Mystery in White (British Library Crime Classics)

by J. Jefferson Farjeon

  “Oh, you don’t know that?”

  “I would not ask if I did.”

  “Well, I don’t know either. I mean, just some fellow or other. The guard found him. As a matter of fact I was out in the corridor when he came along—the guard—and I asked him a question, but he didn’t answer. When I repeated it, he still didn’t answer, and I found him staring into the compartment, so I joined him, and there was this man, lying on the ground—dead.”

  “Look here, hadn’t we better have the rest of this later?” interrupted Lydia, glancing at Jessie, whose eyes were dilating.

  But Jessie herself protested against a postponement.

  “Why does everybody think I can’t stand anything?” she demanded. “It’s only my foot that keeps on twinging! Please go on!”

  “I don’t know that there’s much more to go on about,” answered the bore. “He was dead, and you can’t bring a dead man to life again.”

  “Did you find out how he had been killed?” inquired Mr. Maltby.

  “No.”

  “Have you any theory?”

  “Is this an inquest?”

  “Were there any signs of a struggle?”

  “I don’t know! I’m not a detective!”

  “Detectives are not the only people with opinions. What did the guard think? Or do? Or say? I don’t suppose you both stood there and played ‘Buzz’?”

  “Look here, I want to forget it!” retorted the bore. “Can’t you see, I’m nearly dead myself? How do I know what the guard thought? All I know is that we soon had a crowd round us, and—and that while they were all staring and gaping, it seemed to me we wanted a policeman.”

  His tone took on a little flourish of triumph, as though he had suddenly justified himself in a company of doubters.

  “I see,” nodded the old man. “And that’s why you left the train.”

  “That’s it.”

  “While we sought a railway station, you sought a police station.”

  “Couldn’t put it more neatly myself.”

  “Only you mentioned the word ‘escape.’ ”

  “Eh?”

  “ ‘I left the train to escape another hell of a time.’ That was your expression.”

  “What are you getting at?” exclaimed the bore.

  “I don’t know that I am ‘getting at’ anything,” replied Mr. Maltby, rather acidly, “but I suggest that, when you are telling a story of some importance you choose your words a little more carefully. Whether you actually left the train to assist the situation or to escape from it probably makes only a spiritual difference, for we may assume the material result would have been the same in either case, but in judging a man his point of view is more important than his action. Your own action, sir, unless the guard asked you to go for the police, or unless there is some vital factor of which we have not been informed, seems to have been definitely idiotic.”

  The bore glared.

  “If you mean that it was idiotic to face this damned weather——!” he began.

  “No, I did not mean that,” interrupted Mr. Maltby. “I meant that a man in the next compartment is found dead, and you promptly leave the train.”

  “Come to that, we all left the train,” said David.

  “Thank you,” muttered the bore. “So we all had a hand in it and that’s settled!” He jumped up from his chair nervily, and then sat down again. “Look here, I feel dizzy. I’ve been nearly buried alive! If I’m not in for pneumonia, my name’s not Hopkins!”

  Thomson sneezed.

  “Hallo, some one else getting pneumonia?” queried Hopkins.

  “I should think we’ll all get pneumonia,” added Lydia. “Isn’t that what inevitably happens when cold clothes dry on a numb body? I feel like hot ice!”

  “So do I!” murmured Jessie.

  “I’m sure you do. David, do you think you could carry her again? Upstairs, this time. And perhaps you could manage our suitcases, Mr. Thomson without a p. I don’t care what anybody says, we’re going to find a nice warm bedroom, and we’re going to get properly rubbed down and dry!”

  CHAPTER VI

  SNEEZES OBLIGATO

  A FEW minutes later David descended the stairs and found Mr. Edward Maltby alone in the lounge-hall.

  Lydia’s suggestion to make use of a bedroom had been seized on by Mr. Hopkins, who had declared that if the ladies were going to get dry there was no reason why he shouldn’t, and who had followed them up. Then he had added to the unpopularity of his move by waiting to see which room David carried Jessie into, and promptly commandeering the room adjoining. Meanwhile Thomson, anxious to earn good marks, was sneezing and washing up in the kitchen.

