“Well, you certainly do find things out, George,” I said.
“The Old Gent’s not dead yet,” he told me with a sideways nod of approbation. Then the oil fairly oozed out of him. “You haven’t done so badly yourself.”
“We aim to please,” I told him ironically, but it just bounced off his hide.
“Want to come with me to Halberg’s place?”
I shook my head. That part of the game never did intrigue me. I hate arrests and scenes, which shows what a bum detective I am.
“I don’t blame you,” he said. “Tell you what. You go to Richmond in my car and I’ll take the local one. You can get a train or a bus from Richmond. Then I’ll ring you up when I get back myself.”
“That’s good of you, George,” I said. “I think I’ll take your offer.”
“Only too glad,” he told me effusively. “You and I have got to look after each other.”
“That’s right,” I said. “And damn the Government’s petrol!”
I thought I’d riled him at last. But the noise he was making was only a chuckle.
It was three-thirty when I got to Richmond and nearly five when I entered the flats. As I did so a man rose from the far corner where there were chairs for people who had any waiting to do. I only saw the man out of the corner of my eye; then I knew it was Hamson, and that he was making straight for me.
“Afternoon, Travers,” he said, perfectly calmly. “Can you possibly spare me a minute.”
“I think so,” I said, rather offhandedly. “Been waiting for me long?”
“Nearly a couple of hours,” he said. “I’m an obstinate devil, though. I’d given myself till eight o’clock; if you hadn’t turned up, then, I was going.”
“Well, come upstairs,” I said, and then called to Frank to send up tea for two. After all, I did owe a repayment of that bread and salt.
As soon as we were in my room he was remarking that I looked as if I’d had a tiring day. I said I was a bit tired but I’d be fit as a flea after a cup of tea.
“Been exciting for me, too,” he said. “Laura Griffiths has been arrested.”
“Good God!” I said. “How did you know that?”
“One of Bill Ellice’s men saw the whole thing,” he told me. “I’d engaged him to have Laura watched.”
“The devil you had!” I said. “Know anything else?”
“Nothing at all. I hoped you might help.”
Tea came in then with margarined toast and little cakes. I poured out and as I passed his cup, passed some news with it.
“Molde and Scylla have been arrested too.”
His eyes narrowed. “A damn good thing too,” he said, and gave a little grunt. I could have said it was a damn good thing for him. Worrack gone and now Molde.
“They’ve been pulled in for being concerned with the death of Georgina Morbent,” was what I did tell him, and rather obtrusively passed the salt for his toast.
He didn’t say a word at that. He did say it was good toast and real good tea, and a cup was just what he’d been wanting too.
“Like to hear a story?” he suddenly asked me.
“Who doesn’t?” I told him.
“This is a true one,” he said. “It virtually begins when Molde tried to touch me for a loan of five hundred quid. He had God’s own amount of papers in his pockets to prove his solvency and his prospects. You know what a careless, untidy devil he is. That’s why he didn’t notice the pawn-ticket when it fell on the floor. He never knew I’d got it. He thought it was Worrack who’d found it and he’d dropped it in that office. Sure this isn’t going to bore you?”
“Carry on,” I told him. “I’ll let you know right enough when I’m bored.”
“Well,” he went on, “I’d been doing a lot of worrying about Georgina, as I told you once, and I couldn’t understand why the devil Barbara wasn’t worried too. Yet she was worried about something, and that puzzled me still more. And when an old police wallah is worried he tries to do something about it. Still, there was I in possession of the pawn-ticket that Molde had dropped. And I knew about Scylla’s sister. I only guessed she was her sister when she brought her to the club one night and I saw her fingers. Also I found out she was working at a doctor’s, and he a gynaecologist. That made me think a bit. Even if I didn’t see half the things I should have seen.”
He gave a slow shake of the head.
“The trouble with me, as you may have noticed, is that somebody must once have told me I had brains and I’ve been trying to convince myself of it ever since. Too damned clever by half—that’s me. So this is what I did about things.
