Unnatural death
remark—if you had not anticipated me—that since I could _not_ put the
appearance down to sunburn, there remains some such possibility as you
suggest. I can’t possibly say that it is the result of
chloroform—medical pronouncements of that kind cannot be hastily made
without cautious investigation—but I was about to remark that it _might_
be.”
“In that case,” put in Wimsey, “could she have died from the effects of
the chloroform? Supposing she was given too much or that her heart was
weak?”
“My good sir,” said the doctor, deeply offended this time, “look at that
blow upon the head, and ask yourself whether it is necessary to suggest
any other cause of death. Moreover, if she had died of the chloroform,
where would be the necessity for the blow?”
“That is exactly what I was wondering,” said Wimsey.
“I suppose,” went on the doctor, “you will hardly dispute my medical
knowledge?”
“Certainly not,” said Wimsey, “but as you say, it is unwise to make any
medical pronouncement without cautious investigation.”
“And this is not the place for it,” put in Parker, hastily. “I think we
have done all there is to do here. Will you go with the body to the
mortuary, doctor. Mr. Andrews, I shall be obliged if you will come and
take a few photographs of some footmarks and so on up in the wood. The
light is bad, I’m afraid, but we must do our best.”
He took Wimsey by the arm.
“The man is a fool, of course,” he said, “but we can get a second
opinion. In the meantime, we had better let it be supposed that we
accept the surface explanation of all this.”
“What is the difficulty?” asked Sir Charles, curiously.
“Oh, nothing much,” replied Parker. “All the appearances are in favour
of the girls having been attacked by a couple of ruffians, who have
carried Miss Whittaker off with a view to ransom, after brutally
knocking Miss Findlater on the head when she offered resistance.
Probably that is the true explanation. Any minor discrepancies will
doubtless clear themselves up in time. We shall know better when we have
had a proper medical examination.”
They returned to the wood, where photographs were taken and careful
measurements made of the footprints. The Chief Constable followed these
activities with intense interest, looking over Parker’s shoulder as he
entered the particulars in his notebook.
“I say,” he said, suddenly, “isn’t it rather odd—”
“Here’s somebody coming,” broke in Parker.
The sound of a motor-cycle being urged in second gear over the rough
ground proved to be the herald of a young man armed with a camera.
“Oh, God!” groaned Parker. “The damned Press already.”
He received the journalist courteously enough, showing him the
wheel-tracks and the footprints, and outlining the kidnapping theory as
they walked back to the place where the body was found.
“Can you give us any idea, Inspector, of the appearance of the two
wanted men?”
“Well,” said Parker, “one of them appears to be something of a dandy; he
wears a loathsome mauve cap and narrow pointed shoes, and, if those
marks on the magazine cover mean anything, one or other of the men may
possibly be a coloured man of some kind. Of the second man, all we can
definitely say is that he wears number 10 shoes, with rubber heels.”
“I was going to say,” said Pillington, “that, à propos de bottes, it is
rather remarkable—”
“And this is where we found the body of Miss Findlater,” went on Parker,
ruthlessly. He described the injuries and the position of the body, and
the journalist gratefully occupied himself with taking photographs,
including a group of Wimsey, Parker and the Chief Constable standing
among the gorse-bushes, while the latter majestically indicated the
fatal spot with his walking-stick.
“And now you’ve got what you want, old son,” said Parker, benevolently,
“buzz off, won’t you, and tell the rest of the boys. You’ve got all we
can tell you, and we’ve got other things to do beyond granting special
interviews.”
The reporter asked no better. This was tantamount to making his
information exclusive, and no Victorian matron could have a more
delicate appreciation of the virtues of exclusiveness than a modern
newspaper man.
“Well now, Sir Charles,” said Parker, when the man had happily chugged
and popped himself away, “what were you about to say in the matter of
the footprints?”
But Sir Charles was offended. The Scotland Yard man had snubbed him and
thrown doubt on his discretion.
“Nothing,” he replied. “I feel sure that my conclusions would appear
very elementary to you.”
And he preserved a dignified silence throughout the return journey.
The Whittaker case had begun almost imperceptibly, in the overhearing of
a casual remark dropped in a Soho restaurant; it ended amid a roar of
publicity that shook England from end to end and crowded even Wimbledon
into the second place. The bare facts of the murder and kidnapping
appeared exclusively that night in a Late Extra edition of the _Evening
Views_. Next morning it sprawled over the Sunday papers with photographs
and full details, actual and imaginary. The idea of two English
girls—the one brutally killed, the other carried off for some end
unthinkably sinister, by a black man—aroused all the passion of horror
and indignation of which the English temperament is capable. Reporters
swarmed down upon Crow’s Beach like locusts—the downs near Shelly Head
were like a fair with motors, bicycles and parties on foot, rushing out
to spend a happy week-end amid surroundings of mystery and bloodshed.
Parker, who with Wimsey had taken rooms at the Green Lion, sat answering
the telephone and receiving the letters and wires which descended upon
him from all sides, with a stalwart policeman posted at the end of the
passage to keep out all intruders.
Wimsey fidgeted about the room, smoking cigarette after cigarette in his
excitement.
“This time we’ve got them,” he said. “They’ve overreached themselves,
thank God!”
“Yes. But have a little patience, old man. We can’t lose them—but we
must have all the facts first.”
