Ginger satisfied his curiosity on the point; and these two cold-blooded young persons proceeded to hoist the body on to an ingenious arrangement of sticks, and so carried it off, under Gordon’s directions, to the tool-house.
As the spell of the uncanny presence was removed, Reeves’s horrified embarrassment ebbed from him a little, and left him with the sense that he ought to take command of the proceedings.
“Where’s Beazly likely to be?” he asked—Beazly was the doctor.
“He went out in the rain,” said Marryatt; “I should say he’d be about the tenth or eleventh by now. Look here, I’ll nip across and get him,” and in a moment he was running across the fairway.
“Seemed glad to get away,” said Reeves; “well, it’s too late for visiting the sick, and too soon for burying the dead. Carmichael, you’re looking a bit on edge, too; would you mind going across to Paston Whitchurch station and phoning up the police? Binver, I suppose, is the nearest place to get a bobby from. You will? Good.” And as Carmichael too made off, “Look here, Gordon, what are we going to do about it? I’ve got the feeling that there’s something wrong here. What do you say to doing a bit of detective work on our own—or are you feeling rotten?”
“Oh, I’m feeling all right,” said Gordon, “only what about the police? Won’t they want to look through the man’s things first? It would be awkward if we put ourselves on the wrong side of the law. Funny thing, I’ve no idea whether there’s any law against searching a dead body; yet, if there isn’t, how do the police ever get their clues?”
“Oh, rot, the police can’t be here for a good half-hour, and Beazly won’t mind if he comes along. Let’s take a bit of a look round, anyhow. He fell off the arch, and smashed up his face against the buttress, that looks pretty clear. Now, did he fall off the line, or off a train?”
“If you ask me, I should say he fell off the parapet. I’ve noticed, sometimes, what a long way it really is from the door of one’s carriage to the parapet—a man falling from a carriage would never reach the edge.”
“Ah,” said Reeves, looking up, “but you’re imagining the train stationary. He would be hurled forward some way by the impetus, if he jumped off a moving train. And I should say he could have started falling down that bank to the right, just before the parapet begins. He’d roll forwards and sideways, if you see what I mean, till he got to where the stonework begins, up there, and then, plop.”
“I dare say you’re right. Anyhow, we’d better be quick and look at the body.”
As they went towards the tool-house, Reeves gave a sudden exclamation. “By Jove, his hat! And it’s—let’s see—I should say fifteen yards to the north of the body. Now why?”
“How do you mean?”
“There was no wind this afternoon. If his hat fell with him, it would lie with him. If it lies a dozen yards away, that looks as if—as if it was thrown after him. The considerate fellow-passenger hardly does that, does he?”
“You mean there’s been dirty work?”
“I mean it looks as if there’d been dirty work. Now for the tool-shed.”
To search a dead body is not an easy performance, unless you are in a hurry and have got to do it. Gordon did most of the work, and Reeves checked his results for him. The pockets contained a handkerchief, marked with the name “Masterman,” a cigarette-case, of a common pattern, containing a cigarette of a brand smoked by every second man in the neighbourhood, a half-empty box of matches, a pipe and an empty pouch, two florins, a letter and a business communication both addressed to S. Brotherhood, Esq., and a watch and chain. They also found, written on the back of the letter, a pencilled list of goods, as if to remind a man of his shopping needs.
“It’s a queer thing,” said Reeves, “that watch; because he’s got one on his wrist too. How many people, I wonder, carry a stomach-watch as well as a wristwatch? It’s stopped, I suppose?”
“Blessed if it isn’t going! An hour fast, apparently, but going. Good advertisement for the makers, what?”
“But the wristwatch?”
“That’s stopped.”
“When?”
“Six minutes to five.”
“What did I say about trains? The 4:50 from Paston Oatvile would be just passing here at six minutes to five. How’s that for deduction?”
“Looks all right, anyhow. And, by Gad, here’s a third single from town to Paston Whitchurch. Is today the sixteenth? Yes, then that’s quite on the square. Now, stand by while I see if his clothes are marked.”
But neither coat nor shirt, neither collar nor trousers bore any mark of ownership. The suit was from Messrs. Watkins in New Oxford Street, the shirt and collar were of a brand which it would be mere advertisement to mention. During all this time, Reeves was making a transcript of the three documents, not without a certain sense of intrusion upon a dead man’s confidence. As Gordon began to look into one of the boots, Reeves gave a whisper of warning, and a policeman (for they have motorcycles even in the police force) came into distant view. Panic seized the forces of Baker Street, and (forgetting that they had a perfect right to be in charge of the dead man’s body) they resumed, very shamefacedly, their search for the lost ball. It seemed incongruous somehow, to be worrying about a golf-ball—ought there to be a local rule about what happened if you found a corpse on the links? Certainly the game had been abandoned, and the caddies, to their great regret, sent back with the clubs.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” said the policeman, eyeing them narrowly. It was not that he suspected them or anybody of anything; he merely sized them up by force of habit to see whether they were the kind of
