Death Treads Softly (A Cozy Mystery Thriller) (Inspector Little John Series)

by George Bellairs

  Finally, they reached the promenade, a long curving road which, with a few turns inland and interruptions by buildings, stretched right out to Fort Island on the long Langness peninsula. To the left, King William's College surrounded by playing fields. Boys from the school taking walks along the shore or making their way to chapel.

  Where the promenade first faced the sea, a row of about a dozen small houses, each with a porch to protect it from the full blast of rough weather. The kind of property which sells well for summer cottages, little pieds à terre for weekends and holidays.

  "I've got the address."

  Knell took another look in his pocket-book.

  "Chanteclair. . . . That's the name."

  Littlejohn raised his eyebrows.

  "Mrs. Christian didn't call it that. It was the previous owner. He was a writer of books and ran away with a schoolgirl. Caused quite a scandal, I can tell you."

  The tide had gone out, leaving a wide expanse of sand and seaweed. There was a strong smell of iodine on the air.

  "This is it."

  A green door with a brass knocker. Small windows freshly painted green, as well. Knell beat with the knocker and the door flew open as though they'd been expected.

  "Well?"

  Mrs. Christian was almost twice the size of her sister. A huge, powerful woman with large hands and a foghorn of a voice. She had been a schoolmistress at a village school and treated everybody as though they needed discipline.

  "Is Mrs. Cottier at home, Mrs. Christian?"

  "Yes, and she doesn't wish to be disturbed. Besides, it's Sunday."

  Mrs. Christian was all in black, too, including stockings. A large gold locket at her throat, from which gazed the pale eyes and whiskered cheeks of her husband, the late Caleb Christian, dead for thirty years, and in his picture looking already far gone.

  "It's important, Mrs. Christian. This is Chief Inspector Littlejohn, of Scotland Yard, who was a friend of Mr. Crennell and who's undertaken the case of his murder."

  Knell was like a schoolboy himself, excusing his misdemeanours to his teacher!

  "Come in, then, the two of you, but I won't have my sister bothered. She's had enough, as it is."

  Mrs. Christian must have lived in a larger house before she retired. The living-room looked as if she'd squeezed all she had in the way of furniture into it by hook or crook. You could hardly turn round. There was even a piano as well as a harmonium, a large sideboard, and more chairs than you could take in at one glance.

  Mrs. Cottier was sitting before the fire, fully dressed in black, as well, stockings, too. She had a dazed look, and as she rose she looked even smaller than normal on account of her sister's size. They were alike somehow, but the small one made you think that some head-hunter or other had used his powers of shrinkage on her sister, screwed her down to half the size, and made a Mrs. Cottier of her. She nodded to Knell and then saw Littlejohn.

  "Good mornin', sir. My sister says you're goin' to find out who killed Finlo. I hope you do find him and make 'im suffer."

  Suddenly she gnashed her teeth with rage at the thought of the murderer's suffering. She must have been a little terror when her temper was roused!

  "We won't trouble you much, Mrs. Cottier. . . ."

  Mrs. Christian was going to have them settled for a real interview now that they were there.

  "Sit down, both of you. No, not there. You'll smash it up, a big man like you. Take the big chair."

  Littlejohn hung poised over a small dining-chair for a moment, and then moved over to a large basket chair which creaked and groaned as he lowered himself.

  "We just wished to know if Mr. Crennell's behaviour had been in any way strange before his disappearance?"

  "In what way, sir?"

  "How did he spend his time in his retirement?"

  "They oughtn't to have made him retire when he did. He was took up with his work and when he gave it up, he was lost. He used to keep goin' down to the harbour and the quay watchin' in the boats and envyin' the new harbourmaster his job. He often said so. He used to be in charge of Derbyhaven, too. That's just along the coast. He'd walk out there as well, two or three times a week, just like he did when he had the job."

  Littlejohn looked out through the small window on the stretch of cold bay, with the long spit of Langness sweeping out to sea. A lighthouse, a large hotel, and a ruined oratory. Beyond them, the channel. White crests on the waves and, far out, a large ship going south and, from where he was watching, apparently sailing over the land.

  "He liked his work and he liked people. It was a shame when he had to retire."

