Death Among the Sunbathers

by E. R. Punshon

  From suspicious eyes the A.A. man watched his retreat, and then going into his box rang up the police station and reported the incident.

  ‘Up to no good if you ask me,’ he said, ‘sort of fellow you wouldn’t like to meet on a dark night when you had had a drop too much and your week’s money in your pocket. Walks like a cat, and when he grins at you, shows a black gap in his teeth, at the back, top jaw.’

  ‘Sounds like that fellow who’s been doing odd jobs at the Grange this last week or two,’ observed the sergeant from the other side of the wire. ‘I’ll keep an eye on him.’

  ‘I would if I were you,’ said the A.A. man and went back to his job, while, unaware of the interest he had thus roused in himself, Bobs-the-Boy made his way back to the car park, where once again he met with but a cold reception, since the attendant, the one-legged Wilson, suspected him of being after the job and promptly packed him off with an assurance that no one wanted to see his ugly mug round there.

  With a meekness a little surprising in a gentleman who could show such truculence on occasion, Bobs-the-Boy accepted his dismissal, merely remarking that he would go up to the house and see if there was any chance of his being wanted next day. Instead of doing so at once, however, he produced a packet of cheap cigarettes and hung about, though out of sight of the car park, till presently he saw the huge, lumbering form of Zachary Dodd, Mr Bryan’s partner, coming up from the male in puris naturalibus section that he had specially in charge. Dodd dressed in more normal fashion than did Mr Bryan, his chief concession to progress being flannel trousers held up by a belt, and rather badly in need of a visit to the laundry, and a brilliantly striped shirt open at the neck to show a chest so hairy it certainly seemed to have need of little other covering. Increasing flesh, that did not seem as if it could possibly all be due to the kind of provender the Grange canteen offered to its clients, had deprived him of that quickness and agility whereof at one time he had possessed enough to enable him to make a very creditable figure in the ring, but he still possessed great, if clumsy, strength. Today, however, though his grip remained formidable and his blows heavy enough, these last came so slowly, with such deliberation, they were easy to avoid, and as a fighting man his career was over. At present he did not look in the best either of tempers or condition, for his face had a pale, pasty look and his eyes were heavy and bloodshot, while he muttered to himself as he walked; and when Bobs-the-Boy moved forward so as to cross his path with the evident intention of speaking, the ex-heavyweight boxer told him with the addition of an oath or two to clear out and quick about it, unless he wanted his face pushed down his throat.

  ‘Yes, sir, certainly, sir,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered obsequiously, keeping a wary eye on the great clenched fist that might presently come travelling in his direction. ‘It’s about them two “busies”, sir, Mr Mitchell and the other bloke what’s been here to-day.’

  ‘What about them?’ growled Dodd suspiciously, ‘what do you know about them anyway?’

  ‘Only as they’ve been asking questions and rooting round like as they suspicioned something,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered coolly, ‘and now an A.A. scout’s been calling at the police station down in the village, giving them information.’

  ‘Telling them Miss Frankland stopped and spoke to him after she left here, I suppose,’ Dodd growled. ‘Well, what about it? Why shouldn’t she?’

  ‘I hadn’t no idea,’ answered Bobs-the-Boy, looking quite downcast, ‘as you knew it already, that that was what he was come about. They don’t know it in the village.’

  ‘About the only thing they don’t know then,’ Dodd said in the same growling, almost threatening tone. ‘They know it all down there and a lot more as well.’

  ‘Well, some of them do say,’ admitted Bobs-the-Boy, ‘that the A.A. scout saw the actual shooting and knows just who did it,’ and Dodd grunted scornfully but made no other comment. Bobs-the-Boy went on, ‘It isn’t only the two big bugs that have been rooting round here to-day. There’s one of their lot, a bloke named Owen–’

  ‘I’ve heard of him,’ Dodd exclaimed with a sudden animation in his voice. ‘Yes, I’ve heard of him.’

  ‘So have I,’ said Bobs-the-Boy slowly and darkly. He added still more slowly, his face, his half-hidden eyes, as if a veil of darkness had spread across them, ‘Some day he’ll hear of me.’

