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Show sE MAGNUM, Scientific Consultant THE SEVEN OAKS TUNNEL ENIGMA WHAT does it matter whether cr it were accident or suicide sui-cide P" said Magnum into tho telephone, with decided decid-ed irritation, because he was being interrupted in-terrupted in the. midst of a highly complex com-plex calculation of formulae bayed on crystal log rapine angles and n xo?, requiring requir-ing quaternions and perfect quiet. "It matters 50,000 pounds. replied the legal voice at the other end oi the wire. : ' That 's the value of his in- surancc poliev. The company contends it was a case of suicide and therefore the poliev is null and void.'' "At the present moment," snapped Magnum, "I don't care if he were insured in-sured for the national debt! Find a detective and don't bother me!" Leaving the receiver off the hook, so that he could not be rung up further. Magnum plunged again into tho ord of signs and symbols. The interrupter was the junior partner part-ner in East, East & Stacey a young man of some pertinacity as well as legal ability. lie happened to have a verv special interest in tho ease of the deceased, because the next of kin was a particularly charming young lady at least, particularly charming to himself. So he iumped into a taxi and drove from Clifford's Inn to Upper Thames street, where the scientific, consultant had his office and laboratories.' ' Damnation! ' ' was Magnum 's welcome wel-come for him. ' ' Awfullv sorrv to interrupt. How long will you take to finish"?'' was the soft answer designed to turn away wrath. "Til! midnight!" snapped Magnum, hunching his bushy reddish eyebrows and thrusting out his straggly reddish beard belligerently. "I'll wait' decided Stacey. "I'll go and talk scandal with Meredith' Ivor Meredith was a young Welshman, Welsh-man, an analytical genius and Magnum's Mag-num's right-hand man. He was the very essence of sli vness and modesty. Stacey went into the laboratories and began to chaff him in order to kill time. "What's that I heard about you and ; a certain fascinating widow?" was his opening gambit. Young Meredith, blushing furiously, protested that he didn't know any fascinating fas-cinating widow. Which was perfectly true, as he was mortally afraid of ail the feminine sex. In an hour's time. Magnum appeared from the office. His crystallographic analysis had borne out his personal guess exactly, and the thundercloud of temper had vanished from his skies. He found that his young Welsh protege had scored off Stacey by challenging him to blow a glass bulb, which looks delightfully simple and in reality requires re-quires months of practice. Stacey, perspiring per-spiring over the blow lamp, was surrounded sur-rounded by a score of horrible bulbous monstrosities. "Better stick to the law," smiled Magnum. "Von can make a successful lawyer even if you have ten thumbs to your hands. Now what's this trouble about the insurance policy?" Stacey answered him seriously with a resume of the case. Abel Jonassou, a seme what eccentric recluse, a man , of fifty-four and a bachelor, had insured his life for fifty thousand pounds with the Empire Assurance company six months previously. On. a-railroad journey jour-ney through the Seven Oaks tunnel, he had been alone in a second-class compartment. com-partment. Jn some way he had fallen out of the moving train :had possibly been killed by the fall and had certainly certain-ly been run over by a train passing on the other line of metals. A coroner 's jury had returned an open verdict. On the advice of their doctors and counsel, the Empire company, a firm of hiizh-rlass reputation, had decided to fight the claim up to the house of lords if necessary. nec-essary. They contended that for a man of his limited income, a fif ty -thousand -pound policy was far too heavyunless he deliberately intended to take his life in order to secure a large sum of money for his relatives. Such cases had cropped up before. i , "Then they shouldn't have insured for such a heavy amount,'' interrupted Magnum. "Well, they did," answered Stacey. "They took his premium, and now they fight the claim. Miss Gerard, his niece and next of kin, has very slender means, and eo " Something in Stacey 's tone gave Magnum Mag-num the clew to this unusual interest in a client of slender means. "Another wedding present to buy!" he injected cynically. Stacey took the remark on the half volley and flicked it neatly over the net: "Help us, and we'll consider it as the wedding present!" ' ' I don 't see that the case lies in my province. Try Scotland Yard. ' ' ft- " ' "r"?r Tr k ' 'T'- T-"-T; r-v y 1 -P J- -4 I Lt'T&r y ) ; ' y: . 