That night French and his wife went down to Portrush by the six-fifteen train. He was satisfied that M‘Clung would deal with his new idea in an entirely adequate way. The sergeant had promised to keep him posted as to his progress, and French in a quite private and unofficial way was to help with sympathy and advice.
For two days he heard nothing, but on the morning of the third there was a long letter from M‘Clung. It was headed ‘Reginald Platt, deceased’, and marked ‘Private and Confidential’. It read:
‘DEAR SIR—As agreed at our interview I put in hand certain inquiries relative to the new theory of the crime put up by your good self, in three instances with useful results.
‘M‘Morris’s visit to England. I went personally to Hillsborough to interview M‘Morris. I found him with Ferris in the latter’s cottage. To account for my visit I had brought a note of some points of their evidence at the trial, and I discussed these with them, saying they would come up at the appeal. Then I worked the conversation round to M‘Morris’s visit to England, and got out of him that he had gone to Windsor to the funeral of an uncle. I did not ask the address of the uncle as I did not want to put him on his guard, and so turned the talk on to the difference between Irish and English funerals.
‘I then got an urgent inquiry made to the Windsor police. They informed me that there was no funeral in or near Windsor during the two days M‘Morris was away. I have no doubt that when he is asked his uncle’s address it will give us all the proof we need that he went to no funeral.
‘Car to “Loughside.” I put some men on to visit every house alongside the road from the station at Carnalea to the sea, also with good results. At Ivanhoe, a house a short distance from the sea, a servant girl, by name Mary M‘Gaw, stated that about 3.30 on a Sunday morning about the date in question she had heard a car coming up from the sea. She had not been able to sleep and she remembered it was a Sunday morning because she had been thinking that she would not need to get up as early as usual. She had noticed the car because, though there was an occasional car passed down going home at that hour of the night, there were very few started up from the shore so late. She remembered wondering if there had been a dance at any of the houses lower down, because she had not heard of any. Then when there were no more cars passed, she knew it was not a dance and wondered if maybe someone was ill. She had a friend living down there who had had a baby two days before and she wondered if it was maybe her, but afterwards she found it was not. She said it sounded like a small car with a rattley engine. We found the date of the child’s birth and it was two days before the night of Platt’s murder, so that fixed the passing of the car for the night of the murder. A house-to-house call at all the houses on the seaside of where this girl is living showed that no car had arrived at or left any of them at that hour anywhere near the date in question.
‘This would work in all right because Ferris’s car is small and has a rattley engine. Further, it would coast quietly down the hill and the girl would not likely have heard it arriving. Up the hill it would have to work and she would have heard it.
‘Penrose’s Flat Tyre. I had an interview with Penrose and asked him about his tyre being flat on the evening of the crime. He said he couldn’t tell what had punctured it, for he hadn’t seen any nail in the tyre. When I asked him if he thought it might have been done maliciously he got very excited and said he had not thought of it, but it would explain what had puzzled him many a time. From his manner and all he said I thought it was as likely as not that it was done on purpose. The man who mended the tyre said there was a hole like from a nail, but there was no nail there.
‘All this makes your theory look likely enough, and only for the difficulty at the boat I would be ready for an arrest. But I don’t see how the evidence at the boat is to be got over.—Yours faithfully,
‘ADAM M‘CLUNG.’
French proved a somewhat silent companion that morning, as with Mrs French he took the tram out to Dunluce, explored the ruins of the castle on its isolated and once impregnable rock, and then walked back to Portrush beneath the magnificent chalk headlands of the White Rocks and along the firm clean sand of the East Strand. It was a bright day and the thin winter sunshine drew out the colours everywhere; the dead green of the bent on the dunes, the yellow of the sand, the ultramarine of the sea with its fringe of brilliant white, the dark brown of the Skerries and the hard straight line of the northern horizon against the pale blue of the sky. French felt he should have enjoyed every inch of the scene and every minute of the time. But he couldn’t. Pamela Grey’s despairing face came up between him and the landscape. He knew that for his own peace of mind he must do something more about her trouble. But what that something should be was not so obvious. Then he thought he saw his way and rang up M‘Clung.