  “Aren’t you afraid of pneumonia, sir?” David asked Mr. Maltby.

  “I have more important things to think about than pneumonia,” answered the old man.

  “Pneumonia can be quite important.”

  “Yes, yes, but less important at my age than at yours. Some people think I have lived much too long already. Mr. Hopkins, for instance. Fortunately, you and your sister seem to be bearing up pretty well.”

  “Oh, we’re all right.”

  “That is lucky. Our somewhat odd party needs a few able-bodied members to look after the rest. Our friend Mr. Thomson is sneezing his head off. Not that the absence of his head would make much material difference to his utility——”

  “Come, sir, he is washing up!” interposed David with a grin. “As a matter of fact, I think I ought to go and help him.”

  “You will disappoint him if you do,” retorted Mr. Maltby. “Mr. Thomson is one of those sensitive young men who need so much help that they insist on none. He is, as you say, washing up, and from sundry sounds I have heard between sneezes he is also breaking up. I imagine we shall have to include two cups and a saucer in the account for damages. I also imagine that, before midnight, our Mr. Thomson will be running a very high temperature. He is the one who ought to be in bed.”

  “He certainly looks a bit glassy,” nodded David.

  “So does the lady you have just carried upstairs. What is her name?”

  “Jessie Noyes.”

  “Jessie Noyes. Well, she probably has a temperature, too. I am less certain about the last victim, Mr. Hopkins. My estimation of that individual is that he will develop a temperature if he wants to, but not otherwise. I undoubtedly have a temperature. Young man—I beg your pardon, you do not like being called young man.”

  “By Mr. Hopkins,” qualified David.

  “Thank you,” smiled Mr. Maltby. “Personally, I should like to be called a young man by anybody. Still, I will avoid the phrase, in case you retaliate by calling me old man.”

  “My name is David Carrington.”

  “Well, Mr. Carrington, we have met in a most extraordinary situation, and it is this extraordinary situation that is causing me to pay no attention to my temperature. I am sorry to have missed Charles the First, but, do you know, I find that old chap up on the wall there equally interesting? In fact, I find this entire house interesting, though so far I have seen little of it—there goes another sneeze, and another cup—yes, and I am quite ready to contract pneumonia or any other physical complaint to discover its secret.”

  “Secret?” repeated David.

  “You do not agree with me that it has a secret?” inquired Mr. Maltby.

  “You mean, everybody being out, and the fires going?”

  “Is that all?”

  “No. The bread-knife on the floor.”

  “The bread-knife on the floor. Most important, that! ... Yet, of course, it may be.... And that is all?”

  David frowned.

  “You know, sir,” he said, “I think you and I might get on quite well if you’d be a bit more explicit.”

  “I have the same idea, Mr. Carrington,” answered Mr. Maltby. “But I can only be explicit on one condition.”

  “What is it?”

  “That you do not pass on what I tell you without my permission.”

&
nbsp; David hesitated. “I don’t like giving blind promises,” he said.

  “I don’t like exacting them,” replied Mr. Maltby. “You are under no obligation to give this one.”

  “Only I won’t hear what you’ve got to tell me if I don’t?” The old man shook his head. “All right, I agree. No, wait a moment. Why am I privileged?”

  “Because I may need some help before we leave this place. I may need some one to talk to—to think aloud to. You seem to me the best person for that office.”

  “Thanks. Well, sir, it’s a bargain.”

  Mr. Maltby walked slowly round the hall. In his little tour he opened doors, looked up the stairs, and returned to the fire. Then he said:

  “You have just heard about a tragedy on the train.”

  “We all heard about that,” answered David.

  “A bad tragedy. One that is going to affect us uncomfortably. But the tragedy on the train is not the only tragedy. Oh, no.” He turned his head and glanced at the picture over the mantelpiece. The figure of paint appeared to be listening to the figure of flesh and blood. “There is another tragedy, and it may be that this other tragedy is going to affect us even more uncomfortably. You see, the horror on the train, great though it may turn out to be—as yet I know little about it—will not compare, I am certain, with the horror that exists here, in this house. Tell me, Mr. Carrington, am I just spinning melodramatic words to you, or do you feel the horror in this house?”

