The Body in the Beck

by Joanna Cannan

  ‘That should be easy,’ said Harriet. ‘Edmund does for weeks at a time.’ She gave a little gulp and raised her long-lashed eyes, wet with tears, to the harassed face of her lover. But for the first time in their acquaintance he gave her no comfort. He said, ‘You’ve chosen Edmund.’ and went out into the hall and shouted, ‘Gloria!’ and Gloria came from the kitchen with a bill discreetly folded on a tin tray advertising a beer unobtainable in Berrinsdale. Francis went up to his room, now smelling sweetly of Harriet, and came down again carrying her pigskin suitcase. He helped her into her coat, followed her out to the yellow car, placed the suitcase in the boot, opened the door for her. The wind, coming down from the pass, blew her black curls about her face; her mouth was the dark red of a clove carnation.

  ‘Well, goodbye, Francis.’

  Under her hands the monstrous car leaped into life.

  ‘Goodbye, my love,’ said Francis.

  A voice behind him said, ‘The inefficiency of the local exchange is beyond belief. I experienced such a long delay in getting through to headquarters that I have only just commenced my breakfast. I had hoped to catch Lady Nollis before she left and thank her for her co-operation and wish her a comfortable journey. From here to Oxford is a long drive for a lady.’

  From a throat with a knot in it, Francis said, ‘She’s a good driver.’

  ‘The police car should be here by now,’ Price fretted. ‘However, I will take advantage of the time-lag by completing the placation of the inner man.’

  ‘I should,’ said Francis indifferently.

  He sat down on the bench hoping for a few moments of solitude, but first came David, with his knapsack on his back and hard blue eyes. ‘Goodbye, Mr Worthington,’ he said woodenly. So I’m losing him too, thought Francis, but a scene with a disillusioned young person was more than he could bear at this moment, so he waved his hand and said, ‘Goodbye, David.’ Then came Dr Ormonde and clapped a surgical dressing on his head, and Meade came to ask if there were any sign of the postman, and Gloria to say that Lady Nollis had left her hot-water bottle with ever such a lovely white quilted satin cover in her bed; and then came Sebastian, to whom Francis said, ‘Go away.’ Sebastian went away at once and in silence, but immediately the police car came into sight, and Price, sucking his teeth, hurried from the dining-room and, after remarking to the driver and the burly sergeant that, if intelligently analysed, their delay would prove to be due to slowness off the mark, he bundled Francis into the back of the car, which the enraged driver set in motion almost before Price had taken his seat. All this and the drive down the dale was ignored by Francis. He was thinking of Oxford in a May-time that would bring wistaria blossoms to his window, bird song to the Fellows’ garden, the shadows of the cedars to the lawns, but never Harriet to call him from ‘the dusty corridors of learning.’ He’d fossilize, of course. Ultimately he’d get like Muswell . . . He was surprised to find that the car had come to a stand-still under the crumbling façade of the Hall.

  ‘Follow me in, Mr Worthington, please,’ said Price and Francis thought that standing by the beautiful sombre building he looked more than usually drab, constipated and mean. ‘Don’t be longer than you need before you join us, Sergeant. I don’t anticipate any trouble, but one never knows.’

  The door was opened by Mrs Patten, dressed as Price had already seen her. Asking for a few moments of her time, Price called her by name and Francis thought: not so fragile, but certainly not a murderess. He looked again, saw the ample bosom, the thin, dispirited lips, the sagging, powdered cheeks, the predatory nose. There were thousands like her, thousands of ungracious untalented undistinguished women passing away the residue of lives, that had come to nothing, in card-playing, boasting and back-biting in country clubs and private hotels. Old trouts, Sebastian called them, but they were harmless . . . yet this was her house . . . she might not be a murderess, but the begging letters must certainly be hers.

  He found himself in the great musty drawing-room, and Price was asking her to call her son.

  ‘Certainly, Inspector, I’ll fetch him. I believe I know what you’ve come about — the unpleasant encounter my boy had a couple of nights ago with an intruder in the grounds. Though all’s well that ends well, I intended to report the incident to the police as soon as my servant comes back from her little holiday. We are not on the telephone and, as I told you before, my boy is extremely delicate and I dare not leave him in the house alone.’

