The Case of the Seven Whistlers

by George Bellairs

  The policeman bent and prodded the body with a fat forefinger.

  “Why! He’s cold and stiff,” he mumbled as though making a phenomenal discovery. And not knowing quite how to behave next, he removed with difficulty his helmet and bowed his head reverently.

  Two more women then fainted, another dissolved into hysterics and had her face smacked by Mrs. Hollis, and Mr. Hale, the joiner, fell unconscious to the ground with a great rattle of bones.

  By this time, Miss Adlestrop had inhaled enough ammonia and burnt feathers to pull her back to consciousness and pointing a limp hand in the direction of the garden, muttered “Uncle Alfred … Mr. Councillor Blanket …”

  Whereupon Mrs. Hollis walked to a bell-push prominently fixed on the wall and pressed it. The result was a hullaballo like that made by a fire-engine in full cry and an American police car out quietly to round-up a gang of killers. This racket of bells and klaxons started outside a small shack like a hen-coop at the far end of the vegetable garden and brought forth two men, one like John Bull and the other like Ben Turpin.

  John Bull was Councillor Blanket, shortly to have his popularity and worth tested at the Rural District Council elections. He was the village wiseacre. He knew, or professed to know, all about farming, flour-milling, quarrying and shopkeeping, which were the principal ways of earning a living in Hartsbury. He was always here, there and everywhere telling you what to do and how to do it. He was also a homœopathist, and if in his presence you complained of a cold, he would press upon you small pillules of Camphor, Aconitum Napellus and Arsenicum Album. More complicated complaints also tackled … He looked made-up for the part of John Bull, like an actor just ready for the footlights. Grease-painty complexion, tufts of hair, bald head with puffs of white at the side complete.…

  His companion was a little rabbity man with a squint and a ragged moustache. Mr. Alfred was Miss Adlestrop’s uncle and under her protection, for he was locally said to be nine-pence to the shilling, if you understand the term. He was eccentric and an inventor. His inventions never earned him any money but were widely known in the locality. For example, the alarm system which brought him from the hut in which he lived to the rescue of the feminine section of the family in the house, was a child of his brain. It was used when tramps, hawkers or strange men called and wouldn’t be gainsaid. Uncle Alfred always promptly answered the loud call to duty and invariably caused great mirth and greater truculence from the offenders he had ostensibly arrived to chuck out. Other inventions to his credit were an alarm nest-box which rang a gong when a hen laid in it; an automatic shot-gun which discharged itself every ten minutes to scare off crows from crops; a rabbit snare which sounded a siren when it caught anything; and a mole-trap which rang a bell in your bedroom when it functioned. There was a ring, a hoot or an explosion with every product of uncle’s brain and his workshop, convertible into a small living-room, bedroom or bathroom on pulling a specified lever which rang a bell to show that it was operating, was always in eruption. The discovery of the body provided a welcome relief to Mr. Blanket, for Alfred was trying to persuade him to invest in thief-proof ballot-boxes for the election—a horn sounded if you tried to extract a votingpaper—in exchange for his cross opposite the councillor’s name.…

  The two men broke into a shambling trot down the garden and gradually accelerated, Uncle Alfred running so fast that you couldn’t see his legs going, like a mouse, and John Bull lumping along steadily, his head held firmly erect to keep his hat from falling off.

  By the time they arrived, P.C. Puddiphatt had the body on the floor. Not having handy his volume of The Policeman’s Vade Mecum, which he consulted on all extraordinary occasions, and feeling that some action was expected of him by the crowd of helpless women, he had hoisted Mr. Grossman, deceased, from his resting place, laid him on the rug and was prodding him with two fingers as though trying to rouse him from sleep.

  “Wonder whether artificial resp’ration ’ud be any use?” he was asking himself for the benefit of the ladies when the huge form of Mr. Councillor Blanket filled the doorway and then entered and almost filled the room.

  A great calm fell upon the place as this mountainous know-all put in an appearance. His prominent eyes fell upon the village constable and the corpse he was auscultating.

  “What do you think you’re doing there, Puddiphatt?”

