Abbey Court Murder: An Inspector Furnival Mystery: Volume 1 (The Inspector Furnival Mysteries)

by Annie Haynes

  Looking at the detective’s impassive face, listening to his carefully modulated voice, Crasster felt his heart sink. He had been telling himself, ever since he saw the detective on the preceding Monday, that there must be some way out of this horrible impasse in which the Carews were involved. To-day, however, it seemed to Crasster that Furnival spoke as if the matter were one entirely out of his control, as if he had to some extent lost interest in it.

  “What are you going to do now?” Crasster questioned.

  The inspector looked up as if startled from a daydream. “Well, I have a plan, sir. Not much of one, but still it may answer. I should have put it into execution to-day but for this illness of the child’s.”

  “Child’s, what child’s?” Stephen questioned. “What child is ill?”

  Furnival looked surprised. “I thought you would have heard, sir. Sir Anthony Carew’s little boy. They telegraphed to London for a specialist an hour ago.”

  “What?” Stephen looked at him in consternation. “It must be terribly sudden. I saw him last night, he was all right then.”

  “Children are like that,” the inspector observed philosophically.

  Stephen hardly heard the conclusion of the sentence. He looked at his watch.

  “You will forgive me, inspector, I must go over and see how the boy is.”

  The inspector stood up and buttoned his coat. “I must be getting back too, sir. There may be some news waiting for me. If you will be so good as to give me a lift, I shall be greatly obliged.”

  “Delighted, I’m sure,” said Crasster cordially. “Though I wish you would stay, inspector.”

  “Not to-day thank you, sir.”

  It was a drive of nine miles from Talgarth to Heron’s Carew, but Stephen’s powerful car made short work of the distance. The night was dark and threatening. The air was sultry and heavy with the weight that presages the coming of the storm, To Stephen it seemed prophetic; the very elements were in sympathy with his mood, with the tragedy that overhung Heron’s Carew. He put the inspector down at the Carew Arms and drove on to Heron’s Carew. As he passed the Dower House he caught sight of a white figure leaning against the gate. With a quick exclamation he stopped the car and sprang out. “Peggy, what are you doing here?”

  “Waiting for Dr. Bennett.” The girl let him take her cold hand in his; she looked at him with dull, uncomprehending eyes. “Paul is ill, you know, they say he is dying. They—Judith—sent me to tell Mother, because she always loved him, and the shock has made her quite ill, so ill that I can’t leave her and go back to Heron’s Carew. So I came down here to watch for Dr. Bennett to ask him—”

  “You poor child,” Stephen said tenderly. “Let me take you back to the house, Peggy. I will go up to Heron’s Carew and bring you back word how he is.”

  She let him draw her arm through his and lead her up the drive. She shivered, her fingers clung more closely to Stephen’s arm.

  “I—I am frightened, Stephen,” she whispered.

  He looked down at her with a smile. “Of what, Peggy?”

  She gave a little hoarse sob. “Of—of everything.”

  “Of everything. Nonsense!” Stephen spoke in a tone of calm authority. “Paul’s illness has upset you, of course.”

  Presently, there rose the low rumbling of distant thunder.

  “There!” Peggy caught her breath. “It is coming. I can feel it. And—and—” She drew Stephen onward quickly. She looked up at him with big, fear-laden eyes; her lips trembled; the hand lying on his arm shook as if with ague. “I have helped to bring trouble. What shall I do, Stephen? What shall I do?”

  Inside the hall Crasster stopped determinedly. “You are overwrought, tired out, Peggy. And there is thunder in the air. It upsets many people. Promise me you will put these fears aside, and to-morrow, when Paul is better—”

  Peggy had dropped his arm now. She stood apart, her white face lifted to the sky. To his last sentence she apparently paid no heed at all.

  “There are other things in the air to-night as well as thunder,” she said breathlessly. “There is trouble and treachery and—and worse. It is terrible not to know, to wait here and imagine the horrors the darkness hides. Oh, Stephen, when shall we—”

  A forked, zigzag tongue of blue flame seemed to shoot right between them, almost simultaneously the thunder broke overhead, and pealed and reverberated around.

