Lord Peter Views the Body (30 page)

    ‘They think we’re burglars, Gherkins. Always misunderstood. Give way, my hearties—

‘A-roving, a-roving, since roving’s been my ru-i-in,

I’ll go no more a-roving with you, fair maid.’

    ‘Is that you, my lord?’ said a man’s voice as they drew into the boat-house.

    ‘Why, it’s our faithful sleuths!’ cried his lordship. ‘What’s the excitement?’

    ‘We found this fellow sneaking round the boat-house,’ said the man from Scotland Yard. ‘He says he’s the old gentleman’s nephew. Do you know him, my lord?’

    ‘I rather fancy I do,’ said Wimsey. ‘Mr Pope, I think. Good evening. Were you looking for anything? Not a treasure, by any chance? Because we’ve just found one. Oh! don’t say that.
Maxima reverentia
, you know. Lord St George is of tender years. And, by the way, thank you so much for sending your delightful friends to call on me last night. Oh, yes, Thompson, I’ll charge him all right. You there, doctor? Splendid. Now, if anybody’s got a spanner or anything handy, we’ll have a look at Great-grandpapa Cuthbert. And if he turns out to be old iron, Mr Pope, you’ll have had an uncommonly good joke for your money.’

    An iron bar was produced from the boat-house and thrust under the hasp of the chest. It creaked and burst. Dr Conyers knelt down tremulously and threw open the lid.

    There was a little pause.

    ‘The drinks are on you, Mr Pope,’ said Lord Peter. ‘I think, doctor, it ought to be a jolly good hospital when it’s finished.’

THE PISCATORIAL FARCE OF THE STOLEN STOMACH

‘What in the world,’ said Lord Peter Wimsey, ‘is that?’

    Thomas Macpherson disengaged the tall jar from its final swathings of paper and straw and set it tenderly upright beside the coffee-pot.

    ‘That,’ he said, ‘is Great-Uncle Joseph’s legacy.’

    ‘And who is Great-Uncle Joseph?’

    ‘He was my mother’s uncle. Name of Ferguson. Eccentric old boy. I was rather a favourite of his.’

    ‘It looks like it. Was that all he left you?’

    ‘Imph’m. He said a good digestion was the most precious thing a man could have.’

    ‘Well, he was right there. Is this his? Was it a good one?’

    ‘Good enough. He lived to be ninety-five, and never had a day’s illness.’

    Wimsey looked at the jar with increased respect.

    ‘What did he die of?’

    ‘Chucked himself out of a sixth-story window. He had a stroke, and the doctors told him – or he guessed for himself – that it was the beginning of the end. He left a letter. Said he had never been ill in his life and wasn’t going to begin now. They brought it in temporary insanity, of course, but I think he was thoroughly sensible.’

    ‘I should say so. What was he when he was functioning?’

    ‘He used to be in business – something to do with shipbuilding, I believe, but he retired long ago. He was what the papers call a recluse. Lived all by himself in a little top flat in Glasgow, and saw nobody. Used to go off by himself for days at a time, nobody knew where or why. I used to look him up about once a year and take him a bottle of whisky.’

    ‘Had he any money?’

    ‘Nobody knew. He ought to have had – he was a rich man when he retired. But, when we came to look into it, it turned out he only had a balance of about five hundred pounds in the Glasgow Bank. Apparently he drew out almost everything he had about twenty years ago. There were one or two big bank failures round about that time, and they thought he must have got the wind up. But what he did with it, goodness only knows.’

    ‘Kept it in an old stocking, I expect.’

    ‘I should think Cousin Robert devoutly hopes so.’

    ‘Cousin Robert?’

    ‘He’s the residuary legatee. Distant connection of mine, and the only remaining Ferguson. He was awfully wild when he found he’d only got five hundred. He’s rather a bright lad, is Robert, and a few thousands would have come in handy.’

    ‘I see. Well, how about a bit of brekker? You might stick Great-Uncle Joseph out of the way somewhere. I don’t care about the looks of him.’

    ‘I thought you were rather partial to anatomical specimens.’

