The Man in the Queue ag-1

by Josephine Tey

  "Can you see him?" Grant asked anxiously. "I can't."

  "Yes; he's making in to the south shore. Don't worry; we'll be there before he makes it."

  As they tore along, the south shore came up to meet them in fashion seemingly mi raculous. And in a moment or two Grant could make out the boat again. The man was rowing desperately for the shore. It was difficult for Grant, unacquainted with distances on water, to measure how far he was from the shore and how far they were from him, but a sudden slackening in Master Robert's speed told him all he wanted to know. Drysdale was slowing up already. In a minute they would have overhauled him. When the boats were about fifty yards apart, Lamont suddenly stopped rowing. Given it up, thought Grant. Then he saw that the man was bending down in the boat. Does he think we're going to shoot? thought Grant, puzzled. And then, when Drysdale had shut down the engine and they were approaching him with a smooth leisureliness, Lamont, coatless and hatless, sprang to his feet and then to the gunnel, as if to dive. His stockinged foot slipped on the wet gunnel, his feet went from under him. With a sickening crack that they heard quite distinctly, the back of his head hit the boat and he disappeared under water.

  Grant had his coat and boots off by the time they were up to him.

  "Can you swim?" asked Drysdale calmly. "If not, we'll wait till he comes up."

  "Oh yes," Grant said, "I can swim well enough when there is a boat there to rescue me. I think I'll have to go for him if I want him. That was a terrific crack he got." And he went over the side. Six or seven seconds later a dark head broke the surface, and Grant hauled the unconscious man to the boat, and with Drysdale's help pulled him in.

  "Got him!" he said, as he rolled the limp heap on the floor.

  Drysdale secured the rowing-boat to the stern of Master Robert and set the engine going again. He watched with interest while Grant perfunctorily wrung his wet clothes and painstakingly examined his capture. The man was completely knocked out, and was bleeding from a cut on the back of the head.

  "Sorry for your planking," Grant apologized as the blood collected in a little pool. "Don't worry," Drysdale said. "It will scrub. This the man you wanted?"

  "Yes."

  He considered the dark, unconscious face for a while.

  "What do you want him for, if it isn't an indiscreet question?"

  "Murder."

  "Really?" said Drysdale, very much as though Grant had said "sheep-stealing." He considered the man again. "Is he a foreigner?"

  "No; a Londoner."

  "Well, at the moment he looks very much as if he would cheat the gallows after all, doesn't he?"

  Grant looked sharply at the man he was tending. Was he as bad as that? Surely not!

  As Carninnish House swam up to them from across the water Grant said, "He was staying with the Logans at the manse. I can't very well take him back there. The hotel is the best place, I think. Then the Government can bear all the bother of the business."

  But as they floated swiftly in to the landing-stage, and Pidgeon, who had been on the lookout for their return, came down to meet them, Drysdale said, "The man we went for is a bit knocked out. Which room was the fire lit in for Mr. Grant?"

  "The one next yours, sir."

  "Well, we'll carry this man there. Then tell Matheson to go over to Garnie for Dr. Anderson, and tell the Garnie Hotel people that Mr. Grant is staying the night with me, and bring over his things."

  Grant protested at this unnecessary generosity. "Why, the man stuck his friend in the back!" he said.

  "It isn't for him I'm doing it," Drysdale smiled, "though I wouldn't condemn my worst enemy to the hotel here. But you don't want to lose your man now that you've got him. Judging entirely by appearances, you had a very fine time getting him. And by the time they had lit a smoking fire in one of the glacial bedrooms over there" — he indicated the hotel on the point across the river — "and got him to bed, your man would be as good as dead. Whereas here there is the room you would have had to wash in, all warm and ready. It is far easier and better to dump the man there. And, Pidgeon!" as the man was turning away, "keep your mouth entirely closed. This gentleman met with an accident while boating. We observed it, and went out to his assistance."

  "Very good, sir," said Pidgeon.

