“You would not think of any of your colleagues, while in his right mind, as remotely likely to murder?”
“Certainly I would not think anything of the sort – spontaneously.”
“Only on proof?” Sitting nibbling Titlow’s biscuits and drinking Titlow’s whisky, Appleby felt he could get no nearer direct inquisition than this.
And Titlow’s response was enigmatic. “What is proof?”
III
Appleby rose. Of all this there must be more on the morrow, or rather later this same day. Meantime it would be discreet to withdraw from a slightly uncomfortable position. But Titlow had something further to say. His restlessness, the characteristic nervous agitation which had expressed itself in his earlier talk, and which he had by some great effort controlled later, was back again now in full possession of the man. He had paced across the room; now he turned round with a new and tempestuous gesture, as if to say some conclusive, some final thing. But for a moment he seemed to seek delay on a minor theme.
“Who could have told, Mr Appleby, that you would come amongst us? Not one of us would have believed there was such a person – outside Gott’s nonsense… Tell me, when were you here before?”
Appleby answered the unexpected question with some reluctance, but truthfully. “Eight years ago.”
“Exactly – obviously! A good head that has had the right training – of course one knows it anywhere. But talk of erratic conduct…! What of erratic walks of life? From our angle, you know, you yourself are the oddest thing in the case.”
“You mean,” said Appleby, remembering a facetious remark of Dodd’s, “that you expected Gott’s other stock figure, the village policeman?”
“I say we should not have been inclined to count–” and suddenly Titlow was off on another tack. “Did you ever read De Quincey’s Murder considered as one of the Fine Arts?”
This was not the aimless belletristic habit which had prompted the venerable Professor Curtis to discourse on The Purloined Letter. Titlow meant something – was indeed poised again to take his plunge. But for a moment he wavered anew from the issue. “Rather in your line. But poor stuff really – much slack erudition on a thread of feeble humour…” And then he said what he had to say. “It records an anecdote about Kant. You would find that interesting, if only because it deals with an academic attitude to murder. And if you turned it upside down it might even be illuminating.”
Appleby smiled. “Thank you. I will look it up with all speed.” He moved to the door. And when Titlow spoke again it was easily, benignantly, as when he had first invited Appleby to his rooms.
“Well, you ought certainly to be in bed. You can get three or four good hours – and so perhaps can I. Put a notice on your door and the servant won’t disturb you.”
Easy, benignant again – but with a difference. Titlow was easy now. It was as if, in giving some hint or pointer through De Quincey’s essays, he had reached a position, or come to a decision on which he could rest. He moved to the door with his guest.
“Later – we shall see,” said Titlow. He gave his agitated little gesture – by way of farewell this time – and turned back into his rooms. Appleby went slowly downstairs. Through the orchard was seeping the first glimmer of dawn.
7
Inspector Dodd walked down Schools Street in stolid satisfaction. The business of the burglaries was going well. In his pocket nestled a sheaf of notes for his London colleague that witnessed to the efficiency of his department. The morning was cold but pleasant, with gleams of sunshine filtering down the street, gilding St Baldred’s tower, playing hide and seek in the odd little temples in front of Cudworth, exploring the dusty intricacies of the ornate and incongruous portals of the Museum, straying across the way to Ridley in an effort to brighten up the heavy-featured effigies of Jacobean divines. A group of undergraduates passed in riding-kit: a solitary and exquisite youth, in the most beautiful scarlet slippers, was crossing the street with the evident purpose of breakfasting with a friend in Joseph’s; occasionally a female student, capped and gowned, bicycled hurriedly past in that zealous pursuit of early morning instruction proper to her kind. A small boy was sitting innocently on the doorstep of the Warden of Dorset, selling an occasional newspaper to unenthusiastic purchasers. No one could have guessed that the same boy had been dashing wildly up and down Schools Street the evening before, waving the Evening Standard and bawling of the death of Dr Umpleby… The Master of St Timothy’s, venerable, bearded and magnificent, swept down the street on his morning perambulation as he had done every morning these forty years – plainly untroubled either by the decease of his colleague or by the reflection that St Timothy’s rather than St Anthony’s might have been the seat of the crime. It suddenly occurred to Dodd to rejoice that he was not a policeman in Chicago or Sydney or Cardiff. Praising heaven for his lot, he turned down St Ernulphus Lane.
