Diabolic Candelabra: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  “Strong on Latin, our hermit,” Bobby remarked.

  “It doesn’t follow that he read them,” Olive suggested.

  “They have both been read and pretty thoroughly,” Bobby remarked. He was turning over the pages, trying hard to remember his Latin, but without much success. He was able to recognize the portions more specially dealing with the care of bees, and these he noticed had often pencil notes against them, as though the old Roman poet’s instructions had been studied with some care. Showing them to Olive he told her what they were and added: “I wonder if Miss Mary got handed any tips out of old Virgil. Do you notice anything—the binding, I mean?”

  “No. What?” Olive asked.

  Bobby pointed to the crest and motto stamped thereon. The crest showed an arm in armour holding a pen. Beneath was a Latin motto. Bobby translated it as ‘Both sword and pen’.

  “The crest and motto of the Rawdon family,” he said. “Looks as if the books came from Barsley Abbey—like the lost El Grecos.”

  “Well, you don’t think the El Grecos are here too, do you?” Olive asked.

  “Doesn’t look like it,” Bobby agreed. “It would be a bit rummy to find a hovel like this with pictures worth a good many thousands on its walls. Though it’s quite on the cards they may be on the walls of some cottage or farmhouse round about here. Or for that matter used to stop a hole in a cowshed.”

  Olive looked suitably appalled by the suggestion and Bobby began to search again through the debris that cumbered the floor of the hut.

  “Someone been smoking cigars,” he said, presently discovering a small pile of ash. “Do hermits smoke cigars as they read their Horace and their Virgil? Getting curiouser and curiouser, isn’t it? Hullo, look at this.”

  ‘This’ was a visiting card, bearing the name and address of a Mr Charles Crayford, of ‘Bellavista’, Tombes, the small straggling town, not far away, inhabited chiefly by Midwych business people, so that it was almost a suburb of that great commercial and manufacturing centre. Bobby took out his notebook and copied into it name and address.

  “What’s that for?” Olive asked.

  “Oh, you never know,” Bobby answered. “Somehow I don’t quite like the look of things. I can’t help wondering what scared Loo, and why that chap bolted like a hare when we caught him washing his hands. It seems such an innocent occupation. And why this place has been mucked up the way it has, and what’s become of the old man himself, and why the axe he must have used to chop his firewood with doesn’t seem to be anywhere about?”

  So far he had been paying attention chiefly to the pile of torn and broken articles of one sort and another that had been flung aside against the wall and into the corners of the hut. Now he began to look more closely at the floor of hard-beaten earth. Here and there a beginning, soon abandoned, seemed to have been made at digging it up. Near the door Bobby found something else that sent him down upon his hands and knees, peering closely at the ground.

  “What is it now?” Olive asked.

  “I don’t know,” Bobby said. “I don’t know for certain, but I think it’s blood.”

  CHAPTER IX

  RICHARD RAWDON

  BOBBY WAS STILL in the same position, a somewhat undignified position, on his hands and knees, his nose nearly touching the ground, so intently was he examining that strange, dull, discoloured patch he had noticed on the earthen floor of the hut. Olive was still watching him with an uneasiness she did not in the least understand, but that she knew might at any moment swell to panic. On their abstraction broke a sound of footsteps. They both looked round. A tall young man had come to the doorway of the hut and was standing there, staring at Bobby with mingled surprise and disapproval. He was a well-dressed youngster, good looking, fair complexion, fair haired, grey eyed, with the prominent nose and high cheek-bones so often seen in England. There was about him, too, much of that air of superb self-confidence other nations often find in the islanders and are occasionally apt to resent. There was demand and decision in the quick tones of his voice now, as of one who knew he spoke with authority, when he said:

  “Hullo, what’s all this?”

  Bobby did not answer. After that one quick upward glance to see who the new-comer was, he seemed to lose interest in him, and to become again intent on the dull stain he was examining with such care. Very likely it was of no significance whatever. He was by no means sure that it was really blood. Tobacco juice, for example, can produce very similar stains. So can other agents. With the aid of his pocket knife he began carefully to lever up a piece of the stained earth. The young man in the doorway, unused to being thus ignored, said more loudly and more sharply:

  “Here, what are you up to? What’s the game? Who are you anyhow?”

