In her first interview with Inspector Caird on Friday evening Betty had told him that she came in alone on Thursday night, locked and bolted the door, and went straight up to bed, not noticing whether the dog-leash was on the umbrella stand or not. It had not occurred to her that the presence of Basil in the hall for a moment was of any importance, one way or another, and so far as the world in general was concerned, she had come in alone. Now the inspector was apparently going to question her further about that evening. He knew, evidently, that Basil had come up to Hampstead with her that night; Basil himself may have mentioned it, or Mrs. Bliss may have heard of it from the expansive Cissie and passed it on.
The idea in the inspector’s mind, thought Betty, was that Basil took the leash from the hall on that night before the murder. Apart from Betty’s inability to believe that Basil could have connived at the murder beforehand—much less committed it—she was positive that he could not have taken anything from the hall on that romantic occasion. He had only just stepped inside the door. She knew well that his arms were fully occupied. She had pushed him out and locked the door immediately afterwards. But how explain all that to an inspector, even a comparatively human one? Wouldn’t it be safer to stick to her original story—told, not with intent to deceive but because it was the truth, Betty said to herself, so far as inspectors and such outsiders were concerned? If Basil were questioned he was sure to say that he didn’t go inside the door. He would realize that to admit that he did go inside would incriminate him and perhaps bring suspicion upon Betty too.
“Confound it!” Betty muttered. “If only I had had more time to talk to Basil I might be sure about that!” But it must be all right. She would have heard before now if there had been any discrepancy between her story and Basil’s. Had she better telephone to him to make sure? No, that was too risky; he would be at Beverley House and couldn’t answer freely. And if the police found that she had been telephoning to him, that might arouse their suspicions. No, she was sure it was safe to say that he didn’t come in; and really true in spirit, too, if not in fact.
Betty went downstairs to tea, taking with her a new detective story which she had obtained from Mudie’s before the Pongleton affair had linked detective stories with life as Betty knew it. She tried to settle down to read it after tea, but it didn’t sound right. There was a lot of telephoning in the book—that seemed true to life—but all these people were provided with telephones through which they could have confidential conversations with others at any moment without fear of being overheard. What a blissful state of affairs, thought Betty with some annoyance.
She was interrupted by Basil’s hasty call to hand over the pearls to her once more. His interview with her was so startling, and so rapid, that it was only when he was sprinting away again down Church Lane that she realized that she might have asked him what he had said to the police about Thursday night. Too late! She could never catch him up now, and someone was sure to notice her if she dashed out after him. She returned to the sitting-room, where Mr. Slocomb—comfortably settled in the chair to which his right now seemed firmly established—Mrs. Daymer in her draughty seat opposite, and Cissie on the sofa, were engaged in desultory conversation.
“I wonder whether the police will find that other will to-morrow,” mused Mrs. Daymer. She looked across severely at Mr. Slocomb, who was working out a crossword puzzle. “You should be able to think where it might have been put,” she informed him—“your mind being attuned to the solution of problems. But I have often noticed that the working out of abstract formulae is not necessarily conducive to an understanding of human nature.”
Everyone in the Frampton had heard by now of Beryl’s and Gerry’s visit that morning to fetch Tuppy, and of Nellie’s chance remark about witnessing what appeared to be Miss Pongleton’s latest will.
Mr. Slocomb looked up from the dictionary. “I believe that it is not so much a question of understanding human nature as a matter of accident. Miss Pongleton had no system in her habit of concealing things in odd places; it was purely capricious. It is quite probable that someone will light upon the hiding-place of this will—if it exists—by the merest chance.”
“That is likely,” agreed Mrs. Daymer coldly. “Chance may, of course, intervene when human perspicuity fails. But if we could simplify our lives and get more closely in touch with nature, we might understand people better, and depend less upon the vagaries of chance. All my best work has been done in a simple cottage in the Cotswolds; the place breathes craftsmanship; a constant reminder of man’s true function— creation, honest workmanship. It is good for the style, keeps it simple.” Mrs. Daymer drew her peacock-hued scarf of handwoven silk higher up on her shoulders and shivered delicately. “But we are degenerate; we are ill-fitted to bear the rigours of life which our forefathers barely noticed. Though I am bound to say that as regards the exclusion of draughts, with all the ingenuity of modern invention, we have not yet reached perfect accomplishment.” She shot a glance of envy at the opposite chair.
Cissie was sprawling on the sofa, waggling her feet. Her theory that this exercise improved the shape of her ankles gave her an excuse for indulging in it conspicuously when she was bored.
“I wish we could hunt for the will,” she suggested. “I suppose Pongle’s room is still locked up? It would give us something to do and it would be too thrilling if we found it and it turned out that Pongle had left her money to someone quite different.”
“There’s no reason to suppose that she ever thought of leaving it to anyone except Basil or Beryl,” Betty reminded her. “And then she often made wills and tore them up, I’ve heard, so this one that Nellie witnessed on Wednesday may not be in existence now.”
“As between Basil Pongleton and his cousin, Miss Sanders, I believe it will make no difference as to which of them ultimately inherits the money,” announced Mrs. Daymer incautiously. She wanted the others to listen to her, and had been disappointed when craftsmanship and draughts had failed to draw any response.
