THE WHODUNIT COLLECTION: British Murder Mysteries (15 Novels in One Volume). Charles Norris Williamson

Foyle asked.

      "Fair. Very fair indeed," said Menzies cautiously.

      "Heard about Ling?" demanded the superintendent.

      "What about him? I was down at the station on my way here and there was nothing much fresh then."

      "Nothing much. It's interesting, though." Foyle kicked an obdurate coal with the toe of his brightly polished boot. "It happened after you had gone and they've just had me on the 'phone. You know they put a constable in the cell with him? He offered the man one hundred pounds to smuggle him out."

      "That's interesting. Looks as if he doesn't fancy his chance overmuch." The detail did not appear to greatly stir Menzies.

      "Yes, but listen to this. The blame fool, after refusing it, seems to have got into conversation with Ling and asked him if he really did shoot Greye-Stratton."

      Some sign of consternation flickered over Menzies' face. "You don't say," he exclaimed. "The cabbageheaded idiot!"... Words failed him.

      There is one unforgiveable blunder in the Metropolitan Police, the hideousness of which no layman can adequately plumb. To question a prisoner, to coax or bully him into an admission of guilt is one of those things that no zeal, no temptation can excuse. It is not merely that it is against the law. It is not playing the game. The slightest suggestion that such a course has been pursued has before now secured a guilty man's acquittal.

      Foyle kicked the coals again and the action seemed to afford him some relief. '' And Ling admitted it. The chap was so proud of what he'd done that he took a note of the conversation."

      "I don't see what we can do," said Menzies slowly. "We can't put the constable in the box. The only thing to do is to let it slide. If we don't use it the defence won't make a point of it."

      "What I'm wondering about," said the superintendent, "is if your evidence is water-tight as it stands. You see, even if Ling should make a voluntary admission now it's tainted. He's been seeing that shyster Lexton and I wouldn't wonder if all this wasn't a carefully put-up trap."

      Weir Menzies drew his brows together and began eating his moustache. "There might be something in that," he agreed. "Lexton's a good lawyer and it's like him."

      "See." Foyle demonstrated with a forefinger. "If we could be tempted into putting an officer in the box to say that Ling had confessed he'd have us by the short hair. We'd have to admit that at least one of our men had questioned him and "he snapped his fingers

      "there you are. The whole police evidence tainted. We're so anxious for a conviction that we've applied third-degree methods in England. Why, he'd be acquitted if he'd committed as many murders as Herod."

      "I quite understand, sir." Menzies was a little peevish at having the i's dotted. "If he makes a thousand confessions we won't use them."

      "I only wanted to put you wise," said Foyle almost apologetically. "You've got to rely on a straightforward case. Got it mapped out?"

      "I think so. There's the direct case against him. There's plenty of evidence to indicate Gwennie Lyne's association, and we've got Miss Greye-Stratton's story. Big Rufe was caught, so to speak, red-handed, and I rather fancy when he sees how deep he's in he'll turn King's evidence. We don't want that, though, if we can help it."

      "No. I should think not," said the superintendent quickly. He had all the prejudice of the trained man against calling the assistance of one guilty person to convict others. King's evidence is never suggested by Scotland Yard officers except as a last resource.

      "The weak point," said Menzies, "is Dago Sam. Except his threatening Hallett, and what Cincinnati Red can tell us about him, we've got little to connect him up."

      "Well, see what the lawyers say," said Foyle. "After all, it's their funeral now."

      Menzies nevertheless had a doubt rankling in his mind, and before he left for the consultation with the legal lights he had put into motion again all the machinery that he could bring to bear to find out whether any part of the case as affecting Dago Sam had been overlooked. He held no animus. He would cheerfully have volunteered any statement in favour of a prisoner, but equally he had that stern sense of duty that impelled him to make sure he had every accessible fact.

      Many difficulties had been brushed away since all the main persons of the drama were in his hands, and it not infrequently happens that evidence of vast import is picked up after arrests have been effected. It is then possible to go over the ground more at leisure and with an undetached mind.

      Congreve, with a big Gladstone bag and an air of jubilation, was awaiting him when he returned from Whitehall. He had been assisting in the search of the opium house, and, though he suppressed it well, it was plain to the inspector's keen eyes that he was labouring under some excitement.

      "Having a birthday, Congreve?" he said. "You look happy."

      The other was diving into the bag. He stood up with something wrapped in tissue paper in his arms. "We went over that place as you said, sir. Mostly old pipes and lamps and all the old junk that you'd expect. I left it in charge of Hugh. There was one room, though, that had apparently been lived in by a European, proper bed and washstand and everything. The mattress looked rather uneven, so we undid it. Found this suit of clothes stuffed in it. Shouldn't wonder if we found that they fit Ling. Here's the jacket. Look at the stain on the left sleeve and breast.

      "Don't be in a hurry to jump to conclusions, Congreve," said Menzies calmly.

      "It's blood, all right, sir," asserted Congreve confidently. "Look." He pointed as Menzies spread the jacket carefully over the desk. "You'll remember how the dead man was lying on his left side with his face towards the fireplace. Anyone approaching the body would naturally come from behind and use the left arm to support the head. If the wound was bleeding freely then the jacket would be soaked exactly like this one."

      Menzies opened a penknife and removed a hair from the breast of the coat. "Go and get me two small pieces of glass," he said.

      He placed the hair between the small glass slabs which Congreve secured and tied a piece of tape round them. His lips were pressed together tightly.

      "Does it strike you, Congreve," he said quietly, "that if you're right and this is the suit that was worn by the murderer it queers my theory? I was relying on the thread of cloth I found to show that it was Ling. Now this material isn't in the slightest respect like that.

      It means that we've got an entirely new angle to look into."

      "Yes, but--"

      "Never mind about anything else for the minute. Take the coat round to Professor Harding's and make sure that it is human blood. Before you do that 'phone through to Mr. Fynne-Racton and ask him if he'll oblige me by coming on here as quick as a motor can bring him. Tell him to bring an instrument. It's very urgent or I wouldn't trouble him." He opened the breast pocket of the coat, wrote a few words on an envelope and passed out, carrying the hair in its glass shield.

      He held a brief conversation with Foyle in the latter's room and left the hair with him. Thence he walked to the Home Office, from there took the tube to Kensington, and thence returned to a certain tailoring firm in the Strand. From the Strand he took a taxi to Buxton Prison.

      He had entirely forgotten his appointment with Jimmie Hallett and that young man's reproachful face peering out of the waiting-room was one of the first sights that he encountered on his return to the Yard.

      "Hullo, Hallett, old man. Sorry. Hope I haven't kept you waiting long?"

      "Only a matter of a couple of hours," said Jimmie. "Don't apologise."

      '' Lucky you're a man of leisure," grinned the detective. "Another ten minutes won't hurt." He swung into the superintendent's room.

      It was nearer another sixty than another ten minutes before he emerged and carried the impatient Jimmie to the electric cars opposite the Houses of Parliament. "That's another good day's work done," he said thankfully. "I clean forgot all about you, Hallett, or I'd have left a message.