“I threw out hints and I tried to get Barbara to open out. When she didn’t lie she just shut up like a clam. Sometimes she drove me nearly crazy, like that day at lunch. So I decided to be clever and to hell with what happened to myself. What I did was to drop that pawn-ticket in her room, so that she’d think it an accident. You know what I mean. If that didn’t start anything, then I knew nothing would.” He shook his head again. “You see, I thought at the time she was pretty fond of me. I was fond of Georgina too. We all were, and something had to be done about it.
“I didn’t give a damn about myself.”
Then he was producing a little red book from his breast pocket. It was a bank pass-book and he opened it and marked the spot with a finger as he passed it to me. I read the entry. Five hundred pounds paid to H. Lewton-Molde. And I couldn’t see any entry made for repayment.
“Yes,” he said as he put the pass-book back. “I lent Molde that five hundred after all.” He tapped his pocket. “I have his IOU on me now. I can see you’re thinking it was a hell of a sum to lend a bloke like Molde, and maybe it was. But I’m an obstinate cuss and I was prepared to pay. Also I didn’t know then that you were taking a hand in the game on behalf of Worrack.”
He passed his cup and waited till I’d filled it.
“Thanks,” he said. “Best cup of tea I’ve had for weeks. But I was mentioning Worrack. I told you I’d killed him, didn’t I? So I did. And this is how.
“Remember that morning when I was in your flat and Worrack rang you up to say you were to be at the club that night and that he was going to make a disclosure? He also said I was to come. Then Molde dropped in on us and I’ve often wondered why. He and I went off together, and then the devil whispered something in my ear. I’d got Molde absolutely under my thumb, and I didn’t give a damn what I said to him or how I treated him. So what I made up my mind to do was to scare the daylights out of him and put him off the scent, in case he might have come to suspect he’d dropped that ticket in my room after all. So I told him that Worrack was having special enquiries made about something, and you were working for him, and you’d often worked with the police. I said I’d learned, by just happening to come into your room when you were telephoning, that Worrack was going to make a sensational disclosure at the club that night and that it was something to do with a pawn-ticket. I made it just gossip, mind you. Didn’t throw out any hints about himself. Just sort of chatted and let it sink in. Made him swear, of course, that he wouldn’t repeat it.”
He’d been talking with eyes on nowhere. Then he suddenly looked straight at me.
“That’s how I killed Peter Worrack. After that, Molde couldn’t possibly afford to let him live. He had to kill him and he had to try to get back that ticket.” His lip curled. “I told you I was a brainy sort of cuss.”
“I’m beginning to think I’ve got you all wrong,” I said. “But here’s something I may tell you some time. What happened to me when I caught Scylla looking for that ticket.”
“Well, there we are,” he said. “Worrack was dead and you dropped me like a hot potato. You’d given me one little commission about Jean, but I could have told you a whole lot more if I’d have liked. But you didn’t want me, so I thought I’d act on my own. I gave a hint by asking your advice about a detective agency, and then I fixed things up with Bill Ellice. A good chap, Ellice. Do you know he actually
found out that Georgina had spent her last night at a Richmond hotel!”
“The devil he did!” I said admiringly. Heaven forbid that I should give Bill Ellice away.
“He found out a lot more,” he went on. “I reckon that if we’d had another couple of days we’d have had the whole thing worked out.”
He absent-mindedly pushed away his plate as if he had finished both tea and tale.
“I guess you would,” I said. I knew I was looking very much of a fool and there was no doubt about my feeling one.
“One thing I must say,” I went on. “When you castigated yourself just now you showed neither justice nor mercy. I think myself that you tried to do a damn fine job. In fact, I’ll go farther and say you have done a fine job. But for what you did, things wouldn’t have happened to-day. Sometime I may be able to tell you why.”
“That’s decent of you, Travers.” He nodded to himself. “I’d rather like to say something too. It’s a pity you and I didn’t work together. I like you, Travers, and I’m damned if I don’t tell you so to your face.”
