The Case with Nine Solutions

I

The Dying Man

Dr. Ringwood pushed his chair back from the dinner-table. A glance at the clock on the mantelpiece told him that on this evening he had been even later than usual in getting home for dinner. The expression in his eyes showed that he had gone short of sleep for some time past; and when he rose to his feet, every movement betrayed his overtired condition.

“Bring my coffee to the study, please, Shenstone,” he ordered. “And you might take the telephone in there as well.”

He crossed the hall wearily, switched on the study lights, and stood for a moment on the threshold as if undecided what to do. A bright fire burned on the hearth; the heavy pile of the carpet was soft to his feet; and the big saddlebag armchairs spoke to him of pure physical comfort and relaxation after the strain of the day. He moved over to a table, hesitated again, and then picked up a copy of the B.M.J. in its postal wrapper. Taking a cigar from a box on the table, he clipped it mechanically and sat down in one of the chairs by the fire.

Shenstone drew a small table to Dr. Ringwood’s elbow and placed the coffee on it; then, retiring for a moment, he returned with the telephone, which he plugged to a connection in the room.

“Bring it over here, Shenstone. I want to be sure that the bell will wake me if I happen to doze.”

Shenstone did as he was ordered and was about to leave the room when Dr. Ringwood spoke again.

“Fog clearing off, by any chance?”

Shenstone shook his head.

“No, sir. Worse now than when you came in. Very thick indeed, sir. One can’t see even the nearest street lamp.”

Dr. Ringwood nodded gloomily.

“It’s to be hoped no one wants me to go out this evening. Difficult enough to find one’s way about a strange town in the daytime with a fog like this over everything. But in the daytime there are always people about who can give you some help. Nobody bar policemen will be out tonight, I should think.”

Shenstone’s face showed his sympathy.

“Very difficult for you, sir. If there’s a night call, perhaps you’d knock me up, sir, and I could go out with you and help you to find your way. I’d be quite glad to do it, sir, if I could be of any service. When Dr. Carew went into the nursing home he specially impressed on me that I was to give you every assistance I could.”

A tired smile crossed Dr. Ringwood’s face.

“Doubtful if you can see any further through pea-soup than I can myself, Shenstone. Half the time, as I was coming back for dinner, I couldn’t see even the pavement; so I’m afraid your local knowledge wouldn’t give you much of a pull. Thanks all the same. I’ve got a map of the town and I’ll try to find my way by it.”

He paused, and then, as Shenstone turned to go, he added:

“Put a decanter—Scotch—and some soda on the table over yonder. Then I shan’t need to worry you again tonight.”

“Very good, sir.”

As Shenstone left the room, Dr. Ringwood tore open the wrapper of the B.M.J., threw the paper into the fire, and unfolded the journal. He scanned the contents while sipping his coffee; but in a few minutes the bulky magazine slipped down on to his knees and he resigned himself completely to the comfort of his surroundings.

“Thank the Lord I didn’t need to become a G.P.” he reflected. “Specialism’s a tough enough row to hoe, but general practice is a dog’s life, if this is a sample of it.”

He picked up the B.M.J. again; but as he did so his sharp ear caught the sound of the front door bell. An expression of annoyance crossed his features and deepened as he heard Shenstone admit some visitor. In a few seconds the door of the study opened and Shenstone announced.

“Dr. Trevor Markfield, sir.”

Dr. Ringwood’s face cleared as a clean-shaven man of about thirty entered the room; and he rose from his chair to greet the newcomer.

“Come in, Trevor. Try that pew beside the fire. I’ve been meaning to ring you up ever since I came last week, but I haven’t had a moment. This flu epidemic has kept me on the run.”

Trevor Markfield nodded sympathetically as he moved towards the fire and extended his hands to the blaze.

“I’d have looked you up before, but it was only this morning I heard from someone that you were doing locum for old Carew. It’s a bit out of your line, isn’t it?”

“Carew’s an old friend of ours; and when he went down with appendicitis he asked me in a hurry to look after his practice and I could hardly refuse. It’s been an experience, of sorts. I haven’t had two hours continuous sleep in the last five days, and I feel as if the next patient runs the risk of a free operation. I’m fit to bite him in the gizzard without anaesthetics.”

Markfield’s stern features relaxed slightly.

“As bad as all that?” he asked.

