Dark is the Clue: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  “Yes, I know,” Bobby said sympathetically. “All right. I’ve met Mr Kimms once or twice. Very efficient officer, too. Not that there’s much to be done for the moment, till the routine stuff has been finished. Must lay the foundations first of all. Luckily neither Sir Charles nor Mr Wynne will disappear. The Over All Arms will have Mr Dowie’s address, so it shouldn’t be difficult to find him—unless it’s false. If you have his fingerprints you can find out at once if he has a record—on tap at Central. There’s the spade, too. That might help if you can trace where it was bought. Maxton lives here, doesn’t he? Is he on the ’phone? If he is, he might be got hold of and told Inspector George would like to see him.”

  But Mr Wynne shook his head.

  “His place—Hidden Cottage, he calls it—is a long way from here: two miles or more. It’s right inside a small wood. Mr Jones, at Weston Fields farm, is his nearest neighbour, and I believe he has an arrangement with them to take messages for him. I expect if you rang them, they would send it on. I’ll get their number.”

  He got up and left the room, so quickly and quietly the other two hardly knew that he had gone. Bobby said:

  “You’ve found nothing to identify her by, Inspector? No papers or anything?”

  “Not a thing,” the Inspector answered. “Handbag missing. Question is—was there a hundred pounds in it, as reported in earlier case?”

  “There’s always that to remember,” agreed Bobby.

  “If she’s the one Mr Wynne saw,” the Inspector continued, “where was she between then and her visit to the copse, and why did she go there?”

  “To wait for someone she expected, or else to watch who came,” Bobby said. “That’s fairly plain. She must have known something.”

  “Yes, sir,” agreed the Inspector. “Only what? Doctor says he thinks she’s been dead about twelve hours and he can’t be more precise till he’s made a closer examination.” The Inspector paused, looked cautiously at the door, lowered his voice: “Mr Owen, sir, what do you make of Sir Charles saying Mr Wynne knew where the body was and led you and him up to it?”

  Bobby was saved the necessity of replying by the return of Mr Wynne, a slip of paper in his hand.

  “That’s the Weston Farm ’phone number,” he said as he gave it to the Inspector.

  “I hope he hasn’t done a bunk,” the Inspector said. “Very nice respectable young gentleman, as far as we know, and must have a bit of money of his own, not having any proper job, Jenkins says, only writing books and such like.”

  “I think we’ve troubled Mr Wynne long enough now, don’t you, Inspector?” Bobby asked, glancing at his wrist watch. “If he agrees, I suggest we let all arrangements made for tonight stand, in the hope that someone or another may turn up nosing after these buried pound notes. Possibly Rogers. He may have nothing to do with the murder, know nothing about it, and come along to-night as our information suggests he meant to. If he does it will probably mean he’s innocent, and he may be able to put us on to the right man. Rogers may be the suspicious character reported at the Over All Arms. Having a preliminary look round. If, as is likely enough, he has been talking about the Post Office van robbery and part of the stolen stuff being buried hereabouts, one or more of his pals may have been trying to cut in ahead. I’ll get on to our people at Central and ask them if they can learn anything of his recent movements. I’ll ask them to send one of our chaps who knows Rogers—I think young Ford does—to wait at the Twice Over station and see if he can spot him arriving by train. Crooks always use cars nowadays, though. Plenty to do, Inspector, even if it’s all mere preliminary clearing the ground. Will it be all right, Mr Wynne, if I come back later on, after dark, and slip into the copse by way of your garden door? I shall probably have one man with me, but not more, and meanwhile Mr George will be putting some of his men on watch on the other side of the copse. If anyone does come we must take care they don’t get away.”

  “Of course; anything I can do to help you may rely on, anything at all,” declared Mr Wynne in his quiet, confident way, and both Bobby and the Inspector expressed appreciation of such willing co-operation.

