Whose Body? A Lord Peter Wimsey Novel
“I expect so—oh, yes!”
“You can remember some of them. Who is your local funny man, so to
speak?”
“Tommy Pringle.”
“What was Tommy Pringle’s doing?”
“Can’t remember.”
“Whereabouts was Tommy Pringle working?”
“Over by the instrument cupboard—by sink C.”
“Yes. Get a picture of Tommy Pringle in your mind’s eye.”
Piggott began to laugh.
“I remember now. Tommy Pringle said the old Sheeny—”
“Why did he call him a Sheeny?”
“I don’t know. But I know he did.”
“Perhaps he looked like it. Did you see his head?”
“No.”
“Who had the head?”
“I don’t know—oh, yes, I do, though. Old Freke bagged the head himself,
and little Bouncible Binns was very cross about it, because he’d been
promised a head to do with old Scrooger.”
“I see. What was Sir Julian doing with the head?”
“He called us up and gave us a jaw on spinal haemorrhage and nervous
lesions.”
“Yes. Well, go back to Tommy Pringle.”
Tommy Pringle’s joke was repeated, not without some embarrassment.
“Quite so. Was that all?”
“No. The chap who was working with Tommy said that sort of thing came
from over-feeding.”
“I deduce that Tommy Pringle’s partner was interested in the alimentary
canal.”
“Yes; and Tommy said, if he’d thought they’d feed you like that he’d go
to the workhouse himself.”
“Then the man was a pauper from the workhouse?”
“Well, he must have been, I suppose.”
“Are workhouse paupers usually fat and well-fed?”
“Well, no—come to think of it, not as a rule.”
“In fact, it struck Tommy Pringle and his friend that this was
something a little out of the way in a workhouse subject?”
“Yes.”
“And if the alimentary canal was so entertaining to these gentlemen, I
imagine the subject had come by his death shortly after a full meal.”
“Yes—oh, yes—he’d have had to, wouldn’t he?”
“Well, I don’t know,” said Lord Peter. “That’s in your department, you
know. That would be your inference, from what they said.”
“Oh, yes. Undoubtedly.”
“Yes; you wouldn’t, for example, expect them to make that observation
if the patient had been ill for a long time and fed on slops.”
“Of course not.”
“Well, you see, you really know a lot about it. On Tuesday week you
were dissecting the arm muscles of a rheumatic middle-aged Jew, of
sedentary habits, who had died shortly after eating a heavy meal, of
some injury producing spinal haemorrhage and nervous lesions, and so
forth, and who was presumed to come from the workhouse?”
“Yes.”
“And you could swear to those facts, if need were?”
“Well, if you put it in that way, I suppose I could.”
“Of course you could.”
Mr. Piggott sat for some moments in contemplation.
“I say,” he said at last, “I did know all that, didn’t I?”
“Oh, yes—you knew it all right—like Socrates’s slave.”
“Who’s he?”
“A person in a book I used to read as a boy.”
“Oh—does he come in ‘The Last Days of Pompeii’?”
“No—another book—I daresay you escaped it. It’s rather dull.”
“I never read much except Henty and Fenimore Cooper at school....
But—have I got rather an extra good memory, then?”
“You have a better memory than you credit yourself with.”
“Then why can’t I remember all the medical stuff? It all goes out of my
head like a sieve.”
“Well, why can’t you?” said Lord Peter, standing on the hearthrug and
smiling down at his guest.
“Well,” said the young man, “the chaps who examine one don’t ask the
same sort of questions you do.”
“No?”
“No—they leave you to remember all by yourself. And it’s beastly hard.
Nothing to catch hold of, don’t you know? But, I say—how did you know
about Tommy Pringle being the funny man and—”
“I didn’t, till you told me.”
“No; I know. But how did you know he’d be there if you did ask? I
mean to say—I say,” said Mr. Piggott, who was becoming mellowed by
influences themselves not unconnected with the alimentary canal—“I say,
are you rather clever, or am I rather stupid?”
“No, no,” said Lord Peter, “it’s me. I’m always askin’ such stupid
questions, everybody thinks I must mean somethin’ by ’em.”
This was too involved for Mr. Piggott.
“Never mind,” said Parker, soothingly, “he’s always like that. You
mustn’t take any notice. He can’t help it. It’s premature senile decay,
often observed in the families of hereditary legislators. Go away,
Wimsey, and play us the ‘Beggar’s Opera,’ or something.”
“That’s good enough, isn’t it?” said Lord Peter, when the happy Mr.
Piggott had been despatched home after a really delightful evening.
“I’m afraid so,” said Parker. “But it seems almost incredible.”
“There’s nothing incredible in human nature,” said Lord Peter; “at
least, in educated human nature. Have you got that exhumation order?”
“I shall have it tomorrow. I thought of fixing up with the workhouse
people for tomorrow afternoon. I shall have to go and see them first.”
“Right you are; I’ll let my mother know.”
“I begin to feel like you, Wimsey, I don’t like this job.”
“I like it a deal better than I did.”
“You are really certain we’re not making a mistake?”
Lord Peter had strolled across to the window. The curtain was not
perfectly drawn, and he stood gazing out through the gap into lighted
Piccadilly. At this he turned round:
“If we are,” he said, “we shall know tomorrow, and no harm will have
been done. But I rather think you will receive a certain amount of
confirmation on your way home. Look here, Parker, d’you know, if I were
you I’d spend the night here. There’s a spare bedroom; I can easily put
you up.”
Parker stared at him.
“Do you mean—I’m likely to be attacked?”
“I think it very likely indeed.”
“Is there anybody in the street?”
“Not now; there was half-an-hour ago.”
“When Piggott left?”
“Yes.”
