The Bulldog Drummond Megapack

by H. C. McNeile

  “Oh! I hope they catch the brute,” she cried passionately. “What a pity you ever let him escape! I can’t understand how you could have been taken in for a moment by such a story.”

  “You mean with regard to the housekeeper?”

  “Of course. There’s no such person in the house. Why, if there had been you would have seen her.”

  “That is true, Comtessa: perhaps we were credulous. Anyway, Morris is bound to be caught very shortly, and the whole thing will have to be thrashed out in court. Are you proposing to stay long at Glensham House?”

  He poured her out another glass of champagne.

  “It all depends on my father,” she answered. “Mr. Hardcastle is very interested in cinema work, and he wants a place where he can work undisturbed at a new invention of his which he thinks is going to revolutionise the whole business.”

  “Indeed,” murmured Drummond. “Then we can only hope there are no more diversions of the sort that occurred tonight. It will have a most upsetting effect on his studies. By the way, you know it is your room, don’t you, that is reputed to be haunted?”

  “What: my bedroom!” she cried. “Is that really so?”

  “My host, Mr. Jerningham, is quite positive about it,” he answered. “We didn’t see anything, I must admit, but perhaps your father and Mr. Slingsby have an antagonistic aura for ghosts. Fortunately we did one good deed in shutting up a box of your cigarettes, which would otherwise have got dreadfully stale.”

  She stared at him thoughtfully.

  “Do you think it’s possible,” she remarked at length, “that the woman this man Morris said he saw was a spirit?”

  “My dear Comtessa,” said Drummond gravely, “I have reached the age when I never think anything is impossible. And there is no doubt that the amount of beer he had consumed might have rendered him prone to see things. However, those surely are the fairy footsteps of the police I hear on the drive. After we have talked to them, you must allow us to see you home.”

  It turned out to be a sergeant, who stood in the door with his helmet under his arm.

  “Mr. Jerningham?” He looked round the group, and Jerningham nodded.

  “That’s me,” he said.

  “It was you that telephoned, sir, wasn’t it, about this murder at Glensham House? Well, sir, the Inspector has gone straight there, and he gave me orders to ask you to go round there at once and the other gentlemen that were with you.”

  “Of course,” cried Drummond. “We’ll all go. And you too, Comtessa.”

  “He didn’t say nothing about any lady, sir,” said the sergeant dubiously.

  “The Comtessa is living at Glensham House,” said Drummond. “Fortunately for her, she has been in Plymouth today, and lost her way in the fog coming back.”

  “Then that’s a different matter, sir,” answered the sergeant. “It’s much clearer now: we shan’t have any difficulty in getting there.”

  “Good,” said Drummond. “Let’s start.”

  The sergeant proved right: a few isolated stars were showing as they left the house. Pockets of mist still hung about the road, but they grew thinner and thinner each moment. And in a few minutes they could see the outline of Glensham House in front of them. There were lights showing in several of the downstair rooms, and finding the front door open, they walked straight in.

  An inspector, with a constable beside him, was seated at the table: opposite him were Hardcastle and Slingsby and a third man who was smoking a cigar.

  “Gee, honey,” cried Hardcastle, springing to his feet, “what under the sun are you doing here? I thought you were in Plymouth.”

  “I suddenly decided to come back, Dad,” she said, “and in the fog I went to this gentleman’s house by mistake. What is this aweful thing I hear?”

  He patted her on the arm. “There, there,” he cried soothingly. “It’s just one of the most terrible things that’s ever happened. An escaped convict has murdered poor young Bob Marton.”

  “Are you the gentleman who telephoned?” asked the Inspector, rapping on the table for silence.

  “I telephoned from Merridale Hall,” said Jerningham.

  “I’ve explained that our instrument was disconnected,” said Hardcastle.

  “Please allow me, sir, to do the talking,” said the Inspector firmly. “Now, sir, would you be good enough to tell me exactly what happened? But before you begin, would you, sir,”—he swung round in his chair and addressed Drummond—”be good enough to stop walking about?”

  He patted her on the arm.

