The Curious Case of the Copper Corpse Read online

  I turned round to see if Mr. Denning was still dead in the tub, which he was.

  The door rattled, and from outside in the hall came a murmur of voices, Somerville’s louder than the rest.

  “I say, open up, Veronica,” he called. I did not reply. A minute passed.

  “Put her out, sir,” Somerville said, apparently addressing the deceased housemaster. “She has no right to be in this house. Please remember that it’s off-limits to females. Just put her out the door, sir, and I’ll see her off the premises.”

  Again I kept silent, only gradually realizing that here was a God-sent opportunity for a closer look at the crime scene. Somerville and his cronies could howl all they wanted at the door: There wasn’t a schoolboy on the planet—or a man, for that matter—who would dare disturb a female locked into a WC. I knew that for a fact.

  Perhaps they would tire and call in someone with authority: some roving housemaster, or even the headmaster himself.

  But in the meantime, I had the late Mr. Denning all to myself.

  Tucked knees-up in the tub, he reminded me of one of Mrs. Mullet’s least successful poultry courses, brought cold and naked to the table in the bain-marie in which it had been steamed.

  A closer look revealed that several small, irregularly shaped chips of copper had broken away from the body and fallen into the bottom of the tub—perhaps when I had moved it earlier. Small patches of the corpse’s skin had been revealed: most of them fish-belly white, but one or two an angry red. And oddly enough, the copper around the red spots had rather a rough, raised surface, like little craters, while that around the white spots was quite smooth and flat.

  I was reluctant to touch the corpse—not out of any fear of handling the dead, mind you, but because I didn’t want to leave further signs of my examination. In due time, the police would need to see for themselves this copper-plated curiosity with an electrical cable clipped like a crab to its nose: surely one for the record books.

  Using a washcloth to prevent fingerprints, I pried open Mr. Denning’s mouth with a handy wire soap dish. As I had suspected they would be, the mouth and palate were ulcerated and the tongue and gums tinted a greenish blue.

  A quick unclasping of the crocodile clip and a look up the nose showed old lesions and extensive erosion of the mucous membranes. I replaced the clip, taking great care to line up its teeth with their previous impressions.

  It was then that I noticed for the first time the clothing draped over the sink behind the door: trousers, jacket, and waistcoat, all of navy serge; shirt and linen underthings all neatly laid out. On the floor beneath them, a small military kit bag of khaki color. Without unfolding the trousers, I worked my hand into each pocket and removed its sparse contents: a large ring of keys with a rabbit’s foot charm and a change purse containing a few small coins, including a shilling, a sixpence, and a bent coin marked C. 20, with a female Italia on one side and bearing, on the other, the head of a mustachioed gentleman, VITT. EM. III, whom I took to be a king. The rest of the markings had been obliterated by a fierce fold in the coin, as if it had stopped a bullet.

  Next was a worn black letter case that was coming apart at the seams. The contents were few. It was obvious that it belonged to a man of frugal habits. There was a five-pound note, a creased black-and-white snapshot of an Irish setter with “Brownie x/ix/39” penciled on the back, a prescription for Pentostam written by a Harley Street specialist, several prewar postage stamps bearing the image of King George V, and a worn newspaper clipping with a photo of the British Eighth Army landing on Sicily in 1943. The photograph had been handled so much that it looked like a hole-riddled snowflake cut by a child from a sheet of repetitively folded paper.

  Overtaken suddenly by an inexplicable sadness, I glanced at the man in the tub as I laid aside the letter case.

  Steady on, Flavia, I thought. Keep your mind on the business at hand. Harsh as it may seem, in detective work there’s no place for feelings.

  Right, then: now for the kit bag. I removed the contents one at a time, a little squeamish at handling a man’s personal belongings, even if he was dead. Fortunately, they were pitifully few: hog-hair shaving brush, pewter mug, shaving soap, tin mirror, double-edge safety razor, nail scissors, toothbrush, tooth powder, and a tube of theatrical greasepaint makeup, Number 12 rouge.

