“No.”
The Inspector decided to open up a fresh line of inquiry.
“I remember,” he said, “that when I came to Carron Hill on the day of Mrs. Castleford’s death, you were changing your clothes, and you came down, rather later, in the dark suit you’re wearing now, or one like it. What clothes had you been wearing just before that—during the afternoon?”
“A golfing suit—plus-fours,” Castleford answered without hesitation. “There was just a chance that I might pick up a game when I got to the clubhouse, though I didn’t set out with the idea of playing.”
“You have that suit here, I suppose? Any objection to my seeing it? I have a reason for asking.”
“I suppose you have,” Castleford retorted, though without any marked signs of reluctance. “It’s upstairs. I’ll bring it down, if you wish.”
“I’ll go up with you,” Westerham suggested. “There’s no need to carry it up and down stairs.”
Castleford agreed with a nod and led the way up to his room. Opening a wardrobe, he pointed to a jacket and waistcoat on a hanger, and then, going down on his knees, he opened a drawer and began to search for the corresponding plus-fours. The Inspector took the jacket from its hanger, spread it out on the bed, and made a rapid examination of it. Suddenly he suppressed an exclamation, as he turned over one of the sleeves. He then examined the waistcoat, without finding anything to interest him; and finally he scrutinised the plus-fours which Castleford was holding out to him with a slightly sardonic smile.
“Have you found anything to interest you?” he asked, hardly taking the trouble to repress a sneer.
“As it happens, I have,” the Inspector returned blandly “You might take a look at this, Mr. Castleford.”
He twisted the coat-sleeve over so as to disclose on its under surface—out of sight of the wearer—an ominous brown stain of considerable dimensions.
Castleford seemed to reflect for a moment before answering.
“I suppose I must have come up against some wet paint somehow or other, but I can’t remember where it can have been. I leaned my arms on a stile that afternoon, to look at the view; and perhaps the wood may have been newly painted. That would have marked the sleeve just like that, wouldn’t it? I certainly didn’t notice that I’d got that smear on the cloth, and no one told me about it at the time.”
“Most likely they’d other things to think about,” the Inspector suggested drily. “Your house was rather badly upset when you came back to it that day, you remember. But take a good look at this mark, Mr. Castleford.”
Castleford obeyed and the Inspector watched a look of consternation grow on his features as he stared, as if hypnotised, at the rusty brown stain on the cloth.
“I’ll have to take this jacket away with me,” Westerham said bluntly. “I’m not certain what this stain may be and I must find out. You don’t object?”
Castleford evidently recognised that protest would be worse than acquiescence; and he gave a half-hearted permission with a nod.
“Then there’s another point,” Westerham pursued. “I suppose your stockings have gone to the wash—the ones you wore that day—but you might let me see the shoes you were wearing that afternoon.”
Castleford led the way downstairs to a cloakroom and opened a boot-cupboard. The Inspector noticed that he seemed to have no objection to this part of the proceedings. He ran his eye along the shelves and picked out a pair of golfing-shoes which he handed to Westerham.
“These are the ones I was wearing. But I can’t quite see what bearing they may have on my wife’s death. Are you not taking rather much on yourself, with all this prying, if you don’t mind my putting it in rather plain language?”
“Have you worn them since then?” asked Westerham disregarding the complaint.
Castleford shook his head. The Inspector, turning the shoes over in his hand in an apparently casual fashion, saw on the sole of one of them the thing he was looking for, but which he had not expected to find. Obscured by road-grit and worn away by friction, still the paint-mark was visible; and just under the instep, where the sole had been raised from the ground, it stood out almost as though fresh.
“I’ll take these shoes as well; if you’ve no objection,” the Inspector announced, with an effort to suppress all excitement from his tone.
Here it was plain that Castleford could make neither head nor tail of the proceedings . Westerham had continued to turn the shoes about in his hand as though examining the uppers, and Castleford had not noticed any special attention being given to the soles. He stared at the Inspector with unfeigned incomprehension written large on his face.
“I can’t see what you want with them,” he said, unsteadily, “but if you insist on taking them, I don’t propose to object. I think I may ask, though, why you find them important.”
“They may be of no importance whatever,” Westerham answered disingenuously. “As I told you, I’ve got to check a lot of things, and these shoes may help me that. That’s all I’m prepared to say at present.”
Suddenly Castleford flashed up into the temper of a weak man.
“I’m not satisfied with this way of doing things,” he exclaimed vehemently. “You come here; you suggest this and you hint at that; you pry into my affairs; you confiscate one thing and another without so much as by-your-leave. Are you suspecting me of being concerned in my wife’s death? Is that what you’re after? Is all this prying and spying . . . Are you going to charge me with causing her death? Is that what you have in view? Is that it?”
He stopped, apparently choked by his emotion.
“I’m not bringing any charge against you,” Westerham retorted with more than his usual suavity. “My business is to collect all the evidence I can get which may bear even remotely on the case. There’s no reason why any innocent person should object to that, is there? It isn’t likely to do him any harm, if he’s innocent, surely. This case, so far as I’ve gone, wouldn’t justify my making a charge against anyone.”