    ‘So I am, but not on the breakfast-table. “A place for everything and everything in its place,” as my grandmother used to say. Besides, it would give Maggie a shock if she saw it.’

    Macpherson laughed, and transferred the jar to a cupboard.

    ‘Maggie’s shock-proof. I brought a few odd bones and things with me, by way of a holiday task. I’m getting near my final, you know. She’ll just think this is another of them. Ring the bell, old man, would you? We’ll see what the trout’s like.’

    The door opened to admit the housekeeper, with a dish of grilled trout and a plate of fried scones.

    ‘These look good, Maggie,’ said Wimsey, drawing his chair up and sniffing appreciatively.

    ‘Aye, sir, they’re gude, but they’re awfu’ wee fish.’

    ‘Don’t grumble at them,’ said Macpherson. ‘They’re the sole result of a day’s purgatory up on Loch Whyneon. What with the sun fit to roast you and an east wind, I’m pretty well flayed alive. I very nearly didn’t shave at all this morning.’ He passed a reminiscent hand over his red and excoriated face. ‘Ugh! It’s a stiff pull up that hill, and the boat was going wallop, wallop all the time, like being in the Bay of Biscay.’

    ‘Damnable, I should think. But there’s a change coming. The glass is going back. We’ll be having some rain before we’re many days older.’

    ‘Time, too,’ said Macpherson. ‘The burns are nearly dry, and there’s not much water in the Fleet.’ He glanced out of the window to where the little river ran tinkling and skinkling over the stones at the bottom of the garden. ‘If only we get a few days’ rain now, there’ll be some grand fishing.’

    ‘It
would
come just as I’ve got to go, naturally,’ remarked Wimsey.

    ‘Yes; can’t you stay a bit longer? I want to have a try for some sea-trout.’

    ‘Sorry, old man, can’t be done. I must be in Town on Wednesday. Never mind. I’ve had a fine time in the fresh air and got in some good rounds of golf.’

    ‘You must come up another time. I’m here for a month – getting my strength up for the exams and all that. If you can’t get away before I go, we’ll put it off till August and have a shot at the grouse. The cottage is always at your service, you know, Wimsey.’

    ‘Many thanks. I may get my business over quicker than I think, and, if I do, I’ll turn up here again. When did you say your great-uncle died?’

    Macpherson stared at him.

    ‘Some time in April as far as I can remember. Why?’

    ‘Oh, nothing – I just wondered. You were a favourite of his, didn’t you say?’

    ‘In a sense. I think the old boy liked my remembering him from time to time. Old people are pleased by little attentions, you know?’

    ‘M’m. Well, it’s a queer world. What did you say his name was?’

    ‘Ferguson – Joseph Alexander Ferguson, to be exact. You seem extraordinarily interested in Great-Uncle Joseph.’

    ‘I thought, while I was about it, I might look up a man I know in the ship-building line, and see if he knows anything about where the money went to.’

    ‘If you can do that, Cousin Robert will give you a medal. But, if you really want to exercise your detective powers on the problem, you’d better have a hunt through the flat in Glasgow.’

    ‘Yes – what is the address, by the way?’

    Macpherson told him the address.

    ‘I’ll make a note of it, and, if anything occurs to me, I’ll communicate with Cousin Robert. Where does he hang out?’

    ‘Oh, he’s in London, in a solicitor’s office. Crosbie & Plump, somewhere in Bloomsbury. Robert was studying for the Scottish Bar, you know, but he made rather a mess of things, so they pushed him off among the Sassenachs. His father died a couple of years ago – he was a Writer to the Signet in Edinburgh – and I fancy Robert has rather gone to the bow-wows since then. Got among a cheerful crowd down there, don’t you know, and wasted his substance somewhat.’

    ‘Terrible! Scotsmen shouldn’t be allowed to leave home. What are you going to do with Great-Uncle?’

    ‘Oh, I don’t know. Keep him for a bit, I think. I liked the old fellow, and I don’t want to throw him away. He’ll look rather well in my consulting-room, don’t you think, when I’m qualified and set up my brass plate. I’ll say he was presented by a grateful patient on whom I performed a marvellous operation.’

    ‘That’s a good idea. Stomach-grafting. Miracle of surgery never before attempted. He’ll bring sufferers to your door in flocks.’

