Nightmare

by Lynn Brock

  ‘Well, well,’ demanded Mr Knayle, ‘what’s the matter now? I can’t have this sort of thing, Inspector. You can’t come here interrupting this man in his work constantly like this.’

  ‘I’ve got to do my duty, sir. This man has committed a serious offence. He has incited another person to give false information to the police. I’ve come here in pursuance of my duty to ascertain—’

  ‘False information? What about?’

  Inspector Bride referred to his notebook.

  ‘I have information that he called at the house of a person named Eustace Shawley on the night of November 11th and asked him to state to the police that he had seen him in the Rockwood Palace Cinema on the night of November 5th, knowing at the time that he had not seen him—’

  ‘Oh—he—him!’ exclaimed Mr Knayle impatiently. ‘Why the devil don’t they teach you chaps to speak English? What’s all this, Chidgey? Did you ask this man to say that he saw you?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Chidgey replied miserably.

  ‘Did he see you?’

  ‘No, sir. But he might have done. He was in the Palace that night.’

  ‘Oh, dammit,’ said Mr Knayle. ‘I’m sick of this, Chidgey.’

  Inspector Bride put away his notebook very carefully and allowed a little silence to pass before he took Mr Knayle down another peg. He knew the effect of little silences.

  ‘There’s another matter, sir. I believe you’ve been away in Guildford for the past fortnight or so, and that you took your car with you. Am I right in supposing that you were in Guildford on the evening of last Tuesday? I mean the Tuesday of this week—the evening before last?’

  ‘Quite right. And if you want to know where Chidgey was, he was in his lodgings—in bed. You were in bed ill, Chidgey, weren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I went to bed after me dinner, Inspector, and stayed there till the next morning. The people at the lodgings will tell you that.’

  ‘I see,’ said Inspector Bride, taking out his notebook again. ‘Now, where might these lodgings be in Guildford?’

  ‘32 Springfield Road.’

  The stumpy pencil wrote the address with ominous deliberation and Chidgey’s voice wilted into a cowed whimper.

  ‘If you’re going to make inquiries about me, I’d better tell you I had a row with Prossip in Guildford.’

  ‘I see,’ said Inspector Bride, after another little silence. ‘A row, eh? What was the row about?’

  ‘Now this is quite irregular, Inspector,’ interrupted Mr Knayle. ‘I won’t have my servants bullied and cross-examined in this way. What is the object of these questions about Chidgey’s having been in Guildford?’

  ‘I must ask you, sir—’ began the inspector.

  His voice checked and, turning to discover the cause, Mr Knayle saw that Whalley had entered the garage. He was very much annoyed because he had lost his temper in a weak, ineffectual sort of way and because he had said too much. Chidgey had suddenly become a serious anxiety again; the notebook and the stumpy pencil and the glassy stare had made him look like a cornered rat. Mr Knayle had an abrupt impression that he didn’t like Whalley’s appearance—didn’t like his shabby overcoat and his old shoes and his faded hat and his white face and his bloodshot eye and that raw scrape on his chin. He collected these unpleasing details into a whole which he removed from himself. He felt that he didn’t want shabby-looking people—of whom, really, he knew nothing—walking into his garage and taking their shabby little cars out, at awkward moments. He decided to light a cigarette to avoid the necessity of speaking.

  As Whalley passed on to his car Chidgey moved to lean into it and take a pair of oil-stained gloves from the driving-seat.

  ‘I found those in your car, sir, when I was cleaning it this morning. I left them there, thinking you might have wanted them for some purpose.’

  Whalley stared blankly. ‘They’re not mine.’

  ‘I know that, sir. They’re an old pair I used to use for oily jobs. Then you don’t want them for anything, sir?’

  ‘No. I don’t know how they got into my car. I didn’t put them there.’

  Not a word of thanks to Chidgey for having cleaned the car, thought Mr Knayle. Ungracious, shabby writer of novels that no one had ever heard of. Bloodshot eye. Driving out a shabby, noisy little car, saying, ‘Pretty thick now, isn’t it?’ as if one knew all about him. Just drawl ‘Yes,’ without looking at him.

