The Secret Life and Curious Death of Miss Jean Milne

by Andrew Nicoll

  “Yes, man, for God’s sake speak up!”

  A quiet pause.

  “Yes, I’ll wait. I am waiting!”

  And then. “Hello? Can you hear me? Listen. Carefully. It. Must. Be. Preserved. Secure. Everything. Until. We. Arrive.

  “Thank you. Yes. Yes. Goodbye.”

  Chief Constable Sempill was red in the face when he replaced the earpiece. He undid the top button of his Prussian collar and wiped his neck with his handkerchief. “The blighter took his chance,” he said. “The warder tells me Warner was returned to jail in the usual way and given his prison garb. His shirt had disappeared, as Bowles said, but it’s been found in the room where the prisoners get changed.”

  “And is there any sign of evidence? Any bloodstains?”

  “Oh, better than that. They found it rolled up and jammed in a corner, under the bench, torn to shreds. The cuffs, the neckband and the shirt front – all gone. The first chance he got, the very minute he was allowed to get his hands on it, he destroyed the incriminating evidence.”

  “Then we have no proof,” said Mr Neaves.

  “It may not be proof, but it’s still evidence! It shrieks of his guilt.”

  “Could you put it before a jury? When a man stands in fear of his life?”

  “Yes! By God, I could and I would. I will have him.”

  Mr Neaves was a little shocked, so he waited a moment until the passion had passed off. “What would you like to do now?” he asked.

  “We must get to Maidstone. I have to talk to him. Is it far?”

  “Perhaps fifteen miles or so. We regularly send prisoners on the train and I will send a telegram from the station to have them meet us.”

  Mr Sempill was obliged to restore his top button before striding out, side by side with Mr Neaves, to the railway station. He was downright florid by the time they reached the platform and his buttons strained with every moment they had to wait for the train. Profanity would have helped, but he was a police officer, the Chief Constable of Broughty Ferry no less, and such indulgence was forbidden to him while he was in public. Even the comfort of a cigarette was out of the question, so he had to content himself with chewing furiously on his whiskers while Mr Neaves rocked gently back and fore on his thick-soled shoes, humming snatches of H.M.S. Pinafore.

  “Is he reliable, the warder?”

  “Perfectly, in my experience.”

  Mr Neaves returned to singing softly under his breath: “Many years ago, when I was young and charming, as some of you may know, I practised baby-farming.”

  The train arrived trailing hot smuts of soot and spitting hot steam, and the two men climbed into the front carriage, since it would leave first and be the first to arrive and speed was essential. A man in a brown coat tried to follow, but Mr Sempill put his hand on the door and pulled it firmly shut. “Terribly sorry, sir. This coach is taken. Required for confidential police business, I’m afraid.”

  In the opposite seat, Mr Neaves gave him a long look.

  “I’m sorry, Neaves. I couldn’t be bothered. My nerves are tight as fiddle strings. I have to admit this business is weighing on my mind. Murders are a rarity in Broughty Ferry and the burgh magistrates are keen to see a resolution. Most keen.”

  Mr Sempill had the embarrassed look of a man who has said too much. He smoked a frantic cigarette in three long draws, ground the stub under his toe and went back to the business of chewing his whiskers. To spare him, Mr Neaves looked out the window and sang softly to himself “and so do his sisters and his cousins and his aunts, and so do his sisters and his cousins and his aunts” in time with the clacking of the tracks as he watched the passing clouds.

  25

  MAIDSTONE JAIL WAS as grim a place as Chief Constable Sempill could have hoped for. One rough stone laid on another, piled four storeys high and left to soak in misery and fear for a hundred years until it was as lonely and grey and chill as the moon. If he could not have Warner standing on a trapdoor with his head in a noose, then Mr Sempill would be content to have him in Maidstone jail, inside these walls, behind that great, fortress-like gatehouse, watched over by those cruel towers – for now. But only for now.

  They were expected, of course. Mr Neaves hammered on the huge, wooden gate with a gloved fist and a tiny part of it opened, like a door into the magic mountain. They stepped through the gate and out of the world into another place, where the clocks stopped.