“I say—I hope the boy is in no danger.”
“That’s what I went down to see. I don’t think so. Fact is, I don’t
suppose anybody would imagine we’d exactly made a confidant of Piggott.
But I think you and I are in danger. You’ll stay?”
“I’m damned if I will, Wimsey. Why should I run away?”
“Bosh!” said Peter. “You’d run away all right if you believed me, and
why not? You don’t believe me. In fact, you’re still not certain I’m on
the right tack. Go in peace, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“I won’t; I’ll dictate a message with my dying breath to say I was
convinced.”
“Well, don’t walk—take a taxi.”
“Very well, I’ll do that.”
“And don’t let anybody else get into it.”
“No.”
It was a raw, unpleasant night. A taxi deposited a load of people
returning from the theatre at the block of flats next door, and Parker
secured it for himself. He was just giving the address to the driver,
when a man came hastily running up from a side street. He was in
evening dress and an overcoat. He rushed up, signalling frantically.
“Sir—sir!—dear me! why, it’s Mr. Parker! How fortunate! If you
would be so kind—summoned from the club—a sick friend—can’t find
a taxi—everybody going home from the theatre—if I might share your
cab—you are returning to Bloomsbury? I want Russell Square—if I might
presume—a matter of life and death.”
He spoke in hurried gasps, as though he had been running violently and
far. Parker promptly stepped out of the taxi.
“Delighted to be of service to you, Sir Julian,” he said; “take my
taxi. I am going down to Craven Street myself, but I’m in no hurry.
Pray make use of the cab.”
“It’s extremely kind of you,” said the surgeon. “I am ashamed—”
“That’s all right,” said Parker, cheerily. “I can wait.” He assisted
Freke into the taxi. “What number? 24 Russell Square, driver, and look
sharp.”
The taxi drove off. Parker remounted the stairs and rang Lord Peter’s
bell.
“Thanks, old man,” he said. “I’ll stop the night, after all.”
“Come in,” said Wimsey.
“Did you see that?” asked Parker.
“I saw something. What happened exactly?”
Parker told his story. “Frankly,” he said, “I’ve been thinking you a
bit mad, but now I’m not quite so sure of it.”
Peter laughed.
“Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed. Bunter, Mr.
Parker will stay the night.”
“Look here, Wimsey, let’s have another look at this business. Where’s
that letter?”
Lord Peter produced Bunter’s essay in dialogue. Parker studied it for
a short time in silence.
“You know, Wimsey, I’m as full of objections to this idea as an egg is
of meat.”
“So’m I, old son. That’s why I want to dig up our Chelsea pauper. But
trot out your objections.”
“Well—”
“Well, look here, I don’t pretend to be able to fill in all the blanks
myself. But here we have two mysterious occurrences in one night, and
a complete chain connecting the one with another through one particular
person. It’s beastly, but it’s not unthinkable.”
“Yes, I know all that. But there are one or two quite definite
stumbling-blocks.”
“Yes, I know. But, see here. On the one hand, Levy disappeared after
being last seen looking for Prince of Wales Road at nine o’clock. At
eight next morning a dead man, not unlike him in general outline, is
discovered in a bath in Queen Caroline Mansions. Levy, by Freke’s own
admission, was going to see Freke. By information received from Chelsea
workhouse a dead man, answering to the description of the Battersea
corpse in its natural state, was delivered that same day to Freke. We
have Levy with a past, and no future, as it were; an unknown vagrant
with a future (in the cemetery) and no past, and Freke stands between
their future and their past.”
“That looks all right—”
“Yes. Now, further: Freke has a motive for getting rid of Levy—an old
jealousy.”
“Very old—and not much of a motive.”
“People have been known to do that sort of thing.[D] You’re thinking
that people don’t keep up old jealousies for twenty years or so.
Perhaps not. Not just primitive, brute jealousy. That means a word
and a blow. But the thing that rankles is hurt vanity. That sticks.
Humiliation. And we’ve all got a sore spot we don’t like to have
touched. I’ve got it. You’ve got it. Some blighter said hell knew no
fury like a woman scorned. Stickin’ it on to women, poor devils. Sex
is every man’s loco spot—you needn’t fidget, you know it’s true—he’ll
take a disappointment, but not a humiliation. I knew a man once who’d
been turned down—not too charitably—by a girl he was engaged to. He
spoke quite decently about her. I asked what had become of her. ‘Oh,’
he said, ‘she married the other fellow.’ And then burst out—couldn’t
help himself. ‘Lord, yes!’ he cried. ‘To think of it—jilted for a
Scotchman!’ I don’t know why he didn’t like Scots, but that was what
got him on the raw. Look at Freke. I’ve read his books. His attacks on
his antagonists are savage. And he’s a scientist. Yet he can’t bear
opposition, even in his work, which is where any first-class man is
most sane and open-minded. Do you think he’s a man to take a beating
from any man on a side-issue? On a man’s most sensitive side-issue?
People are opinionated about side-issues, you know. I see red if
anybody questions my judgment about a book. And Levy—who was nobody
twenty years ago—romps in and carries off Freke’s girl from under
his nose. It isn’t the girl Freke would bother about—it’s having his
aristocratic nose put out of joint by a little Jewish nobody.
“There’s another thing. Freke’s got another side-issue. He likes crime.
In that criminology book of his he gloats over a hardened murderer.
I’ve read it, and I’ve seen the admiration simply glaring out between
the lines whenever he writes about a callous and successful criminal.
He reserves his contempt for the victims or the penitents or the men
who lose their heads and get found out. His heroes are Edmond de la
Pommerais, who persuaded his mistress into becoming an accessory to
her own murder, and George Joseph Smith of Brides-in-a-bath fame, who