Adders on the Heath (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  “Nothing, child. Are you content to leave Hamish with Henri and Célestine?”

  “They’ll spoil him, as usual, but it will be fine to escape from his clutches for a bit. I call him a demented, demoniac child.”

  “That is much the best kind of child to have,” said Dame Beatrice serenely. “Ring the bell and we will break the news to the foster-parents.”

  An hour later she and Laura, driven by Dame Beatrice’s imperturbable chauffeur George, were on their way to the New Forest Hunt Hotel. The main Bournemouth road ran between glades and groves, between beeches and oaks, past woodland rides and blindingly dazzling contrasts of shade and sun. Forest ponies cropped grass at the roadside or stood, heedless of fast-moving traffic, in the middle of the road itself. Once Laura caught sight of deer and once a stoat, like a shadow, slipped across in front of the car.

  Just before they reached the small village, they took a turning to the right and found themselves in a blind little lane, all twists and difficult bends. Then they came out upon a common and George accelerated a little. The hotel stood out, a landmark, but not a stark or an ugly one, on the far side of an enormous expanse of green. They made towards it. The lane took a right-hand turn and they pulled up on a gravel frontage.

  Denis had been apprised of their coming, for his great-aunt had caused Laura to telephone the hotel from Lyndhurst. He was on the steps of the hotel when they arrived. He greeted them affectionately.

  “Come and meet Tom Richardson, about whom is all the hoo-ha,” he said. “Sorry it’s still too early for a drink. Tom’s in the garden exercising the hotel dog.” He led the way through a handsome entrance hall, at the end of which a bright fire was burning, and along a passage to a side-door which opened on to a well-kept gravel path. Richardson and the handsome collie were at the far end of the garden, and both came running as soon as Richardson saw Denis and his companions, the tall young man covering the grass with the easy effortless strides of a trained athlete, the dog beside him bounding and joyously barking. Denis performed the introductions.

  “Sorry it’s too early for a drink,” said Richardson.

  “Yes, I’ve already broken the sad news, but,” said Denis, looking at his watch, “in twenty-two and a half minutes’ time it will be just right and we will all pour into the bar and jangle the cow-bells. I love doing that. Much nicer and far more musical than banging on the counter with half a crown and shouting, “Service, miss!” I don’t think they’d like that here—hence the cow-bells. Swiss and genuine, just like Tom Sawyer’s tooth, except that that was American, not Swiss. Now, where are we going to sit while we let time pass?”

  “The bar really is the best place,” said Richardson. “It’s used as a lounge, anyway. Besides, it’s vast and comfortable and we can talk there without worrying about being overheard. It’s too chilly to sit in the garden, and the small drawing-room is in possession of the old boy of ex-naval aspect who seems to think it’s his private sanctum, and the television lounge is thick with people propped up behind morning papers and waiting, like us, for the bar to open, so that’s no good for a private get-together.”

  “The bar it is,” said Denis. He led the way, and Laura, from an armchair in the window, was soon working out the story of an eighteenth-century fox-hunt as told by the patterns on the curtains. Dame Beatrice ignored the decorative nature of the furnishings and concentrated on Richardson.

  “Now, dear child,” she said. Richardson, who had been warned by Denis to expect this nominative of address, smiled wanly, hitched the knees of his trousers a little higher and asked her where he ought to begin. She told him. Soon she was in possession of as much of the story as Richardson thought it necessary to tell her.

  “So,” said Dame Beatrice, looking up from the notes she had been scribbling, “you have informed the police of the body which the two of you found in the woods, but you did not tell them that it was this same body which you found in your tent and which was subsequently removed and another body substituted.”

  “I didn’t think they’d believe me. I did try to tell the Superintendent, near the beginning of things, that I didn’t think the second body was the one I’d reported to him over the phone, but he didn’t seem interested, so I thought I’d better let it go at that.”

  “Hm!” said Dame Beatrice. “But, as that first body has turned up again, he may well take an interest now, if you tell him that you recognise it as the one you attempted to mention previously, when he was not prepared to listen to you.”

