“Rather, it is something that I do not notice,” Bobby answered, “but I can’t think what. Only I feel that there is something missing that was here before.”
“Try to remember,” Alain urged. “In an affair so difficult as this, so puzzling, with so little to go upon, with so many complications and so few facts, even the smallest observation may have its significance.”
“Yes, I know,” agreed Bobby. “It is all very difficult,” he added vaguely and then said: “Is it permissible to ask when Monsieur Shields left?”
“It is permissible to ask,” replied Alain, “but it is not possible to answer. He has not been seen for several days but no one is quite certain when was the last time. There has not been much occasion for tradesmen to call, and if they came and got no answer they thought no more of it. Monsieur Shields was often out. The woman who cooked and cleaned for him has not been coming recently. She has not always found it easy to get her money, and when Shields paid her last she seems to have made up her mind to give him no more chance of getting into her debt. Ducane has been working in the garden but he has noticed nothing and he made no inquiry. Shields’s movements were no concern of his. It almost seems as if you yourself, monsieur, were the last in the company of the missing man.”
It was said very smoothly, but all the same Bobby did not fail to appreciate the suspicion latent in Alain’s voice.
“ It jolly well looks as if I’m going to be for it,” he thought uncomfortably, and then abruptly there came into his mind a knowledge of what was the trifling change that had been made in the room since he had been here with Shields.
“What is it? You remember something?” Alain asked, noticing the sudden alteration in Bobby’s expression.
“There was a small framed landscape on the wall there,” Bobby explained. “Look, you can see where it hung. Now it has gone.”
He did not himself understand the excitement that thrilled in his voice as he spoke. For a moment it was as though everything had somehow been made clear in one swift flash of revelation, and then once again the curtain fell and he knew no longer what it was that he had almost but not quite understood. Yet that the disappearance of this picture had its own significance he remained convinced, and there was still excitement in his voice as he said:
“It has been removed. Some one has taken it away. Why?”
“Do you mean that it was valuable? Was it Shields’s own work?”
“Yes. It was signed. I noticed that. It couldn’t have been of much value. If it had been valuable, one could understand why it has gone. It was called ‘The Duel’. There were two men with pistols facing each other. Primarily it was a landscape. Shields was fond of putting figures into his landscapes. He thought it added what he called ‘human interest’.”
“Was it any place you recognized?”
“No, nowhere I had ever seen. Somewhere in this neighbourhood, I should say. It looked like that. The drawing was very bad. The two duellists had their pistols pointing yards away from each other. They would have hit a tree in the middle background or thereabouts.” He was silent then, still dimly struggling in the recesses of his mind to understand why all this was of such supreme importance.
“For my part,” said Alain severely, “I do not see how a missing picture concerns us. You say that it was of little value?”
“I doubt if any one would have given ten francs for it,” Bobby answered. “Why did Shields have that special picture framed? There are plenty of other canvasses, as good or better, generally better, lying about unframed.”
“An artist has his whims,” Alain answered. “I do not see that it concerns us why Shields preferred to frame one of his works rather than another. Probably it appealed to him for some reason.”
Bobby made no comment. He did not know himself why there was still struggling for expression in his mind a feeling that the disappearance of the picture had some deep and hidden significance. He did not yet see for that matter how it could have any such significance. He tried to put the idea out of his mind. He said:
“Has Shields’s bicycle been found?”
“The garden and outhouses are being searched,” Alain answered. “There is nothing here apparently. Not even,” he added smilingly, “a small, framed landscape called ‘The Duel’, so we will see if anything of interest has been discovered outside—such as, for example,” he added with another smile, “more half-burned candles, or even a pair of rope ladders.”
He made no objection to Bobby accompanying him. A rapid but very thorough search of the garden and out-buildings had been made without much result so far. One of the searchers reported the discovery of a pile of artificial manure that had apparently been dumped in a heap in an out-of-the-way corner of the garden, between a tree and the garden wall. Some excitement resulted for a time from this discovery; but the stuff when cleared away showed ground beneath plainly undisturbed, and one of the police inspectors remarked that Ducane had expressed dislike and mistrust of all artificial manures, protesting that never would he use them since they did nothing but burn up the ground.
“He was given some and instead of using it he threw it away, most likely,” remarked the inspector. “For my part, I confess I am also a little of the same opinion concerning these products of the factories. At any rate, that he should have thrown it away rather than use it, is of no importance.”
It was in fact difficult to suppose that anything had been concealed, by burial or otherwise, in a garden where Ducane was constantly working and where any disturbance of the ground he would have been sure instantly to notice. Bobby was asked in which shed he had taken shelter and he duly pointed it out. The bicycle was still there, still hidden by the sacks of artificial manure behind which it had been thrust. One of the inspectors got it out and Alain and Clauzel gave it a minute examination.
“Identification will be difficult,” pronounced the juge destruction. “It is like many others. Volny himself might be able to swear to it but hardly his family. It had better be placed in the shop of some dealer with the rest of his stock and then the Volny family can be requested to see if they can tell which it is. If they can, it will be important, but also it will be surprising.”