  Whereupon the poor constable leapt to his feet and saluted, although he had no reason for doing so, and the unconscious women recovered through the stimulus of the booming voice.

  “Jest wonderin’ whether to artificial respirate, sir …”

  “You … you … you. Can’t you see that rigor mortis has already set in upon the cadaver?” explained the councillor, like an anatomist ready to dissect before a flock of students.

  “Um … Ah …”

  “You want to send for the police …”

  “But I’m the police …”

  “YOU!!”

  Whereupon John Bull took up Miss Adlestrop’s telephone without so much as a by-your-leave, and called for a doctor and the Sergeant of Police at Gosley-in-the-Marsh, the nearest headquarters.

  “Leave everything as it is,” he commanded, and in their anxiety to obey the oracle, many of the women stood to attention like pillars of salt.

  Uncle Alfred closely inspected the box, apparently turning over in his mind the feasibility of installing some sort of alarm signal to function should another corpse be dumped in it.

  “Leave that alone, Alfred,” said Mr. Blanket irritably. And then he pulled from his pocket his portable medicine case of homoeopathic remedies. “Some of you ladies look a bit seedy after this experience. Let’s see what we can do. Florence, just get me a jug and some water and glasses. Now for shock … Let me see … Veratrum Viride … yes, yes … Similia similibus curantur … Like cures like …”

  Like an alchemist muttering the potent words, Mr. Blanket mixed and dispensed his potions.…

  P.C. Puddiphatt stood to attention on the hearthrug, wishing he’d got his Vade Mecum before he appeared on the scene.…

  The homoeopathist rounded up the women like a good sheep-dog and drove them into the next room. The bobby, the corpse and Uncle Alfred were left together keeping watch.…

  3

  SQUABBLE AT THE SARACEN’S HEAD

  LORD TROTWOODE, chairman of the local railway company, grew impatient of the county police investigation of The Seven Whistlers crime after the first day.

  Already, two factions had arisen in the neighbourhood. One treated the delivery of a corpse neatly folded in an oak chest by the railway with apprehension. The company became the centre of alarmist agitation. People were terrified of travelling alone in compartments. Some declined to make a journey at all by train and joined ’bus queues. Others saw homicidal maniacs hiding in every waiting-room, warehouse and siding. The other section, which had suffered long from trains running hours behind schedule, uncomfortable carriages, and surly officials, saw in the tragedy a cheap source of ridicule. They laughed and passed round jokes about travellers dying of boredom and exhaustion during slow progress.

  Lord Trotwoode’s patience, of which he had not a large stock, gave out over lunch at The Saracen’s Head, Fetling, two days after the crime, the solution of which still eluded the local police.

  His Lordship, infuriated by finding in his boiled pudding a piece of the cloth in which it had been cooked, looked round for a victim in the absence of any of the waiters, who for long periods seemed to become invisible. At a nearby table the Chief Constable was blandly dining with the local Member of Parliament, as though murders and suffering railways didn’t exist at all.

  Lord Trotwoode disentangled the pudding cloth from his false-teeth, glared hard at the Chief Constable, turned a dirty red and rushed across to him.

  Colonel Carslake looked up mildly from the peach melba he was obviously enjoying and smiled agreeably.

  “Mornin’, Trotwoode,” he said.

  The peach melba was
the last straw. His Lordship had been told that there was no choice of sweets and had been served with jam roll and a piece of old rag. And here was Carslake with an ice. It was …

  “Damme, man. Get on with findin’ the murderer at large in this district and presumably plannin’ another crime among our rollin’ stock, instead of dallyin’ over food—and damn rotten food at that—or I’ll complain to the Home Secretary …”

  Colonel Carslake slapped his spoon down in the remains of his water ice, which tasted of powdered milk, and rose to the challenge. All eyes were upon him. A pretty scene of wrangling and abuse began, too shocking and childish to chronicle here. It may be heard in detail from anybody who dined there that day. The food was forgotten. The brawl eclipsed all else, and the local M.P., fearing that any taking of sides on his part might cost him votes at the next general election, suddenly spotted a warm supporter in one corner and, offering excuses to his host, which weren’t heard above the din of battle, he slid away to accept an invitation to a garden-party of which he had previously determined to fight shy.…

  The upshot of it all was that the Chief Constable telephoned to Scotland Yard that afternoon.…

  Detective-Inspector Littlejohn, of the Metropolitan C.I.D., arrived at county headquarters, Fetling-on-Sea, the following morning.

