by Ewan Lawrie
‘Indeed, remarkable initiative for a policeman, is it not?’
Again he moved his feet. ‘It was the reporter’s idea.’
I laughed aloud.
‘Reporter? Here? Maccabi, I would have thought you incapable of such a ludic jest!’
‘He is from the Alnwick Mercury, sir. He happened to be in Seahouses. There was nothing I could do.’
‘And why should you have done aught, you buffoon?’
He kept his counsel at that, so I enquired when he thought they might arrive. To which he replied, ‘Within the hour.’
‘Best someone renders my home into a more appropriate estate for the reception of visitors, be they only a Peeler and a scribe.’
Maccabi made for the servants’ quarters with a stamping gait, although I surmised Mrs Gonderthwaite and Cullis would be of little help to him.
Miss Pardoner was not in evidence – I was unsure as to where she might be. For no other reason than a want of anything better to do, I thought I might take a promenade along the drive to the gatehouse. The day was fulfilling its early promise: the sun was high overhead and the drive descended between the rolling hillocks and unsupervised ovines. The panorama was the epitome of bucolic paradise. ‘Et in Arcadia ego sum’ would have been appropriate indeed – but for the unfortunate lack of shepherds. The gatehouse looked scarcely better from the rear. A trellis enlivened the darkened sandstone and provided a home for several dull-coloured avian specimens – the only evidence of life in the building.
The rear elevation was possessed of the remnants of a door, the boards warped and cracked so that tongue had long parted company with any groove. From the scraps of paint that clung to the weathered wood, I could tell that its colour had once been green. I found it a little humorous that someone in the distant past had locked the door. I removed a board at a time and entered the ruin.
Inside, I was greeted by a multitudinous flapping of wings and a screeching that might be associated with vermin. Such the bats were, I supposed. Some flapping of my own dispersed them to their inverted perches in the rotten-timbered rafters. It was a single-story building. The room I had entered was – or had been – a scullery.
Through a void doorway I saw a sitting room, sofa rotted and chewed by some or other fauna. Once inside I saw that it was furnished with a window to the front and a door to another room on the side wall. It seemed in reasonable condition – and it was locked. Once more I perceived a dissonance between the outward dimensions and the internal disposition of the building. The scullery, the only room to the rear of the building, was considerably smaller than the sum of the area of the two rooms to the front, however tiny the locked room might prove to be. On the wall opposite the mysteriously sealed room was a door to the exterior, presumably to enable the erstwhile gatekeeper to facilitate access for visitors to the estate.
I was on the point of leaving when the toe of my boot met with a hard object that slid rattling along the floor. A large and rusted ring holding one solitary key lay on the floorboards, half hidden by the remnants of the sofa’s skirts. I picked it up: it appeared to be a key for a mortice lock and of an appropriate size to allow access to the sealed room. It was disturbing to note that –aside from a modicum of dirt, dust and damage from rodent teeth – the door was in unfeasibly good repair.
The key turned slickly and I opened the door, which offered no protesting creak – or indeed any indication that it was in less than daily use. The room was small but could not have squared with the paradox of the scullery’s dimensions. It could not possibly have been an illusion of the optical kind, or if it were I could not begin to guess the mechanics of it. The outside of the building was clearly based on the standard box-like shape: to the eye, all vertices were isometric and angles isogonal. And yet.
There was nothing peculiar or noteworthy about the room itself – save that it was in better condition than many in the main house. It seemed that a duster had been in use within the last few days, which was more than could be said of many of the rooms I had seen of late. I could see no items of a personal nature. The furniture was serviceable, if plain, comprising a narrow bed, some drawers and a chair. I was unsurprised by the absence of a mirror. The only remarkable thing about the room was its resident, who sat motionless in the chair. He, for it was a man, showed little emotion at my intrusion into his sanctum. I was foolish enough to attempt to engage him in conversation before I noticed the peculiar leathery texture of his skin and the glassy unblinking eyes.
