Fatal Descent by John Dickson Carr & Carter Dickson

Author:John Dickson Carr & Carter Dickson [Carr, John Dickson & Dickson, Carter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: detective, locked-room, mystery
ISBN: 9781927551561
Google: vecVAgAAQBAJ
Publisher: St. Swithin Press
Published: 2012-12-21T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

“And what,” said Glass, “about our chubby friend? He’s cleaning house, right enough. But would you like to take the opposite end of a small bet that he sends this business to the devil in six months?”

Hornbeam was not listening. He strode beside Sergeant Biggs, while the doctor stumped along and glowered. In the foyer, the noise of their footsteps came back from the roof in rattling echoes.

“You haven’t got the gun?” the chief inspector demanded.

“No, sir. But we’ve got that Spectator book. Somebody chucked it down the elevator shaft. And we’ve got some other scraps that are probably—well, you’ll see.”

Davis, the plain-clothes constable, was now in the bottom of the shaft. A collection of grimy rubble had spread over the edge of the marble floor as though it had been shoveled there. As they approached, Davis crawled through the aperture and put the portable electric lantern on the floor beside a row of exhibits which had been systematically set out. These were:

Volume the third of Spectator papers, comprising numbers 170 to 251, with the name of Joseph Addison on the flyleaf, and notes in the same handwriting. It was bound in modern dull black leather, the back broken and the pages defaced.

Innumerable burnt matches and cigarette ends, with two empty packets of Players’ cigarettes, crumpled.

A folded copy of Tallant’s Fireside Companion, dated eighteen months back.

A rusty pair of pliers.

Two short lengths of gas pipe, one much corroded.

A headless silver statuette, five or six inches high. It was mutilated, and its base was engraved with the words, “Sir Ernest Tallant.”

Fragments of a Black Beauty Chocolate Peppermints box, about of a size to contain the statue.

Assorted nuts, bolts, washers, and loose wire.

A flashlight battery.

A woman’s earring.

A heap of metal fragments resembling very tiny wheels and springs. It was toward this that Sergeant Biggs pointed.

“All that’s left of the gent’s little traveling clock, sir,” he told Hornbeam. “We’ve been scraping up pieces of it all over the shaft. I didn’t know whether you wanted every last bit of it. Then there’s that silver statue thing. Somebody’s taken a hatchet to that. Everything this chap pinched was thrown straight down the shaft after it’d been smashed up. Looks like a woman’s work, doesn’t it?”

Dr. Glass stiffened. The chief inspector, who had been pulling thoughtfully at his underlip, glanced round.

“Woman’s work? Why do you say that?”

Biggs shrugged his shoulders.

“Well—the earring and the chocolate box. Together, as it were. I don’t know, sir. I was just thinking.”

Hornbeam picked up the chocolate box and turned it over. Then he examined the silver statuette.

“Rather valuable, this thing,” he observed. “Funny we hadn’t heard about it before. It’s apparently a statue of the old boy himself, or would be if it had a head on. Looks as though it’s been in the shaft some time, like the rest of this junk. If it is junk. I’ll just get measurements and descriptions.” He took out his notebook.

“Will that be all for tonight, sir?” asked Biggs.

Hornbeam looked at him.

“No, it will not be all for tonight,” he snapped.

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