The Man Who Grew Tomatoes (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  “That does not mean that he murdered him. It only means that it matters to him that Paul and Stephen Camber died.”

  “What do we do now, anyway?”

  “You are to instruct me in the art and craft of salmon-fishing, child.”

  “Why?”

  “It was while he was fishing for salmon that Paul Camber was drowned. As I make my perfect cast, something may come to me…”

  “Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful…”

  “…to give me the exact knowledge which I lack. Have you anything better to suggest?”

  “Yes, I have. As I see it, the next thing to do is to bombard this Wayland with shrewd and penetrating questions until he lets fall some pearl of truth which will either incriminate him or lead to the real murderer.”

  “We are not in a position to bombard him. No, no. The salmon-rod and some unbiased, well-informed instruction are what I require, not to speak of waders, a fish-basket, and the wherewithal to gaff the salmon when I have it safely hooked.”

  Laura, always willing and ready (as she herself expressed it) to try anything once, entered into the spirit of the thing and began, on the following morning, to initiate her employer into the mysteries of the greased line, the dry fly, the upstream cast, and the lure.

  “Funny thing,” she remarked chattily when they had been into Strathpeffer and, upon the expenditure of a considerable sum of money, had armed Dame Beatrice with the requisite materials for her newly-chosen sport, “but, as salmon are thought not to feed in rivers (although some aver that they do), nobody really knows why they go for the bait.”

  “An interesting life-cycle, that of the salmon,” Dame Beatrice responded. “I have been reading about it. It would be incredible if it did not happen to be true. From alevin to parr, from parr to smolt, from smolt to grilse, and from grilse to fully-grown salmon; from river bed or spawning redd, from trout-like hue to silver, the cock from silver to a sullen red, the hen from sheen of silver to dull lead…”

  Laura looked at her with the suspicious gaze she kept for her employer’s wilder but more knowledgeable poesies.

  “Hm!” she said. “You ought to get more sleep instead of doing so much reading in bed.”

  Dame Beatrice leered at her.

  “I did not wish you to begin with a complete Philistine who had no conception of the honour which was about to be paid her,” she said. “I could go on, for I have studied my subject closely, as you observe.”

  “No, no. I expect I’ve read it all somewhere. Salmon are ugly brutes. Stupid, too. This insistence on re-visiting their birthplace seems to me a compulsion neurosis of the dimmer, more inexplicable kind. It’s morbid. You’d think they’d choose bigger and better rivers rather than those in which they happened first to have seen the light. Salmon lack vision and are uninstructed in the American way of life.”

  “Not Canadian salmon, child. And now, what about some sherry before lunch?”

  They went into the small cocktail bar. This, at the Hydro, was a mere slip of an ante-room partitioned off from the immense entrance hall in which were displayed cases of trout and salmon, each item brass-plated with information of its weight, its successful opponent, the date on which it had been caught, and the exact location of the battlefield on which it had met defeat.

  Stuffed olives, just before lunch, were more to Laura’s taste than stuffed fish. She led the way to one of the small, inconvenient, rickety tables in the bar, established her employer in the slightly less uncomfortable of the chairs, and took the two steps necessary to reach the bar counter. Returning with two charged glasses, she almost ran into Wayland, as the passage between bar and tables was so narrow.

  “Hullo! Join us,” she said hospitably. “What will you have?”

  “No, no, thanks, thanks,” said Wayland. “But I’ll sit at your table if I may.”

  “Good chance to pump him!” hissed Laura, behind her hand when she had put down the glasses and was seated. “Do you want me to take my drink elsewhere?”

  “I think we might all go into the lounge,” said Dame Beatrice. “It is unpleasantly claustrophobic in here.” She grinned with crocodile duplicity at Wayland when he turned from the bar to set down his glass. “What do you say, Mr. Wayland? Shall we withdraw?”

  Wayland asked the barman for a tray, set the three glasses on it, and jerked his head towards the door.

