Chapter 3 prelude

On that extraordinary February afternoon, the deep-sea trawler Lavinia D returned from a long Atlantic voyage, sailed across Sandy Hook Point, honked its whistle toward Hancock Harbor, and bowed and waved its stern along the way. Push down the bay.Not much catch on board, dirty decks like a killing field, foul-smelling Atlantic winds nauseating, crew cursing the captain, the sea, the fish, the leaden sky and the barren coast of Staten Island on the port side .Bottles were passed from hand to hand, and sailors shivered under their foul-smelling tarpaulins. A large man leaning against the railing, gazing sadly at the blue waves, straightened up suddenly, with bulging eyes in a flushed face, and shouted loudly.The crew looked in the direction of his index finger, and three hundred feet away, there was a small, black body, undoubtedly dead, bobbing and sinking in the bay.

The crew was thrilled. "Full left rudder!" The man at the helm leaned on the steering wheel and yelled. The Lavinia D began to move awkwardly to port, creaking at every joint, circling its prey like a wary beast, getting closer and closer to the object round and round.The crew was happy and excited, slapping the water with their fishing rods, and couldn't wait to catch the weirdest fish of the day. Fifteen minutes later, the object lay in a pool of foul-smelling water on the damp deck, messy and decayed, but unmistakably a man.From the state of decomposition of the body, it was evident that the man had been scoured by tidal waters in the depths of the sea for several weeks.At this time, the crew stood on the deck with their hands clasped behind their backs, and there was silence.No one touched the body.

And so, with the stench of fish and the salty wind filling his lifeless nostrils, York Head began his last journey.The filthy trawler, his coffin; the coarse unshaven crew in scaled sackcloth, his pallbearers; the soft oaths of sailors and the sound of the wind blowing through the narrow bay, It is his mass. The wet nose of the Lavinia D paddled lightly through the scum-laden water as the cable was tied to a small slipway on the shore of Batley.An unexpected cargo was brought back from the sea, the crew gesticulated, the captain broke his throat, the port officials nodded in understanding, briefly inspected the slippery deck, and the phone in the small Betley Port Office rang loudly.York Hatter lay buried under a tarpaulin.

But this peace was short-lived.An ambulance arrived in a hurry, and medical staff in white carried away the wet body.The funeral procession left the sea, loud sirens played dirges, and York Height was driven from Lower Broadway to the municipal morgue for reclaiming remains. His life was strange and mysterious.On December 21 last year, four days before Christmas, Emily Height, Sr., who lives north of Washington Square in New York City, reported her husband missing to the police.When no one was watching that morning, he walked out of the red-brick mansion that stood like an ossuary, representing the fortune of the Hatter family, without saying goodbye to anyone, and just disappeared.

The old man was missing, and old Emily Hitter had no explanation for her husband's disappearance.The theory put forward by the Population Loss Department was that Hett was kidnapped and someone might come to ask for a ransom, but this theory was soon shattered, because the old man's wealthy family did not receive any word of the so-called kidnapper.There were various other theories in the papers: one of them was that Hayter had been murdered—nothing was out of the question when it came to the Hayt family.The Hatters vehemently denied such a possibility; York Hatter was a little man who never offended, a quiet old man with few friends, and, as far as the investigation had gone, no enemies.Another paper, perhaps from the strangely hilarious history of the Hatters, deduced that the old man had simply run away—from his domineering wife, from his tiresome, deviant children, from his debilitating home. .However, this statement was not accepted later, because the police pointed out that there was no change in his private bank account.Also because of this fact, the speculation about a "mysterious woman involved in this case" is self-defeating.Old Emily Hayter, furious at such insinuations, asserted that her husband was sixty-seven years old--an age at which it is highly unlikely that a man would run away from home and abandon his family for a small lust. property.

