The Tragedy of the Silver Moon E-Book

Arthur Gask

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

PROFESSOR PARIS STARBANK, for so he called himself, had a long string of letters after his name, but they did not indicate diplomas which had been granted to him by any recognised university or college and were quite worthless as far as his ability in any walk of life was concerned. Their meaning was of course, unintelligible to most people, but they meant that he belonged to the Society of Natural Healers, was a member of the Dietetic Brotherhood, and had joined the Union of Universal Therapeutists.

Leseprobe

THE TRAGEDY OF THE SILVER MOON

BY

ARTHUR GASK

1940.

© 2022 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782383832690

Table of Contents

CHAPTER I.—THE CRAFT OF THE QUACK.

CHAPTER II.—THE EXECUTIONER.

CHAPTER III.—BEAUTY AND THE BEAST.

CHAPTER IV.—THE THUG IN OUR MIDST.

CHAPTER V.—ANOTHER SENTENCE OF DEATH.

CHAPTER VI.—ON THE TRACK OF THE THUG.

CHAPTER VII.—THE TRAIL OF BLOOD.

CHAPTER VIII.—RUN TO EARTH.

CHAPTER IX.—RETRIBUTION.

CHAPTER I.—THE CRAFT OF THE QUACK.

PROFESSOR PARIS STARBANK, for so he called himself, had a long string of letters after his name, but they did not indicate diplomas which had been granted to him by any recognised university or college and were quite worthless as far as his ability in any walk of life was concerned. Their meaning was of course, unintelligible to most people, but they meant that he belonged to the Society of Natural Healers, was a member of the Dietetic Brotherhood, and had joined the Union of Universal Therapeutists.

The Professor was a man of varied attainments, and in his time had been a chemist’s errand boy, an employee in the Zoological Gardens, a kennelman to a veterinary surgeon, a conjurer, and a chauffeur and handyman to an East End practitioner of medicine. From the experiences gained in these occupations he now carried on a very successful practice as a quack doctor, styling himself “Professor” to avoid trouble with the police.

From his association with the chemist and the East End doctor he had started to acquire a knowledge of medicine, from his work with the veterinary surgeon he had learnt the use of the knife, from handling wild animals he had cultivated courage and authority, and from his conjuring he had come to realise that the great majority of people were quite easy to deceive.

He was of medium height, stoutish build, and about forty years of age. He had a large and heavy type of face, with full rounded cheeks and shrewd, calculating eyes. In repose his mouth was anything but kind.

Still, altogether he was by no means ugly, and hiding a cunningness of expression with an ever-ready smile, he passed with most people as a man of broad understanding and most sympathetically inclined.

Dressed smartly and in excellent taste, his outward appearance was that of an educated professional man, and no one would have supposed his father had been only a porter in the meat-market and his mother a little drab serving in a fried-fish shop. It was only when he spoke quickly and without care that one would have had grave doubts both as to his gentility and education, for then his aspirates were often missing and his grammar often incorrect.

A bachelor, his private residence was a good-class house in the best part of Hampstead, where a gardener-butler and a housekeeper ministered to his comfort. His consulting-rooms were at 69 Edgware Road, a corner building of five stories where he occupied as a self-contained flat, the whole ground floor of five rooms, with the yard at the back also included in his tenancy. The entrance to his flat was in a side street round the corner.

The professional rooms were furnished stylishly, with good engravings upon the walls, comfortable leather-covered chairs, and thick carpets covering all the floors. Two smart girls in the late twenties, dressed as nurses, were always in attendance. The Professor himself was always attired in spotless white ducks during his consulting hours.

His practice was quite a large one, and often seeing over twenty patients a day, he made plenty of money. Many of the patients were well dressed, and apparently of a good class. Not a few of them could have driven up in expensive cars had they so wished, but for reasons best known to themselves they preferred to park or garage their cars some distance away and arrive at the rooms on foot. Most of these latter patients were women.

Sometimes the Professor attended patients at their own homes, and then, upon occasions, his ways were most peculiar. He would not arrive until after nightfall, and the house would have to be in perfect darkness, or he would not enter. He would go, too, all muffled up, and spoke only in a hoarse whisper, so it was impossible for any of the patients to swear afterwards who it was who had actually attended them.

