in short order. Then he climbed into his
seat to test it out. Then he drove off with-
out troubling to return the borrowed ham-
mer.

Did the mechanic, the detective asked,
remember what the ungrateful stranger
looked like?

Sheepishly the mechanic said no, he did
not note the stranger’s face. The detectives
investigated the mechanic and became con-
vinced that he knew no more of the murder
than he had told.

Meanwhile another squad searched the
premises of the murder. Behind a drum of
oil they found a crumpled piece of oil-
stained paper, on it a notation in pencil.
““Gar——Saty——10 a.m., or—12.30.” It
was obviously a note of an appointment at
the garage for some Saturday; and it was
on a Saturday that Messiter had been mur-
dered.

The handwriting was not Messiter’s.

The detectives from London then went
through the waste basket of the garage
office and searched and sifted other litter
about the place. From these they selected as
interesting, several bits of paper which
would have been passed by as worthless by
other investigators. One was a screwed-up
fragment of a note bearing only the signa
ture “Thomas.” The other was also part of
some memorandum, its contents missing,
leaving only the signature “W. F. Thomas.”

There was nothing about these signatures

|

|

|
i i

|

to indicate that they were clues, but Scot-

land Yard made note of them nevertheless.

In the garage, by the side of the delivery truck, lay the body.

was visited and questioned. In this way Scot-
land Yard plodded on till one day they
found the factory that had made the ham-
mer; then the store that had sold it. Then
the district about that store was canvassed,
until a man was found who said:

“Yes, this hammer belongs to me.”

He was a mechanic in a local automobile
factory, but had kept the hammer at his
home in a working-class neighbourhood in
Southampton. He told of being here one
Sunday when, looking out of a window, he

1938

OCTOBER,

At the same time the detectives examined
' Messiter’s business books. Exhaustive in-
vestigation of the recorded entries yielded
nothing. But the Scotland Yard men found
also a receipt book, blank, but showing that
nine pages had been torn out. On the tenth
page, however, they found the faintest pos-
sible indication that something had been
written on the page on top of it; the pres-
sure of the writing had left its mark on

saw a small delivery automobile was stand-
ing in front of his house. The chauffeur was
tinkering with the engine. The mechanic
came down and asked if he could be of
assistance.

“Yes,” the stranger told him, “you the blank page beneath.
might lend me a hammer for a few moments.
I left mine in my garage.”

The mechanic went indoors and came out
with the hammer. The chauffeur of the
delivery truck seemed intelligent about
motor trucks, for he got the engine to work

ReEcEIPT Book GivES CLUE

With the aid of powerful lenses and a
special process used in the laboratories of
Scotland Yard on such clues, these indenta-
tions were finally read and photographed.

BRITISH COLUMBIA
DEPARTMENT OF MINES

The value of mine production in 1937 was $74,475,902,
an increase of $20,393,935 over 1936. All phases of
the mining industry have shown increases in both
volume and value.

For copies of the Annual Reports of the Minister of
Mines and other publications dealing with the mining
industry of this province, apply to:

DEPUTY MINISTER OF MINES

VICTORIA, B.C.

Page Forty-Three