  Inspector Bride had stood outside looking up and down the road. It was a side-road, and there was nothing to see except the fog, but to right and to left he found placid satisfaction. It looked to him now as if there might be something in Chidgey after all. And he had taken cocky little Mr Knayle down a peg. His tone was quite genial as he turned, straightening his tie.

  ‘A funny thing, sir—as we were talking about Guildford—I saw that gentleman at Guildford station a couple of weeks ago—no, three weeks ago it must be, now. It’s the gentleman that has the flat above you, isn’t it? A Mr Whalley, I think?’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ replied Mr Knayle abstractedly. ‘He—er—I allow him to use my garage. Er—is there anything more that I can tell you?’

  ‘Not for the present, sir—not for the present, thank you,’ chanted Inspector Bride pleasantly and disappeared into the fog with a salute that was not quite a salute.

  Two hours later Inspector Strong of the Surrey Constabulary called in person at 32 Springfield Road and interviewed the landlady and her maid. On the evening of the preceding Tuesday the landlady had taken Chidgey’s supper into his room at half-past six and had then seen him in bed. She had gone out a little later and had not seen him again until the following morning. The maid had not seen him at any time that evening, though she had heard him moving about in his room between nine and ten o’clock. Inspector Strong had another conversation with Inspector Bride over the telephone and arranged to lunch with him at the Imperial Hotel in Rockwood on the following day.

  6

  When Hopgood brought in his tea-tray that afternoon Mr Knayle looked up from the almanac of his pocket-diary.

  ‘Can you remember, Hopgood—what day was it that I went up to Guildford? Monday the 23rd, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was a Monday, sir, anyhow.’

  ‘Monday. I thought so. Monday the 23rd, then. Yes. When did Mr Whalley go away, can you remember?’

  ‘Which time, sir?’

  ‘Why?’ asked Mr Knayle, turning, ‘has Mr Whalley been away more than once, then?’

  ‘Oh yes, sir. He’s been away a lot. He went away the week before you went to Guildford—that was the first time.’

  ‘Yes. Well?’

  ‘Well, then, he came back the day after you left and went away again the next day. Then he came back last Monday night, very late, and the next day, I think, he was away again all day. There was no light up in his flat all the evening.’

  ‘So he didn’t come back on Tuesday night?’

  ‘I can’t say as to that, sir. I thought I heard him going up his steps late that night—getting on for twelve, it must have been. But I couldn’t say for sure.’

  ‘No scones,’ exclaimed Mr Knayle, putting away his diary and turning to the tea-tray. ‘Dear, dear. And I’ve been looking forward to your scones for a fortnight.’

  It was too foggy to do anything after tea. He fidgetted about his sitting-room for a little space and then went down and rang Mr Ridgeway’s bell. After some delay the door opened and Mr Ridgeway appeared, carrying a toasting-fork on which was impaled a large, untidy slice of bread.

  He stood in silence and for a moment Mr Knayle, too, stood in silence and looked at him, wondering why he had come down and rung his bell and made him appear in his dirty old dressing-gown, carrying a revolting hunk of bread on a toasting-fork. The dressing-gown was appalling—stained, faded, frayed, burst at the armpits. Mr Knayle felt sure that it smelt and that beneath it lay no beauty at all, but horrors of uncleanliness. Only a ravening animal could eat a hunk of bread like that. And what a face—what
a travesty of a face—sagging and loose, with heavy, sensual lips and a double chin that creased like india-rubber. Everything crooked and uneven—ears sticking out at different angles; one eye lower than the other—

  ‘You look very mysterious, Knayle,’ said Mr Ridgeway at length. ‘You’re not trying to ask me to go up and play chess, are you?’

  ‘No, no,’ laughed Mr Knayle.

  ‘Oh, then that’s all right,’ yawned Mr Ridgeway.

  ‘Though I do feel a little mysterious, as a matter of fact,’ said Mr Knayle, grasping at the opening. ‘You know, there is something queer about this business, Ridgeway.’

  ‘What business?’

