By Christopher Bush
and available from Dean Street Press
The Perfect Murder Case
Dead Man Twice
Murder at Fenwold
Dancing Death
Dead Man’s Music
Cut Throat
The Case of the Unfortunate Village
The Case of the April Fools
The Case of the Three Strange Faces
Christopher Bush
Murder at Fenwold
Somebody at that very moment might be watching from behind the hedge! Melodramatic perhaps—but the fact remained that one murder had been committed and a second seemed more than likely.
When the wealthy Cosmo Revere is killed by a falling tree, ex-CID officer John Franklin and Ludovic Travers chance to be staying in the vicinity. After examining the scene Franklin determines it was no accident. At the family lawyer’s request Franklin and Travers go undercover at Fenwold Hall, where the dramatis personae, among others, include a bewitching niece, a blustering colonel, and a vicar with a passion for amateur theatricals. Fenwold is a country house beset by secrets … and devious murder.
Murder at Fenwold was originally published in 1930. This new edition features an introduction by crime fiction historian Curtis Evans.
“A cleverly plotted tale of murder … in rural England.” Dashiell Hammett
“It is always a pleasure to read a really complicated detective story and Murder at Fenwold fully deserves a place in this category.” Spectator
CHAPTER I
FRANKLIN TELLS A STORY
“The thing that puzzles me,” said Wrentham, “is why any mysteries are ever left unsolved. What with the official sleuths and the unofficial ones like Franklin here, and the Press and the general body of law-abiding citizens like you and me, Ludo; well, I ask you?”
“It’s no use your trying to pull Franklin’s leg,” said Ludovic Travers, giving his glasses a polish. “He’d be an uncommonly poor sleuth if he couldn’t see through you.”
Franklin cocked an eye at the pair of them. “Talking shop, and if there were any way of proving it, I’d like to bet that ten times more of what we call mysteries never come to light, than there are either solved or unsolved.”
“You’re thinking of the number of people who’ve been done in with arsenic and buried with a perfectly sound certificate,” suggested Travers.
“Well, that’s one class. I don’t know if I can think of the lot of ’em at the moment. Still; think it over. All the people with a decent sized skeleton in the family cupboard; all the blackmailing that goes on; the number of people living lives of hermits and the simply colossal number living double lives and never getting found out.”
Wrentham freshened up his whisky with a squirt of the siphon. “I suppose you’re right. You must have been a trifle suspicious more than once in your life—sort of run up against something and sensed there was a skeleton about somewhere?”
“I expect I did; if I could only think of ’em.”
“If I might be allowed to put in a pretty simile,” observed Travers; “Franklin must have been rather like that brindled bitch of yours. When she puts up a hare she goes straight on. While she’s chasing that she may put up three or four, but she’s disciplined enough to know that one job’s got to be finished at a time.”
“It isn’t for me to agree,” said Franklin, “but as far as I’m concerned, or used to be concerned, it’s perfectly true. Many a time when I was at the Yard I’d be on a case and another trail would cut clean across the one I was following. Of course there’d be no time to go off the main road into the side track but sometimes you’d report to the necessary quarter, and if you heard no more about it you’d wonder what had happened and what it had all really been about.”
The three of them were seated at the moment in the smoking-room of Hainton Vicarage. Wrentham, agent of the immense Hainton estate, might have been guessed as the host if only from the fact that his legs were balanced on the mantelpiece. In the subdued light of the lamp his face was the colour of a mellowed, tile roof, and that tooth-brush moustache of his added an expression of austere control which was the last thing in the world that he possessed. In the corner of the settee legs tucked under him, was John Franklin, head of the detective bureau of Durango House, and looking more like a fellow agent or country doctor. A glance at his eyes and the cut of his mouth would tell you that he was a fellow not easily ruffled—perhaps the best of all qualifications for the company he was in. As for Ludovic Travers, he was so embedded in another chair that from a front view he seemed a head on the end of perfectly enormous legs. With the mantelpiece they made a square in the middle of which was the table, so happily adjusted that with the least possible effort a hand might pick up a glass or set it down.
