The Mystery at Stowe

by Vernon Loder

  ‘I see, sir; but, if she was making up as Mrs Tollard, why did she not wear a dressing-gown of the same colour?’

  ‘Well, that point hints that she was an outsider. An outsider might be familiar with Mrs Tollard’s appearance in the street, or when dressed for the house, but she would not know what colour of dressing-gown she would wear. The lady might have had two or three, being a wealthy woman.’

  Inspector Warren nodded. ‘That’s true. But, to get back to the blow-pipe. Why should she have it, when she was within hands’ reach of Mrs Tollard?’

  ‘We don’t know that she had it,’ said Fisher slowly. ‘Either Jorkins has made a mistake, which is very unlikely, or else we have to suppose the presence of this other woman in the room. Suppose she had the dart in her hand, not the blow-pipe at all, and stuck it into Mrs Tollard, who was lying in bed. The prick may have been slight. You heard what the doctor said about the fall having driven the dart in further.’

  ‘You mean she may have stabbed Mrs Tollard with it, while sleeping, and got away. Then Mrs Tollard began to feel the effects of the poison, and got out of bed, to fall dead near the window?’

  ‘I only say it could have been done that way. There were only the distinct fingerprints of three people on the weapon.’

  ‘Miss Gurdon, Mr Haine, and Mr Tollard.’

  ‘I’m assuming so, since they all confessed to using that blow-pipe once, but you must ask them for their prints today when you go over. What I mean is this, if there was an outsider, and she used the blow-pipe, there would be four fingerprints. Or prints from four hands, I should say.’

  ‘Eight,’ corrected Warren. ‘It requires one hand to steady the thing and one to aim. But I take your meaning, sir. No outsider either could have cleaned her prints off the weapon, for she couldn’t see where the other ones were, and what would have removed one ought to have cleaned off the others.’

  ‘The point is this,’ said Fisher. ‘This dart could have been used by hand. The sounds Miss Gurdon heard could have been those made by the intruder, and not by the dead lady when in pain before her death.’

  They entered the station, and went to the superintendent’s room. Fisher sat down, and pointed to a seat.

  ‘What did you think of Mr Tollard’s evidence, sir?’ Warren asked, after a moment.

  ‘I shouldn’t have thought anything of it if it hadn’t been for the evidence I took up at the house from those young women. From what they say, and what they were sorry they said, I had a notion that it was not all lavender in Tollard’s home. But Mr Tollard certainly looks broken down, and it can’t be remorse, for his alibi is good enough. His friend who kept the yacht, is not only prepared to swear he was with him at the time, but took the trouble to get his skipper to write a letter confirming it.’

  ‘I suppose, sir,’ said the inspector thoughtfully, ‘there isn’t a possibility of a poison having been administered for some time secretly. The lady had a bad headache the day before, and didn’t come down to some meals.’

  ‘The presence of the dart being a blind to make it appear she was shot from outside?’

  ‘That’s what I mean. I don’t say it’s likely.’

  Fisher ruminated. ‘Um. We couldn’t say if it was even a possibility till the people at the Home Office supply us with their experts’ reports. When they analyse the organs, they may find that the only traces of poison were of the same poison with which the arrow point was saturated. Of course they may find something else as well. But that means suspecting the husband, Warren.’

  The inspector pursed his lips. ‘If he wasn’t happy, sir, we can’t quite exonerate him yet, can we?’

  ‘Well, you can keep that in mind, but I don’t think there is anything in it.’

  ‘No chance of any of the staff being in it?’

  ‘No, and Mr Barley has no motive whatever, apart from not being the kind of man one would suspect.’

  ‘The young fellow, Haine, was on the same landing.’

  ‘He was, but from what I can make out he was more the victim of a silly passion for Mrs Tollard than a man likely to hurt her.’

  Warren nodded. ‘That leaves us Miss Gurdon. I had a talk with the sergeant.’

  ‘He’s an excellent officer in his limits, but not very intelligent.’

  ‘Perhaps not, but it struck him that he had never seen a lady in a like situation, who was so calm and careless.’