“Oh, I don’t mind real cases. But last night I was called out at two in the morning, when I’d just got back from a relapsed flu case. A small boy. ‘Dreadfully ill, doctor. Please come at once.’ When I got there, it was simply an acute case of overstuffing. ‘It was his birthday, doctor, and of course we had to let him do as he liked on that day.’ By the time I’d got there, he’d dree’d his weird—quite empty and nothing whatever the matter with him. No apologies for dragging me out of bed, of course. A doctor isn’t supposed to have a bed at all. I expect the next thing will be a fatal case of ingrowing toenails. It’s a damned nuisance to have one’s time frittered away on that sort of thing when one’s at one’s wits end to do what one can for people at the last gasp with something really dangerous.”

“Still got the notion that human life’s valuable? The war knocked that on the head,” Markfield commented, rubbing his hands together to warm them. “Human life’s the cheapest thing there is. It’s a blessing I went over to the scientific side, instead of going in for physicking. I’d never have acquired a good sympathetic bedside manner.”

Dr. Ringwood made a gesture towards the decanter on the table.

“Have a spot?” he invited. “It’s a miserable night.”

Markfield accepted the offer at once, poured out half a tumblerful of whisky, splashed in a very little soda, and drank off his glass with evident satisfaction. Putting down the tumbler, he moved across and sat down by the fire.

“It’s an infernal night,” he confirmed. “If I didn’t know this end of the town like the palm of my hand, I’d have lost my way coming here. It’s the thickest fog I’ve seen for long enough.”

“I’m in a worse box, for I don’t know the town,” Dr. Ringwood pointed out. “And we’re not near the peak of this flu epidemic yet, by a long way. You’re lucky to be on the scientific side. Croft-Thornton Research Institute, isn’t it?”

“Yes, I came here three years ago, in 1925. Silverdale beat me for the head post in the chemical department; they gave me the second place.”

“Silverdale?” Dr. Ringwood mused. “The fellow who works on alkaloids? Turned out a new condensate lately as sideline? I seem to know the name.”

“That’s him. He doesn’t worry me much. I dine at his house now and again; but beyond that we don’t see much of each other outside the Institute.”

“I’ve a notion I ran across him once at a smoker in the old days. He played the banjo rather well. Clean-shaven, rather neatly turned out? He’ll be about thirty-five or so. By the way, he’s married now, isn’t he?”

A faint expression of contempt crossed Markfield’s face.

“Oh, yes, he’s married. A French girl. I came across her in some amateur theatricals after they arrived here. Rather amusing at first, but a bit too exacting if one took her on as a permanency, I should think. I used to dance with her a lot at first, but the pace got a bit too hot for my taste. A man must have some evenings to himself, you know; and what she wanted was a permanent dancing-partner. She’s taken on a cub at the Institute—young Hassendean—for the business.”

“Doesn’t Silverdale do anything in that line himself?”

“Not a damn. Hates dancing except occasionally. They’re a weird couple. Nothing whatever in common, that I can see; and they’ve apparently agreed that each takes a separate road. You never see ’em together. She’s always around with this Hassendean brat—a proper young squib; and Silverdale’s turned to fresh woods in the shape of Avice Deepcar, one of the girls at the Institute.”

“Serious?” Dr. Ringwood inquired indifferently.

“I expect he’d be glad of a divorce, if that’s what you mean. But I doubt if he’ll get it, in spite of all the scandal about Yvonne. If I can read the signs, she’s just keeping the Hassendean cub on her string for her own amusement, though she certainly advertises her conquest all over the shop. He’s not much to boast about: one of these young pseudo-romantic live-your-own-lifer’s with about as much real backbone as a filleted sole.”

“A bit rough on Silverdale,” commented Dr. Ringwood apathetically.

Trevor Markfield’s short laugh betrayed his scorn.

“A man’s an ass to get tied up to a woman. Silverdale got caught by one side of her—oh, she’s very attractive on that side, undoubtedly. But it didn’t last, apparently, for either of them—and there you are! Outside their own line, women are no use to a man. They want too much of one’s time if one marries them, and they’re the very devil, generally. I’ve no sympathy with Silverdale’s troubles.”

Dr. Ringwood, obviously bored, was seeking for a fresh subject.

“Comfortable place, the Institute?” he inquired.

Markfield nodded with obvious approval.

“First-rate. They’re prepared to spend money like water on equipment. I’ve just come in from the new Research Station they’ve put up for agricultural experiments. It’s a few miles out of town. I’ve got a room or two in it for some work I’m doing in that line.”

Before Dr. Ringwood could reply, the telephone bell trilled and with a stifled malediction he stepped over to the instrument.

“Dr. Ringwood speaking.”

As the message came through, his face darkened.

“Very well. I’ll be round to see her shortly. The address is 26 Lauderdale Avenue, you say? … I’ll come as soon as I can.”

He put down the telephone and turned to his guest.

“I’ve got to go out, Trevor.”

Markfield looked up.

