old devil, Thorndyke!” I exclaimed with conviction. Then, knowing that cross-examination would be futile, I asked: “What are we going to do after lunch?”
“The inspector is going to show us over ‘the scene of the tragedy,’ as the newspapers would express it.”
I noted gratefully that he had reserved this item for me, and dismissed professional topics for the time being, concentrating my attention on the old-world, amphibious streets through which we were walking. There is always something interesting in the aspect of a sea-port town, even if it is only a small one like Southaven.
The inspector arrived with such punctuality that he found us still at the table and was easily induced to join us with a cup of coffee and to accept a cigar—administered by Thorndyke, as I suspected, with the object of hindering conversation. I could see that his interest in my colleague was intense and not unmingled with awe, a fact which, in conjunction with the cigar, restrained him from any undue manifestations of curiosity, but not from continuous, though furtive, observation of my friend. Indeed, when we arrived at the late Mr. Riggs’s house, I was secretly amused by the close watch that he kept on Thorndyke’s movements, unsensational as the inspection turned out to be.
The house, itself, presented very little of interest excepting its picturesque old-world exterior, which fronted on a quiet by-street and was furnished with a deep bay which, as Thorndyke ascertained, commanded a clear view of the street from end to end. It was a rather shabby, neglected little house, as might have been expected, and our examination of it yielded, so far as I could see, only a single fact of any significance: which was that there appeared to be no connection what ever between the blood-stain on the study floor and the train of large spots from the middle of the hall to the street door. And on this piece of evidence—definitely unfavourable from our point of view—Thorndyke concentrated his attention when he had made a preliminary survey.
Closely followed by the watchful inspector, he browsed round the little room, studying every inch of the floor between the blood-stain and the door. The latter he examined minutely from top to bottom, especially as to the handle, the jambs, and the lintel. Then he went out into the hall, scrutinising the floor inch by inch, poring over the walls, and even looking behind the framed prints that hung on them. A reflector lamp suspended by a nail on the wall received minute and prolonged attention, as did also a massive lamp-hook screwed into one of the beams of the low ceiling, of which Thorndyke remarked as he stooped to pass under it, that it must have been fixed there by a dwarf.
“Yes,” the inspector agreed, “and a fool. A swinging lamp hung on that hook would have blocked the whole fairway. There isn’t too much room as it is. What a pity we weren’t a bit more careful about footprints in this place. There are plenty of tracks of wet feet here on this oil-cloth; faint, but you could have made them out all right if they hadn’t been all on top of one another. There’s Mr. Foxley’s, the girl’s, mine, and the men who carried out the body, but I’m hanged if I can tell which is which. It’s a regular mix up.”
“Yes,” I agreed, “it is all very confused. But I notice one rather odd thing. There are several faint traces of a large right foot, but I can’t see any sign of the corresponding left foot. Can you?”
“Perhaps this is it,” said Thorndyke, pointing to a large, vague oval mark. “I have noticed that it seems to occur in some sort of connection with the big right foot; but I must admit that it is not a very obvious footprint.”
“I shouldn’t have taken it for a footprint at all, or at any rate, not a human footprint. It is more like the spoor of some big animal.”
“It is,” Thorndyke agreed; “but whatever it is, it seems to have been here before any of the others arrived. You notice that wherever it occurs, it seems to have been trodden on by some of the others.”
“Yes, I had noticed that, and the same is true of the big right foot, so it seems probable that they are connected, as you say. But I am hanged if I can make anything of it. Can you, inspector?”
The inspector shook his head. He could not recognise the mark as a footprint, but he could see very plainly that he had been a fool not to have taken more care to protect the floor.
When the examination of the hall was finished, Thorndyke opened the door and looked at the big, flat doorstep. “What was the weather like here on Wednesday evening?” he asked.
“Showery,” the inspector replied; “and there were one or two heavy showers during the night. You were noticing that there are no blood-tracks on the doorstep. But there wouldn’t be in any case; for if a man had come out of this door dropping blood, the blood would have dropped on wet stone and got washed away at once.”
Thorndyke admitted the truth of this; and so another item of favourable evidence was extinguished. The probability that the blood in the hall was that of some person other than the deceased remained undisturbed; and I could not see that a single fact had been elicited by our inspection of the house that was in any way helpful to our client. Indeed, it appeared to me that there was absolutely no case for the defence, and I even asked myself whether we were not, in fact, merely trying to fudge up a defence for an obviously guilty man. It was not like Thorndyke to do that. But how did the case stand? There was a suggestion of suicide, but a clear possibility of homicide. There was strong evidence that a second person had been in the house, and that person appeared to have received a wound. But a wound suggested a struggle; and the servant’s evidence was to the effect that when she left the house a violent altercation was in progress. The deceased was never again seen alive; and the other party to the quarrel had been found with property of the dead man in his possession. Moreover, there was a clear motive for the crime, stupid as that crime was. For the dead man had threatened to revoke his will but as he had presumably not done so, his death left the will still operative. In short, everything pointed to the guilt of our client, Robert Fletcher.
I had just reached this not very gratifying conclusion when a statement of Thorndyke’s shattered my elaborate summing up into impalpable fragments.
“I suppose, sir,” said the inspector, “there isn’t anything that you would care to tell us, as you are for the defence. But we are not hostile to Fletcher. In fact, he hasn’t been charged. He is only being detained in custody until we have heard what turns up at the inquest. I know you have examined that blood that Mr. Foxley took, and Fletcher’s blood, too, and you’ve seen the premises. We have given all the facilities that we could, and if you could give us any sort of hint that might be useful, I should be very much obliged.”
Thorndyke reflected for a few moments. Then he replied: “There is no reason for secrecy in regard to you, inspector, who have been so helpful and friendly, so I will be quite frank. I have examined both samples of blood and Fletcher’s, and I have inspected the premises; and what I am able to say definitely is this: the blood in the hall is not the blood of the deceased—”
“Ah!” exclaimed the inspector, “I was afraid it wasn’t.”
“And it is not the blood of Robert Fletcher.”
“Isn’t it now! Well, I am glad to hear that.”
“Moreover,” continued Thorndyke, “it was shed well after nine o’clock at night, probably not earlier than midnight.”
“There, now!” the inspector exclaimed, with an admiring glance at Thorndyke, “just think of that. See what it is to be a man of science! I suppose, sir, you couldn’t give us any sort of description of the person who dropped that blood in the hall?”
Staggered as I had been by Thorndyke’s astonishing statements, I could not repress a grin at the inspector’s artless
