Chapter X

“There’s the mark,” Colonel Lockwood said. “Right under his hair, as you see.” They were standing, late in the evening of the same day, in the dark little mortuary, whose only light was an oil lamp, which shed a sickly greenish ray on the face of the corpse. Neither Wilson nor Michael, however, was enough of a novice to be moved in any way by their physical surroundings; and the latter coolly got out his electric torch and bent to survey the bruise.

Whatever charm it was that Wilson had employed on the Colonel--perhaps only the disclosure of his own identity--it had worked a considerable change in the latter’s manner to Michael. It was a very worried and perplexed, but not a truculent soldier, who came to the inn after dinner to conduct them to the mortuary; and his one desire appeared to be that Michael should have all the facilities he required. Dr. Kershaw, Michael noted with pleasure, either had not been invited to be present, or had decided not to come.

“It’s hardly serious enough to cause death, Kershaw says,” the Colonel remarked to Wilson; “but it’s quite sufficient to cause him to break his neck, if he was falling at all hard. Well, doctor, what d’you make of it?”

Michael made no answer, but motioned to Wilson to take his place. His brow was puckered with perplexity. Wilson, in his turn, bent over the corpse and examined the head closely, opening the mouth, feeling the cut under the hair, and passing his hands around the skin of the neck. When, after three or four minutes, he too straightened himself, the light fell for a moment full on his face, and Michael read in it a confirmation of his own opinion.

“Is it all serene, doctor?” the Colonel asked again.

“I’m afraid _not_,” Michael said gravely.

“Why? What’s the matter?”

“There _is_ a contusion,” Michael said; “and it might have been sufficient to break his neck, if he had been alive when it was made. But it was made after death.”

“After death! What do you mean? You can’t know that.”

“Pardon me. If you look at the skin now----” Michael drew him to the body, and gave a brief technical explanation. “That wound was made after death,” he ended, “and some considerable time after death, too.”

“Then--he didn’t hit his head as he fell in. He must have hit something while he was in the water.... Of course, he struck the barge, or the barge struck him.... But, in that case, how did he break his neck?”

“Precisely,” said Michael. “How did he break his neck?”

“I suppose,” the Colonel pursued his agitated reflections, “that must have been the barge too--or something else he hit up against while he was in the water. He _could_ have broken his neck after death, couldn’t he, doctor?”

“In that case, Colonel Lockwood, what did he die of?”

“Good God! I see what you mean. In that case, he _must_ have been drowned.”

“Well, you’ve had the post-mortem, haven’t you? What did the doctors say?”

“I think they disagreed, at first. But finally they both reported that death could not possibly have been due to drowning.”

“But the man is dead.”

“Not much doubt of that, poor fellow,” said the Colonel. “But I don’t quite follow you, doctor. What are you suggesting?”

“What _did_ the doctors find to be the cause of death?”

“A broken neck, they suggest, consequent upon his hitting his head in a fall.”

“Well, he didn’t. Not in that place, anyway--though I can’t think how I came to miss it yesterday,” said Michael.

“If you made a mistake yesterday,” said Colonel Lockwood hopefully, “don’t you think it may be possible that you’re making another to-day?”

“I’m afraid not. You see, I’ve had plenty of time to-night.”

“Then what in hell _did_ the man die of?”

“I think I can answer that,” said Wilson, who had been standing silently by. He went back to the corpse. “Look at that, Michael,” he said. Michael bent down, and gave a horrified exclamation. “Good God!” he said.

“You agree?” said Wilson.

“What is it?” the Colonel asked.

“He’s been strangled,” said Michael slowly.

“_What?_ What’s that?” said the Colonel, now thoroughly alarmed. “What fairy-tale is this, sir?”

“Look for yourself,” said Michael. “Take my torch and the lens. Do you see that mark? It goes right round the neck--here--and here; that’s the mark of a rope--a very fine rope----”

“Probably a silk rope,” said Wilson. “I think there’s a silk fibre there.” He took it off as he spoke, and held it out for Michael and the Colonel to see.

“You’re right,” said Michael. “You see, Colonel, the superficial marks have been nearly obliterated by the water; but they’re quite plain when you’ve noticed them. And that explains some things that had puzzled me about his face. I thought he didn’t look like a drowned man.”

“But, good God,” the Colonel said again, “I can’t believe it! You say the poor devil was strangled. That means, as far as I can see, that it wasn’t accident--or suicide.”

“The case,” said Michael grimly, “is one of murder.”

“Is that your view too, Mr. Wilson?” asked the Colonel. Wilson nodded. The three stood still for a moment, facing the fact, in the dark, half-lighted room.

“He was strangled,” the Colonel repeated. “Strangled! But how?”

“With a silk rope,” said Michael.

“And in a rather peculiar way,” Wilson added. “Did you notice the position of the marks, Michael?” He illustrated on his own neck, while the Colonel shuddered in horror. “Do you remember, they come close up under his chin, and then slope up at the back of his head? And his neck was broken. Doesn’t that suggest anything to you?”

