Dark Matter

“What does this mean?” I enquired uncertainly. “That the rope slipped when he threw himself off the Tower?”

“No,” Newton said firmly. “That he was strangled before he was thrown off the Tower. And since strangulation is rarely suicidal, we must conclude that he was murdered.”

“Must we?”

“Yes indeed,” he insisted. “The first mark which identifies the strangulation shows even on the back of the neck where the skin is thick and the tissues are tough, and could only have been made by extreme violence and, as its corollary, a most desperate resistance. Moreover this mark is horizontal as would denote someone attacking the Major from behind.

“Now contrast the second mark, which is much more vertical and shows almost no resistant damage. This suggests that the man was dead when it was made.”

All of which made me think that Newton knew as much about how a man might hang as Jack Ketch himself, so that his arguments seemed to be quite without answer, except to say that I could utter no objection to his findings. And, as ever, I was astonished how much he seemed to know about nearly everything. But perhaps it was only fitting that the man who explained gravity should be so well informed—even, it must be said, animated—on the subject of hanging; and since then I have often considered the possibility that he was morbidly fascinated by the gallows. For my own part I find hanging a very unpleasant sight, and said as much to Newton.

“All the doctors I have talked with,” said he, “inform me that there is no pain at all in hanging, for it stops the blood’s circulation to the brain and so ends all sense in an instant.”

“I have yet to see the man turned off a ladder who bears his experience with a smile on his face.”

“What?” exclaimed Newton, and leaving off his examination of the Major’s neck, he set about an inspection of his hands, as if, like some ancient chiromancer, he might divine the origins of the poor man’s fate. “You think that we should let rogues walk free who also deserve to hang?”

“I think that there is much difference between a flash ballad and a capital crime.”

“Oh, you would have made a fine barrister,” teased Newton. And then, holding up one of Mornay’s hands, he asked me to note the fingers. “Look at his fingernails,” he said. “Torn and bloody. As if he struggled against the rope. A real suicide would meet the means of his own end with greater equanimity. It may be that the Major’s murderer bears the scars of his crime. Perhaps some scratches on his hands and face.”

Newton prised open the dead man’s jaws and, pushing aside his tongue, searched his mouth. But finding nothing, he began to search the dead man’s pockets.

“I regret that I did not foresee this circumstance,” admitted Newton. “This is my fault. I confess I did not think they would kill their own confederate. My own consolation is that by proving this is murder and not suicide, I shall save him from a dishonourable burial. But am I mistaken or did he not try and kill you last night? Why should you be sorry for him?”

“I am sorry for anyone who meets such a fate as this,” said I.

Newton paused. “Ah, but what have we here?” His long lean hands produced a letter which he unfolded.

“Now we have something,” he said, mighty pleased at this new discovery. “For this is written in the same code as those other messages before.”

He showed me the letter, which appeared thus:vahtvjrqcyubxqtmtyqtowbbmhwdjpmgulmplyaklyualrek kmjbatapffehyztmweenlolkymnolcoevkbbdmhffjamiocc cqsaayuwddogscaostanxmcadppbokwqdsknuvkhlpjrzrg waxcifdtjgxtbohbjxkpeuqwfmchvwmvhqycrwmkrrwgapr xjjovzhhryvqpbzlnklplzaysagsgckbvtxzbhfptmhldqchyy czgwraebbbntvzmbsrzbmsxnqtbaxqcipkbacmtizrrmiqyi qdsjuojbsh

“Excellent,” he said, pocketing the letter upon my returning it to him. “Our material is accumulating. Now, at last, we may make some progress in this case.”

“With three people murdered, let us hope so.”

“Four,” said Newton. “You have a habit of forgetting George Macey.”

“I had not forgotten,” I said. “How could I when the manner of his death was so memorable? But at your own instruction I had put it out of my mind. Or at least one part of my mind. And yet for all its singularity, I sometimes think his death can hardly be associated with these others.”

Newton only grunted, and seeming much preoccupied with the poor Major’s death, he walked slowly back to the Mint office—not along Water Lane, which would have been more direct, but up Mint Street; for although he did not say, I knew that he wished to avoid a further confrontation with Lord Lucas—with me following at a distance respectful to his deep thoughts.