  The prison governor was waiting on the path circling a lawn which the prisoners were permitted to look at but forbidden to touch. He shook hands and welcomed them. “Warner is being brought up from his cell at this moment,” he said. “He has not been told why, or where he is going. He has no idea that you are even on the premises.”

  The prison had taken root in Maidstone like a fungus in a fallen tree. Little by little, in the course of a century, it had spread out and up, away from its original design, with bits added on here and altered there so doors that had once led into corridors now opened on empty air and once-solid walls had been pierced. The warder led them by strange routes inside the building. It was a kind of drowning. The deeper they sank, the less light there was, and their ears were assailed by a heavy, distorted silence. Normal, human sounds were displaced by a weight of quietness and, far away and echoing, the sound of sadness and lonely misery, mad howls, shrieking laughter, hidden weeping, the sounds of shipwreck, as if the prison and everybody in it had suddenly been dropped in the middle of a cold ocean and the dark waves had closed over the roofs and poured into every cell and muffled every conversation and filled all their mouths with a choking brine which robbed them of speech and thought and left nothing in exchange but a moan of frightened pain and ceaseless, ceaseless boredom.

  “In here, gentlemen.” The governor turned a brass knob and flung open a door onto a bare room where Warner was waiting, standing under the high window between two warders. For a second he looked startled by the sudden opening of the door, but he recovered himself when he saw the two policemen. His chin was high. He actually dared to look down his nose at them and, damn him, he was smiling. Chief Constable Sempill hated him fiercely.

  The governor said: “Warner, these gentlemen have come to ask you some questions. This is Superintendent Neaves of Kent Constabulary and this other gentleman is Chief Constable Sempill of Broughty Ferry Burgh Police.”

  “We meet again,” said Warner, and he dared to extend his hand.

  “We have not met,” said Mr Sempill.

  “We have not been properly introduced, that’s true, but I saw both you gentlemen earlier today, for my big performance.”

  “It was certainly that,” said Mr Sempill. “Sit down, please.”

  Warner put his hand away and pulled out a chair. He sat on one side of the table between the two guards; Sempill and Neaves sat opposite with their backs to the door.

  Mr Sempill took out his notebook and spread it on the table. He took out a pencil and laid it across the open pages. Warner watched him intently all the while.

  “I’m not going to beat about the bush,” he said. “You are a person of great interest to me, Warner. The fact is I believe you are connected with the murder of an elderly lady in Broughty Ferry.”

  Warner’s jaw dropped. “That’s ridiculous. I couldn’t find this Broughty Ferry place on a map. I’ve never heard of it – not until you showed up.”

  “So you’ve never been to Scotland.”

  “I’ve never been to Scotland.”

  “That’s not what you told Constable . . .”

  Mr Neaves leaned closer and said: “Bowles.”

  “Constable Bowles.”

  “I’ve never heard of Constable Bowles either.”

  “He was the police officer who accompanied you on your return from court.”

  Warner snorted. “That slack-jawed halfwit? So, you put him up to saying that I told him I went to Scotland and murdered some old lady, is that the game you’re playing here?”

  “Nobody put him up to anything. And
nobody is saying that you confessed. He volunteered the testimony that you told him you had been to Scotland. You landed at Liverpool on August 2 and you went to Scotland.”

  “Well, it’s a damned lie. I’ve never been to Scotland in my life.”

  Chief Constable Sempill took a deep breath and started to count to ten. He got to five and said: “Warner, you need to understand the seriousness of your situation. I want to talk to you in connection with the murder of Jean Milne—”

  “Nice name. Jean Milne,” Warner tested it out in his mouth. “Jean Milne, Jean Milne.”

  Mr Sempill brought his fist down on the table so his pencil flew about. “Murder, Warner. We are talking about murder. You could hang.”

  “Seems like you’ve got me hanged anyway.”

  “But if you care to give me an account of your movements, I can have them verified.”

  “That’s mighty white of you, Chief Constable, and I’m grateful. I do not care to.”

  “May I ask why not?”

