Before he went to bed that night, Inspector Harbottle, who had spent some part of the evening at the police-station, studying the Firearms Register, was able to inform his chief, with a certain gloomy satisfaction, that thirty-seven persons, living within reasonable distance of Thornden, possessed .22 rifles. “And that, mind you, is only within a twenty-mile radius,” he added, unfolding a piece of paper.
Hemingway, who had himself been engaged with the papers he had taken from Sampson Warrenby's desk, perceived that he was about to read his list aloud, and instantly discouraged him. “I don't want to hear you reciting the names of a lot of people I've never heard of, Horace! Checking up on the rifles is a nice job for the locals, and one that'll just about suit them. You tell me who owns a .22 in Thornden! That'll be enough to be going on with.”
“It wouldn't surprise me if we had to throw the net much wider,” said Harbottle. “You're very optimistic, Chief, but—”
“Get on!” commanded Hemingway.
The Inspector cast such a glance upon him as Calvin might have bestowed on a backslider, but replied with careful correctitude: “Very good, sir. According to the Register, there are eleven .22 rifles in Thornden. That includes three belonging to farmers, living just outside the village, which I daresay you aren't interested in.”
“You're right. And if I have any cheek from you, Horace, I'll give you the job of checking up on the whole thirty-seven!”
Cheered by this threat, the Inspector permitted himself to smile faintly. “Well, the Squire has one,” he offered. “Likewise a chap called Eckford, his agent; and a John Henshaw, game-keeper. Setting aside the possibility that someone might have got hold of their rifles unbeknownst, there doesn't seem to be any reason, from what Carsethorn tells me, to think they could have had anything to do with the case. Next, there's Kenelm Lindale: he has one.”
“Which he lent to Ladislas the Pole not so long ago. I remember that one,” interpolated Hemingway.
“I thought you would,” said Harbottle, eyeing him with melancholy pride. “Then there's young Mr. Haswell's, which he spoke about; and Mr. Plenmeller's, which you picked up. Josiah Crailing has one—he's the landlord of the Red Lion; and the last belongs to Mr. Cliburn, the Vicar. Mr. Drybeck's got a shot-gun only; and Major Midgeholme's hanging on to his Service revolver, and six cartridges, which there's a fight about every time his Firearms Licence is due for renewal. So far he's managed to keep them.” He folded his list, and put it back in his pocket. “That's the lot, Chief—so far as the Register goes. Do you want Carsethorn to pull them all in?”
“What, the whole thirty-seven?”
“Eleven,” Harbottle corrected him.
“Call it eight, Horace! If all else fails, maybe I'll start to take an interest in these three farmers of yours, but so far I've got enough on my hands without annoying people that very likely wouldn't have recognised Warrenby if they'd met him in the street. Tell Carsethorn to make the usual enquiries, and not to go cluttering poor old Knarsdale up with a lot of rifles which their owners can account for.” He paused, and considered for a moment. “No sense in us treading on one another's heels—nor in getting ourselves disliked more than we probably are already. I'm going to Thornden myself tomorrow, and I shall be paying a call on the Vicar. Tell Carsethorn I'll bring in that rifle if I see fit. He'd better pull in the Squire's, Lindale's, and young Haswell's first thing. He seems a fairly sensible chap, but you'd better warn him to do the thing tactfully—particularly when he gets to the Squire. The usual stuff about persons unauthorised perhaps having got hold of it.”
The Inspector nodded, but said: “You're going to see the Vicar?”
“Yes, and his rifle gives me a nice excuse.”
“Carsethorn did check up on his alibi. It seems all right, Chief.”
“That's why I need an excuse. By what the Colonel tells me this Reverend Anthony Cliburn is just the man I want to give me the low-down on this high-class set-up. So far, I've had to listen to Mrs. Midgeholme, who thinks Lindale murdered Warrenby, because Mrs. Lindale gave her a raspberry; and to Drybeck, who's in a blue funk; and to Plenmeller, who wants to be funny; and I'm getting muddled. When you want to know the ins and outs of village-life, Horace, go and talk to the Vicar! Not that it's any use telling you that, because you haven't got the art of making people talk, which is what becomes of drinking sarsaparilla instead of an honest glass of beer.”
“Anything in Warrenby's papers, sir?” said the Inspector coldly.
