“I guess you’re right,” Renton sighed. “Matrimony is making me old-maidish. Ernesta’s always been able to take care of herself and a couple of dozen other people at the same time. She probably can still.”
We reached the Bray house a few minutes after ten, and all the other members of the picnic party were already assembled in Ernesta’s frivolous living room. The news of the second tragedy seemed to have engulfed them in a mood of passive fatalism, and they reminded me of a flock of sheep huddled together helplessly at the approach of a wolf or some less palpable menace. Lorie and Caleb, young and towheaded, sat together on a large couch. Caleb was scowling, his arms folded across his chest. Lorie was nervously fingering a thin, evil-looking paper knife with an ornately carved steel handle. Love Drummond and the Reverend Jessup, side by side in stiff chairs, looked grim and uneasy. To my surprise, I saw that even Avril was present. She had changed her dress again and, while still in black, was wearing a flowing, more austere model which suggested the wife of a Roman senator or a figure on a piece of Grecian pottery. She sat with her hand in Phoebe’s and her eyes cast down in Stoic grief.
Lorie had obviously abandoned any pretense of acting hostess. It was Phoebe who rose to greet us, her gypsy eyes bright and strained.
“It’s such a relief to see you,” she whispered. “I can’t do anything with them. They’re all sunk in gloom.”
Avril lifted her eyes and threw Renton a glance loaded with suffering and courage. Carefully avoiding her, he chose a seat at the other end of the room. I sat down with Phoebe.
As I did so, the Reverend Jessup rose to his feet. Beneath the bulging, intellectual forehead, his face had assumed the solemnity of expression which he used in the pulpit before beginning his sermons. I could tell he had prepared a speech and had been waiting until we were all assembled to deliver it.
“Before the police arrive,” he announced, “I wish to make a statement. I understand that the village is to organize a patrol tonight to insure our physical safety, but I feel that in this, Skipton’s darkest hour, we should also be mindful of our spiritual security. There is One to whom we can turn in all tribulation, however dark the road, and I intend to spend the night in the church praying for His guidance. Should any of you wish to join me in prayer for the welfare of our community, there is no need to remind you that you can find no safer place of refuge than under God’s roof.”
Dr. Jessup’s sentiments, though admirably Christian, did little if anything to ease the tension. In fact, silence settled on the gathering like a collapsed tent, and no one spoke until the door opened on Cobb, accompanied by Dan Leaf. The inspector looked pale, tired, and rather rattled. I had been wondering whether he would let these people know that all the evidence at the moment pointed to the murderer’s being one of them. He didn’t. He merely gave a brief speech, addressing them as the most responsible members of the community and pointing out that it was their duty to do all they could to avert a panic.
When he had finished, his blue eyes surveyed the room carefully and he asked:
“There’s one thing in particular I want to know right now. Did any of you go over to the Raynors’ house any time this afternoon? Or did any of you see anyone else go?”
I glanced at Caleb and Lorie, wondering what I should do if neither of them said anything. But I didn’t have to worry, for Caleb, staring belligerently back at Cobb, said:
“I went over. Around three-thirty, I guess.”
“And you saw George Raynor?”
Caleb shook his head. “I didn’t see anyone. I was bored; thought I might get someone to join me in a walk to Hurst Pond. I went onto the porch. I heard Miss Lane’s typewriter upstairs. I didn’t want to disturb her, so I left and walked over to Hurst Pond myself.”
Cobb asked quietly: “Then you made no effort to find George Raynor?”
“No.” Caleb flushed. “Matter of fact, George wasn’t much of a walker. I’d really been hoping that Avril—Miss Lane—” He broke off.
“I see,” said Cobb. “And you didn’t smell gas, I suppose?”
“I certainly did not.”
Cobb seemed satisfied. His gaze roaming again, he asked: “Anyone else?”
Lorie had been playing agitatedly with the paper knife while Caleb was talking. Now, without looking at him, she blurted:
“Yes. I went over. It must have been about four. The same thing happened. I mean, I heard Avril’s typewriter. I didn’t want to disturb her—so I went away.”