  “Two reasons. Firstly, I come of good family and it would distress them immeasurably if they were to hear of my misfortunes. Secondly, I do not see why I should do your job for you. If you want to investigate me, go ahead and investigate, and if you think I killed some old lady, go ahead and prove it – but I won’t help you.”

  “Listen to me. Jean Milne died between October 14 and the third of this month. I won’t deny, I want to see a man hang for what happened to that lady, but I want it to be the right man, and I swear to you, if you can show me you are the wrong man, you will not hang.”

  Warner said nothing. He folded his arms across his chest and looked up at the ceiling, counting cobwebs.

  “I am trying to help you.”

  Warner said nothing.

  “Let’s start at the beginning. Your name is Charles Warner.”

  “You know that already.”

  “Age?”

  “Thirty-eight.”

  Mr Neaves stifled a laugh. “Have you been thirty-eight for long?”

  “I’m thirty-eight,” he insisted.

  “Very well, we’ll put thirty-eight. Address 210 Wilton Avenue, Toronto, Canada.”

  “You won’t find anything of me there. That was my address at one time, but not now and not for some time.”

  “Then tell me your correct address.”

  “I prefer not to give my Canadian address.”

  “Why?”

  “I told you that. I don’t want you snooping round my folks.”

  “Very well. You’re obviously an educated man. A college man. Where did you go to university?”

  Warner looked down from the ceiling for the first time. “Chief Constable, give a guy some credit. I won’t give you my address, so you think you can track me down through college? Oh, you’re correct, I was educated at college. Which college I decline to say.”

  “Very good. Will you at least explain how you came to be in Scotland?”

  “I already said. I have never been to Scotland.” Warner gave a bored sigh. “Are you trying to catch me out, Chief Constable? You won’t catch me out. I am a salesman in business. This past year I did myself a favour in mining stocks in Canada and the States.”

  “Mining stocks?” said Mr Sempill. “That’s interesting.”

  “I don’t know why you should be so interested. I made a heap and I decided to take a trip.”

  “What for?”

  “Entirely for pleasure. I left Montreal on Friday, 2nd August, and went first of all to Philadelphia and, from there, on to New York. I sailed from New York on 10th August.”

  “What was the name of the boat?”

  “You find out.”

  “Where did you land?”

  “Find that out too. But I’ll tell you this, I wasn’t even in England when the old lady was killed.”

  “Scotland,” said Sempill quietly. “She was killed in Scotland.”

  “I wasn’t any place on your tiny, foggy little island. I left Antwerp on 16th October and I landed at Harwich the following day.”

  “The boat?”

  “I don’t know. But it’s a downright lie that I ever told your man that I landed at Liverpool in August and went to Scotland. I have never been in Scotland in my life. When I landed at Harwich I took a train direct for London. Liverpool Street station.”

  Sempill asked: “Was this your first visit to London?”

  “You work it out. I’m not helping you. First visit, last visit, it doesn’t matter. The point is I was no place near your old lady. No place near.”

  “Where did you stay in London?”

  “Here and there.”

  “The Palace? The Bonnington?”

  Warner leaned across the table. “You’re not listening. Here. And. There.”

  Mr Sempill remained calm. “What is your explanation for your shirt?”

  “You may as well ask me to explain my shoes, or my coat.”

  “I think we can all agree that you are far, far cleverer than I, Mr Warner. Can’t we, Mr Neaves?”

  “Oh, he’s too clever for both of us. No doubt about it.”

  “But, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, could you see your way to explaining how it was you arrived with a shirt, your shirt was returned to you, and yet you departed for court without a shirt? And how was it that your shirt was torn to ribbons and hidden in the prison changing rooms?”

  “It was dirty.”

  “That’s all?”

  “It was dirty.”

  “Not bloodstained? Not covered in the blood of the woman you beat to death in Broughty Ferry?”

  “It was dirty.”

  “Very good,” said Mr Sempill. “I will record that as your reply and have you sign my notebook.” He held out his pencil. “A college man like you won’t have any trouble signing his name.”

  He scrawled “Charles Warner” across two open pages.

  “Very good. Thank you.” Mr Sempill turned to the prison governor. “Is your man here?”

  “He’s waiting next door.”

