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Authors: John Dickson Carr
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the house on my own responsibility.
“ This afternoon, just previous to the writing of this report, stroke of good fortune has rendered this easy. Another occupant of 16, L. I. F. (not my previous informant), who had promised to give me some cast-off clothes, suggested that I call round for them tonight. I had a good excuse for scraping his acquaintance at the beginning, as I did with other occupants of the house; in this case since he and I were of a similar height, and I said that I was in need of suitable—’”
“Boscombe, of course,” nodded Dr. Fell. He had lit the cigar and was puffing at it in a sort of puzzled obstinacy at the report. “Personally, Hadley, I don’t like the sound of the whole thing. It’s fishy. It may have impressed Ames’s mind; but then Ames died because it did. The question is, what damned sort of trick were Boscombe and Stanley going to put up on him? There was something, I’ll swear. And it’s a new confusing set of tracks that runs side by side with Jane the Ripper’s footprints … No, no. Boscombe didn’t intend to give a derelict any new clothes. Boscombe, in a pub, would only have cursed such a seedy beggar and had him chucked out. There was a game he and Stanley played, right enough. What else?”
Hadley ran his eye down the reports.
“That’s about all. He says that he arranged to call on Mr.— whoever it is, his benefactor—at a late hour. Then he sketches out what he intends doing. He will call on this Boscombe, receive the clothes, pretend to leave the house, hide, and then indulge in a little burglary in the room of the accused woman. He trusts that this slight irregularity will meet with the approval of his superiors— Bah! Why write that?—and concludes at 5 p.m., Thursday, the 4th inst, G. F. Ames … Poor devil!”
There was a silence. Hadley threw the report on the table; he discovered that he was rolling to pieces an unlighted cigar, and made an ineffectual attempt to light it.
“You’re absolutely right, Fell. It does sound fishy. What I can’t do is put my finger on the exact point where its fishiness is most apparent. Maybe that’s because I don’t know enough facts. So—”
Dr. Fell said, meditatively, “I suppose he really did write that report?”
“Eh? Oh yes. Well, there’s no question of that. Even aside from his handwriting, he brought the thing in himself. He wrote it right enough. Besides, I don’t want you to get the impression, from whatever I’ve said, that Ames was anybody’s fool; far from it. He had good reason for writing what he did. He had—”
“Did he have a sense of humour, for instance?” enquired Dr. Fell, with owlish blankness. “Was he above juggling facts a bit and indulging in a little leg-pull, if he thought he did it in a good cause?”
Hadley scratched his chin.
“Suppose he had? Ames would have needed a very remarkable sense of humour to invent a story about a woman burning blood-stained gloves merely to get a hearty laugh out of the C. I. D. Look here,” said Hadley, querulously, “you don’t doubt that this woman, this Jane the Ripper, is really in the house, do you?”
“I haven’t any reason to doubt it. Besides, there’s no need to be charitable in our suspicions; there’s certainly a murderer here, and as nasty a one as I’d ever thought to meet … Listen, now. I’ll tell you exactly what happened, and you can draw your own conclusions.”
Dr. Fell spoke briefly and sleepily; but he omitted nothing. Cigar smoke began to thicken in the room, and Melson felt his wits thickening with it. He tried to fasten on the essential points that puzzled him, to ticket them in readiness for Hadley’s questions. Long before Dr. Fell had finished, Hadley was pacing the room. As Dr. Fell waved his hand and uttered a long rumbling sniff to indicate that the picture was complete, Hadley stopped by one of the clock-cases. “Yes,” agreed the chief inspector, “it makes some things straight, and a
“ This afternoon, just previous to the writing of this report, stroke of good fortune has rendered this easy. Another occupant of 16, L. I. F. (not my previous informant), who had promised to give me some cast-off clothes, suggested that I call round for them tonight. I had a good excuse for scraping his acquaintance at the beginning, as I did with other occupants of the house; in this case since he and I were of a similar height, and I said that I was in need of suitable—’”
“Boscombe, of course,” nodded Dr. Fell. He had lit the cigar and was puffing at it in a sort of puzzled obstinacy at the report. “Personally, Hadley, I don’t like the sound of the whole thing. It’s fishy. It may have impressed Ames’s mind; but then Ames died because it did. The question is, what damned sort of trick were Boscombe and Stanley going to put up on him? There was something, I’ll swear. And it’s a new confusing set of tracks that runs side by side with Jane the Ripper’s footprints … No, no. Boscombe didn’t intend to give a derelict any new clothes. Boscombe, in a pub, would only have cursed such a seedy beggar and had him chucked out. There was a game he and Stanley played, right enough. What else?”
Hadley ran his eye down the reports.
“That’s about all. He says that he arranged to call on Mr.— whoever it is, his benefactor—at a late hour. Then he sketches out what he intends doing. He will call on this Boscombe, receive the clothes, pretend to leave the house, hide, and then indulge in a little burglary in the room of the accused woman. He trusts that this slight irregularity will meet with the approval of his superiors— Bah! Why write that?—and concludes at 5 p.m., Thursday, the 4th inst, G. F. Ames … Poor devil!”
There was a silence. Hadley threw the report on the table; he discovered that he was rolling to pieces an unlighted cigar, and made an ineffectual attempt to light it.
“You’re absolutely right, Fell. It does sound fishy. What I can’t do is put my finger on the exact point where its fishiness is most apparent. Maybe that’s because I don’t know enough facts. So—”
Dr. Fell said, meditatively, “I suppose he really did write that report?”
“Eh? Oh yes. Well, there’s no question of that. Even aside from his handwriting, he brought the thing in himself. He wrote it right enough. Besides, I don’t want you to get the impression, from whatever I’ve said, that Ames was anybody’s fool; far from it. He had good reason for writing what he did. He had—”
“Did he have a sense of humour, for instance?” enquired Dr. Fell, with owlish blankness. “Was he above juggling facts a bit and indulging in a little leg-pull, if he thought he did it in a good cause?”
Hadley scratched his chin.
“Suppose he had? Ames would have needed a very remarkable sense of humour to invent a story about a woman burning blood-stained gloves merely to get a hearty laugh out of the C. I. D. Look here,” said Hadley, querulously, “you don’t doubt that this woman, this Jane the Ripper, is really in the house, do you?”
“I haven’t any reason to doubt it. Besides, there’s no need to be charitable in our suspicions; there’s certainly a murderer here, and as nasty a one as I’d ever thought to meet … Listen, now. I’ll tell you exactly what happened, and you can draw your own conclusions.”
Dr. Fell spoke briefly and sleepily; but he omitted nothing. Cigar smoke began to thicken in the room, and Melson felt his wits thickening with it. He tried to fasten on the essential points that puzzled him, to ticket them in readiness for Hadley’s questions. Long before Dr. Fell had finished, Hadley was pacing the room. As Dr. Fell waved his hand and uttered a long rumbling sniff to indicate that the picture was complete, Hadley stopped by one of the clock-cases. “Yes,” agreed the chief inspector, “it makes some things straight, and a
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