French thought his conclusion was pretty well proven, but as he stood looking round he saw something which strongly confirmed it. The railway track with its broken stone ballast was rough and unpleasant walking. But beside it, between the ends of the sleepers and the top of the sea pitching, was a space of some six or eight feet, and down the middle of this ran a smooth well-trampled path.
‘Tell me, Mr Parry,’ French said as he took in these details, ‘Why would Mr Ackerley have been on the railway at all? Would he not rather have walked on this path?’
The point had evidently not occurred to Parry and it obviously puzzled him. It was Ackerley’s habit to walk on the path. Parry had been with him scores of times and he had always done so. Parry did not believe he would have walked on the line, though he suggested that he might have stepped on to it for some reason just before the ballast engine came along.
French nodded absently. All this evidence was cumulative, and French knew that there is nothing in the world so convincing as cumulative evidence. When to what he had now discovered were added the three other facts which pointed to murder, first, the unlikelihood of an experienced railwayman being run over under the circumstances in question, second, the chronological discrepancy in any other theory, and third, the hurried departure of the unknown man on the bicycle, French felt he had enough to establish this part of the case.
There being nothing else to be seen on the railway, he turned to his companion.
‘How can we get back to Whitness, Mr Parry?’
‘Walk it, or if you like, get up on the road and wait till a ’bus passes.’
‘I’d rather walk, if you don’t mind.’
They set off in the pleasant sunshine. French improved the opportunity not only to see the pitching which Parry had been sent to measure up, but also to make inquiries about the personnel of the Widening. Then he turned to the question of who had known that Ackerley would be on the railway at Downey’s Point on the evening of his death.
‘I should think that everybody knew it,’ Parry returned. ‘I knew it, for I parted from him a few minutes before. Bragg knew it, for he was aware of what we proposed to do. The contractors’ men, Carey, Lowell and Pole, knew that he was walking through that evening. They mightn’t have known the exact time he would have passed Downey’s Point, but they could have guessed it approximately. Potts might also have guessed it: that’s the farmer Ackerley had to meet. Ganger Mutch of the Whitness length could have deduced it, and also other railwaymen who might have seen us walking out.’
This did not seem a very promising line of research. French therefore dropped it and set himself to pick up as much of the railway politics as he could, finally getting Parry, on reaching Whitness, to introduce him to the other members of the office staffs, so that he might form his own opinion of their personalities. His somewhat veiled inquiries, however, threw no light on possible motives for desiring Ackerley’s death.
Having thanked Parry for his help, French walked out again to Downey’s Point, this time by the road. The coastguard officer had been sworn to silence about the man he had seen, and French had not wished to give away that he was working on any special line. Hence his revisiting the place alone.
It was a striking enough view that he looked out on from the road. Away to the horizon stretched the sea, a great flat plane of deepest blue, with in the middle distance a small coaster threshing along, probably making for Lynmouth. On each side were bays round which ran the railway. That to the left ended in a headland, in the side of which showed the V-shaped cleft of the entrance to Cannan’s Cutting. To the right were several low lying points, one behind the other and reaching away to near Lydmouth, each fainter and bluer than the last. Below, showing here and there through gaps in the shrubs which covered the slopes, was the permanent way, its sleepers looking from the height tiny and placed with extraordinary neatness. As French gazed down a train passed—a toy on a model line. He followed its passage rond the curve of Browne’s Bay till it disappeared into Cannan’s Cutting.
He climbed down the slope to the railway, first through the shrubs, and then down the rather poor grass of the cutting. How long, he wondered, would it have taken a potential murderer to escape? A man in a hurry could, he thought, run up to the road in about two minutes. One more minute to retrieve a bicycle from the shrubs at the opposite side of the road would make three altogether from the leaving of the victim to the departure on the bicycle. French was now strongly of opinion that some unknown man had on the night of Ackerley’s death spent three minutes in just that way.
The marks of the man’s hurried climb discovered by Hart were still visible, but though French examined them with great care, they were too blurred to afford any clue. He then crossed the road and soon found the tracks of the bicycle, crossing a small patch of loose sand thrown up by a rabbit at the root of a small birch tree. This tree, as Hart had stated, had two stems about four inches apart, and the front wheel of the bicycle had been thrust between them, as into a stand. The patch of sand was very small and it bore no footprints.
French examined the ground all about in the hope of finding some little object which the unknown might have dropped, but without success. He did, however, discover a mark which for a short time puzzled him. On the left hand stem of the birch, about a foot from the ground, was a small cut or scrape in the bark. It showed first on the back and dragged round to a point almost opposite the other stem.
A little thought, however, told French what it was. A cyclometer evidently. The bicycle had been hurriedly withdrawn and the cyclometer had caught in the tree. Considerable force had obviously been used and French wondered whether the cyclometer had not been broken off. If it had, the unknown must have seen and removed it, as it was not anywhere to be found.
French stood thinking. Here at last was a clue: a push bicycle with a bent or broken cyclometer. To find it was surely a job for the local men. Would it be dealt with by Rhode and Dawe and Hart, or by the local staff at Whitness? He felt sure there must be a local staff at Whitness, and as the bicycle had disappeared towards that town, it was probably there that he should apply.
