Who Pays the Piper?

by Patricia Wentworth

  “Dale didn’t commit suicide,” said Bill Carrick.

  Mrs. O’Hara looked pained.

  “My dear Bill, of course he did.”

  “I’m afraid he didn’t. He was murdered.”

  Mrs. O’Hara shook her head.

  “The Press is so dreadfully sensational nowadays. I shall open the door to no one while you are out. In fact I should not do so in any case, as I shall be resting.”

  Susan sat back in her chair and took no part. Bill said with restrained violence,

  “It isn’t the Press—it’s the police. It’s the medical evidence. He couldn’t possibly have committed suicide.”

  “My dear Bill, spare me! I prefer to think that he committed suicide. That is quite bad enough without having to believe that we have a murderer in our midst. And now I think I will go up and sit with Cathy for half an hour before I have my rest.”

  Bill picked up the handkerchief she had dropped, shut the door after her, and groaned.

  “She prefers to think he committed suicide, so he did. What a mind! No, that’s wrong—she hasn’t got a mind. If she wants anything, it’s that way as far as she’s concerned. Last, lingering, horrible results of the feudal system. You see, in their heyday, if they wanted anything they could just make it so. And it went to their heads. When the power was gone they put up a social camouflage and pretended they’d still got it. Would your Uncle James have admitted to a living soul that he was broke to the wide, and that he’d nothing to leave but debts and mortgages? Did he tell his own sister? You know he didn’t. He preferred to believe that it wasn’t true, just as Aunt Milly prefers to believe there hasn’t been a murder. They just can’t bring themselves to believe that they haven’t the power to control events.”

  Susan raised her eyes with a lost look.

  “I wish I could pretend, Bill,” she said.

  CHAPTER XXIII

  Frank Abbott opened the rusty iron gate of 17 Gladstone Villas and walked up a narrow path whose red and blue tiles were in the last stages of dirt and dilapidation. The little square patch of front garden contained a decayed-looking holly tree and half a dozen bushes of golden privet. These had perhaps been intended to form a hedge, but it was obviously years since they had been clipped.

  Gladstone Villas lie on the lower side of Ledlington Market Square, a neighbourhood not highly esteemed. No. 17 was inhabited by Mrs. Clancy, who let to the less affluent members of theatrical touring companies. Enquiries at the Theatre Royal had brought Abbott to her door. He rang a bell whose brass had long forgotten how to shine, and had to ring it again. He was just going to try his luck at the back door, when the sound of slow advancing footsteps halted him and the door swung in. Mrs. Clancy stood revealed, a vast and shapeless person with a sacking apron tied on over an old red flannel dressing-gown. Her face streamed with heat, and her wild grey hair stood out all round it in tangles which rather reminded him of the privet. Out of all this wreck a pair of very bright blue eyes twinkled at him.

  “Is it Miss de Lisle? Well then, she’ll be in her dis-habill like meself, and neither of us expecting a foine young man. Wait you a minute.” She stepped back to a dark ascending stair and called up it in a rich, sonorous voice, “Miss de Lisle me dear, here’s a visitor for ye. Will you be after seeing him?”

  There was some faint response which Abbott did not catch. He thought a door had opened. Mrs. Clancy swung round on him.

  “Up with ye—and it’s the second door on the left.”

  The second door on the left was standing open. Abbott came to it, and was aware of Miss de Lisle in the middle of the room. He said, “May I come in?” and saw her big black eyes change from apprehension to surprise. She nodded.

  “Who are you? What do you want?”

  Abbott shut the door. The room was a bed-sitting-room, ill furnished, ill kept, and at the moment littered with Miss de Lisle’s possessions—stockings and an old pair of tights on the bed rail; a crushed mass of crimson satin slipping to the floor; across the bed the old black cloth coat and the hat with the scarlet feather in which she had come to King’s Bourne—as described by Raby; on the pillow shoes very down at heel, a spangled scarf, a disintegrating pair of stays, a moulting feather wrap.

  His eyes came back to the owner of this sordid hotchpotch. Like Mrs. Clancy she wore a dressing-gown. It had once been costly. The silk was frayed and stained. Something dark had been spilt all down the front. The vivid orange colour still flattered the dark skin, the great eyes, and the falling masses of black hair. On the road Cora de Lisle might come very near to looking like a tramp, but in this strange garish garment she was a handsome, haggard creature who must once have been beautiful. She stood clutching her wrap about her and swaying on her feet. The chair from which she had risen was drawn up to a small, hot fire. On a gimcrack table in the angle stood a bottle of brandy and a tumbler.

  “What do you want?” said Miss de Lisle.

  Frank Abbott came forward.

  She looked at the card he offered her and said in a stumbling voice,

  “What’s all this? I’ve not done anything.” Then, with a sudden flare of anger, “I haven’t done anything! He can’t put the police on me! I tell you he gave it to me! And what’s that got to do with the police? I don’t wonder you’re called busies—busy with everybody else’s business, and no more use than a sick headache if you lose your purse or have your pocket picked! I tell you he——” She broke off suddenly and said in a different tone, “What do you want?”

  Frank Abbott used his pleasantest voice.

  “I just want to ask you a few questions. Even if you did lose a purse and we were too stupid to find it for you, I’m quite sure you would do all you could to help the police. We do our best, you know, and people are mostly very kind about helping us. But won’t you sit down? I don’t want to keep you standing.”

  She went back to her chair, arranging her draperies, thrusting out a foot in an old tinsel slipper, laying her left hand along the arm of the chair to display a large gaudy ring which caught the light and turned it ruby-red. She threw back her head against a crimson cushion and said,

  “If you’ve come from Lucas, I haven’t got anything to say to you. He gave me the money freely, and there’s an end of it.”

  “The fifty-pound note, Miss de Lisle?”

  She laughed.

  “Is he going to say I stole it? He’d better not try that on with me! He gave it me, I tell you, and wrote on the back so I could change it. And why shouldn’t he? Isn’t he rolling in money—and don’t I deserve something for putting up with him for five years?” She laughed on a deep, harsh note. “I could tell his Miss Susan Lenox a thing or two, and see if she’d marry him then.”

  Abbott was leaning against the mantelpiece. His elbow had to find room between a broken china candlestick and a bright blue vase encrusted with gilding. He said quietly,

  “When did you see Mr. Dale last?”

  She threw him an exasperated look.

  “What are you trying to do—trip me up and then make out I’ve said a lot of things that never entered my head?”

  “No, I’m not trying to trip you up. I’m only asking you when you last saw Mr. Dale, and you needn’t answer if you don’t want to.”

  Exasperation changed to suspicion.

  “Who says I don’t want to answer? I’m sure I’ve got nothing to hide—not like some people I could name that’d be in Queer Street if I was to open my mouth. Well, what do you want to know?”

  “Just when you last saw Mr. Dale.”

  She pushed back her hair with the hand that wore the ring.

  “We were here for the week. Thursday I went over and he was out, or said he was—and mind you he knew I was coming, because I wrote. And all I saw was a girl that looked as if she thought I was going to bite her—Miss Cathleen O’Hara. And you’d expect a girl with a name like that to have a bit more spirit. Monday I went over again—that was yesterday. I had to push my way past the butler, or I wouldn�
��t have got in then. I meant to see Lucas if I had to wait all night.”

  “What time was this?”

  She stared.

  “I got the bus to the village—got in about five, if you want to know, and had something at the Crown and Magpie just to get my courage up—that’s a queer sort of a name, isn’t it? I suppose it might have been half past five when I got up to the house.”

  “Wasn’t that going to make you a bit late for the theatre if you were playing last night?”

  She looked away.

  “Well then, I wasn’t. If you must know, I’d got the sack. The show had cleared out. That’s why I had to see Lucas.”

  “And you saw him, and he gave you a fifty-pound note?”

  Her look came back, angry and direct.

  “Any business of yours if he did?”

  “Well, I’m afraid it is. When did you leave Mr. Dale?”

  She sat up with a hand on either arm of the chair.

  “Look here, what’s all this? Do you keep your watch in your hand all the time you go visiting? Because I don’t, and I never heard of anyone else that did either.”