  “Poor old Tom is stressing that he thinks he will be a bit in the red if he now confesses he recognises this first-and-third corpse,” said Denis, “because he knew him beforehand and they had a bit of a row—none of Tom’s seeking—on a cross-country run, and, also, another small fracas.”

  “Was there bloodshed?” asked Dame Beatrice. “You did not mention these feuds just now.”

  “No,” said Tom, “no bloodshed.”

  “Threats uttered in front of witnesses?”

  “There weren’t any witnesses the first time except a few cows.”

  “And the testimony of cows, rendered, if at all, in a language not recognised in a court of law, would be valueless, you think? You may be right. Why, then, are we cast down?”

  “Somebody’s got it in for me,” said Tom, “else why pick on my tent both times?”

  “Your tent was conveniently to hand, I should imagine, and that was one reason for making free with it. The interesting thing to find out will be why it was not used a third time. That would have been delightful.”

  Richardson looked at her incredulously and Denis laughed.

  “You mustn’t mind Aunt Adela,” he said. “Her mind functions like that.” He turned to Laura, who had worked out the sequence of events as told by the curtains. “What say you, dear Dog?”

  “Where did this cross-country run take place?” asked Laura. “Anywhere at all in this neighbourhood?”

  “Well, no, not really. It was Winchester way. We started from that bridge by the old mill at King Alfred’s end of the high street and we were sent off in twos, one from each team. It was very different from the ordinary cross-country free-for-all, because all you had to do was beat your opposite number. There were only a dozen members in each team and we were sent off at five-minute intervals.”

  “So it took an hour before the last pair could be sent off,” commented Laura.

  “And you and this Mr. Colnbrook were the last to go, I take it,” said Dame Beatrice.

  “We were; but how do you know?”

  “It was merely a guess. I went by the fact that you say there were no witnesses of your quarrel except the cows. In cross-country running, so different from sub-four-minute miling, five-minute intervals are not long ones and, in open country, over which some of your way surely would have taken you, the pair, if any, behind you must surely have seen something of the fracas, for you and your opponent stopped short, no doubt, in order to settle your differences. I deduce, therefore, that nobody was behind you.”

  “Yes, I see.”

  “And how did this cross-country competition come about?”

  “The fixture was made at their request. Their secretary wrote that they had a vacant date and would like to meet us.”

  “Was the unusual nature of the match mentioned in the correspondence?”

  “No. Until we met them we had concluded that it would be the ordinary cross-country run, with the usual points system of scoring.”

  “And that is?”

  “Roughly speaking, the first man home counts as one, the second two, and so on. The team with the smallest number of points is the winner.”

  “And what did your team think of the new arrangement?”

  “Oh, the blokes didn’t mind. In cross-country running you go for the fun of it. At least, I always do. I think everybody thought it was quite an idea. Of course, if it ever became the usual thing, you’d need to seed your runners if both teams were to get the ultimate out of it.”<
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  “The best against the best, the weakest against the weakest, I suppose?”

  “That’s it. But, as I say, we didn’t really mind what the arrangements were. They were the hosts, you see, and I must say they did their stuff nobly afterwards.”

  “You imply?”

  “The drinks and the supper, and so on.”

  “Is the other team based on Winchester?”

  “Oh, no. Somewhere near Southampton. I went there—yes, I went there once, I remember, with other of our officials.” His voice tailed off, but Dame Beatrice appeared not to notice this. She went on,

  “And your team? Where do all of you come from?”

  “We come from all over the place. Berks, Bucks, and Oxon mostly. Our secretary lives in Surrey and the treasurer hangs out in Kent. A representative body, one might say, take us all in all.”

  “Do you have many outside competitions?”

  “As many as we can get. We don’t do much on the track, because we haven’t got a ground, so it’s mostly cross-country. Anyway, most of us like it that way. It’s cheaper than golf!”

  “How did your club come to be formed?”

  “I don’t know, really. Chaps knew other chaps, and, before we came down, there was a sort of meeting and some of us agreed to join.”

  “It sounds very casual.”

