The Moving Toyshop

by Edmund Crispin

  ‘All right.’ Fen tapped the ash from his cigarette into a convenient saucer. ‘Now let’s hear precisely what happened.’

  Miss Winkworth was sullen. ‘I’m not going to tell any more. You can’t make me.’

  ‘No? In that case, we’ll go along to the police. They’ll make you, all right.’

  ‘I’ve got my rights – ’

  ‘A criminal has no rights in any sane society.’ Cadogan had never known Fen so harsh before; it was a new and unfamiliar aspect of his character. Or was it merely an expedient pose? ‘Do you think that after your filthy little conspiracy to murder a deaf, helpless woman anyone is going to trouble himself about your rights? You’ll do better to keep out of the way – and not put them to the test.’

  Miss Winkworth put her handkerchief to her pudgy nose and blew. ‘We didn’t mean to murder her,’ she said.

  ‘One of you did.’

  ‘It wasn’t me, I tell you!’ The woman raised her voice, so that the proprietor of the café stared.

  ‘I’ll be the judge of that,’ said Fen. ‘Talk more quietly if you don’t want the whole world to know about it.’

  ‘I – I – You won’t let me get into trouble, will you? I didn’t mean any harm. We weren’t going to hurt her.’ The voice was a small, poisoned whine. ‘I – I think it was about a quarter past ten when we finished arranging the shop. Then we all went upstairs. Mr Rosseter and Mold and me went into one of the back rooms, and the man called Berlin stayed out to meet the old woman. He’d got bandages round his face, so he wouldn’t be recognized again. Mr Rosseter was in charge of everything – he said he’d tell us what to do and how to do it. We were paying him money to help us.’

  In memory, Cadogan was back in that dark, ugly little place; the linoleum-floored passage with the rickety table where he had left his torch, the two bedrooms at the back, the two sitting-rooms at the front; steep, narrow, uncarpeted stairs; the smell of dust and the gritty feel of it on the fingertips; the curtained windows, the cheap sideboard and leather armchairs; the sticky warmth and the faint smell of blood and the blue, puffy face of the body on the floor …

  ‘Then the girl brought in the woman and went away again – or so we thought. We heard the man called Berlin talking to the woman for a bit, and then he came back to us. Then Mr Rosseter said he’d need to talk to the woman, and we must wait. I thought that was funny, because he wasn’t wearing a mask, but I didn’t say anything at the time. Before he went out he told us we’d better separate and wait in different rooms. The man called Mold asked why – he’d been drinking and he was aggressive – but the other one told him to be quiet and do what he was told; he said he’d discussed the whole thing with Mr Rosseter, and it was essential to the plan. I thought Mr Rosseter looked a bit surprised at that, but he nodded. Berlin went into the other room at the front, and I stayed where I was, and Mold went into the second bedroom. Then after a while Berlin came in and joined me, and a bit later Mr Rosseter – ’

  ‘Just a moment,’ Fen interposed. ‘Where was Rosseter all this time?’

  ‘He was with the woman. I saw him go in.’

  ‘Was she alive when he came out?’

  ‘Yes. I heard her voice, saying something to him as he closed the door.’

  ‘Did anyone else go in while he was there?’

  ‘No. I had the door open and I could see.’

  ‘And when he left he came straight back to your room?’

  ‘That’s right. He told Berlin and me it was going to be a job to frighten her, and he and Berlin argued for a bit about something, and I said if they didn’t shut the door she’d hear them. So they shut it.’

  ‘Then Sharman must have murdered her,’ Cadogan interposed.

  ‘Hold on a moment,’ Fen said. ‘What were they arguing about?’

  ‘It was something legal, about witnessing and so on. I didn’t understand it. Then about five minutes after, the other man – Mold – came in and said he thought there was someone prowling round the shop, and we’d better keep quiet for a bit, and we did. I wondered if the woman wouldn’t get away in the meantime, but Mr Rosseter whispered it was all right, because she wasn’t frightened yet and that he’d told her he had some papers to prepare which might take a certain time. Well, we stayed quiet for quite a time, and I remembered towards the end of it hearing one of the town clocks strike a quarter to twelve. Finally, Mr Rosseter and Berlin began arguing again, and said it was all a false alarm, and Mr Rosseter gave the man Mold a gun and a legal paper and told him to go and get on with it.’

