The Longer Bodies

by Gladys Mitchell

‘Of the murders of Hobson and Anthony, of course,’ said the inspector shortly.

  ‘Of Hobson and Anthony,’ said Richard thoughtfully. ‘Oh, well—yes. Very good. I’ll plead guilty if it will save you trouble. You see’—he glanced at his wristwatch—‘it is now almost eleven-thirty. Lunch is at one, and you have still—excuse me!’ He stepped to the opening, and gently but firmly prodded the sergeant in the back to move him out of the way. Then he put his head out between the two doors and swiftly counted the remaining occupants of the library. ‘You have still six persons to interview besides myself. That is, if you don’t recall anyone. But I should almost think you’d be bound to ask one or two of them some more questions, when you’ve heard what everyone has to say.’

  The inspector scowled at him.

  ‘Tell me all your movements from dinnertime onwards on the night of Anthony’s death, Mr Cowes,’ he said coldly. ‘And leave me to manage my affairs as I think fit. I am not in the habit of receiving gratuitous assistance, except from persons of’—he bowed to Mrs Bradley—‘tact and experience.’

  ‘Oh, quite, quite!’ said Richard, waving his hands gracefully. ‘Just as you wish. I thought it might save trouble, that is all.’

  ‘You were at dinner with the others, of course?’ said Bloxham.

  ‘On the night you mention? Yes . . . yes, I must have been. And after dinner was over I accompanied Hilary Yeomond to his hut.’

  ‘What did you do there?’

  ‘We remade the bed.’

  ‘Remade the bed?’

  ‘Yes, inspector. We removed the bedclothes, turned the camouflaged-potato-sack-misrepresented-to-the-general-public-as-a-mattress completely over, and replaced the divots—pillows, I mean—and then the bedclothes.’

  ‘But why?’

  Richard shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Are you a married man, inspector?’ he asked.

  The inspector snorted.

  ‘Well,’ concluded Richard, ‘at any rate, that is what we did. Then I asked Yeomond to play chess. Do you play chess, inspector?’

  ‘I do,’ said Mrs Bradley, before the inspector could answer. ‘You must play with me one day.’

  ‘Nothing would give me greater pleasure, O Sibyl,’ replied Richard, gravely inclining his body in a gracious bow. He thrust the stick of rhubarb further round to the left, and faced the inspector again.

  ‘Up to the house we went, and into the dining room we meandered.’

  ‘Why the dining room?’ asked Bloxham.

  ‘“Why not?”’ quoted Richard under his breath. Aloud, he said:

  ‘Oh, it’s comfortable and the table is convenient and the chessmen are kept in the bottom of the sideboard, and the port and the biscuits are easy of access, and the lights are charmingly shaded, and the colour of the curtains matches my eyes. That’s all, I think.’

  ‘Well, go on,’ snorted Bloxham.

  ‘But I am, inspector. Really and truly I am. Well, we played—do you want a detailed description of the game?’

  ‘No. Get on to the time of the first disturbance.’

  ‘The first disturbance,’ said Cowes obediently, ‘occurred at the time which everybody else has stated, but for the accuracy of which statements I myself am quite unable to vouch. You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘Carry on,’ said Bloxham, who had begun to write in a grim, a steady, and, to a less complacent person than Richard Cowes, a terrifying manner.

  ‘The disturbance took the form of a loud knocking, kicking, and banging at the locked door of the sunk garden, together with a noise of confused, deep-voiced shouting.’

  ‘I see. By “deep-voiced” I suppose you mean that it was a man’s voice that you heard?’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t swear to that. It might have been my sister’s voice, or even that of the cook. I wouldn’t like you to compel me to swear that it was a man’s voice.’ And Richard Cowes looked considerably perturbed.

  ‘You’re quibbling rather, aren’t you?’ said Bloxham, looking up from his papers.

  Richard smiled nervously and said nothing. Mrs Bradley said suddenly:

  ‘I wonder whether we could have Miss Caddick here again for a moment?’

  ‘Oh, not yet, not yet!’ said Bloxham hastily. ‘Afterwards, if you like. Make a note of it, will you, and we’ll see her again later. I feel we’re on to something really important here.’

  He turned again to Richard Cowes.

  ‘Well, Mr Cowes,’ he said, with an unpleasant rasp in his voice, ‘never mind about the voice. We can go into that, if necessary, later on. Now, then, please be very careful, as everything you say will be most carefully checked. What did you do upon hearing this loud noise at the door of the sunk garden?’

