“Oh dear, I’m always so dreadfully frightened when I see you,” she twittered. “I always think you’ve got those awful things just waiting in your pocket, ready to put on anyone you see.”
“What awful things are those?” Bobby asked smilingly.
Surely this innocent girlish chatter, those big, wondering, pleading eyes so trustfully upturned, could not be mere camouflage for the hard threat and deadly purpose he had seemed to see mirrored only the moment before in those same soft eyes. He told himself that this case with its mingled and opposed motives of gold and religion, was getting him down. What part in all that dark and evil tangle could this little flirting typist have to play?
“What awful things do you mean?” he asked again.
“Oh, you know,” she said as she tripped along by his side, for it seemed she, too, was on her way to the centre of the town, whither this footpath led, “those things you make people put on when you take them away to prison so they can’t do anything. Oo-oo.” She gave a pretty little shudder. “I don’t know how you can,” she said. “I should—die,” and again she looked up at him, her expression full of fear at the thought of what he could do and of complete confidence that he would never do it to her.
“You mean handcuffs?” Bobby suggested. “As a matter of fact, you know, we don’t use them very often. We have to sometimes, of course, if people start giving trouble.”
She seemed to lose her interest in handcuffs then, but Bobby was soon aware that she was trying hard to start a flirtation with him. Her little plump face of a china doll, her pouting mouth, her eyes all confidence and allure, were all called into play. Bobby did his best to respond. He was trying to decide whether Miss Foote was one of those girls to whom flirtation is as natural and automatic as breathing, or whether flirtation was being used to hide some deeper purpose—as, for instance, to make him forget what she might fear he had seen in that strange and passing moment when their eyes met.
He even dallied with the idea of suggesting a visit to the pictures—the classic step when relations have once been established. However, he contented himself when he got near his destination with a warm and lingering handshake, with putting on as soulful a look as he could manage, with telling her how much he hoped he would have the pleasure of meeting her again.
“I’ve such a lot to attend to at the moment,” he lamented. “I expect you’ve heard Mr. Spencer met with an accident last night. He had a fall and hurt his head very badly.”
Miss Foote said she had heard about that, and Mr. Spencer was such a nice man, wasn’t he? And she did hope it wasn’t serious.
Then they shook hands again and Miss Foote tripped away. Bobby had stopped to say goodbye a little further from the police station than was necessary and opposite a grocer’s shop. Next to it, further on, was a hairdresser’s with, in the window, as Bobby had noticed, a large mirror fixed at a convenient angle. After they had parted, after that handshake that had been just a fraction of a second or so longer than was quite necessary, Bobby moved quickly to get a clear view of what the mirror showed. Merely Miss Foote’s back as she tripped away, fumbling in her handbag as she did so, and was it only his imagination again—or self-consciousness perhaps?—that made him think her shoulders were quivering with a sort of suppressed and sardonic mirth? And how did she manage to convey in her gesture, as she snapped to her handbag, a kind of defiant confidence, even threat? Or was that, too, merely fantasy and was he entirely losing his grip upon realities?
He walked on, angry and puzzled. Was it possible she also had noticed that so conveniently placed mirror in the next shop window, and knew very well why he had chosen to stop and say goodbye just where he had? Was she, he wondered, merely an empty-headed little fool to whom one pair of trousers was as good as another? Or was she something very different indeed? Nor was Bobby’s temper in any way improved when he entered the police station to find Sergeant Hicks turning away from the window and looking almost as if he were about to venture on an understanding and sympathetic wink, had not a sudden, fierce glare from Bobby nipped any such intention somewhat more than frostily.
Unfortunate, of course, that a long, lingering hand-shake can be so easily misunderstood—especially when it seemed likely that that same long lingering handshake had not been in the least misunderstood by the recipient thereof. Anyhow, Sergeant Hicks had not misunderstood that frosty glare he had received for he was looking quite pale now. Bobby indeed never himself fully realized the formidable and devastating anger and resolve he could at times almost unconsciously put into a single glance.
