I was in Africa when the news of my father’s death reached me. The work on which I was engaged was nearly completed, and I at once made arrangements for handing over the concluding portions of the job and returning to England. It took a little time to settle all this and to arrange for my journey to the coast, and it was not till the 6th of January, 1930, that I arrived in London.

From the moment that I heard the cause of death assigned, I was positively convinced that there was no accident about it. My father’s expert knowledge of fungi was very great; and he was a man of almost exaggerated precision in matters of this kind. It was entirely incredible to me that he could ever have mistaken a stool of Amanita muscaria for Amanita rubescens, even in the gathering of it; far more so that he could have peeled and prepared the fungus for eating without noticing the difference. To the average coroner’s jury, accustomed to dealing with schoolchildren and trippers, such a mistake would no doubt seem perfectly natural; but my father was no more likely to take Muscaria for Rubescens than to take a piece of cast-iron for a piece of chilled steel. I immediately scouted the whole idea of accident. Two possibilities remained for me to investigate. Either my father, in his unselfish devotion to the worthless woman he had married, had destroyed himself by a painful method which would look like accident and so disarm suspicion; or else he had been murdered. In either case, I was determined that the woman should not benefit by the crime which she had caused.

Feeling as I did towards Margaret Harrison, I could not bring myself to take up my residence at my father’s house. I therefore took a room at an hotel in the Bloomsbury district, which has the advantage of being central, and set myself to examine the problem under all its aspects.

I read and reread carefully all the newspaper reports of the inquest, and also all the letters which my father had written to me during the last two years. The most important of these latter I have included among the documents submitted to you. There was another, the essentials of which are covered by Mr. Munting’s statement, which mentioned that Miss Agatha Milsom had had to be “put away,” and that the character of Mr. Munting was accordingly considered to have been cleared from suspicion.

I fastened at once upon this incident. I had naturally never believed that Miss Milsom’s version of this episode was the true one. I believed my father to have been quite correct in his original suspicions. Miss Milsom’s illness had, I decided, enabled Munting to pull the wool over his victim’s eyes very nicely. Margaret Harrison and Munting had been corresponding all along, until the convenient decease of my father set them free to come together again after a decent interval.

This suggestion led me directly to the idea of suicide. In some way my father’s eyes had been opened to what was going on; and the agent must undoubtedly have been Lathom. He was Munting’s friend and, deliberately or unconsciously, he must have let fall some words during his stay at The Shack which made the situation plain. I thought it probable that this young man had played a double-faced part, and forwarded Munting’s interests under pretence of being friendly with my father. As regards the idea of murder, Munting appeared to have an alibi. His arrival with Lathom on the Saturday night had been witnessed, and I did not think it likely that he could have made any earlier appearance in that sparsely-populated district without being seen. It seemed possible that he and Lathom had been confederates, and committed the murder in collusion; but at the moment I was inclined to think that my father had been hounded into self-destruction by this precious pair, or rather trio.

It seemed to me that any first step must be to see Margaret Harrison. She would learn before long that I was in London, from my father’s solicitors, with whom I necessarily had business. It was better, therefore, to call on her at once, both to prevent her from suspecting my suspicions and to keep up appearances in the eyes of the neighbourhood.

Accordingly, I went round to Whittington Terrace on the day after my arrival. I sent up my name by the maid (a new girl since my time), and, after a short interval, Margaret Harrison came down to me. She was dressed in deep mourning, very fashionably cut, and came up to me with the gushing manner which I had always so greatly disliked.

“Oh, Paul!” she said, “isn’t this terrible? How dreadful it has been for you, poor dear, all that long way away! I am so glad you have managed to get home!”

“If you are,” I said, “it must be for the first time on record.”

Her face took on the sulky look I knew so well.

“I knew you never liked me, Paul,” she said, “but surely this is hardly the time to bear a grudge.”

“Perhaps not,” said I, “but it hardly seems worth while to pretend that you are delighted to see me.”

“As you like,” she replied. “We may as well sit down, anyway.”

She sat down, and I went over and stood by the window.

“You are staying here, of course?” she inquired, after a short silence.

I replied that I preferred to live at an hotel for the present, because it was more convenient for business.

“Of course,” she said, “you will have a lot of things to see about. I quite understand. I kept the house on, because I didn’t know what your plans would be. But perhaps you think it would be better to give it up?”

“Do just as you like,” I answered. “The furniture is yours, I believe?”

“Yes; but this place is really more than I want when I am by myself. Besides”⁠—here she gave an affected shudder⁠—“it seems, well, haunted, rather. If you are not coming here, I think I shall give it up and take a couple of rooms somewhere. I can look after your things till you get settled.”

I thanked her, and asked if she had made any plans for the future.

“None at all,” she said. “I feel rather stunned, just at the moment. It has been such a shock. I shall wait for a little time, anyhow, and see how things turn out. I shall be rather lost at first. We saw so few people⁠—I have rather lost touch.”

“You have all my father’s friends,” I said.

“Oh, but they are not my friends. They only used to come to tea and dinner and so on. They wouldn’t want me. I should only be an intruder. And, of course, they are all much older than I am. We should have really nothing in common.”

“Yes,” I said, “you are a young woman, Margaret. You will probably marry again before very long.”

She made a great display of indignation.

“Paul! How can you say such a heartless thing, and your poor father only just passed away! Anybody would think you don’t care for him at all. But I suppose a father isn’t the same thing as a husband.”

I was nauseated.

“You need not trouble to display all this feeling on my account,” I said. “It was quite enough to make him as unhappy as you did while he was alive, without playing the brokenhearted widow.”

“You are very like him, you know,” she observed. “You have just his way of snubbing and repressing people. You don’t seem to understand that everybody can’t keep their feelings bottled up as you do. It was not my fault that he was unhappy. I think he had an unhappy nature.”

“That is nonsense,” I said, “and you know it. My father was a most simple, friendly, companionable man⁠—only you never would be a real wife to him.”

“He wouldn’t let me,” she said. “I know we didn’t hit it off very well, at the end, but I did try, Paul. I did indeed. In the beginning I was ready to give him all the love and affection that was in me. But he didn’t like it. He dried me up. He broke my spirit, Paul.”

“My father was not a demonstrative man,” I said, “but you know quite well that he was proud of you and devoted to you. If you had heard him speak of you as I have heard him⁠—”

“Ah!” she said, quickly, “but I never did. That was the trouble. What is the good of being praised behind one’s back if one is always being scolded and snubbed to one’s face? It only makes it worse. Everyone thinks one has such a good husband, and that one ought to be so happy and grateful⁠—and all the time they never know what one is suffering from unkind words and cold looks at home.”

“Many women would envy you,” I said. “Would you rather have had a husband who was all charming manners at home and unfaithful the minute your back was turned?”

“Yes,” she said, “I would.”

“I can’t understand you,” I said. “You ought to be ashamed to speak like this.”

“No,” she said, “you can’t understand. That’s it. Neither could he.”

“All I understand is that you ruined his life, and drove him to a dreadful death,” I burst out. I had not meant to go so far, but I was too angry to think what I was saying.

“What do you mean?” she said. “Oh, no⁠—you can’t think that he⁠—But why should he?”

I had gone too far now to retreat, and I told her what I thought.

“You are quite wrong,” she said. “He wouldn’t have done that.”

“He would have done anything for you,” I cried angrily, “anything. Even to laying down his life to set you free⁠—”

“Even to sacrificing his reputation as a connoisseur of fungi?” she interrupted, with an unpleasant smile.

“Even that,” I answered. “It’s all very well for you to sneer⁠—you never cared for his interests⁠—you didn’t understand them⁠—you understand nothing at all, and you care for nothing except your twopenny ha’penny emotions.”

“I do know this,” she said steadily, “that if your father had thought that I wanted to be free of him⁠—which he didn’t, because he had too good an opinion of himself⁠—but if he had, he would have taken care I didn’t get rid of him without a row. He loved making rows. He wouldn’t have made things easy for me. He wouldn’t have missed the opportunity of rubbing it in.”

Her expression was as ugly and common as her words. I felt that I could not control myself much longer and had much better go.

“I repeat,” said I, “that you never understood my father, and you never will. It isn’t in you. I don’t think it’s any good prolonging this discussion. I had better be going. Can you give me Mr. Munting’s address?”

I hoped to have frightened her by the sudden question, but she only looked mildly astonished.

“Mr. Munting? I’m sure I don’t know. I’ve only seen him once since he was married, and that was at the Royal Academy. And at the⁠—the inquest, of course. I think he lives in Bloomsbury somewhere. I expect he’s in the telephone-book.”

I thanked her, and took my leave. Married! My father had never thought to mention that. It upset all my ideas. Because, if Munting was married, then what object could there have been in my father’s suicide⁠—or murder, whichever it was? His death would have left Margaret no nearer to marrying Munting. And any other relation could have been carried on perfectly well, whether my father was alive or not. Certainly, he might simply have destroyed himself in sheer despair and misery, unable to bear the dishonour. But it did not seem so likely.

