Tom Brown's Body mb-22

by Gladys Mitchell

  21. The Hunt is Up

  *

  Where was your Post last Night, my Boy?

  IBID. (Act 1, Scene 6)

  'AND that is the obstacle, of course, to the Roman Bath theory of the drowning,' said Mrs Bradley. 'Her striking metaphor carries extraordinary weight. Mr Loveday would never have polluted his Roman Bath by throwing Mr Conway into it.'

  'That wouldn't apply to Miss Loveday, though,' said Mrs Wyck. 'That's what you're getting at, isn't it? I wonder why she hates poor John Semple?'

  'I don't think she does. But I certainly think (as I have thought all along) that she is pretty certain of the identity of the murderer, and does not propose to share her knowledge with us. I have a theory, too, that her brother shares this secret. It might be much easier to force his confidence than hers.'

  'Well, the next thing I'm going to do is to have another go at that chap Dobbs, Mr Loveday's knife-and-boot boy,' said Gavin. He sent immediately for the youth, who arrived under the escort of Miss Loveday herself.

  'I hope,' said the latter, 'that there is no complaint against Dobbs. He is, in every respect, an excellent lad, keen, clean, and obliging, of sanguine temperament and innocuous habits. State your case.'

  'We want to ask him who committed the murder,' said Mrs Bradley, before Gavin could speak.

  'Do you know, Dobbs?' enquired Miss Loveday severely. 'If so, you should have spoken before. Much time, and a great deal of public money, have been wasted already over this apparently fruitless enquiry.'

  ''Ow should I know anything?' demanded Jack the Ripper, alarmed into a display of pugnacity. 'If all these 'ere narks and coppers can't follow their noses better'n a poor bloke what's done no 'arm to nobody . . .'

  'Your words are ill-advised and ill-selected, Dobbs,' said Miss Loveday, breaking in with vigour upon her manservant's jeremiads. 'There is but one nark present, and she is resident at this seat of learning and discipline. Confine and annotate your nouns.'

  'Beg pardon, madam,' responded Dobbs, looking sheepish. 'But I never knoo you knoo . . .'

  'But little escapes these ears, these eyes, or this enquiring and pertinacious proboscis,' pronounced Miss Loveday. 'Give attention, Dobbs, to your mental superiors, the police.'

  Upon this advice, she departed, accompanied by a sigh of relief from Gavin and sped by Mrs Bradley's eldritch and appreciative cackle.

  'And now, Dobbs,' said Gavin, 'what were you doing on the night of the murder?'

  'Being took bad,' replied the Ripper.

  'How do you mean?'

  'Fish pie,' said Dobbs. 'We doesn't often 'ave it downstairs, but there was no 'elp for it that night. It was fish pie or go without. We 'ad even finished up the cheese ration, that goin' nowhere with Mr Loveday in the 'Ouse.'

  'Doesn't Mr Loveday like fish pie, either?' asked Mrs Bradley.

  'Nobody don't like fish pie if they can get meat,' said Jack the Ripper. 'But being as 'ow it was fish pie or nothink, well, fish pie 'e 'ad, and fish pie 'e wished 'e'd never 'ad, for I met 'im in 'is dressing-gown, bein' on me way to a place, and 'e looks green as grass. Green as grass 'e looks, and 'e shoves past me without a single bloomin' word.'

  'At what time was this?' asked Gavin.

  'I reckon it would 'ave been around two o'clock in the morning. I never felt me qualms come on before eleven, and after that I 'ad a rare old time of it, I don't think, trottin' there and back, and there and back till I wonder I 'ad any bloomin' inside left be'ind.'

  'What else happened that night?'

  'Nothing, so far as I'm aweer.'

  'Are you sure you can remember nothing else?'

  'Me mind was on other things than murder,' said Dobbs with dignity. They were obliged to let him go.

  'Point is, Loveday might have been green as grass with fish pie, or green as grass after witnessing murder,' said Gavin, gloomy with disappointment and frustration. 'You know, Mrs B., I don't believe you're trying.'

  'Time flies quickly enough,' said Mrs Bradley complacently. Her sharp black eyes and beaky little mouth gave nothing away. 'We must try someone else, that's all.'

  'Mr Loveday was in his dressing-gown,' said Gavin. 'Over a bathing suit, do you suppose?'

  Mrs Bradley cackled.