Bobby thought it a test both severe and fair. He ventured to ask if Shields’s other bicycle had been found and was told it was in the place where, according to Ducane, it was generally kept. He took an opportunity to point, too, to what was left of the bale of binder twine, and to remark that it had almost all been used.
“I am wondering,” he explained, “to what use it can have been put. There must have been miles of it employed for some purpose or another.”
“You ask a good many questions but you do not provide the answers,” Alain remarked, a trifle impatiently.
“Questions are so much easier than answers,” Bobby observed. “For example—those sacks of artificial manure.
“I notice that they seemed to interest you,” Alain said. “Or is it something else? You do not,” he added, again mildly sarcastic, “remark that here also there is a half-burnt candle or that a small framed landscape of the value of ten francs, has disappeared?”
“No,” Bobby answered slowly, “but it is in my mind that when I came in here out of the sun that Sunday afternoon, it was on those sacks that I sat down to rest and smoke a cigarette.”
“And that it concerns our inquiry?” Alain asked. “It concerns us where it was you sat that afternoon to smoke your cigarette?”
“It is only this,” Bobby said, speaking now more confidently for the idea that had been struggling for some time in the recesses of his mind was slowly beginning to shape itself into a theory. “I chose them for a seat because they seemed less dusty than most of the rest of the stuff lying about.”
“Well?”
“It suggests to me that perhaps they were less dusty because recently they had been moved.”
“Evidently it is a reason,” agreed Alain, still mildly impatient. “One even remembers that one of them mu
st have been opened, since a part of its contents has been found thrown away in a pile in the garden.”
“Surely it is unusual to open a sack for the sake of throwing part of its contents away?” Bobby said. “In these cases I do not like the unusual.”
“You have something in your mind?” Alain asked. “There is something you notice?”
“Once more, there is something I do not notice,” Bobby replied. “I do not notice that any of the sacks shows any signs of having lost any part of its contents. To me, they all appear well filled.”
“That is true,” Alain agreed, now staring at the sacks as intently as Bobby himself had been doing. “Yes, that is certainly true.”
“I ask myself,” Bobby said softly, “if when the contents of one of the sacks was removed, something else was placed within.”
Alain looked quickly at Bobby, then again at the sacks piled there so competently, so naturally, so innocently. He went to the door. He called an order, and two of the Sûreté inspectors came hurrying up. Alain gave them brief directions. They began to lift down the sacks and to open them one by one. Those they came to first were evidently as they were when they left the factory. One had as evidently been opened and then refastened. It was dragged out into the middle of the floor and there reopened. Within was the dead, doubled body of Henri Volny, the artificial manure packed closely round it to give the sack containing it the same well-filled undisturbed appearance possessed by the others.
CHAPTER XX
BOBBY THEORISES
There began now just such a scene of busy, purposeful activity as Bobby had so often shared in. Photographs were taken, measurements were made, fingerprints looked for, consultations held, messengers came and went, doctors appeared, presently there arrived a stretcher and the sad relic of humanity just discovered was removed with all that careful respect always shown in France to Death, man’s last hope and refuge.
All the time this was going on, Bobby stood quietly watching, taking a kind of professional interest in the scene and admiring the calm and unhurried efficiency with which everything was accomplished. He had a feeling, too, that neither Alain nor Clauzel, even in the midst of all their busy preoccupations, had forgotten him, and that occasionally their brief consultations had himself for their object. Uncomfortably aware was he, too, that the glances occasionally sent in his direction were still not entirely devoid of doubt or even of suspicion.
Presently preparations were begun for clearing the shed and for putting in position the official seals. Bobby went outside accordingly. He saw Père Trouché at a little distance, the very image of eager and alert attention, giving himself entirely to the recording and the interpretation of every passing sound or other impression he received. Bobby began to understand how it was that the old man, though blind—if blind indeed he were—was yet able to know and to understand so much of what went on around him. Most men have eyes and see little, ears and hear less, nor to most of them does touch mean anything at all. This old man had no eyes perhaps, but to every difficult impression that reached him through the other senses he gave his full attention to wrest from it all its meaning and significance. But to the easy knowledge others gained with little effort, since it was there before their eyes as they were wont to say, they often gave little consideration and less thought. Bobby went to join him and the old man said as he approached:
“Hé, hé, the Englishman again, the Englishman who points out where dead men are hidden.”
“You heard that?” Bobby asked.
“I have ears. By the mercy of God, I am not deaf,” retorted the old man. “I can even hear what is in their thoughts, these good men of the police.”
“What is in their thoughts?” Bobby asked.
“That it is easy for those who hide to find.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it?” said Bobby grimly, and the old beggar chuckled once more.
“That makes you angry and even a little uneasy,” he said. “Above all, you say to yourself: ‘Very good, very good, presently we shall see about that.’”
“You read a lot into what others say,” Bobby remarked. “Does it ever strike you that you may be wrong?”
“I seldom find it so,” the other answered simply. “When I was young perhaps, but not now. One learns in life.” Bobby grunted, and after a time Père Trouché added: “They were going to confront us with Monsieur Shields apparently, but now it seems that will have to wait, for where is Monsieur Shields?”