  I’ve always been amazed by the ease with which a stranger’s life can be reconstructed by simply snooping through their belongings. Art and imagination combine to tell a tale that’s more complete than even a fat printed biography could ever hope to equal. And Mr. Denning was no exception: His secrets were laid so bare that I felt I ought to be apologizing.

  But I didn’t, of course. The man was dead and I needed to get on with my investigations.

  Somerville and his herd were still shuffling and mumbling on the landing. I could not let them in to trample on the evidence. All but one of them, or two, perhaps, were still in ignorance of Mr. Denning’s death.

  They would not break down the door—of that I was certain. The British schoolboy may be many things, but he is not a beast. In spite of his outward shell of highly polished indifference, he is at heart a gentleman and a jellyfish. I had learned this from years of close observation of my own father, who was himself an old Greyminsterian.

  By the time the door was opened, I would be gone. I smiled at the thought of the looks on those boyish faces.

  The window above the bathtub was like all the rest at Greyminster: diamond panes in a lattice of lead strips. It was but the work of a moment to haul myself up on the edge of the tub (begging the corpse’s pardon, of course), lift the latch, and swing the opaque panes outward.

  Scaling the exterior of the school was nothing new to me: Because I had done so during a previous investigation, I knew my way around. After a quick look outside to see that no one was in the quad, I squeezed through the open window and scrambled onto the network of vines which clung everywhere to the old stones.

  My descent was ridiculously easy: I felt a bit like Tarzan of the Apes as I swarmed hand over hand to the ground as a choir of angelic voices came floating from the chapel. Borne on the tide of the mighty organ, their words provided a perfect and cinematic musical score for my bold escape:

  “Praise to our God; the vine he set

  Within our coasts is fruitful yet;

  On many a shore her offshoots grow

  ’Neath many a sun her clusters glow.”

  Whistling along with the hymn, I strolled nonchalantly off toward the far end of the building.

  I remembered that the housemaster’s study was located just inside the west door. Taking care to avoid the porter’s lodge, I made my way along the back of the building.

  Sundays, I decided, are perfect for detective work. Everyone expects that Justice is set aside—at least until church or chapel lets out—and their guard is let down.

  I met not a soul, and slipped as easily into Staircase No. 1 as if I were invisible.

  The study was precisely where I had remembered it, with the name W. O. G. Denning lettered neatly on a card.

  I suffered a brief pang as I realized I should have brought the keys from Mr. Denning’s pocket. Perhaps, though, a man of such authority would have no need to secure his doors: Respect would serve as its own lock and key. Even if he had shot the bolt, I could always count on my powers of lock-picking, for which I am eternally grateful to Dogger. A bent fork from the dining hall or a bit of stout wire from a stovepipe was as good as a Yale key in the right hands. As it turned out, though, I needn’t have worried: The door opened at a touch, and I had locked myself into the housemaster’s study before you could say “Spit!”

  My stealth was wasted. The room was as empty of personal belongings as a tomb. Save for a foxed Christmas card from four years ago, propped open on a windowsill, addressed “Dear Mr. Denning,” and signed “Norah Willett (for the Battersea Dogs’ Home),” there was nothing but a bed, a desk, and a shelf of dusty schoolbooks. The desk drawers were
empty except for a red pencil, a ruler, scissors, an India-rubber eraser, a box of drawing pins, and a spoon.

  It was as if the man had no more needs than a phantom: as if he scarcely existed.

  Although I checked under the mattress and pillows and inspected the undersides of drawers and the insides of rolled-up socks, my heart was not in it. I expected to find nothing, and nothing’s what I found.

  I let myself out.

  In order to reach the stairs, I had first to run the gauntlet of staring, black-framed faces that lined both sides of the hall: those Old Boys of Greyminster, students and masters, who had graduated into death “That Others Might Live,” as it said on each of the frames. I kept eyes front as I passed in review before these now-dead eyes, trying with all my strength not to break into a run before I reached the staircase.

  At the back of the next floor up was the chemistry lab: a shameful jungle of unwashed flasks, stained beakers, and soiled petri dishes which showed clearly that Mr. Winter, the chemistry master, was more obsessed with Jaguars and speed than with cleanliness. I could have swatted him!

