By noon on the following day, the Chief Constable was listening to a report from Detective-Sergeant Carsethorn, who had spent a busy but unpromising morning; half an hour later he expressed a desire to be allowed to think the thing over; and within ten minutes he had reached a not unexpected but not very welcome decision. “And I don't mind telling you, Carsethorn,” he said, as he sat waiting to be connected with a certain London telephone number, “that I should do exactly the same if Inspector Thropton hadn't chosen this moment to go down with German measles!”
“Yes, sir,” said the Sergeant, torn between a natural desire to achieve promotion through his brilliant handling of a difficult case, and an uneasy suspicion that the problem was rather too complicated for him to tackle.
It was therefore with mixed feelings that, shortly before four o'clock, he made the acquaintance of a bright-eyed and cheerful individual, who was ushered into the Chief Constable's room at the police-station, a tall and rather severe man at his heels.
“Chief Inspector Hemingway?” said Colonel Scales, rising behind his desk, and holding out his hand across it. “Glad to meet you! Heard of you, of course. I warned Headquarters this would need a good man, and I see they've sent me one.”
“Thank you, sir!” said the Chief Inspector, without a blush. He shook the Colonel's hand, and indicated his companion. “Inspector Harbottle, sir.”
“Afternoon, Inspector. This is Detective-Sergeant Carsethorn, who has been in charge of the case.”
“Very happy to work with you,” said the Chief Inspector, briskly shaking the Sergeant's hand. “Of course, I don't know much about it yet, but I'm bound to say it sounds like a nice case, on the face of it.”
“Eh?” ejaculated the Colonel, startled by this view of a case which he (like Miss Patterdale) feared would lead to much unpleasantness. “Did you say nice?”
“I did, sir. What I meant was that it's out of the ordinary.”
“In a way I suppose it is. The murder itself does not present us, I think you will agree, with any unusual features, however.”
“Plain case of shooting, isn't it, sir? No locked rooms, or mysterious weapons, or any other trimmings?”
“The man was shot in his own garden,” said the Colonel, looking at him rather uncertainly. It appeared to him that Chief Inspector Hemingway approached his task in a disquietingly light-hearted spirit. He recalled that he had been warned by an old friend at Scotland Yard that he would find the Chief Inspector a little unorthodox.
“Ah!” said Hemingway. “What you might call a nice, wide field.”
“No, a garden,” said the Colonel.
“Just so, sir.”
“I'd better tell you exactly what has happened to date. Sit down, all of you! I'm going to light a pipe myself. You can do the same. Or there are cigarettes in that box.”
He sat down, and began to fill his pipe from an old-fashioned rubber pouch. The Chief Inspector took a cigarette, and lit it; and his subordinate, offered the box by Sergeant Carsethorn, said in a deep voice that he never smoked.
Having, by the expenditure of several matches, got his pipe going, it did not take the Colonel long to lay the bare facts of the case before Hemingway. It took rather longer to enumerate and to describe the various persons who made up the society of Thornden; and here it was seen that the Colonel was picking his words carefully. Inspector Harbottle, who had been sitting with his eyes fixed on the opposite wall with an immobility strongly suggestive of catalepsy, suddenly bent a gloomy gaze upon him; but his superior maintained his air of birdlike, uncritical interest.
“Dr. Rotherhope performed the autopsy this morning,” concluded the Colonel. “Perhaps you'd like to read the report. Nothing much to it, of course: the cause of death was never in doubt.”
Hemingway took the report, and ran through it. “No,” he agreed. “The only information it gives us which we didn't know before is that the bullet was probably fired from a .22 rifle, and that's a bit of news I could have done without. Not but what I daresay I should have guessed it. Oh, well! I don't suppose there are more than forty or fifty .22 rifles knocking around the neighbourhood. It'll make a nice job for my chaps, rounding them up. Cartridge-case been found, by any chance?”
“Yes, sir,” said Carsethorn, not without pride. “It's here. Took a lot of time to find it. It was in the gorse-bushes you see on the plan.”
