He'd Rather Be Dead

by George Bellairs

  “Excuse the state of the room, Inspector,” said Gaukroger, whose grey eyes began to twinkle at the sight of it. “This is my den … I keep it tidy myself. Nobody but myself is allowed to touch a thing here. I like to find things where I leave them. And now, you want to see me?”

  “Yes. About the luncheon at which the Mayor met his death. Did you notice anything unusual at the affair, sir? Anything which might throw light on the motive or the identity of the murderer?”

  “Dear me, Inspector. There were motives in plenty. Everybody there had some grievance or other against Ware. He even upset the Christian spirit of the clergy. Canon Wallopp, who sat next to me, refused to recognise my existence at all, and Father Manfred, the Roman Catholic priest, seemed to think that by undertaking the purely nominal and sinecure office of Mayor’s Chaplain, I’d aided and abetted the process of consigning Sir Gideon’s soul to the pit. Really, I can’t offer a single helpful suggestion to you, Mr. Littlejohn. I can’t begin to think how the murder was committed. Whether you know, is another thing, but to the layman it seems impossible for one man out of thirty or more eating from the common pot, to be poisoned without some of the rest being affected, too.”

  “We’re waiting for expert opinion from the Home Office on that point. Then, maybe, we’ll see more daylight. Meanwhile, I must explore every avenue. You were in the front line, so to speak. One of those nearest to the Mayor when the thing was done.”

  “The first I knew of it was when Ware fell under the table. Then, I thought he was drunk … I was very much against introducing alcohol on the occasion, but, as I expected, I was overruled.”

  “What do you think of the rumours that municipal affairs here are corrupt, sir?”

  Gaukroger’s eyes glowed with a fanatical light. He looked for a moment to be about to fall into one of his spiritual deliriums again, but it died down.

  “I know nothing about the money side of affairs. But graft, unfair preference, bullying, toadying, bribery … to get office, power or profit, are rife. I accepted the office of Chaplain—although it was offered in a very unworthy and undignified fashion—in the hope that I might get to Ware’s ear and thereby to his conscience. I took it on for no other purpose, for, since he arrived in Westcombe, things have gone from bad to worse in public life. The whole inside of the vessel wants cleansing.”

  Gaukroger was warming up again and Littlejohn thought that no useful purpose would be served by remaining longer.

  “I won’t keep you from your duties, Mr. Gaukroger,” he said. “Thanks for the friendly reception and the information.”

  “Sorry, I can’t help at all, Inspector,” replied the pastor, coming down to earth again. “I hope your efforts are crowned with success and thereby much good is done to this town.”

  He then accompanied Littlejohn to the end of the street, put him safely on his way to the Roman Catholic Church, and departed with his jaunty step, his straw boater and his crosier-like umbrella, to spellbind on the beach and to compete vocally with Professor Howie, a herbalist, who had the next pitch to his own, but who, in spite of his rivalry and inexhaustible stock of vulgar, physiological jokes, was his very good friend and supporter.

  Littlejohn found Father Manfred in the church, where he was superintending some work on the fabric. The day was hot and the priest was wearing an alpaca frock-coat of an out-of-date cut and carrying a black straw panama in his hand. His eyes sparkled shrewdly behind his lozenge-shaped spectacles when Littlejohn told him the purpose of his visit.

  “We can’t talk here, Inspector. Come into the presbytery. But first let me show you some of the late Mayor’s benefactions to the church.”

  Whereat, Father Manfred took his visitor by the arm and conducted him round the building. It was a spacious modern place, smelling faintly of incense and reminding one in style of a small replica of Westminster Cathedral. An amethyst light illuminated the nave and entered through magnificent stained-glass windows; the gift of Sir Gideon and Lady Ware, said the priest. The interior was being gradually decorated in the most exquisite mosaic.

  “Ware brought Italian workmen from London to do the mosaic work, which, you see, isn’t yet completed. It is very costly, I can assure you, for this type of decoration is hand-set piece by piece. Fortunately, the work will still go on, in spite of the unhappy end of the donor, for all the materials are here, and I have managed to find a refugee monk from Austria who’s an expert at the art, and he will replace the Italians, who come every day from an alien camp near here, but whose wages cannot now be paid. It will take years to finish, however.”

