Sorcerer's House

by Gerald Verner

  “That only makes it more interesting,” said Gale.

  “That’s as maybe, sir,” said Hatchard dubiously. “But what we’re faced with, now, is two murders instead of one, and—”

  “Three,” said Gale, breaking in. “You’ve forgotten the tramp. Three people, all killed in the same way. Two within a few weeks of each other, and the third one, Meriton, after a lapse of nearly two years. It’s a nice little problem.”

  “And Meriton’s the only one we can identify,” grunted the Chief Constable disgustedly. “It may seem a ‘nice little problem’ to you, Gale, but so far as we’re concerned it’s a damned blasted headache!”

  “What are you doing—about trying to find out who the girl was?” demanded Gale, ignoring this outburst.

  “We’ve asked for a list of all women between the ages of sixteen and twenty who were reported missing at the time she must have been murdered, sir,” answered Hatchard. “The majority of ’em will have been traced by now, of course, which’ll make it easier...”

  “Pity you couldn’t do the same about that tramp,” grunted Gale, pulling thoughtfully at his beard.

  Hatchard shook his head.

  “There’s quite a few tramps ‘on the road’ that nobody ’ud ever miss,” he said. “With a young woman, it’s different. I expect we shall know who she was pretty soon, sir.”

  “I hope it’s going to help, when we do,” grunted the Chief Constable pessimistically. “I’m not at all sure that we’re not up against a homicidal lunatic...”

  “That’s the popular belief in the village, sir,” said Hatchard. “I must say that if we can’t find a reasonable motive that covers all the—”

  “No, no, no!” cried Simon Gale, sweeping his arm round in violent disagreement and knocking a pile of books off a small table. “I won’t have that. I told you at the beginning that there’s a pattern to this business, d’you see? The murderer’s working to a plan...” He flung himself into a chair. “I’ve slipped up, somewhere,” he muttered, scowling ferociously. “I got hold of the wrong end of the stick...”

  The telephone bell rang with eager insistence. Since Simon Gale appeared completely oblivious of the fact, Alan, who was nearest to the instrument, lifted the receiver.

  “Yes?” he said into the mouthpiece.

  The telephone demanded to know, metallically, if Inspector Hatchard was there.

  “Hold on,” answered Alan. He turned to Hatchard. “It’s for you.”

  The inspector got up and took the receiver. “Yes…Oh…what is it?”

  The telephone chattered excitedly, and Alan saw Hatchard’s face change.

  “I see… Yes…yes.... It may be very helpful.”

  The chatter from the telephone ceased, and Hatchard put the receiver down slowly.

  “What was it?” demanded Major Chipingham. Simon Gale had taken no notice whatever. He remained, hunched up in his chair.

  “They’ve just had an answer from Meriton’s solicitors to our inquiry, sir,” said Hatchard. “As near as they can tell, he died worth about seventy thousand pounds. There’s a Will, which he made about a year ago...”

  “Who benefits?” asked the Chief Constable, as Hatchard paused.

  A queer look came into Hatchard’s eyes. He said, speaking very slowly and distinctly:

  “His wife gets the bulk of it, sir. But he left fifteen thousand pounds to—Dr. Ferrall.”

  *

  The inquest on Paul Meriton was held in an upstairs room at the Three Witches at ten-thirty on the following morning. It was not a large room, its normal purpose being a meeting place for various local clubs and societies, but it was the largest place available, since the school was unobtainable, and Ferncross did not possess a village hall. In consequence, only those people who were actually necessary to the proceedings were admitted; the remainder, which seemed to include the entire population, were forced to stay outside, gathered in little groups of avid discussion.

  Miss Flappit was well to the fore. She flitted, like a mosquito, from one group to another, her dry, high-pitched voice clearly distinguishable above the general hum of conversation.

  Colonel Ayling, his face rigid and devoid of expression, was listening, with an occasional grunted comment, to a small, fat man in a ginger-coloured suit of plus-fours, whose face looked like a well-polished apple. On the fringe of the small crowd, quite alone and looking, as usual, rather dazed, stood Mr. Veezey.

  Alan Boyce and Flake arrived almost at the same time as Dr. Ferrall and Avril. They met, in fact, at the door and only had time to exchange a hurried greeting before they were ushered to their seats in the improvised court-room. The Coroner, a stout, capable-looking man, was already seated at his table, turning over his papers, and the proceedings began without delay.