“Nice work!” approved Hemingway, putting a tiny magnifying glass to one eye, and closely scrutinising the cartridge case through it. “Got some clear markings on it, too, which all goes to show you should never make up your mind in advance. I thought it wouldn't show anything much: nine times out of ten a .22 rifle is so worn it doesn't give you any help at all. We ought to be able to identify the gun this little fellow was fired from. Supposing we were to find it, which I daresay we shan't. If I didn't know that the easier a case looks at the start the worse it turns out to be in the middle, I should say this one's a piece of cake.”
“I hope you may find it so,” said the Colonel heavily.
“Yes, sir, but it's standing out a mile I shan't. From what you've told me I can see we've got a very classy decor, and, in my experience, that always makes things difficult.”
“Does it?” said the Colonel staring.
“Stands to reason, sir,” said Hemingway, flicking over a page of the police-surgeon's report. “For one thing, these people you've been telling me about—Squire, Vicar, family solicitor, retired Major—will all stand by one another. I'm sure I don't blame them,” he added cheerfully, oblivious of a slight stiffening on the Colonel's part. “They don't want to have a lot of nosy policemen prying into their affairs. They weren't brought up to it, like the more usual kind of criminal. And, for another, they're apt to have a lot more sense than the criminal classes. In fact, it's a good thing they don't take to crime more often. Yes, I can see this isn't going to be all beer and skittles, not by a long chalk it isn't!” He laid the report down. “Bit coy about the time of death, your Dr. Rotherhope, sir. Any doubt about that?”
“Dr. Rotherhope was unfortunately prevented from seeing the corpse until some hours had elapsed. Dr. Warcop—the deceased's medical adviser—was called in by young Haswell. It is true that he did not commit himself to any very precise time, but he is a man of strict integrity, and the time was, in any event, fixed by Miss Warrenby's evidence.”
“Any reason, barring a bit of professional jealousy, sir, why Dr. Rotherhope doesn't what-you-might-call confirm that?”
A laugh was surprised out of the Chief Constable. “You're very acute! None at all! Dr. Warcop has been for long established in Bellingham, and is perhaps thought by his colleagues to be a trifle—er—out of date! But a perfectly sound man!”
“I see, sir. Is it known yet who stands to benefit by this death?”
“Barring a few very minor legacies, his niece. His Will was in the safe at his office. If you want to go into his business affairs, you'll find his head clerk very helpful. Coupland's his name: decent little chap, living in Bellingham pretty well all his life.”
“On good terms with him, sir?”
“Oh, I think so! Speaks very nicely about him. He comes in for a small legacy—a couple of hundred pounds, I think: nothing much! A good deal shocked by the murder, wasn't he, Sergeant?”
“Yes, sir, he was. Well, he's a very respectable man, Mr. Coupland is, so it's natural he would be shocked. Setting aside that it's a pretty serious thing for him. Head clerkships don't grow on every tree, as you might say, and I'm sure I don't know where he's to find another. Not in Bellingham, he won't, for even if Throckington & Flimby wanted a new head clerk it isn't quite the kind of business he'd fancy, and Mr. Drybeck's had his head clerk with him for thirty years.”
“Drybeck,” repeated Hemingway. “That's the gentleman you told me was given a lift to his home after this tennis-party. Where does he live?”
The Sergeant placed a spatulate finger on the plan. “Here sir, nearly opposite the opening into Fox Lane. As far as we can make out, he must have been set down there at about seven o'clock, or just after. He sat down to his supper at half-past seven. That's corroborated by his housekeeper. What he was doing before that she doesn't know, not having seen him.”
“What does he say he was doing?”
The Sergeant consulted his notes. “He states that he let himself into the house, and went straight upstairs, and had a shower. Which he might have done, because he's got one of those old-fashioned baths with a shower fixed up at one end of it. After that, he went out into the garden to water his flowers. According to his story, that was . . . what he was doing when the housekeeper sounded the gong for his supper. She states that she had to sound it twice, him not hearing it the first time.”
“Where was the housekeeper all this time?”