This news made me alter my plans. I determined not to go and see Munting at once. It would be better, I thought, to get hold of Lathom, and see if I could obtain any light on the question from him.

A little inquiry among the dealers produced Lathom’s address. He was living in a studio in Chelsea. I presented myself at the place the next morning, and was received by a vinegary-looking elderly woman in a man’s cap, who informed me that Mr. Lathom was still in bed.

As it was already eleven o’clock, I handed her my card and said I would wait. She ushered me into an extremely untidy studio, full of oil-paint tubes and half-finished canvases, and waddled away with the card towards an inner door.

Before reaching it, however, she turned back, sidled up to me and said in a glutinous whisper:

“Begging your pardon, Mr. ’Arrison, but was you any relation to the pore gentleman wot died so mysterious?”

“What business is that of yours?” I snapped. She nodded with ghoulish enjoyment.

“Oh, no offence, sir, no offence. There ain’t no need to take a person up so sharp. That was a funny thing, sir, wasn’t it? You’d be ’is son, per’aps?”

“Never you mind who I am,” I said. “Take my card to Mr. Lathom and say I should be glad if he could spare me a few minutes.”

“Oh, ’e’ll spare you a few minutes, sir, I shouldn’t wonder. Look funny if ’e didn’t, sir, wouldn’t it? There’s lots of things as ’ud look funny, I daresay, if we knew the rights on ’em.”

“What are you getting at?” I said, uneasily.

“Ho, nothink, sir! Nothink! If you ain’t a relation it ain’t nothink to you, is it, sir? People do go off sudden-like, sometimes, and nobody to blame. There’s lots of things ’appens every day more than ever gets into the papers. But there! That ain’t nothink to you, sir.”

She sidled away again, grinning unpleasantly. I heard her talking and a man’s voice replying, and presently she shuffled back again.

“Mr. Lathom says ’e’ll be with you in five minutes, sir, if you will be so good as to wait. ’E’ll come fast enough, sir, don’t you be afraid. A very agreeable gentleman is Mr. Lathom, sir. I been doin’ for ’im over three months, now, ever since ’e come over from France. Some time in October that would be, sir, before this ’ere sad accident ’appened. Mr. Lathom was very much upset about it, sir. You’d ’ardly ’ave known ’im for the same gentleman w’en ’e came back after the inquest. Looked as if ’e’d been seein’ a ghost⁠—that white and strange ’e was. A terrible sight the pore gentleman must ’a’ been. A crool way to die. But there! We must all die once, sir, mustn’t we? And if it ain’t one way it’s another, and if it ain’t sooner it’s later. Only some folks is misfortunit more than others. Would you care for a cup of tea, sir, while you’re waitin’?”

I accepted the tea, to get rid of her. The stove, however, turned out to be in a corner of the studio, and having lit the gas and put the kettle on, she returned. All the time she was speaking, she rubbed one skinny hand over the other with a curious, greedy action.

“Very strange ’ow things turns out, ain’t it, sir? There was a gentleman lived down our street, a cats’-meat man ’e was, and the best cats’-meat in the neighbourhood⁠—thought very ’ighly of by all, ’e was. ’E married a girl out of one of them shops w’ere they sells costooms on ’ire purchase. They ain’t no good to nobody, them places, if you asks me. Well, ’e died sudden.”

“Did he?”

“Ho, yes! very sudden, ’e died. A very ’ot summer it was, and they brought it in ’e’d got the dissenter, with eating somethink as didn’t agree with ’im. So it may ’a’ bin, far be it from me to say otherwise. But afore the year was up she’d gone and married the young man wot was manager of the clothes-shop. A good marriage it was for ’er, too. Ho, yes! She didn’t lost nothink by ’er ’usband dyin’ w’en ’e did, if you understand me, sir.”

I made no answer. She took the kettle off and filled the teapot.

“Now, that’s a nice cup o’ tea, sir. You won’t find nothink wrong with that. That’s ’olesome, that is. I knows ’ow to make the sort of tea that gentlemen like. Cutts is my name, Mrs. Cutts. They all knows me about ’ere. I been doin’ for the artists this thirty year, and I’m up to all their goin’s-on. I know ’ow to cook their breakfisses and look after their bits of paintings and sich, an’ w’en to speak an’ w’en to ’old my tongue, sir. That’s wot they pays me for.”

“Thank you,” I said, “it’s an excellent cup of tea.”

“Yes, sir, thank you, sir. My name is Cutts, if you should ever be a-wantin’ me. Anybody in these studios will tell you w’ere to find Mrs. Cutts. ’Ere’s Mr. Lathom a’comin’, sir.”

She lurched away as Lathom emerged from his bedroom.

I will admit that the first impression he made upon me was a good one. His appearance was clean, and his manners were pleasant.

“I see Mrs. Cutts has given you a cup of tea,” he said, when he had shaken hands. “Won’t you have a spot of breakfast with me?”

I thanked him, and said I had already breakfasted.

“Oh, I suppose you have,” he answered, smiling. “We’re rather a late crowd in these parts, you know. You won’t mind if I carry on with my eggs and bacon?”

I begged him to use no ceremony, and he produced some eatables from a cupboard.

“It’s all right, Mrs. Cutts,” he shouted. “I’ll do the cooking. This gentleman wants to talk business.”

The noise of a broom in the passage was the only answer.

“Well now, Mr. Harrison,” said Lathom, dropping his breezy manner, “I expect you have come to hear anything I can tell you about your father. I can’t say, of course, how damned sorry I am about it. As you know, I wasn’t there at the time⁠—”

“No,” I said, “and I don’t want to distress you by going into details and all that. It must have been a great shock to you.”

“It certainly was.”

“I can see that,” I added, noticing how white and strained his face looked. “I only wanted to ask you⁠—after all, you were the last person to see him⁠—”

“Not the last,” he interrupted, rather hastily. “That man Coffin saw him, you know, gathering the⁠—the wretched fungi⁠—and the carrier saw him later still, after I had left the place.”

“Oh, yes⁠—I didn’t mean quite that. I mean, you were the last friend to see and talk to him intimately.”

“Quite, quite⁠—just so.”

“I wanted to hear from you whether you were, yourself, quite satisfied about it⁠—satisfied that it really was an accident, that is?”

He put the bacon into the pan, where it sputtered a good deal.

“What’s that? I didn’t quite catch.”

“Were you satisfied it was an accident?”

“Why, of course. What else could it have been? You know, Mr. Harrison, I hate to say anything about your father that might seem⁠—to blame him in any way, that is⁠—but, of course, I mean it is a very dangerous thing to experiment with wild fungi. Anybody would tell you the same thing. Unless you are a very great expert⁠—and even then one is liable to make mistakes.”

“That is what is troubling me,” I said. “My father was a very great expert, and he was not at all a man to make mistakes.”

“None of us are infallible.”

“Quite so. But still. And it was odd that it should have happened just at the very time you were away.”

“It was very unfortunate, certainly.” He kept his eyes on the bacon, while he prodded it about with a fork. “Damnably unfortunate.”

“So odd and so unfortunate that I cannot help thinking there may have been a reason for it!”

Lathom took two eggs and cracked them carefully. “How so?”

“You are aware, perhaps, that my father was⁠—not altogether happy in his married life.”

He gave an exclamation under his breath.

“Did you speak?”

“No⁠—I have broken the yolk, that’s all. I beg your pardon. You are asking me rather a delicate question.”

“You may speak frankly to me, Mr. Lathom. If you saw much of my father’s family life, you must have noticed that there were⁠—misfits.”

“Well, of course⁠—one sees and hears little things occasionally. But many happily-married people spar at times, don’t they? And⁠—well⁠—there was a difference of age and all that.”

“That is the point, Mr. Lathom. Without necessarily saying anything harsh about my father’s wife, it is a fact that a young woman, married to an older man, may, not unnaturally, tend to turn to someone more of her own age.”

He muttered something.

“In such a case my father, who was the most unself-regarding man who ever breathed, might have thought it his duty to give her back her liberty.”

He turned round swiftly.

“Oh, no!” he said, “surely not! That’s a dreadful idea, Mr. Harrison. It never occurred to me. I am sure you can put it out of your mind.” He hesitated. “I think⁠—” he went on, with a troubled look, “oh, yes, I am sure you need not think that.”

“Are you quite sure? Did he never say anything?”

“He never spoke of his wife except in terms of the deepest affection. He thought very highly of her.”

“I know. More highly than she⁠—more highly than any woman perhaps could deserve.”

“Perhaps.”

“But,” I said, “that very affection would have been all the more reason for him to⁠—to take himself out of her life in the most complete and unanswerable way.”

“I suppose so⁠—from that point of view.”

“And, if it was so, I should like to know it. Will you tell me, Mr. Lathom, on your honour and without concealment, whether there was anything between my father’s wife and your friend Mr. Munting?”