  With a despairing cry Peggy turned and rushed into the house.

  CHAPTER XXVI

  Dawn was breaking slowly, as the first rays of the rising sun filtered through the unclosed windows of the nursery. Judith, with her child in her arms looked up wildly into the doctor’s face. But the doctor’s expression was inscrutable, his watch was in his hand, his gaze fixed on the tiny waxen face.

  Sir Anthony stood opposite; daylight made him look haggard. There were wearied circles round his eyes. Suddenly the doctor stooped, looked more closely at the child in Judith’s arms, then with an imperative gesture he pointed to the white cot. “Lay him there,” he whispered. “Nay, my dear Lady Carew, you must! It is most important that he should have all the air he can possibly get.”

  Judith obeyed. Then she waited, standing back, waited for the doctor’s word that should bid her look for the fluttering of the wings of the Angel Azrael.

  On the other side of the cot the doctor stood, his eyes bent on his little patient. Sir Anthony crossed over to his wife, he took her ice-cold hands in his.

  “Judith,” he said softly. “My poor darling.”

  For the time being the dark abyss of sin and horror that lay between them was forgotten; they were not the estranged husband and wife now; they were simply Paul’s father and mother, watching together by their sick child’s bed.

  Judith let her hands rest in her husband’s; she rested herself against him as if she were too much exhausted to stand alone. “Anthony, will he live—will my little baby Paul live?” she questioned beneath her breath. Sir Anthony put one strong arm round her and held her up. “Pray we may keep him, Judith, our dear little Paul,” he whispered, his whole frame quivering, strong man though he was.

  As in a vision all that the future might hold rose before her, the torturing shame, the horrible fear and disgrace. A long shiver shook her from head to foot.

  “Perhaps it is best that he should go,” she said dully. “Perhaps it is best, Anthony.”

  She felt his form stiffen, then very gently he put her from him; he moved away and stood by the mantelpiece, waiting.

  Dr. Bennett was standing at the foot of the cot, his eyes fixed intently upon his little patient. He bent forward now, then beckoned to the nurse who was standing behind. She handed him the cup from which she had been trying to get Paul to take some nourishment, and with a spoon he managed to get a few drops between the parted lips. Then he set the cup down on the table and glanced round.

  Sir Anthony stepped quickly to his side. Surely the last moment had come, he thought, but the doctor looked beyond him at the mother’s face.

  “It is good news, Lady Carew,” he said softly. “The one chance that I had hardly dared to hope for has come to pass. Nature is righting herself, the stupor has passed into natural sleep, and little Paul is saved. Please God he will do well now!”

  “Please God!” Judith echoed the words mechanically, staring at Dr. Bennett as though her benumbed brain failed to grasp the meaning of his words, then her whole face quivered, she burst into tears. “He is going to live, our little Paul,” she gasped. Sir Anthony drew her to an easy chair and made her sit down.

  Dr. Bennett eyed her benevolently. “The best thing for her,” he said in answer to Sir Anthony’s look of anxious inquiry. “She is worn out by anxiety and watching. Now, if you could get her to her room—I shall be here for some hours yet, and I want the patient kept as quiet as possible.”

  But for some time Judith resisted both his and her husband’s entreaties to rest, to leave Paul to his nurse and the doctor. At last, however, the night’s vi
gil, coming on the top of her previous weakness, made of her compliance a thing outside her own will, and Sir Anthony half carried her from the room. She clung to him as he laid her fully dressed on the bed, and drew the quilt around her. “Anthony,” she whispered, “don’t leave me. Stay with me here, where I can see you.” For the moment, Sir Anthony hesitated; then he laid his hand on hers as he sat down beside her.

  “Try to sleep, Judith,” he urged. “Nothing will do you so much good as that. And when Paul wakes we will call you.”

  Judith closed her eyes obediently, but her brain had been too thoroughly overtaxed to rest at once; one thought obsessed it now; there was something she must tell Anthony, something she had promised to tell Anthony, but she could not remember what it was.