  “There’s nobody in the lounge,” he said. “We can have a very cosy conversation and you can pump me as much as you like. I’ll be very glad to swop information with you, provided that you’ll agree it shall be a swop and not merely a come-clean on my part.”

  “At present I am not prepared to make such a bargain as you suggest. I am here on official business. You, I imagine, certainly are not. You are dreeing your own weird, I take it. Well, Mr. Wayland, on one point I can reassure you. I am as interested in the deaths of Paul Camber and his son as you are. And now…”

  “Yes?”

  “Is your name really Wayland?”

  Wayland stared at her.

  “Well—yes, it is,” he replied, “in a way.”

  “That seems a cautious answer. Would you care to enlarge upon it in any way?”

  “You asked me whether it was my name. Well, here you are, then. Part of my name, a long time ago, was Wayland. How’s that?”

  “Excellent. Before I tell you why I am interested in the deaths of Mr. Paul Camber and his son Stephen, I am going to tell you that I can guess the rest of your name, the name by which you were known in the village of Camber and at Camber Abbey.”

  “Oh? I don’t see how you can guess, but you seem to have done. Still, need we go into that? Walls have ears! I see that you know who I am; but to have it broadcast might interfere with what I am trying to establish.”

  “And that is?”

  “That, in coming up here, Paul Camber was running away from his conscience and his responsibilities. What do you say to that?”

  “I say that I am certain Paul Camber’s son was murdered and that I am prepared to go to all lengths in order to find the murderer and expose him. As for you, Mr. Wayland, when you talk about Paul Camber’s conscience and his responsibilities, you are not, I take it, making any reference to the death of Stephen Camber?”

  Wayland smiled, but it was a bitter grimace. “I mean that Paul, I am almost certain, was the father of the Beresford girl’s baby,” he said.

  “You may well be right. Farmer Beresford would agree with you, I think.”

  “I wish I’d known that at the time, before I gave in my notice.”

  “Or were dismissed, you mean.”

  “Dismissed?” Wayland frowned, put down his glass, and leaned across the table. “Paul Camber, as you seem to know, did his utmost to ruin me. I let him talk me…”

  “Bribe you…”

  “I let him talk and/or bribe me into doing a damn-silly thing and he made capital out of it in a way I hadn’t suspected he might. Oh, I bought it! I’m not whining. All the same…”

  There was a long pause while Wayland picked up his glass and twirled it thoughtfully. He did not attempt to complete his remark, but added, at last, “What makes you suspect that young Stephen Camber was murdered?”

  “I do not suspect it. I am certain of it, Mr. Wayland. What is more, you share my belief and you have a definite idea that you could name the murderer. Come, now. Our aims are identical. Tell me what you know.”

  “If I knew, I think I would tell you. The trouble is that I don’t know. In any case, it’s too late for the information to be of the slightest value. Besides, if I’m not careful, I myself could be shown to have a motive—the sort of thing, at any rate, that the police would consider to be a motive…”

  “Not a motive to kill Stephen, but a reason for revenging yourself on Paul—yes, yes, I had thought of that. You would do better to trust me, Mr. Wayland.”

  “Maybe. Later on, perhaps I will. But there are other things to do first.”

  “Up her
e in Scotland?”

  “Well, I feel I’ve exhausted all other possibilities.”

  “You are looking for something, perhaps?”

  Wayland stared at her.

  “I’m looking for evidence, the same as you are.” He swallowed what was left in his glass, pushed it aside, rose from the table, and walked unsteadily out of the lounge.

  “He can’t be tight!” observed Laura, gazing after him. “Is he ill?”

  “Time will show, child. Meanwhile, let us go in to lunch, and then I must speak to the manager again.”

  “Why? Are we going to complain?”

  “No, no. It is an excellent hotel. But come with me, by all means. A witness may be most useful. Besides, your presence will reassure Mr. McKintyre. He, I am astounded to observe, is inclined to change colour at the sight of me. I cannot imagine why.”

