints of Levy himself, off his little bedside book and his hairbrush. This and this. You can't mistake the little scar on the thumb. B. The smudge is made by the gloved fingers of the man who slept in Levy's room on Monday night. They show clearly on the water bottle and on the boots, superimposed on Levy's. They are very distinct on the boots, surprisingly so for gloved hands, and I deduced that the gloves were rubber ones and had recently been in water. Here's another interesting point. Levy walked in the rain on Monday night, as we know, and these dark marks are mud splashes. You see they lie over Levy's fingerprints in every case? Now, see, on this left boot we find the stranger's thumbmark over the mud on the leather above the heel. That's a funny place to find a thumbmark on a boot, isn't it? That is, if Levy took off his own boots. But it's the place where you'd expect to see it if somebody forcibly removed his boots for him. Again, most of the stranger's finger marks come over the mud marks. But here's one splashed of mud which comes up on top of them again. Which makes me infer that the stranger came back to Park Lane wearing Levy's boots, in a cab, carriage or car, but that at some point or other he walked a little way, just enough to tread in a puddle and get a splash on the boots. What do you say? Very pretty, said Parker. A bit intricate, though, and the marks are not at all that I could wish a fingerprint to be. Well, I won't lay too much stress on it, but it fits in with our previous ideas. Now, let's turn to C. The prince obligingly left by my own particular villain on the further edge of Thip's bath, where you spotted them, and I ought to be scourged for not having spotted them. The left hand, you notice. The base of the palm and the fingers, but not the tips. Looking as though he had steadied himself on the edge of the bath while leaning down to adjust something at the bottom. The pants may perhaps. Gloved, you see, but showing no ridgess seam of any kind. I say rubber, you say rubber, that's all, now see here. D and E come off a visiting card of mine. There's this thing at the corner marked F, but that you can disregard. In the original document, it's a sticky mark left by the thumb of the youth who took it from me, after first removing a piece of chewing gum from his teeth with his finger to tell me that Mr. Milligan might or might not be disengaged. D and E are the thumb marks of Mr. Milligan and his red-headed secretary. I'm not clear which is which, but I saw the youth with the chewing gum hand the card to the secretary, and when I got into the inner shrine I saw John P. Milligan standing with it in his hand, so it's one or the other, and for the moment it's immaterial to our purpose which is which. I boned the card from the table when I left. Well now Parker, here's what's been keeping Bunter in me up till the small hours. I've measured and measured every way backwards and forwards till my head's spinning, and I've stared till I'm nearly blind, but I'm hanged if I can make my mind up. Question one, is C identical with B? Question two, is D or E identical with B? There's nothing to go on but the size and shape of course, and the marks are so faint. What do you think? Parker shook his head doubtfully. I think E might almost be put out of the question, he said. It seems such an excessively long and narrow thumb, but I think there is a decided resemblance between the span of B on the water bottle and C on the bath, and I don't see any reason why D shouldn't be the same as B, only there is so little to judge from. Your untutored judgment and my measurements have brought us both to the same conclusion. If you can call it a conclusion, said Lord Peter bitterly. Another thing, said Parker, why on earth should we try to connect B with C? The fact that you and I happen to be friends doesn't make it necessary to conclude that the two cases we happen to be interested in have any organic connection with one another. Why should they? The only person who thinks they have is Sugg, and he's nothing to go by. It would be different if there were any truth in the suggestion that the man in the bath was Levy, but we know for a certainty he wasn't. It's ridiculous to suppose that the same man was employed in committing two totally distinct crimes on the same night, one in Battersea and the other in Park Lane. I know, said whimsy, though of course we mustn't forget that Levy was in Battersea at the time, and now we know he didn't return home at twelve as was supposed. We've no reason to think he ever left Battersea at all. True, but there are other places in Battersea besides Thips's bathroom, and he wasn't in Thips's bathroom. In fact, come to think of it, that's the one place in the universe where we know definitely that he wasn't. So what's Thips's bath got to do with it? I don't know, said Lord Peter. Well, perhaps we shall get something better to go on today. He leaned back in his chair and smoked thoughtfully for some time over the papers which Bunter had marked for him. They've got you out in the limelight, he said. Thank heaven Sugg hates me too much to give me any publicity. What a dull agony column. Darling Pipsy, come back soon to your distracted Popsy, and the usual young man in need of financial assistance, and the usual injunction to remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth. Hello, there's the bell. Oh, it's our answer from Scotland Yard. The note from Scotland Yard enclosed an optician's specification identical with that sent by Mr. Crimplesham, and added that it was an unusual one owing to the peculiar strength of the lenses and the marked difference between the sight of the two eyes. That's good enough, said Parker. Yes, said Whimsy. Then possibility number three is knocked on the head. There remain possibility number one, accident or misunderstanding, and number two, deliberate villainy, of a remarkably bold and calculating kind. Of a kind, in fact, characteristic of the author or authors of our two problems. Following the methods inculcated at that university, of which I have the honour to be a member, we will now examine severally the various suggestions afforded by possibility number two. This possibility may be again subdivided into two or more hypotheses. On hypothesis one, strongly advocated by my distinguished colleague Professor Snapshed, the criminal whom we may designate as X is not identical with Crimplesham, but is using the name of Crimplesham as his shield or aegis. This hypothesis may be further subdivided into two alternatives. Alternative A, Crimplesham is an innocent and unconscious accomplice, and X is in his employment. X writes in Crimplesham's name on Crimplesham's office paper, and obtains that the object in question, i.e., the eyeglasses, be dispatched to Crimplesham's address. He is in a position to intercept the parcel before it reaches Crimplesham. The presumption is that X is Crimplesham's child woman office boy clock, secretary or porter. This offers a wide field of investigation. The method of inquiry will be to interview Crimplesham and discover whether he sent the letter, and if not, who has access to his correspondence. Alternative B, Crimplesham is under X's influence or in his power, and has been induced to write the letter by A bribery, B misrepresentation, or C threats. X may, in that case, be a persuasive relation or friend, or else a creditor, blackmailer or assassin. Crimplesham, on the other hand, is obviously venal or a fool. The method of inquiry in this case, I would tentatively suggest, is again to interview Crimplesham, put the facts of the case strongly before him, and assure him in the most intimidating terms that he is liable to a prolonged term of penal servitude as an accessory after the fact in the crime of murder. Ahem. Trusting, gentlemen, that you have followed me thus far, we will pass to the consideration of hypothesis number two, to which I personally incline, and according to which X is identical with Crimplesham. In this case, Crimplesham, who is, in the words of an English classic, a man of infinite resource and sagacity, correctly deduces that, of all people, the last whom we shall expect to find answering our advertisement is the criminal himself. Accordingly he plays a bold game of bluff. He invents an occasion on which the glasses may very easily have been lost or stolen, and applies for them. If confronted, nobody will be more astonished than he to learn where they were found. He will produce witnesses to prove that he left Victoria at 5.45, and emerged from the train at Balm at the scheduled time, and sat up all Monday night playing chess with a respectable gentleman well known in Balm. In this case, the method of inquiry will be to pump the respectable gentleman in Balm, and if he should happen to be a single gentleman with a deaf housekeeper, it