  ‘It’s the first time he has met a lady explorer, Warren. I’ve had a look through her first book, and some of the things she did, or says she did, would frighten an ordinary man. Why, somewhere in Paraguay, she helped defend a town against revolting Indians.’

  ‘Allowing for that, didn’t it strike you in her evidence today that she skirted round the question of Mrs Tollard having an enemy?’

  ‘It did. I am saving up the real examination for the next sitting of the enquiry. It struck me that she disliked the dead woman.’

  ‘Then there was the husband backing her with money.’

  ‘Not actually her—the expedition to come. I don’t think he was doing anything out of the way. But it counts all the same. If his wife was jealous, and unhappy, and he was not happy either in the marriage, we can’t rule out the possibility that he was in love with Miss Gurdon. He denied it strongly to me, at least by inference, but that isn’t everything. If you can get a quiet talk again with those two young ladies, Mrs Gailey and Miss Sayers, try to pump them. But don’t frighten them.’

  ‘From what I could see,’ said Warren, ‘the old lady would be as good a spec as anyone.’

  ‘You’re quite right. Mrs Minever had a lot on the tip of her tongue, and she only swallowed it because she got frightened. Whether it’s mere gossip and froth, or truth, I don’t know. Find out if you can.’

  ‘Have we had any luck in the matter of searching the hotels and places about for a strange lady?’

  ‘Not yet. It’s hard to say if we ever shall. I began this case, Warren, pretty sure that the criminal was outside, but the deeper I get into it the more inclined I am to think that the one who killed Mrs Tollard was in the house, or in touch with someone in the house!’

  CHAPTER XIV

  AN OPEN MIND

  WHEN Jim Carton advised Elaine of the advantages of being logical, and looking at everything with an open mind, he was following the common practice of recommending a course he himself was not following. He was not aware of this, but it was a fact nevertheless.

  No human being keeps an open mind in the ultimate sense of the word. Prejudices will creep in, habits give the mind a twist, certain pathways are never explored, and exceptions are made unconsciously.

  Had he been able to approach this problem logically, he would not have started with the premise that Elaine Gurdon was necessarily innocent of the crime. But he loved her, and love made it impossible for him to see her in a clear light. He had never doubted his love for her, and now jealousy stepped in to confirm his knowledge.

  He did not admit even to himself that he was jealous. But he began actively to dislike Tollard, who seized every opportunity to monopolise Elaine, and did not appear to care that this might lead to gossip, or arouse strange feelings in the man who loved her.

  It was possibly this growing hostility to Tollard that made a suspicion creep into Carton’s mind; the very suspicion which had been debated between Warren and the superintendent. He did not believe Elaine was at all in love with Tollard, but that did not exclude the possibility of Tollard loving her.

  He remembered a case in his African experience, where a native had been poisoned by a witch-doctor, and the skull afterwards fractured with the club of a rival medicine-man, under the impression that this would divert suspicion from the actual cause of death. There were other poisons than those used on the points of darts, poisons that were cumulative in their effect.

  He dismissed this suspicion at first with the greatest haste. He was annoyed with Tollard, but he must not allow that feeling to make him unjust. Ned Tollard was har
dly the sort of man to use such a cruel means of getting rid of his wife, even if he found the situation intolerable, and was already in love with another woman.

  Ortho Haine left by the train after four, and with him went Nelly Sayers. Mr Barley had seen them both, apologised for the trouble and worry that had fallen on them while in his house, and begged them to act as they pleased.

  ‘It was not my fault that this dreadful tragedy happened,’ he said, ‘but I am sorry all the same. If you wish to go, if any of my guests wish to go, they will please themselves.’

  Tollard said that he would remain for a day or two, in case anything turned up. Carton said he would like to stay also, if Mr Barley did not mind. Mrs Gailey, in an access of sympathy for the troubled host, said she thought Mrs Minever might like to have her company for a little while.

  ‘And you, Miss Gurdon?’ asked the old man.

  ‘I think I ought to stay. If any point comes up about the blow-pipe and the darts, I may be able to help.’

