After the Exhibition: A Jack Haldean 1920s Mystery (A Jack Haldean Mystery)

by Dolores Gordon-Smith

  ‘Betty,’ cut in Maud Lythewell sharply. ‘One of the vases is missing. What do you know about it?’

  Betty drew back. ‘Nothing.’ She pushed her hair back from her forehead in a puzzled way. ‘Missing, you say? I don’t know where it can be. There were certainly two there yesterday. I filled both of them with fresh flowers yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘Were you in this room last night?’ asked Jack, including Mrs Lythewell in the question with a look. ‘Did you notice if there were one or two vases on the mantelpiece then?’

  Both women looked at each other. ‘We were certainly in here,’ said Maud Lythewell. ‘I listened to the wireless and read for a while, but I didn’t notice the vases particularly. Betty? How about you?’

  Betty shook her head. ‘I’m afraid I didn’t give the vases a thought.’ She frowned in an effort of remembrance. ‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said eventually. ‘I can’t help you.’

  ‘Perhaps you can help us with another matter,’ said Bill. Avoiding Jack’s eyes, he opened his briefcase and took out the enamelled cigarette case.

  ‘That’s mine!’ exclaimed Betty, reaching out her hand.

  Bill drew back. ‘When did you last have it, Miss Wingate?’

  ‘Yesterday afternoon, I think. It was after lunch. I was in the garden and wanted a cigarette, but I couldn’t find my case. Colin was here and gave me one of his, but he always smokes Player’s Weights and I find them too strong.’

  ‘What time was that?’

  ‘Round about two o’clock, I suppose. I looked for my cigarette case all day after that, off and on, but couldn’t find it. Look, what is all this? Can I have my case back?’

  ‘Not just yet, I’m afraid,’ said Bill. ‘Miss Wingate, would you mind if I took your fingerprints?’

  Commander Pattishall grunted in approval. ‘That’s more like it!’

  ‘My fingerprints?’ repeated Betty in alarm. Instinctively she put her hands behind her back. ‘Why? What for?’

  ‘Yes, Inspector,’ drawled Maud Lythewell. ‘What for?’

  ‘We wish to eliminate Miss Wingate from a certain line of enquiry,’ said Bill stiffly.

  The Commander snorted once more. ‘Eliminate, yes. Very good.’

  Jack, who’d been standing back, nodded at her encouragingly. ‘It’ll be all right, you know. You needn’t worry.’

  Betty bit her lip nervously. ‘All right,’ she said apprehensively. ‘I suppose so. What do I have to do?’

  Bill produced a card, ink pad and cloth from his briefcase and put them on the table. ‘Just put your fingers on the pad like so – and now on the card – and there we are.’ He handed the cloth to Betty to wipe her hands.

  ‘Well?’ barked Commander Pattishall, unable to restrain himself. ‘Are the prints a match, man?’

  ‘A match?’ questioned Betty anxiously. ‘A match for what?’

  ‘I can’t tell yet, Commander,’ said Bill firmly. ‘I need to have the photographs from the chantry developed before I can compare them properly.’

  Commander Pattishall sighed dangerously. ‘I don’t hold with this shilly-shallying. Miss Wingate, do you confirm this cigarette case belongs to you?’

  ‘Certainly I do,’ said Betty, scrubbing her hands. ‘My name’s engraved in the lid.’

  The Commander squared his shoulders. ‘Then, unpleasant as it is, it is my duty to inform you that, because of the circumstances in which that cigarette case was found, you are under arrest on suspicion of murdering the late Henry Cadwallader. You are under no obligation to say anything but anything you do say—’

  The rest of his sentence was lost in Maud Lythewell’s screams.

  Betty, paper-white, stared at him unseeingly. She swayed as if she might faint.

  ‘It’s all right,’ hissed Jack, catching her round the waist. ‘It’s going to be all right. Trust me.’

  Fifteen

  The next day saw Bill back at Scotland Yard where, with Jack’s help, he was going through the case for the benefit of Sir Douglas Lynton.

  On Sir Douglas’s desk were the two brass vases and a collection of photographs. Sir Douglas looked from the enlarged photographs of Betty Wingate’s fingerprints to the photographs of the fingerprints found on the brass vase. ‘They’re a match,’ he said. ‘That’s very clear.’

