The Studio Crime (29 page)

“And it was I,” said Mordby dispiritedly, “who gave Inspector Hembrow the information that Merewether had gone. When I left the taxi-rank I went straight to Merewether's address. His sister informed me that he had been called away suddenly to see his brother, who had been taken ill, and that a locum-tenens was arriving in the afternoon. I went straight with this information to Scotland Yard. I told myself that it was to save the woman I had loved from association with a murderer. But I knew in my heart that it was nothing but blind, instinctive jealousy and hatred. I was glad to have an excuse for putting the police on Merewether's track.”

“If it is any comfort to you, Dr. Mordby,” said John, “I think I can assure you that your information to the police was quite superfluous. Dr. Merewether and Mrs. Frew would have been arrested in any case, without your intervention. I must thank you for being so frank with me. And now I have to make a little journey to Fleet Street.”

“But,” cried Mordby, springing to his feet as John rose and looked at his watch, “can you assure me, Christmas, that Phyllis—that she—”

“That she is innocent of this charge? Undoubtedly, Dr. Mordby. If you will come here to-morrow, I hope to prove it to you, and to all of Merewether's friends. I shall be back in about two hours, Laurence, and I hope to bring with me the last links in the chain of evidence.”

So saying, he took his departure, followed soon by Dr. Mordby. Laurence wandered meditatively around the studio for a while, unable to settle down to work, feeling in no very cheerful frame of mind. The news brought by Dr. Mordby had disturbed him deeply, and although the suspicion that Merewether might be guilty did not cross his loyal mind, he did not altogether share John's optimistic hope of a speedy discharge. However, John had promised to return in two hours, and he realized that until then he must possess his soul in patience, and settled down to work as the surest antidote to melancholy.

He had just completed a fresh, and, as he himself observed with some surprise, highly-idealized portrait of Serafine Wimpole, when Greenaway entered and announced that Sir Marion Steen had called. Laurence, who did not feel at all in the mood for discussing the turn events had taken with anybody but John, muttered, to Greenaway's shocked surprise:

“Blow Sir Marion Steen!” and contemplated for a moment saying that he was out. His natural truthfulness and amiability, however, got the better of his inclination, and he added that Greenaway might show Sir Marion in. The old man still hesitated in the doorway.

“Is it true, sir,” he asked at last, “that Dr. Merewether's been arrested for the murder of Mr. Frew, sir? My son says as it is, sir, but surely it can't be! Dr. Merewether always seemed such a—”

“Oh, go away, Greenaway!” said Laurence irritably. He perceived that he would have to endure a good deal of harping on this string before long, and felt his nerves weakening already at the prospect. “We shall no doubt know quite as much as we want to when we open our morning papers.”

Greenaway vanished with an apology, and Laurence immediately regretted his own ill-temper. It was plain from Sir Marion's grave face as he entered the studio that he also had read the stop press news, and he began without preamble, dropping into a chair:

“I was hoping I might find Christmas here in your company, Mr. Newtree. Have you seen the—ah, I see you have! And I see by your face that the worst has happened. I've been hoping against hope as I came along here that the arrested man would turn out to be a stranger.”

“There seems to be no doubt,” said Laurence, sitting down on his working-stool and bracing himself up to endure the inevitable questions and condolences as best he could, “that Merewether has been arrested. But I shouldn't call it the worst. Christmas says he'll soon be discharged.”

Laurence was surprised at the amount of confidence he managed to infuse into his voice, and went on, encouraged by the sound of it: “He says that he knows who the murderer is, though he hasn't quite completed his case yet.”

“God grant that he may be right,” said Sir Marion quietly. “Are you expecting him here soon? If so, perhaps I might wait a while and see him, if my presence doesn't worry you in these tragic circumstances, Newtree. I should like in any case to know the name of Merewether's solicitor, for if this matter should come to the worst I shall make it my business to procure him the best defence that can be got.”

“Oh, I don't think there'll be any need for that, Sir Marion!” said Newtree with a cheerfulness that sounded positively blatant in his own ears, in contrast to the heaviness of his heart. “Christmas says he'll be discharged to-morrow.”

