by Sapper
The morning wore on slowly. Midday came, and there was still no sign of Miss Verney or Scott, though an increasing number of cars had passed the gate on the way to Temple Tower. And then, at half-past twelve, the Inspector looked in, ostensibly to see Drummond, but in reality to quench his thirst.
“Reporters like flies,” he said. “And there’s one – probably a photographer – circling over the house in an aeroplane. Look – there he is now.”
I glanced up: sure enough there was a machine passing backwards and forwards over Temple Tower.
“You’ve found out nothing more, I suppose?” I asked him.
“Nothing, sir,” he said. “I can’t say that I hold with those newspaper chaps myself, but I’m bound to admit that I think that red-haired young fellow has got it right this time. That is, as far as the actual murders are concerned. The man Vandali did them, and then hanged himself. But as to why, he doesn’t know any more than I do. Tomorrow, I think, should help us a little there.”
“At the inquest, you mean?” I said.
“That’s right, sir – at the inquest. That man Granger will have to talk then. I’ve been up there this morning, but he says he is sick and can’t see anyone.”
“By the way,” I said casually, “these Vandalis had a chauffeur, didn’t they?”
He nodded, and drained his glass.
“I’ve examined him already,” he said, “but he can’t tell me anything. Speaks very little English. From what he says he has only been with them about a month, and knows nothing about them at all. Secretive sort of chap: I wouldn’t be surprised if his past was a bit hectic. But as far as this show is concerned, he doesn’t come into it. He has no idea whatever as to why they went to Temple Tower: didn’t even know they had been there, in fact. No, sir, Granger is the man. Even though he had nothing to do with the actual murders, he knows why they were committed.”
He took his leave, and I sat on thinking idly. The aeroplane had finished its manoeuvres over Temple Tower, and was making off in the direction of Lympne: presumably the photographs had been taken. And then, happening to glance at my watch, I found, to my surprise, it was one o’clock.
“Will you have lunch now, sir, or will you wait?” said Denny, coming out of the dining-room. “Mr Scott has just returned.”
“Hasn’t Miss Verney come?” I cried.
“She has not,” said Freckles, appearing on the scene. “I did my level best to persuade her, but when Pat sticks her toes in she’s like a mule.”
“We’ll have lunch, Denny,” I said. “Now what has happened?”
“After the devil of a lot of fuss we managed to get in,” he began. “And, incidentally, it’s lucky we went when we did: when I left the place, ten minutes ago, a crowd of some fifty people hailed me as the murderer. However, we got in all right, and Pat went straight into the house while I oozed round the grounds. There was no difficulty whatever about spotting the tree. It is a big oak standing by itself in a bit of a clearing, and you couldn’t possibly fail to get it, even at night.”
“Did you find the entrance to the passage?” I asked.
“I can’t say I did,” he said. “To tell you the truth I wasn’t quite certain which way North was. I had a vague dip, but the only thing I saw was a rabbit scrape.”
“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “We’ll get it tonight by the Pole Star. Go on.”
“Well, I sat about the grounds for over two hours, when Pat suddenly appeared. And, according to her, the bloke was entrenched in his room absolutely gnawing the blotting-paper with fright. Worse, far worse, apparently, than he’s been before. Kept on saying ‘He can’t get in: he can’t get in,’ and wanting to know if they could force him to go to the inquest if he was ill. In fact, she seemed almost sorry for him, though I pointed out to her that, from what we’d heard, he must be a pretty ungodly maggot. Still, you know what women are – queer fish.”
I nodded gravely.
“Is that why she is staying with him?” I asked.
