by Kerry Tombs
‘Interesting, sir,’ ventured Crabb.
‘Would you take this stick to your mistress and ask Mrs Gladwyn if she can tell us how long her husband has had the item, and if she knows what the letters stand for,’ said Ravenscroft, addressing the maid.
The maid took the stick from him and left the hall.
‘Is it not interesting, Crabb, that both men should have identical walking sticks with the same letters engraved on the handle?’
‘Perhaps they were both members of some club, like say the Oddfellows or a smoking club?’ suggested Crabb.
Ravenscroft nodded. ‘I wonder what the letters M.W.B. represent?’
Two minutes later the maid returned, still carrying the walking stick. ‘Mistress says all she can remember is the master having the stick for as long as she can recall, and that he probably acquired it shortly after they moved to Malvern, she thinks, but she can’t be sure. She does not know what the letters stand for. In fact, she was unaware that there were any letters at all on the handle, sir’
Ravenscroft thanked the maid and returned the cane to its resting place, before leaving the house.
‘Well, sir, no luck there.’
‘It would appear so, but I still think that cane may be of some significance to our investigations. But we will have to put that aside for now, for we have more pressing things to attend to. It is about time we paid our Mr Troutbridge another visit. Let us go back to the station and take some of your men out to the farm. Do you have any guns at the station?’
‘There is an old pistol, sir,’ replied Crabb.
‘Then bring it with us, we may have need of it.’
* * *
Later that morning Ravenscroft and Crabb, accompanied by two other police officers, made their way over the hills in the direction of Troutbridge’s farm.
‘Do you think we might find Armitage there?’ enquired Crabb.
‘There remains that possibility, Crabb. He may well have been the face I saw at the window when we drove away last time.’
The police wagon made its way up the rutted track until it arrived at the farm.
‘We’ll try the shed again first,’ suggested Ravenscroft.
The group walked over to the milking shed and entered the building, Crabb calling out Troutbridge’s name.
‘No sign of him here, sir.’
‘Let’s try the other buildings. You two men search the buildings on that side of the yard. Crabb, come with me, we’ll try that old barn over there.’
They walked over to the building, but as they were about to enter the barn, they were suddenly confronted by Troutbridge, who stepped out abruptly in front of them. The farmer was holding a piece of old rope, the end of which was tied round the collar of a large Alsatian dog.
‘What do you want?’ he snapped.
‘Mr Troutbridge. I would ask you to accompany us to the police station in Malvern for further questioning. I also have permission to search your property,’ said Ravenscroft. Crabb looked down nervously at the dog.
‘I told you that if you came back, I’d set the dog on you!’ snarled Troutbridge.
‘Have a care, sir. I would advise you to tie the dog up and come quietly,’ said Ravenscroft, eyeing the dog, which had now begun to growl loudly.
‘Go to hell!’ shouted Troutbridge, seeking to restrain the dog, which was pulling violently on the end of the rope. ‘Get off my property, now, or I’ll let go of him!’
‘Come now, Troutbridge, put up the dog. There is no need for this,’ said Ravenscroft, trying to sound as confident as he could.
‘I warned you!’ shouted Troutbridge.
‘Don’t you threaten us, my man,’ said Crabb.
‘Put up the dog, man!’ urged Ravenscroft.
Suddenly the dog broke free from its owner, darted across towards the two men, and jumped onto Crabb, throwing him violently to the ground.
‘Call off the dog, Troutbridge!’ yelled Ravenscroft, taking the pistol from his coat pocket and aiming it at the animal. ‘I say, call him off man!’ He saw that Crabb had covered his face with his hands and was trying desperately to free himself from the creature. ‘For God’s sake, sir, shoot!’ shouted the constable.
Ravenscroft took steady aim of the gun at the dog and fired.
‘You murdering swine,’ growled Troutbridge, lunging at Ravenscroft.
‘Grab him, men!’ Ravenscroft shouted instructions to the other two officers who had run across from the other buildings. ‘Put the cuffs on him!’
The constables wrestled Troutbridge to the ground and after a short struggle, secured his wrists with their handcuffs. Ravenscroft walked over to where the dead dog lay on top of Crabb.