“Good Lord, no!” he said, taking the pan off the fire and shovelling the eggs and bacon out into a plate. “Nothing of the sort.”

“Just a minute,” said I. “Mr. Munting is your friend, and you want to be loyal to him. That’s obvious. And I’m aware I’m asking you to do one of those things which people with public-school educations don’t do. I am not a public-school man myself, and you must excuse me if I suggest that just for once you should come down to brass tacks and cut out the Eton-and-Harrow business. My father has died, and I want your personal assurance that he did not kill himself on your friend Munting’s account. Can you give it to me?”

“On my word of honour, there was not the very slightest attachment or understanding of any kind between Mrs. Harrison and Jack Munting. They rather disliked each other, if anything. Jack was married last Easter to a very charming woman, with whom he is much in love. He never gave a thought to Mrs. Harrison, or she to him.”

I felt sure he believed what he said.

“Wasn’t there a disturbance of some kind?” I asked.

“Oh, yes.” A cloud passed over his face. “There was. That wretched potty woman, Miss Milsom, invented some sort of story. But it was the most absolute rubbish. And Mr. Harrison came to see what utter nonsense it all was. My dear man, the woman’s in an asylum.”

“There was no foundation for it, then?”

“None whatever.”

“Then why did your friend Munting take it lying down, and let himself be kicked out of the house?”

“I wish you wouldn’t keep on calling him ‘my friend Munting,’ as if you took us for a pair of undesirables,” he retorted, irritably. He picked at his eggs and bacon, and pushed the plate away again.

“What else could he do but go? Your father was perfectly unreasonable⁠—wouldn’t have listened to the Archangel Gabriel. Anyway, the more you protest about these matters, the less you’re believed. Munting did the right thing⁠—cleared out and married somebody else. Couldn’t have a row with a man twice his age, you know.”

I got up.

“Thank you very much, Mr. Lathom. I’m sorry to have troubled you. I am very glad to have your assurance. Mr. Munting is in town, I suppose?”

“You’re not going to rake it all up with him?”

“I should feel more satisfied if I had had a word with him,” I answered.

“I wouldn’t. You can take my word for it. I mean to say, there’s Mrs. Munting to be considered.”

“I shouldn’t say anything to her. After all, it’s surely natural enough that I should wish to have Mr. Munting’s account of the business.”

“Yes⁠—oh yes, I suppose it is.” He still looked worried and dissatisfied. “Well, goodbye. If you really must see Munting, here’s his address.”

As I opened the door of the studio, I nearly tripped over Mrs. Cutts, who was washing the linoleum. She came and let me out at the house-door.

“Puttin’ yer money on the wrong horse, young man, ain’t you?” she whispered.

“Look here,” I said, “you know something about this.”

“That’s as may be,” said she, slyly. “Mrs. Cutts knows ’ow to govern ’er tongue. An unruly member, ain’t it, sir? That’s wot the Bible says.”

“I’ve no time to waste,” I answered; “if you have anything to say to me, you will find me at my hotel.” I mentioned the name, and then, with a certain disgust at the business, slipped half a crown into her hand.

She curtseyed, and I left her bobbing and dipping on the doorstep.

I cursed myself for a fool as I set off to find Munting. Undoubtedly Lathom would have warned him by telephone of what to expect. I was sure of it when I saw him. He struck me as conceited and pretentious⁠—the usual type of modern literary man.

He was perfectly polite, however; assured me in a tone of the utmost sincerity that the story about himself and Margaret Harrison was entirely unfounded, and referred me back to Lathom for evidence as to my father’s state of mind in the week preceding his death.

Finding myself quite unable to penetrate this polished surface of propriety, I took my leave. The manner of both men left me in no doubt that there was something to conceal, but I could get no farther than a moral certainty.

Mrs. Cutts seemed to offer the best hope of information, but I could not as yet reconcile myself to handling so dirty a tool. It occurred to me that it might possibly be worth while to get hold of Miss Milsom. I was not at all clear in my mind that her madness might not have some method in it.

At first I could not think how to trace her. I could have asked Margaret Harrison, of course, but I did not want to do that. Finally, I decided to call on the local padre, the Rev. Theodore Perry, and see if he knew where his lost sheep had strayed to.

I knew him well, of course, and it did not seem unnatural that I should ask after the welfare of a woman who had been for some time in my father’s employment. I sandwiched the question in, in the course of a casual conversation, and he told me at once what he knew.

“Poor woman, I’m afraid she is not altogether normal. One hopes it is only a passing phase. I don’t quite know where she is⁠—one of these nursing-homes of the modern sort, I think. Her sister, Mrs. Farebrother, would be able to tell you. No, I don’t suppose they are very well off. The fees in these places are high. In the days of faith⁠—or superstition, if you like⁠—a convent or a béguinage would have provided the proper asylum for such a case, with some honest work to do and a harmless emotional outlet⁠—but nowadays they make you pay for everything, not only your pleasures.”

He gave me Mrs. Farebrother’s address, and I said I would see what could be done. He smiled at me in a futile, clerical way, and said it would be a work of charity.

I left him, feeling anything but charitable, and went to see Mrs. Farebrother. She seemed to be a good, honest, sensible woman, worried by family and financial cares, and accepted gratefully my suggestion of a small pension, during the period that her sister might be requiring medical care.

The interview with Agatha Milsom was a painful one to me. The woman is undoubtedly quite unbalanced, with a disagreeable sex-antagonism at the bottom of her mania. According to her, my father had treated his wife with abominable cruelty, and I was obliged to listen for a long time to her rambling accusations. The name of John Munting roused her to such excitement that I was afraid she would make herself ill; unfortunately, I could get nothing reliable out of her. For one thing, she was obsessed with the idea that he had had designs upon her maiden modesty, and for another, many of her statements were so ludicrous that they cast suspicion over the rest.

As regards my father, however, I obtained one thing. I suggested that her memory of certain domestic incidents might be at fault, and in proof of her assertions she promised to get back from her sister, and send to me, all the letters she had written home during the previous two years.

It seemed to me that, since her mental deterioration had come on only gradually, the letters written at the time might possibly be considered to attain a reasonable level of accuracy. She kept her promise, and from this correspondence I selected the letters of relevant date, and these are the documents included in this dossier. It will be seen that great allowance must be made for bias; that much conceded, the statements may, I think, be accepted as having a basis in fact.

I need not say how distressing they were to me. They cast a light upon the miserable domestic conditions which my father had had to endure. I regretted most bitterly that I had taken over that work in Central Africa, thus leaving him to the undiluted companionship of a selfish, discontented wife and a semi-demented and vulgar woman. My father was not the man to go abroad for the sympathy he could not find at home, and it was no wonder that he had welcomed the acquaintanceship of two young men who could, at least, make some pretence of entering into his interests.

But the thing which emerged from the letters with startling illumination was the intimate footing upon which Lathom had stood with the whole household. As may be seen by the few letters included above, my father was by no means a gossipy correspondent, and I had not realised that Lathom had become so much of a tame cat about the drawing-room. I had thought of him as being my father’s friend almost entirely, and I believe that my father himself took that view, and, wittingly or unwittingly, gave me that impression. But it now seemed clear to me that this was not so, and that, what with my father’s innocent pleasure in the apparent admiration and friendliness of this brilliant young man, and what with the perverse misconception of the wretched Agatha Milsom, we had all been “led up the garden,” as the expression is.

I saw now why both Lathom and Munting, standing by one another in a conspiracy of silence, had been able to deny with such obvious sincerity that there had ever been an undue intimacy between Munting and Margaret Harrison. Lathom had said that my father’s last days had been free from suspicion; I saw now that this was possible. I also saw why Lathom had been so unwilling that I should ask Munting the same question, and why Munting had referred me back to Lathom for the answer. Munting must, I thought, be considered cleared of any offence except a refusal to betray his friend’s confidence; and I was obliged to confess that most people would think he had acted rightly. Lathom, too, had kept to the code of what is usually called honour in these matters. As for Margaret Harrison⁠—but from her I had never expected anything but lies.

But if this was the truth, why should my father have committed suicide? For I still did not believe in the theory of accident. Either something must have opened his eyes during Lathom’s visit to town, or else that other, darker suspicion, which I had hardly liked to glance at, was only too well-founded.

I am a business man. I have the business man’s liking for facts. To me, an expert’s knowledge is a fact. Experts occasionally make mistakes, but to me it appears far less probable that an expert should be mistaken than that an artist and a woman should be unprincipled. And I cannot make it too clear that my father’s expert knowledge in the matter of fungi was to be trusted. I would as cheerfully stake my life on the wholesomeness of a dish prepared by my father as on the stability of a girder-stress calculated by my chief, Sir Maurice Berkeley. But I would not venture a five-pound note on the honesty or virtue of such people as Lathom and Margaret Harrison.

But to prove the truth of my suspicions, I needed more facts⁠—the sort of facts that a jury would accept. To them, my father’s knowledge of fungi would not be a fact at all.