may be no easy matter to impugn the alibi since, outside detective romances, few ticket collectors and bus company conductors keep an exact remembrance of all the passengers passing between Balm and London on any and every evening of the week. Finally, gentlemen, I will frankly point out the weak point of all these hypotheses, namely that none of them offers any explanation as to why the incriminating article was left so conspicuously on the body in the first instance. Mr. Parker had listened with commendable patience to this academic exposition. Might not ex, he suggested, be an enemy of crimple shums, who designed to throw suspicion upon him? He might, in that case he should be easy to discover, since he obviously lives in close proximity to crimple shum and his glasses, and crimple shum in fear of his life will then be a valuable ally for the prosecution. How about the first possibility of all misunderstanding or accident? Well, well, for purposes of discussion nothing, because it really doesn't afford any data for discussion. In any case, said Parker, the obvious course appears to be to go to Salisbury. That seems indicated, said Lord Peter. Very well, said the detective. Is it to be you or me or both of us? It is to be me, said Lord Peter, and that for two reasons. First, because if, by possibility number two, hypothesis one, alternative A, crimple shum is an innocent cat's paw, the person who put in the advertisement is the proper person to hand over the property. Secondly, because if we are to adopt hypothesis two, we must not overlook the sinister possibility that crimple shum, X, is laying a careful trap to rid himself the person who so unwarily advertised in the daily press his interest in the solution of the Battersea Park mystery. That appears to me to be an argument for our both going, objected the detective. Far from it, said Lord Peter, why play into the hands of crimple shum X by delivering over to him the only two men in London with the evidence, such as it is, and shall I say the wits, to connect him with the Battersea body. But if we told the yard where we were going, and we both got knobbled, said Mr. Parker, it would afford strong presumptive evidence of crimple shum's guilt, and anyhow, if he didn't get hanged for murdering the man in the bath, he'd at least get hanged for murdering us. Well, said Lord Peter, if he only murdered me, you could still hang him. What's the good of wasting a sound, marriageable young man like yourself? Besides, how about old Levy? If you're incapacitated, do you think anybody else is going to find him? But we could frighten crimple shum by threatening him with the yard. Well, dash it all if it comes to that. I can frighten him by threatening him with you, which seeing you hold what evidence there is, is much more to the point. And then, suppose it's a wild goose-chase after all, you'll have wasted time when you might have been getting on with the case. There are several things that need doing. Well, said Parker, silenced but reluctant. Why can't I go in that case? Bosh, said Lord Peter, I am retained by old Mrs. Thipps for whom I entertain the greatest respect, to deal with this case, and it's only by courtesy I allow you to have anything to do with it. Mr. Parker groaned. Will you at least take Bunter? he said. Indeference to your feelings, replied Lord Peter. I will take Bunter, though he could be far more usefully employed taking photographs or overhauling my wardrobe. When is there a good train to Salisbury Bunter? There is an excellent train at ten fifty, my lord. Kindly make arrangements to catch it, said Lord Peter, throwing off his bathrobe and trailing away with it into his bedroom. And Parker, if you have nothing else to do, you might get hold of Levy's secretary and look into that little matter of the Peruvian oil. Lord Peter took with him for light-breeding in the train, Sirubin Levy's diary. It was a simple and in the light of recent facts, rather a pathetic document. The terrible fighter of the stock exchange, who could with one nod set the surly bear dancing or bring the savage bull to feed out of his hand, whose breath at devastated whole districts with famine or swept financial potentates from their seats, was revealed in private life as kindly, domestic, innocently proud of himself and his belongings, confiding, generous, and a little dull. His own small economies were duly chronicled side by side with the extravagant presence to his wife and daughter. Small incidents of household routine appeared such as, man came to mend the conservatory roof, or the new butler Simpson has arrived, recommended by the Goldbergs. I think he will be satisfactory. All visitors and entertainments were duly entered, from a very magnificent lunch to Lord Dewsbury, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, and Dr. Jabez K. Watt, the American plenipotentiary, through a series of diplomatic dinners to eminent financiers, down to intimate family gatherings of persons designated by Christian names or nicknames. About May, there came a mention of Lady Levy's nerves, and further reference was made to the subject in subsequent months. In September it was stated that Frecky came to see my dear wife and advised complete rest and change of scene. She thinks of going abroad with Rachel. The name of the famous nerve specialist occurred as a diner or luncher about once a month, and it came into Lord Peter's mind that Frecky would be a good person to consult about Levy himself. People sometimes tell things to the doctor, he murmured to himself. And by Jove, if Levy was simply going round to see Frecky on Monday night, that rather disposes of the Battersea incident, doesn't it? He made a note to look up Sir Julian and turned on further. On September 18th Lady Levy and her daughter had left for the south of France. Then suddenly, under the date October 5th, Lord Peter found what he was looking for. Goldberg, Schreiner and Milligan to dinner. There was the evidence that Milligan had been in that house. There had been a formal entertainment, a meeting as of two dualist shaking hands before the fight. Schreiner was a well-known picture-dealer. Lord Peter imagined an after-dinner excursion upstairs to see the two cross in the dining-room and the portrait of the eldest Levy girl, who had died at the age of sixteen. It was by Augustus John and hung in the bedroom. The name of the red-haired secretary was nowhere mentioned, unless the initial S, occurring in another entry, referred to him. Throughout September and October, Anderson of Windoms, had been a frequent visitor. Lord Peter shook his head over the diary and turned to the consideration of the Battersea Park mystery. Whereas in the Levy affair it was easy enough to supply a motive for the crime, if crime it were, and the difficulty was to discover the method of its carrying out and the whereabouts of the victim. In the other case, the chief obstacle to inquiry was the entire absence of any imaginable motive. It was odd that although the papers had carried news of the affair, from one end of the country to the other, and a description of the body had been sent to every police station in the country, nobody had as yet come forward to identify the mysterious occupant of Mr. Thipps's bath. It was true that the description which mentioned the clean-shaven chin, elegantly cut hair in the pants-nay, was rather misleading, but on the other hand, the police had managed to discover the number of molars missing, and the height, complexion, and other data were correctly enough stated, as also the date at which the death had presumably occurred. It seemed, however, as though the man had melted out of society without leaving a gap or so much as a ripple. Assigning a motive for the murder of a person without relations or antecedents, or even clothes, is like trying to visualize the fourth dimension, admirable exercise for the imagination, but arduous and inconclusive. Even if the day's interview should disclose black spots in the past or present of Mr. Krimpelscham, how were they to be brought into connection with a person apparently without a past, and whose present was confined to the narrow limits of a bath and a police mortuary? Bunter, said Lord Peter. I beg that in the future you will restrain me from starting two hairs at once. These cases are getting to be a strain on my constitution. One hair has nowhere to run from, and the other has nowhere to run to. It's a kind of mental D.T., Bunter. When this is all over I shall turn pussy-foot, force swear the police news, and take to an emollient diet of the works of the late Charles Garvis. It was its comparative proximity to Milford Hill that induced Lord Peter to lunch at the Minster Hotel, rather than at the White Heart, or some other more picturesquely situated hostel. It was not a lunch calculated to cheer