The blue scarab
We followed him to his office behind a long row of sheds, where, on a
table, was a strong wooden case, somewhat larger than the “bullion”
case, while, on the desk a large, many-leaved document lay open.
“This is your case, I think,” said the official; “but you had better
check it by the manifest. Here is the entry: ‘One case containing
seventeen and three-quarter dozen brass six-inch by three-eighths
screw-bolts with nuts. Dimensions, sixteen inches by thirteen by nine.
Gross weight a hundred and nineteen pounds; net weight a hundred and
thirteen pounds.’ Consigned to ‘Jackson and Walker, 593, Great Alie
Street, London, E.’ Is that the one?”
“That is the one,” Thorndyke replied.
“Then,” said our friend, “we’ll get it open and have a look at those
brass screw-bolts.”
With a dexterity surprising in an official of such high degree, he had
the screws out in a twinkling, and prizing up the lid, displayed a
fold of coarse canvas. As he lifted this the two police officers
peered eagerly into the case; and suddenly the eager expression on
Badger’s face changed to one of bitter disappointment.
“You’ve missed fire this time, sir,” he snapped. “This is just a case
of brass bolts.”
“Gold bolts, Inspector,” Thorndyke corrected, placidly. He picked out
one and handed it to the astonished detective. “Did you ever feel a
brass bolt of that weight?” he asked.
“Well, it certainly is devilish heavy,” the inspector admitted,
weighing it in his hand and passing it on to Miller.
“Its weight, as stated on the manifest,” said Thorndyke, “works out at
well over eight and a half ounces, but we may as well check it.” He
produced from his pocket a little spring balance, to which he slung
the bolt. “You see,” he said, “it weighs eight ounces and two-thirds.
But a brass bolt of the same size would weigh only three ounces and
four-fifths. There is not the least doubt that these bolts are gold;
and as you see that their aggregate weight is a hundred and thirteen
while the weight of the four missing bars is a hundred and thirteen
pounds, two ounces, it is a reasonable inference that these bolts
represent those bars; and an uncommonly good job they made of the
melting to lose only two ounces. Has the consignee’s agent turned up
yet?”
“He is waiting outside,” replied the officer, with a pleased smile,
“hopping about like a pea in a frying-pan. I’ll call him in.”
He did so, and a small, seedy man of strongly Semitic aspect
approached the door with nervous caution and a rather pale face. But
when his beady eye fell on the open case and the portentous assembly
in the office, he turned about and fled along the wharf as if the
hosts of the Philistines were at his heels.
“Of course it is all perfectly simple, as you say,” I replied to
Thorndyke as we strolled back up Nightingale Lane, “but I don’t see
where you got your start. What made you think that the stolen case was
a dummy?”
“At first,” Thorndyke replied, “it was just a matter of alternative
hypotheses. It was purely speculative. The robbery described by
Halethorpe was a very crude affair. It was planned in quite the wrong
way. Noting this, I naturally asked myself: What is the right way to
steal a case of gold ingots? Now, the outstanding difficulty in such a
robbery arises from the ponderous nature of the thing stolen, and the
way to overcome that difficulty is to get away with the booty at
leisure before the robbery is discovered--the longer the better. It is
also obvious that if you can delude some one into stealing your dummy
you will have covered up your tracks most completely; for if that some
one is caught, the issues are extremely confused, and if he is not
caught, all the tracks lead away from you. Of course, he will discover
the fraud when he tries to dispose of the swag, but his lips are
sealed by the fact that he has, himself, committed a felony. So that
is the proper strategical plan; and, though it was wildly improbable,
and there was nothing whatever to suggest it, still the possibility
that this crude robbery might cover a more subtle one, had to be borne
in mind. It was necessary to make absolutely certain that the gold
bars were really in the case when it left Bellhaven. I had practically
no doubt that they were. Our visit to the Custom House was little more
than a formality, just to give us an undeniable datum from which to
make our start. We had to find somebody who had actually seen the case
open and verified the contents; and when we found that man--Mr.
Byrne--it instantly became obvious that the wildly improbable thing
had really happened. The gold bars had already disappeared. I had
calculated the approximate size of the real bars. They would contain
forty-two cubic inches, and would be about seven inches by three by
two. The dimensions given by Byrne--evidently correct, as shown by
those of the case, which the bars fitted pretty closely--were
impossible. If those bars had been gold, they would have weighed two
hundred pounds, instead of the hundred and thirteen pounds shown on
his report. The astonishing thing is that Byrne did not observe the
discrepancy. There are not many Customs officers who would have let it
pass.”
“Isn’t it rather odd,” I asked, “that the thieves should have gambled
on such a remote chance?”