After five weeks of restless investigation, the police came to a conclusion—suicide.It appears that the police were right this time. Inspector Sam of the NYPD's Homicide Squad could not have served as the chaplain at York Height's brutal funeral.There is no big or ugly part of his body: a hard and ugly face, a broken nose, flat ears, and big hands and feet on a huge frame.You'd think he was a retired heavyweight boxing champion, his knuckles bruised and knotted from years of fighting criminals, his head a mixture of gray and red: gray hair, stern eyes, sandstone red face.He was solid, dependable, he had brains, and he was quite frank and honest for a policeman; but he was old, too, after years of hopeless fighting.

This time the case was different.From declaring missing, finding no one, to discovering the body eaten by fish, and there is sufficient evidence for identification, everything is open and clear.But since there is a theory of homicide, the inspector believes that he has the responsibility to solve people's doubts and let the matter settle. New York County Medical Examiner Dr. Schelling motioned to his assistant, and the naked body was immediately moved from the dissecting table to the trundle.Schelling's squat German figure bent over a marble sink, washed his hands, sanitized them, and dried them thoroughly.After he wiped his fat and small palms to his satisfaction, he took out an ivory toothpick full of tooth marks and began to pick out his teeth thoughtfully.The inspector breathed a sigh of relief, and the errand was finally done.Once Dr. Schelling started digging the cavity, it was time to talk.

Together they followed the trundle to the mortuary locker. No one spoke, and York Height's body was dumped on a flat sheet.The assistant turned around and inquired: Push the closet?Dr. Schelling shook his head. "How is it, doctor?" The forensic doctor removed the toothpick: "It's a clear case, Sam. It can be seen from the lungs that the man died almost immediately after touching the water." "You mean he drowned right away?" "No, he didn't drown, he died of poisoning." Inspector Sam frowned at the death board: "Then this is murder, doctor, we were wrong in our judgment. The suicide note may have been arranged by someone."

Dr. Schelling's small eyes were shining behind old-fashioned gold-rimmed glasses, and he wore a small gray cloth cap on his ugly bald head: "Sam, you are really straight, poisoning is not necessarily murder... Yes, he Hydrocyanic acid left in the body, what does that mean? I would say the man stood on the side of the boat, swallowed the hydrocyanic acid, and then fell or jumped into the water. By the way, it's sea water. Is that murder? Sam , You were right before, it was suicide." The inspector looked unconfirmed: "Excellent! Then he died almost when he touched the water—of hydrocyanic acid, eh? Excellent."

Dr. Schelling, leaning against the death board, woke up with a bleary-eyed look, as the man usually looks sleepy. "It doesn't look like murder. Nothing suspicious. Don't you know that seawater has an embalming effect? ​​Not even common sense? Just a few bone bruises and skin abrasions, no doubt corpses and sea sediments The result of the collision. Obvious bruises, and the fish enjoyed their meal." "Well, but his face is blurred, that's a fact." The dead man's clothes were in tatters on a chair next to him, "Why didn't we find him before this? The body won't just drift like this for five weeks, right? ,is it possible?"

