The Murder of Busy Lizzie mb-46

by Gladys Mitchell

  ‘Forensic will,’ said Laura, sotto voce.

  ‘Thank you, Celestine. And that is all you can tell us?’ said Dame Beatrice.

  ‘That is all, madame.’

  ‘Interesting,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘All the blood was under and around the dead animal, you say?’

  ‘Precisely, madame.’

  ‘Well, this begins to hot up,’ said Laura, when the servant had gone. ‘We may take it that the dead pig was a blind. Wonder whether it’s of any use to ask at the hotel whether anybody heard a pig being killed on that particular Wednesday?’

  ‘Of no use at all,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘Nobody will have heard anything. These are islanders and clannish. I agree with you that a deception had been practised, but we shall not be told by whom.’

  ‘You mean the pig was killed elsewhere and the carcass and a bucket of blood brought here to cover up the bloodstains left by the murder of Eliza Chayleigh, don’t you? Pity Celestine washed away the evidence. Still the forensic people might make something of it. Wonder whose pig it was? If the police can find that out, it would be a pretty good pointer to the murderer. Trouble is, I expect that, as you say, these islanders are too clannish to give one another away, especially if murder is involved.’

  ‘That might be the very reason they might be persuaded to talk, I think,’ said Sebastian. ‘One thing: it looks as though the murder was premeditated. My aunt was sent here, and I bet the dead pig and the rest of it were on the spot, ready for the cover-up. What an absolutely beastly business it all is! Who on earth can have hated my aunt so much? It sounds as though Miss Crimp is involved.’

  ‘Miss Crimp is the likeliest, I suppose,’ said Margaret, ‘if we are going to mention names. If Aunt Eliza left the hotel, or, rather, her share of it, to her partner, it might offer a motive, don’t you think? But it’s really much too horrible to talk about. Father will have to tell the police and let them deal with it. There is nothing we can do on our own, is there?’

  ‘What I mean to do,’ said Sebastian, ‘is to hire Dimbleton’s boat and have a look at those rocks where my aunt’s body was found. I agree there’s been dirty work, and I’d like to find out more about it.’

  ‘You’re too young to be drowned,’ said Laura. ‘Look, I can think of a much better way of going about things, if you really intend to go ahead with a spot of investigation. If I were you I’d chuck the idea of the boat trip. It won’t bring home the guilt to any extent that will satisfy you.’

  ‘What do you suggest, then?’ asked Sebastian. ‘By the way, my father has gone home on this afternoon’s boat, so nothing we do now will concern him. There’s no bother on that score.’

  ‘I suggest,’ said Laura, ‘that we mobilise these bird-watchers. They have ropes, cameras, climbing things and heads for heights. The cliffs are their natural haunt. Get them on the job and make them report back to you. I myself could bear to know a bit more about what happened. It’s obvious your aunt met somebody at this house. What we’ve heard has interested me very much. What’s more, I’ve talked to some of these naturalists and, if you think well of the scheme, I can put you in touch with a small party of the best of them. Let them do the exploring from the face of the cliffs.’

  ‘But we wanted to see for ourselves,’ protested Margaret.

  ‘Much better leave it to the experts and let them do the donkey work. There’s another aspect, too, which, it appears, has already occurred to you. The police are apt to take a dim view of amateurs like yourselves who horn in on their preserves, whereas these bird-watchers are neither to hold nor to bind. Nobody is going to ask what they’re up to if they’re spotted climbing the cliffs and scrambling over the rocks and generally infesting the scenery. It will merely be assumed that they are about their lawful occasions and they’ll be left alone to get on with whatever breakneck expeditions they choose to embark on.’

  Margaret looked at her brother. Sebastian nodded.

  ‘It makes good sense to me,’ he said. ‘When do we make contact?’

  ‘Well,’ remarked Dame Beatrice, when the young people had gone, ‘I must admit that your methods excite my admiration and envy.’