‘If you like,’ he suggested, ‘I’ll run up to Belfast this afternoon and we’ll go down together to the Liverpool boat and have another look round.’
M‘Clung was enthusiastic. ‘I’ll meet you at the train,’ he said joyfully, ‘and we could have a bit of dinner before we go over.’
He was there smiling on the platform when French arrived. ‘I’m glad you came up, Mr French,’ he greeted him. ‘I believe you’re right about this thing and that we’ve been diddled about what happened on the boat, but I’m blessed if I can see how.’
French was hungry and he refused to talk shop till after their meal. Then as they sat smoking, he returned to the subject.
‘Now let’s see just what we want to do. I think I’d better state my theory again and you note the points that have to be gone into.’
‘I’ll do that, Mr French. I’ve been thinking of little else for the last three days, but I only get the more puzzled.’
‘Very well: we’ll try again. I admit my ideas are not proven, but here they are for what they’re worth.
‘Platt cames over with the intention of stealing the process to sell to Mitchell, and he succeeds—he does steal it. Doubtless he means to disappear, starting life again elsewhere. Ferris or M‘Morris or both get wise to the theft—probably on the Saturday morning. You remember, Miss Grey said both of them seemed worried. They see that if Platt gets away with the secret all their work and hopes are gone. And nothing will meet the case—nothing but the one thing. Only if Platt is dead will they feel safe. Why? Because he now has the thing in his head. They decide to kill him.’
M‘Clung nodded.
‘Very well. They keep in touch with Platt that day to prevent him from giving them the slip. They spend the morning, afternoon and evening with him, though they leave him alone for lunch and dinner, when doubtless they think he will be at the hotel and out of mischief. About nine they leave the hotel with him to take him to the steamer.
‘On their own statement they drive to the cottage instead of straight into Belfast. There I suggest the murder takes place. They begin by rendering Platt insensible. Probably Platt is sitting beside Ferris and when Ferris stops, M‘Morris from behind puts a chloroformed pad round his face while Ferris prevents him from struggling. Jammed up in a small car it could be quite easily done. I suggest that they then lift him into the cottage and put him with his face in a basin of water till he drowns. That’s the first stage of the affair.’
Again M‘Clung nodded.
‘Next,’ went on French, ‘they arrange their alibi. They strip the body and Ferris puts on the clothes, having used some make-up lotion to make his swarthy face pale like Platt’s. Ferris then starts off for Belfast while M‘Morris rides his push-bicycle home. Afterwards M‘Morris says he has walked, so that the time will work in correctly and give him his alibi.
‘In the meantime Ferris, made up as Platt and with Platt’s tickets, now drives as quickly as he can into Belfast. He reaches the quay and parks his car. Then as Platt he goes aboard. He is shown his cabin and pretends to be going to bed. Actually he slips ashore, picks up the car and drives home.’
‘Ah, but that’s just what he couldn’t have done, sir. The passengers are too well checked.’
‘That’s the point we’re going to look into presently. Leave it for the moment and suppose he manages it.’
‘Right, Mr French.’
‘After waiting till the house is quiet, M‘Morris slips out silently and goes back to the cottage. There Ferris presently joins him from Belfast. They redress the body in its own clothes, putting in the pocket the rail ticket, now punched by the steamer purser, as well as the berth ticket which Ferris had got aboard. Then they put the body into the car, run down to Carnalea, take out the Whitesides’ boat, which we saw could be untied by anybody, row out to the track of the steamer, throw the body into the sea and return to Hillsborough.’
‘It could be,’ M‘Clung admitted.
‘But,’ French continued, ‘here they strike their first bit of bad luck. In lifting the body out of the car at the gate of the drive M‘Morris’s pencil—of which the clip has been broken off—is worked up out of his pocket. When he starts with Ferris to carry the body to the boat it falls out. Miss Whiteside finds it; and the whole affair comes out.’
