‘Let us have the suggestion.’
‘You remember that Weatherup reported to me that Swinburn spilled his wine on the night he dined at The Moat? Now, I suggest that Weatherup may have seen more than he told me. Suppose he saw Swinburn actually changing the bottles, or something equally vital. Suppose he thought he would make something out of it and began to blackmail Swinburn. If this had happened the whole of the rest of the facts would be accounted for. Swinburn would know that to murder him would be his only real safeguard, and he could easily ask him to come to the boat-house to receive the money, accounting for the choice of the boat-house on the ground that the light required to count the notes would not be seen from there.’
‘But that doesn’t account for the burglary of the notes.’
‘Unhappily, I know that,’ French smiled. ‘I suggest, again without any proof, that Swinburn was looking for something – something that he thought might give him away. I suggest he found the notes unexpectedly and thought if he took them it might tend to fix suspicion on Weatherup. I suggest that this was an afterthought and not part of the original scheme.’
‘That’s likely enough, inspector. But what could Swinburn have been looking for?’
French shrugged his shoulders. ‘There again I made a guess – which again I couldn’t prove. I thought that Weatherup, knowing Swinburn was a murderer, would scarcely risk dealing with him without some safeguard. I put this forward for what it’s worth. I suggest this safeguard took the form of some kind of sealed document and that Weatherup told Swinburn that he had given it to Morley to keep and to be opened in the event of his, Weatherup’s, death. He had not done anything of the kind; I asked Morley. But I suggest he bluffed Swinburn into thinking he had, and that it was to recover this documentary evidence that Swinburn broke open the desk.’
‘Likely, but unproven?’ Heppenstall smiled.
‘Yes, sir, but I’d remind you that we hadn’t to prove what the desk was broken open for. We had only to prove that Swinburn killed Weatherup, and that was established beyond possibility of doubt.’
‘That’s quite true,’ Heppenstall admitted. ‘Well, inspector, it only remains for us to congratulate you and the super and Inspector Appleby. I don’t know when I’ve heard a better reasoned case. What do you say, Byng?’
Byng said the proper things in the proper manner. ‘By the way, French,’ he added, ‘here’s a point. Shall I call you in my book Inspector French or Chief-Inspector French?’
French, highly delighted, explained that his leg would come off if pulled too hard, and the meeting terminated.
Other British Library Crime Classics
Murder of a Lady
Anthony Wynne
Inspector Dundas and gifted amateur sleuth Eustace Hailey tackle a locked-room mystery in a Scottish castle.
Murder in the Museum
John Rowland
The murder of an academic in the British Museum brings together Inspector Shelley and mild-mannered museum visitor Henry Fairhurst.
Death on the Riviera
John Bude
Counterfeit currency—and murder—darken the sunlit glamour of the Riviera. Detective Inspector Meredith needs to keep one step ahead.
The Secret of High Eldersham
Miles Burton
When a pub landlord is stabbed, Detective-Inspector Young calls on “living encyclopedia” Desmond Merrion to help uncover the secrets of the village.
The 12.30 from Croydon Page 33
