The Curious Affair of the Third Dog

by Patricia Moyes

  Bill and Emmy heard the telephone being laid down on the table, and Henry’s step in the hall. Then the sitting room door was closed quietly from the outside.

  Bill put his drink down very deliberately, and said, “Well, I’ll be damned.” He was clearly not amused. “What does Henry think we are? Ruddy criminals or spies or something?”

  Emmy smiled. “Don’t worry, Bill,” she said. “I’m used to it. The theory is that what you don’t know can’t hurt you. Whenever Henry has a bit of information that could be dangerous, he’s always very careful only to give it to people who absolutely have to know it. It used to upset me at first, as if Henry didn’t trust me—but I know better now. You and I know that Henry is out of the hospital. It’s best if we don’t know too much more.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Bill, a trifle bitterly. “I for one know strictly nothing, except that my wife, who is perfectly well, is incarcerated in a hospital somewhere in the suburbs, and that Henry is interested in lists of runners at racetracks tomorrow.”

  “And that,” said Emmy firmly, “is plenty. Well, personally, I’m for bed.”

  Ten minutes later, Henry came upstairs. He sat down heavily on the bed, and said, “Help me out of these extraordinary clothes, will you, darling?” He pulled at the blonde chignon, which came off with a shower of hairpins. He smiled, a tired smile. “I must look pretty funny.”

  Emmy did not smile back. She said, “You look dead beat and ill. How’s your shoulder?”

  “It’s OK.”

  “It’s not. It’s hurting you. I can tell.”

  “Well, the painkillers are beginning to wear off. It’s bound to ache a bit.”

  “Hold your left arm up,” Emmy ordered, “and I’ll get the blouse over your head and then ease it round the bandage. The sooner you get to bed, the better. And tomorrow you’re to stay absolutely quiet and—”

  Henry, whose head was enveloped in the silken folds of Jane’s shirt, made an inarticulate sound of protest. Emmy tugged, the blouse came free, and Henry said, “I’m afraid not, darling. Work to do.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Emmy said. “Stand up, and I’ll unzip your skirt. You can have the telephone by your bed and talk to anybody you want—but you’re staying here.”

  “I wish I could,” said Henry, “but it’s out of the question. I’ll stay in as long as I can, of course, but as soon as I know exactly where the action is going to be, I must go there.”

  “To a racetrack?”

  “Yes.”

  “For heaven’s sake, can’t somebody else do it? Someone who isn’t sick?” Emmy laid a hand on her husband’s uninjured arm. “I’m sorry, darling. I do try not to interfere with your work, but this could be really serious.”

  “You’re telling me,” Henry said. “Somebody—maybe several people—could get killed. That’s why I have to be there.”

  Emmy sighed. “I give up,” she said. “Come on, I’ll help you into your pajamas.”

  ***

  The publicity was very smoothly handled. The next morning, sitting up in bed and eating breakfast with one-handed awkwardness, Henry noted with satisfaction the paragraph in the mass-circulation daily paper:

  Chief Superintendent Henry Tibbett of Scotland Yard is in serious condition at Coombefields Hospital today, after a shootout with a gunman at a Wimbledon house last night. Police say a man is helping them with their inquiries. A hospital spokesman told me, “The Chief Superintendent is still unconscious, but we feel that he has at least a 50-50 chance. We will be issuing further bulletins on his condition.” No other details of the shooting are available at this time.

  Henry nodded approvingly to himself. The item was prominent enough to catch the eye of anybody interested, but it was deliberately unsensational. It would hardly grip the average reader. An officer of the C.I.D. was bound, after all, to tangle occasionally with armed criminals. The hospital, while scarcely cheerful, was not despairing. Most important, the gunman had been captured, so law-abiding citizens could sleep soundly. If the paragraph caused any comment, Henry reflected, it would not be so much on the incident itself, as its location. Wimbledon, of all places! What is the country coming to? Why, Aunt Mildred lived in Wimbledon for fifty years—you didn’t get gun battles there in her day…

  Henry’s musings were interrupted by the ringing of the extension phone, which Emmy had plugged in by his bedside. He picked it up eagerly.

