Death in the Fearful Night (An Inspector Littlejohn Mystery)

by George Bellairs

  “If you like, you can take the files with you, sir, and look them over at your leisure in the hotel to-night.”

  He was even assuming the London men were going to work overtime!

  “I’ll lend you a brief-case to put them in.”

  Littlejohn had first turned over the pages of the swollen dossiers with such a bewildered expression on his face that Cromwell had to suppress a smile. Stacks of paper-work reflecting a very thorough enquiry by the local men. And all the roads had converged in a dead-end. For a detective who soon got bored by typewritten records and by dictating notes for the archives, and who usually scribbled little aide-mémoires on old envelopes from his pocket, it was a nightmare.

  “We’d better have some lunch …”

  What a relief!

  There was a little old inn in Fenny Carleton which, although it now belonged to a brewery and had been modernised to the extent of installing a lot of cocktail-bars, phoney antiques, and silly little table-lamps, nevertheless possessed an amiable old waiter with a bald head, sideboards and flat feet, who knew how to be civil and prompt with the service. Like the farmers, the police cut out the smoked salmon and scampi and left them to the local tycoons and went straight ahead to excellent roast beef and then a magnificent Stilton cheese.

  “It won’t take us long to Freake’s Folly.”

  Herle couldn’t seem to take his mind from his job, so they all went off straight after coffee. Littlejohn hadn’t even time to fill and light his pipe after the meal and had to do it in the car on the way.

  And then, a reception committee of more police, newspaper men and local idlers was waiting for them. They wouldn’t have been surprised if the spectators had raised a cheer as Herle drove them into the clearing.

  “Anything fresh?” asked a reporter in a slouch hat and dirty raincoat.

  “Give us a chance,” said Cromwell reproachfully.

  Three rooms of the half-ruined house had been occupied and were all on the ground floor. The shutters of these had been flung back; the rest, upstairs and downstairs, were closed. The trees round the place kept it in semi-darkness indoors and outside in a dull melancholy light. There had been a courtyard and a small garden in front, but now rank grass grew from between the stones and covered them, and the soil of the one-time flower beds—from one of which still rose a huge old rosebush gone wild—was sour and uneven.

  Here and there were dumps of rubbish. Old iron, an antiquated mowing-machine, a rotten barrow, and an old plough. In a tumbledown shed, the door of which was open and askew, stood an out-of-date saloon car and behind it in the gloom a farm-wagon with one wheel off and the rest with the spokes half out. The remainder of the buildings consisted of derelict stables and pigsties and an outdoor brick oven with the rusty door hanging off. The background to all this ruin consisted of a wing of the house which had collapsed from neglect, with the tower on which Freake, the alchemist, had spent his nights, hanging dangerously over it all.

  The air smelled of dead leaves, mould, and rotten wood. The weight of the high trees oppressed the courtyard.

  Inside, the odour of damp and decay persisted, like an aura of impending catastrophe. In one living-room some semblance of comfort had been established. There was an old carpet on the floor and a threadbare rug before the fire. Here and there, pieces of what might have been someone’s cast-off furniture. A commode with drawers, the brass handles of which were verdigrised. A huge oak chest, black and worm-eaten. A table, a couple of horsehair-seated dining-chairs from which the stuffing was leaking, and a soiled wing-chair in faded red plush beside the wide fireplace. The room was moderately tidy, but the paper on the walls was peeling off and patches of damp showed on the outer ones. A paraffin lamp with a half-broken mantle stood in the middle of the table.

  On the floorboards near the door, the police had out-lined the shape of a body in chalk.

  Across the hall, which was red-tiled and uneven, was the bedroom. Another chest, an old dressing-table with a broken marble top, and a walnut bed which resembled a huge boat. The bedclothes had been stripped from it, revealing a stained and uneven box mattress. The floorboards were bare and there was an old rug by the bedside.

  “Upstairs is completely empty and full of dust and cobwebs. We’ve looked it well over,” said Herle.

  The staircase had been a fine one and the graceful handrail followed about eight steps and then turned at a landing. Some of the spokes of the balusters had been broken or had disappeared. There was no carpet on the oak treads. Behind the stairs, the kitchen, a damp, dark room almost like a cave, with an old sink and a neglected oil cooker on which stood a kettle and two pans. There was a rusty iron oven and boiler flanking a disused grate. The place seemed little used.

  Beyond all these were doors leading into the interior, which became more and more ruined and barren at each step until, finally, the roof and walls were falling-in and the daylight began to illuminate it through the gaps.

  Littlejohn followed Herle about disconsolately. The dead man had been discovered here and lived here before his murder. So, what? The records said the place had been searched, but beyond a few books, bills, and letters of no account, nothing personal had been found; nothing at all to throw any light on the crime. There had been a few pounds and an old watch and ring left untouched on the dressing-table. No fingerprints, not a trace left behind by an intruder, not a clue as to the past and present life of the dead owner of Freake’s Folly.

  Samuel Bracknell had kept himself to himself. Hardly a day had passed without his being seen in the town where he bought-in his food and other necessities. He had been civil enough and had exchanged the time of day with people he met or with the shopkeepers whom he patronised. He had read a lot, too, and borrowed books at the public library. These, according to the librarians, questioned by the indefatigable Herle, had been volumes of local history and antiquarian lore about the Carletons and their neighbourhood. He seemed to have spent his life quietly, loafing the days away, doing little useful work about his land and property.

  Littlejohn had gathered an impression that Bracknell had not been a man in keeping with his tumbledown home, which, however, he had tried to keep tidy, in spite of its unprepossessing condition. The police file had been liberally laced with photographs of the corpse, clothed, unclothed, in the place where it had been found, and on a slab in the morgue. It revealed, even in death, a large, clean, well-built, swarthy man, with a short beard, strong features, intelligent head and large Roman nose. The police photographer made a gruesome hobby of fashioning death-masks of his subjects and that of Bracknell might have passed for one or two of the Huncote family, whose busts and effigies littered the parish church of Carleton Unthank.

  The dead man, too, had not been as shabby as the Folly he occupied. The clothes in his wardrobe were of good material and he had patronised good tailors. The suits, although well-worn, were neat and well-kept and the same applied to the small quantity of linen found in drawers and chests.

  But Littlejohn was irritated by the crowds outside the Folly, controlled, more or less, by the bobby, but noisy, eager and curious, as though Scotland Yard were about to solve the crime any minute.

  Superintendent Herle was crowding him too much. This decent, energetic, impatient officer had had his fill of the Freak’s Folly affair. His reputation was beginning to suffer owing to the complete absence of any progress. His other business was piling-up, too, and he hoped to be rid of the murder case quickly now. He overdid his eagerness and Littlejohn, who relied so much on imagination and background, could not get in the mood on which his work always depended.

  “I’d like a quiet walk round the neighbourhood to begin with, Herle,” he said at length. “And I do wish you’d have all this mob of spectators cleared away …”

  Herle looked amazed.

  “I thought …”

  “Don’t take it badly, old chap. I merely want to get a quiet idea of the surrounding in which Bracknell lived and where the two dead girls spe
nt their lives. This part of the country is quite new to me. I’d like to get to know it a bit.”

  “You mean, you won’t need me with you all the time?”

  There was relief, almost appeal, in Herle’s voice.

  “Not at all, Superintendent. I know you’ve a lot to do, and whilst we enjoy your company …”

  “I’m up to the neck in other jobs!”

  “All the routine work has been most carefully done and will save us a lot of time and worry. The files have given us an excellent start. You’re quite handy at Carleton Unthank and if I need any help—and I’m sure I shall—I’ll get in touch with you right away. Meanwhile, Cromwell and I will take up where you left off …”

  Not long after, they parted at the end of Dan’s Lane and Herle drove away. P.C. Gullet, too, had nimbly cleared off all the sightseers and newsmen and Freake’s Folly had lapsed into a sombre silence again. Gullet remained on guard there, shortly to be relieved by a man from Fenny Carleton.