1 , A , s v , , - r i ' . i n ' $ - e p L k , - - r- " f " 5 "A warning," returned Magnum. ' r ; " " "I have. Xo satisfaction. A scientist scien-tist is wanted. Scotland Yard can 't tell me why the dead man carried in his pocket a vial of atoxyl." "Specific against sleeping sickness." "A Central African disease. It's unknown un-known in England. Why should he carry the antidote about with him,'" "Have h's serum examined." "That's been dime. No trace of the disease has been found. Hut 1 he Empire Em-pire doctor id nil us that donasson must have thought he had tho disease, and therefore he committed suicide. A book on the subject way found at his country coun-try cottage. Our side will have to prove some other reason for his carrying carry-ing that vial of atoxyl. Tha t 's one point on which L want your help." Magnum pulled out a disgracefully malodorous pipe from his baggv, shapeless shape-less working jacket, and proceeded to stuff it witli a smoking mixture of his own blending, strong to the point of rankness. Meredith hastened to their library above the office, and' returned with one of the twenty bulky volumes of Watts' Dictiona ry of l 'hem istry. His chief took it, and turned thoughtfully to the half-column deseri ption of the chemical properties of the drug, ono of the arsenic derivatives. Presently he remarked, ' ' Have von considered the possibility of foul play ? ' ' "That was one of our first thoughts, ' ' returned Stacey. ' ' Hut Jonasson was seen alone in the compartment com-partment at Ton 1) ridge Junction, only five mi les from the tunnel, and there were no traces on the footboard of any one clambering along from one compartment com-partment to' another. " j ' ' Windows ? ' ' ! "All shut." "A man under the scat?" "Xo traces." "When was the discovery made?" "As soon as the train came out of the tunnel into the Seven Oaks station. The door of Jonasson 's compartment was open and banging to and fro.... All the evidence goes to show that he was entirely nbmc in the compartment; that he opened the door himself finger fin-ger prints on the handle and fell out. We claim that he must have be- 'come suddenly frightened -he was a nervous old man and that he lost his jhead, opened tho door to call for help, and was th rowu out by the rush of I wind against the open duor." ' ' Sounds very probable. ' ' ' ' 1 he Km pi re company say that if he wauled help he could have pulled the alarm cord. There was no one eUe in the compartment t hat 's certain from the footprints in the dust. He had nothing to be - afraid of, they claim. ' " ' ' Kqunlly plausible. " ' ''(.';tn you tell me why lie carried that atoxyl with him '? ' ' Magnum was not a man to confess openly to ignorance. JTe replied'.eurtly: '"I'm not a theorist. Ask me practical questions. ' ' For reply, Stacey produced from his poehet a blank manuscript-size envelope, en-velope, and from the envelope a much creased sheet of folded paper blank. ' ' I found this in Jonasson 's study while hunting for his will. I have a strong feeling that H contains a message mes-sage wri t ten in invisi ble ink. Miss Gerard tells me that he was the kind of eccentric who would do that. Will you try to get the message out''' ' ' Suppose, ' ' ayked Magnum shrewdly, ''it were to ?:iy that he intended to commit suicide V 1 ' In that ease. ' ' laughed tho lawyer. law-yer. "I shouldn't call you as a witness. wit-ness. 1 ''Von young scoundrel!" "But it won't be that," answered Stacey, returning to seriousness. ''Miss Gerard knew him well he was very fond of her in his ijneer, angular way and she is perfectly certain that he had no intention of committing suicide." ' Jf you prove wrong, ' ' warned Magnum, ' ( don Jt count on me to keep silent in a case of fraud." He passed 1 he sheet of paper to Meredith, who examined it eagerly, his eyes a-Hyht at the thought of pitting his chemical knowledge against this enigma. Meredith's first move was to cut the sheet into four quarters, so as to avoid the risk of spoiling the whole of it iu the course of experimenting. Tho heat test gave no result; nor did the iodide test; nor the sulphuretcd hydrogen hy-drogen test. Magnum, suspecting tha t they were in for a long session, looked at, his