his mind. As in all cathedral cities, the atmosphere of the close pervades every nook and corner of Salisbury, and no food in that city but seems faintly flavoured with prayer books. As he sat, sadly consuming that impassive pale substance known to the English as cheese, unqualified, for there are cheeses which go openly by their names, as Stilton, Camembert, Grier, Wensleydale, or Gorgonzola, but cheese is cheese and everywhere the same. He inquired of the waiter at the whereabouts of Mr. Krimpelscham's office. The waiter directed him to a house rather further up the street on the opposite side, adding, but anybody'll tell you, sir, Mr. Krimpelscham's very well known hereabouts. He's a good solicitor, I suppose, said Lord Peter. Oh, yes, sir, said the waiter. You couldn't do better than to trust Mr. Krimpelscham, sir. There's folks say he's old-fashioned, but I'd rather have my little bits of business done by Mr. Krimpelscham than by one of these fly-away young men. Not but what Mr. Krimpelscham will be retiring soon, sir, I don't doubt, for he must be close on eighty, sir, if he's a day, but then there's young Mr. Wicks to carry on the business, and he's a very nice, steady-like young gentleman. Is Mr. Krimpelscham really as old as that, said Lord Peter? Dear me, he must be very active for his years. A friend of mine was doing business with him in town last week. Wonderful active, sir, agreed the waiter, and with his game leg, too, you'd be surprised. But there, sir, I often think, when a man's once past a certain age, the older he grows the tougher he gets, and women the same or more so. Very likely, said Lord Peter, calling up and dismissing the mental picture of a gentleman of eighty, with a game leg carrying a dead body over the roof of a Battersea Flat at midnight. He's tough, sir. Tough is old Joey Bagstock. Tough and devilishly sly. He added thoughtlessly. Indeed, sir? said the waiter. I couldn't say I'm sure. I beg your pardon, said Lord Peter. I was quoting poetry. Very silly of me. I got the habit at my mother's knee and can't break myself of it. No, sir, said the waiter, pocketing a liberal tip. Thank you very much, sir. You'll find the house easy. Just before you come to Penny Farthing Street, sir, about two turnings off, on the right-hand side opposite. Afraid that disposes of Crimplesham X, said Lord Peter, I'm rather sorry. He was a fine sinister figure as I had pictured him. Still, his may yet be the brains behind the hands, the aged spider sitting invisible in the centre of the vibrating web, you know, Bunter. Yes, my lord. Said Bunter, they were walking up the street together. There is the office over the way, pursued Lord Peter. I think, Bunter, you might step into this little shop and purchase a sporting paper. And if I do not emerge from the villain's lair, say, within three quarters of an hour, you may take such steps as your perspicuity may suggest. Mr. Bunter turned into the shop as desired, and Lord Peter walked across and rang the lawyer's bell with decision. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, is my long suit here, I fancy. He murmured, and when the door was opened by a clock, he delivered over his card with an unflinching air. He was ushered immediately into a confidential-looking office, obviously furnished in the early years of Queen Victoria's reign, and never altered since. A lean, frail-looking old gentleman rose briskly from his chair as he entered and limped forward to meet him. My dear sir, exclaimed the lawyer, how extremely good of you to come in person. Indeed, I am ashamed to have given you so much trouble. I trust you are passing this way, and that my glasses have not put you to any great inconvenience. Pray take a seat, Lord Peter. He peered gratefully at the young man over a pance-nay, obviously the fellow of that now adorning adossier in Scotland Yard. Lord Peter sat down, the lawyer sat down. Lord Peter picked up a glass paper-weight from the desk, and weighed it thoughtfully in his hand. Subconsciously he noted what an admirable set of fingerprints he was leaving upon it. He replaced it with precision on the exact centre of a pile of letters. It's quite all right, said Lord Peter. I was here on business, very happy to be of service to you. Very awkward to lose one's glasses, Mr. Crimplesham. Yes, said the lawyer. I assure you I feel quite lost without them. I have this pair, but they do not fit my nose so well. Besides, that chain has great sentimental value for me. I was terribly distressed on arriving at Balham to find that I had lost them. I made inquiries of the railway, but to no purpose. I feared they had been stolen. There were such crowds at Victoria and the carriage was packed with people all the way to Balham. Did you come across them in the train? Well, no, said Lord Peter. I found them in rather an unexpected place. Do you mind telling me if you recognised any of your fellow travellers on that occasion? The lawyer stared at him. Not a soul, he answered. Why do you ask? Well, said Lord Peter, I thought perhaps the—the person with whom I found them might have taken them for a joke. The lawyer looked puzzled. Did the person claim to be an acquaintance of mine? He inquired. I know practically nobody in London, except the friend with whom I was staying in Balham, Dr Phil Potts. And I should be very greatly surprised at his practising a jest upon me. He knew very well how distracted I was about the loss of the glasses. My business was to attend a meeting of shareholders in Medleycott's bank, but the other gentlemen present were all personally unknown to me, and I cannot think that any of them would take so great a liberty. In any case, he added, As the glasses are here, I will not inquire too closely into the matter of their restoration. I am deeply obliged to you for your trouble. Lord Peter hesitated. Pray forgive my seeming inquisitiveness, he said, but I must ask you another question. It sounds rather melodramatic, I'm afraid, but it's this. Are you aware that you have any enemy—anyone, I mean—who would profit by your—er—decease or disgrace? Mr. Crimplesham sat frozen into stony surprise and disapproval. May I ask the meaning of this extraordinary question? He inquired stiffly. Well, said Lord Peter, the circumstances are a little unusual. You may recollect that my advertisement was addressed to the jeweler who sold the chain. That surprised me at the time, said Mr. Crimplesham. But I begin to think your advertisement and your behaviour are all of a peace. They are, said Lord Peter. As a matter of fact, I did not expect the owner of the glasses to answer my advertisement. Mr. Crimplesham, you have no doubt read what the papers have to say about the Battersea Park mystery. Your glasses are the pair that was found on the body, and they are now in the possession of the police at Scotland Yard, as you may see by this. He placed the specification of the glasses and the official note before Crimplesham. Good God! exclaimed the lawyer. He glanced at the paper and then looked narrowly at Lord Peter. Are you yourself connected with the police? he inquired. Not officially, said Lord Peter. I am investigating the matter privately in the interest of one of the parties. Mr. Crimplesham rose to his feet. My good man! he said. This is a very impudent attempt, but Blackmail is an indictable offense, and I advise you to leave my office before you commit yourself. He rang the bell. I was afraid you'd take it like that, said Lord Peter. It looks as though this ought to have been my friend Detective Parker's job after all. He laid Parker's card on the table beside the specification, and added, If you should wish to see me again, Mr. Crimplesham, before tomorrow morning, you'll find me at the Minster Hotel. Mr. Crimplesham disdained to reply further than to direct the clerk who entered to show this person out. In the entrance, Lord Peter brushed against a tall young man who was just coming in, and who stared at him with surprised recognition. His face, however, aroused no memories in Lord Peter's mind, and that baffled nobleman, calling out Bunter from the newspaper shop, departed to his hotel to get a trunk call through to Parker. Meanwhile, in the office, the meditations of the indignant Mr. Crimplesham were interrupted by the entrance of his junior partner. I say, said the latter gentleman, has somebody done something really wicked at last? Whatever brings such a distinguished amateur of crime on our sober doorstep? I have been the victim of a vulgar attempt at blackmail, said the lawyer, an individual passing himself off as Lord Peter Whimsy. But that is Lord Peter Whimsy, said Mr. Wicks. There's no mistaking him. I saw him give evidence in the Attenbury Emerald case. He's a big little pot in his way, you know, and goes fishing with the head of Scotland Yard. Oh, dear! said Mr. Crimplesham. Fate