The Glimpses of the Moon

by Edmund Crispin

  ‘Humans are different from animals,’ said Widger. ‘At any rate, they are as far as Mrs Clotworthy’s concerned. I once had to take her to the morgue to identify a nephew who’d been drowned. He wasn’t messy at all - looked very peaceful, really -but she’d no sooner set eyes on him than she fainted dead away.’

  ‘Well, but that was a relative.’

  ‘Yes, but she’s a tough old girl. I shouldn’t have been surprised if she’d cried a bit - but fainting …!’

  ‘Ah well, it’s a small matter. We’d better have a word with Fen now, I think.’

  But Fen’s evidence was brief and unenlivening. He had not particularly wanted to make brawn, he said, but had felt unable to reject Mrs Clotworthy’s well-meant gesture, and consequently had gone along to her cottage about 10.30 yesterday, the Saturday. He had knocked on the one door, but there had been no reply. So then he had looked round the little wooden porch. It was very clean and tidy, with some potted plants on a shelf, and an empty milk bottle, and, of course, the Harris’s Bacon sack, firmly tied at the neck with coarse string: this he had naturally assumed to be the pig’s head, so he had taken it to The Stanbury Arms, where he had met the Major, who knew all the gossip and who had told him about Mrs Clotworthy’s great-niece, thus accounting for her absence from home. He had talked to the Major, and to Padmore, and to Old Gobbo, and later, upstairs, to Jack Jones. Then he and Padmore and the Major had strolled along the lane to see the Rector, and after that he had gone home to the Dickinsons’ cottage, where he had left his sack, still unopened, on top of the refrigerator. In the afternoon he had attended the Fete, and when everyone was at last allowed to leave, had taken Padmore home with him, to have a drink and telephone the gory news to his paper. Meanwhile, however, he had been thinking about the Routh-Hagberd case, and had decided that the sack, still on top of the refrigerator, had better be investigated. Opening it, he had found the mangled head of a man. He had telephoned the police, and they had come and collected the head, and Padmore, enraptured, had rung his paper a second time, and that was that.

  Ling said, ‘And was there any time when the sack you picked up at Mrs Clotworthy’s could have been switched for another?’

  ‘Certainly there was. There was the whole time when I was at the Fête. I didn’t lock up, and even if I had, the Dickinsons’ cottage is very easy to get into.’

  Widger said, ‘You say that when you were at The Stanbury Arms you went upstairs to talk to Jack Jones. Did you take the sack with you then?’

  ‘No, I didn’t. I left it in the bar.’

  ‘So there could have been a switch then?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ said Fen. ‘Isobel Jones was there, I think - and the bar was beginning to fill up. So it’s possible, but not very likely. A second sack would certainly have been noticed.’

  ‘Seems as if you had the head in your possession all along, then.’

  A faint gleam of amusement appeared in Fen’s eyes. ‘It would seem so,’ he said.

  Ling squinted into the bowl of his pipe. Then he sucked at its stem. Then he sat forward in the desk chair, so abruptly that his stomach knocked the blotter, and Widger’s report, on to the floor. Fen leaned forward and retrieved them for him.

  ‘Ah, thanks,’ he said. ‘Now, Professor Fen, we have you down as one of the people who visited the… the Botticelli tent during the course of the Fête. Is that right?’

  ‘Yes, quite right.’

  ‘What did you do when you were in there?’

  ‘Do? I thought about religion.’

  Ling was clearly taken aback by this; he could scarcely have been more flabbergasted, Widger reflected, if Fen had announced that he had conversed with Harold Wilson or the ghost of Rasputin. ‘Oh, ah,’ he said feebly.

  ‘That’s what you’re supposed to do, so I did it.’

  ‘Quite, quite,’ said Ling hurriedly. ‘And did you go into the back part at all - behind the picture?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you hear anything?’

  ‘I heard the Whirlybirds.’

  Ling stared. ‘Helicopters?’

  ‘No, no. The Whirlybirds are a female pop group which was performing. They had one of their loudspeakers rigged up immediately outside the Botticelli tent. Full amplification.’

  Concealing his disappointment reasonably well, Ling said, ‘Yes, I remember. A pity.’