    ‘Good old Great-Uncle – he may be worth a fortune to me after all.’

    ‘So he may. I don’t suppose you’ve got such a thing as a photograph of him, have you?’

    ‘A photograph?’ Macpherson stared again. ‘Great-Uncle seems to be becoming a passion with you. I don’t suppose the old man had a photograph taken these thirty years. There was one done then – when he retired from business. I expect Robert’s got that.’

    ‘Och aye,’ said Wimsey, in the language of the country.

Wimsey left Scotland that evening, and drove down through the night towards London, thinking hard as he went. He handled the wheel mechanically, swerving now and again to avoid the green eyes of rabbits as they bolted from the roadside to squat fascinated in the glare of his head-lamps. He was accustomed to say that his brain worked better when his immediate attention was occupied by the incidents of the road.

    Monday morning found him in town with his business finished and his thinking done. A consultation with his ship-building friend had put him in possession of some facts about Great-Uncle Joseph’s money, together with a copy of Great-Uncle Joseph’s photograph, supplied by the London representative of the Glasgow firm to which he had belonged. It appeared that old Ferguson had been a man of mark in his day. The portrait showed a fine, dour old face, long-lipped and high in the cheek-bones – one of those faces which alter little in a lifetime. Wimsey looked at the photograph with satisfaction as he slipped it into his pocket and made a bee-line for Somerset House.

    Here he wandered timidly about the wills department, till a uniformed official took pity on him and enquired what he wanted.

    ‘Oh, thank you,’ said Wimsey effusively, ‘thank you so much. Always feel nervous in these places. All these big desks and things, don’t you know, so awe-inspiring and business-like. Yes, I just wanted to have a squint at a will. I’m told you can see anybody’s will for a shilling. Is that really so?’

    ‘Yes, sir, certainly. Anybody’s will in particular, sir?’

    ‘Oh, yes, of course – how silly of me. Yes. Curious, isn’t it, that when you’re dead any stranger can come and snoop round your private affairs – see how much you cut up for and who your lady friends were, and all that. Yes. Not at all nice. Horrid lack of privacy, what?’

    The attendant laughed.

    ‘I expect it’s all one when you’re dead, sir.’

    ‘That’s awfully true. Yes, naturally, you’re dead by then and it doesn’t matter. May be a bit trying for your relations, of course, to learn what a bad boy you’ve been. Great fun annoyin’ one’s relations. Always do it myself. Now, what were we sayin’? Ah! yes – the will. (I’m always so absent-minded.) Whose will, you said? Well, it’s an old Scots gentleman called Joseph Alexander Ferguson that died at Glasgow – you know Glasgow, where the accent’s so strong that even Scotsmen faint when they hear it – in April, this last April as ever was. If it’s not troubling you too much, may I have a bob’s-worth of Joseph Alexander Ferguson?’

    The attendant assured him that he might, adding the caution that he must memorise the contents of the will and not on any account take notes. Thus warned, Wimsey was conducted into a retired corner, where in a short time the will was placed before him.

    It was a commendably brief document, written in holograph, and was dated the previous January. After the usual preamble and the bequest of a few small sums and articles of personal ornament to friends, it proceeded somewhat as follows:

‘And I direct that, after my death, the alimentary organs be removed entire with their contents from my body, commencing with the oesophagus and ending with the anal canal, and that they be properly secured at both ends with a suitable ligature, and be enclosed in a proper preservative medium in a glass vessel and given to my great-nephew Thomas Macpherson of the Stone Cottage, Gatehouse-of-the-Fleet, in Kirkcudbrightshire, now studying medicine in Aberdeen. And I bequeath him these my alimentary organs with their contents for his study and edification, they having served me for ninety-five years without failure, or defect, because I wish him to understand that no riches in the world are comparable to the riches of a good digestion. And I desire of him that he will, in the exercise of his medical profession, use his best endeavours to preserve to his patients the blessing of good digestion unimpaired, not needlessly filling their stomachs with drugs out of concern for his own pocket, but exhorting them to a sober and temperate life agreeably to the design of Almighty Providence.’