“Well, it’s an easy idea,” I said. “What time did you have your lunch—dinner, I mean—on the day of the murder?”
“That was one of the twelve o’clock days. You see, Ingrid goes out that day. She goes to the cinema or to have her hair done and a Mrs. Perry comes and keeps me company. She’s terrible, really. She pats one.”
“Pats one?” I said, slightly puzzled.
“You know, on the head. Says things like ‘dear little girlie.’ She’s not,” said Geraldine, “the kind of person you can have any proper conversation with. But she brings me sweets and that sort of thing.”
“How old are you, Geraldine?”
“I’m ten. Ten and three months.”
“You seem to me very good at intelligent conversation,” I said.
“That’s because I have to talk to Daddy a lot,” said Geraldine seriously.
“So you had your dinner early on that day of the murder?”
“Yes, so Ingrid could get washed up and go off just after one.”
“Then you were looking out of the window that morning, watching people.”
“Oh, yes. Part of the time. Earlier, about ten o’clock, I was doing a crossword puzzle.”
“I’ve been wondering whether you could possibly have seen Mr. Curry arriving at the house?”
Geraldine shook her head.
“No. I didn’t. It is rather odd, I agree.”
“Well, perhaps he got there quite early.”
“He didn’t go to the front door and ring the bell. I’d have seen him.”
“Perhaps he came in through the garden. I mean through the other side of the house.”
“Oh, no,” said Geraldine. “It backs on other houses. They wouldn’t like anyone coming through their garden.”
“No, no, I suppose they wouldn’t.”
“I wish I knew what he’d looked like,” said Geraldine.
“Well, he was quite old. About sixty. He was clean-shaven and he had on a dark grey suit.”
Geraldine shook her head.
“It sounds terribly ordinary,” she said with disapprobation.
“Anyway,” I said, “I suppose it’s difficult for you to remember one day from another when you’re lying here and always looking.”
“It’s not at all difficult.” She rose to the challenge. “I can tell you everything about that morning. I know when Mrs. Crab came and when she left.”
“That’s the daily cleaning woman, is it?”
“Yes. She scuttles, just like a crab. She’s got a little boy. Sometimes she brings him with her, but she didn’t that day. And then Miss Pebmarsh goes out about ten o’clock. She goes to teach children at a blind school. Mrs. Crab goes away about twelve. Sometimes she has a parcel with her that she didn’t have when she came. Bits of butter, I expect, and cheese, because Miss Pebmarsh can’t see. I know particularly well what happened that day because you see Ingrid and I were having a little quarrel so she wouldn’t talk to me. I’m teaching her English and she wanted to know how to say ‘until we meet again.’ She had to tell it me in German. Auf Wiedersehen. I know that because I once went to Switzerland and people said that there. And they said Grüss Gott, too. That’s rude if you say it in English.”
“So what did you tell Ingrid to say?”
Geraldine began to laugh a deep malicious chuckle. She started to speak but her chuckles prevented her, but at last she got it out.
“I told her to say ‘Get the hell out of here!’ So she said it to Miss Bulstrode next door and Miss Bulstrode was furious. So Ingrid found out and was very cross with me and we didn’t make friends until nearly teatime the next day.”
I digested this information.
“So you concentrated on your opera glasses.”
Geraldine nodded.
“So that’s how I know Mr. Curry didn’t go in by the front door. I think perhaps he got in somehow in the night and hid in an attic. Do you think that’s likely?”
“I suppose anything really is possible,” I said, “but it doesn’t seem to me very probable.”
“No,” said Geraldine, “he would have got hungry, wouldn’t he? And he couldn’t have asked Miss Pebmarsh for breakfast, not if he was hiding from her.”
“And nobody came to the house?” I said. “Nobody at all? Nobody in a car—a tradesman—callers?”
“The grocer comes Mondays and Thursdays,” said Geraldine, “and the milk comes at half past eight in the morning.”
The child was a positive encyclopaedia.