  ‘This—this murder. I mean—the Prossips’ maid was murdered only a few weeks ago—and now Miss Prossip has been murdered—almost in the same way. I mean, you know—it is quite a curious thing. Of course, I suppose I’m a little thrilled because I was on the spot, so to speak; but quite apart from that—I mean, doesn’t it strike you as being a little curious?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ replied Mr Ridgeway. ‘That girl—what was her name?—Rudd or Judd or something—she wasn’t the Prossips’ maid when she was murdered. You never open the paper now without finding that two or three women have been knocked on the head.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ urged Mr Knayle. ‘But there’s no connection between them. There is a connection in this case. You must admit there is. And it’s quite clear that Miss Prossip wasn’t murdered in a haphazard way. The thing was evidently deliberately planned. It seems that she was in the habit of going to Farnham several times a week and that she always got back at the same hour—about half-past seven. Besides, you can’t imagine anyone going about with a hammer looking for someone to murder.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I can.’

  ‘Oh, nonsense. This must have been a deliberate business. According to the report, Miss Prossip always got back at half-past seven—and she was murdered between seven and eight. Someone must have watched the lane.’ Mr Knayle lowered his voice. ‘I’ll tell you a curious thing, Ridgeway. Er—you heard me ask Whalley this morning if I had seen him in Guildford last week?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, he said I hadn’t. Or rather, he didn’t say anything, now that I come to think of it, but he shook his head. Yes, that was it—he shook his head and made some remark about my glasses. At any rate I feel sure that he gave me to understand that I hadn’t seen him. But I did see him. I know for a fact that he was in Guildford three weeks ago—and I’m perfectly certain that I saw him there one night last week. And the curious thing is that I saw him coming out of the lane where Miss Prossip was murdered.’

  ‘That was the lane where you didn’t find the hammer at one o’clock in the morning?’ asked Mr Ridgeway.

  ‘Oh, well—’ said Mr Knayle, turning away rather huffily. Before he could turn again, Mr Ridgeway laughed and shut his hall-door.

  It shut quickly but quietly and the effect produced in Mr Knayle’s mind was that it had shut on something foolish which could be left outside with impunity. He felt foolish and somewhat alarmed by what he had done. He had put into words a most appalling and grotesque suspicion—deliberately coupled the fact that he had seen Whalley in the lane with the fact that Miss Prossip had been murdered by someone who had watched her movements for some time beforehand. There had been no previous intention whatever in his mind to couple them. But suddenly something—something quite apart from Ridgeway’s sardonic amusement at his interest in the affair—had aroused an eager, savage little desire to connect them—in a lowered voice, too, not in the casual way in which he had meant to refer to the fact that he had seen Whalley. He felt that he had done something extremely serious and imprudent. After all, Ridgeway was almost an entire stranger. He was quite capable of repeating the whole conversation to Whalley—garbling it, and making it appear still more serious.

  However, the hall-door was shut and Mr Knayle didn’t see how he could very well ring again and ask Ridgeway not to repeat what he had said about Whalley. Besides, of course, it would be utterly ridiculous to couple the two things—grotesque. Ridgeway had laughed. He had seen at once that it would be utterly ridiculous to couple them. The whole conversation would fade from his fusty brain in a quarter of an hour.

  Utterly absurd—grotesque.

  But Mr Knayle was now quite sure that he had seen Whalley come out of the lane. And he couldn’t understand why Whalley should deny having been in Guildford when he had been in Guildford. He regretted very much that his voice had lowered itself and made an absurd and most indiscreet connection, between the fact that the lane had probably been watched for some time beforehand and the fact that he had seen Whalley in the lane at night during the week preceding Miss Prossip’s murder. But the connection had been made, and he took it back to his sitting-room with him.

  During the past few months the range of his thoughts had contracted steadily and his mind had grown accustomed to short views. A number of small stresses had soured his outlook and made him feel restless and a little undignified and peevish. When he had stared at the fire for a little space he remembered that, just after Whalley had come out of the lane he had heard a clock somewhere towards the town, strike the half-hour, and that it had occurred to him that there might possibly not be time to shave before dinner. Half-past seven—a curious coincidence. Supposing that someone had been keeping watch.

