Comes a Stranger

by E. R. Punshon

  “What do you mean? what are you talking about?” Major Harley demanded sharply.

  “It’s Sir William, sir,” explained the man. “We can’t find him, he’s not in the house, his bed’s not been slept in, we can’t make it out.”

  The little party of police looked at each other. The significance seemed plain. Major Harley beckoned to Bobby. Killick joined them. The Major said:—

  “Bolted? Is that it, do you think?”

  “Shouldn’t wonder,” said Killick.

  Bobby did not say anything, but he thought much the same.

  Major Harley asked Wilson a few questions. The man had little to tell. He had locked up as usual. At that time his master had been sitting in the study, reading. The study was the room where he generally sat at night. Wilson was certain he had bolted the side door. It was provided with a spring lock, a mortice, so it was not really necessary to draw the bolts to make it secure. In the morning he had found it unbolted. That was not in itself very unusual or alarming. Sir William often took a stroll last thing at night, sometimes going to see Mr. Broast, and then would generally return after the rest of the household had gone to bed. When that happened he always came back by the side or garden door, and occasionally forgot to draw the bolts. After all, the mortice lock was safe enough in the ordinary way. Wilson therefore had not been unduly alarmed. Elsewhere downstairs everything seemed as usual, nothing disturbed, and it was only later on that he grew alarmed when he took early morning tea to his master and found the room empty and the bed apparently not slept in.

  He went at once to inform Miss Winders, Sir William’s daughter. A search had been started. No trace of the missing man had so far been found. But when Wilson saw, he said, the little group of police near the pond, it had given him a real turn.

  The Major asked Killick to organize as complete a search as practicable of the immediate vicinity, and told Bobby to come up with him to the house.

  “Must hear what they have to say, may find something,” he said, “though his running for it like this is as good as a confession. Only what did he do it for? The murder, I mean. Can’t understand that. And how did he know Nat Kayne was coming through the woods?”

  “Well, sir, as you said yourself,” Bobby remarked, “the occasion may have been offered by chance and seized upon.”

  “What about Broast’s pistol?” the Major asked. “Winders hadn’t that with him just by chance.”

  “Do you see over there, sir?” Bobby asked.

  A man was running towards them. As he came nearer they recognized Adams, looking a good deal less prim and precise than usual. He was calling to them and waving. What he said seemed incoherent, incomprehensible. But something about him, about his attitude, his waving arms, the tones of his voice uttering these words they could not plainly hear, all suggested urgency, urgency and terror. The Major began to run. Bobby followed. Behind them puffed Wilson who had come with them and who was not much used to running. Adams’s cries became clearer.

  “Over there,” he was shouting, “by the hedge, the ditch, over there.”

  He turned round and began to run in the direction in which he had been pointing. The Major caught him up. He tried to speak but could not. Less breathless, Bobby said:

  “What is it? Sir William…?”

  “Dead,” Adams answered, still running. “Dead,” he said, his voice rising in a shrill scream as with sudden panic. “Dead,” he whispered, but in a whisper that carried almost as far as the scream. “Murdered,” he said and stood, as though all at once he dared go no further.

  Bobby raced on. The Major was close behind. They had been crossing a field laid down in pasture. They came in sight of something that lay still and humped, half in, half out of the ditch that ran at the foot of the hedge about the field. Nearer, they saw it was Sir William Winders, supine, his calm face upturned to the calm sky, as still himself as was that still, clear morning, quiet and peaceful as though he slept.

  Bobby stood, looking keenly around. The Major bent over the dead man.

  “Shot through the body half a dozen times or so,” he said. “Riddled.” He stood up. “Where is Adams?” he asked.

  CHAPTER XIX

  FORGET-ME-NOTS

  For a moment they both thought that somehow he had managed to disappear, though that seemed difficult in an open field. Then they caught sight of him on the further side of the hedge, hurrying away. The Major shouted. Adams took no notice. The Major said to Bobby:—

  “What’s he up to? Fetch him back, will you?”

  Bobby forced his way through the hedge and began to run. Adams, hearing him coming, look back. Bobby shouted to him to stop. Adams obeyed. Bobby caught him up and said:—

  “Please go back at once. Major Harley wishes to question you.”

  Mr. Adams hesitated.

  “Is that really necessary now? I confess to experiencing much discomfort at the spectacle presented. I am not accustomed nowadays—not to such sights. I find them unpleasantly reminiscent, most unpleasantly.”

  Bobby did not answer, but the gesture he made was eloquent. So probably was the long, searching look of doubt and suspicion he gave Adams. He was wondering what was the true cause of the agitation Adams was certainly experiencing. Was it only because this violent death in this quiet English scene reminded him of those scenes of horror in the past in France that dwell like a nightmare in the minds of some of our neighbours, controlled only by an effort of the will, ready to push themselves forward again in the silent watches of the night or when some chord of memory is touched? Or was there some other, some stronger, more immediate reason? He remembered that Adams had gone out a little before Nat Kayne’s murder, and that there was no independent proof of the time of his return. Now he was first on the scene of this fresh murder.