Once again M‘Clung nodded.
‘Now for one or two bits of confirmatory evidence. First, we have the pencil: its being found down there and M‘Morris’s efforts to replace it. Second, we have the car. On that Sunday morning a rattley car is heard coming up the road from the Whitesides’, and you have proved that this car was not coming from any of the houses in the area. Third, we have the difficulty of committing the murder on board, which is admitted on all hands, but which only this theory meets. And lastly, we have the evidence of the car puncture. Just consider this puncture for a moment.
‘On Saturday morning when Ferris and M‘Morris have worked out their plan, they get a horrid shock. They learn that Penrose is crossing by the same boat as Platt. If Penrose sees Ferris on board, the game will be up. They cannot urge him to change his plans, as this might afterwards seem suspicious, so they work out a scheme to safeguard themselves. They hear the arrangement that Miss Grey is going to drive Penrose in, and they decide to make use of that. One or other slips up to the Penrose yard and drives a nail or a bradawl into the car tyre, withdrawing it again. This delays Penrose and Ferris completes his stunt at the boat before he arrives. Probably they intended Penrose to miss the boat altogether, and it must have been a dreadful blow to them when he was arrested for the murder.’
‘To my way of thinking, Mr French, all that’s as sound as you could wish. If it wasn’t for the evidence we got from those steamer people that no one who went on board could have got ashore again unbeknownst, I’d be thinking of an arrest.’
‘Well, it’s getting on to eight o’clock. Let’s go down to the steamer and have a look round.’
‘I don’t believe he went down the gangway,’ French declared, when a few minutes later they were aboard the boat. ‘The checks, as you said, are too complete. We must concentrate on looking for other ways of getting ashore.’
M‘Clung agreed, but his manner indicated that there were none.
French did not reply. A phrase from one of the Sherlock Holmes stories was running in his mind, though he wasn’t sure of its exact wording. ‘Eliminate the impossible and the result, however unlikely, must be the truth.’ Something of this kind seemed the motto for their present search.
‘Eliminate the impossible.’ That, they had agreed, meant, eliminate the gangways. There were two, one for the first class and one for the third. What other means were there of getting ashore?
So far as French could see, only three, and two of these he felt he might dismiss without further consideration. There were the mooring ropes. Could a man pass down one of these from ship to quay? He thought not. Physically it might be possible, but there were two serious difficulties in the way. These ropes were at the bow and stern where passengers were prohibited, and with the loading of the cargo fore and aft anyone going towards them would certainly be challenged. The second difficulty was still greater. There were a number of people about the wharf, as well as aboard the steamers berthing above and below the Ulster Sovereign. It would be strange indeed if an attempt to pass down the rope should not be seen. And if Ferris tried it and were seen, his guilt of the murder would be established. Passage along the mooring ropes need not be considered.
Secondly, there was the river itself. Could Ferris have dropped into the river and have swum ashore? When French looked down the towering side of the ship he felt it would be utterly impossible. A man would want a rope to slip down, else he would make such a splash that he would be heard. Besides even if he reached the water in safety, French did not believe he could ever get out. A boat was out of the question; no boatman could have been trusted with such knowledge. And there was no place along the wharf nearby where he could have landed. Besides, if he were dripping wet he could not have regained his car unobserved. No, jumping into the water was equally out of the question.
There remained the third method; by means of one of the gangways from the fore and aft well decks used by the freight porters. But here observation was just as keen and complete as at the passenger gangways. No unauthorised person would be allowed to cross unchallenged.
French stood with M‘Clung at the rail looking down into the gaping cavern of the after hold. Cargo was coming aboard and he watched it automatically while puzzling his brains over his problem. Boxes and bales, roped together in slings, were swinging in from circling derricks and being raised and lowered to the whine of the electric winches. Men below were storing, men ashore bringing forward, men on deck level operating the winches and passing to and fro on various jobs. It would have been quite impossible for Ferris to have gone ashore here unobserved.