  Richard drew the rhubarb from his belt with a flourish, held it vertically in stiff salute to Mrs Bradley, and then bit off a generous section and chewed it crisply but thoughtfully as he appeared to consider the question.

  ‘Answer the question at once,’ said Bloxham. ‘Don’t stop and—and—’

  Richard finished chewing, and replaced the remainder of the provender in his cummerbund.

  ‘I can’t talk with my mouth full,’ he observed mildly. ‘The first thing that I did was to listen to a remark made by Yeomond.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘“Shall I go and let that idiot in, or will you?”’

  ‘Oh, Yeomond said that, did he?’

  ‘Yes. Then I said that we need not bother. One of the servants could get the key from the kitchen more quickly than we could.’

  ‘Oh! That is what you said, is it?’

  ‘Yes. But the noise grew so loud that Yeomond said that, at any rate, we had better go out on to the terrace and yell to the person or persons to be quiet, as our great-aunt, old Mrs Puddequet, had retired to bed, and might be alarmed by the noise.’

  ‘Who went out on to the terrace?’

  ‘Both of us.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Both of us, inspector.’

  ‘Sergeant!’ yelled Bloxham. ‘The next, please!’

  Richard retired gracefully, taking three steps backwards out of the presence.

  ‘And Mr Cowes is not to leave the library. I haven’t finished with him yet!’ the inspector added ferociously.

  ‘The next on the list is Mr Hilary Yeomond, sir. Is that all right?’ asked the sergeant in a hoarse whisper.

  ‘Yes, yes! Of course it’s all right. Bring him in!’ snarled Bloxham, whose temper seemed to be suffering under the strain.

  ‘Beg pardon, sir!’ The sergeant coughed discreetly as he again inserted his head. ‘Mr Cowes says may ’e eat ’is rhubub while ’e’s waiting?’

  ‘He can eat his hat if he likes,’ said Bloxham shortly.

  Hilary Yeomond came in, looking very youthful and clean in his flannels.

  ‘One question, Mr Yeomond,’ snapped the inspector. ‘Did you and Mr Cowes go on to the terrace together or separately when you heard that disturbance at the gate of the sunk garden on the night of Anthony’s death?’

  Hilary frowned thoughtfully. Then his brow cleared.

  ‘Together,’ he said. ‘You mean when that fool—when somebody tried to hoof the gate down?’

  ‘Yes. What happened next?’

  ‘Nothing. The row stopped.’

  ‘Do you know why?’

  ‘Yes. We both bellowed, “Shut up your row, Anthony! Someone’s coming with the key.” A sort of combined roar.’

  Mrs Bradley leaned forward.

  ‘Who made up the form of words you both used?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, I don’t mean we settled on the exact words first and then bellowed them out like a college yell. No, we just shouted, and that’s about what it amounted to, both yelling together.’

  ‘I see.’ Mrs Bradley leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. A pity, she thought, that the inspector was making such a mess of it.

  ‘And now, Mr Yeomond,’ she went on, ‘what happened when you had shouted to the person
at the gate?’

  ‘To Anthony?’ Hilary frowned at the carpet.

  ‘I did not say that,’ said Mrs Bradley very gently.

  The inspector sat up with a jerk.

  ‘What’s that?’ he said.

  ‘We have had no evidence yet to show that the person at the gate was Anthony,’ said Mrs Bradley, in a peculiarly expressionless voice.

  ‘But—but look here!’ cried Bloxham—‘if—er—go back into the library one moment, Mr Yeomond, if you don’t mind—see you again in just a minute—’ He turned excitedly to Mrs Bradley. ‘But if it were not Anthony who made that noise at the gate at eleven forty-three p.m. it would upset all my ideas about the time of the murder!’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Mrs Bradley, smoothing out the creases in the sleeve of her violently coloured jumper.

  ‘But, I say, you know!’ Bloxham was seriously perturbed. ‘Now you’ve raised the point it must be cleared up at once. Of course, I think the probabilities are that it was Anthony who made the noise. You see, there’s the javelin which was flung through Amaris Cowes’s bedroom window.’

  ‘Ah, yes, that peculiar bedroom window,’ said Mrs Bradley drily.

  ‘Exactly.’ Bloxham took up the new point with vigour. ‘That’s where we get back to the previous crime.’

  ‘Crime?’ said Mrs Bradley, with a faint, cynical grin.

  ‘The murder of Jacob Hobson,’ the inspector austerely explained.

