Dead or Alive: A Frank Garrett Mystery

by Patricia Wentworth

  Bill stared at the printed name—Mr Robin O’Hara. Then he turned the card over and sat up straight.

  “Why do you think this card came out of the drawer?”

  “Because there’s about half a packet of Robin’s cards there.”

  “Get them, will you? I’d like to have a look at them.”

  She brought him the narrow yellow box, still loosely folded in its white wrapping-paper. The lid came off and the cards ran out upon the wide arm of the chair. A single glance was enough. He said sharply,

  “I thought not. That card never came out of this box—at least not this year, Meg.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He held up the card which she had given him.

  “Look! This isn’t a new card out of a box—it’s a card that’s been knocking about in somebody’s wallet. Look at the colour beside one of these. And look at the corners—worn—you see?”

  Meg saw. It was impossible to help seeing what was so evident once it had been pointed out. But it didn’t seem to her to make any difference, except that this worn card was more of a witness to Robin’s presence than a brand new one would have been. It had been with him through these months of absence. He had touched it and handled it. She knew just where it had lain in his wallet. And with that she had a sudden stab of terror, because Robin’s wallet had come empty out of the river a year ago.

  The telephone bell rang, and went on ringing. Even after she had put the receiver to her ear, it went on upon a ghostly thrumming note. She shook the instrument and said, “Hullo!” She shook it, and the note went on buzzing in her ear. Then all of a sudden it stopped, and a man was speaking.

  “Is that Mrs O’Hara?”

  Bill heard her say “Yes,” and then “Oh yes, I am.” And after that, “What is it?… Oh yes, I could.… Yes, I think I’d rather.… Yes, twelve o’clock would be all right for me.” She rang off and turned round to Bill.

  “That was the bank manager—Robin’s bank. He wants to see me. He won’t say why.” She spoke in a slow, troubled voice.

  Bill laughed a little.

  “I should say at a guess you’re overdrawn.”

  She shook her head.

  “I haven’t got anything to overdraw. It’s not my bank—it’s Robin’s. I’ve never had an account there.”

  “Then it can’t be anything to bother you.”

  She said, “I don’t know,” letting the words fall slowly. And then, “Will you come with me, Bill? I don’t want to go alone. You see, the only think I can think of—the only reason he might want to see me—is something to do with that packet I told you about. I was to open it in the manager’s presence if Robin was dead. It might be something to do with that, and it if is, I would like you to be there.”

  Bill shook his head.

  “It won’t be that, Meg—he’d want legal proof before he’d let you open it. But of course I’ll come.”

  He made her have a cup of coffee and something to eat on the way. His relief at seeing how much better she looked after the food and the hot drink was off-set by exasperation and distress. If she wasn’t starving herself, a cup of coffee and a bun wouldn’t bring her colour back like that. He cursed the conventions with all his heart. They permitted him to take Meg out and feed her, but forbade him to finance her so that she could feed herself at home. At least that seemed to be Meg’s point of view.

  They were shown into the manager’s private room. He rose to greet them, shook hands, and asked them to be seated, with an air of brisk efficiency. Meg’s introduction of Bill as an old friend who was helping her with her business affairs was received with a hard look which only just fell short of being a stare. Not, Bill thought, a genial person, in fact a good deal the reverse, but efficient, undoubtedly efficient. A little man with black hair and a cocksure carriage of the head. He leaned forward in his chair, facing them across the table, and rapped upon his blotting-pad with the fingers of his left hand. It was rather as if they were a class and he was calling it to order. He said,

  “I have asked you to come here, Mrs O’Hara, because I was anxious to know whether you can give me any information with regard to your husband.” His eyes were sharp on Meg’s face. They saw her wince.

  She said, “But, Mr Lane—” and then stopped. Her eyes went to Bill.

  Bill leaned forward.

  “Mrs O’Hara, on the advice of her friends, is about to ask leave to presume her husband’s death. We believe that it will be granted. There is—evidence which has lately become available.”

  Mr Lane transferred that very direct gaze of his to Bill.

  “Evidence of Mr O’Hara’s death?”

  “Yes.”