I turned the matter over in my mind, and eventually came to the conclusion that, whether I liked it or not, I must see the woman Cutts. I hoped that she would come to me, but several days passed and I saw nothing of her. Either the creature had no facts to sell, or she was holding off in the hope of securing better terms. I saw through her artifice well enough, but I saw also that she had me at a disadvantage. Eventually, and with great reluctance, I wrote to her as follows, addressing the letter to Lathom’s studio.

“Mrs. Cutts⁠—

“Madam⁠—When I saw you the other morning at Mr. Lathom’s studio, you suggested that you might be in a position to do some work for me. I shall possibly be requiring some assistance of this kind in the near future, and shall be obliged if you would call on me one evening at my hotel to discuss the matter.”

On the second day after dispatching this, I was informed that a lad was waiting downstairs to see me. I went down and found a ferrety-eyed youth, who introduced himself as Archie Cutts.

“Oh, yes,” I said, “you have come about the work I mentioned to your mother.”

“Yes, sir,” he replied. “Mother says as she can’t bring it ’ere, not ’avin’ the tools by ’er, but if you was to come down to our place on Friday, the party as she obliges bein’ out that night, she would be willing to make an arrangement.”

This was disagreeable.

“If I am to take that trouble,” said I, “I shall want to know, first, whether your mother is likely to be able to do what I want.”

He looked cunningly at me with his shifty eyes.

“Mother says she could show you letters from a lady as you know very well, only she won’t trust ’em to me, bein’ valuable to ’er and not wantin’ to lose ’em.”

“Oh, I see,” said I, loudly, “testimonials, eh? Letters of recommendation. I see. And your mother thinks she understands what is required and would be able to give satisfaction?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did she say anything about terms?”

“She says she’ll leave that to you, sir, w’en you see the work.”

“Very well.” There was nothing to be got by argument. “Tell your mother I will try and find time to call on her on Friday evening.”

“Yes, sir. Nine o’clock would suit mother best.”

I made the appointment for nine, and gave the lad a shilling for his trouble. At nine o’clock on the Friday evening I found myself knocking at a dilapidated door in a long drab street of very squalid houses. The ferret-eyed lad let me in, and I saw, with considerable repulsion, my former acquaintance, seated in some pomp at a round table, containing a lamp, a wool mat and a family Bible.

She greeted me with a condescending nod, and the youth withdrew.

“Well, now,” I said, “Mrs. Cutts, you have asked me to come and see you, and I hope you are not wasting my time, because I am a very busy man.”

This forlorn effort to establish my dignity made no impression on her.

“That’s for you to say, sir,” said she. “I wasn’t for intrudin’ on you. I am a respectable woman, thank God, and can maintain myself in my station by ’ard work, and never ’ad no complaints. Not but wot I’d be willin’ to oblige a gentleman if ’e was requirin’ my services, not bein’ too proud to do a favour.”

“Quite so,” said I, “and if you can do the work I want, I will see that it is made worth your while.”

“Wot sort of work was you thinkin’ of, sir?”

“I gathered from what you said to me,” I answered, “that you thought you might be able to throw some light on the circumstances of my father’s death.”

“That’s as may be. There’s ways and ways of dyin’. Some is took, and some takes French leave, and others is ’elped out of life, ain’t they, sir?”

“Have you got any information to show that my father was helped out of life?”

“Well, there, sir. I wouldn’t go for to say sech a thing⁠—nor yet for to deny it, ’uman nature bein’ that wicked as you can see for yourself any Sunday in the News of the World. But wot I says is, w’en persons is wicked enough to ’ave goin’s on be’ind a gentleman’s back, there’s no knowin’ wot may come of it, is there?”

“You said you had letters to show me.”

“Ah!” she nodded. “There’s good readin’ in letters sometimes, sir. There’s letters as would be worth ’undreds of pounds in a court of law, to some people as one might name.”

“Come, come, Mrs. Cutts,” said I, “very few letters are worth anything like that.”

“That’s not for me to judge, sir. If letters should turn out not to be worth nothin’, why, they’re easy destroyed, ain’t they, sir? There’s many a person I daresay wishes that ’e, or it might be she, sir, ’ad destroyed the letters wot they ’ad written. I was never one for writin’ letters myself. A word’s as good, and leaves nothin’ but air be’ind it, that’s wot I say. And them as leaves letters about casual-like, might often be grateful for a word of warnin’ from them as is wiser’n themselves.”

Her screwed-up eyes twinkled with consciousness of power.

“A word of warnin’ is soon given, and may be worth ’undreds. I ain’t got no call to press you, sir. I ain’t dependent on anybody, thank God.”

“Look here,” I said, briskly, “it’s no use beating about the bush. I must see these letters before I know what they’re worth to me. For all I know they’re not worth twopence.”

“Well, I ain’t unreasonable,” said the hag. “Fair and square is my motter. Ef I was to show you dockyments ter prove as your pa’s missis was sweet on my young gentleman there, would that be worth anything to you, sir?”

“That’s rather vague,” I fenced. “People may be fond of one another and no great harm done.”

“Wot may seem no ’arm to some may be great ’arm to a right-thinking person,” said Mrs. Cutts, unctuously. “You can ask all about this neighbour’ood, sir, and they’ll tell you Mrs. Cutts is a lawful married woman, as works ’ard and keeps ’erself to ’erself as the sayin’ is. Not but wot there’s a-many things as a ’ard-workin’ woman in these parts ’as to shet her eyes to, and can’t be blamed for wot is not ’er business. But there is limits, and w’en people is writin’ to people as isn’t their own lawful ’usbands about bein’ in the fambly way and about others as is their lawful ’usbands not ’avin’ the right to exist, and w’en them lawful ’usbands dies sudden not so very long arter, then wot I ses is, it might be worth while for them as is right-thinkin’ and ’ose place it is to interfere, to ’ave them there dockyments kep’ in a safe place.”

I tried not to let her see how deeply I was interested in these hints.

“This is all talk,” I said. “Show me the letters, and then we can get down to brass tacks.”

“Ah!” said Mrs. Cutts. “And supposin’ my young gentleman should come ’ome and look for them letters, as it might be tonight, wot a peck of trouble I might be in. Do right and shame the devil is my motter, but motters won’t feed a fambly o’ children when a ’ard-workin’ woman loses ’er job⁠—now, will they, sir?”

I thought the time had come to lend an air of business to the bargain. I drew a five-pound note from my pocket, and let it crackle pleasantly between my fingers. Her eyelids twitched, but she said nothing.

“Before we go any further,” I said, “I must look at the letters and see that they are actually from the person you mention, and that they are of genuine interest to me. In the meanwhile, since I have put you to some trouble⁠—”

I pushed the note towards her, but held my hand over it.

“Well,” she said, “I don’t mind lettin’ you ’ave a look. Looks breaks no bones, as the sayin’ is.” She fumbled in a remote pocket beneath her skirt and produced a small packet of papers.

“My eyes ain’t so good as they was,” she added, with sudden caution. “ ’Ere, Archie!”

The ferrety youth (who must have been listening at the door) answered the summons with suspicious promptness. I noticed that he had provided himself with a formidable-looking stick and immediately pushed my chair back against the wall. Mrs. Cutts slowly detached one letter from the bundle, and spread it out flat on the table, disengaging it from its folds with a well-licked thumb.

“W’ich one is this, Archie?”

The youth glanced sideways at the letter and replied:

“That’s the do-something-quick-one, Mother.”

“Ah! and w’ich is the one about the pore gentleman as was done in in a play?”

“ ’Ere you are, Mother.”

She slid the letters across to meet my hand. I released the note; she released the letters and the exchange was affected.

These were the letters numbered 43 and 44, and dated August 2nd and October 5th respectively, as above. If you will glance back to them, you will see that they offered valuable evidence.

I at once recognised them for genuine documents in my stepmother’s handwriting.

“How many letters have you?”

“Well, there’s more than I ’ave ’ere. But them as I ’old in my ’and, w’ich makes eight, countin’ them two, is the ones as ’ud interest anybody as wanted to know w’y a gentleman might die sudden.”

“Are there any that say definitely how he died or what he died of?”

“No,” said Mrs. Cutts, “I wouldn’t deceive a gentleman like you, sir. Tell the truth, likewise fair and square. Them eight letters, sir, is wot they calls excitements to murder, and would be so considered by any party as might ’appen to receive them. But as for saying in so many words ‘weedkiller’ or ‘prussic acid,’ I will not say as you will find them words in black and white.”

“That, of course, detracts from their value,” I said carelessly. “These letters are evidence of sad immorality, no doubt, Mrs. Cutts, but it’s one thing to wish a person dead and another to kill him.”

“There ain’t sech a great difference,” said Mrs. Cutts, a little shaken. “It says in the Bible⁠—‘ ’E that ’ateth ’is brother is a murderer,’ now, don’t it, sir? And there’s some as sits on juries ’as the same way of thinkin’.”