“Nothing that looks like doing us any good. We may find something at his office tomorrow, but I shall be surprised if we do.”
The Inspector grunted, and sat down. He watched Hemingway collect the papers into a pile, and then said: “There is something that strikes me, Chief.”
“Second time today. You're coming on,” said Hemingway encouragingly. “Go on! Don't keep me on tenterhooks!”
“From the moment I was told the shot was probably fired from a .22 rifle,” said the Inspector, “I've been turning it over in my mind, wondering what was done with that rifle. Because it seems to me it would be taking a big risk to walk away with it over your shoulder, or under your arm. Who's to say you'd meet no one? But I watched you go off up the street with Plenmeller, Chief, and it came to me then that if anyone could walk about with a rifle concealed he could push it down his left trouser-leg, and, with that queer limp of his, no one would notice a thing.”
“Not bad at all, Horace!” approved Hemingway. “Now tell me why he takes it home, and puts it back in the gun-cabinet, instead of dropping it in the river, or somebody's backyard—which is just the sort of little joke that would appeal to him, I should think. He inherited his guns from that brother of his; he doesn't shoot himself—which I believe, because, for one thing, he's not the kind of fool who'd tell lies to the police which they could easily disprove, and, for another, I noticed that the guns in that cabinet were showing signs of rust—and if he'd chosen to say that he didn't know where the rifle was, and hadn't even known it wasn't in the cabinet, it would have been a difficult job to prove it hadn't been pinched. Because it could have been, easy! His door's kept on the latch, and he's got a deaf housekeeper.” He got up, glancing at the marble clock over the fireplace. “I'm going to turn in, and you'd better do the same, or you'll start brooding, or get struck by another idea, which would be bad for my heart.”
The Inspector rose, and after eyeing his chief for a pregnant moment, addressed himself to the vase of pampas-grass in a musing tone. “If I had to explain why I like my present job, I'm blessed if I could do it!”
“If you're thinking the B.B.C. is going to ask you to take part in a programme, you needn't worry!” retorted Hemingway. “They won't!”
“How Sandy Grant put up with it as long as he did I don't know!” said Harbottle.
“That's all right, Horace: he knew if he stuck to me he'd precious soon get promoted.”
“It's a fact your assistants do,” admitted Harbottle grudgingly.
“Of course they do! Recommending them for promotion is the only way I can get rid of them. Come on up to bed!”
On the following morning, Inspector Harbottle betook himself to Sampson Warrenby's office, and Hemingway went round to the police-station, where, after putting through a call to Headquarters, he had an interview with the Chief Constable, and received a brief report from Sergeant Knarsdale.
The Sergeant had already despatched the bullet, with its cartridge-case, which he had fired from Gavin Plenmeller's rifle, to London, but said frankly that he was not hopeful. “I wouldn't like to say, not for sure, without seeing them under the comparison-microscope,” he told Hemingway, “but I think they'll find there's some marks on this cartridge-case I couldn't spot on the other. Got any more for me, sir?”
“Sergeant Carsethorn will be bringing in three more this morning, unless they've got unaccountably mislaid.”
Knarsdale grinned. “Regular arsenal we'll have here!”
“You don't know the half of it! The Inspector's got thirty-seven on his list.”
“Ah, well! we'll be able to get up a competition,” said the Sergeant, who knew his Chief Inspector.
“That's right: I'm just off to Woolworth's to buy some nice prizes for you!” said Hemingway, and left him chuckling gently.
Ten minutes' walk brought the Chief Inspector to Sampson Warrenby's office. A guide was offered, but as he was informed that he had only to cross the market-place to South Street, which was the main shopping-street in Bellingham, and to walk down it until he reached East Street, which intersected it, he declined the offer, and set off alone. A large number of country omnibuses were ranked in the market-place, and South Street was already congested with all those who had come into the town to do the week's shopping. Hemingway caught a glimpse of Miss Patterdale, stalking into a grocer's, with a large basket on her arm; and a minute later he met Gavin Plenmeller, emerging from the portals of a bank.
“Good heavens! Scotland Yard in person!” exclaimed Gavin, causing everyone within earshot to turn and stare avidly at Hemingway. “But what are you doing, frittering away your time in idle sightseeing, Chief Inspector?”