  "But was he strange in any way before his disappearance? I mean, did you get the impression that he was afraid of anything, interested in anything, dealing with queer people."

  "I never heard of such a thing. Of course not."

  Mrs. Cottier's mouth shrivelled into a thin line. She imagined that, somehow, Finlo Crennell's character was being blackened.

  "Did Mr. Crennell leave a will?"

  Mrs. Cottier dried up and gave Littlejohn a funny look. She thought Crennell's personal affairs were no business of anybody except the family.

  "I don't see how his private business comes into it."

  Mrs. Christian did, however. Besides, now was the time to appease her insatiable curiosity.

  "Don't be so silly, Alice. Of course it's his business. Suppose Finlo left his money to somebody and they did away with him to get it?"

  It was obvious the thought had never entered Mrs. Cottier's head, and now it struck her with terror.

  "Don't speak about it. It's horrible. Of course, they wouldn't. . . . Who?"

  "Look here, Alice. You'd better tell the Inspector if there was a will. It's the police asking you, not the first gossip you meet in the town. You'd better tell him."

  Mrs. Cottier gulped.

  "There was a will. He'd saved a bit. About a thousand pounds, and he owned the house. He left the house to me. The rest . . ."

  And with that, Mrs. Cottier started to weep and moan.

  "It's not fair to leave all the worry of it to me. There's the funeral. How am I to arrange that? It's all left to me, and I'd no sooner got up this morning, than Wilfred was here, askin' how the money 'ad been left, and sayin' that him and his family wouldn't come to the funeral if any of the others was there."

  Knell's face was a picture. He looked at Mrs. Cottier as if she'd gone mad.

  Littlejohn took out his pipe, asking if he might smoke, and slowly filled it.

  "Now, Mrs. Cottier, suppose you tell us what all the worry is about. In the first place, who's Wilfred?"

  Mrs. Christian didn't wait to be asked. Her booming voice filled the room.

  "He's Finlo's nephew. Wilfred Crennell. He lives in the town and his father . . . his late father . . . was Finlo's brother. Wilfred's father was in a nice way as a grocer, and left a tidy sum between Wilfred and his brother, Leonard, who's in Canada. In addition to which, Wilfred has a good job. What does he want with Finlo's money, and who's he to set himself up against anybody. If him and his don't attend the funeral, good riddance, that's what I say."

  "My sister doesn't like Wilfred's wife," explained Mrs. Cottier, mildly.

  "Who does she think she is?"

  Littlejohn struggled to get a word in edgeways.

  "And why won't Wilfred come to the funeral? And who are the others you speak of?"

  Mrs. Cottier was embarrassed, but her sister suffered no such reticence. Her voice boomed like a fog-horn.

  "The others she speaks of are Nancy Cribbin and her family. You might as well know. Finlo Crennell's wife couldn't have any children. So Finlo had a daughter by her younger sister. That child was Nancy Cribbin. . . ."

  Mrs. Cottier uttered a cry of alarm and Knell, who had been balancing a little glass globe in which a snowstorm took place when you shook it, let the thing slip from his fingers and just managed to rescue it in mid-air.

  "What are you screechin' about, Alice? M
en are men the world over, and if you were to ask questions from a lot of people you think respectable, you'd get a big surprise."

  And with that, she uncorked a bottle labelled The Mixture, which stood on the mantelpiece and looked like gin, took a tablespoonful, and hiccoughed.

  4

  THE OTHER WOMAN

  QUESTION after question. Gently put and with tact, to prevent Mrs. Cottier shying off again.

  From previous experience of Littlejohn, Knell knew that he bothered little about fingerprints, clues, alibis and scientific tricks. His line of attack was a patient, careful building-up of background and atmosphere, piece by piece like a jigsaw, until the last bit slipped into place and the case was done.

  And now, Finlo Crennell, one time harbourmaster of Castletown, was coming slowly to life again. His home, his habits, his daily routine, and the relentless unfolding of his past.

  "His wife has been dead ten years?"

  "Yes. A long illness and I went to keep house for them and I stayed on with Finlo after. I'm a widow, too. My husband was lost at sea. He was Finlo's first cousin."

