by Richard Hull
‘Doing everything he could to bring him round,’ indeed! He wondered Ford had swallowed that! Of course he had at one time, but not with that syringe, and not just before Ford had walked in all unannounced. Unconsciously sharing one sentiment at least with the secretary, he considered that Ford, merely as a matter of good taste, should have knocked on the door before he came in.
Carefully Anstruther checked over each word of the interview. When he got home he would commit as much as he could to paper, in case any detail should escape him and cause him to make some stupid slip. He even let his mind wander back to the day that Morrison died, and he had rapidly examined him in that very bedroom as being the most conveniently situated to the library.
Both then and now he had very little doubt as to how Morrison had met his death; never for one moment had the secretary’s fear that Benson had flavoured the soufflé with the contents of the wrong bottle worried him. For years he had known that Morrison was suffering from a bad heart, the extreme weakness of which he had in pride concealed from all the world. As to his having died from the results of perchloride of mercury, or any other poison for that matter, he had been able to feel a moral certainty from the very first that that had never happened. At any rate, so far as perchloride was concerned, there was not a symptom to suggest it. Of course, without a post-mortem he could not be absolutely certain, but lacking the evidence that that would give, he was as sure as made no difference.
He well remembered his feelings as he had looked at Morrison that night. Of all his patients he was the one who had given the most trouble, had caused him more work, grumbled most at being charged a fee which Anstruther considered was below his proper scale, and had rewarded him merely by occasional disparagement. He had felt that Morrison owed him something. That had been the meaning of his remark at the time, when he consented to sign the death certificate because he was ‘thinking of the dead man’.
And then, suddenly, as he had stood there irresolutely turning the matter over in his mind, he had seen how Morrison dead could repay some of the debt due by Morrison living. What an opportunity there was to square so many accounts! The temptation had been too much for him – and it had seemed so harmless. After all he was only going to certify what was probably true!
He remembered his intense delight as the whole plan had formed in his mind. He had always longed to take Ford by the scruff of his neck and shake him, and go on shaking him until it hurt, and until he had got some sense in his head. Even now, standing in the bedroom in the Club, he felt his blood quicken at the mere thought of what joy the physical sensation would have been when he saw Ford’s fat head wag from side to side, and his knees gradually begin to give in. There was a roll of fat at the back of the secretary’s neck from which several times he had hardly been able to keep his hands.
Alas! that the shaking had been only moral. Still, the pleasures of the mind, as he had written one day when he had been unable to concentrate his thoughts so as to exclude his fingers from typing too much, were more subtle, more keen, if not so entirely satisfying as those of the body. Carefully playing on the nerves of a weak man he had been able to get complete control, and at the same time to watch the unconcealed reactions of his victim to the twists of the screw. It had been a stroke of genius to manoeuvre himself into the position of both the torturer and the confidant on whose shoulder the victim sobbed, and at the same time to put right all the grievances as to the Club that he had so long cherished, and so fortunately never mentioned.
The first suspicion of a fly in his ointment had been Hughes. It had always seemed to Anstruther that there was a very real danger that Hughes might know too much. At first he had felt that he could rely with confidence on the waiter’s stupidity, but as the days went by, he thought he detected a curious look in the man’s eye. He seemed to be always watching him, and he made up his mind that it would be better and safer if he went.
Well, that matter was not yet finally settled, but Anstruther flattered himself that it was by now well on the way to being disposed of; what between the pressure he could exert through his typewriter, and the direct spur he could add by his alleged doubts about the glass of sherry, with which of course there had in fact been nothing the matter, he was pretty sure that Ford would have to obey. It was quite time, by the way, that this disobedience was ended. He must devise some additional punishment for that lack of good discipline.
Then the play-acting had been fun. He had enjoyed nothing so much as writing those letters to himself, letters so violent that when he got them next day they had actually hurt. He had hugged them to himself and let their taunts sink in. After the first time he had decided that it was well worth the three half-pence to post them to himself late at night. The next day they came to him as something fresh, something new and barbed with points dipped in irony. The reading of them had been even finer than the writing of them.
Then he had at any rate forced himself to learn more about poisons. A useful and profitable study, that of poisons. Besides which the alleged compulsion under which he worked might serve other purposes. It had helped to throw dust in Ford’s eyes for one thing, and, if by any chance anything should subsequently emerge, it might serve as a screen to save him from hanging. He was not quite sure of the law as regards people who supplied poisons either knowingly or carelessly – he expected that it earned a pretty severe sentence – but if you could manage to get a judge and jury to believe that it was the result of blackmail, he strongly suspected that you stood a very good chance of being dealt with leniently. The popular prejudice against blackmail was so strong!
But – he looked at the syringe – he must get his facts a little better if he was to continue along the charming path he had mapped out for himself; if he was frequently to have the fun of watching the reactions of arrogant men to the doses he could insidiously insert into their food or their drink, or inject into them. There must be no more mistakes as in the case of Pargiter! For one thing he had not in fact, whatever he might have said, so very many more patients in the Club whom he could use as victims in his experiments, and it would not be safe, since he could only sign certificates for his own patients, to select any member of the Club casually.
