One hypothesis fitted the case neatly, whether it was correct or not. Suppose that Francia, on his arrival, had concealed himself behind the big monoliths beside the altar-stone, and had waited there, pistol in hand, ready for anything that might turn up. Roca had arrived, gone up to the circle, and, failing to notice Francia, had sat down on the altar-stone to wait. After that, it was of very little importance whether Francia shot him in the back at once or held him in talk until at last he confronted Roca’s empty pistol with his own deadly weapon. Roca had been taken by surprise in any case; and the first alternative seemed the more likely. Probably Roca had presumed too hurriedly that his own real identity was unknown to the Argentiner and had taken a risk for which he had paid with his life.
The rest was easy enough. Francia had carried the body down to Roca’s car, poured petrol over it from the spare tins, cleaned up the blood on the altar-stone, set fire to the car, and then gone off to Fern Lodge again, overlooking the evidence of the milometer dial once more when he put up the car.
“It’s no use trying to guess what gave Roca away,” Sir Clinton reflected. “Nobody’s ever likely to puzzle that out. And it doesn’t matter very much, in any case.”
Satisfied that he had arrived at approximately accurate conclusions about the course of past events, Sir Clinton then turned his mind to the future; and here he found a much more intricate series of problems awaiting him, some of which demanded almost immediate solutions.
Two major possibilities presented themselves at once to his mind: either Francia would escape detection or he would be arrested for the murder of Roca.
In the first case, the obvious thing would be for Francia to leave the country as soon as possible. All his arrangements were already made, his berth had been booked long in advance, and, if he got clear away, it was doubtful if anyone would think of him as flying from justice, unless they already had some ground for suspicion. And what grounds had the police for suspecting Francia? As Sir Clinton reflected, he himself had discovered all the really telling evidence against the Argentiner: his relations with the White Slave traffic, Roca’s telephone calls, the use of the drug to clear Elsie out of his way that night, the employment of Sir Clinton’s car with its tell-tale milometer, and the uncleaned automatic. Ledbury knew nothing of all this; and without evidence the case must seem almost hopeless.
As Ledbury’s name crossed his mind, Sir Clinton was struck by a fresh possibility. Ledbury undoubtedly knew that a Fern Lodge car had been on the spot when the murder was committed; and the sergeant was the last person in the world to drop a clue of that sort. In a muddle-headed way, he had begun to suspect Sir Clinton himself, it seemed; and the late Chief Constable recognised that this might lead to difficulties. If he were seriously accused, he knew that he could produce no alibi; and he was undoubtedly the only person at Fern Lodge who had made Roca’s acquaintance, so far as the public knew. It might lead to an awkward state of affairs if Ledbury carried his suspicions into action and managed to secure a warrant for Sir Clinton’s arrest.
If that happened, then Sir Clinton could clear himself only by accusing Francia and producing his evidence; and in that case his earlier suppression of the facts would constitute him an accessory ex post facto. Should he suppress the evidence until Francia had time to leave the country, the Argentiner might take the girls with him, whilst Sir Clinton was in gaol on suspicion and thus unable to intervene. It would certainly produce an awkward situation if Ledbury pushed things to that stage.
“Elsie’s the keystone of the whole business, so far as I’m concerned,” Sir Clinton summed up his personal position; and he began to reconsider the matter from a fresh angle.
If Francia fell into the hands of the law and Sir Clinton supplied the evidence in his possession, then Francia would undoubtedly be convicted. No jury could do anything but bring in a verdict of guilty with the facts before them. Everything fitted together far too neatly to leave any room for doubt. But this meant that Elsie would be stamped as the wife of a murderer and a trader in women—for the whole story of Francia would come out if the police once began to investigate his career. That was an ugly possibility for Sir Clinton: to publish the very evidence which would put a stain upon his niece. On the other hand, if he suppressed the evidence, he would be deliberately conniving at the escape of a murderer from his proper punishment.