  Superintendent Gillespie of the county force was in charge of the case. He was fed-up with it already, for he had been subjected to a series of pep-talks about it by the Chief Constable, who seemed to be under the impression that clues grew on trees and merely awaited the picking and that a case could be solved, like an African campaign, by concentrating a lot of men on it and doing a lot of planning beforehand.

  Colonel Carslake, tall, thin, peppery and self-important, said he was glad to see Littlejohn, looked him up and down as though he were the new batman, gave him a pep-talk and then went off for a day’s shooting.

  Gillespie was very helpful. Littlejohn liked him at once, although he was puzzled as to how he had ever got in the Force. For Gillespie was slightly knock-kneed and bad on his feet. This was due to his jumping fully-clothed into the canal on one occasion and bringing out a half-drowned child, which he saved by artificial respiration instead of changing his clothes, thereby giving himself a number of arthritic complaints. But, of course, he didn’t tell Littlejohn that. He had also a reputation for eccentricity, due, it was conjectured, to the state of his liver. He would go for days without speaking to anyone and then suddenly change into bouts of great jocularity.…

  It was one of Gillespie’s off-periods when Littlejohn arrived. He hadn’t spoken to any of his subordinates, except to order them about, for three days, but he had to stir himself a bit when his visitor appeared. He sat there, like a melancholy sea-lion propped up at a desk, and detailed a lot of painstaking work and a confused assortment of information. He had his hat on. He always wore it in the office when his liver was wrong side out. He said there was a draught from the windows, even when they were closed.

  The deceased had lived in a flat in Fetling, alone, and attended by a daily woman who cleaned up for him and generally saw to his comfort. His partner, Small, had his quarters over the business premises at The Seven Whistlers.

  “Queer name,” said Littlejohn, interrupting.

  Gillespie looked disgusted.

  “As soon as anybody sets up a café, antique shop or curio place in a town like this, they think they have to give it a damn’ silly name. The main tea-rooms here are called Fred’s Pantry, and there’s neither a pantry nor a Fred. And then there’s another, The Cherry Orchard, right in the High Street, with no cherries or orchards for miles. And now this Seven Whistlers … What do they want to whistle for, and why seven, and why call the blasted place …?”

  He paused and looked a bit sheepish.

  “Sorry, Inspector Littlejohn. This case is getting on my nerves. The Chief’s been awful … Pestered us to death … What about a cup of tea?”

  Littlejohn wasn’t very fond of constabulary tea, but he agreed. It was served in thick cups and boiling, as usual, and whilst Littlejohn waited for his to cool, Gillespie took three pillules from a bottle labelled Podophyllum and washed them down with a mighty draught of the scalding liquid without turning a hair.

  Yes, Small had his quarters over The Seven Whistlers. He was Grossman’s brother-in-law. He had married his late partner’s sister as second wife and she had been dead for years.

  “Did the two of them get on well together?” asked Littlejohn.

  “Oh, yes. I’ve been thoroughly into that. How they came to be associated, I can’t for the life of me think. Grossman was a little, mincing, fastidious chap. Almost ladylike in his ways. And Small’s a great hulking brute of a fellow, drinks heavily and looks like a bruiser. You can well imagine him and Grossman getting on one another’s nerves and Small outing his partner, stuffing him in the oak chest and sending him on his travels. But it’s not as easy as that. Small’s got a good alibi.… Tell you about it when we get to that.…”

  The police-station was an old building in a backwater facing the graveyard of the parish church, the clock-chimes of which punctuated the interview every quarter-hour. There was a funeral in progress and the mourners had to struggle to keep themselves upright against the stiff breeze blowing from the sea. The parson’s vestments flapped at right-angles to his body. The bearers staggered beneath their burden and tottered from side to side as they advanced to the graveside. Tall, tortured trees surrounded the churchyard, leaning at an angle caused by the fury of the prevailing winds.

