The Toff and the Runaway Bride

by John Creasey

  He stepped inside.

  Until that moment he accepted the possibility that Guy was in the cottage but hadn’t heard him come; also the possibility that the car itself was parked somewhere out of sight. He bent his head as he crossed the low-ceilinged room, which had some old pieces of furniture and a smell of furniture polish, but was not as picturesque as the outside promised. He went through a doorway and saw a flight of twisting stairs. That was when he heard a faint sound.

  He stood at the foot of the stairs.

  “You there, Guy?”

  He could not be sure that the sound had been the movement of a man or woman, and he did not hear it again; and there was no response. He glanced along the narrow passage towards the kitchen, and then towards the stairs. As the stairs were nearer he actually started up.

  Then he saw the hand on the floor.

  He had not been able to see it at the foot of the stairs themselves, but from the third tread the angle was different, and he saw it. It was a woman’s hand, quite shapely, and it lay limp upon the stone slab. The position was so odd that it shot alarm through Rollison. He turned awkwardly on the narrow space, then strode towards the kitchen; he forgot to duck, and banged his head on a lintel which was no more than five feet nine from the ground.

  He fell back, head ringing, eyes smarting, and the pale hand seemed to be going round and round; but that was illusion, it was there on the floor. He pushed the door a little wider, and stepped into the tiny kitchen, with its small windows, the big dresser along one side, the open hearth with an electric cooker and a refrigerator standing side by side and looking incongruously clean and white.

  Behind the door, curled up, one arm flung about her head, the other pressed into her bosom, was a young woman in a bright-blue frock.

  At one glance, Rollison was afraid that she was dead.

  He stood for a moment, staring at her, prepared for the shock by what he had already seen, and yet hating to admit the inescapable. She lay so still. Her hands were so shapely but work-stained and red. He could see one ear, pink and pretty, poking out from hair so dark that it was almost black, so curly that he felt sure that the curls were natural. He could see another thing, the wicked thing: a cord tied and twisted tight round her neck.

  The momentary paralysis lifted.

  Rollison stepped across the outstretched body, went down on one knee and moved the woman. The knot was buried in a neck which had been smooth and white. Her mouth was slack, and he could just see the white of the teeth. Her eyes were partly open.

  Her hand was warm.

  He felt no fluttering at the pulse, but there was a chance to save her, and only he could do it, for ten minutes might make the difference between life and death. He took his penknife and began to cut the cord with desperate urgency. It meant that he had to cut her flesh, too, and there was a little blood. He had to use the blade as a saw, once it was underneath the cord.

  He thought, “Not Guy.”

  He had sent Guy here.

  The cord parted, but it was so deeply embedded that it did not fall away; that was the moment when he felt sure that there was no hope. Whoever had killed this woman had meant to make sure there was no chance that she would come round. But Rollison had to try artificial respiration; and he had to send for help.

  He turned the woman over gently, on her front, with her head turned to one side. Once he started he mustn’t stop, and if he wasted seconds now, seeing if anyone was outside, he might throw away what chance he had. So he knelt down, and began to apply the pressure. His back was to the window and the back door, and he could see the foot of the stairs. He heard no sound. He kept telling himself that this could not have been done by Guy Lessing, but he could not convince himself. A new kind of dread entered his mind: that this was Helen née Goodman; that this was Lessing’s wife.

  To and fro, to and fro; weight on, off; on off; on off. Slowly, steadily, without any pause, that was the way: to give the lungs every chance of drawing in air again. He knew at heart that there wasn’t really a chance.

  He could not get Guy out of his mind. He could not believe it of the groom, but – well, the car wasn’t here, yet he had come down here.

  But he had not planned to, as far as Rollison knew; that was a point to remember: he had sent Guy here, so nothing could have been premeditated, unless …

  Had this woman been waiting for him, expecting to confront him and his “new bride”?

  If she had—

  Rollison heard a sound behind him, a slight slithering, and for the first time since he had started the artificial respiration he stopped and twisted round; but all he saw was an upraised arm, a gloved hand and a weapon in it; a hammer. He flung his own arms up, to protect himself. He felt the full force of the hammer on his right wrist, and the pain was so great that he cried out. He pitched forward, sprawling over the woman, but kept his arm over his head, knowing that there would be another attack, and fearful of what would happen if this assailant struck and struck and struck again. He felt a glancing blow on the side of the head, and tears of pain blinded him; then he received a savage blow at the nape of the neck and lost consciousness. His last thought was fear of death.

  He remembered that when he came round. There was darkness and a humming noise which he knew was inside his head, and then flickering light which hurt his eyes and grew brighter. The humming sound was louder, as if an aeroplane was flying overhead; and swooping lower and lower, as if to crash. The light was blinding. He moved his head, and winced; he moved his left wrist, and pain streaked through it.

  He realised that he was still on the floor.

  He rolled over and saw the woman, just as he had left her; limp and lifeless. He got to his knees, slowly. It would be impossible to help the dead. He tried to get to his feet, but his legs wouldn’t carry him, and the humming had become a pounding in his head. There was a table near him. He edged towards this and pulled against it with his right hand and then hauled himself to his feet. He swayed. He ran his right hand over his head, gingerly; there was a smarting wound on top, from the first blow, and that was bleeding a little; but the nape of his neck was much more painful. He couldn’t turn his head without pain.