  They were brief and, to the reporters filling the back of the room, disappointing.

  Evidence of identification was supplied by Mrs. Horly, the deceased’s housekeeper, a white-haired, comfortable woman, with an ample bust, dressed discreetly in black, who gave her evidence quietly and without emotion. She was followed by Dr. Ferrall and the police surgeon, who testified to the cause of death, and then Alan was called. When he had related how he had come to discover the body, Inspector Hatchard got up and asked for an adjournment, pending further inquiries. The Coroner, obviously primed beforehand, immediately granted his request, and, except for a question by one of the jury—a local tradesman—the proceedings came to an end.

  “What about this other body?” demanded the juryman.

  “That, sir,” replied the Coroner, gathering his papers up, “will be dealt with at a fresh inquiry.”

  And that was all.

  Alan had expected to see Simon Gale, but there was no sign of him. They had left him on the previous day, after the telephone message to Hatchard about Meriton’s Will, still hunched up in his chair, scowling at nothing. The information that Ferrall was a beneficiary to the extent of fifteen thousand pounds, he had received with a non-committal grunt and, apparently, complete indifference.

  Colonel Ayling joined them when they came out.

  “Well?” he said, looking at them sharply from under his ragged brows. “They adjourned it, did they?”

  Ferrall nodded.

  “I expected that,” grunted Ayling. “The police are waiting for fresh evidence, I suppose. They won’t find it, if they listen to that feller Gale too much. Why don’t they tell him to mind his own business, eh?”

  “I guess, if he had, they’d never have found this other body,” said Alan.

  “An interfering mountebank, that’s what I call him,” Colonel Ayling said angrily. “Like all these fellers who think eccentricity is the hallmark of genius. Without all that posing an’ bluster, nobody ’ud notice him, eh? Tried to make the police believe in a wild-cat theory that Paul had killed my daughter… Bah! I could have told ’em that was sheer rubbish...”

  “Yes, indeed,” chimed in Miss Flappit, from behind them. As usual she had materialized from apparently nowhere and overheard what Ayling was saying. “I do so agree with that. If Inspector Hatchard would only listen to me, I’m quite sure that he would be able to make an arrest at once. There is no doubt in my mind concerning the guilty person.” She shot a quick and meaning glance in the direction of Mr. Veezey, who still stood, dazed and aloof, several yards away.

  “Nonsense!” said Colonel Ayling curtly. “Veezey wouldn’t harm a fly. The whole trouble round here is there are far too many people with stupid ideas. Leave the matter to the police. That’s what I say. It’s their job, not the job of a lot of interfering incompetent amateurs!’’

  He walked quickly away, pushing unceremoniously through the people who got in his path.

  “Well, really!” said Miss Flappit, her small eyes glinting with annoyance behind her glasses. “I do think Colonel Aylin is one of the rudest men. Anyone would think he didn’t want this matter cleared up—”

  “Let’s go and have a drink,” suggested Ferrall, gla
ncing at his watch, and rather pointedly ignoring Miss Flappit. “Come on, the pub’ll be open now!”

  Leaving Miss Flappit to find ‘fresh woods and pastures new’ on which to drip the venom of her tongue, they went into the Three Witches.

  And the first person they saw, leaning up against the bar with a huge tankard in his hand, talking to Mr. Jellyberry, was Simon Gale.

  “Hello, hello,” he greeted with a vast grin. “What are you going to have, eh?”

  “You weren’t at the inquest?” said Alan when the orders had been given.

  “No,” said Gale. “Jellyberry and I were having a quiet drink on our own.” He winked at the beaming landlord. “I sneaked in the back way. There was nothing new to be learned from the inquest.”

  “I thought you’d given up being the Great Detective, Simon,” said Avril, sipping her gin and french. She was still pale, and there were shadows under her eyes, but she looked better than when Alan had last seen her. Compared with Flake’s more vivid beauty, her blue eyes and honey-coloured hair seemed rather washed-out, but there was no denying that she was very attractive.

  “I never give anything up,” declared Simon Gale, “until I’ve brought it to a successful conclusion, or discovered that it can’t be done!” He drained his tankard and pushed it over to Mr. Jellyberry to be refilled.

  “This is my shout,” said Ferrall, signing to the landlord to repeat the round. “What makes you so interested, Gale?” he asked curiously.

  “In this business?” Gale waved his arm in a vast gesture that embraced the whole affair. “It’s a problem, d’you see? And I like problems. Especially human problems. What made so-and-so do so-and-so? It’s all the more exciting, in this case, because there’s a hangman’s noose for somebody at the end of it. Did you know Meriton was leaving you fifteen thousand?”

  He flung the question quite casually, with scarcely a change of tone to his voice, but if, as Alan thought, he expected Ferrall would be disconcerted he was disappointed.

  “Yes, I did,” answered Ferrall, collecting his change from Mr. Jellyberry. “He told me he was going to when he made the Will. I suppose the police told you—”

  “ ’Ere he comes,” broke in the hoarse voice of the landlord, “for ‘the usual’. I was thinkin’ it wouldn’t be long.” He chuckled.

  Alan looked round. Mr. Veezey had drifted into the bar. Uncertainly he walked up to the counter, and the ritual of the two double-whiskies, and the hesitating search for the money, was conducted as before. Mr. Veezey drifted out again.

  “Miss Flappit’s chief suspect,” said Ferrall with a grimace. “I’d sooner believe it was Miss Flappit than Veezey.”

  “What makes him like that?” asked Alan curiously. “As if he was in a kind of dream all the time.”

  “Ah,” remarked Mr. Jellyberry, who had returned in time to overhear the question, “It’s my belief that ’e’s not quite right in the ’ead, poor chap. Not that ’e’s ever given any trouble. Got one interest in life, an’ that’s

  ’is garden...”

  “I don’t think he’s cracked,” said Gale, shaking his head, “have you ever noticed his eyes? They’re weak, but they’re damned intelligent. There’s a brain behind ’em—”

  “I should never have thought poor Mr. Veezey particularly brainy,” said Flake doubtfully. “He always seems to me rather—pathetic.”

  “Like a lost child,” said Avril almost inaudibly.

  “Well,” exclaimed Ferrall, finishing his drink at a gulp, “I must go. I’ve got patients to look after. You coming, Avril?”

  She nodded.

  “Yes, I must do some shopping if you want any lunch,” she said.

  Simon Gale looked after them as they went out, with the cocked eyebrow look that Alan was beginning to know so well.

  “Nice round sum—fifteen thousand, hey?” he grunted. “I wonder if it was just a friendly gesture that made Meriton leave it to Ferrall—or whether there was any other reason...?”

  *

  The Onslow-Whites went to Barnsford that afternoon, taking Flake with them, and Alan Boyce was left to his own devices. They had suggested that he might like to go with them, but they were calling on some friends, and he felt that he would rather stay in the peace of Bryony Cottage than make himself agreeable to strangers. Although he did not realize it, he was feeling the strain of exhausted nerves. The excitement of the last few days had been very wearing.

  When they had gone he sat down in the pleasant old drawing room and wrote a long letter to his father... The country’s fine (he wrote), and, I guess, you were right when you said this place had got everything. And how! There’s already been a murder and the police have dug up the body of an unknown girl in the ruins of an old house that’s supposed to be haunted! This morning I had to go to an inquest...

  He finished his letter and went out into the garden. Making himself comfortable in one of the deck-chairs under the pear tree, he lighted a cigarette and let the peace of the summer afternoon soak into him like a hot bath. Outside this oasis there might be battle, murder and sudden death, but here, with the birds singing, and butterflies chasing each other over the flowers, there was peace...

  Bang! Pop-pop-pop… bang!

  The American was startled to sudden wakefulness. Bang! The last explosion sounded as though the entire cottage had blown up!

  “Hello, hello!” cried the voice of Simon Gale. “Anyone at home?’’

  He came striding round the side of the house, a figure of immense energy, and grinned at Alan. The peace of the garden fled...

  “They’ve all gone to Barnsford,” said Alan a little resentfully,

  “So much the better,” said Gale, dropping into a chair beside him. “It’s you I came to see, young feller. I feel like talking... I want to clarify some ideas I’ve got—about this Meriton business....” He whipped out his battered tin of black tobacco and a packet of papers and, almost with the effect of a conjuring trick, rolled a cigarette. “I’ve been thinking,” he went on, “and I’ve got a vague idea of the pattern…part of it, anyway...” He scraped a match to flame on his thumb-nail, and lit his cigarette. “Mind you,” he said with a fiendish scowl at Alan, “I’m only conjecturing, but it all fits. By all the cards in the Tarot, how it fits...”

  “Well, let’s hear it,” said Alan impatiently, annoyed at the interruption to his peaceful afternoon.

  “You’ve got to keep this to yourself, young feller,” said Gale. “I don’t want Chippy, or Hatchard, or anybody to know about it—yet. Because, d’you see, I may be wrong.” He blew a curl of burnt paper off the end of his cigarette and stared up into the branches of the pear tree. “Now, look here,” he said, “leaving the murder of Meriton out of it, what have we got? We’ve got two other murders—an unknown tramp and an unknown woman, both killed in the same place and in exactly the same way and, apparently, within a few weeks of each other. Right? There’s only one difference in these two murders. While the body of the tramp is left lying under the window of the Long Room, for anyone to find, the body of the woman is buried under the tiled floor of a wash-house. Suggestive, eh?”

  “Do you mean,” said Alan, frowning, “that it didn’t matter about the tramp being found, but it mattered a heck of a lot that the woman shouldn’t be?”

  Gale slapped his knee.

  “Double-twenty first shot, young feller!” he cried. “The woman’s body was never meant to be found. It was only because I made a damn stupid mistake that it was. Anyone could have buried a dozen bodies in that old house, and nobody would have been the wiser. It was the one place, d’you see, that was absolutely safe. There’s not a soul in the village who’d go near it. They’re all scared to death of the ghosts and the goblins...”

  “Fay Meriton wasn’t scared,” said Alan. “Not if she really used that room…”

  Had she been up there, with the candle-flames flickering in the draught, while somebody worked feverishly in an outhouse below, re-laying a tiled floor…?


  “Of course Fay Meriton wasn’t scared,” said Simon Gale with an odd inflection in his voice. “There was no need for her to be scared. Because, d’you see, she was responsible for the ghosts and the goblins... I’ll bet a used stamp to all the fleas on a stray cat that it was Fay Meriton who killed the tramp and the woman…”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Alan Boyce had seen what was coming, but when it came, it was nonetheless a shock. Fay Meriton, whose shadowy figure and queer personality had hovered in the background, like an uneasy ghost, suddenly took on shape and substance, as though she had stepped out of the picture over the mantelpiece in that dusty, attic room.

  “D’you see what happened?” said Simon Gale, flinging away the end of his cigarette, and deftly rolling a fresh one. “D’you see how perfectly it fits? That insane streak in her that was responsible for the furnished room in Sorcerer’s House, and the fits of hysteria, suddenly kicked bang over the traces. It turned homicidal, and the tramp an’ the girl were the result...”

  “But, surely,” objected Alan, “if she became violent, everybody would have known?”

  “No, no, no,” Gale cried. “It doesn’t work like that. Once it was over, once Fay had got the killing bug out of her system, she’d be more or less normal—until the next time the urge welled up. There have been dozens of similar cases, young feller. The homicidal maniac is usually as normal, outwardly, as you or I. An’ then the blood-lust comes and, pouf!” He snapped his fingers.

  “Paul Meriton must have known.”

  “Of course he knew!” broke in Gale impatiently. “That’s the reason why the poor devil always looked as though hell was burning inside him. He covered up for her. The tramp didn’t matter—it was generally supposed that he’d fallen out of the window. His body was put there so that it would look like that. But the girl... that was different. If her body had been found, a few weeks later, there’d have been a devil of a rumpus. The police might be persuaded that one accident had taken place, but they’d never accept two. So Meriton buried the body under those tiles in the outhouse. Wouldn’t you have done the same, young feller, if you were desperately in love with your wife and you’d suddenly found out that she—” He stopped abruptly, and cocked an inquiring eye at Alan. “Think what it would have meant,” he went on, after a pause. “A trial...Broadmoor...a whole cartload of mud-slinging. He wasn’t going to let her face that, so he got her away, after persuading her to write that note.”