“What do you mean?” asked Cissie, bringing her feet down on to the floor, and thereby levering herself into a more upright position. “You can’t mean—Basil and Beryl—but she’s engaged to Gerry—whatever?”
“I mean,” said Mrs. Daymer deliberately, “that Miss Sanders is quite well off, whereas Mr. Basil Pongleton is not exactly affluent, and has not so far met with much success—financially—in his authorship; perhaps he has not yet found his own line. Miss Sanders is of a generous disposition—I have observed that—and I do not think she would allow her cousin to be deprived, through some caprice of their aunt’s, of money which everyone believes to have been intended for him.”
“I don’t see that all that amounts to much,” said Cissie ungraciously. “Beryl may be generous, but who would give up money once they’d got it? Even if you’re well off you can’t have too much.”
“And perhaps Basil wouldn’t take it,” said Betty, underestimating Basil’s conviction of his genuine right to the money.
“But the Wednesday will, if discovered, may have some quite different content,” remarked Mrs. Daymer with great significance.
“D’you think she really left it all to someone quite different and they’ve murdered her?” enquired Cissie.
“There’s no knowing,” declared Mrs. Daymer. “But you may feel assured that if the Wednesday will”—she liked that phrase—“merely names Miss Sanders, instead of Mr. Basil Pongleton, as legatee, it will make no real difference in the ultimate destination of the money.”
Mrs. Bliss looked in. “Miss Watson, you won’t be going out any more to-day, I suppose? And you too, Miss Fain?”
Betty shook her head.
“We’ll stay put,” Cissie assured Mrs. Bliss. “What’s up?”
“The police inspector wishes to see you both; he’ll be here any time now; he thought you might be able to clear up some little points. Dear, dear! They don’t seem able to fit things together. It’s all very confusing, I’m sure. About
some letter Miss Pongleton wrote; I thought you might have posted it, Miss Fain. She’d sit up writing letters at night—the electricity she must have used! But we mustn’t grudge it her now, poor lady! I know she often gave them to you to post in the morning.”
Cissie’s mouth fell open and her tongue shot out a little way. It was a grimace which she often made when suddenly reminded of something about which her conscience was not easy. It had led to her abrupt dismissal from her first job, for insolence, but even after that she had not cured herself of it. Mrs. Bliss did not notice this sign of confusion because she had come into the room and was shaking up a cushion here, pulling a curtain straight there, and generally “putting things to rights”.
“I declare I miss that little animal,” she murmured. “He may have been a nuisance, but the house doesn’t seem the same without him. Poor little fellow! I hope he has a kind home. The Yorkshire climate is very severe, and they say dogs feel a change the same as humans. They know a lot, and we ought to be careful how we treat them.”
“Do you feel a draught, Mrs. Daymer?” asked Mr. Slocomb suddenly. “A window?”
“No, no!” declared Mrs. Daymer, blandly wagging her head from side to side. “I am a great believer in the beneficial effects of fresh air.”
Mrs. Bliss had put all the furnishing accessories in order and sailed away.
“What’s up, Cissie?” Betty enquired. “Did you forget to post a letter?”
“Well, I did,” Cissie admitted. “But I posted it later. Pongle gave me a letter to Basil to post on Thursday morning. I expect she wrote it late on Wednesday night, as Blissie said. She wouldn’t give it to you to post, you know, because, although you were more certain to do it, Pongle seemed to think you might put a spell on it so that it would say samething different by the time it got to Basil. Anyhow, I forgot it and I found it in my bag when I got home that evening, and I actually went out again and posted it, before I’d seen Pongle, so that I could tell her without blushing that it had been done.”
“Cheer up!” Betty admonished her. “They won’t arrest you for having forgotten to post a letter. Was that the only one? It doesn’t sound as if it had anything to do with the case.”
“I don’t think I posted another one. I hadn’t thought any more about that one till just now.”
“It’s not such an unusual event, after all,” said Betty rather unkindly. “You’ve forgotten to post lots of letters before this. Sure there’s not another one still in your bag?”
Betty was trying to stifle her own anxiety by building up suggestions about other letters and the unimportance of this one. A letter from his aunt which would reach Basil on Friday morning! She couldn’t see the exact significance of it, but it certainly seemed likely that it had something to do with his strange behaviour on that dreadful day.
“Of course!” exclaimed Cissie, loudly and triumphantly.
The others all stared at her.
“Pongle was annoyed with Basil on Wednesday for some reason—he came to tea with her and upset her somehow. She made another will on the spot—the one Nellie witnessed—and wrote to tell Basil. That’s just what she would do: ‘Naughty boy, you shan’t have my money!’ sort of thing. I thought there was a spiteful look in her eye when she gave me that letter. So there is another will—and perhaps Basil knows where it is! Too romantic!”
“In whose favour, I wonder?” enquired Mrs. Daymer solemnly.
“I’m sick of all this talk about wills,” Betty declared. “Can’t we think of something else? How is your new book progressing, Mrs. Daymer?”