  “There, there,” he cried soothingly. Its just one of the most terrible things that’s ever happened. An escaped convict has murdered poor young Bob Marton.”

  “Are you the gentleman who telephoned?” asked the Inspector, rapping on the table for silence.

  “Sorry, old lad,” boomed Drummond, coming back into the centre of the room. “Carry on, Ted.”

  “One moment,” interrupted Hardcastle. “I’m sure you don’t want to ask my daughter anything, Inspector, and she must be tired. Go to bed, honey: go to bed.”

  “Well, if the Inspector will allow me, I think I will,” she said.

  “Certainly, miss,” he said. “If I do want to ask you anything I will do so tomorrow. Now, sir “—he turned to Jerningham as Hardcastle led the Comtessa upstairs—”will you fire ahead?”

  He listened to the story, taking copious notes, whilst Drummond studied the third man covertly.

  “By Gad! Peter,” he whispered after a while. “Number Three looks, if possible, a bigger tough than the other two. What’s that you say, Inspector?”

  “This gentleman says that it was you who identified the man as Morris. How did you know him?”

  “By the red scar on his face,” said Drummond. “Two warders this afternoon described him to me. And afterwards he admitted it.”

  “And you knew the clothes were the clothes of the murdered man. How?”

  “Because I saw them on Marton this afternoon, when he lost his way in the fog and came to Merridale Hall instead of here,” answered Drummond. “They were so obviously London clothes that I noticed them particularly. When you catch him you’ll see what I mean.”

  “I guess the Inspector will have to take it on trust,” said the newcomer shortly. “That was the guy right enough: the scar proves it. Say, mister “—he turned to Drummond—”when he bolted was he wearing a hat?”

  “He was not,” remarked Drummond.

  “Then that settles it. He’s cheated the hangman all right. He went bathing in Grimstone Mire.”

  “What’s that?” said Drummond slowly. “You say he fell into Grimstone Mire?”

  “Yep,” answered the other. “There can’t be two birds like him loose. I was in the garage tinkering with the car when I heard someone crashing about in the bushes near by. So I went out and flashed a torch around. Suddenly I saw him: a wild-looking fellow without a hat and a great red scar on his face. He bolted like a hare towards the Mire, and I went after him to try to stop him, but I couldn’t do anything in the fog. And in he went—splosh. Let out one yell, and then it was all over.”

  “An amazing development, isn’t it. Captain Drummond?” said Hardcastle, who had rejoined them.

  “Most amazing,” agreed Drummond. “However, as you say, it saves the hangman a job.”

  And at that moment the constable let out a yell. “Look at the top of the stairs, sir!”

  They all swung round and stared upwards.

  Standing motionless in the dim light was a woman dressed in black. Her hair was grey; one arm was outstretched, pointing towards them. And the only thing that seemed alive in her were her two eyes that gleamed from her dead-white face.

  For a few seconds they all stood rooted to the ground; then very slowly, almost as if she was floating on air, the woman receded, and disappeared from sight.

  “What the devil?” cried Hardcastle, and the next instant he dashed up the stairs, followed by the others. For a scream of ter
ror had come from the Comtessa’s room.

  It was Hardcastle who reached it first, to find that the door was locked.

  “Honey,” he shouted. “Honey: open the door. Are you all right?”

  There was no reply, and in a frenzy he beat on the door with his fists. But the wood was stout, and it was not until they had all charged it several times with their shoulders that it began to show signs of giving. At last the bolt tore away from its fastening and in a body they surged into the room.

  The Comtessa was lying on the bed clad in pyjamas. She was motionless, and Hardcastle rushed to her and picked her up.

  “It’s only a faint, boys,” he cried. “Get some brandy.”’

  But even as he spoke, with a shuddering sigh the Comtessa opened her eyes. For a moment she stared in bewilderment at the group of men; then suddenly they dilated with terror.

  “Where is she?” she screamed. “What is she?”

  “There, there, honey,” said Hardcastle, “it’s quite all right now. Tell your old Dad what frightened you.”

