Whose Body? A Lord Peter Wimsey Novel
connection with Reuben Levy and his family. This enabled me to remain
in touch with his fortunes and interests, so that, when the moment for
action should arrive, I might know what weapons to use.
Meanwhile, I carefully studied criminology in fiction and fact—my work
on “Criminal Lunacy” was a side-product of this activity—and saw how,
in every murder, the real crux of the problem was the disposal of the
body. As a doctor, the means of death were always ready to my hand, and
I was not likely to make any error in that connection. Nor was I likely
to betray myself on account of any illusory sense of wrong-doing. The
sole difficulty would be that of destroying all connection between
my personality and that of the corpse. You will remember that Michael
Finsbury, in Stevenson’s entertaining romance, observes: “What hangs
people is the unfortunate circumstance of guilt.” It became clear to
me that the mere leaving about of a superfluous corpse could convict
nobody, provided that nobody was guilty in connection _with that
particular corpse_. Thus the idea of substituting the one body for
the other was early arrived at, though it was not till I obtained
the practical direction of St. Luke’s Hospital that I found myself
perfectly unfettered in the choice and handling of dead bodies. From
this period on, I kept a careful watch on all the material brought in
for dissection.
My opportunity did not present itself until the week before Sir
Reuben’s disappearance, when the medical officer at the Chelsea
workhouse sent word to me that an unknown vagrant had been injured that
morning by the fall of a piece of scaffolding, and was exhibiting some
very interesting nervous and cerebral reactions. I went round and saw
the case, and was immediately struck by the man’s strong superficial
resemblance to Sir Reuben. He had been heavily struck on the back
of the neck, dislocating the fourth and fifth cervical vertebrae and
heavily bruising the spinal cord. It seemed highly unlikely that he
could ever recover, either mentally or physically, and in any case
there appeared to me to be no object in indefinitely prolonging so
unprofitable an existence. He had obviously been able to support life
until recently, as he was fairly well nourished, but the state of his
feet and clothing showed that he was unemployed, and under present
conditions he was likely to remain so. I decided that he would suit my
purpose very well, and immediately put in train certain transactions
in the City which I had already sketched out in my own mind. In
the meantime, the reactions mentioned by the workhouse doctor were
interesting, and I made careful studies of them, and arranged for the
delivery of the body to the hospital when I should have completed my
preparations.
On the Thursday and Friday of that week I made private arrangements
with various brokers to buy the stock of certain Peruvian Oil-fields,
which had gone down almost to waste-paper. This part of my experiment
did not cost me very much, but I contrived to arouse considerable
curiosity, and even a mild excitement. At this point I was of course
careful not to let my name appear. The incidence of Saturday and Sunday
gave me some anxiety lest my man should after all die before I was
ready for him, but by the use of saline injections I contrived to keep
him alive and, late on Sunday night, he even manifested disquieting
symptoms of at any rate a partial recovery.
On Monday morning the market in Peruvians opened briskly. Rumours had
evidently got about that somebody knew something, and this day I was
not the only buyer in the market. I bought a couple of hundred more
shares in my own name, and left the matter to take care of itself. At
lunch time I made my arrangements to run into Levy accidentally at the
corner of the Mansion House. He expressed (as I expected) his surprise
at seeing me in that part of London. I simulated some embarrassment and
suggested that we should lunch together. I dragged him to a place a bit
off the usual beat, and there ordered a good wine and drank of it as
much as he might suppose sufficient to induce a confidential mood. I
asked him how things were going on ’Change. He said, “Oh, all right,”
but appeared a little doubtful, and asked me whether I did anything in
that way. I said I had a little flutter occasionally, and that, as a
matter of fact, I’d been put on to rather a good thing. I glanced round
apprehensively at this point, and shifted my chair nearer to his.
“I suppose you don’t know anything about Peruvian Oil, do you?” he said.
I started and looked round again, and leaning across to him, said,
dropping my voice:
“Well, I do, as a matter of fact, but I don’t want it to get about. I
stand to make a good bit on it.”
“But I thought the thing was hollow,” he said; “it hasn’t paid a
dividend for umpteen years.”
“No,” I said, “it hasn’t, but it’s going to. I’ve got inside
information.” He looked a bit unconvinced, and I emptied off my glass,
and edged right up to his ear.
“Look here,” I said, “I’m not giving this away to everyone, but I don’t
mind doing you and Christine a good turn. You know, I’ve always kept
a soft place in my heart for her, ever since the old days. You got in
ahead of me that time, and now it’s up to me to heap coals of fire on
you both.”
I was a little excited by this time, and he thought I was drunk.
“It’s very kind of you, old man,” he said, “but I’m a cautious bird,
you know, always was. I’d like a bit of proof.”
And he shrugged up his shoulders and looked like a pawnbroker.
“I’ll give it to you,” I said, “but it isn’t safe here. Come round to
my place tonight after dinner, and I’ll show you the report.”
“How d’you get hold of it?” said he.
“I’ll tell you tonight,” said I. “Come round after dinner—any time
after nine, say.”
“To Harley Street?” he asked, and I saw that he meant coming.