  “Yes, speaking… You have? That’s very good work, Sergeant…yes, at once, half a dozen copies…now, here’s what I want you to do. Get on to Wimbledon, and tell them to recall Constable Hawthorn from Coombefields Hospital and post somebody else there instead…no, no, certainly not…he’s to be told I’m too ill to be interviewed…it would be a good idea if Hawthorn and his replacement exchanged a few remarks to that effect when they change over—you never know who may be listening. Then I want you to put Hawthorn into a police car with a driver and send them down here…yes, to this address… officially, they’ve been sent as police protection for my wife, who has received a threatening phone call…no, thank God, but that’s the story, and the driver is to be told no more. Hawthorn himself saw me at the hospital, so he must know I’m not at death’s door…anyhow, I need him for my plan this evening. Try to have a word with him yourself and tell him the facts—he’s a bright young man…yes, as soon as possible…and he can bring the lists with him.”

  Henry’s next move was to hold a bedside conference with Emmy and Bill. Jane was not expected back until lunchtime, as she would have to leave the hospital with departing midday visitors in order to remain inconspicuous. Her unavailability to speak on the phone during the morning was to be explained away by an RSPCA meeting in Middingfield—not an unusual occurrence, according to her husband. It was important, Henry stressed, to have the cover story well worked out, because calls were certain to come. He also gave instructions on how the various callers were to be handled.

  And come they did. As the morning wore on, and more and more of the residents of Gorsemere found time to read their newspapers, enquiries and messages of condolence began to jam the line to Cherry Tree Cottage. Amanda Bratt-Cunningham was the first. Bill spoke to her, explaining that Jane was at a meeting and Emmy too distressed to talk. Yes, Emmy would be visiting the hospital later on, he thought. Well, yes, of course, she had wanted to go at once, but things were rather difficult… “Well,” Bill went on, in a burst of indiscretion, “I suppose I shouldn’t tell you this, but the fact is that Emmy had a threatening phone call early this morning… yes, very upsetting on top of everything else…well, the upshot is that Scotland Yard is sending police protection, and she’s not to leave the house to go to the hospital till her escort arrives… if you ask me, probably a practical joker with a sick sense of humor, but one has to take these things seriously…no, we don’t have any details about what happened…we thought he was at an Old Boys’ Dinner…yes, thank God they caught the man, according to the paper, but that phone call could mean there was another one who got away…yes, of course I’ll tell her…very kind of you to call, my dear…and—” Bill gave an embarrassed little laugh—“if you see a police car outside our house, you’ll know we haven’t fallen foul of the law…quite the reverse… good-bye, Amanda…” And that, reflected Bill, as he hung up, should ensure circulation for that particular story.

  Close on Amanda’s heels came the Reverend Mr. Thacker, and Emmy was persuaded to come to the telephone to receive the consolations of the Church.

  “I do appreciate your thoughtfulness, Mr. Thacker…yes, well, all we can do is hope…it’s most kind of you, but I really think I’d rather be alone for the moment…in any case, I’m hoping to go to the hospital again…oh yes, Jane drove me up to Coombefields last night, as soon as we got the news…not really, it was very disappointing, they wouldn’t let me see him… yes, still unconscious…the doctors made it clear they didn’t want me to stay, and there didn’t seem much point in…yes, they’re going to telephone me…no, we know
no more than you do…as soon as there’s any…no, they didn’t give his name, just that a man was being questioned…and that’s why we want to keep this telephone line free…no, I’ve no idea…I’m sure you understand…good-bye, Mr. Thacker.” Emmy put down the receiver and turned to Bill. “Phew!” she said. “That man has missed his vocation—should have been a journalist. Ah, well, he got his tidbit about the hospital visit last night. I trust he’ll make the most of it.”

