Dead or Alive: A Frank Garrett Mystery

by Patricia Wentworth

  Meg looked at him with startled eyes.

  “You mean—”

  “Wait a minute. The next thing was someone coming into your flat and laying out the word ‘Alive’ on your hearth-rug in slips of writing-paper. That was in February, and it happened just after you made up your mind to go and see Mr Pincott after all. You had written to the Professor and been told that he wasn’t attending to his personal letters, so you got desperate and made an appointment with Mr Pincott—and right there you came home and found those letters on the hearth-rug. And you didn’t go and see the lawyer that time either.”

  “I couldn’t,” said Meg. “Bill, I couldn’t.”

  Bill put out a hand and drew it back again.

  “That is exactly what you were meant to feel. Then in July you lost your job, had another shot at the Professor, failed, and once more screwed yourself up to seeing Mr Pincott. You didn’t get as far as making an appointment with him that time—did you?”

  “No—I hadn’t time.”

  “And before you had time someone put what might have been one of your own envelopes in at your letter-box. There was nothing inside except a leaf—a maple leaf—and on this leaf someone had pricked out the word ‘Alive.’ And you gave up the idea of going to see Mr Pincott.”

  “Bill—”

  “Wait a minute. Now we come down to the present day. I come along, and I urge you to see Pincott. Garrett urges you to see Pincott, and says his people will back you up in an application to presume Robin’s death. What’s the result? Someone walks into your flat in the middle of the night and leaves Robin’s visiting-card on a polished table which has been carefully cleared and put bang under the light where you can’t miss it—all very melodramatic and impressive. Now, Meg, think—think hard! What’s at the back of all this? Someone who doesn’t want you to get proof of Robin’s death. Why? What happens when you get your proof—what is the first thing you do? You go to the bank with it, and you and the manager open the packet which Robin tied up with such very strict conditions. That’s where we get down to brass tacks. I don’t know what’s in the packet, and you don’t know what’s in the packet—but someone does, and that someone is prepared to go to pretty dangerous lengths to prevent its being opened.”

  Meg looked at him with tired, steady eyes.

  “But don’t you see, it all points to Robin. You say it’s someone who knows what’s in the packet. Robin knows. You say someone doesn’t want the packet to be opened. Robin wouldn’t want anyone to know his affairs as long as he was alive. The person who came into the flat had a key—Robin’s key. He had Robin’s card—an old card that had been carried about in a wallet. Don’t you see that it points to Robin all the time?”

  “Wait, Meg—I haven’t finished. You’ve got to take today’s attempt to get hold of the packet. Now it may have been a serious attempt, or it may not. That would depend on how much was known about the conditions. If the conditions of surrender were known, no one could have hoped to get away with it on the strength of a signature to a typewritten letter presented by a messenger-boy. But the conditions may not have been known—I don’t believe this, but I feel bound to put it in as a possibility—or there was no serious expectation of getting hold of the papers, the real object being to strengthen your belief that Robin was still alive, and to make the bank manager sit up and start thinking along the same lines. In other words, it was a try-on of the same kind as the others.”

  “And doesn’t that point to Robin?” said Meg. “It does—you must see that it does.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” said Bill bluntly. “If it was Robin who was nervous about the packet and wanted to make sure it wasn’t handed over to anyone else while he was alive, he’d only got to walk into the manager’s office and show himself. That’s one absolutely solid reason why I don’t believe it was Robin.”

  Meg said in a voice so low that the words only just reached him,

  “He wanted me—not to be sure—”

  “Meg, why?”

  She leaned her head on her hand. It had not seemed possible that any words could be fainter, but what she said now had so little breath behind it that it seemed to Bill as if he were hearing her thoughts.

  “He was angry—because I said—I would divorce him. He said—I wouldn’t find it so easy—”

  Bill looked at her. Because her eyes were hidden, he could just for that space let all his passion of love and anger have free course. Was it possible that the truth was behind Meg’s whispered words? That Robin O’Hara was capable of a cruel revenge he had no doubt. There was a devilish ingenuity about the man which would have fitted him into a plot like this. Meg had threatened to divorce him, and he had told her that she would not find it so easy—and by gum, he was right. As long as his fate was uncertain, he had Meg tied to him. If she could prove that he was alive, she could divorce him. If she could prove that he was dead, she would be free. It would be most entirely like Robin O’Hara to keep her in a torturing uncertainty. He said,

  “Meg, don’t! We’ve got to think straight, and we’ve got to talk it out. If it was Robin who wanted the packet, he could have gone to the manager, and if he wanted him to keep his mouth shut he could have bound him to secrecy. I don’t believe Robin was behind today’s attempt. There isn’t any earthly reason why he should have typed a letter that he could just as easily have written with his own hand. No—it was a try-on, and it was meant to make you and the bank manager feel shaky about assuming that Robin was dead.”

  Meg dropped her hand and looked at him.

  “And do you think that anyone who was playing a trick like that would have dared come right up to the bank to meet the messenger-boy and take the answer from him? No—it was Robin—it was Robin.”