“You’re sure those fellows have got Mrs. Forrest safe?”
“Oh, yes. She came back to the flat on Monday night—or so the garage man
says. Our men are shadowing her continually and will let us know the
moment anybody comes to the flat.”
“Monday night!”
“Yes. But that’s no proof in itself. Monday night is quite a usual time
for week-enders to return to Town. Besides, I don’t want to frighten her
till we know whether she’s the principal or merely the accomplice. Look
here, Peter, I’ve had a message from another of our men. He’s been
looking into the finances of Miss Whittaker and Mrs. Forrest. Miss
Whittaker has been drawing out big sums, ever since last December year
in cheques to Self, and these correspond almost exactly, amount for
amount, with sums which Mrs. Forrest has been paying into her own
account. That woman has had a big hold over Miss Whittaker, ever since
old Miss Dawson died. She’s in it up to the neck, Peter.”
“I knew it. She’s been doing the jobs while the Whittaker woman held
down her alibi in Kent. For God’s sake, Charles, make no mistake.
Nobody’s life is safe for a second while either of them is at large.”
“When a woman is wicked and unscrupulous,” said Parker, sententiously,
“she is the most ruthless criminal in the world—fifty times worse than a
man, because she is always so much more single-minded about it.”
“They’re not troubled with sentimentality, that’s why,” said Wimsey,
“and we poor mutts of men stuff ourselves up with the idea that they’re
romantic and emotional. All punk, my son. Damn that ’phone!”
Parker snatched up the receiver.
“Yes—yes—speaking. Good God, you don’t say so. All right. Yes. Yes, of
course you must detain him. I think myself it’s a plant, but he must be
held and questioned. And see that all the papers have it. Tell ’em
you’re sure he’s the man. See? Soak it well into ’em that that’s the
official view. And—wait a moment—I want photographs of the cheque and of
any finger-prints on it. Send ’em down immediately by a special
messenger. It’s genuine, I suppose? The Bank people say it is? Good!
What’s his story? . . . Oh! . . . any envelope?—Destroyed?—Silly devil.
Right. Right. Good-bye.”
He turned to Wimsey with some excitement.
“Hallelujah Dawson walked into Lloyds Bank in Stepney yesterday morning
and presented Mary Whittaker’s cheque for £10,000, drawn on their
Leahampton branch to Bearer, and dated Friday 24th. As the sum was such
a large one and the story of the disappearance was in Friday night’s
paper, they asked him to call again. Meanwhile, they communicated with
Leahampton. When the news of the murder came out yesterday evening, the
Leahampton manager remembered about it and ’phoned the Yard, with the
result that they sent round this morning and had Hallelujah up for a few
inquiries. His story is that the cheque arrived on Saturday morning, all
by itself in an envelope, without a word of explanation. Of course the
old juggins chucked the envelope away, so that we can’t verify his tale
or get a line on the post-mark. Our people thought the whole thing
looked a bit fishy, so Hallelujah is detained pending investigation—in
other words, arrested for murder and conspiracy!”
“Poor old Hallelujah! Charles, this is simply devilish! That innocent,
decent old creature, who couldn’t harm a fly.”
“I know. Well, he’s in for it and will have to go through with it. It’s
all the better for us. Hell’s bells, there’s somebody at the door. Come
in.”
“It’s Dr. Faulkner to see you, sir,” said the constable, putting his
head in.
“Oh, good. Come in, doctor. Have you made your examination?”
“I have, Inspector. Very interesting. You were quite right. I’ll tell
you that much straight away.”
“I’m glad to hear that. Sit down and tell us all about it.”
“I’ll be as brief as possible,” said the doctor. He was a London man,
sent down by Scotland Yard, and accustomed to police work—a lean, grey
badger of a man, business-like and keen-eyed, the direct opposite of the
“tutster” who had annoyed Parker the evening before.
“Well, first of all, the blow on the head had, of course, nothing
whatever to do with the death. You saw yourself that there had been next
to no bleeding. The wound was inflicted some time after death—no doubt
to create the impression of an attack by a gang. Similarly with the cuts
and scratches on the arms. They are the merest camouflage.”
“Exactly. Your colleague—”
“My colleague, as you call him, is a fool,” snorted the doctor. “If
that’s a specimen of his diagnosis, I should think there would be a high
death-rate in Crow’s Beach. That’s by the way. You want the cause of
death?”
“Chloroform?”
“Possibly. I opened the body but found no special symptoms suggestive of
poisoning or anything. I have removed the necessary organs and sent them
to Sir James Lubbock for analysis at your suggestion, but candidly I
expect nothing from that. There was no odour of chloroform on opening
the thorax. Either the time elapsed since the death was too long, as is
very possible, seeing how volatile the stuff is, or the dose was too
small. I found no indications of any heart weakness, so that, to produce
death in a healthy young girl, chloroform would have had to be
administered over a considerable time.”
“Do you think it was administered at all?”
“Yes, I think it was. The burns on the face certainly suggest it.”
“That would also account for the handkerchief found in the car,” said
Wimsey.
“I suppose,” pursued Parker, “that it would require considerable
strength and determination to administer chloroform to a strong young
woman. She would probably resist strenuously.”
“She would,” said the doctor, grimly, “But the odd thing is, she didn’t.