Lord Peter Wimsey [01] Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers Read Free Book Online Page B

in Niagara. I searched the roofs right along–and came to the jolly conclusion that any person in any blessed flat in the blessed row might have done it. All the staircases open on to the roof and the leads are quite flat; you can walk along as easy as along Shaftesbury Avenue. Still, I've got some evidence that the body did walk along there."
     
    "What's that?"
     
    Parker brought out his pocketbook and extracted a few shreds of material, which he laid before his friend.
     
    "One was caught in the gutter just above Thipps's bathroom window, another in a crack of the stone parapet just over it, and the rest came from the chimney-stack behind, where they had caught in an iron stanchion. What do you make of them?"
     
    Lord Peter scrutinized them very carefully through his lens.
     
    "Interesting," he said, "damned interesting. Have you developed those plates, Bunter?" he added, as that discreet assistant came in with the post.
     
    "Yes, my lord."
     
    "Caught anything?"
     
    "I don't know whether to call it anything or not, my lord," said Bunter, dubiously. "I'll bring the prints in."
     
    "Do," said Wimsey. "Hallo! here's our advertisement about the gold chain in the Times –very nice it looks: 'Write, 'phone or call 110, Piccadilly.' Perhaps it would have been safer to put a box number, though I always think that the franker you are with people, the more you're likely to deceive 'em; so unused is the modern world to the open hand and the guileless heart, what?"
     
    "But you don't think the fellow who left that chain on the body is going to give himself away by coming here and enquiring about it?"
     
    "I don't, fathead," said Lord Peter, with the easy politeness of the real aristocracy, "that's why I've tried to get hold of the jeweler who originally sold the chain. See?" He pointed to the paragraph. "It's not an old chain–hardly worn at all. Oh, thanks, Bunter. Now, see here, Parker, these are the finger-marks you noticed yesterday on the window-sash and on the far edge of the bath. I'd overlooked them; I give you full credit for the discovery, I crawl, I grovel, my name is Watson, and you need not say what you were just going to say, because I admit it all. Now we shall–Hullo, hullo, hullo!"
     
    The three men stared at the photographs.
     
    "The criminal," said Lord Peter, bitterly, "climbed over the roofs in the wet and not unnaturally got soot on his fingers. He arranged the body in the bath, and wiped away all traces of himself except two, which he obligingly left to show us how to do our job. We learn from a smudge on the floor that he wore india rubber boots, and from this admirable set of fingerprints on the edge of the bath that he had the usual number of fingers and wore rubber gloves. That's the kind of man he is. Take the fool away, gentlemen."
     
    He put the prints aside, and returned to an examination of the shreds of material in his hand. Suddenly he whistled softly.
     
    "Do you make anything of these, Parker?"
     
    "They seemed to me to be ravellings of some coarse cotton stuff–a sheet, perhaps, or an improvised rope."
     
    "Yes," said Lord Peter–"yes. It may be a mistake–it may be our mistake. I wonder. Tell me, d'you think these tiny threads are long enough and strong enough to hang a man?"
     
    He was silent, his long eyes narrowing into slits behind the smoke of his pipe.
     
    "What do you suggest doing this morning?" asked Parker.
     
    "Well," said Lord Peter, "it seems to me it's about time I took a hand in your job. Let's go round to Park Lane and see what larks Sir Reuben Levy was up to in bed last night."
     
    * * *
     
    "And now, Mrs. Pemming, if you would be so kind as give me a blanket," said Mr. Bunter, coming down into the kitchen, "and permit of me hanging a sheet across the lower part of this window, and drawing the screen across here, so–so as to shut off any reflections, if you understand me, we'll get to work.''
     
    Sir Reuben Levy's cook, with her eye upon Mr. Bunter's