The police had their suspicions about a lot of things and were very interested in him. Not a few times they had called at the consulting-rooms to ask him certain questions. Then, however, he had neither seen nor heard of the person they were inquiring about, or else he stated he had only given a very harmless indigestion medicine, containing only the simplest drugs.

He had been invited to attend several coroners’ inquests, upon subpoena of course, but somehow he had never been able to help on the inquiries in any way, always assuming the pained attitude of a much maligned and misunderstood man.

The police had gnashed their teeth in impotent rage, being quite certain he would many times have been sent to penal servitude if only they could have sheeted home to him his undoubted guilt.

Among his unlawful activities they knew that he was trafficking in forbidden drugs, but although they had twice raided both his private house and his professional rooms, they had found nothing. To add to their fury, upon these occasions he had not showed the slightest resentment at their search. On the contrary, he had bowed them out, for all the world as if they were among his most valued and respected patients.

“And who’ll dare to tell us,” had snarled Inspector Tullock once to his colleague, Inspector Miles, when they were out in the street again, “that this ignorant quack here makes enough money to keep up all this style by pretending to treat people like a properly trained doctor? Why, he’d have been found out years and years ago, for he can’t know anything about the business. Damn it all, he used to be cleaning out the hyenas’ cages in the Zoo not long ago, and with all his silk shirts and suede gloves he’s only an ignorant, common fellow.” He had sworn angrily. “He’s cunning, right enough. I’ll grant you that.”

And certainly this self-styled Professor was cunning, for he managed to avoid all the traps which were set for him. He was always suspicious of people with big feet and could smell out, as if by instinct, a member of the Women Police who had been sent as a bogus patient to him. Directly she entered the room, one glance was sufficient to tell him what she was, and then, by a pre-arranged signal, the moving of the ink-pot upon his desk, the nurse in attendance never left his side. Upon these occasions, too, he always demanded his fee of one guinea in advance, and then would decline to examine the patient, and only discuss diet and regular exercise as a means of restoring lost health.

When a patient came accompanied by a friend he was always suspicious again, and to the talk which ensued neither the Chairman of the British Medical Association nor the Chief Commissioner of Police could have taken the slightest exception. It was a rule of life with Professor Starbank—never incriminate himself in front of a witness.

But the inspector had been quite wrong in stating that the Professor could know nothing about medicine. On the contrary, by the time the police came to be interested in him he had picked up quite a lot about the art of healing. He subscribed to a medical library and took in medical journals, being able both to understand and assimilate a lot of what he read. Added to that he had acquired quite a profound knowledge of human nature.

Indeed, there could be no denying he had made some remarkable cures, and among others, Sir Pompey Beadle, the wealthy company promoter, was a great feather in his cap. This man of many hundreds of thousands of hard cash swore right and left to all his cronies that Starbank knew more about diseases than all Harley and Wimpole Streets put together.

Sir Pompey’s had been quite an interesting case, for he had been the despair of practitioners in the West End, with irritating rashes upon his arms, legs and stomach. Nothing had seemed to do them any good, for Sir Pompey had absolutely refused to give up his heavy dinners, his champagne, his liqueurs and his old vintage port. Then one day he had heard of Professor Starbank, and as much to annoy his regular medical men as for any other reason, had gone to him.

“Can you cure me?” he asked scowlingly. “Mind you, I’m not going to alter my mode of living. I’ve lived the same way for twenty years and it can’t be doing me any harm.”

“Quite so,” agreed the Professor judicially. “Indeed, I consider it would be unwise to do so.” He nodded. “Yes, I can cure you in a fortnight, and you’ll begin to get better almost at once.” He had sized up his man and spoke sternly and with no cringing. “But you’ll have to follow my instructions minutely and come here every day, permitting nothing to interfere with your attendances.”

“Well, what are you going to do?” asked Sir Pompey, rather taken aback at being addressed, as he thought, so cavalierly by a practitioner who lived in so unfashionable a quarter as the Edgware Road.

“I’m going to give you some special Red Rays and some very strong medicine, of which you’re only to take the exact amount, not a quarter of a teaspoonful more or less. I shall only supply you with a day’s quantity of the medicine upon each visit, so that you won’t be tempted to take more, and you’re on no account to drink it within an hour of any food or it will be most dangerous to you. You’re to take it an hour before each meal and the last thing at night. You can have just the usual things to eat and drink which you are accustomed to, except that you’re not to take burgundy or any white wines.”

