Lord Peter Views the Body (41 page)

    ‘An hour and a half since the President left,’ said one.

    Wimsey glanced up. Then he returned to his examination of the room. There were many curious things in it, which he wanted to memorise.

    Presently the trap-door was flung open. ‘Bring him up!’ cried a voice. Wimsey rose immediately, and his face was rather pale.

    The members of the gang were again seated round the table. Number Two occupied the President’s chair, and her eyes fastened on Wimsey’s face with a tigerish fury, but when she spoke it was with a self-control which roused his admiration.

    ‘The President has been two hours gone,’ she said. ‘What has happened to him? Traitor twice over – what has happened to him?’

    ‘How should I know?’ said Wimsey. ‘Perhaps he has looked after Number One and gone while the going was good!’

    She sprang up with a little cry of rage, and came close to him.

    ‘Beast! liar!’ she said, and struck him on the mouth. ‘You know he would never do that. He is faithful to his friends. What have you done with him? Speak – or I will make you speak. You two, there – bring the irons. He
shall
speak!’

    ‘I can only form a guess, madame,’ replied Wimsey, ‘and I shall not guess any the better for being stimulated with hot irons, like Pantaloon at the circus. Calm yourself, and I will tell you what I think. I think – indeed, I greatly fear – that Monsieur le Président in his hurry to examine the interesting exhibits in my safe may, quite inadvertently, no doubt, have let the door of the inner compartment close behind him. In which case—’

    He raised his eyebrow, his shoulders being too sore for shrugging, and gazed at her with a limpid and innocent regret.

    ‘What do you mean?’

    Wimsey glanced round the circle.

    ‘I think,’ he said, ‘I had better begin from the beginning by explaining to you the mechanism of my safe. It is rather a nice safe,’ he added plaintively. ‘I invented the idea myself – not the principle of its working, of course; that is a matter for scientists – but just the idea of the thing.

    ‘The combination I gave you is perfectly correct as far as it goes. It is a three-alphabet thirteen-letter lock by Bunn & Fishett – a very good one of its kind. It opens the outer door, leading into the ordinary strong-room, where I keep my cash and my Froth Blower’s cuff-links and all that. But there is an inner compartment with two doors, which open in a quite different manner. The outermost of these two inner doors is merely a thin steel skin, painted to look like the back of the safe and fitting closely, so as not to betray any join. It lies in the same plane as the wall of the room, you understand, so that if you were to measure the outside and the inside of the safe you would discover no discrepancy. It opens outwards with an ordinary key, and, as I truly assured the President, it was left open when I quitted my flat.’

    ‘Do you think,’ said the woman sneeringly, ‘that the President is so simple as to be caught in a so obvious trap? He will have wedged open that inner door undoubtedly.’

    ‘Undoubtedly, madame. But the sole purpose of that outer inner door, if I may so express myself, is to appear to be the only inner door. But hidden behind the hinge of that door is another door, a sliding panel, set so closely in the thickness of the wall that you would hardly see it unless you knew it was there. This door was also left open. Our revered Number One had nothing to do but to walk straight through into the inner compartment of the safe, which, by the way, is built into the chimney, of the old basement kitchen, which runs up the house at that point. I hope I make myself clear?’

    ‘Yes, yes – get on. Make your story short.’

    Wimsey bowed, and, speaking with even greater deliberation than ever, resumed:

    ‘Now, this interesting list of the Society’s activities, which I have had the honour of compiling, is written in a very large books – bigger, even, than Monsieur le Président’s ledger which he uses downstairs. (I trust, by the way, madame, that you have borne in mind the necessity of putting that ledger in a safe place. Apart from the risk of investigation by some officious policeman, it would be inadvisable that any junior member of the Society should get hold of it. The feeling of the meeting would, I fancy, be opposed to such an occurrence.)’

    ‘It is secure,’ she answered hastily. ‘
Mon dieu!
get on with your story.’