  These preliminaries settled, the two of them departed. The interval before Mr Kimms arrived Bobby spent first in putting through a call to Scotland Yard, informing them there of what had happened, explaining that he had been asked to wait till Mr Kimms arrived to take over, adding that it was at present intended to carry on with the earlier arrangements in the hope that someone might appear in the copse on a hunt for the buried notes. If so, he would of course be held for questioning, and might be able to give valuable information. Bobby also asked that steps should be taken to verify the address given by the vanished Mr Dowie to the Over All Arms and now obtained therefrom. He asked also that Detective Constable Ford might be sent to keep watch at the Twice Over station.

  After that, he and Inspector George had a hurried meal together and then retired—coffee accompanying them—to the private room Bobby had asked for. There they were presently joined by Superintendent Kimms, a tall, taciturn man whose prolonged silences appeared to be due either to deep, concentrated thought or else to a total absence thereof—Bobby was not sure which. In the war he had been a Regimental Sergeant Major, and possibly had come to rely too much upon established routine, which indeed is generally a very safe guide, even though at times it is necessary to throw it out of the window.

  “An unholy mess,” was the brief comment he made on his arrival, and then he sat down and waited for one of the other two to continue.

  “All tied up somehow with what first brought Mr Owen here,” Inspector George suggested; “and first thing, to my mind, is to concentrate on identifying deceased.”

  “Yes,” agreed Kimms and waited.

  “It may prove difficult,” Bobby said. “A woman who tangles up with crooks may easily disappear without anyone worrying or coming forward to say anything. More prudent not to. A normal woman is sure to have friends or relatives to start inquiries sooner or later.”

  Mr Kimms nodded acquiescence and continued silent.

  “To my mind,” said Inspector George, “there’s odd things about all five concerned, requiring explanation.”

  “Five’s a lot,” pronounced Mr Kimms.

  “So it is,” agreed Bobby.

  “Too many by half,” said Mr Kimms, and, stirred to unwonted eloquence, added: “What I like is to find a straight line and stick to it.”

  Bobby agreed enthusiastically. Inspector George said:

  “Five straight lines in this affair.”

  Again Bobby agreed, but Kimms said with authority:

  “None of ’em straight.” He paused, and Bobby for a moment feared he was going to retire again into silence and thought—or no thought. Instead Kimms said: “Have to spend all night hanging round the copse.” Again he paused, silent and meditative. Then, while the other two waited, unwilling, or too respectful, to break in on this contemplative mood, he said slowly: “Hope it doesn’t rain,” and Bobby perceived that when Kimms’s silent thought blossomed into words, they were words of weight and wisdom.

  After these exchanges, talk became brisker. Kimms was given a fuller account of recent events. He listened silently, but Bobby felt now that every detail was being assimilated in the slow-moving, ponderous, but effective machinery of Kimms’s mind. The one question he asked was when Inspector George had finished his story. Then Kimms turned to Bobby and put the same one that George himself had posed earlier.

  “What do you make,” he asked, “of Sir Charles saying Wynne knew all the time the body was there but wanted him to find it?”

  “Probably only neighbourly ill will,” Bobby answered; “but to be remembered, all the same. Sir Charles himself suggested it might be Wynne trying to dodge the fuss and worry. Wynne does seem to dislike publicity.”

  “Even if so,” said Mr Kimms, after giving this due consideration, “there’s implications.”

  “So there are,” agreed Bobby. “Not all of Mr Wy
nne shows on the surface. He told me that what Sir Charles inherited under his aunt’s will didn’t come to very much—three or four thousand at most after mortgages and death duties had been settled.”

  Kimms looked at George to indicate he was to answer, as being better acquainted with local affairs, and George said:

  “A tidy bit, all the same—three or four thousand,” and to himself he thought how nice it would be if he possessed even half that ‘tidy bit’.

  “But,” Bobby objected, “he must be living at the rate of at least that much a year?”

  “That’s right,” George agreed. “Very free-spending gentleman. Makes him much respected. What they said hereabouts at the time was that an uncle of his in America he didn’t know much about had died suddenly and left him all his money.”