“The atmosphere during the last few days has not been conducive to work, but it goes pretty well. By the way, I have to take a journey to the Midlands to-morrow; a matter of local colour. I am rather particular about local colour. People’s surroundings influence their thoughts more than you would believe, and I want to get a fresh impression of a Midlands manufacturing town. That is the sort of place in which a tendency to crime is born.”
“Oh, do you think Mr. Blend did the murder? He used to have a shop in Rugby—or was it Birmingham?” said Cissie.
“In that district, I believe,” agreed Mrs. Daymer. “But not all the inhabitants of a manufacturing town are susceptible to its debasing influence. Yet how much better we should all be if we breathed unpolluted air and saw branches against the blue sky every morning.”
“That would be rather a question of weather, I should think,” said Betty with extreme politeness of manner which concealed weariness and exasperation.
At that moment Mrs. Bliss came back to announce that the inspector was here to see Miss Fain. Cissie heaved herself off the sofa with a sigh.
“I suppose I must confess?”
“Oh yes,” said Betty, wishing she could give some other advice. “Get the crime off your chest and it will soon be over.”
“From my own experience of being questioned by the police in this case,” announced Mr. Slocomb cautiously, “I should say that they are better pleased if you answer their questions briefly and to the point, without volunteering any conjectures which may seem to you to be of value but to which they do not attach any special significance.”
“Don’t tell them more than I must, you mean?” Cissie, who had stood on one leg by the door to listen to Mr. Slocomb’s advice, swung out.
Betty was glad Mr. Slocomb had given that advice, with his usual fondness for offering wise counsel. Certainly there was no need to put unnecessarily incriminating ideas about the subject of that letter into the inspector’s head. Her own turn would come next, she supposed. She clasped her handbag firmly. Rather a joke to go and answer the inspector’s questions demurely, with those pearls in her bag under his very nose!
Cissie’s interview was short. She sank on to the sofa again with a sigh. “Not so bad! Now he wants you.” Betty walked out resolutely, saying to herself over and over again: “Basil did not come inside the door.”
Whilst she was talking to the inspector in the smoking-room she heard the supper bell ring, so she was not surprised to find the drawing-room empty on her return. She paused for a moment, until she had heard the front door bang and felt sure that Inspector Caird was out of the way. Then she stuffed the tissue-paper packet down the side of what had been Miss Pongleton’s chair and went to join Cissie at supper.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
BASIL REPORTS PROGRESS
AS Mr. Slocomb reached the corner of Church Lane at half a minute after nine on Monday morning, he saw Basil hurrying across Rosslyn Hill from the direction of Hampstead underground station.
“Hullo!” Basil panted as he came within earshot. “Things have been getting a bit hot, but it’s not so bad. Your advice did help.”
“Considering the mesh of deception in which you have entangled yourself, that is fortunate—very fortunate!” said Mr. Slocomb severely as they strode together towards Holly Hill. Basil noticed that his companion, without any apparent effort, kept pace, by an easy gliding movement, with his own long strides.
“I’ve got six—no, seven—special points to tell you about. Been going over them in the train. The police came last night——”
“Ah!” said Mr. Slocomb. “To Tavistock Square?”
“You say ‘Ah!’ as if you’d sent them!” complained Basil. “Yes; to my rooms; two of ’em, and asked me politely to accompany them to the police-station as they thought I could give them further information which might throw some light on the crime. Hypocrites! Well, I went quietly, as the saying is—as quietly as their car would take me, but it was one of those noisy popping brutes. There they had what they call an identification parade, I think—I’m getting awfully good at all the crime lingo. I was lined up with a lot of others—and, by Jove! it gives you a pretty poor opinion of yourself to see the specimens that the police pick out as being roughly of the same type as yourself! There were two fellows came and looked at us. One of them I didn’t know from Adam, and he didn’t seem to know me either, which was a bit of a relief. But I�
��m sure he was there to identify me, though the police didn’t say so. He kept dodging about and squinting at us from all angles, and I think the police were pretty fed up with him for making himself so conspicuous.”
“You are sure you have no knowledge of him? Hm! Possibly he saw you at Belsize Park station?”
“Yes; I thought of that. Anyway, he didn’t recognize me again. Then the other chap gave us the once-over and picked me out pretty soon. He turned out to be the ticket collector at Golder’s Green. Pity I didn’t get my hair cut yesterday—he asked us to take our hats off and swore that I hadn’t a hat on when I left Golder’s Green platform on Friday morning. That’s why he noticed me specially, I think—that and having a ticket only to Hampstead.”
“Your bowler hat,” said Mr. Slocomb, his enunciation icily distinct, “which you profess to have left at Mrs. Cut-us-off’s house, was—er—discarded at some earlier point. The stairs?”
“No, no! I can’t have taken it off there. I’ve thought about it and I’m sure. Must have left it in the train. But I can’t see that it matters much. No one could identify my bowler for certain; there must be hundreds like it.”
“It is hardly possible that hundreds of bowler hats were recklessly abandoned in an underground train on the Hampstead line on Friday morning,” Mr. Slocomb pointed out meticulously.
Murder Underground (British Library Crime Classics) Page 16
