“I’m not blaming any one for thinking I’m a murderer,” he began, slowly, his gaze intent on her, intent and fierce in its absorption. “Bully, gambler, all the rest of it. That’s me. Why not murder, too? I started wrong. Married a barmaid at Oxford, got sent down, cast out by family, found the kid wasn’t mine, after all. God, how that woman hated me. When ever I did get a job, there she turned up, probably drunk, wanting money. I hit her on the nose once. Forty shillings or a month and you ought to have heard what the magistrate said, especially when he saw my old school tie I put on for the occasion. She’s dead now. Couldn’t stand the drink. The kid’s dead, too. Lucky for the poor little devil. Now I live by gambling. Horses. Cards. Cards, chiefly. Straight play. Needn’t believe that, of course, but it is. And before we start I tell ’em I’m about as good a player as they’ll find anywhere and I’ve got card sense, too, so they’ll be up against it. Sometimes that puts ’em off, sometimes it brings ’em on. Their affair but they’ve been warned. Sometimes I lose. Generally I win. Card winnings last year near three thou. Horses about even. I’ll drop horses, I think. Cards are my strong suit. Poker, not bridge. No partner at poker to let you down. Oh, and I’ve never yet pressed a man for payment, if I thought he was really hard up. There’s a tidy bit out owing me I never dun for. Only I don’t play again with debtors. And if they lose and get sore, I get sore, too. One man threw the cards in my face and I picked him up and dropped him in the pond opposite. That was at the cottage. Sometimes there is crooked play. I don’t start it but if I see it going on, I take my own steps. I’ve had operators from the American liners at my place. They thought I was a rich mug. I acted the pigeon and they came to pluck me. They got plucked instead. One of them drew a gun and I took it from him and he went into the street, head first. He told his tale to the policeman who picked him up and how he had been sharped but he couldn’t prosecute because he had to go back to the States that week. Very sympathetic policeman. Had heard of my poker parties before, he had. Well, the johnny had been sharped all right. I saw him park a couple of aces so I parked a royal flush and when he showed four aces, I showed my flush. That was when he showed his gun, so I stood him on his head to collect winnings in cash before I threw him out. Other gains and losses cancelled that night but I was up seven hundred on what that bird dropped over his four aces and my royal flush. Plenty of people didn’t believe my version. The club asked me to resign and I told them nothing doing except an action for damages if they wanted one. They didn’t. It’s not been the only time. If wide boys choose to roll up, I take ’em on at their own game. Straight play or crooked on tap, as preferred. A bird tried the blackmail game on me a little time ago. He didn’t stop to discuss it. He ran. I nearly got my hands on him but he was too quick. I think I would have killed him if I had caught him. He thought so, too.”
Judy was on his feet now. Words had tumbled out, one on top of another, a torrent without pause. Ernie was sitting very still, very pale, her eyes very bright and intent. It seemed as though she, too, had forgotten they were not alone. Strange, Bobby thought, even at that moment, that these two should, as it were, speak naked soul to naked soul before others whose very presence they had forgotten. For though Ernie had said no word, every thing that she felt and thought was eloquent in her attitude. And now it seemed as though he flung back at her everything she had not spoken but had expressed.
“That’s no good,” he said. “It’s too late now. I am what I am, bully and gambler and all the rest of it. You don’t change that, you little fool.”
He paused, staring at her challengingly. Still, she did not speak and still he understood, they, all understood.
“Well, you don’t, that’s flat,” Judy said. “I’ve had another rough house down at the cottage, too. Not about cards. Something else.”
“Yes, I know,” Ernie said then.
“You think you do, you don’t,” he retorted roughly. “Not you.” He took out his handkerchief, he wiped his mouth, and his wrists where they had grown damp. “You understand nothing at all,” he said finally.
There grew the faintest smile about the lips of the listening girl, the softest light in her eyes. Judy turned as if to go, to run, indeed. Bobby stopped him.
“You say you took a pistol from an American card sharper,” Bobby said. “Have you got it still?”
The question seemed to recall to Judy that there were others present.
