The Inspector smiled wryly. “You're forgetting, sir, that you're not to believe a word Mr. Drybeck says.”
“Well, I don't believe many of them,” said Hemingway, climbing over the stile. “Come on! I've got a fancy to take another look at the scene of the crime.”
Together they walked down the lane for some twenty yards, and then climbed the slope on to the common. Fox House had ceased to attract sightseers, and there seemed to be no one about. Hemingway paused by the gorse-clump, and stood looking thoughtfully at the gardens of Fox House. The seat had been removed, but a bare patch in the lawn showed where it had stood.
“I seem to remember that someone told me once you were by way of being a good shot, Horace,” said Hemingway. “How does a man's head, at this range, strike you, as a target?”
The Inspector, whose modest home was made magnificent by the trophies that adorned it, appreciated this, and at once retorted: “It's wonderful, how you discover things no one else has ever heard of, sir! I have done a bit of shooting in my time, and I should consider it a certain target.”
“All right, you win!” said Hemingway, grinning. “Would you call it a certain target for the average shot?”
“I think a man would need to be a good shot, but not necessarily a crack shot. I thought so when I first saw this place, and it's one reason why I've never seriously considered Miss Warrenby. I don't say women aren't good shots: I've known some who were first-class, but they're few and far between, and we've no reason to think Miss Warrenby has ever had a gun in her hand.”
“It seems to rule Reg out too,” said Hemingway. “Pity you didn't ice his targets! I'm always trying to find something that'll give you a laugh.”
“Are you ruling out the possibility of an accident as well?”
“For the lord's sake, Horace—! If a chap was standing here, do you see him firing into a man's garden, with the owner in full view?”
“No,” admitted the Inspector. “It does seem unlikely.” He glanced curiously at his chief. “What's in your mind, sir?”
“I'm wondering why the murderer fired from here, instead of trying for a closer shot. Unless he was a very good shot, I think it was chancy.”
“There's the question of cover,” the Inspector pointed out.
“If he came from the stile, he couldn't have got a shot from the lane, without coming into Warrenby's sight. I took particular note of that. Those trees at that side of the lawn make it impossible for you to get a view of the seat until you're almost abreast of it. I should say that the murderer didn't cross the stile, but climbed up on to the common beyond it, and worked his way round under cover of the bushes.”
“Why?” demanded Hemingway. “How did he know Warrenby would be sitting in the garden? On what we've heard about his habits, it wasn't likely.”
The Inspector thought for a moment. “That's so. But there must be an answer, because one of the few things we know about this murder is that the shot was fired from where we're standing. We've got proof of that, so an answer there's got to be. I think I've got it, too. It's safe to assume that the murderer was proceeding pretty cautiously, isn't it? He didn't know where Warrenby would be, but he did know that all the sitting-room windows in the house look out this way. I don't see him walking along outside that low hedge to get to the gate, and running the risk of being seen by Warrenby. Once he saw there was no one in the lane, I should think he pretty well stalked the house, if you get my meaning. Probably kept down under cover of the hedge. He could have seen Warrenby like that, but he'd have had to stand up to get a shot at him. He'd want to take careful aim too, and it's not to be supposed Warrenby would have sat still to let him do it. My idea is that he did see him, and doubled back to the stile. In fact, the long range was forced on him just because Warrenby was in the garden.”
“You may be right,” Hemingway said.
“I can tell you don't think so, though.”
“I don't know, Horace. It sounds reasonable enough. I've just got a feeling there was more to it than that. Come on! We'll take a look at Biggleswade's favourite seat.”
They walked in a north-easterly direction, to where some silver-birch trees stood. Beyond them, the ground began to fall away more steeply, and a little way down the slope a wooden seat had been placed, commanding a good view over the common. It was not unoccupied. After one keen look, Hemingway said: “If it isn't old granddad himself! You'd better mind your p's and q's, Horace: he's inclined to be testy. Good-afternoon, Mr. Biggleswade! Taking the air?”
Mr. Biggleswade looked him over with scant favour. “And why shouldn't I be?” he demanded. “Tell me that!”
“I can't. What's eating you today, grandfather?”