An awkward dilemma for a late Chief Constable! On the one side, a sensitive girl made miserable for life owing to the action of one of her nearest relations; on the other, a late high official voluntarily thwarting the course of justice.
Sir Clinton ground his cigarette-stub in the ash-tray at his side, got up restlessly, and walked over to the window to look out. He drew back the curtains again and gazed out over the lake; but it was evident that his eyes saw very little of the scene before him. He threw back the two valves of the casement and leaned out, as though he found the room too close. Then, mechanically restoring the window to its original state, he fingered the row of books in front of him, glancing aimlessly from title to title, but obviously paying no real attention to the names which he read.
At last a thought struck him. There was still another possibility, one which he had overlooked. Suppose that before the police got upon Francia’s track, something happened to Francia himself? That would be a solution of the problem. Roca’s confederate was still lurking somewhere in the background. What if he took a hand in the game and eliminated Francia? The police would have no reason for pushing the Roca case into public view then, since they could not secure a conviction. He himself could offer his evidence if necessary—but only if it was necessary in order to get the whole matter hushed up. Elsie would come out of it with her credit safe, since the most that anyone could do would be to pity her for the loss of her husband. The whole White Slave business would be buried once for all. And when Elsie had got over the shock of Francia’s death, Rex would have a chance of coming into his own if he played his cards properly.
“I wish I could find out something about that confederate of Roca’s,” Sir Clinton mused. “If he had any direct interest in the affair, he may be the man to carry the business through by avenging Roca. If he does, I certainly shan’t lend a hand in bringing him up for it.”
This fresh view of the case seemed to have relieved his mind considerably. At least it gave him an excuse for delaying the choice between the two horns of the original dilemma; for if the confederate meant business he would obviously act before Francia slipped away out of the country. Sir Clinton decided that in the meantime he would keep his own counsel, so far as the evidence against Francia was concerned.
He turned back to his original problem again. There was now no doubt in his mind as to Francia’s character; and clearly there must be a break between Elsie and her husband sooner or later. If the whole thing came to light in this country, or even if he was able to prove—as he suspected—that Elsie’s marriage had been merely one of Francia’s business deals involving bigamy, Elsie would suffer. But there was an alternative scheme which had marked advantages. Suppose the whole party went out to South America as arranged and that he sprang his mine as soon as they had landed. It would be easy enough to come home again with the story that Francia had been taken ill suddenly and had died almost on their arrival. Estelle could be counted on to back up the tale when all the facts were laid before her; and, from his knowledge of the two Anstruther girls, he thought he could reckon on their gratitude when they found the fate from which he had saved them. It would be a complex affair and would involve a good deal of hard lying; but he knew that he himself would not stick at a mere lie or two when it was a case of ensuring Elsie’s happiness.
“That seems to cover the ground,” he said to himself at last. “If I draw blank with the confederate, and Francia’s still alive by the time we’ve got to leave for South America, then I’ll go with them and arrange to explode my mine under Mr. Francia as soon as the proper occasion presents itself. We’ll be clear of everyone who know
s us then, and we can fix things up to suit ourselves. I’ll undertake that Francia won’t come back to this country to give the show away. I have the whip-hand of him there, with the evidence I could hand over to the police as soon as he turned up.”
His reflections seemed to have ended in cheering him up; for now he briskly set about effacing any traces of his stay in the house during the afternoon. He picked up the ash-tray which he had used, threw the contents into the garden, and replaced it in its original position. Then he went across to the window and examined it carefully, as though to make sure that it was precisely the same as when he had entered the room. Satisfied on this point, he collected the bunch of keys and pick-locks and went out to get his car.
In the village, he stopped at the ironmonger’s, and, handing over the keys, paid the man’s charges. As he crossed the pavement on the way to his car, Constable Peel happened to pass along; and Sir Clinton hesitated for a moment so as to give him the chance of speaking if he wished to do so. The constable seemed only too glad of the opportunity.
“Good afternoon, sir,” he said tentatively.
“Good afternoon, Peel. Got everything cleared up now at the Bale Stones?”
