[Mrs Bradley 41] - Three Quick and Five Dead

by Gladys Mitchell

  ‘One of a series?’

  ‘The complete absence of motive worries me, sir.’

  (8)

  Mrs Schumann was a fair-skinned, well-scrubbed woman of about forty-five to fifty. To make Gavin’s questioning appear to be less formal than it actually was, Dame Beatrice invited her to lunch at the Stone House, a bidding which she accepted with pathetic and touching gratitude.

  ‘So kind, so kind,’ she said. Dame Beatrice introduced Gavin first as Laura’s husband, and then, in fairness, informed the visitor of his position at Scotland Yard, but added that he was not directly concerned with the local police investigation.

  Mrs Schumann appeared apprehensive at first, but Gavin’s charm and good looks soon overcame her suspicions, and the talk, during lunch, was on various subjects of general interest. After lunch, however, Mrs Schumann herself introduced the subject which Gavin had been wondering how to approach. She asked Dame Beatrice whether it would be necessary for her to attend the resumed inquest.

  Dame Beatrice passed the question across to Gavin who replied that he thought it probable that she would be wanted as a witness.

  ‘So I shall be required to answer questions?’

  ‘Not difficult questions,’ he assured her.

  ‘Such as? … You see, I am anxious with the police, even after all these many years of safety. We had to leave Germany soon after the Nazis began to gain power.’

  ‘But you’re not Jewish, are you?’

  ‘Oh, no, but my husband was a man of liberal views, a scholar, a pastor, and one of the first, I think, to realise what was coming. So, while it was possible, we left our country. My husband died five years ago. I am glad he did not live long enough to know what has happened to my Karen.’

  There was silence for some moments. Dame Beatrice thought it kinder to her guest not to allow it to go on too long.

  ‘You were wondering what kind of questions would be asked you at the resumed inquest,’ she said. ‘Well, one of the things they may want to know is whether your daughter had any men friends apart from her fiancé.’

  ‘Karen was a good girl, a very good girl. She made friends, men and women friends, at the University, of course, but they are scattered now. She wrote to some of them, I believe, but since she has become engaged to Edward she has not any men friends. It was not at the University that she met him. He is of a serious mind and would not care for her friends, perhaps. Students – well, you know of them, some serious, some lighthearted, but all without much money.’

  ‘And has her fiancé much money?’ asked Gavin.

  ‘Oh, no, nothing but his salary from the school where he and Karen were teachers. Karen taught German and French, Edward teaches history and something he calls R.K.’

  ‘Religious Knowledge,’ said Laura. ‘They used to call it Scripture in my young days; Divinity, if you wanted to sound up-stage.’

  ‘I see. He taught this R.K., he said, from the historical point of view, but, as I did not know what it was, this meant nothing to me. Well, Karen came down from the University and took this teaching post, and Edward was one of the senior masters. Soon, between him and Karen, there was an understanding which turned into an engagement, but Edward did not wish to marry until they had saved money for a house. My husband, you see, brought very little out of Germany, and also left us almost nothing when he died.’

  ‘You say that – er – Edward—’

  ‘Mr James.’

  ‘That Mr James was one of the senior masters,’ said Gavin. ‘Does that mean he was older than your daughter?’

  ‘Oh, yes. It gave me a little anxiety, that. He was the same age, almost, as myself. Karen was only twenty-three when they became engaged, and I asked myself what would happen when Karen was forty-three and Edward sixty-three, and so on.’

  ‘Twenty years is not a serious difference in age, if the parties are compatible,’ observed Dame Beatrice.

  ‘You think that? You may be right. But what I asked myself is how to find this compatibility. Karen was fun-loving, fond of dogs, liking to dance and go to parties. Edward is serious, learned, does not wish to love dogs, does not like to dance, thinks parties a great waste of time and money. He is ambitious. Karen had no ambition, either for him or for herself. I was anxious about them.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Gavin, ‘but, after all, there must have been something. I mean, what do you think attracted your daughter to him in the first place?’