“Maybe,” said I, “but all the same, it’s not proof.”

“Very good, sir,” said Mrs. Cutts with dignity. “I wouldn’t contradict a gentleman. You ’and me them letters back, Archie. The gentleman don’t want ’em. Ef Mr. Lathom ’ad any sense ’e’d burn the rubbishin’ stuff, and so I’ll tell ’im, clutterin’ up the place.”

“I don’t say that, Mrs. Cutts,” said I, holding on to the letters. “They are of interest, but not of as much interest as I thought they might be. What value did you think of placing on them?”

“To them as knew ’ow to use ’em”⁠—here Mrs. Cutts appeared to size me up from head to toe⁠—“letters like them might be worth a ’undred pounds apiece.”

“Rubbish,” said I. “I’ll give you fifty pounds for the lot, and that’s more than they’re worth.”

I put the two letters back on the table and flicked at them disdainfully.

“Fifty pound!” shrieked Mrs. Cutts, “fifty pound! And me riskin’ losin’ a job as is worth more than that any day in recommendations and perks, not countin’ my money regular every week!”

She gathered the letters together and began to tie the packet up again.

“Mr. Lathom ’ud give five times that much to know as they wos safe,” she added.

“Not he,” said I. “I doubt if he has as much as a hundred pounds in the world. Whereas, if your son likes to come round with me to my hotel, I can give him cash on the nail.”

“No,” said Mrs. Cutts, “I can’t let them letters go. Supposin’ Mr. Lathom wanted to read ’em and they wasn’t there.”

“That’s your affair,” said I. “If you don’t want to sell them, you can keep them. If I were you I’d put them back quickly where you found them, and say nothing to Mr. Lathom about it. There’s such a thing as blackmail, you know, Mrs. Cutts, and judges are pretty strict about it.”

Mrs. Cutts laughed scornfully.

“Blackmail! Nobody ain’t goin’ to charge theirselves with murder, and don’t you think it.”

“There’s no murder there,” said I. “Good night.”

I rose to go. The woman let me get as far as the door and then came after me.

“See ’ere, sir. You’re a gentleman, and I don’t want to be ’ard on a gentleman wot’s pore father ’as died sudden. Give me two ’undred pound, and I’ll let yer take copies of ’em and Archie shall go with you and bring ’em back.”

“Copies don’t count so well in a court of law as originals,” I said.

“They could be swore to,” said Mrs. Cutts.

“Not at this time of night,” said I.

The youth Archie leaned across and whispered to his mother. She nodded and smiled her unpleasant smile.

“See ’ere, sir, I’ll risk it. Archie shall bring you them letters to your ’otel in the mornin’ and you shall take copies and ’ave them swore to afore a lawyer. I dursn’t let you ’ave them, really I dursn’t, sir. I’m takin’ a sad risk as it is for a respectable woman.”

“Very well,” I replied. “But copies are only worth a hundred pounds to me at the very outside.”

“You’re makin’ a very ’ard bargain, sir.”

“It’s that or nothing,” said I.

“Well, sir, if you say so. I’ll send Archie round at ten o’clock, sir.”

I agreed to this and walked away, glad to get out. I lay awake all night, fancying that Mrs. Cutts would go to Lathom in the interval and make better terms with him.

However, Archie was there with the letters in the morning as agreed, and I took him and them round to a solicitor’s, where typed copies were made and sworn. I also made an affidavit that I recognised the writing of the originals as being in my stepmother’s handwriting. I then paid the lad the agreed hundred pounds in Treasury notes, and dismissed him.

I have entered into all these details in order that there should be no doubt as to the genuineness of these copies, and to make quite clear why I am unable at the moment to forward the originals.

It is true that I could probably have forced Archie into handing the letters over, since he had no right to them. But several reasons urged me to take the other course. First, I had no legal right to them either, and was not clear how my action might be looked upon by the police. Secondly, and this was more important, I could hardly hope that Lathom would not discover their absence, and, if he did, he might take fright and leave the country and thus add great difficulties to my task. It would take some weeks, perhaps, to collect all the evidence I needed, and by the time I was ready to set the law in action, he might hide himself very effectually. Thirdly, I did not wish to alienate Mrs. Cutts. I foresaw that she might be very useful, not only in bringing me fresh letters, if any arrived that threw further light on the business, but also in keeping watch on Lathom’s movements. I suggested to Archie that there might be possibilities of further reward in the future, and cautioned him against alarming Lathom.

It is conceivable, however, that Mrs. Cutts may consider it more advantageous to blackmail Lathom than to assist me. Up to the moment of writing, he is still living in Chelsea, and apparently feels himself safe. But for all I know, Mrs. Cutts may have retained the letters and be blackmailing him on her own account. Or she may have delivered her warning, and he may have destroyed the letters and made himself (as he imagines) secure. In the latter case it will, of course, be impossible to produce the original documents in court, and then the certified copies will justify their existence.

Having obtained the evidence of the adultery, I now felt myself in a position to put pressure on Munting, and accordingly went round to see him again.

“I perfectly appreciate,” I said, “the reasons for your silence at our last interview. But if I tell you that I have in my hands independent proof that Lathom was Margaret Harrison’s lover, perhaps you will feel justified in assisting my inquiries.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“My dear man,” he said, “if you have proof already, I don’t see what assistance you require. May I ask what you call proof? After all, one doesn’t make these accusations without sufficient grounds.”

“I have got the letters written to Lathom by my stepmother,” I said, “and they leave the matter in no doubt whatever.”

“Indeed?” said he. “Well, I won’t ask you where you got them from. Private detective work is not in my line. If you really believe that your father was driven to do away with himself, I am extremely sorry⁠—but what can one do about it?”

“I do not think so,” I said. “I believe, and these letters afford strong evidence to my mind, that my father was cruelly and deliberately murdered by Lathom at Margaret Harrison’s instigation. And I mean to prove it.”

“Murdered?” he cried. “Good God, you can’t mean that! That’s absolutely impossible. Lathom may be a bit of a rotter in some ways, but he’s not a murderer. I’ll swear he isn’t that. You’re absolutely mistaken.”

“Will you read the letters?”

“No,” he said. “Look here. You’re a man of the world. If things have got to this point, I don’t mind admitting that Lathom did have some sort of an affair with Mrs. Harrison. I did what I could to make him drop it, but, after all, these things will sometimes happen. I told him it was a poor sort of game to play, and when I got the opportunity⁠—over that Milsom affair⁠—I told him I’d shut up about it on condition he cleared out. He assured me afterwards, in the most solemn way, that it was all finished with. Why, damn it, I asked him about it the very day we went down to Manaton, and he repeated that the whole affair was absolutely over and done with.”

“He was wise,” I said dryly, “since he was taking you down there to view my father’s dead body. Even you might have suspected something if you had gone to The Shack in the knowledge that it was to Lathom’s interest to find what he did find.”

His face changed. I had touched him on the raw somewhere.

“Did you, as a matter of fact, believe Lathom?”

“I believed him⁠—yes.” He turned his pipe thoughtfully over between his fingers. “I believed that the affair had been put an end to. But I was not altogether sure that Lathom’s affection for Mrs. Harrison had ceased.”

“And when you found that my father had died so opportunely⁠—did no suspicion enter your mind?”

“Well⁠—I admit it did just pass through my mind that Harrison might have done it himself. I⁠—I didn’t want to believe it. I don’t know that I did really believe it. But it did occur to me as a possibility.”

“Nothing more?”

“Absolutely nothing more.”

“Will you read the letters, and tell me if, after that, you still think there was nothing more?”

He hesitated.

“If you are so sure that Lathom is innocent, you may be able to prove his innocence.”

He looked at me doubtfully, and slowly put out his hand for the letters. He read the endorsement by the solicitor, and looked sharply at me again, but said nothing. I waited while he read the documents through⁠—first quickly, then for a second time slowly and with great attention.

“You will notice,” I said, “that, shortly before the time when he told you the affair was over, Margaret Harrison had written him a letter clearly indicating that she believed herself to be about to have a child by him.”

“Yes, I see that.”

“And that he was not informed that this belief was erroneous, till after my father’s death.”

“No.”

“Plenty of motive for murder there.”

“Plenty of motive, certainly. But motive by itself is nothing. Good heavens, man, if everybody committed murder because they had a motive, precious few of us would die natural deaths.”

“But you will admit that murder was being urged upon him in various ways, in all these letters.”

“I wouldn’t necessarily go so far as to admit that. Mrs. Harrison is an emotional, imaginative woman. She picks up phrases out of books. Plenty of people talk in this vague way about love⁠—about its being supreme, and justifying itself, and sweeping obstacles aside and so on, without ever intending to put their words into action. I’ve written that kind of thing myself⁠—in books.”

“Very likely. As a modern novelist you need not be expected to uphold a high standard of morals. But in practice, I take it, you would not wish to excuse or justify murder.”