  So Grant and Drysdale, between them, carried the limp heap upstairs, and rendered first aid in the big firelit bedroom; and then, between them, Pidgeon and Grant got him to bed, while Drysdale wrote a note to Mrs. Dinmont explaining that her guest had met with a slight accident and would stay here for the night. He was suffering from slight concussion, but would they not be alarmed.

  Grant had just changed into some things of his host's, and was waiting at the bedside until dinner should be announced, when there was a knock at the door, and in answer to his "Come in," Miss Dinmont walked into the room. She was bareheaded and carried a small bundle under her arm, but appeared to be completely self-possessed.

  "I've brought down some things of his," she said, and went over to the bed and dispassionately examined Lamont. For the sake of saying something, Grant said that they had sent for the doctor, but it was in his — Grant's — opinion a simple concussion. He had a cut on the back of the head.

  "How did it happen?" she asked. But Grant had been facing this difficulty all the time he was changing out of his own wet things.

  "We met Mr. Drysdale, and he offered to take us out. Mr. Lowe's foot slipped on the edge of the jetty, and the back of his head came in contact with it as he fell."

  She nodded. She seemed to be puzzling over something and not to be able to make herself articulate. "Well, I'm going to stay and look after him tonight. It's awfully good of Mr. Drysdale to take him in." She untied her bundle matter-of-factly. "Do you know, I had a presentiment this morning when we were going up the river that something was going to happen. I'm so glad it's this and nothing worse. It might have been somebody's death, and that would have been incurable." There was a little pause, and, still busy, she said over her shoulder, "Are you staying the night with Mr. Drysdale too?"

  Grant said "Yes," and on the word the door opened and Drysdale himself came in.

  "Ready, Inspector? You must be hungry," he said, and then he saw Miss Dinmont. From that moment Grant always considered Drysdale a first-class «intelligence» man wasted. He didn't "bat an eyelid."

  "Well, Miss Dinmont, were you anxious about your truant? There isn't any need, I think. It's just a slight concussion. Dr. Andersen will be along presently."

  With another woman it might have passed muster, but Grant's heart sank as he met the Dinmont girl's intelligent eye. "Thank you for having him here," she said to Drysdale. "There isn't much to do till he comes round. But I'll stay the night, if you don't mind, and look after him." And then she turned to Grant and said deliberately, "Inspector of what?"

  "Schools," said Grant on the spur of the moment, and then wished he hadn't. Drysdale, too, knew that it was a mistake, but loyally backed him up.

  "He doesn't look it, does he? But then inspecting is the last resort of the unintellectual. Is there anything I can get you before we go and eat, Miss Dinmont?"

  "No, thank you. May I ring for the maid if I want anything?"

  "I hope you will. And for us if you want us. We're only in the room below." He went out and moved along the corridor, but, as Grant was following, she left the room with him and drew the door to behind her.

  "Inspector," she said, "do you think I'm a fool? Don't you realize that for seven years I have worked in London hospitals? You can't treat me as a country innocent with any hope of success. Will you be good enough to tell me what the mystery is?"

  Drysdale had disappeared downstairs. He was alone with her, and he felt that to tell her another untruth would be the supreme insult. "All right, Miss Dinmont, I'll tell you the truth. I didn't want you to know the truth before because I thought it might save you from — from feeling sorry about things. But now it can't be helped. I came from London to arrest the man you had staying with y
ou. He knew what I had come for when I came in at teatime, because he knows me by sight. But when he came with me as far as the torof the road he bolted. In the end he took to a boat, and it was in diving from the boat when we followed that he cut his head open."

  "And what do you want him for?"

  It was inevitable. "He killed a man in London."

  "Murder!" The word was a statement, not a question. She seemed to understand that, if it had been otherwise, the inspector would have said manslaughter. "Then his name is not Lowe?"

  "No; his name is Lamont — Gerald Lamont."

  He was waiting for the inevitable feminine outburst of "I don't believe it! He wouldn't do such a thing!" but it did not come.

  "Are you arresting him on suspicion, or did he do the thing?"

