The Z Murders

by J. Jefferson Farjeon

“Very, Dutton,” nodded the inspector. “Almost looks as if Albert Bowes and—our unknown murderer travelled from Bristol to Boston at about the same time. Yes—distinctly important.”

  He paused and stared ahead of him along the straight flat road. He tried to visualise others who had travelled recently over the road—tried to read the secrets in their eyes and the hidden impulses in their hearts. Soon Boston would appear to him. It would appear out of a grey, cloudy smudge; moistly, for a thin drizzle had now started. How had it appeared in those other, those earlier journeys? Out of what form of light or darkness had it shaped, and with what personal significance?

  “Going into dirty weather, sir,” observed Dutton.

  “It looks like it,” answered James, frowning. “Dirty in every sense. This fellow Smale, now, who found Albert Bowes. I should put him down as a semi-imbecile.”

  “I should delete the ‘semi,’’’ smiled Dutton. “Don’t think we need worry about him, sir.”

  “No—nor about Mrs. Mostyn, Gerald Turndike, or Ted Diggs,” replied James, glancing at the notes. “You’ve been very thorough, Dutton, I must say, and don’t seem to have left out anybody! While, as for Mr. Richard Temperley, you’ve written a three-volume novel about him! But we don’t suspect him, either, do we?”

  “Hardly, sir.”

  “Nor, any longer, the young lady he is so interested in?”

  “Nor any longer, sir. She’s a puzzle though. Tied up in the business somehow from the start. Right back as far as Euston. What brought her into it? Euston, Bristol, Boston!”

  He shook his head, in gloomy impotence.

  “For the moment, Dutton, I’m more interested in what has brought the last two individuals on your list into it,” responded Inspector James. “It seems to me that the movements of these two really form the key to the whole puzzle. Admire the scenery for a moment, please, while I read through your last two notes again. I want to get them fixed in my mind.”

  And, while Dutton tried dutifully to discover the beauty of utter flatness, James read:

  “‘Farmer. Possibly a genuine farmer. Possibly not. Address not known. Age, fifty?

  “‘Of interest on account of certain incidents obviously implicating him in the business. Big, strong, rough man. Not so simple as he looks.

  “‘Movements, as far as known. Took the 5.30 p.m. train to Bristol on the day of the first two murders. In train sat opposite Temperley and chatted with him. Later on in the journey, occupied seat at table with myself and two ladies, near table occupied by Temperley and Miss Wynne. Note that, at this point, we did not know the lady was Miss Wynne. Farmer moved over to their table once to ask for the sugar, though our table had plenty. Query, did he know the lady was Miss Wynne?

  “‘Later on still in the journey, he attacked Temperley in his compartment, while Temperley was dozing, and the results might have been fatal if I had not appeared in the corridor. Upon this, the farmer hurriedly left the compartment, and Temperley, meeting me in the corridor, suspected me in my new disguise.’’’

  James broke off for a moment in his reading, and regarded his faithful second-in-command. Dutton, still dutifully staring at the flatness ahead, stirred slightly.

  “Cathedral or something,” reported Dutton.

  James looked at the tall tower of St. Botolph’s Church, then resumed his reading:

  “‘Freed from the supervision of Temperley, owing to the compact made with him, I was now detailed to watch the farmer, and when we arrived at Bristol my attentions clearly worried him and interfered with his freedom of action. I assumed he was trying to follow Temperley, but now think it more probable he was trying to follow Miss Wynne. He threw me off the scent two or three times, but I stuck to him and discovered, shortly before midnight, that he had a car hidden away near the Carpenter’s Arms.

  “‘Matters came to a head between us a few minutes later. He surprised me round a hedge and laid me out. Fortunately my eye-glass had no glass in it.

  “‘I adopted the old dodge of feigning insensibility, and while the farmer was bending over me and I was wondering whether the dodge would succeed, Temperley arrived.

