The Threefold Cord

by Francis Vivian

  “Yes, I see,” said the Chief Constable. “Either of them might warn the other.”

  “There is one other peculiar point,” went on Knollis. “If the axe was placed in Temple’s dustbin, as we know it was, then how the deuce did anyone but Temple manage to put it there? Surely Mrs. Temple would have been suspicious if she had seen one of, say, the guests messing about round her out-offices?”

  The Chief Constable stared moodily at his pipe, and slowly filled it from the humidor. “The thing looks horribly complicated, Inspector. I’m beginning to think that Manchester was right when he said that my men weren’t up to such an investigation—although he didn’t know then that his corpse would be the centre of attraction. By the way, Inspector; what about those silk cords?”

  “Not a darned thing,” said Knollis in a disgusted voice. “They were taken from Mrs. Manchester’s work-box, and that is all I know about them.”

  “You think they hold any significance?”

  “They suggest nothing that has come within my experience,” Knollis said with complete frankness, “and yet I am sure that there is a significance. They were blue, they were silken, and they were appropriate lengths for the necks they surrounded. Why Manchester’s was crammed into his pocket, I cannot conceive—although of course the bloody state of his neck would have obscured the colour. I wonder if that has any meaning?”

  His voice trailed away, and his eyes vanished behind narrowed lids. “Yes, that may be it,” he said after a minute or so.

  “What might be what?” demanded the Chief Constable.

  Knollis awoke. “Look, sir! If the cord had been placed round Manchester’s neck, the effusion of blood would have dyed it. It would have been red instead of blue.”

  “Yes?” murmured the Chief Constable.

  “In which case the blue colour must be the vital factor. The significance lies in the colour. Now what the devil is it?” he demanded testily. “I need a Brewer.”

  The Chief Constable stared. “If you need a drink to stimulate your brain . . .”

  Knollis made a gesture of impatience. “I mean Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. That might help.”

  The Chief Constable spoke into the blower. “Have you got a copy of—what is it, Inspector?”

  Knollis repeated the title.

  The Chief Constable gave it, and waited. He lifted the switch. “They are bringing a copy.”

  When it appeared, Knollis thumbed the pages over until he reached Blue.

  “Blue-Apron Statesman, Blue-bag, Blue beans, Key, Billy, Blood, Boar—there’s everything blue here from apes to zephyrs. Chickens, John, Murder, Peter, Flyer, Ribbon—we may be getting warm. Cordon bleu, term used to denote the highest honour attainable in any profession or walk of life. That takes us to Blue Blood again. Now I wonder . . .”

  “Yes, Inspector?”

  “Nothing, sir,” replied Knollis. “I was just wondering about an idea. . . .”

  “I noticed it,” the Chief Constable replied dryly. Knollis looked up and smiled. “Sorry if I am in a provoking mood, but when I get an idea I like to mull over it. It seems to disappear if I talk about it.”

  He stared keenly at the Colonel. “Yes, I think I’ve got something—two somethings, if you know what I mean.”

  The Chief Constable repolished his monocle and fixed it in his eye. “I enjoy working with you, Inspector! You are so interesting. Of course, you don’t have to take me into your confidence if you don’t want to do so.”

  Knollis was not aware of the Chief Constable’s sarcasm. An idea was teasing him, and he was far away from Trentingham’s Guildhall. He suddenly rose, and grabbed his hat. “I’ll be back later, sir,” he said perfunctorily, and hurried down the stairs to the car which was constantly at his disposal. Ellis was idling at the wheel, and looked up with a quizzical expression as Knollis strode across the pavement.

  “Something doing, sir?”

  “Drive me out to Knightswood, Ellis,” said Knollis. “I think I’ve got hold of something.”

  Ellis knew better than to ask questions when Knollis was in his present mood. He drove out to Knightswood, turned down the red gravelled drive, and pulled up outside a house so much like Baxmanhurst that it was difficult to believe that they had not been built from the same plans. Sir Giles walked across the lawns to meet them as they stepped from the car.

  “Hello, Inspector!” he greeted Knollis. “I had an idea that you would want to see me again. My movements were not very satisfactorily explained, were they?”