“Between the kitchen and the dining-room, getting supper ready, and laying the table. The dining-room's at the front of the house, and the kitchen's behind it, at the back. There's a pantry between the two, with communicating doors. She states that she always goes from one room to the other through the pantry, which would account for her not having seen Mr. Drybeck. What I mean is, she never went into the hall during that half-hour, so there was no reason why she should have seen him.”
“If the kitchen's at the back doesn't it overlook the garden?”
“No, sir, not properly speaking. There's just a bit of ground outside the kitchen-window, like a gravel-yard, and then there's a laurel-hedge, shutting off the kitchen from the garden.”
“Nice, cheerful look-out,” commented Hemingway, his eyes on the plan. “So what it boils down to is that from about seven o'clock to seven-thirty this Mr. Drybeck might have been anywhere. If this plan of yours is accurate, I make it under half a mile from his place to Fox House.”
“Yes, sir. He'd have had to pass Miss Patterdale's cottage, of course.”
“Any reason why he shouldn't have walked across this common?”
“He could have done that,” admitted the Sergeant.
“Well, that isn't to say he did,” said Hemingway, in consoling accents. “I can see he isn't a popular candidate for the chief role in this highly interesting drama. What terms was he on with Sampson Warrenby?”
The Sergeant hesitated, casting a glance at Colonel Scales. But the Colonel did not raise his eyes from his pipe, which had gone out, and needed attention. The Sergeant said, a little awkwardly: “Well, sir, I wouldn't say they was on good terms. I don't want to put it too high, but it's a fact that Mr. Warrenby has done Mr. Drybeck a good deal of harm, professionally speaking—him being what you might call very go-ahead, and Mr. Drybeck more old-fashioned, like. Very successful, Mr. Warrenby has been.”
“All right,” said Hemingway, apparently dismissing Mr. Drybeck. “Tell me a bit about the rest of the dramatis personae! You can skip this Miss Patterdale of yours, and young Mr. Haswell, and the niece—I've forgotten her name, but as she's got an alibi, same like the other two, I daresay it doesn't matter.”
The Colonel looked up. “You have a good memory, Chief Inspector!”
Inspector Harbottle, casting upon his superior a look of vicarious and slightly melancholy pride, made his voice heard. “He has that, sir.”
“That'll be all from you, Horace!” said the Chief Inspector conclusively. “Let's take this Pole of your first, Sergeant! If I'd been told there was a Pole mixed up in this case I'd have reported sick. What's his unnatural name?”
The Sergeant once more consulted his notes. “Zamagoryski,” he enunciated painstakingly. “Though they mostly seem to call him Mr. Ladislas, that being his Christian name.”
“Well, we'll call him that too, though a more unchristian name I never heard!” said Hemingway. “The sooner we can be rid of him the better. I've had one case with a Georgian mixed up in it, and two more with Poles, and they pretty nearly gave me a nervous breakdown. This Ladislas, now, who was seen riding his motor-bike up Fox Lane shortly after five-thirty, how does he come into the picture?”
“Well, sir, they do say, in the village, that he's running after Miss Warrenby, and that her uncle wouldn't have him, not at any price. He's some sort of an engineer by profession, and he's got a job at Bebside's. He lodges with Mrs. Dockray, in one of the cottages beyond Mr. Drybeck's house. That one,” the Sergeant added, indicating it on the plan. “Nice-looking young fellow, in his way, but a bit excitable. By what he told me, though I'm bound to say I wasn't attending very closely, it not being any of my business, he used to be very well-off before the War. Estates, and such, in Poland. He was so keen on telling me I thought it best to let him get it off his chest. One or two of the gentry have taken him up, but most of them don't know him. He got to know Miss Warrenby, through meeting her at the Vicarage, and it seems she took a fancy to him. She's a very kind-hearted young lady. She told me she was sorry for him in the first place, and got to like him enough to be very friendly. Quite frank she was about it. Said it was true her uncle had forbid her to have anything to do with him, but that she hadn't held with that kind of snobbishness. Seems they used to go for walks together, and to the pictures once or twice, when Mr. Warrenby was away. Well, it was like I told you, sir. He was seen turning into Fox Lane on his motor-bike, round about five-thirty, by Miss Kingston. She keeps the sweet-shop in the village, and she'd gone out for a bit of an airing on the common, after she closed the shop. Quite definite it was him. Well, you wouldn't mistake him: he's a very dark, handsome sort of chap, and foreign-looking.”