“Not on your life,” he said, lowering his voice mysteriously. “The old bean thinks she is well on the road to spotting some more cubby holes. Secret hiding-places,” he explained kindly, as he saw my look of bewilderment, “where he has hidden the rest of the stuff. She’s got one – the panel by the fireplace – already, and she strongly suspects the waste pipe in the bathroom to be another. Apparently he gave tongue like a wounded hare on hearing the water turned on, but that was probably due to fright at the thought of washing. However, she thinks, to cut the thing short, that if she does a bit of nosing about this afternoon she might find out some pretty useful information. I thought it a bit risky myself, but she said that that was what Matthews had said she ought to do. And so I pushed off, and trickled back here. Though I don’t like the idea much – leaving her practically alone in a house with a bloke crazy with fear.”
Undoubtedly the Toad was in an awkward position. A criminal himself, with hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of stolen stuff in his possession, he dared not avail himself of police protection. Nor was he in a position to give the police any information as to the real terror that was hanging over him – le Bossu – for the very good reason that, unlike us, he didn’t know who le Bossu was. He could give no description of him. And it struck me that if ever there was an example of evil bringing its own retribution, that was it. All these years, flying from hiding-place to hiding-place, in mortal terror of an unknown man. What a life! Le Rossignol, at any rate, he knew by sight, but any stranger might have been le Bossu. And then, when at last he had got his loot over from France, to be run to earth by both of them, unable to do anything save sit and wait behind his barricades.
“I wonder if he knows about the secret passage?” I said thoughtfully.
But to that question there was no answer: all that we could arrive at was that he had said nothing about it to Miss Verney. Which, of course, proved nothing at all.
The afternoon dragged on slowly until at about seven o’clock Hugh returned, and I lost no time in putting my theory in front of him.
“I haven’t said anything to Scott,” I told him. “But, if your idea is right, and that plan was left there on purpose, I don’t see any other solution that fits. He wants to get us bunched, and then out us.”
But somewhat to my surprise Hugh would have none of it.
“Not that I put it a bit beyond him, Peter,” he remarked. “If it suited his purpose, he would blow up a babies’ crèche without scruple. But I cannot think that that would suit his purpose. Killing a stray individual silently is one thing: but to burst a bomb in the middle of the night is a very different affair. In all probability Temple Tower will have a certain amount of police attention tonight, and if the hell of an explosion takes place, it will be the scene of considerable activity. And there is another thing too, Peter. Supposing this entrance is all rusted over: supposing it takes a considerable time to get in? Then, according to your theory, he is going to draw the attention of everybody to the one spot which he wants to keep private.”
“Well, what the devil is your idea then?” I said peevishly.
“Something far more subtle, old boy,” he remarked with a grin, and from his tone of voice I knew that that was all I was going to get out of him. There are times when an oyster is chatty compared to Hugh.
“Here is John,” he said, glancing out of the window. “But no Matthews. I wonder where he has strayed to.”
“I left the policeman wallah running round in small circles in Rye,” said John as he came in. “I’d fixed to meet him at a quarter to seven, and he didn’t appear till ten past. From what he said he seems to have found out something completely new this afternoon. And he told me to tell you not to wait dinner for him, but that he would come up after.’’
“Good,” said Hugh. “Then we might get down to it.”
“And what have
you been doing all day, old horse?” went on John chattily.
“This and that, laddie,” said Hugh. “Trying to make four equal six, to be exact.”
“Presumably there is some meaning in your remark,” said John kindly. “But at the moment I confess it eludes me.”
“And yet the fact that under certain circumstances four are as good as six will, unless I’ve bloomered badly, prove to be the deciding factor,” laughed Hugh. “Come on, chaps: let us go and feed our faces.”
CHAPTER 12
In which we hear the noise of turning wheels
That Hugh had some theory of his own was obvious, but by what possible method of subtlety le Bossu hoped to outwit us defeated me. His objection to my bomb idea was sound, I realised, but there seemed equally powerful objections to the use of cunning. Boiled down to rock-bottom facts, if five of us who all knew Jean Picot by sight were sitting round the entrance of the passage, it would require the deuce of a lot of subtlety to get past us. Force would be out of the question, and so what was going to happen? And the more I thought about it, the more did I come back to my original answer to the question – nothing at all. We should spend a night of intense discomfort for no result whatever.