“You didn’t look for Mr. Raynor either?”
“No, no. That is …” Lorie stammered. “You see, I really went over to see if Caleb was there. I … I just thought he might be there.”
She reached across Caleb, took one of Ernesta’s fancy Russian cigarettes out of a crystal box and lit it. I suppose she was trying to look at her ease. It was pathetically unconvincing.
Obviously both Lorie and Caleb had had an opportunity to kill George, but it was equally obvious that anyone else could have slipped into the Raynor house without being seen.
Cobb must have realized this, for he carried the matter no further, merely inquiring if anyone present had anything to offer that could have any conceivable bearing on either murder. I noticed that Love turned sharply and caught the inspector’s eye. But if she had intended to speak, she changed her mind and remained silent. No one else uttered a sound.
In a few minutes the able-bodied men of the village started to shuffle awkwardly in under the solemn leadership of Ray Simpson. Soon I counted twenty of them, and they were all, of course, men I knew at least by sight. Their solid, unimaginative faces were reassuring.
The organization of the patrol turned out to be a simple affair. Cobb divided the men into two shifts. The first, under Dan Leaf and Renton Forbes, was to go on duty at once. The second, under Ray Simpson and myself, was to relieve the first shift at four o’clock and remain on duty until morning. Since virtually all of Skipton concentrated around the single main street, it was easy to provide an efficient guard. A man was to be stationed regularly at two-hundred-yard intervals and was to walk his beat with whatever rustic weapon he had at hand.
When Dan Leaf and Ray Simpson picked up sides, I noticed that Caleb had been selected for the first shift. As the other men hurried off to their cars, Caleb, with a stiff, unconvincing swagger, strode after them. I was anxious about him. I followed, caught up with him on the terrace, and drew him aside.
“You think it’s sensible for you to go?” I asked.
“Sensible?” He turned on me, his dark eyes hostile. “Why the hell not?”
“You know as well as I do. It’ll be dark out there—and lonely. With this thing you picked up in the Pacific, you—”
“My God, you’d think I was a nut or something. Sure, I told you I’m scared of the dark. And it’s true. At least it was true. Maybe I still am—sometimes.” He laughed harshly. “But what you expect me to do? Sit home and hold my own hand? It’d look good, wouldn’t it—Skipton’s lone war hero cowering at home while all the goddam civilians go out searching a maniac?”
I didn’t argue any more. I could tell from his eyes that he was terrified at the thought of a lonely vigil on a dark road. But I could also tell that his pride would torture him if he didn’t take his part with the rest of them. I grinned and patted his arm.
“Okay,” I said. “Maybe it’s the best cure there is anyway. When you’re thrown from a horse, you get up and ride. When you’re scared of the dark—”
“—you go out into it.” Caleb stared past the huddle of cars across the moonlit valley and shivered. “Cold.” He turned up the collar of his jacket. “Well, Doctor, wish me good hunting.”
“Good hunting.”
“And don’t tell the others. Don’t even tell Mother.” His young face was bleak with pleading. “Promise.”
“Promise.”
He laughed again, a laugh that was meant to be cynical. “If the inspector heard this, he’d probably think I was the murderer. A
gibbering lunatic running amok in the dark murdering little boys and writers’ husbands. Oh no, George was killed in the daytime, wasn’t he? It won’t fit. Too bad. Hey, Perry!” He hailed one of the farmers who was climbing into his jalopy. “Take me down, will you? Mother’ll need my car.”
Without looking back at me, he ran off the terrace and jumped into the moving car.
CHAPTER XI
As I moved back onto the terrace, the tall, heavy-hipped figure of Love Drummond emerged from the living room and came toward me.
“Dr. Westlake,”—behind the shell-rimmed glasses, her eyes gleamed purposefully—“I’ve been tracking you down. There’s something I’ve decided you should know.”
“What is it, Love?”
“You’ll probably say I’m a nosy old spinster poking around in other people’s business, and of course you’ll be right. But at least give me credit for not bringing it out in front of her. I was sorely tempted to when the inspector asked if anyone knew anything, but I controlled myself. Hilary would say I struggled with the Devil and won. Anyway, I didn’t make a scene, and I’ve decided to tell you in confidence—and then you can tell the policeman in confidence if you think it’s something he ought to know.”