“You said 26 Lauderdale Avenue, didn’t you?” he asked. “Talk of the Devil! That’s Silverdale’s house. Nothing wrong with Yvonne, is there? Sprained her ankle, or whatnot, by any chance?”

“No. One of the maids turned sick, it seems; and the other maid’s a bit worried because all the family are out tonight and she doesn’t know what to do with her invalid. I’ll have to go. But how I’ll find my way in a fog like this, is beyond me. Where is the place?”

“About a couple of miles away.”

“That’ll take a bit of finding,” Dr. Ringwood grumbled, as he thought of the fog and his own sketchy knowledge of the local geography.

Markfield seemed to reflect for a moment or two before answering.

“Tell you what,” he said at last, “I’ve got my car at the door—I’m just down from the Research Station. If you like, I’ll pilot you to Silverdale’s. I’ll manage it better than you possibly could, on a night like this. You can drive behind me and keep your eye on my taillight. You could get home again all right, I expect; it’s easier, since you’ve only got to find your way to a main street and stick to it.”

Dr. Ringwood made no attempt to dissemble his relief at this solution of his difficulties.

“That’s decent of you, Trevor. Just let me have a look at the map before we start. I’ll take it with me, and I expect I’ll manage to get home again somehow or other.”

He glanced ruefully round the comfortable room and then went to the window to examine the night.

“Thicker than ever,” he reported. “You’ll need to crawl through that fog.”

In a few minutes, Dr. Ringwood had put on his boots, warned Shenstone to attend to the telephone in his absence, and got his car out of the garage. Meanwhile Markfield had started his own engine and was awaiting the doctor at the gate.

“Hoot like blazes the moment you lose sight of me,” he recommended. “If I hear your horn I’ll stop and hoot back. That should keep us in touch if the worst comes to the worst.”

He climbed into his driving-seat and started slowly down the road. Dr. Ringwood fell in behind. The fog was denser than ever, and the headlights of the cars merely illuminated its wreaths without piercing them. As soon as his car had started, Dr. Ringwood felt that he had lost touch with all the world except the taillight ahead of him, and a few square feet of roadway immediately under his eyes. The kerb of the pavement had vanished; no house-window showed through the mist. From time to time the pale beacon of a streetlamp shone high in the air without shedding any illumination upon the ground.

Once the guiding tail-lamp almost disappeared from view. After that, he crept up closer to the leading car, shifted his foot from the accelerator to the brake, and drove on the hand-throttle. His eyes began to smart with the nip of the fog and his throat was rasped as he drew his breath. Even in the saloon the air had a lung-catching tang, and he could see shadows in it, thrown by the nimbus of the headlights in the fog.

Almost from the start he had lost his bearings and now he pinned his whole attention on Markfield’s tail-lamp. Once or twice he caught sight of tramlines beside his wheels and knew that they were in a main thoroughfare; but this gave him only the vaguest information of their position. The sound-deadening quality of the vapour about him completed the sense of isolation. Except for the faint beat of his own engine, he seemed to be in a silent world.

Suddenly Markfield’s horn surprised him, and he had to jam on his brakes to avoid colliding with the car in front of him. A shadowy figure, hardly to be recognised as human, moved past him to the rear and vanished in the fog-wreaths. Then once more he had to concentrate his attention on the dim lamp ahead.

At last Markfield’s car slid softly alongside a pavement and came slowly to rest. Dr. Ringwood pulled up and waited until his guide got down from his seat and came back to him.

“We’re just at the turn into Lauderdale Avenue.”

Dr. Ringwood made no attempt to conceal his admiration.

“That’s a pretty good bit of navigation,” he said. “I didn’t notice you hesitate once in the whole trip.”

“I’ve a fairly good head for locality,” Markfield returned carelessly. “Now all you have to do is to turn to the left about ten yards further on. The numbering starts from this end of the road, and the even numbers are on the left-hand side. The houses are villas with big gardens, so you’ve only got to keep count of the gates as you pass them. Stick by the pavement and you’ll see the motor-entrances easily enough.”

“Thanks. I doubt if I’d have got here without you, Trevor. Now what about the road home?”

“Come straight back along here. Cross three roads—counting this as No. 1. Then turn to the right and keep straight on till you cross tramlines. That’ll be Park Road. Keep along it to the left till you’ve crossed two more sets of tramlines and then turn to the right. That’ll be Aldingham Street, at the Blue Boar pub. You’ll find your way from there simply enough, I think. That’s the easiest way home. I brought you by a shorter route, but you’d never find it on a night like this. See you again soon. ’Night!”