arranged that the nerves of Mr. Crimplesham should be tried that afternoon. When escorted by Mr. Wicks, he arrived at the Minster Hotel. He was informed by the porter that Lord Peter Whimsy had strolled out, mentioning that he thought of attending Evensong. But his man is here, sir, he added, if you'd like to leave a message. Mr. Wicks thought that on the whole it would be well to leave a message. Mr. Bunter, an inquiry, was found to be sitting by the telephone, waiting for a trunk call. As Mr. Wicks addressed him, the bell rang, and Mr. Bunter, politely excusing himself, took down the receiver. Hello? he said. Is that Mr. Parker? Oh, thanks. Exchange? Exchange. Sorry, can you put me through to Scotland Yard? Excuse me, gentlemen, keeping you waiting. Exchange, all right. Scotland Yard, hello. Is that Scotland Yard? Is Detective Parker round there? Can I speak to him? I shall have done in a moment, gentlemen. Hello, is that you, Mr. Parker? Lord Peter would be much obliged if you could find it convenient to step down to Salisbury, sir. Oh no, sir, he is an excellent health, sir. Just stepped around to hear even-song, sir. Oh no, I think tomorrow morning would do excellently, sir. Thank you, sir. It was, in fact, inconvenient for Mr. Parker to leave London. He had had to go and see Lady Levy towards the end of the morning, and subsequently his plans for the day had been thrown out of gear, and his movements delayed by the discovery that the adjourned inquest of Mr. Thip's unknown visitor was to be held that afternoon, since nothing very definite seemed forthcoming from Inspector Sugg's enquiries. Jury and witnesses had been convened accordingly for three o'clock. Mr. Parker might altogether have missed the event, had he not run against Sugg that morning at the Yard, and extracted the information from him as one would a reluctant tooth. Inspector Sugg indeed considered Mr. Parker rather interfering. Moreover, he was hand in glove with Lord Peter Wimsey, and Inspector Sugg had no words for the interferingness of Lord Peter. He could not, however, when directly questioned, deny that there was to be an inquest that afternoon, nor could he prevent Mr. Parker from enjoying the inalienable right of any interested British citizen to be present. At a little before three, therefore, Mr. Parker was in his place, and amusing himself with watching the efforts of those persons who arrived after the room was packed to insinuate, bribe, or bully themselves into a position of vantage. The coroner, a medical man of precise habits and unimaginative aspect, arrived punctually, and, looking peevishly round at the crowded assembly, directed all the windows to be opened, thus letting in a stream of drizzling fog upon the heads of the unfortunates on that side of the room. This caused a commotion, and some expressions of disapproval checked sternly by the coroner, who said that with the influenza about again, an unventilated room was a death-trap, that anybody who chose to object to open windows had the obvious remedy of leaving the court, and, further, that if any disturbance was made he would clear the court. He then took a formament lozenge, and proceeded, after the usual preliminaries, to call up fourteen good and lawful persons, and swear them diligently to inquire and a true presentment make, of all matters touching the death of the gentleman with the pence-née, and to give a true verdict according to the evidence, so help them God. When an expostulation by a woman juror, an elderly lady in spectacles, who kept a sweet-shop, and appeared to wish she was back there, had been summarily quashed by the coroner, the jury departed to view the body. Mr. Parker gazed round again, and identified the unhappy Mr. Thipps, and the girl Gladys led in to an adjoining-room, under the grim guard of the police. They were soon followed by a gaunt old lady in a bonnet and mantel. With her, in a wonderful fur coat, and a motor bonnet of fascinating construction, came the dowager Duchess of Denver, her quick dark eyes darting hither and thither about the crowd. The next moment they had lighted on Mr. Parker, who had several times visited the dower-house, and she nodded to him, and spoke to a policeman. Before long, a way opened magically through the press, and Mr. Parker found himself accommodated with a front seat just behind the Duchess, who greeted him charmingly, and said, What's happened to poor Peter? Parker began to explain, and the coroner glanced irritably in their direction. Somebody went up and whispered in his ear, at which he coughed, and took another formament. We came up by car, said the Duchess. So tiresome, such bad roads between Denver and Gunbury St. Walters. And there were people coming to lunch. I had to put them off. I couldn't let the old lady go alone, could I? By the way, such an odd things happened about the Church Restoration Fund. The vicar. Oh dear, here are these people coming back again. Well, I'll tell you afterwards. Do look at that woman looking shocked, and the girl in tweeds trying to look as if she sat on undraped gentlemen every day of her life. I don't mean that, corpses, of course, but one finds oneself being so Elizabethan nowadays. What an awful little man the coroner is, isn't he? He's looking daggers at me. Do you think he'll dare to clear me out of the court, or commit me for what you may call it? The first part of the evidence was not of great interest to Mr. Parker. The wretched Mr. Thipps, who had caught a cold in jail, deposed in an unhappy croak to having discovered the body when he went in to take his bath at eight o'clock. He had arrived at St. Pancras at ten o'clock. He sent the girl for Brandy. He had never seen the deceased before. He had no idea how he came there. Yes, he had been in Manchester the day before. He had arrived at St. Pancras at ten o'clock. He had cloakroomed his bag. At this point Mr. Thipps became very red, unhappy and confused, and glanced nervously about the court. Now Mr. Thipps, said the coroner briskly, we must have your movements quite clear. You must appreciate the importance of the matter. You have chosen to give evidence, which you need not have done, but having done so you will find it best to be perfectly explicit. Yes, said Mr. Thipps faintly. Have you cautioned this witness, officer? Inquired the coroner, turning sharply to Inspector Sugg. The inspector replied that he had told Mr. Thipps that anything he said might be used against him at his trial. Mr. Thipps became ashy and said in a bleeding voice that he hadn't—hadn't meant to do anything that wasn't right. This remark produced a mild sensation, and the coroner became even more assiduated in manner than before. Is anybody representing Mr. Thipps? he asked irritably. No? Did you not explain to him that he could—that he ought to be represented? You did not? Really, Inspector? Did you not know, Mr. Thipps, that you had a right to be legally represented? Mr. Thipps clung to a chair-back for support, and said, No, in a voice barely audible. It is incredible, said the coroner, that so-called educated people should be so ignorant of the legal procedure of their own country. This places us in a very awkward position. I doubt, Inspector, whether I should permit the prisoner, Mr. Thipps, to give evidence at all. It is a delicate position. The perspiration stood on Mr. Thipps' forehead. Save us from our friends! whispered the duchess to Parker. If that cough-drop devouring creature had openly instructed those fourteen people, and what unfinished-looking faces they have, so characteristic, I always think, of the lower middle class, rather like sheep, or calves-heads—boiled, I mean—to bring in willful murder against the poor little man he couldn't have made himself plainer. He can't let him incriminate himself, you know, said Parker. Stuff! said the duchess. How could the man incriminate himself when he never did anything in his life? You men never think of anything but your red tape. Meanwhile Mr. Thipps, wiping his brow with a handkerchief, had summoned up courage. He stood up with a kind of weak dignity, like a small white rabbit brought to bay. I would rather tell you, he said, though it's really very unpleasant for a man in my position, but I really couldn't have it thought for a moment that I'd committed this dreadful crime. I assure you, gentlemen, I couldn't bear that. No, I'd rather tell you the truth, though I'm afraid it places me in rather a—well, I'll tell you. You fully understand the gravity of making such a statement, Mr. Thipps, said the coroner. Quite, said Mr. Thipps. It's all right. I—might I have a drink of water? Take your time, said the coroner, at the same time robbing his remark of all conviction by an impatient glance at his watch. Thank you, sir, said Mr. Thipps. Well, then, it's true I got to St. Pancras at ten, but there