‘What, has the Squire gone in for detection too?’ demanded Hemingway.
‘Of course he has! Everyone in Thornden has! The Squire’s idea is that the murderer was a Bellingham man, who came out by car or motor-cycle, hid same in his gravel-pit, and then lay up in the gorse-bushes until the right moment.’
‘And what’s your own theory, sir?’
‘No, no!’ Charles replied, laughing. ‘I’m not going to do your job for you! Or get myself sued for uttering slanders!’
‘Perhaps you’re right,’ agreed Hemingway.
‘I wish I could ginger Mavis up to sue Mr Drybeck!’ said Abby, with feeling.
‘Good lord, you haven’t told her he thinks she did it, have you?’ exclaimed Charles.
‘I didn’t tell her, but someone did. She said she would rather not talk about it, and one had to make allowances, and she was sure he didn’t mean to hurt her feelings.’
‘That girl is really a saint!’ declared Mrs Midgeholme. ‘She may be exasperating, but you have to admit that she’s an example to us all!’
The Chief Inspector was amused to perceive, from their expressions, that the example set by Miss Warrenby was not one which either Charles or Abby meant to follow. He took his leave of the party, and went away with Harbottle to where the car awaited them.
‘What do you suppose they were doing up at Fox House?’ said Abby, watching the two detectives turn the corner into the main road.
‘Probably having another look at the terrain,’ said Charles.
‘I only hope they haven’t been pumping Gladys,’ said Mrs Midgeholme worriedly. ‘You know what servants are! She’d be bound to make the most of every little unpleasantness there had ever been in the house, and what with that, on top of Thaddeus Drybeck’s really wicked attempt to throw suspicion on poor Mavis, I’m very much afraid the police may be thoroughly misled. Well! I’ve done my best, and I can’t do more! Come along, Ulysses! Home to Father!’
Charles, watching with approval Ulysses’ first assumption of deafness and subsequent leisurely progress in Mrs Midgeholme’s wake, said: ‘I like that dog. He knows what is due to his own dignity. All the same, I’m damned if I’d put up with being called his father.’ He turned his head, and looked down at Abby. ‘You stood me up yesterday: what about running down to Filey Cove now?’
‘Don’t you ever do any work?’ asked Abby provocatively.
‘I do a great deal of work. I’ve been out on an important job this very afternoon. If you need reassurance, I shan’t get the sack for not returning to the office. I’m a full partner, let me tell you! No, you don’t!’
Miss Dearham, about to retire strategically, found her right wrist clamped suddenly to the top of the gate, and at once protested. She said that Charles was hurting her arm, upon which he lifted her wrist and kissed it. Much shaken, she could think of nothing to say, but, blushing, adorably, peeped up at him under the huge brim of her hat. Charles, quick to seize opportunity, kissed her in good earnest.
‘What on earth are you doing?’ demanded Miss Patterdale, suddenly emerging from her little potting-shed, and screwing her monocle into her eye, the better to observe her young friends.
‘Asking Abby to marry me,’ responded Charles brazenly, one arm round Abby’s shoulders, his other hand still clasping her maltreated wrist.
‘Nonsense! You don’t ask a girl to marry you in front of her aunt!’
‘I’ve already made several attempts to ask her to marry me not in front of her aunt, but you always turn up just as the words are hovering on my tongue!’ Charles retorted.
Miss Patterdale looked suspiciously from one flushed face to the other. ‘Well, I don’t know what the world’s coming to, I’m sure!’ she said. ‘Kissing and cuddling across my garden-gate! If you really are going to marry Abby you’d better come inside, and stop making a public exhibition of yourself! Or are you pulling my leg?’
‘Certainly not!’ said Charles, affronted. ‘You don’t suppose I’d kiss Abby across your gate, or anyone else’s, if I didn’t hope to marry her, do you?’
‘As far as I can make out,’ said Miss Patterdale, ‘you’re all so promiscuous these days that it would be unwise to suppose anything! Are you going to marry her?’
Charles looked at Abby. ‘Am I, my only love?’
‘Yes,’ said Abby. ‘If – if you think we could make a do of it, I’d like to – awf’ly!’