  Ware had been lavish in his gifts. Stations of the Cross in the most expensive enamel work. Sacred vessels in gold. A number of rather showy images, specially imported from Italy.

  “And he quarrelled with me because I refused to allow him to erect a tablet enumerating the gifts as coming from himself,” said Manfred. “This church has been built from the savings of hundreds of humble people, many of whom couldn’t afford the money they gave. Not one of their names is publicly advertised. Neither shall I allow anyone else’s to be.”

  And he snapped his thin lips together belligerently.

  The room they entered in the presbytery was furnished in pitch-pine and as clean as a new pin. It seemed to be a kind of office where the priest transacted his public business.

  Manfred flung his old hat on a chair and signalled Littlejohn to take a seat. A little, withered old lady, smiling all over her face, entered with a cup of tea for each of them, and after a lot of hovering round her master and his guest to make quite sure that the drinks were satisfactory, departed content and with a quaint little curtsey for each.

  Father Manfred crossed his long, thin shanks and sipped his tea.

  “Smoke, if you want, Littlejohn.”

  When they got down to business, his genial manner slipped from the priest like a garment. He was certainly very annoyed with Ware, and very concerned about what was going to happen to his soul now that somebody had forcibly released it from his body.

  “I cannot understand it. All his life he has been a member of our Church. Yet, because I refused to allow him to advertise himself in my nave, he cut himself adrift for so long, and publicly and—I say it with regret—jestingly, attached himself to a heretic and one whose religion he knows nothing whatever about. To insult the Holy Church in such a manner was intolerable! Nay, it was damning to himself …”

  The gaunt, hairless Jesuit was furious at the thought of the past. He looked ready to call down fire from heaven to avenge the indignity. Then, his face softened and his old charm returned.

  “… But he was received back at the end. In the ambulance on the way to the Infirmary, he had a calm spell in the midst of the most frightful spasms caused by whatever was killing him. He confessed and received absolution … That was a good thing.”

  “ Did you give him the Viaticum, father?” asked Littlejohn.

  “No. Why?”

  Littlejohn hesitated. The priest’s shrewd eyes sought his own and at once seemed to gather his meaning.

  “You are thinking that I was the only one who, besides the doctor, might have given him anything on the way to the Infirmary. Yes, and I too suggested strychnine as the cause of the collapse at the luncheon-table. Suppose the attack were some kind of fit and in the ambulance I gave him a dose of something … You are thinking that?”

  Littlejohn looked steadily into the bowl of his pipe and then back at Manfred.

  “It crossed my mind,” he replied candidly. “You know as well as I do, that such thoughts do come and go. Perhaps like bubbles of nasty gas rising from a stagnant pool …”

  “Now, now, now. Don’t use such a metaphor about what I’m sure is a perfectly healthy mind … You know I didn’t murder Ware, don’t you? I was concerned with other things than his convulsed and dying body when I forced my way in the ambulance.”

  “I know that, father.”

  “I can’t help you at all in this investigation, Li
ttlejohn. I’m sorry. It’s public property that Ware made more enemies in Westcombe than all the other notables put together. The banqueting-hall was full of his enemies when death took hold of him. Who was responsible for the crime, I can’t even guess. I’ll tell you what his last words were, however. It will be breaking no confidences. He said, ‘My son! My son!’ That was all.”

  “I heard he had a son, father, but he’s in Canada, training with the R.A.F., isn’t he?”

  “Yes. I cabled him the bad news and he has replied in kind with comfort to his mother. So, you see, he’s still there. I think Ware must have been thinking of his son as he died and just uttered his name in his distress.”

  “I wonder, father. Well, I’ll be on my travels again. I’ve still a long way to go, even for an idea of who might have done it and how.”

  “Do the best you can, Inspector. None of us can do more. If I can help at a later stage, don’t forget to call on me.”

  Outside, Hazard met Littlejohn as arranged. He seemed to be bursting with some important news, for before he asked the results of Littlejohn’s latest endeavours he blurted it out.

  “I say, Littlejohn, here’s a stunner for you! The police have been round checking up poison books for the missing strychnine. Just after lunch, they went to Dr. Preedy’s. He’s four grains short in his stock!”

  CHAPTER NINE - TURNING POINT

  “I’d intended calling on the deputy-Mayor and crossing the ferry to see Wilmott Saxby as my next jobs. However, it looks as though we’d better get down to headquarters again in view of your news,” said Littlejohn to Hazard.

  They retraced their steps to the Town Hall.

  McAndrew was in his office as they passed along the corridor and they called in.

  The M.O.H. of Westcombe was a gaunt Scot with keen grey eyes, a rugged, clean-shaven face and an unruly shock of grey hair on which he had long since abandoned as a bad job, the use of so-called controlling agents.

  “So we meet at last, Inspector,” said the doctor as they shook hands. “Ah’m sorry ah’ve been so elusive, but I’ve other things to do as well as probing in the corpse of our late Mayor. It’s about him you’ve called here, no doubt.”

  “Yes, doctor. The Chief Constable told me yesterday afternoon that your report was, as then, merely provisional, showing death from strychnine and that certain organs had been sent to the Home Office for further expert examination.”

  “Did Boumphrey show you my written report, Inspector?”

  “No. He hadn’t got one at the time I saw him.”

  “Aye, but he had it this morning. Didn’t he let you have a peep at it then?”

  “No. Never mentioned it.”

  “That’s funny.”

  “I agree with you, doctor. I must be asking for explanations.”

  “Did he tell you what I told him last night when our post-mortem was finished?”

  “No. Perhaps you’ll tell me now.”

  “Certainly. Poison wasn’t administered in food or drink. There was, as far as we could say, none in the stomach. In other words, it was found in the blood and had been injected hypodermically.”

  “But why wasn’t I told this when you reported?”

  “Well, Ah naturally thought the Chief Constable would have told ye. Otherwise, I’d have made a point o’ ringing ye up myself.”

  The doctor lit a large foul pipe and puffed phlegmatically.

  “What are ye going to do about it, Inspector?”

  “I’m going to see Boumphrey, and if I don’t get a satisfactory story, I’m reporting the thing right away to the Assistant Commissioner. It looks to me like a deliberate suppression of evidence.”

  “But what good could it do Boumphrey? In the witness-box tomorrow morning, Dr. Harris and I’ll make the whole thing public. He can’t keep a thing like that to himself.”

  “Mind if I butt-in?” said Hazard.

  Littlejohn and the doctor had forgotten the man from the Morals Squad in their preoccupation.

  “Of course we don’t,” said Littlejohn warmly.

  “Say nothing about it to Boumphrey. Behave as though you’d known it all the time, Littlejohn.”

  “But whatever for?”

  “Listen. There’s more than meets the eye in that omission. I’ve told you before, this place is rotten with graft, wheels within wheels, corruption … I’m right, doctor?”

  “Aye, you’re right, man.”

  “Very well. This looks to me like some more of it. Boumphrey’s conveniently forgotten a vital point in the medical evidence to give himself time to think. He couldn’t withhold it for long, but he might have kept you from the right track just long enough to warn someone or confuse the trails …”

  Littlejohn puffed his pipe disconsolately. This was a new experience indeed!

  Hazard’s face grew pinched with earnestness.

  “I beg you, Littlejohn, don’t quarrel with the Chief Constable about this. Carry on with the investigation and keep your eyes open. This is the very opportunity we’ve been waiting for to clean up this town once and for all, isn’t it, doctor?”

  McAndrew’s long upper lip grew tight and he shook his head.

  “This is your business, gentlemen; not mine. I’m just a plain scientist in charge of the pheesical welfare of this community. But this Ah will say: when plagues and infections threaten the community, it’s war for me. When the like attack the moral or social organism, it should be the same for you. Ye have my promise of silence and my moral support. More I cannot do.”