But would it? Suddenly a fresh idea shot into French’s mind and he stood rigid, thinking it over. Yes, he believed there was a way in which it might have been managed. Given any kind of reasonable luck, he felt increasingly certain it could have been done. Excitement began to grow in his mind. If this new idea were correct, and if he could prove it, the case would be well on to completion.
‘Look here, M‘Clung,’ he said; ‘see this ladder? It reaches down from here to the well deck below. What’s to prevent you or me or Ferris or anyone else from climbing down and walking ashore over those planks?’
M‘Clung grinned. ‘If you really want to know, sir, I’ll try it and then you’ll see.’
‘You think you’d be stopped?’
‘I’m certain sure.’
‘Well, so am I—if you went down looking as you do now. But suppose,’ French glanced round and sank his voice, ‘suppose you were to leave off those clothes and put on a sailor’s or a steward’s or a greaser’s? What about it then?’
M‘Clung looked at French with an expression which turned rapidly from surprise to admiration. ‘By the hokey, Mr French, I believe you’re on to it this time and no mistake. Ferris could have got the clothes and changed in his cabin. He’d have had to carry a bundle of Platt’s clothes that he’d worn coming aboard, but that wouldn’t have mattered. He could have covered them with his overcoat while passing through the alleyways, and on deck—perhaps behind a boat—have taken off the coat and have put it in the parcel with the clothes. Yes, sir, I believe you’ve got it!’
A number of experiments soon demonstrated the feasibility of French’s suggestion. Six tests on different ships with different stevedores showed that passengers in their ordinary clothes were instantly stopped when they attempted to use the cargo gangways. But when these same persons were made up as greasers they were allowed to pass unchallenged. Indeed, in four cases out of the six it turned out that they had gone ashore entirely unnoticed.
At a conference at police headquarters, at which French was present through a hearty invitation from Rainey—whose lumbago was better—it was agreed that on general grounds the theory of the guilt of Ferris and M‘Morris was at least as likely as that of Penrose; that from the point of view of character it was more likely; and that while there was no specific piece of evidence directly connecting Penrose with the crime, that of the pencil did definitely suggest the guilt of M‘Morris. On the whole it followed that the new theory was the more likely of the two. It was therefore decided that the appeal must be put back for a day or two.
It was at this point that French suggested a simple test of the whole affair. ‘It may not work,’ he admitted. ‘But if it doesn’t, you’re no worse off, whereas if it does, your entire case is proved,’ and he went on to describe his idea.
Rainey was enthusiastic and as a result the test was made. James Thompson, the cabin steward of the Ulster Sovereign, was invited to police headquarters and placed behind a screen in M‘Clung’s room, a tiny hole enabling him to see what went on in the room while himself remaining invisible. At the same time Ferris was asked to call, on the pretence of a fresh point having cropped up about his evidence. Some half-dozen young men, as like Ferris as could be found, were also collected.
Thompson having been placed in position, the half-dozen other young men were brought in one by one, and prearranged mythical business was discussed with each. Then at last Ferris was called, while the police officers grew tense. But their anxiety was quickly removed. Thompson gave the required sign! It seemed that he had noticed—and forgotten—the curious length of Ferris’s earlobes, and seeing them again recalled the man to his mind.
This evidence that Ferris had masqueraded as Platt on board the Ulster Sovereign was considered proof of the new theory, and Ferris was immediately arrested. M‘Clung then went down to Hillsborough and brought in M‘Morris. At the same time a hint was given to Jack and Pam to expect a happy end to the appeal.
Research on definite lines for definite ends was now possible and further information began rapidly to come in. Three facts in particular were learnt, which with the evidence already held made the conviction of the newly accused a foregone conclusion.
The first was that at some time in the comparatively recent past someone had entered or left M‘Morris’s bedroom by the window. The window gave on a balcony supported from the ground on moulded pillars. One of these pillars revealed numerous scrapes, such as could only have been caused by the shoes of a climbing man.
