Just as she was preparing to leave, two convoys of police were converging upon the farm. The one, led by the inspector and reinforced by the sergeant, was still on its way, but the other, to her amazement, proved to consist of the householder himself (still carrying his suitcase), a policeman, and an A.A. scout. Both of these were wheeling bicycles.
“Well,” said Mr. Bleriot, upon the arrival of his party at the farm, “you see! I knew she was up to no good. Where is my housekeeper?” he demanded. “What have you done with the pearls? Search the house, you two men, whilst I remain here with the prisoner! Or—no! I will help in the search. Constable, you are in charge of the prisoner.”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” said the policeman, removing his helmet and staring at Laura. “He said you broke in and menaced him with a gun. Have you got a gun?” he continued, as Amos Bleriot and the A.A. man went out and could be heard ransacking rooms.
“Well, yes,” replied Laura, taking it out. “But it belongs to him. I mean, he threatened me with it, and—”
“You take the upstairs!” shouted Amos Bleriot from without. “And look especially in the wardrobe. Search it thoroughly! A pound if you find the pearls still there!”
“Look bad, you know,” said the country policeman to Laura. “How do I know you’re telling the truth about it? He say you have a gun, and sure enough you have.”
“You’d better make a note of it,” said Laura.
“And that’s wholly what I intend,” replied the policeman, disregarding the sarcasm, and taking out his notebook. “What’s the date?”
It took them a quarter of an hour to get all the particulars set out relating to Laura’s possession of the revolver, and, by the time they had finished, the inspector and his party were at the door. The inspector’s knock was preceded by a shout from the scout, who was still busy trying to earn his pound.
“Can’t find nothing in the wardrobe or the drawers and suitcases, sir!”
“You open the door,” said the policeman to Laura, after both of them had waited a minute or two for the householder himself to do so, “and don’t forget I’ve got my eye on you. Seem the gentleman’s gone to sleep in the next room, or something.”
But the gentleman was nowhere to be found, and neither was the bicycle belonging to the A.A. scout. The policeman’s bicycle, although present, was out of commission owing to the unfortunate circumstance of its having big, untidy slashes in both tyres, slashes which had ripped the inner tubing as well as the covers.
The inspector had some remarks to make about policemen who harried foolish but innocent young ladies whilst their real prey slashed bicycle tyres and rode away on borrowed machines. Then he, too, made a search of the house, but beyond the discovery, sworn to by Laura, that Mr. Bleriot must have changed his clothes again, for the tweed suit in which he had made his first departure lay neatly folded on one of the chairs in the study and the suitcase lay open and empty on the table, nothing came to light.
“And that’s that,” observed the inspector bitterly. “A nice mess we’ve made of it. Couldn’t you see the young lady’s explanation had to be believed, and that that fellow was the one to keep the tabs on?” he demanded irascibly of the country policeman.
“No, sir,” said the policeman, respectfully. “But I saw the wanted man, sir. I should know him again.”
“Well, you’d better shove that useless jigger of yours back to wherever you’ve come from and have a look for him,” said the inspector sourly.
“I’m giving up detection,” said Laura, disgustedly, having been compelled to listen to a long lecture from the inspector on the iniquity of, and the probably penalties for, obstructing the police. “I think a change of scene might be a jolly good idea after all.”
She returned disconsolately in charge of the sergeant to the cruiser, in which the patient Alice and the bored but good-tempered Kitty were still patrolling up and down the River Bure. They were glad to see her and she was more than glad to see them. The sergeant’s humorous remarks had been difficult to bear.
“Mind you, ma’am,” said the inspector on the telephone to Mrs. Bradley later, “although the young lady made a mess of it, she’s not done so badly as all that, from our point of view. He can be sworn to by that bat-eyed constable, and if we can find him we can hold him for stolen and damaged bicycles, and all that revolver-pulling stuff. And, of course, we know the old woman isn’t in it. She was just a stooge, and a good one, I should say. She’s been known in these parts all her life. She certainly knows nothing of anything fishy, although it’s taken us all our time getting anything out of her. She’s hard and shrewd enough, but she swears she doesn’t know what this chap’s game was. Just thought he was ‘natural’ she says, and I believe her. Says she was well-paid for being his housekeeper, and that he was very peculiar. He’s only been in the house a fortnight, she says, and has never been out until today. Says he bought the house six months ago, when the owner died, and installed her as housekeeper straight away, although she lived there alone for the following five and a half months. I can’t make head or tail of it, ma’am, but I’m certain she’s telling the truth. I’ve checked up as much as I can from other farms round about, but it doesn’t lead anywhere at all. He may be our murderer. The old woman admits the peddler came to the house last night, but she didn’t hear the conversation and there was nothing I could get her to tell me about the worsted vipers. She doesn’t seem to have seen one. She never reads the papers, because her sight is so bad, and that, of course, may have been to the man’s advantage. If you can throw any light, ma’am, I shall be much obliged. Scotland Yard are sending a man. They’ve identified the third body positively. It’s another street-walker, by the name of Rilitz, and she also attended at that club.”