  “I’ve often heard of long-lost uncles in America with a million or two in their pockets turning up unexpectedly, but it’s the first time I’ve come across one in real life,” Bobby observed thoughtfully. “Just about the time of this first P.O. van robbery, wasn’t it? At the end of the 1914 war, too, when everybody was thinking so much about the good days coming there wasn’t much time to think of anything else.”

  “Oh, well,” said George and looked startled.

  “Implications there, too,” pronounced Mr Kimms.

  CHAPTER VIII

  IN THE DARK

  THE SOMEWHAT UNEASY silence that followed on these remarks was broken by a knock at the door, and there appeared Sergeant Jenkins.

  “Message from London, sir,” he said. “Just received by ’phone. ‘Re Detective Constable Ford, same detailed for duty at Twice Over station, as per request to hand. Re suspect Dowie, same not known at address given, being small boardinghouse. If fuller description received, further inquiries will be made as desired’.”

  “False name and address given,” said George. “What for?” and, getting in first this time, he added: “More implications there, too.”

  “Further,” Jenkins said, with a reproachful glance at his Inspector for interrupting him, “re Maxton. Information now to hand that same was seen in car on London Road, proceeding London way, about four this afternoon or a little later.”

  “Making a get-away and no time lost,” said George. “I would never have thought it.”

  “Implications again,” Bobby put in, scoring for the first time.

  “Too many of ’em,” said Kimms. “By a long sight,” he added.

  “That’s right,” agreed George.

  Jenkins coughed to indicate he still had something to say. When they turned to him, he continued:

  “Re deceased. Dr Harrison reports by ’phone he can place death of same as taking place not earlier than eleven p.m. and not later than two a.m.”

  “That reminds me,” Bobby said. “Mr Wynne has since told me his daughter saw a light in the copse the night before the murder as she was going to bed. Last night Wynne himself heard a cry. Miss Wynne woke up too, but she went to sleep again. Wynne was lying awake reading. A habit of his. Doesn’t amount to much, but it may work in later.”

  Kimms looked at his wrist watch and then at Bobby.

  “Best get moving,” he said. “Growing dark. Ready?” he asked George.

  “All ready,” George assured him. “All concerned warned to move to posts as arranged at nine-thirty.”

  “I’ll drive round by the station,” Bobby said, “and collect Ford as soon as the last train is in.”

  He was however a little late, and when he did arrive he found Ford waiting disconsolately outside a station being somewhat hurriedly closed for the night by a staff eager to get back to television. But he cheered up at the sight of Bobby and explained he had seen no one in the least resembling either the missing Dowie or the expected Rogers or anyone in any way of ‘suspicious appearance’.

  “The ticket collector said he thought they were all locals,” Ford added and went on: “I had no instructions how to proceed. I was thinking of walking on to the village to report from there.”

  “Our next proceeding,” Bobby informed him, “is to seek a certain copse where we shall sit all night in the most damp and uncomfortable conditions possible on the very slim chance of a certain badly wanted man turning up there. Which he won’t.”

  “Very good, sir,” said Ford, for, though young in the Force, he already knew full well that most of a detective officer’s life is spent waiting in the most uncomfortable circumstances for something that never happens.

  “Well, hop in,” said Bobby, “and look cheerful.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Ford, but obeyed only the first of these injunctions.

  “Got your sandwiches?” Bobby asked. “What is a detective without sandwiches? Just a hollow sham,” he answered himself.

  “Yes, sir,” Ford assured him. “Ham and beef, sir. And a thermos. Coffee.”

  “Good,” approved Bobby. “Hot? Strong?”

  “Yes, sir,” Ford repeated. “Very. Trust the missus for that. And a drop of whisky in a pocket flask. Trust me for that.”

  “Bad,” said Bobby, disapproving. “Coffee’s a stimulant. Whisky’s a soporific—all right before you go to bed when you expect a good night in, but not so when you have to keep awake.”