  Then he heard voices.

  He thought that they were excited, a man’s and a woman’s, but he could not be sure. He heard a flurry of footsteps, like distant thunder, and every footstep seemed to send more pain through his head.

  Then he heard footsteps inside the cottage. He stood facing the open kitchen-door as an elderly man came in, breathless, and a younger one followed; the younger one carried a pitchfork, and the glint in his eyes suggested that he longed for a chance to use it.

  They saw him.

  They saw the woman on the floor.

  The older man, small, compact, dressed in old tweeds, as obviously from the country as the trees outside, drew in a sharp breath, and said, “Don’t move.”

  The younger man did not speak, but stared at the woman, and then moved towards her, fearfully, still gripping the pitchfork. His eyes were no longer bright, but anguished, and suddenly he let the pitchfork go, and flung himself on his knees beside the woman.

  “Helen,” he gasped. “Oh, Helen, speak to me.”

  Chapter Seven

  Poor Helen

  “Helen,” the young man sobbed. “Don’t move,” the older man ordered.

  “I’ve got to sit down,” Rollison said, very carefully, and he moved towards a Windsor chair standing close to the table, and lowered himself. “What—” It was even an effort to speak. “What brought you?”

  “Never mind what brought us, we’re here.”

  “If you get a doctor instead of standing there, you might have a chance to save her,” Rollison said to try to break the impasse, and each word sent pain shooting through his head.

  The man seemed startled, as if
that was a new thought. “Aye,” he said, and looked down at the youth, who was holding the girl’s right hand and pressing it to his lips; as distraught as a man could be.

  “Go and get a doctor,” Rollison said. “Can’t you see that I’m in no shape to move?”

  “Arthur,” said the older man, so sharply that he made the other look up. “Watch un. I’m going for Dr. Brasher, I know he’s home, I saw him half an hour ago. Watch un, now.”

  “I’ll watch un,” Arthur muttered.

  There was no hope for the woman Helen – who could it be but Helen née Goodman? – but at least the tension was broken. As the old man went out, there came a new tension, for Arthur bent down and picked up the pitchfork, holding it in his hands as if it were a pike. He stared at Rollison with a single-minded hatred which could not be misunderstood. There was no point in arguing, point only in making sure that if he did lunge, the gleaming prongs could be thrust aside. Rollison sat quite still, prepared to throw himself to the right or left, while the older man went hurrying outside, footsteps sharp on a concrete yard, and then muffled by turf or soil.

  The old man shouted to someone.

  The tears glistening in the young man’s eyes were tears of grief, now, and the hatred seemed to be dimmed, although the weapon was still held forward, as if it would be thrust into Rollison’s chest if he so much as moved.

  Rollison broke a silence which seemed to have lasted for an age.

  “Will he bring the police as well?”

  “Just sit still,” the young man ordered.

  “The quicker the police come—”

  “The quicker they’ll put you in prison.”

  “Why don’t you use your head?” asked Rollison testily; and his own head hurt abominably with the effort of speaking, “she was dead when I arrived. I tried to save her life.”

  “You’re trying to talk your way out of it, more like. Don’t you move.”

  There was a curious kind of lilt to the man’s voice; it was like that of a radio actor using a dialect. But there was no doubting his intention to stand guard as a bulldog; nor doubt of his grief.

  The two men came hurrying back, and Rollison knew that he need not keep up this tension any longer. Arthur actually lowered the pitchfork as the old man and another, younger, came in. The newcomer was not the doctor. He was massive and burly, and he looked like a policeman out of uniform.

  “Here’s the man,” the older man said.

  Blessedly, the massive man had a quiet voice, a calm expression and goodwill.

  “You look as if you’ve had a nasty time, sir,” he said, and went straight to the girl. “Who gave her artificial respiration?”

  The two men who had first arrived looked startled.

  “I did,” said Rollison.

  “I could see from the way she was lying that someone had,” said the massive man, and he knelt astride and began to do exactly what Rollison had done, although he must have known that there was no hope. Rollison watched him; the rhythmic movement had a kind of mesmeric effect. Then a car arrived, a man came hurrying, this time an elderly, broad-shouldered doctor, swinging a black bag. He was remarkably brisk, but it was ten minutes before he turned to Rollison, took one look at his head, shook two white tablets on to the palm of his hand and said:

  “Take these. Arthur, get a glass of water, please, for this gentleman. Blake, you’d better telephone to Winchester, hadn’t you? You’ve a case of murder on your hands.”

  The tablets did not work miracles, but after ten minutes of pounding, Rollison’s head began to feel less painful, although he could not turn it with any comfort. The doctor had a look at the cut on the back, declared that it was nothing to worry about, dabbed it with antiseptic and declined to put on a plaster.