  Littlejohn was standing watching the road which ran from Castletown to Derbyhaven, as though, any time, Finlo Crennell might come wobbling along in his usual way, taking his routine walk from one place to the other. Men pushing perambulators or giving young children an airing whilst the women cooked the dinner. Dogs playing on the beach. Boys from King William's College taking a stroll. The kind of people Crennell met.

  "And Nancy. . . . Tell me about her."

  A pause. Then:

  "It happened a long time since. Nancy's twenty-four now and has a husband and three children. It was when Finlo was at sea. His wife was a Gawne. Ethel Gawne. Her and her sister, Mary, lived together, their parents havin' died. Ethel was the one with the brains and useful fingers. Mary was a bit flighty. . . . "

  The account was becoming too long-winded for Mrs. Christian.

  "To cut a long story short, when Finlo married Ethel, they took Mary to live with them. It seemed the best way. Finlo at sea . . . "

  "A sort of menage à trois, eh?" said Knell, whose wife was a teacher and made him read highbrow novels.

  "What does he say? Some nasty French joke, I'll be bound. Well, you needn't be rude about it."

  Knell turned a dull red and shook the little globe until it snowed a blizzard.

  "Finlo and Ethel had no children and then, one time after he'd been home . . . well . . . it soon became obvious what had happened between him and Mary. You can go on from there, Alice."

  Having thus skated over the dangerous ice, Mrs. Christian handed over to her sister again.

  "Ethel was upset, but she took it very Christian-like. The child was born, a little girl, and she let Mary and the baby, little Nancy, live with her still. I don't know what went on between Ethel and Finlo, but they hardly ever spoke much to one another after that. Just lived on together under a cloud till Ethel died."

  "You've missed what happened to Mary. Tell them."

  "She ran away with a commercial traveller to the mainland and left the child. It would be about two when she ran away. Yes, just about two years old, Nancy was. . . ."

  Littlejohn turned.

  "Was she ever seen again?"

  "Oh, yes. Just after the war ended. Her and her husband, a man called Tramper, came over on holiday. They'd risen in the world. Stayed at a first-class hotel in Douglas. Came to see Finlo, bold as brass, in a car. She was pretty when she was young . . . very pretty. Blue eyes, golden 'air, and the loveliest complexion. . . ."

  She trailed away.

  "Go on. They don't want to know how good-looking she was. She was a bit full-blown last time she was over. She'd gone fat and common. Her husband was a common man, I always said so."

  Mrs. Christian thereupon dried up again. It was like a treble and contralto duet.

  "Where do they live, Mrs. Christian?"

  "Liverpool, I think. And I'd like to know where they get their money from."

  "Oh, he's honest enough. They keep a shop of some sort in a good-class part. . . . "

  "So you say. I don't trust him."

  "Did they inquire about Nancy, Mrs. Cottier?"

  "Not as far as I know. I don't know really why they came, except to flaunt themselves. She had an expensive fur coat on although it was midsummer."

  "And Nancy. . . . She married. Who did she marry?"

  "He was a farmer from these parts. Worked on his father's farm. They moved after the war. Out at Druidale, they are now, hill-farmin', I hear."

  Knell sat upright.

  "Oh, it's that Cribbin, is it? Charlie Cribbin. I don't think so much of Charlie. He's a bit of a dark horse himself."

  Mrs. Christian sat upright, too. Her medicine had flushed her cheeks a bit.

  "And what's wrong with Charlie Cribbin, might I ask? Tryin' to give a dog a bad name and hang him? What's he done wrong? Tell me that."

  For answer, Knell looked wise but said nothing.

  "And Finlo Crennell has left his ready money to his daughter?"

  "Illegitimate to be exact," corrected Mrs. Christian.

  "Yes," said Mrs. Cottier. "He was always fond of 'er. Used to go up to Druidale now and then, leck, to put a sight on her and see his grandchilder. They were his own flesh and blood, don't forget. After all this time and 'im bein' so alone, I didn't blame him. Would you?"

  "He'd no right to flaunt his wrong-doing, and you know it, Alice."

  "All right. He's dead, Lucy. Let him rest."

