Criminals -- Fiction; Detective and mystery stories; England -- Fiction
“Nothing, except that it is possible someone is using Four Square
Jane’s name in vain,” he said, “someone who was in a position to get
one of the old labels she had used on her previous felonies. May I sit
down?” he asked, for he had not been invited to take a seat.
Claythorpe nodded curtly, and Dawes pulled a chair from the table and
seated himself.
“I have been reconstructing that crime,” he said, “and there are one
or two things that puzzle me. In the first place, I am perfectly
certain that no woman was in your office on the night the murder was
committed.”
Lord Claythorpe raised his eyebrows.
“Indeed!” he said. “And yet the constable who was first in the room
told me that he distinctly smelt a very powerful scent--the sort a
woman would use. I also noticed it when I went into the room.”
“So did I,” said Peter, “and that quite decided me that Four Square
Jane had nothing to do with the business. A cool, calculating woman
like Four Square Jane is certain to be a lady of more than ordinary
intelligence and regular habits. She is not the kind who would
suddenly take up a powerful scent, because it is possible to trace a
woman criminal by this means, and it is certain that in no other case
which is associated with her name was there the slightest trace or
hint of perfume. That makes me more certain that the crime was
committed by a man and that he sprinkled the scent on the floor in
order to leave the impression that Four Square Jane had been the
operator.”
“What do you think happened?” asked Lord Claythorpe after a pause.
“I think that Remington went to the office with the intention of
examining the contents of the safe,” said Peter deliberately. “I
believe he had the whole of the envelopes on the table, and had opened
several, when he was surprised by somebody who came into the office.
There was an argument, in the course of which he was shot dead.”
“You suggest that the intruder was a burglar?” said Lord Claythorpe
with a set face, but Peter shook his head.
“No,” he said. “This man admitted himself to the office by means of a
key. The door was not forced, and there was no sign of a skeleton key
having been used. Moreover, the newcomer must have been well
acquainted with the office, because, after the murder was committed he
switched out the light and pulled up the blinds which Remington had
lowered, so that the light should not attract attention from the
street. We know they were lowered, because the constable on beat duty
on the other side of the street saw no sign of a light. The blinds
were heavy and practically light-proof. Now, the man who committed the
murder knew his way about the office well enough to turn out the
light, move in the dark, and manipulate the three blinds which covered
the windows. I’ve been experimenting with those blinds, and I’ve found
that they’re fairly complicated in their mechanism.”
Again there was a pause.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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