Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 48, No. 1, January 2003

Darwin nodded absently. He had paused on the threshold and was sniffing the air. He did not long pause there but continued into the bedroom, where a still form covered with a sheet lay on a wide bed adorned with a carved wooden head and foot. No one, seeing his earlier bantering with Jacob Pole on the coach, would have recognized the man, coldly serious and absorbed, who removed the sheet and bent over the body.

“His clothes are wet.” He spoke as though to himself. “But we lack the facies of drowning. This body was broken — at feet and ankles, and much above. Tibia and fibula, femur and pelvis, all smashed. Spine and ribs shattered. Elias Barton suffered a long fall onto rock or stone.”

Wentworth started to say, “That is exactly what—” but Darwin held up his hand.

“Not yet, Collie. Detail is the heart of diagnosis, and I am not yet finished.”

He bent again over the body, now baring the torso and examining the chest, shoulders, and upper and lower arms, especially the hands. He turned these over to inspect the palms and the fingers and moved at last to the head. He rolled back an eyelid with his thumb and peered hard at the sightless orb behind it. He grunted, then pried open the mouth to examine the lips, teeth, and tongue.

“Erasmus, is this necessary? Surely you have already—”

“Now I have.” Darwin replaced the sheet over the body, returned to the study, and plumped down hard on the only comfortable chair. There he sat motionless, a vacant expression on his fat face, until at last Wentworth glanced across at Jacob Pole, who nodded and said, “Well, ’Rasmus? Are you going to offer an opinion, or do you propose to take a nap there?”

“Eh?” Darwin looked up.

“The death of Dr. Elias Barton.”

“Oh, it is as I said. He slipped from some high place, and the impact with the ground killed him. That is clear enough. That his clothes are damp is no mystery, if he fell last night before or during that torrential rain. It all fits. Yet there is... something...” He again stared vacantly across the room, to the open windows at the far side.

“You say he fell.” Wentworth spoke the last word with unusual emphasis. “He was not, you think, picked up and thrown?”

If Darwin was surprised by the question, he chose not to show it. He shook his head. “Strictly speaking, one cannot rule out the possibility. However, I judge it unlikely. From the nature of the injuries the body landed erect, as though during the fall he had struggled to land feet first. The lower body is horribly injured, so if someone held him by the legs and threw him down, any evidence there would of course be undetectable. On the other hand, there are no bruises on arms or shoulders consistent with violent gripping, which would surely have been necessary, if one were to overpower and hurl to his death a struggling victim. Finally, I find no head wounds to suggest that Elias Barton was knocked unconscious prior to his fall. He fell, he was not thrown. And he was alive — also, I surmise, awake and aware — until the moment of impact.”

Darwin stared at Wentworth. “I suspect that my comments in no way surprise you.”

“In truth, they do not, although in thoroughness of detail they go beyond the information offered by Dr. Arbuthnot, the physician who first examined the body. However, his conclusion, although more summary, was in essence no different from yours.”

“On the other hand, from your expression neither of our efforts is satisfying to you.”

“I cannot deny that your conclusion disturbs me, although the Master of St. John’s has already made his official announcement, that Elias Barton was unfortunate enough to fall from a high window and kill himself. An accidental death, with no room for doubt. However, will you permit one more call upon your time and attention?”

“The Cook Expedition lecture is, you said, postponed. My time today is yours.”

“Then pray follow me.”

Wentworth led them out of the rooms, but not, as Darwin and Pole had perhaps expected, taking the right turn back into Third Court. Instead he went left and up, ascending a dark, steep stairway with deep treads and tight right-hand turns. They went up and up, until by the fortieth step Pole was cursing and only lack of wind prevented Darwin from joining in.

“Where the devil are you taking us?” Pole halted, his hand on his side. “Up to heaven?”

“Or perhaps to hell.” Wentworth had reached his destination, a narrow door of dark oak, and was waiting for them there. “We are at the top floor, almost at the roof. This room is not occupied during the summer, so the door is never locked. It was not locked yesterday.”

He led them through a doorway small enough that Jacob Pole banged his head on the way in. The single room beyond, substantial in size but far less grand than Elias Barton’s quarters, had windows on three sides. Wentworth urged his companions across to the left, to a single oval window with a chest-high sill.

“Look over, if you can.”