The Case of the Running Mouse: A Ludovic Travers Mystery

by Christopher Bush

  But all the same I was scared stiff that Hamson should see me. Luckily I had bought my ticket when I made the enquiries about trains, so I watched the platform from the vantage-point of the bridge crossing. Hamson had gone well along the platform, so as soon as the train drew in I nipped down and took a seat at the near end, and a pretty filthy third-class compartment it was. But I had it to myself for a few stations and by then I’d lost all anxiety about Hamson’s looking through the train. There was no reason why he should, so I told myself, but I sat behind that same old newspaper for all that.

  When we drew in to town I delayed my exit and when I got out to the barrier Hamson must have been well on his way. It was almost dark, but I found a telephone kiosk and rang up Mrs. Grays. I didn’t expect her to be in, but she was.

  “How are you?” I said. “Still feeling better?”

  “Very much better,” she said.

  “Can you put up with me for a few minutes if I come round at once?”

  She didn’t reply and I thought the line was dead. Then she merely said she’d love to see me, and that again was that.

  I couldn’t find a taxi but I did get a bus, though the short journey took the best part of half an hour. Barbara Grays was waiting for me, and so was an excellent glass of sherry. She was certainly looking very much better, and I told her so. We also talked about the perfectly magnificent weather we were having, and the talk was so artificial that you could have cut it with a knife. She was trying not to appear anxious, and I was thinking how to slide easily into the exceedingly awkward news which I had come specially to give.

  “I haven’t seen much of Hamson these days,” I remarked. “Have you run across him at all?”

  “Not a great deal,” she said, and it seemed to me that her voice had a studied indifference.

  “I wonder if I might be highly personal,” I went on. “You may even think it rude.”

  “Why not?” she said. “Surely these days it’s the fashion to be rude.”

  “But some of us remain old-fashioned,” I said. “What I was going to say was, that I had an idea—I don’t know who put it in my head—that you and Hamson were practically engaged.”

  She smiled, and with the same indifference. “My dear Major Travers! You of all people listening to gossip!”

  “Don’t be hypocritical,” I told her archly. “I love it, and so do you. La Rochefoucauld was eternally right. There’s always something in the misfortunes of our friends which is not wholly displeasing to us.”

  “It would have been a misfortune if I had been engaged to Tommy Hamson?”

  I smiled. “You know too many answers. But to go on being rude, are you thinking of marrying him when all this dreadful business is over?”

  “But why should I marry Tommy Hamson?”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Why do people get married?”

  Then she was asking me if I would have another sherry. I said I wouldn’t, and it was when I was taking her glass and my own to the side-table that she put her question.

  “You didn’t come here to-night to talk about Tommy Hamson?”

  “I didn’t,” I said. “I came here to redeem a promise. That if I discovered anything about your sister I’d reveal it to you before going to the police.”

  “What have you discovered?” Her eyes were fixed on me with a disconcerting intensity, and I took my time about going back to my chair.

  “I think you know most of it yourself,” I said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just what I say. Perhaps that’s why I’m being so abrupt. If I’d thought you knew nothing, then I think I’d have been afraid to tell you.”

  That frightened her, and that was the last thing I’d intended. But it did tell me that there were things about which she knew even less than I.

  “Will you let me tell you about it in my own way?” I went on.

  She nodded, and I caught the nervous movements of her hands.

  “This is what happened,” I said. “I may be wrong in little details but the main outline I know is right. The story begins for both of us on that morning when your sister came here to see you. She gave you a piece of news. I imagine she gave it perfectly calmly, but to you it was something like the end of the world—as things turned out. What she told you was that she was pregnant.”

  She didn’t nod or even move her head, and her eyes were so intensely on mine that mine turned away.

  “The gist of the talk that followed was something like this,” I went on, “and your voice was certainly raised, because you were angry at her obstinacy and the matter-of-fact way she was taking things. Perhaps you took it for granted that she’d be marrying Worrack at once, and that she had no intention of doing. Then you thought she’d go away for a long holiday and have her child, but she had no intention of doing that. Then came the biggest shock of all, when you realised what that operation really was.”

  It was no prudery on my part but I couldn’t look at her as I told her that. But she made never a sign and I knew that so far I was right.

  “It was you, probably, who described the man as he really was,” I said. “She preferred to call him a doctor, or surgeon. In any case you couldn’t budge her. Her mind was made up. Perhaps both your voices were raised then—that I can’t say. I do know that she fainted. She was sick perhaps, as women are in early pregnancy, and when you rushed out for sal volatile, you caught your maid by the door. What she had heard, if anything, you didn’t know, but though you came to the final conclusion that she’d heard nothing incriminating, you dismissed her. To keep in her good books, in case she might have heard anything, you paid her well.”

  I looked up at her then, and it was her eyes that turned away.

  “When you asked your sister who the doctor was, and where his surgery was, I think she told you he lived in Dublin, and that she was giving out that she was going to see O’Clauty and her horses as an excuse for the crossing. After the operation, of course, she would have gone to see O’Clauty. And one other thing. I think she made you swear by all that was holy that you’d never say a word to Worrack. That’s all—at least so far.”

