Cromwell took out his notebook.
“You needn’t bother. I’ll lend you the copies of the Trumpet, if you’ll promise to let us have them back, and you can read them at your leisure. Meanwhile if you just jot down these four points.”
Cobbett ticked them off on his fingers.
“One: Liddell was lowering a bale of hay from the loft to the yard. His wife said she was in the barn below, raking together the last bits of hay to find a place for the bale. She said her husband seemed to catch his foot in the rope of the hand-hoist he was using, tripped, and fell. Got that?”
Cromwell took it down in a mixture of scribble and a private shorthand which was his own invention.
“Yes.”
“Two: The time was given as ten thirty. Check it later from the news report. But at ten thirty, a man passing the Saracen on his way from digging for bait on the shore, said he saw Mrs. Liddell with her husband in the loft. That was got over at the inquest by her saying she’d given the time by their clock, which was five minutes slow, and she’d just heard it strike the half-hour from where she was in the barn below. Her explanation was readily, I might say eagerly, accepted by the Coroner. She’s a damn’ good-looker, you know, and at the inquest she pulled out all the stops. She was in black and most striking.”
Cromwell wrote it down.
“Three: She was in the village five minutes later, asking for help and breaking the news. She telephoned from the Saracen for a doctor and the bobby at Reddishaw... Now...The doctor was a chap called Horrocks...”
“I know him.”
“Yes, he’s still there, on the retired list. He was also police surgeon, so his evidence was important at the inquiry. He said the post-mortem bore out all Mrs. Liddell had said. The body had been left just as it fell, except that Mrs. Liddell said she had raised her husband’s head in an effort to help and found that his neck seemed broken and he was dead. But this is note three: Horrocks was a friend of Mrs. Liddell, and also her family doctor. There was gossip about him and her. He was a married man, but he spent a lot of time at the Saracen and was sometimes there out of hours and when Liddell was away. Take that for what it’s worth.”
“I understand.”
“Four: The local constable stationed at Reddishaw village and in charge of Pullar’s Sands, was a chap called Boddy. He was another of Mrs. Liddell’s admirers and was always calling at the Saracen on his beat. In fact, the locals made a joke of it. Boddy had a wife and kids, too, and his conduct during the inquiry and inquest called for comment. He behaved like a man bemused and his routine work, to say the least of it, was juvenile. The man who passed the pub at half-past ten came forward of his own accord. Boddy just took Mrs. Liddell’s tale as gospel, reported exactly what she said, and did no independent investigation at all. He and Dr. Horrocks smoothed it all over, you’d nearly say hushed it up, and Mrs. Liddell went home with the Coroner’s sympathy, buried Jack, and carried on as before.”
Cromwell looked Cobbett steadily in the eye.
“And you think she might either have pushed him through the door of the loft, or hit him on the head and thrown him down?”
Cobbett lit another cigarette.
“Now, don’t put me down as saying that, sir. All I said was, it was a damned funny business. I fancied myself an amateur sleuth at the time. I wanted to be a London crime reporter. I’ve married since and I have three kids and I’ve put all those follies away. But, as I say, I was interested in crime at the time and I thought it all a bit fishy and followed my own lines of inquiry. They led nowhere, of course. Boddy was moved almost at once and put on traffic control or something in a town at the other end of the county. That showed the constabulary powers-that-be thought he’d fallen short. I think he fell short deliberately to protect Mrs. Liddell. Horrocks was a power in the land, and he’s now a JP. What he said at the inquest was just lapped up like holy writ.”
“And that’s just your theory? You’d no proof?”
“None whatever. I don’t suppose I was the only one who thought things. But it all died down and things were as before. The idea was purely circumstantial on my part. But look at it...”
He held up his hand and ticked off his fingers.
“Jack Liddell and his wife didn’t get on. He was all over the shop after women. She was decidedly easy on the virtue, too. They’ll tell you that in Pullar’s Sands. It’s a wonder the women there don’t tar and feather her and run her out of town. But the men like her. She’s a good looker and has the reputation for being a good sport. Perhaps Jack’s philandering made her that way. Why didn’t they get a divorce, you say? They were Catholics. There’s quite a number on the marsh and there’s a church at Reddishaw where the lord of the manor’s also Catholic. The only way was for one of them to die...”