  “Oh! it was horrible,” she moaned. “I was just getting into bed when a hand touched me on the shoulder. A woman was standing there—a woman in black with grey hair. Her arm was stretched out pointing at me—and her eyes—”

  She began to shudder violently.

  “They seemed to shine like balls of fire. And then, while I was looking at her in amazement, she just vanished. She was standing just where you are. Captain Drummond, and she disappeared.”

  Hardcastle looked significantly at the other men; then he turned soothingly to his daughter.

  “Perhaps you imagined it, honey: maybe it was a trick of the light.”

  “But it wasn’t,” she cried wildly. “And Mr. Jerningham said this room was haunted, didn’t you?”

  She appealed to him, and he nodded.

  “That’s right, Comtessa,” he agreed.

  “It was a ghost,” she went on. “It must have been a ghost. It must have been her the convict saw. Oh, let me get out of this room! I can’t stop here another moment. And never again after tomorrow will I set foot inside this house.”

  “Honey, don’t take on so,” implored her father. “Even if it was a ghost, the poor thing didn’t do you any harm. Come into your Dad’s room, and he’ll stop with you till you’re all right again.”

  He put his arm round her waist, and led her gently out, whilst the others, after a brief pause, trooped down into the hall again.

  “Well, if that don’t beat cock-fighting, gentlemen,” said the Inspector, scratching his head. “I take it we all saw the woman or the ghost or whatever it was.”

  “Very clearly,” agreed Drummond. “And, gentlemen, the lady’s door was locked. Locked on the inside. It must have gone clean through the wood.”

  Slingsby lit a cigarette with a puzzled frown. “I guess,” he said, “that I’m a converted man. Up till now I’ve regarded any guy who got chatting about ghosts as dippy. And now, damn it, I’ve seen one with my own eyes. Gosh! it gave me the creeps.”

  “She is quieter now,” said Hardcastle, coming down the stairs. “I’ve given her a dose of sleep dope. And the first thing that I guess I owe is an apology to you. Captain Drummond, for my sneering remark about ghosts earlier in the evening.”

  “Don’t mention it, Mr. Hardcastle,” answered Drummond. “We are all of us wiser and more tolerant men, I trust, after the amazing escapade of psychic phenomena we have just witnessed.”

  Darrell glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, but his face was expressionless.

  “Moreover, as my daughter says, it does seem to bear out part of Morris’s story,” went on Hardcastle. “If we saw it, so may he have done.”

  “That’s so, sir,” said the Inspector. “But there’s one point we mustn’t forget. A ghost can go through a closed door: we’ve seen it happen. But a ghost can’t carry a suit of clothes through a closed door: a ghost can’t carry anything at all.”

  He glared round the group as if challenging anyone to contradict him.

  “That being so,” he continued, “we still have not accounted for Morris having on the murdered man’s clothes.”

  “That’s very true,” agreed Hardcastle. “Don’t you think so, Penton?”

  The third man rolled his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other before replying.

  “I guess I don’t know what to think,” he remarked at length. “I’m with Jake in what he said. The whole thing is a new one on me.”

  “Anyway, gentlemen,” said the Inspector, “clothes or no clothes, one thing is certain: no ghost can murder a man, certainly not by bashing his head in.”

  “I suppose that’s a fair assumption,” said Penton.

  “Very well, then: let’s disregard the ghost for a moment, and I think we can reconstruct what happened. Morris broke in, and in all probability thought the place was empty. All you gentlemen were out: only Mr. Marton was in the house. Maybe he came downstairs, thinking it was one of you returning, and Morris attacked him. Marton fled and Morris pursued him, finally doing him to death in the room above. Then he changed clothes, came down and found the supper spread out. While he was in the room he suddenly saw the ghost, which terrified him so much that he daren’t leave. And there you other gentlemen found him. To his dismay, you recognised his clothes, and the blood on the ceiling showed him the game was up. Half tipsy with beer, and with the thought of the ghost in his mind, he said the first story that came into his head.”

  “That sounds very feasible,” said Hardcastle: “very feasible indeed.”

