Dark is the Clue: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  Sometime in the 1950s an increasingly fragile Punshon took a dreadful tumble down the landing steps at the Detection Club premises at Kingly Street, an event Christianna Brand vividly recollected many years later in 1979, with what seems rather callous amusement on her part:

  My last memory, or the most abiding one, of the club room in the clergy house, was of an evening when two members were initiated there instead of at the annual dinner [possibly Glyn Carr and Roy Vickers, 1955 initiates]. As they left, they stepped over the body of an elderly gentleman lying with his head in a pool of blood, just outside the door . . . dear old Mr. Punshon, E.R. Punshon, tottering up the stone stair steps upon his private business, had fallen all the way down again and severely lacerated his scalp. My [physician] husband, groaning, dealt with all but the gore, which remained in a slowly congealing pool upon the clergy house floor. . . . However, Miss Sayers had, predictably, just the right guest for such an event, a small, brisk lady, delighted to cope. She came out on the landing and stood for a moment peering down at the unlovely mess. Not myself one to delight in hospital matters, I hovered ineffectively as much as possible in the rear. She made up her mind. “Well, I think we can manage that all right. Can you find me a tablespoon?”

  The club room was unaccountably lacking in tablespoons. I went out and diffidently offered a large fork. “A fork? Oh, well . . .” She bent again and studied the pool of gore. “I think we can manage,” she said again, cheerfully. “It’s splendidly clotted.”

  I returned once more to the club room and closed the door; and I can only report that when it opened again, not a sign remained of any blood, anywhere. “I thought,” said my husband as we took our departure before even worse might befall, “that in your oath you foreswore vampires.” “She was only a guest,” I said apologetically.

  “Dear old Mr. Punshon,” no vampire he, passed through a door to death in his 84th year on 23 October 1956, four years after his elder brother, Robert Halket Punshon. On 25 January 1957 the widowed Sarah Punshon presented Dorothy L. Sayers with a copy of her husband’s thirty-fifth and final Bobby Owen mystery, the charmingly retrospective Six Were Present. “He would like to think that you had one,” wrote Sarah, warmly thanking Sayers “for your appreciation of my husband’s work during his writing life” and wistfully adding that she would miss her “occasional visits to the club evenings.” Sayers obligingly invited Sarah to the next Detection Club dinner as her guest, but Sarah died in May, having survived her longtime spouse by merely seven months. Sayers herself would not outlast the year. As Christianna Brand rather flippantly reports, Sayers was discovered, just eight days before Christmas, collapsed dead “at the foot of the stairs in her house surrounded by bereaved cats.” Having ascended and descended the stairs after a busy day of shopping, Sayers had discovered her own door to death.

  * * * * *

  Dorothy L. Sayers’s literary reputation has risen ever higher in the years since her demise, with modern authorities like the esteemed late crime writer P.D. James particularly lauding Sayers’s ambitious penultimate Peter Wimsey mystery, Gaudy Night--a novel E.R. Punshon himself had lavishly praised in his review column in the Manchester Guardian--as not only a great detective novel but a great novel, with no delimiting qualification. Although he was one of Sayers’s favorite crime writers, Punshon was not so fortunate with his own reputation, with his work falling into unmerited neglect for more than a half-century after his death. With the reprinting by Dean Street Press of Punshon’s complete set of Bobby Owen mystery investigations—chronicled in 35 novels, five short stories and a radio play—this long period of neglect now happily has ended, however, allowing a major writer from the Golden Age of detective fiction a golden opportunity to receive, six decades after his death, his full and lasting due.

  Short Stories by E.R. Punshon

  FIVE BOBBY OWEN detective short stories complement E.R. Punshon’s 35 Bobby Owen detective novels, and these short stories are reprinted, one to a volume, with the new Dean Street Press editions of Punshon’s The Attending Truth, Strange Ending, Brought to Light, Dark Is the Clue and Triple Quest. Although Punshon’s Bobby Owen detective novels appeared over nearly a quarter-century, between 1933 and 1956, the publication of the Bobby Owen short stories was much more concentrated, with the first one, “A Study in the Obvious,” appearing in the London Evening Standard on 23 August 1936 and the remaining four, “Making Sure,” “Good Beginning,” “Three Sovereigns” and “Find the Lady,” in the Evening Standard in 1950, on, respectively, 15 February, 1 August, 17 October and 21 December.