  “Oh, yes,” said Richardson earnestly, “it is. That’s the beauty of it. Nobody’s bound to turn out. You get the notice—usually at some dashed awkward time when you’ve already fixed up to do something quite other—and you don’t have to answer. You just roll up or not, exactly as you please.”

  “And the result of this idyllic arrangement?”

  “Curiously enough, quite a lot of people do roll up. There’s some sort of psychological explanation, I shouldn’t wonder. Oh, dash it! I forgot! You’re a psychologist, aren’t you?”

  Dame Beatrice cackled, and Laura remarked that she herself had noticed that where there was no compulsion there was often a better response than when a press-gang was at work.

  “You say that you took care not to be seated near Mr. Colnbrook at the supper,” said Dame Beatrice. “Could you tell whether he still felt animosity towards you?”

  “Well, he wasn’t very pleased when, on the run-in, I beat him, but I did make the distance between us as narrow as I could. I had to win, of course, because of scoring for the team, otherwise I’d have let him beat me to it.”

  “You did not know whether your team really needed your help, I suppose?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. Those who had finished in front of us were howling their heads off, particularly the opposition, so I thought I’d better pull it off.”

  “Well, I should think you’re in the clear, all right,” said Laura. “You couldn’t have had any reason at all to wish Colnbrook out of this world. You won the scrap and you won the race. It was for him to wish you to hell, not vice-versa.”

  “Exactly my opinion,” said Denis.

  “I shall be interested to hear what is said at the inquest,” said Dame Beatrice, “but, like Laura, I cannot see that you have anything to fear provided that you have related all that you know about Mr. Colnbrook.”

  “Oh, I say, are you really going to attend the inquest?” said Richardson, ignoring the insinuation. “That’s most awfully good of you. I’m not looking forward to it much. It’s rotten in the middle of a holiday. Oh, look! They’re taking down the shutters. That means the bar’s open. Now, Dame Beatrice, what can I get you?”

  Nothing serious was said or done until after lunch, but, when the party left the dining-room, Dame Beatrice took her grand-nephew aside, leaving Richardson to escort Laura.

  “Why is your friend so nervous about all this?” she asked. “Can he be involved in any way? After all, he tried to tell the police about the exchange of bodies, it appears. He could do no more if they refused to allow him to explain.”

  “I think he got wind-up when we came upon Colnbrook’s body in those woods,” said Denis. “It really was the toughest kind of luck that we should be the people to stumble on it like that. It’s as though some malignant fate is dogging Tom down here, and the worst of it is that I really was responsible for suggesting we had a look for Colnbrook.”

  “Yes?” said Dame Beatrice doubtfully. “You have no reason to think that Mr. Richardson knew perfectly well where Mr. Colnbrook’s body was, and deliberately led you to its discovery?”

  “Good Lord, no, of course not! That’s a fantastic suggestion, darling great-aunt. Besides, the forester said they’d moved it from where they found it. It was in their way.”

  “Very likely,” his great-aunt agreed. “But, as Laura would say, it is as well to explore all avenues. What made him pitch a tent up there on the heath when he would have been far more comfortable sleeping here in the hotel? I understand that he took all his meals here, including his breakfast.”

  “Well, he’s a solitary sort of old lunatic, you know. I doubt whether he’s got a close pal in the world besides myself. I gather that he wanted to do a bit of badger-watching and so forth, and, of course, I did let him down. I couldn’t help it, but there it was. He had two days more on his own than we’d planned. It was damned bad luck that this business of two dead men should have cropped up.”

  “Yes. One might argue that one dead man was enough. Two…”

  “Overdoing it? I agree. But what’s the answer?”

  “That is what we have to find out, dear child.”

  “In the old days, I got half a crown when you called me that. Do you remember?”

  “I hardly think that you are in dire need of half a crown in these days.”

  “You never know,” said Denis.

  “What is this athletics club of which Mr. Richardson is a member? And what kind of people are the other members?”

  “They call themselves the Hen-Harriers—a sort of play upon words, if you take me, although they don’t have women members. They’re a casual bunch, as he indicated. They’re the sort of chaps who ran as second strings for their colleges in the three miles when they were up—third strings, most likely—plus a sprinkling of hockey players who turn up for cross-country running when they haven’t a fixture, or, more likely, when a fixture falls through at the last minute. Happy-go-lucky types, I should say, on the whole. I only know what Tom tells me about them.”

  “You would not call them a desperately keen band?”

  “Lord, no! They really do run for the fun of it, and, if nobody bothers to finish, well, nobody bothers!”

  “It sounds an ideal arrangement.”

  “Oh, it is, and old Tom enjoys it. He has to be pubbable and clubbable, you see, and it’s jolly good for him, otherwise he’d probably turn into every kind of hermit.”

  “Girls?”

  “He’s a bit like the hero of She Stoops to Conquer—good with barmaids, but otherwise, I fear, not even a spent force, although I did hear a rumour that he might be getting engaged. I haven’t met the girl.”

  “What does he do for a living?”

  “Oh, prep-school master, as long as he can stick the school, and then a bit of private tutoring while he works up steam to apply for another post. Lives with a widowed mother who, I gather, has plenty of dough. What Tom really ought to do is to write, but his first novel was turned down by the only two publishers he sent it to, and that seems to have soured on the boy. He’s by way of being Shelley’s original sensitive plant.”

  “Interesting.”

  “You can tell the sort of chap he is by the way he’s taking these deaths. They can’t possibly be anything to do with him, but his attitude is that the black cap is already on the judge’s head. It gets fatiguing. It will be a jolly good thing when the inquest is over and he can breathe again.”

  “How did you come to make his acquaintance?”

  “A common interest in music.”

  “Does he play an instrument?”

  “No, but he understands the Elizabethans.”<
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  Dame Beatrice, who understood Bach and nobody else, allowed this statement to pass without challenge. Richardson and Laura were in the garden admiring the dahlias and some late carnations and Denis and his great-aunt were walking on the finely-cut lawn.

  “In what way do you think I can help your friend?” Dame Beatrice enquired. She bent to pick up a handsome fir-cone which had fallen from Pinus Pinea, the Stone Pine (introduced, as she remarked to her great-nephew, four hundred years ago, in the time [more or less] of his friend’s Elizabethans), and studied it while Denis answered,

  “Well, I think you’ve given his morale a considerable boost by coming down here at all, and now he knows you’re going to attend the inquest it’s made his day. What do you want to do this afternoon? See the spot where we found Colnbrook’s body?”

  “No, child. Did I understand from Mr. Richardson that Mr. Colnbrook belonged to an association of mixed athletes (in the sense, I mean, of the way one describes a co-educational school as being mixed) called the Scylla and District Club?”

  “Yes, that’s Colnbrook’s mob. Social and Athletic, they call themselves, according to Tom. They’ve got a ground of sorts, somewhere outside Southampton. I expect you heard him say so. They’ve had one or two good people—steeplechasers, mostly—but not exactly world class, I believe. I don’t much follow athletics. Anyway, they’re a pretty minor club, the same as Tom’s lot.”

  “By which you mean—?”

  “Well, they’re not exactly Achilles, or Poly. Harriers, or Herne Hill or Thames Valley, for example.”

  “I see.” There was a pause, then Dame Beatrice added, “Perhaps, when we have attended the inquest, your friend will honour me with the whole of his confidence. I dislike to work on half-truths.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Inquests Are Odious

  Poisoned with henbane. His whole body stinks of it.

  Jerome K. Jerome

  The inquests on Colnbrook and the so-far unnamed body also dumped in Richardson’s tent were held separately but on the same day. Richardson was called as a witness in both cases. Accepting Dame Beatrice’s advice (in the tradition that drowning men clutch at straws, and having about as much faith in the result), he had been to the Superintendent to tell him that he recognised the body he and Denis had found in the woods as that of the first deceased occupant of his tent. The Superintendent (suspiciously so, in Richardson’s opinion) had been friendly and almost jocose.