  “I just thought you might have some idea,” said Abbott mildly.

  She seemed mollified.

  “I suppose I was there for the best part of twenty minutes. I’d a bus to catch, and I know I had to hurry.”

  “The six o’clock bus from the Crown and Magpie?”

  “That would be it.”

  “And did you catch it?”

  She turned a full, bold stare upon him.

  “Trying to catch me out, dear? Well then, you can’t? I could have caught it if I’d wanted to. But I didn’t want to—see? And why? Because a nice young man came along with his car and gave me a lift. And you can put that in your pipe and smoke it, Mr. Busy from Scotland Yard!”

  “You didn’t go back to King’s Bourne, did you?”

  Her eyes brightened uneasily.

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Are you quite sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure. What’d I go back for? I’d got my fifty pounds, hadn’t I?”

  “Had you?”

  The dark colour rushed into her face. He thought of Cleopatra and Semiramis.

  “What do you mean? What do you mean? What do you mean?” Her voice ran up to a scream and broke. She got to her feet and stood there shaking—was it with rage? “What’s all this about? You’ll tell me what you mean or you’ll get out! Do you hear?”

  Frank Abbott straightened up.

  “I’ve been listening with the greatest interest, Miss de Lisle. Now I’m going to ask you to listen to me. You got into Netherbourne at about five o’clock, and you went into the Crown and Magpie and had a double brandy.”

  “And what if I did? I told you, didn’t I?”

  Abbott nodded.

  “You did—and now I’m telling you. You went up to King’s Bourne and had your talk with Mr. Dale, and came away at about ten minutes to six. And then you went back to the Crown and Magpie and had another double brandy, and missed the bus. You didn’t tell me that bit—did you?”

  She looked darkly sullen.

  “I told you I missed the bus.”

  Frank Abbott said, “Well——” and saw her colour rise. She bit her lip and did not speak. He thought, “Why doesn’t she throw me out—why hasn’t she thrown me out long ago? She’s angry all right, but she’s less angry than afraid. She’s dropped the pretence that I’ve come from Dale. I think she knows he’s dead. If the news reached her in any ordinary way, why should she pretend she doesn’t know? If she really doesn’t know, why should she have answered a single one of my questions—unless the fifty pounds was blackmail? It might be that. I think she knows he’s dead, and knows it in a way that she can’t or won’t own up to. She knows something—something——” He let the silence go on until the room was heavy with it. Then he said so quietly that the silence broke without jarring.

  “When you came out of the Crown and Magpie, which way did you go?”

  She frowned and tapped with her foot on the floor.

  “Come, Miss de Lisle, the landlord remembers your coming in at five o’clock, and again at just after six. It’s all downhill from King’s Bourne, so it didn’t take you so long to come back as it took you to go. And you had your double brandy and ‘took it off quick and out again’, and he didn’t see which way you went. The bus was gone when you got there. Now what did you do when you left the Crown and Magpie?”

  She looked down at her tapping foot.

  “I told you I got a lift.”

  “What sort of car was it, Miss de Lisle?”

  He got an angry stare.

  “I don’t know one from another.”

  He smiled.

  “Big car—little car—tourer—sports model? Red—blue—green—black—grey?”

  She said with a kind of goaded energy,

  “It was dark. Do you think I can see in the dark? I didn’t give a damn what sort of car it was. I wanted to get back here.”

  “Very natural. But you haven’t told me which way you turned when you came out of the Crown and Magpie.”

  The air became charged with furious suspicion. He could almost see her thinking, “Perhaps someone saw me—perhaps they didn’t. Better be on the safe side.” She said,

  “I turned to the right.”

  “To go back to King’s Bourne?”

  “No!” She almost shouted the word at him.

  “Well, you wouldn’t get to Ledlington that way—would you? Wrong direction, I’m afraid.”

  “Don’t you ever take a wrong turning in a place you don’t know?”

  “I might after two double brandies.”