  “A Study in the Obvious” appeared as part of an Evening Standard series devoted to “famous detectives of fiction,” edited by Dorothy L. Sayers. Besides Bobby Owen, fictional detectives included in “Detective Cavalcade” were Sherlock Holmes, Sexton Blake, Raffles, Eugene Valmont, Father Brown, the “Man in the Corner,” Max Carrados, Dr. Thorndyke, Dr. Priestley, Dr. Hailey, Hercule Poirot, Reggie Fortune, Philip Trent, Albert Campion, Lord Peter Wimsey, Roger Sheringham, Ludovic Travers, Mrs. Bradley, Mr. Pepper, Mr. Reeder, Mr. Pinkerton, Chief Constable Sir Clinton Driffield, Inspector French, Superintendent Wilson, Inspector Head, Uncle Abner, Trevis Tarrant, Charlie Chan and Ellery Queen.

  As editor of the series Dorothy L. Sayers warned Gladys Mitchell, who was contributing an original Mrs. Bradley short story, that the Evening Standard “will probably say they want it as short as possible and as cheap a possible! Don’t let them screw you down to 4000 words, because I know they are prepared to go to 6000 words or thereabouts. . . . I have almost broken their hearts by pointing out to them that all the older people, like Conan Doyle and Austin Freeman, run out to something like 10,000 [words] and their columns will be frightfully congested.”

  In her Evening Standard introduction to “A Study in the Obvious,” (2814 words) Sayers wrote:

  E.R. Punshon’s detective novels are distinguished by two things: a delicate, sub-acid humour and a fine vein of romantic feeling. They fall into two groups—the stories about Inspector Carter and Detective-Sergeant Bell, and the more recent series about Superintendent Mitchell and Detective-Sergeant Bobby Owen.

  In this short story . . . Owen—that nobly-born and Oxford-bred young policeman—appears alone, exploiting his characteristic vein of inspired common sense.

  The crime here is a trivial one; those who like to see serious crimes handled with delicate emotional perception should make a point of reading some of the novels, such as “Mystery Villa” and “Death of a Beauty Queen.”

  “A Study in the Obvious,” which appeared the same year as The Bath Mysteries, a Punshon detective novel that delved into Sergeant Bobby Owen’s aristocratic family background, is Bobby Owen’s origin story, showing how he came to be a policeman. Though light, the tale is one of considerable charm that should delight Bobby Owen fans.

  The later Evening Standard stories are shorter affairs, though they are all murder investigations. “Good Beginning” and “Find the Lady” take us back to earlier years in Bobby Owen’s police career, when he held the ranks of, respectively, constable and sergeant. “Making Sure” and “Three Sovereigns” capture something of that quality of what American mystery critic Anthony Boucher called “the obscure destinies that drive [Punshon’s] obsessed and tormented characters,” which so impressed Dorothy L. Sayers about Punshon’s novels.

  Curtis Evans

  CHAPTER I

  THE ATROPOS

  COMMANDER BOBBY OWEN, of the Metropolitan C.I.D., was driving rather carefully down the narrow, twisting main street of the small but quickly growing village of Twice Over, past the old village church, from which the village itself was rapidly receding, preferring perhaps proximity to the railway station to proximity to the church, and so on towards Over Abbey, erected in Victorian Gothic early in the last century on the site of the very ancient, venerable, and once-famous Benedictine Abbey of Over Once, and now the seat of Sir Charles Stuart, well known and prominent in all local affairs.

 
; A little outside the village, but nearer to it than was the Abbey, stood the Old Dower House, dating from at least a century earlier, and if of no architectural pretension, at any rate showing that sense of proportion which seems to have been innate in the master builders and craftsmen of the period.