  “All,” she said, and I scarcely heard the word, for she had spoken it to herself. Then she was shaking her head. Another moment and her question came so fiercely that it startled me.

  “Who else knows it besides you?”

  “No one,” I told her quietly. “Didn’t I promise I’d come to you first?”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I oughtn’t to have doubted you.”

  Her lips quivered and I thought for a moment she was going to cry. That was why I went so hastily on.

  “If you’d asked me how I discovered it, then I couldn’t have told you, because it involves all sorts of people and things. I will say I only discovered it a few hours ago—and—”

  “Those other people. They will talk?”

  “Oh, no,” I told her, and smiled reassuringly. “There’ll be no talk. I think I can safely promise you that. But what I would like to do, and believe me when I say I’m sincere, is to say how I sympathise with you in the dreadful predicament in which you found yourself when you discovered she’d never been to Ireland at all. And, of course, when you didn’t hear a word from her. You simply couldn’t go to the police. You might have mentioned the pregnancy—and yet I don’t know. Even that would have been too dangerous.”

  I had to shake my head when I thought of something else.

  “You must have gone through hell, even that day at Moroni’s—when you were trying to make yourself out indifferent. Then there was I, blundering in with that ring and asking you to identify it.”

  “It was good of you,” she told me quietly. “I’ll never forget it.”

  “No, no,” I said quickly. “Thanks are the last thing I want. But just one thing more, and then I’ve finished. There’s something else you did, and I’m certainly not going to upbraid you for it. I think you broke your word to your sister. Perhaps you had to. You just had to
confide in someone or you’d have gone mad. That was why you confided in Worrack. That was why he in turn confided in me. You both hoped I’d discover something, and the whole business could be cleared up without the intervention of the police.”

  She made no reply. It was a moment or two before she spoke. “What are you going to do?”

  “Well, I’ve redeemed my promise and I can’t do more unless you can give me overwhelming reasons to the contrary, I’ve simply got to go to the police.”

  “But you mustn’t!”

  “Listen,” I said gently. “Why be afraid of the police? Do you think they haven’t any hearts? Do you think they want to drag your sister’s name in the mud? I tell you that’s the last thing they want to do. There’ll be no scandal—that I can assure you. But justice has got to be done. Whoever was responsible for your sister’s death not going to be allowed to get away with it. There’s something else. What about Worrack? Do you think he committed suicide? I don’t, and—between ourselves—the police don’t. There’s something else that has to be paid for.”

  “The police will come here again?”

  “No,” I said. “I think I can promise you even that.”

  I got to my feet, for there seemed no more to say. Then her hand went out and I thought she was motioning me to sit down again, so I sat down.

  “That ring. You still have it?”

  “Yes,” I said ruefully. “There’ll have to be some very curious explaining done to show how I got it.”

  “It didn’t upset me when I saw that ring,” she said. “I knew about it all the time.”

  My eyes fairly bulged.

  “There’s something I ought to say in fairness to you,” she was going on. “I thought I’d never have to say it, but now I must. It wasn’t Peter Worrack who got you to come to his flat. It was myself.”

  “Good Lord!” I said, and then a light began to dawn. “But it wasn’t you who sent me a certain letter?”

  “Yes,” she said. “It was I who sent that too.”

  “Then you’re READY!”

  She smiled wanly. Perhaps it did sound a bit foolish. “Yes,” she said. “And afterwards I was afraid it was something you would guess.”

  CHAPTER XV

  READY FOR ACTION

  “Good Lord!” I said again. “Then it was you behind that door!”

  She stared at that.

  “I saw your gloved hand on it,” I said. “But I never guessed it was you!”

  Talk was easy now and there were no hesitations.

  “But why did you think of confiding in me?” I asked.

  “Your wife had told me about you long ago,” she said. “Then I remembered it, so I got her address from the hospital and wrote to her. In very strict confidence, I made it, and perhaps I didn’t tell her the truth. She said she knew you’d be glad to help, and she told me you would be at the flat on leave. She promised she’d never say a word. Then I was afraid to take advantage of her kindness, so I went to Peter Worrack.”

  “I see. And that was why he hinted that you were up to the neck in the business, so that I’d never dream you were behind him.”

  “Yes,” she said. “I knew I had nothing really to fear. I’d been foolish perhaps, but that was all. Then, when Peter was dead, I was in despair again. Then I forced myself to write that letter. As soon as I’d sent it I wished I hadn’t. I thought you’d discover me from the name.”

  “The name?” I said, and then saw it. “Your hair, of course. But thank heaven you did write it. Which reminds me. How did you come into possession of that pawn-ticket?”

  “I can’t tell you,” she said, and shook her head. “That’s something you must never ask me.”

  “But, listen,” I said. “The only basis on which you and I can work together is absolute confidence. You’ve got to tell me!”

  She shook her head again, and once more I had the idea that she was near to tears.

  “Well, let’s hope you’re right,” I said, and shrugged my shoulders resignedly.

  “But you’ve got to trust me,” she said, and the hell of a lot of logic, as I thought, was in that. Then she was wanting to know what else I had found out.

