The Monday Theory

by Douglas Clark

  As Helga went off to sort out this unaccustomed transaction, Brice asked: “What’s this chap done? Or oughtn’t I to ask?”

  “Nothing,” replied Masters and bit into his bun.

  “Nothing?” Brice looked at Reed in amazement. “Nothing?”

  “He’s a witness,” said Reed. “To a very serious crime. We had to check his evidence.”

  “That’s all right then. I’m glad the Inn doesn’t figure in it, whatever it is.”

  *

  Following the instructions given earlier by the Chichester police, Berger drove straight to Climping and then westwards along a stony track for almost a mile. There was no chance of missing the cottage. It was the only building in sight.

  “Lonely,” grunted Green. “Away from the crowds of visitors and day trippers. What’s it been?”

  “Farmhouse, perhaps,” suggested Masters. “It doesn’t look like a labourer’s cottage. They may call it a cottage, but it looks like a very substantial dwelling to me.”

  The fields round about were plough. A whitish-greyish soil that had been turned over for winter sowing or weathering according to what the crop was to be. But the earth didn’t seem to have the strength of wholesome soil that holds the pattern of the plough for weeks, much as good thick cream will hold the pattern of a whisk. Too friable or sandy or chalky, Masters supposed. He couldn’t decide which. He was no farmer and an unskilled gardener. Wanda kept the plants in their little home garden, and most of her soil came in bags—peat and potting compost. Masters, still somewhat depressed, realized he suddenly felt sad he had never really learned much about nature, despite his academic knowledge of the biological sciences. Out here, in the autumn afternoon, he sensed the yawning gap between his knowledge and practical experience. The loneliness around the building seemed to be drawing him nearer to Mother Earth. He wondered about it with a kind of silent, melancholy philosophy. How near to Mother Earth was truth? How near to truth would he get at this isolated house?

  A black Rover saloon was drawn up at the front gate of the house, which was neighboured by a pair of tarred, weather-beaten sheds which stood like gatehouses to the property. Behind them was a still pleasant garden with passable lawn about fifty feet square—presumably the one on which Rhoda and Heddle had sunbathed. There was a border of shrubs to the east, four or five gnarled apple trees still bearing some fruit, while windfalls dotted both the grass and the garden path. The deadening stalks of perennials stood up among chrysanthemums bearing small, old blossoms.

  “Robson,” said the Chichester DI, introducing himself. “And DS Middleton. I was glad when you said you’d come today, sir.”

  “Why?”

  “Why, sir?”

  Masters grinned. “Yes, why today particularly?”

  He was aware that Robson and Middleton were staring at him in amazement. They obviously thought his question bizarre, if not stupid. The first question from a senior detective investigating a serious crime. “Why are you glad I’ve come this afternoon?” Bathos! He stood waiting for a reply looking quizzically at Robson with such an intensity of expectation that the DI, suspecting there must be more reason for the question than first appeared, stopped to think before answering.

  “I don’t like the feel of this place,” he managed at length.

  “Ah! Not just pleasure at handing over the case?”

  “I’m not really handing it over. I’m to work with you.”

  Masters nodded. “I’m pleased to hear your answer. I felt spooky myself. If you feel it, too, I know it’s not just me being fanciful. Can we go in?”

  Robson led the way through the open front door and into the large room on the left of the hall. Masters looked about him, hands in the pockets of his overcoat.

  “What’s it called?”

  “Abbot’s Hall.”

  “Hall? Not cottage?”

  “Abbot’s Hall, sir.”

  “It’s got a history, I suppose?”

  The Chichester man nodded. “Look at the windows, sir. Four-inch oak. Look at this floor.”

  It was of red brick, and though evenly laid, the whole area of it dipped, saucer-like, from the walls to the middle. The Carvells had covered it with a number of rush mats, with a conventional hearthrug in front of the wide fireplace. A half-burnt log, over a yard long, sat across the top of the wrought iron fire-basket from which the ash had fallen as the fire died;

  “Abbot’s?” asked Green. “Sounds religious.”