watch, found it marking 7 o'clock and sent out for three porterhouse steaks, a Stilton cheese and bread and lager beer. "I should prefer oysters, a fried sole. and a bottle of claret," suggested Sta.cey. "You'll have what's good for you," retorted Magnum, who had unaesthetic view? on food. Jt was close to 0 o'clock before Meredith Mere-dith at length triumphed. Fitting together to-gether three-quarters of the sheet of paper the other quarter had become spoiled in the course of testing the following fol-lowing words stood out in roughly written writ-ten capital letters: TO A. .T. Fh'OM T11K FATmT KKOM Till1; WAT VAX K SKY! Magnum turned to Stacev, "There's your wedding pro-cut, ' ' said he grimly. All Stacey 's pose of flippancv had dropped from him. Staring at the paper, pa-per, he asked in a hushed voice: "What does it mean ' ' ' ' ' A warning, ' ' returned Magnum. "A warning that must have put Jonas-; sou's nerves on edge. In that railroad! compartment, alone, passing through the long Seven Oaks tunnel, somethi ng happened to .terrify him into trying to esca ne. ' ' ' ' If we could prove it. But what exactlv happened ? ' ' "The last words of the warning f re, judging from the 'first two lines: 'From the' sky! ' ' ' ' ' Yes, yes! ' ' cried Stacey, eagerly. "That railway carriage i t s been sealed and shunted into a siding? ' ' "Xatuiallv." "Tomorrow morning 14-e'll go and examine ex-amine it. ' ' "Yes, but what's your theory?" Ma gnu in 's temperament included a strong dash oi' human vanitv. lie Uked to have his ach ivemen t s bulk la rirc. lie 1 ik ed to d is pi a v his resul ts against an effective background. Having Hav-ing jvrived at. a simple exnlana t ion of a puz.li ng mystery, lie preferred to keep silent about it until the morning should bring the glowing moment for the revelation. reve-lation. Stacey had to be content to wait. The railroad carriage possible evidence evi-dence in a 50, 00U-pound law case, had been shunted into a freight yard of the Chatham and Southeastern, "and housed in a shed under lock anil key at the instigation of the insurance company. A legal representative of tho company, com-pany, as well as a district freight agent of the Chatham and Southeastern, accompanied ac-companied Stacey and Magnum to the fresh inspection of it. The insurance lawyer dry, thin-lipped, pince-nez-ed cynically, critical, abundantly sure of himself allowed a ghost of" an acidulated acidu-lated smile to flicker around his eves as he viewed Magnum's air of expectant triumph. The freight agent preserved an attitude of strict neutrality. Stacey was on a hair-trigger of expectation, masked under a pose of legal dignity and self-restraint. The railroad official broke the seals on the door of 'the compartment and threw it open for Magnum's inspection. The latter 's shrewd eyes darted about the interior, taking in every detail. To all appearance it was an entirelv ordinary, ordi-nary, humdrum, common place second-class second-class compartment carrying no hint of tragedy. The dead man's ulster, umbrella um-brella and traveling bag, replaced on the rack in the position where thev had first been found, merely suggested that some traveler had left them there while he went nut to buy a journal at a newsstand. news-stand. A small volume of Lamb's Essays, Es-says, lying on a corner seat, might have been put there to secure his place. Then Magnum asked to see the adjoining ad-joining compartments, one a smoker, one a general compartment. They were bare of extraneous objects and entirely un-suggestive. un-suggestive. ' Well ? ' ' challenged the opposing lawyer with his thin and acid smile: "Have you discovered some point wre all have been dense enough to miss?" "There are always two sides to every question," returned Magnum. "Your side and my side?" ' ' The inside and the outside, ' ' amended Magnum, with a cutting edge to his words. "And tho application of that verv sound maxim?" "The application is that to view the outside one needs a ladder." "And why a ladder, may I ask?" "1 am iiot a Child's Guide to Knowledge, but if you are . seriously anxious for an answer to your question, ques-tion, it is in order to climb." Having delivered this snub, Magnum turned and addressed himself to the freight agent. "Please send for a short ladder, so that I can examine the roof.'' When it arrived, Magnum mounted briskly to the roof of the carriage and looked for the footprints or traces of a man having