This opinion, based rather on collective experience than on any one episode, can be substantiated by several incontrovertible facts. In this instance, one will suffice. Therefore, I take the Brixton case to illustrate Chance as a factor in human affairs. Had it not been for that Maori fetish – but such rather ends than begins the story. Therefore it were wise to dismiss it for the moment. Yet that piece of green-stone hanged – a person mentioned hereafter.
When Mr and Mrs Paul Vincent set up housekeeping at Ulster Lodge they were regarded as decided acquisitions to Brixton society. She, pretty and musical; he, smart in looks, moderately well off, and an excellent tennis-player. Their progenitors, his father and her mother (both since deceased), had lived a life of undoubted middle-class respectability. The halo thereof still environed their children, who were, in consequence of such inherited grace and their own individualisms, much sought after by genteel Brixtonians. Moreover, this popular couple were devoted to each other, and even after three years of marriage they posed still as lovers. This was as it should be, and by admiring friends and relations the Vincents were regarded as paragons of matrimonial perfection. Vincent was a stockbroker; therefore he passed most of his time in the City.
Judge, then, of the commotion, when pretty Mrs Vincent was discovered in the study, stabbed to the heart. So aimless a crime were scarce imaginable. She had many friends, no known enemies, yet she came to this tragic end. Closer examination revealed that the escritoire had been broken into, and Mr Vincent declared himself the poorer by two hundred pounds. Primarily, therefore, robbery was the sole object, but, by reason of Mrs Vincent’s interference, the thief had been converted into a murderer.
So excellently had the assassin chosen his time, that such choice argued a close acquaintance with the domestic economy of Ulster Lodge. The husband was detained in town till midnight; the servants (cook and housemaid), on leave to attend wedding festivities, were absent till eleven o’clock. Mrs Vincent, therefore, was absolutely alone in the house for six hours, during which period the crime had been committed. The servants discovered the body of their unfortunate mistress and raised the alarm at once. Later on Vincent arrived to find his wife dead, his house in possession of the police, and the two servants in hysterics. For that night nothing could be done, but at dawn a move was made towards elucidating the mystery. At this point I come into the story.
Instructed at nine o’clock to take charge of the case, by ten I was on the spot noting details and collecting evidence. Beyond removal of the body nothing had been disturbed, and the study was in precisely the same condition as when the crime was discovered. I examined carefully the apartment, and afterwards interrogated the cook, the housemaid, and, lastly, the master of the house. The result gave me slight hope of securing the assassin.
The room (a fair-sized one, looking out on to a lawn between house and road) was furnished in cheap bachelor fashion; an old-fashioned desk placed at right angles to the window, a round table reaching nigh the sill, two arm-chairs, three of the ordinary cane-seated kind, and on the mantelpiece an arrangement of pipes, pistols, boxing-gloves, and foils. One of these latter was missing.
A single glimpse showed how terrible a struggle had taken place before the murderer had overpowered his victim. The tablecloth lay disorderly on the floor, two of the lighter chairs were overturned, and the desk, with several drawers open, was hacked about considerably. No key was in the door-lock which faced the escritoire, and the window-snick was fastened securely.
Further search resulted in the following discoveries:
1. A hatchet used for chopping wood (found near the desk).
2. A foil with the button broken off (lying under the table).
3. A green-stone idol (edged under the fender).
The cook (defiantly courageous by reason of brandy) declared that she had left the house at four o’clock on the previous day and had returned close on eleven. The back door (to her surprise) was open. With the housemaid she went to inform her mistress of this fact, and found the body lying midway between door and fireplace. At once she called in the police. Her master and mistress were a most attached couple, and (so far as she knew) they had no enemies.
Similar evidence was obtained from the housemaid with the additional information that the hatchet belonged to the woodshed. The other rooms were undisturbed.
Poor young Vincent was so broken down by the tragedy that he could hardly answer my questions with calmness. Sympathizing with his natural grief, I interrogated him as delicately as was possible, and I am bound to admit that he replied with remarkable promptitude and clearness.
‘What do you know of this unhappy affair?’ I asked when we were alone in the drawingroom. He refused to stay in the study, as was surely natural under the circumstances.
‘Absolutely nothing,’ he replied. ‘I went to the City yesterday at ten in the morning, and, as I had business to do, I wired my wife I would not return till midnight. She was full of health and spirits when I last saw her, but now -’ Incapable of further speech he made a gesture of despair. Then, after a pause, he added, ‘Have you any theory on the subject?’
‘Judging from the wrecked condition of the desk I should say robbery -’
‘Robbery?’ he interrupted, changing color. ‘Yes, that was the motive. I had two hundred pounds locked up in the desk.’
‘In gold or notes?’
‘The latter. Four fifties. Bank of England.’
‘You are sure they are missing?’
‘Yes. The drawer in which they were placed is smashed to pieces.’
‘Did any one know you had placed two hundred pounds therein?’
‘No! Save my wife, and yet – ah!’ he said, breaking off abruptly, ‘that is impossible.’
‘What is impossible?’
‘I will tell you when I hear your theory.’
‘You got that notion out of novels of the shilling sort,’ I answered dryly. ‘Every detective doesn’t theorize on the instant. I haven’t any particular theory that I know of. Whosoever committed this crime must have known your wife was alone in the house and that there was two hundred pounds locked up in that desk. Did you mention these two facts to any one?’
Vincent pulled his moustache in some embarrassment. I guessed by the action that he had been indiscreet.
‘I don’t wish to get an innocent person into trouble,’ he said at length, ‘but I did mention it – to a man called Roy.’
‘For what reason?’
‘It is a bit of a story. I lost two hundred to a friend at cards and drew four fifties to pay him. He went out of town, so I locked up the money in my desk for safety. Last night Roy came to me at the club, much agitated, and asked me to loan him a hundred. Said it meant ruin else. I offered him a cheque, but he wanted cash. I then told him I had left two hundred at home, so at the moment, could not lay my hand on it. He asked if he could not go to Brixton for it, but I said the house was empty, and -’
‘But it wasn’t empty,’ I interrupted.
‘I believed it would be! I knew the servants were going to that wedding, and I thought my wife, instead of spending a lonely evening, would call on some friend.’
‘Well, and after you told Roy that the house was empty?’
‘He went away, looking awfully cut up, and swore he must have the money at any price. But it is quite impossible he could have anything to do with this.’
‘I don’t know. You told him where the money was and that the house was unprotected, as you thought. What was more probable than that he should have come down with the intention of stealing the money? If so, what follows? Entering by the back door, he takes the hatchet from the wood-shed to open the desk. Your wife, hearing a noise, discovers him in the study. In a state of frenzy, he snatches a foil from the mantelpiece and kills her, then decamps with the money. There is your theory, and a mighty bad one – for Roy.’