  “Another point that goes to prove it,” continued the Inspector, “was his great reluctance to go upstairs and look at the body—a well-known characteristic of murderers. That’s what happened, gentlemen, or as near to what happened as we are ever likely to get now the man is dead. I don’t wonder, sir “—he turned to Drummond—”that you were taken in for a bit. You didn’t know that there wasn’t a caretaker in the house: besides, it’s amazing the yarns these old lags will spin.”

  “So it seems,” answered Drummond. “By the way, has the weapon with which Marton was murdered been discovered?”

  “Not yet. He probably threw it out of the window, and I’ll have the ground searched thoroughly tomorrow morning. Then we’ll have his fingerprints and absolute proof.”

  “Look here, Mr. Inspector,” said Hardcastle in a rather hesitating voice, “I don’t know if what I’m going to suggest is very irregular, but if it is you must put it down to my ignorance of the law. Now I take it we are all agreed that Morris murdered Marton in some such manner as you described, and then blundered into Grimstone Mire. At any rate, Morris can never be brought to trial. Wait—I’ve just obtained a lease of this house; I’m engaged in certain scientific researches, and I must frankly admit I don’t want to be disturbed. Now what I want to know is this: is it necessary to say anything about this ghost? I quite understand that if Morris wasn’t dead it would be impossible not to allude to it: he would tell the same story he told Captain Drummond. But now that he is dead, are we defeating the ends of justice in any way if we keep our mouths shut about it? It can do neither Morris nor Marton any good, and the only result that is going to happen is that this house will be surrounded with swarms of journalists and sightseers.”

  A faint smile twitched round Drummond’s lips, but his face was in the shadow.

  “In addition to that,” Hardcastle continued, “though naturally such a thing will not deter us if it is our duty to speak, I’m sadly afraid we’re all of us going to have our legs pulled nearly off. We have seen it—we know; but that’s a very different thing from convincing somebody else. If we hadn’t been here tonight, would we have believed it if we’d been told it? Your police are second to none in the world, but they’re a hard-headed body of men. And I can’t help thinking, Inspector, that you’re going to come in for the hell of a lot of chaff from your brother officers. What do you say, Captain Drummond?”

  “Don’t
you think,” Drummond murmured, “that in a case of such remarkable psychic interest we ought to get in touch with that jolly old society that goes spook-hunting?”

  “I do not,” said the other firmly. “If, in the interests of justice, the Inspector considers we must speak—that’s one thing. But I flatly refuse to have bunches of people sitting all over the place on the chance of seeing something.”

  “I quite see your point,” agreed Drummond pleasantly. “I believe most of ’em are trained to the house, but it would be deuced boring to have an ancient professor permanently in the bathroom. Well, well—the Inspector must decide. Do we burble of ghosts or do we not?”

  The Inspector cleared his throat. Until Hardcastle’s remarks, that aspect of the case had not struck him. Now it did—forcibly. No one knew better than he did that there was an enormous amount in what had been said. He could imagine the headlines in the papers: “Police Inspector sees Ghost. New Scope of Activity for Scotland Yard.” And even nearer ahead, the thought of telling his own Chief Constable, a retired Major of unimaginative temperament—was not one that he relished. If only the constable wasn’t there it would be so much easier. And then a sudden inspiration came to him—a perfect way out of the dilemma. He cleared his throat again.

  “I think we can look at it this way, gentlemen,” he remarked. “The crime we are investigating began with the death of Morris in Grimstone Mire. Nothing that has happened subsequent to that can have any bearing on the crime. In other words, the fact that we saw this ghost has nothing whatever to do with the matter. It lends a certain air of truth to part of Morris’s rigmarole, I agree: and, as you said, Mr. Hardcastle, if he were still alive it would be our duty to say what we had seen. But as he isn’t, it is a thing which it seems to me does not come within the scope of enquiry.

  “Naturally, Captain Drummond will have to state what was said by Morris to him and his friends, but at that I think we are entitled to leave it. It is no part of the duty of the police to cause inconvenience to law-abiding citizens, and I quite understand that you, sir, would find it most annoying to have crowds of inquisitive people all round the house.”