The Hand of Fear

by Gerald Verner

  He had been down to the village in order to purchase some stamps at the little post office, and on his return had taken the short cut across the golf links. One of the plainclothes men, whose duty it was to keep an eye on every resident of the estate, had followed him to the village, and was trailing him back when he was stopped by a man on a bicycle who had inquired the way to a neighbouring town. By the time the detective had explained, Mr. Blessington was out of sight, but concluding that he had gone back the same way as he had come, the man had continued along the road which led to the entrance of the estate, never imagining that his quarry had turned off by the little lane which led to the links.

  It was dusk by this time, and reaching the estate the detective was talking to one of his fellow watchers when they were startled to hear faint cries coming across the central garden from the direction of the golf course. They had hurried to see what the matter was, and had discovered Mr. Blessington, his face and shoulders covered in blood, lying in the fairway in an unconscious condition. He had been struck savagely several times on the head, but there was no sign of his assailant, and although an almost immediate search had been made, the person had not been discovered.

  When Mr. Blessington had recovered consciousness, he was able to give but the vaguest account of the mysterious attack. He had been crossing the links when a man had suddenly appeared from the shadow of a little copse of trees. Mr. Blessington, whose eyesight was not of the best, had thought at first that it was one of the detectives on duty in the valley. He had passed him and was continuing on his way, when some instinct made him swing round. The man had changed his course and was almost immediately behind him. A handkerchief covered his face so that it was impossible to recognise him, and before Mr. Blessington could defend himself he had struck at him with a short bludgeon. Mr. Blessington remembered calling for assistance, and then nothing more until he had recovered consciousness in his own house.

  ‘It’s lucky your men were about,’ said Blagdon, ‘otherwise I think we should have had another murder on our hands. He’s been pretty badly handled.’

  Hallick went upstairs to see the victim of the outrage. A doctor and a nurse were in attendance, and Mr. Blessington, his large head swathed in bandages and another on his plump right hand, lay in his bed against a pile of cushions, his eyes closed and his face almost as white as the pillows on which his head rested.

  ‘A monstrous affair, Inspector!’ he said weakly. ‘I might easily have been killed.’

  Hallick tried to extract some further information concerning the appearance of his attacker, but this Mr. Blessington was unable to supply.

  ‘Have you any idea why you should have been subjected to this attack?’ asked Hallick.

  ‘I haven’t the least idea!’ declared the stout man. ‘I have no enemies, to my knowledge. At least, I hope I haven’t. I have always tried to live in peace with my fellow men, and I’m sure there is nobody in the valley who would wish me harm. The thing to me is quite inexplicable.’

  It was to Hallick as well, and he was not above saying so to the local inspector when he returned downstairs. ‘Why should anyone wish to injure this fellow?’ he said, frowning. ‘He’s a bit of a fool, but quite harmless.’

  ‘The only thing I can think of,’ said Blagdon, ‘is that he knows something about these murders.’

  ‘If he did, I think he would have told us,’ said the inspector.

  ‘I don’t mean that he knows it consciously,’ said Blagdon. ‘I mean that somehow or other he’s stumbled on a clue, and the person responsible for these murders knows he has.’

  Hallick pursed his lips. ‘Maybe something in the idea,’ he said doubtfully. ‘Perhaps they’re under the impression that that fellow Miller said more than he ought to have done when he met Blessington the day he first came to the estate.’

  ‘That’s what I was thinking,’ said Blagdon, nodding. ‘Anyhow, it’s the only reason I can suggest for anyone wishing to harm Mr. Blessington.’

  ‘Unless it was some tramp out for ordinary robbery,’ ended Hallick. ‘That’s the most likely explanation, I should think. Blessington looks a prosperous old boy, and a profitable victim. Probably this fellow bashed him with the idea of running through his pockets and was disturbed by our fellows before he could finish his plan.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Blagdon, but his tone was completely lacking in conviction.

  Until quite late that night the search in the valley was continued, but no sign of Mr. Blessington’s assailant was discovered. He had made off on the approach of the plainclothes men and vanished into thin air, taking with him the weapon with which he had struck his victim down.