Then Sir Pompey was conducted into a room well filled with electrical appliances of various kinds and, with most of his clothes off, was laid upon a narrow operating-table. A nurse appeared and both she and the Professor put on big blue glasses and rubber gloves. Sir Pompey was given a pair of glasses of the same kind and told upon no account to remove them until the treatment was over. Strict silence was enjoined and the room was darkened. Then a fierce red light from above was swung over his body and at the same time a gentle magnetic current was run through him by way of two metal plates strapped to the soles of his feet. High up on one of the walls an electrical appliance crackled loudly, emitting long blue sparks. A strong, but pleasantly aromatic, perfume not unlike incense filled the room.

It was all most impressive, and Sir Pompey closed his eyes contentedly, being quite confident that at last he had come to the right man.

Three days later he shook the Professor warmly by the hand, giving it as his emphatic opinion that he felt at least a hundred per cent. better, and that the medicine he was taking must be very strong. Whereupon the Professor nodded with the solemn mien of one who was accustomed to handle drugs of a most deadly nature every day of his life.

Inwardly, however, he was much amused, for all he had given Sir Pompey to counteract his over-eating was a full teaspoonful of bicarbonate of soda dissolved in water flavoured with peppermint. It was an obsession of the Professor that an over-acid condition of the body accounted for quite half of the ailments from which people suffered.

Sir Pompey paid him a hundred guineas.

Another great triumph of Starbank had been old Mrs. Beddoes. This lady lived in South Kensington, and had plenty of relatives waiting upon her demise. She had suffered from deafness for many years, and all the great London aurists had been able to do for her was to recommend mechanical appliances of various kinds. The idea of these had been hateful to her and she had refused to make use of them. In the end she had given up all doctors, taking the view that it was sheer waste of time to go to them.

Two years later, however, her deafness had become much worse, and hearing of the Professor, she had consulted him. She told him her history and it pleased her that in his questioning he did not ask her age. She was very sensitive about that.

“I shouldn’t mind if I could get a little better,” she shouted, “even as I was two years ago when I gave up going to Dr. Villiers. Now do you think you can do anything for me? I don’t want you to start on any treatment unless you are quite sure.”

“I will examine you,” shouted back the Professor, and then, with the nurse in attendance, she was taken into the electrical room and laid upon the operating-table. The room was plunged into darkness except for the small but powerful light which was focussed, in turn, into each of her ears.

The examination was very brief there, and then the Red Ray was swung over her and through a stethoscope the Professor listened long and intently behind both ears, commanding her to breathe deeply the whole time.

This examination took quite half an hour, but it need not have lasted half a minute, as Starbank had seen all he wanted to with the first glance into her cars. They were nearly blocked up with wax.

“Yes, I can cure you,” he announced confidently as he helped her off the operating-table, “but I shall have to operate. No, no, I shall only use a local anaesthetic and you won’t feel it at all. There will have to be four days’ preparation, too, to render the ears perfectly sterile.”

So the old lady’s ears were plugged with cottonwool soaked with glycerine, and strapped over with adhesive plaster so that the plugs could not be dislodged.

Then on the fifth day, with great solemnity, and in complete darkness except for the inevitable Red Ray, Mrs. Beddoes was given a prick with a needle in both ears. Then a small cut was made, just enough to draw blood, and show stains afterwards upon the towels. Then the blue spark buzzing appliance was switched on fully and in the deafening roar which ensued, the softened wax was quickly syringed from the ears and glycerine plugs immediately re-inserted and bandaged in as before.

“Now, the day after tomorrow,” wrote the Professor upon a leaf of his professional paper, for of course the patient was now stone-deaf with her ears plugged up as they were, “I’ll come to your house at five o’clock and remove the plugs. Of course your hearing will not be perfect, but it will be improved tenfold.”

Two days later the plugs were taken out and the old lady was overjoyed. She said she could now hear much better, certainly as well as two years ago, and she wrote out a cheque for sixty guineas on the spot. Indeed, she was so delighted that Starbank left the house feeling rather glum. He swore angrily at himself that he had not asked double what he had been paid.

Yet a third triumph upon which he always looked back with great pride.

A little boy of eleven years of age, of well-to-do parents in Sussex had suddenly developed epileptic fits and it had been found that unless he was treated with drugs in sufficiently strong doses to make him dull and heavy, the fits kept on recurring.