  “What kind of evidence?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say, but the application will undoubtedly succeed.”

  Mr Lane looked down at his blotting-pad. There was for a moment a certain effect of rigidity. It seemed to Bill as if he had just heard something which surprised him very much, and that he did not wish to show that he had been surprised.

  The effect passed. He looked up again at Meg and asked quickly,

  “Then you have not seen your husband lately?”

  It was Bill who said, “Of course she hasn’t!” And after than Meg answered in a wavering voice,

  “Oh no!”

  “Or heard from him?” said Mr Lane quite unabashed.

  “Mr Lane,” said Bill, “Robin O’Hara disappeared over a year ago. Evidence is now available to show that he met with his death by misadventure at the time of that disappearance or a little later. Now may I ask what you are driving at?”

  Mr Lane said, “Certainly.” He leaned back in his chair and addressed them both. “A week before he disappeared Mr O’Hara deposited a packet with us for safe custody. He told me that it contained papers of considerable importance, and that he wished to safeguard them by imposing some very stringent and unusual conditions. He wrote those conditions down and insisted that we should both sign them. The conditions were as follows. During his lifetime the packet was only to be surrendered to him in person, he himself signing for it in my presence. In the event of his death, it was to be surrendered to his wife, who was similarly to sign for it in my presence. The packet was then to be opened, and she was to consult with me as to the disposal of the contents. I have no idea what the packet contains, except that Mr O’Hara once informed me that he was doing government work of a confidential nature, and I concluded that the papers about which he was taking such precautions had some connection with this work. When Mrs O’Hara informed me that her husband was missing, and that it was feared he was dead, I told her what I am now repeating. I added that I considered myself bound by the conditions under which I had accepted the packet, and that it would therefore be necessary for the death to be proved legally before I could consider that the second of the contingencies provided for had arisen.” He spoke with an air of being pleased with his own lucidity.

  Meg said “Yes?” in a faintly inquiring voice.

  Bill said, “Well?”

  Mr Lane went on speaking. He leaned forward. His delivery became less measured, and he tapped on his blotting-pad to emphasize a salient point.

  “I will now come to my reasons for wanting to see you, Mrs O’Hara. At ten o’clock this morning, as soon as the doors were open, I received a letter asking me to deliver to the bearer the packet deposited by Mr O’Hara.”

  “What?” said Bill. Then he looked at Meg. She was very pale indeed. Her hands clasped one another tightly. Her face had a pinched and horrified look. He saw her try to speak, and he saw her fail. He asked what she had not been able to ask.

  “A letter? You say you had a letter. Who wrote it?”

  The manager opened a drawer on his left, drew out a thin sheet of paper, and laid it down on the blotting-pad before him.

  “It was signed by Mr O’Hara,” he said drily, and once again his eyes were on them both with that look which was not quite a stare.

  Meg spoke then. Sh
e said,

  “Robin—” in a small quivering voice.

  “Robin O’Hara,” said Mr Lane briskly. He lifted the sheet of paper and passed it across the table.

  It was Bill who took it—an ordinary sheet of typing paper with yesterday’s date and no heading—a brief typed note:

  “Dear Sir,

  Kindly hand over to bearer the packet which I left in your charge just over a year ago.

  Yours faithfully

  Robin O’Hara.”

  The noticeable ornamental signature with its upward thrust stared from the white paper. Bill stared back at it. When Meg put out a hand he gave her the letter. Their fingers touched. Hers were very cold. He thought they were too stiff and cold to shake.

  She read the letter through and put it back on the table. Mr Lane picked it up. None of them had spoken a single word.

  The silence went on until Bill said bluntly,

  “What did you do?”

  Mr Lane tapped the blotting-pad.

  “There was only one thing I could possibly do.”

  “You refused?”

  Mr Lane’s manner became rather more reserved.

  “I wrote a line to Mr O’Hara reminding him of the conditions which he had himself laid down, and asked him to call for the packet at his convenience.”

  Meg made a sudden movement.

  “Why did you want to see me?” she said, her voice low but perfectly controlled.