    ‘Thank you – you have relieved my mind. Very good. This big book lies on a steel shelf at the back of the inner compartment. Just a moment. I have not described this inner compartment to you. It is six feet high, three feet wide, and three feet deep. One can stand up in it quite comfortably, unless one is very tall. It suits me nicely – as you may see, I am not more than five feet eight and a half. The President has the advantage of me in height; he might be a little cramped, but there would be room for him to squat if he grew tired of standing. By the way, I don’t know if you know it, but you have tied me up rather tightly.’

    ‘I would have you tied till your bones were locked together. Beat him, you! He is trying to gain time.’

    ‘If you beat me,’ said Wimsey, ‘I’m damned if I’ll speak at all. Control yourself, madame; it does not do to move hastily when your king is in check.’

    ‘Get on!’ she cried again, stamping with rage.

    ‘Where was I? Ah! the inner compartment. As I say, it is a little snug – the more so that it is not ventilated in any way. Did I mention that the book lay on a steel shelf?’

    ‘You did.’

    ‘Yes. The steel shelf is balanced on a very delicate concealed spring. When the weight of the book – a heavy one, as I said – is lifted, the shelf rises almost imperceptibly. In rising it makes an electrical contact. Imagine to yourself, madame; our revered President steps in – propping the false door open behind him – he sees the book – quickly he snatches it up. To make sure that it is the right one, he opens it – he studies the pages. He looks about for the other objects I have mentioned, which bear the marks of fingerprints. And silently, but very, very quickly – you can imagine it, can you not? – the secret panel, released by the rising of the shelf, leaps across like a panther behind him. Rather a trite simile, but apt, don’t you think?’

    ‘My God! oh, my God!’ Her hand went up as though to tear the choking mask from her face. ‘You – you devil – devil! What is the word that opens the inner door? Quick! I will have it torn out of you – the word!’

    ‘It is not a hard word to remember, madame – though it has been forgotten before now. Do you recollect, when you were a child, being told the tale of “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves”? When I had that door made, my mind reverted, with rather a pretty touch of sentimentality, in my opinion, to the happy hours of my childhood. The words that open the door are – “Open Sesame.”’

    ‘Ah! How long can a man live in this devil’s trap of yours?’

    ‘Oh,’ said Wimsey cheerfully, ‘I should think he might hold out a few hours if he kept cool and didn’t use up the available oxygen by shouting and hammering. If we went there at once, I dare say we should find him fairly all right.’

    ‘I shall go myself. Take this man and – do your worst with him. Don’t finish him till I come back. I want to see him die!’

    ‘One moment,’ said Wimsey, unmoved by this amiable wish. ‘I think you had better take me with you.’

    ‘Why – why?’

    ‘Because, you see, I’m the only person who can open the door.’

    ‘But you have given me the word. Was that a lie?’

    ‘No – the word’s all right. But, you see, it’s one of these new-style electric doors. In fact, it’s really the very latest thing in doors. I’m rather proud of it. It opens to the words “Open Sesame” all right –
but to my voice only
.’

    ‘Your voice? I will choke your voice with my own hands. What do you mean – your voice only?’

    ‘Just what I say. Don’t clutch my throat like that, or you may alter my voice so that the door won’t recognise it. That’s better. It’s apt to be rather pernickety about voices. It got stuck up for a week once, when I had a cold and could only implore it in a hoarse whisper. Even in the ordinary way, I sometimes have to try several times before I hit on the exact right intonation.’

    She turned and appealed to a short, thick-set man standing beside her.

    ‘Is this true? Is it possible?’

    ‘Perfectly, ma’am, I’m afraid,’ said the man civilly. From his voice Wimsey took him to be a superior workman of some kind – probably an engineer.

    ‘Is it an electrical device? Do you understand it?’

    ‘Yes, ma’am. It will have a microphone arrangement somewhere, which converts the sound into a series of vibrations controlling an electric needle. When the needle has traced the correct pattern, the circuit is completed and the door opens. The same thing can be done by light vibrations equally easily.’

    ‘Couldn’t you open it with tools?’