Cobbett ticked another point off on his finger.
“...Mrs. Liddell had plenty of good chances and Jack stood in the way. Finally, she had in Horrocks and Boddy a couple of men who’d swear black was white if she said so. They seemed absolutely infatuated. And they happened to be the local police doctor and the Liddell’s doctor at the same time, and the village bobby who was supposed to investigate the catastrophe. . . .”
Cromwell shut his book and snapped the elastic band. Cobbett made a neat bundle of the old copies of the Trumpet and handed them to him.
“Thanks, Mr. Cobbett. I’ll not forget this.”
“Don’t let on that I told you. You’ll have to base your own theories on what you read in the paper and it’ll be the official account and the official verdict. I’ve not said a word, remember. It’s as much as my job’s worth.”
“I’ll see you aren’t involved. But, in turn, don’t say or report a word of this line I’m following in your paper. I’ll let you know any developments and you’ll get the first news.”
“It’s a bargain. Can I give you a lift to the ferry?”
“Thanks.”
It was an easier ride than the one to the ferry over the water. Cobbett’s was an old family car and took things quietly.
All the way to the landing-stage Cromwell brooded on the information he’d just received. This was a new line with a vengeance. Lucky Littlejohn had concentrated on the Saracen’s Head angle. Suppose Mrs. Liddell had killed her husband. How did it affect the death of John Grebe?
As they drove in the car, there nagged at Cromwell’s mind a question he’d forgotten to ask Cobbett and he couldn’t think what it was. It worried him, and twice he opened his mouth to speak, and closed it again each time.
“What is it, sir?” asked the reporter after the second attempt.
“Something I wanted to ask you and I’ve forgotten what it was. It’ll come to me and I can ring you up. Perhaps it’s not important.”
But Cromwell knew, deep down, that it was.
He thanked Cobbett again as they parted at the turnstiles of the ferry and Cobbett gave him his card in case the elusive question definitely arose in the sergeant’s mind. Cobbett waved as the ferry cast off and returned to his old car.
Hooting warnings to the Sunday shipping weaving about in the river, the ferry described a long arc. There was a festive air about the shipload. This was the one-thirty boat and excursionists to Elmer’s Creek and beyond filled it. Men with their wives and sweethearts, lads of the town in parties out for a spree, members of families off for a reunion, and a group of old men and women from the Falbright Old Folk’s Home out on leave with free ferry tickets to spend half a day with their own people over the river. One of them was talking to Cromwell, when, suddenly, the lost question rose in the sergeant’s mind.
Who was the man returning from the shore who said he saw Mrs. Liddell on the upper floor of the barn with her husband?
Cromwell hastily excused himself and retired to the little saloon which was usually full in winter and on wet days, but today was empty on account of the cold sunshine and the sights of the yachts and fishing boats on the river. He took the bundle of old newspapers from his pocket
and turned them over and over until he found the account of the inquest. He read it hastily, a line at a time.
The Coroner asked the witness, Jonathan Snyde, to tell his story in his own words. Snyde said...
And then the account already given of how Snyde had passed the Saracen’s Head at half past ten and seen Mrs. Liddell in the loft with her husband.
How did he know the time? Why, by the ferry bell at Elmer’s Creek, of course. It was a still morning and it was plain to be heard.
Then, Mrs. Liddell had explained it all, about the clock being slow, and the Coroner seemed satisfied.
Cromwell turned back to read another part of Snyde’s statement.
Coroner asked, was there nobody else about at the time? Mr. Snyde replied there was nobody on the shore. Only a small boat rowing ashore on the tide...
Cromwell looked at the date of the death of Jack Liddell. June 1st, 1946...
He wondered who and where Jonathan Snyde might be, and could hardly wait for the ferry to tie up, before he was off and hurrying to the Barlow Arms to find Littlejohn.