  ‘It is, sir,’ said Bill. ‘There’s no doubt about it. Miss Wingate’s prints match those on the vase found in the chantry. To sum up the rest of the evidence from yesterday, Dr Oxenhall’s examination of the stomach contents in the post-mortem showed that Cadwallader died about an hour to two hours after eating his evening meal. That, along with the temperature and rigidity of the body, gives us a time of death of between seven to eight o’clock in the evening or thereabouts. Although Miss Wingate was seen at intervals during that time, she doesn’t have a real alibi. In addition, her cigarette case – her very distinctive cigarette case – was found under Cadwallader’s body. On the face of it, it’s an open and shut case.’

  Sir Douglas leaned back in his chair with an encouraging expression. ‘I know Miss Wingate’s in custody. Commander Pattishall has informed me. However, I gather you don’t think it’s quite as simple as that.’

  ‘It could be, sir,’ said Bill seriously. ‘Right from the start, the start being Miss Wingate reporting the supposed murder of Signora Bianchi, Mr Colin Askern, who knows Miss Wingate well, has said that Miss Wingate is prompted by a desire to be in the limelight. And,’ he added with a shrug, ‘I have to say, there’s a lot to be said in favour of that theory. Miss Wingate discovered John Askern’s body. She says Askern wrote to her, asking her to meet him at Dorian House at three that afternoon, but the letter has been lost. She could’ve easily written that letter herself. If the motive is simply a desire to be in the spotlight, then it all adds up.’

  ‘Motives,’ said Sir Douglas, ‘can be tricky to understand.’

  ‘I know, sir,’ agreed Bill. ‘However,’ he said, with a glance at Jack, ‘what isn’t hard to understand is Major Haldean’s observation about the murder weapon that killed Cadwallader.’

  ‘I found the vase under the empty tomb near Cadwallader’s body,’ said Jack, in response to Sir Douglas’s enquiring look. ‘As you can see, it’s a modern design, quite out of place in the chantry. It looked to me as if it was one of a pair of vases.’

  ‘Which it is, of course,’ muttered Sir Douglas.

  ‘Yes, but we couldn’t find the other vase in the chantry. That made me think it was a premeditated crime. No one happens to have one vase from a pair with them by chance. The blood and hair, the size and shape of the wound, plus the fingerprints, make it seem obvious that not only is the chantry vase, if I can call it that, the murder weapon, but it was wielded by Betty Wingate. However, when we were shown into the drawing-room of Whimbrell House, we found the other vase from the pair. Now,’ said Jack, leaning forward. ‘That vase had no prints on it at all.’

  ‘And?’ questioned Sir Douglas.

  ‘It should’ve done, sir. Miss Wingate had put flowers in those vases the previous day. She handled both vases. Mrs Lythewell said as much and Miss Wingate didn’t dispute it. I didn’t particularly want to spell this out in front of Miss Wingate or Mrs Lythewell, but it struck me as the perfect example of Sherlock Holmes’ famous dog in the night time.’

  Sir Douglas smiled. ‘Is that what Commander Pattishall meant when he said to me on the telephone …’ He consulted his notes and cleared his throat. ‘… That Haldean feller seems to think he’s Sherlock Holmes, eh?’

  ‘That’s it,’ said Jack with a grin. ‘Inspector Rackham twigged it right away, I’m glad to say. The dog in the night time didn’t bark when it should’ve done and there were no prints on the vase when there should’ve been. Somebody must have taken not one vase but two to the chantry. They used one to kill Cadwallader and wiped it clean. That vase was returned to the drawing-room mantelpiece of Whimbrell House. They then took the other vase, being careful not to disturb those prints of Miss
Wingate’s, daubed Cadwallader’s blood and hair on the base and left it under the tomb for us to find.’

  ‘It’s an interesting theory,’ began Sir Douglas, when he was interrupted by a meaningful cough from Bill. ‘Yes, Rackham?’

  ‘It’s more than a theory, sir. After hearing what Major Haldean had to say, I examined the Whimbrell House vase carefully. It looks clean, right enough, but there’s traces of blood beneath the screw-head fitting the base to the vase proper. I’d testify that, despite appearances, the clean vase is the murder weapon.’

  Sir Douglas reached out his hand for the clean vase and hesitated. ‘I can pick it up?’

  ‘Yes, sir. It’s been thoroughly examined and the evidence documented.’

  Sir Douglas weighed the vase in his hand. ‘It’s a nice weapon,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Very heavy for its size and it fits nicely into the hand. It’s the sort of weapon it might occur to a woman to use.’ He replaced the vase on the desk. ‘I suppose, in view of what you’ve told me, we’d better recommend that Miss Wingate is released.’