“No. I confess to an old-fashioned prejudice against murder. It may be inconsistent of me, but I do. And so, I am sure, would Lathom.”

“Lathom is obviously very much under the influence of Margaret Harrison.”

“I should have said it was the other way round.”

“In some things. In theory, no doubt. But when it comes to doing things, I should say she was infinitely more practical⁠—and more unscrupulous. But say, if you like, he is only under the influence of a strong passion⁠—don’t you think that might lead him to do things which conflicted with his principles, or prejudices, or whatever you like to call them? Come now, you have called me a man of the world. Murders are done every day, for much less motive than Lathom had.”

He drummed on the table.

“Well,” he burst out at last, “I’ll admit that. I’ll admit⁠—for the sake of argument⁠—that Lathom might have murdered your father, though I don’t believe it for a moment. But it was physically impossible. How could he? He was here in London all the time.”

“That’s where you can help me. Why was it impossible? How do you know it was impossible? Can you prove that it was impossible?”

“I’m sure I can.”

“Will you let me have all the facts you know about the whole thing from the beginning?”

“Of course I will. Damn it all, if Lathom did do it, he deserves everything that’s coming to him. He’d have to be an absolute swine. Mind you, Lathom and I didn’t always get on together, but⁠—its absurd. He can’t have done it. But we’ve got to kill the possibility.”

He began to walk up and down, visibly perturbed. I waited. We were interrupted by a servant announcing dinner.

“You’ll stay?” said Munting. “You must meet my wife. She has a very clear head for this kind of thing.”

I accepted, not wishing to lose a day in getting to the bottom of the matter. We did not, of course, talk about the subject while the maid was in the room, but after dinner we all went into the library, and there outlined the story to Mrs. Munting. I mention her, not because she was able to contribute anything of great value to the discussion (though, being a woman, she was more willing than her husband to allow that a young man might murder an older one for a woman’s sake), but because she fetched out the letters which Munting had written to her during his period of residence at Whittington Terrace, in order to verify facts and dates. In the end, she handed the letters over to me in case I might find in them any clue or suggestion which we had overlooked. Munting rather naturally objected to having his love-letters (if one can call these rambling effusions by that name) put into the hands of a comparative stranger, but his wife, with that curious lack of delicacy which virtuous women often display, laughed, and said she was sure I should not pay any attention to the personal passages.

“Mr. Harrison is not proposing to publish your Life and Letters, you know,” she said.

This childish remark seemed to amuse Munting. He said: “No; I fancy I’m safe with him,” and raised no further objection. Probably his vanity was sufficient to assure him that the exposure of his intimate feelings was bound to leave a favourable impression. Indeed, it is obvious that, even in writing to his fiancée, he was writing for effect half the time, and quite possibly with an eye to future publication. With young men like Beverley Nichols and Robert Graves prattling in public about their domestic affairs, we need hardly expect to find any decent reticence among the smart novelists of today.

Taking the question of Motive as settled for the moment, we proceeded to discuss the subjects Means and Opportunity. Under these heads, the Muntings put forward a number of objections to the murder theory, and I was bound to recognise that they looked sufficiently formidable. Here is the schedule which I drew up immediately after this conversation.

Points to be Investigated in Connection with the death of George Harrison

A. Means

1. Did Harrison really die of muscarine poisoning?

   Muscarine (the poisonous principle of Amanita muscaria) was obtained in large quantities from (a) the viscera; (b) the bedclothes; and (c) the half-eaten dish on the table.

   The appearance of the body and the symptoms of the illness, as deduced from the attendant circumstances, were both consistent with muscarine poisoning.

   Sir James Lubbock stated on oath that the cause of death was muscarine poisoning.

   Questions: Could any other poison have produced similar effects or a similar chemical analysis? The analyst’s attention having been specially directed to muscarine by the inquiries on the opening day of the inquest, did he, in fact, search for any poison other than muscarine?

   Note: To write to Sir James Lubbock and put these points before him.

2. In any case, how did the muscarine get into the body, if we exclude the hypotheses of accident and suicide?

   Supposing that Lathom had himself gathered the poisonous fungi and surreptitiously added them to the dish while it was in course of preparation, the murder might have been very simply accomplished. If he had merely put them into the basket with the genuine edible fungi gathered by my father, the latter would certainly have discovered and thrown them away when preparing the dish. It would, therefore, be necessary to wait, and add them when the process of cooking was already so far advanced that the fungi had lost their characteristic colour and shape.

   On any ordinary occasion it would have been easy for Lathom to do this. It will be seen from the evidence at the inquest that Lathom was often left at home in The Shack while Harrison went sketching or botanising.

   In the actual case there are difficulties, some of which have to be considered under the heading “Opportunity.”

   Questions: Did Lathom know Amanita muscaria sufficiently well to be able to find it and know it for what it was? (Answer: Quite possibly my father might have shown it to him and warned him against it. Or he might have studied the pictures in my father’s books or in some other book.)

   If not, can he have got some accomplice to procure the fungus for him? (Not impossible, but unlikely. Country people usually pay little attention to fungi, and the element of risk involved would be very great.)

   In what way was the dish of fungi cooked? It would be easier to add a foreign substance to a stew, for example, which is done slowly and needs little superintendence, than to a grill or a fry, which takes only a few minutes and is under the cook’s eyes all the time. (Answer: Munting, speaking from memory, thinks the dish appeared more in the nature of a stew. My father’s letter to me (No. 15) of October 22nd, 1928, is of interest in this connection.)

   Note: To ask Sir James Lubbock if he can confirm this.

   If Lathom was able to recognise and procure Amanita muscaria, could he not have boiled it on some previous occasion and added the poison to the stew in liquid form, so as to run less risk of my father’s recognising the intrusion of the wrong fungus?

   (Answer: Very probably.)

   (As regards the question of Means, therefore, it seemed clear that Lathom might readily have had access to the poison, and that there was no mechanical difficulty at all to prevent his having introduced it into the dish of mushrooms. When, however, we came to consider the subject of Opportunity, we were faced with a more important set of difficulties.)

B. Opportunity

1. At what time was the poison actually administered to Harrison?

   A terminus a quo is provided by the evidence of Harry Trefusis, who saw Harrison alive and apparently well at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday. By this time, Lathom was presumably in the train and on his way to London.

   The terminus ad quem can be stated with rather less accuracy. From the fact, however, that the shin of beef delivered that morning was afterwards discovered still wrapped in its original paper, it appears quite certain that Harrison was rendered incapable of seeing to any household affairs before the evening. From my knowledge of my father, I should be prepared to swear that he would certainly never have left meat in this condition overnight. He would have put it on to boil for stock, or, at the very least, would have transferred it to a plate⁠—particularly in the case of shin of beef, which, being glutinous, has a habit of sticking to the wrapping-paper. When I stayed at The Shack with my father, he was accustomed to have his evening meal about seven o’clock. After this, he would wash the crockery and tidy the place up, and put on any stock that might be required for the next day. He would then sit and read for an hour or two, retiring to bed about ten, possibly taking a cup of cocoa or some patent food before retiring.

   It thus seems likely that the poison was taken between the hours of 10:30 a.m. and 8 p.m., and most probably at or about 7 p.m.

   ---

   Question: What evidence have we that Lathom actually went to London by the 7:55 at all? Could he have returned to The Shack surreptitiously during the interval? By hiring a motor-bicycle or car, he might easily have made his way back from Bovey Tracey or (if this might appear too obvious) from Brimley Halt, Heathfield, Teigngrace of Newton Abbot. He could then have lurked about in the neighbourhood of The Shack till he saw Harrison go out, and taken the opportunity to add the poison to the dish or stockpot.

   ---

   Note: To inquire as to Lathom’s movements in town. If anybody met him there on Thursday morning, this hypothesis falls to the ground. If not, to find out whether he really entered the train at Bovey Tracey, and if anybody of his description hired any sort of motor vehicle at any point along the line. This would not, in fact, cover every contingency, for an active man might easily have walked the ten or twelve miles between Newton Abbot and The Shack. A motor vehicle is perhaps more likely, as providing a quicker getaway after the crime.

2. Is it possible that the poisonous fungus, or liquid prepared from fungus, was added, not to the fungus gathered by my father on the Thursday, but to some other collection of fungus gathered the previous day?

   This appears unlikely, for three reasons. First: My father always made a great point of eating his fungi freshly gathered. It would have been quite unlike him to gather them overnight and eat them next day. He considered early morning the best time for picking fungus. He had stated his intention of gathering Warty Caps on the Thursday morning, and was, in fact, seen apparently doing so by the witness Coffin. Secondly: If the fungi eaten on Thursday night were gathered the previous day, what became of those gathered on Thursday morning? They were not found in The Shack. Thirdly: For Lathom’s purpose it was necessary that Harrison should have had the intention of gathering Warty Caps, and no other kind of fungus, since this is the only variety which could reasonably be confused with Amanita muscaria. It would appear, therefore, more than a coincidence that my father should have been seen gathering fungus in a spot where Warty Caps were usually to be found. Of course, Lathom’s evidence on this point is suspect, and verification is necessary.

