The Eight of Swords dgf-3

by John Dickson Carr

  But there seemed to be a large crowd inside, and he wanted a drink. He waited only long enough to complete his original design of removing the spark plugs. Then, as the door closed behind Spinelli, he strolled up the court after him.

  CHAPTER XVI

  The Puzzle of the Shoes

  Thus guiltily excusing himself from the fact that, even in the midst of adventure, he could not resist the temptation to stop and have a glass of beer, Hugh walked up the court and through a low door. The place smelt heavily of beer, earth, and old wood; and the walls, he judged, must be four-feet thick. Nobody could tell when or why this house had been built, except that two cloister-like structures along the court, full of disused hay carts and straw, suggested a stable. Inside there was an even larger crowd than he had expected, comfortably tipsy, wandering and bumping in the narrow passages. Through the windows he could see a public-room in each wing, and there was a bar at the rear. Spinelli had turned into the room on the right.

  Lowering his head in the passage, Hugh penetrated back to the bar. A couple of oil lamps smoked against perspiring walls. Most of the crowd had gathered in the room across the way, where somebody was strumming the piano, and two loud voices were arguing about a song. The room Hugh entered was low and raftered, with high-backed settles and long tables; polished brass jugs along the tops of the settles; walls patched up in grimy linoleum of different patterns; a wooden mantelpiece bearing an ancient clock without hands; and, squeezed into one dark corner, a fly-blown picture of Prince Albert in Highland costume. Prince Albert looked disapproving. Just beneath him, two or three grimy sages in cloth caps huddled about a table, flourishing pewter mugs as they argued, their long necks rising and wriggling above brass collar studs. One said: "Don't 'ee be a bloody fool, now!" and turned sulkily and banged his mug down on the table. "Tell 'ee 'tes nowt 'ow the Princess Mary was blowed up, and if the’ can't take the ward of a gunner in Is Majesty's Sarvice, look, then Gawd bless me, look! I’l1—" Bang! went the tankard again, and he glared at his opponent. A stout harassed barmaid hopped past with a tray of glasses; she seemed to be moving her head to avoid the layers of tobacco smoke, and giving an absent-minded smile to everybody. She said, "Tcha, tcha!" to the contestants, who then appealed to the proprietor. This latter was a pacifying dignitary in shirt sleeves, with a wary eye out: he stood behind the bar in a wilderness of beer cases, his arms folded; but he would jerk to life the moment a hand was raised for more beer. He sprang forward as Donovan approached the bar.

  Hugh changed his mind, said, "Whisky and soda," and fixed his eyes on a polished brass plate on a shelf beside him. Despite the smoke and blur, he could see the door to the passage and the other room reflected there. Spinelli was directly in line with it. The other room seemed to be a sort of parlor; and Spinelli slouched in a large tasselled chair, defiantly. Even Hugh could hear the whispers in the noise there—"that genlman," "dreffle murder," "Sh-shh!" drowned out by the bang of the piano. Subtly, the news was going all around. Even the three sages finished their beer all together, as at a drill order, and peered round…

  Squirting soda into his glass and watching the brass plate from the corner of his eye, Hugh turned quickly towards plate and wall. Spinelli had got up. He strode out of the room, into the passage, and' through to the bar; he looked angry. People drifted out to follow him, obtrusively interested in their drinks. An insistent voice kept calling, "Sing 'Old" John Wesley!' "

  Spinelli strode up to the bar.

  "Is it possible," he said in a voice of freezing dignity which somehow reminded Hugh of Maw Standish, "is it possible, my man, or isn't it, to get any service in this place?"

  A part of the clamor had died down to a buzz; there were many people straining their ears. Spinelli's elaborate unconsciousness of everything, his airs and dignity, made a rather ludicrous spectacle. The proprietor sprang forward.

  "I'm sorry zir! I'm sorry! Thought they do be and attended to 'ee, zir! Ysszir?"

  “I’ll have brandy? said the other, aloofly fingering his tie. "If you have any. Your best. Bring the bottle, and give me a glass of beer with it. Would you like a drink?"

  "Ah! Thank 'eezir. Eh don't mind."

  If Spinelli got a good view of him, Hugh was thinking… He turned still farther away. But the American was not noticing. Pouring out a large dose of brandy, he swallowed it neat and followed it with a draught of beer. Then he poured another. The landlord, with a great carelessness of manner, was opening a bottle of home-brewed.

  "Nice weather we'm 'aving, Mr. Travers," he observed critically.

  "Uh."

  "Ah! Bit waarm, though," the landlord qualified with a judicial air. The bottle cap went Sss-t! and the landlord frowned still more judicially as he poured out his beer. "Still, zir, the' get him much waarmer in the States, I expect?"

  "Plenty. Fill up that glass again."

  "Ah! Fine country, the States! Did Eh tell 'ee, zir, Eh've a wife's cousin's step-brother that lives in Kansas City? — Ah, ay!" He nodded approvingly. "Lived there fatty year’ now, 'e 'as. Gearge Loopey 'is name is. Maybe you've 'eard of him, zir; Gearge E. Loopey? 'E do run a big lumber yaard, I’ve 'eard. No! Ah, well; 'tes a big place… Your good 'ealth, zir!"

  Never before had Hugh appreciated so thoroughly the restraint of the English people. Everybody in that house was exploding with curiosity as to what had been happening at The Grange; it must have been the chief topic of conversation all evening; and here was the chief actor — supposed to have been already under arrest — in their midst. Yet conversation, even though strained, went on as usual. Not a glance was obviously turned towards Spinelli. The landlord pattered on.

  "The’ll be staying with us some time, now, I hope, Mr. Travers?" "No," said Spinelli. I’m leaving tonight." "Ah?"

  "Tonight. And damned glad to get away. Listen…"

  He finished his third brandy with a swaggering gesture, and leaned against the bar. Whether it was the brandy, or some deliberate purpose, or merely a love of being in the limelight — for, as he spoke, a rustling quiet settled down, and his voice rang loud against it — Hugh never knew. But Spinelli was aware that he was talking to the house. And three double-brandies, on top of his nervous strain, did things to his tongue. He cleared his throat. His spiteful little eyes rolled round at the assembly with some satisfaction, but he turned back to the landlord.

  "Come on, admit it! Don't stand there lapping up that beer and trying to be polite. I know what you're thinking about. The murder. Yeah. And wondering, in your charitable way, why they haven't got me in the can for it right now. Eh?"

  The landlord tried to play his part by also seeming unconscious of all the others. He assumed a look of diffidence.

  "Well, zir, now that you do mention it —! Of carse, us've 'eard all about it, and what a 'orrible business he was," he polished the bar vigorously, "and, ah, ah, we do feel sorry for the poor genlman…"

  "Push that bottle over here. Horrible business, nuts! They tried to hook me in on it. And couldn't. Tell that to your friends. Because I didn't happen to have anything to do with it, and I proved it."

  The landlord beamed. "Why, Eh'm sure Eh do congratulate you, Mr. Travers! Us thought nothing against 'ee, mind, zir! Only 'twas said 'ereabouts — you know what gossip is! — " he lowered his voice, "only that you'd paid poor Mr. Depping a visit, and a lot of dimp people—"

  "You're telling me? Listen." He drained his glass, set it down with a thump, and poked the proprietor in the chest. "I was never inside his house. The man they thought was me was old Nick Depping himself, got up into a fancy disguise so nobody would recognize him. Tell that to your friends, and your dumb flatfeet too"

  "Zir?"

  "It was Depping, I tell you! Trying to tell me I'm a liar?"

  The landlord was so obviously puzzled that even Spinelli did not press it. He grew confidential, almost paternal.

  "Listen. I’ll tell you how it was. Old Nick Depping wanted to get out of his house; see? Never mind why. I’m not telling
that. But he wanted to get out of his house; see? All right. He goes up to London and buys a make-up box at a theatrical outfitter's, and he goes to a ready-made clothes store and buys a suit there. All right; you can do all that without anybody being suspicious of you. But Nick was an artist, see? — a real artist; I’ll give him credit for that. And, if he left any footprints anywhere, he didn't want the footprints traced to him. He even wanted to have the shoes a different size from his own. All right! But you can't go into a shoe store and ask for a pair of shoes three or four sizes too large. That's nutty; and they're going to remember it in the store, and, if there's any trouble afterwards, maybe the dicks can trace you; see?"