  ‘He is interested in the things her father was interested in. Karen loved her father very dearly. His every wish was her law, always, always.’

  ‘You think, then, that she substituted Mr James for her father?’ asked Dame Beatrice. ‘It is likely enough. I have met such situations many times in the course of my work. But, if she found satisfaction in this substitution, I do not see why you were anxious.’

  ‘I felt she was not awakened, my little Karen. I thought that, some day, perhaps sooner, perhaps later, she would realise that a father-figure is not a lover-figure. You understand me?’

  ‘Perfectly.’

  ‘And you agree?’

  ‘With some reservations, yes, I do, especially when, as in this case, there is some conflict in tastes and outlook. Did you ever speak of these things to your daughter? Did you talk matters over with her and offer her any advice or give her any warnings?’

  ‘Oh, yes, but you could not move Karen once she had made up her mind, so me, I made the best of things, and hoped in my heart that she would be very happy. Edward is a good man. That I know.’

  ‘Did your daughter mind when you sold Fergus to me?’ asked Laura, struck by an aspect of the matter which had not occurred to her before.

  ‘Mind? How so?’ Mrs Schumann sounded surprised.

  ‘Well, I understand he was your daughter’s dog. Hadn’t she bought him from you and trained him?’

  ‘Oh, that! When she found that Edward did not want him, she gave me permission, well, she almost begged me to sell him. I gave her the money you paid me, of course.’ She looked down at the huge dog, who was asleep in front of the fire, and stirred him caressingly with the toe of her shoe. Fergus raised his noble head, banged the floor politely with his tail, and went to sleep again. ‘He is a good dog. He found my Karen in time, before her body was too long above the ground. He knew where to find her. He guarded her. He is a very good dog. He wanted her to be found quickly.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Gavin, ‘that’s a point which I find of very great interest. How could he have known where she was?’

  ‘They have instinct, these hounds.’

  ‘Enough to lead them more than two miles from home to find a body which nobody but the killer knew was there?’ He spoke with what Laura reproachfully thought of as brutal directness.

  ‘It is mysterious, that,’ agreed Mrs Schumann. ‘But what do we know of animal instinct?’

  ‘That it is held by some psychiatrists not to exist,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘They believe that behaviour pattern, not instinct, is a more suitable and exact term to employ. So you cannot offer any explanation of Fergus’ conduct in leaving Laura’s side and bounding away some two miles to where your daughter’s body lay?’

  Mrs Schumann shook her head.

  ‘He was very fond of my Karen,’ she said. ‘More than that I cannot explain. But now, please, the inquest. What more will they want me to tell them?’

  ‘Possibly whether your daughter had enemies and whether you knew of any recent quarrel between your daughter and her fiancé.’

  ‘Two only, all the time they knew one another, and both quarrels so stupid, and not recent, either. One I think Mrs Gavin knows about. I told her when she bought Fergus for her son.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Laura, ‘you mean when your daughter wanted to give her fiancé the dog, and he refused to accept it?’

  ‘Yes, that was the second quarrel. Karen was deeply hurt and disappointed when Edward would not take the dog. She had been training Fergus very carefully and keeping him a secret, and she could not und
erstand that Edward did not want him. She was hurt, and the hurt made her angry. Edward was not very kind or tactful, either. He said that he did not “have time to look after a wretched dog”. He was needing all his evenings and week-ends to study for his further degree. He had his B.A. but he had set his heart on obtaining, ultimately, his doctorate in divinity. There was what one calls in English a flare-up.’

  ‘And the first quarrel?’ asked Dame Beatrice. ‘You mentioned there were two.’

  ‘Ah, that first quarrel! So unnecessary and so ridiculous, I thought. Karen came home one Friday evening and said to me: “I have had a big row with Edward. What do you think he called me? He called me his misguided little Aryan! What do you think of that, mother? His misguided little ARYAN! As though I have ever made any distinction between Germans like yourself” – she was born in England and claimed to be English, you see – “and Germans who are already Jews!” Oh, she was at boiling-point, my little Karen. Of course, she got over it later. Edward had meant it as a joke, he said, not to offend, and he apologised.’

