Music Tells All: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  Bobby smiled. Women were like that, he thought tolerantly. No woman could ever see an eligible bachelor and an unattached spinster without deciding they must be in love with each other—and if they weren’t, then the sooner they were made to be, the better. Well, thank goodness, his business was with law and order, with crime, and, taking it all round, crime was less complicated, less dangerous, and less violent than love. Most certainly, too, much easier to understand. But Olive was speaking again. She said:

  “Mr. Fielding called for a few minutes this morning on his way to town. He wanted to know if he could do anything for us. Miss Bellamy was here and he was watching her all the time.”

  Olive paused and said slowly: “I think in a way she fascinates him.”

  “The boa constrictor and the rabbit?” Bobby asked lightly and when Olive nodded he looked puzzled and asked her what she meant.

  But that was a question she couldn’t answer because she didn’t know. Instead she said that Miss Rogers was rather frightening, too, or could be. She had been in the A.T.S. during the war. She had been given a special mention or decoration or something for something she did out East—Olive didn’t know what, Miss Rogers hadn’t said—and then she had been sacked, as she put it, for chasing a senior officer round with a gun. That, she had admitted to Olive, was largely cocktails added to fatigue and no sleep, and probably she would have been let off more lightly if she hadn’t told the court that the only thing she was sorry for was that she had fired up in the air. Because the senior officer had been really most offensive—fatigue and no sleep again, most likely—and she, Rhoda Rogers, would have loved to use her as a target.

  “Rhoda says,” Olive explained, “that she’s a first-class shot and took prizes out there and she could have shot all round the senior officer and scared her awfully without really hurting her.”

  “I hope she won’t try tricks of that sort here,” Bobby said uneasily. “She seems as if she might be a formidable young woman.”

  “I think she is, I think she might be,” Olive admitted. “But she’s very nice. She knew Mr. Fielding’s chauffeur out there. I think he had something to do with whatever she got her decoration for. He was waiting outside with the car and Mr. Fielding called him in for something. I said to Rhoda after they had gone what a dreadful scar it was on his face and what a pity because he would be rather good-looking but for that, and she said he had been in Egypt, too, while she was there.”

  “Was he?” Bobby said. Another coincidence? But not very surprising. When so many have served abroad, no wonder they occasionally meet again when they get back home. He said: “It may have been only fancy, and, of course, you must keep it to yourself, but the motor cyclist I told you I went after did look rather like Biggs. I couldn’t be certain, or anything like. He had goggles on and his cap pulled down and his collar turned up, but there was something about the way he held his head that made me think of Biggs at once. I may have been quite wrong, imagination very likely. I haven’t said anything about it.”

  “You’ve only seen him that one time here, haven’t you?” Olive remarked.

  “That’s all,” Bobby agreed. “I expect it was only fancy. It came into my mind the moment I saw him and the way he seemed to be almost wanting me to notice him. Very likely it was only some chance resemblance.”

  “Gould you see if he had a scar on his face?”

  “No. He was on my left and it’s his left cheek.”

  Olive said she expected it really was only fancy. Biggs was probably busy at the time driving his employer somewhere or another. And now it was time she saw about the dinner. Bobby, a little surprised, asked if there were any? What with food shortages and ‘moving in’ and changing the retail suppliers and all the rest of it, he hadn’t very much expected more than bread and margarine. Olive explained that she had managed to get some fish, and, she added with mild triumph, it wasn’t cod either. It seemed there was a man brought fish round nearly every week and this had happened to be the day he came. In a severe voice, Olive added that dinner was more than Bobby deserved, and a wonder he hadn’t to cook it himself—and both he and she and the powers above knew what his cooking was like—considering how easily she might have had to leave everything and rush off to hospital where it was a wonder he wasn’t after the way he had been risking life and limb chasing about after motor bikes and things.