  There was a good smell of cooking beef on the air and Mrs. Christian left them for a minute to see that the joint in the stove in the kitchen was coming along all right. They could hear her opening the door of the gas-stove and banging it to again. Until she returned, nothing more was said.

  Littlejohn knocked out his pipe against the bars of the fire and put it in his pocket.

  "Would you have any objection to our looking over Mr. Crennell's house, Mrs. Cottier? It might save you a journey if you lent us the key."

  She hesitated, turning over in her mind whether or not she had left it quite tidy when she locked it in the early hours of that day.

  "Yes. . . . I'll get the key."

  She went upstairs and returned with the imitation crocodile-skin bag, took the key and handed it to Littlejohn.

  Service was over as the two detectives returned to the town. Knots of people standing about gossiping, others taking a short stroll along the waterfront before lunch.

  Knell, leading the way, crossed the swing bridge again and took Littlejohn along the quayside to the harbour. Groups of men festooned along the frontage eyed the pair of them curiously. News had travelled round that a famous detective from 'over' was already on the job.

  "That's the harbourmaster's house and office."

  A large, handsome building with a dozen or more windows on the front and a fine Georgian portico and door. A sign with the three legs and Isle of Man Harbour Board. A tall erection like a drainpipe rising from the roof and a seagull balanced on it and looking down on them.

  Along the waterside, up Quay Lane, and to a little square, with more fine old houses and a stone rocket-station, like a little chapel, with a green door. Parliament Lane. Just like a tiny metropolis. The church and the Parade in front of it and the last gossips having their after-service chat. Queen Street. Littlejohn found the house, unlocked the door, and they entered.

  The dark lobby again, with the living-room to the right and the kitchen at the end. The two men turned-in at the first door. It was already familiar to Littlejohn. A dead fire, the sideboard, the two arm chairs, the rocking-chair and the table, now covered with a plush cloth. Over the mantelpiece a framed wedding-group. The Chief Inspector vaguely recognized Crennell, serious this time, by the side of his bride, who wore a large merry-widow hat. Crennell was in ordinary clothes, looking awkward. His bride was about an inch taller than he was; slim, tightly waisted, flat-chested, with dark hair and eyes and thin lips. A plain, ho
mely sort.

  There were two others in the picture; a bridesmaid and the best-man. The least said the better about the latter. He looked as if they'd forced him to dress-up for the occasion; ill-fitting clothes, large unkempt moustache, enormous fisherman's hands, a tense look on his face, waiting for the exposure to end. Afraid of the camera and as stiff as a ramrod.

  The bridesmaid was different.

  "That must be Mary, the one who Finlo . . . . who Finlo . . . " said Knell, breathing hard down Littlejohn's neck and searching for the right word.

  "Seduced?" said Littlejohn with a smile, and Knell blushed heavily.

  Mary was the life and soul of the picture. Fair, vivacious, smiling, quite at home before a camera. It made you wonder why her sister had beaten her in the marriage market. Mary even made the hideous hat and its outrageous feather look chic. And though the wedding dresses of the time left a lot to the imagination, Mary showed herself plump and tempting against her sister's flat-chested austerity.

  "It was asking for it, letting that one come to live with the married couple," muttered Knell, as if to himself.

  The drawers of the chest which was used as a sideboard were full of linen and what looked like the best cutlery. Nothing of any importance.

  The kitchen was as clean as a new pin. Red tiles on the floor, a gas-stove, a table with a scrubbed white top, a china cupboard and a larder. Bright aluminium pans on hooks. . . .

  Littlejohn looked through the window. A low wall, and beyond it, shingle, the tideline, and then the sea, and a wide view of Castletown Bay. Outdoor sanitation, the Manx thie beg, the little house. . . . A small garden, too, in which Crennell must have spent a bit of time. Bedraggled michaelmas daisies, marigolds, dahlias, lobelia. Dead or dying plants which, had Finlo Crennell lived his normal life of late, would probably have been cleared out and the little beds turned over and left neat for the winter. Instead . . .

  They climbed the stairs which went up from the hall, covered by a strip of red carpet held in place by bright brass rods, to a small landing. Two bedrooms, the one at the back and overlooking the sea obviously Crennell's.