“Yes, it's easy to see why you aren't, so to say, popular with Sergeant Carsethorn, sir,” said Hemingway, eyeing him grimly. “Pity you forgot your megaphone!”
Gavin laughed. “I am so sorry!” he mocked, and passed on up the street.
Hemingway proceeded on his way, and soon arrived at Sampson Warrenby's office in East Street. Here he was received by a junior clerk, and afforded two stenographers and the office boy their second thrill of the day. All three contrived to catch a glimpse of him, as he was led to Sampson Warrenby's room, and although the glimpse was a brief one it was sufficient to enable the elder of the two damsels to state that he had eyes that looked right through you, and to convince the younger that if she were summoned before him to answer any questions she wouldn't be able to speak a word, on account of her being very high-strung, as anyone who knew her could testify. The office boy said in a very boastful way that it would take more than a C.I.D. man to scare him, after which he went off to the Post Office with two unimportant letters, his mind being troubled with a horrid fear that from so high-ranking an official not one of his youthful peccadilloes could remain hidden.
Meanwhile, the Chief Inspector had joined his subordinate in Sampson Warrenby's room, and had made the acquaintance of Mr. Coupland, the head clerk.
Mr. Coupland was a thin little man, with sparse, grizzled hair, and anxious face. He greeted the Chief Inspector nervously, and said: “This is a shocking business! I can't get over it. As I've been saying to the Inspector, I don't know what's going to happen, I'm sure, Mr. Warrenby not having a partner. It's very worrying, very! I really don't know what I ought to do. Not when we've cleared up what we have on hand.”
“Well, I'm afraid I can't help you there,” said Hemingway. “Busy practice, this?”
“Oh, very! Very busy indeed!” Mr. Coupland said earnestly. “The biggest practice in Bellingham, and growing so—well, Mr. Warrenby was talking of having to take a partner. And now this! Well, I don't seem able to believe it's happened, and that's a fact!”
“Came as a surprise to you, did it?”
The clerk blinked at him. “Oh, yes, it did indeed! More like a shock, really. Well, as I say, I can't realise it. I keep thinking Mr. Warrenby will come walking in any moment, wanting to know if the Widdringham lease has been posted, and— But, of course, he won't.”
He glanced up, with an uncertain smile, and was disconcerted to find himself the object of a bright, piercing scrutiny. He did his best to meet it, the smile fading from his face.
“Been his head clerk for long?”
“Ever since he started practice in Bellingham,” said Mr. Coupland, with a touch of pride.
“And you didn't know that he had any enemies?”
“No—no, indeed I didn't! Mr. Warrenby wasn't one to take people into his confidence. Even in practice, there were always some things he preferred to deal with himself. He was a—a very energetic, forceful man, Chief Inspector.”
“By what I've heard he was a man who made a lot of enemies.”
“Yes, I believe—that is, as to his private affairs I couldn't say, but professionally, of course, he wasn't well-liked. He was very successful, you see, and that made for a good deal of jealousy. On the Council too, and all the committees he sat on—well, in everything, really, he would have his own way, and—perhaps I shouldn't say this, but—but I fear he wasn't always very scrupulous in his methods. He once said to me that there were few things he enjoyed more than making people dance when he pulled their strings, and, of course, that sort of thing doesn't make a man popular. He always treated me very well, and all the staff, but I couldn't but wonder sometimes at the trouble he'd go to to discover everything about the people he came into contact with. I ventured to ask him once, but he only said you could never know when it might be useful.”
“Blackmail?” asked Hemingway bluntly.
“Oh! Oh, no, I wouldn't say that! I never saw anything to make me suspect—it always seemed more to me as though it amused him to make people he didn't like uncomfortable by letting them see he knew something about them they wouldn't wish to be known. Oh, quite trivial things—I don't mean to suggest—I daresay you know the sort of thing I mean, Chief Inspector. There aren't many of us who haven't ever done anything we wouldn't be a bit ashamed to have known. If you understand me!”
“I understand you all right. And you were surprised when you heard someone had shot this pocket-Hitler of yours?”
Mr. Coupland looked startled. “Yes, indeed, I was! Oh, dear, I hope I haven't given you a wrong impression! I didn't mean to say that Mr. Warrenby did anything to make anyone want to murder him! Often he would say things more by way of a joke than anything: twitting on about some little misfortune or mistake. Well, he's done that to me, and I won't deny it did make one angry, but—but there was nothing in it really!”