“The cauliflowers and things Miss Pebmarsh buys herself. Nobody called at all except the laundry. It was a new laundry,” she added.
“A new laundry?”
“Yes. It’s usually the Southern Downs Laundry. Most people have the Southern Downs. It was a new laundry that day—the Snowflake Laundry. I’ve never seen the Snowflake Laundry. They must have just started.”
I fought hard to keep any undue interest out of my voice. I didn’t want to start her romancing.
“Did it deliver laundry or call for it?” I asked.
“Deliver it,” said Geraldine. “In a great big basket, too. Much bigger than the usual one.”
“Did Miss Pebmarsh take it in?”
“No, of course not, she’d gone out again.”
“What time was this, Geraldine?”
“1:35 exactly,” said Geraldine. “I wrote it down,” she added proudly.
She motioned towards a small notebook and opening it pointed with a rather dirty forefinger to an entry. 1:35 laundry came. No. 19.
“You ought to be at Scotland Yard,” I said.
“Do they have women detectives? I’d quite like that. I don’t mean policewomen. I think policewomen are silly.”
“You haven’t told me exactly what happened when the laundry came.”
“Nothing happened,” said Geraldine. “The driver got down, opened the van, took out this basket and staggered along round the side of the house to the back door. I expect he couldn’t get in. Miss Pebmarsh probably locks it, so he probably left it there and came back.”
“What did he look like?”
“Just ordinary,” said Geraldine.
“Like me?” I asked.
“Oh, no, much older than you,” said Geraldine, “but I didn’t really see him properly because he drove up to the house—this way.” She pointed to the right. “He drew up in front of 19 although he was on the wrong side of the road. But it doesn’t matter in a street like this. And then he went in through the gate bent over the basket. I could only see the back of his head and when he came out again he was rubbing his face. I expect he found it a bit hot and trying, carrying that basket.”
“And then he drove off again?”
“Yes. Why do you think it so interesting?”
“Well, I don’t know,” I said. “I thought perhaps he might have seen something interesting.”
Ingrid flung the door open. She was wheeling a trolley.
“We eat dinner now,” she said, nodding brightly.
“Goody,” said Geraldine, “I’m starving.”
I got up.
“I must be going now,” I said. “Good-bye, Geraldine.”
“Good-bye. What about this thing?” She picked up the fruit knife. “It’s not mine.” Her voice became wistful. “I wish it were.”
“It looks as though it’s nobody’s in particular, doesn’t it?”
“Would that make it treasure trove, or whatever it is?”
“Something of the kind,” I said. “I think you’d better hang on to it. That is, hang on to it until someone else claims it. But I don’t think,” I said truthfully, “that anybody will.”
“Get me an apple, Ingrid,” said Geraldine.
“Apple?”
“Pomme! Apfel!”
She did her linguistic best. I left them to it.
Twenty-six
Mrs. Rival pushed open the door of the Peacock’s Arms and made a slightly unsteady progress towards the bar. She was mu
rmuring under her breath. She was no stranger to this particular hostelry and was greeted quite affectionately by the barman.
“How do, Flo,” he said, “how’s tricks?”
“It’s not right,” said Mrs. Rival. “It’s not fair. No, it’s not right. I know what I’m talking about, Fred, and I say it’s not right.”
“Of course it isn’t right,” said Fred, soothingly. “What is, I’d like to know? Want the usual, dear?”
Mrs. Rival nodded assent. She paid and began to sip from her glass. Fred moved away to attend to another customer. Her drink cheered Mrs. Rival slightly. She still muttered under her breath but with a more good-humoured expression. When Fred was near her once more she addressed him again with a slightly softened manner.
“All the same, I’m not going to put up with it,” she said. “No, I’m not. If there’s one thing I can’t bear, it’s deceit. I don’t stand for deceit, I never did.”
“Of course you didn’t,” said Fred.
He surveyed her with a practised eye. “Had a good few already,” he thought to himself. “Still, she can stand a couple more, I expect. Something’s upset her.”