There was a good deal of routine work to be attended to, paper stuff that Bobby had come here to supervise, work that is not in itself in the least dramatic or interesting, but that is the base all the same of all successful detective work—for that matter of all work everywhere. There were reports to be read and considered, other reports to be written, including one to the Home Office explaining the situation caused by the temporary disablement of Mr. Spencer. In all this Bobby directed and advised, taking great care that as little as possible was said about himself and his activities. Sergeant Hicks was deeply gratified to find that while formal and polite reference was made to the assistance rendered by the Wychshire county police he himself appeared as the fount and the origin of all activities. At first, the good sergeant was a little surprised by this, but very soon he began to think that after all it really was like that.
But the truthful chronicler, when drawing a portrait, must not omit the warts, and the fact is that Bobby was scared to death lest the Home Office should realize the exact position and he in consequence get a rap over the knuckles and instructions to attend to his own Wychshire duties. Enough, he would be told, to keep him fully occupied. All of which would probably mean a Home Office Inspector of Constabulary turning up with Scotland Yard not far behind and all ready to take over. Bobby had a great respect, both human and official, for all the Constabulary Inspectors he had so far come in contact with, but the further away they kept from Wychshire the more he liked them. His ideal Inspector of Constabulary would have been one seconded for duty in one of the more remote provinces of China. In all of which Bobby did less than justice to the perspicacity of the aforesaid inspectors who, as a matter of fact, were saying to each other that if young Bobby Owen, unable to resist the fascination and the challenge of the Oldfordham mystery, as the papers were beginning to call it, had managed to muscle in on the job, so much the better, and very likely the affair was being handled almost as well as it could have been by one of themselves. Anyhow, now it was his pigeon and he could carry on.
By now it was nearly lunch time—long past indeed in Sergeant Hicks’s opinion—and he and Bobby had come to the end of their labours. Bobby, consulting his notes to make sure that nothing had been overlooked, said:
“Oh yes. Langley Long. I had almost forgotten about him. You said you would make inquiries. Any information?”
“Well, sir, nothing to speak of,” Hicks answered. “Quiet sort of gentleman. Looking out for property to buy. Staying at Mason’s.”
“Is that the Temperance Hotel?” Bobby asked.
“That’s right, sir,” agreed Hicks.
“Do they serve lunches?” Bobby asked. “I mean to non-residents?”
“Oh yes, sir, very good lunches indeed,” declared the treacherous and ungrateful Hicks, who knew very well that the Mason lunches were a byword in the town, but simply didn’t care as long as he got Bobby off somewhere and a chance to adjourn to his own tasty rabbit pie he knew was waiting for him. “You have to send out for your drink,” he admitted, “but it’s only round the corner.”
“I think I’ll try them,” Bobby said, and Hicks beamed approval.
Thither accordingly Bobby took his way, for he remembered that thence he had seen emerge Miss Theresa Foote, and Miss Theresa Foote was a young woman in whom he was beginning to take a real interest. He remembered having heard something about Langley Long having been seen in her company, a
nd so it seemed likely that her visit to Mason’s had been to meet Mr. Langley Long. And Mr. Langley Long bore an odd family resemblance to Denis Kayes. Further the two of them had turned up in this small country town at about the same time and only shortly before these events began. To Bobby, all this, apparent family resemblance, a nearly simultaneous arrival, suggested strongly something more than mere coincidence. Anyhow, it seemed to him plainly desirable to get to know more about Mr. Langley Long, and, in especial, to investigate his connection with a flirtatious young lady who nevertheless could look like a young goddess of death. The possibilities seemed vague, doubtful, uncertain in the extreme, but then this was a case in which it might be said of anything that it might lead anywhere.