  The next caller was Bella Yateley. So kind, distressed, and discreet was she that Bill Spence felt like a heel, having to lie to her. However, orders were orders, and he duly spun his yarn, but without embellishments. No mention of Emmy’s imaginary threatening phone call, no word about police protection. He did not even have to refer to Jane’s fictitious meeting, because Bella did not ask to speak to her. As Bella was about to hang up, Bill said impulsively, “It’s so good to talk to you, Bella. Frankly, the atmosphere in this house is beginning to get me down…of course, nobody’s more upset about old Henry than I am, but moping about here won’t do him any good, and what with the Reverend Nosey-Parker Thacker on the phone every two minutes…no, not yet, but he’ll turn up in person, don’t you worry…look, by opening time I’m really going to need to get out of here and have a quiet beer somewhere cheerful… Why don’t you and Simon meet me at the Bull at twelve?… Surely you can’t be as busy as all that…you’ve got the kennel lad, haven’t you, and it really would be an act of charity…bless you, Bella…see you later…”

  Bella was followed on the line by a few of Henry and Emmy’s closest friends from London—the handful of people who knew where Emmy was spending her holiday. Then, after a short interval, came a call from P.C. Denning. His wife, he told Bill, had seen the news item and was sure it was Mrs. Spence’s brother-in-law, and they both wanted Mr. and Mrs. Spence to know how sorry they were. And the poor gentleman’s wife too, of course. Meanwhile, P.C. Denning was hoping he could have a word with Mrs. Spence about a racing pigeon which had been picked up exhausted between here and Middingfield, and brought in to the station. If Mrs. Spence was about…

  Bill explained about the nonexistent meeting, and assured the policeman that Jane would call him when she came home. The next excitement was the arrival of the police car. The driver parked it conspicuously outside the gate of Cherry Tree Cottage, and informed Bill that his instructions were to remain in or near the vehicle.

  “The very fact that the car’s here,” he explained, “that’s the best protection the lady can have. Anyone with an eye on the house, they’ll know better than to try anything with a squad car right here. My colleague,” added the driver, indicating Constable Hawthorn with a certain amount of patronage, “will go in and interview the lady, and he’ll stay in the house. But the important thing is for me to be outside here, with the car.”

  Bill agreed gravely, and escorted Hawthorn into the house.

  Ever since Henry’s telephone call to Wimbledon Police Station the day before, Police Constable Hawthorn seemed to have been living in a dazed dream. Mrs. Rundle-Webster’s complaint, the chase to Parson’s Drive, the hospital, the embarrassing interview with Chief Superintendent Tibbett, the further vigil in the hospital, the utterly unexpected summons to Scotland Yard and Sergeant Reynolds—all these events seemed rolled into an hallucinatory experience: a sensation which was compounded by the fact that the constable had had virtually no sleep for nearly thirty hours.

  And now, here he was, being escorted into a cozy country cottage by an amiable, red-faced farmerlike character—a cottage which, if Sergeant Reynolds had not been romancing, contained not only Chief Superintendent Tibbett and his wife, but the makings of a dangerous and difficult murder case. For all his ambition to transfer to the C.I.D., Constable Hawthorn had joined the police force more as a steady job than anything else, and because he genuinely liked dealing with people and helping them whenever possible. He had to admit that he had not quite bargained for this sort of thing, and he was not sure that he liked it. As he followed Bill Spence into the hall of Cherry Tree Cottage, clutching the bulky envelope which Sergeant Reynolds had given him, and uncomfortably aware of the hard and unfamiliar outline of the gun under his jacket, he thought with distinct nostalgia of the station office at Wimbledon, the cups of tea and ledgers and parking tickets and traffic reports, and all the familiar routine that now seemed so far away.

  Hawthorn followed Bill up the stairs, and found himself ushered into a cheerfully chintzy bedroom. In the bed, propped up on pillows and with his right arm bandaged, sat the now-familiar figure of Chief Superintendent Tibbett, with his sandy hair and disturbingly direct blue eyes. An attractive middle-aged woman, plumpish and dark-haired, came forward to meet him.

  “You must be Mr. Hawthorn,” she said. “I’m Emmy Tibbett. I think you know my husband.”

  “Er…yes. We have met,” Hawthorn admitted uneasily.

  “Certainly we have,” said Henry. “How tall are you, Constable?”

  “How tall?” In this Alice-in-Wonderland world, nothing surprised Hawthorn any longer. “Six foot one, sir.”

  The Chief Superintendent and his wife exchanged a quick glance. Then she said, “OK. I can do it if Jane will lend me her machine.”

