The Red Thumbmark

Preface

In writing the following story, the author has had in view no purpose other than that of affording entertainment to such readers as are interested in problems of crime and their solutions; and the story itself differs in no respect from others of its class, excepting in that an effort has been made to keep within the probabilities of ordinary life, both in the characters and in the incidents.

Nevertheless it may happen that the book may serve a useful purpose in drawing attention to certain popular misapprehensions on the subject of fingerprints and their evidential value; misapprehensions the extent of which may be judged when we learn from the newspapers that several Continental commercial houses have actually substituted fingerprints for signed initials.

The facts and figures contained in Mr. Singleton’s evidence, including the very liberal estimate of the population of the globe, are, of course, taken from Mr. Galton’s great and important work on fingerprints; to which the reader who is interested in the subject is referred for much curious and valuable information.

In conclusion, the author desires to express his thanks to his friend Mr. Bernard E. Bishop for the assistance rendered to him in certain photographic experiments, and to those officers of the Central Criminal Court who very kindly furnished him with details of the procedure in criminal trials.

I

My Learned Brother

“Conflagratam An^o 1677. Fabricatam An^o 1698. Richardo Powell Armiger Thesaurar.” The words, set in four panels, which formed a frieze beneath the pediment of a fine brick portico, summarised the history of one of the tall houses at the upper end of King’s Bench Walk and as I, somewhat absently, read over the inscription, my attention was divided between admiration of the exquisitely finished carved brickwork and the quiet dignity of the building, and an effort to reconstitute the dead and gone Richard Powell, and the stirring times in which he played his part.

I was about to turn away when the empty frame of the portico became occupied by a figure, and one so appropriate, in its wig and obsolete habiliments, to the old-world surroundings that it seemed to complete the picture, and I lingered idly to look at it. The barrister had halted in the doorway to turn over a sheaf of papers that he held in his hand, and, as he replaced the red tape which bound them together, he looked up and our eyes met. For a moment we regarded one another with the incurious gaze that casual strangers bestow on one another; then there was a flash of mutual recognition; the impassive and rather severe face of the lawyer softened into a genial smile, and the figure, detaching itself from its frame, came down the steps with a hand extended in cordial greeting.

“My dear Jervis,” he exclaimed, as we clasped hands warmly, “this is a great and delightful surprise. How often have I thought of my old comrade and wondered if I should ever see him again, and lo! here he is, thrown up on the sounding beach of the Inner Temple, like the proverbial bread cast upon the waters.”

“Your surprise, Thorndyke, is nothing to mine,” I replied, “for your bread has at least returned as bread; whereas I am in the position of a man who, having cast his bread upon the waters, sees it return in the form of a buttered muffin or a Bath bun. I left a respectable medical practitioner and I find him transformed into a bewigged and begowned limb of the law.”

Thorndyke laughed at the comparison.

“Liken not your old friend unto a Bath bun,” said he. “Say, rather, that you left him a chrysalis and come back to find him a butterfly. But the change is not so great as you think. Hippocrates is only hiding under the gown of Solon, as you will understand when I explain my metamorphosis; and that I will do this very evening, if you have no engagement.”

“I am one of the unemployed at present,” I said, “and quite at your service.”

“Then come round to my chambers at seven,” said Thorndyke, “and we will have a chop and a pint of claret together and exchange autobiographies. I am due in court in a few minutes.”

“Do you reside within that noble old portico?” I asked.

“No,” replied Thorndyke. “I often wish I did. It would add several inches to one’s stature to feel that the mouth of one’s burrow was graced with a Latin inscription for admiring strangers to ponder over. No; my chambers are some doors further down—number 6A”—and he turned to point out the house as we crossed towards Crown Office Row.

At the top of Middle Temple Lane we parted, Thorndyke taking his way with fluttering gown towards the Law Courts, while I directed my steps westward towards Adam Street, the chosen haunt of the medical agent.

The soft-voiced bell of the Temple clock was telling out the hour of seven in muffled accents (as though it apologised for breaking the studious silence) as I emerged from the archway of Mitre Court and turned into King’s Bench Walk.

The paved footway was empty save for a single figure, pacing slowly before the doorway of number 6A, in which, though the wig had now given place to a felt hat and the gown to a jacket, I had no difficulty in recognising my friend.

“Punctual to the moment, as of old,” said he, meeting me halfway. “What a blessed virtue is punctuality, even in small things. I have just been taking the air in Fountain Court, and will now introduce you to my chambers. Here is my humble retreat.”

We passed in through the common entrance and ascended the stone stairs to the first floor, where we were confronted by a massive door, above which my friend’s name was written in white letters.

“Rather a forbidding exterior,” remarked Thorndyke, as he inserted the latchkey, “but it is homely enough inside.”

The heavy door swung outwards and disclosed a baize-covered inner door, which Thorndyke pushed open and held for me to pass in.

“You will find my chambers an odd mixture,” said Thorndyke, “for they combine the attractions of an office, a museum, a laboratory and a workshop.”

“And a restaurant,” added a small, elderly man, who was decanting a bottle of claret by means of a glass syphon: “you forgot that, sir.”

“Yes, I forgot that, Polton,” said Thorndyke, “but I see you have not.” He glanced towards a small table that had been placed near the fire and set out with the requisites for our meal.

“Tell me,” said Thorndyke, as we made the initial onslaught on the products of Polton’s culinary experiments, “what has been happening to you since you left the hospital six years ago?”

“My story is soon told,” I answered, somewhat bitterly. “It is not an uncommon one. My funds ran out, as you know, rather unexpectedly. When I had paid my examination and registration fees the coffer was absolutely empty, and though, no doubt, a medical diploma contains—to use Johnson’s phrase—the potentiality of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, there is a vast difference in practice between the potential and the actual. I have, in fact, been earning a subsistence, sometimes as an assistant, sometimes as a locum tenens. Just now I’ve got no work to do, and so have entered my name on Turcival’s list of eligibles.”

Thorndyke pursed up his lips and frowned.

“It’s a wicked shame, Jervis,” said he presently, “that a man of your abilities and scientific acquirements should be frittering away his time on odd jobs like some half-qualified wastrel.”

“It is,” I agreed. “My merits are grossly undervalued by a stiff-necked and obtuse generation. But what would you have, my learned brother? If poverty steps behind you and claps the occulting bushel over your thirty thousand candlepower luminary, your brilliancy is apt to be obscured.”

“Yes, I suppose that is so,” grunted Thorndyke, and he remained for a time in deep thought.

“And now,” said I, “let us have your promised explanation. I am positively frizzling with curiosity to know what chain of circumstances has converted John Evelyn Thorndyke from a medical practitioner into a luminary of the law.”