  Bobby protested meekly that he had run no undue risks. Just an exhilarating ride, he said. Olive said she knew what she knew and went off to get her cooking done. Afterwards, during the meal, she extracted from Bobby a more detailed account of his day’s adventures. When he had finished, he said:

  “Now, tell me—was it a pure accident it all ended here?”

  “Must have been,” protested Olive, but uneasily. “Why should anyone want to bring you back home?”

  “I can’t imagine,” Bobby admitted. “But there it is. It does look as though that had been the idea and I’ve still a sort of feeling that the way we got this house looks less like luck than plan.”

  “Very nice plan,” declared Olive appreciatively.

  Bobby went on to tell the story of the raid as he had learned it now from the full reports received.

  The objective had been a small but flourishing and well stocked jeweller’s shop. The day before the raid an imposing limousine—probably the one reported that same morning as stolen from a street in Mayfair and later found abandoned—had driven up. A showily dressed woman alighted. She explained that a friend had promised to buy her a diamond ring. So would they please have a really good selection ready for her to choose from? She was quite frank about it all. She made it plain that she used the word ‘friend’ in the technical sense in which it is employed in the profession she so plainly adorned—an appropriate word, this last. She made it plain, too, that she meant to choose a really expensive ring. So would care be taken, please, to make sure that no ring in the selection to be shown should be worth less than £100. From that up to £250, she said, admitting reluctantly that her friend was not likely to go even as high as £250, and no use hoping he would stand for more. But she would like, you could never tell, a few other pieces of jewellery to be on show on the counter. A necklace or two, for instance, that she could pick up and admire. Perhaps a few really good wrist watches as well. Her friend, she explained, had pots of coin, and when in the mood he could be really generous. But one had to catch him in the mood. If there did happen to be, say, a £500 or £1,000 necklace lying about that she could pick up in a casual way and exclaim about, her friend might not say anything at the time and certainly she wouldn’t. But he might remember, especially if she put the thing down with the remark that only someone really rich could afford such a costly article. To hold a man back, she had remarked confidentially to the jeweller, as one wise guy to another, was often the best way of making him want to go on. Men were like that, weren’t they? Wanted managing.

  Bobby paused in his narrative at this point to remark that very likely it was the apparent frankness of this invitation to the shop-keeper to become a partner in plucking the pigeon, that had helped to avert suspicion. At any rate on the appointed day everything had been in readiness. Two trays of diamond rings were on the counter—not one ring priced at less than £100. So was a collection of wrist watches and a pearl necklace that had been borrowed for the occasion from another firm on a sharing basis, since this establishment was not one where necklaces of that value were a part of the ordinary stock.

  At first everything had gone well. The lady was the first to appear. She explained that her friend was to meet her there and she had wanted to make sure all was in order. The beauty of the necklace pleased her greatly but she shook her head sadly when she heard the price. She hardly thought, she said with a sigh, that her friend would be willing to pay as much as all that. Then she brightened up and said that one could always try. Men were funny and they did so love to show off. At this point she gave a delighted exclamation. There was a ’bus stop close by and she
explained that her friend had just alighted from a ’bus and that this was a very good sign. He always went economical in pennies when he was preparing to spend pounds freely.

  “Oh, dear, his cold’s worse,” she added as a man appeared in the doorway and paused, sneezing violently into his handkerchief. “I must find his tablets he asked me to get.”

  She had opened her handbag and was fumbling within. It was then things began to happen. The two men behind the counter each received from her a handful of red pepper full in the face. One of them was still able to make a grab for the trays of rings but was laid out by a blow on the jaw from a gentleman suddenly recovered from his fit of sneezing. Then he grabbed the trays of rings and wrist watches, and so departed, bearing his sheaves with him. Simultaneously the lady opened the door at the back of the shop and smashed a bottle of pure ammonia on the table where two startled men were busy. Next she picked up the ’phone, threw it out of the window, ran back into the shop, collected the necklace, and disappeared into the street, where at that moment a powerful motor car was slowly passing by. Her friend, the trays of rings and watches, were all already inside. She and the necklace followed. The car shot away and all was over—except the tumult and the shouting, of which there was a good deal, as those within the shop struggled with the effects of panic, pepper and pure ammonia.