  “‘Farmer made a remark about an accident, then vanished. Temperley started to follow, and then turned back to me. But, by that time, I also had vanished. Felt groggy, but chased the farmer unsuccessfully across several fields. Saw him get into the driver’s seat of a waiting car, and then suddenly leap off again.

  “‘Query: Was this the car subsequently driven by Ted Diggs to Boston, and was Sylvia Wynne inside at the time? If so, this would appear to have been the farmer’s first definite attempt to kidnap her.

  “‘Finally, I lost the farmer in the vicinity of the Carpenter’s Arms again. By this time I was feeling very groggy indeed. On reaching the spot where his car had been I discovered that it was gone.

  “‘It is obvious now, from what we have learned from Boston, that the farmer travelled to Boston. It is also fairly obvious that the farmer’s car reached Boston first, either passing Temperley’s car on the road, or beating it by taking some alternative route at some point or other. In any case, the farmer succeeded in his second attempt to kidnap Sylvia Wynne a few miles from Boston, and he took her away in his car.

  “‘Query, where?’’’

  The drizzle increased. Clouds, flying low, came in from the North Sea, bearing its mood in their frayed edges. The automatic screen-wiper changed from a luxury into a necessity.

  “Getting worse, sir,” remarked Dutton.

  “Damn the North-West of Ireland,” grunted James.

  “More like the South-East of Finland this time,” said Dutton. “Mustn’t blame Ireland for everything!”

  But James hardly heard him. He was engaged in a battle, unusual for him, against the sinister atmosphere of the elements. They increased a disturbing, gnawing sense of impotence.…

  “Seems to me, sir, we came down to earth just in time,” observed Dutton. “I wouldn’t care to be up in the sky just now!”

  Yes, one could be pretty helpless up in the sky, if pitched against the fury of the elements. But down below here, when pitched against the simpler mechanisms of mere human beings, no self-respecting detective-inspector should be helpless! Yet there was a human being somewhere who had committed three murders, one after the other, leaving behind him an ironic symbol to identify each as his work, and who was still free to add to his ghastly list of victims…and, unless the detective-inspector dissipated his helplessness and, here in Boston, picked up a definite trail…

  “Deformed man,” ran the final note in Dutton’s report. “Said to have been seen with the farmer, but nothing definite known about him.”

  “You’re wrong in your last note, Dutton,” said James. “We do know something definite about the deformed man.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “We know, I think, that he is Z!”

  “And does it help us?” muttered Dutton.

  Chapter XXXI

  The Z Route

  They reached Boston at eighteen minutes past twelve.

  It was good going, for the roads were wet and slippery, and during the latter portion of the journey a driving wind had added its inconvenience to the rain; but it was not quite good enough. They missed Richard Temperley by ten minutes, and it was not until some hours later that any news of him reached them. When the news did reach them it was brought by the half-wit, Bob Smale, and for once Detective-Inspector James, who prided himself on his equanimity and had even lectured on the value of composure, forgot himself and swore.

  He stared at the note that was handed to him, and his eyes dilated. “But—but this letter was written at 12.45!” he spluttered to the messenger.

  “Wer’ it?” blinked the messenger.

  “Yes—12.45! And look at that clock!”

  Bob Smale looked at the clock. It did not seem to make any
violent impression on him.

  “What have you been doing since this note was given to you?” cried the inspector, angrily. “Watching a dog-fight?”

  “There wern’t no dog-fight,” Bob assured him. “I’d ’a seed it.”

  “I’m asking you why you didn’t come here direct, man!”

  “Well, I’m ’ere, ain’t I?”

  “Yes, you’re here!” exclaimed the inspector, already at the telephone. “And probably too late!”

  “Ah, now I remember!” ejaculated Bob Smale, suddenly. “Now I do remember. Tha’s right. ’Twas a cow. A white cow she was, an’ she come round the corner, and I ses to myself, seein’ ’er all white, ‘You wasn’t born on earth,’ I ses, ‘there ain’t no spots on you—’’’

  “Take him away, Dutton!” shouted James. “How can I telephone while that babble’s going on?”