  “Good,” said the Chief Superintendent. Then, to Hawthorn, he added briskly, “All right, young man. Take off your trousers.”

  “But…sir…” Hawthorn was purple.

  Henry grinned. “If you wouldn’t mind, Emmy darling…” he said.

  Emmy grinned back. “Of course. Don’t be too long.” She went out, closing the door behind her.

  “Right,” said Henry. “Now, look lively. Off with your trousers and your uniform jacket. My wife needs them. You can put on that dressing gown that’s hanging behind the door. Then I think you ought to get some sleep. Oh…and I believe you have an envelope for me from Sergeant Reynolds…”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  ELEVEN O’CLOCK. HENRY, with a look of grim satisfaction on his face, was consulting a map of southern England to determine the best route to a country town by the name of Bunstead. Emmy was busy at Jane’s sewing machine. Constable Hawthorn, clad in underpants and an old dressing gown, was sound asleep on Bill Spence’s bed. Bill was making a pretense of weeding a flowerbed, and wondering where Jane was. The police driver, lounging at the wheel of his car, was glaring suspiciously at the character in clerical gray and dog-collar—almost certainly a disguise—who was ringing the front doorbell of Cherry Tree Cottage.

  Blasphemous but unsurprised, Bill Spence put down his trowel, wiped his earthy hands perfunctorily on his corduroy trousers, and went to open the front door.

  “Ah, Mr. Spence…felt I had to come in person to present my condolences…how is poor, dear Mrs. Tibbett?… Such a very trying time for all of you…” Moving like an eel, and warding off discouragements by a smooth flow of pastoral patter, Mr. Thacker was through the front door and into the drawing room before Bill could do anything to stop him. In fact, the next thing Bill knew was that Mr. Thacker was comfortably ensconced in the best armchair, and accepting Bill’s grudging offer of hospitality.

  “Most kind of you…just a very small glass of sherry would be most refreshing…yes, I felt it was my duty to call…of course Mrs. Tibbett is not one of my parishioners, but since she is out of reach of her usual parson, I must do what I can in loco rectoris, if I may put it like that…”

  Bill pulled himself together. “It’s very kind of you, Mr. Thacker,” he said, “but I’m afraid Emmy can’t see anybody. She is resting at the moment. The doctor gave her a sedative,” he added, with a burst of inspiration.

  “Ah, yes…that would be the doctor at the hospital, I presume? She told me she had gone there last night…and then was not allowed to see her husband. So disappointing, a long journey like that for nothing.”

  “Yes, it was disappointing,” Bill agreed stolidly. He measured the smallest sherry on record into a liqueur glass and handed it to Mr. Thacker.

 
“Thank you. So kind. Ah, well, I am glad to hear that your good lady wife is not feeling any ill effects after her nighttime journey…”

  “Eh? What?” Bill was taken off his guard. “My wife—?”

  Mr. Thacker blinked over the rim of his tiny glass, like a surprised owl. “Pray don’t misunderstand me, Mr. Spence. I simply meant that I can hear her busy at work on her sewing machine at this moment…the daily round, the common task… very sensible, and the best way to keep oneself from brooding… if I might perhaps have a word with her before I go…a few details to settle about the fête…”

  Bill, thoroughly flustered, did his best. “Oh…no…no, that’s not Jane…Jane’s in Middingfield…RSPCA meeting, you know…no, that’s…em…that’s Mrs. Denning…she comes in and borrows the machine from time to time…making clothes for the kiddies…”

  As a last-minute inspiration, Bill felt that it was not bad. It was well known that Mr. Thacker and the policeman’s wife had not been the best of friends since the day when Mrs. Denning—who came from an extremely low-church family—had denounced Mr. Thacker’s altar candlesticks and vases of lilies as idolatrous. The memory obviously rankled still, for Mr. Thacker cleared his throat censoriously, and changed the subject.

  “I couldn’t help noticing, Mr. Spence, that there appears to be an official vehicle parked outside your house. I hope that does not portend further bad news?”

  “An official—? Oh, you mean the police car. No, nothing sinister about that. Scotland Yard very kindly sent it, to take Emmy to the hospital as soon as the doctors say that—”