  ‘It was during the Fête that the arm was cut off, was it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ling briefly. ‘Well, Professor Fen, you’ve been very helpful.’

  ‘Oh, have I, have I? I shouldn’t have thought so.’

  ‘We shall be needing a signed statement from you, of course.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Tomorrow or the next day.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And will you please stay on the premises for a little longer? We’re still in the early stages of the investigation, and something more may crop up.’

  ‘I’ll do that. And good luck,’ said Fen benignly, as he disappeared out of the door.

  3

  Ling yawned and stretched. ‘Thank the Lord for one lucid witness,’ he said. ‘And now, I suppose, we shall have to talk to that dolt of a constable of yours.’

  ‘Rankine?’

  ‘No, Luckraft.’

  ‘Luckraft’s not mine, he’s Graveney’s.’

  ‘Don’t fuss, Charles.’ And since Ling seemed capable of no exertion greater than that required to fill a fourth pipe which he had conjured up from somewhere, Widger rang the Duty Sergeant and asked him to send Luckraft up.

  Luckraft looked uncomfortable, both professionally and physically; and although his red, meaty face was not adaptable to any great range of expression, he also looked decidedly apprehensive. It being his day off, he was crammed into a lightweight grey suit too small for him. His shoes shone; his tie blared. He had a large piece of Elastoplast stuck to the back of his head, and he was sweating slightly.

  Ling, a kindly man at bottom, told him to sit down.

  Luckraft said that he would rather stand.

  Ling, having consulted Widger’s report, told him to tell his story.

  Luckraft cleared his throat and began. And what emerged was this:

  The Stanbury Arms was situated in Holloway Lane, and a little way along from it, in the direction opposite to Glazebridge, a footpath led through to Chapel Lane, debouching between Luckraft’s small but newish bungalow on the one side and Mrs Clotworthy’s cottage on the other. Mrs Clotworthy’s cottage was one of a pair, but its neighbour had for a long time been uninhabited - unsaleable, seemingly, - and was verging on ruin, its garden completely overgrown, its windows smashed, its paintwork peeled away, and a number of slates missing from the roof. To this deplorable condition vandalism had contributed much, and Luckraft, who knew the owner, had promised to do what he could about any vandals, vagrants, junkies and other such social undesirables as might come to his notice.

  Yesterday morning, then - Saturday - he had left his bungalow at about 10.15 and set off on his motor-cycle to ride into Glazebridge. Passing the abandoned cottage, he had thought he saw, out of the corner of his eye, an indistinct figure ducking into cover round at the back; and since he had time in hand, he had decided to stop and investigate, leaving his motor-cycle against the hedge and forcing his way into the desolation of the garden by way of a small, lop-sided wicket gate. A tour of the garden and cottage - peering into empty dusty rooms through broken panes - had brought nothing to light, and Luckraft had terminated his efforts by making his way into a ramshackle garden shed, still crammed with all manner of decaying household and garden rubbish. Here he had decided to remain for a little, on the watch: the shed’s window, though grimy, was intact, and gave a good view of the surroundings, in case someone was still dodging about. And it was here that disaster had struck. Luckraft had scarcely had time to wipe a portion of the window, and so provide himself with a peephole, before he accidentally trod on the tines of a propped-up rake. Its handle fell for
ward, hitting him on the forehead (he was not wearing cap or helmet) and causing him to lose his balance and fall back with a crash on to an enormous old rusty iron mangle, whose roller caught him on the occiput with such violence as to actually knock him unconscious.

  Ling was frankly incredulous. ‘Good heavens, constable,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t have thought that was possible.’

  Luckraft’s face grew redder than ever. ‘It happened, sir,’ he said stiffly.

  ‘You mean you actually knocked yourself out?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was talking to Doc Mason about it afterwards, and he says there are weak spots in the skull where quite a light blow will - will - well, it’ll do what it did to me.’

  ‘I see. And how long did this condition last?’

  ‘I fell down on to the floor, sir.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve no doubt you did. But how long for?’

  ‘I suppose it must have been about ten minutes, sir. When I came round there was a boy standing over me with a bunch of herbs.’

  ‘What was he doing - waving them under your nose to revive you?’

  ‘No, sir. He was taking my pulse.’