  'Stranger things could be true,' she answered, 'but, if you are canvassing my opinion, I am bound to tell you that I think it most unlikely.'

  'Well, I'm going to try to reconstruct the scene in the last Common Room that Conway attended. It might give us a line.'

  *

  'I am asking no questions,' said Mr Wyck, to his wife's intense disappointment, 'except that I should be interested to know what Gavin hopes to gain from this reconstruction of a Common Room meeting.'

  'He hopes to sow alarm and despondency,' Mrs Bradley replied. 'The murderer has been singularly discreet and sensible, but the Detective-Inspector believes that the attack on Mrs Poundbury may have followed the murder because she was in possession of a letter which might have proved dangerous to the murderer.'

  'And is that letter now destroyed?'

  'It is reasonable to think so. There is not much doubt that the murderer got it back.'

  'Does Detective-Inspector Gavin want me to be present at this Common Room gathering?'

  'That is as you wish. From his point of view, it would be much better if you stayed away.'

  'Very well. My presence would undoubtedly depress some of the Staff. Whom will you get to play the part of Conway?'

  'Oh, Mr Poundbury, of course. He is much the best actor, I fancy, and will give us all that he can remember of Mr Conway's exact words.'

  'That means that you do not suspect him of being an accomplice to the murder?'

  'Does it? It means, at the moment, that we are hoping that he will prove to have an excellent verbal memory and some slight gift of mimicry.'

  'Ah,' said Mr Wyck, vaguely.

  The Common Room, four hours later, presented a familiar appearance to its members, but was filled with an atmosphere alien to its traditions. It was a place of suspicion and fear. Its groups stood about, chiefly in the corners and around the hearth, and at the moment of Gavin's and Mrs Bradley's entry, Mr Reeder, who seemed the only person at ease, was suggesting that he hoped the business was not going to take long, because he had papers to mark and a move of chess to play against his postal opponent in Australia.

  'I am sorry, gentlemen, to break into your leisure time,' said Gavin, advancing, 'but we have arrived at the point in our enquiry where a reconstruction of some conversations which may have taken place on the evening of Mr Conway's death may help us very considerably. I wonder whether you would be good enough to stand or sit about just as you were at that last Common Room which Mr Conway attended?'

  'Right,' said Mr Reeder, taking charge. 'Let's begin at the beginning. Now, when I came in there was nobody here but Painter.'

  'That is so,' said a dark man who was standing near the window. 'I was sitting at the table here, I think, correcting English essays. You came in . . .'

  'And said: "Mind if I shut the window?" Then, when it was shut, I lit my pipe . . .'

  'Neither of you two gentlemen is important to my plans,' said Gavin, 'and the rest of that conversation does not matter. Could we come to the point of Mr Conway's entry?'

  'He came in with Johnson, Semple, and myself,' said Mr Sugg. 'By that time the Common Room was almost full. We were late because we'd sat at table after dinner discussing the Richmond and Blackheath match, which Conway and Johnson had been to see –'

  'Yes, they went up to Town,' said Mr Poundbury, who had recovered, it seemed, from his breakdown and also from his confession. 'I think, myself, that it is too far to go in a short week-end, as one has to start back so early on the Sunday to get here before the small hours of Monday morning.'

  'Yes,' said Mr Loveday, 'I quite agree. In fact, there, I always say, Housemasters, in spite of what some have chosen to consider as their privileges, are at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to week-end leave. W
hy, only last summer . . .'

  He was firmly interrupted by Mr Poundbury, who said loudly;

  'Yes, yes. We've had all that out before. Where do you want me to pick up Conway's dialogue, Detective-Inspector?'

  Everybody looked astounded, for this was not the Poundbury they knew. Mr Reeder went so far as to enquire of Mrs Bradley in a stage whisper:

  'What's all this? Have you been playing one of your tricks on him, as you did on young Takhobali?'

  'No, no,' Mrs Bradley replied. 'His nerves have had a rest and a change, that's all.'

  'If you're talking about my hitting my wife over the head, you're an old ass, Reeder,' said Mr Poundbury genially. 'Now, then, someone, give me my cue.'