  “And now, sir,” Gullet ventured to say, saluting respectfully and nervously fiddling with his helmet until it dropped into its proper position in the deep furrow which circumscribed his head. “Now sir, you’ll be able to ’ave a nice quiet little browse over the scene of the crime, as I expect you want to do.”

  He was an avid follower of Sherlock Holmes, the volumes of whose adventures on his bookshelves at home were falling to pieces from constant use.

  Gullet was a sturdy middle-aged man, the father of a family of which he was very proud. One of his sons taught science in a university, and his elder daughter was a ballerina. His other son was an air pilot and his youngest girl travelled all over the world with her boss, who was a London financier and never stopped dictating letters to her in ’planes, trains, over meals, and even from his bed. The Gullet family had lived in Carleton Unthank for over four hundred years and had always been regarded as a cut above the ordinary. Every winter, P.C. Gullet himself gave a lecture to the Women’s Institute on some aspect of crime or the law and terrified all the members to death …

  “I don’t think we’ll bother going over the place again, Gullet, thank you. And really, there’s not much point in your staying here on your own to guard it. There’s nothing anyone’s likely to disturb. You can lock the door, give me the key, and go home and get a good tea. ’Phone your relief, too, and tell him the same. I’ll put it right with headquarters.”

  Gullet gulped, locked the place, and handed over the large key. He was too surprised and dutiful to say much, but he was pleased. The vigils at the Folly since the murder had not been to his liking at all. Hanging about in the damp hollow, haunted by events, his imagination running riot and picturing a return of the maniac didn’t suit his own busy nature. He wanted to be back on his normal routine on the beat, chucking his weight about when things weren’t to his liking, digging his garden in his off-time, representing the majesty of the law in Carleton Unthank, and reading Carlyle’s Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches or Sherlock Holmes as the mood took him. He bade them both a deferential good-day and stumped away along Dan’s Lane.

  Left alone, Littlejohn and Cromwell lit their pipes and smiled with relief at one another.

  “What now, sir?”

  “Let’s take a look round.”

  First they walked up Dan’s Lane. It had a gentle upward incline all the way to the main road and, at the junction of the two, they were on higher ground than the Folly and could see the general lay-out of the district.

  Facing Freake’s, now lost again in its dark trees, they got a clear view of the buildings of Home Farm to their left. They walked a little way along the main highway to a large white gate at which terminated the long drive to the farm.

  “Let’s call on Bracknell’s neighbours.”

  There could not have been a greater difference between Freake’s and the next farm. This was a fine holding in a beautiful setting. The gentle undulating fields stretched, it seemed, for miles, some of them golden squares with the stubble of recent harvest, some already ploughed for the winter and showing their rich brown soil. The drive to the farm passed between pastures, the short grass of which was already beginning to glisten with the dampness of approaching night. At the end of the road, the farmhouse itself rose like a fortified place, set in a walled yard with its gaunt chimneys stark against the darkening sky.

  In the courtyard a heavy, elderly man saw the visitors at the gate. He wore old tweeds and was examining the legs of a pony held by a groom. A younger man nearby was driving a cow and her calf to a water-trough. The rattle of cans, the sounds of activity in the dairy, and the steady hum of a milking-machine were going on around them. The older man handed the pony over and came to meet Littlejohn and Cromwell. He had a ruddy, old-fashioned, prosperous look. A broad red face, grey hair trimmed down to sideboards about his ears, slightly shifty blue eyes. His gait was a bit lumbering and he swung his arms rhythmically as he walked, as though ploughing his way across sticky ground.

  “Good afternoon. What can I do for you?”

  He spoke with a trace of the local sing-song, with a guttural ring when the words were resonant.

  Littlejohn introduced himself and Cromwell.

  “Ah …”

  The man seemed slow of thought and was turning-over cautiously in his mind the purposes of the visit.