  ‘Good heavens.’

  ‘It was Oliver Meakins, sir.’

  Ling looked at Widger. ‘Oliver Meakins?’

  Widger explained. Oliver Meakins, he said, was a stooped, studious Burraford lad of eleven whose unlikely ambition it was to become a male nurse. He was currently going through a homoeopathic phase - without, however, relaxing his grip on idiopathy.

  ‘He was picking herbs in the garden, sir, when I came along,’ said Luckraft. ‘He knew, of course, that he didn’t ought to be there, so while I was looking around he managed to dodge me, or hide, or something. It must have been him I glimpsed from the lane.’

  Again addressing Widger, ‘Is this boy here?’ Ling asked.

  ‘No. I had a few brief words with him before you arrived this morning, but - ’

  ‘Did you ask him if he saw anyone lurking around Mrs Clotworthy’s cottage? That sack must have been dumped in her porch some time.’

  ‘Yes, but surely much earlier.’

  ‘Depends. What time did Mrs Clotworthy go off to see this great-niece?’

  ‘I found that out,’ said Widger defensively. ‘It was shortly after eight. Come to that, though, the sack could surely have been put there during the night.’

  ‘In that case, wouldn’t she have noticed it when she left?’

  ‘She might not have. She was excited and in a hurry.’

  Ling grunted. ‘I’ll have to ask her - though I should have thought that if she had noticed it, she’d have mentioned the fact. I’ll have to talk to the boy, too. Luckraft’ - he turned back to the sweating constable, who during this interchange had been shifting uneasily from foot to foot - ’Luckraft, I suppose it’s too much to hope that you noticed, before you knocked yourself out, if there was any - Wait a minute, though, I’m getting this wrong. Mrs Clotworthy’s porch would be round the other side of the cottage, on Chapel Lane.’

  ‘Well, no, sir,’ said Luckraft, ‘as a matter of fact, it isn’t. For some reason I’ve never understood, it’s at the back. You get to it from the footpath which leads from Chapel Lane to Holloway.’

  ‘So you could have seen it from the toolshed window.’

  ‘Only the roof of it, sir, because there’s a fairly high hedge between the two gardens. Besides,’ said Luckraft with some dignity, ‘I didn’t have much chance to see anything.’

  ‘No one about?’

  ‘No, sir. Apart from Oliver Meakins, I didn’t set eyes on a living soul.’

  ‘All right. Go on.’

  But Luckraft had little more to tell. Oliver Meakins had heard the crash from the toolshed, and, his professional instincts triumphing over the urge to get out of there, with his herbs, fast, had crept up to the rickety erection, peered in at the door and seen Luckraft sprawled on the grimy boards with his head in a small pool of blood; and he had still been in the process of testing for unconsciousness - which, he had learnedly reported to Widger, was at the time of his entry complete - when Luckraft had come round. Reluctantly concluding that his medical qualifications were as yet too embryonic to cope with the situation, and that Luckraft had better see a proper doctor, he had punily assisted the unfortunate constable back to his bungalow and the arms of his alarmed wife, who had got in touch with Dr Mason. The doctor had bound the injury up, pronouncing it not serious, but advising a few hours’ rest; Mrs Luckraft had telephoned Inspector Graveney in Glazebridge, to say that her husband had had a slight accident, and wouldn’t be in that morning; Oliver Meakins, a helpful boy despite his eccentricities, had effortfully salvaged Luckraft’s motor-cycle and put it away in the garage next to the white Saab; and Luckraft, after a cup of tea, had fallen asleep on his bed.

  ‘But you woke up again,’ said Ling, ‘in time to go to the Fête.’

  ‘Yes, sir. By then I was feeling much better. And it’s such a big affair, Mr Graveney likes to have someone on duty there.’

  ‘As far as I can make out, you spent most of your stint sitting outside the entrance to the… the Botticelli tent.’

  ‘Well, yes, sir, I did. The Misses Bale are so afraid that picture’s going to get stolen, they’re glad of a bit of extra reassurance, like. And besides, sir,’ said Luckraft with candour ‘it was somewhere to sit down. I was better, yes, but I was still getting an occasional giddy spell.’