   Questions: Are Warty Caps (Amanita rubescens) actually plentiful in the spot where Harrison was seen by Coffin?

   Can any of the contents of the dish of fungi actually be identified as Amanita rubescens?

   When did Harrison mention to Lathom his intention of gathering Amanita rubescens? This question is important, because, if the poisonous fungi were introduced among the harmless ones in their natural state, it is absolutely necessary that the two varieties should bear at least a superficial resemblance to one another. Even in a half-cooked state, there could be no confusion between Amanita muscaria and, say, Chantarelles or Bolitus edulis or Amanitopris fulva. Unfortunately, no one can throw any light on this except Lathom himself, and it is not likely that he will tell the truth.

   Note: To verify the habitat of Amanita rubescens, and, if possible, its presence in the actual dish of fungi analysed.

C. Further Questions and Objections (Miscellaneous)

If Lathom was guilty of administering poison to Harrison, why did he return to The Shack on Saturday? Would it not have been wiser to remain in town till the death was discovered?

This is an objection which to me appears to carry some weight. I can, however, see certain considerations which might account for a proceeding so apparently reckless from a practical point of view.

(a) Lathom may have wished to be on the spot to conceal any accidental traces of the crime. As we do not yet know his exact procedure, it is not certain what these could have been⁠—a bottle, perhaps, containing extract of Amanita muscaria, a pan in which he had prepared it; a book or papers containing notes; traces of his previous arrival by motor-bicycle or otherwise; possibly some letter or message left by Harrison, containing his own suspicions as to the manner of his death.

Note: Munting’s opinion is that Lathom originally intended to remain alone in The Shack while he (Munting) came to fetch help, but when it came to the point found himself unable to face it. This is consistent with the above explanation, if we suppose that Lathom was overcome by fear or remorse at the sight of the body, and was thus prevented from carrying out his design. From Munting’s own statement it will be seen that Lathom was in a nervous state from the moment of his meeting Munting in town, down to the time when the body was discovered.

(b) Supposing the plot had failed to work, Harrison would have been expecting Lathom’s return. Let us say he had discovered an Amanita muscaria among his fungi⁠—he would wonder how it had got there, and if Lathom never turned up might conceive such suspicion of him as would put him on his guard against any further attempts. On the other hand, he might have mentioned to people in the neighbourhood that Lathom was due to come back, in which case, the plot succeeding, Lathom’s absence might have a suspicious look.

Further explanations suggested by the Muntings:

(c) Lathom (supposing him guilty) would probably have no idea when the death might be expected to take place. As Thursday, Friday and Saturday passed without news, he might be overcome by nervous restlessness and an overwhelming anxiety to see for himself what was going on. (I suppose that from artists and persons of unbalanced temperament, such behaviour may be expected, half-witted as it may appear.)

(d) The alleged hankering of a murderer to revisit the scene of the crime. (This I hold to be pure superstition and quite baseless in fact.)

(e) Remorse. Perhaps Lathom regretted what he had done, and was making a belated effort to save Harrison’s life by fetching medical assistance before it was too late. (In this suggestion, put forward by Mrs. Munting, the wish is probably father to the thought.)

Why did Lathom take Munting down to The Shack with him? This again seems to me to have been the act of a madman. Unless, indeed, he was cunning enough to foresee that this was exactly the appearance it would present, and was therefore the best defence he could put up against suspicion.

Further, of course Munting provided Lathom with a complete alibi for the whole of Saturday and an unprejudiced witness as to the discovery of the body. Suppose, for example, that Harrison, instead of having been dead six or seven hours, had been only just dead or on the point of expiring when they got there, Munting could have given evidence that they had found him in that condition on their arrival.

On the other hand, Lathom was running a very serious risk, not only of defeating his own ends, but of having the whole vile plot exposed. If they had found Harrison still alive, they would have had no choice but to summon a doctor immediately; the victim might have recovered, or at least recovered sufficiently to denounce Lathom.

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Note: Is Munting entirely cleared from complicity in the murder? His behaviour has been suspicious, and he has withheld information as long as possible. Not to trust him too far.

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Neither Munting nor his wife seems to find as much difficulty as I do about this part of the business. They agree that a man of Lathom’s temperament, having committed a murder, would be afraid to be alone, and would take any risks to secure companionship. They instance Patrick Mahon’s incredible rashness in taking Miss Duncan to sleep at the Crumbles on the very night after he had murdered Emily Kaye, and while her dead body was actually lying in the next room. These people are both novelists and are supposed to have studied human nature. They say it is full of inconsistencies and I daresay they are right. I admit that, to me, the mentality of men like Lathom is perfectly incomprehensible, and I am ready to believe anything.

It was late when I left the Muntings, taking away with me the letters they gave me, and having obtained from Munting a promise that he would draw up a statement of the course of events during the periods not covered by the letters, and containing, in particular, an exact account of what took place at The Shack. This is the statement which forms part of this dossier, divided into chronological sections for greater ease of reference. I regret that it is so diffuse and adorned with so many unnecessary personal reflections and literary embellishments. It seems that the vanity of writers must be indulged at all costs, even where a straightforward summary of events would be far more useful. I have not, however, ventured to omit or alter anything, preferring to submit the documents exactly as they stand.

My next step was to write to Sir James Lubbock, raising the various points noted in the schedule for his consideration. In the course of a few days I received the following courteous reply.

Home Office
12 January, 1930

Paul Harrison, Esq.

Dear Sir,

I have your letter of inquiry with regard to the circumstances attending your late father’s unfortunate death. I quite understand that you are anxious to have the fullest information about it, and will do my best to clear up the various points you raise.

You may rest fully assured that the death was in fact due to the cause stated at the inquest, viz.: poisoning by muscarine, the poisonous principle of the fungus Amanita muscaria. In such a case I should not confine myself to searching for the particular poison suggested by the circumstances, but should search, as a matter of routine, for all the various classes of scheduled poisons, including not only the other vegetable alkalis but also the metallic poisons. The analysis was made with great care, and I can confidently state that every possibility was eliminated, except that of poisoning by muscarine. This poison, which was present in very considerable quantities, was unmistakably identified, while the symptoms and postmortem appearances, as reported by the witnesses, were indubitably consistent with this form of poisoning.

I may add that preparations of the viscera, vomit, etc., and the unconsumed part of the dish of fungi have been preserved untouched, as is my invariable custom in such cases, so as to be available for future reference or analysis in case of any further question being raised. Humanly speaking, however, you may rely absolutely on the accuracy of my results.

With regard to the composition of the dish, I find, on referring to my notes, that this consisted of fungi exhibiting the structural features of Amanita, stewed whole in a preparation of beef broth, flavoured with garlic and pot-vegetables.

Your further question displays a slight misapprehension. The isolation of muscarine itself in a pure state from the fungus would be a chemical experiment of considerable difficulty, and has, so far as I know, been accomplished only by two men, Harnack and Nothnagel; their results have not, I believe, received confirmation as yet. Choline aurichloride and muscarine aurichloride have been obtained by Harnack from fractionation of extracts of the fungus, and, more recently, King obtained muscarine chloride from the same source. But I conceive your question to mean, simply, “Could a poisonous liquid be produced by simply boiling the fungus in water of broth?” To this, my answer is, Yes; the liquid part of a stew made with Amanita muscaria would be equally poisonous with the solid part. In fact, according to Dixon Mann, the solid parts of the fungus, when thoroughly desiccated, are harmless, and are eaten with impunity in certain parts of the Continent, so that the juices when extracted by ebullition would probably contain a greater proportion of poisonous matter than the solid residue.

Trusting that these facts are what you require,

The ground being thus cleared for my investigations, I determined to clear up the Manaton end of the thing first, Munting having meanwhile undertaken to make inquiries as to Lathom’s movements in London on the 17th and 18th of October.

The Shack had been locked up, and the key deposited with the local constable. Being the executor under my father’s will, I had no difficulty in obtaining it, and took the opportunity of asking a few questions at the public-house. All I could gather was, however, that Mr. Lathom had knocked them up on the Saturday night in a “terrible state” and “looking as though he had seen a ghost,” and had announced that Mr. Harrison had been found dead. As he seemed on the point of collapse, the publican had comforted him with strong drink and had himself summoned the police from Bovey Tracey, the village constable being, as it happened, absent on some duty or other. While waiting, Mr. Lathom had recovered himself and had asked to make a trunk call to town. This was, of course, the call to Margaret Harrison. The telephone is in the landlord’s private room, and the landlord had, with a proper delicacy, retired and shut the door on his guest, so that nothing had been overheard. On coming out, Lathom had seemed greatly agitated, and had explained that he had been breaking the news to the dead man’s family. This was disappointing, as it would have been interesting to know in what words Lathom had announced the event. From Margaret Harrison’s letter, however, it seems that he represented the thing as an accident. Yet she must surely have had her suspicions of a death occurring so opportunely and so pat upon her own instigations to murder. Possibly she managed to convince even herself by her hypocrisy⁠—Munting thinks it not unlikely, and no doubt he has had experience of her type of mentality.