The second piece of evidence was more convincing, indeed it was this which finally clinched the case against the two men, leaving no doubt that the murder had been premeditated and carried out in cold blood with the object of preserving the expected fortune. When Ferris’s safe was opened and the four sheets of chemical formulæ—the secret of the process—were examined, all four were found to bear Platt’s fingerprints. How French congratulated himself that though he had not foreseen that anything could come of it, his devotion to routine had made him photograph the impressions he had found on Platt’s ink bottle! Now there could no longer be any doubt of the theft and of the motive for the crime.
The third matter unearthed by M‘Clung’s researches was suggestive rather than in the nature of direct proof. On Ferris’s key ring were two keys for which no use could be found. One was like a Yale doorkey, the other was smaller, that perhaps of a box or chest. A considerable search ensued, and was at last crowned with success. The large key was that of the entrance door of Messrs Currie & M‘Master, the analytical chemists of Howard Street, the former employers of both men, and the small one that of a cupboard containing poisons and drugs not easily obtainable by the public. Before giving his keys up on leaving, Ferris had evidently taken the precaution to supply himself with duplicates, in the event of his requiring for his own purposes any of the firm’s property.
An inquiry from the staff of the chemists revealed the further interesting fact that about the date of the murder some chloroform was missed. It was not a large quantity, and after an investigation by the heads of the department the conclusion was reached that a mistake had been made as to the quantity previously existing. Now, however, it became pretty obvious not only where it had gone, but also that French’s suggestion as to the method of the murder was broadly correct.
After arrest Ferris still tried to brazen things out. But M‘Morris went completely to pieces. As soon as he heard the evidence against him he broke down, confessed his part in the affair—which he said had been forced on him by Ferris—and offered to turn King’s Evidence against his former friend; an offer which, it may be mentioned, was not accepted.
But he said enough, when added to what the authorities already knew, to enable a pretty complete history of the crime to be built up. The points thus established were as follows.
On the afternoon of the first day of Platt’s inquiry, the Wednesday, Ferris happened to come suddenly into the room where the visitor was working. He observed that Platt was trying to see behind the pole piece screens by means of a tiny mirror fixed to a pencil. Ferris pretended to have noticed nothing, but the incident showed him Platt’s character and what he and his friends might have to face. He therefore took the precaution of never again leaving Platt alone with the apparatus.
But he took, too, further precautions. That night he removed the screens from his pole pieces and inserted a tiny piece of hair between each screen and its base. Over the edges of the sheets of formulæ in his safe he laid a longer hair. These hairs would unfailingly indicate if either were tampered with.
The last precaution was of a grimmer kind. That night he and M‘Morris discussed the situation and decided that under no circumstances would they allow Platt to rob them of the rewards of their work. They would do all they could to preserve their secret by fair means, but if Platt outwitted them there would be only one result—he would die. It was Ferris’s keen brain that worked out the scheme to be adopted under these unhappy circumstances, a scheme which was to be put in operation on whatever night Platt proposed to leave Ireland.
After this, however, all seemed to go well and though the two men had made all necessary preparations, they were congratulating themselves that their dreadful plan would prove unnecessary. But on Saturday morning Ferris discovered that he had been duped. He woke that morning much later than usual, feeling sleepy and heavy and with a bad taste in his mouth. His suspicious mind instantly leaped to the idea of a drug, and when he considered the incidents of the previous night he felt sure that such had indeed been administered.
The party on returning from the fishing expedition to Carnalea had dined at the Penroses’, after which he and M‘Morris had driven Platt to his hotel. Platt had invited them in for a drink. They had not particularly wanted to go, but he had insisted on the ground that it was his last night. Now Ferris remembered that Platt had told the waiter to leave the drinks on the side table and had himself mixed them. To slip a drug into his, Ferris’s, glass would have been child’s play.
Directly this idea occurred to Ferris he hurried downstairs and removed the screens from his apparatus and opened his safe. It was as he had feared. All the tell-tale hairs had disappeared.