“Didn't see him come out of the lane again?”
“No, sir. She wouldn't have, though, being on her way back to the village.”
“What's his story?”
“First he swore he hadn't been near Fox Lane, but I don't set much store by that, because by the time I saw him it was all over the village Mr. Warrenby had been shot, and I don't doubt he had the wind up. After we got through with that, and with him working himself into a state because of him being foreign and everyone against him, he admitted he had gone to Fox House, to try if he could see Miss Warrenby. He didn't know she'd gone to a tennis-party. On account of its being Saturday, and Mr. Warrenby likely to be at home, he says he left his bike a little way away from the house, and went in the side-gate that leads to the kitchen, meaning to ask the maid if he could have a word with Miss Warrenby. Only, Saturday's her half-day, so she wasn't in. He says he knocked on the kitchen-door, and when he got no answer he went away again. Swears he was back at Mrs. Dockray's before six, and never stirred out again. But as she'd gone off to the pictures, here in Bellingham, leaving him a bit of cold supper, she can't corroborate that.”
“Does he own a rifle?”
“He says not, sir. So far, I haven't been able to discover that he does. Mrs. Dockray said she's seen him with one once, but that turned out to have been a couple of weeks ago, and was Mr. Lindale's .22 which he lent him, and which was subsequently returned to him. Corroborated by Mr. Lindale. He's the gentleman who owns Rushyford Farm—this place, on the Hawkshead Road.”
“Well, let's take him next,” said Hemingway. “I see his farm is very conveniently placed for this footpath which leads to the stile at the top of Fox Lane. Any reason why he should want to murder Sampson Warrenby?”
The Colonel answered this. “None at all, on the face of it. He's a newcomer to the district. Bought Rushyford Farm a matter of two years ago. Used to be a stockbroker. Got a very pretty wife, and one child. I fancy they're fairly newly-wed: the child's only an infant.”
“That's right, sir,” corroborated the Sergeant. “There doesn't seem to be any reason to think he could have had anything to do with the murder, barring the fact that he didn't like the deceased, which he makes no bones about, and having been pestered by him a bit to try to get him appointed as solicitor to the new River Board. Mr. Warrenby seems to have been set on that, but by what I can make out they none of them wanted him.”
“Who are "they"?” demanded Hemingway. “Shouldn't have thought it was much of a job to be after, but I don't know a lot about River Boards.”
“Oh, no, it isn't!” said the Colonel. “That is to say, there's not a great deal to be got out of it, but it would make quite a pleasant addition to his business. My own view of the matter is that he wanted it for social reasons. It would bring him into contact with the sort of people he was ambitious to know. Give him more of a finger in county affairs, too. Pushful sort of man, you understand. The appointment is pretty well in the hands of just those people: the Squire, Gavin Plenmeller, Henry Haswell, and Lindale. They're all riparian owners, and they represent the interests of the Fishery rights. The Rushy runs through the Squire's and Lindale's lands; and Haswell and Plenmeller both own property on it. I can't see what bearing a thing like that has on murder. If Lindale hadn't been at that party, he wouldn't, in my opinion, have come into the case at all.”
“Well, sir, seeing as his movements, between the time he left The Cedars, at 6.50, as near as I can get at it, till close on 7.30, aren't corroborated by any witness—”
“Oh, yes, yes, Carsethorn, you were quite right to interrogate him!” the Colonel said impatiently.
“What does he say his movements were?” asked Hemingway.
“At or around 6.50,” said the Sergeant, his eyes on his book, “he left The Cedars, in company with Mr. Ainstable, by way of the gate on to the footpath. Mrs. Lindale had gone off home by the same route about a quarter of an hour earlier. The woman who works for her daily isn't prepared to swear to the time when she got back to the farm, but she says she'd been in a considerable time by seven o'clock, which is when the woman leaves. Of course, she could have gone out again later, but it don't seem likely, not with the baby. She's not one to leave her baby. Mr. Lindale accompanied Mr. Ainstable a little way up the path. Then the Squire turned off to look at his new plantation, and Mr. Lindale walked on to Rushyford Farm. He says he didn't go into the house immediately, but went off to see whether his chaps had finished a job they had to do, repairing some fencing in one of his water-meadows. That's some little distance from the house. The men had gone off by that time, of course, and he didn't meet anyone. He says he went home by way of his wheat-field, and was in by 7.30. Which Mrs. Lindale corroborates.”
