by John Bude
“But damn it all…!” blustered Meredith.
“Oh and that’s not all,” said Maxton smoothly. “Miss Parker was going to have a baby. Not immediately. But in about six months’ time. Not particularly noticeable at a cursory examination, but in the case of an autopsy…” Maxton paused, uttered another short sardonic guffaw and concluded: “I wouldn’t be at all surprised if she were murdered on account of her condition. And since Mildmann had been writing her those intimate letters…Well, au revoir, my dear fellow. We’ll meet at the inquest on Monday, I imagine.”
III
“Well, Sergeant,” said Meredith, when he had handed on Maxton’s information to O’Hallidan, “where do we go from here?”
“’Tis back to Chichester Oi’d be an’ no question asked, sorr, if Oi had me way. There’s no future in this case—no future at all there isn’t. Oi’d have said that Mildmann murthered the poor colleen because it was herself that was going to have a baby. An’ having murthered the girl, Oi’d have said it was himself who committed suicide to diddle the hangman’s noose. But Oi’ve a notion you won’t be agreeing with me about that, sorr.”
Meredith shook his head.
“How the devil can I? If Mildmann had wanted to commit suicide he’d have taken a glass of that poisoned sherry. Point is, he didn’t. He died of a concentrated dose of unadulterated prussic acid.”
“Which he couldn’t have drunk before leaving the house, sorr.”
“Exactly. To have reached his car after such a dose would have been impossible. So what?”
“Would he have poisoned himself now, after he was back in the car?”
“He could have done. But what about his condition as he came down the drive? Arkwright said he was staggering and obviously in pain. In fact, the poor devil gasped out that he was ill and told Arkwright to get him back to the North Lodge as soon as possible.”
“Would it have been play-acting at all?”
“If so I can’t see the point of it,” objected Meredith. “Frankly I can’t see the point of anything. You’d never have thought that one decanter, two glasses and a shot of hydrocyanic acid could have set such a bamfoozling problem.” Meredith looked up sharply as the landlord of The Leaning Man came into the now deserted dining-room. “Looking for me?” he asked.
“Aye, surr. There’s a call just come through for you from Hitchin.”
“Splendid!” said Meredith, jumping up. “I’ll take it at once.” A few minutes later he rejoined O’Hallidan. He looked as pleased as a kitten with two tails. “Progress at last, thank God! Hitchin have picked up Dudley at his house and he’s prepared to make a full statement. He’s already admitted that he was down here on the night the girl died. Hitchin are driving him down at once so that I can cross-examine. They hope to get here in about three hours’ time. In the interim, I suggest we—” Meredith broke off and jerked a finger towards the window. “Hullo, who’s this? I wonder if they’re looking for us, Sergeant?” He crossed quickly to the latticed casement and asked politely: “Can I help? You don’t seem to know your way about. Are you looking for the landlord?”
“No, I…as a matter of fact…I was told that I should find the police inspector here. The detective who’s investigating—”
Meredith smiled.
“Then you needn’t look any further, young lady.”
“Oh thank heaven! If you’re Inspector Meredith, may I come in?”
“Please do.”
After Meredith had introduced O’Hallidan, they settled themselves about the table.
“And your name,” asked Meredith, “is…?”
“Oh, I’m Denise Blake. Mrs. Hagge-Smith’s secretary.”
“You have all my sympathy,” chuckled Meredith. “And what exactly brings you to me?”
“Well, it’s something that I’ve heard—a rumour that’s going around the camp. You’ve no idea how swiftly things get around here. It’s startling.”
“It’s the divil!” exclaimed O’Hallidan. “Oi’ll be wagering ivery soul in the place knows me middle name is Corny, though me own mother would have long since forgetten the fact.”
“And what is this rumour, Miss Blake?”
The girl hesitated, blushed becomingly and then murmured:
“It’s something I’ve heard about Terence Mildmann. You’ve met him?”
“Oh yes, I’ve met him,” said Meredith with a meaning glance at O’Hallidan.