Without waiting for more, Markfield strode off to his car and soon Dr. Ringwood saw the red star, his only point of contact with the real world, slip away from him and vanish in the fog. When it had gone, he let his clutch in and began to grope his way laboriously along the pavement-edge and into Lauderdale Avenue.

The fog was as thick as ever, and he had some difficulty in detecting even the breaks at the edge of the pavement which indicated the positions of house-gates. The walls of the gardens were concealed behind the climbing curtain of vapour. He counted seven entrances and was well on the way to the next when suddenly the roar of a horn made him lift his eyes to the spaces ahead; two golden discs shone almost upon him and only a wild wrench at the wheel saved him from a collision as the strange car swept past on the wrong side.

“Damn their eyes!” he grumbled to himself. “People like that should be hanged. No one has a right to go barging along at twenty miles an hour on a night like this, hustling everyone out of their way. And on the wrong side of the road, too.”

In his swerve he had lost touch with the pavement and he now crept back to the left, steering in gently for fear of rubbing his tyres on the kerb. Then he began counting the gates once more.

“Eight … Nine … Ten … Eleven … Twelve. It’s the next one.”

He passed the next gate and drew up just beyond it. Then reflecting that it was hardly safe to leave a car on the street in a night like this, he got down from his seat and went across the pavement to open the gate of the short drive leading up to the house. The entrance was clear, however, and he was about to return to his car when a thought struck him and he lit a match to examine the pillar of the gate.

“No number, of course!” he commented in annoyance. “Ivy Lodge. This must be the place, anyhow.”

Returning to his car, he backed it past the gate and then drove in and up the carriageway. Just in time, as he came near the front door, the lights of a standing car warned him and he pulled up short to avoid a collision. Shutting off his engine, he got out and approached the house, passing a lighted window as he did so. The standing car was empty, and he climbed the steps to the front door, from which a light was shining. After some searching he discovered the press-button and rang the bell. The fog seemed thicker than ever; and as he stood on the steps and gazed out into it, he could see no lights except those of the empty motor and his own headlamps. The house seemed completely isolated from the world.

Growing impatient, as no one came to open the door, he rang again; and then, after a shorter interval, he held his finger down on the button until it seemed impossible that anyone in the house could fail to hear the sound of the bell. But still no one appeared. The lighted rooms and the waiting car convinced him that there must be someone on the premises; and once more he set the bell in action.

As its notes died away again, he bent towards the door and strained his ears to catch any sound of movement within the building. At first he heard nothing; but all at once something attracted his attention: a noise like a muffled cough. Dr. Ringwood hesitated for only a moment or two.

“Something damned queer about this house, it seems to me,” he commented inwardly. “Technically it’s burglary, I suppose; but if the door’s unlocked, I think I’d better go in and look round.”

The door opened as he turned the handle, and he stepped softly into the hall. Everything seemed normal in the house. He could hear the ticking of a grandfather’s clock further back on the stairs; but the noise which had first attracted his attention was not repeated. Gently closing the door to shut out the fog, he stood for a moment listening intently.

“Anybody here?” he demanded in a carrying voice.

There was no answer; but after a short time he heard again the sound which had puzzled him, evidently coming from the lighted room on the ground floor. Half a dozen swift steps took him to the door which he flung open.

“Good God! What’s wrong with you?” he ejaculated, as his glance caught the only occupant of the smoke-room into which he had come.

On a chesterfield, a fair-haired young man was lying helpless. From the red stain on the lips, Dr. Ringwood guessed at a haemorrhage of the lungs; and the quantity of blood on the boy’s shirtfront and the dark pool on the carpet pointed to the severity of the attack. The youth’s eyes caught the newcomer, and he beckoned feebly to the doctor. Ringwood crossed to the chesterfield and bent down. It hardly needed an expert to see that assistance had come too late. The sufferer made an effort, and the doctor stooped to catch the words.

“… Caught me … pistol … shot … thought it was … all right … never guessed …”

Dr. Ringwood bent closer.

“Who was it?” he demanded.

But that broken and gasped-out message had been the victim’s last effort. With the final word, a cough shook him; blood poured from his mouth; and he fell back among the cushions in the terminal convulsion.

Dr. Ringwood saw the jaw drop and realised that he could be of no further service. Suddenly his weariness, accentuated by the strain of the drive through the fog, descended upon him once more. He straightened himself with something of an effort and gazed down at the body, feeling himself curiously detached from this suddenly-emergent mystery, as though it were no direct concern of his. Then, in his own despite, his cool medical brain began to work as though by some volition independent of his own. He drew out his notebook and jotted down the few disjointed words which he had caught, lest he should forget them later on.