“Well, that's all right, as far as it goes,” said Hemingway. “What about this Squire you talk of?”
“Mr. Ainstable. It's like I told you, sir. He went off to look at the plantation, and didn't get home till about a quarter to eight. Mrs. Ainstable, I should mention, had left the party early, by car, at 6.30. That's corroborated by Mr. Plenmeller. He met her in the drive—he'd been back to his house to fetch some papers the Squire wanted—and she stopped to have a word with him. Seems she wasn't very well: he says she looked bad, and was very nervy. She's a bit of an invalid. Another person who went away early was Mr. Cliburn, the Vicar. He went directly after tea, to visit a sick parishioner. I should say that's all right, sir. I haven't yet checked up on him, but—”
“Well, don't, unless you're hard up for a job,” Hemingway advised him. “Of course, we may have to fall back on him, but if we do, all I can say is I shall be surprised, and it takes a lot to surprise me. I might be able to swallow the Vicar's wife, at a pinch, but even that'll take a hit of doing.”
“Mrs. Cliburn and Miss Warrenby were the last to leave, sir,” said the Sergeant, uncertain how to take the Chief Inspector. “They both left at ten past seven, Miss Warrenby going by way of the garden-gate, and Mrs. Cliburn down the drive to Wood Lane. I've checked up on that. There's an old chap who lives in one of the cottages in the High Street, facing Wood Lane. He was sitting on his doorstep, and he saw Mrs. Cliburn come down the lane. He couldn't say what time that was, because he wasn't noticing particularly, but it seems Mrs. Cliburn stopped to pass the time of day with him, and then went straight into the Vicarage. He says he saw Mr. Plenmeller too, and that he didn't go to Thornden House but along the street to the Red Lion. And he didn't have a rifle, because that's something old Rugby would have been bound to have noticed.”
“Well, we can rule out Mrs. Cliburn, too,” said Hemingway. “Which brings us to this chap with the queer name. I've heard it before, but I don't seem able to put a face to it.”
“I suppose you might have heard it,” said the Colonel grudgingly. “He writes detective stories. Don't read 'em myself, but I'm told they're very ingenious.”
“Yes, I thought this case sounded a bit too good to be true,” said Hemingway. “So I'm stuck with one of these amateur crime-specialists, am I, sir? Has he got an alibi?”
“There seems to be some doubt about that,” replied the Colonel, on a dry note. “You'd better tell him what Plenmeller said to you, Sergeant. He may as well know what he's up against.”