  “If you mean that they were suspicious,” said Knollis, “I am not with you. The only unsatisfactory point about your statement was that you didn’t tell me the full story.”

  Sir Giles played with the silk scarf that was twisted round his neck. He was handsome, although it was doubtful whether he was aware of the fact, and Knollis liked him for his frank smile and direct eyes.

  “I didn’t tell you all, eh?” he said. “So that’s it, Inspector. What did I miss out. I’ll help all I can, and I do mean that.”

  “Then you’ll let me question you in my own way, and not resent it,” said Knollis.

  “Why should I resent it?”

  “Why should you, indeed?” Knollis replied. “Now, Sir Giles, I’d like to know how you feel about those people living in Baxmanhurst.”

  Sir Giles offered his cigarettes, and when the three men were smoking he stared at his shoes for a moment, and then suddenly raised his head to look straight at Knollis.

  “I don’t like it! I don’t like the times. I’m twenty-nine, and this thing has been working-up for generations before my birth. It’s a social revolution, or so we have learned to call it. I suppose it started with Wat Tyler and all the other village Hampdens, and is just reaching its culminating point. I’m depressed about it, too, because I can’t see where it is going to end.

  “And what does it amount to? Simply that one aristocracy has given place to another. An aristocracy of birth and manners has given place to one of money and dictatorial power. I wonder if you see what I am driving at, Inspector? These people like Manchester have been yelping at our heels for hundreds of years—they weren’t sturdy enough to bark—and now they have turfed us out of our homes, and collared our heritages, they are trying to live exactly as they accused us of living—the same old ways which they affected to despise. Does that sound snobbish?”

  “Please go on,” Knollis said quietly.

  “Well, if it does, it does. It’s all a matter of angle, or what the Americans call slant. As I see it, we’ve been twisted. For all these years these people have been trying to hound us out—but I’ve said that, haven’t I? It’s the French Revolution all over again, bloodless, fortunately, but nevertheless the French Revolution with all the same mob-cries and shibboleths. These people have power! These people have wealth! Take it from them! And then, once we were ousted, the mob tries to ape our ways. Tell me, frankly, wherein lies the difference between Frederick David Manchester and Fouquier-Tinville?”

  Sir Giles flicked his ash to windward. “You know, Inspector, people of Manchester’s calibre are worse than we ever could have been. Our so-called power, our undisputed wealth, was used on and for the common people, but it was used in conformity with a code. Now I ask you; what code had Manchester? He didn’t know the word, nor even the ideas that it represented. No, I didn’t like Manchester, and I don’t like the class he stands for. Put him in the Commons, and you’d have a Robespierre, or a Danton, or a Marat, and the times are too milk-and-watery to provide a Charlotte Corday. In the eyes of these people I am a blasted aristo, and yet have to work for my living, while the symbol of democracy up at Baxy can golf all day, rob rich and poor alike under cover of the laws of the land, and call himself a worker because he attends a board meeting once a month.”

  He sighed. “Oh well, old orders do change, and perhaps this present one will not last as long as ours did. You’re right, you know! You suspect me of hating Manchester and all his works, an
d I do, most heartily.”

  “Your antagonism would not have led you to wipe him out?” Knollis asked quietly.

  Sir Giles shrugged, and kicked his cigarette end to the path. “What would have been the use of that? Why bash one poor idiot over the head when five million more are crowding into the Tuileries to get their pound of flesh? Birth control is the only answer to the threat of a race of Manchesters. And if they won’t stand for that, then we must try education.”

  “You are totally undemocratic?” suggested Knollis.

  Sir Giles stared at him. “Good lord, no! Have I given you that impression? I’m the most patriotic cove alive. I’m only moaning about the sharpers of democracy, the men who do all the shouting and take all the gain, who gain all the votes by telling the mob that they are being fooled, and then proceed to rob those who have voted them in. Good lord, no! Don’t get me wrong, Inspector! The worst I can say about the common man is that he is too trustful, or too big a fool, for this earth. He’s bovine-minded, and will trot from his pasture twice a day to be milked by people like Manchester. Anthropologists call him Homo sapiens, but they should call him Homo erectus. He’s got on to his back feet, but he hasn’t even started to think. I’ve mixed my genders, but still—!”