“A thing happened to me once,” went on Franklin, “which I shan’t forget in a hundred years. It’s rather a long story, but if you’d like to hear it—”
“Why not?” began the other two, and then the major, “When Ludo’s done interrupting, you get on with it.”
“Right-ho!” laughed Franklin. “By the way I’m a pretty poor hand at spinning a yarn and that’s no false modesty, but what happened was something like this. It was about three months before I left the Yard; let me see, that’d be a couple of years ago. I was on a case in the neighbourhood of Camden Town and I’d arranged to meet a man—proprietor of a public house as a matter of fact—who’d promised to give me news as to the movements of certain parties I was interested in, and as it wouldn’t have done for him to have run any risk of being seen with me, we’d agreed to meet at a spot at the back of an old timber yard; some hell of a place as the major would say, with a disused factory and a filthy canal and miles of alley ways. Of course real detectives aren’t expected nowadays to disguise themselves, but that night I’d got on—”
“Not that really charming plus four suit of yours?” broke in Wrentham flippantly.
“Shut up, Geoffrey!” snapped Travers, and the major, after giving Franklin a wink, resumed his lethargy.
“Not being on holiday,” went on the story-teller, “I didn’t think of that particular camouflage; however, I was looking a pretty tough lad that night and a poisonous night it was, what with a drizzle and fog pockets everywhere. However, my man turned up all right and from what he told me I thought I’d push on a bit further. A few minutes later I knew I was lost; as a matter of fact, though I didn’t know it at the time, I’d wandered round in a circle to the back of the factory again. The fog was very thick just there so I backed into a kind of passage not far off a lamp and waited for somebody to roll up and give me my bearings.
“I’d been there about two or three minutes when I heard footsteps, and I was just going to move out sort of casually when they suddenly stopped and something told me to keep doggo. There happened to be a bit of fencing at the side of the opening where I was, so I crouched down behind it, well out of the gleam of the lamp. Then the man, whoever it was, whistled—a furtive sort of whistle—and in a second or two somebody answered away out in the fog. Then the first man whistled again in a different way, listened for a moment and moved along a bit; actually slap bang in front of my piece of fencing. I got a good view of his hefty back, big as the end of a house and I reckoned there was a good six foot of him into the bargain. Then I heard more footsteps and two men came into sight, shuffling up—or cringing up if you like. One was a rat of a man and the other a big negro who looked as if he’d just been kicked out of hell.”
Travers drew in his legs and sat up in the chair. “You’re not piling it on?” came Wrentham’s voice from the depths.
“I’m toning it down,” said Franklin. “I’ll admit that the conversation isn’t every word correct but it’s near enough. I’ve thought about that night a good many times since and I think it’s a fairly faithful account. The very first word that was said for instance, made me hold my breath.
“‘Well, Peters; you’re a punctual little fellow. Who’s
your blond friend?’
“Mind you, it wasn’t the words; they’re pretty ordinary. It was the culture in the voice and the purity of the accent. It was the least bit blasé and all the time perfectly charming and—well, musical, and yet it struck me as authoritative. Whoever the man was he was an aristocrat to the finger tips. That of course was Bigback. Ratface had a cockney whine—professional beggar type.
“‘He’s off the boat, boss. Skipper said he’d better come along as I was carryin’ all this dough.’
“‘Damn thoughtful of him—and very touching,’ said Bigback. ‘Well, what the hell are you standing there for? Pass it over, then you can hold hands and be damned to you.’
“I was squinting out of a knot hole and the fog seemed to be a bit thinner. It was something like being in the front of the stalls for a first-class thriller. Ratface looked at the negro and he might as well have looked at the wall for all the answer he got, so he fumbled very laboriously in his breast pocket and finally hauled out a roll of what were probably notes. Then he had another look at the negro; then he made a suggestion. ‘What about goin’ to a nice quiet little pub, boss, where we can see what we’re doin’?’
