A Question of Proof

by Nicholas Blake

  Armstrong raised the megaphone to his lips and shouted: ‘If anyone saw anything unusual happening here after the beginning of the last over, will he kindly report it to me at once.’ Again the crowd stirred and heaved uneasily, but no one stepped forward. ‘Did any of you touch the body before we came over?’ Nigel asked of the group standing nearest. There was a brief silence, then Sims volunteered: ‘Tiverton and I turned him – it – over, to see if –’ his voice trailed away. ‘And who reached it first?’ ‘Tiverton. I was j-just behind him.’ The superintendent broke in brusquely. ‘And why did you or he remove the weapon? Don’t you know that you should never –’ ‘Oh, but we didn’t. Really, we didn’t. I mean to say, there was no weapon there,’ interrupted Sims, looking bewildered. The superintendent gave Nigel an enigmatic look, then he turned to Evans and said, ‘Would you mind asking Mrs. Vale whether there was a weapon in the body when she saw it fall to the ground.’ Nigel reflected that, though Armstrong was putting up a show of tact and consideration, he seemed to be listening very carefully to the whispered colloquy between Michael and Hero.

  ‘She says she is certain there was no weapon,’ Michael finally informed the superintendent, then, with a spurt of indignation, he added, ‘If you’ve finished your badgering, perhaps you’ll let her go indoors where these human sheep can’t stare at her any longer.’

  ‘No one may leave the field till he has been searched. You can take her into the tent there, if you like.’

  Michael carried Hero into the tent, in full view of two hundred eyes. He could see nothing but her desperate tears, hear nothing but the sobbing of her breath. The tent was empty; the tea had been cleared half an hour ago. Hero clung to Michael like a child; over her shoulder he could see a section of the crowd, waiting, white and silent; he could not see the superintendent, who was standing close to the outside wall of the tent – listening.

  Whatever Armstrong may have hoped to hear, he was not given much time for listening. Dr. Maddox arrived, his jaunty walk sobered to the occasion. He nodded to Armstrong and bent over the remains of Percival Vale. ‘Dead, of course. Instantaneous. Can he be moved?’ ‘Yes; it can’t make any difference. Will some of you gentlemen help me to carry him behind the tent.’

  The remains of Percival Vale were taken up and put down again. Dr. Maddox bent over the body. After a minute or two he stood up and brushed his knees. ‘Well, sir?’ said Armstrong eagerly.

  ‘He was stabbed. Some very thin weapon, like a stiletto, for instance. The point entered the body below the left shoulder blade and pierced the heart. I should say it was delivered a little from the left; the post-mortem will verify that. Death, as I say, was instantaneous. There was practically no bleeding.’

  Nigel glanced at the superintendent. It was easy to imagine which way his thoughts were tending. Hero had been sitting on the left of her husband. He strolled round and inspected the chair on which Vale had been sitting; the canvas was pierced at the back, just below the bar. A group of masters were standing near, speaking in undertones.

  ‘God!’ Gadsby was saying, ‘it’s amazing – incredible. Killed in full view of every one. Why, damn it, it’s impossible.’

  ‘Well, it’s been done, anyway,’ said Wrench. ‘I guess the murderer’s feeling pretty sick, too.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Sims.

  ‘The police are going to search every one. And presumably he’s still got the gory blade concealed amongst his underwear.’ ‘Really, Wrench,’ protested Gadsby, ‘this is not the time or place for your rotten cynicism.’ ‘Nor the time or place for a murder,’ returned Wrench: ‘damned bad form, I call it – in front of all the parents.’

  It was not long now before the police from Staverton arrived. Sergeant Pearson, several constables, a police matron, and with them the chief constable, looking flustered and ill at ease. Armstrong went straight up to the latter, saluted and spoke quickly. Nigel edged nearer; he was only able to catch the last words, but these were quite enough:

  ‘… search warrant for Evans’ rooms, sir.’

  ‘Are you sure it’s absolutely necessary. I mean –’

  ‘It’s essential, sir, and the sooner the better.’

  ‘Very well, Armstrong.’

  The superintendent sent constables to relieve the plainclothes man and the amateur sentries. As the former came over he whispered to him, ‘Was Mr. Evans carrying anything?’