crawled over the roof, which he confidently, expected to find. A grievous disappointment awaited him. The roof was streaked with rain-: drops trickling over soot, now dried into the semblance of a map of some fantastic fantas-tic mountain range. There were no footprints. "Did it rain on the day of the accident?" acci-dent?" he asked sharply.' Stacey, after a moment's thought, replied re-plied in the affirmative. ' ' Unfortunate, ' ' commented Magnum. Mag-num. "Rain would have- obliterated footprints. Come up here. ' ' At last Stacey understood what Magnum Mag-num was driving at. "From the sky!' had been the concluding words of the warning to the dead man. Someone had crawled on the roof, pulling up the lamp over the compartment in which Jonasson was traveling, and then ! In a flash he pictured the old man alone in the compartment, through the long tunnel, where a cry for help would be ! drowned in the roar of the rushing train, ; looking upward to see a menacing face staring at him from the aperture of the lamp, a revolver at cock and ready to shoot him down in any corner of the compartment. T nipped, helpless, terrified, terri-fied, Jonasson had tried to escape by the door and had been thrown on to the rails. M agnum, moving forward over the roof, in plain view of the other three, went to pull up the lamp and demonstrate demon-strate his point. But a sentence from the railroad of- By MAX RiTTENBERG Copyright, l'J16, by AK'Clure Newspaper Syndicate. ficial chpekerl Mm in mid-action. "You arc thinking of the old type of lamp, sir. These ones are not removable. re-movable. They're fixtures." Magnum, incredulous, went on and found tho lamp screwed in tight and the screws rusted in firmly. The insurance lawyer permitted himself him-self a dry laugh of cynical amusement. "Facts, " said he, "have an unfortunate unfor-tunate habit of contradicting the most ingenious and elegant theories." b Magnum was now thoroughly aroused by the mocking mystery of the railroad compartment. Ho had, in plain words, made a fool of himself in frnnt ot the insurance lawyer. That was unbearable. The only way 'to get back his self-respect was to wrest out the secret and flourish it in tho lawyer's face. Hurrying to New Cross station with Stacev," he took ticket to Paddock Wood', bevond Tollbridge, where dnnas-Ison dnnas-Ison had lived his recluse life in a coun-1 coun-1 try cottage a couple of miles away from the raihvav line, alone save for a housekeeper house-keeper servant. (In the way, Magnum plied Stacey with question after question ques-tion regarding the life history, the habits hab-its and eccentricities of the dead man. Stacey 's information was limited; the housekeeper could tell much more. On their- arrival they found the cottage cot-tage bolted and barred. A hedger and ditcher, working in a neighboring lane, expressed the thoughtful opinion that the housekeeper must have locked up and gone away. "Where!" demanded Magnum, assisting his cerebrations with a couple of half crowns. He didn't rightly know. Could lie find out by asking neighbors? That struck the hedger as an idea of great brilliance, and, dropping h'is tools, he set off to make inquiries. Meanwhile, Magnum, impatient of obstacles, ob-stacles, broke a window in tho cottage and secured unconventional entrance. 'With -.Stacey 's guidance he went through the dead man's books and papers pa-pers and personal possessions in search of a fresh light on the mystery. Both were now firmly convinced that Jonas- I son had come to his death by foul play or, more exactly, that he had been terrified out of the closed railway compartment com-partment bv some human agency. Both were equally of the opinion that it was a matter of loug-stamling revenge, reaching back into the obscurities of Jonasson 's past life. But mere opinions would be poor weapons for a big law case. They must have facts. They must find out -whom, why, how. They must be prepared pre-pared to prove in court how a man, indisputably in-disputably alone in a railway compartment, compart-ment, with closed doors, closed windows and no aperture for human entrance, could be so terrified as to be driven out so hurriedly that he did not even pull the alarm chain. A long search through books, papers and clothes proved annoyingly inconclusive, incon-clusive, .lonasson's tastes were evidently evi-dently cultured and leisured. Whatever What-ever he might have beeu in his vouth. in the immediate past ho