  Spinelli leaned across the bar and thrust a flushed countenance within an inch of the landlord's. He went on rather hoarsely:

  "So what does Nick do? He goes up to that big place they call The Grange; the one with the lousy furniture in it, and pictures I wouldn't put in my coal cellar. Well, he goes up one afternoon with a satchel that's supposed to have books in it; get me? He goes back to a room where they store a lot of junk, and swipes an old pair of somebody's shoes to wear; and then if he does happen to make any footprints anywhere, why, it's going to be just too bad for the bird who owns the shoes. See? That's what Nick does, and all because he wants too get out of his house and. ”

  Hugh did not hear the last part of the sentence. He was so startled that he almost faced round and spoke to Spinelli. He remained motionless, his empty glass to his lips, staring at a placard behind the bar whereon a high-stepping figure of Johnny Walker grinned back with a rather sardonic leer. Down came one of the props of the case, shattering every hypothesis built on it; a clue blown up, shot to pieces; ashes and smoke: viz., the mysterious shoes that belonged to Morley Standish. All sorts of explanations had been, and might be, propounded. The simplest explanation of all — that Depping himself had used them for his masquerade — had been overlooked or at least not mentioned. What became now of his father's fantastic picture of Henry Morgan playing poltergeist in order to steal the shoes?

  He risked a short sideways glance at Spinelli. The latter was too preoccupied; too malicious, too full of new alcoholic courage, to greedy of the limelight, even to turn his head or lower his voice. Spinelli laughed. His foot groped vainly for a rail under the bar.

  "And that's how it was," he said, tapping the counter, "that he got mistaken for me, see? Because he wanted to get out of his house, and nobody to know it. That's old Nick Depping for you! And when he got back to his house he couldn't get in. Because why? Because he'd lost the key out of his pocket while he was on his little expedition, that's why. Ha. ha ha ha. Don't tell me. I know."

  All this was so much gibberish to the landlord. He stole a look at the brandy-bottle, thoughtfully, and coughed.

  "Ah, ay. Well, zir, after all," he suggested in a persuasive manner, "after all, Mr. Depping was a strange sort of gentleman, look. Ah, ay. (Shall Eh sarve the' some Gearges' home-brewed, zir? Mind, he's good!) And if poor Mr. Depping do wish to dress 'imself up 'ow 'e likes, why, we've no right to complain, have us?"

  Spinelli whirled. "You don't believe me, eh? Listen. I'm telling you this, I'm telling the world, just what kind of a heel Nick Depping was. I'm going to tell you about him, and I want everybody to know it, by God! Because—"

  "Mr. Travers, zir! Ladies present!"

  "And, anyway, somebody was smarter than he was. Somebody'd got in there with a duplicate key while he was out, and then pretended they had no key. But that's not what I want to tell the world. What I'm going to tell all you people who thought Nick Depping was a nice, high-hat, Park-Avenue swell; well, I'm going to tell you…"

  Exactly how far he would have gone Hugh could not guess. He realized that Spinelli's idea was to take the only revenge on Depping now possible. But the proprietor interrupted it. He glanced at his watch, gave a start of realization, and with a voice of surprising power bellowed through the house: "Last or-ders! Last orders, ladies and gentlemen, if you please! Ten minutes apast closing! Gome, come if you please—!" His voice held that note of extraordinary agony which seems to galvanize publicans like a cramp, and comes as suddenly as a cramp at ten o'clock. In an instant he had become all busde. He exhorted his listeners, in almost lachrymose entreaty, not to make him lose his license. In the ensuing rush on the bar for final drinks, Hugh was able to crowd himself out into the passage unseen, and wait there to see which direction Spinelli would take.

  From the darkness he could see his quarry's face. Indubitably there had been a let-down in the man's elation. There was an oil lamp just over his head; and he looked hunted. The old fears were coming back. This man wanted desperately to cling to lights and company; now they were all fading, and he would have to walk down a dark road to his interview. There could be no doubt that he was meeting the murderer; meeting him tonight, and at the Guest House. Hugh Donovan had at that moment a cold premonition, a conviction so growing and certain that he could have spoken it aloud.

  This man is going to his death.

  He had, furthermore, an almost maniacal impulse to elbow his way to Spinelli, grab him by the shoulder, and shout, "Look here, you damned fool, don't do it! Stay away from there. Stay away from there, or you'll get what Depping got as sure as he got it." He could have sworn to his conviction. In this babbling crowd, death was as palpable as the tobacco smoke round Spinelli's frightened face.

  Spinelli was buying the bottle of brandy, stuffing it hurriedly into the pocket of his coat. And he was buying two packs of cigarettes, which probably meant that there was still some time to pass before his interview. Nobody paid any attention to him; each was elaborately unconscious of his presence. As the first to leave began drifting out the door, he took a sudden resolution and followed them.

  Groups were breaking up in the moonlit road before the house. An argument waxed, passed, and faded away under ringing footfalls down the road. Somebody, in an unmusical baritone, was singing, "Me Old Corduroys"; and the countryside was so quiet that the loud voice almost seemed to have an echo from the sky. A woman, giggling-tipsy, went skipping towards the bus stop on somebody's arm. Already the lights were going out in the house.

  Presently it was dark and silent again; an incredible silence, in which Hugh hardly dared to breathe. He was against the side of the tavern, wondering vaguely whether they let loose a dog at night. Somebody raised a window over his head, and afterwards he could even hear a creak as somebody tumbled into bed.

  Spinelli was sitting in the front seat of his parked car, no lights on. He had not attempted to start it. He shifted constantly; at intervals he would strike a match for a cigarette, and peer at his watch; and he seemed to be steadily drinking. Afterwards Hugh could never tell how long a time it was, but he had a cramp in every muscle. The moon had begun to decline: a watery moon, with heat clouds banking up around it…

  There was a faint thunder, as stealthy as somebody's footstep. Hugh could hear cattle stirring in the stable yard. Stiff and half drowsy, he jerked alert as he heard the door of the car opening softly. His quarry slid down, and the bottle bumped against the door. Then he was off up the road; he seemed cold sober.

  Until he was out of hearing of the tavern, Spinelli moved with great care, and Hugh had to exercise a greater. But halfway up the hill Spinelli stepped out into the center of the road. At the low stone wall bordering the churchyard he unexpectedly stopped, and leaned on the wall. He giggled to himself. He looked up at the square church tower, where the moon made shadows with the ivy, the queer little porch, and the toppling headstones in the yard. Then he made a magniloquent gesture.

  " 'Each in his narrow cell forever laid,' " Spinelli said aloud, " 'the rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.' Nuts!”

  Something described a circle in the air, and there was a smash of a botde breaking against stone.

  Spinelli moved on.

  That defiance, which had genuinely shocked Hugh, seemed to give Spinelli a fresh courage. For the pursuer's part, his impulse wa
s now to overtake Spinelli, tap him on the shoulder, measure him for one on the jaw, and lay him out senseless along the side of the road. A neat, clean proceeding which anybody must approve of, and which would avoid endless trouble; certainly ease the strain of this night. He had no particular fear of the man's gun. He doubted that Spinelli, even in an extremity, would have the nerve to use it. In a rather vague way, as he considered his idea, he puzzled over the intricacies of the man's character as he had seen them revealed that night; Spinelli was a case for either a well-administered beating or a mental specialist, according to your view of the matter. He—

  Hugh drew up short. Almost opposite Morgan's dark house, Spinelli had stopped. He moved to the left-hand side of the road, towards the boundary wall of The Grange park, groped, struck a match, and touched the wall. Towards the Guest House, no doubt of it. Hugh was pressing back against the hedge on the opposite side. He crept forward softly…

  Somebody grasped his arm from behind.

  It was the most horrible shock he had ever had. Hugh stiffened, momentarily unable to think; motionless, without turning round. All he could think of was a murderer. He gathered himself to pivot suddenly and hit out: Then a voice spoke close to his ear, in such a whisper that he thought he must have imagined it; it was lower than the rustle in the hedges.

  "It's all right," the voice said; I’ve been watching. May I come along? You might need help."

  The almost inaudible whispering ceased. Turning softly, Hugh saw that his back was directly against the gate in the hedge round Morgan's house. A fugitive spark of moonlight struck Morgan's glasses. He was leaning over the gate, invisible except for that. Hugh bent his shoulders to indicate an assent, and risked a whisper for silence. He wanted company. To his strained nerves he thought the gate creaked perceptibly as Morgan vaulted it, and landed on tennis shoes in the wet grass outside.