  ‘Yes, sir, a tumbler of water.’

  ‘Don’t be a damned fool. When he left the field, I mean.’

  ‘Sorry, sir. No, sir, he didn’t appear to be.’

  Armstrong now summoned the sergeant and the police matron. He addressed the latter first: ‘I want you to search all the women, in that tent. You can start off with Mrs. Vale; she’s there already. You’re looking for some kind of very thin pointed blade. You will also, in Mrs. Vale’s case only, examine the clothing carefully for bloodstains.’ He turned to the sergeant. ‘Pearson, your job is to search all the boys and the gentlemen who were playing in the match. You won’t find anything but it must be done. Take the visitors’ room in the pavilion. I shall do the rest of the men myself.’ Armstrong moved towards the crowd and bellowed the necessary directions through his megaphone. The crowd began to break up into two streams, the women moving towards the tent and the men over to the pavilion. Many of them were too dazed by the tragedy to protest, but there were a good number who stuck in their heels and made scenes. The chief constable nibbled his moustache uneasily in the background; he foresaw an unpleasant correspondence on his breakfast table tomorrow. Armstrong, however, like a large sheepdog, barked and manoeuvred and threatened to bite, rounding up the recalcitrants and putting them in their place.

  A constable was left to picket the actual site of the crime, and Armstrong began his search. ‘Mr. Evans, please.’ Michael came into the room in the pavilion and Nigel entered uninvited with him, looking faintly puzzled. ‘Will you please undress, sir.’ Michael lifted one eyebrow, but obeyed; a curious use this changing room is being put to, he thought. The superintendent minutely examined each article of clothing as it was removed. His expression at the end of this was far from pleasant. ‘No bloodstains, after all?’ said Nigel mildly. Armstrong glowered at him and paced once or twice across the room. ‘Just a minute, Mr. Evans,’ he said, as Michael was about to depart, ‘you took a long time about that glass of water, didn’t you?’

  ‘No longer than I could help.’

  ‘Hm. Where did you get it?’

  ‘My bedroom.’

  ‘Do you mean to say there’s no tap nearer than that?’

  ‘No, there are lots. But not glasses.’

  ‘Wouldn’t it have been quicker for you to get a glass from the kitchen?’

  ‘I don’t think so. It might, perhaps. But I knew there was one in my bedroom; I went there naturally.’

  ‘That will be all, then, for the present. I must ask you, though, not to return to your rooms till I give you permission.’

  Michael looked inquiringly at him; he had no idea what all the fuss was about, which was fortunate for his peace of mind. The moment he went out Armstrong signalled to a policeman and told him not to let Evans leave the field till further orders. Armstrong now began the tedious business of searching the rest of the men. He started with the masters who had been standing near the victim; their clothing, too, was searched for blood as well as for a weapon. Nigel stood unnaturally still during these operations. It was too much to hope for, he thought. God knows what the murderer has done with it, but he’s a sight too clever to be found with any traces of the crime on him. And Nigel was right. After what seemed an interminable period, the last person was searched and dismissed. Not an inch of steel, not a drop of blood had been discovered. The police matron entered and informed Armstrong that she had found nothing. ‘Mrs. Vale?’ he said sharply. The woman shook her head. ‘Very well,’ said Armstrong, ‘we can’t keep her out here any longer. Will you take her into the house, Miss Gilray, and don’t let
her out of your sight.’ Sergeant Pearson came in to report. ‘Nothing?’ said Armstrong. ‘Take Jones and search Mr. Evans’ rooms. Colonel Humphries will give you the warrant; you may find a bloodstained handkerchief or something as well; he must have contrived somehow to keep the blood off his clothes.’ Nigel raised his eyebrows, but said nothing. He was busy with his own thoughts. Michael and Hero had not done this – that was his major premise – therefore the weapon could not have been taken off the field. The weapon had not been found on anybody, therefore it must have been hidden on the field. They would have to search there in the end, for it would not be found in Michael’s rooms, but the delay was intolerable.