  ‘Just a minute. You’d all been together in that room from the time Mold came in and told you someone was prowling around?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No one left it for even a moment?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How long would you say you all waited there?’

  ‘About twenty minutes.’

  ‘All right. Go on.’

  ‘This man Mold seemed to be the one they’d chosen to do the job. He said he’d call us in when we were needed, and then he went away. But after about a minute he came back and said there was no light in the room where the woman was. Someone had taken the bulb out. He thought the woman had gone, and he was groping about looking for a candle he knew was there when he fell over her, lying on the floor. We went back there with a torch and she was dead, all puffy with a string tied round her neck. The man called Berlin said he was a doctor, and bent down to look at her. Mr Rosseter seemed all yellow and frightened. He said someone from outside must have done it, and we’d better look in the shop downstairs. Just as we were going down, we saw a girl who was hiding there. Mr Rosseter showed her the body, and said something to her which frightened her, and sent her away. We didn’t like that, but he said we were masked, so she wouldn’t recognize us again, and she’d keep quiet for her own good. Berlin got up from the body and looked at us queerly and said suddenly: “No one here did this.” Mr Rosseter said: “Don’t be a damned fool. Who else could have done it? You’ll all be suspected if it ever comes out.” Then Mold said: “We’ve got to keep it quiet,” and I agreed. It was then they decided to draw lots about who should get rid of the body.’

  Abruptly, the woman stopped. The recital had been, physically, a strain, but Cadogan saw no sign of any moral appreciation of the acts she had been recounting. She talked about murder as she might have talked about the weather – being far too selfish, thick-skinned, and unimaginative to see the implications either of that final, irrevocable act or of her own position.

  ‘We get nearer the heart of things,’ said Fen dreamily. ‘Personnel: Mold (equals our Mr Sharman), Berlin (the doctor, unidentified), Leeds (this creature here), Ryde (Sally), and West – where does the enigmatical West come into it, I wonder? Did he claim his inheritance? Rosseter said nothing about him. The impression one gets is that there was a great deal of fumbling and failure all round – except in one instance, of course. God knows what nonsense Rosseter told Sharman and the doctor, or what their precious plan was; it’s of no importance now, anyway. I suppose it doesn’t really matter, either, how Rosseter proposed to contrive his murder and frame-up; that went astray, too. The real point is not who intended to kill the woman, but who did. I confess I shall be interested to discover what the doctor meant when he said no one there could have done it – it links up with Rosseter’s talk about an impossible murder.’ He turned again to the woman, who was sniffing at a small yellow bottle of sal volatile; Cadogan noticed that her finger-nails were ringed with dirt. ‘Would it have been possible for anyone to have been hiding in the flat or the shop before you arrived?’

  ‘No. It was locked, and, anyway, we had a good look round.’

  ‘Could anyone have got through the window of the room Miss Tardy was in?’

  ‘No, it was nailed up. They all were. I haven’t used the flat for a year.’

  ‘Which lets West out,’ said Fen ‘If anyone had come through the shop Sally would have said, and there’s no other way up to the fl
at except by the staircase from the shop, is there?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No fire-escape, for instance?’

  ‘No. It’s my belief,’ said the woman suddenly, ‘that that girl did it.’

  ‘As far as we’ve got at present, it’s quite possible,’ Fen admitted. ‘Except,’ he added to Cadogan, ‘that I don’t think she’d have been so ready to tell us things if she had. A bluff like that would have needed colossal nerve, and in any case it wasn’t necessary for her to say anything at all. We shall see.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Five-twenty – we must go. I want to make sure Sally’s all right, and then go on to the “Mace and Sceptre” to wait for a message from Mr Hoskins. We shall have to return by devious routes; if that constable’s done his job, half the police of Oxford will be running about looking for us by now.’ He stood up.

  ‘Listen,’ said the woman urgently. ‘You’ll keep my name out of it, won’t you? Won’t you?’

  ‘Good heavens, no,’ said Fen, whose habitual cheerfulness seemed to be restored. ‘Your evidence is far too important. You never really thought I should, did you?’

  ‘You bastard,’ she said. ‘You bloody bastard.’

  ‘Language,’ said Fen benevolently. ‘Language. Don’t try to leave Oxford, by the way; you’ll only be caught. Good afternoon.’