  'Very well,' said Mr Loveday, breaking the strange silence which succeeded Mr Poundbury's remarks. 'Here it is, so far as I can remember: "It's time we thought of some better way of managing boys than by beating them and putting them in Detention." Then I think I said something rather insulting about poor Conway's form-room methods and he retorted by mentioning Mr A. S. Neill, the progressive schoolmaster whose life-work, as you probably know, has revolutionized what we are pleased to call discipline. Nobody who has read his enlightened books . . .'

  'Oh, no, Loveday! That was a much earlier conversation!' cried Mr Semple. Mr Loveday looked annoyed and then confused.

  'Yes, yes,' he said feebly. 'Yes, so it was. Oh, dear!'

  'What you said was something about wasting time in term which ought to be devoted to the interests of the School. You said –'

  'My turn,' said Mr Poundbury. 'Here you are: "Go and work it off somewhere else, Loveday, old dear. I can't help it if your wretched puppies . . ."'

  'Whelps,' amended Mr Johnson, grinning. 'And then Loveday knocked the system of evening prep, as usual, didn't you, Loveday, and –'

  'And talked about "competent teaching" again. You were damned rude, you know,' said Mr Reeder.

  'Was I! I know he mentioned bats and moles,' said Mr Loveday. 'Not that I bear the poor fellow any malice now, of course, but he used to try me high. He talked about my Roman Bath, too, in a most improper and, sometimes, a most indelicate manner. You were all witnesses,' he added. 'I remember, on one occasion . . .'

  'Yes, it must have been most provoking,' said Mrs Bradley. 'Go on, Mr Poundbury.'

  'Not until I get my cue,' said Mr Poundbury. 'Come on, Loveday. You must remember what you said next.'

  'I think I do. I expect,' said Mr Loveday, with a nervous and propitiatory smile, 'that I mentioned my Roman Bath once more.'

  'Mentioned it! I should think you nearly drowned the fellow in it!' said Mr Reeder. 'Oh, Lord! Sorry! Tongue running away with me, as usual.'

  'It certainly is,' said Mr Mayhew. 'And I should like to say, in this connexion, that I personally consider these proceedings to be farcical. We can gain nothing by this muckraking . . .'

  'Except some useful pointers to Conway's murderers,' said Gavin.

  'Murderers!' The plural was passed from one master to another until it came to Mr Kay, who was standing in a very inconspicuous position just inside the doorway, almost hidden behind the massive and Olympian Mr Semple.

  'Of course it was the work of more than one person!' said Mr Kay. 'Anybody but an idiot would have seen that from the beginning.'

  'Hullo, Kay!' said Johnson. 'What axe you doing here? You don't usually favour us with your company after dinner.'

  'I've as much right in the Common Room as you have!' was Mr Kay's angry retort. 'Some of you clean-run Englishmen think everybody stinks except yourselves!'

  'Gentlemen, please!' said the Bursar urgently.

  'All right, I've got my cue, I think,' said Mr Poundbury. 'I'm afraid I can't repeat the whole speech verbatim: it amounted to a description of Loveday's House by Conway. He said Loveday's boys ran out and about at nights exactly as they pleased, stole his property – his bicycle I suppose was meant – and, as usual, said that his House were lazy, dirty, and slack, and finished up . . .'

  'No, no!' cried Mr Loveday, in great agitation. 'I won't listen to that again! It cannot and must not be repeated. I cannot have my sister insulted!'

  'But it wasn't his sister who was insulted. It was Loveday himself,' said Mr Semple. 'And, anyway, that was the former time again, wasn't it?'

  Mr Loveday rushed out of the room. There was no sound for a moment but the embarrassed shuffling of the younger masters' feet and Mr Reeder's dry cough.

  'Go on, Mr Poundbury,' said Mrs Bradley.

  'I think that was about all. After that, the conversation broke out generally.'

  'And then?'

  'Oh, well, Loveday didn't rush out, of course. There wasn't any worse row between them than usual. It was just that the conversation turned on to Scrupe and the cockerel –'

  'Yes, I began that bit,' said Mr Reeder proudly, 'and Loveday said that he didn't believe in fisticuffs, and Conway took that up. And soon after that, Pearson walked in with his champagne and startled us all into a fit.'

  'How did Conway take the champagne and compliments?' enquired Gavin.

  'Well, that's the strange part,' said Mr Reeder, in his gossiping way. 'The chap seemed completely at sea. Didn't seem to know what the congratulations were about. However, he rallied himself, more or less. Old Pearson seemed a bit queer, though, I thought. Looked like a walking corpse trying to laugh at its own death, if you can follow me.'