  ‘Oh, I intend to hire the boatman myself later on,’ said Laura. ‘He won’t suspect me, but he might think the police ought to be informed if close relatives of the deceased want to go in his craft to take a look at the spot marked X, don’t you think? After all, we’re now certain the woman was murdered. Another point: is it of any use, after this lapse of time, to subject this house to scrutiny of a more meticulous kind than so far we have accorded it? I regard it as a matter of more than passing interest that Mrs Chayleigh doesn’t seem to have been seen alive since she toddled over here with, or without, the viands. To my mind, the pig clinches matters. She was killed by that knock on the head, the pig’s blood was poured over her blood, and the pig left as a material witness while her body was flung into the sea. Be interesting to find out where, and I want to take a look-see.’

  ‘Very well, then: it shall be as you wish. By the way…’ Dame Beatrice fixed her sharp black eyes on Laura. ‘… I rely on you to see that your proposed boat-trip does not deprive me of my secretary and amanuensis. The Memoirs would suffer sadly without the assistance of your memory and imagination.’

  ‘Oh, I’ll be all right, and the chap won’t risk getting his boat bashed in, that’s for certain. We shall keep well off-shore and I shall rely on my binoculars to pick up any items of interest.’

  ‘That may, or may not, help the enquiry. What I should like to find out is what inducement was offered to Mrs Chayleigh which brought her to this house on the flimsy pretext of delivering a basket or parcel of food.’

  ‘Miss Crimp may have suggested that it was on her way to the boat, so if the maid was right, and Eliza agreed to come here, Miss Crimp can’t be concerned in the murder,’ said Laura, ‘because she remained at the hotel.’

  ‘We are in no position to name the murderer, in any case, but Mrs Chayleigh could have been followed here, you know. There was an interval while two people drank tea.’

  ‘Do you think it was Eliza and her murderer who drank the tea?’

  ‘Eliza and one of her murderers, you mean. What interests me is the flimsy reason for the errand which seems to have been given. One would have supposed that so trivial a commission could have been given to one of the hotel servants. Mrs Chayleigh must have expected to meet somebody here, but the probability is that we shall never find out who it was.’

  chapter ten

  Boat and Scramble

  ‘Your stormy chiding stay;

  Let zephyr only breathe,

  And with her tresses play,

  Kissing sometimes these purple ports of death.’

  William Drummond

  « ^ »

  Dame Beatrice, who had boundless faith in Laura’s ability to take care of herself and who, in any case, was convinced that the young (among whom she still included her secretary) should be given a free hand so long as it was not one which dealt trouble to other people, made no objection and offered no opposition to the proposed expedition.

  Laura laid her plans carefully. She was anxious (and kind-hearted and tactful enough) not to allow the brother and sister to know that she proposed to follow a course against which she had persuaded them. She had also decided to make the sea-trip before she looked for clues on the cliff-top.

  Sebastian and Margaret, ignoring their father’s advice, had gone off to see Ransome as soon as they left Puffins. Laura, having seen them on their way, climbed the knoll at the back of the house and kept them in view long enough to note that they had by-passed the hotel and were taking the road to the farm. Upon this, she took the cliff road down to the landing stage. Two or three fishing-boats were drawn up on the disconsolate shore and a little further up the coast the surf was thundering on to the unpromising-looking beach. The main-land away to the south was clearly defined in the late afternoon sunshine, and on the cliff to her left stood the modern lighth
ouse which guarded the channel.

  Among the fishing boats was the malodorous little launch which ferried passengers to and from the mainland steamer, and near it, but anchored off-shore, was a bigger and better boat, a sea-going cruiser, the craft, in fact, which belonged to that Saint Christopher of churchgoers, J. Dimbleton. Having brooded upon its possibilities, Laura climbed the cliff and, keeping an eye open for Sebastian and his sister, she, too, followed the road.

  J. Dimbleton’s cottage was near the church and stood alone in an overgrown garden containing an empty pig-sty, otherwise the only concession to tidiness and utility was in the form of a small vegetable patch near the dwelling. Laura pushed open a remarkably well-oiled gate and walked up to the cottage, trusting that at that hour Dimbleton would be at home and having his tea. She hammered on the front door with her fist and, like Goldilocks at the home of the three bears, lifted the latch and walked in.