  “Because,” said Mr Lane, “to be quite frank, Mrs O’Hara, I wanted to know whether you had any knowledge of your husband’s whereabouts, and I also wished to ask you for your opinion of this signature.”

  Meg’s eyes widened. She took up the letter, looked at it for a long time, and then gave it to Bill.

  “It’s Robin’s signature,” she said.

  After one quick glance at the manager’s imperturbable face Bill reversed the sheet and studied the signature upside down. Mr Lane’s hand offered him a magnifying glass.

  “Satisfy yourself. I see you know how the ordinary forgery is done.” He turned to Meg in explanation. “Forgers usually turn a signature upside down and copy it stroke for stroke as if they were drawing. A magnifying glass will show where the pen has been lifted. But if this is a forgery, it wasn’t done that way.”

  Bill had been looking through the magnifying glass. He put it down now and said,

  “No, there’s no break.”

  “None at all,” said Mr Lane. “I naturally subjected it to a careful scrutiny. May I ask whether you were familiar with Mr O’Hara’s signature?”

  “Yes—we were at school and college together.”

  “And you would say that this—”

  “I should have said that he had written it, if I didn’t know that it was impossible.”

  “And your reason for supposing it to be impossible?”

  “I have told you—I believe O’Hara to be dead.”

  “And you, Mrs O’Hara?”

  “I—don’t—know,” said Meg in a faint, steady voice.

  There was a pause. Then Bill said,

  “The man who brought this letter—what was he like?”

  “District Messenger,” said Mr Lane drily. “His instructions were to take the answer back to the office. I asked him to describe the person who had commissioned him, and he gave a description which might have applied to Mr O’Hara.”

  “What did he say?” said Meg quickly.

  “A gentleman in a blue suit and a bowler hat—not out of the way tall, but taller than some. He couldn’t say whether he was dark or fair, he hadn’t noticed. He supposed he might have noticed if the gentleman had been very much one way or the other. He couldn’t say what colour his eyes were. The gentleman was a very pleasant gentleman. He said he’d call back at the office for the answer.”

  “Not a very useful description,” said Bill. “It would fit a good many thousands of people.”

  Mr Lane nodded.

  “Exactly. I did my best to check up on it by instructing one of the clerks to follow the messenger.”

  “You did?”

  “With very disappointing results,” said Mr Lane. “The clerk followed him all the way to the office and hung about there for some time. When the messenger came out again, he made some excuse and asked him about the answer. Well, the boy said the gentleman had met him outside the bank, so he had given him the answer there. It must have been just before the clerk came out. He couldn’t add anything to his description except that the gentleman was a real gentleman and had tipped him five shillings.”

  “I see,” said Bill.

  Chapter Twelve

  “What does it mean Bill?” said Meg as they walked away.

  “I don’t know,” said Bill Coverdale.

  “It was Robin’s signature.”

  “It looked like his signature. But I’m asking why the letter should have been typed, or why it should have been written at all. You see, Robin evidently considered the packet very important. He laid down those very strict conditions about its surrender, and he would know perfectly well that the manager couldn’t go back on them. That packet wasn’t to be handed over to anyone except Robin in person or you in person—Robin, if he was alive, or you if he was dead. Now nobody who had made those conditions would be likely to have forgotten them.”

  “Robin might,” said Meg. “You know, Bill, he took things up for a bit and—and dropped them.” That was what Robin had done with her, taken her up and—dropped her. Her breath caught for a moment, but she went on. “He ran things hard, and then—lost interest. They were everything one minute and nothing the next. He might have made those conditions and forgotten them—I do really think he might.”

  Bill frowned over that. He said,

  “I doubt it. But if he’d lost interest enough to be hazy and indifferent about the packet, why should he want it at all? And if he did want it, why not write a holograph letter, which he must have known would carry a great deal more weight than a bare signature? It seems to me that there’s only one possible reason for that letter’s being typed, and that is that the forger knew he could fake a perfect signature, but was afraid to risk anything more. Did you ever know Robin to type a letter?”

  Quite unexpectedly, Meg said, “Yes.”

  “When?”

  “He got a typewriter about a month before he—went. It was a new toy, and he was typing everything.”