Mr Appleby was to be found in Six-four. Meditating on this unorthodox way of conducting police investigation, Dodd found Six – which was a staircase – passed Six-two with its unacceptable announcement, “The Rev. the Hon. Tracy Deighton-Clerk: Dean,” found Appleby’s temporary quarters and knocked loudly. There was no reply, so Dodd walked in. A big fire was burning ruddily. Appleby’s table was laid for breakfast; Appleby’s coffee was keeping warm on the one side of the fire; a covered dish that was certainly Appleby’s bacon and eggs was keeping warm on the other. But of Appleby himself there was no sign – until Dodd’s eye lighted on a sheet of paper pinned to the inner door. Its message was short and to the point: “Breakfast at nine – J. A.” Dodd looked at his watch. It was just nine-ten. “Well I’m damned!” said Dodd, and was just about to penetrate into the bedroom when Appleby emerged.
“Morning, Dodd,” he said. “Have some coffee? I expect there’s plenty, and fairly warm still.” And then, noticing his colleague’s doubtful glance at his still-bandaged head, he chuckled. “Yes, I’ve been in a rough house all right. Nocturnal rioting in St Anthony’s. The police attacked with sandbags, lead pipes and the butt-ends of heavy revolvers… But I think this picturesque touch might come off now.” And Appleby disposed of the bandage before proceeding to fall upon his coffee and bacon and eggs.
Dodd looked at him wonderingly. “You’ve really been knocked out?”
Appleby nodded. “Knocked out, gently but firmly – and on the very verge of solving the St Anthony’s mystery. I’m in disgrace.” He took a large gulp of coffee and nodded again in solemn assurance. “One of your henchmen will be going home this morning with a sadly diminished respect for the conception of the metropolitan sleuth.”
“Who was it attacked you?”
“I don’t know. But he – or perhaps she? – was the possessor of the tenth key. At least he was, and then I was, and then we did a bit of an exchange. I’ve got his tenth and he’s got my ninth, so to speak. He took it from me after hitting me on the head.”
“Took it from you! And where did you take the tenth from?”
“The lock, Dodd; I found it in the lock. Natural place for a key, no doubt.”
Dodd groaned.
“And, by the way, Dodd, Umpleby’s safe has been burgled – very successfully. Not a thing in it now – to interest us.”
Dodd fairly started to his feet. “Burgled? Who in heaven’s name can have done that? Someone in college?”
“I don’t know.”
The local inspector looked at his colleague for a moment with what might have been positive mistrust. “Have you had any light on it – on the whole affair, I mean?”
“Indeed I have. Lots. Light comes flooding in from every angle – far too much light, from far too many angles. And I’m quite sure you’ve brought another surplus of it yourself…”
“I’ve got something,” responded Dodd. “But in a general way I’d like to be hearing what has happened. If you’ve got time, that is.” And he glanced with a sort of humorous severity at his watch and at the notice on the bedroom door. His admiration for Appleb
y was increasing rapidly. If he himself had lost that key he could never have contrived this air about it all. And Appleby, he felt, was doing something more than simply carrying the matter off: he was showing a quite natural and unforced faith in himself. He could be hit on the head and still remain in control of the situation – or so it seemed. If Dodd were hit on the head he would be hot and angry for days afterwards.
“Very well,” Appleby was saying. “Here is an abstract of what has turned up.
“First, your friend the Honourable and Reverend Tracy is in a stew. But whether he’s simply worried about the reputation of the college, or whether he’s worried somehow on his own account, I don’t know. St Anthony’s is due to come into the limelight in the near future, and he seems to have got his worries mixed up with that.
“Secondly, I know where the bones come from–”
Dodd sat up straight. “Where?”
“Australia, my dear Dodd. Earth’s last-found jewel. Terris magna Australis incognita.”