  He stepped out of the pavilion. The superintendent had given his orders. The boys had been sent in with Griffin. The visitors were straggling off the field in a mute, funeral sort of procession, the fine feathers of the women seeming to droop upon them. The masters had been told not to leave the ground yet; they were collected in a group around Tiverton, upon whose shoulders the responsibility for carrying on the school had presumably fallen. Somewhere in that bleak great building its late lord and master was lying; no longer a scholar, a gentleman, an absolute ruler: only a body with a hole in it.

  It was not long before Sergeant Pearson came out. There are few possible hiding places in the bare rooms of masters. He had ransacked Evans’, and there was nothing to be found. The superintendent bit his lip, but he was not beaten yet. He divided up his little force and sent one half to search the school. ‘The common room first, Pearson; when you’ve done that, let me know and I’ll send these gentlemen in there. See that they stay there, too. Then go over the whole blasted building; that weapon can’t have vanished. Interview the servants yourself, and find out if any of them saw Mr. Evans after he went in for that glass of water or knew anything at all about the murder. Not much hope of their having seen anything; that infernal tent stands right between the windows and the place where Mr. Vale was sitting. Off you go!’

  As Armstrong turned aside to give his own men their orders, Nigel spoke to him in a low voice, ‘There’s always Wrench and the megaphone.’

  ‘I’ve not forgotten that, Mr. Strangeways. Like to help me search the pavilion?’ The other men received their instructions and began moving slowly about the field, radiating from the place where the body had lain. It did not look as if a pin could escape them. Nigel and the superintendent crossed the deserted pitch and entered the pavilion. Nigel left the burden and heat of the search to his companion. Armstrong was a thorough man, he reflected; he might jump too quickly to conclusions, but he gave every possibility a good run for its money. After quarter of an hour the pavilion had been turned inside out, and there was nothing to show for it.

  ‘I suppose he couldn’t have hidden it here and taken it away again after you’d searched him?’ Nigel suggested tentatively.

  ‘Not he. I had a man watching every one as they left the changing room. They had to move off double quick.’

  ‘You think of everything,’ said Nigel, not without admiration.

  At this moment Sergeant Pearson came up. ‘We’ve been over the common room, sir. No good.’ Armstrong frowned. ‘Very well, the school next. I’ll come across and help in a minute.’ Pearson doubled off and Armstrong approached the little group of masters.

  ‘You gentlemen may go in now. But I’m afraid I must ask you all to stay in the common room for the present. We’ve searched that and there only remains the rest of the building to do.’

  The masters presented a woebegone and shattered appearance. Tiverton’s lean, sunburnt face was twitching spasmodically; Evans stood by himself, gazing over towards the school as though he expected any moment to hear another call for help from Hero; Gadsby, Sims and Wrench were clustered together, conversing in jerky undertones; Gadsby’s face was mottled; Sims and Wrench looked white and sick.

  ‘S-searched the common room?’ repeated Sims dully.

  ‘Yes, sir. The weapon must be hidden somewhere. But we’ve found nothing so far.’

  Sims moistened his lips and stared uncomprehendingly at the superintendent. ‘Nothing so far,’ he repeated. Armstrong thought he was going to collapse, and put a hand under his elbow, saying, ‘Hold up, sir. This tragedy has been too much of a shock for you. Just you go indoors and I’ll send in some whisky for you. Perhaps one of you gentlemen would be so kind as to –’

  ‘There’s sure to be a bottle under Gadsby’s bed. I’ll fetch it down,’ muttered Wrench.

  Gadsby’s face became more mottled than ever. ‘Wrench, you little tick, can’t you ever do anything but try to be clever? If you were a gentleman, you’d know that there are occasions when one tries to show a little self restraint.’

  Wrench grew red as fire and glared at him furiously. ‘When you’ve all finished blackguarding each other, perhaps we might go in,’ remarked Tiverton in a voice not quite so bored and detached as he tried to make it.

  ‘If you have some whisky, sir, by any chance, I think it would do none of us any harm,’ said Armstrong smoothly to Gadsby. ‘I’ll fetch it myself’

  ‘You’ll find a bottle in the cupboard,’ said Gadsby.

  ‘Empty,’ said Wrench.