“I see,” said Hemingway. “Well, Mr. Coupland, I don't have to tell you that it's your duty to give me any assistance or information you can, so I'll put it straight to you: have you any reason to suspect that he may have been blackmailing—or whatever you like to call it!—anyone, at the time of his death?”
“No, Chief Inspector! No, no, none at all—I assure you! Well, I couldn't have! I never knew him privately, and in his practice—oh, no!” said Mr. Coupland, looking frightened and unhappy.
Hemingway, who had been watching him with his head a little on one side and an expression in his eyes which reminded Harbottle irresistibly of a robin on the watch for a titbit, nodded, and said briefly: “All right!”
At this point, the junior clerk slid into the room through as narrow an opening of the door as was possible, and stood hesitating on the threshold. Mr. Coupland glanced at the Chief Inspector for guidance, but as Hemingway did not seem to think that the intrusion in any way concerned him, he cleared his throat, and said, in rather a strained voice: “Yes, what is it?”
The youth trod delicately up to him, and murmured something to him, of which the only words which Hemingway heard were “Sir John Eaglesfield.” They appeared to exercise a powerful influence on Mr. Coupland, for, after exclaiming in a dismayed and startled way, he said: “I wonder if you would excuse me for a few minutes, Chief Inspector? One of Mr. Warrenby's most valued clients—!”
“That's all right,” said Hemingway. “You go and deal with him!”
Not unthankfully, Mr. Coupland removed himself. When the door had closed behind him and his junior, Harbottle, who had remained seated at Warrenby's desk throughout his chief's interview with the head-clerk, silent and observant, said: “What do you make of him, sir?”
“Oh, perfectly honest!” Hemingway replied, going to the desk, and looking at the mass of papers on it. “How are you doing, Horace? You seem to have got enough to keep you occupied!”
“I have,” said Harbottle, on a mordant note. “That chap was just explaining to me, when you came in, that things aren't as straight as he'd wish, owing to the office being so cramped. Which it certainly is. He was telling me that Warrenby was determined to get an office next to the Town Hall, which he says is the best pitch in the whole of Bellingham, and wouldn't be content with anything else.”
“And I don't doubt he would have got it,” remarked Hemingway.
“Nor I. I wish he had, for I should have found my job easier,” said Harbottle, casting a glance round the room, which was indeed crammed with cupboards, shelves with labelled deed boxes piled on them, a safe, standing open, two filing-cabinets, and a large bookcase. “If there's any scheme in this town he hadn't got a finger in, I can't think what it could be. That cupboard over there is full of the stuff, and I take it I'd better go through it. He seems to have kept all his private business letters and such here. Mostly in the safe, but this lot comes from the cupboard under the books. That's what you want me to work on, isn't it?”
Hemingway nodded. “Yes, don't try to meddle with the deed-boxes belonging to his clients: you'll be getting into hot water if you do, and wasting your time as well. Well, I've seen some solicitors' offices which I thought were so cluttered up no one could ever find a thing in them, but this fairly takes the cake! Poor old Horace!”
“Oh, it isn't in a muddle!” Harbottle said. “Everything's docketed, and bundled up. The trouble is there's so much of it, and what he's written on his bundles doesn't always convey as much to me as it no doubt did to him.”
“Coupland no use to you?”
“Not on all these side-lines. He only knows about the real business of the office. I've got hold of one bit of information I think'll interest you, Chief. Did you know Warrenby was the Clerk of the Peace?”
“No, but I'd have betted any money on it.”
“He was appointed last year,” said Harbottle. “I got it out of Coupland. Old Drybeck was laid up when the appointment fell vacant. Used to be held by some old solicitor, who died just before Quarter Sessions. Warrenby slid into the job when Drybeck was convalescing in Torquay.”
“Probably murdered the old Clerk to get the job,” commented Hemingway, who had picked up a sheaf of letters, and was running a rapid and practiced eye over them.
“I could tell from the way Coupland spoke Drybeck thought he ought to have been appointed.”
“Well, I don't know that I blame them for choosing Warrenby. I should think he was an efficient bloke, which is more than I'd be prepared to say of Drybeck on the evidence I've got so far. Yes, yes, Horace, I know what you're after! It gives Drybeck a bit more motive. You may be right, but I should think he must have got used to seeing Warrenby grabbing every job in sight. Don't tell me he didn't get himself appointed Town Clerk, Coroner, Sexton, Welfare Officer, and Town Crier as well, because I wouldn't believe it!”
