The Draycott Murder Mystery: A Golden Age Mystery

by Molly Thynne

  “I’ll tell you exactly what I propose to do,” he went on. “Then you won’t feel that we are being idle. Directly I get back to town to-morrow I will see the man I have in mind for Leslie. He is a young solicitor I’ve had my eye on for some time. As keen as mustard and with his name to make. He’ll do better for Leslie than one of the older fellows who’ve settled into their grooves long ago. He’ll probably come down here at once and see Leslie. Then, later, he’ll brief me and if we don’t get your young man off between us, I shall be surprised. Your job is to stand by and keep a brave face on things. Let Leslie know that you believe in him and see that other people realize it too. You’ve got Miss Allen on your side and, from the look of it, a good portion of the people who were present to-day. That sort of thing helps more than you may realize. See any reporters who may approach you and talk to them. You’ve got nothing to hide, remember. You won’t like it, of course, but keep in mind that the more confidence you manage to inspire, the better, and you can do that best by publicly advertising your own belief in Leslie. Make a point of the fact that he had no motive for the crime. In short, carry on on the lines you took at the inquest. The press can be an abominable nuisance, but, fortunately, it can be used too. I leave that part of the business in your hands. You’ve no idea how important it is.”

  Later, after they had handed the girl over to Lady Staveley and were sitting over the fire with Sybil Kean in the deserted billiard-room, Fayre went back to the subject.

  “That was clever of you, Edward,” he said. “And merciful. The inaction was driving the child frantic. Now you have given her something to do and made her feel that she has actually helped already.”

  Lady Kean’s eyes stole to her husband’s face. To her, his tact and consideration had always been unfailing, but it had never been his way to show much kindness to others and she had often been half amused, half exasperated, by the cold courtesy with which he had treated even her closest friends. She felt very grateful to him now for his gentleness to Cynthia.

  “As a matter of fact,” he said slowly, “it wasn’t all eyewash. She can be quite useful and it will keep her out of mischief. She’s got a head on her shoulders and plenty of grit. Leslie’s a lucky man.”

  “I only hope his luck won’t fail him now,” put in his wife.

  “Don’t you worry, my dear,” Kean assured her. “We’ll pull him through, all right. You needn’t lose any sleep over him!”

  His hand was on hers and Fayre, after a glance at them, slipped out of the room and settled himself by the fire in his bedroom. For one thing, he wanted to think; for another, he possessed tact enough to leave these two to their own devices till the time came for Kean to catch the London train.

  With a smile at his own childishness, he fell back on the time-honoured method of all detectives of fiction and set to work with a pencil and paper to get his thoughts in order.

  According to Gregg, Mrs. Draycott had been shot some two hours before Leslie discovered her body in the sitting-room at the farm. Going on this assumption Fayre headed his paper:

  “March 23rd. Between six and seven, Mrs. Draycott shot.”

  When he had finished, half an hour later, his notes ran as follows:

  “John Leslie. According to his own account at six o’clock was walking across the fields in the direction of Besley. Motive: apparently none. Have only his own explanation of his movements and of the empty chamber in his revolver.”

  “Tramp seen by juryman outside Whitbury: May have no connection with the person whose footsteps were found by the police outside the sitting-room window at Leslie’s farm. Some one undoubtedly slept in the barn on the day of the murder and this man was passing through Whitbury at four o’clock. This would get him to the farm before six. Motive: Robbery? May have been scared away by Leslie or the police.”

  “Cynthia Bell. Was at Galston Manor by six. Note: See lodge-keeper at Galston for corroboration. Motive: None, unless she and Leslie are keeping back Leslie’s possible connection with Mrs. Draycott in the past. This is unlikely, as Mrs. Draycott herself stated that she had never met Leslie.”

  Fayre sat back in his chair and contemplated his handiwork. He did not seem to have got very far. Then he picked up his pencil again.

  “May as well go through the lot of them,” he muttered, out of patience with his own futility.

