The Man in the Brown Suit

The inspector fell in with the suggestion readily enough.

‘Yes, come now, Miss Beddingfeld, don’t be offended. You’ve asked questions and hinted things. Just say straight out what it is you’ve got in your head.’

I wavered between injured dignity and the overwhelming desire to express my theories. Injured dignity went to the wall.

‘You said at the inquest you were positive it wasn’t suicide?’

‘Yes, I’m quite certain of that. The man was frightened. What frightened him? It wasn’t me. But someone might have been walking up the platform towards us—someone he recognized.’

‘You didn’t see anyone?’

‘No,’ I admitted. ‘I didn’t turn my head. Then, as soon as the body was recovered from the line, a man pushed forward to examine it, saying he was a doctor.’

‘Nothing unusual in that,’ said the inspector dryly.

‘But he wasn’t a doctor.’

‘What?’

‘He wasn’t a doctor,’ I repeated.

‘How do you know that, Miss Beddingfeld?’

‘It’s difficult to say, exactly. I’ve worked in hospitals during the war, and I’ve seen doctors handle bodies. There’s a sort of deft professional callousness that this man hadn’t got. Besides, a doctor doesn’t usually feel for the heart on the right side of the body.’

‘He did that?’

‘Yes, I didn’t notice it specially at the time—except that I felt there was something wrong. But I worked it out when I got home, and then I saw why the whole thing had looked so unhandy to me at the time.’

‘H’m,’ said the inspector. He was reaching slowly for pen and paper.

‘In running his hands over the upper part of the man’s body he would have ample opportunity to take anything he wanted from the pockets.’

‘Doesn’t sound likely to me,’ said the inspector. ‘But—well, can you describe him at all?’

‘He was tall and broad-shouldered, wore a dark overcoat and black boots, a bowler hat. He had a dark pointed beard and gold-rimmed eyeglasses.’

‘Take away the overcoat, the beard and the eyeglasses, and there wouldn’t be much to know him by,’ grumbled the inspector. ‘He could alter his appearance easily enough in five minutes if he wanted to—which he would do if he’s the swell pickpocket you suggest.’

I had not intended to suggest anything of the kind. But from this moment I gave the inspector up as hopeless.

‘Nothing more you can tell us about him?’ he demanded, as I rose to depart.

‘Yes,’ I said. I seized my opportunity to fire a parting shot. ‘His head was markedly brachycephalic. He will not find it so easy to alter that.’

I observed with pleasure that Inspector Meadows’s pen wavered. It was clear that he did not know how to spell brachycephalic.

CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_3097f440-84c1-50d6-9ef3-152ec2db8626)

In the first heat of indignation, I found my next step unexpectedly easy to tackle. I had had a half-formed plan in my head when I went to Scotland Yard. One to be carried out if my interview there was unsatisfactory (it had been profoundly unsatisfactory). That is, if I had the nerve to go through with it.

Things that one would shrink from attempting normally are easily tackled in a flush of anger. Without giving myself time to reflect, I walked straight to the house of Lord Nasby.

Lord Nasby was the millionaire owner of the Daily Budget. He owned other papers—several of them, but the Daily Budget was his special child. It was as the owner of the Daily Budget that he was known to every householder in the United Kingdom. Owing to the fact that an itinerary of the great man’s daily proceedings had just been published, I knew exactly where to find him at this moment. It was his hour for dictating to his secretary in his own house.

I did not, of course, suppose that any young woman who chose to come and ask for him would be at once admitted to the august presence. But I had attended to that side of the matter. In the card-tray in the hall of the Flemmings’ house, I had observed the card of the Marquis of Loamsley, England’s most famous sporting peer. I had removed the card, cleaned it carefully with bread-crumbs, and pencilled upon it the words: ‘Please give Miss Beddingfeld a few moments of your time.’ Adventuresses must not be too scrupulous in their methods.

The thing worked. A powdered footman received the card and bore it away. Presently a pale secretary appeared. I fenced with him successfully. He retired in defeat. He again reappeared and begged me to follow him. I did so. I entered a large room, a frightened-looking shorthand-typist fled past me like a visitant from the spirit-world. Then the door shut and I was face to face with Lord Nasby.

A big man. Big head. Big face. Big moustache. Big stomach. I pulled myself together. I had not come here to comment on Lord Nasby’s stomach. He was already roaring at me.

‘Well, what is it? What does Loamsley want? You his secretary? What’s it all about?’

‘To begin with,’ I said with as great an appearance of coolness as I could manage, ‘I don’t know Lord Loamsley, and he certainly knows nothing about me. I took his card from the tray in the house of the people I’m staying with, and I wrote those words on it myself. It was important that I should see you.’

For a moment it appeared to be a toss up as to whether Lord Nasby had apoplexy or not. In the end he swallowed twice and got over it.

‘I admire your coolness, young woman. Well, you see me! If you interest me, you will continue to see me for exactly two minutes longer.’

‘That will be ample,’ I replied. ‘And I shall interest you. It’s the Mill House Mystery.’

‘If you’ve found “The Man in the Brown Suit”, write to the editor,’ he interrupted hastily.

‘If you will interrupt, I shall be more than two minutes,’ I said sternly. ‘I haven’t found “The Man in the Brown Suit”, but I’m quite likely to do so.’

In as few words as possible I put the facts of the Tube accident and the conclusions I had drawn from them before him. When I had finished he said unexpectedly:

‘What do you know of brachycephalic heads?’

I mentioned Papa.

‘The Monkey man? Eh? Well, you seem to have a head of some kind upon your shoulders, young woman. But it’s all pretty thin, you know. Not much to go upon. And no use to us—as it stands.’

‘I’m perfectly aware of that.’

‘What d’you want, then?’

‘I want a job on your paper to investigate this matter.’

‘Can’t do that. We’ve got our own special man on it.’

‘And I’ve got my own special knowledge.’

‘What you’ve just told me, eh?’

‘Oh, no, Lord Nasby. I’ve still got something up my sleeve.’

‘Oh, you have, have you? You seem a bright sort of girl. Well, what is it?’