  “Some old boy from the Abbey which used to be round here is said to have built it as a love-nest about four hundred years ago. The story had it he installed women here—fallen women—under the pretence he was trying to make them see the error of their ways and to restore them as good citizens.”

  Green grunted. “Whereas, in reality, what he was doing was giving them food and lodging in return for the favours he wasn’t allowed to enjoy in the Abbey?”

  “That’s why it’s so isolated,” admitted Robson. “It became a farm later on, and remained so until about six or seven years ago when the Carvells bought it. The house and land were sold separately.”

  “You’ve been doing your homework,” said Masters approvingly.

  “We thought you’d like to know the score, sir.”

  “You never spoke a truer word, son,” said Green. “I was only telling these two lads of ours an hour ago that his nibs likes to get the feeling of a case. The texture if you like. All the background detail. It affects the way he thinks.”

  “That’s what my boss said.”

  “Then your boss is a wise bloke. Have a fag.” Green drew out his usual battered packet of Kensitas and offered it to the DI.

  Masters was wandering round the room. It was a large apartment, with windows piercing the stone walls at both ends. The frames Robson had mentioned may have been original, but the windows themselves were modern. He tried one. It opened outwards very easily on its stretcher bar. He remembered that Rhoda Carvell had enjoyed the reputation of being a fresh-air fiend. He supposed he should have expected her windows to open easily.

  “Nice furniture,” said Reed who had recently become interested in antiques.

  “It all looks like old second-hand stuff to me,” said Sergeant Middleton who hitherto had found little to say. “Junk picked up for a seaside cottage.”

  “Pay no attention to him,” said Robson. “He wouldn’t know the difference between Hepplewhite and kitchen units you buy in packs to put together yourself.”

  Masters turned and said to Middleton: “You’re not interested in material things, like good bits of furniture?”

  “They don’t help with a case like this, sir, do they? I mean whether that glass-fronted cupboard was made two hundred years ago or last month is neither here nor there when you’re looking for a murderer.”

  “You’ve said the wrong thing, chum,” said Reed.

  “Have I? How? Why? New or old, we can still dust it for prints if that’s what we have to do.”

  “You’re interested in people rather than things, Sergeant? Is that it?” asked Masters mildly.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I have no quarrel with that except . . .”

  “Except what, sir?” asked Middleton.

  “You can’t separate the two. You heard Sergeant Reed say that this furniture is nice, meaning that it is all probably quite old and valuable.”

  “I’ll take his word for it, sir, not knowing anything about it myself.”

  “But surely the fact that the Carvells had good taste, and indulged it here, tells you something about them as people. Doesn’t it?”

  Middleton scratched his head. “I don’t know what you’re getting at, sir.” He looked around at the faces of the other four detectives as if seeking help. He got none, but Green said: “Just keep on listening, son.”

  “Reed’s observation about the furniture and my own nosing about the room have cleared up a very important point for me, Sergeant. I’ll explain, so as not to leave you too mystifie
d. People who like good furniture usually look after it and the comfort of the house in which they install it. Agreed?”

  “It sounds logical, sir.”

  “The Cai veils have put new windows into the old original frames either because the former ones were rotten or because they were ill-fitting. I favour the latter reason. Why will become obvious in a moment.

  “Ill-fitting windows would definitely detract from the comfort of a lonely house only two or three hundred yards from the sea. On-shore gales would make a place such as this almost uninhabitable if the windows let in draughts. And the same goes for doors. But doors don’t rot, so if they have been replaced, it must have been because they were ill-fitting.

  “In a fireplace like this one, you could build a fire big enough to roast an ox, but if the room door wasn’t snug in its frame, you’d get scorched in front and frozen at the back. Now come and look at the door.”

  “It’s new, sir,” admitted Middleton.

  “Quite so. Not only is the door new, but so is the frame. See how the edge of the door itself is chamfered to fit snug. The frame is of modern design.” Masters indicated the strips of sponge-loaded green felt, an inch and a half wide, let in all round, and drew their attention to the new threshold of four-inch, chamfered oak. “When this door is closed and the catch is in position, the room would be almost hermetically sealed if it weren’t for the chimney.” Masters turned to Robson. “Have they put doors like this in all the rooms?”

  “Everywhere. It must have cost a bomb.”

  “Upstairs? In the bedrooms?”

  “Everywhere, sir.” Robson sounded slightly irritated that he had to repeat himself.

  “As I thought.” Masters turned again to Middleton. “Now to get to the point or moral of my lecture. This morning when I interviewed the young man who discovered these bodies, a chap called Heddle, I was inclined to believe his story except for the fact that there was one point in it that didn’t ring true. So I decided that if one bit sounded distinctly off, all the rest could be a tissue of lies.”

  “Understandable, sir.”

  “So I set out to test Heddle’s story. On the way down here we stopped to check events at the restaurant where he said he had supper last evening. That part of his account was true—vouched for by the manager and a waitress. But there remained the doubtful point I mentioned a moment ago.”

  “Sir?”

  “Now I’ve cleared it up. Would you like to know what it was?”

  “Yes, I would sir. You’ve been nowhere except this room. Spoken to nobody except us about pieces of furniture . . .”

  “And consequently doors and windows.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Young Mr Heddle told me that when he came into the house last night all he got was what he called a rotten, fusty smell down here. Now that seemed wrong to me, because the stink of death after corpses have lain unattended for some time would pervade an ordinary house. There would be no mistaking it. But Heddle said he suspected nothing wrong until he opened the bedroom door and got the full blast of it. But it appears that he didn’t dream up that account. It was true, because the doors are so well fitting. Now, Sergeant, if a witness told you something that sounds patently wrong but which subsequently turned out to be true, what would be your reaction?”

  “I reckon I could risk believing everything he had told me, sir.”

  “Fine. I don’t think I need waste any more time on checking Mr Heddle’s statement. At least for the time being. So we are free to push ahead with other things.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “So don’t despise Hepplewhite, lad,” said Green.

  “The stench is hanging about down here now,” said Berger. “It shows that once the bedroom door was opened . . .”

  “We’ve had enough lectures for today, son,” said Green. “Hand over one of your fags. Oh, and have one yourself. The more of us who smoke, the less of that pong there will be.”

  Masters led the way upstairs. He went slowly, as if so deep in thought that his brain had no spare capacity for directing his feet. The three sergeants followed. Robson, hanging back to talk to Green, whispered: “Your guv’nor sounds a bit of a charlatan to me.”

  “Oh, yes?”

  “Anybody could have guessed that if the doors fit well the stench wouldn’t percolate out of the room. All that rubbish about old furniture leading him to conclusions was so much eyewash.”

  “Was it?” asked Green blandly.

  “You don’t think so?”

  “Well, I didn’t pick the hole in Heddle’s story, and I didn’t inspect the doors to check it, so what his nibs sussed out of it all seems fair enough to me. But perhaps I’m old-fashioned.”

  “Look at him now. He looks to me as if he couldn’t move fast enough to catch cold—either mentally or physically—let alone solve a baffling case of double murder.”

  “Have you decided who did it, chum?”

  “Of course I bloody-well haven’t.”

  “Then why criticize him?”

  “He’s supposed to be the greatest. I’m not.”

  “I get you. You’re not the most expert of jacks, but you can see enough of what’s going on to know he’s not going to succeed?”

  “I can see enough of what’s not going on.”

  “We’ll have to wait and see then, won’t we?”

  They followed up the stairs.

  “This the room?” asked Masters.

  “That’s it.”

  Masters opened the door and entered.

  “Have you touched the windows, Mr Robson?”

  “No. They were closed when we came.”