“You mean it’s something about the murders?”
“Not exactly. I mean, it doesn’t in any way explain the awful thing that happened to Bobby and Billy. But—about poor George.” She hesitated and then moved a little closer. “This evening, when you broke the news to Hilary and me, I hinted, Dr. Westlake. It’s about that frightful Avril and—and Renton.
“We all know Renton, of course, and love him,” said Love. “I mean, even Ernesta must know that he’s—well, quite a devil with the ladies. And, since Hilary’s not within hearing, I’ll admit that I don’t see why a bachelor shouldn’t have a little fun once in a while. But with Avril—”
“You think there’s something between them?” I put in.
“I don’t think, my dear. I know. I’m on the same party line as the Raynors. And it just happened that last week I picked up the receiver to call Carl at the store for some beetroots when”—she sniffed—“I heard Avril’s voice on the wire. I heard her giggle and say: ‘Friday, then. I’ll slip away when George is doing the supper dishes. Eight-thirty—at the sawmill.’ And then Renton answered. I’m sure it was Renton. And he said: ‘Okay. I’ll be there.’ Of course, I hung up immediately and didn’t hear anything else, but …”
“But—what, Love?” I asked. “Are you trying to say you think Avril and Renton killed George so’s they could marry?”
Love seemed flustered. “Now, now, I certainly said nothing of the sort. It’s just that I thought you should know. After all, we all of us know that little woman is a preposterous sham, but I never realized that she was actually deceiving her husband behind his back and—”
“Okay, Love.” I patted her arm. “I’ll think about it. If I think it’s necessary, I’ll tell Cobb.”
“He probably knows anyway, because I’m almost sure someone else was listening on the party wire too.” A faint smile moved Love’s thin lips. “You can’t imagine how much better I feel, coming out with it. I didn’t really think it was my duty to tell, of course. It was sheer spite, my dear, nothing but spite. Don’t tell Hilary, but when you’re old and unmarried like me, indulging your spite is the most attractive pastime I know—better even than a nice, juicy steak.”
At that moment the Reverend Jessup came somberly out of the living room and joined us, announcing that he was going to drive Love home. When I saw him, the little goading song in my mind started up with “Four for the gospel makers.” I felt a sudden impulse to forbid him from carrying out his praiseworthy plan of spending a night of prayer in the church. Then I decided that, with the patrol, he would be just as safe there as in the rectory. To make doubly sure, however, I caught Dan Leaf just before he left and told him to be certain to post a man outside the church.
When I returned to the living room, only Cobb, Phoebe, and Lorie were left. Those villagers who were not on the first shift had gone home to catch some sleep before their turn came at four o’clock. Lorie, who was spending the night with Phoebe, was moving around, turning out lights.
Soon the house was locked and in darkness. Phoebe and Lorie drove off in Caleb’s car, and I took Cobb down the hill in mine. His own car was parked outside the Community House, and he was not staying for the vigil. There was too much to be done in Grovestown.
“Well, Westlake,” he grunted, “if anything happens tonight, the D.A. can’t blame me. The village’ll be crawling with representatives of the law. How’s it coming with you? Get anything out of Forbes?”
I told him everything I had learned from Renton. He groaned when he heard the news of his marriage to Ernesta.
“There’s that motive knocked on the head.” He sucked at his unfilled pipe. “Motive. What’m I jabberin’ about motives for? There ain’t no motive. Just a lunatic.”
“Who’s crazy about a song?”
“Yeah. Maybe it’s the guy who wrote it, Westlake. Maybe he’s trying to boost it onto the Hit Parade.” Cobb turned to glance at me from the wheel. “I’ve asked you this before and I’m asking you now and I’ll be asking you a dozen more times before I’m through. Which one of your pals could be nuts? This Forbes seems to be out. And that writin’ woman’s too smart a fake to be a loony. What about the others? That Stone boy, he’s just outta the Marines, isn’t he? A medical discharge, they tell me down in the village.”