  “You don’t want a bald patch there,” he said. He had taken control completely now that the massive Blake, the local police-constable, then off duty, had gone to summon the Winchester police and so hand this over to the Criminal Investigation Department. The woman’s body had not been moved, but was now covered with a sheet. Arthur stood by the window, clenching and unclenching his hands, while the older man, grey, hardy, berry-brown, watched Rollison with a curious intensity. There were a dozen questions in Rollison’s mind, but the urgent one was screaming.

  Had Guy Lessing been here?

  He had been using a hired or a borrowed car, and Rollison did not know what make it was.

  He knew so little.

  Arthur and the older man, his father, had been coming to the cottage, where the father was the gardener and general handyman when anyone was in residence. They had seen a man running away, had known that Helen was here, had come running and been shocked to a point of horror at what they had found.

  Helen who ?

  Rollison still wasn’t sure. He was almost sure, but could not believe that coincidence would stretch so far, so – Helen who?

  The father and son were vague about the man running away, for the old man’s eyes were not good, and the young one had been behind him. They had known that Major Lessing was coming down here, had been asked to make special preparations, including dinner for tonight.

  Helen had been preparing that.

  It wasn’t making any sense.

  One thing was obvious, although no one had said a word: that Arthur had been in love with the dead Helen, and would readily kill her murderer; he was not yet convinced that the murderer was not Rollison.

  Then a car arrived, an ambulance immediately after it, and there was an invasion of plain-clothes men with cameras, equipment, finger-print powder. All the routine of a murder investigation began, and the man who questioned Rollison was Chief Inspector Wilfred Reno, whom the Toff had met several times before.

  There were times when the only possible thing was to tell the police the whole truth.

  This was one of them.

  Reno asked questions, made notes, sent messages to Winchester, made it clear that he expected his superiors to consult Scotland Yard at once, and then said almost casually to Rollison: “Yes, the dead woman’s name was Goodman before she got married. She was a very quiet type. Her parents died years ago, and everyone thought she would marry Arthur Lloyd.” Arthur was now outside, nursing his grief if not his pitchfork. “She went off one week-end and came back with a wedding-ring, but she wouldn’t give anyone any details, except that she’d married a gentleman—she probably meant officer and gentleman,” Reno added, with heavy sarcasm. “She went off every now and again, after that, sometimes for a week-end or two, sometimes for a week or more. When she’s at Bane she lives alone in a tiny cottage, and does housework and cooking for some of the people in the bigger houses near by.”

  “An officer and gentleman,” Rollison echoed. “No name?”

  “She said her name was Smith,” Reno told him, and this time kept a straight face. “That was her way of telling the village that it was her business and she was going to keep it so. She was a strong-willed young woman, and had her way. We’ll soon find out whether in fact she married Lessing.”

  “Do you know where she was married?” asked Rollison.

  “I believe the only man in her confidence was the Vicar Of Bane, and he’s on a church outing. He should be back by ten o’clock.”

  Rollison glanced at his watch; and pain streaked through his neck.

  It was a little after nine.

  “Meanwhile, there’s a call out for Lessing, on the strength of what you’ve told us,” Reno went on, “and the Yard say they’re looking for Miss Lorne or Mrs. Lessing. Know what I’d do if I were you?”

  “You’d take a room at a local hotel, get the doctor to give me a sleeping-draught, and sleep solidly for eight hours,” said Rollison. “Then you’d feel better in the morning.”

  “That’s it!”

  “What I’m going to d
o is wait until you’ve had word from London about the register, and then get someone to drive me back to town,” Rollison said. “That’s unless you tell me I mustn’t leave the vicinity.”

  “Oh, you can go as far as London,” Reno conceded airily. “I don’t mean you are clear of suspicion, of course, but you’ll be all right in London, the Yard will watch you!”

  “Thanks very much,” said Rollison dryly. “I’d like to telephone my man. Any objection to that?”

  “None at all. Stroll as far as the village, that won’t hurt you,” Reno said.

  In fact, the cool night air did Rollison good. It was still daylight, although dusk was dimming the brightness of the sky. Already dozens of people were standing about and watching the cottage, and others were streaming from the main London-to-Bournemouth Road. Some children were admiring the pony. A dozen cars were in sight. Six policemen had been drafted in, to make sure that no one went too close to the cottage, and Rollison realised that everyone was watching him. A slender young man wearing a big lumber jacket of bright tartan, a jersey cap and a pair of loose-fitting grey flannels showed especial interest.

  He was standing close to the path which led to the village. The motor road was in the other direction. Ahead was the church and several cottages, one of them marked Post Office; the telephone would be outside that. Rollison went on, and glanced again at the youth in the bright tartan; then he realised who it was.

  He stopped.

  He knew that Reno had sent a plainclothes man after him, ostensibly to see that he was all right, so he did not speak to the “youth”, who was in fact Barbara Lorne.

  “No, sir,” said Jolly. “Mrs. Lessing did not get in touch with us again. I am extremely sorry that I was not able to find her.”

  “Forget it. How about Major Lessing?”

  “He has not called, sir.”

  “In short, an absolute blank,” said Rollison gloomily. “Right, Jolly, I’ll be back by midnight, all being well.”

  “Are you sure you wouldn’t be well advised to stay in Winchester until you’ve had a chance to recover from the attack, sir?”