was a man in the carriage with me. He'd got in at Lester. I didn't recognize him at first, but he turned out to be an old school fellow of mine. What was this gentleman's name? Inquired the coroner, his pencil poised. Mr. Thipps shrank together visibly. I'm afraid I can't tell you that, he said. You see, that is, you will see, it would get him into trouble, and I couldn't do that. No, I really couldn't do that, not if my life depended on it. No, he added, as the ominous pertinence of the last phrase smote upon him. I'm sure I couldn't do that. Well, well, said the coroner. The Duchess leaned over to Parker again. I'm beginning quite to admire the little man, she said. Mr. Thipps resumed. When we got to St. Pancras I was going home, but my friend said no. We hadn't met for a long time, and we ought to—to make a night of it was his expression. I fear I was weak, and let him over persuade me to accompany him to one of his haunts. I used the word advisedly, said Mr. Thipps, and I assure you, sir, that if I had known beforehand where we were going I never would have set foot in the place. I cloak-roomed my bag, for he did not like the notion of our being encumbered with it, and we got into a taxicab and drove to the corner of Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Street. We then walked a little way and turned into a side street. I do not recollect which, where there was an open door with the light shining out. There was a man at a counter, and my friend bought some tickets, and I heard the man at the counter say something to him about your friend, meaning me, and my friend said, oh yes, he's been here before, haven't you, Alf? Which was what they called me at school. Though I assure you, sir— Here, Mr. Thipps grew very earnest. I never had, and nothing in the world should induce me to go to such a place again. Well, we went down into a room underneath, where there were drinks, and my friend had several and made me take one or two, though I am an abstemious man as a rule, and he talked to some other men and girls who were there, a very vulgar set of people I thought them, though I wouldn't say but what some of the young ladies were nice-looking enough. One of them sat on my friend's knee and called him a slow old thing and told him to come on, so we went into another room, where there were a lot of people dancing all these up-to-date dances. My friend went and danced, and I sat on a sofa. One of the young ladies came up to me and said, didn't I dance, and I said, no, so she said, wouldn't I stand her a drink then? You'll stand us a drink then, darling, that was what she said, and I said, wasn't it after hours, and she said that didn't matter, so I ordered the drink, a gin and bitters it was, for I didn't like not to, the young lady seemed to expect it of me, and I felt it wouldn't be gentlemanly to refuse when she asked. But it went against my conscience, such a young girl as she was, and she put her arm round my neck afterwards and kissed me just like as if she was paying for the drink, and it really went to my heart, said Mr. Thipps, a little ambiguously, but with uncommon emphasis. Here somebody at the back said, chero, and a sound was heard as of the noisy smacking of lips. Remove the person who made that improper noise, said the coroner with great indignation. Go on, please, Mr. Thipps. Well, said Mr. Thipps, about half past twelve, as I should reckon, things began to get a bit lively, and I was looking for my friend to say good night, not wishing to stay longer, as you will understand, when I saw him with one of the young ladies, and they seemed to be getting on altogether too well if you follow me, my friend pulling the ribbons off her shoulder, and the young lady laughing, and so on, said Mr. Thipps hurriedly. So I thought I'd just slip quietly out, when I heard a scuffle and a shout, and before I knew what was happening there were half a dozen policemen in, and the lights went out, and everybody stampeding and shouting, quite horrid it was. I was knocked down in the rush, and hit my head a nasty knock on a chair. That was where I got that bruise they asked me about, and I was dreadfully afraid I'd never get away, and it would all come out, and perhaps my photograph in the papers, when someone caught hold of me. I think it was the young lady I'd given the gin and bitters to, and she said, this way, and pushed me along a passage, and out at the back somewhere. So I ran through some streets, and found myself in Good Street, and there I got a taxi, and came home. I saw the account of the raid afterwards in the papers, and saw my friend had escaped, and so, as it wasn't the sort of thing I wanted made public, and I didn't want to get him into difficulties, I just said nothing. But that's the truth. Well, Mr. Thipps, said the coroner, we shall be able to substantiate a certain amount of this story, your friend's name. No, said Mr. Thipps, stately, not on any account. Very good, said the coroner. Now, can you tell us what time you did get in? About half past one, I should think, though really I was so upset. Quite so. Did you go straight to bed? Yes, I took my sandwich and glass of milk first. I thought it might settle my inside, so to speak. Added the witness, apologetically. Not being accustomed to alcohol so late at night, and on an empty stomach, as you may say. Quite so. Nobody sat up for you? Nobody. How long did you take getting to bed first and last? Mr. Thipps thought it might have been half an hour. Did you visit the bathroom before turning in? No. And you heard nothing in the night? No, I fell fast asleep. I was rather agitated, so I took a little dose to make me sleep, and what with being so tired, and the milk, and the dose, I just tumbled right off, and didn't wake till Gladys called me. Further questioning elicited little from Mr. Thipps. Yes, the bathroom window had been open when he went in in the morning, he was sure of that, and he had spoken very sharply to the girl about it. He was ready to answer any questions. He would be only too happy, happy, to have this dreadful affair sifted to the bottom. Gladys Horrocks stated that she had been in Mr. Thipp's employment about three months. Her previous employers would speak to her character. It was her duty to make the round of the flat at night when she had seen Mrs. Thipps to bed at ten. Yes, she remembered doing so on Monday evening. She had looked into all the rooms. Did she recollect shutting the bathroom window that night? Well, no, she couldn't swear to it, not in particular, but when Mr. Thipps called her into the bathroom in the morning it certainly was open. She had not been into the bathroom before Mr. Thipps went in. Well, yes, it had happened that she had left that window open before, when anyone had been having a bath in the evening, and had left the blind down. Mrs. Thipps had had a bath on Monday evening. Mondays was one of her regular bath nights. She was very much afraid she hadn't shut the window on Monday night, though she wished her head had been cut off before she had been so forgetful. Here the witness burst into tears and was given some water, while the coroner refreshed himself with a third lozenge. Recovering, the witness stated that she had certainly looked into all the rooms before going to bed. No, it was quite impossible for a body to be hidden in the flat without her seeing of it. She had been in the kitchen all evening, and there was an orderly room to keep the best dinner service there, let alone a body. Old Mrs. Thipps sat in the drawing-room. Yes, she was sure she'd been into the dining-room. How? Because she put Mr. Thipps milk and sandwiches there ready for him. There had been nothing in there that she could swear to, nor yet in her own bedroom, nor in the all. Had she searched the bedroom cupboard and the box-room? Well, no, not to say searched. She wasn't used to searching people's houses for skeletons every night, so that a man might have concealed himself in the box-room or a wardrobe. She supposed he might. In reply to a woman juror, well, yes, she was walking out with a young man. Williams was his name, Bill Williams. Well, yes, William Williams, if they insisted. He was a glazier by profession. Well, yes, he had been in the flat sometimes. Well, she supposed you might say he was acquainted with the flat. Had she ever? No, she hadn't, and if she'd thought such a question was going to be put to a respectable girl she wouldn't have offered to give evidence. The vicar of St. Mary's would speak to her character and to Mr. Williams. Last time Mr. Williams was at the flat was a fortnight ago. Well, no, it wasn't exactly the last time she had seen Mr. Williams. Well, yes, the last time was Monday. Well, yes, Monday night. Well, if she must tell the truth she must. Yes, the officer had cautioned her, but there wasn't any arm in it, and