  'Interesting,' said Mrs Bradley, in mild understatement, when the Common Room meeting was reported to her.

  'Oh, yes, there's no doubt about Pearson,' said Gavin seriously, 'except that I can't see why Mrs Poundbury had to be knocked on the head and the note taken from her.'

  'We should have to see the note to know why she was knocked on the head,' said Mrs Bradley. 'And the note, of course, has been destroyed.'

  'I'd like to know what was in it,' said Gavin wistfully.

  'Well, arrest Mr Loveday, or some other innocent person, and see what happens,' suggested Mrs Bradley carelessly. Gavin looked at her.

  'You've got an idea about the note, haven't you?' he said. 'What is it?'

  'It is not about the note. I can guess what that was about. I think the boy Micklethwaite knows more than he has told us, though, about the night of the murder.'

  'Do you, by Jove!'

  'Yes.'

  'What would loosen his tongue? Any good springing it on him, and demanding that he tell us?'

  'Would that have worked with you when you were fifteen or sixteen?'

  'No, it wouldn't. I was shockproof. Most boys are.'

  'Then we must bluff. Let us look at the facts of the death once more. The body was found at some distance from the water. The man had been drowned. He had also been knocked on the head. We have assumed – and the medical evidence at the inquest bears us out – that Conway was stunned –'

  'Probably never even knew who hit him –'

  'And then his unconscious body was dumped into water. By the other marks it seems likely that a heavy weight was tied round his neck to keep him under. Now what we have to look for and to find is a swimmer sufficiently accomplished to remain under water long enough to release the dead body from the weight and to bring the body and the weight severally to the surface.'

  'Then comes the business of transporting the body to Kay's cottage garden, though,' said Gavin. 'We still don't know how that was done, and he was lying right on a flowerbed, you know.'

  'I do know. I have turned the question over in my mind from the very beginning. What do you say to those stilts?'

  'Eh?'

  'The appurtenances used to give height to the second idol.'

  'But I don't see . . .'

  'Don't you? Given sufficient strength and resolution, it would be simple enough. Imagine a fireman's lift, the arms and legs of the body secured together, and the possession of ood thigh and abdominal muscles by the rescuer. With a little assistance, it would be quite possible, although, I agree, not easy, to step up on to the stilts. The absence
of footprints, and the negligible imprints of the stilts on the gravel and the stretches of damp turf, predispose me to wonder whether this was the method used to transport the body.' She cackled, as though she dismissed this ingenious but unlikely argument.

  'But the fellow who did all that – for Conway wasn't a light-weight, you know – must have been a trained fireman or a giant,' said Gavin seriously.

  'He wasn't, I am sure. He was a big, athletic young man with a mission in life – two or three missions, in fact. It was probably the fact that he had more than one mission which caused him to help move the body of Mr Conway.'

  'You're not talking about Semple?'

  'Whom else?'

  'Well, I'm damned!'

  'No, no. I doubt that,' said Mrs Bradley, paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw. 'All the same, it is not Mr Semple that we want to see next, but the lad Micklethwaite, preferably in front of his Housemaster.'

  'Micklethwaite?' said Mr Loveday, approached upon the matter. 'Surely you don't suspect the boy of being concerned in Conway's death?'

  'In his death, no. As an innocent accessory after the fact, yes,' said Mrs Bradley. 'But, as I want you for an absolutely unbiased witness, I shall not prejudice you either for or against the boy.'

  'One is always prejudiced in favour of one's boys. I'll see him at ten,' said Mr Loveday. He looked deeply perturbed. 'You did say innocent?'

  'I said it and meant it,' said Mrs Bradley firmly. 'The boy had nothing to do with the death. I am quite convinced of that. Neither had he any wish or incentive to assist the murderer. Can you, and will you, possess your soul in patience? We are almost at the end of the matter.'

  'I will undertake to put the whole thing out of my mind,' said Mr Loveday. 'It is an exercise to which, as Housemaster, I am not entirely unaccustomed.'

  'There goes a worried man,' said Mrs Bradley complacently. 'Now to arrange our little tableau. I think a uniformed constable is indicated. Will you telephone for one to come along? And I think it would be only fair to take Mr Wyck into our confidence.'