  ‘Why misguided, I wonder?’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘And why Aryan? It is not a word that Englishmen would often use.’

  ‘Is it not?’ said Mrs Schumann. ‘I asked Karen what had occasioned him to taunt her, and she said they had been arguing about religion.’

  ‘A bold thing to attempt when one of the protagonists is a student of theology,’ commented Dame Beatrice, ‘but it might account for his having referred to your daughter as misguided. I suppose you know of no enemies she may have made? Was there anyone on the school staff, for instance, whom she had offended in any way?’

  ‘I know of none. Karen was good-natured and friendly. Whenever I went to functions at the school she seemed to be quite well-liked.’

  ‘When did you speak to her last?’ asked Gavin. ‘Did she live at home?’

  ‘Yes and no. By that I mean the school, it was too far for her to go day by day, so she and two other young teachers – women, of course – shared a flat, and Karen came home after school closed on Fridays and returned to the flat on Sunday evenings. Then, of course, she was with me at holiday times, so my house was her home.’

  ‘Yes, I see. So the last time you saw her was on a Sunday?’ said Gavin.

  ‘Until I was taken to identify …’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course.’

  ‘It makes me sad now to think that I might have seen her again before – before—’

  ‘Please don’t distress yourself, Mrs Schumann. I am only asking a question which is almost certain to be put to you at the next enquiry,’ said Gavin hastily.

  ‘I know. I am sorry. You see, there was a day’s holiday given to the school, following the annual Speech Day. A half-holiday was normal, but there was also another half-day due, so the teachers decided to have the two put together to make a whole day, and Karen telephoned to ask whether I would be at home, but on that day I was going over to Ringwood with my dog Monty to give service to a thoroughbred clumber bitch. It was all arranged, and the bitch was on heat since ten days, so I could not break the contract. If I had not gone, I ask myself, day and night, whether I might not have saved my Karen’s life, for it was on that day, so I understand from the doctors, that she must have died.’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ said Gavin. ‘Whoever killed your daughter would have done so, sooner or later, anyway. It was no unpremeditated action, you know. The message left on the body proves that. It was a deliberately planned murder. You can’t explain the message, I suppose?’

  ‘The very kind policeman, Superintendent Phillips, asked me that. It means nothing to me, nothing, nothing at all.’

  (9)

  ‘So there’s a fiancé,’ said Gavin, ‘and he’s at the same school as the dead girl, and they had a holiday on the day she was killed, and they’d had quarrels. Well, he’d be the man for my money, if I were in charge of the case. I think I could bear to take a look at him. I’m going to find out from Phillips when it will be convenient for us to have another little chat, and at the same time I’ll get him to introduce me to the school. I wish you’d come with us, Dame B., so that we can compare notes afterwards.’

  The headmaster received them in a reserved although courteous manner, but, understandably, was not at all happy about the unwelcome publicity given to his school by the murder of one of his staff.

  ‘Of course you must see Mr James if you wish,’ he said stiffly, when Gavin had produced his credentials and had introduced Dame Beatrice (quite truthfully) as a psychiatrist attached to the Home Office, ‘but I feel sure that he has already given all the help he can, and he is in a sad state about the whole dreadful business, as you may imagine.’

  ‘I quite realise that, but I’d be glad of a word with him,’ said Gavin. The headmaster rang through to his secretary and a few minutes later there was a tap on the door and a tall, middle-aged man wearing pince-nez and a sober, dark grey suit came in and inclined his head with rather affected courtesy towards his headmaster. He then stared in hostile fashion at the visitors. When the headmaster, having performed the introductions, had gone out, Edward James said coldly,

  ‘I presume I may sit down.’ He took a chair. Gavin looked him over.

  ‘I expect you’re tired of being questioned,’ he said, with a sympathetic smile, ‘but I’ve talked to Superintendent Phillips here, and there are just one or two points which Dame Beatrice and I would like to touch on.’