  “I—I’m not sure,” replied David unconvincingly.

  “I am to accept that?”

  “No.”

  “Then try again.”

  “Yes, I do feel it.”

  “I knew you did,” answered Mr. Maltby. “We all feel it, but not in the same degree, or in the same way. Perhaps there is one exception at the moment. Mr. Hopkins. So far he has felt little beyond his own misery. But he will feel it, too, in due course, for all his pooh-pooh’s. It would not surprise me at all if he is the first to crumble.... Your mind is rebelling against all this,” the old man challenged suddenly. “You are saying to yourself, ‘Oh, nonsense! This is just nerves! I am being influenced by that silly spook-spouting old idiot Mr. Maltby.’ Let us examine that theory, then, to dismiss it. Did you begin to feel something strange about this house after I arrived, or before?”

  “Before,” admitted David.

  “Then I cannot be responsible.”

  “It wouldn’t seem so.”

  “When did you first feel it?”

  “I suppose, pretty well as soon as I entered.”

  “Were your sensations general, or did any particular thing strike you? We will exclude such items as bread-knives.”

  “Yes, one thing did strike me.”

  “What?”

  “It doesn’t seem any good telling you, since you appear to know everything in advance.”

  “Of all there is to know, I know very little in advance. What struck you?”

  “Well, that picture over the fireplace.”

  “In what way did it strike you?”

  “I don’t know. Sorry if that’s not satisfactory.”

  “Shall I put a suggestion into your head?”

  “Please do.”

  “Did it strike you that the old fellow in the picture was watching you? Listening to you?”

  “But, of course, that was ridiculous!”

  “Absolute nonsense. Well, what else struck you? You were coming down the stairs as I arrived. I caught a glimpse of your face. You were not very happy.”

  “I’d had a bit of a shock.”

  “Yes?”

  “When you saw me coming down those stairs I was returning from my second ascent of them. I’d been poking round a bit before, and the first time I’d found a door locked. Top room. It worried me, because I thought I heard sounds behind it, but I got no reply when I knocked.”

  “What sort of sounds?” inquired Mr. Maltby.

  “Nothing very distinct. Somebody moving, that was the impression. And then silence.”

  “Did you form any conclusion?”

  “I can’t say that I did.”

  “Of course, you tried the keyhole?”

  “The key was in it, on the other side.”

  “Well? That was the first time.”

  “Yes. And the second time——”

  “No, wait a moment,” interrupted Mr. Maltby. “Have you told me everything about the first time? How long were you there? Was the sound repeated? It is a good plan, I have always found, to know all there is to know at once, then one does not have to go back to it.”

  “I agree that’s a good plan,” responded David, finding some comfort in the old man’s thoroughness, “only in this case it doesn’t advance us any, as I’ve told you the lot.”

  “On the contrary, Mr. Carrington, you haven’t answered my specific questions.”

  “So I haven’t. I was there about half a minute, I should say, and the sound wasn’t repeated. No, wait—as we’re being so particular! I’ve told you things in the wrong order. I didn’t hear any sound till I knocked. Then the quick, faint movement. Then the silence.”

  “Thank you. And now for the second time.”

  “Yes, the second time,” said David. “The door wasn’t locked the second time. I walked into the room, a sort of attic, and found it empty. That’s what gave me my shock.”

  “Naturally,” nodded Mr. Maltby. “Did you form any conclusion this time?”

  “Only that—that whoever had been in the room had now left it, and—and was somewhere else in the house.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The window looked closed, or it would have occurred to you.”

  “Oh, I see. Well, it was closed, so it didn’t occur to me.”

  “You examined the window?”

  “No. I didn’t do that.”

