Daredevil
owners. And when they saw what he proposed to do, they said nothing.
"I shall ask you to give me your opinions on the less certain cases,"
he said steadily. "There are some which you don't have to be a doc.
to diagnose. I shall give the shot myself, and I take full
responsibility..."
It was an hour before all the human scath which could ever hope to
live had been removed in the ambulances, and the dead decently laid
out.
Storm was weary of body and soul by that time, and when he found
Inspector Teal he saw that, husky as the detective was, he was in no
better case.
"I've killed seven men to-night," said Storm heavily. "It was God's
blessing to 'em. But I'm--sick! This is worse than war."
Teal was silent. Then:
"What do we do now, Chief?" he asked.
"Go home, I suppose. We can't do any more here. Where's Joe?"
"Somewhere round--I saw him lending a hand with the best of 'em, soon
as he'd got over rubbering. He's taken it better than either of us.
He must have nerves of ice!"
Blaythwayt came up at that moment, wiping his hands on a stained
handkerchief. He was still round-eyed with interest; but otherwise,
except for an excusable excitement, he was remarkably self-possessed.
"An Extraordinary Experience!" he said. "Of course, one's very sorry
for all those poor wretches; but still..."
He broke off with a shrug, as though to imply that the scientific
mind transcended such mundane considerations.
"I ought to drop in at the Yard," Teal said with a sigh. "You've got
an advantage over me, Captain Arden--you're not a regular and you
don't have to bother so much about routine." He yawned. "Lordy! I
seem to average about ten minutes' sleep per night these days," he
complained somewhat paradoxically.
"You'll average less for the next seventy hours or so!" Storm told
him. "I'll come with you--I might find the Commissioner in."
Joe Blaythwayt was skipping eagerly in front of them.
"D'you think I could come too?" he pleaded wistfully. "I've never
had a chance to see inside Scotland Yard, and after what's happened
to-night it seems as if my Luck Is In--I don't mean to be callous,"
he excused himself incoherently. "I'm sorry, as I said, but----"
Teal shook an admonishing finger at him.
"Joe, you go home to bed," he commanded sternly. "You're a
bloodthirsty little man, and I think you've had all the horrors
that's good for you to-night."
"Oh, let him come," Storm interrupted wearily. "What the devil does
it matter, anyway?"
They found a taxi in Trafalgar Square and piled in. Joe Blaythwayt,
still clasping his umbrella, which somehow he had managed to retain
throughout the proceedings, was all agog with anticipation.
Decidedly, one would have thought, he regarded it as His Evening.
Storm was less cheerful.
"The hell of it is that I feel responsible," he explained bitterly.
"I deliberately let the Triangle get away, and now he's made
to-night's mess. Selfishness--or quixoticism, if you like--I don't
know. Listen, Teal, and I'll tell you something! I've known the
Triangle for days, but I wasn't going to show him up in the usual
way, as I told the Inquiry, for the reason you know."
"You know the Triangle?" broke in Teal incredulously. "I thought
that was a bluff you put up for the Board."
"Yes, I know him. I'll tell you what my idea was. I'm a fool,
maybe, but because he's my father I didn't want any publicity. And
by the same token, I couldn't very well kill him myself. So what I
intended to do was collect so much evidence that I could go to him
and lay it before him so definitely he'd see the only alternative to
hanging was--suicide. I know what his choice'd have been."
"Have you got that evidence now?"
"No," said Storm bitterly, and was silent all the rest of the way to
Cannon Row.
They left Blaythwayt in charge of the reserve sergeant and went up to
the Commissioner's room. Smethurst was away, but they had not been
there five minutes before Bill Kennedy came in for first-hand news of
the Piccadilly Circus explosion. Storm left Teal to give the
account, and himself went over to the window and sat down on the
sill, smoking a cigarette.
Storm's face was chiselled out into grim lines, but behind its
inscrutability and actuating the leisurely precision of his movements
was a hurtling mill of mental concentration. What was the next move
to be? He strove to grapple with the problem, but his over-tired
brain refused to function with the methodical accuracy he demanded of
it. Teal had complained of the curtailment of the hours of slumber,
but Storm himself had had little sleep that last week, and mind is
not tireless like machinery. Yet he kept on, keying his already taut
faculties almost up to snapping pitch, calling up all his reserves of
energy, and struggling with their aid to outline a practical plan.
Teal had just finished his account when the telephone rang. Storm,
who was nearest, took the call.
It was the City Commissioner speaking.
"You've had a blow-up in Piccadilly Circus, haven't you?"
"Oh--er--yes! I believe we have!" said Storm ironically, and the
Commissioner snorted in disgust.
"Well, we've had a smaller one in Fleet Street. Just one man--blown
to crumbs. There's no hope of identifying him. I just thought you
might be interested. Sands, a pickpocket belonging to the Walton
Street manor, was seen haring away from the scene as if he'd a big
scare, so you might put out a call for him."
"I will. Fleet Street, I think you said?"
"Yes."
"Uh-huh. The dead man is John Cardan, editor of the _Daily Record_,"
said Storm calmly, and hung up the receiver.
After what had happened that night, such minor details as solo
murders seemed things of no account. Storm had reached the stage
where he was beyond the reach of agitation.
