‘Did they say the cause of death?’
‘No, they didn’t, but there can’t be much doubt about that. The whole face and head is battered in. It’s not a nice sight, I can tell you.’
‘I don’t expect so. Your report said that the crate was found by a fisherman?’
‘An amateur fisherman, yes,’ and Nield repeated Mr Morgan’s story.
‘That’s just the lucky way things happen, isn’t it!’ French exclaimed. ‘A man commits a crime and he takes all kinds of precautions to hide it, and then some utterly unexpected coincidence happens—who could have foreseen a fisherman hooking the crate—and he is down and out. Lucky for us and for society too. But I’ve seen it again and again. I’ve seen things happen that a writer couldn’t put into a book, because nobody would believe them possible, and I’m sure so have you. There’s nothing in this world stranger than the truth.’
The sergeant agreed, but without enthusiasm. In his experience it was the ordinary and obvious thing that happened. He didn’t believe in coincidences. After all it wasn’t such a coincidence that a fisherman who lowered a line on the site of the crate should catch his hooks in it. The crate was in the area over which this man fished. There was nothing wonderful about it.
But a further discussion of the point was prevented by their arrival at the police station. They passed to the outhouse containing the body, and French forthwith began his examination.
The remains were those of a man slightly over medium height, of fairly strong build, and who had seemingly been in good health before death. The face had been terribly mishandled. It was battered in until the features were entirely obliterated. The ears even were torn and bruised and shapeless. The skull was evidently broken at the forehead, so, as the sergeant had said, there was here an injury amply sufficient to account for death. It was evident also that a post-mortem had been made. Altogether French had seldom seen so horrible a spectacle.
But his professional instincts were gratified by a discovery which he hoped might assist in the identification of the remains. On the back of the left arm near the shoulder was a small birthmark of a distinctive triangular shape. Of this he made a dimensioned sketch, having first carefully examined it and assured himself it was genuine.
But beyond these general observations he did not spend much time over the body. Having noted that the fingers were too much decomposed to enable prints to be taken, he turned his attention to the clothes, believing that all the further available information as to the remains would be contained in the medical report.
Minutely he examined the underclothes, noting their size and quality and pattern, searching for laundry marks or initials, or for mendings or darns. But except that the toe of the left sock had been darned with wool of too light a shade, there was nothing to distinguish the garments from others of the same kind. Though he did not expect to get help from the clothes, French in his systematic way entered a detailed description of them in his note-book. Then he turned to the crate.
It measured two feet three inches by two feet four, and was three feet long. Made of spruce an inch thick, it was strongly put together and clamped with iron corner pieces. The boards were tongued and grooved, and French thought that under ordinary conditions it should be water-tight. He examined its whole surface, but here again he had no luck. Though there were a few bloodstains inside, no label or brand or identifying mark showed anywhere. Moreover, there was nothing in its shape or size to call for comment. The murderer might have obtained it from a hundred sources, and French did not see any way in which it could be traced.
That it had been labelled at one time was evident. The heads of eight tacks formed a parallelogram which clearly represented the position of a card. It also appeared to have borne attachments of some heavier type, as there were seven nail-holes of about an eighth of an inch in diameter at each of two opposite corners. Whatever these fittings were they had been removed and the nails withdrawn.
‘How long would you say this had been in the water?’ French asked, running his fingers over the sodden wood.
‘I asked Manners, our coastguard, that question,’ the sergeant answered. ‘He said not very long. You see, there are no shells nor seaweed attaching to it. He thought about the time the doctors mentioned, say between five and six weeks.’
The bar was a bit of old two-inch shafting, some fourteen inches long, and was much rusted from its immersion. It had evidently been put in as a weight to ensure the sinking of the crate. Unfortunately it offered no better clue to the sender than the crate itself.
French added these points to his notes and again addressed the sergeant.
‘Have you a good photographer in the town?’
‘Why, yes, pretty good.’
‘Then I wish you’d send for him. I want some photographs of the body, and they had better be done first thing in the morning.’
When the photographer had arrived and had received his instructions French went on: ‘That, sergeant, seems to be all we can do now. It’s too dark to walk round tonight. Suppose we get along to the hotel and see about that dinner?’
During a leisurely meal in the private room French had engaged they conversed on general topics, but later, over a couple of cigars, they resumed their discussion of the tragedy. The sergeant repeated in detail all that he knew of the matter, but he was able neither to suggest clues upon which to work, nor yet to form a theory as to what had really happened.
‘It’s only just nine o’clock,’ French said, when the subject showed signs of exhaustion. ‘I think I’ll go round and have a word with this Mr Morgan, and then perhaps we could see the doctor—Crowth, you said his name was? Will you come along?’
Mr Morgan, evidently thrilled by his visitor’s identity, repeated his story still another time. French had brought from London a large scale Ordnance map of the district, and on it he got Mr Morgan to mark the bearings he had taken, and so located the place the crate had lain. This was all the fresh information French could obtain, and soon he and Nield wished the manager goodnight and went on to the doctor’s.
Dr Crowth was a bluff, middle-aged man with a hearty manner and a kindly expression. He was off-hand in his greeting, and plunged at once into his subject.
‘Yes,’ he said in answer to French’s question, ‘we held a post-mortem, Dr Wilbraham and I, and we found the cause of death. Those injuries to the face and forehead were all inflicted after death. They were sufficient to cause death, but they did not do so. The cause of death was a heavy blow on the back of the head with some soft, yielding instrument. The skull was fractured, but the skin, though contused, was unbroken. Something like a sandbag was probably used. The man was struck first and killed, and then his features were destroyed, with some heavy implement such as a hammer.’
‘That’s suggestive, isn’t it?’ French commented.
‘You mean that the features were obliterated after death to conceal the man’s identity?’
‘No, I didn’t mean that, though of course it is true. What I meant was that the man was murdered in some place where blood would have been noticed, had it fallen. He was killed, not with a sharp-edged instrument, though one was available, but with a blunt one, lest bleeding should have ensued. Then when death had occurred the sharp-edged instrument was used and the face disfigured. I am right about the bleeding, am I not?’
‘Oh, yes. A dead body does not bleed, or at least not much. But I do not say that you could inflict all those injuries without leaving some bloodstains.’
‘No doubt, but still I think my deduction holds. There were traces of blood in the crate, but only slight. What age was the man, do you think, doctor?’
‘Impossible to say exactly, but probably middle-aged: thirty-five to fifty-five.’
‘Any physical peculiarities?’
‘I had better show