  Little familiar though he was with the roads in this neighbourhood, Bobby drove back by a circuitous route, so as to avoid passing through a village all agog with the news of what had happened and all on the look-out for fresh developments. Possessing as he did a good sense of direction, he managed to reach his destination without going too far astray. Some three or four hundred yards from the Old Dower House he parked the car in a conveniently dark spot by the roadside, whence he and Ford completed their journey on foot.

  There were lights showing in the house, but nothing to suggest they had been heard. Making a circuit to the right, they reached the door admitting them to the copse and left open as arranged. Here progress was more difficult, the darkness more complete under the close-growing trees. Near the loganberry bush where the unknown woman’s body had been found Bobby halted.

  “As likely a spot as any,” he said in a low voice. “Bury what you want to find and plant a loganberry bush on top. Easy to remember, easy to find, and the only bush of its sort nearer than Wynne’s garden. Any implications there?”

  Ford said he didn’t know, and they proceeded to settle down as comfortably—or uncomfortably—as circumstances permitted. Slowly the slow moments passed, adding up as they did so into hours that seemed to pass more slowly still. The night was dark and as silent as night ever is when a faint, chill wind rustles the tree-tops and the small things that love the protection of night’s cloak emerge to grow busy with their private affairs.

  In the distance the church clock struck midnight. Bobby began to work out how many seconds, minutes, hours, had yet to pass before their vigil could be written off as both useless and completed. Ford had dropped off to sleep. Till now Bobby had let him sleep, since that one should keep on the alert was sufficient. But now he poked him in the ribs to wake him, for a faint, cautious footstep was becoming audible, or so Bobby thought, but one coming from the wrong direction—that of the Old Dower House, not from the side of the copse along which the public footpath ran and whence access was so much easier. Bobby hoped it was not Mr Wynne, come out to see what was going on. Not likely, for Mr Wynne seemed an incurious man. But now the footsteps seemed to be passing to one side, as if they had purposely left the right-of-way path or else gone astray. All at once came an outbreak of shouting, of electric torches flashing, of men running. Bobby began to run himself. Someone ahead of him on the right-of-way path was making at headlong speed for the unlocked garden door. In spite of the delaying, treacherous darkness, the fugitive, Bobby, Ford close behind—all three of them—managed to keep up an unchecked speed. Another man dashed out of the bushes just behind Bobby and joined in the chase, between him and Ford, whom collision with a tree-trunk had momentarily delayed. Presumably one of Kimms’s men—or an accomplice
or companion of the fugitive? Bobby was close upon the foremost runner now. Bobby could afford to run the faster, the less cautiously, since any obstacle or impediment should hamper or delay first the man in front. The garden wall loomed ahead, a faint shadow in the night. Bobby was now close upon the fugitive’s heels, as the newcomer in the race was close on Bobby’s. Of him Bobby took no heed; indeed, in the heat of the chase was hardly aware of him. Now Bobby flung out his hand and plucked at the other’s shoulder. At the same moment the man behind Bobby, making a sudden spurt, was able to throw himself forward on Bobby’s back. Taken by surprise, Bobby went down, his assailant on top of him, while the so nearly captured fugitive shot away in the dark.

  “Got him,” shouted Bobby’s assailant.

  “Got you,” Ford panted, jerking him off Bobby. “Got the cuffs on him neat as one o’clock,” he said, complacent, and to Bobby he said: “Not hurt you, has he, sir?” To his captive, he said: “Now, now; language like that won’t help you.”

  Bobby thought he knew the voice in which the ‘language’ was echoing through the night air. He switched on his torch.

  “Oh, you,” he said.

  “Take ’em off,” bellowed the fettered victim, holding out his wrists.

  “It’s Sir Charles Stuart,” Bobby said to Ford. “Lives at Over Abbey.”

  “It was him helped his pal to get away,” Ford said, unimpressed, for he had never heard either of Sir Charles Stuart or of Over Abbey.

  By this time Inspector George and one or two other of his men had arrived, and there was a babel of confused explanations before it became more or less clear what had happened.

  “A lot of police barging about my land without a word to me,” shouted Sir Charles, making his booming voice heard above all else. “Trespassers all of you.”