“Deceit,” said Mrs. Rival. “Prevari—prevari—well, you know the word I mean.”
“Sure I know,” said Fred.
He turned to greet another acquaintance. The unsatisfactory performance of certain dogs came under review. Mrs. Rival continued to murmur.
“I don’t like it and I won’t stand for it. I shall say so. People can’t think they can go around treating me like that. No, indeed they can’t. I mean, it’s not right and if you don’t stick up for yourself, who’ll stick up for you? Give me another, dearie,” she added in a louder voice.
Fred obliged.
“I should go home after that one, if I were you,” he advised.
He wondered what had upset the old girl so much. She was usually fairly even-tempered. A friendly soul, always good for a laugh.
“It’ll get me in bad, Fred, you see,” she said. “When people ask you to do a thing, they should tell you all about it. They should tell you what it means and what they’re doing. Liars. Dirty liars, that’s what I say. And I won’t stand for it.”
“I should cut along home, if I were you,” said Fred, as he observed a tear about to trickle down the mascaraed splendour. “Going to come on to rain soon, it is, and rain hard, too. Spoil that pretty hat of yours.”
Mrs. Rival gave one faint appreciative smile.
“I always was fond of cornflowers,” she said. “Oh, dear me, I don’t know what to do, I’m sure.”
“I should go home and have a nice kip,” said the barman, kindly.
“Well, perhaps, but—”
“Come on, now, you don’t want to spoil that hat.”
“That’s very true,” said Mrs. Rival. “Yes, that’s very true. That’s a very prof—profumed—no I don’t mean that—what do I mean?”
“Profound remark of yours, Fred.”
“Thank you very much.”
“You’re welcome,” said Fred.
Mrs. Rival slipped down from her high seat and went not too steadily towards the door.
“Something seems to have upset old Flo tonight,” said one of the customers.
“She’s usually a cheerful bird—but we all have our ups and downs,” said another man, a gloomy-looking individual.
“If anyone had told me,” said the first man, “that Jerry Grainger would come in fifth, way behind Queen Caroline, I wouldn’t have believed it. If you ask me, there’s been hanky-panky. Racing’s not straight nowadays. Dope the horses, they do. All of ’em.”
Mrs. Rival had come out of the Peacock’s Arms. She looked up uncertainly at the sky. Yes, perhaps it was going to rain. She walked along the street, hurrying slightly, took a turn to the left, a turn to the right and stopped before a rather dingy-looking house. As she took out a key and went up the front steps a voice spoke from the area below, and a head poked round a corner of the door and looked up at her.
“Gentleman waiting for you upstairs.”
“For me?”
Mrs. Rival sounded faintly surprised.
“Well, if you call him a gentleman. Well dressed and all that, but not quite Lord Algernon Vere de Vere, I would say.”
Mrs. Rival succeeded in finding the keyhole, turned the key in it and entered.
The house smelled of cabbage and fish and eucalyptus. The latter smell was almost permanent in this particular hall. Mrs. Rival’s landlady was a great believer in taking care of her chest in winter weather and began the good work in mid-September. Mrs. Rival climbed the stairs, aiding herself with the banisters. She pushed open the door on the first floor and went in, then she stopped dead and took a step backwards.
“Oh,” she said, “it’s you.”
Detective Inspector Hardcastle rose from the chair where he was sitting.
“Good evening, Mrs. Rival.”
“What do you want?” asked Mrs. Rival with less finesse than she would normally have shown.
“Well, I had to come up to London on duty,” said Inspector Hardcastle, “and there were just one or two things I thought I’d like to take up with you, so I came along on the chance of finding you. The—er—the woman downstairs seemed to think you might be in before long.”
“Oh,” said Mrs. Rival. “Well, I don’t see—well—”
Inspector Hardcastle pushed forward a chair.
“Do sit down,” he said politely.
Their positions might have been reversed, he the host and she the guest. Mrs. Rival sat down. She stared at him very hard.
