Dead Man's Bluff

by Roderic Jeffries

  ‘There’s something more I want to know,’ said Clayton.

  ‘What?’ He pushed in the tractor’s stop button.

  ‘Where were you at three in the afternoon on Monday?’

  ‘What’s that? The time when the old fool was getting his chips?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘D’you think I might have shot the old bastard?’

  ‘That’s your suggestion.’

  ‘I’ll tell you, whenever I came over here and saw what he was doing to the place I could’ve choked the bloody daylights out of him.’

  ‘So now tell me where you were.’

  ‘Making hay for old Fingle — who was told as a boy you shouldn’t ever cut for hay until the middle of August and who never allowed anyone to teach him differently.’

  ‘Can you prove you were there?’

  ‘Ask him.’

  ‘Did he see you at three o’clock, then?’

  Hulton’s heavy forehead creased. ‘He was around earlier some time, then I saw him at half-past three. I’d stopped cutting and he came up and asked me why I was stopped. I told him, if he wanted his bloody cows milked, I had to.’

  ‘How far’s that farm from here?’

  ‘Thirty miles, near enough.’ Hulton started the tractor. He backed to the edge of the ditch, lowered the mole, and engaged second low.

  Clayton watched the tractor moving slowly but inexorably forward, dragging the mole which was shattering the ground several inches below the surface. There must be a primeval satisfaction from tilling the land, he thought, a satisfaction that came from doing something wholly constructive, wholly beneficial.

  He walked back to the house and was greeted by the barking of the dogs at the rear. As he knocked on the front door, he wondered what Mrs Knott would do with them — she didn’t strike him as a woman who had much love for animals.

  There was no answer to his knock. Mrs Knott had said there probably wouldn’t be and he’d find the key under a brick by the front door.

  He went in and upstairs to the bedroom she had identified as her husband’s. He searched it, but found nothing of any significance. He went into the other four bedrooms and the bathroom, all small and, he was certain, far different from the kind of rooms she had imagined she would inhabit as Mrs Knott of Knott Farm.

  Downstairs, the two original houses had not been thrown together so that to get from one side to the other one had either to go outside or upstairs and along to the second stairs. The two sitting-rooms were poky and the furnishings had become very worn. Leading off the smaller sitting-room was what had obviously once been the larder and this had been turned into a gunroom — a very grand description for what was virtually just a dark closet. Inside was a gun cupboard and he opened this. A twelve-bore, a four-ten, and a two-two stood in the racks and on the shelf above there was cleaning equipment, cartridge bag, and a cartridge belt. He took out the twelve-bore. It had the balance of a top-quality sidelock and when he checked the maker he saw it was a Churchill. How much had that cost? How many fields had not been slagged and fertilized because Knott had bought it? He replaced the gun and shut the cupboard. On top was a cardboard carton and he brought it down and looked inside. There were eight boxes of cartridges, seven a light browny-red in colour and one green. He returned the carton. He’d never shot. He couldn’t understand the pleasure some people seemed to gain from shooting living animals although, equally, he didn’t condemn the sport out of hand.

  He checked the far two ground-floor rooms. One was an office and the other was an untidy workshop. The office clearly hadn’t been used for months: on the table were some papers covered in dust and these were dated the previous November.

  He returned upstairs and went down to the front door he had entered by. He locked up and replaced the key under the brick and thought what an obvious hiding-place this would be to any housebreaker.

  He drove off, cutting through the lanes to pick up the main road to Abbotsbridge and Trighton.

  *

  Clayton arrived at No. 5, Dock Road, at the same moment as a blonde and he introduced himself to Hazel Clews. She seemed flustered by the meeting, but in his experience most people remembered their latest peccadilloes whenever introduced to a detective.

  Morris had been right, thought Clayton, she really did exude sex. Every movement of her shapely body drew attention to it in a lascivious manner. Margery would have named her tart within seconds of meeting.

  She opened the front door, shouted to her mother, and led the way into the front room. She sat down and her very short skirt rode higher up her thigh. She tugged at it in a way that made it seem almost as if she were caressing her own flesh.

  ‘I just want to clear up a point or two,’ Clayton said. ‘You know that it’s now been confirmed Daniel Knott died in the fire?’

  ‘Yes.’ She showed no emotion.

  ‘You were having an affair with him?’

  ‘He wouldn’t leave me alone.’

  ‘Did you know he was married?’

  ‘That was his business.’

  ‘Did his wife know of your relationship with him?’

  ‘Give over,’ she said scornfully.

  She was tough, brought up in a tough school of life. She had seen Knott as a dirty old man who desperately wanted her and was ready to pay for her favours: she would never have considered the wife’s misery. ‘Can you be quite certain she didn’t know of your existence?’

  ‘If you’d seen how scared he was to take me anywhere he might run into her, you wouldn’t ask.’

  ‘Whereabouts did he take you?’

  ‘Up to the big smoke, mainly.’

  ‘How often did you see him?’

  ‘Too often. He wouldn’t leave me alone.’

  ‘If that’s what you thought, why go out with him at all?’

  ‘Why d’you think?’ She sneered.

  He regretfully gave her some credit for her unabashed honesty. ‘Did he ever tell you about the life insurance he’d taken out that named you the beneficiary?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘When did you first hear about it?’

  ‘I read it in the papers.’

  ‘Are you quite certain of that?’

  ‘He didn’t tell me.’ Her voice had become slightly shrill.

  ‘Forty thousand pounds is a lot of money.’

  She began to chew her lower lip between her even white teeth. She uncrossed her legs and instinctively his gaze was attracted. There was an animal magnetism about her that a man in his forties, married to a woman who was inclined to be frigid, would find irresistible.

  ‘When’s the money mine?’ she suddenly asked.

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘They’ve got to pay up quick, haven’t they?’

  ‘Why not ask them?’

  She looked at him. ‘Are you sure it’s forty thousand quid?’

  ‘That’s what the manager of the insurance company said.’ She began to fidget with the outsize loop of the zip fastener which ran right down the front of her dress. With a sense of shocked irritation, he suddenly found he was imagining what it would be like to pull the zip down. ‘You haven’t expressed very much sorrow at his death,’ he said harshly.

  ‘I’m not crying myself sick. The only thing he did for me was to take me to places.’

  ‘And put you down for forty thousand quid when he died.’

  She ran her tongue slowly around her full lips.

  ‘Did he ever mention the farm?’

  She shook her head. ‘No.’

  ‘You’d no idea how it was doing?’

  ‘Look, he didn’t talk about it when he was with me. Why should he?’

  Why indeed? he thought. ‘Where were you at three o’clock Monday afternoon?’

  ‘At work.’

  ‘Can you prove that?’

  ‘Ask the old bitch who runs the shop. Went at me all ends up for being late back from lunch, then started all over again because a friend dropped in for a chat. That was near thre
e.’

  ‘Who was this friend?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Information.’

  ‘It ain’t none of your business.’

  ‘Male or female?’

  She was silent.

  ‘I’ll be seeing the manageress when I leave here.’

  ‘Male,’ she answered sullenly.

  ‘The same male who visited you when my detective-sergeant came here?’

  ‘What if it was?’

  ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Find out.’

  ‘What’s the matter — has he got a record?’

  ‘You bastards never let alone, do you?’ she shouted.

  ‘What’s his name?’

  She hesitated, then said: ‘Alf Shear.’

  ‘Go around with him much?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Did you see much of him when you were going about with Daniel Knott?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Would you call it a recent friendship?’

  She stared at him with hatred.

  He stood up. ‘Thanks for your help.’

  ‘I ain’t helped you.’

  No, he thought as he left, she hadn’t. If her evidence and Hulton’s was corroborated, each of the three persons who benefited from Knott’s death had a good alibi for the time of death. In that case, Akers had to be right — the odd scraps of curious evidence were meaningless.

  Chapter 11

  Clayton knocked on the front door of No. 36, Hammerton Road, and it was opened by Mrs Wade. Pritchard had said she was a slice of desiccated coconut and he was not inclined to argue with that description. He introduced himself and she said, sharply, that she’d been more than enough troubled already and all that the police seemed to be interested in was getting her a bad name in the district. It was with a very ill grace that she let him into the house.

  Alexander’s bedroom was undergoing a spring clean: the bed was stripped, the curtains and carpet were missing, and the walls had recently been washed down.

  She stood just inside the room, arms crossed. ‘When are you going to take all his things away?’

  ‘As soon as possible, Mrs Wade, but so far we’ve been unable to locate his sister.’

  ‘You’re the police, aren’t you? You ought to be able to do a simple thing like that.’

  ‘Im afraid it’s not all that easy,’ he answered pacifically.

  ‘As I’ve always said, when you call on the police to do something for you, they say they can’t.’

  ‘Unfortunately, we don’t even know her married name.’

  ‘Well I’m telling you, I’ve got to have this room emptied and clean to let to someone else.’

  He hurriedly began to search the room. Margery had always said he was no match for a shrewish woman, being unable to be rude enough.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ she demanded suddenly.

  ‘His washing tackle.’

  ‘In the top left-hand drawer of the chest-of-drawers.’ She uncrossed her arms and pointed.

  He pulled open the indicated drawer. Inside was a sponge bag, which contained soap and flannel, a tin of denture cleaner, a safety razor, a tube of shaving cream and a pair of metal-backed hair brushes and comb. He closed the drawer. ‘Where did he keep his medicine?’

  ‘If there’s nothing in any of the drawers, he didn’t have any. I wouldn’t allow anything anywhere else.’

  He searched the other drawers and found no medicine. Curiosity made her ask him, in a slightly more pleasant voice: ‘Are you looking for something special, then?’

  ‘I wondered if he’d some sleeping tablets. Did you ever see any empty medicine bottles in his waste-paper basket?’

  ‘No.’

  He stood in the centre of the room. ‘Would you always have known when he left the house and when he returned?’

  ‘I did not spy on him.’

  He assured her that nothing had been further from his thoughts.

  She appeared to be mollified. ‘He had a key to the front door and let himself in and out when he wanted. I’m a sound sleeper and his comings and goings never worried me.’

  ‘What kind of time did he leave in the mornings?’

  ‘He was usually very early. He was always telling me that in his job it was the early bird who caught all the worms.’

  ‘Could there have been times when he got back here after you’d gone to bed and then he’d already left in the morning when you got up?’

  ‘That happened.’ She thrust forward her angular chin. ‘But that’s not to say I waste my time lying in bed of a morning.’

  Lying in bed in the morning was a Sybaritic pleasure and therefore he was sure she had never ever indulged in it. ‘Did you give him breakfast when he wasn’t away early?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘How often did this happen?’

  ‘Not very often. He usually left early.’

  ‘What about the other meals?’

  ‘He made his own arrangements.’

  ‘Did you see him on Monday?’

  ‘He came back to the house around lunchtime and said he’d forgotten some papers: went up to his room for them.’

  ‘Have you any idea exactly what time this would have been?’

  ‘He left again at half-past one.’

  ‘Did you by any chance see him leave?’

  ‘I was tidying up the hall when he came downstairs and went out.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you’d have noticed whether he was wearing gloves?’

  ‘Of course he wasn’t. Not in that heat,’ she said scornfully.

  ‘Are you quite sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The journey need only have taken half an hour, he thought, but the van had not arrived at the farm until a quarter past two. Was there any significance in this?

  Clayton was in his office at five that afternoon when Akers came in, crossed to the second desk, and sat down. He looked at Clayton. I’ve been expecting a report from you,’ he said sharply.

  ‘I tried to contact you earlier on, sir, but they said you were out at the farm.’

  ‘I’ve been back a long time now.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I took a quick trip up to Relstone to see Mrs Wade’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I wanted to check if there were any signs of barbiturates amongst Alexander’s effects. My DC hadn’t reported finding any, but I reckoned he might have overlooked their importance.’

  ‘What did you discover?’

  ‘There were no medicines of any sort and Mrs Wade said there were never any empty medicine bottles in the waste-paper basket … That’s odd, you know,’ said Clayton thoughtfully. ‘A bloke who takes barbiturates usually has a store of them. Another thing, he wasn’t wearing gloves when he left and the journey took him fifteen minutes longer than it need have done. Fifteen minutes surely isn’t long enough for him to have visited another farm.’

  ‘Have you considered the possibility of heavy traffic or his doing a spot of shopping?’ Akers rested his elbows on the desk and placed his fingertips together. ‘Did you by any chance manage to find the time to do the two small things I told you to?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then may we now leave the non-essentials and hear the results of your inquiries?’

  ‘Both parties offered alibis. One of my DCs is checking out Hulton’s, I followed up Hazel Clews’s. Hers is corroborated.’

  ‘If all three parties have an alibi, would you agree that none of them can have had anything to do with the deaths?’

  ‘On the face of it … ’

  ‘Did you go to Relstone before or after you’d questioned Hulton and Miss Clews?’

  ‘After.’

  ‘Then would you not agree that the question of whether or not Alexander had an entire pharmacopoeia in his room was of supreme irrelevance?’

  ‘But I’m not certain … ’

  ‘Another feeling, another break in the rhythm, Inspector?’

/>   ‘Yes, sir,’ said Clayton doggedly.

  Akers stood up. He began to pace the floor, turning smartly at the same spot each time. ‘I fail to understand how a man in your position … ’ He stopped and slowly shook his head. ‘I shan’t be in Gertfinden much longer.’

  Clayton tried to maintain a neutral expression.

  ‘But before I go, I’d like to tell you something that might help you in the future if you take it to heart. The most important attribute which distinguishes an expert from the … the all-rounder … is his ability to appreciate simplicity. Conversely, the attribute which most distinguishes the all-rounder from the expert is his insistence on complicating everything.’

  ‘But don’t you think … ’ began Clayton.

  ‘What?’ snapped Akers angrily.

  ‘Nothing, sir.’ To mention the cow cake now would surely be the height of folly.

  *

  Margery had made a Quiche Lorraine and she had naturally expected her husband to appreciate it. However, when he ate he stared blankly into space and said nothing.

  ‘Jim, what’s wrong?’ she asked in a worried tone of voice.

  He looked at her. ‘Why should anything be wrong?’

  ‘Because you haven’t the vaguest notion of what you’re eating — and that’s certainly not like you.’

  He apologized. ‘I’m sorry. It’s the Knott case — got me tied up in knots.’

  ‘You obviously weren’t always going to be able to miss out on that pun! What’s happened? Has that horrible superintendent been troubling you again? Why doesn’t he go on back to London?’

  ‘He says he very soon will be.’

  ‘Good riddance to bad rubbish.’

  ‘And when he leaves, he’ll go convinced I’m a boneheaded country bumpkin.’

  She spoke indignantly. ‘Who the hell cares a fig what he thinks?’

  ‘The trouble is, on the face of it he’s right.’ He slowly ate a mouthful, then said: ‘What would be your reactions if I told you that it’s absolutely clear what happened, that it couldn’t have happened in any other way, but I’ve a feeling it did.’

  ‘Can you tell me more?’

  He briefly gave her all the facts.