face appeared in the opening.
“Now then,” the hairy person demanded, “what the deuce do you want?”
“Are you Mr. William Pouting?” the superintendent inquired.
“What the devil is that to do with you?” was the genial answer—in the Scottish mode.
“We have business,” Miller began persuasively.
“So have I,” the presumable Ponting replied, “and mine won’t wait.”
“But our business is very important,” Miller urged.
“So is mine,” snapped Ponting, and would have shut the door but for Miller’s obstructing foot, at which he kicked viciously, but with unsatisfactory results, as he was shod in light slippers, whereas the superintendent’s boots were of constabulary solidity.
“Now, look here,” said Miller, dropping his conciliatory manner very completely, “you’d better stop this nonsense. I am a police officer, and I am going to come in,” and with this he inserted a massive shoulder and pushed the door open.
“Police officer, are you?” said Ponting. “And what might your business be with me?”
“That is what I have been waiting to tell you,” said Miller. “But we don’t want to do our talking here.”
“Very well,” growled Panting. “Come in. But understand that I am busy. I’ve been interrupted enough this evening.”
He led the way into a rather barely furnished room with a wide bay-window in which was a table fitted with a writing-slope and lighted by an electric standard lamp. A litter of manuscript explained the nature of his business and his unwillingness to receive casual visitors. He sulkily placed three chairs, and then, seating himself, glowered at Thorndyke and me.
“Are they police officers, too?” he demanded.
“No,” replied Miller, “they are medical gentlemen. Perhaps you had better explain the matter, doctor,” he added, addressing Thorndyke, who thereupon opened the proceedings.
“We have called,” said he, “to inform you that Miss Millicent Fawcett died suddenly this evening.”
“The devil!” exclaimed Panting. “That’s sudden with a vengeance. What time did this happen?”
“About a quarter to nine.”
“Extraordinary!” muttered Ponting. “I saw her only the day before yesterday, and she seemed quite well then. What did she die of?”
“The appearances,” replied Thorndyke, “suggest suicide.”
“Suicide!” gasped Ponting. “Impossible! I can’t believe it. Do you mean to tell me she poisoned herself?”
“No,” said Thorndyke, “it was not poison. Death was caused by injuries to the throat inflicted with a razor.”
“Good God!” exclaimed Ponting. “What a horrible thing! But,” he added, after a pause, “I can’t believe she did it herself, and I don’t. Why should she commit suicide? She was quite happy, and she was just going to be married to that mealy-faced parson. And a razor, too! How do you suppose she came by a razor? Women don’t shave. They smoke and drink and swear, but they haven’t taken to shaving yet. I don’t believe it. Do you?”
He glared ferociously at the superintendent who replied: “I am not sure that I do. There’s a good deal in what you’ve just said, and the same objections had occurred to us. But you see, if she didn’t do it herself, someone else must have done it, and we should like to find out who that someone is. So we begin by ascertaining where any possible persons may have been at a quarter to nine this evening.”
Ponting smiled like an infuriated cat. “So you think me a possible person, do you?” said he.
“Everyone is a possible person,” Miller replied blandly, “especially when he is known to have uttered threats.”
The reply sobered Panting considerably. For a few moments he sat, looking reflectively at the superintendent; then, in comparatively quiet tones, he said: “I have been working here since six o’clock. You can see the stuff for yourself, and I can prove that it has been written since six.”
The superintendent nodded, but made no comment, and Ponting gazed at him fixedly, evidently thinking hard. Suddenly he broke into a harsh laugh.
“What is the joke?” Miller inquired stolidly.
“The joke is that I have got another alibi—a very complete one. There are compensations in every evil. I told you I had been interrupted in my work already this evening. It was those fools next door, the Barnetts—cousins of mine. They are musicians, save the mark! Variety stage, you know. Funny songs and jokes for mental defectives. Well, they practise their infernal ditties in their rooms, and the row comes into mine, and an accursed nuisance it is. However, they have agreed not to practise on Thursdays and Fridays—my busy nights—and usually they don’t. But tonight, just as I was in the thick of my writing, I suddenly heard the most unholy din; that idiot, Fred Barnett, bawling one of his imbecile songs—‘When the pigs their wings have folded,’ and balderdash of that sort—and the other donkey accompanying him on the clarinet, if you please! I stuck it for a minute or two. Then I rushed round to their flat and raised Cain with the bell and knocker. Mrs. Fred opened the door, and I told her what I thought of it. Of course she was very apologetic, said they had forgotten that it was Thursday and promised that he would make her husband stop. And I suppose she did, for by the time I got back to my rooms the row had ceased. I could have punched the whole lot of them into a jelly, but it was all for the best as it turns out.”
“What time was it when you went round there?” asked Miller.
“About five minutes past nine,” replied Ponting. The church bell had struck nine when the row began.”
“Hm!” grunted Miller, glancing at Thorndyke. Well, that is all we wanted to know, so we need not keep you from your work any longer.”
He rose, and being let out with great alacrity, stumped down the stairs, followed by Thorndyke and me. As we came out into the street, he turned to us with a deeply disappointed expression.
“Well,” he exclaimed, “this is a suck-in. I was in hopes that we had pounced on our quarry before he had got time to clear away the traces. And now we’ve got it all to do. You can’t get round an alibi of that sort.”
I glanced at Thorndyke to see how he was taking this unexpected check. He was evidently puzzled, and I could see by the expression of concentration in his face that he was trying over the facts and inferences in new combinations to meet this new position. Probably he had noticed, as I had, that Ponting was wearing a tweed suit, and that therefore the shreds of clothing from the fence could not be his unless he had changed. But the alibi put him definitely out of the picture, and, as Miller had said, we now had nothing to give us a lead.
Suddenly Thorndyke came out of his reverie and addressed the superintendent.
“We had better put this alibi on the basis of ascertained fact. It ought to be verified at once. At present we have only Ponting’s unsupported statement.”
“It isn’t