  Gillespie sadly eyed the funeral procession and went on with his tale.

  “There’s another party in the shop, too. A Mrs. Doakes. She’s Small’s niece by his first marriage and keeps house for him. She’s married to a sailor … Officer in the Merchant Navy. I don’t care for her …”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, dunno, really. A bit uppish … and on the loose. That sort don’t appeal to me.”

  Littlejohn was sure they didn’t.

  “Medical evidence shows that Grossman had been dead since about nine o’clock on the night before he was delivered at Miss … Miss … Adlestrop’s—damn silly name—Miss Adlestrop’s house in the box. Cause of death, suffocation. Seems he was rendered unconscious by a crack on the head and locked in the box to die …”

  “Nasty …”

  “Very nasty …”

  The church clock chimed half-past twelve and Gillespie started, drew a large watch from the side pocket of his trousers and consulted it.

  “Good heavens! Twelve-thirty already. Lunch time. Come and have a bit of food and then we’ll carry on after. The inquest’s at two, so we can go there together if you like. You’ll get a lot of information first-hand then … Medical and the like. Eh?”

  “All right to me, sir.”

  “Good. One thing, though. We’ll not discuss the case over lunch, if you don’t mind. I’m bothered with my digestion and the doctor says I must relax over my food. So we’d better change the subject. Don’t mind, do you?”

  Littlejohn said he didn’t mind at all. On the contrary … But he groaned within him, for he anticipated a very boring session. Gillespie looked like making very poor company.

  They lunched at The Saracen’s Head. They were undisturbed except for casual greetings from acquaintances of Gillespie, which he didn’t return in many cases and in others very curtly on account of his liver. They all understood and expected that next week it would be all right and he would be slapping them on the back and roaring pleasantries at them.

  Littlejohn was pleasantly surprised at the lunch, and even more pleased with Gillespie’s company. The Superintendent turned out to be an enthusiastic pigeon-flyer in his off-hours and warmed to his subject and held Littlejohn spellbound. He even took the Scotland Yard man by the arm, led him to the window, showed him the old pigeons in the square below, busy picking among the cobblestones and horse-droppings, and explained the difference between them and homers, whilst
the roast pork went cold and greasy. Then he sent for the waiter, complained about the food and managed to get some good roast beef in exchange!

  This happy interlude did Gillespie’s bile ducts so much good that he said good-bye cordially to those whom he had hardly greeted when he entered, and when he got back to the police station he warmly commended certain officers for their diligence in a case they were handling.

  “Gussie’s got over it, thank God,” said the constables to one another, and smiled and relaxed.

  Gillespie’s Christian names were Augustus Wilfred, by the way.

  The inquest was quiet and precise. The Coroner, Mr. Emmanuel Querk, was tall, thin, and had a peculiar head. It was only a little broader than his long neck and ended in a point from which a fringe of downy grey hair spread like a curtain over his neck and ears. He wore old-fashioned spring pince-nez and looked very obstinate, which he was. He detested noise, had had double windows fitted to his court, and had given strict instructions that the usher was to eject anyone who made a sound. Every time anybody coughed, or even cleared his throat, Mr. Querk looked up and glared, a feat which put his head and neck in a constant state of agitation. A great hush, like that at a Quakers’ meeting, pervaded the place, and this, added to the peculiar acoustics of the room, accentuated the noise of the witnesses.

  Mr. Querk was County Coroner and had chosen to hold the inquest at his headquarters rather than at Hartsbury, where the presence of a sawmill right under the windows of the village hall frayed his nerves to such an extent that he was unable to concentrate on the work in hand.

  Proceedings were brief with the exception of P.C. Puddiphatt’s testimony, which he read from long sheets of paper apparently taken from the counter of the local butcher’s shop. He had compiled this with the help of The Policeman’s Vade Mecum, and was very proud of it, until Mr. Querk set about him for verbosity. But without his copy the village constable was hopeless, so the Coroner had to put up with it, which he did with the help of a number of bromide tablets, the taking of which caused him dreadful facial contortions.