  “Miss Allen. Was writing letters in her study at Greycross at six o’clock. Motive: None, unless her disapproval of her sister’s mode of life amounted to insanity. Does not impress one as a person likely to go to extremes. Note: Find out whether she benefits to any extent financially by her sister’s death, also whether she was seen by any of the servants at Greycross round about six o’clock.”

  While he was in the act of writing the last entry Kean’s words at the hotel recurred to his mind: “Why ‘the man’?” Had he had Miss Allen in his thoughts then, Fayre wondered?

  He sat over the fire for a long time, his thoughts busy with the problem of Miss Allen. He recalled her emphatic denial that her sister had ever had any dealings with John Leslie, her letter to Cynthia. Kean’s suggestion that Mrs. Draycott might have died at the hand of a woman had come hot on his return from his visit to Miss Allen. Fayre wished with all his heart that he had been present at that interview. What had she told him?

  As he dressed for dinner he was conscious of a growing resentment against Kean. The more he pondered on his manner at the hotel, the more he suspected that Kean had discovered something of importance at Miss Allen’s, something, Fayre told himself with growing exasperation, that to-morrow he would pass on as a matter of course to Leslie’s solicitor. He did not blame Kean. He knew him well enough by now to accept his methods, however annoying and inhuman they might seem; but there was a streak of obstinacy in Fayre’s nature which responded to just such treatment as he had received from his old friend and he felt more than ever determined to take a hand in the game. He had offered to meet Grey, the solicitor, at the station and Kean had not demurred. He made up his mind to get as much out of him as possible and then work on his own lines. He realized that these were disconcertingly vague, so far.

  The events of the next morning, however, opened out a possible field of action. Crossing the hall, he ran into Dr. Gregg on his way to visit Lady Kean. The doctor’s greeting was curt, but friendly.

  “Have you heard that they’ve got our friend, the tramp, who was at the farm that night?” he said. “The police seem to have moved fairly quickly, for once.”

  “Have they got anything out of him?”

  “I don’t know. Except for old Gunnet, they’re a close-mouthed lot. The fellow’s safe enough, at all events. Literally tied by the leg in the infirmary at Whitbury. He was run down by a silly young ass on a motor bike and got his ankle badly smashed. I gather that he was up at the farm that night, meant to sleep there. Something seems to have frightened him off at the last minute. Probably the arrival of the police. If he does turn out to be the chap that did it, Leslie’s troubles are over.”

  “Leslie’s solicitor is coming to-day and I’m by way of meeting him. I suppose he will be allowed access to this man if he wants to see him?”

  “I imagine so. Can I be of any use? I’m for Whitbury after this and can run you over in about half an hour’s time.”

  Fayre accepted the invitation, glad of the chance to talk to the man, of all others, most likely to know the neighbourhood well. Gregg had not impressed him very favourably at the inquest and he did not take to him now. As a witness he had seemed almost surly; to-day, no doubt in an effort to be agreeable, he was garrulous and, at the same time, ill at ease. Fayre knew that he had the reputation of being a clever doctor, though something of a vulgarian.

  Lord Staveley joined him as he was collecting his hat and coat in the hall and confirmed his impression of the man.

  “Clever chap, Gregg,” he said. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sorry to have, him on hand when Sybil’s here. It’s always a bit of a responsibili
ty and I sometimes think Kean would murder us if anything happened to her. Amazing, the way the fellow’s wrapped up in her. Never would have thought he was that sort. My wife’s about the one person he’ll trust to look after her. Thank goodness, Gregg’s dependable.”

  “A queer fellow,” commented Fayre thoughtfully. “A bit of a rough diamond, isn’t he?”

  Lord Staveley laughed.

  “Very much so. Didn’t get on with the old women round here at all at first. However, the old chap at Whitbury is such a dud that they had to come round. Now they swear by him. He’s a self-made man. Son of a vet up in the North, so they say.”

  As he spoke, Gregg appeared at the top of the staircase and he and Fayre were soon on their way to the Junction.

  “A bad business, this of Leslie’s, if they find they haven’t got their man, after all,” said Gregg in his abrupt way. “I met Lady Cynthia on the stairs and she looked pretty hipped. It isn’t doing my patient any good, either.”

