“You see, Mrs. Cliburn and I stayed on after the others had gone to talk about the prizes for the village whist-drive,” she explained. “And I know it was ten past seven when I left The Cedars, because I caught sight of the clock in the drawing-room, and that's what it said. I'd no idea it was as late as that. I told Mrs. Haswell I must simply fly, or Poor Uncle would be wondering what had become of me, and I ran across her garden to the gate on to the footpath, and came home that way. And it only takes about five minutes to reach the stile from there, so it must have been about a quarter past seven, or perhaps twenty past when it happened.”
“Thank you, miss: that's very clear. And after you heard the shot, you didn't hear or see anything else?”
“No, only a sort of smack, and I didn't think anything of that at the time. I mean, it was so soon after the bang that it seemed part of it, in a way.”
“You didn't see anyone? No one on the common, for instance?”
“No, I'm sure I didn't. Of course, I wasn't looking particularly, but I should have been bound to have noticed if there had been anyone.”
“You didn't look particularly?” repeated the Sergeant. “The shot was fired from close enough to give you a fright, wasn't it, miss?”
“Yes, but, you see, I didn't know that. I'm afraid I'm silly about guns. I can't bear sudden bangs. I just thought it couldn't have been as close as it seemed.”
The Sergeant made a careful note in his book, but offered no comment on this explanation. After a minute, he said: “Do you know of any person, miss, who had a grudge against your uncle?”
“Oh, no!” she replied earnestly.
“You know of no quarrel with any person?” She shook her head. “To your knowledge, he had no enemies?”
“Oh, I'm sure he hadn't!”
There was little more to be elicited from her; and after a few further questions the Sergeant took his leave, telling her that she would be advised of the date of the inquest.
The prospect of having to give evidence at an inquest seemed to affect Miss Warrenby almost as poignantly as its cause, and it was several minutes before she could be reconciled to it. She reiterated her conviction that her uncle would have strongly disliked it, and was only partly soothed by an assurance from Miss Patterdale that neither the post-mortem examination nor the inquest would preclude her from burying her uncle with all the ceremonial she seemed to consider was his due. When Charles conveyed his mother's message to her, her eyes filled with grateful tears, and she begged him to thank Mrs. Haswell very, very much for her kindness, and to say how deeply touched she was by it. But she was quite sure Uncle Sampson would have wished her to remain at Fox House.
Nobody could imagine on what grounds she based this conviction. Abby, who was quite uninhibited, asked bluntly: “Why on earth?”
“It has been our home for such a long time,” said Mavis, visibly investing it with ancestral qualities. “I know he would hate to think I couldn't bear to live there any more. Of course, it will be dreadfully painful just at first, but I've got to get over that, and I believe in facing up boldly to unpleasant things.”
The slight discomfort which was too often provoked by Miss Warrenby's nobler utterances descended upon the company. After an embarrassed silence, Charles said, in a practical spirit: “Have you got to get used to living there alone? I suppose it's been left to you, but will you be able to keep it up?”
She looked startled, and a little shocked. “Oh, I haven't thought of such things. How could I? Please don't let's talk about them! It seems so sordid, and the very last thing one wants to think about at such a time. I just feel it's my duty to stay at home. Besides, I have to remember poor Gladys. She'll be coming out on the last bus, and I couldn't bear her to find the house all locked up and deserted. Whatever would she think?”
“Well, she couldn't think of much worse than the truth,” said Miss Patterdale. “However, that certainly is a point: you don't want to lose a good maid on top of everything else. I was thinking you'd be alone in the house: I'd forgotten about your Gladys. If you'd really prefer to go back, you'd better stay here until later, and then I'll take you home, and stay with you till Gladys arrives. Good gracious, look at the time! You must all be famished! Charles, you'd better stay to supper: luckily it's cold, except for the potatoes, and they're ready to put in the deep-frying-pan. Abby, lay the table, there's a good child!”