CHAPTER XVIII
LUNCHEON AT MASON’S
But in the Mason dining-room, no Mr. Langley Long was visible. Bobby was disappointed. He had calculated that Miss Foote’s call indicated Long’s presence in the hotel during the morning and that therefore he was likely to be lunching there. Apparently not, however, so Bobby turned his attention to the menu of ‘Mason’s famous three-course luncheon for one and eight.’ Nothing wrong with the price anyhow, and soup, main dish, and sweet were provided—coffee extra. Bobby, catching sight of the soup on the neighbouring table, shuddered slightly. He decided to give it a miss and proceed direct to the main dish. Here there was a choice of spam jardinière, egg and fish cake, omelette au spam, fish cake hors d’oeuvre, spam pie, fish cake varié, and finally, nobly alone—Spam. The vegetables were boiled potatoes and boiled cabbage. And boiled here means boiled. But Bobby was never one to flinch where the path of duty led and it was still possible that Mr. Langley Long might yet appear. He made his choice, though not without a secret hope that what he ordered would be ‘off,’ as generally happens to-day in a London restaurant. However, it duly arrived, and at the same time there bustled in Mr. Langley Long himself, apparently fearing, and not as might more reasonably have been expected, hoping, that luncheon was over. Bobby had only seen him once before and then only for a moment, but he knew him again at once. To Bobby’s trained eye the resemblance to Denis Kayes was marked, though not so much in feature or colouring, as in a certain trick of carriage, in the distinctive shape of the facial bone structure and also in the unusually small lobe of the unusually flat ear. And Bobby always maintained that the ear was the most characteristic of all features and the one most difficult to disguise.
Langley Long did not seem to notice Bobby, sitting unobtrusively in a corner behind one of the enormous aspidistras that adorned several of the tables. Bobby dallied over his sweet if that can be called a sweet which has never known sugar, and then ordered a cup of coffee—unexpectedly good—and when it arrived took it over to Mr. Long’s table, that gentleman, too, having by now arrived at the coffee stage. He greeted Bobby’s appearance with that stare of outraged bewilderment and almost incredulous indignation with which any Britisher naturally resents such an intrusion. Bobby produced his most ingratiating smile.
“Mr. Langley Long, I believe?” he said.
Mr. Langley Long remained unappeased. He found relief in the classical retort:
“You have the advantage of me.”
“Oh yes, I expect so,” agreed Bobby and brought out his card.
He handed it across the table. Mr. Long was still being dignified, distant, resentful, when he took it, but then abruptly his expression changed. There was a startled fear in his eyes now, dismay in his dropped jaw. He became a little pale and even made a slight movement as if to rise and hurry away. Perhaps another glance at Bobby made him realize that that would not be allowed. Instead he muttered sulkily:
“Well, now then. Well, what do you want?”
“Well, you see, if you don’t mind,” Bobby answered, “there are just one or two things I would like to ask about. Routine inquiries, you understand. One has to do it. I say, this coffee’s not so bad, is it? Didn’t think much of their lunch, even for a war time lunch, but I’ve tasted worse coffee. Most people make it like tea—one teaspoon for each person and one for the pot, pour boiling water on and there you are but the coffee isn’t. They seem to think it’s like logic and mustn’t be separated from its grounds. Have a cigarette?”
This chatter, the offer of the cigarette, were intended to put Langley Long more at his ease. The effort was not very successful. The cigarette was accepted, but with more suspicion than gratitude. Nor did it long remain lighted. It was quickly put down and forgotten, and something was mumbled about an appointment, an important appointment.
“I shan’t keep you long,” Bobby assured him. “If you prefer it, we could walk along together, if your appointment’s not too far, and have our chat as we go.”
The offer was not accepted. Bobby had not expected that it would be. He felt sure that the appointment was ‘ad hoc’—invented for the occasion. Langley Long muttered again, nor had his obvious agitation in any way diminished:
“What’s it all about?”
“Routine. Routine,” Bobby repeated airily. “Red tape in fact. Police are great devotees of red tape. Have to be. By the way, may I see your identity card?”
“What for?”
“Part of the general check up,” Bobby explained. “You’ll have heard about the murder here? Poor fellow called Brown killed rather brutally and not a thing to show who did it or why. So all we can do is to make a general check up.”