it was better to lose her place than to be young, though it was a cruel shame a girl couldn't have a bit of fun without a nasty corpse coming in through the window to get her into difficulties. After she had put Mrs. Thipps to bed, she had slipped out to go to the plumber's and glazier's ball at the black-faced ram. Mr. Williams had met her and brought her back. He could testify to where she'd been and that there wasn't no arm in it. She had left before the end of the ball. It might have been two o'clock when she got back. She'd got the keys of the flat from Mrs. Thipps' drawer when Mrs. Thipps wasn't looking. She had asked leave to go, but couldn't get it, along of Mr. Thipps being away that night. She was bitterly sorry, she had behaved so, and she was sure she'd been punished for it. She had heard nothing suspicious when she came in. She had gone straight to bed without looking round the flat. She wished she were dead. No, Mr. and Mrs. Thipps didn't hardly ever have any visitors. They kept themselves very retired. She had found the outside door bolted that morning, as usual. She would never believe any arm of Mr. Thipps. Thank you, Miss Horrocks. Call Georgiana Thipps, and the coroner thought we had better light the gas. The examination of Mrs. Thipps provided more entertainment than enlightenment, affording as it did an excellent example of the game called Cross Questions and Crooked Answers. After fifteen minutes suffering, both in voice and temper, the coroner abandoned the struggle, leaving the lady with the last word. You needn't try to bully me, young man, said that octogenarian with spirit, set in their spoil in your stomach with them nasty jujubes. At this point a young man arose in court and demanded to give evidence. Having explained that he was William Williams, Glacier, he was sworn and corroborated the evidence of Gladys Horrocks in the matter of her presence at the black-faced ram on the Monday night. They had returned to the flat rather before to, he thought, but certainly later than one-thirty. He was sorry that he had persuaded Miss Horrocks to come out with him when she didn't ought. He had observed nothing of a suspicious nature in Prince of Wales Road at either visit. Inspector Sug gave evidence of having been called in at about half-past eight on Monday morning. He had considered the girl's manner to be suspicious and had arrested her. On later information, leading him to suspect that the deceased might have been murdered that night, he had arrested Mr. Thipps. He had found no trace of breaking into the flat. There were marks on the bathroom window sill which pointed to somebody having got in that way. There were no ladder marks or foot marks in the yard. The yard was paved with asphalt. He had examined the roof but found nothing on the roof. In his opinion, the body had been brought into the flat previously and concealed till the evening by someone who had then gone out during the night by the bathroom window with the connivance of the girl. In that case, why should not the girl have let the person out by the door? Well, it might have been so. Had he found traces of a body or a man or both having been hidden in the flat? He found nothing to show that they might not have been so concealed. What was the evidence that led him to suppose that the death had occurred that night? At this point Inspector Sugg appeared uneasy and endeavored to retire upon his professional dignity. On being pressed, however, he admitted that the evidence in question had come to nothing. One of the jurors. Was it the case that any finger marks had been left by the criminal? Some marks had been found on the bath but the criminal had worn gloves. The coroner. Do you draw any conclusion from this fact as to the experience of the criminal? Inspector Sugg looks as if he was an old hanser. The juror. Is that very consistent with the charge against Alfred Thipps, Inspector? The Inspector was silent. The coroner. In the light of the evidence which you have just heard, do you still press the charge against Alfred Thipps and Gladys Horrocks? Inspector Sugg. I consider the whole set-out highly suspicious. Thipps' story isn't corroborated, and as for the girl Horrocks, how do we know this Williams ain't in it as well? William Williams. Now you drop that. I can bring a hundred witnesses. The coroner. Silence, if you please. I am surprised, Inspector, that you should make this suggestion in that manner. It is highly improper. By the way, can you tell us whether a police raid was actually carried out on the Monday night on any nightclub in the neighbourhood of St. Giles Circus? Inspector Sugg. Sulkily. I believe there was something of the sort. The Coroner. You will, no doubt, inquire into the matter. I seem to recollect having seen some mention of it in the newspapers. Thank you, Inspector, that will do. Several witnesses having appeared and testified to the characters of Mr. Thipps and Gladys Horrocks, the coroner stated his intention of proceeding to the medical evidence. Sir Julian Frecky. There was considerable stir in the court, as the great specialist walked up to give evidence. He was not only a distinguished man, but a striking figure, with his wide shoulders, upright carriage, and leonine head. His manner, as he kissed the book presented to him with the usual deprecatory mumble by the coroner's officer, was that of a St. Paul condescending to humour the timid mumbo-jumbo of superstitious Corinthians. So handsome, I always think, whispered the duchess to Mr. Parker. Just exactly like William Morris, with that bush of hair and beard, and those exciting eyes looking out of it, so splendid, these dear men always devoted to something or other. Not but what I think socialism is a mistake. Of course it works with all those nice people, so good and happy, and art linen, and the weather always perfect. Morris, I mean, you know, but so difficult in real life. Science is different. I'm sure if I had nerves, I should go to Sir Julian just to look at him. Eyes like that give one something to think about, and that's what most of these people want. Only I never had any. Nerves, I mean, don't you think so? You are Sir Julian Frecky, said the coroner, and live at St. Luke's house, Prince of Wales Road, Battersea, where you exercise a general direction over the surgical side of St. Luke's hospital. Sir Julian assented briefly to this definition of his personality. You were the first medical man to see the deceased? I was. And you have since conducted an examination in collaboration with Dr. Grimbold of Scotland Yard? I have. You are in agreement as to the cause of death? Generally speaking, yes. Will you communicate your impressions to the jury? I was engaged in research work in the dissecting room at St. Luke's Hospital at about nine o'clock on Monday morning, when I was informed that Inspector Sugg wished to see me. He told me that the dead body of a man had been discovered under mysterious circumstances at 59 Queen Caroline Mansions. He asked me whether it could be supposed to be a joke perpetrated by any of the medical students at the hospital. I was able to assure him, by an examination of the hospital's books, that there was no subject missing from the dissecting room. Who would be in charge of such bodies? William Watts, the dissecting room attendant. Is William Watts present? inquired the coroner of the officer. William Watts was present and could be called if the coroner thought it necessary. I suppose no dead body would be delivered to the hospital without your knowledge, Sir Julian? Certainly not. Thank you. Will you proceed with your statement? Inspector Sugg then asked me whether I would send a medical man round to view the body. I said that I would go myself. Why did you do that? I confessed to my share of ordinary human curiosity, Mr. Coroner. Laughter from a medical student at the back of the room. On arriving at the flat I found the deceased lying on his back in the bath. I examined him and came to the conclusion that death had been caused by a blow on the back of the neck, dislocating the fourth and fifth cervical vertebrae, bruising the spinal cord, and producing internal hemorrhage and partial paralysis of the brain. I judged the deceased to have been dead at least twelve hours, possibly more. I observed no other sign of violence of any kind upon the body. Deceased was a strong, well-nourished man of about fifty to fifty-five years of age. In your opinion, could the blow have been self-inflicted? Certainly not. It had been made with a heavy, blunt instrument from behind, with great force and considerable judgment. It is quite impossible that it was self-inflicted. Could it have been the result of an accident? That is possible, of course. If, for example, the deceased had been looking out of a window, and the sash had shut violently down upon him? No, in