  An hour later. Nigel and the superintendent are sitting in the morning-room. A very stiff tot of whisky indeed is in front of the superintendent. Nigel has somehow conjured up a pot of tea, and as they talk he moves restlessly from one part of the room to another, carrying his cup and saucer with him and putting them down precariously whenever he comes to a halt.

  ‘Well, this fair beats me,’ groaned Armstrong, clapping his hand to his forehead. ‘The field, the tent, the pavilion, the path into the school, and the school itself; we’ve been over the whole ruddy caboodle with a fine-tooth comb, and not a smell of that bleeding dagger – nothing even that begins to look like a dagger.’

  ‘I have thee not, and yet I see thee still,’ quoted Nigel, ‘only we don’t see thee.’

  ‘Whassat?’

  ‘Poetry. The Bard.’

  Armstrong beat his clenched fist again and again upon the table. ‘Am I going batty or am I not? A man is stabbed. Every one and everything within a hundred yards of him is searched – no one could possibly have got away – but, hey presto! the weapon is gone.’

  Nigel loped over to another comer of the room and balanced his teacup on the edge of a pouffe. ‘We ought to have found out if anyone here is a sword-swallower. He may be coughing it up privily at this very moment.’

  ‘Ah, t’chah!’

  ‘Well, produce something better.’

  ‘Why, it’s as plain as my foot – or should be,’ the superintendent’s feet did certainly obtrude themselves upon one’s notice. ‘Mrs. Vale carries the stiletto in her clothing, waits for a moment when every one’s eyes are glued on the game, stabs him in the back. Quite easy from where she was sitting; weapon entered the body rather from the left; it all fits in. Then she gives him a push and pretends to faint. That is the signal preconcerted with Evans. He runs up, cuddles her a bit, and she passes the weapon to him. He puts it inside his coat, goes off for water, and hides it somewhere in the school. Damn it, it must be right. There must be some hiding place we’ve missed.’

  ‘Blood, old boy, blood. There’d be bound to be some on her clothing or his.’

  Armstrong lowered an eyelid ponderously. ‘That’s all right, sir. I forgot to tell you, there was so much to do. After you’d gone in with the masters just now I took another squint at the ground by the tent. Two smears of blood on the grass, quite close where Mrs. Vale fainted. One of ’em must have wiped the blade.’

  ‘That’s certainly a point to you. But, look here, what was the point of Mrs. Vale’s pretending to faint? Surely she would want all eyes concentrated on Vale while she transferred the weapon to Evans. Fainting would distract some attention to herself.’

  ‘That’s true, sir. But there had to be some pretext for Evans going so close to her.’

  ‘And the motive? On your theo
ry Evans murdered Wemyss to prevent his intrigue with Mrs. Vale coming to her husband’s ears. That seemed to me thin enough. And now Mrs. Vale murders her husband, although she knows she and Michael are under suspicion of the first crime – what for? To get a separation? She’d only to ask Vale for a divorce, hadn’t she? One might conceivably murder a person if that was the only way out, but she hadn’t even asked her husband for a divorce yet.’

  ‘Can you prove that?’

  Nigel was taken rather aback. ‘Prove it? No. But one of them would have told me if they’d decided to take the step.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t take that as evidence. You see, I happened to be passing the drawing-room door on Sunday evening before supper, and I heard Mr. Evans ask Mrs. Vale whether she would ever be really free of her husband till he was dead. I’m afraid that will sound more convincing in court than something which one of them would have told you.’

  ‘ “Happened” is good.’

  Armstrong shifted in his chair and said stiffly, ‘This is not a game of cricket; it’s a murder investigation. Someone’s got to do the dirty work.’

  ‘So you’re really going to arrest them this time.’

  ‘We’ll have another look for that weapon tomorrow morning. If we find it, I shall arrest them. If not, I shall ask the chief constable to call in the Yard.’

  ‘Yes, you’d certainly have a pretty good case. But just think a minute. A woman might use that sort of weapon. But I ask you, would anyone in their senses go and commit a crime in full view of two hundred people, when there were a thousand opportunities for doing it on the quiet, and quite enough brains to think out any number of safer methods if, as you hold, they had enough brains to think out the first murder.’