“It is pretty certain,” he replied, “that they were unaware of the
risk they were taking. Probably they assumed--as most persons would
have done--that a case of bullion would be merely inspected and
passed. Few persons realize the rigorous methods of the Customs
officers. But to resume: It was obvious that the ‘gold’ bars that
Byrne had examined were dummies. The next question was, where were the
real bars? Had they been made away with, or were they still on the
ship? To settle this question I decided to go through the manifest and
especially through the column of net weights. And there, presently, I
came upon a package the net weight of which was within two ounces of
the weight of the stolen bars. And that package was a parcel of brass
screw-bolts--on a homeward-bound ship! But who on earth sends brass
bolts from Africa to London? The anomaly was so striking that I
examined the entry more closely, and then I found--by dividing the net
weight by the number of bolts--that each of these little bolts weighed
over half a pound. But, if this were so, those bolts could be of no
other metal than gold or platinum, and were almost certainly gold.
Also, their aggregate weight was exactly that of the stolen bars, less
two ounces, which probably represented loss in melting.”
“And the scrivelloes,” said I, “and the gum copal and the kola nuts;
what was their bearing on the inquiry? I can’t, even now, trace any
connection.”
Thorndyke cast an astonished glance at me, and then replied with a
quiet chuckle: “There wasn’t any. Those notes were for the benefit of
the shipping gentleman. As he would look over my shoulder, I had to
give him something to read and think about. If I had noted only the
brass bolts, I should have virtually informed him of the nature of my
suspicions.”
“Then, really, you had the case complete when we left Bellhaven?”
“Theoretically, yes. But we had to recover the stolen case, for,
without those lead ingots we could not prove that the gold bolts were
stolen property, any more than one could prove a murder without
evidence of the death of the victim.”
“And how do you suppose the robbery was carried out? How was the gold
got out of the ship’s strong-room?”
“I should say it was never there. The robbers, I suspect, are the
ship’s mate, the chief engineer and possibly the purser. The mate
controls the stowage of cargo, and the chief engineer controls the
repair shop and has the necessary skill and knowledge to deal with the
metal. On receiving the advice of the bullion consignment, I imagine
they prepared the dummy case in agreement with the description. When
the bullion arrived, the dummy case would be concealed on deck and the
exchange made as soon as the bullion was put on board. The dummy would
be sent to the strong-room and the real case carried to a prepared
hiding-place. Then the engineer would cut up the bars, melt them
piecemeal and cast them into bolts in an ordinary casting-flask, using
an iron bolt as a model, and touching up the screw-threads with a die.
The mate could enter the case on the manifest when he pleased, and
send the bill of lading by post to the nominal consignee. That is what
I imagine to have been the procedure.”
Thorndyke’s solution turned out to be literally correct. The
consignee, pursued by Inspector Badger along the quay, was arrested at
the dock gates and immediately volunteered King’s evidence. Thereupon
the mate, the chief engineer and the purser of the steamship _Labadi_
were arrested and brought to trial; when they severally entered a plea
of guilty and described the method of the robbery almost in
Thorndyke’s words.
VII.
THE FUNERAL PYRE
Thorndyke did not often indulge in an evening paper, and was even
disposed to view that modern institution with some disfavour; whence
it happened that when I entered our chambers shortly before dinner
time with a copy of the _Evening Gazette_ in my hand, he fixed upon
the folded news-sheet an inquiring and slightly disapproving eye.
“’Orrible discovery near Dartford,” I announced, quoting the juvenile
vendor.
The disapproval faded from his face, but the inquiring expression
remained.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I replied; “but it seems to be something in our line.”
“My learned friend does us an injustice,” he rejoined, with his eye
riveted on the paper. “Still, if you are going to make my flesh creep,
I will try to endure it.”
Thus invited, I opened the paper and read out as follows:
“A shocking tragedy has come to light in a meadow about a mile from
Dartford. About two o’clock this morning, a rural constable observed a
rick on fire out on the marshes near the creek. By the time he reached
it the upper half of the rick was burning fiercely in the strong wind
and, as he could do nothing alone, he went to the adjacent farm-house
and gave the alarm. The farmer and two of his sons accompanied the
constable to the scene of the conflagration, but the rick was now a
blazing mass, roaring in the wind and giving out an intense heat. As
it was obviously impossible to save any part of it, and as there were
no other ricks near, the farmer decided to abandon it to its fate and
went home.
“At eight o’clock he returned to the spot and found the rick still
burning, though reduced to a heap of glowing cinders and ashes, and
approaching it, he was horrified to perceive a human skull grinning
out from the cindery mass. Closer examination showed other bones--all
calcined white and chalky--and close to the skull a stumpy clay pipe.
The explanation of this dreadful occurrence seems quite simple. The
rick was not quite finished, and when the farm hands knocked off work
they left the ladder in position. It is assumed that some tramp, in
search of a night’s lodging, observed the ladder, and climbing up it,
made himself comfortable in the loose hay at the top of the rick,
where he fell asleep with his lighted pipe in his mouth. This ignited
the hay and the man must have been suffocated by the fumes without
awakening from his sleep.”
“A reasonable explanation,” was Thorndyke’s comment, “and quite
probable; but of course it is pure hypothesis. As a matter of fact,
any one of the three conceivable causes of violent death is possible
in this case--accident, suicide or homicide.”
“I should have supposed,” said I, “that we could almost exclude
suicide. It is difficult to imagine a man electing to roast himself to
death.”
“I cannot agree with my learned friend,” Thorndyke rejoined. “I can