For me this latest specimen of the taxidermist’s art was by far the most disturbing. I wondered who the poor fellow had been, and how he had come to such a pass. At that point, I heard the crunch of wheels coming to a stop.
Withdrawing from the room and quickly locking it behind me, I opened the door to the side and peered out. Two fellows, one uniformed, one not, both a little bedraggled and in the act of removing straw from their persons, were arrived in the back of a farmer’s cart. Plainly, I was to play gatekeeper for the reporter and the constable. Moving to the gate, I saw that Maccabi had had the foresight to leave the chain un-padlocked, and with some effort I removed the heavy chain from the iron gates. I looked up expectantly at the passengers. The constable attempted to speak first, but the reporter, who appeared to think much of himself for a fellow with straw in his hat, interrupted.
‘Edgar Allan, Alnwick Mercury: Constable Turner is here about the body. Show us up, man.’
There was something odd about the man’s accent, but I was more concerned about his presumption in judging me a servant of the house. Perhaps I would avail myself of Maccabi’s raiment sooner than planned. Nonetheless, I waved them through and followed the cart up the drive, losing very little in distance thanks to the dilatory nature of both horse and driver. The cart pulled up at the doorway, which opened to reveal Maccabi. The man was either prescient or had intended to wait on the threshold until the constable’s arrival. To my reckoning there was no vantage point over the drive from which he could possibly have arrived so quickly at the entrance.
The visitors alighted from the rustic vehicle, the reporter somewhat more nimbly than the policeman. Allan’s introduction was the same terse, almost brusque, pronouncement he had given me. The constable appeared to have given up hope of getting the first word in any exchange. Maccabi raised his eyebrows at me over Allan’s shoulder; I gave him a rapid shake of the head.
He spoke. ‘Good morning, gentlemen. I shall show you to the unfortunate fellow’s last resting place.’
He addressed me then. ‘Moffat, accompany us, we may need to move the cadaver.’
The man was not so dull as to misunderstand that I wished – for the time – to remain incognito, but I felt he could have relished the peremptory tone a little less.
We went, passing swift, on foot to the pond. Allan kept up a rattling farrago of questions that Maccabi wisely ignored, whilst I brought up the rear behind my supposed betters. If the policeman was peevish at this usurpation of his role, he hid it well behind his silence. The angle of the late shepherd’s neck was still convincing enough to my eye to be the cause of death. The silent policeman bent down to examine the body more closely. The greater part of it was not underwater, only one leg, and the other below the knee. The constable lifted each leg carefully out of the water and uttered but one word: ‘Broken.’
Cullis deceased’s tumble down the hillside had been a precipitous one, true, but I was mildly surprised at this intelligence. I stood a little closer, the better to hear any more gobbets of wisdom that might fall from the policeman’s lips. The man ran his hands the length of the body, felt the neck with its improbable angle and discovered – I assumed from the wordless grunt he gave when he felt the cranium – the site of the blow I had dealt the shepherd.
Allan had followed this with feverish attention, all the while scribbling in his damned notebook. I was half expecting – no, gleefully anticipating – the next terse utterance from the policeman’s mouth, which was, of course, �
�Murder.’
Maccabi was completely and utterly unmoved. Allan grew still more excitable, asking me, ‘Know him, did you? Like him? Likeable fellow, was he?’
‘I did not, sir, I am recently arrived myself.’
If the scribbler had noticed that my own diction was somewhat more refined than his own, he gave no sign of it, merely turning his fervid eye on Maccabi and sending a further salvo of questions in his direction. Maccabi caught my eye with a questioning look and I gave him a nod. The man was no dullard, I had to allow him that.
He began the introductions forthwith; again, for a reporter, Allan proved remarkably unobservant – or the scribbling was proof of a prodigiously unreliable memory. It appeared he had not noticed my sudden promotion to master of Gibbous House. It interested me more that the policeman did not care to make anything of my brief masquerade as a humble servant.
‘So, Constable Turner, may the cadaver be despatched to the undertakers? I fear his brother is determined to achieve a rapid burial.’
Turner merely uttered ‘Brother?’ in the most quizzical manner, and I suggested we all repair to the house to discuss what should next be done. The policeman strode purposefully toward the house entrance, thwarting my intention to herd the both of them in via the servants’ entrance. The reporter, perhaps affronted by being ignored, took to reading aloud excerpts from his notebook. It seemed his handwriting was not of the highest quality as, amongst other things, I was surprised to learn that I had in my employ one Zebediah Macindoe and that a shepherd named Portcullis was recently found murdered in a pound.
Chapter Nineteen
In an effort to restore the correct social order, I steered the company into the kitchen; Mrs Gonderthwaite was present, at least in what passed for the flesh, Cullis vivat was not. The cook-cum-chatelaine was in a distracted state, stirring the empty air in front of her with a wooden spoon. I bellowed ‘TEA’ at a suitably insistent distance from her blank face. She came to herself immediately, although quite unstartled, and busied herself with a large kettle. There were some rustic chairs near to a large table and we all, save Constable Turner and the cook, availed ourselves of the little comfort they offered. No one spoke, not even the reporter.
Believing the policeman’s silence a clumsy effort to tempt one or other of us into some rash utterance of use to him, I took the opportunity to study him more closely. He was not young, and in common with the men of his age in this area he sported the ruddy flush of the outdoor life. I had been long enough in Northumbria to note the savage winds and it seemed forty years’ experience of them tinted the cheeks a vibrant red. His whiskers were fairly restrained for a man of his class; I could not see the colour of his hair for the incongruous top hat, which, I noted, he forbore to remove in my house. I wondered that the policemen themselves did not demand some more practical – and sartorially harmonious – headgear. His uniform fit – as many such garments do – where it might. The dark-blue serge of his tailcoat strained at certain seams and bagged voluminously in others. His trousers were white in colour and still less practical than the hat. The boots had been polished to a high shine, but were a little dusty after their journey in the cart.
I had been sure the reporter would fill the aural void, but he merely contented himself with running his finger along the lines of his notebook and mouthing the words, occasionally looking up as if startled by the surreal world his note-taking had created. It was Maccabi who proved least able to bear the inscrutable silence of the policeman. Clearing his throat, he said, ‘Constable, ah... ;’ he shifted uncomfortably in his seat, ‘surely you don’t think... ’
His voice trailed off and I was convinced he was squirming under the gimlet eye of the policeman. The Peeler replied, ‘I do think, Mr Maccabi. The detection of crime is a cerebral pursuit.’
This was a veritable feat of oratory from the taciturn officer. Allan looked up sharply from his notebook.
‘Detection? What do you mean?’
He withdrew a pair of spectacles from a pocket of his coat and placed them so that he could peer over them at the policeman. He then scribbled the word in his notebook and looked up expectantly. Perhaps vanity had prevented him from using the eye-glasses earlier, although I supposed no ocular improvements would improve his pencraft.
‘The work of a detective, Mr Allan. Or, more correctly, a detective policeman.’
The reporter scrawled again, but looked none the wiser. The constable went on at some length concerning the collection of clues and evidence, the use of reasoning, corollary and surmise to bring criminals to justice. The very idea of such a person sounded like something from the most outlandish novel. I wished for a little more of his erstwhile brevity. The reporter continued to scribe as though in the role of Jehovah’s amanuensis, and Maccabi fidgeted like a bored girl. Had it not amused me so, I would have found it uncomfortable to watch.
Eventually, the soi-disant ‘police detective’ appeared to realise that his proselytising on the innovatory development in the world of police work was hindering the investi-gation. He stopped in the midst of some many-syllabled neologism, his mouth closing like a gin-trap sprung by an unwitting badger. The reporter gave a great sigh at this development. The constable turned his gaze once more to Maccabi, who had not desisted in his squirming at any point. What possessed Maccabi to utter the following, I did not know.
‘The body, Cullis, I should like to see to its removal... If... ’
His resolve withered under the stare.
‘It’s just, his brother... ’ . He faltered again.
The policeman let him fidget a little longer, then said, ‘All in good time, Mr Maccabi. The brother might be summoned, I take it?’
Myself, I would have found this new departure into civil-ised speech an unnerving departure. Maccabi relaxed a little, and, voicing his compliance loudly, dashed out to the servants’ entrance, presumably towards the stables.
The uncompanionable silence prevailed once more and I was glad of it, idly perusing the peculiar figure of the newspaperman scribbling at the table. He seemed to be about forty-five years of age. I remarked in him the inclination to a furtive and timid manner as observed in such people as are unused to the fugitive life – and who seldom prosper long in it. He was of middling height, dark of hair and with eyes of the wateriest blue, save for those parts that by rights should have been white, which were threaded with a myriad of red filaments. Whether this was a symptom of some undiagnosed affliction or simply a sign of the extent to which his vanity prevented him from wearing the eye-glasses he so clearly needed, I did not know. His attire was, I had to admit, as garish as something I might have worn had I not benefited from the much-needed education in matters of taste that my late wife had given me. His tailcoat was high in the waist and long in the tails. It was violet – not a sin in itself, of course. His trousers, however, were a plaid monstrosity such as might have been worn by one of the more unlikely mechanicals in one of Scott’s puerile romances. Perhaps his eye-glasses should have been the first item assumed on rising from his bed.
Maccabi returned in the time it took to note these things – which is to say, in no time at all. He was unaccompanied and prevailed on the constable to make shift to the stables, as Cullis was unable to enter the house at that moment. The reporter leapt to his feet, intent on witnessing the interview. I thought I might follow suit and it struck me that I had theretofore seen no sign of a notebook in Turner’s hands. Perhaps an extraordinary memory was another aspect of the new science of detection.
Outside, Cullis was waiting. He had assumed a rough and filthy leather apron over his clothes, although they would not have been ruined by any amount of the blood coating the roughly cured skin. In either hand he held an extremely large and bloodied knife; the one blade was toothed in the manner of a saw and the other visible as being exceptionally keen – even to the naked eye. The reporter looked wide-eyed as though in fear of his life. The policeman was stolidly silent. I considered that this ‘detection’ see
med to be a remarkably passive activity. Then Maccabi turned to me.
‘Have you spoken with Cullis earlier today, sir?’
‘What of it?’ I asked.
The ‘detective’ intervened. ‘He would like to know if you ordered the disposal of a horse. It appears there is a use for its skin, at least.’
The reporter looked at him like a bumpkin at a magic show. Maccabi looked equally impressed.
‘For pity’s sake, we’re outside a d____ stable, Cullis reeks of horse, he’s wearing an ostler’s apron and... I am right, am I not, Constable, that the poor fellow in the pond has been a corpse too long to produce such gouts of blood! That’s all there is to this wonderful detection; any fool might pretend to be a practitioner.’
I turned to the policeman expecting a deserved look of respect. He gave me something that approximated a smile.
‘My father owned the knacker’s in Morpeth when I was young. It must have been a greater feat of detection for you. Although, in fact, you mean deduction, Mr Moffat.’
He appeared to stop and consider that he had not wanted to say so much, and then went on in his more customary terse style. ‘Strange thing. Corpses, blood. Not a military man, are you.’
It was not a question. Therefore I did not answer.
Chapter Twenty
Maccabi was still looking uncomfortable. I would have given anything for a moment alone with him to ascertain why. In the meantime, Constable Turner turned his gaze to the brother of the deceased. He spoke in a more intelligible version of the local patois; both Cullis and I were able to understand it.
‘Mr Cullis. Older brother, yes. On the estate since March, is it?’
Although Cullis’s answer was as impenetrable as expected, the look of bewilderment was unmistakable. Turner leaned his face toward the labourer and glowered, the man shrank back.
‘I gave you something to remember me by in Felton, man.’