  She turned feebly to her husband. “Anthony, there is something you ought to know, something I ought to tell you—”

  Sir Anthony’s face was very sombre. His mind was revolving that sentence that had fallen from her lips in the room above. Perhaps it is best that he should go. Would it have been best, he was asking himself, that the little life should have flickered out? It might be that in the future baby Paul himself might wish that to-day had been the end of all, that he had died before he grew up to share in the horrible shame that might fall any day now on the Carews of Heron Carew.

  Judith’s weak voice went on insistently. “You don’t listen, and I—I want you to help me. I can’t remember what it is I have to tell you.”

  Sir Anthony glanced at her. She was looking very ill, he noted it dispassionately.

  “Help me, Anthony. What am I to tell you?”

  “Nothing,” he spoke sternly. “Nothing, there is nothing you can tell me, Judith. You are to be still and go to sleep.”

  But the great eyes that looked purple now in the shadow only gazed at him more anxiously. “But I must tell you, I promised Peggy—”

  “Promised Peggy!” Sir Anthony echoed, startled in spite of himself. “What did you promise Peggy?”

  Judith drew her brows together. “I—I don’t know,” she said faintly. “Peggy said I must be brave; we were coming together to tell you—something. Then they came, and said that Paul was ill, and I think a black cloud burst in my brain; everything is dark and mixed up together. I can’t remember what I wanted to say to you. I—I wish I could.” The tears sprang into her eyes, ran down her cheeks; she began to sob pitifully.

  Anthony felt that this was no time for further questioning. He soothed her agitation as well as he could, and Judith yielded herself to his influence and presently fell into a restful slumber.

  Sir Anthony waited until the soft regular breathing told him that she was really asleep, then he went into his dressing-room and closed the door. He felt a certain prevision that the day that he had been dreading for so long, the day that he had always known in his heart was inevitable, was close at hand.

  It was wearing towards seven when Lady Carew woke at last with her mind fully conscious of her surroundings. She got out of bed then, and walking slowly, helping herself by the balustrade like one recovering from a serious illness, she made her way to the nursery, and satisfied herself that Paul was going on well.

  The nurse cried out when she saw her mistress’s face, but Judith only smiled wanly, and told her that she was going to speak to Sir Anthony, and that she would come up again presently.

  The irony of her words made her smile as she went back to her room. What would have happened before she saw her child again? What pity, what help could she hope for, from Paul’s father, when he had heard her story?

  She took the nourishment her maid brought her, and forced herself to swallow it. She would need all her strength, she knew, for the coming interview, if she could hope in any way to make Anthony understand.

  As she went downstairs she heard voices in the hall—Anthony’s and Crasster’s. “I’ll just show you what I mean, Crasster,” Anthony was saying. “But I won’t come any farther to-day. Truth to tell, I have had such a fright about the boy, I don’t care to be out of hearing of him.” There was an inaudible reply from Stephen. Judith drew back out of sight on the bend of the stair. They crossed to the front door.

  The door slammed behind them. Judith waited a minute or two to make sure the coast was clear, then she came down slowly and, after a moment’s hesitation, opened the study door. Anthony had said he was going to do some work there; well, he would find her waiting.

  The study was a large room, furnished in a severely masculine style, with big leather covered easy chairs and solid looking tables, a low divan ran across one end of the room, since Sir Anthony preferred it to the regular smoking room.

  A big screen of stamped leather stood near the window, Judith took the chair it shaded, the partial gloom was very grateful to her tired eyes. Anthony was longer in coming back than she imagined he would be. At last, her eyelids drooped, her thoughts trailed into unconsciousness, and she was asleep once more.

  How long she had been there she never knew. She was awakened by the sound of voices on the other side of the screen, strange voices, but they were speaking of things that concerned her. She caught words that drove the blood back from her heart. “The Abbey Court murder.” She realized that the speakers believed themselves to be alone, that they were speaking of her and Anthony. She leaned forward and listened, her white face aglow with a strange eagerness.