  The search was at its height when Mr. Harold Earnshaw climbed the low fence that separated the grounds of his house from the surrounding country and let himself furtively into the house by way of the French windows of his study. With the curtains drawn and the door locked, he switched on the light, and pouring himself out a stiff whisky and soda, drank it at a gulp.

  His hands were trembling and his face was drawn and haggard. The spirit steadied his nerves, and after listening at the door for some time and hearing no sound in the hall outside, he softly unlocked it, peered out, and assuring himself that there was no one in sight, hastily climbed the stairs to his bedroom. Here he locked himself in, pulled the blinds down over the windows, and began to undress. When he had changed completely he stood looking thoughtfully at the rumpled clothes he had taken off. They must be got rid of at once. The question was, how? He came to a decision, and rolling them into a neat bundle, tucked them under his arm and descended once more to his study.

  The fire was laid but not lighted, and locking the door he put a match to it. In half an hour or so it was a cheerful blaze, and during that time he occupied himself with a pair of scissors, cutting up the clothes he had brought down into small pieces. When the fire had burnt up to his satisfaction, he began to feed it with these, slowly, one after the other, watching each piece consumed before he added the next.

  It took him some time, but eventually it was done. When the last strip of cloth had burned to a charred mass of reddish cinders he heaved a sigh of relief. The jacket and waistcoat of that suit had been spattered with blood, and if it had been found it would have taken a lot of explaining away.

  Chapter Fifteen – What the Gardener Saw

  Farringdon Street heard of the outrage and came post-haste to Deneswood, but he was not allowed to see the unfortunate Mr. Blessington. The doctor had left strict orders that his patient was on no account to be disturbed, and all the reporter’s attempts to get round the hard-faced nurse were without avail. He had to content himself with an interview with Oliver, the injured man’s servant, a portly individual with a great sense of his own importance, in manner and deportment not unlike Mr. Blessington himself.

  ‘It’s a very terrible thing to have happened,’ he said, shaking his bald head. ‘And is likely to have a deleterious effect on the community. This is a very select district. The inhabitants will not relish the sensational publicity accruing from all these unpleasant events.’

  He was a man of pompous speech, given to the use of long words and rolling periods. He could suggest no reason for the attack on his master. It was his theory that the assault had been committed by some tramp who was out for personal gain.

  Farringdon left him and went back to the car in which he had driven down with Stanley Holt. The young American had been with him when the news had come through, and had offered to accompany him to the valley. The reporter told him the meagre result of his inquiries and Holt pursed his lips.

  ‘I don’t see how it can have anything to do with the Dexon business,’ he said. ‘This man, Blessington, had nothing to do with Dexon.’

  ‘Not so far as we know,’ answered Farringdon. ‘Maybe the butler’s right and it was a tramp.’

  They went in search of Hallick and discovered that the inspector had taken up his abode at the inn in the village. He was gloomily drinking beer
in the saloon bar when they ran him to earth. ‘Hello!’ he said, setting down his tankard. ‘You haven’t been long in getting here.’

  ‘What do you make of this latest development?’ asked the reporter, when he had introduced Holt and fresh drinks had been ordered.

  The inspector shook his head. ‘I don’t make anything of it,’ he replied, ‘but I’m pretty sure it’s mixed up with these murders, and I’ve decided to stop here until I get to the bottom of it. It’s my opinion that Deneswood holds the secret of the Dexon business, and if we ever find it out we shall find it down here.’

  Farringdon was inclined to agree with him. He put forward Oliver’s suggestion, and Hallick shook his head. ‘I considered that aspect,’ he said, ‘but I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s more in it than that. The object of the attack on Blessington was murder, not robbery.’

  ‘Why should anyone want to murder Blessington?’ demanded the reporter.

  ‘I can think of several reasons,’ retorted Hallick with a faint smile. ‘If I was long in Blessington’s company I should want to murder him myself. One thing I’m convinced of, the man who coshed him is a resident on the estate.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’ asked Holt.

  ‘He’s either a resident or he’s known to the residents,’ said Hallick. ‘He couldn’t have got away so easily otherwise. My men have been combing the whole district, and if he was a stranger they would have caught him or found some trace of him, and they’ve done neither.’

  ‘Have you interviewed the residents?’ asked the reporter, and the inspector gave him a pitying look.

  ‘What do you think?’ he grunted. ‘Do you suppose I’ve been spending the time in here drinking beer? ’course I’ve interviewed the residents, and a fat lot of good it did. Somebody’s hiding up something and I wish I knew who it was.’

  ‘We knew that Feldon and Sopley knew something,’ muttered Farringdon, frowning. ‘It seems incredible to believe there’s a third.’

  ‘The whole thing’s incredible,’ growled the inspector, swallowing the remainder of his beer with a gulp. ‘But because it’s incredible it doesn’t mean it’s impossible. For all we know, every man jack living on the estate may be mixed up in the affair.’

  ‘That’s a bit sweeping, isn’t it?’ said Stanley Holt.

  ‘Maybe,’ agreed Hallick, ‘but if you’ve interviewed ’em you’d feel as I do. They’re all scared to death, and they’re all afraid of opening their mouths too wide.’

  ‘It’s not surprising they’re scared,’ said Farringdon. ‘It’s not very nice living in an atmosphere of battle, murder and sudden death.’

  ‘It’s not that sort of scare,’ said the inspector. ‘The impression they give me is that they’re all afraid of something coming out. Something they don’t want known.’

  ‘But you don’t seriously suggest,’ said Holt, ‘that the residents of Deneswood Valley are all crooks?’

  ‘Something of the sort,’ answered Hallick. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Sounds a bit far-fetched to me,’ said Farringdon, ‘though if it was true it would make a first-class story.’

  ‘You’re wanted on the phone, Mr. Hallick,’ broke in the shrill voice of the rosy-faced barmaid before the inspector could reply.

  With a muttered apology, Hallick dived under the flap of the counter and disappeared through an arched opening in the back of the bar. He was gone for barely a minute, and when he came back the gloom had disappeared from his face. ‘That was a call from Blagdon,’ he explained. ‘One of the gardeners on the estate has just called in at the station saying he’s got some information concerning something he saw on the night Blessington was attacked. I’m going along there now.’

  ‘Can we come with you?’ asked Farringdon quickly.

  The inspector hesitated. ‘All right,’ he said after a moment. ‘Come on.’

  Holt’s car was standing outside the inn, and climbing into this the young American drove them to the small police station. Inspector Blagdon was in the charge room talking to a little wizened man with grey hair and a face that was so wrinkled that it looked like a dried-up apple. The local man greeted Farringdon with a smile. ‘Hello, Mr. Street!’ he said. ‘I didn’t know you were down here.’

  ‘I’m everywhere,’ said the reporter extravagantly.

  ‘This is Mr. Feener,’ went on Blagdon, jerking his head at the nervous figure of the little old man. ‘He’s one of the gardeners employed by Mr. Blessington to look after the Deneswood Estate, and he says he’s got something to tell us.’

  ‘That’s right, sir,’ said Feener in a thin voice. ‘It were the night the guv’nor was bashed on the ’ead —’

  ‘Better come into my office,’ interrupted Blagdon. He led the way over to a tiny apartment at the back of the charge room, into which they just managed to squeeze themselves.

  ‘Now,’ he said, seating himself behind an untidy desk and pulling a pad of paper towards him. ‘Just tell us what it was you saw, Mr. Feener.’

  The gardener perched himself uncomfortably on the edge of a chair and rubbed his gnarled hands up and down the knees of his corduroy trousers. ‘Well, it was like this,’ he began. ‘I’d been at work trimmin’ the ’edge up at the end of the central garden, and I was on my way ’ome when I remembered that I’d left a pair of shears out. They was a new pair, wot I’d only bought that day, an’ I was afeared if it rained durin’ the night they’d be spoiled. So I came back to lock ’em up in the shed with the others. I found ’em all right an’ I took ’em along to the little tool-shed, which is up at the end of the green, close by where the golf course begins. It was almost dark, and I’d put me shears away and was goin’ ’ome when I saw a man come runnin’ from the direction of the golf course and cross the path a few ’undred yards in front of me. I couldn’t see who it was, but I saw where ’e went to.’