  “Mrs Carvell was a fresh-air fiend.”

  “So she may have been, but there was no fresh air in here.”

  Masters turned to Middleton. “What was the weather like a week ago?”

  “Round here, sir?”

  “We’re not talking about Ashby-de-la-Zouch, lad,” said Green.

  “A week ago!” The sergeant looked at his DI. “There was a southerly gale, wasn’t there?”

  “High winds, at any rate. They lasted for several days. But why a week ago, sir?”

  Masters mused for a moment and then turned to Middleton. “Go to the phone and get to know exactly. From the Coast Guard people. From five to seven days ago, please.”

  Middleton went. Robson stood quiet until Masters addressed him. “Putrefaction,” he said laconically.

  “What?”

  “The decomposition of organic matter under the influence of micro-organisms, accompanied by the development of disagreeable odours.” He still looked at Robson. “That’s a quotation from the Police Pathology Manual—if you hadn’t already guessed.”

  “I still don’t see . . .”

  “Have you had the medical report yet?”

  “Only the verbal while they were here.”

  “They? Police Surgeon and pathologist?”

  Robson nodded. “They told us that they suspected arsine straight away and that’s really all we’ve had.”

  “Did they say why they suspected arsine?”

  “The pathologist said that apart from all the other stinks in the room there was a strong smell of garlic.”

  “What else did they say?”

  “The pathologist said that most arsenical vapours smell like a Spaniard’s breath after Sunday dinner. That’s exactly how he put it, and said that’s why he suspected arsine.”

  “Then what?”

  “He said he’d had some experience of non-fatal bouts of arsine poisoning. He gave our police surgeon a lecture on how the use of arsenical agricultural preparations constitutes a constant hazard, not only to the farmer, but to the consumer. Evidently agricultural workers can get arsine poisoning from dust or sprays or whatever they use to keep down weeds and pests.”

  “Did they examine the eyes closely?”

  “Yes, they did now you come to mention it. The path bloke said one of the things he looks for in these cases is . . . er .
. .”

  “Oedema?”

  “That’s it. I’d forgotten the word for a moment. Oedema in the eyelids, particularly the bottom ones.”

  “He suggested that oedema round the eyes was one of the obvious signs of arsine poisoning?”

  “So he said. They both looked at the eyes on both the bodies and nodded to each other. Definite signs of fluid swelling one of them called it. So the pathologist turned to me and said, ‘Off the top, DI, we suspect arsine. But don’t take it for granted, because neither of them appears to have vomited, which seems a bit strange when there’s any form of arsenic involved.’”

  “Anything else?”

  “He said the post-mortem would take a long time because with arsine it can be quite difficult to make a diagnosis without their histories and with apparently so few symptoms.”

  “No hint as to how long they’d been dead?”

  “I asked, naturally. But they merely said more than forty-eight hours. Too difficult to say with any accuracy beyond that until after the p.m.”

  “So,” said Masters, “putrefaction.”

  “You’re back on that again, sir. Why?”

  “Don’t buy it, lad,” said Green.

  Robson replied: “I want to know what’s going on. And that includes what people are thinking about.”

  “Very well,” said Masters, his hands still in the pockets of his overcoat. “It’s autumn. It’s not hot weather. Yet the bodies were stinking. In your experience, how long does it take for corpses to smell?”

  “Several days, I suppose. Funerals aren’t held for three or four days usually.”

  “They would be if there was any chance of decomposition being so far advanced in that time as to be unpleasant. Ignoring any form of embalming or cold storage, that is. So though the pathologist won’t be more precise, I’m guessing they’ve been here a week, or the best part of a week. If Middleton tells me there were gales a week ago, that will tie in, because otherwise Mrs Carvell would have had her windows open when she went to bed.”

  “Logical,” agreed Green. “Closed windows, airtight door, no fireplace and death by gassing. Just what the old suicides tried to achieve when they gassed themselves.”

  “But where does it get us?” demanded Middleton.