“Good God!” said Michael, as Wilson’s meaning came gradually home to him. “It’s not possible. You don’t mean----?”

Wilson nodded, and Michael took hold of the bench for support. He was feeling slightly sick.

“Mean what?” asked the Colonel. “You’re talking in riddles. _How_ was he strangled?”

“He was hanged,” said Michael in a low voice. The brutality of the crime appalled him, but “appalled” is no word to describe the Colonel’s appearance.

“_Hanged!_” he said in a stupefied voice. “_Hanged!_ But what do you mean? _Hanged?_”

“Hanged by the neck until he was dead,” Wilson said slowly. The meaning of his words began gradually to dawn on the Colonel.

“Hanged!” he said at last. “But--who on earth would hang him?”

“That, I imagine,” said Wilson, “is what has now to be discovered.”

For a minute or two the soldier paced up and down the mortuary, with a look of desperate perplexity on his face. Then it suddenly lightened a trifle, and he turned to Wilson.

“But, surely,” he said, “what you’ve just said is compatible with suicide at least. A man may hang himself.”

“A man may hang himself,” Wilson replied, “but he certainly can’t cut himself down and throw away the rope. If it was suicide, all the circumstances go to show that some one else is pretty deeply implicated. And I don’t need to tell you, Colonel, that complicity in suicide is murder in the eyes of the law.”

The Colonel looked up at him with a face from which all hope had fled. “What am I to do now?” he said piteously. “I never had a murder to handle before, much less--this sort of murder.”

“Do you want me to help?” Wilson asked. “I’ve no business here, you know, unless you call me in. This is your show.”

“Do you think I want it?” the Colonel groaned. “I’m a plain man, Mr. Wilson, and I know when waters are too deep for me. Here’s a man brutally murdered, and I haven’t the ghost of a notion how or why--the murderer may be my own butcher, for all I know! Will you help me, Mr. Wilson? Or do you want an official letter?”

“Your word will do, I think,” said Wilson, smiling a little in spite of the situation. “But you realise we may be in for rather an unpleasant time?”

“I do,” said the Colonel, with emphasis. “But if you’ll help me--I’ll put myself entirely in your hands.”

“I’ll do the best I can,” said Wilson. “Let’s consider the inquest, then; that’s the first question. When is it?”

“Two-thirty to-morrow.”

“Who is the coroner?”

“Dr. Evershed, from Malton.”

“A good man?”

“I think so. But he’s a friend of mine,” said the Colonel, who had apparently come to the conclusion that suspicion must immediately rest on every one of his acquaintance.

“Well, I think you’d better prime him to take no more than the absolutely necessary evidence to-morrow--identification, of course, and the bargees, and the sergeant, and Dr. Kershaw--and then adjourn, if necessary. Above all, see that he doesn’t call Dr. Prendergast, or let out a hint of our discoveries to-night. And keep my presence dark--if you can,” said Wilson, remembering the garrulous Brandreth.

“But why all this secrecy?”

“Well, we don’t want to give the murderers full warning, do we?” said Wilson, with what Michael considered remarkable patience. “If I dared, I would like the coroner’s jury to bring in a verdict of misadventure. But it’s not safe; there’s been too much talk, and some juryman or other would be sure to ask awkward questions. So Dr. Evershed will just have to keep it as brief as he can. I’d better have a word with him myself, perhaps, if you don’t mind.”

“We’ll have to let Kershaw know,” the Colonel said, “or he’ll be giving misleading evidence.”

“So much the better for us,” said Wilson. “No, seriously, Colonel, I must insist that not a soul beyond ourselves knows what has taken place in this room to-night. If Kershaw’s got his diagnosis wrong, I’m afraid it’s his funeral.”

“It’s hardly cricket, to let him down,” the Colonel objected.

“Nor was it cricket to hang Meston. I’m sorry, Colonel, but we can’t afford to be gentlemanly in this business. We’re agents of justice at the moment--not of the M.C.C.”

The Colonel sighed, but agreed. He was obviously too far out of his depth to think of combating anything that Wilson laid down; and after a few more brief interchanges, they parted.

“I think that’s the most diabolical crime I’ve ever seen,” Michael said, as they regained their room.

“I’m not sure you’re not right,” was the reply.

“And I’m really prepared to swear that mark on the head wasn’t there when I saw the body yesterday.”

“As long as you don’t swear it at the inquest, well and good.”

“Then you don’t think I’m mad?”

“Of course I don’t. I never did. Besides, that was a fresh mark--I could see for myself.”

“Then how the devil did it get there?”

“That, perhaps, we shall discover in due course. I have only noted who found it.” Michael stared.

“Harry! Do you mean to suggest that _Kershaw_ murdered the man, and then tried to cover up the traces?”

“We can’t go as far as that, yet,” said Wilson. “But you observe there is a pretty good reason for not interfering with Dr. Kershaw’s evidence.”