“I couldn’t see for a second or two because Bigback squared his shoulders well into the fence, but it looked to me as if he saw through the game quicker than the other two imagined.
“‘No, I don’t think so, Peters. Pubs, as you call them, are full of temptations.’ Then his voice changed. ‘You come across pronto, or I’ll cut the guts out of you!’
“He made a step forward and the next moment I heard him rustling the notes. Then he shoved them into his pocket. ‘What about the passport?’
“There was silence for a bit then Ratface appealed to the negro. ‘He said he was goin’ to send it later; didn’t he, Bob?’
“Bigback took a step or two towards them. The negro squared up with his fists and Ratface got behind him. The other backed to the fence but well clear of my knot hole.
“‘Oh, that’s the idea is it? Most ingenious! Well, Peters, you stay here. And you, you bastard, you get back to the office and bring him along here! Tell him if I haven’t that passport inside ten minutes I’ll carve the guts clean out of him.’ Not much Oxford about that as I say it, but except for being a bit more matter of fact the voice was just as delightful.
“Then the fun started. Ratface gave a quick glance down the road into the fog, then squealed out, ‘There’s somebody comin’, boss. Look out! Here’s the police!’ Bigback turned his head for a moment and the negro was on him like a streak. I can’t describe the fight like a broadcast announcer, but the two big ’uns were at it with their fists, grunting and panting and thudding, and Bigback cursing away like hell. There wasn’t much Balliol about that torrent of blasphemy he let loose. It absolutely made your blood run cold. And there was Ratface dodging round with a nice little silencer in his hand, trying to pick Bigback out of the scrap-heap, until he got a sideways kick on the kneecap and rolled on the ground groaning like blazes and then spitting like a cat.
“Then Bigback did a perfectly amazing thing and did it quicker than I can describe it. The negro seemed to give a wild swing and just as he ducked it he let fly with his foot and caught him clean in the belly, and as he doubled up and grunted he caught him another kick clean on the point of the chin and the negro just gave a sort of gurgle and sank down. Bigback stood there panting for a moment and just as he went to have a look at him Ratface hit him behind the ear with his lump of lead piping and he went down like a pole-axed bullock. I don’t think he’d quite hit the ground when Ratface was going through his pockets. You fellows laugh about the police keeping out of a scrap, but I don’t mind telling you it all happened so quickly that I must have had my mouth open and my eyes bulging like marbles. Then, just as I was going to get up from my knees, all cramped, Ratface got down, hitched the negro over his shoulder, staggered up and tottered off.
“I was just going to make a bolt after him and then my knee gave way—leg all needles and pins—so I thought I’d have a look at Bigback and see how he was coming along. I could still hear Ratface padding away in the fog and there was I, rubbing my leg and squinting at Bigback at the same time, and when I clapped eyes on him I didn’t half have a shock. What do you—well, after what I’ve told you, what did you expect me to see?”
“Lord knows!” said Travers. “Broken-down Oxford don.”
“Don’t be a damn fool, Ludo,” cut in Wrentham. “You never knew a don who could put up a scrap like that. I know what you saw. Bloke in evening dress—full war-paint, top hat, diamond studs; amateur cracksman, king of the underworld, Raffles—”
“Shut up, Geoffrey! What did you see, Franklin?”
“Well, he’d on the filthiest set of dungarees you ever saw on a third-class stoker—and a stubbly beard, about three days’ growth. Only his hands—they were all different; white as milk, sort of flat at the nails and manicured absolutely—well, first class. And his face! Most attractive I ever saw. You chaps may laugh, but do you know what I called him?—sort of passed through my mind as soon as I had a look at him? The Marquis! Don’t think I’m blowing about it, but the previous night I’d happened to be at the Mansion House and a chap like that was speaking there at a banquet—Spanish fellow, marquis of—well, lord knows what, string of names as long as your arm. That’s what this chap Bigback reminded me of. Honestly I can’t describe him, but he’d a noble sort of face; magnificent white hair, nose like a Roman general’s; made you think of the real old aristocracy—dukes, sedan chairs, wigs, duels and—well, there you are! Ever since then I’ve called him the Marquis—to myself.”