Their late lunch stood neglected as Cromwell told his chief all that he knew and all that he thought about it.
I7 THE LOST WITNESS
“AND now for Jonathan Snyde...”
Littlejohn and Cromwell had finished lunch and taken little interest in it on account of the turn of events and the way the case was taking.
Braid was hanging about the dining room, pretending to tidy up after the meals served to trippers. He was trying to overhear what was being said, too. It was almost opening time at the Barlow Arms and excursionists from inland and from the ferry were gathering round the door waiting for beer.
“Do you know a man called Jonathan Snyde, Mr. Braid?”
Braid almost ran to the table in his anxiety to get hold of more gossip to purvey with his beer.
“Snyde? Of course, I do. Regular customer ’ere. Likely as not he’ll be over tonight on his way to the ferry with his wife. He comes over reg’lar to see his old dad who lives just along the river. You can see his cottage from here.”
Braid ran to the window and pointed. Nobody followed him so he ran back.
“Did you want ’im? You’ll find ’im at his dad’s. He’s a native of these parts, who moved over to Falbright when he got a job on the docks.”
The riverbank on the Elmer’s Creek side was alive with people enjoying the fine day. Fishermen, walkers, whole families promenading, children playing on the mud of the tideline, hunting out treasures brought up by the river and left behind on the ebb. Old Snyde’s cottage lay about a mile from the ferry, a single storeyed, tarred little place where he lived himself, a retired fisherman watching the river traffic pass his door. In front, on the bank itself, an old rowing boat, overturned, served as a shelter for coal and lumber.
The front door was open and Mrs. Jonathan Snyde was standing there taking the air and nursing her grandchild. A fat, shapeless woman, rocking the infant to and fro and making strange noises to keep it good.
“Is Mr. Jonathan Snyde in?”
The woman eyed the two detectives up and down.
She’d seen their pictures in the local paper and had a terror of the police. She clutched the child to her heavy rolling bosom as though they were about to kidnap it.
“What’s it all about? He’s respectable.”
Having given her husband this testimonial, she wobbled indoors and called him loudly.
Snyde appeared quickly. He’d been helping his father dig his little bit of back garden. A family man was Jonathan Snyde, and he was often heard to say how much he admired his dad: “Eighty, and as sprightly as a chap of forty. Puts it down to eating raw onions straight out o’ the earth...Says they disinfect the innards.”
“Here I am.”
A burly man of fifty, with a walrus moustache, a round red face, hair clipped close to his skull, and a mouth full of false teeth which didn’t fit properly and made his speech sibilant.
“Yes, Mr. Snyde. Sorry to disturb your Sunday, but we need a bit of help.”
“Oh.”
Mr. Snyde looked round for his wife to hear this. A bit of help for the famous Littlejohn, the present talk of the town. Mrs. Snyde was there, all right, listening as hard as she could. She proudly imagined reading all about it in next Friday’s Trumpet. ‘Johnny Snyde, the popular local bowler, assists Scotland Yard.’ Oh, yes. Johnny was a champion bowler when the crown greens were at their best. Mrs. Snyde also imagined Scotland Yard as a vast flagged court somewhere in the highlands, a remote headquarters where mysteries were practised.
“Can you throw your mind back, Mr. Snyde, to the inquest on Jack Liddell? You were a principal witness, I think.”
“S’right,” whistled Jonathan through his teeth. The face of his father appeared round the curtains like an old apple framed in a shaggy ring of white whiskers.
“You passed the place just before Jack’s death...”
“S’right. Five minutes afore. She wuz with Jack in the loft. I’ll alwiz stick to that. Swore it on me Bible oath.”
“I think you said there was someone else about. Somebody rowing a boat in from the sea.”
“S’right. Jest beaching the boat as I got past the Saracen.”
“They’d pass the inn about five minutes after you?”
“If they came that way. They might ‘ave gone to Peshall along the shore...Likely they did.”
“They? Who were they?”
“Mrs. Iremonger from the big ’ouse and a man a-rowing of her. She always goes there every June first. Went this year. Takes a wreath and chucks it in the deep water. ’As herself rowed out.”