“What’s that?” he asked. “I’ve been talking, haven’t I? The pistol? Oh, well, you can find that out for yourself. No man obliged to answer incriminating questions, is he? Known to the police, I am. An inspector came to see me once, at least that’s what he said he was. To ask questions, he said. I gave him two minutes to clear out before I threw him out. He said it wasn’t a wise attitude to take but he went all the same. Now, pin a murder on me if you can, Mr. Sergeant Owen, or whatever your name is. I’ve told you what I am. Bully. Professional gambler. That’s me. Make the worst of it.”
Still they were all very quiet and silent. The only sound in that little room behind the shop where now two women were trying on the latest thing in hats, was Judy’s heavy, panting breathing. Ernie got to her feet.
“Don’t you think you are being rather silly?” she asked mildly.
She came up to him and took his hand and led him out through the shop, past the two absorbed customers round whom little Jenny was hovering, eagerly assiduous, and so into the street. Olive said, drawing a deep breath,
“Well, that’s the funniest offer of marriage I ever heard of.”
“Isn’t he just going to catch it now?” said Vicky with deep satisfaction. “He’s in for such a talking to as he won’t forget in a hurry.”
Jenny came into the room.
“Oh, please,” she said, “they want a hat just like Norma Shearer wears in the new film, and we’ve got it, only they won’t believe me when I tell them it’s just the same.”
“I will come,” said Vicky, majestic. “In one moment.”
Jenny said.
“Oh, wasn’t Mr. Patterson rude? He jumped into a taxi and left Miss Maddox standing there.”
“Ran for it,” said Vicky disappointedly. “Mean. Just like a man. He’ll catch it worse afterwards, though,” she added, consoling herself.
Jenny returned to her customers and Bobby looked at Olive who had now a somewhat worried air.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“It’ll be touch and go,” she said.
“In what way?” Bobby asked.
“He may go on being stupid,” she said. “He may go and do something most awfully silly, just to settle everything.”
“If he loves her—” began Vicky. “I mean, if he really loves her.”
“Yes, I know,” said Olive. “That’s the danger.”
“Perhaps he doesn’t—” said Bobby.
“Yes, I know,” said Olive, “that’s the danger.”
“Oh, well,” said Bobby, giving it up. “What about her?”
Olive and Vicky exchanged glances, gravely, silently, consulting each other. They spoke almost together,
“You can hardly tell yourself what you think about a boy—” began Vicky.
“—so how can you tell what another girl thinks?” said Olive.
“Of course, she’s attracted,” said Vicky. “I should, if he had ever noticed I existed.”
“It’s as if he had knocked her flat down,” said Olive, “and she doesn’t know whether she likes it or not.”
“Oh, yes,” cried Vicky, clasping her hands ecstatically. “Oh, did you notice how she looked when he said that about having punched his wife on the nose?”
“Vicky!” said Olive, horrified.
“Well, it was—fascinating, wasn’t it?” protested Vicky. She went towards the door. She said, “Well, anyhow, he wouldn’t murder any one,” and with that she disappeared, to lend all the weight of her authority to Jennie’s protestations that the hat in question was the very image of Norma Shear
er’s latest, and then to lay it gently aside and produce another, costing a guinea more and slightly more suited, as she pointed out, to a style of feature and to colouring precisely stronger in those very points where Miss Shearer was, possibly, to some tastes, a shade lacking in chic.
“A wonderful actress,” Vicky said, “but chic,—well, that’s somehow different, isn’t it?” and afterwards reproached herself bitterly for having quoted only a guinea more for the new hat from which now the customer could not have been prised with a crowbar.
In the little room behind the shop Bobby said slowly, after a long pause,
“I wonder who it was he says tried to blackmail him. I wonder if who ever it was, did try again. I wonder if by any chance it was Munday.”
“OK, Bobby,” Olive cried, “oh, you frighten me, oh, it couldn’t be like that.”
“I think it could,” Bobby said. “I don’t think Judy Patterson would be a safe man to push too far. No proof, though, that any one tried. No proof, as far as that goes, that there’s any ‘too far’ where he could be pushed. All the same, there it is. He’s told us of a pistol in his possession, he’s made open threats to a blackmailer, there’s the fact that some one wearing a hat like his was seen in the neighbourhood.”