Dinner was over and we were sitting in the smoking-room. In half an hour it would be sufficiently dark to start, but there was still no sign of Victor Matthews. And we were just wondering when he would roll up when the telephone rang close by my chair.
“Probably him,” said Hugh. “Take the call, Peter.”
It was, and I told him we were all waiting.
“Good,” came his voice. “Listen, Mr Darrell; the most extraordinary development has taken place. I’m hard on le Bossu’s trail. I think he has lost his nerve. Will you come at once – all of you – to Tenterden to the — Oh! my God.”
His voice rose to a hoarse scream, then stopped abruptly, and for a moment or two I was too stupefied to speak.
Then, “Matthews!” I shouted wildly. “Matthews! What’s happened?”
But there was no answer – only silence, though again I shouted into the instrument.
“Steady, Peter,” came Hugh’s voice. “What is the excitement?”
“It was Matthews,” I said. “He’s just said he was hard on le Bossu’s trail, and wanted us all to go to Tenterden at once. He was just going to say the name of the hotel, when he screamed out ‘Oh! my God.’ Then nothing more. Le Bossu must have got him.”
“Give me the receiver,” said Hugh quietly. “I’ll ring the exchange.”
We waited for what seemed an eternity. “That last call you put through to me,” he said. “Where did it come from?”
Again an interminable delay, and then he turned round.
“The AA road box,” he remarked, “on the road to Tenterden. I know it well. How very extraordinary.”
“Extraordinary!” I said. “It is more than that: it is uncannily devilish.”
It seemed so easy to reconstruct the scene. Matthews pausing on his way to Tenterden, believing himself hot on le Bossu’s trail. He sees the AA box; decides to ring us up. And then as he stands there, unconscious of his danger, the very man he thought he was hunting steals on him from behind. The hunter hunted. And now a fifth murder to le Bossu’s credit.
“Come on,” said Hugh quietly. “This requires investigation.”
We tumbled into the Bentley and started off. I could see Hugh’s face silhouetted against the reflection of the headlights, and it was like an expressionless mask.
“It’s simply amazing, Peter,” he said suddenly. “I can’t understand it. You’re certain it was Matthews?”
“Of course I’m certain,” I answered. “I’d know his voice anywhere.”
He relapsed into silence again, and I tried to make out what was puzzling him. It seemed to me to be a development quite in keeping with the whole affair.
“Here’s the telephone box,” he remarked, “about fifty yards ahead.”
He pulled up the car, and in the glare of lights the box stood out clearly outlined by the roadside. But of anything else there was no sign: the road was empty, there was no trace of any body.
“He would have hidden it,” I said. “He wouldn’t leave it where anybody passing could see it.’’
“No,” said Hugh. “He would not. Can it be possible?” he added half to himself. He suddenly switched off the lights. “Come on – we must look. But, for God’s sake, move warily. There’s something here I don’t understand at all.”
Halfway to the box he halted, and for a time we stood in the road listening intently. Not a sound could be heard save a train in the distance, and I suggested we should go a bit closer, and begin to search.
“What I’m afraid of,” said Hugh in a low voice, “is a trap. If Picot strangled Matthews, he must have heard what Matthews was saying, as he crept up to him from behind. If so, what will he assume? Why, that we shall do exactly what we have done. The flies are walking straight into the parlour, and your theory, Peter, of the bomb is quite feasible here. We must string out: I’ll go first. And don’t make a sound.”
He faded into the darkness, and we followed at intervals. Every now and then I stopped to listen, but I heard nothing except an owl hooting mournfully in a little wood ahead of us. Suddenly I saw a light on the road some twenty yards in front; Hugh had turned his torch on to the ground at the foot of the box, and was examining it carefully. I almost called out to him: if there was any chance of a trap, he was surely asking for trouble. But after a moment or two he switched it off again, and once more I crept forward till I came to the telephone box myself. He had disappeared, and for a while I stopped there trying once more to reconstruct in my mind what had happened.