“A good many would like to know,” Bobby remarked.
“One disappears a little too frequently just now,” Père Trouché said. “The young Volny, but then he has been found. The young Camion also, but of him one knows nothing?”
“Nothing,” Bobby agreed.
“That one does not like for he is a youngster concerning whom it is not safe to prophecy. He needs always an outlet, he looks within always and then—a something gives way and there are happenings.”
“Yes, I think he needs a vent,” Bobby agreed again.
“There was hatred between them, those young men,” Père Trouché went on. “Now one is dead and one has disappeared. It is a thing these good police will not over-look. But then also Monsieur Shields is missing, and Monsieur Williams—but he, Williams, he is in Paris, isn’t he?”
“He was,” Bobby said.
“Difficult to make of it sense that fits,” said the old man. “No wonder you are so puzzled that you scratch your chin.”
“How do you know what I’m doing?” Bobby asked, startled, for indeed he had not known it himself till his companion spoke.
“Psst,” came the contemptuous retort. “Have you shaved so recently that there are no bristles on your chin and I cannot hear your nail scrape on them? Also you are uneasy and even perhaps afraid for your breathing is not as usual. You are longing to do something, you are worried that you have to stand and watch. That is why I hear your foot go: Tap, tap. And you feel that if only these fools of Frenchmen would take you into their confidence, you could help them. That I know because there is in you all the arrogance of the English who always think they can do everything better than any one else.”
“We don’t,” exclaimed Bobby, quite indignant at what he felt a most unjust accusation.
“Hé, you are so sure of it, your superiority, that you do not even know your own certainty. But all this I am aware of only by reasoning, in the same way that I know you are furious because you feel they are idiot enough to doubt your good faith. For that, I have not the plain evidence of my ears, as I have for the rest.”
“It’s a good thing you aren’t deaf as well as blind,” Bobby growled, “or there would be no limit to what you knew.”
Père Trouché considered this thoughtfully.
“No,” he decided, “one must either hear or see. The two, they often cancel out each other so that both are poor and dim, but one or other is needed. And hearing is best, for all men are blind half their lives, in the dark, at night, asleep, but at night, in the dark, asleep, one can still hear—as I hear there is some one coming to you with a message.”
One of the agents of the Sûreté was in fact coming quickly towards them. His quick, purposeful tread explained, Bobby supposed, why Père Trouché guessed he came with a purpose and probably a message. He said:
“Yes, a message, but why for me?”
“Messages are not sent to old blind beggars, they come and go without,” retorted Père Trouché impatiently. “Therefore it is for you.”
The inspector came up and proved the old man right. Monsieur the juge d’instruction would like the privilege of a few words with Monsieur Owen. Bobby obeyed the summons. Alain explained that now it had grown so late and darkness had fallen, further investigation would have to wait till the morning, but he would like to get a full statement from as many concerned as possible, including Monsieur Owen, whose assistance in the discovery of the body of the murdered Volny had been so valuable. But Monsieur Owen was probably needing food, in view of that very
sketchy luncheon taken so long ago. Was it too much to ask that Monsieur Owen should consent to spend the night at Barsac? A room would be found for him in one of the hotels where also he could dine. Later they could have a little talk together, when certain points at present a trifle obscure could be cleared up, no doubt.
All this was put very politely, with an air in fact of requesting a favour, but there was also a very clear impression given that a refusal was not expected.
However, Bobby having no desire to make any objection, agreed readily to accept the guidance of one of the Surety inspectors to the hotel suggested. He said good night to Père Trouché, who had been standing near listening with his usual close attention to what the inspector said.
“Me, too,” he answered Bobby now, “they are keeping under watch and guard. Even, they wanted to find me a room to sleep in, as though on such a night as this one might not as well be in a coffin as within four close walls. It is understood, of course, that one can train oneself to anything, even to sleeping indoors on summer nights. But I did not say ‘no’ to food and wine.”
Bobby and the inspector moved away and the inspector said crossly:
“That old scamp, he has had it three times over—his food and his wine. One of our men gave him both. Afterwards he persuaded another who knew of the order to take him to a pub near. Finally he found yet a third—and that third,” said the inspector ruefully, “it was me—to carry out yet once again the order to provide him with a bottle of wine and a little something to eat. He is a devil, that old man.”
“Must have had a good appetite to get through three meals,” Bobby remarked.
“What he did not eat, he pocketed,” explained the inspector. “Those rags of his, they are all pockets. As for wine, they say he has bottles of wine hidden everywhere in holes and hollow trees.”
They arrived at the hotel arranged for and Bobby was soon enjoying a good dinner and a rest he found very welcome. Then about ten o’clock another inspector came in a car to say Monsieur Alain would now be happy to receive him. Bobby was accordingly driven to Alain’s temporary office and there the interview began with formal questions. Asked for his passport, Bobby explained it was in his bag at the Citry hotel, but judged it prudent to explain both his profession and his errand. Alain did not seem much surprised. Apparently he had either known or guessed the truth.
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