Mrs. Bradley did not affect to be able to “throw any light,” but sighed with relief to think of her self-appointed assistant Laura Menzies safely in the south of the county harmlessly pursuing her holiday activities with friends.
“Anyway, ma’am,” said the inspector, “there’s one comfort. Your theory that there would be another murder hasn’t proved itself yet. Have a job to, if you saw the cordon I’ve drawn round the district. I’ll back that even a mousehold couldn’t worm its way through without my knowledge.”
“Mousehold?” said Mrs. Bradley. “Why, that was the name used by the man on the island. You remember that story we had from the two boys, Ian and Edward?”
“Perfectly, ma’am. But a mousehold only signifies a ferret round about these parts. There’s plenty of these local names. I’m a Londoner myself, but that’s one of the ones that always struck me particular. You didn’t think that was his name, ma’am?”
Before Mrs. Bradley could reply the telephone rang. The inspector’s face hardened as he listened.
“The fourth body, I presume?” said Mrs. Bradley, as he put down the receiver.
“An elderly man, this time. Found dead in a field. May have no connection with this case. If it hasn’t, I shall get to work on it, and leave this business to the Yard. The dead women are their pigeon, and so is your Mr. Bleriot, come to that. Although what they’ll make of a district like this, unless their man knows it thoroughly, is more than I can say.”
“Who found the body?” Mrs. Bradley enquired.
“Some people named Potter. Just another lot of holidaymakers. This time staying at Cromer. They’ve reported the body at Stalham. Out for a walk, they say, and came upon it on a footpath.” He reached for his pen, looking haggard. “The Chief Constable will take this big,” he added. “He’s been on to me proper already, and the superintendent isn’t too happy, either.”
• CHAPTER 15 •
“I know what ‘it’ means well enough when I find a thing,” said the Duck: “it’s generally a frog or a worm. The question is, what did the Archbishop find?”
—From Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.
The Potters were a cheerful, noisy family, consisting of Mr. Potter, who playe
d golf, Mrs. Potter, who played golf, too, but so much better that they usually played on different courses to keep the peace, Eddie Potter, who liked swimming, boating, and playing the saxophone, and Betty Potter, who liked dancing, tennis, and radio programmes.
Among people with tastes so diverse and family ties so powerful there was always a six-months’ argument about a holiday centre. They did not want to be separated from one another—this feeling was perfectly genuine, and was, in fact, a kind of family religion—and yet each fought hard for a locality in which his or her own particular bent could achieve full scope.
Mr. and Mrs. Potter were often in agreement, for, provided that the place was so situated that two or more golf courses were within easy reach of the hotel, both were perfectly satisfied, and would exchange courses and thereafter gossip about the courses, with a friendly readiness, which held no rivalry. Occasionally, Eddie and Betty could combine, but, whatever the difficulties in the way of a friendly agreement, this admirable family, year after year, surmounted them, and in the end, a happy holiday was enjoyed by all.
The problem was solved in the particular year under review by the choice of Cromer as a holiday resort. Here, as those who have visited it will know, there were golf links adjoining the town, with a choice of further golf links at Sheringham and West Runton. There was, of course, plenty of tennis by the season, the day, the half-day, or even by the hour; swimming was from a firm, sandy shore, and the hotel at which the family elected to stay offered dancing and (for those who liked it) the radio.
Yet it was given to this pleasant, inoffensive party (although not in Cromer itself) to discover the fourth body.
Besides their immediate preoccupations with golf, swimming, tennis, and dancing, the Potters were all fond of what they termed “a stroll.” With them, strolling entailed all the arduous labour of rough walking combined with the necessity, as they saw it, of covering not fewer than fifteen miles in a day.
When they had been at Cromer for just over a week, Eddie Potter suggested, on the morning of the Bank Holiday Monday, a “stroll,” adding the reason, “Everything will be lousy here today.”
“Where to?” enquired his sister, who was still seated at the breakfast table consuming toast and marmalade, for which she had a passion.
“Mundesley.”
“How far?”
“Seven and a half.”
“Good enough. What about Mum and Dad?”
“Said they’d come. Upstairs now, getting ready.”
“Right.” Hastily accounting for the last piece of toast, Betty gulped down the rest of her coffee, tapped a cigarette on the top of the marmalade container, accepted a light from her brother, and went off to change her shoes.
The walk was along the coast. Occasionally it became necessary to go inland because of cliff falls. The walk was enjoyable and successful, so much so that, after they had returned to the hotel, Mr. Potter proposed that they should walk to Mundesley again on the following day and go on to Happisburgh instead of returning by way of Knapton, Trunch, and South Repps as they had done on the previous day.
The walk would have proved to some people, at any rate after Paston had been left behind and the bungalows were becoming a little monotonous, slightly disappointing; but to the admirable Potters the distance walked counted for a great deal more than any incidental scenery. In any case, Happisburgh was well worth visiting, for it was a pleasant old village very close to the sea. Perched on high cliffs, the family studied the view, rested (having lunched in Mundelsey), ate the chocolate they had brought with them, and began to discuss the question of returning to Cromer, a point which had not been referred to when Mr. Potter had made his suggestion for continuing the walk.