A Harley Street specialist had been consulted, but apparently the child was never to be free from trouble unless he were unusually heavily drugged. Then the parents heard of Professor Starbank through Sir Pompey Beadle, and, unbeknown to their local doctor and the Harley Street specialist, asked him if he would come down to their place, a few miles out of Dorking, and give his advice as to what should be done for their son.

The Professor found the boy looking well-nourished, and healthy except for the dullness induced by the drugs which were being given him. He realised at once that the parents were shrewd and intelligent and not the type of people to be taken in for a moment, by any parlour conjuring tricks. He had made inquiries about them before he had come down and learnt that the father was an important person in the district and Chairman of the Bench of Magistrates.

So he sat back in his chair, looking very solemn and thoughtful and regarding the boy most intently. He let the father and mother do most of the talking.

He learnt of the doctors to whom the boy had been taken, the various treatments which had been given him and at his, the Professor’s, request, the exact details of the boy’s mode of daily life. Then he considered for a long time before he gave his opinion, wondering what on earth he could suggest in return for the big fee he was intending to charge for coming down. He might well have been puzzled, for as a matter of fact it was the first case of epilepsy he had been called upon to treat.

Yes, certainly he must tell them something very much out of the ordinary! His advice must be very different from that of the Harley Street specialist! He must startle them with something original!

He spoke at last and he spoke very slowly in order that he would drop no aspirates and his grammar be quite correct. He spoke decisively and in his best professional manner.

He told them that the boy was naturally healthy and strong, but that there was some kink in his constitution which would not allow him to live the ordinary life of a lad of his age, in the usual way. But their mistake was they were trying to make him live that ordinary life by filling him up with most powerful drugs in order to enable him to do so. That, however, was all wrong, for the aim must be to give him the life which suited him and which he could follow without recourse to any drugs at all.

So he must have no more drugs and his mode of life must be entirely altered. His whole diet must be changed. He must be taken at once off all dairy foods. He must be deprived of his daily four glasses of milk, his cream, his butter, and his milk puddings. Instead, he must live on fruit juice, margarine on his bread, crushed nuts—almonds preferred—potatoes and haricot beans. No, not an entirely vegetarian diet, for he could have a little beef, but it must be raw and finely scraped.

Now how the boy responded to this treatment can best be told by a conversation which took place in the following year between the mother and the Harley Street specialist when the two met by chance at a garden party.

The specialist inquired after the little boy, and the mother informed him that her son had not had a fit now for nearly fourteen months, the great doctor nodded smilingly.

“Ah, then our treatment proved quite a success!” he exclaimed, looking very pleased.

The mother looked rather embarrassed. “We—ll, no, Doctor,” she replied hesitatingly. “In fact, we took him to someone else and he cured him completely. We consulted a gentleman in Edgware Road. We called in a Dr. Starbank.”

“Starbank!” exclaimed the horrified doctor. “The man who calls himself ‘Professor.’” He spoke angrily. “You shouldn’t have gone to a cheap man like that!”

“Cheap!” ejaculated the mother, with her eyes opened very wide. “Why, he charged us a hundred guineas for coming down, and we’re only thirty miles from town!”

One evening, a few minutes before six, the Professor was alone in his consulting-rooms. The day’s work was over and the nurses had just left, but he was remaining to write some letters. The day had been rather a worrying one, for the police had been in to make some inquiries about a man in Eaton Square who had died from an overdose of morphia, and whom they had found out was a regular patient of his.

Naturally he had denied that he had ever supplied the man with any morphia or, indeed, had ever had any in his own possession, but the nasty-eyed Inspector Tullock had undoubtedly not believed him and had gone on questioning him until he had thought the beast would never stop.

Of course the dead man had got the morphia from him, and as a matter of fact for many months had been paying two guineas for a little phial, the actual cost of winch had been only half a crown. Still, they would never be able to prove anything and he felt quite safe.

But all the same the coming of the police was very annoying, for they had not worried him for a long time and he had been hoping they had crossed him off the list of suspects and forgotten all about him.

The door bell buzzed suddenly and he frowned. He did not like late callers; at the same time, however, he was always keen on the money and it was not his habit to let anything slip.

He opened the door to find an elderly man, carrying a leather handbag, standing upon the doorstep. “Professor Starbank?” queried the man. “Well, I’m very sorry to be calling so late, and if you can’t see me now I’ll make an appointment for another day, but it’ll have to be some time after five, because my work keeps me until then.”