“Why?”
“Dunkirk Day, o’ course. Her old man died June first at Dunkirk. Went down with the Euryanthe. Many’s the time I’ve sailed in ’er.”
“Yes. We know.”
Snyde’s mouth opened. He wondered if he’d put his foot in it. However, Littlejohn’s bland smile comforted him.
“S’right.”
Cromwell couldn’t resist it.
“S’right,” he said, and Mr. Snyde looked at him as if he’d gone mad. ‘The chap in the cap’s a bit potty,’ he later told his dad.
“Did you see who the man was?”
“No. Too far away. She generally gets the gardener to row out the boat. They ’ave a rowin’ boat at the big ’ouse, you know. Motor boat, too...Used to ’ave a yacht...”
“Yes, the Euryanthe.”
“S’right.”
“Well, thanks, Mr. Snyde. Sorry we butted in on your Sunday peace.”
“S’quite all right.”
And he bade them good afternoon and went straight to tell his dad all about it and take his advice as to what he ought to do next.
“We’ll have to call and see Chickabiddy again. This is an awful nuisance, Cromwell. I hope she’s not drunk.”
She wasn’t. Just half-seas over, and she welcomed Littlejohn and Cromwell like two invited guests.
“Come right in, Inspector. And bring your friend.”
She was sitting in the garden, drinking her own mint julep, and reading Fox’s Book of Martyrs.
“I just love these old plates showing how they spiked and fried and roasted people they didn’t like. Don’t you think they’re interest’n? I found this book in the attic and I’m sorry I never read it before.”
Just bored. Bored to death and in search of anything to relieve the tedium.
“Have one of my mint juleps...Recipe given to me by a friend from the Old South.”
She poured two glasses.
“Go on, drink.”
Cromwell’s face was a study at first, and then he looked relieved, and then delighted as the drink went down.
“You can both call me Chickabiddy. All my friends do.”
“We’re in rather a hurry...ahem..Mrs...”
“Ah-ah. Call me...”
“We’re in rather a hurry...ahem...Chickabiddy...”
Littlejohn daren�
��t look at Cromwell or there’d be one of those explosions of Cromwellian mirth which would spoil everything.
“...We just want to ask you if you remember Dunkirk Day...the day Jack Liddell fell and killed himself?”
Mrs. Iremonger rolled her head from side to side and sniffed.
“Shall I ever forget that day? My heart went down with the Euryanthe, the day I lost my dear...Shall I ever forget?”
“Yes. Do you remember that particular day? You rowed out to put your beautiful flowers on the sea.”
“Yes. I grew them in the greenhouses. Red, white and blue, they were. I remember the day very well...What did you say your name was?”
“Littlejohn, madam.”
“Ah-ah...Call me...Your first name...”
“Thomas.”
“Well, Thomas, I remember that day because Williams, the gardener, gathering the flowers knocked over my beeautf’l hydrangea...‘And for that, I shan’ let you row me out to sea,’ I told him, an’ I didn’.”
“Who did?”
“You’ll never guess. Why, Fothergill. He was jus’ delivering the letters and arrived providesh’ly...You shall row me, my good Fothergill, I told him. And he did...”
“And you both returned here?”
“Oh, no. I came home on the shore, but poor Fothergill got so hot rowin’ the boat, I gave him five shillings. ‘Go and getta drink, my good Fothergill,’ I said, ‘and I sent him off to the Saracen’s Head to quench his thirsht...By the way, Thomas, another julep to quench your thirst? And that of your good friend...Mr...?”
“Cromwell.”
“What’s your real name? Don’t joke about it.”
“It is Cromwell, madam. Robert Cromwell.”
“Well, Robert, have a mint julep and call me Chickabiddy.”
Just then, and providentially, the telephone rang indoors, the maid came out to get Mrs. Iremonger, and the pair of detectives were able to get away, although she told them to wait.
“It’s too bad to drink her julep and then sneak off at the first chance. But, I just can’t stand any more of it, Cromwell.”
Death Drops the Pilot Page 20