that case there would have been signs of strangulation and a bruise upon the throat as well. But deceased might have been killed through a heavy weight accidentally falling upon him? He might. Was death instantaneous, in your opinion? It is difficult to say. Such a blow might very well cause death instantaneously, or the patient might linger in a partially paralyzed condition for some time. In the present case I should be disposed to think that deceased might have lingered for some hours. I base my decision upon the condition of the brain revealed at the autopsy. I may say, however, that Dr. Grimbold and I are not in complete agreement on the point. I understand that a suggestion has been made as to the identification of the deceased. You are not in a position to identify him? Certainly not. I never saw him before. The suggestion to which you refer is a preposterous one, and ought never to have been made. I was not aware until this morning that it had been made. Had it been made to me earlier I should have known how to deal with it, and I should like to express my strong disapproval of the unnecessary shock and distress inflicted upon a lady with whom I have the honour to be acquainted. The coroner. It was not my fault, Sir Julian. I had nothing to do with it. I agree with you that it was unfortunate you are not consulted. The reporters scribbled busily, and the court asked each other what was meant while the jury tried to look as if they knew already. In the matter of the eyeglasses found upon the body, Sir Julian, do these give any indication to a medical man? They are somewhat unusual lenses. An oculus would be able to speak more definitely, but I will say for myself that I should have expected them to belong to an older man than the deceased. Speaking as a physician who has had many opportunities of observing the human body, did you gather anything from the appearance of the deceased as to his personal habits? I should say that he was a man in easy circumstances, but who had only recently come into money. His teeth are in a bad state, and his hands show signs of recent manual labour. An Australian colonist, for instance, who had made money? Something of that sort. Of course I could not say positively. Of course not. Thank you, Sir Julian. Dr. Grimbold called, corroborated his distinguished colleague in every particular, except that, in his opinion, death had not occurred for several days after the blow. It was with the greatest hesitancy that he ventured to differ from Sir Julian frecky, and he might be wrong. It was difficult to tell in any case, and when he saw the body, deceased had been dead at least twenty-four hours in his opinion. Inspector Sugg recalled. Would he tell the jury what steps had been taken to identify the deceased? A description had been sent to every police station, and had been inserted in all the newspapers. In view of the suggestion made by Sir Julian frecky, had inquiries been made at all the seaports? They had. And with no results? With no results at all. No one had come forward to identify the body? Plenty of people had come forward, but nobody had succeeded in identifying it. Had any effort been made to follow up the clue afforded by the eyeglasses? Inspector Sugg submitted that, having regard to the interests of justice, he would beg to be excused from answering that question. Might the jury see the eyeglasses? The eyeglasses were handed to the jury. William Watts, called, confirmed the evidence of Sir Julian frecky with regard to dissecting room subjects. He explained the system by which they were entered. They were usually supplied by the workhouses and free hospitals. They were under his sole charge. The young gentlemen could not possibly get the keys. Had Sir Julian frecky or any of the house surgeons the keys? No, not even Sir Julian frecky. The keys had remained in his possession on Monday night? They had. And in any case the inquiry was irrelevant, as there was no body missing, nor ever had been. That was the case. The coroner then addressed the jury, reminding them with some asperity that they were not there to gossip about who the deceased could or could not have been, but to give their opinion as to the cause of death. He reminded them that they should consider whether, according to the medical evidence, death could have been accidental or self-inflicted, or whether it was deliberate murder or homicide. If they considered the evidence on this point insufficient they could return an open verdict. In any case their verdict could not prejudice any person, if they brought it in murder all the whole evidence would have to be gone through again before the magistrate. He then dismissed them, with the unspoken adoration to be quick about it. Sir Julian frecky, after giving his evidence, had caught the eye of the Duchess, and now came over and greeted her. I haven't seen you for an age, said that lady. How are you? Hard at work, said the specialist. Just got my new book out. This kind of thing wastes time. Have you seen Lady Levy yet? No, poor dear, said the Duchess. I only came up this morning for this. Mrs. Thipps is staying with me. One of Peter's eccentricities, you know. Poor Christine, I must run round and see her. This is Mr. Parker, she added, who is investigating that case. Oh! said Sir Julian, and paused. Do you know, he said, in a low voice to Parker, I am very glad to meet you. Have you seen Lady Levy yet? I saw her this morning. Did she ask you to go on with the inquiry? Yes, said Parker. She thinks, he added, that Sir Rubin may be detained in the hands of some financial rival, or that perhaps some scoundrels are holding him to ransom. And is that your opinion? asked Sir Julian. I think it very likely, said Parker, frankly. Sir Julian hesitated again. I wish you would walk back with me when this is over, he said. I should be delighted, said Parker. At this moment the jury returned and took their places, and there was a little rustle and hush. The coroner addressed the foreman, and inquired if they were agreed upon their verdict. We are agreed, Mr. Coroner, that deceased died of the effects of a blow upon the spine, but how that injury was inflicted we consider that there is not sufficient evidence to show. Mr. Parker, and Sir Julian frecky, walked up the road together. I had absolutely no idea, until I saw Lady Levy this morning, said the doctor, that there was any idea of connecting this matter with the disappearance of Sir Rubin. The suggestion was perfectly monstrous, and could only have grown up in the mind of that ridiculous police officer. If I had had any idea what was in his mind, I could have disabused him and avoided all this. I did my best to do so, said Parker, as soon as I was called into the Levy case. Who called you in, if I may ask? inquired Sir Julian. Well, the household, first of all, and then Sir Rubin's uncle, Mr. Levy of Portman Square, wrote to me to go on with the investigation. And now Lady Levy has confirmed those instructions? Certainly, said Parker, in some surprise. Sir Julian was silent for a little time. I'm afraid I was the first person to put the idea into Sugg's head, said Parker, rather penitently. When Sir Rubin disappeared, my first step almost, was to hunt up all the street accidents and suicides and so on that had turned up during the day, and I went down to see this Battersea Park body as a matter of routine. Of course I saw that the thing was ridiculous as soon as I got there, but Sugg froze on to the idea. And it's true there was a good deal of resemblance between the dead man and the portraits I've seen of Sir Rubin. A strong superficial likeness, said Sir Julian. The upper part of the face is not an uncommon type, and as Sir Rubin wore a heavy beard and there was no opportunity of comparing the mouths and chins, I can understand the idea occurring to anybody, but only to be dismissed at once. I am sorry, he added, as the whole matter has been painful to Lady Levy. You may know, Mr. Parker, that I am an old, though I should not call myself an intimate, friend of the Levy's. I understood something of the sort. Yes, when I was a young man I—in short, Mr. Parker, I hoped once to marry Lady Levy. Mr. Parker gave the usual sympathetic groan. I have never married, as you know, pursued Sir Julian. We have remained good friends. I have always done what I could to spare her pain. Believe me, Sir Julian, said Parker, that I sympathize very much with you and with Lady Levy, and that I did all I could to disabuse Inspector Sugg of this notion. Unhappily the coincidence of Sir Rubin's being seen that evening in the Battersea Park road. Ah yes, said Sir Julian. Dear me, here we are at home. Perhaps you would come in for a moment, Mr. Parker, and have tea, or a whisky and soda or something. Parker promptly accepted this invitation, feeling that there were other things