  "I'm afraid there isn't any doubt about it," Grant said gently.

  "But my aunt — is she — how did she come to send him here?"

  "I expect Mrs. Everett was sorry for him. She'd known him some time."

  "I only met my aunt once in the time I've been in London — we didn't like each other — but she didn't strike me as a person to be sorry for a wrongdoer. I'd be much more likely to believe she did the thing herself. Then he isn't even a journalist?"

  "No," Grant said; "he's a bookmaker's clerk."

  "Well, thank you for telling me the truth at last," she said. "I must get things ready for Dr. Anderson now."

  "Are you still going to look after him?" Grant asked involuntarily. Was the outburst of disbelief coming now?

  "Certainly," said this remarkable girl. "The fact that he is a murderer doesn't alter the fact that he has concussion, does it? — nor the fact that he abused our hospitality alter the fact that I'm a professional nurse? And even if it weren't for that, perhaps you know that in the old days in the Highlands a guest received hospitality and sanctuary even if he had his host's brother's blood on his sword. It isn't often I boost the High-lands," she added, "but this is rather a special occasion." She gave a little catch of her breath that might have been a laugh or a sob, and was probably half one, half the other, and went back into the room to look after the man who had so unscrupulously used herself and her home.

  13 — Marking Time

  Grant did not sleep well that night. There was every reason why he should have slept in all the sublime peace of the righteous man of good digestion. He had finished the work he had come to do, and his case was complete. He had had a hard day in the open, in air that was at once a stimulant and a narcotic. The dinner provided by Drysdale had been all that either a hungry man or an epicure could have wished for. The sea outside his window breathed in long, gentle sighs that were the apotheosis of content. The turf fire glowed soothingly as no flickering bonfire of wood or coals ever does. But Grant slept badly. Moreover, there was discomfort in his mind some-where, and like all self-analytical people, he was conscious of it and wanted to locate it, so that he could drag it out to the light and say, "Goodness, is that all!" and find relief and comfort as he had so often done before. He knew quite well how that uneasiness which ruined the comfort of his twelve mattresses of happiness proved on investigation to be merely the pea of the fairy-tale. But, rout round as he would, he could find no reason for his lack of content. He produced several reasons, examined them, and threw them away. Was it the girl? Was he being sorry for her because of her pluck and decency? But he had no real reason to think that she cared for the man other than as a friend. Her undeniable interest in him at tea might have been due merely to his being the only interesting man from her point of view in a barren countryside. Was he overtired, then? It was a long time since he had had a whole day's fishing followed by a burst across country at a killing pace. Or was it fear that his man would even yet slip through his fingers? But Dr. Anderson had said that there was no fracture and the man would be able to travel in a day or two. And his chances of escape now weren't worth considering, even as hypothesis.

  There was nothing in all the world, apparently, to worry him, and yet he had that vague uneasiness in his mind. During one of his periodical tossings and turnings he heard the nurse go along the corridor, and decided that he would get up and see if he could be of any use. He put on his dressing-gown and made for the wedge of light that came from the door she had left ajar. As he went, she came behind him with a candle.

  "He's quite safe, Inspector," she said, and the mockery in her tone stung him as being unfair.

  "I wasn't asleep, and I heard you moving and thought I might be of some use," he said, with as much dignity as one can achieve in the déshabillé of the small hours.

  She relented a little. "No, thank you," she said; "there's nothing to do. He's still un-conscious." She pushed open the door and led him in.

  There was a lamp at the bedside, but otherwise the room was dark and filled with the sound of the sea — the gentle hushzsh which is so different from the roar of breakers on an open coast. The man, as she said, was still unconscious, and Grant examined him critically in the light of the lamp. He looked better, and his breathing was better. "He'll be conscious before morning," she said, and it sounded more like a promise than a statement.

  "I can't tell you how sorry I am," Grant said suddenly, "that you should have had all this — that you should have been brought into this."

  "Don't worry, Inspector; I'm not at all fragile. But I'd like to keep my mother and uncle from knowing about it. Can you manage that?"