  Three persons were seated at a scrubbed wooden table and were indeed at tea. Father Bear she took to be Dimbleton himself, a big, sun-and-wind-tanned man wearing a blue jersey and a spotted neckerchief. Baby Bear was a slim young fellow in a reefer jacket and Mother Bear was Miss Crimp. They stared at Laura, but not malevolently, and Dimbleton stood up and came round the table to where she was standing.

  ‘Business?’ he asked. ‘Or would ee like a cup o’ tea. Made it for Miss Crimp, never touch the poison myself.’

  ‘Business,’ Laura replied. ‘Tomorrow at dawn, if you will be so good.’

  ‘You want to cross over first thing in the morning?’

  ‘No. I want to make a circular tour of the island.’

  ‘Oh, ay? Anybody going with you?’

  ‘No. My employer, on whose behalf I shall be making this survey, is not enthusiastic about rough sea-trips. She has read that this island used to be the haunt of smugglers, but she claims that landing cargo on these shores would have been too hazardous an undertaking to be feasible, and she wishes to prove her point in an article to a geographical magazine to which, from time to time, she contributes. I am to ask what you charge for the hire of your boat for such a trip.’

  ‘Oh, well, let me see now. You see, for the round trip I usually reckon on half-a-dozen passengers, and that come cheaper for each one of ’em, like.’

  ‘My employer does not wish me to be distracted. I shall be making notes, you see, and must remain undisturbed, so I am to make the trip on my own. She will meet any reasonable demand for a fee.’

  ‘Well, I dunno. What would you say to two pound fifty? I’ll be going with you to handle the boat, of course.’

  ‘Make it two pounds. There won’t be nearly as much wear and tear on your boat as there would be with six passengers, some of them, perhaps, sea-sick.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be sea-sick?’

  ‘No. Besides, I could crew for you if necessary.’

  ‘Two pound, then. Let’s wet it with a drop o’ Scotch.’

  ‘Right. And a small rake-off for me if I do crew for you.’

  Dimbleton laughed and the young man at the table said, ‘You’ve caught a right one there, Jake.’

  Miss Crimp said, ‘Well, if that’s all right about the fish, then, Mr Dimbleton, perhaps Mrs Gavin and I might walk back together, as our ways lie in the same direction.’

  ‘It was the fishiest set-up you ever saw,’ said Laura to Dame Beatrice when she had left Miss Crimp at the hotel and had returned to Puffins. ‘She mentioned fish, incidentally, but I bet those particular fish were never taken out of either fresh or salt water.’

  ‘Your figure of speech eludes me.’

  ‘Fish,’ explained Laura, ‘is one of the Americanisms for money. If you ask me, smuggling is still a gainful occupation on this island. The young chap at the table wore gold rings in his ears and was a Cornishman. He was absolutely cut out for the part and so is Dimbleton, who can’t possibly make a living merely by hiring out his boat at odd times. He must have another source of income. I had a squint at his boat before I went to his cottage, and it’s a three-thousand pound job, put it at the lowest, and could have cost three times that much, if he bought it new. You could cross to America in it, I shouldn’t wonder, and I bet it’s fast, too. However, I’ll be able to assess it better when I go aboard. It begins to look as though there is method in Gavin’s madness in sending us here, after all.’

  ‘What else had Miss Crimp to say?’

  ‘Nothing more while I was in the cottage, except that she proposed to walk back with me.’

  ‘And then she conversed with you?’

  ‘Yes, about witches. Asked me whether I knew there was a coven on the island. I pleaded ignorance of any such thing, but said I had noticed some red paint splashed over one or two of the headstones in the churchyard, and I asked, in my innocent way, whether that was the doing of the witches. At this she waxed shrill and indignant and stated that the coven operated only for good, and that desecration of tomb-stones had no part whatever in its ritual. She added, though, that she knew vandalism was rampant on the mainland and she supposed that at some time it had been brought to Great Skua through the agency of some of the visitors. She hinted that she suspected two women, but she did not disclose any names.’

  ‘Did she say whether she herself is a member of the coven?’

  ‘I didn’t think I’d better ask her, and she didn’t volunteer the information, but she seemed to know a good deal about its doings, if that’s anything to go by, but I don’t think it is. I expect she only picks up gossip from the staff at the hotel.’

