The Cornish Coast Murder (British Library Crime Classics)

by John Bude

  Inspector Bigswell turned to the Superintendent.

  “That's all, sir. Thank you.”

  The Superintendent motioned to the Constable standing in the doorway and Cowper was led away to the cells, there to await his appearance before the local magistrates. It was pretty well certain, however, that his case would come up, eventually, at the quarterly sessions. Particularly as the theft bore some connection with Tregarthan's murder.

  As soon as they were alone, the Superintendent turned to Bigswell, who was seated on the far side of the desk drumming his fingers on his open notebook.

  “Well—what d'you make of it, Bigswell?”

  “A blind-alley business,” replied the Inspector with a dismal grin. “Waste of valuable time, I'm afraid. The man's telling the truth. You agree, Sir?”

  The Superintendent did.

  “A petty criminal type—not the major article,” was his pertinent verdict. “Still it was snappy work, Bigswell. I'll see that the Chief gets an ungarbled account of your smartness.”

  “For those kind words ... many thanks!”

  The two men laughed.

  “No news of Hardy, I suppose?” asked the Inspector, obviously expecting a negative answer.

  “None. The Yard are engaged in the usual routine comb-out of all the likely places—but so far without result.

  The Inspector sighed, and shutting his note-book got slowly to his feet.

  “A trifle depressed, eh, Bigswell?”

  “Well, sir, things aren't turning out any too well. Until I can get hold of Hardy and put him through a bit of third degree I'm, more or less, at a standstill.”

  He explained briefly the results of the day's investigations—the collapse of Mrs. Mullion's evidence and the discovery of the initialled revolver.

  “So you can see what I'm up against, sir. With Cowper and that poacher fellow struck off the list, I'm left with Ronald Hardy. But since Hardy's revolver has been found in the ditch, fully loaded and with the barrel unfouled, I'm damned if I quite see how he enters into the business now!”

  “You don't think it was a plant?”

  “The revolver, sir? But why?”

  “Misleading clue. He might have initialled the revolver specially for the occasion, removed the spent cartridges after the murder, reloaded it and cleaned the barrel.”

  “Umph! Seems a trifle unlikely somehow. There may be something in it, but I'm still inclined to believe that the Tregarthan girl did have a revolver in her hand when Mrs. Mullion saw her.”

  “And perjured herself at the inquest?”

  “Exactly.”

  “But why?”

  “Because she wanted to shield Hardy.”

  “Then he must have had two revolvers.”

  “That's just the conclusion I've come to, sir. With one revolver he commits the murder. The second, the initialled one, he previously drops in the ditch, perhaps realising that it would be found by Tom Prattle.”

  “It certainly seems the only explanation,” agreed the Superintendent without much enthusiasm. “By the way—anybody on duty at Greylings to-night? I see Fenner came back with you.”

  “Yes—the local Constable. I saw him before coming over. I've also let Miss Tregarthan know about Cowper. The housekeeper is moving up to the Vicarage this evening, which leaves Grouch in sole charge of Greylings.”

  “Then you'll get in touch with him and corroborate Cowper's statement about the hiding-place of those notes.”

  “I was going to, sir.”

  “Good.”

  “Nothing more, is there, sir?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Right, sir—then I think I'll get home and run over my notes. I may have missed something. You never know.”

  “In my opinion,” said the Superintendent slowly, “an arm-chair review of a case is often far more profitable than any number of enquiries and cross-examinations. You get a better perspective. More wood. Fewer trees. You agree, Bigswell? Good night!”

  CHAPTER XVI

  THE VICAR MAKES AN EXPERIMENT

  IT was a long time before the Vicar got to sleep after Pendrill's departure that Thursday night. Little scraps of their conversation floated into his mind and started him off on all manner of speculations. He was troubled as to the identity of the person who had written the note. That it was a woman, he did not doubt. The handwriting alone was characteristic enough of the female sex to leave little doubt in his mind on that score. But the initials puzzled him. Although he racked his brains in an effort to recall some woman in the locality whose name would fit the initials M.L. he failed entirely. There were many L.’s in the village and, to his knowledge, three M.L.’s, but not one of them could possibly be identified with the sender of the note.