  Dutton obeyed. He had not yet seen the letter himself, but he gathered, from his superior’s unusual manner, that its contents were disturbing.

  Let us return a few hours, and find out how those contents came to be written.

  After satisfying the dictates of both conscience and necessity by getting into touch with James over the telephone—and it was merely by the accident of fortune that he was able to fulfil his obligation only a few minutes after the scheduled time—Temperley did not sit down and watch the local police at work. He worked himself, joining one of the hastily improvised search parties, and sharing its failures and its disappointments. For the people for whom they were searching had enjoyed the advantage of a long start, and of commencing their flight in the early hours of the morning when scarcely a soul was about.

  Thus, no one could be found who had met the kidnappers on the road, or who could give any clue to their whereabouts. They had vanished into the void.

  There was not even any theory to work upon. The murders with which the kidnappers were connected occurred, apparently, at any time and at any place. They appeared to be motiveless and purposeless, and to form no settled scheme. Within thirty hours three tragedies had occurred, known already as “The Z Murders” in thousands of homes, and countless anxious lips were voicing the questions, “How many more?” “Where will the next occur?” and “Who will the next victim be?”

  To the first and second of these questions Richard Temperley had no answer, but the answer to the third burned into his brain and sickened his heart. And because he believed he knew the answer without any shadow of doubt, he worked with a desperate calmness that concealed a spirit almost demented.

  His faithful ally, Ted Diggs, worked meanwhile on his car. The damage, although rendering his car hors-de-combat at the crucial moment when it had been most needed, was not of a permanent description, and the assistance of a local garage soon remedied the petrol trouble and provided new tyres. Then Diggs joined in the search himself, connecting up with Temperley at the Boston police station and participating with him in the hopeless hunt. “Let’s get back to the spot where they set on us,” said Temperley, after they had made fruitless inquiries at a dozen cottages.

  “That ain’t likely to ’elp, sir,” replied Diggs, gloomily.

  “Nothing’s likely to help!” retorted Temperley. “But we can’t stand still, can we?”

  “That’s right,” nodded Diggs. “’Oo minds gettin’ wet?”

  They returned to the spot. A figure was lurking there. Temperley leapt from the car and dashed at it. The frightened face of Bob Smale stared back at him through the drizzle. “What are you doing here?” demanded Temperley, in angry disappointment.

  Smale shook his head vaguely. The implication was that he didn’t know.

  “Well—have you found anything?” asked Temperley, more quietly. Now Smale nodded.

  “What?”

  “Eh?”

  “What? What?”

  Smale advanced his mouth mysteriously.

  “Blue eye!” he whispered. “Angel’s, I reckon!”

  He unclosed a fist that had been held tight, displaying a small blue button. Temperley recognised it with a pang. “Where did you pick that up?” he demanded, almost fiercely, to hide another emotion.

  “Eh?”

  “Where did you pick it up?”

  “Oh!” Then Smale pointed. “There!”

  The spot he pointed to was a little way along the road. Temperley ran to the spot, and searched it.

  He found nothing more, but all at once he gave an exclamation. “Diggs!” he cried. “Where was your car, when you stopped?”

  Diggs indicated the place.

  “And this button was found behind it. That is, farther away from Boston. In the direction from which we had come.”

  “That’s right, sir.”

  “Then—they wouldn’t have gone back to Boston, would they?”

  “P’r’aps not, sir.”

  “Why, ‘perhaps not?’’’

  “I mean, sir, that if that there button come off in, well, a struggle like—”

  “Yes, yes, I know what you mean!” groaned Temperley. “She might have jumped out of the car, and been caught while trying to run away. And what happened outside the car would be no proof of the direction the car ultimately took.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m just snatching at straws, Diggs. But what else is there to snatch at?” He stared at the button, but its significance almost unnerved him, and he slipped it quickly into his pocket. “Where’s your map, Diggs. Let’s have another look at it.”