“What do you want to see me about?” asked the Professor, frowning, thinking from the man’s bag that he was only a commercial traveller.

“Pain in the back, lumbago, I think. I get dreadful twinges at times.”

Starbank’s face cleared. Ah, a patient, and lumbago was often profitable! He might be able to put in much more than a bottle of medicine! It might mean battery and the all-curing Red Ray! He might get a fiver out of him! The man wasn’t poor! His clothes were of good quality.

He smiled with an assumption of great kindliness. “Well, come in, I’ll see you at once. I never turn anyone away who’s in pain.”

So the man entered and Starbank very quickly gave it as his opinion that the trouble was lumbago and must be treated at once if the risk of being laid up for many months was to be avoided.

The arrangement was made for a five-guinea cure, for which the patient was to have six treatments with the electric battery, with the first one being given straight away. The Professor was always of opinion that there was nothing like starting at once upon a treatment and getting a good deposit, cash down.

So the patient was taken into the electrical room, and with his coat and waistcoat removed and his shirt and vest pulled high up, was laid upon his side on the operating table. He indicated where he had been having pain and, the current of the battery being turned on, the electrode was moistened and pressed against the affected spot.

Then instantly a most unexpected thing happened. The patient gave a low moaning cry and rolled over upon his back, with his body sagging down in a horrible limpness. He closed his eyes and his jaw dropped.

“It won’t have hurt you,” called out the Professor anxiously, alarmed at the man’s appearance. “You’re quite all right.”

But the patient was not quite all right. On the contrary, his heart had stopped beating and he had ceased to breathe.

“Good God!” ejaculated the Professor, “he must have had a crock heart and the shock was too much for him!”

Then followed dreadful minutes for Starbank. He tried in every way possible to resuscitate the patient, but all to no purpose and at last he had to realise the man was dead.

With hands which trembled, he took some brandy from a cupboard and gave himself a stiff drink. Then, subsiding into a chair, he wiped over his forehead with a handkerchief and considered what he must do.

It was damnedly awkward. There was no doubt about that. He had done nothing wrong and it was not his fault, but it would do his practice a lot of harm. It would mean the cursed police coming in again and they would make as much fuss about it as they could, to spite him.

Then there would be the coroner’s inquest and it would be broadcast everywhere that he had had no training as a doctor and that his diplomas were quite worthless! It might even come out that he had once been an attendant at the Zoo. That brute, Inspector Tullock, had found it out somehow, for he had pretended to recognise him as the keeper in charge of the hyenas fifteen years ago.

What a paragraph it would make for the evening newspapers! “Hyena Attendant Practising as a Doctor in Edgware Road.”

Gad! It would ruin him! Ridicule kills!

A cunning look came into his face and he sprang briskly to his feet. He searched the man’s pockets and, from a card in his wallet, saw that his name was Husson and that he represented a firm of estate agents in Paddington Road. He was authorised to collect rents.

The Professor’s hands were quite steady as he unlocked the man’s bag with a key he found upon a bunch in his pocket. The bag contained a number of memorandum books, a fat bundle of notes done up with an elastic band—he found later that £72 10s. was the amount they totalled—and two big handfuls of loose silver.

Then, on the instant, he made up his mind what he would do. It could never be proved the man had visited him and so he would wait until it was dark and then carry his body away and dump it out in the country in some unfrequented spot.

Yes, it would be quite safe if he managed it properly! His car was in the garage in the yard outside and he could hide the body down upon the floor at the back and get it away without anyone being the wiser.

Ah, but he must be careful, for the windows of two houses overlooked his yard and people often sat at them of an evening with the blinds drawn up!

No, he mustn’t be seen carrying the body across the yard, and if it came out afterwards that the dead man had told someone of his intention to visit him that evening then he, Starbank, must be prepared with all the evidence to prove he must have left the rooms when the man had called.

His movements became very quick. He pocketed the bundle of notes and a certain amount of the silver. Then, putting on gloves, he carefully wiped away with a cloth all possible traces of finger-marks upon the leather bag. He locked up the bag and put back the keys in the pocket. Then he quickly re-dressed the man and laid his body out in the passage close to the back door.

Finally, he let himself out of the front door and proceeded to walk jauntily down Edgware Road in the direction of the Marble Arch.