“I don't think I could eat anything,” said Mavis, rather faintly. “I wonder if I might go upstairs and lie down quietly by myself, Miss Patterdale? Somehow, one feels one would like to be alone at a moment like this.”
To the imperfectly disguised relief of Charles and Abby Miss Patterdale raised no objection to this, but took her young friend up to her own bedroom, drew the curtains across the windows, gave her an aspirin, and recommended her to have a nice nap.
“Not but that I've no patience with these airs and graces,” she said severely, when she came downstairs again. “Anyone would think Sampson Warrenby had been kind to the girl, which we all know he wasn't. If he's left his money to her, which I should think he must have done, because I never heard that he had any nearer relations, she's got a good deal to be thankful for. I can't stand hypocrisy!”
“Yes, but I don't think it is, quite,” said Abby, wrinkling her brow. “I mean, she's so frightfully pious that she thinks you jolly well ought to be sorry if your uncle dies, and so she actually is!”
“That's worse! Don't forget the spoon and fork for the salad!” said Miss Patterdale, disappearing in the direction of the kitchen.
The murder of Sampson Warrenby naturally formed the sole topic for conversation over the supper-table, Miss Patterdale making no attempt to restrain the enthusiasm of her niece and (adopted) nephew, but maintaining her own belief that it would lead to unpleasantness. Charles was able to perceive, academically speaking, that there might be a great deal of truth in this; but Abby said simply that she had never hoped to realise an ambition to be, as she phrased it, mixed up in a murder-case. Miss Patterdale, regarding her with a fondly indulgent eye, very handsomely said that she was glad it had happened while she was there to enjoy it.
The subject was still under discussion when, having washed up all the plates and cutlery, the party sat down to drink coffee in the parlour. Miss Patterdale had just ascertained that Mavis, under the influence of aspirin, had sunk into a deep sleep, when a knock on the door heralded the arrival of Gavin Plenmeller, who had come, as he unashamedly confessed, to Talk About the Murder.
“Good heavens, is it all over the village already?” exclaimed Miss Patterdale, ushering him into the parlour.
“But could you doubt that it would be? We had the news in the Red Lion within ten minutes of Hobkirk's setting out for the scene of the crime. Mrs. Hobkirk brought it to us, and very grateful we were. News has been coming in for the past hour and more: I was quite unable to drag myself away, though there was a duck and green peas waiting for me at home. Instead, I ate a singularly nauseating meal at the Red Lion. I can't think how we ever came to be famed for our hostelries. Thank you, I should love some coffee! Where is the heroine of this affair?”
“Lying down upstairs,” answered Abby. “How did you know she was here?”
“It is easy to see that you are a town-dweller,” said Gavin, dropping a lump of sugar into his cup. “I used to be one myself, and I'm so glad Walter made it possible for me to return to Thornden. Life is very dull in London. You are dependent on the Radio and the Press for all the news. Of course I know that Mavis Warrenby is here! I'm delighted to learn, however, that she's lying down upstairs: I didn't know that, though I suppose I might have guessed it. Now we can talk it all over without feeling the smallest gene.”
“How much is known in the village?” asked Charles.
“Oh, much more than the truth! That's why I came. I want to know what really happened. Now, don't tell me it was an accident! That was the first rumour that reached the Red Lion, but nothing would induce me to lend it
ear. Of course Sampson Warrenby was murdered! He is recognisable as a character created only to be murdered.”
“You mean if he's been a character in one of your books,” said Abby.
“Well, he may yet be that.”
“Charles thinks he must have been shot from the bushes opposite the house, on the common,” said Miss Patterdale.
Gavin turned his eyes enquiringly to Charles, who briefly explained his reasons for holding this opinion. “He was sitting in the garden with his profile turned to the lane, presumably reading some papers he's taken out with him. It wouldn't have been a very difficult shot.”
“But where was Mavis while all this marksmanship was going on? Report places her actually on the scene of the crime.”
“No, she wasn't quite that close, though darned nearly. According to her story, she was getting over the stile at the top of the lane when she heard the shot. That's where the murderer was in luck: a second or two later and she would have been on the spot—might even have stopped the bullet.”
“No, she mightn't,” contradicted Abby. “That's fatuous! The man wouldn't have fired if she'd been in the way!”
“Who knows?” murmured Gavin. “I shall go and view the terrain tomorrow morning. Can't you see the stile from the common? I rather thought you could.”
“Yes, I thought of that too,” agreed Charles. “Several explanations possible. The murderer may have been too intent on taking aim to look that way. He may have been lying with the gorse bushes shutting off the stile from his sight.”
“I find both those theories depressing. They make it seem as if the murderer is a careless, slapdash person, and that I refuse to believe.”
“But that's what they usually are, aren't they?” asked Abby. “Real murderers, I mean, not the ones in books. I know I've read somewhere that they nearly always give themselves away by doing something silly.”
“True enough,” said Charles. “It 'ud be nice if ours turned out to be a master of crime, but I'm bound to say I haven't much hope of it.”
“If you have cast your mind round the district one can only be surprised that you have any,” remarked Gavin. “Which brings us to the really burning question exercising all our minds: who did it?”
“I know,” said Abby sympathetically. “I've been thinking of that, and I haven't the ghost of a notion. Because it isn't enough to dislike a person, is it? I mean, there's got to be a bigger motive than that.”
“Besides,” said Charles caustically, “we have it on Mavis's authority that her uncle had no enemies.”
“Did she say that?” asked Gavin, awed.
“Yes, she did,” nodded Miss Patterdale. “When the detective questioned her. I must say, I thought that was going too far. Silly, too. The police are bound to find out that no one could bear the man.”
“But did you all stand by and allow this flight of fancy to go unchallenged?”
“Yes,” said Abby, “though I should think the detective must have known it was a whopper, if he happened to be looking at Charles when he said it. His jaw dropped a mile. The thing is you can't very well chip in and say the man was utterly barred, when his niece thinks he wasn't.”
“Well, I very nearly did,” confessed Miss Patterdale. “Because it's nonsense to say that Mavis thought he was liked in the neighbourhood. She knew very well he wasn't. It's all on a par with pretending to be heartbroken that he's dead. I don't say she isn't shocked—I am, myself—but she can't be sorry! I'll do her the justice to admit that she has always put a good face on things, and not broadcast the way he treated her, but I know from what she's told me, when he's been worse than usual, that she had a thoroughly miserable time with him.”
Gavin, who had been listening to this speech with a rapt look on his face, said: “Oh, I am glad I came to call on you! Of course she did it! It's almost too obvious!”
Abby gave an involuntary giggle, but Miss Patterdale said sharply: “Don't be silly!”
“All the same, it's a pretty fragrant thought,” said Charles, grinning.
“It's nothing of the sort! Now, I won't have you making that kind of joke, any of you! It's in very bad taste. Mavis says those things because she thinks one ought not to speak ill of the dead, that's all.”
“In what terms does she speak of the Emperor Domitian, and the late Adolf Hitler?” enquired Gavin, interested.
“That,” said Miss Patterdale severely, “is different!”
“Well,” said Gavin, setting down his empty cup, and dragging himself out of his chair, “if I am not to be allowed to suspect Mavis, I must fall back upon my first choice.”
“Who's that?” demanded Abby.
“Mrs. Midgeholme—to avenge the blood of Ulysses. I won't deny that I infinitely prefer her as a suspect to Mavis, but there's always the fear that she'll turn out to have an unbreakable alibi. Mavis, we all know, has none at all. That, by the way, will be our next excitement: who had an alibi, and who had none. You three appear to have them, which, if you will permit me to say so, is very dull and unenterprising of you.”
“Have you got one?” Abby asked forthrightly.
“No, no! At least, I hope I haven't: if that wretched landlord says I was sitting in the Red Lion at the time I shall deny it hotly. Surely the police cannot overlook my claims to the post of chief suspect? I write detective novels, I have a lame leg, and I drove my half-brother to suicide. What more do the police want?”
“You know,” said Charles, who had not been attending very closely to this, “I've been thinking, and I shouldn't be at all surprised, taking into account the time when it happened, if quite a few people haven't got alibis. Everyone was on the way home from our party—the Squire, Lindale, the Major, old Drybeck!”
“Don't forget me, and the Vicar's wife!” interrupted Gavin.
“I don't mind adding you to the list, but I won't have the Vicar's wife. She can't have had anything to do with it, and only confuses the issue.”
“What about the Vicar himself?” asked Abby, her chin propped on her clasped hands. “Where was he?”
“Went off to visit the sick, didn't he? Anyway, he's out of the running too.”
“So are Major Midgeholme, and Mr. Drybeck,” Abby pointed out. “We ran them home.”
“On the contrary! I set the Major down at the cross-road, because he told me to. I don't know what he did when I drove on. Not that I think he's a likely candidate for the list, but we must stick to the facts. I then set old Drybeck down outside his house. We left him waving goodbye to us: we didn't actually see him enter his house, and for anything we know, he didn't.”
“No, that's true,” agreed Abby, her eyes widening. “And he really is a likely candidate! Gosh!”
“Now, that's quite enough!” Miss Patterdale interposed. “Talk like that can lead to trouble.”
“That's all right, Aunt Miriam,” said Charles. “I bet he isn't the only one who might have done it.”
“Well, just you remember that!” she admonished him. “It's all very well to talk like that about people like poor old Thaddeus Drybeck, but you wouldn't think it nearly so amusing if someone were to do the same about your father, for instance.”
Charles stared at her. “Dad? But he wasn't there!”
“Of course he wasn't. But what would you feel like if we started to make up stories of where he might have been? You shouldn't let your tongue run away with you.”
She appealed to deaf ears. Young Mr. Haswell, betraying an unfilial delight in this novel aspect of his parent, gave a shout of laughter, and gasped: “Dad! Oh, what a rich thought! I must ask him if he can account for his movements!”
Chapter Five
By noon on the following day, the Chief Constable was listening to a report from Detective-Sergeant Carsethorn, who had spent a busy but unpromising morning; half an hour later he expressed a desire to be allowed to think the thing over; and within ten minutes he had reached a not unexpected but not very welcome decision. “And I don't mind telling you, Car
sethorn,” he said, as he sat waiting to be connected with a certain London telephone number, “that I should do exactly the same if Inspector Thropton hadn't chosen this moment to go down with German measles!”
“Yes, sir,” said the Sergeant, torn between a natural desire to achieve promotion through his brilliant handling of a difficult case, and an uneasy suspicion that the problem was rather too complicated for him to tackle.
It was therefore with mixed feelings that, shortly before four o'clock, he made the acquaintance of a bright-eyed and cheerful individual, who was ushered into the Chief Constable's room at the police-station, a tall and rather severe man at his heels.
“Chief Inspector Hemingway?” said Colonel Scales, rising behind his desk, and holding out his hand across it. “Glad to meet you! Heard of you, of course. I warned Headquarters this would need a good man, and I see they've sent me one.”
“Thank you, sir!” said the Chief Inspector, without a blush. He shook the Colonel's hand, and indicated his companion. “Inspector Harbottle, sir.”
“Afternoon, Inspector. This is Detective-Sergeant Carsethorn, who has been in charge of the case.”
“Very happy to work with you,” said the Chief Inspector, briskly shaking the Sergeant's hand. “Of course, I don't know much about it yet, but I'm bound to say it sounds like a nice case, on the face of it.”
“Eh?” ejaculated the Colonel, startled by this view of a case which he (like Miss Patterdale) feared would lead to much unpleasantness. “Did you say nice?”
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