“Well, it’s all so disturbing and beastly that I felt I just had to come and see you. Mrs. Hagge-Smith doesn’t know I’ve slipped away like this, so I’ve got to be quick.” For the second time Denise hesitated and then blurted out: “Inspector! It isn’t true that Terence had anything to do with this terrible affair at the Dower House, is it? They say the police suspect that he may have…have been responsible for his father’s death. But it’s untrue! I know it is. Terence didn’t like his father, I admit, but to do anything like this…he just couldn’t! It’s horrible of people even to suggest it. I just can’t understand them. They’re supposed to be living a Higher Life and all that sort of thing and yet they can talk about Terence in this vile way. They’re such awful hypocrites.”
“You’re fond of young Mildmann, eh?”
“I…no…yes…” Then rather defiantly: “Yes, I suppose I am. He’s such a helpless sort of mutt. One can’t help liking him.”
Meredith said quietly:
“I’m afraid the rumour is not entirely unfounded, Miss Blake. The police never suspect anybody of anything without good reason. And in this case we have a good reason. You see, shortly before the tragedy at the Dower House occurred, the lad was seen only a few hundred yards away and he refuses to—”
“That’s what I’ve come to see you about,” broke in Denise eagerly. She snatched up her handbag, opened it and handed Meredith a folded slip of paper. “Please read that, Inspector. I think then you’ll realise how this foul rumour began.”
Meredith flattened out the sheet and, for O’Hallidan’s benefit, read the brief missive aloud.
Darling Denise,
If I don’t see you soon I’ll go haywire. We’ve simply got to meet. Now, please listen. I’m supposed to be going over to Downchester with Mrs. Summers next Thursday, but I’ve persuaded her to keep mum if I give this date a miss. I shall wait for you near the lily-pond at eight o’clock, so do your damndest to slip away directly after dinner. I shall hang on there until I have to go and meet Mrs. Summers off the Downchester ’bus. My darling Denise, you know I’m crazy about you.
Lashings of love,
Terence.
“Well, well, well,” said Meredith as he handed back the note. “So that’s the reason for the young man’s reticence. He refused to tell me why he was waiting near the pond. He didn’t want to compromise you, young lady. That was rather nice of him, eh? In view of the circumstances, I mean.”
“Oh, it was marvellous of him!” cried Denise with shining eyes. “Marvellous! But it’s no more than I should have expected of him. Terence is like that. So thoughtful and…and so decent about everything.”
“And you were unable to keep the tryst—is that it?” asked Meredith.
Denise nodded miserably.
“The Blot suddenly took it into her head to dictate a whole batch of letters. She kept me at it until well after ten.”
Meredith’s grey eyes twinkled.
“The Blot, I imagine, is your somewhat graphic pseudonym for Mrs. Hagge-Smith?” Denise nodded again. “And so the poor lad hung about there until it was time to meet Mrs. Summers?”
“Yes, I suppose so. I haven’t had the chance to see him since. He probably thinks I didn’t want to meet him.”
“Well, I’ll soon disillusion him on that score, young lady. Don’t you worry. And thank heaven you had the good sense to show me that note. It explains everything. And if anybody dares to l
ink that boy’s name with what happened on Thursday night, you can tell them from me that he’s entirely cleared of suspicion.”
“That’s nice of you,” concluded Denise warmly.
“Well,” said Meredith to Sergeant O’Hallidan, when Denise had left, “that knocks one more off the list. A charming and level-headed young lady. And if Dudley goes the same way as Terence Mildmann we’re back where we started. Mildmann poisoned the girl and then poisoned himself.”
“Oi’ve been thinking, sorr.”
“The devil you have!”
“About the gloves, Oi have.”
“What about the gloves?”
“It was yourself who was wondering how Mildmann could have got rid of his gloves once he was in the car.”
“That’s true.”
“Well now, sorr, will ye consider my theory that Mildmann was only play-acting when he came out of the house. That he didn’t take the poison at all until he was on his way back to the North Lodge. Faith now, an’ it’s a good an’ simple explanation, as you’ll admit.”