‘Well, if that’s a proposal I’m glad I never received one!’ said Miss Patterdale. ‘However, it’ll give you both something to think of besides meddling in a murder-inquiry, so I daresay it’s a good thing. I’ll go and put the kettle on for tea.’
‘That,’ said Charles, releasing his betrothed, and opening the gate, ‘I take to be an invitation and a general blessing. That’s better! Now I can kiss you properly! To hell with the murder! Who cares?’
Miss Dearham returned his embrace with fervour, but said, as soon as she was able to say anything: ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve rather lost interest in it, too. Though I should like to know what those detectives were doing up the lane, and what they’re up to now.’
They were, in fact, being driven back to Bellingham; and as neither placed any great reliance on Constable Melkinthorpe’s discretion, their conversation would scarcely have interested Miss Dearham. It was not until they had been set down at the police-station, and Inspector Harbottle had given the deformed bullet he had dug out of the elm-tree into the safe-keeping of Sergeant Knarsdale, that the murder of Sampson Warrenby was even mentioned. The Sergeant said: ‘That looks like a .22 bullet all right. Well, if the rifle wasn’t the last you brought in, sir, I’m blessed if I know what to make of it!’
‘What we found out this afternoon puts an entirely different complexion on things,’ said Hemingway. ‘You get going, Knarsdale! I want the report on that little fellow as soon as I can get it! Horace, ask the chaps here for the Firearms Register, and bring it along to me!’
When the Inspector presently entered the small office, he found his superior sorting the papers that had been taken from Sampson Warrenby’s desk. He said, as he put them aside: ‘We must have Coupland on to these. There’s one letter which seems to be written in answer to something I can’t yet find, but it’s a job for him, not for me. Got the Register? Good!’
‘I don’t know if you think I may have missed a .22 rifle, sir,’ said Harbottle, somewhat starchily, ‘but I can tell you now I made a list of every one within a radius of twenty miles of Thornden.’
‘Thirty-seven of them, which I never had any interest in, and never shall,’ said Hemingway. ‘I wish you’d pull yourself together, Horace! Up till today we’ve never considered any weapon but a rifle, because the range seemed to make it certain it could only have been a rifle shot. Which is another of the things we were meant to think. We’ve now got every reason to believe Warrenby was shot at much closer range, and I want to know just what lethal weapons there are in the neighbourhood.’
‘Carsethorn said something about the Major’s army revolver, but that won’t do, because –’
‘Of course it won’t! It’s the wrong calibre! Stop trying to annoy me!’ said Hemingway, opening the register.
Silence reigned for a few minutes. Suddenly Hemingway looked up. ‘We’re getting warmer, Horace. I find here that when his firearms permit was last renewed, a couple of years back, the late Walter Plenmeller had a .22 Colt Woodsman Automatic Pistol in his collection. Which, let me tell you, was not in the gun-cabinet at Thornden House. Now then!’
The Inspector came quickly round the corner of the desk to stare down at the entry.
‘Could you carry a gun like that without anyone’s knowing it?’ demanded Hemingway.
‘I suppose it could be done,’ admitted Harbottle. ‘But – Good Lord, sir, what for?’
‘Seems to me it’s time we did a little research into Plenmeller’s affair,’ said Hemingway, rather grimly.
‘Yes, I see we shall have to, but what I’m thinking
is that no one here knows anything against him. And I can’t help feeling that if there was anything we should have been told fast enough. People don’t like him, and the way they’ve all been searching for clues and motives you’d have expected several of them to have sicked us on to him, wouldn’t you?’
‘No, I wouldn’t. Whatever it was that Warrenby found out – if that was the motive for his murder – you can bet your life it was something no one else knew anything about. That’s obvious.’
‘You’re thinking Warrenby may have tried to blackmail him? That wasn’t what was in my head, sir. To my mind, it was more likely he did Plenmeller some sort of an injury – because Plenmeller’s the type of man who might easily kill out of sheer, wicked revenge. Only I haven’t discovered a trace of anything like that. What’s more, I put it to you, Chief, would he have gone round telling people he must take steps to get rid of Warrenby if he’d meant to shoot him? That’s the last thing a murderer does!’