He set off to walk back and immediately had a minor stroke of luck. A ’bus appeared behind him. He got on board and ten minutes later was entering the police station at Whitness.
Sergeant Emery, the officer in charge, greeted him with surprise and respect. He was evidently keenly interested in French’s statement and eagerly promised to do what he could to help. Yes, he would certainly try to find anyone who had been on the road between Downey’s Point and Whitness on the evening in question and would make inquiries as to a push-bicycle having been seen. Yes, he appreciated the fact that the man was pedalling hard, and it should certainly have drawn attention to him. Emery thought also he could find out, by having the arrivals and departures at the contractors’ yard unobtrusively watched, how many bicycles belonged to the workers there, and he was sure he could make some excuse to examine closely any with cyclometers, or which had lost cyclometers. Also he would try to pick up as much of the gossip of the Widening as he could, and if he came on anything which seemed worth while following up, he would tell the inspector. And if there was anything else the inspector had only to ring him up.
‘Good man,’ said French heartily, ‘that’s just what I want. Now about the inquiries along the roads: how will you set about it?’
‘Our own men first, sir. Then coastguards, postmen, ’bus drivers, doctors, the district nurse, workmen cycling home to Redchurch: there are a good many people to ask.’
French was pleased. This Emery was evidently an efficient man. ‘That’s the style, sergeant. Peg away on those lines and you’re bound to get results. You’ll ring me up at the hotel if you’ve any luck?’
French turned away with the man’s cheery ‘Good evening, sir,’ ringing in his ears. There would, he thought, just be time for one more inquiry that night. Returning to the engineers’ hut, he managed to get Parry to agree to his searching Ackerl
ey’s desk. Here, however, he had no luck. There was nothing in it which gave him the least help.
Having called in to tell Rhode the result of his first day’s work, French returned to his hotel to write up his notes and consider his next step.
5
Concerning a Bicycle
French, having reached virtual certainty on the fundamental question of his new case: Had Ackerley been murdered? went on to consider the two which immediately followed: Who had a motive for the crime? and, Who had the opportunity to commit it?
The answer to the original question had been reached very easily: he had been lucky in finding facts which, if they did not absolutely prove it, at least made it so likely as to amount to very nearly the same thing. Certainly these facts had shown that murder was so likely that no doubt was possible as to the need for going further into the affair.
But it was most improbable that the answers to the second and third questions would be come by so readily. These would be reached, if they were reached at all, by hard work; detailed, uninspiring, monotonous work. To find the motive would mean going carefully into Ackerley’s life, as well as the lives of those with whom he had come in contact: the sort of slow, patient investigation which French hated, but of which he had to do so much. The same applied to the question of opportunity: he would have to learn where all the possibles were at the time of the crime; who had alibis and who hadn’t; also a tedious and wearisome process and as often as not unproductive.
However, it was his job, and the sooner he got on with it the sooner it would be done. He therefore set himself to make a list of all the lines of inquiry he could think of. Next morning he set off on the first.
Going to the Ackerley’s house, he caught Mr Ackerley as he was starting for his office.
‘I’m sorry, sir, to delay you,’ he began, handing over his official card, ‘but if you could give me a few minutes before you leave I think it might be more convenient for both of us.’
Mr Ackerley was obviously surprised, but he led the way to his study. ‘What can I do for you, inspector?’ he asked.
‘I’m afraid, Mr Ackerley, that what I have to say may cause you pain, but I think it is better to tell you what is in my mind. The authorities, to put it bluntly, are not entirely satisfied about the death of Mr Ronald Ackerley. They are inclined to question whether so experienced a man would really have met with an accident as Mr Ackerley was supposed to do. Somebody suggested a doubt, and as suicide appeared to be out of the question, it was asked whether by any possibility there could have been anything in the nature of foul play. I have been sent down to make sure.’
Mr Ackerley was so obviously taken aback that he could scarcely speak.
‘My God,’ he murmured brokenly, staring at French with haggard eyes, ‘what are you saying? Foul play? Oh, no! Surely such a thing is not possible.’
The old man’s distress was pitiable, but he agreed that if any uncertainty existed it must be removed. Slowly he controlled himself, then asked what the suspicious circumstances were.
‘“Suspicious circumstances” is rather too strong a term,’ French told him. Then he went on to explain the points suggestive of murder which Rhode had made, though he did not mention what he himself had discovered. Mr Ackerley seemed far from convinced, but he presently shrugged his shoulders hopelessly and repeated his former question: ‘What can I do for you, inspector?’
‘I want you, sir, first to tell me everything you can about your son: who, as far as you know, his friends were; whether he had any enemies; whether he was engaged or about to become so; how he spent his leisure; those sort of matters and others of the same kind. Anything that may help me to find if anyone wished him ill.’
Mr Ackerley shook his head. ‘There was no one; I’m sure there was no one. Ronald was a general favourite. No one, I’m positive, could have wished to harm him.’
‘All the same, sir, I would like you to tell me in detail what you can. Now, about his friends?’