“At the moment,” agreed Meredith, “it’s the only explanation. It means that somewhere on that drive home, Mildmann opened the car window, threw away his gloves, closed the window again and then settled back to shuffle off his mortal coil, eh O’Hallidan? Why he did all this we can’t say. Why there were two used glasses beside the decanter we can’t say. Why Mildmann waited until he was in the car before poisoning himself, we can’t say. Why he broke into the desk and removed those letters when he knew he was going to commit suicide, we can’t say. The only thing of which we can be certain was his motive for the crime. It wasn’t only the threat of those letters which worried him. Good God, no! He had something far more unpleasant to conceal. He killed Penelope Parker because she was with child, and he, the High Prophet of this fanatical bunch of High Lifers, was the father of that child!”
“Sure an’ Oi won’t be disagreeing with you about that, sorr.”
Meredith rose and picked up his hat.
“Very well, Sergeant, we’ll put your theory to the test. If Mildmann got rid of those gloves by throwing them out of the car window, there’s a chance that they’re still lying somewhere on the verges of the drive. Suppose we take a slow and careful walk from the North Lodge to the Dower House. After all, if we do find those gloves, we’ve got to approach the whole modus operandi of the crime from a new angle.”
IV
A couple of hours later, after a gruelling, back-aching search, Meredith and O’Hallidan returned to The Leaning Man. They had not found the gloves. Near the Dower House drive-gate, however, lying close to the rhododendron bushes in the long grass, O’Hallidan picked up a child’s water-pistol. The utter irrelevance of this discovery infuriated Meredith. He observed sarcastically:
“We comb the ground for a top-line clue and what do we come back with? Damn it all, Sergeant, a kid’s toy! And don’t you start putting up any airy assumptions about it being connected with the crime. It probably is, but for God’s sake don’t suggest it! The whole set-up’s quite complicated enough as it is. Come on, let’s see if mine host can conjure up a nice strong pot of tea!”
Chapter XX
Mr. Dudley Talks
It was about half-an-hour later when a police car, driven by a uniformed constable, swished into the courtyard of the inn. Meredith had once more arranged to have the landlord’s private parlour placed at his disposal, and in a few minutes he, O’Hallidan, Inspector Baker of Hitchin and Mr. Dudley were snugly behind its closed doors. The latter, a well-built, middle-aged man, looked tired and worried. But Meredith liked at once his open expression and unaggressive manner. Right from the start it was evident that Dudley was prepared to be as helpful and outspoken as the occasion demanded. Ordering O’Hallidan to take down a verbatim report of the interview, Meredith began his cross-examination.
“You realise why Inspector Baker asked you to come down here and make a statement, Mr. Dudley?”
“Only too well, I’m afraid.”
“And you’re prepared to answer my questions?”
“To the best of my ability—yes.”
“Very well. Information has come to hand which suggests that you paid a visit to the Dower House last Thursday evening. That you saw Miss Parker for a few minutes shortly before she was found dead in her sitting-room. And that, subsequently, you left the house by the french-windows and returned to your car which you had left on the road to the south of the park. Is this correct?”
“Perfectly correct. May I say ‘startlingly’ correct?”
“This wasn’t your first visit to the Dower House?”
“No. I had come down on two previous occasions after…er…Miss Parker had moved from Welworth.”
“And on one of those occasions a young man came into the room where you were waiting for Miss Parker?”
“He did.”
“And may I suggest that on each of these occasions, Mr. Dudley, you managed to slip into the house without the knowledge of the domestic staff?”
“That’s perfectly true.”
“But why?”
Dudley smiled, uttered a weary little sigh and leaned back with an air of resignation in his armchair.
“Look here, Inspector—you already appear to know a good deal about my recent movements and my attempts to make contact with Miss Parker. Wouldn’t it save time if I told you the whole story from A to Z?—the circumstances which have prompted me to act as I have, the reasons for my somewhat underhand behaviour, a full, straight-from-the-shoulder statement, in fact?”