  “Guilty conscience. I expect he is always wondering how soon his sins will find him out. He knows your reputation, I have no doubt, and will have discovered by this time that you are attached to the Home Office.”

  “I told him so, therefore that should scarcely trouble him. Will you take Scotch broth, followed by Scotch beef?”

  “Certainly. And cheese as well as a sweet at the end. I always eat like a horse when my foot is on the heather. When are we going fishing?”

  “This afternoon, as soon as our interview is over.”

  There was no doubt that the manager looked uneasily at Dame Beatrice when she entered his office after lunch. She seated herself in a proferred chair.

  “I trust,” he said, “that you are comfortable here, Dame Beatrice?”

  “Oh, very. This has nothing to do with the hotel. May I rely upon your discretion, Mr. McKintyre?”

  “Surely, surely.”

  “From our previous conversation you will have realised that I am here upon an important mission. I now want to know whether Mr. Wayland, a guest staying in this hotel, was also present when the late Mr. Paul Camber was with you.”

  “No, he was not.”

  “Could you say whether he was in the neighbourhood?”

  “I could not say that.”

  “He seems to have clear knowledge of the exact spot where Mr. Camber fell into the river.”

  “He was not known to anyone here, but, no doubt, if he was hereabouts at all, he would have read the account in the newspapers.”

  “Ah, yes. Have you ever had another person of the same name staying here?”

  “No. It is a name I should remember. Wayland? No, no, I am sure not.”

  “Had Mr. Paul Camber ever stayed here before?”

  “Oh, yes. He was not a newcomer. We had had him twice before. That was one reason for our being so upset about his death.”

  “Did he not bring his son with him on previous visits?”

  “No. He told us about him and promised to bring him when he was older. A delicate laddie, we understood, and not ready for the rigours of our northern climate.”

  “He usually came earlier in the year than he did this last time, then?”

  “Much earlier. In April, both times, but nearer the end of the month.”

  “Was he ever accompanied by his wife?”

  “No, no. His wife had been dead for some years, we understood.”

  “He invariably came here alone, then?”

  “Yes, he came here alone. I was surprised when Mr. Smith joined him.”

  “I understand that this hotel owns the fishing-rights on the Osseuch water and that all guests have permission to fish there?”

  “Certainly, certainly.”

  “And what were some of those questions in aid of, please?” enquired Laura, when they had left the sanctum. “You’ve never thought that Hugh Camber ever came up here with Paul, have you?”

  “No, child, but, now that we know he did not, colour is lent to his claim that he had not seen his cousin since Stephen Camber’s christening. It only lends colour, of course. It is no sort of proof. I did not expect that Mr. Verith—to give our Mr. Wayland the rest of his name—would have been here, and on friendly terms, with Paul Camber. Their quarrel about the girl Beresford would prevent it. Well, well, let us array ourselves for the task in hand, and then George can convey us to the river. I do not feel that I shall need my waders today. My rod and tackle will be sufficient. Tuition in casting, as I am armed with a twelve-foot salmon-rod and an oil-dressed silk line, should be sufficient for the first afternoon, without my trying to catch fish.”

  “Wonder who else will be down there?”

  “If there is anybody else on the river, I shall not fish today, unless, perchance, we should meet Mr. Wayland Verith at the Falls.”

  “What do you really think happened to Paul Camber up here?” asked Laura. Dame Beatrice told her to use her intelligence. Laura disdained to reply to this suggestion and soon they were on their way. They were fortunate enough to find the rocks beside the rushing, tumbling river quite deserted.

  “Let’s go up on the bridge, for a start,” suggested Laura. “There’s nothing to get your cast entangled with up there.”

  It was a very narrow suspension bridge and it spanned the river just above the grandest part of the falls. Dame Beatrice declined to use it except for crossing the river.

  “I shall cast from the opposite bank,” she said. “It is fairly open there and will suit my purpose better than if I tried first from this side. It is delightfully sheltered in this gorge. There is no wind to speak of. It should make my task very easy. I wonder what the weather was like when Paul Camber and his son met their deaths?”

