Hangmans Holiday Read Online Free Page B

door open, keeping a stern eye on his reflection to see that it played him no trick.
    Of his conversation with the barber, which was lively and varied, only one passage is deserving of record.
    “It’s some time since I was in here,” said Wimsey. “Keep it short behind the ears. Been re-decorated, haven’t you?”
    “Yes, sir. Looks quite smart, doesn’t it?”
    “The mirror on the outside of the door—that’s new, too, isn’t it?”
    “Oh, no, sir. That’s been there ever since we took over.”
    “Has it! Then it’s longer ago than I thought. Was it there three years ago?”
    “Oh, yes, sir. Ten years Mr. Briggs has been here, sir.”
    “And the mirror too?”
    “Oh, yes, sir.”
    “Then it’s my memory that’s wrong. Senile decay setting in. ‘All, all are gone, the old familiar landmarks.’ No, thanks, if I go grey I’ll go grey decently. I don’t want any hair-tonics to-day, thank you. No, nor even an electric comb. I’ve had shocks enough.”
    It worried him, though. So much so that when he emerged, he walked back a few yards along the street, and was suddenly struck by seeing the glass door of a tea-shop. It also lay at the end of a dark passage and had a gold name written across it. The name was “The BRIDGET Tea-shop,” but the door was of plain glass. Wimsey looked at it for a few moments and then went in. He did not approach the tea-tables, but accosted the cashier, who sat at a little glass desk inside the door.
    Here he went straight to the point and asked whether the young lady remembered the circumstance of a man’s having fainted in the doorway some years previously.
    The cashier could not say; she had only been there three months, but she thought one of the waitresses might remember. The waitress was produced, and after some consideration, thought she did recollect something of the sort. Wimsey thanked her, said he was a journalist—which seemed to be accepted as an excuse for eccentric questions—parted with half a crown, and withdrew.
    His next visit was to Carmelite House. Wimsey had friends in every newspaper office in Fleet Street, and made his way without difficulty to the room where photographs are filed for reference. The original of the “J. D.” portrait was produced for his inspection.
    “One of yours?” he asked.
    “Oh, no. Sent out by Scotland Yard. Why? Anything wrong with it?”
    “Nothing. I wanted the name of the original photographer, that’s all.”
    “Oh! Well, you’ll have to ask them there. Nothing more I can do for you?”
    “Nothing, thanks.”
    Scotland Yard was easy. Chief-Inspector Parker was Wimsey’s closest friend. An inquiry of him soon furnished the photographer’s name, which was inscribed at the foot of the print. Wimsey voyaged off at once in search of the establishment, where his name readily secured an interview with the proprietor.
    As he had expected, Scotland Yard had been there before him. All information at the disposal of the firm had already been given. It amounted to very little. The photograph had been taken a couple of years previously, and nothing particular was remembered about the sitter. It was a small establishment, doing a rapid business in cheap portraits, and with no pretensions to artistic refinements.
    Wimsey asked to see the original negative, which, after some search, was produced.
    Wimsey looked it over, laid it down, and pulled from his pocket the copy of the Evening News in which the print had appeared.
    “Look at this,” he said.
    The proprietor looked, then looked back at the negative.
    “Well, I’m dashed,” he said. “That’s funny.”
    “It was done in the enlarging lantern, I take it,” said Wimsey.
    “Yes. It must have been put in the wrong way round. Now, fancy that happening. You know, sir, we often have to work against time, and I suppose—but it’s very careless. I shall have to inquire into it.”
    “Get me a print of it right way round,” said Wimsey.
    “Yes, sir, certainly, sir.