“A strange mixture.”
“Yes, he is.”
“As regards Mrs. William Worth, is there any truth in both the sons being in love with her?”
“Hullo, somebody put you wise on that point already. I don’t know how far Gerry went. He had more regard for the proprieties than Henry. Not likely that he’d make a public exhibition of himself, like Henry did. Gerald would carry on a secret intrigue if he wanted her. Henry, however, was a well known philanderer. He took his new stepmother around quite a bit at one time, but the thing dropped after the old man died. I think Henry and Vera must have squabbled about the inheritance. He’s had several other lights of love since that affair.”
“There’s another point which interests me, sir. Where do Vera Worth’s own family come in in this picture? I’m told they’re county people fallen on evil days.…”
“Yes. A very well known and respected family, the Underhills of Glynn, about seven miles west of here. Colonel Underhill’s still alive and hearty, although bad luck has made him a shadow of what he was. He has two daughters and a son. They were a very happy lot until the Colonel’s wife died. He seemed to go all to pieces then. Neglected his business, let the estates go to rack and ruin, and started drinking heavily. Eventually, he pulled himself together, but couldn’t retrieve what he’d lost without outside help.…”
“So, William Worth arrived …?”
“Exactly. Old William lent Underhill money against mortgages of the estates until he’d got him where he wanted him. Then he asked Vera to marry him. He chose the right moment, for she’d just had an unlucky love affair and took William for spite. I drew up the marriage settlement, which, in effect, cleared the Underhill estate of the debts it owed to William Worth.…”
“What happened to the son, sir?”
“The Colonel rescued enough from the wreck to send him out to Kenya and there he was when Vera married old Worth. Young Stanley, that’s the son’s name, came home when war broke out and joined up. Vera was his particular favourite and he played merry hell when he found out what had happened and that she’d been sold to an old man.”
“Where is Stanley now?”
“Stationed somewhere down south, I believe.”
“I see. And the father … the Colonel … what has his attitude been towards the Worths? How did he tolerate the marriage to William?”
“It quite broke him up for a time. But Vera, intent on cutting off her nose to spite her face, seems to have insisted on its going on. There were one or two hellish rows between old William and Colonel Underhill towards the end. The Colonel had pulled himself together, as I said, and I suppose regarded himself as responsible for his daughter’s marriage and thought that it was up to him to see that she got the best of a bad bargain.…”
“So there was enmity there, too?”
“Yes … but it died out after William’s death, I believe. Old Underhill never visits Trentvale Hall, but Vera goes over to see her dad quite a lot now. She’s independent once more and is her own mistress, you see.”
“Yes. I’m glad you’ve mentioned this connection. It throws open a new avenue altogether. I must call on Colonel Underhill, I think. You see, the old gentleman or young Stanley might easily have a hand in the Worth family mystery. If Vera was suffering at the hands of the Worths, Lord knows what her kith and kin might do for her, especially if they were closely knit and fond of each other, as I gather they are.”
“They are a very united lot … or were until their trouble. Now they’re reviving the old bonds I suppose.”
“What about the other sister?”
“She married the fellow with whom Vera was in love.… That was at the root of all the bother. She lives somewhere in Scotland, I understand. Happily married and reconciled to Vera, that is if ever they did quarrel about it, which I doubt.”
The old gentleman rose to his feet and held out his hand to Littlejohn. He had smoked cigarette after cigarette during the interview and the front of his coat and waistcoat were smothered in ash, which he flicked off casually, merely rubbing in the grey powder instead of removing it.
“I’m never going to get my whiskers off if I don’t get a move on, Inspector,” he said, giving his visitor a hearty handshake and putting on a bowler hat of ancient design. “If your colleague Kane wants me in the next ten minutes, he’ll have to sit in the next chair at the barber’s. Goodbye.… Call and see me again when I can help.”
And with that the coroner waved a jaunty hand and went off for a shave.