Night had well fallen when he returned and he let himself in by his front door, pleased that there was no one in the side street to see him enter.

Then, through a window looking out on to the backyard, he made a stealthy survey of the houses opposite. Things were not quite so satisfactory there, for two rooms were lighted up and the windows of both of them overlooking the yard were wide open. There were people in the rooms and, sitting close to one of the windows, a woman was knitting.

He glanced round the yard. There was no moon showing, but it was a bright, starlit night. The high wall abutting on the side street cast a shadow over part of the yard from an arclight in the Edgware Road. The shadow was tall and dark close up by the wall, but it petered out by the far side of the yard, and everything was as clear as if in daylight there.

Across the middle of the yard, from the door of the house to that of the garage, the shadow was only waist high and the Professor frowned as he noted it. It was most awkward, for if he were carrying the body across the yard and the woman happened to look up, she would perceive instantly what he was doing.

He thought for a long moment and then his face cleared and he smiled at his resourcefulness. He looked for and found a good-sized coil of copper wire in a drawer. He always kept copper wire handy for repairs to his electric appliances if they went wrong. Then he got busy with the body in the passage.

A few minutes later he walked across the yard to the garage. Although he walked very quietly, as he had been expecting, the woman at the window looked up from her knitting. He let himself into the garage and the woman looked down again.

Then if anyone, of fixed purpose, had stared long and intently into the shadows of that little yard, he would have seen something to puzzle him.

Across the brick surface of the yard glided an object of a flattish oblong shape, and the strange thing about it was that it appeared to be moving on its own volition. From the look of it, it might have been something wrapped in a rug, and it moved slowly and with no jerks. Right across the yard it came and disappeared through the garage door.

It was the corpse of Professor Starbank’s patient being drawn into the garage by two long lengths of the copper wire.

Just after midnight a storm broke and the rain fell heavily. The Professor in his comfortable bed at home sighed happily that he had got home in time and that the backyard behind his rooms in Edgware Road would now be washed quite clean. He had been rather worrying about that yard and what marks the trailing of the dead man across it would have left upon the bricks.

The next morning he was the first to arrive at the rooms and he saw to it that by the time the nurse-attendants came, all traces of the late caller of the previous evening had disappeared. The rug had been put back in its proper place, the sheet on the operating-table smoothed down, and the pillow there plumped out, all ready for the next patient. He was confident he was quite safe.

A few minutes before one he went out as usual to snatch a hasty lunch. When he had time, he always chose a small cafe in the basement of a building in Fountain Street, a little unfrequented street, just off Seymour Square. The cafe was select and its charges high, but it was greatly esteemed by persons of certain taste for the excellent coffee it served, dispensed with great solemnity by a Hindu in a flowing garment and a fez, answering to the name of Osman. Osman had been born in a little village in the upper basin of the Ganges; he was elderly and had lived in London for many years.

The cafe had once been a large wine-cellar and its rather high roof was supported by two big arches. It was purposely kept dimly lighted, and its atmosphere was one of peace and quiet. It contained a wireless which, however, was only turned on at lunch time for the news and Stock Exchange information, and, then, tuned in very softly so as not to disturb the subdued conversation of the habitues of the cafe. It was apparently quite understood that people should talk only a little above a whisper when patronising “The Silver Moon.”

That particular morning Professor Starbank was thoughtfully partaking of a little plate of sandwiches when suddenly a police announcement came over the air that information was wanted as to the whereabouts of a Benjamin Husson, of 27 Pile Street, Paddington. It gave his description and asked that any information should be forwarded at once, either to the Paddington police or Messrs. Whistle & Smith, Estate Agents, of Bayswater Road.

Starbank smiled a crafty smile. It might be months or even years before any information would be forthcoming of Mr. Benjamin Husson! His body was certainly easily accessible to those who knew where to look for it, but unless a dog nosed it out—he frowned there—no one was likely to go looking about where it had been thrown! Yes, for a long time to come the man’s disappearance would be but another secret which the greatest city of the world was hugging to its mighty heart.

But the confident Professor was greatly mistaken there, as the body was found almost within twenty-four hours.

That afternoon a small paragraph appeared in some of the evening newspapers. It referred to the missing man, giving his name and address and mentioning that he was a rent collector and probably carrying about with him a good sum of money when he disappeared. It also added that foul play was feared.