  Jack shook his head vigorously. ‘I’d rather you didn’t, sir. Somebody took some pains to incriminate Miss Wingate. I’d far rather they thought their plan had succeeded. For her own safety, I’d much prefer her to remain in custody. Besides that, if we’re going to nail the real murderer – a murderer who I firmly believe has killed at least three people – we need to lull them into a false sense of security.’

  Sir Douglas digested this with a long face. ‘That’s all very well, Major Haldean, and I do appreciate your point …’ He stopped abruptly. ‘What d’you mean, at least three people? We only know of two for certain. The third, the murder in the cottage, is very problematic, but that’s the end of it, surely?’

  ‘It’s just an idea I’ve got,’ Jack replied disarmingly. ‘At the moment that’s all it is and it may very well come to nothing.’

  ‘An idea, eh?’ Sir Douglas chewed his moustache. ‘The trouble is, Major, we can’t keep Miss Wingate locked up indefinitely while we try to get to the bottom of this business, ideas or no ideas. This all started with the supposed murder of Signora Bianchi in her cottage. That proved to be an absolute mare’s nest, but since then we’ve had John Askern’s murder and now Henry Cadwallader. None of it seems to make any sense. These ideas of yours. D’you think they might help?’

  ‘They might, sir. I’ll tell you one thing I’d like to know. Who is Mrs McAllister?’

  Sir Douglas gave a short laugh. ‘If you can answer that, you’re doing well. The wretched woman seems as elusive as gas.’

  Jack laced his fingers together and, stretching out his long legs, put his hands behind his head and leaned back. ‘Miss Wingate thought that the dead woman she saw in Signora Bianchi’s cottage could’ve been Mrs McAllister.’ Ignoring Sir Douglas’s dismissive snort, he carried on. ‘I must say that chimed in with certain ideas of my own.’

  ‘But that woman – if she existed at all – can’t be Mrs McAllister, man! Mrs McAllister rented the flat in Dorian House. She’s made herself scarce now, but she lived there openly for three weeks. She was seen frequently and spoken to by the neighbours and the porter during that time. There’s no doubt she was there.’

  ‘There’s no doubt a Mrs McAllister lived in Dorian House, but was she our Mrs McAllister, if I can phrase it like that? The same woman that Inspector Rackham and I saw at the art exhibition at Lyon House?’

  ‘Well, if she wasn’t the same woman, who was she?’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t know,’ Jack admitted. ‘However, there was a woman’s body found in Euston Station in a trunk that had been despatched from Manchester. She was thought to be a Mrs Ormskirk, but I understand from the report in the Daily Messenger that’s not so.’ He hesitated. ‘I wondered if that woman was actually Mrs McAllister.’

  ‘What?’ Sir Douglas shook his head. ‘But she can’t be, man!’

  ‘Can’t she, sir? On the one hand we have a woman who Betty Wingate reported as murdered in Signora Bianchi’s cottage and, on the other, an unclaimed and unidentified body. Are they one and the same?’

  Sir Douglas shifted uncomfortably in his chair. ‘That sounds like a very neat solution. A little too neat, perhaps?’

  ‘That’s what Bill thought,’ said Jack, turning to his friend with a grin. ‘He said I was chasing moonbeams when I floated the idea past him.’

  ‘That’s right, Jack,’ agreed Bill. ‘I couldn’t see how a body that had disappeared in Surrey ended up in a trunk despatched from Manchester. They’re at different ends of the country, to which you replied that it was Manchester, not Timbuktu, and could I get the report from the Manchester police?’

  ‘And did you get the report from the Manchester police, Chief Inspector?’ asked Sir Douglas.

  ‘I did, sir,’ said Bill. He took a thin official file from his briefcase and put it on the desk. ‘As you can see, there’s not much in it. It’s mainly a collection of negatives, as the Manchester police were really concerned with proving if the woman was or wasn’t Mrs Ormskirk. The body was badly decomposed, so there’s no facial features and no chance of fingerprints. Of course, we know hardly anything about the body Miss Wingate says she saw in Signora Bianchi’s cottage. However, we did find some hair on the sofa in the cottage and threads of a brown silk scarf on the wheelbarrow in the pigsty in the cottage garden. And that, sir, made me think Major Haldean might be right after all. The hair on the trunk corpse – I had a sample of the hair examined under a microscope – is similar to the few hairs we found in the cottage, and snagged up on the lock inside the trunk were a few silk threads which, although badly contaminated by the body, had been brown.’