“That was damn queer!”
“Wasn’t it? You see I think the atmosphere of the place had a lot to do with it; that perfectly appalling neighbourhood and the unexpectedness and so on. Still, there he was.”
“What happened then? Was he dead? ”
“Lord no! Just knocked out. His face looked pale enough, like one of those stone crusaders you see on tombs in cathedrals. It was sort of intellectual—and dignified. Oh yes, and he’d got the devil of a gash over his eye where he hit the road when Ratface slugged him behind the ear.” He paused for a moment and shook his head. “I’d know that face again wherever I saw it. Absolutely unique sort of face. You could never forget it.”
“What did you do then?” asked Travers.
“Well, as I’ve been telling the story you’d think I’d been there five minutes. As a matter of fact, it all took place in a second or two, because I thought I could still hear Ratface—so I legged it after him for all I was worth. I got about twenty yards or so in the fog, then I couldn’t hear a sound. Then I had a minute or two exploring round, but a pretty hopeless job that was, what with the fog and that rabbit warren, so I nipped off back again to attend to his excellency the ambassador. I found the place all right, but when I got to it he wasn’t there! I stepped out down the road the way I thought he’d gone and came a cropper over a heap of refuse. That slowed me down a bit and to cut a long story short I spent an hour exploring the neighbourhood, and as it was too late to go where I’d intended I just went home.”
“How perfectly extraordinary! And you never heard any more about it?”
“Not a word. I called at divisional headquarters on my way and made a report, but they knew nothing and what’s more they never found out anything. And that’s the last I’ve heard about it, in spite of enquiries at all sorts of times from all sorts of people.”
“Ever try to fit the pieces together?” asked Travers. Franklin smiled. “Try was as far as I got.”
Travers nodded. “I suppose anybody with an active imagination could make anything out of an opening like that.”
“Mind you, I’m not throwing doubts on Franklin’s veracity,” put in Wrentham, “but if I ran across a mixture of blaspheming ambassadors and negros I should say as little about ’em as if they’d been pink rats and green elephants.” Then he smiled to himself. “Funny thing i
f you ever ran up against that bloke again one of these days.”
“Funnier things than that,” remarked Travers.
“Now come, Ludo! Don’t get quarrelsome in your cups. It would be a pretty remarkable coincidence.”
“Coincidence, I admit; but not remarkable. Even with quite ordinary people like you and me, coincidences are common enough. Franklin’s different. He’s always more or less on the trail. Ergo, it seems to me he’ll have jolly hard luck if one of these days his trail doesn’t cross that of the interesting bloke he’s rather nicely called the ambassador. I could name heaps of criminals who’d never have been hanged if they hadn’t been caught in some petty bypath as Franklin called it —men like Brown and Kennedy, for instance, who killed that Essex policeman.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” admitted the major, glancing at the clock. “You and Franklin carry too many guns for me. By the way, I know it’s our last night and all that, but how late do you young lads propose sitting up? I’ve got a job of work to do before we go in the morning. What about your bags? All packed?”
“Everything right and tight,” said Franklin. “And how many miles is Fenwold, by the way?”
“Just about twenty. Take Ludo about twenty minutes in that fire-engine of his and me best part of an hour in the Morris.”
“The fact of the matter is,” said Travers, “you want to drive the Isotta. You’ve been itching to break your neck ever since you clapped eyes on the damn thing.”
“And why not?” asked the other airily. “Cause of science and so on. And what about a nightcap?”
“Well, whether you break your neck or not, major,” said Franklin, “you’ve given us a thundering good time. It’s the best fortnight I’ve ever had. You sure you can’t join us in a round before coming back?”
Dead Man Twice Page 28