Then, the next day, by the early morning post, an anonymous letter arrived at the Paddington Police Station, giving the information that Benjamin Husson was dead and disclosing, in a very strange way, where the body could be found. The letter was brief, and a well-executed drawing filled half of its one page. It stated the body was lying in the country somewhere, in a ditch about a hundred yards away from a small lane. There were bluebells and primroses growing in the field through which the ditch ran, and in the lane there was a signpost. The drawing was of the signpost, and on the several arms of it were inscribed: “Harrow 5 miles; Bushey 2 miles; Northwood 2 miles; Watford 3 miles.”

The ink upon the letter was of a peculiar colour and very faint, and Inspector Talbot, who opened it, had to carry it over to the window to read it. He summoned the senior detective on duty and handed it to him. Then he took an ordnance map and spread it out on the table.

“Five miles from Harrow and two miles from Bushey!” he commented. He pointed with his finger, “It’ll be about here, on Bushey Heath.” He frowned. “I expect it’ll turn out to be a fool’s errand, but you’ll have to go. Take Steele with you and start at once.”

But it certainly did not turn out to be a fool’s errand, and less than an hour later the inspector was very astonished to hear the detective’s voice over the phone, announcing excitedly that the body had been located in the exact place the anonymous writer had stated.

“And gee!” exclaimed the detective, “whoever wrote that letter must have been right on the spot when he drew that signpost, as the arm directing to Harrow is at a different angle to the others, exactly as he’s got it on the paper. It’s come out of the post at some time and been pushed back.”

“All right,” exclaimed the inspector, “you remain there and I’ll be round with the surgeon and photographer as quickly as possible. Ring up the Watford police, but don’t let them interfere. This’ll be a case for the Yard.”

Two days later the Inspector Tullock, so much disliked by Professor Starbank, happened to be calling at the Paddington Police Station upon another matter, and Inspector Talbot brought up the Husson case.

“You know, John,” he said frowningly to his brother inspector, “there’s something devilish funny about the whole business. Take that anonymous letter we had telling us where the body was; first, the writing upon it was so faint that I could hardly read it when I got it, and then that same evening, when I went to put the paper in the case, the writing had all faded away and the sheet was perfectly blank. Some kind of disappearing ink must have been used.”

“Ah, but they’ll soon get over that,” nodded Inspector Tullock. “The invisible ink wheeze is out of date now and they’ll get that writing back with photographs or rays or something as easy as pie. So don’t you worry there.”

“But they haven’t got it back, John,” said Talbot earnestly, “and I’ve just had a phone call from the Yard to say they can’t do anything with it. They say they’ve never had a case like it before.”

“Give ‘em time,” frowned Tullock. “They’ve never been beaten yet.”

His brother inspector went on: “Then, of course, although the post-mortem showed the man died from natural causes, heart failure, we don’t know what brought it on. Our surgeon says it might have been from sudden shock. One thing we do know—he died that afternoon somewhere close to the Edgware Road about six o’clock.”

“How the devil do you know that?” asked Tullock.

“Because about a quarter to six he called at Fullarton’s, the baker in Fairholme Street, to collect the month’s rent, and explained he was a bit late as he’d just been having a cup of tea and a bit of toast. Then from the contents of his stomach this toast had not long started to digest. As far as we can find out, this baker’s was the last rent he collected.”

“How much money would he have had on him then?” asked Tullock frowningly. “Have you any idea?”

“His employers say from seventy to eighty pounds. You see what we think happened was this. He suddenly became faint and was helped into some house to recover. Then he snuffed out straight away and the people in that house, realising he had got a lot of money with him, yielded to sudden temptation, took all the money, and waiting until it got dark, carted the body off into the country to where we found it.”

“Quite plausible,” grunted Tullock. “They probably loaded him up in some backyard.”

“There was one funny thing,” remarked the other thoughtfully. “When we took off his jacket and waistcoat we found his braces were twisted at the back, and I can’t understand how he could have gone about all day long with them like that. It’d have been most uncomfortable.”

Tullock did not seem much impressed. “Did he know he’d got a crock heart?” he asked.

“No, his wife says he’d never complained of that. He had, however, been saying he’d got a touch of lumbago and thought he ought to have some electric treatment for it.”

