Dr. Morelle and the Drummer Girl

by Ernest Dudley

  ‘It was obviously an important part of my duties,’ he was saying, ‘to take care no undesirable persons were able to gain admittance.’

  ‘And I am sure you performed your duty admirably,’ Dr. Morelle observed in a honeyed tone.

  ‘Anyone would have to get up very early in the morning to get past his eagle eye,’ Harvey Drummer commented.

  ‘Admittedly I wasn’t looking for anyone behaving suspiciously,’ the secretary went on. ‘But I certainly didn’t notice anyone whose behaviour struck me as being out of the ordinary. None of the guests gave the impression of being capable of purloining, even for the fun of it, the papers you mention. I’ll run my mind back over the events of yesterday, however, and endeavour to recall any incident which might have been connected with your loss.’

  ‘I am grateful to you for your co-operation,’ Dr. Morelle replied.

  The other’s manner seemed to relax. Once again he was the diffident, almost servile individual with no other thought than to serve his employer. He glanced questioningly at Harvey Drummer.

  ‘Is there anything else, Mr. Drummer?’

  Drummer in turn looked at the Doctor.

  ‘There is nothing else I wish to ask,’ Dr. Morelle said urbanely.

  Drummer got up and moved round his desk.

  ‘Thanks, Pearson,’ he said, and the other went out, closing the door after him quietly.

  Harvey Drummer’s pipe had gone out and he lit it again. As he expelled a cloud of smoke, he said:

  ‘Looks as if you’ve drawn a blank there, I’m afraid.’

  ‘You mentioned your housekeeper?’

  ‘Mrs. Huggins? I’ll tell Pearson to fetch her.’

  He crossed to the door and, opening it, spoke to the man who had just gone out. They heard Pearson reply and the door of the outer office close after him as he went to find the housekeeper. Harvey Drummer did not move from the door. He remained there with his back to Dr. Morelle and Miss Frayle, his attitude suddenly tense.

  ‘What is it?’

  It was Dr. Morelle who rapped out the question and moved to the door quickly. Harvey Drummer turned to him, a puzzled frown on his face. He made no reply.

  ‘Something appears to have aroused your interest,’ Dr. Morelle persisted. Miss Frayle, with a sudden tingling at the back of her neck, followed him as he added: ‘Something of significance?’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Drummer smiled unconvincingly. ‘I just thought —’

  He broke off and the Doctor snapped at him: ‘What did you think?’

  ‘It was just — but I must be imagining things. It was just that I thought Pearson closed that drawer in his desk rather quickly. As if I’d surprised him.’

  Dr. Morelle had moved into the other office and stood by the desk.

  ‘It’s nothing, I’m sure,’ Drummer went on. ‘I probably startled him. He’s a nervy devil. Always has been, and I must have made him jump.’ He gave a wry half-laugh, ‘Or perhaps it’s I whose nerves are jumpy.’

  Miss Frayle stood in the doorway and saw the Doctor glance narrowly at the drawer which the other had indicated.

  ‘With your permission,’ Dr. Morelle said, ‘I should like to open it.’

  Harvey Drummer shrugged. He appeared slightly amused.

  ‘Go ahead, I don’t suppose Pearson will have any objections. I imagine he only keeps his pencils and note books and odds and ends in it.’

  Dr. Morelle pulled the drawer open.

  Miss Frayle’s pulse quickened as she saw that familiar tightening of his jaw, that sudden hawk-like expression as he stood staring down. Then with a swift pounce he reached into the drawer, and she gave a sharp gasp.

  In his hands he was holding a pair of black silk gloves.

  Chapter Ten – The Housekeeper

  ‘What on earth —?’ Harvey Drummer exclaimed as he stared at the pair of black gloves which Dr. Morelle held up for his inspection. ‘I don’t seem to remember seeing those before.’

  ‘Possibly your secretary is adopting some new sartorial departure,’ Dr. Morelle observed.

  ‘He’s coming back,’ Miss Frayle breathed, as she caught the sound of voices approaching. