“Well, sir, he always has stuck to his men, I must say,” said Superintendent Bell.
“I wonder he could stick to Sandford for a day.”
“That Mr. Sandford, he is what you might call a superior person,” Bell chuckled. “Funny how they brazen it out, that kind.”
“Yes, I don’t doubt he thinks he was most impressive. Well, Fortune, there’s not much here for you, I’m afraid.”
Reggie had gone to the window and was fidgeting there. “I say, the wind’s changed,” said he. “That’s something, anyway.”
Phase III
The Man Under the Snow
The porter of Montmorency House, awaking next morning, discovered that even in the well of his flats, where the air is ever the most stagnant in London, the snow was melting fast. After breakfast he saw some clothes emerging from the slush. This annoyed him, for he cherished that little court. The tenants, he remarked to his wife, were always doing something messy, but dropping their trousers down the well was the limit. He splashed out into the slush and found a corpse.
After lunch Reggie Fortune, drowsing over the last published play of Herr Wedekind, was roused by the telephone, which, speaking with the voice of Superintendent Bell, urged him to come at once to the mortuary.
“Who’s dead?” he asked. “Sandford hanged himself in red tape? Kimball had a stroke?”
“It’s what you might call anonymous,” said the voice of the Superintendent. “Just the sort of case you like.”
“I never like a case,” said Reggie, with indignation, and rang off.
At the door of the mortuary Superintendent Bell appeared as his car stopped.
“You’re damned mysterious,” Reggie complained.
“Not me, sir. If you can tell me who the fellow is, I’ll be obliged. But what I want to know first is, what was the cause of death. You’ll excuse me, I won’t tell you how he was found till you’ve formed your opinion.”
“What the devil do you mean by that?”
“I don’t want you to be prejudiced in any way, sir, if you take my meaning.”
“Damn your impudence. When did you ever see me prejudiced?”
“Dear me, Mr. Fortune, I never heard you swear so much,” said Bell sadly. “Don’t be hasty, sir. I have my reasons. I have, really.”
He led the way into the room where the dead man lay. He pulled back the sheet which covered the body. “Well, well!” said Reggie Fortune. For the dead man’s face was not there.
“You’ll excuse me. I shouldn’t be any good to you,” said the Superintendent thickly, and made for the door.
Reggie did not look round. “Send Sam in with my things,” he said.
It was a long time afterwards when, rather pale for him, his round and comfortable face veiled in an uncommon gravity, he came out.
Superintendent Bell threw away his cigarette. “Ghastly, isn’t it?” he said with sympathy.
“Mad,” said Reggie. “Come on.” A shower of warm rain was being driven before the west wind, but he opened everything in his car that would open, and told the chauffeur to drive round Regent’s Park. “Come on. Bell. The rain won’t hurt you.”
“I don’t wonder you want a blow. Poor chap! As ugly a mess as ever I saw.”
“I suppose I’m afraid,” said Reggie slowly. “It’s unusual and annoying. I suppose the only thing that does make you afraid is what’s mad. Not the altogether crazy—that’s only a nuisance-but what’s damned clever and yet mad. An able fellow with a mania on one point. I suppose that’s what the devil is, Bell.”
“Good Lord, sir,” said Superintendent Bell.
“What I want is muffins,” said Reggie—“several muffins and a little tea and my domestic hearth. Then I’ll feel safe.”
He spread himself out, sitting on the small of his back before his study fire, and in that position contrived to eat and drink with freedom.
“In another world, Bell,” he said dreamily—“in another and a gayer world it seems to me you wanted to know the cause of death. And you didn’t want me to be prejudiced. Kindly fellow. But there’s no prejudice about. It’s quite a plain case.”
“Is it indeed, sir? You surprise me.”
“The dead man was killed by a blow on the left temple from some heavy, blunt weapon—a life-preserver, perhaps; a stick, a poker. At the same time, or immediately after death, his face was battered in by the same or a similar weapon. Death probably occurred some days ago. After death, but not long after death, the body received other injuries, a broken rib and left shoulder-blade, probably by a fall from some height. That’s the medical evidence. There are other curious circumstances.”
“Just a few!” said Bell, with a grim chuckle. “You’re very definite, sir, if I might say so. I suppose he couldn’t have been killed and had his face smashed like—like he did—by the fall?”
“You can cut that right out. He was killed by a blow and blows smashed his face in. Where did you find him?”
“He was found when the snow melted this morning in the well at Montmorency House.”
“Under the snow? That puts the murder on the night of the fifteenth. Yes, that fits; that accounts for his sodden clothes.”
“There’s a good deal it don’t account for,” said Bell gloomily.
“I saw him just as he was found?” Bell nodded. “Somebody took a lot of pains with him. He was fully dressed—collar and tie, boots. But a lot of his internal buttons were undone. And there’s not a name, not even a maker’s name, on any of his clothes. His linen’s new and don’t show a laundry mark. Yes, somebody took a lot of pains we shouldn’t know him.”
“I don’t know what you’re getting at, sir.”
“Don’t you? Is it likely a man wearing decent clothes would not have his linen marked and his tailor’s name somewhere? Is it likely a man who had his tie and collar on wouldn’t do up his undershirt? No. The beggar’s clothes were changed after he was killed. That must have been a grisly business too. He’s not a tenderhearted fellow who did