‘Soon have you out from under there,’ he said, pulling the animal away. ‘How are you, Crabb?’
‘Grief, sir! I thought my number was up! Another few seconds and he would have had his jaws round my throat. ’Tis a good thing we brought the gun,’ replied Crabb, lifting himself of the ground.
Ravenscroft placed his hand on the other’s shoulder, concerned. ‘Are you hurt?’
‘It just seems to be my hand, sir, where the beast sank his teeth. Afraid I shall need a new tunic, though,’ said Crabb taking out his handkerchief and placing it on his bleeding wrist.
‘Here, let me look,’ said Ravenscroft, examining his constable’s hand. ‘We’ll go into the house and wash it, and I’ll try and find something to bind it with, until we can get a doctor to look at it. Sorry I was a bit late in firing. I didn’t want to shoot too soon, until I had a clear view of the dog.’
‘That’s alright, sir, better late than never,’ replied Crabb, holding his wrist.
‘He was certainly a vicious creature and no mistake. Dogs like that should not be owned by blaggards like Troutbridge,’ said Ravenscroft, staring down at the dead animal.
‘Not the animal’s fault, sir,’ added Crabb.
‘You men, put that ruffian in the cart and stay with him while we go into the house,’ instructed Ravenscroft. ‘Come now, Crabb, let’s go and get that hand seen to.’
The two officers dragged the abusive farmer across to the cart, as Ravenscroft lead the way across the yard.
‘You won’t get away with this Ravenscroft!’ shouted Troutbridge as he was being bundled into the cart. ‘I’ll have the law on you!’ Ravenscroft ignored the remarks as he and Crabb opened the door of the farmhouse kitchen.
Ravenscroft surveyed the piles of old papers, rags and jumble, which seemed to clutter every corner of the room. The table was covered with dirty plates and mugs, the remains of a half-eaten meal lying side by side with debris left over from previous meals. Ravenscroft walked over to the bowl and ladled some water into an old cracked bowl.
‘Lord, it smells in here!’ said Crabb attempting to stem the flow of blood from his injured hand. ‘I think I prefer old Gladwyn’s surgery to this place.’
‘Put your hand in there, Crabb,’ instructed Ravenscroft. ‘Now let’s see if I can find something to bind it with,’ he said, searching through the old clothes on the floor.
Crabb placed his hand into the bowl and began to wipe it with his handkerchief. It was not long before the water began to cloud over with the red liquid.
‘You’ve got a nasty gash there,’ said Ravenscroft, tearing up an old sheet he had found. ‘Give me your wrist and I’ll bind it to stop the flow of blood. That should do until we can get it cleaned up better when we return to the station.’
After Crabb’s wrist had been attended to, the two men began to look around the room.
‘What a dreadful place to live in! I have seen cleaner rooms than this in Whitechapel,’ said Ravenscroft. ‘How anyone can live in such filth. These plates look as though they have never been cleaned, and this food looks days’ old. This bread and cheese appear to have been the last meal eaten but do you notice something, Crabb?’
‘There are two plates set?’ suggested Crabb.
‘Exactly! Troutbridge shared his last meal with
someone else.’
‘It could be his wife?’
‘I don’t think so. No woman would put up with this squalor. I think there is someone else in the house.’
‘You mean the face you saw at the window?’
The two men looked at one another.
‘Upstairs!’ said Ravenscroft. ‘But quietly. We don’t want to frighten him off.’
Ravenscroft crossed over to the staircase and began to make his way up the steps. ‘You stay here, Crabb, in case he comes down,’ he whispered.
Gaining the landing, Ravenscroft found himself confronted by two closed doors. He paused to listen for a moment, then with his boot, he pushed open the door to one of the rooms but found it empty. Quickly he kicked open the second door.
‘So, Mr Armitage, we have caught up with you at last,’ he said addressing the lone figure who sat on the side of an old bed, staring up at him with a look of fear, as he entered the room.
‘Mr Ravenscroft.’
‘You have given us a great deal of trouble, Mr Armitage. You will oblige me by accompanying me to the station, sir,’ said Ravenscroft, addressing his quarry.
Armitage stood up slowly and made his way across the room. As he neared Ravenscroft, he suddenly pushed him out of the way, darted from the room, and began to run down the stairs.