had been a triflcr with books, garden and fishing. That gave them no help. In the bedroom of the dead man Magnum Mag-num 011 a sudden impulse, threw up the window. Outside it. he was surprised sur-prised to find a screen of fine-meshed wire netting. (Though common enough in the United States, such netting is rarely used in Kngland.") "Why this?" he asked of Starey. "To keep out summer insects, I should imagine." Magnum suddenly became very thoughtful, hunching his bushy eyebrows eye-brows and twisting at his straggly beard. The hedger and ditcher, beaming with pride at the success of his detective detec-tive work-, came to announce that the housekeeper had gone to visit a married mar-ried daughter living at Tollbridge. "We'll go there at once," said Magnum, Mag-num, "and the first question to ask her is why Jonasson put up that wire netting. ' ' Stacey looked at him ciuesfioninglv. "The loadeil revolver ho kept in' his bedroom," pursued Magnum, "is nothing noth-ing out of the ordinary for a nervous man living in a lonely country cottage. But the wire screen is highly unusual. The unusual is worth analysis." An hour latr they were at Ton-bridge. Ton-bridge. Mrs. PritclieU was readily found in the parlor above her daughter's daugh-ter's confectionery shop in High street a time-worn, gray-haired, gray-minded woman, dull of 'speech, with a love for irrelevant detail. In essence, her information in-formation amounted to this: Mr. Jonasson had 'had the wire screen fixed up six months previously. He was a very reserved man, liking to give orders without giving reasons. It was in winter-time, so that there was no reason to guard against wasps, gnats or mosquitoes. No, she had no idea whv he wanted it. but he was very concerned con-cerned about having it put up at once. "At once?" questioned Magnum, seizing on the suggestiveness of the phrase. It was directly after he received a visit from the dark gentleman with the gold-rimmed spectacles. High words had passed between them. No she had no idea who he was. Mr. Jonasson was very reserved, keeping his affairs entirely en-tirely to himself. The dark gentleman was a foreigner he looked like a half caste, lie was seen in the neighborhood neighbor-hood of Paddock Wood three months later. She believed that this man must have tried to murder Mr. Jonasson in the train. "That has been proved impossible," put in Stacey. Mrs. Pritchett was of the opinion that , nothing was impossible to a foreigner. for-eigner. fiegarding the past life of the dead man, her information was mostly conjecture, con-jecture, embroidered fantastically after the fashion of country gossip. The only definite fact was that he had gone to Africa as a young man. The name, "Uganda," persisted in her memory. At one time ho had kept souvenirs of Africa in his study, but some years back he had made a clean sweep of them, burning them in a bonfire at the end of the garden. Letters! When Mr. Jonasson received re-ceived letters, he usually burned them. No, indeed, she never pried into his private pri-vate papers! She hoped she knew her place! No, she didn't listen to the conversation con-versation between Mr. Jonasson and the foreigner. - She couldn't help hearing that they were angry with one another, but to suggest that she would stoop to listen at a keyhole! "If von had," retorted Magnum impatiently, "Mr. Jonasson might be alive todav." Mrs. Pritchett relapsed into the easy tears of old age, and it took all Stacev Sta-cev 's efforts to comfort her. "Yon '11 be saving next as it was me as murdered him'!" she cried accusingly at Magnum. He. offered her a five-pound note as consolation for wounded feelings, and the interview proceeded. But no further fur-ther information of importance re sulted. Magnum and Stacey returned to town. The scientist chose an empty second-class compartment of the same type as the mystery carriage, and asked S'tacey to leave him there alone during the journey. . , , At Cannon Street terminal, when Stacey Sta-cey went to rejoin his friend, he found ' Magnum glowing with excitement. "I think we've got it!" he cried, slapping Stacev on the shoulder with a lusty thump. ''First set. your detectives on the limit for that half caste with the gold-rimmed spectacles." "Yes, I'd settled to do that," returned re-turned the young lawyer, "but even if we find him, it doesn't help much for our side of the ease. Assume that he threatened to murder Jonasson. Assume As-sume that