  The blackboard was covered with equations, as well as a list of test results, upon which the names of Somerville and Plaxton led all the rest.

  The chemicals were stored on shelves in a long, dim, narrow anteroom, and were arranged more or less alphabetically, although not always, since zinc sulfate came before sulfur. I could see, even before I came to it, what I was looking for. An empty space between calcium carbonate and hydrochloric acid showed that a large jar of copper sulfate was missing. I had no doubt that it would turn up sooner or later in one of the rubbish bins at Anson House. The question was this: Who had moved the jar from here to there? Fingerprints might or might not come to light, but all of that was still in the future.

  For now, there was only one thing left to do before I took my leave. I erased a few of the chemical equations on the blackboard and, taking a stub of chalk in my left hand so as to obscure my handwriting, I wrote on the board in large letters: CLEANLINESS > GODLINESS, which could be read in several ways. Actually, I was quite proud of myself.

  As I emerged into the quad, a stream of boys and masters came spilling out of the chapel’s open mouth. The sun had made its appearance, promising a fine day after all. I drifted slowly over to an old oak, where, after shedding and spreading my mackintosh, I sank demurely and sat with my hands folded in my lap, my placid face upturned to the sunshine in a slight smile. Somebody’s sister, up for Sunday tea and biscuits: no more, no less.

  How easy it is, on the whole, to pull the wool over the eyes of men and boys.

  As I waited for the worshippers to disperse, I began to review the facts and possibilities in the case.

  First and foremost was the evidence of the tub itself, and the copper-plated body that remained seated in it, looking like nothing so much as an oversized motor-racing trophy. Not that it wasn’t tragic, and so forth, but still, in its own way, it was a spectacle second to none, and I was grateful to Plaxton for having called upon my services.

  There was no doubt that the body had been copper-plated by one lead of the automobile battery having been dropped into the tub—filled at the time with a solution of copper sulfate—and the other clipped to the nose of the deceased like a clothes-peg.

  The ring of sediment left behind was remarkable for its regularity: another clue that needed to be considered.

  Identifying the culprit was going to be no easy task, I thought as I reviewed the suspects.

  First of all, and top of my list because of his attitude, was Wilfrid Somerville. His father was an avid photographer, according to Plaxton, so it seemed reasonable to theorize that a certain awareness of chemicals would be inevitable in the son. Even the most careless observer would likely know that copper sulfate was sometimes used as a reversal bleach in the photo lab.

  And then there was Lawson, whose father was a chemist in Leeds.

  “Taffy”—Wagstaffe’s father—after his glorious career in the RAF, had taken up a hereditary post at the head of Wagstaffe Chemicals, a position into which the boy would likely someday follow him.

  Henley, if my deductions were correct, came from a family made wealthy by plumbing supplies: a profession in which the use of copper sulfate to kill tree roots in sewer lines is known to every scullery maid. A medallion head of Henley senior—the family resemblance was remarkable—was stamped on every tin of their patent product, including the one that Dogger kept in the greenhouse at Buckshaw for emergencies, and I had recognized the son at once.

  The chubby Smith-Pritchard, by contrast, seemed to have no obvious connection with the metal salts. The son of a member of Parliament, he appeared to be far more interested in stuffing food into his face than in fungicides.

  That, except for Baker, was the first and second landings accounted for on Staircase No. 3, leaving only Cosgrave, Parker, and Plaxton himself, who had called me into the case.

  Cosgrave was, of course, the son of Harrison Cosgrave, the noted—not to say famous, in certain circles—author of one of the standard works on chemistry.

  Parker was the dark horse: the quiet one, the one who kept to himself and played American jazz on his gramophone in the small hours of the morning. Plaxton had said nothing about Parker’s family connections and it was quite clear that I needed to question Plaxton again.

  One of these boys, I was certain, had had a hand in what I was already coming to think of as The Curious Case of the Copper Corpse. (It is no longer enough simply to solve crimes: We modern private detectives must also be able to come up with catchy names for our cases.)