  ‘I don’t know anything more than I’ve already told the police,’ said James, even more coldly than before.

  ‘I am not sure that what we would like you to tell us has any bearing on what you have told the police,’ said Dame Beatrice.

  ‘For instance?’ He raised supercilious eyebrows.

  ‘For instance, why did you once call your fiancée a misguided little Aryan?’

  ‘I have no recollection of having called her any such thing.’

  ‘No, it was some time ago, I believe. However, according to her mother, Miss Schumann took exception to the phrase.’

  ‘Did she? I don’t remember anything about it.’

  ‘Why did you refuse her present of an Irish wolfhound?’

  ‘The obvious reason. I didn’t want the dog.’

  ‘She must have thought you did, surely?’

  ‘I suppose that, knowing she and her mother bred the things, I felt it incumbent upon me to show interest. Her mother, I ought to warn you, has never approved of me as her daughter’s prospective husband, so I think you would be well-advised to treat any statements she makes about me – derogatory statements are what I mean, of course – with very great caution.’

  ‘We are accustomed to treat all statements made to us with very great caution, Mr James, until we are able to get them checked and confirmed,’ said Gavin.

  ‘Oh, yes, of course. I beg your pardon. You will realise that I have been through a difficult time.’

  ‘Quite so. Can you ride a horse?’ asked Dame Beatrice.

  ‘A horse? No. I have never taken riding lessons.’

  ‘A bicycle, of course?’

  ‘I imagine most people can ride a bicycle. I sold mine years ago.’

  ‘You teach history, I believe, and something which is called R.K., and is connected with the Scriptures.’

  ‘Quite so. I am hoping to take a degree in theology. As to history, well, I have to follow the school syllabus, of course, but my special interests lie in the events and trends of the sixteenth century.’

  ‘Ah, yes, the Reformation and the emergence of the Puritans. So a date in the fourth century, for instance, would mean little to you?’ suggested Dame Beatrice.

  ‘355 to 363 would suggest the reign of the Emperor Julian the Apostate, would it not?’ replied James.

  ‘Ah, yes. He, I suppose, would occur to you, as would the sixteenth century you mention, in connection with your theological studies, as well as with history. But you may feel that we are wandering from the point. Now I am sure that you have given
Superintendent Phillips a fully satisfactory account of yourself for the time in question. What I did not ascertain from him is whether you know how Miss Schumann spent that day.’

  ‘Oh, he asked me that, and I told him I did not know. On the previous afternoon we had had an Open Day followed by the prize-giving, and the principal speaker asked, as we had anticipated, that there should be a half-holiday on the following day. As it happened, we were also due for a half-day in honour of a pupil who had saved a child from drowning, but that came in the middle of G.C.E. so the headmaster had put it off and we asked to have it added to the prize-giving half-day. I myself spent the day in the school library, but I have no idea what Miss Schumann did. The girls who shared a flat with her might know.’

  ‘Thank you very much indeed, Mr James,’ said Dame Beatrice, ‘for your co-operation. Perhaps …’ she looked at Gavin, who shook his head to indicate that he had no further questions to ask … ‘perhaps we should now take leave of the headmaster.’

  James left them. Gavin looked at Phillips and raised his eyebrows. Phillips shrugged.

  ‘Not much gets past his guard, I’d say,’ he remarked.

  ‘What was all that about dates in history?’ asked Gavin.

  ‘A shot in the dark,’ Dame Beatrice replied.

  ‘That missed its mark?’

  ‘There are more artful dodgers than have found fame in literature, dear child.’

  Phillips looked gratified.

  ‘Just what strikes me about that smooth alec,’ he said. ‘He can bear watching, I reckon.’

  Dame Beatrice said,

  ‘His response to a question he could hardly have been expecting was prompt, and very much to the point.’

  ‘Well, I suspect him,’ said Phillips sturdily, ‘but I can’t get any further forward. He answers all questions smoothly and even promptly, as you say, otherwise he claims that he doesn’t know or can’t remember. He’s even got an alibi of sorts.’