“Oh, yes, sir. We finished up there before very long. The body’s in safe keeping, waiting for the P.M., sir. And the sergeant’s been working double tides. Wonderfully zealous, he is. He spares no pains.”
Something in the tone of the constable’s voice suggested that he thought little of the results of his superior’s zeal. Sir Clinton gave him the opportunity of amplifying his criticism. It was no time to consider the niceties of etiquette.
“Has he found out anything?” he asked, half-indifferently. “He dragged me into the affair much against my inclination, so I suppose I may as well hear what’s come out of it all.”
“Well, you were quite right about its being a murder, sir,” Peel hastened to inform him, with a malicious expression in his eyes. “Ledbury, he’s had to admit that he made another bloomer and that you put him straight a second time. Suicide, says he! Why, when we came to examine that corpse really careful like, there was the mark of the shot square in the back. That was a nasty one for Sergeant Ledbury to swallow, after having been so ready with his theories in the morning.”
“Well, well,” Sir Clinton interjected, “we all make mistakes now and again, and think no worse of ourselves for doing it.”
Peel was evidently sublimely unconscious of any personal application which this statement might have.
“Don’t worry yourself to sympathise with Ledbury, sir,” he advised. “That sort of thing runs off him like water off a duck’s back. He’s been worrying half the countryside already with this here case. I’ve been sitting in the office listening to him a-wearing out the telephone with calls. Sometimes I laughed fit to split over it when he’d turn away with a “Damn!” and hunt up a new number. It was real funny, that was.”
“Did he make anything out of it in the end?” Sir Clinton inquired in a tone which suggested that he was almost tired of the conversation.
Constable Peel was manifestly enjoying his share of it, and, lest Sir Clinton should turn away, he hastened to admit that Ledbury had discovered something after all.
“He’s found the burned car was garaged once at Friar’s Bush—that’s about thirty miles away from here; and once at Silvergrove—that’s a matter of six-and-twenty miles off in another direction. The garage people think they recognise the car from the description, but the numbers they remember don’t tally with each other. So he must have been changing the numberplates between times, sir. But my impression is that all that evidence is just ‘all my eye and Betty Martin,’ as one might say; for the descriptions of the man who brought in the car at these places don’t tally with Roca at all. The garage people can’t give any clear description themselves—they never noticed the man particularly; but they’re sure it wasn’t anyone like Roca.”
Sir Clinton nodded as though in mere politeness; but actually he was keenly interested. Here was Roca’s confederate appearing at last in the solid flesh. Hitherto he had been a purely hypothetical figure; and Sir Clinton was not sorry to find the accuracy of his conjectures established by this evidence.
“Roca was on the tall side, if he was anything,” Constable Peel continued. “Now these garage people say the car—if it was the same car, which the sergeant hasn’t proved yet—was brought in by a man who was middle-sized at the most. In fact, sir, that’s about all the description they can give of him; so there you have it! A lot of help that’ll be to anyone! A middle-sized man! Why, nearly every stranger that comes to this village is what you’d call middle-sized.”
He seemed to be struck by the acuteness of this observation, and apparently racked his memory for examples.
“That Mr. Brandon, now, that’s staying at the Black Bull,” he went on, “he’s middle-sized. Then there’s a Mr. Scotswood that’s taken a house for the summer—he’s middle-sized too. And the commercial traveller that stopped here last week or so, he was middle-sized. A funny bloke, that was, sir. He kept the bar of the Black Bull in fits, he did. Amusing wasn’t the name for it, I heard. But he wasn’t so good at his business, they say. Didn’t sell a pennyworth of stuff in the place to my knowledge.”
He broke off and glanced up the street.
“And this little pest that’s coming along now, sir, you’d call him middle-sized too. You’ll see, he’ll stop and ask me some of his silly questions. He always does.”
Sir Clinton followed the direction of the constable’s glance and caught sight of an unmistakably middle-sized man moving towards them on the opposite pavement. He was dressed in loud-patterned tweeds, which seemed incongruous with his short, tripping steps and general air of bird-like alertness. Catching sight of the constable’s uniform, he turned at once in their direction and crossed the road. Constable Peel made an inarticulate sound of disgust.