What would le Bossu have done with the body?
Hidden it, of course, but hidden it as quickly as possible. A hedge ran behind the box, but as far as I could see there was no gap in it, and after a bit the hopeless futility of finding the body at night struck me. One might stumble on it, but the chances were all against it. And at that moment I heard Hugh’s low whistle.
He was standing in the road, and I joined him.
“Look here, Peter,” he said, “this is utterly futile. It’s a hundred pounds to a banana skin against finding him.”
“I quite agree,” remarked Freckles, looming up. “I’ve stubbed my toe, and I don’t want to play any more. The only way to spot him will be by day. Take an aeroplane and fly over the ground low, like that bloke was doing this morning at Temple Tower.”
“What’s that you say?” yelled Hugh. “An aeroplane over Temple Tower?”
“What under the sun is the excitement?” I cried. “I saw the fellow myself. A journalist taking photographs.”
“Journalist be damned,” snapped Hugh. “Why in God’s name didn’t you tell me that before? To the car – and leg it.”
Almost speechless with amazement I followed him: what on earth was the great idea?
“The one point that was missing,” said Hugh tensely, as the speedometer touched seventy. “If only you had told me, Peter! Don’t you see, man, the vital significance of it? The line between the tower and eastern turret, when produced, hits the ground at one end, and the other goes into the air. Get into that line from the air and you pick up the tree. It wasn’t a journalist who was in the plane: it was le Bossu. And le Bossu, whilst we have been wasting time here, has calmly entered Temple Tower on the strength of the information that we thought only we possessed. Merciful Heavens!” he suddenly added in a low voice, “and the girl is there, too.”
The car roared on, whilst I cursed myself bitterly and savagely. Why had the point not struck me? I had accepted the Inspector’s remark about a Press photographer without thought. It had seemed quite a probable explanation, and I hadn’t bothered to look any further. And now, with a sick feeling of fear, I reali
sed the result. Le Bossu was loose in Temple Tower, and Pat Verney was alone and unprotected in the house. Just as Hugh had said, he had assumed we should come to Matthews’ aid, and had turned that assumption to good account. Probably we had actually passed him on the road as we came, in one of the cars we had met.
“Lord! Peter,” said Hugh, as I expressed my opinion of myself, “this is no time for regrets. And it wouldn’t matter a tinker’s curse, old man, but for the girl. But it is the one point that has been worrying me ever since le Bossu presented us with the plan. How was he going to find the tree without our assistance? And since it seemed an impossibility to me, I assumed he was proposing to invoke our assistance. On that assumption I mapped out his plan of campaign – a plan which I think I told you was one of subtlety.”
“What was it?” I asked.
“All in good time, old boy,” he said. “This is not the moment for discussing theories that have proved to be wrong. All that we have to concentrate on at the moment is beating the gentleman. But I will say one thing: I agree with Matthews’ description of him. He is a very clever and dangerous man. And I blame myself bitterly for having given way to an extremely stupid and foolish impulse.”
But what that impulse was I had no time to ask, because at that moment we drew up outside Hugh’s house.
“Bolsters,” he said. “One apiece.”
“What on earth do we want bolsters for?” cried John.
“Denny,” shouted Hugh. “I want four big bolsters.”
“Very good, sir,” said Denny. “I will get them at once.”
“If I asked for four elephants,” said Hugh, “Denny would get them at once. My dear John,” he remarked, “you don’t suppose, do you, that our friend is going to leave the rope ladder in position on the wall? All nicely ready so that we can follow him in? He is going to get over himself, and then, with that wooden implement, remove the thing altogether, hiding it somewhere inside the wall. Moreover, he won’t even go over in the same place as he went over before, so that we can dismiss the ladder as a method of entrance.”