Whose Body?, Dorothy L. Sayers [good summer reads .txt] 📗

Get a picture of Tommy Pringle in your mind’s eye.”

Piggott began to laugh.

“I remember now. Tommy Pringle said the old Sheeny⁠—”

“Why did he call him a Sheeny?”

“I don’t know. But I know he did.”

“Perhaps he looked like it. Did you see his head?”

“No.”

“Who had the head?”

“I don’t know⁠—oh, yes, I do, though. Old Freke bagged the head himself, and little Bouncible Binns was very cross about it, because he’d been promised a head to do with old Scrooger.”

“I see. What was Sir Julian doing with the head?”

“He called us up and gave us a jaw on spinal haemorrhage and nervous lesions.”

“Yes. Well, go back to Tommy Pringle.”

Tommy Pringle’s joke was repeated, not without some embarrassment.

“Quite so. Was that all?”

“No. The chap who was working with Tommy said that sort of thing came from overfeeding.”

“I deduce that Tommy Pringle’s partner was interested in the alimentary canal.”

“Yes; and Tommy said, if he’d thought they’d feed you like that he’d go to the workhouse himself.”

“Then the man was a pauper from the workhouse?”

“Well, he must have been, I suppose.”

“Are workhouse paupers usually fat and well-fed?”

“Well, no⁠—come to think of it, not as a rule.”

“In fact, it struck Tommy Pringle and his friend that this was something a little out of the way in a workhouse subject?”

“Yes.”

“And if the alimentary canal was so entertaining to these gentlemen, I imagine the subject had come by his death shortly after a full meal.”

“Yes⁠—oh, yes⁠—he’d have had to, wouldn’t he?”

“Well, I don’t know,” said Lord Peter. “That’s in your department, you know. That would be your inference, from what they said.”

“Oh, yes. Undoubtedly.”

“Yes; you wouldn’t, for example, expect them to make that observation if the patient had been ill for a long time and fed on slops.”

“Of course not.”

“Well, you see, you really know a lot about it. On Tuesday week you were dissecting the arm muscles of a rheumatic middle-aged Jew, of sedentary habits, who had died shortly after eating a heavy meal, of some injury producing spinal haemorrhage and nervous lesions, and so forth, and who was presumed to come from the workhouse?”

“Yes.”

“And you could swear to those facts, if need were?”

“Well, if you put it in that way, I suppose I could.”

“Of course you could.”

Mr. Piggott sat for some moments in contemplation.

“I say,” he said at last, “I did know all that, didn’t I?”

“Oh, yes⁠—you knew it all right⁠—like Socrates’s slave.”

“Who’s he?”

“A person in a book I used to read as a boy.”

“Oh⁠—does he come in The Last Days of Pompeii?”

“No⁠—another book⁠—I daresay you escaped it. It’s rather dull.”

“I never read much except Henty and Fenimore Cooper at school⁠ ⁠… But⁠—have I got rather an extra good memory, then?”

“You have a better memory than you credit yourself with.”

“Then why can’t I remember all the medical stuff? It all goes out of my head like a sieve.”

“Well, why can’t you?” said Lord Peter, standing on the hearthrug and smiling down at his guest.

“Well,” said the young man, “the chaps who examine one don’t ask the same sort of questions you do.”

“No?”

“No⁠—they leave you to remember all by yourself. And it’s beastly hard. Nothing to catch hold of, don’t you know? But, I say⁠—how did you know about Tommy Pringle being the funny man and⁠—”

“I didn’t, till you told me.”

“No; I know. But how did you know he’d be there if you did ask? I mean to say⁠—I say,” said Mr. Piggott, who was becoming mellowed by influences themselves not unconnected with the alimentary canal⁠—“I say, are you rather clever, or am I rather stupid?”

“No, no,” said Lord Peter, “it’s me. I’m always askin’ such stupid questions, everybody thinks I must mean somethin’ by ’em.”

This was too involved for Mr. Piggott.

“Never mind,” said Parker, soothingly, “he’s always like that. You mustn’t take any notice. He can’t help it. It’s premature senile decay, often observed in the families of hereditary legislators. Go away, Wimsey, and play us the ‘Beggar’s Opera,’ or something.”

“That’s good enough, isn’t it?” said Lord Peter, when the happy Mr. Piggott had been despatched home after a really delightful evening.

“I’m afraid so,” said Parker. “But it seems almost incredible.”

“There’s nothing incredible in human nature,” said Lord Peter; “at least, in educated human nature. Have you got that exhumation order?”

“I shall have it tomorrow. I thought of fixing up with the workhouse people for tomorrow afternoon. I shall have to go and see them first.”

“Right you are; I’ll let my mother know.”

“I begin to feel like you, Wimsey, I don’t like this job.”

“I like it a deal better than I did.”

“You are really certain we’re not making a mistake?”

Lord Peter had strolled across to the window. The curtain was not perfectly drawn, and he stood gazing out through the gap into lighted Piccadilly. At this he turned round:

“If we are,” he said, “we shall know tomorrow, and no harm will have been done. But I rather think you will receive a certain amount of confirmation on your way home. Look here, Parker, d’you know, if I were you I’d spend the night here. There’s a spare bedroom; I can easily put you up.”

Parker stared at him.

“Do you mean⁠—I’m likely to be attacked?”

“I think it very likely indeed.”

“Is there anybody in the street?”

“Not now; there was half-an-hour ago.”

“When Piggott left?”

“Yes.”

“I say⁠—I hope the boy is in no danger.”

“That’s what I went down to see. I don’t think so. Fact is, I don’t suppose anybody would imagine we’d exactly made a confidant of Piggott. But I think you and I are in danger. You’ll stay?”

“I’m damned if I will, Wimsey. Why should I run away?”

“Bosh!” said Peter. “You’d run away all right if you believed me, and why not? You don’t believe me. In fact, you’re still not certain I’m on the right tack. Go in peace, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“I won’t; I’ll dictate a message with my dying breath to say I was convinced.”

“Well, don’t walk⁠—take a taxi.”

“Very well, I’ll do that.”

“And don’t let anybody else get into it.”

“No.”

It was a raw, unpleasant night. A taxi deposited