  At dawn on the Friday morning, Laura slipped out of the house and went down to the landing stage. Dimbleton was there with a tiny dinghy. He rowed her out to the cruiser, they hoisted the dinghy aboard and, rounding the long promontory, turned northward up the west coast.

  The dark cliffs exhibited a scowling, perpendicular face of savage grandeur and, although Dimbleton kept the boat well out, Laura could see that in the tiny bays which were part natural, part man-made by the quarrymen, it would be possible to run a small boat in if the pilot knew the coast. More exciting still, after they had passed the quarries and were approaching the old lighthouse from whose gallery the body of Eliza had first been sighted, caves began to appear, yawning black holes in the foot of the awe-inspiring, towering cliffs.

  She exchanged no words with the skipper. He sat at the wheel and she was perched forward on the cabin top with her rubber-soled shoes pressed against the starboard rail and her notebook open on her knee. They passed the old lighthouse and then the mouth of the river in its deep gorge and, some way further on, came inshore a little to wave to the keepers of the modern lighthouse which guarded the north-west promontory.

  They rounded this and, coming southward along the east coast where the cliffs, although formidably grand, lacked the terrifying authority of those on the Atlantic side, Dimbleton spoke for almost the first time.

  ‘Up there,’ he said, jerking his head, ‘be the remains of homes made three thousand and more years ago.’ Laura nodded. She had explored the island thoroughly in her days of occupation, usually after her early-morning swim, and was sufficiently versed in archaeology to recognise primitive hut-circles. She had found two groups of these perched on the windy plateau between the north-east point and the two swift-flowing little brooks which flowed eastward out of the great combe. Almost opposite the combe was a stack of tall, ragged rocks, part of the island before some natural cataclysm had created the combe and left some indestructible granite in the form of a hazard so dangerous to shipping that a light-ship was anchored half-a-mile to the east of the rocks to warn vessels of their proximity.

  There were caves on this side of the island, too, as Laura carefully noted, particularly under the higher and more formidable cliffs on which was the disused lighthouse which Sebastian and Margaret had visited on their first survey of the island and which they had found locked against them. It was built on the southernmost of the south-east promontories and once the boat had passed it and had roun
ded the point and brought the modern lighthouse into focus, the low shores of the landing-place came into view and a few minutes later Dimbleton dropped anchor, lowered the dinghy and rowed Laura ashore.

  ‘Get what you wanted for your notebook?’ he asked, with kindly good humour. ‘You’re a grand sailor; I’ll say that for you. Get wet, did you, when we shipped a few off that northwest corner?’

  ‘Not to notice,’ Laura replied. ‘Anyway, your money was in a waterproof pouch. Here you are, and thanks very much for the trip. That’s a fine boat you have. Must have set you back a bit, didn’t it?’

  ‘Oh, she’s syndicated. My partners put up most of the money. Couldn’t have afforded her myself. She’s a lovely little job, though, ain’t she?’

  Laura agreed, made no reference to the partners he had mentioned and, having parted from him with a handshake, she climbed the cliff road back to a very late breakfast. Dame Beatrice had waited so that they might have it together.

  ‘And how did you get on?’ she asked, spreading honey on a thin slice of bread and butter while Laura, with a gusto which never failed to fascinate her employer, wolfed eggs, rashers, sausages, toast and fried tomatoes. ‘Did you enjoy your trip?’

  ‘Yes, marvellous! Dimbleton may be a smuggler—I’m more sure of it than ever, now that he’s told me his boat is the property of a syndicate—but he’s a very decent sort and knows how to handle his cruiser in choppy seas—and choppy I’ll say they were.’

  ‘Did you manage to get a glimpse of the place where the body was found?’

  ‘Not a very satisfactory one, but I’ll know a lot more when I get the bird-watchers on the job later on this morning. I’ve got an idea about it all, but I don’t know whether it will work out. Anyway, the police will have thought of it, too. I haven’t a doubt about that. Well, the landing-boat from the steamer was in pretty early on Thursday of last week, so I’d better sneak out and make my descent of the cliffs while those Lovelaine kids are still in the hotel. I’m rather surprised that their father is leaving them behind, but I suppose he thinks they’re old enough to look after themselves, and so, of course, they are.’