Free Have His Carcase by Dorothy L. Sayers

year’s hat, reblocked, with new ribbon. Shape, a little
    more emphatic than is quite necessary. Deduction: not wealthy, but keen on his
    personal appearance. Do we conclude that the hat belongs to the corpse?’

    ‘Yes, I think so. The briliantine corresponds al right.’
    ‘Cigarette-case – this is different. Fifteen-carat gold, plain and fairly new,
    with monogram P.A. and containing six de Reszkes. The case is pukka, al
    right. Probably a gift from some wealthy female admirer.’
    ‘Or, of course, the cigarette-case appropriate to a Prime Minister.’
    ‘As you say. Handkerchief – silk, but not from Burlington Arcade. Colour
    beastly. Laundry-mark—’
    ‘Laundry-mark’s al right,’ put in the policeman. ‘Wilver-combe Sanitary
    Steam Laundry; mark O.K. for this felow Alexis.’
    ‘Suspicious circumstance,’ said Harriet, shaking her head. ‘I’ve got three
    handkerchiefs in my pack with not only the laundry-marks but the initials of total
    strangers.’
    ‘It’s the Prime Minister, al right,’ agreed Wimsey, with a doleful nod. ‘Prime
    Ministers, especialy Ruritanian ones, are notoriously careless about their
    laundry. Now the shoe. Oh, yes. Nearly new. Thin sole. Foul colour and worse
    shape. Hand-made, so that the horrid appearance is due to malice
    aforethought. Not the shoe of a man who does much walking. Made, I
    observe, in Wilvercombe.’
    ‘That’s O.K., too,’ put in the sergeant. ‘We’ve seen the man. He made that
    shoe for Mr Alexis al right. Knows him wel.’
    ‘And you took this actualy off the foot of the corpse? These are deep
    waters, Watson. Another man’s handkerchief is nothing, but a Prime Minister in
    another felow’s shoes—’
    ‘You wil have your joke, my lord,’ said the sergeant, with another hoot of
    laughter.
    ‘I never joke,’ said Wimsey. He brought the lens to bear on the sole of the

shoe. ‘Slight traces of salt water here, but none on the uppers. Inference: he
    walked over the sand when it was very wet, but did not actualy wade through
    salt water. Two or three scratches on the toe-cap, probably got when
    clambering up the rock. Wel, thanks awfuly, sergeant. You are quite at liberty
    to inform Inspector Umpelty of al the valuable deductions we have drawn.
    Have a drink.’
    ‘Thank you very much, my lord.’

    Wimsey said nothing more til they were in the car again.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he then announced, as they threaded their way through the side-
    streets, ‘to renounce our little programme of viewing the town. I should have
    enjoyed that simple pleasure. But unless I start at once, I shan’t get to town and
    back tonight.’
    Harriet, who had been preparing to say that she had work to do and could
    not waste time rubber-necking round Wilvercombe with Lord Peter,
    experienced an unreasonable feeling of having been cheated.
    ‘To town?’ she repeated.
    ‘It wil not have escaped your notice,’ said Wimsey, skimming with horrible
    dexterity between a bath-chair and a butcher’s van, ‘that the matter of the razor
    requires investigation.’
    ‘Of course – a visit to the Ruritanian Legation is indicated.’
    ‘H’m – wel; I don’t know that I shal get any farther than Jermyn Street.’
    ‘In search of the middle-aged man of careless habits?’
    ‘Yes, ultimately.’
    ‘He realy exists, then?’
    ‘Wel, I wouldn’t swear to his exact age.’
    ‘Or his habits?’
    ‘No, they might be the habits of his valet.’
    ‘Or his stiff beard and short temper?’
    ‘Wel, I think one may be reasonably certain about the beard.’
    ‘I give in,’ said Harriet, meekly. ‘Please explain.’
    Wimsey drew up the car at the entrance to the Hotel Resplendent, and
    looked at his watch.
    ‘I can give you ten minutes,’ he remarked, in an aloof tone. ‘Let us take a
    seat in the lounge and order some refreshment. It is a little early, to be sure, but
    I always drive more melowly on a pint of beer. Good. Now, as to the razor.
    You wil have