  She went from the room and Francis said, ‘I wouldn’t call her fragile; especially when she’s moving, she looks as strong as a mule. But there are thousands like her . . .’

  ‘That’s always the case, Mr Worthington. It is a commonplace with us that murder is a crime by itself in that there is no murderer type. On the other hand, circumstances may be typical.’

  ‘A threatened livelihood, the livelihood being the begging letters. How could Hawkins have got on to them?’

  ‘Easily. A professional blackmailer has contacts among the servants in large establishments, and, misconduct not being what it was, it may have occurred to Hawkins that the begging letter business would be fruitful ground. He would tell his spies to look out for them, then a bribe to the people at the accommodation address, or even a threat if he happens to have anything on them . . . Hush.’

  Mrs Patten came back and over her shoulder peered the fair and now eager face which Francis had seen distorted into a mask of savagery in the barn. Price looked at Francis, who nodded, a gesture at once confirmed by the young man himself, who, hurrying forward with outstretched arm and pointed forefinger, cried in a high excited voice, ‘Mummy, that’s him, that’s him.’

  ‘Now, Boysie, don’t get excited,’ said Mrs Patten in a soothing tone. ‘This other gentleman is a police inspector, and you must wait for him to ask you questions, and then he’ll deal with everything in the proper way. Sit down beside me, dear.’

  Mrs Patten and her son sat down on the nearest of the sofas. Price said, ‘There are one or two questions I would like to ask you first, Mrs Patten. When did your servant leave for her holiday?’

  ‘It was just a long week-end that I gave her, she left on Friday. I expect her back later today.’

  ‘You seem to be a very indulgent employer, Mrs Patten. If I remember rightly, as recently as April the sixth to the tenth your servant was also on holiday.’

  ‘Is it wrong to be kind?’

  ‘Oh, certainly not. On this occasion, did her husband go with her?’

  ‘No. He has his work on the farm, and William Robertson is not an indulgent employer.’

  ‘Then he was here on Friday night when you found an intruder on the premises?’

  ‘That’s him, Mummy.’

  ‘Quiet, Boysie. No, Inspector. In his wife’s absence, Stefan has been sleeping at the farm.’

  ‘Rather a strange arrangement. You’re very isolated here. I should have thought you would have appreciated some protection.’

  ‘I trust in God to protect me, Inspector.’

  ‘In this case your son seems to have been more than equal to the occasion. I understood that he is delicate.’

  ‘Constitutionally, Inspector. Muscularly he is, as you can judge for yourself, well-developed. All the same, he failed to inflict any serious injury on this’ — she glared at Francis — ‘prowler. He struck him, very pluckily, I think, and the man fell to the ground and lay still and Boysie ran to fetch me. When we reached the yard, the man had gone; probably he had been shamming. We could hear him moving away — indeed, in the bright moonlight we caught sight of him, but when he was off the premises we abandoned the chase, thinking he was perhaps nothing more dangerous than a tramp seeking shelter. My son will identify him if you wish, but I do not see how we can charge him with anything. No doubt you have your own ideas about him.’

  Francis caught Price’s eye and grinned, and Price reddened. ‘Now, Mrs Patten,’ he began, but a soft knock on the door interrupted him. ‘Come in. Yes, Sergeant?’

 
The Sergeant shut the door and stayed by it.

  ‘T’well’s fool oop wi’ water, sir, but Ah mun report a dismantled motor in t’barn. Engin’ number’s obliterated as by filing.’

  Price said, ‘How do you explain this, madam?’

  ‘Easily,’ said Mrs Patten. ‘We do not draw water from the well, so it is usually full. The car has been in the barn for years. It belonged to my late husband.’

  ‘What make of car?’

  ‘An Enslow. But I do not understand why you are asking these questions nor what authority you have for permitting your man to go poking and prying round my premises.’

  ‘I have a search warrant,’ Price told her. ‘We are interested in a missing car, last seen in Berrinsdale.’

  ‘Well, this is not a missing car. It is my late husband’s. When he died I did not care to part with it, so it was laid up in the barn. Owing to the depravations of rats and mice, we have been obliged to destroy the upholstery.’