“All bosh that electric business!” exclaimed Tullock contemptuously. “That’s what those quacks use, and make a pot of money by it. There’s that humbug, Starbank, in Edgware Road who shoves rays and the galvanic battery into every fool he can get a quid out of. It doesn’t matter whether they’ve got a cold in the head, indigestion, rheumatism, lumbago, or any damned thing. It’s all the same to him and he turns on his——” but he suddenly stopped speaking and, with his mouth open and a startled expression upon his face, stood staring hard at his colleague.

“What’s bitten you, John?” asked Talbot. “Have you got a stomach ache?”

“Gosh, no,” exclaimed Tullock excitedly, “but I’ve got a hunch.” He spoke quickly. “Here, where’s that Fairholme Street where the baker lives?”

“Just off Edgware Road, the Marble Arch end.”

Tullock thumped his fist into the palm of his hand. “Then, tarnation, I’ll give you a clue to follow. Now, was that man Husson on the telephone?”

“Yes, his wife runs a little grocer’s shop in Hutt Street.”

“Then put me on to her at once. I’m going to shake the very life out of this mystery. You see if I’m not.”

A few minutes later Inspector Tullock hung up the receiver. “A sure thing!” he nodded grimly. “You heard—they knew of Starbank! He’d cured a friend of theirs of catarrh, when no one else could. Certainly, Husson hadn’t told her he was going to the quack; but then he was a man who often didn’t tell her about himself and she wouldn’t have known about the lumbago if he hadn’t got her to rub his back.” His voice rose in his excitement. “Don’t you understand now the meaning of those twisted braces? The man was partially undressed when he snuffed it. He was receiving treatment and probably the shock of the battery killed him. Then when Starbank put his clothes on after he was dead, he made a mess of those braces. See?”

Inspector Talbot whistled. “That baker’s shop is only a stone’s throw from Starbank’s! Starbank would do anything for money, and he’s got a car and a backyard!” His eyes opened very wide. “Gee! I believe, John, you’re right!”

But it was a very discomforted Inspector Tullock who waited upon the Chief Commissioner of Police late that same night.

“I’m afraid it’s no good, sir!” he said wearily. “I don’t think we can nail him! Starbank did it right enough, but we’ll not get the proof.”

“Well, tell me all about it,” frowned the Chief.

“He was out at lunch when we got to his rooms,” began the inspector, “and we had a good spin with his two nurses. They didn’t know anything of the man and were sure Starbank had no patient of the name of Husson. I think they believed they were speaking the truth. Still, we got out of them that on Tuesday they both went off together about a quarter to six, leaving this precious Professor alone in the rooms.”

The inspector smiled a grim smile here. “Then Starbank himself came in and he went as white as chalk directly he saw me. ‘You had a patient here on Tuesday evening, after the nurses had left,’ I said. He pretended to think, and then shook his head. ‘But you did, and his name was Husson,’ I said, and then he got angry and began blustering to know what I wanted and said we police were always persecuting him. Then he went on to swear he left not ten minutes after the muses had gone and——”

“Left in his car?” interrupted the Commissioner.

“No, left on foot to dine and have the evening in town. He said he returned to get his car about half-past ten and went straight home. Then I brought out the search-warrant, but I could tell by his face we weren’t going to find anything at the rooms, which we didn’t. He wasn’t looking quite so happy, however, when I told him we were going to search his private house as well and he got a bit white again. But off we went to Hampstead and, of course, he came with us.”

“Not in his own car?” asked the Commissioner sharply.

“Certainly not! He came in ours. I left one of our men to examine his car, almost as if it were under the microscope. Then, when we got to his house, he looked very sick and I don’t wonder he was anxious, for, upon making him open the safe he’s got there, we found £72 10s. all in one-pound and ten-shilling notes, except for two fivers.”

“Ah!” exclaimed the Commissioner and he nodded significantly.

The inspector shook his head vexatiously. “But they were all notes which had been well in circulation and there wasn’t a distinctive mark on any one of them.” He took a little brown-paper packet out of his pocket and laid it on the desk. “Still, I’ve brought them along to see if the experts can make anything of them, although to me they seemed hopeless.”

“But how did he explain having all that money in the house?” asked the Commissioner.

“Quite plausibly. He said he always kept a good amount handy because he went to the races almost every Saturday and then took from twenty to thirty pounds with him.” The inspector threw out his hands despondently. “How could we get behind that?”

“And you found nothing else in the house that seemed suspicious?”