  They were both silent for a moment or two. Dodd’s manner had changed now; it was less sullen, smoother, yet doubtful, too. It appeared as if Bobs-the-Boy had acquired a new interest in his eyes and his rumbling voice had a lower note as he asked presently,

  ‘It was Mr Bryan told me about him, he had heard something; there’s not much he doesn’t hear, old Bryan. One of the newspaper men was talking... Well, what about it, what about this Owen ?’

  ‘Been snooping round,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered, ‘that’s what, snooping round, trying to find out things, the swine.’

  ‘Well, what for? Why should he?’ Dodd asked; and Bobs-the-Boy said nothing to that, only his half-closed eyes were intent upon the other’s face. Dodd said again, ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Heard him asking questions... talking... he’s been talking to the car park man, Wilson’s his name, isn’t it? Asked Wilson a whole lot of questions he did, began about the three-thirty to-morrow and what’ll win, and then all kinds of things. Wilson didn’t know who he was, but I did. I knew all right.’

  ‘What sort of other things?’

  ‘It just about came to this,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered slowly, ‘he wanted to know if Wilson was there when Miss Jo Frankland left in her Bayard Seven. Wilson said he wasn’t, said he was up at the house, said he was sent for on some job wanted doing up there, he didn’t say what it was.’

  ‘Well, what about it?’ Dodd demanded. ‘Why should he be there? She could start her own car, couldn’t she?’

  ‘Seems,’ said Bobs-the-Boy, ‘seems there was a lady sun bathing here that day had been pals with Miss Frankland along of working somewhere together and knew her well, seems this here lady spoke to her as she was going to the car park along of Mr Bryan.’

  ‘What about it?’ Dodd repeated. ‘Why shouldn’t she?’

  ‘Seems she says, this lady says, as there was someone in the car park when Miss Frankland went to get her car out after Mr Bryan left her.’

  ‘How does she know that?’ Dodd growled. ‘How can she know unless she followed her? Did she?’

  ‘No, but she heard an engine start running. And so she says if an engine started running, there must have been someone there to start it, at least, that’s what she’s told this snooping Owen fellow.’

  Dodd said nothing. His heavy features showed little interest, only his small bloodshot eyes had grown alert and lively and one enormous hand he held out as if he wished to take hold of something in it, something that he could grip and crush. Bobs-the-Boy went on,

  ‘Seems from what this Owen said, though that wasn’t much, but there’s times when the less what’s said, the more you know what’s meant, and what it seems like is as they’re sure her light was put out in the car park, just after Mr Bryan left her, and that there engine what was running, was running so as nothing shouldn’t be heard, for their idea is she was shot just as she was getting into her car, and that there engine running – well, then the shots couldn’t be heard by no one.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot,’ Dodd growled suspiciously; ‘you picked up all this did you? Just from hearing them talking – or was this Owen telling it all to Wilson?’

  ‘No,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered, ‘not from what Owen said to Wilson, but part from what he said, and more from what he didn’t say, and most from me putting it together by way of guessing like; and what if you ask me, it all boils down to is just this – the “busies” believe there was someone in the car park when Miss Frankland went to get her car, and they believe it was someone waiting for her, and they believe whoever that was is who it was who corpsed her. So what they want to know is, who was that someone?’


  ‘Anyone in particular they think it was?’ Dodd asked.

  ‘If you ask me,’ Bobs-the-Boy replied, though with some hesitation, ‘I don’t think they’ve an idea barring guesses, and what’s the good of guessing, but if they got a hint... why, then it would be bad for anyone they fixed on, and I’m glad it won’t be me.’

  ‘Maybe it will be,’ Dodd retorted grimly.

  ‘I’ve got an alibi,’ Bobs-the-Boy retorted in his turn, with that sudden grin of his that showed so disconcertingly the black gap appearing in his upper row of teeth.

  Dodd was thinking deeply.

  ‘Going to be bad for us,’ he said after a pause, ‘if they really think someone was hiding in the car park and shot Miss Frankland as soon as she went to get her car after she left Bryan. It’ll make a scandal, and a place like this don’t want scandals, can’t stand ’em. But there’s one thing knocks that theory sky high – after Miss Frankland left here she stopped and spoke to an A.A. scout and gave him her card.’