I couldn’t say a thing. Funny how embarrassed we can sometimes be when someone suddenly makes a forthright statement.
“There’s something I’ll tell you now,” he went on. “I didn’t think I’d ever tell it to a soul. It’s horrible and it’s rather preyed on my mind. Do you think Molde is mad?”
“I don’t know,” I said, and frowned in thought. “Unbalanced—yes. And a pervert. But in a lot of things only too sane.”
“I think he’s mad and no one knows it but me,” he said. “Let me try and prove it. I told you I let him have that five hundred. He was most grateful. Really and truly grateful. Like a small nephew to whom you give an unexpected bicycle, shall we say, or like a dog when he knows you’re going to take him for a walk.” He hesitated for a moment as if he hardly liked to go on. “When I gave him that cheque he was like that. Then he gave the most extraordinary smile, as if he’d thought of something that particularly pleased him. Something secret and rather furtive. ‘I’ll see you don’t lose anything over this.’ That was the gist of what he told me, and when he said it he looked even more pleased; you know, as if he saw himself doing whatever it was he intended to do.”
“And what did he do?” I had to ask.
“Hacked off that head,” he said. “Went down to Malcroft and did it himself, or got that doctor to do it.”
“Horrible,” I said. “Thought you were marrying Mrs. Grays, and didn’t want her to have to wait for the money.”
“That’s what it amounts to,” he said, and began getting to his feet.
“I wish I could do something.” I don’t know why I said that. Perhaps it was a vague expression of all I was feeling. “You’ve certainly had a raw deal. You’re in bad with Mrs. Grays and I don’t see quite what you can do about it.”
He smiled. “My dear fellow, I’ve got nothing to grumble at. I went into it with my eyes open. But about that lunch. You can manage it soon?”
“I’d love to,” I said, and meant it. “To-morrow, perhaps, but I’ll let you know.”
He wouldn’t let me go down with him, and as we stood for a moment at the head of the stairs I asked him where he was going.
“Home,” he said, and smiled wryly. “A slow place these days, but it suits me somehow.”
“If anything turns up later to-night I may give you a ring,” I told him. Then I held out my hand.
“Good night, Hamson. Sorry I’ve been such a special kind of idiot.”
“Don’t you believe it,” he said, and as he turned, “It wouldn’t worry me if I had a bit more of your special kind of idiocy myself.”
I watched him down the stairs and then went back to the room. Somehow it seemed uneasily empty and in less than no time a restlessness was on me. So I had a bath and got into mufti. Then I saw to the black-out, and finally opened a bottle of beer. Then suddenly I had an idea, though less of an idea perhaps than the wish to talk to someone who was not myself.
I thought Barbara Grays might be in, and she was.
“Hallo, Mrs. Grays,” I said. “This is Ludovic Travers. I thought I’d let you know that all that business has been cleared up. You may see something in the morning papers but there’ll be nothing about yourself.”
“Thank you,” she told me quietly. “I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”
“I do,” I said quickly. “There’s something you can do for me.”
“I’d love to,” she said. “What is it?”
“You promise you’ll do it?”
“Of course I promise.”
“Then it’s this. There’s someone you’ve very badly misjudged. I’ve seen him and I’ve sent him round to see you. He’s on his way, and you’ve got to see him.”
There was no answer and I thought the line was dead.
“If you wish it,” she told me at last. “Is it . . . Tommy Hamson?”
“Got it in one,” I said, and added a quick good-bye.
That was that and then I rang Hamson.
“Glad you’re in,” I said. “There’s an urgent message for you.”
“From whom?”
“Mrs. Grays. She most urgently wishes to see you and didn’t like to ring you direct. I told her you’d be on your way in five minutes or less.”
“Thanks,” he told me quietly. “Less is right.”
So much for that. I took a pull at my glass and stretched out my long legs in comfort. And I couldn’t help smiling sheepishly at myself. A fine bat-eyed old fool I was to be taking the role of Cupid. Yet, I thought, and maybe the smile had in it something of the Rabelaisian, if I were in the raw and on that pedestal in Piccadilly Circus with a nice little bow and arrow, I’d probably be the year’s sensation.