  ‘Listen to me – ’

  ‘Good afternoon to you.’

  10. The Episode of the Interrupted Seminar

  The sun’s rays no longer shone directly into the room at New College; it was cool and pleasant. The Uccello Martyrdom which hung over the fireplace was almost in shadow. First editions were disposed without ostentation on the shelves. The armchairs were deep and comfortable, each attended by an immense brass ashtray, and on the mahogany sideboard decanters and glasses winked. The owner of the room, Mr Adrian Barnaby, reclined at his ease, holding a glass of madeira, eating iced cake, and listening with distaste to the conversation of the other undergraduates who infested his room. These Restoration tea-and-madeira parties, he reflected, would be all very well if they did not involve people coming in only imperfectly washed and dressed after their exertions on the river; and now he came to examine the matter, there were a number of people who, he was sure, he had not invited; and for the matter of that, never even seen before. A faint movement of indignation stirred within him. His eyes lighting on a hairy youth who stood nearby, wolfing buttered scones, he leaned forward with the air of one about to impart a confidence and said:

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Oh, that’s all right, you know,’ said the youth. ‘I came with Rabbit, you know. He said you wouldn’t mind.’

  ‘Rabbit?’ Mr Barnaby was unenlightened.

  ‘Yes. Look. That chap over there, with the tousled hair.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Mr Barnaby, who could summon up no recollection of Rabbit in any context.

  ‘I say, I hope it’s all right, you know,’ said the hairy youth. ‘Barging in, and all that.’

  ‘Of course,’ Mr Barnaby replied. ‘You’re most welcome.’

  ‘Delicious sherry this is.’ The youth indicated his glass of madeira. Mr Barnaby smiled beneficently at him as he moved off.

  Another young man, almost as elegant as Mr Barnaby himself, approached his host. ‘Adrian,’ he said, ‘who are all these awful people? They’re talking about rowing.’

  ‘My dear Charles, I know: bumps and things. Like a phrenologist … I shall really have to sport my oak, or we shall have the whole rowing tribe in here. Look!’ Mr Barnaby squeaked, sitting up suddenly. ‘There’s another of them coming in now.’

  But a moment after he relapsed into smiles, for the newcomer was, in fact, Mr Hoskins, who had never been known to indulge in any sport save the most ancient of them all. He elbowed his unwieldy form apologetically through the chattering groups and confronted Mr Barnaby with a transcient smile on his melancholy face.

  ‘My dear Anthony, how delightful to see you,’ said Mr Barnaby with pleasure. ‘I’m sorry there are all these frightful gymnasts about, but they simply invited themselves. What will you have to drink?’

  ‘What is that that Charles is drinking?’

  ‘Oh ether and milk, or some terrible chemical affair of that sort. But you know Charles. The poor dear cannot be made to realize that the romantic decadence is over. He still writes verses about affreuses juives and things. How about some madeira?’

  When Mr Hoskins’s madeira had been brought: ‘Adrian,’ he said. ‘Do you know anything about the local doctors?’

  ‘Good heavens, no – you’re not ill, are you, Anthony?’

  ‘No, perfectly fit. I’m trying to identify a man for Fen.’

  ‘For Fen …? I know: someone has committed some ghastly crime.’ Mr Barnaby enunciated the words with relish. ‘But I go to a doctor in London when I’m unwell. Now, I wonder who … Of course. Gower.’

  ‘Gower?’

  ‘A hypochondriac Welshman, my dear Anthony, in Jesus. But he has lodgings in Holywell only a few yards away from here. He’s seen every doctor within mues. We might go to him now if you liked. I shall be only too glad to escape from this party.’

  ‘It’s very good of you.’

  ‘Nonsense. I’m being quite selfish and egotistical. Come along, now. Finish your madeira first.’

  They made their way out, Mr Barnaby uttering unnecessary apologies and excuses as they went. The second gate of the college brought them into Holywell, and after a very short walk, during which Mr Barnaby chattered incessantly, they came to Mr Gower’s lodging. The bedroom in which Mr Gower was found reclining gave evidence of hypochondria on a scale hardly conceivable since the days of Molière. It was thronged with bottles, close-stools, medicine glasses, and throat sprays; the tightly-closed windows made it insufferably hot, and the curtains were drawn so as to admit only the minimum of light. It was, however, possible to see that Mr Gower’s appearance was almost abnormally healthy.