Still held by the rigour of his training, he stooped once more and made a close examination of the body, discovering in the course of it two tiny tears in the dress shirt which evidently marked the entries of the bullets which had pierced the lungs. Then, his inspection completed, he left the body undisturbed, noted the time on his wristwatch, and made a further jotting in his pocketbook.

As he did so, a fresh idea crossed his mind. Had there been more murders? What about the maids in the house? The one who had rung him up must have been somewhere on the premises, dead or alive. Possibly the murderer himself was still lurking in the villa.

Too tired to think of risk, Dr. Ringwood set himself to explore the house; but to his amazement he discovered that it was empty. Nowhere did he see the slightest sign of anything which suggested a divergence from normal routine. The cloakroom showed that two men lived on the premises, since he noted hats of two different sizes on the pegs; and there appeared to be three bedrooms in use, apart from the servants’ rooms on the upper floor.

The next step was obviously to ring up the police, he reflected. The sooner this affair was off his shoulders, the better. But at this point there flashed across his mind the picture of a methodical and possibly slow detective who might even be suspicious of Ringwood himself and wish to detain him till the whole affair was cleared up. That would be a nuisance. Then a way out of the difficulty opened up before him. He remembered paying a visit on the previous night to a butler down with flu. When he had seen the patient, the man’s master had come and made inquiries about the case; and Ringwood had been able to reassure him as to the man’s condition.

“What was that chap’s name?” Ringwood questioned his memory. “Sir Clinton Something-or-other. He’s Chief Constable or some such big bug. When in doubt, go to headquarters. He’ll remember me, I expect; he didn’t look as if much slipped past him. And that’ll save me from a lot of bother at the hands of underlings. What the devil was his name? Sir Clinton … Driffield, that’s it. I’ll ring him up.”

He glanced round the hall in which he was standing but saw no telephone.

“It’s probably in the smoke-room where the body is,” he suggested to himself.

But though he searched all the likely places in the house he was unable to find any instrument.

“They haven’t a phone, evidently,” he was driven to admit. “But in that case, I can’t be in Silverdale’s house at all. This must be the wrong shop.”

Then he remembered the moment when the other car had swept down upon him out of the fog.

“That probably explains it,” he said aloud. “When I had to swerve out of his way, I must have missed one of the entrance gates before I got back in touch with the pavement again. If that’s so, then obviously I’m in the wrong house. But whose house is it?”

He reentered the smoke-room and looked round in search of some clue. A writing-desk stood over against one of the walls, and he crossed to it and took up a sheet of paper from a notepaper case. The heading was what he wanted: “Ivy Lodge, 28 Lauderdale Avenue, Westerhaven.”

“That’s what happened,” he reflected, with a faint satisfaction at having cleared the point up so simply. “I’m next door to Silverdale’s place, evidently, I can phone from there.”

It occurred to him that he had better be on the safe side and make sure of his information by adding the name of the householder when he rang up the Chief Constable. A fresh search among the pigeonholes of the desk produced a letter in its original envelope addressed to “Edward Hassendean, Esq.” Dr. Ringwood put it down again and racked his memory for an association with the name. He had paid only the most perfunctory attention to Markfield’s talk, earlier in the evening, and it was some seconds before his mind could track down the elusive data.

“Hassendean! That was the name of the cub who was hanging round the skirts of Silverdale’s wife, I believe.”

He glanced at the body on the chesterfield.

“It might be that youngster. The police will soon find out from the contents of his pockets, I expect. Besides, the rest of the family will be home soon. They must be out for the evening, and the maids too. That accounts for the house being empty.”

He pulled out his pocketbook and scanned the note he had made of the boy’s disjointed utterance.

“Caught me … thought it was … all right … never guessed …”

A flash of illumination seemed to pass across Dr. Ringwood’s mind as he reread the words. In it he saw a frivolous wife, a dissolute boy, and a husband exasperated by the sudden discovery of an intrigue; a sordid little tragedy of three characters. That seemed to be a plain enough explanation of the miserable affair. Markfield’s suspicions had clearly been fairly near the truth; if anything, they had fallen short of the real state of affairs. Something had precipitated the explosion; and Dr. Ringwood idly speculated for a moment or two upon what could have led to the husband’s enlightenment.

Then he awoke to a fresh aspect of the affair. The Hassendean family would be coming home again shortly, or else the maids would put in an appearance. The sooner the police were on the premises, the better. In the meanwhile, it seemed advisable to prevent any disturbance of things, if possible.

Dr. Ringwood left the smoke-room, locked the door after him, and removed the key, which he slipped into his pocket. Then, making sure that the front door could be opened from the outside when he returned, he went down the steps and out into the fog once more.