The Measure of Malice: Scientific Detection Stories (British Library Crime Classics) by Martin Edwards

Author:Martin Edwards [Edwards, Martin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Detectives, Freeman, Sherlock, forensics, CSI, golden age, short stories, anthology, inspection
Publisher: British Library Publishing
Published: 2019-09-10T05:00:00+00:00

“I take it, Thorndyke,” said I, as the train moved out of the station, “that you came here expecting to find what you did find?”

“Yes,” he replied. “It seemed to me the only possibility, having regard to all the known facts.”

“When did it first occur to you?”

“It occurred to me as a possibility as soon as we discovered that the cremation certificates had been forged; but it was the undertaker’s statement that seemed to clench the matter.”

“But he distinctly stated that he measured the body.”

“True. But there was nothing to show that it was a dead body. What was perfectly clear was that there was something that must on no account be seen; and when Stalker told us of the embezzlement we had a body of evidence that could point to only one conclusion. Just consider that evidence.

“Here we had a death, preceded by an obviously sham illness and followed by cremation with forged certificates. Now, what was it that had happened? There were four possible hypotheses. Normal death, suicide, murder, and fictitious death. Which of these hypotheses fitted the facts?

“Normal death was apparently excluded by the forged certificates.

“The theory of suicide did not account for the facts. It did not agree with the careful, elaborate preparation. And why the forged certificates? If Ingle had really died, Meeking would have certified the death. And why the cremation? There was no purpose in taking those enormous risks.

“The theory of murder was unthinkable. These certificates were almost certainly forged by Ingle himself, who we know was a practised forger. But the idea of the victim arranging for his own cremation is an absurdity.

“There remained only the theory of fictitious death; and that theory fitted all the facts perfectly. First, as to the motive. Ingle had committed a felony. He had to disappear. But what kind of disappearance could be so effectual as death and cremation? Both the prosecutors and the police would forthwith write him off and forget him. Then there was the bigamy—a criminal offence in itself. But death would not only wipe that off; after ‘death’ he could marry Huggard regularly under another name, and he would have shaken off his deserted wife for ever. And he stood to gain fifteen hundred pounds from the Insurance Company. Then see how this theory explained the other facts. A fictitious death made necessary a fictitious illness. It necessitated the forged certificates, since there was no corpse. It made cremation highly desirable; for suspicion might easily have arisen, and then the exhumation of a coffin containing a dummy would have exploded the fraud. But successful cremation would cover up the fraud for ever. It explained the concealment of the corpse from the undertaker, and it even explained the smell of formalin which he noticed.”

“How did it?” I asked.

“Consider, Jervis,” he replied. “The dummy in this coffin had to be a dummy of flesh and bone which would yield the correct kind of ash. Joints of butcher’s meat would fulfil the conditions. But the quantity required would be from a hundred and fifty to two hundred pounds.

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