  “The local map, sir?” asked Diggs, for they had bought one.

  “No, no. The one of England. They’ve gone off the local map by now—damn them!”

  Diggs produced the map, and opened it. They gazed at it hopelessly.

  “Just look at the route they’ve travelled!” muttered Temperley. “First, London. That’s where the first Z murder took place. Look—just there.”

  He made a mark with his pencil. A vicious dig. Diggs looked, and thought, “Yus, that’s nice for my map, that is!”

  “And, second, Charlton. That’s where the second Z murder took place. See—just there!”

  He made another angry jab with his pencil. Diggs thought, “’Corse, wot’s a little thing like a map?”

  “And then, here’s the third place. Boston. London—Charlton—Boston.” Another jab. “A Z murder at each spot—a crimson Z left at each spot—London—Charlton…Boston…God!”

  He became motionless. For a moment, Diggs thought he was going to be sick. “Poor chap!” he muttered, getting ready to catch him. “I thort ’e wouldn’t larst!”

  But Richard Temperley was not swaying. He was like a statue. Like a statue staring at a map. With eyes galvanised. With mouth apart…

  “Gawd, now wot’s ’e doin’?” wondered Diggs.

  For the statue had sprung into sudden life, and the immobile pencil was now zigzagging across the map. From London, westwards, to Charlton…from Charlton, north-eastwards, to Boston…

  “Well, I can get another for ’arf-a-crown,” thought Diggs.

  …and from Boston…

  “’Ere, where’s ’e goin’ now?”

  …westwards, again, through Notttingham…Derby…

  “Whitchurch!” shouted Temperley, in a frenzy. “Whitchurch! The next will be Whitchurch! ”

  Diggs stared, and now his mouth opened, too. Across the map of England, in pencil, was a perfect letter Z.

  The lead was black, but to the men who stared at it, it looked crimson.

  A sudden exclamation from Bob Smale roused them. They had forgotten all about him. He was staring seraphically at a piece of torn paper which he had taken from his pocket. “Angel’s feather—that’s what it is—angel’s feather!” he babbled.

  He gazed skywards, as though expecting to see another piece of paper come fluttering down. But only rain descended
upon his upturned face.

  “What’s that?” demanded Temperley.

  “Angel’s feather,” repeated Smale. “Down there it was.” He pointed towards the spot where he had found the button. “But I kep’ it. You took the other thing! That’s not fair!”

  Temperley snatched it from him. On it was written, in a faint, hardly decipherable scrawl:

  “Rose Tree Cott…”

  Chapter XXXII

  On the Road to Whitchurch

  “What are you stopping for?” asked the man without arms.

  “Because I want a little chat,” answered the countryman who was driving him. “Don’t you think it’s about time we had one?”

  “There will be time enough for our little chat after we have paid our visit to Whitchurch,” said the man without arms.

  “Yes, but I’m not at all sure that we’re going to pay that visit to Whitchurch,” observed the countryman, while his right foot increased its pressure on the brake.

  The man without arms was sitting behind the countryman, and thus the countryman was spared the sight of an expression which the devil himself might have envied. By the time the countryman had brought the car to a standstill and had turned round in his seat, the expression was gone, and in its place was an expressionless blank.

  “Do you realise,” said the countryman, “that this is the first opportunity we’ve had for a proper talk since we separated in London yesterday morning?”

  “Go on,” replied the man without arms.

  “I’m going on,” nodded the countryman. “I suppose, by the way, there’s no chance that our passenger will wake up?”

  The man without arms turned his expressionless face for an instant towards the insensible girl at his side. Then he turned back to the countryman, and responded,

  “There is not the slightest chance that she will wake up.”

  “Well, see that she doesn’t,” frowned the countryman. “She’s one of the things I want to talk about.”

  “Oh! You are becoming sentimental?”

  “God, no! My sole affection just now is for my own skin, thank you. And I’m not satisfied that this Whitchurch trip is going to be good for it.”