‘Crabb!’ yelled out Ravenscroft.
‘I have him, sir,’ replied the constable, as Ravenscroft raced down the steps.
‘Put the cuffs on him, Crabb. Well, Mr Armitage, that was rather a silly thing to do. We have been looking for you for some days now. You have some questions to answer, sir.’
‘I have committed no crime, Inspector. You have no right to arrest me like this,’ said the indignant warden.
‘I think you will find that we have every right, Mr Armitage. If you are so innocent, what were you doing hiding upstairs, and why did you seek to run away from us?’
‘I have a perfect explanation for my presence here.’
‘That may be so, sir, but for now you will oblige us by accompanying us to the station.’
Crabb cuffed the bedraggled Armitage and the trio made their way back to the police cart. ‘Put him in there with Troutbridge,’ instructed Ravenscroft. ‘Well, gentlemen, you have both certainly caused us problems this morning. Let us all return to the station and see what we can discover.’
* * *
Ravenscroft and Crabb faced Troutbridge across the table.
‘Now then, Mr Troutbridge, what is your relationship to Mr Armitage?’ began Ravenscroft.
Troutbridge stared down at the floor and remained silent.
‘What was Armitage doing at your farm? We found him hiding in the upstairs bedroom. He had clearly been there for several days. Were you sheltering him? I would advise you to answer, or it will be the worse for you.’
‘You shot my dog,’ snapped Troutbridge, glaring at his questioner.
‘Your dog was attacking Constable Crabb at the time. If I had not shot him, my constable would have been seriously injured, possibly killed, and you would have been facing a murder charge,’ said Ravenscroft firmly, knowing that he would be facing an uphill struggle to discover the truth.
‘There was no need to have shot him.’
‘There was every reason to shoot him. You had ample opportunity to call the dog off, and you chose not to do so. You had no business keeping such a ferocious animal in the first place. Things are looking very black for you, Troutbridge.’
Troutbridge shrugged his shoulders and glowered, as Ravenscroft continued. ‘You are facing serious charges — failure to restrain a savage animal, unleashing such an animal, attacking a police officer. The local justices will not take kindly to that kind of behaviour. You already have a bad reputation in the county. Oh yes, we have been checking up on you. You are well known to our colleagues in Ledbury, who inform us that you have been up before the bench on two previous occasions. I would say that things are looking very grim for you, Troutbridge, unless you co-operate with us. Now I want some answers to my questions, or you could find yourself up on a murder charge.’
‘You shot my dog,’ repeated Troutbridge angrily, but Ravenscroft ignored his last remark.
‘How long have you known Armitage?’ he asked.
‘I’ve never seen him, before he came to my house.’
‘When was that?’ asked Crabb.
‘Last Monday.’
‘What did he want?’ asked Ravenscroft, leaning forwards.
‘Said he had been driven out of his house and could he stay with me for a few days, until he could go back, like,’ replied the farmer grudgingly.
‘And you let him stay — a complete stranger who you had never seen before? You let him stay in your house?’
‘He paid me to stay. He said he would be gone by the end of the week.’
‘You are in the habit of accommodating strangers in your home. I find that very difficult to accept.’
‘If they pays. What’s wrong with that?’
‘Can’t think why anyone wouldn’t want to stay in your rat-infested hole,’ said Crabb, displaying a tougher, sarcastic side that Ravenscroft had not seen before in his colleague.
‘Well, I tell you I don’t believe a word of it. I think you have known Mr Armitage for at least three years. You will no doubt be surprised to learn that your name appears every month in the accounts of Old Lechmere’s Almshouses in Colwall,’ said Ravenscroft.
‘I don’t know nothin’ about any old almshouses,’ protested Troutbridge, sitting back in his chair and looking up at the ceiling.
‘Don’t play innocent with me, Troutbridge. You were paid the sum of one pound and ten shillings every month for the past three years. Now I want to know why — and if I don’t get the right answer, I’ll put you away for so long, your farm will have crumbled down to a pile of old dust by the time you get out of prison, if you ever get out!’ said Ravenscroft, raising his voice.
‘I’ve told you, I know nothing about any sums of money,’ replied Troutbridge in his usual aggressive tone.