“He was the Coroner, but as for the rest of them, he was not, and couldn't have been,” said the Inspector austerely.
“You don't know what the poor fellow would have managed to be if he hadn't been cut off in his prime. Have you come upon anything that might be of use to us?”
“Not unless you're interested in a letter about Mr. Ainstable's gravel-pit, or the negotiations for the purchase of Fox House. You might like to see that: it gives you a fair idea of what the deceased was like. The way he beat the owner down! But it's old stuff.”
“What was he writing about the Squire's gravel-pit? Trying to buy that too, at cost-price?”
“No, it's only a letter from some firm of London solicitors, which is an answer to one from him on behalf of a client. There ought to be a copy of that, but I haven't found it yet. Must have slipped out of the clip.”
“You don't seem able to find the answer either,” remarked Hemingway, watching him scuffle through the heaps of papers on the desk. “What was it about?”
“Seems Warrenby had a client who was interested in gravel, and he was making enquiries on his behalf.”
“The hobbies people go in for!”
“For goodness' sake!” snapped the Inspector, exasperated by his own failure to lay his hand on the letter he wanted. “I put it aside to show you, but there's no room to turn round in here! His client wanted a licence, of course!”
“Temper!” said Hemingway reprovingly. “What had these London solicitors got to do with it? I thought Drybeck was the Squire's solicitor. In fact, the Chief Constable told me he was.”
“I don't know anything about that, sir, but these people seem to be the solicitors for the estate, or some such thing. Ah!”
“Found it?”
“No, but this must be the copy of Warrenby's letter. Got into the wrong lot. Here you are, sir!”
Hemingway took the copy, and read it, while the Inspector continued his search. “Two years old, I see. You were quite right, Horace: he had a client who was interested in the Squire's gravel-pit! He was informed they were the proper people to apply to, and would be glad, etc. etc. Next instalment in tomorrow's issue—with luck! Go on, Horace! I can hardly wait!”
The Inspector cast him a fulminating look, and said coldly: “I have it here. You put those letters you were reading down on top of it.”
“That's right: you can't learn too early how to pass the buck, if you want to get on in life,” said Hemingway encouragingly. He read the letter, a crease between his brows. “Well, they seemed quite willing to do business, but I don't get the hang of this tenant-for-life business. The licence would have to be by arrangement with the tenant-for-life—oh, I see, it's the Squire! Some sort of an entail, I expect. And all moneys would have to be paid to these people for apportionment as between the tenant-for-life and the Trust funds. Well, I daresay it's all very interesting. Any more of it?”
“I've found nothing more so far.”
“No letters from the unnamed client?”
“No. Which is why I thought it worth while to show you those two. Looks as if nothing came of the proposal. I wondered if perhaps the Squire refused to do business, and whether there might have been bad blood between him and Warrenby over it,” said Harbottle slowly, frowning over it.
“And then Warrenby started pinching the gravel for his client when no one was looking, and so the Squire up and shot him. Really, Horace, I'm surprised at you!”
“If I'd meant anything of the kind, you might well be! Unless you think such folly is catching!” retorted Harbottle.
Hemingway laughed. “Not bad!” he said. “But I've got something better to do than to stay here listening to you being insubordinate. Keep at it! You may find something, though I doubt it. I'll send young Morebattle in to give you a hand.”
“You're not taking him to Thornden, sir?”
“No, I don't need him. He's all yours, Horace.”
“I shall be glad of him,” admitted the Inspector, casting a jaundiced eye over the work awaiting him.
Hemingway left him, and walked back to the police-station. Sergeant Carsethorn had not yet returned from Thornden, but the Station-Sergeant had news for the Chief Inspector. He said, with a twinkle in his eye: “Got a message for you, sir.”
Hemingway regarded him shrewdly. “You have, have you? Now, come on! Out with it, and don't stand there grinning!”
“Sorry, sir! It's from Mr. Drybeck,” said the Sergeant solemnly.
“Oh, well, that's different! What's he want?”