The moment his outburst was over, Castleford evidently realised what harm it might have done him. He calmed himself with an effort and made a half-apology.
“I quite understand, Mr. Westerham; but, as you can guess, this affair has given me a shock and I’m not quite so steady as I might be. My nerves are on edge, and perhaps I’ve been taking offence when there was no need for it. Although,” he added, suspiciously, “you seem to be paying very special attention to me and my affairs.”
The Inspector laughed a little at this criticism.
“That’s only because you happen to be the first person whom I’ve questioned, here,” he explained. “I shall have to do the same with the rest. Everybody has to go through it, you know, in the interests of justice; and there’s no reflection on anyone until a charge is brought.”
“Then you’ve reason to believe it’s a case of murder, not accident?”
“All I can say is that suspicions have been aroused and we’ve got to allay them or confirm them. That’s what I’m paid for, you know; it’s part of my job. And I’ll get on with it, now, if you don’t mind. I understand that Miss Castleford is on the premises. I want to ask her a few questions. Perhaps you could send her to me?”
“I’ll bring her,” Castleford agreed, in a grudging tone
“I’d prefer to see her alone,” the Inspector said, curtly, to make his position quite clear.
Chapter Fifteen
Hilary Castleford’s Statements
Inspector Westerham, connoisseur in feminine attractiveness, experienced a certain titillation when Hilary entered the study. He liked slim, straight-backed girls, especially when they looked as though butter wouldn’t freeze in their mouths. A swift, appraising glance catalogued her hair, her features, her figure, and rested for a moment on her neatly-turned ankles—for ankles were to the Inspector one of the acid tests of a woman’s appearance. The result of his survey satisfied him; and his human side pronounced the slangy verdict: “This is a bit of all r
ight! She must have taken the shine out of the other women in the house.”
The official half of the Inspector had been equally busy. This girl had hitherto been the single unknown factor among the personalities interwoven with the Carron Hill drama. He had been curious to meet her face to face and to gauge, if possible, the part she might have played in the events leading up to the tragedy. He was beginning to realise that the key to his problem might be found among the characters of the actors more readily than by a mere poring over material clues. From that standpoint, Hilary Castleford was already a suspect witness to some extent. Her interests were interlocked with those of her father; and since his evidence had been deliberately misleading, it might be expected that she would follow suit.
The detective half of Westerham noted that Hilary’s dress showed no trace of mourning. Again he received the impression that no one at Carron Hill missed Mrs. Castleford as a human being. She seemed to have dropped like a stone into a pool; once the slight ripples died down no one would feel the worse for her loss.
Westerham’s eyes returned to Hilary’s face. He noted the set of the cleanly-chiselled lips, the firmness of the jaw under the softness of its curves, and the fully-lifted eyelids. “This girl can look after herself pretty well,” was the official estimate. “She’s as cool as a penny ice; and she’s got sticking-power, unless her face lies.”
“You want to see me?” Hilary demanded, as she came forward.
“Yes, Miss Castleford, I’d like you to help me with one or two little points, if you will,” the Inspector explained in a tone which suggested that he attached no great importance to the questions he was going to put.
He felt sure that Castleford had given her a hint to be on her guard; and he made up his mind to approach the crucial subjects by degrees, so as to allay her suspicions if possible.
“Do you mind if I begin rather far back?” he asked. “I’d like to know what you remember about the party at the luncheon table on the day of Mrs. Castleford’s death.”
Hilary knitted her brows slightly, as though making an effort of memory.
“You mean, who was there? I can remember my father, Mrs. Castleford, Miss Lindfield, myself, and Frank Glencaple. That was all.”
“Can you recall anything of the talk that went on at the table?” Westerham asked. Then, realising from the expression on Hilary’s face that he had asked too wide a question, he limited his inquiry. “For instance, can you recall Miss Lindfield making any arrangements with the boy Glencaple for the afternoon?”
Hilary seemed in no haste to answer. She pondered for a time before making up her mind about her reply.
“If I’m not mistaken—and I may be, for I’d no reason to pay attention—she said she was going to take a walk round through Piney Holt, and that he could meet her on her way home in the spinney beside the Chalet. She said, if I remember, that she’d be starting from here at half-past two, and he could be waiting for her. Then they were going into Thunderbridge together.”
She reflected for a moment and then added:
“Unless I’m mistaken, she warned him in an undertone to keep out of Mrs. Castleford’s way if she was at the Chalet. He was taking his rook-rifle with him to pass the time, and Mrs. Castleford had a horror of guns. She was always afraid of an accident happening. I thought it was very sensible of Miss Lindfield to give him that warning.”
“That reminds me,” Westerham put in, “did the boy get on well with Mrs. Castleford?”
“He liked her for what he could get out of her,” said Hilary, rather contemptuously. “He was fonder of Miss Lindfield, I think. I can’t say he was a favourite of mine.”
“He didn’t strike me as being very obedient, from what I saw of him,” the Inspector mused aloud.
“He isn’t,” Hilary confirmed. “He’s been very badly brought up. You can’t count on him to do anything he’s told to do; and you can’t believe much that he says. But I dislike him intensely and perhaps I’d better not say any more about him. I might give you a wrong impression of him, perhaps.”