I next obtained the address of the labourer, Harold Coffin. His wife was at home, and informed me that I should find her husband at work carting some timber which had fallen in the recent gale. If I followed the lane leading down past The Shack I could not miss him. Following these directions, I came upon him on the outskirts of a small wood. He was very ready to tell me all he knew, and led me at once to the spot, not very far away, where he had last seen my father.

It was, of course, too late in the season for Amanita rubescens, but the site which he pointed out seemed suitable enough for it, and he also, without being prompted, mentioned that he had often seen fungi growing there, of a reddish-brown colour with grey patches on the top. I took Edible and Poisonous Fungi from my pocket and asked him to look through it. He hesitated some time between the pictures of Amanita rubescens and Amanita muscaria, and finally said he thought it might be one of those two. The colour of Amanita muscaria seemed a bit overdone, he thought, but then, pictures in books wasn’t always right, was they, sir? The wood, locally known as Five-Acre Wood, was a great place for toadstools, and he had often seen my father gathering the great Hepatica fungus from the trees⁠—the huge liver-coloured lumps commonly known as “Poor Man’s Beefsteak.” Coffin was quite clear that my father was actually gathering fungi, and not merely looking for them. My father had spoken to him and said something about, “Getting my supper, you see, Coffin. You ought to try some yourself; you’re missing a treat.” Coffin had often thought of those cheerful words when he heard of the poor gentleman’s death, and had taken them as a warning.

Coffin said he knew Mr. Lathom quite well by sight, having met him from time to time in the public-house when having a friendly glass. He had never seen him in the Five-Acre Wood but once, and that was with Mr. Harrison, about a week before the latter’s death. His own work had lain in and about the Five-Acre during the first fortnight of October⁠—he was employed by Mr. Carey⁠—all this round here was Mr. Carey’s land⁠—and he thought he should have seen Mr. Lathom if he had come there alone at any time.

Having thanked and rewarded Coffin, I made my way to The Shack. Except for the removal of the bedclothes and other objects required for the inquest it was exactly as it had been left at the time of the death. The broken bedstead, with its terrible witness to my poor father’s death-agony, still stood in a corner of the bedroom. Even Lathom’s painting materials lay huddled in a corner. I suppose he had forgotten to remove them. A few roughly-daubed canvases in oil contrasted strongly with my father’s delicate watercolours, of which I found a number put away in a drawer. Dust had gathered thickly everywhere.

I made a careful search on shelves and in drawers for any notes or papers that might throw light on my problem, but found nothing except a few bills and the last letter my father had received from me. There were one or two novels, a number of local guidebooks and botanical books of reference, and some artist’s catalogues. Delving among these, I at length came on a large-scale map of the district, with notes upon it in my father’s handwriting. He had apparently used it as a kind of botanical chart, marking on it the localities in which various plants and fungi were to be found. Five-Acre Wood was clearly shown, and upon it my father had made a small cross accompanied by the note “Amanita rubescens.” I looked for any mention of Amanita muscaria, but could see none; either my father had not found it in the district, or else he had concerned himself with edible varieties only.

One question, therefore, seemed clearly answered. My father had, without question, been gathering fungi for his supper on the 17th October, and the place where he had gathered them was a place in which he was accustomed to find Amanita rubescens.

I could find nothing further of any interest at The Shack, though I spent a whole day there. I passed the night at the inn, and next day departed to Bovey Tracey to check Lathom’s movements.

My first interview was with the taxi-driver. This man’s name is William Johnson and he lives in the High Street. He perfectly recollects having driven to Manaton on Thursday, 17th October, and taken Lathom to catch the 8:13. The circumstance had been strongly impressed upon his mind by the catastrophe that followed it so closely, and the fact that he had actually visited The Shack and seen the victim, only two days before the discovery of the body, has naturally made him a kind of local hero.

He is positive that my father and Lathom parted on the best of terms. They shook hands, and my father said: “Well, hope you have a good journey. See you back on Saturday. What train do you think you’ll catch?” Lathom answered that he wasn’t quite sure, and added: “Don’t wait up for me if I’m late.”

This answers one of our questions, and makes it quite clear that at least one person besides my father knew that Lathom was expected back on the Saturday.

My next question was, At what time had Lathom ordered his taxi? The man remembered this, too. A telephone message was put through to him from Manaton at about nine o’clock on the Wednesday evening. He can verify this, if necessary, by his order-book.

This is interesting. It makes it seem likely that Lathom only decided to make this trip to town at the last moment⁠—in fact, after hearing my father express his intention of gathering Amanita rubescens the following day.

Finally, I inquired whether Johnson had actually seen Lathom get into the train. By a stroke of good fortune he was able to answer this question definitely. He had to put a parcel on the train for a printer at Bovey Tracey, and, while doing this, he had seen Lathom take his seat in a third-class smoker. As the train went out, Lathom leaned out of the window and shouted something to a porter⁠—some question, he thought, about changing at Newton Abbot.

I hired this man’s taxi, which was a reasonably good one, and interviewed the railway staff at the three intermediate stations between Bovey Tracey and Newton Abbot. Here, as was natural, the men found some difficulty in remembering the events of three months ago. I could not find anybody who recollected seeing Lathom. In each place I asked for a name of anybody in the village who might be likely to have a car or motorcycle for hire, and went to see the proprietors of the vehicles, but without result. Nowhere could I find any record of such a transaction.

Newton Abbot is a larger place, and I anticipated difficulty. On the contrary, and greatly to my surprise, I got on to Lathom’s trail almost immediately. No sooner had I mentioned his name to the stationmaster than he said at once:

“Oh, yes, sir⁠—that was the gentleman who lost a pocketbook last October. Did he ever find it?”

Taking this cue as it presented itself, I replied that he had not, and that, being in the neighbourhood, I had promised to call and ask about it.

“Well, sir,” said the stationmaster, “we made inquiries all down the line, and had several men out searching, but they never found it. They would have brought it to me if they had, for they were all decent fellows and Mr. Lathom offered a reward. I’m afraid some tramp must have picked it up, sir. There’s a lot of them about these days and they’re not over-honest.”

“No doubt that was it,” said I. “Let me see⁠—whereabouts did he say he lost it?”

“Said he thought it must have fallen out of his breast-pocket when he was leaning out of the window. He couldn’t say exactly where, but he thought it must be just the other side of Heathfield. Here’s the note I made in my book, you see, sir, and here’s the gentleman’s name and address that he wrote down himself.”

I recognised the handwriting in which Lathom had written out Munting’s address for me.

“Well, it was very tiresome,” I said, “but I am sure you did all you could. There was money in the pocketbook, I suppose?”

“Yes, sir, and the gentleman’s ticket to town. He was in quite a way about it, because he said he hadn’t enough money on him to book again. So I spoke to the ticket-collector, and he said he could make it all right on the train, and Mr. Lathom could settle it with the Company when he got to town.”

These inquiries had taken the greater part of the day, so I decided to stay that night in Newton Abbot and interview the ticket-collector the next day. He was still on the same train and perfectly recollected the affair of Lathom and his ticket. I went on up to Paddington with him, and there the friendly collector directed me to the official in the Inquiry Bureau who had dealt with the matter on the previous occasion. After considerable referring back and forth and ringing up the head office, it was clearly established that Lathom had duly arrived by the 1:15, without his ticket, had explained the circumstances and had left his name and address, promising to send the ticket on if it turned up. As a matter of fact, it never had turned up, but as the booking-clerk at Bovey Tracey had clearly remembered issuing it and had identified Lathom on his next visit as being the person to whom the ticket had been issued, the Company had accepted the explanation and allowed the matter to drop.

This was something of a blow. I had really reckoned more than I realised on finding that Lathom had left the train at some point and doubled back to Manaton. There was just one possibility. He might have hurried across to the down platform and taken the 1:30, which would land him back at Bovey Tracey at about half-past six. This would have meant very quick work, for the explanation to the authorities at Paddington must have taken him nearly ten minutes. And at the other end he would have had to get, somehow or other, to Manaton and then do the three miles out to The Shack, and then snatch his opportunity to rush in, unseen, and drop the poison into the stew while my father’s back was turned. It seemed almost impossible. Apart from everything else, it was inconceivable that he should not have been seen, either at Newton Abbot or at Bovey Tracey. He would have had to pass the barrier, and he would have had to hire a car, for nothing else would have got him down to The Shack before suppertime.

I turned it over and over in my mind and could make nothing of it. It seemed that I must abandon this whole theory. I returned to my hotel in a mood of deep depression, and found there, waiting for me, a letter from Munting, which I append here in its place.