  Cora de Lisle whirled round, snatched the large bright blue vase from the mantelpiece, and hurled it at his head. That it smashed against the wall instead of in his face was due to quickness of eye and some proficiency in boxing. He side-stepped neatly and received with calm the flood of vituperation which followed the vase. When angry tears supervened he said,

  “That was unpardonable of me. I really do apologize. Why did you go back to King’s Bourne, Miss de Lisle?”

  She stopped midway in a sob and glared at him.

  “I didn’t, I tell you—I didn’t! Are you trying to make out that it was me——” The loud voice failed. The hand with the ring came up across her mouth. She bit upon the knuckles. Her eyes were sick with fear.

  There was a jagged pause.

  “Yes?” said Frank Abbott. “You were going to say——”

  “I wasn’t.” The words came in a desperate whisper.

  “I think you were. I think you knew last night that Lucas Dale had been shot.”

  Her hand fell from her lips. The knuckles were bleeding.

  “I—didn’t——”

  He thought, “She did know it. It’s no surprise—no shock.” He said,

  “When did you hear?”

  “I don’t know—someone told me——”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t—know——”

  “You knew last night—you knew when you were at King’s Bourne. If you shot him—I won’t ask you to incriminate yourself. But if you didn’t—if you didn’t—don’t you see how important your evidence is going to be?”

  Her face went grey. She stood back.

  “You listen to me, young man. What had I got to shoot Lucas for? If I’d been that sort I’d have shot him fifteen years ago, not now. I was married to him for five years. If I’d been the killing sort I’d have killed him then. I didn’t. I ran away from him, and he’d the nerve to divorce me—him! And all I wanted was to get quit of him. I haven’t seen him since, and I wouldn’t have seen him now, only I’m done—finished—out. Can’t keep my jobs—can’t get them—can’t stand it all like I used to. And he’d got all that money. Well, I touched him for fifty pounds, and I’d have gone on touching him. If he’d married his Miss Susan Lenox, it would have paid him to keep me quiet—see? Now perhaps yo
u can tell me why I should shoot Lucas.”

  Abbott walked over to the window. He stood looking down at the untidy yellow privet. Then he turned round and said,

  “It would have been very stupid. People are stupid sometimes. By the way, Miss de Lisle, I see this was a variety show you were with. They left on Sunday. What sort of turn did you put on?”

  She stared without answering.

  “Are you going to tell me?” He paused. “Is there any reason why you shouldn’t tell me? … Well, perhaps I can tell you. I think you were billed as Miss Cora de Lisle, the famous female sharpshooter. That’s right, isn’t it?”

  CHAPTER XXIV

  Bill Carrick and Susan Lenox drove in the pale sunlight. It had been fine all the morning. It was fine still, but there was an east wind blowing and no warmth anywhere. They went by crooked lanes between bare hedgerows, and then up through a cutting, where tree roots propped the banks, to an open heathy common. Right in the middle of it Bill drove off the road on to a flat sandy place and stopped the car. A solitary motor-bicycle went by and disappeared behind a clump of rowans and gorse bushes a couple of hundred yards away. Susan watched it out of sight. She frowned a little and said,

  “He’s been behind us all the way.”

  Bill said, “Yes.”

  She looked at him with startled eyes.

  “I can’t hear his engine.”

  Bill said, “No—he’s stopped.” Then he laughed. “I wonder what he would have done if there hadn’t been a clump of trees.”

  “Do you mean he’s following us? Bill!”

  He sat round against the side of the car and faced her.

  “Of course he is. I expect he’s been told to be discreet. He won’t do anything more than follow us unless he thinks I’m going to do a bunk. It must be very reassuring for him to see us sitting here in a nice open place like this—very calming. And as he’s well out of earshot, we can afford to be calm about it too.”

  “You mean he’s a policeman?”

  “Undoubtedly. Look here, Susan, we’ve got to face this. I’m under suspicion. Old Lamb isn’t going to risk my cutting loose. Of course I’d be a fool to do it, but if I’d really shot Dale I expect I should be so rattled by now that I might be ready for any fool trick. Ever since he saw us this morning I’ve been wondering why he hasn’t had me arrested, but now I think it’s because he’s got me on a string and if I bolt I’ll be giving myself away.”