  ‘Where did he go to?’ asked Hallick, as the old man paused.

  ‘’e went to the fence wot divides Mr. Earnshaw’s ’ouse from the rest of the estate,’ said Feener. ‘An’ I saw ‘im climb the wall and drop down t’other side.’

  ‘Into Mr. Earnshaw’s garden?’ asked Blagdon quickly.

  The gardener nodded.

  ‘Was it Mr. Earnshaw?’ inquired Hallick.

  Mr. Feener’s head stopped nodding and slowly shook from side to side. ‘I couldn’t rightly tell yer,’ he said. ‘I don’ know who it was. But ‘e disappeared inside Mr. Earnshaw’s garden, an’ that’s all I knows.’

  ‘Why didn’t you come forward with this information before?’ asked the local inspector.

  ‘I only remembered it this mornin’,’ explained the gardener. ‘I didn’t think anythin’ of it at the time. I thought per’aps it might be one of the servants who’d gone out on a h’errand and was gettin’ back that way to save time. But this mornin’, while I was ’aving my breakfast, I spoke about it to the missus, an’ she said wot I ought to do was to come an’ tell you.’

  ‘She did quite right,’ said Blagdon.

  ‘How big was this man you saw?’ said Hallick. ‘Was he short, tall, thin, stout?’

  ‘Medium,’ answered the gardener, ‘an’ a bit on the fat side. It weren’t unlike Mr. Earnshaw ’isself,’ he added after a pause, ‘but I wouldn’t like to say it was ’im.’

  Hallick shot a quick glance at Farringdon Street. ‘Oh, it might have been Mr. Earnshaw, eh?’ he said.

  ‘It might ’ave been,’ agreed Feener. ‘But I ain’t sayin’ that it was. Don’t you go puttin’ down that I said it was Mr. Earnshaw, ’cause I told yer I don’t know who it was.’

  ‘That’s all right, Feener,’ said the inspector. ‘We shan’t put down anything you haven’t said. This man you saw came from the direction of the golf course?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said the gardener.

  ‘And he was running?’

  ‘Well, ’e wasn’t exactly runnin’,’ corrected Feener, ‘but ’e was walkin’ quick-like.’

  They put seve
ral more questions, but Mr. Feener could offer no other information. When he had gone Hallick turned to Blagdon. ‘I think a visit to this man Earnshaw is indicated,’ he said, and the local man nodded.

  ‘Shall we go up now?’ he said.

  ‘Might as well,’ answered Hallick. ‘I suppose you want to come too?’ he added to Farringdon.

  ‘You bet I do,’ said the reporter promptly. ‘I don’t want to miss anything connected with this case.’

  ‘It ’ud be difficult for a blind man to do that,’ growled Hallick irritably.

  ‘You mean it’s so obvious?’ said Stanley Holt in surprise.

  ‘No!’ retorted the inspector. ‘I mean there’s so darned little to miss.’

  Chapter Sixteen – Mr. Earnshaw is Indignant

  Pamela Earnshaw learned of Mr. Blessington’s mishap with mixed feelings. Her predominant reaction was one of relief. At least, for some time to come, the stout man would have more pressing things to think about than herself, and she was grateful for the postponement. Her father had said nothing further concerning his wishes in this respect, and, indeed, was apparently so preoccupied with some other matter that he barely spoke to her at all. She raised the subject of the attack at breakfast on the morning following its perpetration.

  ‘It’s an extraordinary affair altogether,’ said Earnshaw absently. ‘The place is getting uninhabitable.’

  ‘Why do you think anyone should have assaulted Mr. Blessington?’ she asked.

  ‘How do I know?’ he answered. ‘There’s a lot of unpleasant people about these days. You can’t open a newspaper without reading an account of someone being attacked. Probably it was an attempted hold-up.’

  She thought his tone lacked conviction, but there was something about him that warned her not to pursue the subject. She went about her household duties, however, wondering what possible reason there could be for anyone wishing to injure the placid and peaceful owner of the Deneswood Valley Estate.