  ‘If that’s so, that’s that,’ Bobs-the-Boy agreed. Again he showed that disconcerting grin of his; and for once his heavy-lidded eyes opened wide as they flashed a full look at the other. ‘But then seems like they don’t believe that was her,’ he added, ‘but someone else that handed out her card.’

  ‘Oh, that’s rubbish,’ exclaimed Dodd hotly; ‘rubbish, plain rubbish. It’s this Owen fellow been rooting all this out, is it? I should like to meet him and hear what he has to say himself.’

  ‘He keeps out of the way,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered. ‘Snoops around and no one knows and gets his report ready, and till it is, not even his bosses know what he’s doing or what he’s thinking.’

  ‘Hasn’t he reported all these cracked ideas of his yet?’ Dodd asked carelessly.

  ‘Judging from what he said to Wilson, I should say he hadn’t,’ answered Bobs-the-Boy. ‘Fact, I’m pretty sure he hasn’t. He likes to have everything complete and written out nice and tidy before he sends it in, all with lovely red ink ruling, ready to go up to the big bugs for them to see what a smart Aleck they’ve got working for them.’

  ‘I see,’ said Dodd; ‘I know that sort. Afraid if they speak too soon, someone else will butt in and get the credit. I know ’em.’

  ‘If you ask me,’ Bobs-the-Boy said softly, ‘he wants his own light putting out, wants corpsing, too, he does, snooping round...’ his voice trailed off into muttered threats but half audible.

  Dodd said,

  ‘I’ll talk to Mr Bryan. If there’s a scandal about this, it’ll do us a lot of harm, a lot of harm; finish us, perhaps. Anyhow, you can come out to-morrow and maybe there’ll be a job for you, and if not to-morrow, then perhaps some other day, that is, if you’re not particular so long as you’re well paid.’

  ‘Oh, I’m not particular,’ Bobs-the-Boy answered, ‘no ways I ain’t – but there’s some jobs what I do with a better heart than others.’

  Dodd looked at him for a moment, but made no other answer; and then lumbered heavily away towards the house. For a time Bobs-the-Boy watched him, and then himself slid away back through the car park towards the village.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Sybil’s Promise

  Whatever errand it was Sybil Frankland had been about so secretly in the neighbourhood of Leadeane Grange, it did not occupy her for long, since she was back again in her Ealing home early that same evening. And the next day she did not go out at all, but concerned herself with household occupations and with the care of her mother, for old Mrs Frankland was still confined to her room, still suffering from the effects of the shock of the news of her daughter’s tragic fate.

  But though Sybil occupied herself thus, in these calm, ordinary, everyday pursuits, signs of the sense of stress and strain under which she laboured were apparent enough. Every knock or ring at the door, though but another in that long procession of sellers of flowers, demonstrators of vacuum cleaners, collectors for charitable institutions, that every suburban household knows so well, sent her into a fresh terror, so that in either one form of panic or another she would rush to the door and tear it open as if to face the worst at once, or else seek refuge in her own room in the hope that the rather deaf daily woman who formed their sole domestic staff would neither hear nor answer the summons.

  It was under the first influence, however, that early in the afternoon she ran down from her mother’s room where she had been sitting, to answer a knock she thought she recognized. But it was John Curtis who was there, and when she saw him she exclaimed,

  ‘Oh, it’s you, I thought it was Maurice.’

  Curtis came by her into the house. She closed the door and he said to her,

  ‘Have you seen him?’

  ‘Maurice?’ she asked quickly, and shook her head; and Curtis went on,

  ‘I’m looking for him, I thought he might be here. I want to find him.’

  ‘What for?’ she asked with quick apprehension, and Curtis said,

  ‘He and that fellow, Hunter, they had a big row this morning.’

  ‘A row? They quarrelled?’ she asked, and when he nodded she said with something like fresh terror in her eyes, ‘Why? What about?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Curtis said. He added with sudden violence, ‘I want to know. I’ve got to know.’

  They were still standing in the hall. Apparently it did not occur to either of them to enter one of the rooms. The hall was no more than a narrow passage leading from the front door to the little drawing-room at the back of the house, and Curtis with his heavy, massive body and broad shoulders seemed to fill it, to dominate, too, the small, shrinking figure of the girl. She said in a low voice,

  ‘Why? Why do you want to know?’ and then when he did not answer but only looked at her gloomily, ‘How do you know Maurice and Mr Hunter have quarrelled?’

  ‘I heard them at it,’ Curtis answered. ‘I went to Deal Street this morning. I wanted to see Keene. There was no one in the shop. That girl he has wasn’t there, or the shop boy or anyone. But I heard him and Hunter shouting at each other in the room behind. Hunter was carrying on like a madman, swearing and threatening. He – I think he was accusing Keene of – of something.’ He paused. ‘I’ve got to know what he meant by what he said, what Hunter said,’ he finished slowly.

  Sybil did not answer. Even if there had been anything she wished to say, her mounting terror would have held her silent. Curtis said,

  ‘She was your sister... will you... I mean... will you help find out who killed her?’

  Still Sybil was silent, for indeed all power of speech had left her. He stared at her intently, his gaze never wavering, and yet it was as if he saw not so much her herself, but rather some far-off vision of which she was but a part.

  ‘I’ve got to know what they were quarrelling about,’ he went on. ‘I want to know what Hunter meant when he talked about something Keene had – done. Something... I’ve got to know... but they were shouting at each other, and both at once, and there was something, too, about that hang-dog looking fellow Keene’s had working there – Bobs– the-Boy they call him. Only then they woke up to it someone was there. Hunter opened the door and looked out, and when he saw me he gave a sort of jump. He didn’t say anything. He just put his head down and rushed by as quick as he could. He looked half mad. In the war, years ago, I remember seeing men look like that, under a barrage, wondering where the next shell would go. Keene came out after him. He didn’t know me at first, at least, he didn’t seem to. He said, “Anything I can do for you?” Then he seemed to cotton to it who I was. He said, “Oh, it’s you.” I asked him what he and Hunter had been rowing about, and he gave just the same sort of jump Hunter did when he saw there was someone there, and then that girl who works there came in. He said to her all in a hurry, as if he were trying to say it all at once, in one word, “Oh, you attend to Mr Curtis, will you?” and then he bolted right out of the shop just as he was, without a hat or anything. I ran after him, but he was too quick, he was across the road at once an
d a lot of traffic came up and I lost him. I went back to the shop and waited, but he didn’t come. Has he been here?’

  ‘No,’ Sybil answered.

  ‘Do you expect him?’

  ‘I don’t think so, no. Why?’

  ‘Jo was your sister,’ Curtis said. ‘You ought to help.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean, why do you say that?’ she almost whispered, and then, more loudly, ‘Maurice doesn’t know anything... not about that.’

  It was a long time before Curtis spoke again, and the tension in the narrow passage grew almost unbearable. Then Curtis said abruptly,

  ‘There’s something he knows or Hunter knows or both of them. I’ve told the police so. I went straight there and told them when I couldn’t find Keene or Hunter either, though I tried his place in Howland Yard.’ He added, as if in concession to her tortured, panic-stricken eyes, ‘The police-inspector or superintendent or whatever he is, Mitchell his name is, he seemed to think it might be all about something else. There’s one of his men he called Owen, he seemed to think he knew more about the case than anyone else, he says he’s on special duty following it up – Mitchell said this Owen chap had made a report and they were trying to check up on Keene’s movements the’ – he hesitated – ‘the afternoon when Jo...’ Again he hesitated, and then went on more quickly, ‘Well, Keene was there, at that sun bathing place, I mean, that afternoon. So was Hunter. Looks as if they were meeting there, so it wouldn’t be noticed. Well, where did Keene go when he left just before Jo arrived? What he says is, he meant to drive out to see a prospective client somewhere near Rugby, but half way he remembered the client was on the continent, and so he turned back and went home. He says he only drove slowly, and that accounts for the time he took; but if that’s so, he drove very slowly indeed, and why should he? He didn’t stop anywhere for tea or anything, he met no one likely to know him, he hasn’t a scrap of evidence to confirm his story.’