"The reason is very simple, you are so naive, you blind people!" The forensic doctor picked up a broken and wet coat that was dissected from the corpse, and pointed to a large hole on the back of the clothes, "Did a fish bite? Bah The hole was made by something big and sharp. Sam, the body was once stuck by a sunken tree stump at the bottom of the water, and finally the tide or other fluctuations untied him, maybe the rainstorm before the rainy day also Maybe. No wonder you couldn't find him for five weeks." "Then from where the body was found," said the inspector thoughtfully, "it's easy to piece together the story. He swallowed the poison, jumped off, say, the Staten Island ferry, and drifted out down the narrow bay. ...What about the things found on the corpse? I have to take another look." Sam and Schelling wandered over to a table.There are a few things on it: Some rotten and crumbled paper, a briar pipe, a box of soaked matches, a key chain, a seawater-soaked wallet containing some bills, a handful of coins, large and small.Also on the other side of the table is a heavy signet ring taken from the third, or engagement, finger of the deceased's left hand, bearing two initials YH carved in silver on the signet. But the inspector was only interested in one thing among this pile of beach remnants—a tobacco pouch.It was made of fish skin, which was waterproof, and the tobacco inside was still dry.They had earlier recovered a piece of folded paper undamaged by seawater.This was the second time Sam opened the paper. The message on it was written in permanent ink, neat and almost perfect, as neat and clear as a typewriter. There is only one sentence in the message: "Brief and simple," remarked Dr. Schelling. "What a bloody man. I'm going to kill myself. I'm conscious. No need to say more. It's a novel in one sentence, Sam." "Oh, save it, I'm going to cry if I talk about it again," the inspector muttered impatiently, "the old lady is here, tell her to come up and identify the body." He hurriedly pulled a thick cloth from the end of the death board Cover the body.Dr. Schelling muttered something in German and stood aside, his eyes sparkling. A silent crowd filed into the morgue: a woman and three men.Why this woman walks ahead of the three men is not surprising at all. This woman, you will think, has always been a leader, in power, and commanding everything.She is very old, looks old and hard like a fossil wood, has a hooked nose, white hair, blue eyes that are like hawks without blinking, and a thick and short chin that shows that she never bows her head to others ... This is Mrs. Emily Hayter, known to generations of newspaper readers as the "big rich man," "the monster," "the wayward bitch" of Washington Square.She was sixty-three years old, but she looked ten years older than she was, wearing clothes from the era when President Wilson was in the White House. She walked straight to the mortuary board covered with thick cloth with no one in her eyes, and the posture of entering the door was swaggering, with the meaning of judgment, like a goddess of fate.Inspector Sam noticed a man following her—a tall, nervous, blond man with features remarkably like Mrs. Hatter's—mumbling something to her, but she turned a deaf ear and walked forward. Okay, come to the mortuary board, lift off the thick cloth, and look down at the broken and unrecognizable face without blinking. Inspector Sam left her alone in her unemotional thoughts.He watched her face for a while, then turned to the men around her.The tall, tense, blond man—appearing to be in his mid-thirties—was Conrad Height, the only son of York and Emily Height.Conrad's appearance is similar to his mother's, which is predatory; but he is also weak and dissolute, and seems to have a taste of world misanthropy.He seemed nervous, and after a quick glance at the dead man's face, he turned his gaze to the floor, and began to move his right foot restlessly. Standing next to him were two old men whom Sam had recognized during the investigation into the disappearance of York Height.One was Dr. Miriam, the family physician, tall, gray-haired, obviously over seventy, with thin, shaved shoulders.When Dr. Miriam looked closely at the face of the deceased, he didn't show any signs of unease, but he was obviously very uncomfortable. The inspector guessed that it was because he and the deceased were old acquaintances.His companion was the strangest of the lot--an alert and not very noble figure, very long and thin, and it was Captain Trevitt, a retired seaman and an old friend of the Hatters.Inspector Sam was horrified—he was so outraged that he hadn't noticed before—that a leather-covered wooden prosthetic leg was protruding from the right trouser leg of Captain Trevitt's sailor suit.The bottom of Trevitt's throat seemed to be choked with foreign objects. In a pleading gesture, he pressed an old weathered hand on Mrs. Hatter's arm, and the old woman immediately threw it away-with just a flick of the stiff arm, Captain Trevitt immediately blushed and stepped back. step. Only then did she look away from the corpse: "This is... I don't recognize it, Inspector Sam." Sam put his hand out of his coat pocket and