  Mrs Bradley’s cynical grin widened slowly.

  ‘Well, you know what I mean!’ said Bloxham, somewhat exasperated. ‘Crime in the technical sense. It takes us back to the night of April eighteenth, anyhow.’

  ‘Agreed,’ said Mrs Bradley absently. ‘So curious about Herring,’ she added, as though to herself. The inspector leapt upon this as a terrier leaps on a rat.

  ‘Ha!’ said he in a short, sharp bark. ‘Yes! Herring. Let’s have him in. I’ll get the truth out of that man if I have to roast him alive!’

  The wretched Joseph was called. He came in as though he were going to his execution, and sagged visibly at the knees as the inspector pointed a finger at him.

  ‘Now, then!’ said Bloxham, with a fearful relish which won Mrs Bradley’s admiration for his histrionic talent. ‘Sit down, and let’s have it first time, if you please!’

  Joseph sat down and gazed agonizedly at Mrs Bradley, who grinned like the Fiend himself and clasped her hands in enjoyable anticipation of what was to come.

  ‘Who stole the rabbits?’ bellowed Bloxham.

  ‘I—I did,’ said Joseph, feebly licking his lips.

  ‘Your rabbits!’ roared Bloxham. ‘Not Colonel Digot’s!’

  ‘I—I worked it out to me own satisfaction it was Mr Timon, pore young chap,’ whined the Scrounger miserably. ‘’E was the one as wanted to frighten ’em all away. Though it were Miss Cowes planned to set Mr ’Ilary’s ’ut afire.’

  ‘Go on.’ Bloxham scowled fiercely. ‘I’ll hear about the hut later.’

  ‘I reckon as ’ow ’e killed ’em and dipped that there javelin in the blood, and frightened Miss Yeomond, I reckon ’e did, and everythink. But I can’t prove it, may I drop dead if I can. But Miss Cowes ’erself told me about the ’ut, because it was ’er I see that night.’

  ‘Cut that bunk! You’ll drop dead all right. From the end of a hemp rope if I know anything about it. And shut up about that hut!’

  A moan of anguish from Joseph preceded his passionate denial of all knowledge of the crimes.

  ‘Oh, get out!’ snarled Bloxham. ‘And stay in the library. I may want you again.’

  ‘Anthony, you see, began practising with the javelin before old Mrs Puddequet finally cut him off,’ he went on to Mrs Bradley when Herring had disappeared.

  He called to the sergeant.

  ‘Send Kost back here a minute. Oh, Mr Kost,’ he added, as the trainer entered through the narrow opening, ‘how good was Anthony with the javelin?’

  ‘Not so bad,’ said Kost. ‘Surprised, though, he should throw so true right through that bedroom window. Very erratic, perhaps, Mr Anthony, with the javelin.’

  ‘Who else could throw the javelin besides Mr Anthony?’ asked Mrs Bradley.

  ‘Miss Cowes. Very good, that lady, perhaps. I think could train on for a championship. Then Mr Malpas Yeomond, and, of course, there is myself. It is not my event, of course, but I throw not so bad.’

  ‘You’re still hanging on to the idea that it may not have been Anthony at the sunk garden gate?’ said Bloxham. ‘It’s an interesting notion, you know. Mr Kost, haven’t you any idea what Anthony did when he left you at the public house the night of his death?’

  But Kost was unable to help him.

  ‘I’ll have old Mrs Puddequet back,’ said the inspector. ‘No, I won’t. Get Miss Caddick again,’ he yelled to the sergeant.

  Miss Caddick, horribly nervous at being recalled, received Mrs Bradley’s encouraging grin with gratitude, and forgot her former animosity towards the shrivelled, yellow-clawed old lady.

  ‘Miss Caddick,’ said Bloxham, ‘how did you know it was Mr Anthony who was making all that noise at the gate?’

  ‘Well, Mrs Puddequet said it was,’ squeaked Miss Caddick.

  ‘Yes. But apart from that? Everybody appears to be so certain that it was Anthony who kicked up that fearful shindy, and yet I haven’t received what I can call definite proof of the matter.’

  ‘Well, but we can account for everyone else at that time, inspector, can’t we?’ said Miss Caddick, advancing the theory timidly.

  ‘Well, can we?’ said Bloxham mildly. ‘If we can, then it must have been Anthony or some outsider, but if we can’t—’ He paused significantly. ‘So come along, Miss Caddick. This is going to be very helpful. Look here, I’ll call out the name and you tell me how you account for that person. Ready?’