  ‘Did you sit there having giddy spells the whole time, then -until the body was found?’

  ‘Oh, no, sir. I did a couple of rounds, just to make sure everything was all right. I even had a go at the hoop-la.’

  ‘Did you, indeed.’ Ling took all of his four pipes, and arranged them symmetrically on the desk in front of him; he then selected one, and levelled its stem accusingly at Luckraft. ‘So you can’t for a certainty name everyone who went into that tent, or came out of it.’

  ‘No, I can’t, sir. I can name some of them, though. There was - ’

  ‘Yes, yes, you’ve told Inspector Widger all that already.’

  ‘Miss Titty Bale would know, though.’

  ‘She’s told Inspector Widger all that already. However, there were two people - men - whom she couldn’t identify.’

  ‘Yes, sir. That Fête’s that popular, people come to it from miles around.’

  ‘One of these men went into the tent while you were there.’

  ‘Quite right, sir.’

  ‘Well, come on, man, what was he like?’

  A long pause followed. Then Luckraft said, ‘Ordinary.’

  ‘ “Ordinary”?’ Ling was outraged. ‘You’re a policeman, and all you can say about a man you saw at close quarters, in broad daylight, is that he was “ordinary”?’

  ‘To tell the truth’ - Luckraft’s face coloured slowly from below upwards, like a July lupin - ’To tell the truth, sir, I wasn’t paying him any attention.’

  ‘Were you asleep, Luckraft?’

  ‘Certainly not, sir.’

  ‘Well, what were you doing?’

  ‘Thinking, sir. I wasn’t to know that there’d been a - that there was a body in the - You can’t take note of everyone,’ said Luckraft, rallying slightly.

  ‘It may interest you to know, Luckraft, that Miss Bale can’t describe the stranger properly, either. Either of the strangers.’

  ‘Sorry about that, sir.’

  ‘You may well be sorry. So how are we to set about tracing them, eh, constable? Can you tell me that?’

  ‘Sir, I’m sure I wasn’t there when the other one -’

  ‘We know you weren’t. Miss Bale has told us. You’re useless, constable, useless,’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Ling picked up a ball-point pen, wrote useless on the blotter, and said, ‘Well, we shall have to test your memory with something else, shan’t we? Did you yourself go into the tent at any time?’

  ‘Yes, sir, I did.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘There was n
o one waiting, so Miss Bale let me go in free.’

  ‘You grudged giving fifty pence to the Church funds.’

  ‘No, sir, not at all. It was meant to be a sort of - a sort of reward. I wanted to pay, but Miss Bale insisted.’

  ‘Very kind of her, I’m sure. And you stayed in there ten minutes?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Did you investigate the back part of the tent?’

  ‘No, sir. I just sat down.’

  ‘You just sat down. And thought, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes, sir. I thought about my head. It was still hurting a bit’

  ’You sat for ten minutes thinking about your head.’

  ‘Well, sir, I’d seen the picture before, other years … I had a drag,’ said Luckraft, apparently in the hope that this admission would soften the heart of a fellow-smoker.

  It didn’t. ‘You had a drag,’ said Ling. ‘So now, of course, Forensic will be wasting time examining your nasty little cigarette butt, which no doubt you ground out on the grass before emerging. Did you see anything? Did you hear anything? Did you hear sawing?’

  ‘I didn’t notice anything out of the way, sir,’ said Luckraft. ‘And as to hearing - well, those girls were kicking up such a din-’

  ‘We know, we know,’ said Ling wearily. ‘All right, Luckraft, that’s all for now. We may need to talk to you again tomorrow, so see to it that you’re available. Now go away.’

  Luckraft moved towards the door. Ling closed his eyes and began filling one of his pipes blindfold. He was starting to say to Widger, ‘What it amounts to, then …’ when he opened his eyes again and discovered that Luckraft hadn’t in fact left, but was still hovering in the doorway.

  ‘Luckraft, did you hear what I said?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I said “Go away.” So why are you still here?’

  ‘Excuse me, sir, but it’s my leave.’

  ‘Your leave, Luckraft, your leave?’

  ‘Yes, sir. It’s due to start on Sunday. The Missus and I, we’ve got a nice little package tour laid on to North Africa.’