  “You’re not anxious about her?” put in Fayre quickly.

  “She’s no worse, if that’s what you mean, but she can’t stand worry. I should be better pleased if she was out of all this. If I had my way she’d be in her bed in London now.”

  “What do you think of Leslie’s chances?”

  “Bad. You and I know he isn’t the sort to do a thing like that, but the evidence is strong against him. Depends what sort of old women they get on the Jury, if it comes to that. I hope it won’t, now they’ve got this tramp.”

  “There’s the lack of motive. Personally, I don’t believe he ever saw Mrs. Draycott in his life until that night. You were there, weren’t you? How did he impress you?”

  “He was speaking the truth, all right. He behaved just as you or I would have done under the circumstances. It’s a nasty jar to find the body of a strange lady in your sitting-room. On the whole, he took it very well.”

  “I wish they could find some clue as to why Mrs. Draycott ever went to the farm. I believe the secret of the whole wretched business lies there.”

  “It’s a mystery. Though, from what I’ve heard of the lady, that’s not the queerest of the many queer things she seems to have been up to,” said Gregg dryly.

  “There’s been gossip already, has there? Bound to be, I suppose. Still, they might have let the poor creature rest in peace.”

  “If you lived in this neighbourhood you’d know that that was the last thing they’d be likely to do. If what they’re saying is true, she was no loss.”

  Fayre was struck by the bitterness of his tone.

  “You never met her, did you?” he asked.

  “I must have paid a couple of calls at Staveley while she was there, but I did not run across her. From all accounts, though, she was a pretty average rotter.”

  Gregg’s tone was brutal and Fayre felt his instinctive dislike for the man increase.

  “I’ve come across that type once or twice in the course of my life and I don’t blame the man that killed her,” Gregg went on. “She probably richly deserved it.”

  “Well, the poor woman’s dead and, unfortunately, her secret, whatever it was, has died with her,” answered Fayre, in a voice calculated to put an end to the discussion.

  But Gregg was not so easily quenched.

  “Very pretty sentiment,” he allowed, with something very like a sneer. “But it’s neither just nor logical. It’s a hard fact that the evil people do lives after them and I don’t believe in the whitewashing process myself. The world’s the better for her removal, so why not say so?”

  “That’s a strong thing to say of a woman who, at the worst, was only heartless and calculating, and, considering that I only knew her slightly and you not at all, it seems a good deal to assume,” Fayre reminded him. He was interested, in spite of himself, in the viewpoint of a man who could work himself up to such a pitch of resentment against a woman who, after all, was a stranger to him. His first instinct had been to drop the subject, but now he found himself trying to draw out the doctor.

  “In my experience, it’s the stupid, greedy people who do the real harm in this world, not the wicked ones. The bad man works with an object and, once that’s gained, is usually content to let his neighbour alone. The stupid man blunders on in his imbecile way, leaving a trail of mischief behind him.”

  “You would put down Mrs. Draycott as a stupid woman?”

  Fayre had been struck himself by the dense strata of obtuseness that lay beneath Mrs. Draycott’s surface acuteness and he was surprised at the accuracy with which Gregg seemed to have diagnosed her.

  “From what I hear, she was of the blunt-fingered, blunt-minded type and a born petty schemer. However, I may be wrong. I’m going by hearsay, you know.”

  “It’s curious how people get hold of their information,” said Fayre thoughtfully. “I don’t suppose more than half a dozen people in this neighbourhood had ever met her.”

  “They read their papers, though, and she’s been before the public more than once, you must remember. Also, the mere fact that she was Miss Allen’s sister would be enough to draw attention to her. After all, there was the Dare Case.”

  “She was mixed up in that, was she? I’ve been out of England for so long that I’ve missed things.”

  “She was called as a witness and came out of it pretty badly, as far as I can remember. I don’t read those things much myself.”

  “All the same, you seem to have got your knife into her pretty thoroughly,” remarked Fayre dryly.

  The doctor sat silent for a moment.