  So, for the moment, only Miss Sayers and Haine deserted the house, and when Inspector Warren turned up in the evening, just before dinner, he was able to record the fingerprints of Elaine Gurdon and Ned Tollard. Haine’s address was given to him, so that he could see him if necessary in town.

  Dinner was a shorter meal than usual, and Carton announced his intention to Elaine of visiting Jorkins in his cottage before night fell. He asked if she would come with him again, but Mr Barley said he was sure Miss Gurdon was too tired for that field tramp after her anxious day.

  So Carton lighted a pipe, after dinner, and hastened towards the fox-cover by the side of which Jorkins had his cottage. Going at a great pace, he reached it in twenty minutes, and found the under-keeper, sitting on a wooden bench outside the front door, cleaning a gun-barrel with great energy.

  ‘Good evening, Jorkins,’ said Carton. ‘I am staying with Mr Barley, you know, and I thought I would like a word with you.’

  ‘I thought I see you at the inquest, sir,’ said the man, touching his cap, and withdrawing a wire brush from the barrel. ‘A nasty business it was too.’

  He got up, made room for Carton on the seat, and ran a pull-through over his palm. ‘Won’t you sit down, sir?’

  Carton sat down, and produced his tobacco pouch. ‘Fill up,’ he said. ‘I want to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind. I thought you gave your evidence as clearly as anyone today.’

  Jorkins smiled, flattered. ‘Mebbe I did, sir. Well, anything you wants to ask I’m here to answer.’

  ‘What puzzles me is that red thing the woman at the window was wearing,’ said Carton. ‘You are sure of that?’

  ‘Of course, sir. I swore it, and would again.’

  ‘I wonder would you recognise the garment again by its shape?’ Carton asked. ‘I know you were some distance away, but do you think you could?’

  Jorkins took up a little bottle of gun-oil from the bench, and began carefully to oil the action of the gun he had been cleaning.

  ‘Doubtful if I could, but I might,’ he said. ‘But it might look different on the lady when she was wearing it from what it would do in the hand.’

  Jim reflected. ‘If I could get a lady to wear it, do you think that would be a help?’

  ‘It would, sir, if I could ’dentify the thing at all.’

  ‘With Mr Barley’s permission you would be willing to come up and make an experiment?’

  ‘What would that be, sir?’

  ‘Simply to walk past the house as you did that morning, and take a glance at the window from the same distance. I can get someone to show themselves there, and you may be able to tell us if there is any resemblance in the dressing-gown worn.’

  ‘I could do that, sir,’ said Jorkins.

  ‘Unless they ask you directly, you need not inform the police of this,’ said Carton. ‘If you are questioned, of course, you must make no secret of it.’

  ‘I see, sir.’

  Carton got up, fished in his pocket for a small note, and handed it over.

  ‘We only want to get at the truth,’ he remarked. ‘Any information that may be of service to the police will go straight to them.’

  Jorkins thanked him, and promised to attend at any time desired. Carton nodded, and turned homewards, arriving just as the dark was beginning to set it. He was fortunate in meeting Elaine in the hall. She had left the others, to fetch something from her bedroom, and turned with him into the billiard-room.

  ‘I’ve been to see Jorkins,’ he told her, ‘and now I want you to help me.’

  Elaine looked at him curiously. ‘In what way, Jim?’

  ‘Well, I want to make sure that he did see a woman’s figure, and not a man’s, at that window. The police have done with that room.’

  ‘I know. But where do I come in?’

  ‘Well, I thought you might show yourself at the window in a dressing-gown something like Mrs Tollard’s, and I would get him to cross the park as he did that morning.’

  ‘But I haven’t a red dressing-gown.’

  ‘It’s the shape and hang of the thing I want to get at. Do you know what sort of thing she wore?’

  ‘Yes, it was not unlike one Netta Gailey has. I mean the cut.’

  ‘You could borrow hers.’

  ‘But it is maize?’

  ‘Is that a colour?’

  ‘Yes, a sort of yellow.’

  ‘That can’t be helped. I want to test Jorkins’s observation. Will you do that? Ask Mrs Gailey to lend you hers, and wear it for a few moments at the window?’