CHAPTER IX
AMONG THE WORKMEN
“THE only persons I met between the police station and well past Worth’s was a couple o’ drunks, habituals that I know well, and a party o’ girls on their way home from Butler’s Riding School.”
Littlejohn had arranged to pick up Kane on his way to the Worth Works, but when he called at the police station, he found the Inspector absent in search of Mr. Silas Capper. The Scotland Yard man therefore filled in the waiting time in conversation with P.C. Warman, who had greeted Mr. Henry just before the crime and hence had probably been the last person to see him alive.
There were several huge and portly constables in the Trentbridge force who looked as though they had been poured into the same mould. Warman was the biggest and heaviest of the lot and at the annual police sports the tug-of-war team which had him as end man always won with effortless ease. His fat cheeks, snub nose and slightly slanting eyes gave him the look of a benevolent Chinese household god. He could throw very little light on the strange events of the night of Henry’s murder. He remembered greeting the victim in the dark and continuing his patrol without stopping. No, there was nobody about the works that he could hear at the time he passed. In fact, it was a very quiet night.
Oh yes, he always passed Worth’s at the same time every night when he was on duty. You see, he met the sergeant at midnight just at the corner of St. Chad’s church, a minute’s walk away from where Mr. Henry was standing. Mr. Henry was always there at the same time when it was his turn for firewatching. He’d talked about it to the men at the works, what a methodical man Mr. Henry was. Worked to a schedule, so to speak. Always at the door of the shop for a smoke and a breath of fresh air at midnight, before he turned in. Anybody wanting to make a rendy-voo with Mr. Worth ’ad only to look up his night on the firewatching list and he’d be sure to find him on the spot at twelve.
This time he’d had a rendy-voo with death, hadn’t he?
“Riding School? What were they doing there at that time of night?” said Littlejohn.
“Well, you see it’s this way, sir. O’Grady who manages the place for Butler, runs a sort o’ social club there. There’s a big room over the stables that he’s poshed up and he has a gramophone set up, so when the girls and their fellows come in after riding, they can go up for a bit of jazz. All straight and above board and seemingly fillin’ a long felt want, as you might say. No drinks served, o’ course, but there’s a pub nearby which does the needful till closin’ time. They usually break up the parties about midnight. It was a crowd o’ girls from there as I see, sir. I know they was from there because I could make out their riding ’abits.”
“I see. Anything else, Warman?”
“No, sir. Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.…”
Inspector Kane bustled in, talking angrily to himself.
“Havin’ a shave, indeed. Must think I’ve all day to be hangin’ around his office. He’ll have to wait.…”
“Been hunting for Mr. Capper, Inspector?” said Littlejohn with a grin. “I parted company with him at the barber’s.”
“Yes, and he’s still there. Must think I’ve nothing to do but mess about for him. Mr. Henry’s funeral’s at two o’clock and the men we want to interview will be going from the works.… So we’d better be getting along, hadn’t we …? Havin’ a shave, indeed!”
They found Worth’s a hive of industry and in passing through the various shops on their way to the offic
es, where they were to meet Gerald Worth again, Littlejohn was amazed at the air of stern preoccupation prevailing among the workers. They felt their responsibility towards the forces they were serving and were carrying on with intense zeal. Loud speakers scattered about the place gave Music While You Work. Everything ran with machine-like precision. Men and women hard at it and leaving the tasks in hand grudgingly when called away.
Hollas, who had found the body, was interrupted in his task of supervising a roomful of girls engaged in making aeroplane parts. He was busy testing something with a micrometer and laid down the gauge with reluctance.
They might as well have left him at his job, for he could tell the police nothing which he had not already revealed at the inquest. He had grown impatient waiting for Mr. Henry to return to his tea and had sought him out, only to find him gassed.
“Did you usually make tea for him, Mr. Hollas?”
The foreman scratched his bald pate and nodded his head.
“Aye. He liked a good cup o’ tea, did Mister Henery.”
“Always at the same time?”