  “That clears that up,” Knollis said thoughtfully. “Now tell me, Sir Giles: Manchester sent for you?”

  “Ye-es,” Sir Giles replied hesitantly, “I suppose it did amount to that. I had mentioned this flying-club effort to him, and he said that he would think it over and let me know. Well, he let me know! He sent a note saying, almost, that he was now prepared graciously to receive me, and would I attend his court at five o’clock on the stated date, when he would have great pleasure in informing me of his decision.”

  “You reared up at that? Was that your reaction?” Sir Giles grinned. “I believe I did pass a few foul remarks about him when the note arrived, but I was a beggar-on-foot, so I had to eat humble pie. I went. He wasn’t there. The rest of the story you know!”

  “I don’t think I do,” Knollis corrected him gently.

  “Oh, I remember,” said Sir Giles. “You think that I missed something out, don’t you? You need a minute-by-minute itinerary. No, don’t say anything. Let me start by entering the drive and working my way out by the hurst, and narrate every movement in between. That’s what you want, I think.”

  Knollis nodded. “I wish all my witnesses would grasp my needs as easily.”

  “Oh well,” laughed Sir Giles, “I’m a frightfully intelligent type, and can read words of three syllables!”

  “Then get on with it,” Knollis chuckled.

  “Well, then I went down the drive, on foot, and up to the front door. Freeman let me in, and I was shown to Milly’s sitting-room—that room is a psychological relic of her bringings-up, and she never got above a sitting-room mentally or emotionally. The idea of a lounge or a drawing-room never entered her head. Milly keeps both feet on the ground, and her head is far below the clouds. However, I was shown in, and she said that Freddy had gone to town and would be back shortly. I talked with her a few minutes, but it was mainly Jones’s pigs, Temple’s flowers, and such-like, so I picked up the paper and excused myself by saying I would have a look round the cactus house. I really intended to park myself in a convenient spot and read what I had missed over my breakfast. There was a draught blowing all round the building, and so I did go to the cactus department, and stooged round for a few minutes, but it was a bit close in there. I got fed up with waiting—ten minutes is my limit—and buzzed off through the hurst, as narrated heretofore. And that, I think, covers everything.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” said Knollis. “You have solved one puzzling problem for me, and here is the vital question: what did you do with the paper when you left?”

  “The paper?” exclaimed Sir Giles. “Why, I bunged it between the wall and the spout—the downright, fall-pipe, or whatever they call it. Y’know, the one against the annexe door—or perhaps you don’t know it?” he added.

  “You are certain of that?” Knollis asked quickly.

  “As certain as I am of going to heaven,” Sir Giles replied. “But perhaps that is the wrong qualification. I’m willing to go into the box and swear to it, if that will satisfy you.”

  And then he gaped. “Lord! The ruddy axe was wrapped in a Courier, wasn’t it?”

  Knollis heaved a great sigh. “I’ve spent all day chasing that paper. Thank heavens for you! You are sure that it was a Courier—the Trentingham Courier?”

  Sir Giles raised a hand, palm outwards. “So help me, Brother Juniper, it was!”

  Knollis was silent for a minute or so, and Sir Giles brought him back to life by the offer of another cigarette.

  Knollis brusquely refused the offer. “You mentioned Mrs. Manchester’s background—her bringings-up, to quote your own words. Who was she before she married Manchester?”

  Sir Giles grimaced. “You mean that you don’t know? I could have told you before, only I imagined that you fellows would know all that. I don’t mean that to sound offensive, incidentally. Anyway, there is good reason for you not knowing it, for it is more or less a secret, and I don’t think Milly would broadcast it.”

  Sir Giles was still holding his case open, so Knollis took one and lit it. “Don’t rush to the denouement, will you?” he murmured acidly. “I’m not in any hurry.”

  “It will prove a bit startling if I rush it,” Sir Giles replied amiably.