  Elaine reflected, her face clouding over. ‘I don’t think I care to, Jim.’

  He stared. ‘Why not? It may bring out an important point.’

  ‘I think we should leave that sort of thing to the police. Ned thinks the same as I do in that matter.’

  ‘Hang Ned! He hasn’t contributed much to the solution of the problem.’

  ‘And you haven’t—yet,’ she said, smiling faintly.

  ‘And never shall, if everyone keeps on the safe and discreet side. But I wish you would do it. I believe it might tell us something.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I am sorry, but I can’t. You forget that very terrible associations are connected with that room in my mind. I found her dead there. I hate the idea of masquerading in that room.’

  He frowned. ‘It isn’t a masquerade. Hang it all! Do you realise what a mess may come of this investigation?’

  ‘I don’t believe your scheme will help. I don’t see how it could.’

  ‘When someone’s safety hangs on the possible presence of another woman in the house?’

  ‘I know, but Jorkins says he saw one, and he will say he saw another after your experiment. What good will that do? Drop it, Jim. I know you want to help, but I think it is a waste of time.’

  He wondered why she let herself be swayed so much by Ned Tollard’s opinions. He felt sure the fellow had been calling him officious. All Tollard seemed to want to do was to get rid of the publicity in the affair.

  ‘Then I’ll ask Mrs Gailey,’ he said irritably.

  ‘Well, I can’t object to that. I can only say I won’t do it.’

  He looked down. ‘How was she compared with Mrs Tollard, in figure, I mean?’

  ‘They were about the same height. Margery was slimmer, and more graceful.’

  ‘Right. I’ll ask her. I wonder could you get her to come here without letting the rest of the crowd know?’

  ‘I’ll try,’ said Elaine. ‘Wait a few moments.’

  She slipped away, and left him pondering. She was surprised apparently to find him so keen on investigating the case; he was surprised to find her putting barriers in his way. She had nothing to hide, therefore it must be Ned Tollard who was trying to put on the brake. Had Tollard anything to hide? Carton could not believe that yet.

  He told himself irritably that Elaine was indiscreet. It was no good saying that when people gossiped you defied them, and so proved that the gossip had n
o foundation. That was rubbish. That attitude only added fuel to the fire of calumny. It would have been better for her to see as little as she could of Ned now that his wife was dead. If Tollard knew no better than to follow her about, a word would check it.

  Mrs Gailey came in smiling. She had a healthy interest in mysteries, and there was something intriguing to her mind in this secret conference in the billiard-room.

  ‘Elaine told me you wanted to see me,’ she said. ‘Do tell me if anything exciting has turned up.’

  It was such an ingenuous question that she smiled involuntarily. ‘Nothing yet,’ he said, getting up from the corner of the table, where he had been sitting. ‘Have a cigarette, and I’ll tell you how you can help me.’

  ‘Can I really?’ she cried. ‘But how jolly interesting. What do you want me to do?’

  ‘Only to be a ghost for a few minutes.’

  She laughed. ‘You’re pulling my leg, Mr Carton.’

  ‘A live ghost,’ he said. ‘I have asked Jorkins if he will help me reconstruct the scene, perhaps tomorrow. He’ll walk across the park and look up at the window where Mrs Tollard was—I mean the window of her room. All I want you to do is to show at the window for a moment in a dressing-gown.’

  ‘It sounds very improper,’ she said, grinning.

  ‘But will really be a most proper action,’ said he. ‘Elaine tells me you have one rather like Mrs Tollard’s in cut. We can’t get hers, unfortunately, for the police have it.’

  ‘As if I would wear hers after that, you horrid man!’

  ‘Well, you can’t, so that’s that! Your own will do quite well. All I ask is that you will go to the window, turn sidewise on to it, then vanish again.’

  ‘It’s a jolly good idea,’ she said. ‘Only I haven’t long hair.’

  ‘Nor time to grow it by tomorrow. Agreed! But if you’re on, what about eleven in the morning? I can get Jorkins by then. Also, I’ll ask Mr Barley to get Tollard away for a drive or something. He may not like my arrangement.’