That was the reason for the dread she had shown on that morning when she had heard of Latinam’s death. She had known instinctively that it was murder, although the word had not been used, and at once her mind had gone to Ivan Holt. It had been the knowledge that Holt was intent on probing the mystery in which she was involved and might be in danger that had taken her out in search of him on the night of the murder.
But she had said nothing that might have betrayed him, and rather than expose him to Marfield’s threats she had run the risk of bringing herself under suspicion. No doubt it was for the sake of Ivan Holt, too, that she had kept silent about the incident at the gun emplacement and had not revealed to the police that the dead man had been not her brother but her husband.
Looking at them now, Holt still with his arm about her waist, Tremaine thought that the doubts had gone and that from this moment they had a chance to make their own way together. His sentimental soul expanded. He left them and went after Colinet.
He found the big man outside, issuing crisp orders. It was clear that the machine was going into prearranged action; Marfield might have emerged undetected from his hiding place but he was going to need more than a little luck to get back to it.
‘Where is he? Which way did he go?’
He turned, thinking that the question had been addressed to him, and found himself staring into Alan Creed’s set face. His wife was with him, pale and alarmed, clinging to his arm.
Creed was not looking at him and he realized then that the question had been meant for Exenley who had gone out at the same time as the Chief Officer.
‘Not sure,’ Exenley said. ‘Over that way, I think,’ he added, with a gesture. ‘But look here, this is no place for you. Go back, both of you.’
Before Creed could reply there was a shout from the direction of the roadway. A wildly running figure broke out of the semigloom, making for the headland.
‘We’ve headed him away from the road,’ Colinet said exultantly. ‘We’ve got him now!’
Both Exenley and Creed automatically followed his pointing finger, Creed turning away from his wife. Tremaine stepped quickly to her side.
‘What happened to the money, Mrs. Creed?’ he said urgently. ‘The money from the Armitage affair that Marfield came here to get!’
‘It went back,’ she said tremulously. ‘Every penny of it. I told that man Latinam but he wouldn’t listen. He was trying to blackmail Alan.’
She realized then that she had betrayed herself. She gave a gasp and her hand went to her lips. Tremaine touched her arm with a gentle pressure.
‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘There’s no need to worry. I don’t think anyone will want to call back the past—at least, not as far as you are concerned.’
Another section of the puzzle had been completed. It had been the prospect of the loot from the Armitage affair which had lured Latinam to the island and later caused him to aid in Marfield’s escape.
The purchase of the Rohane hotel had been merely a blind. He had had no interest in it as a going concern; that was why he had tried to get rid of Mrs. Burres and Major Ayres, first by freezing them out of the circle of the other guests and then by giving them official notice to go.
Resenting it, and suspicious of Latinam, they had spied upon him, no doubt in the hope of discovering something which would enable them to turn the tables. It had been the realization that their actions were in turn likely to arouse suspicion which had accounted for their strained behaviour since the murder.
If Latinam had known what they were doing it had doubtless caused him no more than a cynical amusement. He had been a callous and cunning rogue. The manner in which he had publicly tried to throw Ivan Holt and his wife into each other’s arms when he had been aware of the agony he was causing was sufficient proof of that.
Tremaine realized that Ralph Exenley was trying to attract his attention.
‘There you are, Mordecai! There’s your murderer!’ Exenley pointed across the headland where they could see the running figure making for the edge of the cliff. ‘Marfield, after all! Everything neat and tidy. Couldn’t wish for anything better!’
Creed moved forward.
‘I’ll get him—’
Exenley caught him by the shoulder and pulled him back.
‘No, he’s armed! Look to Valerie. I’ll see to this!’
He began to run across the headland. Colinet’s big form stirred into protesting action.
‘Come back!’ he bellowed angrily. ‘Leave him alone! It’s a job for my men to do!’
Already the policemen who had been posted in a cordon that had pinned the hotel and its grounds against the sea had closed in, and now they were slowly but systematically narrowing the space left to the fugitive. Exenley paid no heed, and Tremaine put a hand on the big man’s arm.
‘Let him go,’ he said quietly. ‘He knows what he’s doing.’
Marfield’s blind flight had brought him now to the very edge of the cliff. He stopped, realizing that he was trapped. With his back against the sky he stood waiting; they were not close enough to see him clearly but they knew he must be panting from the effort he had made, drawing desperate, sobbing breaths into his lungs.
Exenley caught up with him. They saw Marfield’s right fist swing out in a lunging blow and then he turned and ran once more.
This time it was along the crumbling surface of a narrow strip of the headland where erosion had gouged a great gash in the rock so that they could look across at a thin sliver of cliff which was almost detached from the rest.
Then he turned at bay and Exenley ran at him.
‘Oh, take care!’ Valerie Creed cried out.
The two figures swayed and struggled. A sudden sharp report lashed across the gap. One of the figures detached itself in a queer, crumpling movement and fell outwards.
‘Marfield pulled his gun!’ Alan Creed exclaimed. ‘Ralph managed to turn it back on him and the bullet went into Marfield’s own body!’