  How horrible to be afraid that it was Robin—to be afraid that Robin was alive. If anyone had said to her two years ago, “You’ll be afraid to know that he is alive,” it would have seemed the maddest lie in the world.

  Bill shook his head.

  “That’s bad reasoning, Meg. Why on earth should Robin have sent a messenger-boy at all if he could come to the bank himself? It’s arguable that he might have sent for the packet if for some reason he couldn’t come, but if he could come right up to the bank, he could walk in and get the packet. As for its being a risk for anyone who was playing a trick, I don’t see that at all. The manager took a very unusual course in having the messenger-boy followed, and supposing this man had thought of that possibility, why, the very safest place for him to meet the boy and take the answer would be just as he came out of the bank, because that’s just what nobody would be expecting, and if the boy was being followed, it would be certain to be at some little distance—he would be able to count on that.”

  “Robin would be able to count on that,” said Meg. “It’s no use, Bill. I think you’re right in nearly everything you say. I don’t think it was a serious attempt to get hold of the packet. I think it was a try-on, but I think it was Robin’s try-on. He wants to make sure that the packet won’t be opened, and he wants to keep me from being sure whether he’s alive or dead. It’s a trick, but it’s Robin’s trick. It’s no good going on talking about it. You’d better start scolding me—you said you were going to, but you didn’t say why.”

  Bill’s expression changed. She was right, it was no good their going on talking about it, and meanwhile he’d got to stop her starving herself. He said bluntly,

  “I should think you could guess why. This starving business has got to stop. You’ve got to have some money to go on with. Call it a loan or anything you like, and if it makes you any happier, I’ll swear to dun the Professor for it.”

  Meg smiled at him with a sudden bewildering sweetness.

  “All right,” she said in rather a shaky voice. “And don’t scold me any more, because I was going to ask you—I really was. Will you lend me five pounds? And you shall get it out of Uncle Henry if you can, but I warn you that it will be a tough job. I sometimes think there’s a method about Uncl
e Henry’s vagueness, because it always comes on extra bad the minute anyone starts talking about money—especially if it’s his money and they want some of it.”

  Bill frowned.

  “Five pounds is all nonsense!”

  She shook her head.

  “Bill, you’re a lamb, and I know you’d produce fifty without a murmur and never bother whether Uncle Henry paid you back or not. But I don’t want more than five pounds, because I’ve made up my mind to go down to Ledstow. I wouldn’t borrow at all, only to be quite honest, I’m down to my last half-crown and that wouldn’t get me there, so I’ll take the five pounds and say thank you kindly.”

  “I don’t like your going to Ledstow,” said Bill.

  “Nor do I,” said Meg.

  “Then don’t go.”

  Meg laughed a little sadly.

  “Needs must when necessity drives.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Well, that’s where we are,” said Bill Coverdale. He addressed Colonel Garrett, who was sitting with his back to him rummaging in one of the drawers of his writing-table.

  There was a pause, during which Garrett dragged a file from the recesses of the drawer, dumped it on the floor, and then rummaged again.

  “I suppose you haven’t been listening by any chance?” said Bill presently.

  Garrett turned a grinning face over his shoulder. The grin was a malevolent one.

  “Every word. And if you want to know what I think about it—poppy-cock!”

  “Why?” said Bill from the depths of the least uncomfortable chair.

  Garrett spun his chair round and tipped it back at a dangerous angle against the table.

  “Why? Because it is poppy-cock. And if you weren’t in a besotted frame of mind about this young woman, you’d know it was poppy-cock. Good Lord! Marked newspapers slipped into letter-boxes and then vanishing into thin air—visiting-cards at midnight—leaves with mysterious messages pricked on ’em—letters on the hearth-rug! Your young woman wants a husband to look after her, and you’d better marry her and take her away for a change of air. I hope for your sake she’ll lay off the hysteric stunt, because if she don’t you’ll have your work cut out.”

  Bill kept his temper. He said:

  “Are you suggesting that she was the gentleman in the nice blue suit and bowler hat who sent the messenger-boy to the bank this morning? She’s got an alibi for that, you know, because I was talking to her when the manager rang up. Or are you going to prove that she was the thug who followed me into Minnett’s Row and blew off the top of my ear? I’m afraid that’s no go either, because there really wasn’t time for her to get into trousers and pursue me—and I’m prepared to swear to the trousers. Of course she might have had ’em on under her evening dress all the time she was dining with me and going to the theatre—there’s such a lot of room under the sort of skirts girls are wearing that no one would notice a flimsy little extra like a pair of trousers!”

  Garrett made the most hideous grimace.

  “I thought you said it was dark?”

  “So it was. But when he legged it he legged it good and proper, and I’m prepared to swear the legs were in trousers. No one could have run like that in a long flapping chiffon skirt and high-heeled shoes.”

  “Meaning Mrs O’Hara had a long flapping skirt and high-heeled shoes? Well, you can have all that, because I didn’t think she’d been shooting at you. Why should she?” He shrugged his shoulders. “You may have annoyed someone else who was keen on her, or it may have been a playful drunk, or—” He looked maliciously at Bill, rolled his eyes, brought his chair down with a thump, and swung round again to the table.