  Adams began to walk towards where the dead body lay. Bobby followed. They pushed through the gap in the hedge where Adams had passed previously and went on. Major Harley looked up as they approached. He said angrily to Adams:—

  “What was that for, hey? what’s it mean?”

  “As I have already explained,” Adams answered, “I found myself unpleasantly affected. I became aware of a sensation in the pit of my stomach—to express myself vulgarly, I was in some apprehension that vomiting was about to occur. Nor do I feel altogether certain,” he added, “that the danger is entirely of the past.”

  He then proceeded to demonstrate that this last surmise was entirely correct.

  “Get over there and sit down on the bank,” the Major growled, “and don’t try to run off again or I’ll put you in handcuffs. I’ll hear what you have to say later on. Owen, cut off back to the house. There’s a ’phone there. Tell them to get a doctor and send help. Hurry up and get back here as soon as you can.

  Bobby set off at a run. From the further end of the field he glanced back. Mr. Adams was sitting on the ground, his head supported on his hands. Major Harley was examining the body and the ground near. Several of the cartridge cases ejected from the pistol used were lying close by, and he was picking them up and marking the spots where they had lain, in between pausing to give angry and doubtful glances at the seated, huddled figure of Adams.

  Bobby was aware of a very uneasy feeling as he reflected that he was leaving the chief constable alone with one who might be a murderer, who might still have on him the weapon so recently used, who might feel that anything was better than waiting for arrest or even for further questioning.

  Adams had not been searched. In the general flurry and excitement the advisability of that had been overlooked. Bobby wondered whether he ought not to return and warn Major Harley. But he had received direct orders to proceed at once to the house, orders are always orders, the Major was presumably able to look after himself and certainly would not welcome any suggestions to the contrary. Bobby ran on therefore, quickening his speed though, and as soon as possible, hurried back to the field, running again.

  To his relief his fears had been unnecessary. The
Major was still busy with his careful examination, Adams was still sitting on the ground at a little distance, though he looked slightly better now. Very soon, as help began to arrive, the field became a scene of hustling activity. All the general routine of such cases was gone through, photographs taken, measurements made and noted, the ground near examined inch by inch, the actual spot where the body had lain roped off and a constable put in charge to keep away intruders. Spectators began to assemble. Journalists on the spot as a result of the previous murder and all agog with excitement at what they were already describing as ‘Amazing Development, Sensational Sequel,’ hovered around. The doctor, making a preliminary examination of the body where it lay, thought death had occurred between eleven and twelve the previous night, and was not too sanguine that further examination would enable him to be much more precise. Death, he said, must have been nearly instantaneous. A small calibre pistol had been emptied into the body at close range. Seven shots in all had been fired. Probably an automatic had been used and the trigger pulled till the magazine was empty. The doctor thought that possibly, but only possibly, the post-mortem examination might enable him to deduce something from the nature of the wounds. It was at any rate certain the shots had been fired with the pistol almost or quite pressed against the body.

  The empty cartridge cases Major Harley had found, seven of them, came from a two-two automatic, a small weapon with small stopping qualities but deadly enough at close quarters. And this fact, once established, made both the Major and Bobby remember Miss Perkins’s incidental remark that the pistol belonging to Mr. Broast was a ‘tiny thing’. It looked therefore, if Miss Perkins were correct, as if a weapon of the kind used had been in the possession of the librarian, in addition to the one for which he had a licence. Bobby remembered, too, that occasion when he had seen in the librarian’s hand something small and bright and hard that might have been a small automatic but afterwards appeared to have been only an electric torch.

  The careful examination made of the vicinity revealed nothing else of interest. Traces were found of Mr. Adams’s presence, but that was only to be expected since he had been the first on the scene. A half smoked cigarette found in the hedge, for instance, he agreed at once was his. He had been smoking it when he first saw the body, and he supposed he must have thrown it away, though he did not remember doing so.

  From the field Major Harley went on to the house where the only fact of importance that emerged was that Virtue had called the previous evening and had apparently had some dispute with Sir William, since their voices had been heard raised as if they were quarrelling, and since Wilson, the butler, when he took in whisky and soda, noticed that they both looked flushed and angry. Mr. Virtue had left almost immediately, and Wilson remembered that when he cleared away the tray, the glasses had not been used, so that apparently the visitor had either refused a drink or had not been offered one.

  Killick thought this very important. The Major agreed that it would have to be looked into. Bobby reflected that the quarrel had taken place about eight and the murder apparently between eleven and midnight—three or four hours later. The Major said:

  “Only for what? What had Virtue to do with Winders? There’s no motive.”

  “Motive no concern of ours, sir,” said Killick firmly. “It’s facts we want.”

  Bobby said:

  “A jury always wants a motive.” He added: “I get the feeling there’s someone watching all the time, always just one move ahead of us, someone working out a plan we’ve no idea of yet.”

  Killick said:

  “We always seem to trace the pistol back to Mr. Broast.”

  The Major went over to the ’phone and rang up Wynton Lodge. It was Olive who answered. Evidently no news of this fresh tragedy had yet reached there. Olive explained that Mr. Broast had left by the early train for London, and had not said when he would be back. It was a piece of news that made Major Harley, Killick, Bobby, exchange doubtful glances.