  “Excellent. Mr Warner, please go with these gentlemen and have your photograph taken.”

  The two warders jostled Warner out the door as Mr Neaves whispered: “Though a mystic tone you borrow, he shall learn the truth with sorrow, here today and gone tomorrow.”

  “Get his picture,” said Mr Sempill. “Then we’ll see how bloody clever he is.”

  26

  BY GREAT EFFORT on his part, Chief Constable Sempill was able to return to St Pancras station that evening in plenty of time for the last post. He had with him a little packet containing a note for Detective Lieutenant Trench, advising him on recent developments in the inquiry and giving instructions for the enclosed photograph to be shown to such witnesses and informants as he thought useful and appropriate. This he dropped into the pillar box at the station with “POLICE BUSINESS MOST URGENT” written in the corner, trusting the Royal Mail to do its duty.

  You may well imagine the interest with which we examined the contents of that little packet when it arrived in Broughty Ferry the following day. Sitting at the Chief Constable’s desk, Mr Trench slit the envelope and withdrew the sheets of folded notepaper in that same two-fingered pinching grip I recalled from our first meeting on top of the tram, and read from Mr Sempill’s letter with all the tenderness of a mother to her children.

  “Mr Sempill says he has tracked down Clarence Wray, who admits his connection with Jean Milne but strongly denies any flirtation. According to Wray, our young man with the yellow moustache was sniffing around, trying to get her to invest in a Canadian mining interest.”

  We were all most taken with these snippets, Broon and Suttie above all, and I had to recall them to their right behaviours.

  “However, Mr Sempill reports that he has uncovered another most promising lead, a Canadian confidence trickster now imprisoned in Kent—”

  “A foreigner,” said Suttie.

  “Well, a colonial at any rate,” said Mr Trench, “and he dec
lines to give an account of himself, although he has admitted to an interest in mining shares.”

  “The very man! The man himself!” said Suttie with a kind of welcoming glee, as if he had suddenly stumbled upon Constable Broon in the bar of the Ship at just the very moment when he put his hand in his pocket.

  Mr Trench waited until order and calm had restored itself. “Mr Sempill says he is enclosing a newly taken photograph of the suspect, which he urges us to exhibit to the witnesses in the hopes that they may assist the inquiry by providing an identification.”

  But the photograph was still inside its envelope and the envelope still lay, where Mr Trench had placed it, in the middle of Mr Sempill’s desk. It was not for any of us to touch the envelope and we waited in silence until Mr Trench picked it up and removed the picture.

  He examined it for a moment, blew through his teeth and tossed it on the table. “Mr Charles Warner of Toronto. There’s our suspect, lads.”

  “That’s him to the life, right enough,” said Suttie, who was daily sinking in my estimation.

  But, though Suttie had never seen the killer in all his days, there was no denying that picture was the living image of a murderer. He was in his grey prison uniform: a rough woollen jacket, a shirt without a collar. They had pushed him into a corner, with a mirror angled behind his head so both sides of his face were on view. His hands were crossed in front of his chest, like a coffined corpse, to record any distinguishing marks. There were none.

  Mr Trench said: “No moustache, you’ll notice. I want to see all the witnesses who claim to have seen the man, anybody who saw him near the house or on the cars or with Miss Milne. Pay them a visit and have them call in to see us. We need to let them have a look at this photograph. Come along, gentlemen, no time for slacking, I want to send my report to Mr Sempill by tonight, so let’s get knocking.”

  So we went out and found them all, everybody who said they saw the young man with the thin blond moustache: John Wood the gardener, who said he let the man into Elmgrove; James Don the rubbish man, who saw him come out and stand under the street lamp; Margaret Campbell, maidservant to Mrs Luke at Caenlochan Villa, who looked out the window and across the street and saw a man strolling between the bushes; the McIntosh lassies, who ran away from him, frightened out of their wits; Andy Hay the pedlar, who growled at him as he sat smoking on his pack. We found them all – and others I have not troubled you with, like the young boys who fled from him when he disturbed them at play – and we brought them all to the police office and we showed them all a photograph of a middle-aged man without a moustache to see what they might say.