  “Listen, Sir Giles! You naturally know about the deaths of the cat and the bird, and the blue silk cords that were found round their necks. Have they, in your mind, any significance associated to your antagonism with Manchester? I mean, Manchester regarded you as a blue-blooded so-and-so—this is a time for frank speaking, so do excuse my crudeness! Well, that being so, could those cords be intended as a pointer to you? I should tell you here and now that Manchester regarded you as a possible cat-killer.”

  Sir Giles waved an arm. “Manchester was a prize bloody fool. For your questions, well, I’m no detective, but I had a hunch about the link as soon as I heard about the cords—the link between Milly’s upbringing and these three deaths.”

  Knollis gave a sigh of impatience. “For heaven’s sake tell me; WHO WAS MILDRED MANCHESTER?”

  Sir Giles wrinkled his brows. “Now what’s the name of the hangman fellow—hm! Darned if I can remember his name!”

  “Teddy Jessop,” Knollis replied sharply.

  “Before Jessop! His name is on the tip of my tongue.”

  “You mean Marlin?”

  Sir Giles snapped his fingers. “That’s the fellow. Milly is his daughter.”

  “What!” shouted Knollis.

  “It’s true, old man. Perfectly true.”

  The unconscious association of ideas plays queer tricks with us at times, and Knollis was an immediate victim. “Well, I’ll be hanged!” he said.

  Sir Giles slapped his leg and gave a great laugh. “Then you’ll have to apply to Jessop, because Marlin died in mysterious circumstances seven years ago.”

  Knollis sought for information in his well-stored mind. “Ye-es,” he almost whispered; “that’s right, he did.

  The Coroner brought in a verdict of Death by Misadventure.

  “His home was only five miles from here, you know,” said Sir Giles. “I am a bit pally with the johnny who was in charge of the case.”

  “Five miles from here,” Knollis murmured absently. “Quite a small hamlet.”

  “Marlin’s daughter—and three cords. . . .”

  “And if a man prevail against him that is alone, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not easily broken,” quoted Sir Giles.

  Knollis started. “That’s from the Bible!” he announced.

  “Ecclesiastes, chapter four, verse twelve,” said Sir Giles. “I occasionally read the Lessons in church, and that verse, or part of a verse, fixed itself in my mind. I couldn’t get rid of it for days and days. Perseveration, the psychologist blo
kes call it. Er—look, Inspector, would you like me to take you up to Marlin’s old place?”

  Knollis considered the matter. Then he laid a hand on Sir Giles’s arm. “I’d appreciate it.”

  CHAPTER XI

  THE DEATH OF A HANGMAN

  The Inspector of Police at Frampton was looking forward to nothing more exciting than the usual daily routine when he seated himself at his desk at nine o’clock on the following morning. His complacency was shaken when the Station Sergeant announced that two gentlemen wished to speak with him. “One of them is Sir Giles Tanroy, and the other is an inspector from the Yard.”

  The Inspector glanced at the cards, and said: “Oh lord! Now what’s gone wrong!”

  Knollis soon put him at his ease, and assured him that he was only performing a policeman’s normal function, that of asking innumerable questions—“An occupation to which we seem to be eternally fated.”

  “Yes, that’s the whole of our life, more or less,” the Inspector replied. “By the way, my name’s Frank Johnson.” He then looked enquiringly at Knollis, and waited.

  “It’s this Bowland case,” Knollis explained. “There seems to be a tie-up somewhere with the death of Marlin, the ex-hangman. What can you tell me about him?”

  The Inspector beamed. “I thought it would come up again one day, and you couldn’t have come to a better man if you want to know about it, Inspector Knollis. I handled the affair, and I know all about it. I knew Marlin ever since he was so high, and a more unhappy man never lived.”

  “How did he die?” Knollis asked laconically.

  “Fell down the cellar steps and broke his neck. Death from Misadventure was the verdict, but I wasn’t satisfied in my own mind because, you see, I think he was murdered.”

  “Why?” Knollis enquired.

  Inspector Johnson glanced at Sir Giles. “He hasn’t told you my idea? We’ve often talked it over; that’s why I ask. Sir Giles is not a bad criminologist—as an amateur.”