  ‘Look you, I am ill, now,’ Mr Gower remarked as they entered the room. ‘I am not needing visitors when I am trying to preak a fever.’

  ‘My dear, you look too wasted,’ said Mr Barnaby. A phantom expression of pleasure appeared on Mr Gower’s face. ‘I’m sure you might Pass Beyond at any moment. This is Mr Hoskins, whom I’ve brought to see you.’

  ‘We oughtn’t to be disturbing you, in your condition,’ said Mr Hoskins funereally. Mr Gower extended a limp hand from the bedclothes for him to shake.

  ‘My dear Teithryn, I bought you some fruit,’ said Mr Barnaby, whose capacity for improvisation was considerable, ‘but in a moment’s absent-mindedness, I ate it myself.’

  ‘Fruit is forbidden me, look you,’ said Mr Gower. ‘But I thank you for your kind thought. How can a poor invalid help you, now?’

  ‘Do you know of an Oxford doctor,’ Mr Hoskins asked, who is abnormally thin?’

  ‘Oh, it is doctors, is it? They are all charlatans, look you. I know them all. Their accounts are pigger than their success, I assure you. I have no illusions about these doctors. The man you speak of is one of the worst – purgation is his remedy for everything. I do not advise you to go to him.’

  ‘What is he called?’

  ‘His name is Havering – Dr Havering, and he is a heart specialist. But do not take yourself to him, now. He is no good. I am tiring myself with talking, look you.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Mr Hoskins soothingly. ‘We’ll leave you. Havering, was it?’

  ‘You poor, poor thing,’ said Mr Barnaby. ‘You must try to sleep. I’ll tell your landlady that no one is to disturb you.’

  ‘Please replace the wedges in the door when you leave,’ said Mr Gower. ‘When it rattles, it goes through and through my head.’ He turned over in bed to indicate that the interview was now at an end and Mr Hoskins and Mr Barnaby departed.

  ‘Dear Gower,’ said the latter when they were in the street again. ‘He seems absolutely to thrive on these awful potions and philtres. But you got what you wanted, didn’t you, Ant
hony?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mr Hoskins, standing irresolute. ‘I think I’d better go and see this Havering man. But I want some people with me. He may turn nasty.’

  ‘Oh, dear, how frightening,’ Mr Barnaby responded dutifully, but without much evidence of alarm. ‘You are brave, Anthony. Let me come with you.’

  ‘All right. And we might collect some of that gang in your room.’

  ‘Oh, must we?’ Mr Barnaby seemed disappointed. ‘Still, I suppose it’s brawn that counts in these murderous affairs. We’ll look up the man’s address in the telephone book, and then collect some others. They’ll think it’s a kind of rag, my dear. What fun. I know some quite formidable men.’

  For once Mr Barnaby did not prove to be exaggerating; he did know some formidable men. They were assembled by a means peculiar to Oxford – vague promises of excitement accompanied by more definite promises of drink. Mr Barnaby proved an excellent impresario – ‘like a recruit-officer, my dear Anthony, too Farquhar’ – full of lurid, unlikely detail, invented at high speed. When about twelve more or less interested and intoxicated people had been got together, Mr Hoskins addressed them collectively with dark allusions to murder and young women in distress, and they all cheered. Dr Havering was discovered to live near the Radcliffe Infirmary in the Woodstock Road, and thither, somewhat heartened by Mr Barnaby’s madeira, the rout proceeded to make its way. Unaware of the crisis that was approaching, Dr Havering sat alone in his consulting-room and stared out of the window.

  Fen and Cadogan made their way back to St Christopher’s without let or hindrance. It seemed likely that the search for Cadogan had been temporarily abandoned, and it was possible that the constable whom they had informed of Mr Rosseter’s murder had not succeeded in identifying them yet. In any case, the porter, when they reached the College, had no further intrusions to report.

  ‘Wilkes and Sally are probably playing strip rummy by now,’ said Fen, as they mounted the stairs to his room; then, more seriously: ‘I hope they’re all right.’

  They were, though Sally showed a marked inclination to worry about her afternoon’s absence from the shop. Wilkes had found Fen’s Whisky, and was more or less asleep; he was awakened, however, by the violent ringing of the telephone. Fen answered it; the voice of the Chief Constable, charged with indignation, came over the wire.