  Presently he took out his pocket-diary again. As he opened it he remembered that he had noticed a long, raw scrape on Whalley’s chin that morning.

  While Mr Knayle sat busy by his fireside the little old car was climbing the long rise between Calne and Marlborough, edging along the bank, and making heavy weather of it on bottom gear. It had taken four hours to crawl thirty miles and its back-axle was knocking ominously. The black pallor of the fog bulged forward to meet it and blind it and thrust it down the hill again. About it whispered silences that drowned its labouring clamour and mocked its faltering. Its churning was dubious and treacherous Mannikin—mannikin—mannikin—ikin—mannikin—ikin …

  7

  At six o’clock next morning Mrs Prossip awoke and uttered a long, groaning yawn because, once more, she hadn’t died during the night. Ever since she had begun to have her attacks she had hoped that she might have one during the night and die. Not that she wanted in the least to die, or really believed that she ever would die. But she wanted Lionel to come in and be the first to find her cold and dead and get a terrible fright and feel terrible remorse for the way he had always treated her. As there was now no chance of his doing so that morning, she switched on the light over her bed, scratched her legs enjoyably for a little while, wiped her face with a towel, and then threw back the bedclothes. The air about the bed was piercingly cold and for a moment she was tempted to draw the bedclothes back again and not go to early service.

  Everything urged her not to go. Two days of shock and strain had lowered her vitality and made her slack and disinclined for physical movement. There was the inquest at eleven—Lionel to be watched all the morning so that he wouldn’t get drunk and make a show of himself again—mourning to be tried on—telegrams from relatives about the funeral to be answered. She had felt very comfortable and warm scratching her legs under the bedclothes and the bedroom was very cold and filled with fog. She hated cold and she hated cycling in fog and her hands itched to pull the bedclothes up again.

  But it had always annoyed Lionel when she went out to early service—annoyed him because she went out regularly two mornings in the week without ever missing, and because he never went, and because the noise she made dressing woke him up an hour and a half too soon. The infliction of this annoyance had given her acute pleasure for over thirty years and on bad mornings had always afforded her the additional satisfaction of self-sacrifice. The desire to preserve the unbroken regularity of its infliction tightened her bluish lips to resolution. She sprang out of bed and, hurrying to the windows, shut them violently.

  In the adjoining bedroom
Lionel boomed wrathfully and, forgetting that Marjory had been murdered and was dead, she hummed contentedly as she opened the door of the wardrobe and shut it again with a bang. He might boom and pound his pillows and bury his head under the sheets, but he would lie awake now, growling and clearing his throat and trying to think of some way to get his own back and not being able to think of any way.

  As she pushed her bicycle towards the gate of the garden she hesitated again. The fog was so thick that nothing could be seen of the houses at the other side of the avenue and the street-lamp outside the gate was a glow-worm poised on a shadow. But she had pumped up the tyres of her bicycle and lighted its lamp and she didn’t want to have taken so much trouble for nothing. She wobbled off up the avenue, rumbling windily, and keeping the kerb of the footpath within quick reach of her left foot.

  She made an effort to think of Marjory sadly as she went along. But the wobbling of her bicycle made thought of any kind disjointed and diffuse. Marjory, who had been trying in life, had been extremely trying in death. Mrs Prossip felt that she didn’t want to think of her at all just then—that she had done enough thinking about her during the past two days, and that she was entitled to a little rest from her before she faced the inquest. Some little distance behind her—a distance too short to be altogether comfortable—a car was following slowly and noisily. She turned her head a little, endeavouring to calculate its nearness and its speed.

  Suddenly its grinding growl rose to uproar and the glare of its lamps was close behind her. She uttered a cry of frightened anger and, letting go the handlebars, flung herself sideways towards the footpath.

  The car had disappeared when she raised her head and, after some moments, saw her bicycle lying in the gutter a few yards away, crumpled and twisted ludicrously. She felt that she was going to have one of her attacks and lay down again.

  CHAPTER XIII

  1

  MR KNAYLE was frowning over his bank-book towards five o’clock that evening when Hopgood came in to say that Mr Whalley was outside.