“Didn’t I tell you he would?” he demanded in an undertone. “I’m fair polluted out of my life with him and his questions, and here he comes with more of them.”
His forebodings were speedily justified. The stranger came up to them; and, with a jerky gesture which seemed to ask Sir Clinton’s permission to interrupt, he at once addressed the constable.
“Good afternoon. A very pleasant day, very pleasant. By the way, constable, if it wouldn’t be troubling you too much, I’d like to ask you something.”
His voice had a chirping intonation which enhanced the effect of his other bird-like characteristics; and his eager glances from face to face inevitably suggested the curiosity of a sparrow.
Constable Peel, with an air of gloom, gave his permission with a nod.
“Then perhaps you could tell me this,” the stranger went on. “Yesterday evening I was walking along the right of way beside the wood on Staff Hill. Naturally I inspected the wood as I went by; and I was struck by the amount of wild life in it. A very interesting spot, indeed. Weasels—I saw two—and several squirrels. The squirrels were brown ones, Sciurus vulgaris. Evidently the grey Canadian squirrel has not yet penetrated into this district. And I was fortunate enough to observe a badger in the dusk. At least, I am almost sure that it was Meles taxus, though it was fairly far off and the light by that time was poor. And there is an extensive rabbit-warren only a little way inside the fence. I watched the rabbits coming out of the wood to feed. Very interesting animals, rabbits. I hope to study their habits if possible.”
“Ah! You’re interested in rabbits’ habits,” interrupted the constable, evidently in the hope of bringing his interlocutor to the point.
“Rabbits’ habits,” the stranger repeated, as though his attention had been caught by the phrase. “Quite a tongue-tangler, that, isn’t it? Yes, I’m interested in Lepus cuniculus.”
Quite manifestly he was delighted to exhibit his acquaintance with the technical names he had used.
“I was about to enter the wood,” he continued, glancing for sympathy from face to face, “when I
discovered in front of me a large notice-board: ‘TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED.’ I am all on the side of the law, constable, so I refrained from crossing the fence. But I was disappointed, very naturally disappointed. Now could you tell me how I could obtain permission to go into that wood? To whom should I apply. I ask you, since you’re sure to know.”
Constable Peel was evidently relieved to reach something definite in his inquirer’s discourse.
“If I was you, sir,” he answered slowly, “I’d write to Mr. Keppel—he owns the ground—and tell him all about your interest in leppuses and taxies and vulgaries. He’ll know what’s what, then; and I expect he’ll give you permission. You write to Mr. Keppel, High Thorn, Raynham Parva; that’s all you need do, Mr. Yarrow.”
Yarrow put his hand into a pocket of his loud tweeds, drew out a notebook, and made a jotting of the address. But, to the constable’s evident disappointment, he did not replace the notebook.
“There’s just another thing I’d like to ask,” he explained, his glance taking Sir Clinton into his confidence as well. “The other day, I walked up the road over yonder”—he pointed vaguely—“and I saw a little lake with a house at the end of it. With my telescope, I made some observations. I noticed on the water some specimens of the Gallinula chloropus. These I should like to examine at closer quarters, if possible. But perhaps the owner of the house might object to my going there.”
Constable Peel hastened to divert the stream of information from himself.
“That would be the lake beside Fern Lodge, sir,” he suggested. “This is Sir Clinton Driffield, here. He’s at Fern Lodge. He’d perhaps be able to say.”
“Charmed to meet you, Sir Clinton. Most opportune,” Yarrow said effusively. “Would there be any objection to my going down to the lakeside to study the habits of the water-fowl? I am, as you can guess, an amateur naturalist. Very much of an amateur, I’m afraid—merely a beginner. But keenly interested, now that I have begun. If you could give me leave . . .”
Nemesis at Raynham Parva (A Clinton Driffield Mystery) Page 18