“Regular as clockwork when we was firewatchin’. The rota of duties brought us together quite a lot. A few minutes before twelve, the boss always left his room, walked through the shop for a breather, and smoked a cigarette in the open air. If he hadn’t turned up at that time, we’d have thought somethin’ had gone wrong. As a matter of fact, we always make tea, those of us who’re awake, at midnight. Now Mr. Henery’d got used to it and sort of came through the shop to let us know ’e was ready for his drink before sleep. That’s the way I figure it, anyhow.”
“H’m. Ever find anybody prowling round the premises, Mr. Hollas?”
“Just a few kids pinchin’ coal from the yard now and then. Nothin’ else.”
“And Mr. Henry didn’t seem in any way disturbed in his mind that night?”
“No. Did a lot o’ blinking his eyes, as he always did, because, as a rule, he did close work in his room when he was firewatching.”
“Very good, thanks, Mr. Hollas.”
Llewellyn Evans, the engineer, was the next man to be sent for. He was small, wiry and he had shifty eyes like sloes.
“Indeed, gentlemen, you’ll have to make it short, this interview, look you,” he said in sing-song Welsh-English. “The bearings of my engines are very hot, indeed they are, and that means I shall have to work on them tonight. And in the meanwhile, I need to look to them, or else we shall have the whole shop standing idle.…”
“Very well, Mr. Evans. Just a couple of questions and you may go,” said Littlejohn, interrupting the spate of rapid and precise language. “I’ve already seen your gas engine. Apparently the valve which was thrown open and filled the place with gas, was easy to manipulate to anyone who knew of it.…”
“Indeed, it was. Look you, a child could have done it.…”
“Are all the workmen conversant with the engine …?”
“Indeed, they are not. Nobody but those authorized by Llewellyn Evans are allowed to tamper with his engines.…”
“I’m not talking about tampering. I mean, had everyone access?”
“They had not. Working or idle, the engine houses are always under lock and key. Only me and my assistant are allowed access to the engines and motors. That is, unless they are under repair or cleaning. Even then, one of the two of us is there with the rest.”
“The doors are kept locked, then?”
“Indeed they are, unless one of us is in the engine house. “I have one master key, my assistant the other, and the third was with Mr. Henry, who, with Mr. Gerald, of course, could come and go anywhere he pleased.”
“Your key does not leave your possession, Mr. Evans?”
“No, it does not. It is on my bunch of keys and I carry it wherever I go, for the key to my front door is also on the same ring.”
“And your assistant?”
Mr. Evans turned to a passing apprentice.
“Percy, boy, go you and tell Wilfred Booth to come to me this minute.”
Mr. Evans’s deputy turned out to be an older man than his master but was completely under the fiery Welshman’s thumb. He spoke in monosyllables, as if Evans had completely deprived him of powers of coherent speech. Long, lean, with sunken cheeks and a torn-looking moustache he gave the impression of being held together by his overalls.
The engineer displaced Littlejohn from his role as questioner.
“Wilfred, boy, where’s your key to the engine houses?”
“Pocket,” replied Wilfred.
“You always keep it there, yes?”
“Aye.”
“Do you ever part with it, Wilfred lad?”
“No.”
“And what might you do with it when you change into your other suit?”
“Ah change key into th’ same suit,” replied Wilfred in his longest effort. He did not question Evans concerning the rigmarole. He knew that his master had in mind some purpose, which he did not challenge, and after being dismissed, wiped his perspiring face on a piece of oily rag and departed in a docile manner.
“The door was open and a key in it when the body was found, Mr. Evans,” resumed Littlejohn.
“Then the key must have been Mr. Henry’s.”
Kane handed Evans a key.
“Recognize it, Evans?”
“Mister Evans to you, Inspector Kane.”
“Mister Evans, then.”
“That is better. The key is indeed Mr. Henry’s. I made it myself. See the notch in the barrel. My mark, that is. When new locks were put on the engine houses, all fitted to the same key, but two keys only were supplied. I made another for Mr. Henry on his orders.”