cleared his throat. "No, of course you won't recognize it. Almost out of shape, Mrs. Hatter... over here! Look at these clothes and relics." The old lady nodded slightly, and as she followed Sam to the seat piled with wet clothes, she made the only gesture of revealing emotion-she licked her thin red lips, as if the cat had just enjoyed a delicious meal. feast.Dr. Miriam took her place at the death board without a word, motioned Conrad Height and Captain Trevitt to go, and lifted the heavy cloth from the body.Dr. Schelling watched with professional skepticism. "These clothes belong to York. They were the clothes he wore the day he disappeared." Her voice was as tight and tenacious as her mouth. "And, Mrs Hatter, these personal effects." The inspector led her to the table.Slowly she picked up the signet ring with her fingers, her cloudy old eyes—sweeping at pipes, wallets, key chains . . . "This is his," she said without emotion, "this ring, I gave him—what is it?" , nodded almost coldly, "York's handwriting is indeed true." Conrad walked over listlessly, looking from one thing to another, as if he couldn't find a place to rest.He also seemed to be moved by the last words of the deceased: he fumbled in the inner pocket of his clothes, took out some documents, and murmured at the same time: "So it was suicide, I thought he didn't have the guts, old fool—" "Where's his handwriting sample?" the inspector asked suddenly, with an unknown fire rising in his heart. The blond son handed the papers to Sam, and the inspector bent over them in chagrin.Mrs. Hatter looked neither at the body nor at her husband's belongings, but began to straighten the fur shawl about her bony throat. "It's his handwriting, yes," muttered the inspector sullenly, "well, I suppose that's it." Still, he stuffed the suicide note and other handwriting papers into his pocket.He glanced at the death board, where Dr. Miriam was putting back the shroud. "What do you think, Doctor? You know what he looks like. Is this Nak Heit?" The old doctor replied without looking at Sam, "I think so, indeed." "Male over sixty," Dr. Schelling said unexpectedly. "Small hands and feet. Very old cecum resection scar. Operated, about gallstones, six or seven years ago. Isn't that right, doctor?" " "Yes, I cut the cecum for him eighteen years ago. The other one - bile duct stones, is not a very serious disease. Dr. Robbins of the Johns Hopkins Hospital performed the operation... This is York Head." The old woman said, "Conrad, arrange the funeral. Private. Brief statement to the press. No wreaths. Immediately." She started toward the door.Captain Trevitt staggered after him, and Conrad Height mumbled a few words that seemed to be reluctant. "Wait a minute, Mrs. Hatter," said Inspector Sam, stopping to stare back at him. "Don't go so fast. Why did your husband kill himself?" "I said, this—" Conrad started timidly. "Conrad!" He backed away like a dog being beaten.The old woman walked back to the original place until she stood very close to the inspector, and the inspector could even smell the slightly sour smell of her breath. "What are you going to do?" she said in sharp clarity. "Aren't you satisfied that my husband committed suicide?" Sam was very surprised: "Why—yes, of course." "That's the end of the matter, don't let any of you bother me again." She gave a vicious wink, and then left.Captain Trevitt seemed relieved, and followed out after stumbling.Conrad swallowed, and followed with a sick face.Dr. Miriam's shoulders drooped even lower, and he left without saying a word. "Okay, sir," said Dr. Schelling after the door closed, "now you know how to keep your points!" He giggled. "My God, what a woman!" . Inspector Sam yelled helplessly, and slammed out the door like a thunderbolt. A sharp-eyed young man outside the door grabbed his thick arm and started walking with him. "Inspector! Hello, hello, hello, good night, I heard what--you found Hatter's body?" "Damn it," Sam said angrily. "Yes," replied the reporter enthusiastically, "I just saw her come out with a lot of noise. Jaws raised! She's defiant... Listen to me, Inspector, it's not a good thing you're here, I know. What's the matter?" Is there any trouble?" "It's okay, let go of my hand, you little baboon!" "Still so bad-tempered, my dear Inspector . Sam put his hands in his pockets and looked down at his interviewer: "Don't you dare," he said, "and I'll break every bone in you. You bastards, never get enough? Fuck you, suicide !" "I thought the Inspector disagreed with—" "Go away! The evidence is solid, I tell you. Now go away, kid, before I kick you." He strode down the steps of the morgue and waved for a taxi.The reporter looked at him thoughtfully, the smile on his face disappeared. A man came running from the direction of Second Avenue, panting. "Hey, Jack!" he yelled. "Any news on Hayt's case? See the old hag?" The man who had been pestering Sam just now shrugged and watched the inspector's taxi drive away from the side of the road. "Answering your second question - I saw it, but nothing. Anyway, there's a follow-up article to do..." He sighed, "Well, murder or not, all I can say is - thank God for the The crazy Heite family exists!"