  Sir Douglas stared at him. ‘Good Lord!’

  ‘My thoughts exactly, sir. We can’t prove they’re the same, as the contamination is very extensive, but you’ll agree it’s a remarkable coincidence.’

  ‘It most certainly is.’ Sir Douglas reached out his hand for the police report and, pulling it towards him, read through it.

  Jack lit a cigarette and waited.

  ‘Well, that is interesting,’ said Sir Douglas at last. He looked up and tapped the file thoughtfully. ‘As Inspector Rackham said, this isn’t proof, but it’s a remarkable coincidence.’

  He reached for a cigarette and read the report through once more. ‘This has to be followed up,’ he said eventually. ‘We simply can’t ignore it. But if this body really is Mrs McAllister’s – the Mrs McAllister you saw at the exhibition – then how did she come to be in Signora Bianchi’s cottage? Who killed her? And how did her body turn up in a trunk despatched from Manchester?’

  He stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray. ‘And who, for heaven’s sake, is the woman who lived for three weeks as Mrs McAllister in Dorian House? Because I need hardly tell either of you gentlemen that if Miss Wingate is an innocent woman, then the Mrs McAllister from Dorian House is our prime suspect for the murder of John Askern.’

  ‘That’s exactly right, sir,’ agreed Bill. ‘I’d like to add something to that. Miss Wingate says she was invited to Dorian House by a letter purporting to come from John Askern. That letter disappeared. If Miss Wingate is innocent, then someone stole it. The only people who were in a position to steal the letter were the people with her that day. One of them has to be the fake Mrs McAllister.’

  Sir Douglas’s eyebrows rose. ‘But that narrows it down to Mrs Lythewell and Mrs Askern. Of the two, Mrs Askern has by far the most compelling motive.’ He glanced at Jack. ‘Don’t you agree, Major?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Jack. ‘If that letter was stolen, it was stolen by someone in the same room as Betty Wingate. However, I wouldn’t exclude either of the men. They could be in cahoots with Mrs McAllister quite easily.’

  ‘I could get them all in for questioning,’ said Bill. ‘That should give us some answers.’

  ‘Yes, you could,’ agreed Jack. ‘The trouble is, that would tell the real crook that you don’t believe that Betty Wingate’s gu
ilty. It’ll put them on their guard, which is exactly what we’re trying to avoid.’

  ‘But what can we do?’ asked Bill in exasperation.

  ‘Give me a day,’ said Jack. ‘Two days at the most.’ With his head to one side, he scratched his chin thoughtfully. ‘You asked me if I had any ideas.’ His voice was hesitant. ‘The answer’s yes, but my ideas might come to nothing. If it proves to be a washout, I’ll have to try again, but one thing that struck me was the series of drawings that Cadwallader did of the chantry.’

  ‘There’s nothing special about them,’ said Bill. ‘I had a look at the drawings he’d worked on. He didn’t sketch a likely murderer if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘No, that wasn’t what I was thinking of.’

  ‘Well, what’s special about his drawings? They’re just details of the chantry. There’s nothing there you can’t see with your own eyes. What are you getting at, Jack?’

  ‘Just at the moment it’s all a bit vague,’ Jack admitted, ‘but I’m convinced the roots of this business go back a long way. I want to start by looking up the records of the Nordic Atlantic shipping company.’

  ‘The who?’ repeated Bill blankly.

  ‘The Nordic Atlantic. They’ve got an office on Cockspur Street. They operated the SS Concordia, the ship Daniel Lythewell came to England on in 1898. I want to see who else was onboard that ship with him. And then, I think, I might be able to tell you a bit more about our mysterious Mrs McAllister.’

  That afternoon Jack met Bill outside 46, Purbeck Terrace, Paddington. ‘I got your message,’ said Bill. ‘Why did you want me to meet you here?’

  ‘I’ve got a little experiment in mind,’ said Jack. ‘Mrs McAllister lived here for a while. She was friendly with a Miss Sharpe, who knew her as well as anyone.’ He tapped the briefcase he was carrying. ‘I’ve brought my sketch pad and pencils, and I’m hoping that, my artistic talents permitting, by the end of the afternoon I’ll be able to get a working likeness of Mrs McAllister.’