‘Yes, my lad,’ said Hemingway, in a dry voice. ‘And that’s something he knows quite as well as you do. If he’s the man I’m looking for, then I freely hand it to him! He’s been remarkably clever. The killing wasn’t done in some highly ingenious way that might have made us pay particular attention to a man who spends his life writing detective problems; he didn’t try to fake an alibi for himself; he’s told me and everyone else that he hated Warrenby’s guts; and he’s even told us all that he’s quite capable of murdering someone – which I never doubted. He’s even managed to stay as cool as a cucumber throughout, which isn’t usual. That’s probably because he’s got a very good opinion of himself, and thinks he’s far too clever for me to catch up with.’
‘You don’t think he could have done it just because he did hate Warrenby, do you?’ asked the Inspector.
‘No, I don’t. Hating Warrenby was a lot more likely to make him think up ways of getting under his skin. Which I’ve a strong notion he did do. Warrenby wouldn’t like that. We know what happened when he got a snub from Lindale. I’ll bet he had worse to put up with from Plenmeller!’
‘Now, wait a bit, Chief!’ protested the Inspector. ‘If Warrenby was blackmailing him, he wouldn’t have dared get under his skin!’
Hemingway shook his head. ‘I don’t think it was ordinary blackmail. He hadn’t anything Warrenby could want any more than Lindale had. But we know from what his clerk told us that Warrenby liked to find things out about people. He said you never knew when it might come in handy – and in the meantime it gave him a nice feeling of power. I should say he didn’t really mean to let on to Lindale he knew what his secret was: he lost his temper, and out it came. Well, now, supposing he did know something to Plenmeller’s discredit? Do you imagine he’d put up with Plenmeller being rude to him, shoving spokes in his wheel, and running him down to all and sundry if he could bring him to heel just by telling him that he knew what his secret was? If you ask me, Horace, he’d have thoroughly enjoyed lowering Plenmeller’s crest! Anyone would, for that matter! Only that’s where he slipped up: Plenmeller isn’t the type it’s safe to blackmail.’
‘That may be,’ agreed Harbottle, ‘but I’d also say he isn’t the type you could blackmail easily! I mean, from the way he talks you’d think the chances are he’d be more likely to boast of having done something wrong than to try to keep it dark! Well, I ask you, sir! Look at the brazen way he told us he’d driven his brother to his death!’
‘As a matter of fact,’ said Hemingway slowly, ‘I was thinking of that. All things considered, I believe I’ll take a look at that case. Did you read the whole of it?’
‘The inquest on Walter Plenmeller? I haven’t read any of it – barring the letter he left.’
Hemingway looked at him with a gathering frown. ‘What, didn’t you even glance over the report? What made you pick the letter out?’
The Inspector blinked. ‘That’s all there was. I found it in one of the tin boxes. I haven’t been through any of the Coroner’s records.’
‘Do you mean to tell me,’ said Hemingway, ‘that Warrenby had taken that letter out of the proper file, and put it amongst his own papers?’
‘Yes, I suppose he must have, sir. I don’t really know what they do with the reports on inquests. As Warrenby was the Coroner, I didn’t make much of it, except to wonder whether he wanted that letter to taunt Plenmeller with, perhaps.’
‘Next time you find a document like that where it has no business to be perhaps you’ll be so good as to tell me!’ said Hemingway wrathfully. ‘I thought you’d been running through that case!’ He pulled open a drawer in the desk, and turned over the papers it contained.
A good deal chagrined, the Inspector said: ‘I’m sorry, sir. But there was nothing to the case! I had a talk with Carsethorn about it, and it was a straight case of suicide all right.’
Hemingway had found the letter, and was re-reading it. ‘Then what made Warrenby take this letter out of the record? Don’t talk nonsense to me about wanting to taunt Plenmeller with it! Much he’d have cared! It must already have been read aloud in court!’
‘After what Coupland said to us, sir, I only thought it was rather typical of the man to want to get his hands on something to Plenmeller’s disadvantage. Which, to my way of thinking, it is, because it shows him up to be a heartless sort of man, deliberately getting on his brother’s nerves. But I’m sure I’m very sorry.’
‘All right. I ought to have asked you where you found it. Get me that file! If the office is shut, find out where Coupland lives, and –’
‘You needn’t worry, sir: I’ll get it,’ interrupted the Inspector, his back very rigid.