  “I think, when you examine it, you will find that it is closed, but not fastened. It may not even be completely closed. You may find——”

  “Look here,” interposed David. “If the person got out of the window, why should he worry about the door?”

  “He may have tried the door first, and then suddenly changed his mind to the window,” retorted Mr. Maltby. “Obviously your question cannot be answered without some knowledge of the person—whom we merely assume to be male—and his mental attitude. We must search the house very thoroughly, to make sure that this person is not hiding anywhere else. My own theory, however, inclines to the window. By the way, what did you think of our friend Mr. Smith?”

  “Smith? That chap who came in with you?” queried David.

  “Perhaps you are right to query the name,” observed Mr. Maltby, dryly. “But we must use Smith for lack of another.”

  “I didn’t think much of him,” said David. “Nor did you.”

  “I am sorry I did not conceal my antipathy. No, I did not think much of him. You know, of course, that he was on our train?”

  “I rather deduced that.”

  “Yes, it was unfortunate for him that he dropped his ticket. Now, since Mr. Smith was on our train, and stoutly denied the fact, what do you suppose would be the reason?”

  David did not reply at once. The only reason he could suppose was a very unpleasant one, and while he waited some one emerged from the kitchen into the back of the hall. Thomson had finished his rather disastrous operations at the sink.

  His face was paler than ever, despite a little pink spot on either cheek. The pink accentuated the surrounding white. His eyes were watering.

  “Well, here we are!” he exclaimed, with a sort of glazed attempt at cheerfulness.

  He stood for a few moments on one foot, and then sat down rather awkwardly in the nearest chair. It was a very hard chair, with a seat and back of dark polished wood. He looked as uncomfortable as he felt.

  “Nice of you to do all the work,” said David.

  Thomson’s advent had cut across the conversation and temporarily ended it
. He was like a bit of grit that had got into a smoothly running engine.

  “No, not at all, not at all,” he replied. “I like washing up. Well, you know what I mean. If it’s got to be done.”

  The pink spots grew pinker. He didn’t want anybody to think his soul was so small that the pleasure of washing up filled it. On the other hand, he didn’t want to imply that he had been a martyr. Funny how you could sometimes think of the right words, and at other times they seemed a mile off. Lots of things seemed a mile off to Thomson at this moment. In fact, almost everything but the fire, and that was too close.

  “Is it getting warmer?” he asked.

  Before anybody could answer him he began sneezing. It was his longest bout.

  “Seven,” he murmured, smiling mirthlessly. “That must be a record. Not really, of course. I remember one chap who sneezed sixteen times. Hay fever. Atchoo!”

  As Thomson came up from his eighth sneeze, his eyes caught a glimpse of something blue. It was the blue of a dressing-gown. It gave him a strange sense of peace, though also an impulse to cry. Of course, he mustn’t do that. That would finish him! ... Hot? Had he said it was hot?

  Mr. Maltby and David glanced at each other, and then at Lydia on the stairs.

  “That fellow’s going to be ill, if he’s not looked after,” murmured Mr. Maltby.

  “Shall I put him to bed, too?” asked Lydia.

  “Eh? What? I’m all right!” gasped Thomson, as the room swam. “I just get them sometimes. Colds. They don’t mean anything.”

  “I’ll take responsibility for this,” said Mr. Maltby. “Stick him between sheets somewhere!”

  A few moments later Thomson found himself being led up the stairs by the Most Beautiful Girl in the World. She had hold of his arm.... She was close to him ... Oh, nonsense! ...

  “The one thing it is useless to fight, Mr. Carrington,” remarked Mr. Maltby, “is the inevitable. I think we were talking about Mr. Smith.”

  The front door was shoved open the next instant, and the subject of their conversation staggered in.

  CHAPTER VII

  THE RETURN OF SMITH

  SMITH was not a pleasant-looking object. His coarse rough suit was saturated with melting and melted snow, and his hair—he had no hat—streaked wetly down his low, lined forehead. Apparently his lips were the only dry portion of his anatomy, for before he spoke his tongue came out to moisten them. The action revealed the fact that several of his teeth were missing.