  It was here that Bobby halted his new Du Guesclin Twelve he had preferred to use on this trip rather than one of the Yard cars. He alighted to open the gate admitting to the long, straight, rhododendron-lined avenue leading to the house. A well-kept garden, he noticed—no trace there of the difficulty often experienced in these days of keeping lawns and flowerbeds in good order. Possibly, though, Mr Willoughby Wynne, the occupier of this attractive little place, looked after it himself.

  Before the front door Bobby halted his car again, and then, as he was in the act of alighting, a young girl came flying out of the house in a flutter of skirts and little cries of delight.

  “Oh, Marty, how lovely!” she called; and then gasped and stood still as Bobby turned to face her and she saw it was a stranger. “Oh, I am sorry,” she said, changing all at once from a whirlwind in petticoats to a dignified and sedate young lady. “I thought it was a friend I was expecting. He’s buying a new car and he said it would be either a Du Guesclin Twelve or a Tiger Ten and he would bring it for me to see, so when I saw it was a Du Guesclin I made sure it was him, and I got so excited; wouldn’t you?”

  “I’m sure I would,” Bobby agreed; “and I’m so sorry to disappoint you. I hope your friend will like his new car as much as I do mine—I’ve only had it a week. I believe Mr Willoughby Wynne lives here. Do you think I could see him for a few minutes? It’s a small matter of business.”

  “I expect he’s in his study or somewhere,” the girl answered. “Stamps, isn’t it? It almost always is. Or chess? I do think they are both so utterly boring, but Daddy loves them. If you’ll come in, I’ll see if I can find him.”

  Bobby did not attempt to correct her assumption that it was either stamps or chess with which his errand was concerned. They were two subjects of which he knew little, except that you could spend a fortune on the one and a lifetime on the other. He produced his card—private, not official. He said:

  “You are very knowledgeable about cars. Not every young lady would be able to tell at a glance a Du Guesclin Twelve from a Tiger Ten.”

  “Oh, but you’ve simply got to know about cars, haven’t you?” she protested. “You couldn’t live without one, could you? Vital.”

  She was an attractive-looking young woman, though not because of any exceptional claim to beauty, or indeed to beauty at all. Her best point was her complexion, which was very much as God made it, owing little to that excessive use of cosmetics by which some girls manage to give themselves so striking a resemblance to a new-laid egg. Her eyes were good, too—of an unusually clear light brown. But her hair could have been fairly described as ‘mousey’, and her features were irregular: her mouth too large and her nose too small. None the less—though this she hardly knew—she often drew an admiring attention prettier girls sometimes missed, and would occasionally find herself sought out in apparent preference to these others. It was a result, one supposes, of a sense of joy in life that she seemed, though so unconsciously, to spread about her, as though every passing moment were a fresh delight. As a baby in its cradle may be seen at times to chortle to itself as with the sheer pleasure of being here at last, so now an incarnate joy this girl appeared, as she almost literally danced up the few steps leading to the front door, and then turned, with a smile Bobby knew was not meant for him but for all existence, to see if he were following. And the thought came suddenly into his mind that this was how life was meant to be for all created things.

  The lofty hall they now entered was paved in alternating squares of black and white marble, the coldness of this effect much relieved, however, by the rich colours of several oriental rugs lying here and there, and by a soft amber light where the late September sunshine penetrated through the glass cupola in the roof. Opposite the door a graceful semi-circular stair, in gilt and iron, rose to a kind of balcony above. On one side a columned alcove sheltered a striking marble statue—of Atropos, Bobby guessed, to judge by the ‘abhorred’ shears she carried and by the darkly grave expression the sculptor had managed to give her. His guide saw how Bobby paused involuntarily to look, for it was indeed a magnificent piece of work. She said:

  “Doesn’t she look a sulky, solemn old thing? I always make a face at her when I remember,” and this, having remembered, she now proceeded to do. “Daddy’s awfully proud of her, though. He found her in an old back-yard somewhere. Genuine Grecian antique by Phidias or someone, and worth pots of money. People write to Daddy to ask if they can come and look at her. Sort of film star in stone. When I was a tiny years ago I used to be scared she might come walking into my room one night.”