‘And find out if the Chief Constable’s in the building! If he is, I’d like a word with him, at his convenience.’
A few minutes later, he was informed by the Sergeant on duty that Colonel Scales had come in a little while earlier, to do some business with the Superintendent, and had left a message in the charge-room that he would like to see the Chief Inspector before he left the police-station. ‘He says, would you go right in, sir?’
Colonel Scales was just nodding dismissal to a very stout Superintendent when Hemingway went to his room, and he said: ‘Come in, and sit down, Hemingway! Glad to hear you want to see me: I hope it means you’ve got something?’
‘Yes, I have, sir,’ responded Hemingway. ‘Several things. I’ve sent one of them round to your Dr Rotherhope by one of my chaps, and I hope he’ll be able to let me have a report on it tonight. He told me he’d got a small laboratory, so I don’t think I shall have to send it all the way to Nottingham to be analysed.’
‘What is it?’
‘I can’t tell you that, sir: I only know what I hope it may be. It’s quite a long story.’
‘Then have a cigarette, or light your pipe, and tell it to me!’ invited the Colonel. ‘Nothing more you wanted to say to me, is there, Mitcham?’
‘No, sir,’ replied the stout Superintendent regretfully, and withdrew.
‘Now!’ said the Colonel.
‘Well, sir, putting it baldly, Sampson Warrenby wasn’t shot at 7.15; and in all probability he wasn’t shot with a rifle.’
‘Good God! How do you arrive at that?’
Hemingway told him. He listened in attentive silence, surprise in his face, and a good deal of respect, but when Hemingway reached the end of his story, and said, with a rueful smile: ‘I missed a lot of points on this case, and I don’t deny it,’ he gave a gasp, and exclaimed: ‘Did you, indeed? You must set yourself a pretty high standard! But this alters the whole case! If the murder was committed between 6.00 and 6.30, you’ve narrowed the field considerably.’
‘Unless it was committed by someone we know nothing about, which I don’t think, sir, it’s narrowed to four people, only two of whom seem at all likely. Those unaccounted for at that time are the Vicar, Mr Haswell, young Ladislas, and Gavin Plenmeller. If the Vicar got hold of a gun on the side, and shot Warrenby, or anyone else, with it, I’m resigning before I get kicked
out. I can’t form an opinion about Mr Haswell, because he’s not one who gives away much, but I don’t at all fancy him, for various reasons – the principal one being that I haven’t discovered even a hint of a motive for his having wanted to put Warrenby away.’
‘I’m pretty confident you won’t,’ said the Colonel. ‘I’ve known him for years – in point of fact, he’s a friend of mine – and although a thing like that mustn’t be allowed to weigh with either of us, it does enable me to say that if he murdered Warrenby I’ve been deceived in his character ever since I first knew him!’
‘That’s all right, sir: he’s not my fancy by any means. Which leaves us with Ladislas, and Plenmeller. And of those two I prefer Plenmeller.’
‘The Pole – Ladislas, as you call him – has a definite motive,’ the Colonel pointed out. ‘Plenmeller, I agree, is perhaps the more likely of the two to have thought out and executed such a careful murder, but he seems to have had no motive at all.’
‘I wouldn’t be too sure of that, sir. It’s what I particularly wanted to talk to you about. One thing he had which, so far as we know, no one else had, and that’s an automatic pistol of the calibre we’re looking for. It’s listed amongst his brother’s guns, and it wasn’t in his gun-cabinet when I went to his house. Of course, there’s no saying what kind of an armoury Ladislas may have, but I never yet heard that a .22 pistol was issued by any army, English or foreign. And if it wasn’t a left-over from the War, I don’t know how he could have come by it, for, unless I’m very much mistaken, he’s not a member of the underworld, and he wouldn’t have the ghost of a notion how to get hold of an illicit gun. So that leaves Gavin Plenmeller, and it’s about him I want to consult you, sir.’
‘I can’t tell you a thing,’ the Colonel said. ‘I don’t like the fellow; I agree that he’d be capable of planning such a murder; but I know of no reason why he should have done it – unless you think the thrillers he writes have gone to his head, and he wanted to prove he could baffle the police!’
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