French was comprehensive and persistent in his inquiries, and the old gentleman was evidently anxious to answer them as fully as he could. But he was unable to tell French anything which gave him the slightest help. In fact, everything he had to say told against the theory of murder. Ackerley was popular in his own set, a good set of clean-living, hard-working young men and women. He had no enemies, at least, so far as his father knew. He was not engaged, nor, again so far as his father knew, anxious to become so. With the same reservation, he neither owed nor was owed money. His interests were concentrated on his job, and when he came home in the evening he was tired and did not often go out.
French, having obtained all the information he could, asked to see the young man’s room, so that he might ascertain if any of his possessions could be made to reveal a secret. Mr Ackerley agreed at once, also giving French a note to Ronald’s bank manager, authorising him to give French all details as to his son’s finances.
Both of these lines of investigation, however, proved unproductive. Neither from old letters nor other papers, nor from an examination of the deceased’s clothes, nor yet from his finances, was there anything to throw light on the affair.
Information, however, was closer than French anticipated. He had advised Rhode as to his movements, and at the bank he received a telephone message from the superintendent, asking him to return immediately to the police station.
He reached it to find Rhode in conversation with a small, stout, consequential-looking man, whose tiny features were bunched close together in the middle of his huge, round, red face.
‘Come in, inspector,’ the former greeted him. ‘This is Mr Charles Ewing, and he has called to give us some information which may possibly interest you. Perhaps, Mr Ewing, you would tell Inspector French what you found.’
The little man looked at French with obvious interest.
‘You are Inspector French from Scotland Yard, are you not?’ he said, twisting backwards and forwards in his chair. ‘I’ve heard of you. At least I’ve read about you. I’m glad to meet you.’
‘Very kind of you to say so,’ French returned with a somewhat dry smile. ‘I shall be glad to hear what you’ve got to tell me.’
‘Yes,’ went on the other seriously, as if giving a weighty opinion which must of necessity impress his hearers, ‘I’ve read about you. I’ve read several of your cases. I’ve been much interested.’
French laughed outright. ‘You will embarrass me, sir, if you’re not careful,’ he declared. ‘This surely is fame.’
Mr Ewing nodded several times with quick, bird-like movements. ‘Fame,’ he repeated. ‘Yes. I’m very much interested to meet you.’
With the corner of his eye French observed that Rhode was not appreciating this conversation as much as he might. There was no use annoying the superintendent, even in joke.
‘This is very nice of you, Mr Ewing,’ he said, ‘but I’m afraid it won’t help us with our business. Perhaps you will tell me what it was that you found.’
Again the little man twisted in his seat. ‘Nothing much,’ he returned; ‘only a bicycle. It looked to me like an accident, you understand, or I’d never have mentioned it. But it certainly seemed like an accident.’
A bicycle! No wonder Rhode had given French an urgent call to hear the story. There were few things at that moment which French would be more pleased to discuss. But his interest could not have been deduced from his manner as he quietly asked: ‘Where did you find it, sir?’
‘It was this morning,’ said Mr Ewing, frowning slightly. He was not going to have his story minimised by any unseemly haste. ‘I am, you should understand, a writer: I write critical articles on shells; conchology, you know.’
‘I know,’ said French.
‘I frequently walk along the shore in the search for specimens to illustrate my articles. I photograph them and make lantern slides and all that sort of thing. It involves a great deal of work.’ The little man shook himself importantly. ‘For some time I have wanted certain
specimens for a little brochure I have recently completed. These are usually to be found just below low water. Now, as you are doubtless aware, it is low spring tides today, and I decided to go down and have a look among the rocks.’
‘Dash it,’ French thought, ‘the pompous little ass has found a bicycle on the shore. Why can’t he say so and be done with it?’ To Mr Ewing, however, he merely said: ‘Quite so, sir. I follow.’
‘You are also doubtless aware—or perhaps you are not, inspector, if you are a stranger to the locality—that there is a section of the cliffs to the west of the town, about a mile out, where the beach is only uncovered during low springs, and then only in calm weather. It is a place where the particular shells I required are likely to be found, but unfortunately it is a place to which one can but seldom obtain access. Today, as being low spring tide and a perfectly flat calm, I decided to have a search. I went, and about halfway round the cliff I found the bicycle.’
‘Where was it sir, exactly?’
‘It was in a pool, just at the base of the cliff. It was completely covered with water, and I should not have seen it had I not stopped at the place to look for shells. It had evidently come down over the cliff, for it was buckled. I noticed also that it must have fallen quite recently, for the handles were quite bright.’
The little man was evidently extremely proud of his observation, and French did not fail to compliment him upon it.
‘Yes,’ he went on complacently, ‘I noticed that at once. Then it occurred to me that it was unlikely that a bicycle should have fallen over the cliff alone. I mean that some person had probably fallen also. That was why I came in here to tell the superintendent; lest there should have been an accident.’
‘I think, sir,’ said French, ‘that you acted very wisely. Don’t you think so, sir?’ he turned to Rhode with the suspicion of a flicker in his left eye.
Rhode grunted and French went on: ‘How high is the cliff at this point, would you say, Mr Ewing?’
Death on the Way Page 6