Valerie Creed was peering through the gloom, her eyes fixed with strain. Tremaine looked at her, at the line of the chin, the urgent upthrust of the head. He was sure now. The last doubt had been removed.
‘Look out!’ Colinet called sharply. ‘Watch the edge, man!’
Even as he spoke, Exenley, moving along the narrow path, missed his footing and slipped helplessly over.
Valerie Creed screamed. They saw Exenley reach out desperately as he fell for an overhanging lip of rock. He hung there, his whole weight supported only by one hand.
Many things were in Mordecai Tremaine’s mind in that moment which was the climax of the drama.
Hedley Latinam setting that drama in motion by following Alan Creed and his wife to the island. The Creeds choosing it as their retreat because Ralph Exenley—whom they knew by another name—had gone there before them and for the same purpose.
Latinam referring to Smooth Jonathan because he had known that what he had said would certainly go back to Exenley. Smooth Jonathan who had always avoided falling into the hands of the police and who had had a daughter.
Latinam bringing fear and blackmail into what had once seemed a secluded haven where the past could be forgotten . . .
Probably Exenley had paid until he had realized that Marfield had been brought to the island. And then he had decided that he must deal with the menace once and for all.
He had declined the invitation Janet had sent him for the night of the murder, not because his appointment in St. Julian Harbour had been so important but so that there should be no difficulty about his meeting Latinam. It had been Exenley for whom Latinam had been waiting at the kiosk.
Tremaine recalled the words the man had used.
‘You’re early. She must mean a lot—’
Smooth Jonathan’s daughter meant a lot to him. So much that he was ready to submit apparently without protest to blackmail in order to protect her from unhappiness. That was what Latinam had been going to say.
There had no doubt been
other secret meetings before. Tremaine was certain that it was Latinam whom he had encountered on that first night on the island, engaged upon one of his nocturnal excursions to meet someone with whom he had dealings he did not wish to become known—perhaps Le Mazon on that occasion, but possibly even Exenley.
He was satisfied now about the familiar and yet puzzling sound he had heard in the distance on the night Latinam had died. It had been the sound of Exenley’s pump working to fill his water tank.
Exenley had departed from his usual practice and had not filled the tank immediately after watering that day. He had not done so because of the plans he had made. He had reasoned that it would be easier to thrust a dead body beneath the bars of an empty tank than a tank almost filled with water which would give that body a buoyancy which would make his task a troublesome one, and at a time when he dared not risk delay.
And the tank had been chosen, not to hide the body but to make sure of its early discovery before too many enquiries were set on foot, and to be certain that if Latinam had not been killed already by the blow on the head he had been given then he would very quickly drown.
Exenley had known by then, Tremaine realized, of his own desire to climb the ladder and look into the tank. It had been Exenley’s suggestion, in fact, that he should come across for just that purpose on what the man had planned to be the morning after the crime.
Why his own tank? Why draw attention to himself in such a potentially dangerous manner?
It had not been that he wanted to put himself deliberately in peril. He had at any rate hidden the weapon he had used to strike Latinam down, in so successful a fashion that the police had not yet discovered it. He had placed himself in the limelight so that, paradoxically, he should escape it.
He had had too much to risk from a systematic investigation into the antecedents of all the inhabitants of Moulin d’Or. He had planned to put himself so obviously in the foreground that the police would take him for granted, and he had intended, at the same time, to divert suspicion in the wrong direction.
He had been swift to appreciate how useful a friend who had the confidence of the police could be; that was why he had told Chief Officer Colinet all about Mordecai Tremaine. He had estimated the reaction and had foreseen how he might profit by it.
Without making himself too obvious he had suggested that Gaston Le Mazon might be the murderer. Probably he had never anticipated that Le Mazon would be in serious danger; he had been concerned merely with making the trail as confused as possible.
But when Le Mazon, badly frightened, had shown signs of telling the police all he knew—perhaps more than Exenley had at first imagined he knew—he had had no choice but to deal with the man before the danger materialized. That Le Mazon had known very little with certainty seemed a reasonable assumption from the fact that he had not spoken to Colinet, but the story his wife had told was an indication that he had been actively engaged in trying to expand his knowledge.
Exenley, maybe with some such development in mind, had taken Latinam’s cigarette-lighter from the dead man’s pocket and planted it on Le Mazon—precautions about his own fingerprints had caused him to remove Latinam’s as well, but he had expected that so flamboyant an article would be recognized at once. At first he had pretended to be doubtful of the suicide and murder theory, but when a careful question had brought out the fact that the police had found and put the interpretation he had hoped upon the lighter he had accepted it enthusiastically.
Gaston Le Mazon’s wife, with her definite statement that her husband had had no thought of suicide but had in fact been anxious to clear himself, had brought that particular solution tumbling in ruins. But Exenley had still had another shot in the locker. There had still been Marfield.
It had not been until after the demolition of the case against Le Mazon that he had suggested that Marfield might be on the island. He had suggested it, of course, because he had known all along, but for his daughter’s sake he had been hoping to say nothing; perhaps he might even have aided Marfield to get away when the excitement had died down.