  Bill came over and sat on the corner of it facing him.

  “Meaning that I’d caught a touch of Meg’s complaint—hysteria being well known to be catching. All right, have it your way, but I’d like to know why it is your way. You don’t really believe that I faked the top off my own ear, so I would like to know why you’re stunting that you do? However, if you don’t want to tell me you won’t. I notice you haven’t put up any theory about the bank business. To my mind that packet’s the crux of the whole business.”

  Garrett looked up suddenly and sharply, nodded, and looked down again. After waiting for a moment to see if he would speak Bill went on.

  “I don’t suppose you want to know what I think, but I’m going to tell you. O’Hara deposited that packet a week before he disappeared.”

  Garrett looked up again.

  “Sure?”

  “Dead sure. According to you he thought he’d got on the track of something pretty big. He dropped hints, but he wasn’t giving anything away—wanted to scoop all the honour and glory for himself, I should say. But I think he wrote down what he’d got hold of up to date, and I think that packet has got his notes in it, and any bits of evidence he may have come across. Now is there any way of getting that packet handed over?”

  Garrett shook his head.

  “Only by getting leave to presume O’Hara’s death. Has she been to her lawyer?”

  “She won’t,” said Bill.

  Garrett swore, not noisily, but with concentrated bitterness.

  “Why won’t she?”

  “She thinks O’Hara’s alive. I don’t and you don’t, but she does. Well, if O’Hara is alive, he wouldn’t want that packet to be opened.”

  “Damn nonsense!” snapped Garrett. “O’Hara’s dead!”

  “You think so—Meg doesn’t. She thinks he’s lying low for his own ends—to prevent her getting a divorce amongst other things. Suppose that’s so, and suppose he’s got other reasons for wanting to be thought dead—reasons connected with the Vulture’s old gang which he was trailing—then you see he wouldn’t want to have the packet opened prematurely, and he’d be quite likely to take steps to stop Meg’s seeing a lawyer or doing anything to establish his death. That’s what Meg believes, anyhow. If you don’t believe that, then I think you’ve got to believe that there’s someone else who is interested in the packet. Well, who would it be? The fellow O’Hara was trailing—the fellow bossing the Vulture’s old show over here. You say O’Hara was trailing him, and that he knocked O’Hara out. Well, then he can’t afford to have that packet opened—can he? Say he knows that it’ll be handed over to O’Hara’s wife as soon as O’Hara’s proved dead—what would he be likely to do? Why, just what somebody has been doing. If he can make Meg so doubtful about Robin’s death that she can’t bring herself to try and prove it, he’s safe. Don’t you see, Garrett, he’s safe as long as Meg thinks Robin is alive. And that’s my theory—I don’t believe O’Hara is alive, but I think someone is trying to make us believe that he is.”

  “Gleams of intelligence,” said Garrett drily. “What you’ve got to do is to take that young woman of yours by the scruff of the neck and get her into her lawyer’s office—galvanize her and galvanize the lawyer—make yourself damn disagreeable—ring up twenty-four times a day until he’d rather get on with it than hear your voice on the telephone again. Your name’ll be mud, but you’ll get a move on. We want that packet—we want it damn badly. When we’ve got it open we shall know who’s right.” He gave a short laugh. “Amusing if it’s only his will! I don’t suppose he had anything to leave but debts.”

  Bill put the flat of his hand on the table and leaned on it.

  “Look here, Garrett—”

  “What?”

  “What was the Vulture’s game?”

  “High-class blackmail,” said Garrett—“very high-class. Used it to produce strikes. Used it to produce political situations and then played the markets. That was his main line. Lots of ramifications going off into ordinary crime—dope, coining, all that sort of thing. We came into it on the political side. We broke the Vulture—he committed suicide. But the show went on. It’s international, and when they’ve made one country too hot to hold ’em they move on. France has been having a round-up, so it’ll be our turn again. We’ve never been able to stop all the earths.”
r />   “You think—”

  “I think O’Hara got on to something. He was a fool to try and work alone. He wouldn’t have a chance against that crowd. They got him.”

  “And the packet?”

  “There may be something useful there—it looks like it. Get Mrs O’Hara going, and keep her going until we can get hold of it. It’s up to you. And don’t swallow any of that tripe about O’Hara’s being alive. If he ran his head into that hornets’ nest he was as good as dead before he started.”

  Bill got up to go, but when he was nearly at the door Garrett called him back.

  “About that Delorne girl—”

  Bill turned round.

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve had a report about her. Not much in it. Not so young as she was. The sort of actress that don’t act—hangs around the theatrical agents once in a while. Comes and goes a good bit. Said to have been abroad. Was in a Pierrot show at Blackpool for a few days in August—had a row and walked out. That’s the only professional engagement there’s any evidence of. There’s always a man in tow. Small flat in Oleander Mansions—she’s had it for about fifteen months, but more often away than not. No maid—daily woman when she’s there—respectable person who works for several people in the block. Someone’s been put on to sound her about O’Hara.” Garrett made a grimace. “The char may remember him—Della probably won’t by now. I suppose you wouldn’t like to try your luck with her?”