“If I was your granddad you'd 'ave more sense nor wot you 'ave,” said the old gentleman severely. “I'm disappointed in you, that's wot. You're gormless. If you'd paid attention to wot I says to you, you'd 've 'ad the bracelets on young Reg Ditchling last night.”
“Don't you worry about him!” said Hemingway. “I've got my eye on him all right.”
“A fat lot of use that is!” said Mr. Biggleswade. “You 'aving your eye on 'im don't stop 'im coming up to my place, calling me out of me name—ah, an' fetching 'is as along of 'im, and that pair of screeching Jezebels, Gert and Edie, besides. Painted 'ussies, that's wot they are, and don't you let anyone tell you different! Oo's this you got with you?”
A rheumy gaze was bent upon Inspector Harbottle; a note of disparagement sounded in the aged voice. Hemingway said promptly: “You don't have to bother about him: he's just my assistant.”
“Six foot of misery, that's wot 'e looks like to me,” said Mr. Biggleswade, not mincing matters. “You don't want to let 'im get near the milk-cans. Wot's more, if you'd done wot I told you, you wouldn't need no assistant. Plain as I 'ear you now I 'eard that shot, Saturday!”
“You tell me some more about this shot,” invited Hemingway, sitting down beside him. “How was it you only heard one shot?”
“Becos that's all there wos to 'ear.”
“But young Reg tells me he fired a whole lot of shots.”
“'E'd tell you anything, young Reg would. Ah! and you'd swaller it!”
“Now, now! He was firing at targets, you know, in the Squire's gravel-pit.”
“Oh, “e wos, was 'e? If 'e'd told you 'e was firing at a 'erd of rhinorcerusses which 'e 'appened to find in Squire's gravel-pit, you'd swaller that too! Pleecemen! I never 'ad no opinion of 'em, and I ain't got none now, and I never will 'ave. Young Reg never fired no shot in Squire's gravel-pit. “Cos why? 'Cos if 'e 'ad, no one wouldn't 'ear it this far off. Ah! and 'e couldn't 'ave got 'isself on to this 'ere path so soon as wot 'e did do. And I'll tell you another thing, my lad! I won't 'ave you taking my character away like you're trying to!”
“I shouldn't think you've much to take away,” said Hemingway frankly. “Still, I wouldn't think of taking away what you've got left of it.”
“Oh, yes, you would!” said Mr. Biggleswade fiercely. “And don't you give me no sauce! I'll 'ave you know there ain't any man in Thornden wot knows more about guns than wot I do, and I won't 'ave you spreading it about I don't know where a shot's being fired from! Over there's where Reg fired Vicar's rifle!” A trembling and gouty finger pointed in the direction of Fox Lane.
“All right,” said Hemingway soothingly. “So what did you do?”
“I says to meself, Someone's larking about in Mr. “Aswell's spinney, I says. There, or thereabouts,” replied Mr. Biggleswade, nodding wisely.
“That's some way off, grandfather,” Hemingway suggested.
“It 'ud 'ave 'ad to 'ave been a sight further off for me not to 'ear it,” said Mr. Biggleswade, with a senile chuckle. “Very sharp ears I've got! A lot of people 'ave wished I didn't 'ear so quick when I was in me prime.”
“I'll bet they did. You're a wonder, that's what you are, grandfather. It can't have made much of a noise, either, at this distance.”
“No one never said it
did. If you'd 'eard it, you wouldn't 'ardly 'ave noticed it, I dessay. And as for that walking tombstone o' yours, “e'd 'ave thought it was a motor-car back-firing up on the 'Awks'ead-road as like as not.”
“Oh, no, I would not!” said Harbottle, stung into a retort.
“Shut up, Horace! Don't you pay any heed to him, grandfather! What happened after the shot? Did you see anyone besides Reg Ditchling?”
“No, I didn't. I wasn't going to go poking my nose into wot wasn't none of my business. I ain't a nasty, nosy pleeceman! I set off down this 'ere path, like I told 'Obkirk, and I 'adn't gorn so very far when I 'eard someone be'ind me, same like you'd 'ear one of them game-keepers when 'e was trying to creep on you. And I looked round, quick-like, and I see young Reg 'iding be'ind one of the bushes.”