He gave the Assistant Commissioner a brief account of the
conversation, and he was still speaking when the telephone bell
shrilled again. This time it was the Thames Police depot on Victoria
Embankment.
When Storm put down the instrument a queer flush had come into his
face.
"A body's been taken out of the river," he said slowly. "Head
smashed to pulp with an axe. The tailor's tab in the breast pocket,
and some papers in the clothes, say that it's Oscar. I guess this is
the end of the world!"
Storm and Teal went off to view the corpse, and the detective was
surprised to see that Storm hailed a taxi in Cannon Row instead of
setting out to walk the short distance along the Embankment. Mr.
Teal, however, was too well trained to make any demur, and he had
just got in when Blaythwayt came rushing up.
The bank manager climbed in as the taxi started off, and sat down
beaming. The other two let him stay--it was amazing what a fixture
that plump little man had become that night. In normal times he
would probably have been unceremoniously ejected, but both Storm and
Teal were too tired and too occupied with other matters to take the
trouble of arguing him home.
The taxi drove to a house in Harley Street, and Storm had to ring for
some time before he could get an answer. At length a dishevelled
butler swathed in a grey flannel dressing-gown over lamentably
striped pyjamas opened the door. When he had heard Kit's business,
he began to shut the door again, but Storm kicked it wide and entered
the hall. A moment later the Home Office pathologist, himself
awakened by the noise, appeared at the head of the stairs and
inquired sleepily but with some mastery of expletive, what it all
meant.
Storm presented his credentials.
"I'm sorry to turn you out at this ungodly hour, but it's very
important. I may not need you at all, but there's a big possibility
that I may, and if I want you I shall want you at once!"
"All right," said the doctor peevishly. "I suppose it's all in the
night's work. The butler'll give you a drink while I'm dressing."
He was down in an astonishingly short time, and the four of them
entered the taxi. The pathologist seemed surprised to see
Blaythwayt, and Teal was in a quandary until an idea seized him.
"Mr. Blaythwayt is Raegenssen's banker," he explained. "He's going
to identify the body."
Joe stood by while the sheet that shrouded the dead man was removed,
and then peered interestedly into the battered face.
"I couldn't swear to it," he said at last. "But I think it's
he--that yellow beard of his is so distinctive."
"That's half the trouble," remarked Storm cryptically.
Blaythwayt was then shown the clothes that had been worn by the body,
and these he declared without hesitation to be Raegenssen's.
Apparently the Swede had possessed only one lounge suit, for
Blaythwayt said that the garments were those which Raegenssen had
been wearing whenever his banker had seen him.
Storm turned to the pathologist.
"Set up the gadgets!" he ordered curtly, and the doctor, after a
glance of surprise, began to unpack the large black bag he had
brought with him at Storm's request.
In the small room, besides Teal and Blaythwayt, was also a sergeant
of the Thames Police, and to these three Storm addressed his next
command.
"There's to be no dispute about this," he said, "so to make
everything trebly sure you'll all do your bit. I want each of you to
take two hairs from Raegenssen's beard, and lay them on the sheet of
paper Dr. Malleson has laid out for them."
Wondering, they obeyed.
"Now stand by while Dr. Malleson makes his tests."
The pathologist bent to his work, while they waited in a mystified
silence. It was half-an-hour before he straightened his back with a
sigh and indicated that he was satisfied.
"Well?" asked Storm, and Malleson looked at him curiously.
"Peroxide," he replied. "The hair was originally black, and I should
say that it was the hair of one of the more southern races--several
Spaniards and Portuguese are diluted with Moorish blood. What made
you suspect bleaching?"
But this was a question that Storm was not for the moment disposed to
answer. As a matter of fact, all that he had suspected was that the
body was not Raegenssen's, and the rarity of beards of that Nordic
hue was great enough to arouse the suspicion that a black-bearded man
would have had to be found and disguised in order to provide a
substitute.
He led the way into the office, and a combined deposition was made
out and signed. It was an interesting document.
We, the undersigned, do hereby attest and swear that at 1.30 a.m.
this morning we did, in the presence of each other and of the
undersigned Dr. Malleson, pathologist to the Home Office, and Captain
Arden, temporarily attached to the Special Branch of the Criminal
Investigation Department, remove from the beard of a cadaver taken
from the Thames last night and so far presumed to be that of Oscar
Raegenssen, agent, of Cockspur Street, S.W.1, each of us two hairs;
and, further, that the said Dr. Malleson made the examination of
these hairs, which is the subject of his appended affidavit in our
presence.
(Signed)
C. E. TEAL, Inspector, C.I.D.
J. CLAVER, Sergeant, T.P.
J. BLAYTHWAYT.
And I, Soames Malleson, pathologist to the Home Office, do hereby
attest and swear that in the presence of the above-named witnesses I
did examine the said beard hairs, and did find that they were the
hairs of a dark-complexioned man which had been bleached with
peroxide of hydrogen to give a similitude of fairness. I further add
that, from an inspection of other body hairs of the deceased, and
from such cranial characteristics as can be observed, my sworn
opinion is that the deceased was not Scandinavian, but of the Latin
type, and probably of Moorish extraction.
(Signed)
SOAMES MALLESON, M.D.