They enquired in the village for the nearest railway station, and learned that they could get to a station at Stalham, a walk of about five miles, or to one at North Walsham, but that was a good deal further off. It did not occur to any of the four to ask for a conveyance from Happisburgh. Stalham was the station decided upon, and the indefatigable party set out, carrying complicated directions in their heads about lanes which cut off half a mile, and tracks from which one turned sharp onto the road at the bottom of the hill.
The hill, some fifty feet high, was a landmark, and they anticipated no difficulty in following these directions, particularly as there was nothing more to do, once the sharp turn had been made, except to keep straight on along the road.
They reached the hill and surmounted it, but the information given them had been supplied by people who knew the road so well that they could not envisage the traps it might hold for strangers. The lane, instead of proceeding directly up and over the hill, as the Potters, quite reasonably, had taken for granted it would, descended, after a right-angle turn, to the south before proceeding to cross the rest of the hill to the straight road into Stalham.
“Gone wrong somewhere,” said Eddie, regarding a wide-forking lane with a frown. “Better go left, I should think. The other way seems to go over towards North Walsham, from what I remember of the map.”
This error, pardonable in the circumstances, took the party onto a common, for, almost sternly, it seemed, they proceeded to avoid another road which would have led them back onto their route. They came, however, upon a road from the north which was continued directly southward by a footpath, and this footpath the party, still guided by fate, decided to pursue. They were not particularly tired, and the sun was still high.
Halfway along the footpath they found the body. It was that of an elderly man, dressed in the black, which represents still, among the older generation, the villager’s Sunday best. He was lying by the side of the footpath and in line with it. Near him was a massive walking stick with a crook handle and a silver band. There was no blood on the stick, and Eddie, picking it up with his handkerchief over his hand, pointed out that it was not heavy enough to have made the wounds on the head.
The effects of the discovery of the body were various upon the members of the blameless family. Eddie examined the stick. Mrs. Potter dismissed herself from the business with a howl of acute dismay. Mr. Potter looked and felt sick, but knelt down beside the very dead man with the laudable intention of making certain that he was dead. Betty, an omnivorous reader of detective stories, said sharply, “Get up, Dad! You might disturb some clues. We ought to hurry along and get hold of a policeman or a doctor.”
It was agreed, on this, that Betty and her father should remain beside the body, and that Eddie and his mother should go forward. As it happened, they got into Stalham without further deviation from the track, for the footpath came out into a lane, and that same fate, which had played tricks on the Potters so far, now relented, and caused Mrs. Potter and Eddie to take the right turning instead of a possible wrong one, and they found themselves, within reasonable time, in the village. Here Eddie reported the finding of the body. A doctor and a policeman went back with them. They were all held in Stalham and closely questioned after that. A murder can be as disconcerting, in some ways, to the innocent as to the guilty.
“Still, they seem all right, ma’am,” concluded the inspector, concluding this artless narrative to Mrs. Bradley. “But, of course, we shall have to keep an eye on them, same as on all the people who’ve discovered bodies.”
“Including my three students?” suggested Mrs. Bradley. “I thought I had persuaded you—”
“Routine, ma’am. What do you make of it being a man, this time? A local, too. Well known in the neighbourhood. Seems to have been a fairly harmless old fellow. No reason why anybody should lay for him, so far as is known.”
“Was there a worsted viper on him, Inspector?”
“Funnily enough, ma’am, there was not. And, of course, he’d been killed on the previous day—Bank Holiday Monday. His clothes would have proved that, apart from the doctor’s report.”
“His clothes might have proved that he had been killed on the Sunday, apart from the doctor’s report,” Mrs. Bradley pointed out.
“
Like to go over and see the place, ma’am?”
“I intend to go over and see the place, Inspector. It will be odd if, this time, nothing assists our efforts.”
“About time something did,” the inspector grunted. “I’m getting fed up, ma’am, with hints in the papers it’s time I got a move on and made an arrest. Pity we missed that fellow in the house on the marshes. Might easily be your Mr. Bleriot. Those crack-brained fools! Fancy being had with a trick like that! And we can’t get track of him, either. I’ve had a couple of dozen extra men on duty in Yarmouth this afternoon, but not a report has come in.”
“Not surprising, considering we don’t even know how he was dressed. But I think our murderers have made the mistake of a lifetime.”
“That suitcase business was clever—very neat. What makes you think they’ve slipped up this time, ma’am?”
“First, the fact that they have killed not only a man, but a local man. That seems outside their scope and, I imagine, their plan. Secondly, there is no worsted viper. I think this old man was a potential danger to them. He had seen or heard something which might prove serious for them, and his murder was to a great extent unpremeditated. Of course,” she added, “we mustn’t lose sight of the fact that this may be totally unconnected with the other murders, as you indicated.”
“Murder’s like a disease. It can be catching,” amended the inspector, morosely.
Mrs. Bradley did not accompany him to Stalham. She went by herself next day, joined in gossip at the hotel where she had her lunch and heard from the waitress a story, which had not been given to the police. Even to her it was offered apologetically, although by her mention of gypsies (thinking of the girls’ prisoner), she had asked for it.
The Worsted Viper (Mrs. Bradley) Page 14