They were both silent for a moment or two. Olive said in a whisper,
“I think Ernie almost believes it, but I’m sure she doesn’t care.”
“It’s only the beginnings of a case,” Bobby said, “and very often beginnings lead to nothing more than a dead end.”
They talked a little longer and then Bobby departed, Vicky, in good spirits now because she had succeeded in selling her customer’s friend a hat as well, bidding him farewell with a final expression of certainty that he would most undoubtedly knock ’em in Bond Street and Piccadilly too.
Bobby, however, had no intention of wasting his sartorial magnificence on resorts of that character. It was to Barnet that he now proceeded with all the speed tube and ’bus could provide and there when he arrived he was glad to remark, from uncounted glances of admiration and of envy, that Barnet was duly impressed. He had secured from Ernie a description of the spot where Martin had asked to be put down, and he was not surprised to notice that two public houses were near at hand, one magnificent and large, evidently provided, like a French hotel, with all modern comfort, and the other, round the corner, slightly depressed and dirty-looking but doing a good trade, all the same. It was this one Bobby chose, and entering a saloon bar empty by comparison with the public bar, he ordered a double Scotch and with it before him sat there so moodily, filling the whole saloon bar with such gloom, that other customers began to grow uneasy and to slip away. The barmaid, growing uneasy, too, tried to alleviate his distress by a remark about the weather. Bobby allowed it to be understood that he took no interest either in her or in the weather. The barmaid tossed her head and retired in disorder, Bobby seized the opportunity to dispose of his double Scotch behind the fireplace, the landlord received a message that there was a ruddy wet blanket in the saloon and unless got rid of, business would probably be bad.
Thus urged to action the landlord appeared in person and Bobby ordered a second double Scotch. The landlord, the weather having proved a failure, tried the other topic of conversation and referred to football pools. Bobby gave a hollow laugh and asked what football pools were to him or he to football pools? What did they matter? What did anything matter? Was the landlord a married man? If so, said Bobby dogmatically, he was a fool. Why? Because women always let you down and did you in and performed other queer grammatical feats. They put you through the hoop but the difficulty was to get proof. Could the landlord tell him how to get proof, money no object?
The landlord, suddenly attentive, agreed that women were—well, weren’t they? Now, there was a friend of his, very experienced, name of Martin.
What good, demanded Bobby, was any one named Martin or anything else? He would give a thousand pounds—but no, he would keep his thousand pounds where it was.
The landlord, almost visibly licking his lips at the mention of such a sum, insisted that Martin was the man to turn to. A wonderful man, Mr. Martin. Tremendous experience. Often consulted by Scotland Yard. He himself had known Mr. Martin sent for by Scotland Yard in a tremendous hurry. Simply wouldn’t take a refusal, the Yard wouldn’t. Privately, Bobby thought that likely enough, but all the same succeeded in looking very impressed.
“Take that Weeton Hill murder the papers are all full of,” the landlord went on. “Inquest adjourned to allow the police to continue their inquiries, if you notice. That means they’re puzzled, don’t know where they are. See?”
Bobby saw. He nodded an agreement that was quite genuine this time, for he had only too good reason to know the police were, indeed, puzzled.
“Well,” said the landlord triumphantly, “what do they do? They call in Mr. Martin to help, and that’s where he is to-day, down there in that neighbourhood, looking round.”
Bobby whistled softly. This was news. The landlord, pressing the point, was of opinion that it looked as if Scotland Yard thought more of Mr. Martin than it did of its own men, not too bright a lot in his, the landlord’s, opinion, and, anyhow, you could always tell them a mile away. When a busy came into that establishment, no matter how got up, the word went round at once, and they all played up. Mr. Martin was different. Clever. Smart. Brainy. And, above all, trustworthy and honest as the day at noon. Full of grit, too. His job wasn’t too easy, at times. Why, only the other day, he had come in there with his trousers torn and his face and hands scratched something shocking.