  “My name’s Joseph Cropstone, I’m a J.P., and this is my farm. I’m going in for tea. Come and join me.”

  Having recited his credentials, he was now giving orders. They followed him through the side door, which stood open, and led into a vast room like the dining-hall of a small monastery. Plain white walls, red tiles on the floor, and a large table in the middle, covered with a white cloth. Windsor chairs, about a dozen in all, stood with their backs to two of the walls, and there was an armchair to match them at each end of the table. This was the kitchen where Cropstone presided on working-days over the meals of his family and of the hands who slept in the farmhouse. It had a patriarchal look.

  The farmer had been ready to sit down alone to the luxury of afternoon tea. The family and staff were about their business and would assemble for dinner later. His wife was, he explained, attending a meeting of the Women’s Institute in Fenny Carleton—gone to town—and one of his daughters, a red-cheeked, striding Juno in riding-breeches and a canary pullover, brought a tray with extra cups for the visitors.

  More introductions, some small-talk, and the girl left them to attend to her business. She was a qualified veterinary surgeon employed by the county.

  “And now, sirs, what do you want from me? I’m sure I know nothing anybody else doesn’t know about these shameful crimes in the village.”

  He wasn’t much of a talker to strangers. Given a fellow farmer, he would drone away for hours about his business, his troubles, his ailments, and boast about his little personal adventures. But he was cautious and a bit sly when it came to police and crime.

  “I’m not much of a one for discussing murders.”

  Outside, things seemed to get busier and busier. Men carrying churns, driving out cattle to pasture, wheeling out barrow-loads of manure as they cleaned-up the cowhouses, staggering under buckets of food to some pigs which were yelling their hungry heads off in unseen sties. Another girl, obviously the sister of the one they had met, carrying a bucket of eggs with one hand and an indignant broody hen with the other. Finally, a cowman started parading a monstrous bull round the farmyard …

  “I thought you might give us some personal ideas about Bracknell. He was your nearest neighbour, wasn’t he?”

  Cropstone scratched his whiskers.

  “Yes, him and Quarles were my nearest neighbours. Quarles has a holding called Turville’s Ground, just off Dan’s Lane, between Freake’s and the main road. You won’t see Turville’s unless you look hard for it. It’s hidden, like Quarles. Quarles is a secretive man.”

  Cromwell coughed. He wondered what Cropstone would say if he said ‘To hell with Quarles!’ Littlejohn was asking abou
t Bracknell, and here was the old boy yapping about somebody else.

  “Bracknell’s a distant cousin of the lord of the manor, Major Huncote, and he inherited Freake’s Folly through his mother.”

  “He owned it?”

  “Oh, yes. They say about a hundred and fifty years ago, perhaps more, one of the Huncotes built and gave it and the land round to his wife’s father, who wasn’t right in his head and who he refused to tolerate at the hall any longer. The land was carved out of the poorest acres of this farm. It’s damp rushy ground and to have it cut out of the home farm and not to have rent to pay for it, must have pleased the ancestor of mine who was tenant at the time. Cropstones have farmed here for three hundred years as tenants till my day. I bought it when the old squire died and they had to sell land to meet death duties …”

  He droned on and on in a monotone, like that of a milking-machine or the blow-fly which was buzzing round trying every window to get out of the place.

  “And Bracknell inherited the Folly?”

  “Yes. Old Freake’s son came into it when his father died and if he hadn’t fallen drunk off his horse and cracked his skull wide open, he’d have gambled it away by the way things were said to be going. It’s been an unlucky spot and the locals give it a wide berth. Empty for years and two suicides there. Now, a murder …

  “Bracknell inherited the property through his mother, as I said. She’d come into it through her father. She was a Freake and married a local farm labourer who emigrated to Australia. Their son, Samuel Bracknell, turned up later to claim it, and much good it’s done him …”

  The voice buzzed away. It had a soporific quality about it which dulled the senses. Littlejohn imagined the interview continuing until late in the night.