  To all this Olive listened with increasing gravity. When Bobby had finished his story, she said:

  “They got away with a lot of rings, all worth at least £100?”

  “Some worth a lot more, I believe,” Bobby agreed. “Quite a good haul. Only now they’ve got to be turned into cash and that won’t be very easy or very safe either.”

  “You remember Mrs. Gregson?” Olive asked.

  “The woman you got in from the village to help.” Bobby asked. “Yes. Why? What about her?”

  “She went to the village for me this afternoon. When she got back she was full of a story about a jeweller’s travelling salesman. She said he had been at the Much Middles Arms, and he had had too much to drink, and he was showing handfuls of diamond rings—handfuls, Mrs. Gregson said. He was offering to sell them dirt cheap, worth £100 each at least and take a fiver, he said. Mrs. Gregson said no one wanted them. They thought it was all imitation costume jewellery. I wonder if—”

  “So do I,” said Bobby. “So do I, very much indeed.”

  CHAPTER VIII

  THE REAL THING

  A Scotland Yard executive has to be careful about giving any appearance of wishing to interfere outside his own Metropolitan police area. The Yard itself is very conscious, if the rest of the world is not, that it is only one among many local police forces, none of whom intend to put up with any meddling from any outside body. Even in London the Yard holds no complete dominion, for the City force is entirely independent. Bobby, therefore, though disturbed and worried by this tale of what it seemed might be the loot of the smash and grab raid displayed in the local public house, was in some doubt as to what to do, or even whether there was at the moment anything he could do usefully.

  Another oddity, certainly, to add to all the others and perhaps the greatest oddity of all. For who has ever heard of a smash and grab raider the worse for drink or making a display of his booty in public immediately on the conclusion of the job. A cautious, disciplined, and temperate race while working, are smash and grab raiders. It simply didn’t make sense, Bobby told himself.

  The story appeared to be common property in the village so certainly the local police force, consisting of Constable Jonathan Taylor, would know of it, and would, of course, have at once informed his superiors. And they in their turn, would, no doubt, as a part of the ordinary routine, have already informed Scotland Yard of this new and puzzling development.

  He decided finally as he helped Olive to wash up that he would stroll along to Middles, Mr. Fielding’s residence, find out if Mr. Fielding knew anything of this spate of jewellery in the Much Middles Arms, and take an opportunity to say half jokingly and wholly confidentially, that the fugitive motor cyclist who had evaded him so successfully had been oddly reminiscent of Mr. Fielding’s chauffeur. It might then appear whether or no Biggs had a completely satisfactory alibi. If so Bobby decided he could then dismiss the supposed resemblance as imaginary or merely coincidental. As, he felt, most likely it was. Afterwards he would go to the village, possibly look in for a drink at the Much Middles Arms and then try to find Constable Taylor in case he had anything to say and was willing to say it. Almost certainly, too, a sergeant or inspector of the county force would be appearing soon for further inquiry into this queer tale of the man of too many drinks and too many valuable pieces of jewellery. In which case, a chat seemed indicated and might be useful.

  He announced this decision to Olive, who, stopping him just in time from putting the very, very best china on the scullery shelf, sighed resignedly, and remarked that she supposed it was no use saying anything about the piano that wanted moving, because the men had put it in the wrong room, or about the pictures that wanted hanging, or the dining-room carpet that wanted laying, or the curtains that—and Bobby was only able to check the list by promising faithfully to get up at five next morning to help. Therewith he departed and on arrival at Middles, a comfortable-looking, medium-sized house in the Queen Anne style, was at once hailed by a beaming Mr. Fielding who seemed to be pottering about his large and well-kept garden, pulling up a weed here or tying up a shrub or a plant there.

  “I was just thinking of toddling along,” he explained, “to see how you and your good lady were getting on. Getting settled?”