“Down the other end of the path that was, wasn't it?”
“Right down the other end,” corroborated Mr. Biggleswade.
“How long after you heard the shot would that have been?”
“Not more'n ten minutes or so. I don't get about so fast as wot I useter,” said Mr. Biggleswade, flattered to find himself with an attentive audience at last. “And there was young Reg! If you'd 'ave paid more 'eed to wot I told you yesterday, you'd 'ave 'ad 'im safe under lock and key by this time.”
“Well, I might,” said Hemingway, getting up. “That is, if I knew what he was doing, hanging about the scene of the crime, instead of making his getaway.”
“Ah! That's telling,” said Mr. Biggleswade darkly.
“It is, isn't it? I shall have to be getting along now, grandfather. Don't you go sitting it the Red Lion till that daughter of yours has to come and drag you out! Nice goings-on at your time of life!”
The ancient reprobate seemed pleased with this sally, and cackled asthmatically. Hemingway waved to him, and began to walk away.
“'Ere!” Mr. Biggleswade called after him. “Will I 'ave me pitcher in the papers?”
“That's telling too!” replied Hemingway over his shoulder.
“Rogues' gallery, I should think!” said Harbottle, falling into step beside him. “What on earth made you encourage him to hand you all that lip?”
“I don't mind his lip. I reckon he's entitled to cheek the police, when they haven't been able to catch up with him in ninety years. He's a very remarkable old boy, and a lot sharper than the silly fools who say he's getting soft in the head. I wanted to hear some more about that shot of his.”
“Why?” demanded the Inspector.
“Because I think he did hear one.”
“Well, what of it, sir? According to what you told me, what he heard couldn't have had any bearing on the case. It was an hour too early!”
“Horace, I told you only this morning I'd got a feeling the wrong end of the stick had been pushed into my hand, and that there's something important I haven't spotted. We're now going to have a look for it!”
Chapter Sixteen
“Where are we off to?” enquired the Inspector. “Fox House?”
“Out of the old gentleman's sight, for a start,” Hemingway replied. “I want to think.”
They reached the gorse-clump again, and Hemingway stopped. The Inspector watched him curiously, as he stood there, his quick, bright eyes once more taking in every detail of the scene before him. Presently he gave a grunt, and sat down on the slope above the lane, and pulled his pipe and his aged tobacco-pouch out of his pocket. While his accustomed fingers teased the tobacco, and packed it into the bowl of the pipe, his abstracted gaze continued to dwell first on the spot in the garden where the seat had stood, and then upon the stile, just visible round the bole of the elm-tree. The Inspector, disposing himself on the ground beside him, preserved a patient silence, and tried painstakingly to discover, by the exercise of logic, what particular problem he was attempting to solve. Hemingway lit his pipe, and sat staring fixedly at Fox House, his eyelids a little puckered. Suddenly he said: “The mistake we've been making, Horace, is to have paid a sight too much attention to what you might call the important features of this case, and not enough to the highly irrelevant trimmings. I'm not sure I've not precious near been had for a sucker.”
“I've heard you say as much before, but I never heard that it turned out to be true,” responded the Inspector.
“Well, it isn't going to be true this time—not if I know it! This operator is beginning to annoy me,” said Hemingway briskly.
The Inspector was a little puzzled. “Myself, I hate all murderers,” he said. “But I don't see why this one should annoy you more than any other—for it is not as if the case was a complicated one. It isn't easy, but that's only because we have too many possible suspects, isn't it? Taken just as a murder, I'd say it was one of the simplest I've ever handled.”
“When you talk like that, Horace, I think I must be losing my flair. I ought to have spotted at the outset that it was much too simple.”
“But you can't go against the facts, sir,” argued the Inspector. “The man was shot in his own garden, by someone lying up beside these bushes, at about 7.15 or 7.20, according to Miss Warrenby's evidence. You can doubt that, but you can't doubt the evidence of the cartridge-case Carsethorn's men found under the bushes. The difficulty is that the murder happened to be committed just when half a dozen people who all of them had reasons for wanting Warrenby out of the way were scattered round the locality, in a manner of speaking, and couldn't produce alibis.”
Hemingway had turned his head, and was looking at him, an alert expression on his face. “Go on!” he said, as the Inspector paused. “You're being very helpful!”
Harbottle almost blushed. “Well, I'm glad, Chief! It isn't often you think I'm right!”
“You aren't right. You're wrong all along the line, but you're clarifying my mind,” said Hemingway. “As soon as you said that the murder happened to be committed while a whole lot of Warrenby's ill-wishers were sculling about at large, it came to me that there wasn't any "happen" about it. That's the way it was planned. Go on talking! Very likely you'll put another idea into my head.”
The Inspector said, with some asperity: “All right, sir, I will! I may be wrong all along the line, but it strikes me that there's a hole to be picked in what you've just said. It can't have been planned. Not with any certainty. The murderer couldn't have known Warrenby would be in the garden at that exact time; that was just luck. He must have been prepared to go into the house, or at any rate into the garden, where he could have got a shot through the study-window, and when you consider how near he came to being seen by Miss Warrenby, as things turned out, you'll surely agree that there wasn't much planning about it. If he'd been forced to enter the garden, Miss Warrenby would have seen the whole thing. As I see it, he's got more luck than craft.”
“Don't stop! It's getting clearer every minute!”
“Well, do you agree with me so far?” demanded Harbottle.
“Never mind about that! You can take it I don't, unless I hold up my hand.”
“I see no sense in going on, if you don't agree with anything I say, sir.”
“Well, I shouldn't see any sense in us sitting here agreeing with one another,” returned Hemingway. “Where's that going to get us?”
“Look here, sir!” said Harbottle. “If we're going to assume that the murder was planned to take place when all the guests at that tennis-party were on their way home, then we've also got to assume that the murderer was banking on having all the luck he did have—which seems pretty inadequate planning to me! Why, it could have come unstuck in half a dozen places! To start with, he's got to do the job quick, because it cuts both ways, having a lot of people scattered near the scene: who's to say one of them won't come down the lane? You can say it's unlikely, but it might have happened. What was a dead certainty was that Miss Warrenby was bound to arrive on the scene at any moment. So he's got to reach the house ahead of her, shoot Warrenby, and get away without losing a second of time. What would have happened if Warrenby had gone upstairs, or into the back-ga
rden? He must have faced that possibility! He must have thought, if he planned it, that he must allow himself quite a bit of time, in case of accidents.”
“Quite true, Horace. So you think that he laid his preparations—by which I mean his rifle—on the off-chance that he'd get an opportunity to shoot Warrenby?”
There was a pause. “When you put it like that,” said the Inspector slowly. “No, that won't do. But my arguments still hold!”
“They do,” said Hemingway. “They're perfectly sound, and they do you credit. Our operator didn't want to be hurried over the job, and it's safe to assume he wasn't going to take any unnecessary risks.”
“Then what's the answer?” said Harbottle.
“Warrenby wasn't shot at 7.15, nor anything like that time.”
There was another pause, while the Inspector sat staring at his chief. He said at last: “Very well, sir. I can see several reasons for thinking you're wrong. I'd like to know what the reasons are for thinking you're right, because you haven't jumped to a conclusion like that simply because you want to make out the murder was carefully planned.”
“I haven't jumped at all,” replied Hemingway. “I've been adding up all those bits and pieces of information which didn't seem to lead anywhere. Taking it from the start, the doctor was what you might call vague on the time of Warrenby's death.”
“Yes,” conceded Harbottle. “I remember it was the first point you queried, when you were going through the case with the Chief Constable. But it didn't seem to matter much, and goodness knows Dr. Warcop isn't the only doctor we've come across who's more of a hindrance than a help to the police!”
“You're right: it didn't seem to matter. The mistake I made was in accepting as a fact that the time of the murder was fixed. To go on, the next thing was that I was given a highly significant piece of information by Miss Warrenby. She told me, the very first time I saw her, that her uncle very rarely sat out of doors. Well, I didn't pay any particular heed to that, because it didn't seem to matter any more than the doctor's evidence. There the corpse was, sitting in the garden, with a bullet through his left temple; and there the cartridge-case was, lying just where you'd expect to find it, supposing Warrenby had been shot while he was on that seat.”
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