Dodd looked bewildered. “You’re sure they don’t come from Athens or Sparta?” he asked sarcastically, “same as the Deipno-what-was-its in Umpleby’s library?”
“The bones were abstracted from Australia – by no irrational ferrety, as Sir Thomas says. They were snatched from the pious care of an aboriginal posterity to gratify the scientific proclivities of one Johnnie Haveland.”
“Haveland! They’re his?”
“They’re his. And he was suitably apologetic about refraining from explanations when you were making inquiries yesterday. Apparently Johnnie kept the skulls and what-not in his own little toy-cupboard – and now they’re in Umpleby’s study. He invites us to consider two possibilities about the murder. One, that he did it himself and left the bones as a sort of signature; two, that somebody has tried to frame him. And he as good as invited his learned friends to explain to me that there had been a time some years ago when he wasn’t quite sound in the head. He seemed to think that would fit in with either possibility… Oh! and he wasn’t very nice about Empson.
“Thirdly, in the matter of keys, submarines and scaling ladders. St Anthony’s turns out to harbour a man who is likely to make the summit of Mount Everest one day – and who has already made the summit of St Baldred’s tower in this city. That’s Campbell – and I hope you have a little information about him in your pocket at this moment.
“Fourthly, President Umpleby was not beloved. Johnnie Haveland alleges that Umpleby stole from him in a learned way. And that, when you consider it, is more excessively unlikely than any number of murders – nevertheless, it undoubtedly struck some chord in the assembled confraternity.
“Fifthly, Umpleby’s safe, as I’ve told you, has been opened by one X – who incidentally knew the combination. X had the tenth key. He came either from Little Fellows’ or through the wicket from outside. X is erratic but brilliant. He left the west gate open behind him, apparently because it squeaked – an error of judgment. He left the key in the lock – a piece of colossal carelessness.”
“But,” Dodd interrupted, “why should he come through the gate into the main body of the college at all?”
Appleby shook his head. “After his successful burglary perhaps he wanted a little chat with somebody in the other courts. As I say, he is erratic – and brilliant. He found himself trapped when he came to get back – and he got out of the trap ruthlessly, effectively and without losing his head and hitting too hard.” And Appleby stroked his own skull tenderly.
“Sixthly, under the prosaically named Giles Gott, at this time Junior Proctor in the university, is shadowed no less a person than Gilbert Pentreith.”
Dodd fairly leaped. “And I never knew that!”
“Yes. He sits over there in Surrey giving his spare time to imagining just such pretty affairs as this. I told you there was a great deal of light flooding in.
“Seventh, Mr Raymond Pownall, an eminent ancient historian, spends his nights crawling about the floor of his room in a panic.
“Eighth – and, for the moment, lastly – Samuel Still Titlow lures honest policemen into his apartments, bemuses them with large and convincing talk of the end of the world, and just thinks better of concluding that the times are so out of joint that St Anthony’s may well be a hot-bed of murder. And he counsels a little reading in the minor English classics. And he drops dark hints about being in at the death.”
“Would you say,” put in Dodd with his sudden shrewdness, “that Titlow, like X, is erratic but brilliant?”
Appleby nodded thoughtfully. “Yes,” he responded, “he is. But it’s just one of his points, I imagine, that that is a habit here. And I rather agree. I hope my next case is in Hull.”
Dodd smiled a slow smile. “You just love this,” he said. And then a sudden thought struck him. “What about traces of the burglar in that study? What about his slipping back to obliterate any later?”
Appleby shook his head. “Your man’s been sitting there all night since I recovered from my knock – I expect he’ll have rung through for a relief by now. There was an interval, of course, after X got back from Orchard Ground, in which he could have gone to the study and cleared up. But I expect he’d pretty well obliterated himself already – even if he is erratic. I had a shot at the cigarette ends and whatnot earlier – and nothing doing. And I don’t much look to find the damning thumbprint on the tenth key either.” The two men were silent for a moment and then Dodd took his papers from his pocket. It was characteristic of Dodd that he always had something on paper ready to produce; he moved in an atmosphere of neat dockets and conscientious documentations. Appleby at the same time produced the notes and statements that had been made over to him the day before. As yet, his study of them had been superficial; direct contact with the personalities they dealt with had been taking up his time.