Westerham went back to his earlier line of inquiry. “Did you hear Miss Lindfield mention the exact time when she expected to meet the boy near the Chalet?”
Hilary shook her head decidedly.
“No, I don’t think any time was mentioned. She told him she was going round by Piney Holt and back by Six Road Ends and the level crossing over the railway. He knows that walk well; and as he knew she was leaving here at half-past two, he’d guess that she’d be at the Chalet round about a quarter past four. He’d expect her then, I suppose, and make his arrangements accordingly.”
Westerham noted that Hilary gave a fairly sound estimate of the time taken to complete that walk. It was evidently a favourite one for the Carron Hill people. Miss Lindfield had taken three-quarters of an hour longer over it than usual, since she only reached the spinney at five o’clock. But Westerham had unearthed some witnesses whose evidence accounted for this, easily enough. One man had seen her go into Piney bit at about a quarter past three. If she had walked straight through, she would have reached Six Road Ends at about twenty minutes to four. But the driver of a local grocer’s delivery van had overtaken her at Six Road Ends at ten minutes past four, so that she had evidently loitered for half an hour in the cool of the pine wood; and the man in the signal box which controlled the level crossing had seen her walk over the line at a quarter past four.
“I’m not very sure of my ground,” Westerham admitted, doubtfully. “On that route, there’s a short cut to the Chalet, isn’t there? Where does it start?”
“It branches off from the road in the middle of a thicket—they call it The Wilderness—about five minutes’ walk from the level crossing,” Hilary explained. “The short cut takes about a quarter of an hour off the walk to the Chalet. It’s a full half-hour’s walk if you follow the road instead of taking to the path.”
“I see. Thanks very much.”
The Inspector thought that he had managed to put the girl off her guard. She was answering quite frankly, without any apparent calculation, and he wanted to keep her in that form now that he was approaching the really dangerous part of the matter.
“Now, let’s go back to that afternoon,” he said casually. “Miss Lindfield went out for her walk; your father and Mrs. Castleford went out together about half an hour later. That left you alone in the house here?”
“No,” Hilary explained, with no apparent change in her candour. “I’d gone out myself, immediately after lunch. Miss Heskett rang up and asked me to play nine holes with her. She called for me in her car, because I’d told the gardener to clean our own car that afternoon, and I didn’t want to countermand the order. We didn’t go straight to the course, though, I remember. Miss Heskett wanted to exchange some library books in Strickland Regis, so we drove there first, and she spent some time in the Library. After that, we played nine holes and came back to the clubhouse for tea. Miss Heskett had to go off to some engagement or other; and when she had gone, I set off home.”
“When did you leave the clubhouse?” the Inspector asked, as if in casual curiosity.
Hilary looked at him sharply.
“Some time before half-past four, I should imagine—a few minutes before then, so far as I can remember. But I had no reason to look at the time. Is it of any special importance? Why?”
Westerham saw that her father had put her on her guard and that consequently it was useless to pretend that he was merely asking idle questions.
“It is important, perhaps,” he admitted. “In cases of this sort it’s difficult to say what’s important and what isn’t; so I’ve just got to collect all the information I can get and then sift out the chaff from the grain afterwards. You left the clubhouse shortly before half-past four? Which road did you take?”
Hilary’s brows knitted for an instant, as though she were preparing to resent this examination. Then, apparently, the matter seemed to strike her in a fresh light and she became frankly communicat
ive.
“I took the usual road—up through the chicken farm and by the field-path through Ringford’s Meadow. Then I went and sat down in a copse which lies a bit to the east of the Chalet.”
“About what time did you reach the copse?” the Inspector asked.
Hilary shook her head.
“I really don’t know, Mr. Westerham. Remember, I don’t go about with one eye on my wrist-watch. I walked at my usual pace—which is much the same as everybody else’s—and I didn’t loiter on the road. That’s really all I can tell you.”
Westerham had to admit to himself that there was nothing very suspicious in this vagueness. It was perfectly natural. And yet, he had the impression that something was wrong with the story. The girl was quite cool, but in some way which he could not define to himself she was betraying herself. It was a mere matter of trifles—the very faintest change in the set of her features, an almost imperceptible stiffening in her attitude, the very slightest change in the timbre of her voice: things which can be appreciated by the senses but which are almost beyond the range of verbal description.
“What made you sit down there?” he asked. “Had your golf tired you?”
Hilary rejected this suggestion with a very natural gesture of derision.
“Tired? Oh, no. But when I got up to the copse remembered—I’d forgotten it up till then—that this was the afternoon when my father always went over to the clubhouse to read the weekly reviews; and I thought that perhaps he might be coming along, later. If I waited, he might make up on me. That was all.”
That, again, was unsuspicious enough. Westerham began to think that, so far, he had been told the truth and that the girl’s nervousness was due to the anticipation of further questions in store rather than to those which he was actually putting.
“From the edge of the copse where you were sitting, could you see much of the path you had come along?”
Hilary seemed quite at ease as she answered this.
The Castleford Conundrum Page 20