He saw at a glance what Platt had done. Seizing some opportunity—possibly on the first day when he was not being closely watched—he had doubtless snatched the key from the large lock of the front door and taken an impression. Having made a new key, he climbed on that Friday night out of his room at the hotel—it, like M‘Morris’s, gave on a balcony and as in M‘Morris’s case, shoe scrapes were afterwards found on one of the columns—entered the cottage knowing Ferris would be asleep, and removed the screens. Then he must have taken Ferris’s keys from beneath his pillow and opened the safe, copying the formulæ. He replaced the keys and left all as he had found it—except the hairs.
It was later on that same Saturday morning that the conspirators learnt that Jack Penrose was crossing that night by Liverpool, a fact which bid fair to wreck the whole of their scheme. They immediately saw that at all costs Jack must be kept off the ship, if possible altogether, but in any case till Ferris had completed his impersonation. Here again it was Ferris’s keen brain which evolved the means. He would go as early as possible to the Ulster Sovereign, and by puncturing a wheel of Jack’s car would keep him late. Thus he himself would have left the boat before Jack arrived—if Jack did arrive—whether Jack changed the wheel or ordered a taxi. The puncturing was done by M‘Morris who slipped up to the Penroses’ garage while the family was at dinner.
The actual murder was accomplished almost exactly as French had suspected. On leaving the hotel, ostensibly for the steamer, they had driven to the cottage, Platt being told that Ferris had forgotten some letters for the post. In the car Platt was rendered insensible. A chloroform pad was applied by M‘Morris from behind, while Ferris held the man’s arms. The chloroform had been obtained as a precautionary measure from Messrs Currie & M‘Master’s laboratory in the middle of the Thursday night.
When Platt’s pockets were searched, the copy of the formulæ was found. Ferris had been certain that he would not have posted this vital paper to his confederate, lest the confederate, having obtained the secret, should refuse to pay for it. Having kept his knowledge to himself, Platt’s murder would adequately safeguard the party.
The insensible man was drowned in the cottage, the impersonation on the Ulster Sovereign was carried out, and the body was disposed of, all as French had guessed. Ferris saw that for his own sake he must deny the theft, so as to avoid the suggestion that he had a motive for the murder. He was tempted to back up the suggestion of suicide by saying that Platt had been deeply depressed during the drive to the boat, but he saw that if he were contradicted by the hotel staff this might become suspicious. He thought in fact it would be safer to pretend that the affair was a mystery to him, than to try to explain it.
The conspirators’ second shock came when Pam mentioned the pencil. M‘Morris remembered clearly that Pam had seen it on the floor on the Saturday morning, as she had remarked to him on it. He believed that it would only be a question of time till she remembered the episode, when a question would immediately arise which might lead to their undoing. So upset had M‘Morris been that he had at first thought of murdering Pam. Then the idea of replacing the pencil had occurred to him.
At the subsequent assizes both Ferris and M‘Morris were found guilty. Before the end both men confessed their guilt, swearing that if Jack’s appeal had failed, they would have told the truth.
Then one wholly unexpected and disconcerting fact came to light. When Ferris’s formulæ was at last examined by Jefferson’s technical staff, it was found to be incomplete. Ferris had held back one essential and the sustained and almost frenzied work of all concerned failed to reveal it. This, whatever it was, had died with the inventor, and the so-called process was now absolutely valueless. Whether this was Ferris’s final revenge on society, or whether—as a good many people now began to think—there never had been any process, and the whole thing was a clever fraud designed to be sold for cash, no one ever knew. Pam, at first intensely disappointed, soon grew reconciled to the loss, particularly as in her heart of hearts she believed real happiness was more likely to be achieved in comparatively humble circumstances.
M‘Clung, instead of being censured for his volte-face, was highly complimented on what he had done, and when sheepishly he muttered that only for French he would never have discovered his mistake, a letter of warm thanks was sent to French.
French later had another visit at the Yard from Pam, this time with Jack in attendance, and he had to admit to himself that the sight of their happiness fully recompensed him for all the trouble he had taken. He had frequently been assured that virtue was its own reward, but this was the first time he had thought the arrangement equitable.