The escaped convict, although an apparently obvious choice, had not been the killer. He had not shown the murderer’s ruthlessness.
Tremaine was confident that it had been Marfield, seeing him spying upon Ruth Latinam, who had struck him down that night. And he did not doubt that in some such a similar manner Ivan Holt had received his injury.
If Marfield had been a murderer with his neck in peril there would have been more than bruises to show.
The whole pattern fell into place in Tremaine’s mind whilst Exenley hung from the rock. Through blurred vision he saw the supporting arm begin to slip until the last fraction of time when there was space between the outstretched fingers and the crumbled edge of the cliff.
Colinet was already pounding heavily for the path leading to the beach, several of his men at his heels. His heart racing, Tremaine followed them.
Both men were dead when they reached them. The bullet, fired at close quarters, had gone through Marfield’s heart; Exenley must have been killed the instant he had hit the jagged rocks among which they found him.
‘Poor devil!’ Geoffrey Bendall said, looking down at the crumpled body. ‘What a ghastly thing to have happened!’
Tremaine thought of the last words Exenley had addressed to him.
‘There you are, Mordecai! There’s your murderer! Marfield, after all! Everything neat and tidy. Couldn’t wish for anything better! ’
Everything neat and tidy. No need to go digging up past history. That was what he had meant.
He had known that once he had turned the limelight on Marfield the game was up. He had known that it was essential to reach the man before he could talk.
Marfield on the run being accused of Latinam’s murder was one thing; Marfield in the hands of the police and willing to tell all he knew would have been vastly different.
And Exenley had known that with Colinet’s men concentrated upon the district he couldn’t hope to get away with murder a third time . . .
Tremaine pushed back his pince-nez as he faced Bendall.
‘Yes,’ he said quietly. ‘Yes, it was a tragic accident.’
He went back up the path with the Chief Officer, who was panting at the steepness of the climb.
‘I suppose,’ he remarked, probing, ‘that although Marfield can’t be brought to trial now he’ll still go down in the record as the murderer?’
The big man paused a moment. He gave Tremaine a long, steady look, and then he nodded.
‘That way there won’t be any loose ends.’
Tremaine fell back a pace or two, pretending that the slope was defeating him. If Colinet was satisfied with that explanation there would clearly be no point in suggesting any other.
When they reached the top of the cliff he saw that the lights were on in the lounge of the hotel and that several people were standing on the terrace. As he drew nearer he saw Valerie Creed. She was very upset and her husband was trying to comfort her.
He was going towards her, wondering what he could say, when he saw the Chief Officer. The big man’s eyes were on Valerie Creed, and for so purposeful a man the expression on his face was oddly gentle and understanding.
Slowly Mordecai Tremaine turned away. Colinet was shrewd. He kept in close touch with what took place on the island and there wasn’t much he missed.
Maybe he did know, after all.
THE END
Murder Has a Motive
When Mordecai Tremaine emerges from the little train station, murder is the last thing on his mind. But then again, he has never been able to resist anything in the nature of a mystery – and a mystery is precisely what awaits him in the village of Dalmering.
Rehearsals for the local amateur dramatic production are in full swing – but as Mordecai discovers all too soon, the real tragedy is unfolding offstage. The star of the show has been found dead, and the spotlight is soon on Mordecai, whose reputation in the field of crime-
solving precedes him.
With a murderer waiting in the wings, it’s up to Mordecai to derail the killer’s performance . . . before it’s curtains for another victim.
Murder for Christmas
‘Kept guessing to the end, I am left wondering why it has taken so long to discover Francis Duncan . . . With some 20 crime novels to his credit, a relaunch seems long overdue’
Daily Mail
Mordecai Tremaine, former tobacconist and perennial lover of romance novels, has been invited to spend Christmas in the sleepy village of Sherbroome at the country retreat of one Benedict Grame.
Arriving on Christmas Eve, he finds that the revelries are in full flow – but so too are tensions amongst the assortment of guests.
Midnight strikes and the party-goers discover that it’s not just presents nestling under the tree . . . there’s a dead body too. A dead body that bears a striking resemblance to Father Christmas.
With the snow falling and the suspicions flying, it’s up to Mordecai to sniff out the culprit – and prevent someone else from getting murder for Christmas.
‘The book nods towards Agatha Christie but retains a crackling atmosphere of dread and horror that will chill the heart however warm your fireside’
Metro
So Pretty a Problem
Adrian Carthallow, enfant terrible of the art world, is no stranger to controversy. But this time it’s not his paintings that have provoked a blaze of publicity – it’s the fact that his career has been suddenly terminated by a bullet to the head. Not only that, but his wife has confessed to firing the fatal shot.
Inspector Penross of the town constabulary is, however, less than convinced by Helen Carthallow’s story – but has no other explanation for the incident that occurred when the couple were alone in their clifftop house.
Luckily for the Inspector, amateur criminologist Mordecai Tremaine has an uncanny habit of being in the near neighbourhood whenever sudden death makes its appearance. Investigating the killing, Tremaine is quick to realise that however handsome a couple the Carthallows were, and however extravagant a life they led, beneath the surface there’s a pretty devil’s brew . . .
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