  Bobby paused in his work to regard his questioner with some annoyance. He had not the least wish to proclaim his identity. If it became known, he knew well all sorts of stories would quickly be in circulation concerning visits by the police to the old hermit. Undesirable to allow such stories to get about. If nothing was wrong, then the old man would have reasonable cause for annoyance. There might even be complaints. And if his own vague suspicion that here mischief had been afoot had any foundation in fact, all the more reason for avoiding premature gossip. But this new-comer, Bobby recognized reluctantly, had not the air of one very easily put off.

  “Well,” the young man demanded, “what are you doing?”

  “Do you live here?” Bobby asked.

  “What’s that to do with it?” demanded the other, his tone getting more and more aggressive.

  “I was only wondering,” Bobby explained, “who you are and what you are doing here and why you are asking questions?”

  By this time the new-comer had advanced from the threshold into the interior of the hut. He became aware of Olive, who hitherto had been outside his range of vision. He looked even more surprised on seeing her. He became aware of the extreme disorder, not to say chaos around.

  “What on earth . . . ?” he began. “What’s been happening?”

  “I should like to know that myself,” observed Bobby.

  He got to his feet, selected a heavy piece of wood from the debris lying around, and began solemnly to thump the ground round the piece of stained earth he had been about to remove. The new-comer gaped. Bobby had just remembered that in removing a piece of bloodstained earth, it is necessary to be sure that no worm is included, since worms feed on organic matter. If one does lie concealed in the lifted clod, there may presently be nothing left but worm and earth, the blood having disappeared. Worms are, as most people know, very sensitive to earth vibrations, and a hammering on the ground above them will soon send them wriggling off as fast as they can go. Bobby did not much suppose that there would be many worms beneath this hard-beaten, primitive, earthen floor, but he had long ago learnt that in police work nothing may be left to chance. Naturally the young man in the doorway had no idea of all this, and no doubt Bobby’s action seemed sufficiently peculiar as he solemnly pounded away on the ground with the heavy bit of wood he had picked up. The stranger appealed to Olive.

  “What’s the matter with him?” he asked. “Is he mad?”

  Olive considered the point gravely, her head to one side.

  “I shouldn’t wonder,” she decided, “but you see, he is my husband, so I do try to give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  Bobby heard this and paused in his pounding to look very hurt and offended.

  “A calm, cold, calculating sanity is my most marked characteristic,” he announced. “It has often been commented on.”

  “Not by me,” said Olive firmly.

  “A short-sighted woman,” pronounced Bobby, and—the worms in the vicinity having presumably been eliminated by now—he knelt down again and continued with his task of levering up a portion of the earthen floor.

  “Look here,” said the young man resolutely, “I want to know what all this means. I happen to know this isn’t your place—”

  “I should
hope not,” said Olive, and was rewarded for her interruption by a coldly indignant stare.

  “It strikes me something precious queer has been going on,” the newcomer continued, letting his glance wander round the wrecked interior, “and I’m beginning to think it would be just as well to call in the police.”

  “Oh, lor’,” said Bobby resignedly.

  “No need to shout about it, anyhow,” commented Olive.

  “Madam,” said the young man, making an almost superhuman effort to keep control of his temper, “I was not shouting.”

  “Sir,” retorted Olive in wicked mimicry, “I didn’t say you were. I said you needn’t. Because,” she explained, nodding at Bobby, busily engaged packing his slice of earth in an old tin box he had rescued from the wreckage, “because he’s one.”

  “One what?” demanded the now thoroughly exasperated young man, this time making no attempt not to shout.

  “Police,” explained Olive. “In the more stately language of the popular Press—a cop.”

  Bobby looked round from his task he was now completing by writing his name across the joining of the paper wrapping, so that the package could not be opened without the fact being apparent.