There was a pause. Sir Marion's lined and pensive face seemed to express a kindly tolerant scepticism of John's powers to bring about this wished-for result.

“It is difficult to understand,” he said diffidently at length, voicing Newtree's own heavy thoughts. “What can have made an innocent man take to flight? I suppose that he saw that appearances went against him, and lost his head. But it seems extraordinary that a man of Merewether's obvious intelligence and strength of mind—”

The philanthropist finished the sentence with a lift of the eyebrows and a shake of the head. Before Newtree could think of an adequate rejoinder (and, indeed, there was none) brisk footsteps sounded on the gravel, and after a moment or two John Christmas entered, carrying a bundle of papers under his arm and looking both grave and tired.

“Ah, Sir Marion!” he said as the great financier greeted him with a sympathetic smile. “I half expected I should find you here. I knew your interest in Merewether's fortunes, and guessed that it would bring you here for news. Oh, Lord! I'm tired! Get me a drink, Laurence, there's a good chap.”

He took a long draught from the glass Laurence handed him and dropped into a chair with a sigh.

“The last four days must have been very crowded ones for you,” said Sir Marion sympathetically. “Especially if, as Newtree tells me, you have collected sufficient evidence to vindicate Merewether's innocence of this dreadful charge.”

“It has been rather a crowded hour of life,” replied Christmas. “I won't say ‘glorious life.' For though it is pleasant to feel that one holds the power to vindicate a friend, it is not pleasant to have to do so at the expense of someone else.”

“Do I understand then,” asked Sir Marion, leaning forward with a look of keen interest on his fine, gentle features, “that you not only hold proofs of Merewether's innocence, but also of the real murderer's complicity?”

“Yes, Sir Marion. I do not say that my case is sufficiently strong as it stands to convince a jury. But I think that by to-morrow it will be strong enough to procure Merewether's discharge and to turn Hembrow's attention towards establishing the real identity of the man I have in mind.”

“But this sounds almost too good to be true,” said Sir Marion. “I suppose my curiosity must remain unsatisfied until to-morrow. But I cannot refrain from asking you now whether the solution has anything to do with the mysterious Turk who spoke to me in Greentree Road?”

John looked dreamily across the wide studio.

“That is not altogether an easy question to answer, Sir Marion,” he replied gravely. “He figures in the solution. He appears in the story as that lay figure over there appears in an artist's pictures.”

And he pointed to the featureless wooden figure draped in a mandarin's robe which, with its arms bent stiffly under the wide sleeves and its gleaming bald head bent, appeared to be listening earnestly to the conversation.

“In one of Laurence's pictures that wooden figure might appear as a Chinese priest. In another, as a woman dressed in the height of fashion. In another, as a—let us say as a man in a fez. But apart from Laurence's pictures it has no life. It is only a lay figure.”

There was a pause. Sir Marion, who had been listening attentively to this exposition, continued to gaze contemplatively at John's grave face for a moment, then, coming to himself with a start, exchanged a rather puzzled glance with Newtree.

“You might just tell us where you've been this evening,” said Laurence, hoping to draw his friend from the realm of fancy to that of fact. “And what those two papers are you're nursing so carefully on your knee.”

“Certainly,” replied John with a smile. “I have been to Fleet Street, Covent Garden and Bloomsbury. And these two papers are copies of last month's
Collector
.” Laurence took one up and began idly to look through it.

“You could have got a copy of this at a bookstall without chasing down to Fleet Street,” he remarked.

“Until I had chased down to Fleet Street, my dear Laurence, and looked through the files of this and several other similar publications, I did not know what paper it was I wanted. I only knew that I wanted one in which a certain photograph had appeared. Ah, I see,” he added, as Newtree uttered an exclamation, “that you have discovered the photograph in question.”