  “Chaos subsiding slowly into order,” Bobby said and added sadly: “I expect as soon as it’s all over, spring cleaning or something will begin.”

  Mr. Fielding offered a grave masculine sympathy, and Bobby said what a lovely garden Mr. Fielding had, and Mr. Fielding beamed afresh and insisted on taking Bobby round. There was a rosary, a rock garden, a kitchen garden, a small orchard, in which last stood an air raid shelter in course of demolition.

  “An eye-sore,” declared Mr. Fielding severely. “I want to get rid of it. Not too easy. An eye-sore, a funk hole. I’m beginning to be a little ashamed of it.”

  “Good Lord, why?” Bobby asked. “It’s only silly to run unnecessary risks.”

  “Well, yes, I suppose so,” agreed Mr. Fielding. “All the same, I shall be glad to get rid of the thing.”

  Bobby remarked casually that that would take some doing. It had been solidly built; and Mr. Fielding observed that the workman from the village engaged for the job seemed to be of the same opinion, for he had not been near for two or three days. The north end of the erection, which was oblong in shape, had been nearly levelled however, and demolition had begun on the two side walls, though only to a slight extent on the west wall. The resulting debris was being used to fill up the interior. At the southern end the wall was still intact. The two men turned away, and as they were walking back to the house Bobby said he wondered how, when help was so difficult to get, Mr. Fielding managed to keep so large a garden in such good order. It looked like a full time job for one or two men.

  “Oh, we all take a hand,” Mr. Fielding explained with his jolly laugh. “Biggs—that’s my chauffeur, you know, you’ve seen him—and me—and sometimes I think it’s all me—and now and again as a great favour someone from the village. Even Mrs. Hands joins in. She’s my housekeeper, an excellent woman though she’s getting on. Nearly seventy and as brisk as any seventeen. She’s quite keen. Biggs isn’t. He does it when he’s asked, but that’s all. His idea of a garden would be one growing spanners and plugs. Not like the man I had before him. He was a really good gardener and I was sorry to lose him. Cann was his name, Alf Cann. He went off at a day’s notice, and I never knew why. I hear he is back in the village now, so the gamekeepers round here will have to pull up their socks again. I’m afraid he was a bit of a poacher. Sort of spare time job with him. Nothing but suspicion, of course, and I wasn’t going to get rid of
him merely on suspicion. I can’t have him back in his old job, though, if that’s what he wants. No reason to sack Biggs. Good driver, knows his job, and I should make myself very unpopular with the darts team at the local. I’m told he’s about their best man. Ever play?”

  Bobby said very occasionally and anyhow he wasn’t much good at it. He asked casually if Mr. Fielding had heard the queer story about the visitor to the Much Middles Arms who had been offering apparently valuable jewellery at almost ‘giving away’ prices?

  Mr. Fielding said he had heard something of the sort. Mrs. Hands had been in the village and had picked up a story about a pedlar who had been trying to sell artificial jewellery at prices no one wanted to pay. He had offered what he called a lovely real opal for ten pounds, and who was going to give that much for sham stuff not worth as many shillings? Finally, Mr. Sadler, the landlord, had told him to clear out as he was making a nuisance of himself. At the time Mr. Fielding had not paid the story much attention. No doubt the man had had too much to drink, but then to-day even artificial, now ‘costume’ jewellery was fetching absurd prices. But he looked grave and troubled when Bobby told him the story of the smash and grab raid in town and of the pursuit of the motor cyclist who had finally disappeared near Miss Bellamy’s cottage.

  “Miss Bellamy was out at the time,” Bobby explained, “so I got her to come back with me for a look round her place in case the fellow was hiding there.”

  “He wasn’t, was he?” Mr. Fielding asked anxiously.

  “Not a sign,” Bobby answered. “I made sure of that,” but Mr. Fielding still looked worried and anxious.

  “Very queer,” he said, half to himself, half to Bobby. “Very queer. I don’t think I like it. I think I’ll toddle down and see if she’s all right.”