‘You have been wallowing’ in the embraces of Henry Weldon?’
‘Only in the interests of justice. Besides, I boxed his ears.’ ‘Go on: Begin from the beginning.’
Harriet began from the beginning. Wimsey bore fairly well the story of the vamping of Henry Weldon, merely interjecting that he hoped the man wouldn’t make himself a nuisance later on, and listened patiently till she came to the incident of the plate-washing.
‘I was sort of wriggling — because I didn’t want him actually to kiss me, you know — and I looked down and saw his arm — it was round my waist, you understand—’
‘Yes, I grasped that.’
‘And I saw, a snake, tattooed all the way up his arm — just as it was up Martin’s. And then I suddenly remembered how his face had seemed kind of familiar when I first saw him — and then I realised who he was.’
‘Did you tell him so?’
‘No. I just yelled, and Mrs Weldon came up and asked what was the matter. So I said I’d seen a snake — it was the only thing I could think of; and of course it was true.’
‘What did Henry say?’
‘Nothing. He was rather grumpy. Of course, he thought I was just making a fuss about his kissing me, only, he couldn’t tell his mother that.’
‘No — but do you suppose he put two and two together?’
‘I don’t think he did. I hope not.’
‘I hope not — or he may have bolted.’
‘I know. I ought to have stuck to him like glue. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t, Peter, Honestly, I was frightened. It was silly, but I saw Alexis with his throat cut and the blood running all over the place — it was horrible. And the idea that — ugh!’
‘Wait a moment. Let’s think this thing out. You’re sure you aren’t mistaken about the snake and that Weldon really is Martin?’
‘Yes. I’m sure he is. I can see it perfectly now. His profile’s the same now, I come to think of it, and his height and size, and his voice too. The hair’s different, of course, but he could easily have dyed that.’
‘So he could. And his hair looks as if it had been dyed recently, for the matter of that, and re-bleached. I thought it looked funny and dead. Well, if Weldon is Martin, there’s undoubtedly some funny; business somewhere. But Harriet, do put it out of your mind that he’s a murderer. We’ve proved that Martin couldn’t possibly have done it. He couldn’t get to the place in time. Had you forgotten that?’
‘Yes — I believe I had forgotten it. It seemed so obvious, somehow, that if he was there at Darley, in disguise, he must have been up to something or other.’
‘Of course he was up to something or other. But what? He couldn’t be in two places at once, even if he was disguised at Beelzebub.’
‘No, he couldn’t — could he? Oh, what an idiot I am! I’ve been sitting here having the horrors, and wondering how in the world we could ever break it to Mrs Weldon.’
‘We may have to do that in any case, I’m afraid,’ said Wimsey, gravely. ‘It looks very much as if he had some hand in it, even if he didn’t do the throat-cutting part of it. The only thing is, if he wasn’t the actual murderer, why was he at Darley at all?’
‘Goodness knows!’
‘Something do do with the bay mare, that’s a certainty. But what? What was the point of the bay mare at all? It beats me, Harriet; it beats me.’
‘So it does me.’
‘Well, there’s’ only one thing to do.’ ‘What’s that?’
‘To ask him.’
‘Ask him?’
‘Yes. We’ll ask him. It’s just conceivable that there’s some innocent explanation of the thing. And if we ask him about it, he’ll have to commit himself one way or another.’
‘Ye-es. That means open warfare.’
‘Not necessarily. We needn’t tell him all we suspect. I think you’d better leave this to me.’
‘I rather think I had. I’m afraid I haven’t handled Henry as well as I thought I was going to.’
‘I don’t know. You’ve got hold of a pretty valuable piece of information,’’ anyhow. Don’t worry. We’ll turn friend Henry inside-out before we’ve done with him. I’ll just pop round to the Resplendent now, and see that he hasn’t taken alarm.’’
He popped round accordingly, only, to find that Henry, so far from bolting, was dining and playing Bridge with a party of other residents. Should he break in on them with his questions? Or should he wait? Better wait, perhaps, and let the matter crop up quietly in conversation the next morning. He made a private arrangement with the night porter to give him the tip if Mr Weldon showed any signs of departing during the night, and retired to his own quarters to do some hard thinking.
Chapter XIX. The Evidence Of The Disguised Motorist
‘Confess, or to the dungeon—
Pause!’
— Death’s Jest-Book
Thursday, 25 June
MR WELDON did not bolt. Wimsey had no difficulty in catching him the following morning, and was rather glad he had waited, for in the meantime he had received a letter, from Chief Inspector Parker.
‘MY DEAR PETER,
‘What will you want next? I have got a little, preliminary information for you, and if anything fresh turns up I will keep you posted.
‘First of all your Mr Haviland Martin is not a Bolshevik agent. He has had that account in Cambridge for quite a long time, and owns a small house, complete with lady, in the outskirts of the town. He took it, I believe, in 1925, and makes his appearance there from time to time, dark spectacles and all. He was recommended to the bank by one Mr Henry Weldon, of Leamhurst, Hunts, and there has never been any trouble with his account — a small one. He is thought to travel in something or other. All this suggests to me that the gentleman may be leading a double life, but you can put the Bolshevik theory out of your head.