“No,” I said, “to Battersea—Prince of Wales Road; I’ve got some work to
do at the hospital. And look here,” I said, “don’t you let on to a soul
that you’re coming. I bought a couple of hundred shares today, in my
own name, and people are sure to get wind of it. If we’re known to be
about together, someone’ll twig something. In fact, it’s anything but
safe talking about it in this place.”
“All right,” he said, “I won’t say a word to anybody. I’ll turn up
about nine o’clock. You’re sure it’s a sound thing?”
“It can’t go wrong,” I assured him. And I meant it.
We parted after that, and I went round to the workhouse. My man had
died at about eleven o’clock. I had seen him just after breakfast, and
was not surprised. I completed the usual formalities with the workhouse
authorities, and arranged for his delivery at the hospital at about
seven o’clock.
In the afternoon, as it was not one of my days to be in Harley Street,
I looked up an old friend who lives close to Hyde Park, and found
that he was just off to Brighton on some business or other. I had
tea with him, and saw him off by the 5.35 from Victoria. On issuing
from the barrier it occurred to me to purchase an evening paper, and
I thoughtlessly turned my steps to the bookstall. The usual crowds
were rushing to catch suburban trains home, and on moving away I found
myself involved in a contrary stream of travellers coming up out of the
Underground, or bolting from all sides for the 5.45 to Battersea Park
and Wandsworth Common. I disengaged myself after some buffeting and
went home in a taxi; and it was not till I was safely seated there that
I discovered somebody’s gold-rimmed pince-nez involved in the astrakhan
collar of my overcoat. The time from 6.15 to seven I spent concocting
something to look like a bogus report for Sir Reuben.
At seven I went through to the hospital, and found the workhouse van
just delivering my subject at the side door. I had him taken straight
up to the theatre, and told the attendant, William Watts, that I
intended to work there that night. I told him I would prepare the
body myself—the injection of a preservative would have been a most
regrettable complication. I sent him about his business, and then went
home and had dinner. I told my man that I should be working in the
hospital that evening, and that he could go to bed at 10.30 as usual,
as I could not tell whether I should be late or not. He is used to
my erratic ways. I only keep two servants in the Battersea house—the
man-servant and his wife, who cooks for me. The rougher domestic work
is done by a charwoman, who sleeps out. The servants’ bedroom is at the
top of the house, overlooking Prince of Wales Road.
As soon as I had dined I established myself in the hall with some
papers. My man had cleared dinner by a quarter past eight, and I told
him to give me the syphon and tantalus; and sent him downstairs. Levy
rang the bell at twenty minutes past nine, and I opened the door to him
myself. My man appeared at the other end of the hall, but I called to
him that it was all right, and he went away. Levy wore an overcoat with
evening dress and carried an umbrella. “Why, how wet you are!” I said.
“How did you come?” “By ’bus,” he said, “and the fool of a conductor
forgot to put me down at the end of the road. It’s pouring cats and
dogs and pitch-dark—I couldn’t see where I was.” I was glad he hadn’t
taken a taxi, but I had rather reckoned on his not doing so. “Your
little economies will be the death of you one of these days,” I said.
I was right there, but I hadn’t reckoned on their being the death of me
as well. I say again, I could not have foreseen it.
I sat him down by the fire, and gave him a whisky. He was in high
spirits about some deal in Argentines he was bringing off the next day.
We talked money for about a quarter of an hour and then he said:
“Well, how about this Peruvian mare’s-nest of yours?”
“It’s no mare’s-nest,” I said; “come and have a look at it.”
I took him upstairs into the library, and switched on the centre light
and the reading lamp on the writing table. I gave him a chair at the
table with his back to the fire, and fetched the papers I had been
faking, out of the safe. He took them, and began to read them, poking
over them in his short-sighted way, while I mended the fire. As soon as
I saw his head in a favourable position I struck him heavily with the
poker, just over the fourth cervical. It was delicate work calculating
the exact force necessary to kill him without breaking the skin, but
my professional experience was useful to me. He gave one loud gasp,
and tumbled forward on to the table quite noiselessly. I put the poker
back, and examined him. His neck was broken, and he was quite dead. I
carried him into my bedroom and undressed him. It was about ten minutes
to ten when I had finished. I put him away under my bed, which had been
turned down for the night, and cleared up the papers in the library.
Then I went downstairs, took Levy’s umbrella, and let myself out at
the hall door, shouting “Good-night” loudly enough to be heard in the
basement if the servants should be listening. I walked briskly away
down the street, went in by the hospital side door, and returned to
the house noiselessly by way of the private passage. It would have been
awkward if anybody had seen me then, but I leaned over the back stairs
and heard the cook and her husband still talking in the kitchen. I
slipped back into the hall, replaced the umbrella in the stand, cleared
up my papers there, went up into the library and rang the bell. When
the man appeared I told him to lock up everything except the private
door to the hospital. I waited in the library until he had done so,
and about 10.30 I heard both servants go up to bed. I waited a quarter
of an hour longer and then went through to the dissecting-room. I
wheeled one of the stretcher tables through the passage to the house