  “Looks bad, very bad,” Killick said. “Time after the murder to go back to the Lodge, collect what he wanted, and catch the early train. What about warning the Yard and trying to pick him up in town?”

  “Hardly enough to go on,” decided the Major. “He may come back of his own accord. If he is really running for it, well, that’ll make things a bit clearer.”

  Further enquiries over the ’phone revealed that he had taken nothing with him, not even a handbag, and had said he would be back early in the afternoon or at any rate in time for dinner. A suggestion that he might be found at his club at lunch time, or that perhaps he had some favourite restaurant he usually went to, brought the information that he belonged to no club and when he went to London generally lunched at any tea shop he happened to be near when he remembered he was hungry—a glass of milk, roll, butter and cheese, total cost 7d., was his accustomed lunch, and, he used to say, the best value in nourishment obtainable for the money anywhere in the world.

  Major Harley shook his head, hung up the ’phone, and decided that there was nothing to do but wait and see if Mr. Broast returned as he had promised.

  The statements made by the other inmates of the house revealed nothing of importance. Sir William had been sitting in his study, reading, when the rest of the household retired about half past ten. He had not seemed in any way perturbed by his quarrel, if quarrel it had been, with Virtue, nor had he referred to it again. He had not said anything about taking a stroll before bed, but it was not at all unusual for him to do so. He had not been heard to go out, but there was no reason why anyone should, in fact, have heard him. The garden door was only a yard or two away from the door to the study, and Sir William was always quiet in his movements. Someone discovered an odd looking impression in a flower bed beneath the study window, and further investigation showed two morsels of earth on the window sill. It was consistent with the suggestion that Sir William’s attention had been attracted by earth thrown against the window, and that he had then been induced on some pretext, when he had answered the signal, to proceed to the spot where he met his death.

  The impression on the soft earth of the flower bed was too nebulous for any conclusion to be drawn, though Bobby spent a long time staring at it with all the slow concentration of his nature. Someone had once said rudely that it took him as long to bring an idea to fruition as it took for a blossom to take shape as fruit ripe for the plucking, and there was some truth in this, though there was also truth in the retort that generally his ideas, when ripe, were, like the ripe fruit, worth the plucking, and ready for digestion. Now, however, for all his slow and careful pondering as he turned one thing after another over and over in his mind, he could draw no clear direction from this odd, shapeless imprint on the flower bed.

  “If only it could tell,” he thought.

  Careful search revealed nothing like it anywhere else, and in fact recent dry weather, broken only for some time past by faint and ineffectual drizzle on one or two occasions, made it little likely that the ground would have retained many visible tracks or markings.

  All this had taken so much time that it was not till late afternoon that Mr. Adams could be interviewed again, though indeed Major Harley had been in no hurry to question him further. He had made a statement in writing, and it contained nothing of much importance. In it he admitted he had been out late the previous evening. He had gone for a walk after supper, but was sure he had been back by about half past ten or possibly a little later. He agreed, however, that he had spoken to no one on his return, and so far as he was aware no one had seen him come back. He had gone straight to his room and to bed, and so could produce no independent testimony to confirm his statement.

  “A most unsatisfactory story,” commented the Major severely.

  Mr. Adams said that no one regretted it more than he did.

  “You still refuse to give your real name and address or explain your business here?”

  “I am constrained, I am under the compulsion,” Mr. Adams replied slowly, “of a
n unfortunate coincidence of circumstances. It has been well said that self-preservation is nature’s first law, and I do not wish to involve myself and others in risks that might produce the most serious consequences as a result of events in which we are not intimately concerned.”

  Major Harley looked at him for a long time in silence.

  “Self-preservation? risks?” he repeated. “That’s saying a good deal. You mustn’t be surprised if we draw certain conclusions.”

  Mr. Adams looked worried and made no answer. The Major continued:—

  “Where did you go when you went out last night? Did you meet anyone you can tell us about? Had you any special object?”

  Mr. Adams described his route. He appeared to have made a fairly long circuit. It was late, dark, he had met no one he recognized or who could recognize him. Passing through another village some distance away, he had posted letters there. The postmarks would prove that at least. The Major retorted that it wouldn’t prove he had posted them in person, and what was important was to have evidence of his whereabouts between eleven and twelve. Also, why had he gone to this other village to post his letters when there was a letter box within a few yards of the inn?

  “I had no wish,” explained Mr. Adams, “for the address of the person with whom I was communicating to be known at present, and from what I have perceived of the methods in this investigation I am not prepared to affirm any strong belief that strict propriety is always observed. I considered it wiser, therefore, to post my letters unperceived in a locality where a possibly surreptitious glimpse of the envelope would be harder to obtain.”

  Major Harley went red. Bobby, who was acting again as shorthand writer, rubbed his nose reflectively with the end of his pencil and told himself, not for the first time, that Mr. Adams was hard to place. Mr. Adams remained tranquil, apparently quite unaware of any effect his remarks had produced. The Major swallowed twice and, when his self-control was again firmly established, he said: