by J F Straker
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘I’ll take it.’
Mechanically the postman held out the letter. But Archer ignored it. Instead he peered down at the outstretched hand.
‘Blimey!’ he said. ‘So it was you? You’re the chap that brought the letters that night!’ And as the postman stood irresolute Archer leaned swiftly forward and grasped him by the arm. ‘That scar on your thumb — I couldn’t get that wrong. It was you all right.’ Raising his voice, he shouted, ‘Hey, Inspector! I’ve got him! This is the bloke you’re looking for.’
‘You bloody liar!’ shouted the other, struggling to free himself. ‘You couldn’t have seen it. I didn’t call at this house there weren’t any letters for you that afternoon!’
The police were through the gate, were running up the path towards the struggling figures on the doorstep. Archer was a big man, but the postman was no weakling. Exerting every ounce of his strength, he wrenched himself free, raced across the small front lawn and, clearing the hedge in one leap, landed heavily on the pavement.
As he disappeared eastward into the night police whistles shrilled, men came running. The road was suddenly bathed in light as head-lamps were switched on, catching the figure in their beam. For a moment he pounded on. Then, swerving left, he was lost in the darkness of the golf-links.
*
Mrs Gill had prepared tea. She was not one to neglect her meals, not even on such an occasion as this. But it was not the fine spread that had greeted Miss Plant on that memorable Friday. Bread and butter, jam, and a rather stale Madeira cake. But the tea was hot, and the butter was butter and not margarine, and Miss Plant was ready for both. She made a comfortable meal.
Mrs Gill was too excited to eat heartily, but she drank several cups of tea and nibbled at the cake. And all the time she watched the clock.
At ten minutes to five she said, ‘I can’t stand this any longer, Ethel. I must know what’s happening. I’m going out.’ And she stood up determinedly.
Miss Plant was alarmed. ‘You can’t do that, Hermione,’ she protested, gazing up at her friend with troubled eyes. ‘The Inspector would be furious. He’d think you were interfering; you know he would. He said we were to do just as we did that other afternoon.’
‘But if we stay indoors we won’t see a thing, Ethel. Whatever happens, it will be the other side of the gap. The postman didn’t get as far as this. If we go just a little way up the road…’
‘But you’ll know afterwards,’ said Miss Plant, who was not at all anxious to leave the shelter of the house. ‘And probably nothing will happen, anyway.’
‘Yes, it will. I know it will.’ Mrs Gill went out into the hall and returned with raincoat and umbrella. ‘It’s no good, Ethel. This is something I absolutely refuse to miss. Hearing about it afterwards wouldn’t be the same — you know that. I’m going out.’
‘The Inspector will be furious,’ Miss Plant said again, harping on the one argument she hoped might prove a deterrent.
Mrs Gill hesitated. She knew this was true. ‘Very well,’ she said. ‘I’ll go the back way, on to the golf-links. They won’t be able to see me from there.’
She had her raincoat on and was in the hall, with Miss Plant risen from her chair (uncertain whether to stay where she was or to follow her friend), when the whistles shrilled and Grange Road was suddenly light. They acted on Mrs Gill as a spur. Any fear she might have felt was swamped by her curiosity. Without another word she hurried from the house, threaded her way through the familiar labyrinth of the back garden, and out through the gate on to the links. It was only then that she realised she had no torch to light her over the rough ground between the houses and the fairway.
She could see the lights on the road and began to feel her way westward, striking away from the houses the better to improve her view. The whistles were silent now, but she could hear men shouting. I wonder if they’ve got him? she thought, prodding with her umbrella at the uneven ground as she went.
She did not see the fugitive; he did not see her, until he was on top of her. Mrs Gill’s scream of terror was cut short as the running, stumbling figure crashed into her, knocking the breath out of her body. They fell to the ground, the postman uppermost.
It was Mrs Gill’s umbrella that foiled him. Somehow, somewhere it had become hooked into his clothing She was aware of his struggle to free himself, of his feet and hands searching desperately for purchase on the wet and slippery ground. She was bruised and shaken, and convinced that her end was near. As his weight shifted and he scrambled to his feet she screamed again; and then there were others round them, and the lights of torches, and men struggling.
A constable helped her gently to her feet and put a strong arm round her trembling body. Mrs Gill was glad of the support. She could not have stood alone. She wondered vaguely whether she was going to faint. She had never done so before; but then she had never before done personal battle with an escaping criminal.
‘All right, ma’am?’ asked the constable.
‘I — I think so,’ she answered. She put up a hand to push the hair away from her face. There was a pain in her back, and her foot ached where the man had kicked it. But at least she was whole — and alive.
A tall figure came from behind the ring of torches. ‘No bones broken?’ asked Inspector Pitt.
‘I don’t think so, Inspector. Did you — have you got him?’
‘Yes, ma’am, we’ve got him. Thanks to you,’ said Pitt. ‘Looks as though you ought to join the Force. You’ve taken quite a hand in this business, one way and another. But I think you’d be wiser not to tackle escaping criminals single-handed. You might not get off so lightly the next time.’
Was it possible, wondered Mrs Gill, that he didn’t know it was an accident? Did he think she had tried deliberately to stop the man? Good heaven! What would Grange Road say to that? Fame would indeed be hers.
‘I think perhaps you’re right, Inspector,’ she said, almost purring. Forgotten were the trembling limbs, the aching body. ‘But then, one doesn’t stop to consider the consequences to oneself on such occasions, does one?’
Curiosity came once more to the fore, and she moved a few paces nearer to the tall figure flanked by two policemen. They stood just outside the circle of light.
‘Oh, Donald!’ she said, peering forward to look at him. ‘How could you—’
‘Donald?’ A foot shot out, missing her by inches. ‘Go to hell, you ruddy interfering old crow!’ said Michael Bullett.
14—All Very Clever
‘Did you know it was Bullett?’ asked Dick. ‘Or was it just a lucky hunch, the same as I had had about that letter?’
‘It was a hunch until I went to Guildford,’ said Pitt. ‘That more or less settled it. Or perhaps “hunch” isn’t the right word. Whatever it was, its birth was delayed over-long.’
‘Whatever it was, you kept it to yourself,’ chided Dick.
‘I know.’ The Inspector looked guilty. ‘But twice before, when the pangs of detection first started, you scoffed at them. I may not look it, but I’m a sensitive creature; I like my brain-children to be admired, not ridiculed. This time I meant to be sure. I’d have told you yesterday, Dick, if your temperature had been lower. But I knew damned well you’d never stay in bed if you thought an arrest was in the offing.’
Wendy Ponsford smiled at him gratefully.
‘We got off to a bad start,’ mused the Sergeant, leaning back against the pillows. ‘Blake and Sullivan confused the issue properly. Even after Laurie’s body was found I never suspected that everything that happened in Grange Road that Friday hadn’t happened to him. What made you rumble it, Loy?’
‘I don’t know exactly. Right from that first interview with Mrs Laurie I had a suspicion she knew more than she admitted. She spoke of her husband in the past tense, as though she knew he was dead — or gone for good, anyway. But the note to Bullett seemed to contradict that. Even after we found he wasn’t concerned with the Rawsley hold-up, the money sent to Mrs L. indicated
he was still alive.
‘I suppose it was the theft of the torch from No. 14 that first put me, however insecurely, on the right lines. Why should the man be so eager to regain it? Fingerprints, I thought; and then realised the absurdity of that, applied to Laurie.
He wouldn’t worry about leaving fingerprints if he were engaged on lawful business. I’d have dismissed the idea altogether if it hadn’t been for the attack on Heath. If Heath’s account of that was true — which was doubtful, of course — it was an odd way for a postman to behave. And he’d behaved oddly from the start; delivering some letters and not others, abandoning the mail so casually.
‘I began to think more about the postman as a person.
‘Heath had said the man was tall. I wouldn’t have accepted your explanation of that, Dick, if I hadn’t thought of Miss Weston’s hedge from the outside — as you did. So her remark about the postman’s cap indicated a small man; and it wasn’t until I looked at the hedge from the right angle — her angle — that I suspected Heath might be right. And then, when Mrs Gill repeated Miss Fratton’s remark — that the postman’s oilskins were too small for him — I began to see daylight. Laurie had borrowed Gofer’s, and Laurie was five inches shorter than Gofer. They should have been too big for him, not too small.’
He paused to light a cigarette.
‘As you say, Dick, we got off to a bad start. It never occurred to us that the postman wasn’t Laurie, and so all our inquiries dealt with his actions — not with his appearance.’
‘Would it have made much difference?’ said Dick. ‘The only one of that bunch to see him at all clearly was Miss Fratton. And how much attention would we have paid to her? Damn all, if you ask me. Personally, I wouldn’t have believed her if she’d told us straight out that the man was Bullett. What put you on to him, by the way?’
‘Miss Weston’s information about the gun,’ Pitt said promptly. ‘She said it was kept in the hall cupboard, along with the coats. If that was so Bullett must have seen it there; he was a frequent visitor, actually lived in the bungalow for a few weeks. Yet he denied all knowledge of the gun. Why?’
Dick nodded. ‘It’s the sort of stupid and unnecessary mistake they often make,’ he agreed.
‘That’s what I thought,’ said Pitt. ‘Unfortunately, Miss Weston was figuring rather prominently in my mind just then — stop grinning, you ape! You know damn’ well what I mean. There was Heath, too. With two such hot favourites, I didn’t give Bullett the consideration he deserved. But I got around to it gradually. I remembered how shaken he had been when we told him Carrington’s death was murder, not suicide. He hadn’t expected us to rumble that, you see. It seemed odd, too, that as a reporter he should have made no effort to interview any of the people in Grange Road — neither after Laurie’s disappearance nor after Carrington’s death. I don’t think he expected to be recognised; he just wasn’t running any unnecessary risks, that’s all.
‘Then there was the note he wrote himself, purporting to come from Laurie. At the time his explanation seemed fair enough. But I reasoned that, if he had killed Laurie, Mrs L. was likely to be behind it. That meant Bullett had lied to us when he said he had never met her. If he was to live up to the lie he either had to keep away from the woman or account to us — not to her, as he pretended — for his frequent visits to Tilnet Close.’
‘So he wrote the note, eh?’ said Dick. ‘Neat. Very neat.’
‘Yes. It was safer than keeping away from her. It enabled him to deal with any awkward questions we might put to her. And the most awkward of all, from their angle, was our inquiry into her previous engagement. Stilby, you see, was the one man who could disprove Bullett’s statement that he did not know Mrs Laurie prior to her husband’s disappearance.’
‘And I thought you were exploring a dead end!’ said his brother-in-law.
‘I wasn’t too confident myself,’ Pitt admitted. ‘It was only her reluctance to talk that made me persist. But I didn’t suspect then that it would lead me to Bullett. That came later. Just as well it did, too. Stilby didn’t know Bullett’s name, and his memory of his last evening with the girl was hazy. But I jogged his memory by asking for a thumbnail sketch. That did it. He couldn’t forget that scar.’
‘I never suspected Bullett,’ Dick admitted. ‘In fact, my suspicions were as inconsistent as Miss Weston’s affections appear to be — begging your pardon, Loy. Apart from Donald Heath, of course. But then he practically asked to be arrested, the way he carried on.’
‘He’s a frightened fool,’ said Pitt.
‘How did you persuade Bullett to take over the role of postman this afternoon?’ asked Dick. ‘I thought you said he’d turned it down?’
‘His editor persuaded him. I saw the old man and explained that I wanted Bullett because he’d known Carrington. (I was very mysterious about that. I didn’t want him asking how Carrington came into it, as I didn’t know the answer to that one myself.) No editor could refuse a scoop like that, I thought. And how right I was! He almost went down on his knees to thank me.’
‘I bet Bullett didn’t feel that way,’ said Dick.
‘No. But he couldn’t refuse.’
‘I know it’s none of my business,’ Wendy said plaintively; ‘but since you insist on discussing this in front of me, couldn’t I be told what happened? I don’t know about Dick, but I’m positively seething with curiosity.’
‘It could be a little clearer,’ her husband admitted.
The Inspector laughed. ‘Sorry; I forgot. Well, where shall I start?’
‘At the beginning,’ said his sister. ‘And don’t skip.’
‘The beginning, eh? Well, I suppose that was the night Stilby and Jane Abbott picked up Bullett, and Bullett seduced the girl. She was scared of the consequences. And since Bullett refused to marry her, she took Laurie. Laurie was an old stand-by; he wouldn’t make too much fuss, she thought, if a child happened to be born out of turn. Although how right she was in that respect I wouldn’t know. The feared consequences didn’t arrive.
‘Marriage to Laurie only made Bullett appear more attractive. Consequences didn’t matter now, and the two continued to meet. Very much in secret, however; Bullett saw to that. An angry husband and a possible divorce suit were not in his line at all. And their favourite rendezvous — latterly, at any rate — was Carrington’s bungalow. Not when Carrington was there, of course — although I dare say Carrington guessed something of what was going on, even if he never met the woman. But Carrington was often away, and Bullett had the key. He could come and go openly. Mrs Laurie, however, met him there after dark, via the golf-links and the back door. And no one in Grange Road seems to have seen her.’
‘Mrs Gill would have rumbled them if she’d lived down that end,’ said Dick.
‘Yes, I imagine she would. Well — last Friday week Bullett knew Carrington would be staying in Town fairly late, so he caught the early train back and met the girl at the bungalow as arranged. When Laurie rang the bell, having a registered letter to deliver, Bullett, who was in the hall and had no reason to hide his own presence there, opened it. To find the postman was Laurie came as a shock — he knew the man normally worked over at Cambersleigh Park — but he couldn’t shut the door in his face. They were, as he had said, old acquaintances. It was even true that Laurie had saved Bullett’s life — which goes to show what a nice type Bullett is!
‘All might have been well had not Mrs Laurie, who hadn’t heard the bell, chosen that moment to emerge from a bedroom in her underwear and call out some affectionate remark to Bullett. Laurie recognised the voice, pushed his way past Bullett into the hall, and naturally disapproved of what he saw. One can’t blame him if, as Bullett asserts, he started the fight.
‘Anyway, there was a fight. Bullett says he was merely trying to hold the other off; that he had a hand at Laurie’s throat and didn’t realise he was throttling him. Not until Laurie sagged and collapsed, and they found he was dead.’
‘They?’ queried Dick. ‘Did
Mrs L. join in?’
‘No. But she helped Bullett to conceal the body afterwards. They had to get rid of it and clear out before Carrington returned. But Bullett knew the police would start their inquiries from where the postman was known to have made his last call. He must make it appear that Laurie got well past the bungalow before ceasing delivery of the mail. He put on the man’s leggings, cape, and cap, and together they got the body into the Austin (the keys, remember, were kept in the hall). Then he set off, arranging with the girl to pick him up in the car farther down the road.’
‘He was taking a big risk, wasn’t he?’ said Wendy.
‘No bigger than the occasion warranted. It was dark, and raining hard; the road would be deserted. Only a few people in Grange Road knew him by sight. If he avoided direct contact he was unlikely to be recognised.
‘The first snag came at No. 9, with the registered letter for Heath. He couldn’t risk obtaining a signature for it, and if he delivered it without one the police would smell a rat. So he put it in his pocket.’
‘I bet Heath’s behaviour shook him,’ said Dick.
‘It shook him to the core. When Heath came bellowing after him he thought it was all up. Knocking the man down was an instinctive action. After that he took to his heels — until he realised that Heath had had enough, that he wasn’t following.
‘Bullett still wasn’t far enough away from the bungalow to be safe. He knew that. So he pulled himself together and went on with his self-appointed task.
‘He had to bypass No. 13. Miss Weston was one of the few who knew him by sight. Her brooch went into his pocket along with the letter for Heath.’
‘And then came shock number two, eh?’ said Dick. ‘He couldn’t have anticipated anyone like Miss Fratton. Nobody could.’
Pitt smiled.
‘Miss Fratton ditched him in more ways than one,’ he said, ignoring their groans at the pun. ‘She made him drop his torch; and a metal torch takes a nice clean fingerprint. That was why he had to break into her house on Sunday night to recover it. And it was the loss of the torch that caused him to misread the address on Morris’s letter and deliver it to Harris instead.