  “I’m afraid I rather let myself go on the subject of stupidity,” he said at last. “It’s a thing we doctors are always up against and we get to hate it. I was probably doing Mrs. Draycott a gross injustice.”

  He seemed to realize that he had said too much, for, in spite of Fayre’s attempts to get out of him the exact form the gossip had taken, he kept resolutely off the subject during the rest of the drive to the station.

  The London train was late and as Fayre sat waiting on the platform he read over the notes he had made the night before. After some thought, he added a memorandum on Dr. Gregg.

  “Seems curiously well-informed as to Mrs. Draycott’s past and general characteristics and is almost vindictive in his attitude towards her. Did not reach the scene of the murder till ten o’clock. Up till then, movements unknown, but was probably with patients. If possible, find out from Leslie whether he noticed anything unusual in his manner at the farm.”

  Grey, the solicitor, turned out to be an even younger man than Fayre had expected, but he was, as Kean had predicted, very much on the spot and not only ready, but anxious, to discuss the case. His first object was to see Leslie, and he arranged to go straight to the police station and meet Fayre at the hotel on his return. Fayre told him of the arrest of the tramp, and Grey undertook to procure a permit to visit the infirmary. He did not imagine that any objection would be raised to Fayre’s presence at the interview with the patient.

  They parted in High Street and, as luck would have it, Fayre almost immediately ran into Gunnet, the constable from Keys. Fayre was known to him, both as a friend of Lady Cynthia’s and as a guest at Staveley, and, being off duty, he saw no objection to stepping into the hotel and accepting the offer of a glass of beer. He had little of interest to relate. Two things he did say which had some bearing on Fayre’s notes of the evening before.

  “I stepped up to Galston yesterday,” he remarked, “and had a few words with Doggett, the lodge-keeper there. He informed me that he let the young lady in at the gates shortly before five-thirty and she did not go out again till she passed through in the motor on her way to Miss Allen’s.”

  “That tallies with what she and Mr. Leslie said at the inquest.”

  “It does. Come to that, beggin’ your pardon, sir, I’ve known her ladyship since she was so high and she wasn’t never one to tell a crooked story. I’d take her word anywhere, and so would any one in Keys. What I did, I had to do, in the w
ay of duty, if you understand me.”

  Fayre nodded.

  “Anything settled about the funeral?” he asked.

  “The body’s to be moved to Hampshire, I understand. The family grave is there and Miss Allen wished it. Very trying for Miss Allen, the whole thing, though they do say she’s come into a bit of money as next of kin, seeing as the deceased left no will.”

  Gunnet departed, leaving Fayre with further food for reflection. He was very thoughtful as he strolled through the little town, whiling away the time until Grey should return from his visit to Leslie. By the time the solicitor joined him, armed with the permit, he had decided that, reluctant as he felt to do so, he would have to place Miss Allen in his category of suspected persons.

  They found the tramp, a small, grey, shrunken individual, neatly tucked up in the accident ward of the infirmary with a cradle over his injured leg. As a potential murderer Fayre found him disappointing. He had already gathered from Gunnet that the police were inclined to accept his statement that he was not at the farm at the time the crime was committed. At the same time he seemed unable to produce a satisfactory alibi. One thing was obvious, the man was scared, though he tried to hide it under an assumption of indifference.

  Grey questioned him closely as to his movements on the night of the twenty-third. He admitted that he had intended to sleep at the farm and described how he had looked through the window into the sitting-room and been frightened away by what he had seen there. He corroborated the statement of the juryman that he had left Whitbury about four in the afternoon, arriving at the corner of the lane leading to the farm at about five-thirty. According to his statement he then rested for about an hour on the grass by the roadside, not wishing to try the farm while any one was likely to be about in the yard. He had then retraced his steps down the highroad, intending to try his luck at the Lodge at Galston in the hope of begging some food. Here, however, he was frightened away by the barking of a dog and returned to the lane, this time going up to the farm. Finding no one about, he made his way to the barn and crept into the loft, meaning to stay the night there. He remained in the barn till about eight, when he was driven out by hunger. Then it was that he made the discovery that resulted in his abrupt departure from the neighbourhood of the farm.