It had been annoying in the first place to have had to do anything about Pargiter at all. He had never really intended to. He had merely taken his name in vain in order to frighten Ford, and if Ford happened to get into his head the idea that Pargiter was the blackmailer, well, so much the better. But he had all along expected the secretary to give in and sack Hughes.
But when he had not, he had fallen back on the idea of giving him a good fright. It would be a very good moral tonic for that disobedient man if he found one of the members for whose safety he ought to consider himself responsible, lying lightly poisoned in the library. But only lightly poisoned. ‘Death,’ Anstruther repeated to himself as if there was some magic in the phrase, ‘was entirely accidental.’
He had spent the whole evening watching Pargiter, and waiting for his opportunity. He was sure it would be offered sooner or later because of his victim’s habit of sitting in what had been Morrison’s corner, and of turning the chair round so that he got a better light, which involved turning his back on the room. And sure enough eventually the chance had come, and he had been there to take it. Of course he had not been ill. That had been a brilliant afterthought, suggested to him by the presence in his pocket of a strong emetic – another experiment! – and a very convincing corroborative detail he had made of it!
And so, when the chance came, he had been all ready, ready with the syringe containing the hyoscine he had taken from its normal ampoules of a two-hundredth of a grain. The maximum dose, as he knew, was a sixtieth of a grain, and that was what he believed he had got in the syringe. Had he not used just three and a third of the ampoules that contained a two-hundredth of a grain each, so that just a sixtieth of a grain had been shot from behind into the unseeing and unknowing Pargiter? As he had expected, the man had stiffened as if
he had been knocked out. That was exactly as he had planned it, and then that little touch more that he had given him, just for fun. It could not have amounted in all to more than a fiftieth of a grain, and surely that ought not to be fatal?
It had been in a considerable state of alarm that he had gone through for Pargiter exactly the same process, except for the absence of Ford, as had been enacted for Morrison. Sending Hughes away, he had for a while genuinely done what he could for the man who was so unaccountably dead, done what he could, that is, for a while, until he had finally realised that it was hopeless. Then, with a spasm of blind rage, completely out of control, he had allowed his elementary feelings of pure brutal violence to dominate him and had dug the syringe in again and again long after it was empty, and had only just stopped, panting and terrified, as Ford came in.
It was not until several days later that he realised that he had founded all his calculations on the ampoules containing a two-hundredth of a grain, and that in fact he had got hold of ampoules containing one-hundredth of a grain each, so that his first injection had been double the strength that he had intended, in itself the maximum dose.
At first he was inclined to blame the chemist, but a little calm reflection convinced him that the mistake was entirely his. He was inclined to take up the attitude that it was an unfortunate error which had nearly had regrettable consequences for himself. With a resolution to be more careful in future, he dismissed that detail as a mere incident. So far as Pargiter was concerned it was, no doubt, bad luck, but beyond that he did not go. Indeed he was rather indignant. Had he not been deprived of the results and pleasure of a very interesting experiment?
But now a second fly was threatening to get into the ointment. At least to call Cardonnel a fly was an understatement; a positive blue-bottle! One, moreover, who would be difficult to suppress, but who must be kept out at all costs. That Ford should dare to try deliberately to bring him in! The impertinence of it! That was another cause for reading the secretary a much needed lesson. He had had to do it once before and at that time his hypnotic powers had not failed him. So far as he knew, Ford had kept his lips tightly sealed.
As Anstruther wended his way quietly up Regent Street, he began to consider the problem of Cardonnel. By the time he was home, several plans had occurred to him, but as yet, none of them seemed quite satisfactory. However, no doubt with the morning new inspiration would occur.
20
Concerning The Sherry
It was going to be a very delicate matter, and delicacy was scarcely Ford’s strongest point. He even suspected the fact himself. Nevertheless he must somehow or other talk to Hughes about the sherry, and somehow or other he must manage to do it without suggesting that Anstruther’s glass had been deliberately doctored so as to get him out of the way. Considering that Hughes was a bit touchy, it was not going to be too easy. In addition to that it was most important to find out from him who had been on the library floor that evening. Moreover, he had to frame his questions in such a way that they might appear to be quite casual. It would never do for Hughes to suspect that there was any reason why the secretary was particularly anxious to know. He could not have Hughes thinking that there was anything fishy about Pargiter’s death!
Ford sighed as he realised what a muddle he was getting himself into. Not for the first time, he complained bitterly that it was all Benson’s fault. If the chef had not got it into his head that he had made a muddle over the vanilla bottle, Ford would never have tried to keep quiet the mystery of Morrison’s death, and if he had not done that he would have been free to go straight to the police when Pargiter died without having to make the odious decision (to him) of ruining the doctor whom he still thought he had lured into being his innocent accomplice.
In fact, as he summoned Hughes on the morning after Pargiter died, he had reached a state of mind that almost exceeded Anstruther’s fondest hopes. He began by a question which he regarded as leading up to the subject in an indirect manner.
‘Did anyone say anything to you yesterday about the sherry?’
‘No, sir. At least, sir, nothing special.’ With the privilege of an old servant, Hughes went on. After all, surely the man he was talking to knew something of the ways of members by now! ‘You know how it is, sir, about the sherry, since we got the new one, there’s some of them always have to say it isn’t as good as the old one. Sort of convention, sir, I never takes any notice of it.’
Ford frowned. He did not want to discuss the respective merits or demerits of the two wines. ‘I do not mean anything of that sort. I think the members are gradually beginning to realise that we chose an excellent wine for them.’
‘Yes, sir.’ If the secretary wanted to get on his high horse, let him! Hughes, himself a very pretty judge of sherry, knew perfectly well that not only were the members unconvinced, but that they were perfectly right.
‘I mean,’ went on Ford, still under the impression that his approach was indirect, ‘did anyone make any special complaint?’
Hughes considered for a moment. ‘No, sir.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Quite, sir.’ Was this a catch? If so, he could not see where the point was. No one had said anything special about the sherry.
The secretary was compelled to start a more frontal attack. ‘Didn’t Dr Anstruther say something?’
Ah! So that was it! Hughes was not a clever man, but he had a very shrewd idea that he had an enemy there. As he went about his work in the library, he had often caught the doctor looking at him in an odd, almost malevolent manner, and yesterday he had noticed the glances had been more frequent and more peculiar, but he was quite sure he was speaking the truth when he told Ford that Dr Anstruther had made no complaint. If the secretary had not been quite so official that morning, he would have liked to have added that if the doctor had thought there was something wrong with it he might have said so sooner. To Hughes’s mind, one, or at most two, of the club’s large glasses, which he knew quite well only went six to the bottle, was quite enough before dinner for a gentleman. He had his own ideas as to which members of the club were gentlemen and which were not; there were some rather surprising decisions and some that were very far from the mark, but so far as Anstruther was concerned, it must be admitted that he was perfectly right.
Still Ford persisted. He was almost sure that the doctor had told him that he had actually mentioned it. But perhaps Dr Anstruther only thought that the taste was odd and said nothing? ‘At any rate, he thought it was unusual in taste, and something must have upset him. Certainly something made him ill. While he was examining Mr Pargiter too. Very awkward.’
‘Yes, sir.’ It was no business of his, but if his opinion had been asked, he would have given another suggestion as to why the doctor was unwell. He would find out what the fellow had drunk during dinner in addition to his generous ration of sherry. Meanwhile Hughes remained mute, but with a gradually growing conviction that he would have to do something about Anstruther soon. The man was clearly trying to get him into trouble. Besides he could not help wondering why the secretary was talking solely about a glass of sherry. He had imagined that he was wanted to say all he knew about Pargiter’s death, but still the conversation went on about the same subject. He was beginning to get annoyed.
He continued answering the questions put to him as briefly as possible.
No, no one else had complained. Mr Gladwin had been in the library and had been talking to Judge Skinner. They frequently went there before dinner and always broke the rule about silence. Could Mr Ford speak to them, did he think? One or two of the junior members wanted to complain but did not have the courage, being rather afraid of the Judge. Had anyone else been there? Only, he believed, Mr Laming.
A train of thought ran through the secretary’s mind. Laming who complained about the fish, Laming who had repulsed his half-confidences when Morrison had died, Laming who would never take responsibility for anything and was always prepared to let him down, Laming who was so o
ften there and seemed always to have been about when any of these odd events occurred – so he was there once more last night! Could he be the man who preferred to work indirectly? Was that the solution of his mystery? He began to cross-question Hughes rather obviously as to Laming’s movements.
The waiter was clearly surprised, but on the whole not very helpful. After dinner there had not been many people in the library, and most of his time had been spent in looking after the billiard room on the floor above, which it was also part of his duty to attend to after dinner. He had no very clear idea of who had been there. ‘Except, of course, sir, Mr Pargiter.’
‘Yes, yes. Poor Pargiter. A tumour on the brain, I believe, or perhaps a clot of blood. I am not sure. But anyhow Dr Anstruther is investigating. I was too upset last night to take it in fully. So Mr Pargiter was alone in the library – very sad. A little difficult at times, but de mortuis, you know, de mortuis!’
‘Yes, sir.’ Despite the Latin, Hughes did know. ‘But I think Dr Anstruther was there too. At any rate he had coffee there, sir, and brandy.’
The slight emphasis was wasted on Ford.
‘Yes, so he told me, but he was rather disturbed unfortunately, something, as I have said, having upset him. I am afraid he thinks it was the sherry.’
It was on the tip of Hughes’s tongue to say ‘Probably’; but he managed to stifle it and to confine himself to saying that he knew nothing of what had happened to the doctor. While he was up in the billiard room anyone might have gone in and out of the library without his being any the wiser. ‘Indeed, sir, when I am in my service bar, I usually shut the door. The place looks untidy from the passage for one thing – so that anyone might pass and repass without my knowing.’