“What did you mean by one or two things?” she said.
“Little points,” said Inspector Hardcastle, “little points that come up.”
“You mean—about Harry?”
“That’s right.”
“Now look here,” said Mrs. Rival, a slight belligerence coming into her voice; at the same time as an aroma of spirits came clearly to Inspector Hardcastle’s nostrils. “I’ve had Harry. I don’t want to think of him any more. I came forward, didn’t I, when I saw his picture in the paper? I came and told you about him. It’s all a long time ago and I don’t want to be reminded of it. There’s nothing more I can tell you. I’ve told you everything I could remember and now I don’t want to hear any more about it.”
“It’s quite a small point,” said Inspector Hardcastle. He spoke gently and apologetically.
“Oh, very well,” said Mrs. Rival, rather ungraciously. “What is it? Let’s have it.”
“You recognized the man as your husband or the man you’d gone through a form of marriage with about fifteen years ago. That is right, is it not?”
“I should have thought that by this time you would have known exactly how many years ago it was.”
“Sharper than I thought,” Inspector Hardcastle said to himself. He went on.
“Yes, you’re quite right there. We looked it up. You were married on May 15th, 1948.”
“It’s always unlucky to be a May bride, so they say,” said Mrs. Rival gloomily. “It didn’t bring me any luck.”
“In spite of the years that have elapsed, you were able to identify your husband quite easily.”
Mrs. Rival moved with some slight uneasiness.
“He hadn’t aged much,” she said, “always took care of himself, Harry did.”
“And you were able to give us some additional identification. You wrote to me, I think, about a scar.”
“That’s right. Behind his left ear it was. Here,” Mrs. Rival raised a hand and pointed to the place.
“Behind his left ear?” Hardcastle stressed the word.
“Well—” she looked momentarily doubtful, “yes. Well, I think so. Yes I’m sure it was. Of course one never does know one’s left from one’s right in a hurry, does one? But, yes, it was the left side of his neck. Here.” She placed her hand on the same spot again.
“And he did it shaving, you say?”
“That’s righ
t. The dog jumped up on him. A very bouncy dog we had at the time. He kept rushing in—affectionate dog. He jumped up on Harry and he’d got the razor in his hand, and it went in deep. It bled a lot. It healed up but he never lost the mark.” She was speaking now with more assurance.
“That’s a very valuable point, Mrs. Rival. After all, one man sometimes looks very like another man, especially when a good many years have passed. But to find a man closely resembling your husband who has a scar in the identical place—well that makes the identification very nice and safe, doesn’t it? It seems that we really have something to go on.”
“I’m glad you’re pleased,” said Mrs. Rival.
“And this accident with the razor happened—when?”
Mrs. Rival considered a moment.
“It must have been about—oh, about six months after we were married. Yes, that was it. We got the dog that summer, I remember.”
“So it took place about October or November, 1948. Is that right?”
“That’s right.”
“And after your husband left you in 1951….”
“He didn’t so much leave me as I turned him out,” said Mrs. Rival with dignity.
“Quite so. Whichever way you like to put it. Anyway, after you turned your husband out in 1951 you never saw him again until you saw his picture in the paper?”
“Yes. That’s what I told you.”
“And you’re quite sure about that, Mrs. Rival?”
“Of course I’m sure. I never set eyes on Harry Castleton since that day until I saw him dead.”
“That’s odd, you know,” said Inspector Hardcastle, “that’s very odd.”
“Why—what do you mean?”
“Well, it’s a very curious thing, scar tissue. Of course, it wouldn’t mean much to you or me. A scar’s a scar. But doctors can tell a lot from it. They can tell roughly, you know, how long a man has had a scar.”
“I don’t know what you’re getting at.”
“Well, simply this, Mrs. Rival. According to our police surgeon and to another doctor whom we consulted, that scar tissue behind your husband’s ear shows very clearly that the wound in question could not be older than about five to six years ago.”
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