  My train of thought was interrupted by a footstep beside me. I looked up to see Plaxton steadying himself with a hand on the tree. He was breathing heavily, and even from a yard away I could almost hear his heartbeat.

  “The jig is up,” he wheezed. “The head has sent out a search party for Mr. Denning. He was supposed to be at a housemaster’s breakfast at half-seven. He’s never missed in all his years.”

  “Sit down beside me,” I said. “Don’t attract attention.”

  Plaxton sat.

  “Now, then,” I told him, “time is short. There are several points that need clarifying. What can you tell me about Baker?”

  Baker was the only one of the nine students on Staircase No. 3 whom I had learned nothing about.

  “Sandy Baker? He’s the little chap with glasses. Quite frail and a little hunched. You must have noticed him in my study.”

  In fact I hadn’t, and I wasn’t proud of my slipup.

  “He’s studying art and sculpture.”

  “And his parents?” I asked.

  “His father’s a veterinary surgeon somewhere in the west country. I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you.”

  It was enough. I recalled that veterinarians commonly used a footbath of copper sulfate to treat foot rot in sheep.

  How remarkable, I thought, that six of the nine students on Staircase No. 3 had, in one way or another, direct connections to and perhaps some personal experience in the use of good old CuSO4. Knowledge or experience did not, of course, necessarily imply guilt, but it helped greatly in the process of elimination.

  “Is Parker the son of a baker, a bookbinder, or a manufacturer of straw hats?” I asked Plaxton.

  “Not so far as I know,” he said. “A music publisher, I believe.”

  “And your own father?” I asked. It was a question I had been fearing to ask.

  “He’s a Fleet Street journalist,” Plaxton answered. “He’s in jail for refusing to reveal his sources in the government pension scandal.”

  “Of course,” I said. “I’m sorry.” I had seen the sensational stories in the illustrated news magazines: the fist-shaking crowds, the handcuffed prisoner.

  “Tell me about Mr. Denning,” I went on, trying to get past the awkward moment. “Was he in the Service?”

  “As a matter of fact, he was,” Plaxton replied. “He waded ashore at Castellazzo, in Sicily, in
1943, with the Eighth Army. Poor chap—he never really got over it. That’s why I felt so dreadful about—”

  A great flare went off in my brain, and in that instant, everything became suddenly clear.

  “Did he always wear long sleeves?” I interrupted.

  “Funnily enough, he did,” Plaxton said, with an odd look. “Even in summer.”

  “Then,” I said, “the only question left to ask is this: What did you do with the empty bottle?”

  Plaxton’s face collapsed as if it were rubber.

  “You know, then?” His voice was that of a ghost.

  “Of course I know.” I tried my best to sound matter-of-fact. “The poor man was suffering from the Sicilian strain of sandfly fever.”

  It was, I knew, a recurrence of kala-azar, or dumdum fever. Dogger, who knew at first hand a great deal about tropical diseases, had told me tales of the dreaded ailment caused by the bite of the phlebotomine sandfly, which feeds upon the blood of rodents. The fever, common in the Mediterranean, could manifest itself even after twenty years. The sores and lesions in the dead man’s nose should have alerted me at once, as should the prescription for Pentostam.

  “You found him dead in the tub,” I told Plaxton. “He had suffered a heart attack while soaking himself in a bath of copper sulfate, whose crystals he had pinched from the chemistry lab to alleviate his sores. He may already have absorbed enough of the stuff to cause poisoning. An autopsy will tell.

  “The evenness of the blue ring showed that there had been no thrashing around. The ring around his neck was constant and his face had not been immersed. Therefore, he either died in the tub, or was already dead when he was put there.

  “You should have left the empty bottle, Plaxton. It was a careless oversight.

  “Because of the god-awful row you’d had, you were still in a rage. You decided to hook him up to the battery, which you removed from Mr. Winter’s car, to make it look as if someone else—some unknown person, some passing stranger—had murdered him.”

  “They’d never have believed me!” Plaxton blurted. “But how did you know?”