to be said. The two men stepped into a square, finely furnished hall, with a fireplace on the same side as the door, and a staircase opposite. The dining-room door stood open on their right, and as Sir Julian rang the bell, a man's servant appeared at the far end of the hall. What will you take? asked the doctor. After that dreadfully cold place, said Parker, what I really want is gallons of hot tea, if you, as a nerve specialist, can bear the thought of it. Provided you allow a judicious blend of china with it, replied Sir Julian in the same tone, I have no objection to make. Tea in the library at once, he added to the servant, and led the way upstairs. I don't use the downstairs-rooms much except the dining-room, he explained, as he ushered his guest into a small but cheerful library on the first floor. This room leads out of my bedroom and is more convenient. I only live part of my time here, but it's very handy for my research work at the hospital. That's what I do there, mostly. It's a fatal thing for a theorist, Mr. Parker, to let the practical work get behind hand. Dissection is the basis of all good theory and all correct diagnosis. One must keep one's hand and eye in training. This place is far more important to me than Harley Street, and some day I shall abandon my consulting practice altogether and settle down here to cut up my subjects and write my books in peace. So many things in this life are a waste of time, Mr. Parker. Mr. Parker assented to this. Very often, said Sir Julian, the only time I get for any research work, necessitating as it does, the keenest observation and the faculties at their acutest, has to be at night, after a long day's work, and by artificial light, which, magnificent as the lighting of the dissecting room here is, is always more trying to the eyes than daylight. Doubtless your own work has to be carried on under even more trying conditions. Yes, sometimes, said Parker, but then you see, he added, the conditions are, so to speak, part of the work. Quite so, quite so, said Sir Julian, you mean that the burglar, for example, does not demonstrate his methods in the light of day, or plant the perfect footmark in the middle of a damp patch of sand for you to analyze. Not as a rule, said the detective, but I have no doubt many of your diseases work quite as insidiously as any burglar. They do, they do, said Sir Julian, laughing. And it is my pride, as it is yours, to track them down for the good of society. The neuroses, you know, are particularly clever criminals. They break out into as many disguises as— As Leon Kestrel, the master mummer, suggested Parker, who read railway-stall detective stories on the principle of the busman's holiday. No doubt, said Sir Julian, who did not, and they cover up their tracks wonderfully, but when you can really investigate, Mr. Parker, and break up the dead or, for preference, the living body with the scalpel, you always find the footmarks, the little trail of ruin or disorder left by madness or disease or drink or any other similar pest. But the difficulty is to trace them back, merely by observing the surface symptoms. The hysteria, crime, religion, fear, shyness, conscience, or whatever it may be. Just as you observe a theft or a murder and look for the footsteps of the criminal, so I observe a fit of hysterics or an outburst of piety, and hunt for the little mechanical irritation which has produced it. You regard all these things as physical? Undoubtedly. I am not ignorant of the rise of another school of thought, Mr. Parker, but its exponents are mostly charlatans or self-deceivers. Sie haben sich so weit darin eingeheimnisst. That, like sludge the medium, they are beginning to believe their own nonsense. I should like to have the exploring of some of their brains, Mr. Parker. I would show you the little faults and land slips in the cells, the misfiring and short circuiting of the nerves which produce these notions and these books. At least, he added, gazing somberly at his guest. At least, if I could not quite show you to-day, I shall be able to do so to-morrow, or in a year's time, or before I die. He sat for some minutes gazing into the fire while the red light played upon his tawny beard and struck out answering gleams from his compelling eyes. Parker drank tea in silence, watching him. On the whole, however, he remained but little interested in the causes of nervous phenomena, and his mind strayed to Lord Peter, coping with the redoubtable crimpelsham down in Salisbury. Lord Peter had wanted him to come. That meant either that crimpelsham was proving recalcitrant, or that a clue wanted following. But Bunter had said that to-morrow would do, and it was just as well. After all, the Battersea affair was not Parker's case. He had already wasted valuable time attending an inconclusive inquest, and he really ought to get on with his legitimate work. There was still Levy's secretary to see, and the little matter of the Peruvian oil to be looked into. He looked at his watch. I am very much afraid, if you will excuse me, he murmured. Sir Julian came back with a start to the consideration of actuality. Your work calls you, he said, smiling. Well, I can understand that. I won't keep you, but I wanted to say something to you in connection with your present inquiry, only I hardly know. I hardly like— Parker sat down again, and banished every indication of hurry from his face and attitude. I shall be very grateful for any help you can give me, he said. I'm afraid it's more in the nature of hindrance, said Sir Julian with a short laugh. It's a case of destroying a clue for you, and a breach of professional confidence on my side, but since, accidentally, a certain amount has come out, perhaps the whole had better do so. Mr. Parker made the encouraging noise which, among laymen, supplies the place of the priests insinuating, Yes, my son. Sir Ruben Levy's visit on Monday night was to me, said Sir Julian. Yes, said Mr. Parker, without expression. He found cause for certain grave suspicions concerning his health, said Sir Julian, slowly, as though weighing how much he could in honour disclose to a stranger. He came to me, in preference to his own medical man, as he was particularly anxious that the matter should be kept from his wife. As I told you, he knew me fairly well, and Lady Levy had consulted me about a nervous disorder in the summer. Did he make an appointment with you? asked Parker. I beg your pardon, said the other, absently. Did he make an appointment? An appointment? Oh no, he turned up suddenly in the evening after dinner when I wasn't expecting him. I took him up here and examined him, and he left me somewhere about ten o'clock, I should think. May I ask, what was the result of your examination? What do you want to know? It might illuminate, well, conjecture as to his subsequent conduct, said Parker cautiously. This story seemed to have little coherence with the rest of the business, and he wondered whether Coincidence was alone responsible for Sir Rubin's disappearance on the same night that he visited the doctor. I see, said Sir Julian. Yes, well, I will tell you in confidence that I saw grave grounds of suspicion, but as yet no absolute certainty of mischief. Thank you. Sir Rubin left you at ten o'clock? Then, or thereabouts, I did not at first mention the matter as it was so very much Sir Rubin's wish to keep his visit to me secret, and there was no question of accident in the street or anything of that kind since he reached home safely at midnight. Quite so, said Parker. It would have been, and is, a breach of confidence, said Sir Julian, and I only tell you now because Sir Rubin was accidentally seen, and because I would rather tell you in private than have you ferreting round here and questioning my servants, Mr. Parker. You will excuse my frankness. Certainly, said Parker, I hold no brief for the pleasantness of my profession, Sir Julian. I am very much obliged to you for telling me this. I might otherwise have wasted valuable time following up a false trail. I am sure I need not ask you, in your turn, to respect this confidence, said the doctor. To publish the matter abroad could only harm Sir Rubin and pain his wife, besides placing me in no favourable light with my patience. I promise to keep the thing to myself, said Parker, except of course, he added hastily, that I must inform my colleague. You have a colleague in the case? I have. What sort of person is he? He will be perfectly discreet, Sir Julian. Is he a police officer? You need not be afraid of your confidence getting into the records at Scotland Yard. I see that you know how to be discreet, Mr. Parker. We also have our professional etiquette, Sir Julian. On returning to Great Ormond Street, Mr. Parker found a wire awaiting him, which said, Do not trouble to come, all well. Returning tomorrow, whimsy.