“Well, sir, it's a fact I don't know what to make of him,” confessed the Sergeant. “Anyone would think there was nothing he liked better than to be mixed up in a case of murder! I ran him to earth at the Red Lion this morning, drinking a pint with Major Midgeholme, just after twelve. Quite the life and soul of the bar, he was, holding forth about the murder, and saying how he was sure the Major's wife had done it, because of Mr. Warrenby having been brutal to one of her little dogs. All by way of a joke, of course, but you could see the Major didn't like it. So then Mr. Plenmeller started in to prove how he might have done it himself. Very humorous he was, I'm sure, but not having the whole day to waste I stepped up to the bar, and told him who I was, and said I'd like a word with him. And if you was to ask me, sir, that was all he needed to make him quite happy. Anyone would have thought the whole thing was a play, and we was having drinks between the acts, and talking it over. Indecent, I call it, not to say cold-blooded! Naturally I'd no thought of asking him questions in a public bar: my idea was we'd step up to his house, but that wouldn't do for him. "Oh", he says, "you want to know where I was at the time the crime was committed, and I'm sure I haven't got an alibi!" The Major took him up pretty sharp on that, and said as how he knew very well he was on his way home when the rest of them—him, and Mr. Drybeck, and Miss Dearham—set off in young Mr. Haswell's car. "Ah!" says Mr. Plenmeller, "but how do you know I did go home? I might have been anywhere," he says, "and Crailing—that's the landlord of the pub—will swear I didn't come in here till close on eight last night!" Which, however, Crailing didn't do, not by a long chalk! He said he was positive Mr. Plenmeller came in long before that, though he couldn't be sure what the exact time was. Then I'm blessed if Mr. Plenmeller didn't tell him not to go saddling him with an alibi he didn't want. Before I could say anything, the Major spoke to him, very military. Told him not to make a fool of himself, and to stop trying to turn the whole thing into a farce. So then he laughed, and said it was all such good copy he wasn't going to he pushed out of it, and it was going to be very valuable to him to know how it felt to be what he called a hot suspect. However, he got a bit more serious after that, and he said that actually he had gone home before stepping down the street to the Red Lion, though he didn't think he could prove it, because so far as he knew Mrs. Blindburn—that's his housekeeper—couldn't have seen him, being in the kitchen, and certainly wouldn't have heard him, because she's as deaf as a post. Which is true enough: she is.”
“I see,” said Hemingway, somewhat grimly. “I've met his sort before! Oh, well, with any luck we may be able to pin the murder on him!”
The Colonel smiled, but Sergeant Carsethorn looked a little shocked. “Well, I daresay he could have done it,” he said dubiously, “but I can't say I know why he should want to.”
“The Chief Inspector wasn't speaking seriously, Sergeant.”
“No, sir. That's about the lot, then, as far as we've had time to discover.”
“What about young Mr. Haswell's father?” enquired Hemingway. “Or is he out of the running?”
“He wasn't there, sir. He went off to Woodhall that afternoon, and didn't get home till half-past eight. Woodhall's a good fifteen miles from Thornden: it's a big estate which he looks after for the owner. He's an estate agent, and he does a good bit of that sort of work.”
“Was he on good terms with Mr. Warrenby?”
The Sergeant hesitated. “I wouldn't say that exactly, but on the other hand I wouldn't say that there was anything definite, if you take my meaning. They were both on the Council, and I believe they had a few differences of opinion.”
“Tell me something else!” invited Hemingway. “Do you know of anyone who was on good terms with this character?”
The Sergeant grinned. Colonel Scales said: “Yes, you've hit the mark, Chief Inspector. He was a nasty piece of work, and no one could stand him! I don't mind telling you that I couldn't myself. He was one of those men who not only want to have a finger in every pie, but who are never content until they're top-dog. Sort of pocket-Hitler! A bumptious little upstart who wanted to be the kingpin in the district, and would go to any lengths to muscle in on things that were no concern of his, and which you wouldn't have thought he'd want to be bothered with! He even got himself on to the committee for the charity ball Lady Binchester organised, a year ago. I don't know how he managed that, but I've no doubt he thought it would give him a foothold in that set. More fool he!”
“It sounds to me, sir, as though this place where he lived can't have been the only place where he made enemies. We've gone into all the Thornden people. What about the people he must have rubbed up against here, where he had his business?”
“We've thought of that, naturally, but setting aside the fact that Carsethorn hasn't heard of any Bellingham-man being seen in Thornden at the time—of course, it's possible to get to Fox House across the common, I know—I don't know that he had any serious quarrel with anyone. There was a good deal of jealousy, a lot of people disliked him, we should most of us have been glad to have seen him leave Bellingham. He was the best-hated man in the district, but you don't murder a man you just don't like: there has to be some motive! And that, Chief Inspector, is why I thought it wisest to call in Scotland Yard at once: no one has anything that begins to look like a sufficient motive!”
“There's the Pole that seems to have been making passes at the niece, isn't there?” suggested Hemingway mildly. “What's more, there's the young lady herself. If she inherits his money, I should call that a pretty good motive.”
“You'd better go and make Miss Warrenby's acquaintance!” recommended the Colonel, with a bark of laughter.
“I will, sir,” said the Chief Inspector.