  “He didn’t take it with him?”

  “No—I sold it the other day. But you see, he might have typed this letter. And if he didn’t, who did, Bill? That’s what I keep asking myself. Who sent me that paper? Who has been into the flat—twice, and each time left something to make me think Robin is alive? Who is it, if it isn’t Robin?”

  She was so pale that he put his hand on her arm.

  “We’re going to have lunch. We can’t talk like this in the street. It’s early still, so we’ll get a quiet table if we come in here. Then I’ll tell you what I think.”

  She followed him into one of those small lunch-rooms which have multiplied during the last few years. It was painted in primrose and green—green walls, green floor, green ceiling; primrose linen, primrose china; and waitresses in primrose smocked with green, pretty girls with the air of amateurs at a charity bazaar. There was a table in an alcove which promised privacy.

  The prettiest waitress brought them soup in porringers and withdrew. The soup was good and hot. Meg was very glad of it. She felt shaken and bewildered. She waited for Bill to tell her what he thought, and Bill waited to see her colour come back, because just now in the street he had been afraid that she was going to faint.

  When the porringers had been taken away, and a chicken and mushroom stew had been set before them in a primrose casserole, he said,

  “You’ve got to eat before we talk, and when we’ve talked I’m going to put it across you, so you’d better brace up and have a good lunch, because you’re going to want it. I’m feeling pretty fierce.”

  He got a smi
le which shook him a little. Meg said aloud,

  “You’re frightfully good to me, Bill.”

  In her heart she felt, “Why have we got to go on like this? It’s been so long—I’m so tired. Why have we got to go on talking about Robin? I’m too tired to go on. He was cruel. I’m young—I want to be happy. Perhaps Bill doesn’t love me any more—perhaps he does.…” The thoughts went to and fro in her mind while she listened to Bill talking about Ledstow, and the Professor, and Miss Cannock. She was glad that he didn’t want to go on talking about Robin until she had eaten something and got rid of that muzzy feeling in her head. You ought to be able to live on dry bread, but when you are not used to it you get an uncomfortable sort of feeling of being too light. Ever since yesterday she had felt as if there wasn’t anything really to prevent her floating slowly up into the air. It was difficult to think clearly when you had this sort of feeling.

  She ate her stew, and the law of gravity resumed its normal action. Bill insisted on cheese, biscuits, and coffee. By the time they had come to the coffee Meg had herself in hand again. It wasn’t any use being a coward and not wanting to talk about Robin, because they’d got to. And it wasn’t any use saying “I can’t go on,” because whatever happened you had to go on, and if you had a scrap of decent feeling, you kept your head up and tried not to make things hard for other people. There was no point, for instance, in harrowing Bill. With all her professed uncertainty as to the state of his affections, Meg was sure that it would be terribly easy to harrow Bill. She must therefore be sensible, practical, and a number of other things all rather difficult. What she didn’t guess was that her strained courage tried Bill Coverdale higher than her tears would have done. It was so obvious that she was holding on to it with every bit of her strength, and he wanted so terribly to take her in his arms and let her cry there.

  “Perhaps we’d better talk now,” he said. “Now, Meg—we’ve got to talk quite plainly or it’s no good talking at all. Let’s start with the packet. I’ve got a hunch about that packet—I’ve got a feeling that it’s very important. Just listen a minute. You say, who sent you the marked newspaper with the letters spelling out ‘I am alive’? You say, who’s been twice in the flat and each time left something there to make you think that Robin is alive? The first time it was the word ‘alive’ laid out with slips of paper on the hearth-rug. The second time it was one of Robin’s visiting-cards. Now I want you to cast your mind back to what was going on when those things happened. The first thing, the newspaper, was in January, wasn’t it? And when you told me about it you said Garrett had been urging you to see a lawyer. I asked you if you had seen one, and you said no, because things had begun to happen, things that made you believe that Robin was alive. Garrett had been telling you he was dead, and then this marked newspaper came along and made you think what the person who put it in at your letter-box wanted you to think—that Robin wasn’t dead. And you didn’t go to your lawyer.”