Could it be the challenge?
In my personal experience, the solving of murder mysteries had involved the examination of a body, the gathering of clues, the putting-together of two and two, the unmasking of the killer, and … Voilà! Bob’s your uncle! Case closed. It was as easy as boiling water.
But this case was an entirely new kettle of fish. The body had been removed before I’d had a chance to do more than barely glance at it, and there wasn’t the faintest hope that Inspector Gravenhurst was going to show up at the door to pile heaps of evidence at my feet with a shovel. There was no way of gaining access to autopsy results—short of trying to pry them out of Dorsey Rainsmith, which would be about as likely as the sun rising in the north tomorrow and setting in the south.
I was going to have to develop a whole new technique: a new modus operandi, as Philip Odell, the private detective on the BBC wireless, would have put it.
Rather than reasoning from corpse to killer, as I had in the past, I would now have to reverse the process. It would be like solving a crime in a mirror.
Which was, perhaps, the cause of my excitement.
I began a mental list that, if written in my notebook, might have looked something like this:
(a) Who had a motive to murder Francesca Rainsmith?
(i) Her husband, obviously. Daffy says there are motives in marriage that lie beyond reach of the church, the courts, and even the front page. Note: The News of the World claims that most killers and their victims come from the same family.
(ii) Her soon-to-be replacement, Dorsey Rainsmith, whose reasons for wanting her rival dead are as plain as the nose on your face.
(iii) Someone other than above. A stranger, perhaps. Some madman or madwoman.
(b) Who has the capability to behead a corpse?
(i) Dorsey Rainsmith is a forensic surgeon. She certainly possesses the know-how and the medical skill.
(ii) Ryerson Rainsmith is a medical doctor. Not so skillful as his wife, perhaps, but still capable of getting the job done.
(iii) Fitzgibbon is a former nurse, and may well have both the nerve and the stomach required to remove the part in question.
(iv) Some unsuspected brute, such as the Ourang-Outang in Edgar Allan Poe that shoved a body up the chimney: a remarkable parallel to the present case, come to think of it. Remarkable, indeed!
Again I found myself wondering: Could I, by sheer chance, have stumbled upon one of those classic killings, such as those written about by Miss Christie, in which the murderer mocks the police by carrying out killings that mimic nursery rhymes or fairy tales? Was Francesca Rainsmith’s killer intentionally reenacting The Murders in the Rue Morgue? I would never, as long as I live, forget the wild night that Daffy had read that tale aloud to us, the rain drumming on the drawing room windows, the blood and the hair on the hearth, and the old lady with her head cut clean off. I would try to find a copy as soon as possible to search for further parallels. Miss Bodycote’s had a small but serviceable library in an alcove in which nuns had once congregated to pray as they worked away at their invisible mending.
Mending reminded me of the laundry. Edward Kelly, the Human Mountain, the stoker of Miss Bodycote’s boilers, was the only suspect who physically fit the bill. With his bulk and his muscles, he could probably stuff a body up a chimney before you could say “Ginger!” To say nothing of the detached head.
All of these things flickered like summer lightning through my mind as I stood in the lower hall, the telephone receiver still clutched tightly in my hand.
One fact stuck out like a septic thumb: that Mrs. Bannerman’s name did not appear on my list—and yet Inspector Gravenhurst had arrested her without so much as a la-di-da.
Was it because he knew more than I did? That was possible, I suppose, but I can’t say I much liked the idea. Or could it be that, as an acquitted murderess, she had become a perpetual suspect? I didn’t much care for that idea, either.
The inspector, after all, had access to all the evidence gathered, to the autopsy findings, and to the statements of all those who had been questioned, whereas I had to be content with the crumbs.
As I have said, I was on my own, and the business of gathering evidence was, and would continue to be, like picking up spilled pepper in the dark.
I was, like poor, homesick Moses in the book of Exodus, a stranger in a strange land.
An outcast.
But there was no point in feeling sorry for myself. It is always better, and far more rewarding, I have observed, to have someone else feel sorry for you, than to do the job yourself.
Which gave me a splendid idea.
“May I come in?” I asked, knocking lightly on the door frame.
Miss Moate looked up from the shelf attached to her wheelchair, upon which she was sorting fossils.
She did not say yes and she did not say no, so I took a chance and stepped into the lab.
“Well?” she asked, in her permanently peeved voice. I could tell that she hated being interrupted.
“I’m sorry to bother you, Miss Moate,” I said. If I’d worn a cap I’d have been wringing it in my hands. “I wonder if you might spare me a few minutes. It’s rather a personal matter?”
I was proud of my strategy. It was one I had been saving for just such an occasion as this. Who can say no to a personal matter? Even God is curious about such things, which is why He listens to our prayers.
As a teacher, Miss Moate had presumably been trained in some dim and remote teachers college in how to handle the confidences of her pupils. Appealed to directly, she could hardly say no.
“I’m busy,” she said. “Personal matters should be taken up with the head, or with your housemistress.”
“My housemistress is Mrs. Bannerman,” I said, “and she’s been arrested.”
“What?” A fossil clattered onto the hard surface of the tray. I could tell by the genuine look of surprise on her face that Miss Moate had not yet heard the news.
“Arrested,” I said. “They took her away. In the middle of the night.”
Rat-a-tat-tat. Just like that. Shocking news is best delivered in bursts for maximum impact. I was sparing this woman nothing.
“How do you know this? Where did you hear it?”
“I didn’t hear it,” I said. “I was there. I saw it with my own eyes.”
I could see the wheels turning as she lifted the huge padded cozy from the pot and poured herself a cup of tea. Should she gossip with a student, or place herself above idle chatter?
“This … personal matter,” she said at last. “You may speak. But first, close the door.”
I did as I was told, knowing, as I began, that one of us was not good at this sort of thing.
“I’m frightened,” I said.