  ‘When did your husband die, Mrs Patten?’

  ‘In nineteen thirty-five, Inspector.’

  ‘That,’ said the sergeant, ‘ain’t no nineteen thirty-five model. Mooked oop though it ’as been, you can see there’s been an ’eater in it and the gear change is on the steering wheel and the body’s one of them you can’t tell if it’s coming or going.’

  ‘How do you account for that, Mrs Patten?’

  ‘I don’t need to account for it, Inspector. Our family — I say ‘our’ because my husband and I were first cousins — has lived here since the days of Queen Elizabeth and it is unthinkable that our actions should be questioned by a little jack-in-office coming snooping for the first time in his life into the dale.’

  ‘I suppose it was Gilbert Patten who built the house,’ said Francis. ‘He quarrelled with one of Leicester’s young men over a girl called Mary Brewer and . . .’

  Price interrupted. ‘We don’t want a history lesson now, Mr Worthington. Mrs Patten, is it a fact that you support yourself on the proceeds from begging letters, purporting to emanate from persons in distressed circumstances, but actually from your own pen?’

  ‘What nonsense. Where did you get that idea?’

  ‘From information received. Is it also a fact that you make use of an accommodation address at Gas Lane, Pressborough, from which, at regular intervals, you collect the replies?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Price. ‘I regret to inform you, Mrs Patten, that I am not satisfied with your answers and I must ask you and your son to accompany me to the police station for further questioning.’

  ‘No,’ cried Boysie then and leaped to his feet. ‘No. No. Mummy, it’s your fault — you promised they’d never find out. I won’t go.’

  ‘Boysie, be quiet,’ said Mrs Patten. ‘Inspector, can’t you see that you’re upsetting my son?’

  ‘People are bound to get upset in a murder case, Mrs Patten. In view of his unwillingness to be questioned, my only course is to take you both into custody, and I must warn you that anything you say may be used in evidence.’

  At a glance from Price, the sergeant stepped towards Boysie, but with an incoherent sound the young man sprang behind the sofa on which his mother was sitting and, seizing a bronze statuette of Pallas Athene from a console table, held it above his head, a formidable weapon. The sergeant prudently stood still. In a gentle melancholy voice, Mrs Patten said, ‘Be careful, gentlemen. My son was born a killer. Even in childhood he did away with all his pets. He is not responsible for his actions; no court will hold him so, and if I tried to protect him from the consequences of his mad actions, who will blame a mother?’

  ‘You told me to do it. You made me,’ Boysie screamed.

  ‘All that will have to be straightened out in court. Now come along, both of you,’ said Price.

  ‘I won’t go. I won’t,’ sobbed Boysie, backing to the wall and brandishing the statuette.

  Francis said, ‘Come on, Boysie. You’ve got enough on your conscience. Put that down.’ He walked round the sofa and held out his hand and Boysie gave him the statuette and said, ‘You’re the one I hit with the spanner. Mummy was ever so cross because I didn’t kill you, but you’re nice, I like you, and I’m glad I didn’t now.’

  ‘Well, you go along with Mr Price and the sergeant,’ said Francis. ‘They’re both nice men. They won’t be cross at all.’

  ‘Thaat’s reet,’ said the sergeant, taking his cue. ‘You coom along o’ me, laad, and never mind your ma.’

  Linking his arm in the half-wit’s and uttering words of encouragement, he led him from the room. Price said, ‘Now, Mrs Patten.’

  Mrs Patten said, ‘You don’t expect me to go without a coat and hat, I presume.’

  ‘Certainly not, madam. You may fetch what you require, but under the circumstances I shall be obliged to accompany you upstairs. An officer from the local headquarters will be coming to take charge, and I understand your maid will be returning later, so you will able to send for any necessary requirements should we detain you for any length of time.’

  ‘That you will not,’ said Mrs Patten and left the room. Francis said, ‘Can I go now, Inspector?’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Price. ‘Excuse me now. I hope later to adequately express my thanks for your co-operation.’