“Nothing would suit me better,” said Meredith approvingly. “That is if you’re prepared to—”
“I’m prepared to tell you everything!” exclaimed Dudley, suddenly raising his voice and emerging from his previous lethargy. “What can I gain now by concealing any of the details? I’ve acted like a damned fool! I admit it. And now, like any other damned fool, I’ve got to take the rap. But believe me, Inspector, I refuse to look on myself as a criminal fool. A misguided one, perhaps. You see, I’m one of those unhappy devils to whom providence delights in dealing out one shabby hand after another. Five years ago the barometer of my existence seemed to be at ‘set fair’. But now…well, it’s no good whining. I’ll cut the cackle and come to the goose, eh?” He was now sitting bolt-upright in his chair, obviously in a state of acute nervous tension, yet in perfect control of his speech and emotions. He went on jerkily: “Five years ago I was a contented married man. I was interested in my job as a chartered accountant. I was deeply in love with my wife and I fondly imagined that she was as deeply in love with me. That was my first illusion. She wasn’t. I found it out by degrees. A tiff here, an argument there, an ever-increasingly critical attitude to all I said and did. I’m an ordinary average sort of chap, as you may have gathered. I’m interested in the ordinary average things of life. Well, my wife wasn’t. I say ‘wasn’t’ advisedly, because she’s now dead and—beyond the reach of my abortive attempts to bridge the gulf between us.”
“Good God!” rapped out Meredith. “You mean to say—?”
Dudley nodded wearily.
“Yes. Penelope Parker was my wife. When she left me, she retook her maiden name and did her damnedest to forget that she’d ever been Mrs. John Keith Dudley. The trouble was, Inspector, she ‘got religion’. She got it badly. De mortuis nil nisi bonum and all the rest of it, but I can’t be less than honest with you. I went through hell on account of Penelope’s high-flying notions. I wasn’t tuned up to lead the Higher Life. To her I wasn’t far short of a gross and unteachable savage. Well, I won’t drivel on about our wretched married life. I only thank heaven there weren’t any children to complicate matters. Two years ago she left me and went to live at Welworth Garden City. She chose Welworth, needless to say, because it was the Mecca of Cooism—the one place where she felt she could spread her wings and soar onto
the High Plane or whatever they call it.” Dudley paused, mopped his brow, sank back again into his chair and went on brokenly: “The hell of it was that I still loved her to distraction! Once or twice I was driven in desperation to see her and plead with her to return. Oh, I admit she wasn’t exactly unsympathetic, but I couldn’t shake her. She was devoting her life to a cause and I no longer entered into the picture. That was her argument in a nut-shell. Me versus the Higher Life. And the Higher Life won all along the line! Then one day, after some hesitation, she confessed that she had fallen in love with a member of her confounded religion. You can guess, of course, to whom I refer?”
“Naturally,” said Meredith. “To Eustace Mildmann—the late C in C of the Movement.”
Dudley sat up with a jerk and stared at the inspector with an expression of incredulity.
“Mildmann? Good heavens! What are you talking about? She didn’t give a damn about him except as leader of the cult! It was that dago she’d fallen for, that slimy two-faced wog, Penpeti!”
“You’re sure?” demanded Meredith sharply.
“Am I sure?” cried Dudley with a scowl of exasperation. “Haven’t I watched her making a fool of herself with him for months? Haven’t I had his virtues flung in my face every time I visited her? Of course it was Penpeti. I believe Mildmann made a few innocent advances, but he meant nothing to her as a man. You can imagine how I felt. If she’d fallen for a decent upstanding sort of chap, perhaps I shouldn’t have taken it so hardly. But that dolled-up apology for a man gets me under the collar!”
“You met him at the house?”
“No—never face to face. But I used to hang about the place to watch his comings and goings. Penpeti never realised I was watching him. Hitchin is only a few miles from Welworth and it was easy for me to drive over and act the amateur detective. And in the end…well, I just lost control. I decided to—shall I say?—erase him.”
Meredith consulted the dossier which Inspector Duffy had forwarded the day before.