  “The man responsible for your sister’s death,” I told her. “If not that, then the man who pawned her jewellery. That’s why I’ve got to go to the police. It’s a matter of honour. It’s a matter of two honours. They’re employing me and so are you. That’s why I’ll do my damnedest to protect your interests.”

  “It’s good of you,” she said. “Too good of you.”

  “Don’t you believe it,” I told her. “But there’s something you can tell me. Have you any idea who killed Worrack?” She turned her head away and her tongue was nervously moistening her lips.

  “I know who killed him.” she said calmly.

  “Who?”

  She shook her head again. “I can’t tell you. It’s something you must never ask me.”

  But she’d given me the answer all the same.

  “Well,” I said, and stirred in my seat as if to go. “That’s something we’ll be bound to find out. And, unless I’m mistaken, within the next forty-eight hours.”

  As I got to my feet I remembered something.

  “That ring. I ought to have given it back to you.”

  “Keep it,” she said. “I’d like it to go to your wife.”

  “Far too generous of you,” I said. “She’d never accept it. But you and she must talk that over later. And there’s the money. Best part of a hundred pounds.”

  “Keep that too,” she said. “Perhaps you may have to use it.”

  “Some time I’ll send you an account,” I said. “And my word still stands. You can rely on me to make your interests my own.”

  As soon as I’d said that I knew how pompous it must have sounded, and then I thought of something else.

  “Will you answer me a plain question? I’ve asked it before. It’s about Hamson. Did you ever entertain any idea of marrying him?”

  She turned away again. “And if I did?”

  “Nothing,” I said. Then I was going to hint that I had her interests to consider, and leave it at that, but she spoke first.

  “Have you anything against him?”

  “Maybe no. Maybe yes,” I said. “But that’s something that I can’t tell.”

  “I’m not going to marry him,” she told me calmly, and she was giving a challenging look as if she expected some comment. But then the door bell rang.

  “Who can it be?” she said, and suddenly looked frightened.

  “I’ll have a look,” I said. “I’m going now in any case.”

  When I opened the door, there stood Hamson.

  We each tried not to look surprised. Then I said I was just going, but he made me come back with him. He wasn’t staying a minute, he said, and his taxi was waiting. If I was going home we might share it.

  “How are you, Barbara?” he asked her solicitously. “Much better, Tommy. And you?”

  “Oh, I’m all right,” he told her amusedly. “Nothing’s ever wrong with me.”

  “I happened to be near,” he went on, “so I thought I’d pop in for a word.”

  “You’ll have a sherry?”

  “Thanks, no,” he said. “Got a taxi outside ticking up the shillings. But what about lunch with me to-morrow? Feel equal to it? Somewhere nice and quiet?”

  “Sorry, Tommy,” she said, “but I just don’t feel like lunching out.”

  “What do you think?” he asked me. “Oughtn’t she to get out? What’s the sense of sitting here and moping?”

  “I’m not moping,” she told him unruffledly. “It’s just that I don’t feel like going out.”

  “Wish to God I knew what had come over you these days!”

  The brief explosion passed and he was shrugging his shoulders. Then he smiled, and a most attractive smile he had, I’ll say that much for him.

  “Well, some time later then?”

  “Some time later,” she said, a
nd nodded. Then her hand went diplomatically out to me.

  “Good-bye, Major Travers. So good of you to call. And do give my love to Bernice. Good-bye, Tommy. Thanks for calling, too.”

  Down we went to the taxi. It was dark as blazes but he had a pencil torch, and it rather looked to me as if he’d gone home after getting off that train, and had come to the flat specially provided. As soon as the taxi moved off he began to talk. His tone was a drawling quality as if he was mildly bored, or else cocksure.

  “What are you up to these days?”

  “I?” I said. “Oh, like Satan, walking to and fro.”

  “Good. But you’re helping the police, aren’t you?”

  “In a limited way,” I said. “Something to do, and it passes the time.”

  “Got any suspects yet?” There seemed to me some sort of mockery in his tone, and he was beginning to get my goat. I’m a pugnacious individual at times, though you mayn’t have thought so.

  “Yes,” I said, as if suddenly interested. “Rather funny that you should ask it.”

  “Oh?” he said, ears pricked suddenly up. Then the irony came in again. “I suppose I’m not on the list by any chance?”

  “Why not?”

  “As you say, why not?” I heard his little chuckling sneer. “Any questions you’d like to put to me?”

  Ever ridden in a taxi in the black-out? With someone in one corner and you in another, and a voice coming eerily from the pitch dark? Then you know how unnatural everything was. I’ve told you that his damned superiority had been getting my goat. That’s why I lost my temper, even if I didn’t show it, and said the damn silly thing I did.

  “Questions?” I said. “Well, perhaps there are.”

  “Such as?”

  “Well, such as why did you have to kill Worrack?”

  As soon as that slipped out I could have bitten off my tongue. But he was saying nothing, and I didn’t feel like making worst out of worse. Perhaps he was taking it for a joke, I thought, and then I knew he wasn’t.

  “So you guessed that, did you?” he suddenly said, and his voice was so low that I hardly heard him.

  “Maybe,” I told him laconically.