  “Well, now we’ve been properly introduced,” he said, “do you mind reciprocating. Are you Mr Charles Crayfoot by any chance?”

  “No. I’m not. Why?”

  “He is a recent visitor apparently,” answered Bobby. “Left his card here. There it is. I’ve just found it. Looks as if there was no one here when he called, so he left his card instead. I just wondered if it might be you.”

  The young man was fumbling in his pockets. He produced various objects, including a cigar case holding two or three cigars and serving apparently also for a card case, since from it he finally produced a visiting card.

  “There you are,” he said, proffering it.

  “Mr Richard Rawdon,” Bobby read aloud. “Any relation of Sir Alfred Rawdon of Barsley Abbey?”

  “Sir Alfred Rawdon is my uncle,” came the stiff reply.

  “Oh, yes,” Bobby said. “Then unless your uncle marries and has children, you are his heir?”

  “For what it’s worth, yes,” the other answered. “Now perhaps you will explain. Why is the place in such a mess? Where’s the old chap himself? Why are police here?”

  “Not officially,” Bobby explained, answering the last question first, and indeed it was the only question of the three to which he knew the reply. “Just accident. I don’t know in the least what’s been happening here or what’s become of the occupier.” He produced his warrant card and showed it. “Mrs. Owen and I,” he continued, “have been spending the day in the forest as I happened to have time off for once in a way. A Miss Floyd gave us tea and something she said about chocolates she makes at home for sale made us think of calling here. My wife thought she would like to make some of those chocolates herself if she could get the recipe. It seems an invention of the old chap who lives here on his own—the Wychwood Forest hermit they call him sometimes. Or Peter the Hermit. Historical reminiscence, I suppose. Were you wanting to see him?’’

  The young new comer hesitated. Till now his gaze had been frank, direct, authoritative. Now it wavered, became hesitating, almost sly. There was a perceptible pause before he said:

  “I was just passing. Like you. Been having a walk in the forest. Like you. Accident.”

  “Oh, yes, indeed,” Bobby said, trying to make his voice sound as incredulous as in fact he felt.

  Young Mr Rawdon flushed. He evidently realized that he was not entirely believed. Somewhat hastily he said:

  “What were you digging up bits of the floor for?”

  Bobby left the question unanswered. Too obviously an attempt to change the subject. Besides he had no wish to explain. He asked:

  “Have you been here before to-day?”

  Again Rawdon hesitated, quite plainly considering what reply to make.

  CHAPTER X

  OLD BOOKS

  BOBBY WAITED PATIENTLY for an answer to come. Rawdon went across to the door and stood there for a moment or two, staring out at the scene beyond, but not much as though he saw it. Bobby almost expected to see him begin to walk away and decided that if he did so, he would not be called back. Instead he turned to face them and began to talk.

  “I’ve always heard a good deal about an old chap living out here alone as a kind of hermit,” he said. “The story is he can cure all sorts of things. Gives people stuff he brews from plants. Faith healing very likely, but it works all right. All the doctors round here have their knife in him. Dr Maskell says he is a public danger, says he kills a sight more than he cures. Professional prejudice for all I know, but they do say Maskell has lost half his practice through people coming here instead. The doctors can’t do anything though. I believe they actually had a sort of confab about it. Nothing doing. The old man doesn’t pretend to be qualified in any way and doesn’t even sell his stuff. Gives it away if he likes your looks, and, if he doesn’t, chases you off with an axe. At least that’s the story.”

  “Interesting,” murmured Bobby. “I don’t see any axe lying about though.”

  “I was told he makes a lotion,” the young man continued, paying no attention to this comment. “Awfully good if you’re a bit stiff after a game of cricket or anything like that. So I thought I would come along and see if I could get hold of some of the stuff.”

  “Not entirely accident then,” Bobby suggested.

  “I mean, its being to-day and coming across you is an accident,” Rawdon answered, a little angrily, though whether the flushed cheek he showed was wholly anger, or in part at least embarrassment, Bobby was by no means sure. “This is our land, you know. Part of the Rawdon estate. And it may be sold. It doesn’t come under the entail.”