Jonasson was in deadly terror of him. Assume that he traveled in the next compartment to Jonasson. Even then, the Empire company would claim that the deceased threw himself out of the train suicide while tempo rarily insane, but still suicide. ihe 50, 000-pound policy money will never come to Miss Gerard unless we can show the court how Jonasson was terrified out of an empty compartment." "I believe I can do it." returned Magnum, emphatically. "The phial of atoxyl he carried in his pocket, the book" on sleeping sickness, the wire screen to his bedroom window, Uganda, the home of the tse-tse fly they fit together to-gether like tho pieces of a jig-saw puzzle. puz-zle. One more piece in place, and the whole pattern would stand out. Tomorrow Tomor-row we'll search that sealed compartment compart-ment once again." "In the presence of the Empire's lawyer?" "Naturally. Arrange it for the afternoon, aft-ernoon, and I can show him that Magnum Mag-num is not quite the fool he imagines." As mentioned before, Magnum was not without a dash of vanity. On tho following afternoon the same four were back in the shed where the mystery carriage stood mutely waiting to deliver up its secret. The insurance lawyer's acidulated smile was now fattened fat-tened out to a mellow tolerance. Although it was summer, Magnum wore a pair of thick gloves. In his side pocket, a packet bulged out noticeably. notice-ably. "I want every inch of the compartment compart-ment swept out." he said to the railroad rail-road official. "Will you do it yourself, your-self, so as to avoid any suspicion that might arise if I were to do so?" Tolerantly, the. freight agent called for a carriage cleaner's broom and proceeded pro-ceeded to the task, sweeping around the cornices, behind the cushions and underneath un-derneath the seats, and gathering the sweepings into a small piie, which the other three watched intently. "Stop!" called Magnum' suddenly, his eyes a-light with unsuppressed triumph. tri-umph. From the sweepings he picked up a large insect, dead, and displayed it emphatically in his gloved hand in front of the insurance lawyer. "A tse-tse fly," he stated. "Well, and what if it is?" "The carrier of the sleeping sickness. Deadly. One sting from it and a man would stand a poor chance." "I ilon 't follow your argument," objected ob-jected the lawyer, impassively. "That's what drove Jonasson to his death. That one, and perhaos a dozen others. The rest probably flew- out of the open door into the Seven Oaks tunnel. tun-nel. This one was killed by him." "Still, I don't follow you. How-could How-could your dozen tse-tse flies enter a closed compartment? ' ' "Get inside, and I'll demonstrate," snapped Magnum. The lawyer, with a gesture of disbelief, disbe-lief, entered the compartment, and the door was closed on him. Magnum immediately im-mediately proceeded to the smoking compartment alongside, lit himself a cigar, and then produced from his pocket the box which Mas causing the bulge. It contained a dozen live wasps, angrv at their long imprisonment. Magnum, standing on a seat, took out one of the buzzing insects with his hcavi Iv-gloved fingers and placed it in the tube of the alarm chain passing from compartment to compartment. A few pult's from his cigar drove the insect to find escape through the further end of the tube. Wasps Nos. 2, 3 and -1 quicklv followed. fol-lowed. What then took place in the insurance lawyer's compartment would tv-highly tv-highly comic had it not beeaii"-. stration of a tragedy. righting with 'the furious ruffled, disheveled, and wipes f-cynical f-cynical smiles, the lawyer it's; "' driven to throw open the door "' a hurried and undignified outside. "And that," clinched Map:; the way Abel Jonasson was s-death." s-death." The murderer was never ?s: and so the inner history of tb feud never came to light. Bit : came abundantly clear that ti; man had been fearing an tu. the tse-tse fly it was for that : that he screened his bedroom and carried in his pocket the lny might counteract the terrible ef-the ef-the sting. No doubt the unkEcr derer had threatened him with;:, ticular form of revenge. Jonai;: insured his life heavily, either : superstitious hope that it mih: death, or in order to leave ci: j well provided for. The fact, of importance ' mirri demonstrated was the which Jonasson had been driver the railway carriage. On that. :i:i pire company compromised out 0: 4: tor forty thousand pounds. L |