The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes

of murder on that. What was it to do with him that he could see no way by which the wound could have been inflicted by an outside agency? It was for the police to find how that was done. Enough that it was impossible for the unhappy young man to have inflicted such a wound, and then to have strength and will power enough to hide the instrument and to remove perfectly every trace of his having left the bed for the purpose.' It is impossible to enumerate all the theories propounded by the amateur detectives, while Scotland Yard religiously held its tongue. Ultimately the interest on the subject became confined to a few papers which had received the best letters. Those papers that couldn't get interesting letters stopped the correspondence and sneered at the 'sensationalism' of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy there were not a few notable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like rockets posing as fixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog the murderer had ascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a ladder from the pavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes away, and effected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in the pane of glass again (or another which he had brought with him) and thus the room remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being pointed out that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed that that didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and undo the fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process being reversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass was smashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be fixed in from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out when touched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escaped detection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward, and as many trap- doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11 Glover Street, as if it were a mediaeval castle. Another of these clever theories was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the police were there-hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door when Grodman broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement of the discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodman and Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings.

Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassin locked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the door had been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armed with magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. There was only one defect in this ingenious theory-the thing could not be done. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallow swords-by an anatomical peculiarity of the throat-and said that the deceased might have swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was too much for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide had been effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which had then got buried in the wound, not even the quotation of Shelley's line:-

'Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it,'

could secure it a moment's acceptance. The same reception was accorded to the idea that the cut had been made with a candle-stick (or other harmless necessary bedroom article) constructed like a sword stick. Theories of this sort caused a humorist to explain that the deceased had hidden the razor in his hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cook suggested that they were the only persons who could have done the deed, as no one else could get out of a locked cabinet. But perhaps the most brilliant of these flashes of false fire was the facetious, yet probably half-seriously meant letter that appeared in the Pell Mell Press under the heading of

'THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED

'Sir,-You will remember that when the Whitechapel murders were

agitating the universe, I suggested that the district coroner was the

assassin. My suggestion has been disregarded. The coroner is still at

large. So is the Whitechapel murderer. Perhaps this suggestive

coincidence will incline the authorities to pay more attention to me

this time. The problem seems to be this. The deceased could not have

cut his own throat. The deceased could not have had his throat cut for

him. As one of the two must have happened, this is obvious nonsense. As

this is obvious nonsense I am justified in disbelieving it. As this

obvious nonsense was primarily put in circulation by Mrs. Drabdump and

Mr. Grodman, I am justified in disbelieving them. In short, sir, what

guarantee have we that the whole tale is not a cock-and-bull story,

invented by the two persons who first found the body? What proof is

there that the deed was not done by these persons themselves, who then

went to work to smash the door and break the locks and the bolts, and

fasten up all the windows before they called the police in?-I enclose

my card, and am, sir, yours truly,

'ONE WHO LOOKS THROUGH HIS OWN SPECTACLES.'

'[Our correspondent's theory is not so audaciously original as he seems to imagine. Has he not looked through the spectacles of the people who persistently suggested that the Whitechapel murderer was invariably the policeman who found the body? Somebody must find the body, if it is to be found at all.- Ed. P.M.P.]'

The editor had reason to be pleased that he inserted this letter, for it drew the following interesting communication from the great detective himself:-

'THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED

'Sir,-I do not agree with you that your correspondent's theory lacks

originality. On the contrary, I think it is delightfully original. In

fact it has given me an idea. What that idea is I do not yet propose to

say, but if 'One who looks through his own spectacles' will favour me

with his name and address I shall be happy to inform him a little

before the rest of the world whether his germ has borne any fruit.

I feel he is a kindred spirit, and take this opportunity of saying

publicly that I was extremely disappointed at the unsatisfactory

verdict. The thing was a palpable assassination; an open verdict has a

tendency to relax the exertions of Scotland Yard. I hope I shall not be

accused of immodesty, or of making personal reflections, when I say

that the Department has had several notorious failures of late. It is

not what it used to be. Crime is becoming impertinent. It no longer

knows its place, so to speak. It throws down the gauntlet where once it

used to cower in its fastnesses. I repeat, I make these remarks solely

in the interest of law and order. I do not for one moment believe that

Arthur Constant killed himself, and if Scotland Yard satisfies itself

with that explanation, and turns on its other side and goes to sleep

again, then, sir, one of the foulest and most horrible crimes of the

century will for ever go unpunished. My acquaintance with the unhappy

victim was but recent; still, I saw and knew enough of the man to be

certain (and I hope I have seen and known enough of other men to judge)

that he was a man constitutionally incapable of committing an act of

violence, whether against himself or anybody else. He would not hurt a

fly, as the saying goes. And a man of that gentle stamp always lacks

the active energy to lay hands on himself. He was a man to be esteemed

in no common degree, and I feel proud to be able to say that he

considered me a friend. I am hardly at the time of life at which a man

cares to put on his harness again; but, sir, it is impossible that I

should ever know a day's rest till the perpetrator of this foul deed is

discovered. I have already put myself in communication with the family

of the victim, who, I am pleased to say, have every confidence in me,

and look to me to clear the name of their unhappy relative from the

semi-imputation of suicide. I shall be pleased if any one who shares my

distrust of the authorities, and who has any clue whatever to this

terrible mystery or any plausible suggestion to offer, if, in brief,