  “Ware’s gone,” continued Hazard. “Now’s the chance to get rid of a lot more, from the Town Clerk with his fancy women, Boumphrey with his files and his Gestapo … Dammit, it’s like it was in Germany, Spain and France before the war! You don’t know who’s honest and who isn’t. Bench, police, town-council … damned if you know who to trust! But get rid of Boumphrey now that Ware’s gone and we might see some changes …”

  Littlejohn didn’t say anything.

  “I can guess what you’re thinking, Littlejohn. You’re thinking I’ve a grievance and want to take it out of Boumphrey. I assure you, my only grievance is that I refuse to serve in a corrupt police force, and that’s what it is under that time-server. Now’s your chance to prove what I say. Will you try?”

  Hazard was so convincing and the doctor so obviously in agreement, although cannily sparing in speech, that the Inspector at length made up his mind to follow his colleague’s advice.

  They bade the doctor good-bye and hastened to Boumphrey’s quarters.

  The Chief Constable was very pleased with himself. He was animatedly making arrangements with a subordinate concerning the morrow’s inquest and rubbing his great hands together with relish.

  “Come in, come in, Littlejohn,” he bellowed. “I suppose Hazard’s told you the news. We’ve traced the strychnine to Dr. Preedy. He’s four grains short in his stock and can’t … or rather won’t, explain it away. Unfortunately, his dispenser’s having her afternoon off and we can’t get hold of her. He says she’ll be able to account for it. I doubt it …”

  “Are you suspecting Preedy of the crime, then, sir?” asked Littlejohn.

  “Certainly. Almost looks as though we’ve brought you here for nothing, doesn’t it?”

  The Chief Constable was obviously relieved at not having to disturb the bigwigs of the town in the course of the investigation and at seeing the end of it without much fuss.

  “But how does Preedy fit in with the murder, sir?”

  “Well, this is how I figure it out, gentlemen. We know that Ware ruined Preedy’s father. Now, why did Preedy come back to his native town to practise, when everything in it reminded him of the unhappy decline in his family fortunes and the loss of his father? He either came back to show the people that he didn’t care a tinker’s cuss for any of them, or else for revenge on Ware. My idea is the latter.”

  Boumphrey was thinking himself no end of a clever fellow in his theorising and exposition. He leaned bac
k in his chair, gesticulating in a fashion which successively reminded Littlejohn of windmills, a diabolo player, and a performer on a concertina.

  “… Now, gentlemen. Who was the last man Ware called on before the lunch? Why, Preedy, of course! And how was Ware murdered? Why, strychnine, of course! And what did Ware visit Preedy for? An injection, didn’t he? And the poison was injected, not given through the mouth.”

  At this point the Chief Constable eyed Littlejohn shiftily like a small boy who has stolen the jam and wonders if the fact has been discovered.

  Littlejohn met Boumphrey’s eye and stared him out of countenance, but didn’t utter a word.

  Boumphrey broke into a fit of coughing, cleared his throat and thumped the desk to restore his morale.

  “Now, gentlemen. If that isn’t a watertight case, I’d like to know what is …”

  “But why didn’t the poison act until more than an hour after the injection, if what you say is correct?” interjected the Scotland Yard man at length.

  Boumphrey gave him a pitying glance.

  “Good Lord!” he said. “There’s no mystery in that! There must be lots of drugs’ll slow down the action of poisons. Anyway, I’m going thoroughly into it, you can bet your bottom dollar on that. I’m not going to arrest Preedy right away. I’m going to watch him. Or rather, I want you and Hazard to do it. Sooner or later, he’ll betray himself, and then we’ll pounce on him and collar him.”

  Littlejohn caught his breath. The fellow had a nerve and no mistake!

  “Very good, sir. So far, all you know is that Preedy’s short in his stock of strychnine. The rest is theory.”

  “Sound theory, Littlejohn, I reckon. We do know, don’t we, about Ware’s visit to him and that he had an injection?”

  Here Boumphrey coughed again. He was anxious to know just how much Littlejohn knew about the medical evidence and how he was feeling about the deliberate omission of vital facts from the verbal report he’d been given.

  Littlejohn, however, was calmly filling his pipe as if he hadn’t a care in the world.