  Thus encouraged, and much fortified by the inspector’s undoubtedly kindly demeanour, Miss Caddick sat on the chair with much the same expression on her face as people assume who are resolved to play the game called ‘Truth’ in strict accordance with the rules, and gazed at the window curtains.

  ‘Malpas Yeomond,’ said Bloxham, watching her keenly.

  ‘Oh, inspector!’ Miss Caddick came to earth. ‘What an unfortunate first choice!’

  ‘Why?’ Bloxham grinned wickedly.

  ‘How can I account for his movements? He was not even in the house!’

  ‘Well, there you are, you see,’ said the inspector. ‘I can’t account for his movements, either; neither can Mr Cowes, for he was up at the house instead of where he should have been—in his hut with Mr Malpas; neither can I account for the movements of Mr Francis Yeomond or of Mr Brown-Jenkins, or of Miss Brown-Jenkins. What about Miss Cowes?’

  ‘Well, it was through her bedroom window that the dreadful javelin crashed, so I was not at all surprised when she came and spoke to me through the crack of my bedroom door. Her voice was shaking with the shock, inspector.’

  ‘No wonder,’ said Mrs Bradley, ‘when a javelin had just sailed in through her bedroom window. Did you hear the breaking glass?’

  ‘I should think we did,’ exclaimed Miss Caddick. ‘Such a crash! Just the kind of silly, dangerous, alarming trick that poor foolish young man would have played!’

  The inspector turned to Mrs Bradley.

  ‘Certainly underlines the theory that it was Anthony out there,’ he said, grinning. Mrs Bradley looked dubious.

  ‘Don’t lose sight of the fact that it may have been to the murderer’s advantage to make you think so,’ said she. ‘And the doctor was very cautious about giving a definite opinion as to the time of death.’

  ‘They often are nowadays,’ grunted Bloxham discontentedly. ‘Rigor mortis isn’t what it used to be. All right, Miss Caddick. Thank you. Send in Miss Cowes,’ he said to the sergeant, as Miss Caddick walked out.

  ‘You occupy the bedroom which was first allotted to Miss Yeomond, I believe,’ he went on, immediately Amaris appeared.
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br />   ‘I do,’ said Amaris, giving him a long stare. She sat down and smiled equably at Mrs Bradley.

  ‘Except for the—er—passage of the javelin through the window on the night Anthony was killed, have you had cause to complain of the room in any way?’

  ‘I have no cause to complain of the room at all,’ said Amaris, in her large, calm way. ‘It was the fact that the javelin broke the window when it could so easily have been directed through the opening at the top which annoyed me. I had the window wide open—the top sash was pulled right down. Of course, it would have damaged the wallpaper a bit over the head of the bed, I dare say’—she paused to think it out—‘but I felt awfully vexed about the glass being smashed. So unnecessary, that . . . Inartistic. The javelin should have come sailing through. I shouldn’t have minded then.’

  ‘You heard the shouting and kicking at the gate, I presume?’ said Bloxham.

  ‘Who could help it? A great deep voice bellowing like that, and all the kicks on the woodwork, as you say, and then that ass Richard and young Hilary shouting and yelling—it was enough to waken the Seven Sleepers.’

  ‘But not quite enough to waken the dead,’ said Mrs Bradley, to herself.

  ‘Mrs Bradley has some idea that it was not Anthony who made the noise and threw the javelin,’ said Amaris. ‘She thinks he had conked by that time. It’s quite a tenable theory, of course, isn’t it?’

  The inspector grunted. Suddenly a thought occurred to him.

  ‘I suppose it was Miss Caddick’s voice which replied to you through the crack of her bedroom door?’ he said.

  Amaris smiled lazily.

  ‘Poor old Caddie,’ she said. ‘You don’t think she put one over our late lamented relation, do you, inspector?’

  ‘Answer the question!’ snapped Bloxham.

  Amaris raised her eyebrows and glanced whimsically at Mrs Bradley.

  ‘Of course it was Miss Caddick’s voice,’ she stated. The inspector grunted again, and made a short entry in his notebook. He then dismissed her and sent for Clive Brown-Jenkins. Having listened to the young man’s tale of woe, he turned to Mrs Bradley.

  ‘Nothing I can do with all this’—he tapped the copious notes he had made—‘until I’ve been to Southampton and checked this yarn. What I’ve heard about the time of this gentleman’s return with his punctured bicycle absolutely tallies with the other evidence, so that’s something, of course.’