  With regard to the scattered shots, he now felt reasonably certain that he had found an explanation and it was his intention to put his theory to the test the very next morning. It would mean an interview with the Inspector because the experiment which he was desirous of making necessitated his entry into Greylings.

  Next morning, therefore, he rose early and breakfasted alone before the womenfolk showed up. Then donning his inevitable shooting-hat and selecting a stout ash stick from the luxuriant spray in the umbrella-stand, he set out for the village. There he made his way to the Boscawen General Stores, which purveyed everything from hams to hair-pins, and bought a large ball of string. With this purchase under his arm he returned along the cliff-path to Greylings. There he found the Inspector in conversation with Grouch. Bigswell greeted him cheerily.

  “Good morning, sir. You're the very man I was coming to see.” He slapped a wad of notes on to the table. “Firstly about those. Cowper made a full confession when we got him over at Greystoke last night. He'd hidden the stuff in the garden wall. It's all there, Mr. Dodd. Thirty-eight pounds.”

  The Vicar beamed genially.

  “I must congratulate you, Inspector, on your astuteness. Do you wish me to hand over the money to Miss Tregarthan?”

  “If you will. And there's another point. With Miss Tregarthan's permission, now that the Cowpers are no longer here, I should like to lock up the house for the time being. I don't want things touched and it's a waste of the Constable's valuable time for him to remain on duty. Do you think she'll raise any objection to the idea, sir?”

  “Oh, dear, no—none whatever. I'm quite sure of it. In fact I'll take the full responsibility for giving you her permission, here and now, if you wish.”

  “Well, Mr. Dodd, it would save time.”

  “Then perhaps I could lock up the house for you and return the keys to Miss Tregarthan?”

  The Inspector readily agreed to this plan and, after he and Grouch had made a tour of the windows to see that all was secure, they climbed into the police car and drove off in the direction of the village.

  The Vicar was elated. So far so good. He was now in a position to carry on with his experiment without fear of censure or further interruption. If the Inspector should return he could always put forward the excuse that he was making a final examination of Tregarthan's papers. Humming a little tune he unwrapped his parcel and without delay proceeded to work.

  He first reascertained the exact spots where the two bullets, which had missed Tregarthan, had buried themselves in the wall opposite the french windows. The picture of the windjammer had now been taken down, so that the first of the bullet holes was clearly visible about two feet below the ceiling. Taking a large drawing-pin from a box in his pocket, the Vicar pinned the loose end of the twine exactly into the hole. He then unwound about forty feet of the string from the ball and cut it off with a penknife. A second and equal length he then securely drawing-pinned to the second hole in the wall—in this case only an inch or so below the ceiling. Testing his handiwork by pulling lightly on the two strings, he reinforced the single drawing-pin with one or two more and then, satisfied that they would hold, he led the two strings across to the french window. There he threaded the loose ends through the two starr
ed holes in the glass, corresponding to the two holes in the wall.

  His next action was to place a chair opposite the glass-paned door at the approximate spot where Tregarthan must have been standing when the fatal bullet entered his brain. To the back of this chair he lashed his walking-stick, so that it projected considerably above the top of it. Tregarthan's height he calculated at a little under six feet and, seeing that he was possessed of a high forehead, he drew out a tape-measure from his pocket and marked out a spot on the walking-stick about five feet nine inches from the ground. Round this point he tied a third length of string and threaded it through the bullet-hole in the glass door.

  All this the Vicar did with extreme deftness, completely absorbed in his curious task. He realised, not without a thrill of expectation, that the results of his experiment might lead him on to a new and definite conclusion about the murder. Should this line of investigation meet with success, he felt certain that the fresh evidence accruing from it would be sufficient to convince the Inspector that both Ruth and Ronald were innocent of the crime.

  Leaving the sitting-room, he crossed through the kitchen into the scullery, where in one corner he found a tall bundle of faggots. From this he selected three fairly thick stakes, which he pointed with his penknife. A further search revealed a serviceable coal-hammer. Armed with this and the three sharpened poles he returned to the sitting-room, unlocked the door of the french windows and went out into the garden.

  Placing the poles and the hammer on the cliff-path, he returned to the window and one by one led the strings across the lawn and over the seaward wall. Then, with surprising alacrity for one so tubby, he vaulted the wall and with trembling hands, immensely keyed-up and excited, he took up the middle string and pulled it taut.

  Over this part of the business the Vicar exercised abnormal care. He had to make quite certain that the tautened string was at no point touching the splintered rim of the bullet-hole in the window. The slightest deviation and the true line of the bullet's flight would be falsely estimated. Satisfied, at length, that he had hit upon the exact point from which the bullet was fired, he drove in the first of the stakes. It was no easy matter, since the stake was a good seven feet high, but by balancing himself on the wall he eventually succeeded in driving the pole into the ground. Then, once more making an exact and delicate adjustment of the middle string, he tied it to the stick.

  Fifteen minutes later, the three stakes with their corresponding strings were in position.

  Instantly the Vicar realised that his experiment had succeeded far beyond his most sanguine hopes. He was elated beyond measure. There was no atom of doubt left in his mind, then, that the theory which he had evolved to explain away the scattered shots was the right one. The only one in fact. The Inspector was wrong. Neither Ruth nor Ronald could have shot Tregarthan. It was out of the question.

  Suppose that Tregarthan had been murdered from the cliff-path. It seemed reasonable to affirm that the murderer had fired the three shots in quick succession, whilst standing at one particular spot. This being so, the three strings, corresponding to the line of flight of the three bullets, should converge, more or less, at one point. One stake, in fact, should have been sufficient to accommodate all three strings. But this was by no means the case. A good six feet separated the outer poles from the centre one. In other words, the three bullets had been fired from three entirely different spots. But why? Surely, when speed of execution was all-important, once the criminal had lifted his revolver and taken aim, he would discharge the three shots in rapid succession? He would not fire his first shot, walk six feet or so along the path, fire again, walk on and fire a third time. The idea was illogical.

  This was the first factor in the Vicar's startling discovery.

  The second factor was even more startling and even less explicable, if the murderer had shot Tregarthan from the cliff-path. The strings terminated, not at eye-level as one would expect, but at a point nearly seven feet from the ground. This meant, then, that the criminal had not only walked along the path discharging the three shots at intervals, but, at the same time, he had held the revolver in an impossible position high above his head and fired accordingly. Even if one accepted the possibility of the first factor it was inconceivable that one could accept the second. No man, however excited, however nervous and fearful, would attempt to murder a man by shooting him, without taking some sort of aim.

  What, then, was the conclusion the Vicar arrived at by result of his experiment? Simply that Tregarthan had not been shot from the cliff-path.

  But the Vicar was prepared to go further than this. He was prepared to accept the fact, with absolute certainty, that Tregarthan had not been shot by any man on land at all. He knew, then, that his suspicions were correct. His theory held water.

  Tregarthan had been shot from the sea!

  In his moment of triumph the Vicar had no doubts about this. A small boat fairly close in under the cliff—what simpler explanation for the scattered shots? A man in a rocking boat would have the greatest difficulty in taking accurate aim. There was, at all times of the day, a strong current sweeping round the head of the ness. The boat would not only rock, but drift. Wasn't that drift indicated by the fact that the three shots had been fired from three different points? It was a more than feasible theory.

  The Vicar triumphed.

  If the shots were fired from the sea, according to the evidence collected by the Inspector, neither Ruth nor Ronald Hardy could now be incriminated. Their alibis were perfect. Ruth was seen on the cliff-path by Mrs. Mullion. Ronald was seen by Bedruthen in his car up on the Vicarage road. The only possible landing-places along that line of coast were Towan Cove and the cove at Boscawen itself. It would have been impossible for Ronald to have left Cove Cottage at 8.40 (on evidence supplied by Mrs. Peewit), driven his car down to the cove, boarded a boat, pulled out to the ness, shot Tregarthan, pulled back to the cove and be seen on the Vicarage road at nine o'clock. No—if his theory was correct—the reason for Ronald's sudden disappearance had nothing to do with the murder.