I took another pull at the beer and life seemed rather good, and I was far too comfortable to ring down for my dinner. Another case practically over, I thought. And then I remembered something that had puzzled me. I hate loose ends and this was one.
Molde must have known in advance that Georgina was going to Malcroft, and he as certainly knew that her proposed visit to Ireland was a blind. Why then was he such a fool as to report that he had seen her leaving Euston? That was the very thing he should have expected.
As soon as I propounded that question, I got the answer. Molde had the wrong idea. He and Scylla thought they saw Georgina about to make a journey, and to Ireland, which might have meant all sorts of things from their point of view. That’s why they hastened to make the report and find out the truth. Then afterwards they twisted their tale to make it appear that they’d always thought she was coming from a journey instead of being about to make one.
Another little point that needed clearing up was what particular brand of blackmail Lulu had threatened Worrack with. But it was Worrack whom I had heard mention the word blackmail. Probably all Lulu had done was to lose her temper—after making advances to him perhaps—and threaten to inform the police about the club. Still, that wasn’t much of a loose end, however important it had looked at the time.
One other little thing I thought of then. I had told Wharton that the dope in the brandy gave a suicide motive. That’s what Molde may have intended when he gave Worrack the poison earlier in the evening. But Molde had been even more cunning than that. If it hadn’t been discovered that there was no poison in the brandy actually, then it should have been the perfect evidence of his cast-iron alibi, for he had stuck close to me all night, and I must have sworn that he had never been near that brandy.
I finished the beer and wondered if I should order a dinner. Then the telephone bell rang.
“That you, Travers?” came Wharton’s voice.
“Yes,” I said. “What’s the news?”
“Everything’s fine,” he said. “Our Malcroft friend has spilt all the beans.”
“What about Molde? What’s he said?”
Wharton grunted. “They tell me he’s doing nothing but going into hysterics. Maybe he needs a shot of dope.
But about yourself. Can you be round here about ten in the morning?”
“It’ll suit me,” I said. “And congratulations, George. Afraid I’ve been a bit disgruntled all day.”
“We all get fits like that,” he told me with ample forgiveness. “But what I wanted to mention was that we’re running Molde on the double charge after all. We think there’s an easy case.”
“Good,” I said. “Congratulations again. You’ve done fine.”
“What about you,” he said. “I was just telling one of the Big Bugs that if it hadn’t been for you, the case might have taken us months.”
“Thanks, George,” I said. “Unless you’re pulling my leg.”
“Leg, my food” he said. “What about that lunch you owe me?”
“To-morrow, if you like,” I told him, and didn’t mention that I’d probably be bringing Hamson.
Funny, wasn’t it? Times when I could have murdered George and murdered him good and proper, yet when I was ringing through for a dinner, my tail was wagging like one o’clock and I was feeling pleased as Punch. Another case over, and perhaps I hadn’t been such an utter and comprehensive fool as I’d thought.
Then, as I dropped into my chair again, I heard a queer scratching noise from somewhere; it went as soon as it had come. A mouse, I thought, and then frowned. There was another loose end that hadn’t been cleared up. Who the devil was it that had let loose that mouse at the club?
Tubby, for a certainty, I thought. Then the wind outside caught my ear, and I saw Tubby somewhere on the high seas, and on convoy duty perhaps. Good old Tubby, I said to myself, and included him in the kind of universal benevolence that had been flooding me. Whatever Wharton asked me, Tubby should not be betrayed by me. Sooner or later Wharton would be asking me if I had any ideas, for he hated loose ends. What should I say? That I didn’t know?
Then I had a brainwave. I’d say brazenly that it was I who had brought that mouse! I’d wanted to kick up my heels and be for once the life and soul of the party. That was what I’d say, I thought, and it would be worth it to see the look of pious horror that would come to his face.
The Case of the Running Mouse: A Ludovic Travers Mystery Page 23