  “But isn’t that going to be broken?” Bobby asked. “I think I heard your uncle was thinking of getting that done. I suppose your consent as heir would be required.”

  “Oh, I’m joining in,” Rawdon answered. “Got to. Hard up and all that, you know. But it’s a slow job, and this bit of land will go as soon as there’s a purchaser. None in sight at present. No great demand just now for an awkwardly shaped bit of woodland like this. Midwych Corporation ought to want it to join up with the rest, but their idea is a nominal figure or a free gift for that matter. Uncle says he can’t afford. If Midwych wants it, it must pay like anyone else. If a private purchaser turns up, the old man may be cleared out. He doesn’t pay any rent and so far as I know he hasn’t got any lease.”

  “Squatter’s title?” Bobby asked. “I have heard he has some sort of written permission.”

  Young Rawdon shrugged his shoulders.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I haven’t gone into it at all. It just struck me I would ask the old boy himself if I could find him. I was told that very often he wasn’t here. Went off on his own somewhere and no one knew where.”

  “I suppose he doesn’t usually smash up his belongings before he goes off though,” Bobby remarked. “You didn’t say if this was your first visit here.”

  “Well, it is,” Rawdon declared sulkily, too sulkily indeed for Bobby to feel that his answer was altogether satisfactory.

  “Smoke cigars sometimes, don’t you?” Bobby asked.

  “Suppose I do, what about it?”

  “Well, there seems to have been a cigar-smoking visitor here lately, that’s all,” Bobby answered, pointing to the heap of cigar ash he had noticed.

  Rawdon looked at it and scowled.

  “Nothing to do with me,” he said. “What are you trying to get at?”

  “The facts,” Bobby answered. “That ash shows there has been a cigar-smoking visitor here recently—that’s two, counting yourself. Interesting, because cigar smokers are quite rare birds. Cigarettes generally—or a pipe. Whoever it was must have arrived after the place had been upset the way it is, or the ash wouldn’t have stayed undisturbed.”

  “Do you mean—” Rawdon bega
n and paused. “You don’t suppose anything has happened to the old boy, do you?”

  “I’m not supposing anything,” Bobby answered. “I’m just noticing things. I notice, for instance, that there seems to have been rather a rush of visitors here recently—that is, for a hermit. Two cigar smokers, for instance. Then we met a chap coming away. When he saw us he bolted like a scared rabbit. Police get into suspicious ways, and I wondered why. No apparent reason for scuttling off the way he did. Youngish. City business man by his looks. Dark. Big nose. Umbrella and dispatch case. Know him?”

  “A fellow like that called at the Abbey a day or two ago.”

  “Friend, or on business?”

  “You want to know a lot, don’t you?”

  “Police habit,” Bobby explained. “Difficult sometimes, when people won’t answer questions frankly.”

  Mr Richard Rawdon stared, glared, hesitated, then decided to lose his temper.

  “I’m not going to answer any more of your questions anyhow,” he declared angrily. “I think you’ve got a thundering cheek. What right do you think you have to go about cross-examining people? Free country, isn’t it? Even if some of you police don’t seem to notice it.”

  “Would it be pedantic,” Bobby mused, “to point out that this isn’t a cross-examination? If it’s an examination at all, it’s an examination in chief. Of course, it’s a free country all right. Every policeman gets that rubbed into him good and hard from the first day he joins. You can’t guess till you’ve tried what a job it is to protect the lives and property of a free people who jolly well don’t mean to have their lives or their property interfered with. All the same, as it is a free country, we have the right to ask questions, just as you have the right to refuse to answer them. Understood on both sides? Well, did your visitor at Barsley Abbey ask any questions about those El Greco pictures, said to have disappeared from the Barsley Abbey collection half a century ago?”

  The young man stared, gaped, gasped. The question had evidently both surprised and disconcerted him. He began to speak, paused, and then abruptly turned towards the door.