“Told me to give you this, sir—and to be careful how I handled it, because he found it close to the scene of the crime. In some long grass by the gorse-clump. He was quite put out not to find you here. Said at first that he'd look in later, but I told him we wasn't expecting you in, not till this evening.”
“You're wasted down here, my lad,” said Hemingway approvingly. “What's he found? A hairpin, which he thinks must have belonged to Miss Warrenby?”
The Sergeant, who had produced from the drawer of the high desk some small object wrapped in a linen handkerchief, looked up quickly. “If I may say so, sir, you're on to things pretty sharp!”
“I've no objection, but you're not going to tell me that is what he found, are you?”
“No, sir,” said the Sergeant, unfolding the handkerchief. “But when he decided to leave it in my charge he told me to draw your attention to the initial.”
“You'd have to, wouldn't you?” said Hemingway, surveying with an expression of revulsion a powder-compact made of pink plastic with the letter M superimposed in imitation rubies.
“He said,” continued the Sergeant carefully, “that it was not for him to draw conclusions, and he would leave the matter in your hands.”
“Well, that's handsome of him, at all events. I'd give something to see Sergeant Carsethorn's face when he hears he missed this in his search for that cartridge-case. You'd better put a notice outside the station saying a valuable compact has been found. I daresay some girl's boy-friend gave it to her, and she'd like it back.”
“Do you mean that, sir?”
“Of course I mean it! You don't think I want it, do you?”
“I must say it didn't seem likely to me it was the sort of compact Miss Warrenby would have,” admitted the Sergeant.
“It isn't the sort any young lady in her walk of life would have. I never saw such a nasty, cheap job!”
“No. Of course, there is the initial. But you know best, sir!” he added hastily.
“You may take it from me that I do! How many girls in Bellingham have got names beginning with M, do you suppose?” That compact wasn't by those gorse-bushes when Carsethorn and his chaps searched the ground, and it wasn't there when I went out to Fox House. But I'll tell you what was there then, or very shortly afterwards, and that was sightseers, very likely come out from this place to look at the scene of the crime. There was a couple hovering back-stage while I was there: I saw them. By Sunday evening it was probably all over the town there'd been a murder, and a lot of us had come down from Headquarters to take over. Miss Warrenby's probably had them picnicking on the front lawn, poor girl. What's more, she doesn't use powder: I've seen her! And finally, if she did, where do girls keep their compacts? In their handbags! All I can say is, if you think she powdered her nose before shooting her uncle you ought to go and get yourself certified!”
“Yes, sir,” said the Sergeant, grinning broadly.
“And if that's Mr. Drybeck's handkerchief, give it back to him! Hallo, here's Carsethorn. Well?”
“I've brought in the three you wanted, sir.”
“Good man! Any difficulty?”
“Not with Mr. Ainstable, sir, nor yet at The Cedars. Mr. Ainstable quite saw why we wanted his rifle, and made no objection at all. It was in his estate room. That's not part of Old Place: just a small kind of summerhouse, which was converted, so as Mr. Eckford, the Squire's agent, wouldn't have to go through the house every time he went there. I had a look at it, the Squire taking me to it, and I wouldn't like to say the rifle couldn't have been lifted, and put back later, because I think—if you knew when the estate room was likely to be empty—it might have been. Young Mr. Haswell left his rifle wrapped up in a bit of sacking, and told Mrs. Haswell to give it to us if we called asking for it. Now, that rifle was found by him in the cupboard in the cloakroom, sir, and could easily have been taken by anyone at that tennis-party—if they could have hidden it, which I don't think.”
“What about Lindale's?”
“Yes, sir, I have that too. He wasn't best pleased: said no one could possibly have borrowed it without his knowing. But it wasn't him that made the real trouble over it. That was Mrs. Lindale. He wasn't in when I called, and had to be fetched off the farm. She sent the daily woman to find him, though I told her I only wanted to test the rifle, as a matter of routine. Very hostile she was. Scared, I thought. Started tearing me off the strip, the way women do when they've got the wind up. Only then her husband came in, and she quietened down as soon as he spoke to her. Very gone on one another they are, I'd say. He said if it was really necessary for me to take the rifle I could do so, but he'd be obliged to us if we wouldn't come bothering his good lady, because she's very nervous, and things like this murder upset her.”
“In that case,” said Hemingway, “I'm going to be unpopular, because I'm going to go out there to bother her this afternoon.”