  Other facts emerged. The strange lack of footprints on the cliff-path, for example. Now it was obvious. The murderer had evolved a foresighted scheme in which footprints were non-existent.

  What to do then?—the Vicar wondered. Might it not be a good scheme to walk along to Towan Cove and borrow Joe Burdon's boat. He could then row along under the cliff and put his new-found theory to the acid test. If, at a short distance from the land, the low cliff did not intervene between the boat and the french windows, it was pretty well certain that this was the method of approach adopted by the murderer.

  Leaving his strings in position, since they would aid him in his immediate project, he returned with a brisk step to fetch his hat from the sitting-room. Entering the hall, however, much to his confusion and annoyance, the front door was flung open and Inspector Bigswell entered.

  “Still here, Mr. Dodd?”

  “Yes ... yes,” stammered the Vicar. “Still here. A little matter I had to clear up, Inspector. A ... private matter.”

  The Inspector crossed into the sitting-room. His voice rang out sharply.

  “In the name of heaven, Mr. Dodd, what the thunder's all this?”

  Realising that the cat was hopelessly out of the bag, feeling rather like a small boy caught in some nefarious act, the Vicar offered a hasty explanation. The Inspector listened in profound silence. At first he was sceptical, but when the Vicar came to the point of elucidating the discrepancies between the supposed and actual flight of the three bullets, the Inspector sprang to his feet and whistled.

  “I believe you've hit on a valuable clue, sir! Can't think why the idea didn't occur to me. Here, let's go down to the cliff-path. This is going to mean something, if I'm not mistaken! Something pretty conclusive, Mr. Dodd.”

  With long, eager strides the Inspector crossed the little lawn and vaulted the wall. The Vicar, secretly enjoying the Inspector's amazement, continued with his explanation.
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  “You see how I mean, Inspector? Those poles are over six feet apart.”

  “Oh, I get it all right!” growled the Inspector. “No doubt about the shots having come from three different points. It beats me! What's your explanation, sir?”

  The Vicar pointed with a solemn look at the glittering spread of the Atlantic.

  “The sea!” exclaimed the Inspector. “A boat!”

  “Exactly.”

  With a diffident air, as if excusing himself for propounding a theory in the face of a professional detective, the Vicar ran over the reasons for his assumption.

  “Well, it seems reasonable enough, Mr. Dodd,” acknowledged the Inspector grudgingly. “If you're right then, of course, it knocks my idea of the Ruth Tregarthan-Ronald Hardy collaboration on the head. But wait a minute. Not too fast! You said just now that no man in his senses would fire a revolver, holding it at an arm's length above his head. Quite right, sir! He wouldn't. But suppose our man was not on the cliff-path but on the wall—what then, eh?”

  “On the wall?”

  The Inspector rapidly unfolded his idea about the hurdles, the possibility that Hardy had climbed along the wall and dropped his revolver by accident on to the cliff-path.

  “What then? The eye-level is about right if a man was kneeling up on the wall, isn't it? And besides, what about the revolver? Oh, I know Mrs. Mullion's evidence was turned down by the Coroner—but I have an idea that Miss Tregarthan was not telling the truth.”

  “But that would be perjury, Inspector!”

  The Inspector grinned.

  “It's not unknown. Young ladies wishing to shield their young men commit perjury—I was going to say—as a matter of course. There's another point which makes me believe that the girl wasn't telling the truth. The broken impression of a revolver. I found it midway along the path here.” The Inspector crouched down and examined the drying mud. “You've just about hammered your darned stick right through the centre of it! But it was there right enough. You can take my word for it. I verified the measurements after the inquest and they tallied. A Webley .45. How are you going to account for that, Mr. Dodd?”