The Hampstead Mystery

by John R. Watson and Arthur J. Rees

  CHAPTER III

  Inspector Chippenfield, who had come into prominence in the newspapers asthe man who had caught the gang who had stolen Lady Gladville'sjewels--which included the most costly pearl necklace in the world--wasplaced in charge of the case. It was to his success in this famous casethat he owed his promotion to Inspector. He had the assistance of hissubordinate, Detective Rolfe. So generous were the newspaper referencesto the acumen of these two terrors of the criminal classes that it was tobe assumed that anything which inadvertently escaped one of them would bepounced upon by the other.

  On the morning after the discovery of the murdered man's body, the twoofficers made their way to Tanton Gardens from the Hampstead tubestation. Inspector Chippenfield was a stout man of middle age, with a redface the colour of which seemed to be accentuated by the daily operationof removing every vestige of hair from it. He had prominent grey eyeswith which he was accustomed to stare fiercely when he desired to impressa suspected person with what some of the newspapers had referred to as"his penetrating glance." His companion, Rolfe, was a tall well-built manin the early thirties. Like most men in a subordinate position, Rolfe hadnot a high opinion of the abilities of his immediate superiors. He wassure that he could fill the place of any one of them better than it wasfilled by its occupant. He believed that it was the policy of superiorsto keep junior men back, to stand in their light, and to take all thecredit for their work. He was confident that he was destined to make aname for himself in the detective world if only he were given the chance.

  When Inspector Chippenfield had visited Riversbrook the previousafternoon, Rolfe had not been selected as his assistant. A carefulinspection of the house and especially of the room in which the tragedyhad been committed had been made by the inspector. He had then turned hisattention to the garden and the grounds surrounding the house.

  Whatever he had discovered and what theories he had formed were notdisclosed to anyone, not even his assistant. He believed that the properway to train a subordinate was to let him collect his own information andthen test it for him. This method enabled him to profit by hissubordinate's efforts and to display a superior knowledge when the otherpropounded a theory by which Inspector Chippenfield had also been misled.

  When they arrived at the house in which the crime had been committed,they found a small crowd of people ranging from feeble old women tobabies in arms, and including a large proportion of boys and girls ofschool age, collected outside the gates, staring intently through thebars towards the house, which was almost hidden by trees. The morbidcrowd made way for the two officers and speculated on their mission. Thegeneral impression was that they were the representatives of afashionable firm of undertakers and had come to measure the victim forhis coffin. Inside the grounds the Scotland Yard officers encountered apolice-constable who was on guard for the purpose of preventinginquisitive strangers penetrating to the house.

  "Well, Flack," said Inspector Chippenfield in a tone in which genialitywas slightly blended with official superiority. "How are you to-day?"

  "I'm very well indeed, sir," replied the police-constable. He knewthat the state of his health was not a matter of deep concern to theinspector, but such is the vanity of human nature that he waspleased at the inquiry. The fact that there was a murdered man inthe house gave mournful emphasis to the transience of human life,and made Police-Constable Flack feel a glow of satisfaction in beingvery well indeed.

  Inspector Chippenfield hesitated a moment as if in deep thought. Theobject of his hesitation was to give Flack an opportunity of impartingany information that had come to him while on guard. The inspectorbelieved in encouraging people to impart information but regarded it assubversive of the respect due to him to appear to be in need of any. AsFlack made no attempt to carry the conversation beyond the state of hishealth, Inspector Chippenfield came to the conclusion that he was anextremely dull policeman. He introduced Flack to Detective Rolfe andexplained to the latter:

  "Flack was on duty on the night of the murder but heard no shots.Probably he was a mile or so away. But in a way he discovered thecrime. Didn't you, Flack? When we rang up Seldon he came up here andbrought Flack with him. He'll be only too glad to tell you anything youwant to know."

  Rolfe took an official notebook from a breast pocket and proceeded toquestion the police-constable. The inspector made his way upstairs to theroom in which the crime had been committed, for it was his system to seekinspiration in the scene of a crime.

  Tanton Gardens, a short private street terminating in a cul-de-sac, wasin a remote part of Hampstead. The daylight appearance of the streetbetokened wealth and exclusiveness. The roadway which ran between itsbroad white-gravelled footwalks was smoothly asphalted for motor tyres;the avenues of great chestnut trees which flanked the footpaths servedthe dual purpose of affording shade in summer and screening the housesof Tanton Gardens from view. But after nightfall Tanton Gardens was alonely and gloomy place, lighted only by one lamp, which stood in thehigh road more to mark the entrance to the street than as a guide totraffic along it, for its rays barely penetrated beyond the first pairof chestnut trees.

  The houses in Tanton Gardens were in keeping with the street: theyindicated wealth and comfort. They were of solid exterior, of a size thatsuggested a fine roominess, and each house stood in its own grounds.Riversbrook was the last house at the blind end of the street, and itseast windows looked out on a wood which sloped down to a valley, thestreet having originally been an incursion into a large private estate,of which the wood alone remained. On the other side a tangled nutwoodcoppice separated the judge's residence from its nearest neighbours, sothe house was completely isolated. It stood well back in about four acresof ground, and only a glimpse of it could be seen from the street frontbecause of a small plantation of ornamental trees, which grew in front ofthe house and hid it almost completely from view. When the carriage drivewhich wound through the plantation had been passed the house burstabruptly into view--a big, rambling building of uncompromising ugliness.Its architecture was remarkable. The impression which it conveyed wasthat the original builder had been prevented by lack of money fromcarrying out his original intention of erecting a fine symmetrical house.The first story was well enough--an imposing, massive, colonnaded frontin the Greek style, with marble pillars supporting the entrance. But thetwo stories surmounting this failed lamentably to carry on thepretentious design. Viewed from the front, they looked as though thebuilder, after erecting the first story, had found himself in pecuniarystraits, but, determined to finish his house somehow, had built twosmaller stories on the solid edifice of the first. For the two secondstories were not flush with the front of the house, but reared themselvesfrom several feet behind, so that the occupants of the bedrooms on thefirst story could have used the intervening space as a balcony. Viewedfrom the rear, the architectural imperfections of the upper part of thehouse were in even stronger contrast with the ornamental first story.Apparently the impecunious builder, by the time he had reached the rear,had completely run out of funds, for on the third floor he had failedaltogether to build in one small room, and had left the unfinishedbrickwork unplastered.

  The large open space between the house and the fir plantation had oncebeen laid out as an Italian garden at the cost of much time and money,but Sir Horace Fewbanks had lacked the taste or money to keep it up, andhad allowed it to become a luxuriant wilderness, though the slopingparterres and the centre flowerbeds still retained traces of their formerbeauty. The small lake in the centre, spanned by a rustic hand-bridge,was still inhabited by a few specimens of the carp family--sole survivorsof the numerous gold-fish with which the original designer of the gardenhad stocked the lake.

  Sir Horace Fewbanks had rented Riversbrook as a town house for some yearsbefore his death, having acquired the lease cheaply from the previouspossessor, a retired Indian civil servant, who had taken a dislike to theplace because his wife had gone insane within its walls. Sir Horace hadlived much in the house alone, though each London sea
son his daughterspent a few weeks with him in order to preside over the few Societyfunctions that her father felt it due to his position to give, and whichgenerally took the form of solemn dinners to which he invited some of hisbrother judges, a few eminent barristers, a few political friends, andtheir wives. But rumour had whispered that the judge and his daughter hadnot got on too well together--that Miss Fewbanks was a strange girl whodid not care for Society or the Society functions which most girls of herage would have delighted in, but preferred to spend her time on herfather's country estate, taking an interest in the villagers or walkingthe country-side with half a dozen dogs at her heels.

  Rumour had not spared the dead judge's name. It was said of him that hewas fond of ladies' society, and especially of ladies belonging to a typewhich he could not ask his daughter to meet; that he used to go outmotoring, driving himself, after other people were in bed; and thatstrange scenes had taken place at Riversbrook. Flack had told his wife onseveral occasions that he had heard sounds of wild laughter and rowdysinging coming from Riversbrook as he passed along the street on his beatin the small hours of the morning. Several times in the early dawn Flackhad seen two or three ladies in evening dress come down the carriagedrive and enter a taxi-cab which had been summoned by telephone.