“Lady lost her temper?” suggested Bobby.
The landlord laughed dutifully and explained it was nothing like that at all. Bushes and twigs and that sort of thing. Happened during this Weeton Hill investigation. Earnestly the landlord assured Bobby that Mr. Martin was the very man to help any young gentleman as was a young gentleman, same as all could see at a glance was the young gentleman now being addressed, and who happened to want honest, straightforward, smart assistance, same as might any young gentleman. Especially, Bobby thought but did not say, when that young gentleman had dropped a reference to a thousand pounds and looked, in the eyes of men like the landlord, the very type of a rich pigeon ready for the plucking.
He pointed out now that Martin wasn’t there, Martin was, apparently, at Weeton Hill, was it? where ever that might be, so what was the good of Martin?
The landlord admitted that Mr. Martin was very busy. Still, he had a good heart and would possibly be willing to put other things aside to help a gentleman as was a gentleman—the landlord’s impressed eyes wandered over details that had so signally failed to impress others—and, no doubt, willing to pay as a gentleman should. If, said the landlord, the gentleman cared to leave his address...?
Bobby shook his head firmly. No. Not yet. Things were bad enough as it was. Why, if certain people got to know—He left the sentence unfinished but repeated firmly that he wasn’t giving any name or address, either, just yet, not if he knew it.
The landlord applauded such prudence and one could almost read the words ‘blackmail, chance for a spot of’, on his twitching lips. He suggested that, perhaps, the young gentleman might care to call in the following night?
Bobby said he would think about it and departed, shaking off without difficulty a clumsy attempt to follow him. It was long past the dinner hour now, so he rang up the Tamar residence to apologize for his absence and to explain that he was on his way back to take up his peculiar duties as watchdog—though not, he added to himself, till he had changed back to an attire in which he would feel less self-conscious than he did in that which had so successfully impressed the Barnet landlord.
CHAPTER XIX
WHATAH OPE COTTAGE
First thing next morning, provided with an official motor cycle, since the one he had formerly possessed he had recently sold as engaged men must, Bobby proceeded to the Weeton Hill neighbourhood. In his pocket was a list of t
he public houses in the district and at various of them he called and produced a sketch he had made of Martin, from memory, since of that elusive gentleman no photograph was known to exist. Indeed, the story ran that so great was his objection to the camera that once or twice when in fear of it, he had provided himself with an ostentatiously false beard and moustache as a precaution against unexpected snapshots.
Bobby’s sketch was presently recognized in one or two bars as that of a casual visitor, but, beyond proof that Martin had been, in fact, in the neighbourhood, the information was little help. No one had noticed him much, no one had heard him say where he came from or where he was going. At Beam End railway station, the nearest station to Sillington village, not far wherefrom stood Judy’s week-end cottage, it was vaguely thought that a stranger more or less resembling the sketch shown, had recently been seen, though whether arriving or departing or both in due sequence, no one was sure. Sillington itself Martin had, apparently, not visited, or, if he had, he had not been noticed, but then the village had had more visitors than usual of late, as many people had passed through on their way to the scene of the murder at Weeton Hill.
Evidently, it was not going to be easy to get on the track of Mr. Martin, but then Bobby had never supposed it would be. Martin was far too wary a bird for that and was almost certainly playing some game of his own, unless, indeed, he had his own grim reasons for avoiding contact with the police. Leaving Sillington, Bobby rode out to visit Whatah Ope, as Judy had named his cottage, a mile or so away on the main Sillington-Beam End road, or rather, to be more exact, just off that road, on a turning that was little more than a rough track leading only to a farm and cottage or two farther on.
Now, however, Bobby’s luck was unexpectedly in, for as he slowed down to turn into this side track and so secured a view of the cottage, he saw that a bicycle leaned against the garden gate and that at the cottage door Martin himself was knocking, loudly and insistently, but without securing any response. He was making, indeed, so much noise that he failed to hear Bobby’s arrival, though so many cars passed so often up and down the road that it was no wonder the sound of another engine had made no impression.
Suspects—Nine Page 17