‘I got hold of Morris, the Bolshevik-wallah, this evening. He doesn’t know of any Communist or Russian agent who might be knocking about Wilvercombe at the present time and thinks you have got hold of a mare’s nest.
‘By the way, the Cambridge police, from whom I had to wangle the Martin dope by telephone, want to know what is up. First Wilvercombe, then me! Fortunately, knowing their Super pretty well, I was able to get him to put pressure on the bank. I fancy I left them with the impression that it had something to do with bigamy!
‘Talking of bigamy, Mary sends her love and wants to know whether you are any nearer committing monogamy yet. She says I am to recommend it to you out of my own experience, so I do so — acting strictly under orders.
‘Affectionately yours,
‘CHARLES’
Thus armed, Wimsey descended on Henry Weldon, who greeted him with his usual offensive familiarity. Lord Peter bore with this as long ago he thought advisable, and then said, carelessly:
‘By the way, Weldon you gave Miss Vane quite a turn yesterday afternoon.’
Henry looked at him rather unpleasantly.
‘Oh! Did I? Well, I don’t see why you need to come butting in.’
‘I wasn’t referring to your manners,’ said Wimsey, ‘though I admit they are a bit startling. But why didn’t you mention that you and she had met before?’
‘Met before? For the very simple reason that we never have met before.’
‘Come, come, Weldon. How about last Thursday afternoon at the top of Hinks’s Lane?’ He turned an ugly colour.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about’
‘Don’t you? Well, it’s your own, business, of course, but if you want to go about the country incognito, you ought to get rid of that pattern on your arm. I understand that these things can be removed. Re-tattooing in flesh-colour is the simplest method, I believe.’
‘Oh!’ Henry stared for a few moments; then a slow grin, spread itself over his face.
‘So that’s what the little hussy meant when she said she’d seen a snake. Sharp girl, that, Wimsey. Fancy her spotting that’
‘Manners, please!’
said Wimsey. ‘You will kindly refer to Miss Vane in a proper, way and spare me the boring nuisance’ of pushing your teeth out at the back of your neck.’
‘Oh, all right, just as you like. But I’d like to see you try—’
‘You wouldn’t see it. It would happen, that’s all. But I’ve no time to waste in comparative physiology. I want to know what you were doing in Darley in disguise.’
‘What affair is it of yours?’
‘None; but the police might be interested. Anything that happened last Thursday interests them at the moment
‘Oh! I see. You want to fix something on me. Well, just as it so happens, you can’t, so you can put that in your pipe and smoke it. It’s a fact that I came down here in another name. Why shouldn’t I? — I didn’t want my mother to know I was here:
‘Why?’
‘Well, you see, I didn’t like this Alexis business at all. There’s no harm in admitting that I’ve said it already and I don’t mind saying it again. I wanted to find out what was happening. If this marriage was really going through, I wanted to stop it.’
‘But couldn’t you have done that openly, without blacking your hair and dressing yourself up in dark spectacles?’
‘Of course I could. I could’ have burst in on the lovebirds and made a hell of a row and frightened Alexis off, I dare say. And then what? Had a devil of a scene with my mother, and been cut off with a shilling, I suppose. No. My idea was to snoop around and see whether the job was really being put, through, and, if it was, to get hold of the young blighter and buy him off privately.’
‘You’d have needed some cash to do that,’ said Wimsey; drily.
‘I don’t know about that. I’d heard some stories about a girl down here, don’t you see, and if my mother got to know about that—’
‘Ah, yes — a qualified form of blackmail. I begin to see the idea. You were going to pick up information in Wilvercombe about Alexis’ previous entanglements, and then present him with the choice between having Mrs Weldon told’ about it and possibly getting nothing out of it, and taking your cash in hand and letting his credit as a faithful lover go. Is that it?’
‘That’s it.’
‘And why Darley?’
Because I didn’t want to run into the old lady in Wilvercombe. A pair of specs and a bottle of hair-dye might be all right for the yokels, but to the sharp eye of mother-love, you understand, they might not be as impenetrable as a brick wall.’
‘Quite so. Do you mind my asking whether you made any progress with this delicate investigation?’
‘Not much. I only got to the place on Tuesday evening, and I spent most, of Wednesday tinkering with the car. Those fools at the garage sent it out-’
‘Ah, yes! One moment. Was it really necessary to hire a car with all that parade of secrecy?’
‘It was, rather, because my mother would have recognised my own bus. It’s rather an unusual colour.’
‘You seem to have thought it all out very well. Did you have no difficulty about hiring it? — oh, no, how stupid, of me! You could give your own name to the garage, naturally.’
‘I could, but, I didn’t. To be perfectly frank — well! I don’t mind saying that I had another name and address all ready to slip into. Sometimes I slip off to Cambridge on the quiet, see! To visit a lady there. You get me. Nice little woman — devoted and all that. Husband in the background somewhere. He won’t divorce her, and I’m not worrying. Suits me all right as it is. Only there again, if my, mother got to hear about it — there’s been trouble, one way and another, and I didn’t want to start it again. We’re right as rain in Cambridge — Mr and Mrs Haviland Martin — all perfectly respectable, and all that, and it’s easy enough to slip over when one wants a spot of domestic bliss and so on. You get me?’