“I’ve an alibi,” Langley Long said eagerly, a little too eagerly. “Some of us were playing cards that night. Solo. You can ask Mason. He’ll remember. He ought to. He had nearly ten bob off me. We were at it till close on three.” He turned to look for the waitress. Naturally she had her back to him, as is the habit and custom of all her tribe. He began to tap on the table with his spoon. “I’ll ask the girl to get Mason—” he began, but Bobby interrupted.
“No, no, quite unnecessary,” he declared. “I’m perfectly ready to take your word for it and anyhow I never thought of asking you for an alibi. Why should I? I merely want to know if you can help in any way. Don’t forget your identity card, will you?” He added when Langley Long still hesitated: “I expect you know a police officer has the right to ask to see identity cards. I’m not in uniform, I know, but we could go along to the police station if you like.”
Again the suggestion was not welcomed. Again Bobby had not expected it would be. Sulkily the thing was produced. Bobby took a note of the particulars. Not that he thought identity cards were of much value. They are easily forged, easily bought—or sold for that matter—in any large city. True, they can be checked to some extent. But not to any very useful extent. The officials concerned can say that such and such a card was duly issued, but there is no way of knowing that the person holding the card is the person to whom it was originally issued. The addition of finger-prints would of course make them more, so to say, realistic. As a policeman Bobby’s considered opinion was that that would be a most useful and admirable development. As an ordinary Britisher he knew he would fight any such proposal to the death. He handed back the card.
“Thank you so much,” he said. “I understand you are looking out for property to purchase?”
“Well, what about it? Nothing wrong in that, is there?”
“Dear me, no,” said Bobby innocently. “You don’t think then you can help us in any way?”
“I don’t know anything about it,” declared Langley Long, “only what I’ve read in the papers. I don’t see why you should think I did.”
“Then I suppose I needn’t bother you any more,” said Bobby, and Langley Long looked extreme relief. “Sorry to have troubled you, but in a case like this we have to worry a lot of people for nothing. Grab at any straw, so to speak. I do hope you’ll forgive us. I always say if there’s anything at all unusual, any trifle even, even the mere arrival of a new comer in a town—check it up. It might lead anywhere. Oh, by the bye, do you know Mr. Denis Kayes?”
This remark produced immediate effect, even startling effect
. Until now Langley Long, before Bobby’s meek, almost deferential attitude, had been gradually regaining confidence. But this new simple question shattered it again. He stared, gobbled, jumped to his feet.
“I won’t be badgered any more,” he stammered. “I won’t. You’ve no right.” He put his hand to his throat and for a moment Bobby almost thought he was going to collapse. His agitation was so marked that one or two of those still lingering over their lunches looked up and stared. Bobby said sharply:
“Pull yourself together.”
Without answering, Langley Long began to walk towards the door. This time Bobby made no attempt to stop him. Enough had been said for the present. The train had been laid and fired, so to say, and now it would be better to wait the result—explosion or fizzle. All Bobby’s experience told him that developments were very apt to follow when suspects began to realize that the authorities were taking an interest in them. Either they were innocent, and decided they had better tell all they knew, even if that all included matters they would have preferred not to mention. Or they were guilty, and then almost inevitably they made some defensive or precautionary move that again almost inevitably provided fresh indications to follow, fresh clues to follow up. As in chess—or war—when one side has been manoeuvred into a position where he is obliged to move but can only move to his disadvantage. So now he let Long go, hoping that time allowed him for reflection would produce results of one sort or another. He contented himself with calling after Long’s retreating figure in tones he tried to make as genial as possible:
“Well, come along and have a chat whenever you feel like it. Always glad to see you.”
He hoped that not only would Long remember this invitation and act upon it if he decided to tell what he knew—if, that is, he did know anything relevant—but that also the friendly tone adopted would quench the suspicions and curiosity of those present who had begun to look up and stare and suspect trouble between their fellow guest and his visitor. Bobby hoped very much none of them knew who he was. He knew the little town was full of newspapermen and he had no wish to put any of them on Langley Long’s track. Sometimes newspapermen brought in useful information, but there were some of them who had a tendency to put headlines above the claims of justice.
It Might Lead Anywhere Page 14