  “What game are you playing?” demanded Laura. Dame Beatrice cackled in a secretive way and replied:

  “You had better come and see.”

  They made their precarious way by the path, which was blocked by smooth rocks and rough boulders, to the high, narrow bridge. It swung and swayed as they walked. They paused, half-way across, to admire the view which was almost too picturesque to seem quite real. When they reached the opposite bank, which, unlike the one they had left, was grassy and spongy, Laura repeated her question.

  “This game,” said Dame Beatrice. She took the rod which Laura had been carrying and, to the mingled consternation and amusement of her secretary, ignored the hook which Laura handed her and took from her pocket an old leather glove. From this she extracted a hook with which, thought the startled secretary, she could have caught a shark.

  “Now,” she said, handing the rod to Laura, “I want you to place that hook on that black rock on the opposite bank.”

  “Good heavens!” cried Laura, who did not lack intelligence. “So that’s your idea, is it?”

  The gorge was narrow and the hook, considering its size, seemed to be unnaturally light. Laura took her stance, her left leg braced but not stiff, her right knee slightly bent, raised the rod, and gave the classic backward flick which brought the line under control. Then, as the rod reached the vertical, she let the line extend behind her and then flicked forward. It was a beautiful cast and it landed on the rock which Dame Beatrice had indicated.

  “That’s it, then,” said her employer. “I just wanted to prove that it could be done.”

  “But where did you get such a hook?”

  “I had it specially made and brought it with me. I have more, but we shall not need them, and, as I see someone approaching, that is just as well.”

  “So you don’t want to learn salmon-fishing after all? I am deeply disappointed,” said Laura. “In any case, I don’t see why we bought you those waders. It would be far too dangerous to step into these rapids.”

  “Not where Paul Camber was drowned, child.”

  “Ah, but the river was probably a great deal lower at that time of year, you see. Remember, it was high summer.”

  “Well, anyone who could make a cast like yours would have had no difficulty in reaching the other side of a narrow Norfolk dyke, so, if we have found the right answer, we know how—”

  “Look!” said Laura in a very
low tone. In a deep pool, some ten yards from a particularly heavy waterfall, lay a beautiful fish. Laura whipped off Dame Beatrice’s monstrosity of a hook, substituted one she herself had brought, baited it with a salmon-fly which, when submerged, resembled not a fly but a small fish, and cast.

  The salmon was bored and the bait offered the attraction not of food but of fun. It was a beautifully clean-run fish although it had come a good long way up the river. It took the fly. Laura, born and, to some considerable extent, bred in the Highlands, forbore to strike at once. She knew the danger of too precipitate an action. She waited for the familiar heavy tug on the line and, when she felt it, she struck. The great fish, instinctively (it seemed) realising that his only chance was to break the line, attempted a rush upstream, but Laura, manoeuvring him with the skill learned from salmon-fishing father and brother, kept him from the rocks and played him in the comparatively quiet water under the bank. It was a long battle.

  “Gaff!” she gasped, as she drew the tired fish in. Dame Beatrice said:

  “Hold him. I’ll do it.” And she did.

  “Well!” said Laura, gazing ecstatically at the prize. “What luck! But why did you pretend you knew nothing about salmon-fishing?”

  “I have never fished for salmon. My second husband was a keen fisherman, however, and many a meditative hour have I spent in his society, watching, in my dutiful, wifely way, his efforts. I did learn to help him with net and gaff, but my skill extended no further. How do you propose to get your remarkably fine capture to the car? Would you like me to bring George to your assistance?”

  “All right, then, but take care how you go. Those rocks on the other side are pretty slippery. Then you’ll stay in the car, won’t you? There’s no point in your coming back again. George and I will cope.”

  The salmon was acclaimed at the hotel. When the exclamations and the compliments were over and the great fish had been sent to the kitchen, Dame Beatrice sought still another audience of the manager.