‘I get you. Do you also perambulate Cambridge in disguise?’
‘I stick on the specs when I go to the bank. Some of my good neighbours keep an account there.’
‘So you had this handy little disguise ready to slip into.
I do congratulate you on the convenience of your arrangements. They really fill me with admiration, and I’m sure Mrs Martin must be a very happy woman. It really surprises me that you should be so anxious to pursue Miss Vane with your attentions.’
‘Ah! But when a young lady asks for it — besides, I rather wanted to find out what the girl — the lady, that is, was after. When your mother’s pretty well off, don’t you see, you rather get the idea that people are looking out to make a bit out of her.’
Wimsey laughed.
‘So you thought you’d vamp Miss Vane and find out., How great minds do think alike! She had rather the same idea about you. Wondered why you were so damned anxious to push her and me out of the place. I’m not surprised you each found the other so easy to talk to. Miss Vane said she was afraid you had seen through our little plot and were pulling her leg. Well, well! So now we can come out into the open and be perfectly frank with one another. So much jollier and all that, what?’
Henry Weldon looked at Wimsey suspiciously. He had a dim notion that he had somehow been jockeyed into an absurd position. It was all very well — that damned girl and this chattering lunatic of an amateur detective seemed to be working hand in glove. But it did cross his mind that all this talk about frankness was a little one-sided.
‘Oh yes, rather!’ he replied, vaguely; adding rather anxiously: ‘No need to tell my mother all about this, eh? She wouldn’t like it.’
‘Possibly not,’ said Wimsey. But you see — the police, what? I don’t’ quite see — British justice — duties of a citizen and all that, don’t you know. I can’t prevent Miss Vane from going to Inspector Umpelty, can I? Free agent and so on — and she’s not over and above pleased with you, from what I can make out.’
‘Oh, I don’t mind the police.’ Henry’s face cleared. ‘I’ve nothing to hide from them, you know. Not a bit. Rather not. Look here, old man — if I tell you all about it, couldn’t you just tip them off and get ’em to leave me alone. You’re’ damned thick with that Inspector fellow if you tell him I’m all right he’ll take it from you.’
‘Oh, yes! Good fellow, the Inspector. Not his business to betray confidences. There’s no reason whatever, so far as I can see, that Mrs Weldon, should know anything about it. We men must stick together.’
‘That’s right!’ Undeterred by experience, Mr Weldon instantly entered into another alliance, offensive and defensive. ‘Well, look here. I came along to Darley on Tuesday evening and got permission to camp in Hinks’s Lane.’
‘You knew the place pretty well, I gather.’
‘Never been there in my life; why?’
‘Sorry — I thought you, meant you knew about Hinks’s Lane before you got there.’
‘Eh? Oh’ Oh, I see what you mean. I got it from some chap I met in a pub in Heathbury. Don’t know his name., ‘Oh, quite!’
‘I got in some stores and so on and settled in. Then, next day — that was Wednesday I thought I’d better make a start on my inquiries. Stop a bit. That wasn’t till the afternoon. I just loafed round in the morning — it was a grand day, and I was tired with trekking across country, especially as the car hadn’t been going any too well. After lunch I had a go at it. It took me a devil of a time to start the bus, but I got her to go at last, and ran over to Wilvercombe. I went first of all to the registrar’s and found that there was no marriage-notice put up there, so I followed that up by a round of the churches. There was nothing there either, but of course that proved nothing very much, because they might be going to get married in London or somewhere by licence or even by special licence.
‘The next thing I did was to get the address of this chap Alexis from the people at the Resplendent. I took good care to dodge the old lady. I rang up the management with a story about a parcel that had gone to the wrong address, and got it out of them. Then I went round to the address they gave me, and tried to pump the old woman there, but she wasn’t having any. However, sh
e said I might find Alexis in a restaurant she told me about. I went round; he wasn’t there, but I got talking with a fellow who dropped in — some dago, I don’t know his name, and he said something which made me think I could find out what I wanted at the Winter Gardens.’
Henry paused.
‘Of course,’ he said, ‘this must look pretty fishy to you — me hanging round there asking, about Alexis, and then all, this business happening next day, but that was exactly what I did. Well, I went back to where I’d left the car, and had more trouble with it than ever I began to curse the fool who’d hired it out to me, and I thought I’d better take it to a garage. Well, naturally, having once been started and warmed up, it went all right, and the garage people couldn’t find anything wrong with it. They undid a few things and tightened a few things and charged me half a crown and that was all. By the time they’d finished, I was getting fed up, and thought I’d better take the beastly thing home while she was running. So I went back to Darley, with the engine missing all the way. After that, I went for a walk and that was the end of that day, except that I dropped in a bit later for a pint at the Feathers.’
Have His Carcass lpw-8 Page 26