  To avoid the sight of the police car and its melancholy cargo, Francis left the house through the red baize door and the stone corridor, where the scullery tap could still be heard dismally dripping. It was over, he told himself, and there was no reason to feel like a Judas: Boysie, unfit to plead, would go to Broadmoor; he could never be brought as a witness against his mother, and to a charge of accessory after the fact she would plead mother-love and wring the withers of a sentimental British jury. That he detested Price and now wished that Boysie had got him with Pallas Athene was off the point: it was not to the man that he had delivered those poor misfits, but to his office. David, sensible fellow, would be only too glad that an opportunity to help the police had come his way, though his pleasure in telling the story to his family and workmates might be a little dimmed by the fact that at the same time he had learned things about the Skipper which entirely changed his opinion of that hollow man. Sebastian, in spite of the smaller role he had played, would be shattered that such things could be. He’d look for comfort, and what could you tell him but that the life of man is hideous, that but to think — to think of the prisons and the asylums and the slaughterhouses — is to want no further part in it, that with all his fine consciousness of good and evil, the example of his saints, the teaching of his sages, man is still the dark ape from which beast and bird hurry to save themselves? Through the gap in the wall Francis stepped out on the fellside and there beyond the shining mere stood the hills steeped in sunshine, Silver Screes, and High Hoister, Stone Fell and the Pike, and between them the pass, and of course it is all due to the cooling down and contracting of the earth, but who among those that climb the hills believes it — you can debunk the hills, but not their gifts to you, not the heart of joy, the lifted spirit, the faith that the pass leads on. The Arrowhead tomorrow, thought Francis; that’ll sort out young Sebastian better than I can, and even you, my Harriet, my love, my grief, how small your form, how faint your voice as we climb up and up towards the sun . . .

  *

  III

  Price came back to a late dinner. ‘I was sorely tempted to send a car for my goods and chattels while I remained to enjoy the fleshpots of the local metropolis,’ he said as he joined the sprawled assembly in the smoking-room. ‘I decided, however, that such a course would be hardly compatible with the appreciation I feel for the co-operation I have received from all you ladies and gentlemen, including the two no longer with us, to wit, Lady Nollis and Mr Brown; it would scarcely be playing cricket, I told myself, to leave you in ignorance of the termination of the affair. Those of you who read detective fiction must, I am afraid, be disappointed that the mystery was solved purely by chance and not by some intricate deduction
on the part of a superbrain.’ Humorously he tapped his forehead. ‘But I can assure you that if the fickle goddess had not intervened to shorten our labours, it would have been no brainwave of mine, but the patient and thorough investigation, for which our police force is famous, which would finally have apprehended our criminals.’

  Meade said, ‘How?’

  ‘How? It would take me all night, Mr Meade, to describe the intricacies of the vast network which can be drawn about the location of a crime.’

  ‘I can’t see any network, vast or otherwise, catching those two,’ Meade said sceptically. ‘They’d disposed of the corpse very neatly; if they’d thrown it in the well, it would have stank them out: found in the mere, its nearness would have drawn attention to them, but who would suspect an elderly lady and her ‘invalid son’ of carrying the body of a full-grown man halfway up the pass in a snowstorm? They’d got the car well hidden and could get rid of it at their leisure. If Worthington hadn’t taken it into his head to shin up the Dragon’s Tooth as he calls it . . .’

  Dr Ormonde said, ‘It might have been solved from quite a different angle. The accommodation address in Pressborough — wasn’t that a chink in the armour?’

  ‘Indubitably,’ said Price. ‘Mrs Patten herself believes that Hawkins had some hold over the couple who provided it proprietors of a slummy little shop where bets are taken and probably stolen property received. No doubt he’d milked them dry and all they could offer him was other people’s secrets. At my instigation, that is being enquired into by the Pressborough police.’

  ‘How —?’ began Meade, but at the same time Sebastian said, ‘Has Mrs Patten confessed, then?’

  ‘Confronted with the begging letters, she admitted writing them. But she sticks to the story that she told in your presence, Mr Worthington: that the murder was entirely unpremeditated, the blow being struck while she was out of the room, getting her cheque-book. The boy says Mummy gave him a piece of iron and told him to hide behind the curtains and jump out and kill the gentleman as soon as she said, ‘Very well, I’ll pay you.’ In my opinion, that’s true, but it’s no good to us. He’s certifiable.’