“Not me,” said Bell, with a gulp. “You talked about a madman, sir, didn’t you?”
“Oh, no, no, no. Not the kind of mad that runs amuck. Not homicidal mania. This isn’t just smashing up a chap’s body for the sake of smashing. There’s lots of purpose here. This is damned cold, calculating crime. That kind of mad. Some fellow’s got an object that makes it worth while to him to do any beastliness. That’s the worst kind of mad, Bell. Not homicidal mania—that only makes a man a beast. What’s here is the sort of thing that makes a man a devil.”
“You’re going a bit beyond me, sir. It’s a bloody murder, and that’s all I want.”
“Yes, that’s our job,” said Reggie thoughtfully. Together they went off to Montmorency House.
“How would you describe deceased, sir?” said Bell.
“Man of about fifty, under middle height, inclined to be stout, unusual bald.”
“It ain’t much to go by, is it?” Bell sighed. “We don’t so much as know if he was clean shaved or not.”
“He was, I think. I saw no trace of facial hair. But it’s rash to argue from not finding things. And he might have been shaved after he was killed.”
“And then smashed? My Lord! And they smashed him thorough too, didn’t they?”
“Very logical bit of crime, Bell.”
“Logical! God bless my soul! But I mean to say, sir, we haven’t got much to go on. Suppose I advertise there’s a man of fifty missing, rather short and stout and bald, I shall look a bit of an ass.”
“Well, I wouldn’t advertise. He’d had an operation, by the way—on the ear. But I wouldn’t say that either. In fact, I wouldn’t say anything about him just yet. Hold your trumps.”
“Trumps? What is trumps then, Mr. Fortune?”
“Anything you know is always trumps.”
“You’ll excuse me, but it’s not my experience, sir.”
They came to Montmorency House, where detectives were already domesticated with the porter, and had done the obvious things. The body, it was to be presumed, had fallen from one of the windows opening on the well. The men who had flats round the well were all accounted for, save one. Mr. Rand, tenant of a flat on the top story, had not been seen for some days. Ringing at Mr. Rand’s door had produced no reply.
“Well, we do seem to be getting a bit warmer,” said Superintendent Bell. And his subordinate in charge of the inquiries at the flats beamed and rubbed his hands, and remarked that Rand seemed to have been a mysterious chap—only had his flat a few weeks, not used it regularly, not by any means; no visitors to speak of, civil but distant. “That sounds all right,” said Bell, and looked at Reggie.
“What was he like?” said Reggie.
“Middle size to biggish, wore glasses, well dressed, brown hair, which he wore rather long, they say,” the inspector reeled off glibly.
“That’s put the lid on,” said Bell. “Won’t do for the corpse. Warren. Not a bit like it. Well, sir, where are we now?” He turned to Reggie.
“You will go so fast,” Reggie complained, and sat down. “I’m pantin’ after you in vain. What’s the primary hypothesis, Bell?”
“Sir?”
“Do we assume the corpse is Rand, or that Rand chucked the corpse out of window?”
“Ah, there’s that,” said the inspector eagerly. “We hadn’t worked on that.”
“We haven’t worked on anything, if you ask me,” said Bell gloomily. “What’s your opinion then, Mr. Fortune?”
“The primary hypothesis is that we’re looking for an able, masterful madman. Therefore my opinion is that the whole thing will look perfectly rational when we’ve got it all combed out—grantin’ the madman’s original mad idea.”
“Am I to go round London looking for a rational madman?” Bell protested.
“My dear chap, you could catch ’em by the thousand. There’s nobody so damned rational as the lunatic. That’s where he falls down. Do not be discouraged. He’s logical. He don’t keep his eye on the facts. That is where we come in.”
“We’ve come in all right, but we don’t seem like getting out,” Bell grumbled. “I’m keeping my eye on the facts all right. But they won’t fit.”
“You’re very hasty today, Bell,” said Reggie mildly. “Why is this?”
“I can see that fellow’s face,” Bell muttered.
“Well, well! He’s told us all he can, poor devil. We’ll get on, if you please. Because Rand’s away, it don’t follow that Rand’s the corpse. It might have come out of some other tenant’s window. Know anything about the other tenants?”
“All most respectable, sir,” said the inspector.
“My dear man, the whole affair is most respectable. Do get that into your head. I dare say we’ll find the corpse was a conveyancer murdered by a civil servant. A crime of quiet middle-class taste. What sort of fellows are the other fellows?”
“Well, sir, there’s a retired engineer, and a young chap, just married, in the Rimington firm, and a naval officer, and several young doctors with consulting-rooms in Harley Street, and one of the Maynards, the Devonshire family. That’s all with any rooms on the well. I’ve seen ’em all, and, if you ask me, they’re right out of it; they’re not the sort, not one of them.”
“I dare say,” said Reggie. “They don’t sound as if they would fit. None of them heard anything?”
“No, sir; that’s queer, to be sure.”
“It happened the night of the blizzard. You wouldn’t have noticed a bomb. Well, who was Rand?”
“That’s what no one knows, sir. He’d only been here a few weeks. They’re service flats, you know, and furnished. He gave a banker’s reference. Bank says he has no money reason to be missing. Quiet, stable account. Income from investments. Balance three hundred odd. But the bank don’t know anything about him. He’s had an account for years. He used to live off Jermyn Street, apartment-house. The landlady died last year.”
“And the landlady died last year,” Reggie repeated. “He’s elusive, is Mr. Rand. Same like