  CHAPTER XXVII

  “Sir Anthony will see you in a few minutes, if you will please to take a seat.” The butler ushered Mr. Lennox and his companion into the study.

  Mr. Lennox glanced about him keenly as he took the chair the man indicated; then his face assumed a satisfied expression.

  “I think it is the only thing to be done. We can’t afford to pick and choose in our profession, Barker.”

  “No, sir,” the man acquiesced.

  Mr. Lennox straightened himself suddenly. “I should say the Abbey Court murder has been as puzzling an affair as we ever had in hand, take it from first to last.”

  Mr. Barker looked at his superior in a little surprise. “And we are not out of the wood yet, sir.”

  “We are pretty well through with it,” the other contradicted. “There will not be much left to the imagination when I have finished with Sir Anthony Carew, I fancy. You understand what you have to do, Barker?”

  “I think so, sir.”

  “Be careful! A word or two too much or too little might do untold mischief. On the other hand, if you manage successfully there will be a promotion for you over this business. Ah, here is Sir Anthony,” as they caught an echo of his voice in the hall.

  Both men stood up as Sir Anthony came into the room. He was looking manifestly tired and ill.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said as he bowed. “But my time is rather full up to-day. I understand that your business is important, Mr.—er—Lennox,” glancing at the card in his hand.

  “It is, sir,” that functionary answered. “Had it been possible to delay it longer I would have done so, knowing that you had a good deal of anxiety to-day. But I am acting on instructions from headquarters. And I think I had better begin by telling you, Sir Anthony, that, though I have called myself Lennox down here for reasons that you will understand, I am really Detective-Inspector Furnival, of Scotland Yard.”

  “Indeed!” There was a slight stiffening of Sir Anthony’s muscles that did not escape the detective’s keen eyes. “I should be glad if you could make your business as short as possible,” he went on politely, “since my time is, of necessity, much occupied.”

  “I quite understand, Sir Anthony. If you will allow me.” He spoke a few words in an undertone to Mr. Barker. “My friend will wait for us in the hall, sir, if you have no objection.” He opened the door and showed the man out. Then as he closed it, his manner changed; he came back to Sir Anthony. “I am down here to investigate the Abbey Court murder, and I want your help, sir.”

  “My help!” Sir Anthony echoed, his countenance changing, in spite of his
best effort to maintain his composure. “I am at a loss to understand you. In what way can I help you?”

  “I will tell you, sir,” the inspector looked round. “But as it is likely to be a long story, might I suggest a seat—”

  “Take one!” Sir Anthony said curtly. He went ever to the fire-place as the inspector availed himself of his permission, and took up a position on the hearthrug, with one elbow on the high wooden mantelshelf. His dark face was absolutely impassive now, as he looked at the inspector and waited for him to begin.

  The detective cleared his throat. “It would help me greatly, sir, it would help everybody who is interested in the case, very materially, if you would tell us the facts as you know them.”

  “The facts as I know them! I am unable to guess your meaning, you must be more explicit, please! What facts do you imagine I am likely to know?” Sir Anthony’s tone was cold, his countenance was absolutely unmoved, the inspector was obliged to admire his self-command.

  “The testimony of anybody who was on the spot near the time of the murder, if not at the actual moment, is bound to be useful,” the detective said quietly.

  Sir Anthony eyed him more carefully. “Your words imply that you imagine I was on the spot.”

  “We know you were,” the detective said decisively. “Sir Anthony, won’t you deal openly with me? I will not conceal from you that matters may become serious for you. Any moment I may have definite orders from Scotland Yard to effect your arrest. I am here, because, in spite of circumstantial evidence, I cannot believe in your guilt. I am hoping that you may tell me something that may put me on the track of the real criminal. I know you can help me, Sir Anthony. Will you?”

  Sir Anthony did not answer for a minute. He drew a box of cigars that stood at the other end of the mantelpiece towards him, and selecting one carefully, cut off the tip and lighted it, then he held the box to the detective.