“Constable Sheepwash,” Dodd began in the peculiarly wooden manner he adopted when cautiously savouring the absurdities and ironies of his profession – “Constable Sheepwash had a bite of supper last night with the Lambricks’ cook. Earlier in the evening the lighting installation failed at the Chalmers-Patons’. Sergeant Potter represented the Electricity Department and after prolonged operations, mostly in the servants’ quarters, the lights went on again. Constable Babbitt, as a Press reporter, failed to make an impression on the Campbell establishment yesterday, but he has done better as a milkman this morning. Station-Sergeant Kellett undertook to trace the movements of the Junior Proctor, Mr Gott, round the places of refreshment and amusement in the city for the material times. Kellett was unable to avoid the purchase of considerable quantities of liquor, but his report is nevertheless substantially coherent.” And Dodd, having had his little joke, became business-like. “How would it be,” he asked, “if you read out the statements as made yesterday and I followed each with my check-up here? That would begin to get us clear, I think, on these four people who were out of college on the night of the murder.”
Appleby nodded his agreement. “We’ll begin with Campbell,” he said. “I see these are not verbatim statements in evidence?”
“No, they’re simply abstracts of preliminary statements got out of these folk in a hurry. I don’t think they could be evidence. I think you will have to take formal statements today. Anyway, we must have some before the coroner fixes the inquest.”
Appleby nodded and began to read:
“Campbell, Ian Auldearn (29). Became a Fellow of the college six years ago; has been married for four years; lives in a flat at 99 Schools Street; has never possessed a key to the St Anthony’s gates. Declares that he has no knowledge whatever likely to elucidate mystery of Umpleby’s death. Was associated with Umpleby in scientific investigation but was never in any sense a personal friend of the President’s.
“9.30. Left college and went home to flat. About half an hour later went out again to the Chillingworth Club in Stonegate.
“11.50. (approx.) Left club for home, but remembered that he had certain business matters to dis
cuss with Sir Theodore Peek, who lives at a house called Berwick Lodge up the Luton Road. Knowing that Sir Theodore keeps late hours he walked out there and arrived just at midnight. He had a brief conversation with Sir Theodore and then walked back to Schools Street, arriving home a few minutes before half-past twelve.”
Appleby had no sooner finished reading than Dodd took up Constable Babbitt’s report as a sort of antiphonal chant:
“Acting on instructions received entered into conversation with Mary Surname Unknown at 99 Schools Street 7.25 a.m. Subsequent to general remarks not necessary to record Informant declared (1) her employers kept fine hours, (2) Mr Campbell came home night before last shortly after 9.30 but went out again about three-quarters of an hour later, (3) she believes she heard him returning long after midnight, (4) he remarked to Mrs Campbell at breakfast next morning that he had looked in on that old gargoyle Peek at midnight and found him in a sleepy, growly state (? a sick dog). No further information elicited.”
Appleby nodded and made a note. “Questions at the club,” he said, “and questions at Sir Theodore’s – the sick dog! The material time was at the club, and it seems to hang together.” And without more ado he turned to his next note.
“Chalmers-Paton, Denis (40). Lecturer at St Anthony’s – also at two other colleges. Married and lives at 12 Angas Avenue. Can make no suggestion on President’s death.
“9.30. Left college and went home. Read The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire aloud to Mrs Chalmers-Paton. Mrs C-P then went to bed.
C-P retired to his study and continued to read D & F of R E until shortly before midnight. He then went to bed too.”
Again Dodd followed with his subordinate’s report. Chalmers-Paton had indeed come home, had read to his wife and had then retired to his study “a little before eleven.” But after that the servants knew nothing, and Sergeant Potter had not been authorized to approach Mrs Chalmers-Paton in any way. He had, however, timed the walk from Angas Avenue to St Anthony’s and made it just twenty minutes. Chalmers-Paton had no car.
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