‘Have it your own way, Troutbridge. I’ve tried to help you,’ said Ravenscroft leaning back in his chair. Troutbridge glowered at him. ‘Let’s turn to something else. Why did you poison Mr Pitzer?’
‘I ain’t poison no one!’ protested Troutbridge loudly.
‘Why did you hit Mr Sommersby on the back of his head and then topple the bookcase on top of him, so that it looked like an accident?’
‘Here, I ain’t hit no one on their head. You can’t have me for that.’
‘Then there was poor Doctor Gladwyn. You killed him by hitting him on the temple, over at Raggedstone,’ said Ravenscroft quickly, raising his voice again.
‘No! I never did!’ shouted Troutbridge.
‘And Old Penny,’ Ravenscroft banged the table with the palm of his hand. ‘Did you push him off the hill by the cave, a poor innocent blind man?’
‘No! I ain’t killed anyone. You can’t pin all these murders on me!’
‘We can do whatever we like. My superiors are anxious for a satisfactory conclusion to this affair. They won’t mind if we say we have caught you. In fact, they will be more than happy that we have finally caught our man. You will hang, Troutbridge, make no mistake. You will hang very slowly and in great pain, I can assure you. Your days are at an end,’ said Ravenscroft, adopting a tone of resignation.
‘You can try and hang me if you likes. You can’t put anything on me. I never killed anyone,’ protested Troutbridge, anxiously looking around the room.
‘Do you have a walking stick, Mr Troutbridge?’ asked Ravenscroft, suddenly changing tack.
‘Walking stick? What use have I got for a bloody walking stick?’
‘Here, watch your language, Troutbridge!’ interjected Crabb.
‘Do the initials M.W.B. mean anything to you?’
The farmer looked puzzled. Ravenscroft went on, ‘Have you ever owned a walking stick with the initials M.W.B. engraved on the h
andle? The question is a simple one to answer.’
‘I told you, I never had any walking stick.’
‘Have you ever seen a walking stick with those initials on?’ asked Ravenscroft quickly.
‘No.’
‘Perhaps you saw the stick when Mr Pitzer came out to your farm?’
‘Don’t know any Pitzer. I has no visitors out at my farm.’
‘What about Mr Sommersby?’ asked Crabb, looking up from his pocket book, where he had been making notes.
‘Never heard of Sommersby; don’t know anything about him neither.’
‘Was Doctor Gladwyn your doctor?’ asked Ravenscroft.
‘What needs of I for a flaming doctor?’ mocked Troutbridge.
‘This is your last chance, Troutbridge,’ said a frustrated Ravenscroft, realising that his own anger was in danger of rising to the surface. ‘If you don’t tell us what we want to know, I’m locking you up in our cells until you go up before the Magistrates tomorrow morning. They won’t deal with you so lightly. God help you then.’
‘Go to blazes! Do what you like,’ replied Troutbridge defiantly.
‘You’ve had your chance, Troutbridge. A night in the cells might make you see sense. Lock him up, Crabb!’ said Ravenscroft firmly, feigning an air of indifference.
Crabb escorted the farmer from the room, leaving Ravenscroft alone with his thoughts. It did not seem likely that Troutbridge had murdered the three men, not to mention poor Penny, but he was certainly hiding something, and clearly that secret was bound up with Armitage. Perhaps Armitage had killed Pitzer, Sommersby and Gladwyn, and Troutbridge had been his accomplice? Or perhaps the farmer had discovered that Armitage had committed the crimes and was blackmailing him? Troutbridge had to have some hold over Armitage otherwise why would he have been content to have sought sanctuary with the farmer? Then there were the payments. Armitage had been paying Troutbridge a regular sum of money, each month, for the past three years. Why had he paid the farmer the money — or had Armitage invented the payments and kept all the money for himself? But then, if he had done that, why would he have gone to Troutbridge for help? The more he considered these questions, the more unanswered possibilities there remained. He had expected that Troutbridge under his questioning would have been frightened into a confession, and he had been both annoyed and irritated when this had not happened. The farmer was clearly made of stronger stuff. All he could hope for now was that his other prisoner might prove more forthcoming.