“Good Lord!” ejaculated Laurence. “Is this the man who passed you on the night of the murder, Sir Marion? It seems to answer exactly to his description.” Sir Marion put on his glasses and took the magazine from Laurence. The photograph showed the intellectual and rather melancholy face of a middle-aged Greek wearing a fez and having a slight cast in his left eye. He was looking at a small ivory carving which he was holding up against the light, and his lips were parted in a pensive smile. A gold-crowned tooth, showing dark in the white row, had not been touched out by the art of the photographer. Underneath were written the lines:

“Mr. Oscar Lascarides, whose shop in Ainslie Street is much frequented by collectors of fine Oriental works of art, examining a newly-acquired treasure.”

“I can save Sir Marion the trouble of answering your question, Laurence,” said John quietly, as the financier was about to speak. “It is not the man. It is the model. I have seen the man and this is a very good photograph of him, though flattering. It is carefully taken to minimize the effect of the truly appalling squint from which he suffers.”

“You are very uncommunicative, John,” complained Laurence, laying the paper on the table with a last fascinated glance at the interesting face of Mr. Lascarides. “At least you are very mysterious in your communications.”

“On the contrary,” said John gravely, “I am being very communicative and not in the least mysterious. And to prove it I will show you this, which I found waiting for me at my flat in Bloomsbury.”

He drew from his pocket a small cardboard box and took from it a tiny object wrapped in tissue paper, which he unwrapped and laid upon the table.

“Why,” exclaimed Newtree, “it's the little piece of metal old Brett the crossing-sweeper gave you the other day! You don't mean to say that you found out anything from that?”

“I took it to a chemical analyst who is an old friend of mine,” said John with a sigh, “and this is his report upon it: ‘The object is a thin piece of eighteen carat gold and is engraved on one side with an elaborate floral pattern such as is frequently found on old-fashioned lockets and watch-cases. The edges have been cut with a strong pair of scissors or clippers. The fragment shows traces of mud and road-dust, and there is a minute trace of human blood upon one of the roughened edges.'”

John sighed as he replaced the lid of the little box and put it in his pocket.

“And what did you find in Covent Garden?” asked Laurence, with a puzzled but hopeful air. “Though I can't make head or tail of your discoveries at present!”

“In Covent Garden,” said John rather wearily, “I obtained an interesting piece of information at the premises of Messrs. Ryebody and Pratt, theatrical costumiers. And as I walked back here along Greentree Road I noticed, not for the first time, that there is a long, narrow passage about ten yards the other side of Shipman's Mews, which leads through into the recreation ground. And now,” he added, disregarding his friend's exclamation of bewilderment, “do you think you could persuade Greenaway to produce some food? I haven't had a meal since breakfast.”

“I'll leave you to your rest and refreshment,” said Sir Marion, rising, “with many thanks for bearing with my curiosity so long. I am afraid I have fatigued you a good deal... I suppose you do not happen to know the address of Dr. Merewether's solicitor?” he added, turning to Newtree. “You do? I should be glad to have it. For, should our friend Christmas by some evil chance be unable to convince the police of Merewether's innocence, I shall make it my business to procure him a good defence.”

John, who had stayed the night at Madox Court on the feeble pretext that he had an objection to going home in the dark, came to breakfast the next morning looking so heavy-eyed and pale that Laurence exclaimed in concern at the sight of him.

“You don't look exactly brilliant yourself,” remarked John, drawing up a chair.

“To tell you the truth,” replied Laurence, looking somewhat ashamed of himself, “I hardly slept all night, thinking of poor Merewether.”

“I didn't sleep much either,” confessed John, looking with an unfavourable eye at his eggs and bacon and pouring himself out some strong black coffee. “But I wasn't thinking of Merewether.”

His eye strayed speculatively to the newspapers that still lay folded in a pile upon the floor. Newtree subscribed to all the daily papers, under the impression that this catholicity was likely to give him good ideas for cartoons. But he rarely opened more than one or two, and the long-suffering Greenaway struggled in vain to find domestic uses for the never-ceasing accumulation of news-print.

“I haven't had the pluck to open the beastly things yet,” said Laurence, picking up one or two with a wry smile. “I suppose we shall find Merewether's name sprawled all over them. Which one shall I open first?”