  So, chattering happily, she led the way down a corridor into a room commanding a gay prospect over lawn and flowers and shrubs, with in the distance a background of tall tree-tops, now golden with autumn foliage. On this french windows opened, and these were swung widely apart, as though through them the occupant of the room had only that moment left.

  “Daddy can’t be far off,” the girl said. “I’ll see if I can find him. Sit down, won’t you?”

  With that she ran out into the garden, and Bobby watched her as she crossed the lawn so swiftly and so lightly it might well have been she went on wings and not on mortal feet. A corner of the house hid her from sight, and Bobby turned his attention to the room itself, hoping to gather from it, as he always tried to do, some impression of the character of its occupant.

  In this he failed. It seemed to him entirely impersonal, withdrawn, as if inhabited only by some disembodied spirit, a ghost from past times, or even as if it guarded jealously secrets it did not mean any should ever know. A fanciful impression for which he could not account. The room was of fine proportions, the walls panelled in gold and white, with blue-and-white medallions at the corners, the plaster ceiling showing in the centre a gilded floral device. The general effect was charming, though, again, a little withdrawn. It was furnished so impeccably in the style of the period that instinctively the name of a famous firm in Tottenham Court Road came to mind. Even the books on the shelves of a magnificent Gothic library bookcase seemed chosen to be typical of the time, and, closely packed as they were, gave but little the idea of ever being read. Bobby told himself that whoever used the room lived a life entirely apart from it. He found himself beginning to wonder if the complete impersonality of these surroundings did not in itself constitute a clue to the personality of their owner.

  From such rather dreamy thoughts he was abruptly recalled—his back had been to the open french windows as he stood admiring the bookcase—by a sudden conviction that he was no longer alone. He turned quickly. A man was standing just inside the room. The windows he had closed noiselessly behind him as he entered. He appeared to be of middle age, of medium height and build, dark eyes and dark complexion, clean shaven, as are most men to-day. In one hand he was holding both a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles and Bobby’s card. His voice when he spoke was low and soft, and he had a trick of running his words into each other, so that it was not always easy to catch what he was saying. He came forward. He hardly seemed to move, and yet he was suddenly in the middle of the room. He said:

  “Mr Owen, isn’t it? I am Mr Willoughby Wynne. Sylvia tells me you have called on business. Not, I hope, about my Atropos? But won’t you sit down?”

  He waved Bobby to a chair which was either genuine Chippendale or else a remarkably good reproduction, seated himself and waited—waited as if he were prepared to wait for ever, indefinitely and indifferently, with the same unvarying grey patience. Bobby himself knew well how to wait, but he with a controlled force and passion that often brought forth the response that it demanded. The manner of tired attention, as if to what could not possibly be of concern to him, shown by this apparently withdrawn and secret
man was new to Bobby, and he did not think that he much liked it. He produced his official card and handed it to Mr Wynne, who took it, looked at it, laid it down.

  “Yes?” he said, as though well used to visits from highly placed Scotland Yard officials.

  “My information,” Bobby said, beginning to talk more formally, “is that there is a private entrance from these premises to the copse at the back. The copse, I am informed, is the property of Sir Charles Stuart, of Over Abbey, your neighbour, but you have a right of way across it to the public footpath running between it and the fields beyond.”

  “Perfectly correct,” said Mr Wynne. “Yes?”

  “We have reason to believe,” Bobby continued, “that an attempt may be made to-night to recover stolen property of considerable value buried there by the thieves. We are asking your permission to have access to the copse by your right of way. We wish to avoid any risk of attracting attention in the village. It is vital no suspicion should be roused of our presence here, or the attempt may be put off for weeks or even for months.”

  CHAPTER II

  TALE FOR A MORALIST

  MR WYNNE’S gaze had wandered away to one of those blue-and-white medallions at the corners of the ceiling. He might not have heard a word of what had been said, and yet that was certainly not the impression Bobby received. In the same low, toneless voice as before, his aloof gaze still upon that blue-and-white medallion in the furthest corner of the room, he said: