A Murder is Arranged

by Basil Thomson

  “You say that the revolver was lying on the floor near the body and was not grasped in the hand.”

  “It was eight and a half inches from the right hand, sir.”

  “In my opinion that would not point to suicide. A very important and in fact almost certain proof of suicide is the manner in which the corpse retains the weapon in his clenched fist. All sorts of experiments have been made on persons just dead by pressing objects into their hands and these have proved that they cannot continue grasping such objects with the convulsive grip of a person who was holding the object in his hand during life and in the death agony, unless, of course, the weapon was placed in the hand of a dying victim. So, subject to the opinion of the Home Office expert, I think it is clear that Hyam Fredman was murdered.”

  “I think to, too, sir, and we shall work on those lines.”

  “Then let me hear the doctor’s report as soon as it comes in.”

  Chapter Six

  NO ONE would have thought that tragedy was hanging over the little party of three who sat in the dining room at Scudamore Hall on Christmas Eve, albeit they had attended the funeral of Margaret Gask that very morning. Huskisson, it was true, was still plunged in gloom but Oborn was a host in himself. As if to make up for having sprung the surprise of his alibi upon them without telling them beforehand, he entertained his two companions with amusing stories throughout the meal. Forge seemed to forget his distaste for the man. No one touched on the topic of Margaret Gask’s death but Oborn in his triumph at the police court could not resist the temptation to make slighting references to the police. Forge at once took up the cudgels on their behalf.

  “They’ve got pretty good men in the metropolitan police,” he said.

  “And plenty of dunderheads, too—fellows who go off the deep end on the slightest provocation. Look at that fellow—Dallas, I think he calls himself; there’s a deep-ender for you…”

  Forge turned upon him. “Don’t start talking about Inspector Dallas disparagingly…”

  “Why? Has he been making good behind my back?”

  “Well, I’ll tell you something and you can judge for yourselves. Now we are free from interruption by the servants let me say that I’ve recovered a very valuable thing that was pinched by someone in the house no longer ago than three or four days and this was done entirely by Dallas. You remember that uncut emerald I showed you all? Well, to the best of my belief I locked it up in the drawer, meaning to put it back in the safe as soon as I had a moment to spare, but when I went to the drawer I found that it had disappeared and yet I could swear that I locked it up.”

  “You mean that the lock on the drawer was picked?” asked Huskisson.

  “It must have been.”

  “You don’t suspect any of your guests, I hope?” asked Oborn with a grin.

  Forge dismissed the joke with a gesture. “You must keep this entirely to yourselves. Obviously the theft must have been committed by someone in the house and all my servants are more or less new. The police are looking up the characters they brought with them but have warned me not to alarm them and so I hope you will both keep your mouths shut about the theft.”

  The butler came in and, addressing Forge, said, “I’m sorry to disturb you, sir, but there’s a lady on the telephone asking for Miss Gask.”

  “Did you tell her what had happened?” asked Forge.

  “No sir; I said that I would call you to speak to the lady.”

  Forge made a gesture of resignation. “You’ll excuse me,” he said to his guests as he went out to the instrument in the hall.

  He took up the receiver and listened to a voice with a strong foreign accent.

  “Who is speaking?” he asked.

  “Mademoiselle Coulon. I wish to speak to Miss Gask; she told me she would be there, so will you call her, please.”

  Forge clasped and unclasped the fingers of his free hand, wondering how one broke bad news gently. Through his brain—never of the brightest—there flashed the thought that to temporise would only put off the evil day and might possibly involve him in a suspicion of foul play. He must temporise, nevertheless. “I’m sorry to tell you that there has been an accident.”

  The voice at the other end rose almost to a scream. “An accident to Margaret? Is she hurt very badly, yes?”

  “Yes, very badly.”

  “Oh, where is she? I must go to see her at once.”

  “I’m afraid it’s too late.” Forge quickly abandoned all hope of temporising. It was safer to blurt out the truth. “The fact is we attended her funeral this morning.” There was a silence at the other end of the wire; Forge began to fear that the speaker had collapsed in a faint with the instrument in her hand. At last came the words in a faint voice: “Margaret dead: it is not possible; and so suddenly. Then what am I to do? I come from arriving in London just half an hour ago. Margaret wrote to me that her friends would be pleased if I came to stay with them, so I came, but if she is dead…”

  The voice was a pleasant one, the accent that of an educated woman; Forge forgot his resolution never again to invite to his house chance acquaintances—and if this lady at the other end of the wire was not a chance acquaintance what was she? But he could not keep her waiting.

  “Come all the same,” he said, “and I can tell you all about it when you come.”

  “But how shall I get there?”

  “Where are you now?”

  “I am speaking from Waterloo Station.”

  “Nothing could be better. Ask for the platform for the next train to Kingston and I will send the car to meet you there. The chauffeur will be told to ask for Mademoiselle Coulon.”

  “But that sounds very easy. I ask for Kingston, is it not so? And you will tell your chauffeur to look for a lady all in dark blue with a green wing in her hat and I will tell him my name.”

  It is always pleasant to play the part of a knight-errant and Forge returned to his guests with the glow still upon him. He explained to them what had happened.

  “Mademoiselle Coulon!” exclaimed Huskisson with a note of pleasure in his voice. “Why, that must be Pauline Coulon.”

  “You know her then?” asked Forge.

  “I do and she’s a very charming person.”

  “She must be,” agreed Oborn, “for do you know that she’s lifted the atmosphere of gloom from your brow for the first time since I met you.”

  “Perhaps you would go in the car to meet her at Kingston, as you know her,” said Forge; “and, by the way, the car ought to be starting soon: the trains run pretty often.”

  “Have you told her what has happened?” asked Huskisson.

  “I told her that poor Margaret Gask was dead but I did not say how she met her death.”

  “Oh, then I suppose that will be my pleasant job,” observed Huskisson, on whom a deeper gloom had descended. “However, I’ll be off.”

  “I don’t envy him his job,” said Oborn when Huskisson had shut the door behind him.

  “No more do I, but it’ll be easier for him than it would have been for us who have never met the lady.”

  “Do you think you acted wisely in inviting her to come to a house where her friend has just been murdered?”

  “What else could I do? She had been invited to this house by poor Margaret and I couldn’t leave her stranded without a friend in London. After all, we ought to be able between us to make her forget the tragedy.”

  “I hope she won’t mind there being no hostess.”

  “Well, you see I’ve got no female relations. Margaret, poor girl, was to have acted as hostess. I would have asked Huskisson’s mother to come and stay for Christmas but it seems that she has already accepted an invitation to go to some friends in Scotland. If you’ll excuse me I think I’ll see the housekeeper myself about a room for Mademoiselle.”

  As soon as the door had closed behind Forge, Oborn rang the bell. It was answered by the butler, who, seeing that Oborn was alone, closed the door behind him.

  “I’m glad
you answered the bell. Tell me quickly. Did you ever hear Margaret speak of a French friend called Pauline Coulon?”

  “Never,” said the butler without hesitation.

  “Good. That’s all I wanted to know. Clear out now before Forge comes back.”

  A minute later Forge returned with an expression of satisfaction on his face.

  “We must make this lady comfortable,” he said; “but I think that my old housekeeper will see to that now that I’ve put her on her mettle.”

  “I hope she’ll prove worth the trouble you are taking and that her appearance will make as good an impression upon you as her voice seems to have made.”

  Forge grinned. “We shan’t have long to wait; they may be here at any minute.”

  When the visitor did arrive they had to own that, however attractive her voice was, it could not have been more prepossessing than her appearance. She had even succeeded in dispelling the habitual gloom of Huskisson, who introduced her first to her host.

  The girl’s manner was charming. “But how kind of you to ask me here,” she said to Forge, looking at him from beneath her long lashes. She was tall and slender with a kind of ethereal beauty about her which seemed to Forge very unlike the usual type of Frenchwoman. It would have been difficult to describe the exact colour of her eyes, which seemed to change from grey to green. Oborn made an inward note of their extreme intelligence.

  Forge, intent on hospitality, demanded whether she had dined and, learning that she had not, ordered a tray to be brought. He knew that he could leave to his housekeeper the choice of the viands.

  Pauline Coulon allowed a dinner wagon to be wheeled in and helped herself to the various good things without showing the least concern because three pairs of eyes were fixed upon her; moreover, she plied a good knife and fork while chattering away about her impressions of the first Christmas she had ever passed in England.

  “Your Christmas,” she said, “I know is the fête for children but at Waterloo one sees little of that; everyone seems to be hurrying homeward as fast as they can and most of them are laden with parcels.”

  It was Huskisson who first introduced the subject that was uppermost in all their minds, although they had avoided it until now.

  “Mademoiselle Coulon was, of course, very much upset at the news I had to break to her.”

  “Ah yes!” She threw out her hands with a little gesture of horror. “But surely Margaret had no enemies in England. You have, of course, very clever police at your Scotland Yard. They are working on the case—yes?”

  “Oh yes; their best men are working on the case,” said Forge. “I should not be surprised if they called to see you as soon as they hear that you are in England and that you knew Margaret Gask well.”

  “But I know of no enemies that she had.”

  “Perhaps it was no enemy,” suggested Oborn; “it may have been a friend.”

  “Friends do not kill defenceless women.” Then she added thoughtfully: “But a jealous lover might.”

  “He might,” said Oborn with meaning.

  “You are forgetting the fur coat,” said Forge, to whom this innuendo was distasteful.

  “Fur coat?” she asked. “What has a fur coat to do with it?”

  “Merely that it disappeared on the night of the murder.”

  “She was wearing it, you mean?”

  “We think she must have been, as it was such a cold night.”

  “Then the motive was robbery?”

  “The whole mystery is why was Margaret in the lane at that time of night,” said Forge. “There could have been nothing to take her out except to meet someone.”

  “But what contradiction,” she said with a little moue. “If she had a rendezvous it must have been with a lover and yet a lover, even if he killed in jealous rage, would not steal a coat.”

  “That’s what puzzles us all,” said Oborn. “I think perhaps if you had been here all the time your woman’s intuition might have gone a long way towards solving the mystery.”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Of course Margaret was very beautiful and a beautiful woman never lacks lovers.” She passed her hand over her forehead and turned to Mr Forge. “You will forgive me but I have been travelling for so many hours and this news has upset me…”

  “You would like to go to your room,” said her host. “My housekeeper will show you the way and see that you have everything you require.”

  “Thank you: that will be very nice.”

  Chapter Seven

  DALLAS’ NEXT REPORT, received after Boxing Day, read as follows:

  “In connection with what has come to be known as the ‘murder in Crooked Lane’ I have to attach the medical report of Dr Smithers on the death of Hyam Fredman. It will be remembered that at the inquest held yesterday the jury returned a verdict of ‘murder by some person or persons unknown.’”

  Richardson turned to the medical report and noted that it was in the handwriting of Dr Smithers himself. He touched his bell; a clerk answered it.

  “Ah! You’re the very man for this job,” said Richardson. “You can decipher the handwriting of doctors who ought to be dropped into a canal with a stone round their necks as a warning to the profession to write legibly.”

  The clerk looked at the document with knitted brow. “Very good, sir,” he said with resignation; “you shall have a typed copy but this is worse to decipher than most of them.”

  “I’ve often wondered,” said Richardson, “how many deaths have been caused by chemists making up poisonous prescriptions because they can’t read them. There must be an unholy pact between chemists and doctors to keep their dreadful secrets from the outside world on whom they both live. Let me have a transcript as soon as you can.”

  When the clerk had left Richardson turned again to Dallas’ report.

  “We have established beyond doubt that Hyam Fredman was a receiver of stolen goods with a connection among persons who had access either as guests or servants to houses known to contain valuable property. He was suspected, though proof was never obtained, of receiving a masterpiece of an old Italian painter stolen by burglars from the house of Mr Eidelston, in Shepherd’s Market, Mayfair, and disposing of it to a well-known receiver in Paris. In view of the fact that he was a receiver the following persons may be regarded at this stage of the enquiry as suspects:

  “(1) The butler, Alfred Curtis, office number C.R.0.2753. To steal a valuable while employed as a servant on a forged character would be quite in accordance with his criminal record, though it is right to say that he has never been convicted of any crime of violence.

  “(2) Arthur Graves. When we interviewed this man he said that his relations with Hyam Fredman were confined to borrowing money from him. A search of the money-lending books, very carefully kept by Fredman, do not disclose the name of Graves as a debtor but in a locked desk in the antique shop was found a receipt for £50 signed by him. This would suggest that he was disposing of stolen property. He knew both Hyam Fredman and Margaret Gask.

  “(3) Gerald Howard Huskisson. This young man was known to have had a violent quarrel with Margaret Gask during which he or she was trying to wrest some solid object from the other’s hand. This object could have been the emerald, stolen by one of the two. His statement that he retired to bed at 11 P.M. that night can neither be verified nor disproved.

  “It may reasonably be assumed that Hyam Fredman went to Crooked Lane on the night of the nineteenth and received the emerald from Margaret Gask, who was either alone or perhaps accompanied by Huskisson. The finding of a revolver discharged in two chambers beside Fredman’s body seemed to suggest that this pistol may have been used in the murder of both.

  “The disappearance of the fur coat which Margaret Gask must have been wearing might support a theory that her murder was committed by an outsider simply for the object of stealing a coat that would have high value among furriers.

  “Although there is nothing definite to connect Douglas Oborn with the crime there is
a discrepancy between his statement that he did not know the murdered woman and that of the woman herself, who spoke to Mr Forge of looking forward to meeting Oborn as an old friend.

  “Let me now return to the question of the revolver. The weapon lying by the body of Fredman is a Colt of an ancient pattern, rusty and ungreased. The three undischarged chambers contained cartridges and bullets that would fit the rifling. One of these cartridges has been submitted to a gunsmith who reports that the powder has been in the cartridge for a considerable time, probably not less than two years, since the grains showed traces of damp; indeed he was surprised to hear that the fulminate was still efficient in view of the evidence of damp. I authorised him to test one of the live cartridges in order to ascertain its penetrative efficiency: he found that the explosive quality of the fulminate was entirely destroyed and deduced that this must have been the case also with the two empty cartridge cases; moreover, neither of these two empty cases showed any sign of blackening. From these facts I submit that the weapon lying by the body of Hyam Fredman was placed there as a blind. We have traced the sale of this weapon. Mr Cohen, a pawnbroker in Sun Street, Kingston, has identified it as one sold by him to Hyam Fredman, who produced the necessary pistol certificate. Fredman told him that he wanted it as a curiosity, as he had quite a collection of ancient weapons. Against this is the fact that we found no other weapons on the premises of Mr Fredman: probably he wanted the revolver merely to intimidate possible burglars.

  “The medical evidence disproves the idea of suicide. We have as yet no indication pointing to any person having visited the shop that night. As already reported, we had to gain access to the shop by employing a locksmith; we found the back door, leading into the yard, also locked but the key was missing. This would lend support to a theory that Fredman himself opened the shop door to admit the murderer, locking it behind him, and that the murderer made his escape through the back door, locking it behind him and taking the key with him and scaling the wall of the yard which would have given him access to a narrow lane. This theory is supported by scratches found by us on the surface of the wall, which is only eight feet high. The murderer may have hoped to induce a belief that Fredman had killed Margaret Gask and then committed suicide with the same weapon.