    ‘In time, yes, ma’am. But only by smashing the mechanism, which is probably well protected.’

    ‘You may take that for granted,’ interjected Wimsey reassuringly.

    She put her hands to her head.

    ‘I’m afraid we’re done in,’ said the engineer, with a kind of respect in his tone for a good job of work.

    ‘No – wait! Somebody must know – the workmen who made this thing?’

    ‘In Germany,’ said Wimsey briefly.

    ‘Or – yes, yes, I have it – a gramophone. This – this –
he
– shall be made to say the word for us. Quick – how can it be done?’

    ‘Not possible, ma’am. Where should we get the apparatus at half-past three on a Sunday morning? The poor gentleman would be dead long before—’

    There was a silence, during which the sounds of the awakening day came through the shuttered windows. A motor-horn sounded distantly.

    ‘I give in,’ she said. ‘We must let him go. Take the ropes off him. You will free him, won’t you?’ she went on, turning piteously to Wimsey. ‘Devil as you are, you are not such a devil as that! You will go straight back and save him!’

    ‘Let him go, nothing!’ broke in one of the men. ‘He doesn’t go to peach to the police, my lady, don’t you think it. The President’s done in, that’s all, and we’d all better make tracks while we can. It’s all up, boys. Chuck this fellow down the cellar and fasten him in, so he can’t make a row and wake the place up. I’m going to destroy the ledgers. You can see it done if you don’t trust me. And you, Thirty, you know where the switch is. Give us a quarter of an hour to clear, and then you can blow the place to glory.’

    ‘No! You can’t go – you can’t leave him to die – your President – your leader – my – I won’t let it happen. Set this devil free. Help me, one of you, with the ropes—’

    ‘None of that, now,’ said the man who had spoken before. He caught her by the wrists, and she twisted, shrieking, in his arms, biting and struggling to get free.

    ‘Think, think,’ said the man with the treacly voice. ‘It’s getting on to morning. It’ll be light in an hour or two. The police may be here any minute.’

    ‘The police!’ She seemed to control herself by a violent effort. ‘Yes, yes, you are right. We must not imperil the safety of all for the sake of one man.
He
himself would not wish it. That is so. We will put this carrion in the cellar where it cannot harm us, and depart, every one to his own place, while there is time.’

    ‘And the other prisoner?’

    ‘He? Poor fool – he can do no harm. He knows nothing. Let him go,’ she answered contemptuously.

    In a few minutes’ time Wimsey found himself bundled unceremoniously into the depths of the cellar. He was a little puzzled. That they should refuse to let him go, even at the price of Number One’s life, he could understand. He had taken the risk with his eyes open. But that they should leave him as a witness against them seemed incredible.

    The men who had taken him down strapped his ankles together and departed, switching the lights out as they went.

    ‘Hi! Kamerad!’ said Wimsey. ‘It’s a bit lonely sitting here. You might leave the light on.’

    ‘It’s all right, my friend,’ was the reply. ‘You will not be in the dark long. They have set the time-fuse.’

    The other man laughed with rich enjoyment, and they went out together. So that was it. He was to be blown up with the house. In that case the President would certainly be dead before he was extricated. This worried Wimsey; he would rather have been able to bring the big crook to justice. After all, Scotland Yard had been waiting six years to break up this gang.

    He waited, straining his ears. It seemed to him that he heard footsteps over his head. The gang had all crept out by this time. . . .

    There was certainly a creak. The trap-door had opened; he felt, rather than heard, somebody creeping into the cellar.

    ‘Hush!’ said a voice in his ear. Soft hands passed over his face, and went fumbling about his body. There came the cold touch of steel on his wrists. The ropes slackened and dropped off. A key clicked in the handcuffs. The strap about his ankles was unbuckled.

    ‘Quick! quick! they have set the time-switch. The house is mined. Follow me as fast as you can. I stole back – I said I had left my jewellery. It was true. I left it on purpose.
He
must be saved – only you can do it. Make haste!’