“Yes,” I said with some caution. “He has or had some mild form of battle psychosis. But so did thousands of other ex-servicemen. That doesn’t prove he’s homicidal.”
Cobb grunted. “What about that Lorie Bray? Seems like a quiet, mousy little thing. Sometimes the quiet ones—” He broke off. “What’s the use, Westlake? You beat your brains out and you’re back where you started from. The murderer’s nuts, the suspects aren’t. The suspects are nuts, the murderer isn’t. Oh heck, there’s my car. Let me off and get some sleep. You gotta be on the ball at four o’clock.”
Leaf and Renton had got the patrol off to an efficient start. I was flagged, stopped, and checked on as I drove the two or so hundred yards from the Community House to my own home. And, as I parked the car, I could see the shadowy figure of another watcher patrolling silently to the left of the house. Normally, by this time Skipton on a Sunday would have been lonely as a wood. There was something eerie about the thought of those grim, shadowy vigilantes guarding the village from a peril as real as a man-eating tiger but far more incalculable.
My house was in darkness except for the porch light which Rebecca had left burning. I snapped it out and tiptoed upstairs. Before going to my own room, I tried the handle of Dawn’s door. I wanted to make sure she was safely asleep. The door opened less than six inches and then hit an obstruction. Instantly Rebecca’s voice growled an ominous: “Who’s that?” and I caught the dull gleam of steel in the moonlight. Rebecca had dragged her bed into my daughter’s room and had turned herself into a living barricade.
“It’s okay, Rebecca,” I said. “It’s only me.”.
She gave a discontented grunt. I felt she was disappointed that I was not a legitimate candidate for the carving knife.
In my own room, I set the alarm for quarter of four, undressed, and dropped wearily into bed. During the day I had been too busy for the song to plague me much. But now as I lay exhausted in the dim moonlight, it started up again. The haunting melody nagged me, and the words, so simple and yet so cryptic, scurried through my mind like mice in the wainscot.
Two, two the lily-white boys, clothed all in green-O. Six for the six proud walkers. Nine for the nine bright shiners. Five for the symbols at your door, and four for the gospel makers.
Who really were the lily-white boys? Who were the six proud walkers? What were the symbols at your door?
Four for the gospel makers.
As I lay there, drifting into an uneasy sleep, I wondered sud
denly if there was someone else in Skipton, lying just as I was lying, with that obsessive tune and those obsessive words running through his head—but running in a different way, a tantalizing, goading way, urging him to go out, to go out and … kill.
I fell asleep.
The metallic bray of the alarm clock awakened me into pitch darkness. The moon had set. Yawning, confused, I bundled out of bed and started groping for my clothes before I remembered what it was the clock had awakened me for. I found the bedside lamp and turned it on. The clock hands showed a quarter to four. I remembered then, of course. As I hurried into my clothes, I shivered slightly. That was partly because the small hours are cold in Skipton even at midsummer. It was partly too because the song still lingered from my dreams and somewhere deep inside me was still pounding:
Green grow the rushes-O.
Fully dressed, I picked up the flashlight I had placed beside the bed and, moving quietly down the stairs, opened the front door. There was no hint of dawn in the sky; no sign of the silent patrol; and no light anywhere except a dim flicker from the windows of the church immediately in front of me.
That quavering light seemed ominous until I remembered that Dr. Jessup was at his orisons.
I hurried down the garden path and out into the street. My ears, quicker now, picked up faint sounds of life. I could hear heavy footsteps moving regularly to my left. To my right, somewhere close to the Community House, I heard a gruff male voice that sounded like Dan Leaf’s calling out. Yes, the patrol was on the job all right.
We had arranged for the second shift to congregate at the Community House, where Ray Simpson and I would give each individual his beat. Then we were to relieve the first shift. I turned right in the darkness and started toward the Community House. I had deliberately given myself an extra quarter hour. It was too early yet to expect the other men from my shift. And yet the darkness immediately surrounding me seemed disturbingly vacant. I had asked Leaf particularly to put a close guard on the church, and yet there seemed no one near me.
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