  "Oh, I think so. We can get Dr. Anderson to prescribe south treatment for him."

  She moved abruptly, and he was conscious of the unhappiness of his phrase, but could see no way of remedying it, and was silent.

  "Is he a bad lot?" she asked suddenly. "I mean, apart from —"

  "No," said Grant, "not as far as we know." And then, afraid that the green growth he had burned out last night might begin to shoot again, and more pain be in store for her, he added, "But he stuck his friend in the back."

  "The man in the queue?" she said, and Grant nodded. Even yet he was waiting momentarily for the "I don't believe it." But it did not come. He had at last met a woman whose common sense was greater than her emotions. She had known the man only three days, he had lied to her every hour of these days, and the police wanted him for murder. That was sufficient evidence in her clear eyes to prevent her taking any brief in his favour.

  "I have just put the kettle on the gas-ring in the bathroom for tea," she said. "Will you have some?" and Grant accepted and they drank the scalding liquid by the open window, the sea heaving below them in the strangely balmy west-coast night. And Grant went to bed again quite sure that it was not Miss Dinmont's emotions that worried him, but still uneasy about something, And now, writing triumphant telegrams to Barker in the golden morning, with the comfortable smell of bacon and eggs con-tending amiably with the fragrance of sea-weed, he was still not as happy as he should have been. Miss Dinmont had come in, still in the white overall that made her look half surgeon, half religieuse, to say that her patient was conscious, but would Grant not come to him until Dr. Anderson had been? — she was afraid of the excitement; and Grant had thought that eminently reasonable.

  "Has he just come round?" he asked,

  No, she said; he had been conscious for some hours, and she went serenely away, leaving Grant wondering what had passed between patient and nurse in those few hours. Drysdale joined him at breakfast, with his queer mixture of taciturnity and amiability, and arranged that he should have a real day's fishing as an offset to the distracted flogging of the water which had occupied him Yesterday. Grant said that, once Anderson had been and he had heard a report of his man, he would go. He sup-posed any telegrams could be sent down to him.

  "Oh, yes; there's nothing Pidgeon likes like being important. He's in his element at the moment."

  Dr. Anderson, a little man in ancient and none too clean tweeds, said that the patient was very well indeed — even his memory was unimpaired — but he would advise Grant, whom he took to be the man's nearest frien
d, not to see him until this evening. It would be best to give him a day to be quiet in. And since Miss Dinmont seemed determined to look after him, they need have no fear about him. She was an excellent nurse.

  "When can he travel?" asked Grant. "We're in a hurry to get south."

  "If it is very important, the day after to-morrow, perhaps." And seeing Grant look disappointed, "Or even tomorrow, if the journey were made comfortable. It all depends on the comfort of the travel. But I wouldn't recommend it till the day after to-morrow at the earliest."

  "What's the hurry?" Drysdale said. "Why spoil the ship for a ha'p'orth of tar?"

  "Afraid of loose moorings," Grant said.

  "Don't worry. The excellent Pidgeon will dote on being head warder."

  Then Grant turned to the surprised doctor and explained the truth of the situation. "There's no chance of his getting away if we let him stay here till he is stronger?"

  "He's safe enough today," Anderson said. "The man isn't fit to lift a little finger at the moment. He'd have to be carried if he escaped, and I don't suppose there's any one here who would be willing to carry him."

  So Grant, conscious of being entirely unreasonable and at sea with himself, agreed, wrote a second report to Barker to supplement the one he had written on the previous night, and departed to the river with Drysdale.

  After a day of wide content, broken only by the arrival of Pidgeon's subordinate, a youth with a turned-up nose and ears that stuck out like handles, with telegrams from Barker, they came back to the house between tea and dinner; and Grant, after a wash, knocked at the door that sheltered Lamont. Miss Dinmont admitted him, and he met the black eyes of the man on the bed with a distinct feeling of relief; he was still there.

  Lamont was the first to speak. "Well, you've got me," he said, drawling a little.