“Didn’t the late Mr. William or Mr. Gerald have keys?”
“They did not. They knew better than to interfere with a good man at his work, although they knew how to stop and start the engines, but always borrowed my key. Mrs. William, too, and Miss Alice, they knew about the engines. Terribly interested in engines is everybody.…”
“The women, too?”
“Yes, indeed. Both women have interested themselves in the works since we took on ladies here for the war work. Although Mrs. William has grown less keen since the death of the old man last winter. I must be going, or that Wilfred will be getting himself into mischief. A good boy, Wilfred, but short of initiative. Good day, gentlemen.…”
“Just a minute, Mr. Evans,” said Littlejohn. “As a matter of routine I’d like to ask you where you were at midnight on the night of the murder of Mr. Henry Worth.”
Llewellyn Evans went off at the deep end. He reminded Littlejohn of Donald Duck in a rage.
There followed long, purple patches of incoherent Welsh and then the engineer broke into English again.
“… it is heretic I have been called by the Papists, a ranter by the Episcopalians, the breaker of my mother’s heart by my own father … now it is a murderer I am become. Indeed, some of you shall be made to suffer for this. Alderman Price-Jones, chairman of our diaconate and head of the Watch Committee of this town, shall hear from me concerning the irresponsibility of our police.…”
“That will do, Mr. Evans,” said Littlejohn, damming the spate of chatter with a flick of his hand. Kane seemed to have gone down for the third time beneath the billows. “That will do. Nobody’s suggesting for a minute that you had anything to do with the death of Mr. Henry Worth. I am asking a routine question. Please yourself whether or not you answer it, but make up your mind which you’ll do. Then I can make up mine concerning whether you’re for, or against us in this investigation.…”
“And what do you mean by that …?”
“I mean, Mr. Evans, that several people are prepared to swear that you have been heard to say that, rather than allow Mr. Henry to lead your daughter into sin, you would kill him.… Don’t you think you’d better answer my question? If you’re in the right, you’ve nothing to fear, Mr. Evans. You ought to know that without my needing to tell you. You, a pillar of the churc
h.…”
Mr. Evans changed his tune. All his fire died away and he became a wheedler.
“Oh … that. Come, come, Inspector bach, we all say things in the heat of the moment.…”
“So your anger against Mr. Henry for his treatment of your daughter was a lot of hot air …?”
“Indeed it was not! Show me the man who says so. It was true what I said. I would have killed him with these two hands, indeed, rather than have my Blodwen wantoning about the countryside with him. But I did not kill him.… I was far enough away from here at that time, indeed I was.”
“Well?”
“From ten until one o’clock on the night of Mr. Henry’s death, I was watching at the bedside of old Mr. Lewis, of the Chapel. Very ill was Mr. Lewis, though now on the mend. Very ill, indeed.… Watching and praying, I was, until the small hours. Dr. Cragg will bear witness to that … present he was at the bedside until Mr. Lewis took a turn for the better after midnight.…”
“That’s all I want to know, Mr. Evans. You’ve wasted a lot of your own time and mine by not telling me at once.…”
“Wasting time, am I, Inspector bach?” Evans’s tone was sarcastic and slimy. “Wasting time, indeed. And what are the police doing? What are they doing? Answer me that, Inspector. Running here and running there, they are. Questioning innocent people of good repute, when all the time the guilt is plain.…”
“Yes, Mr. Evans …? Whose is the guilt?”
“I am not the one to point the accusing finger.… Indeed I am not. Let others cast the stone. But, Inspector, I would ask, if I was you, what was Mrs. William Worth’s brother, Mr. Stanley Underhill, doing hanging round this town half an hour before midnight … half an hour before Mr. Henry was gassed to kingdom-come. Seen by Mr. David Thomas, postman, also of the Chapel, who met him prowling near St Chad’s as he was on his way back from the Post Office Home Guard drills.… Wasting time, was I …?”
Death in the Night Watches Page 7
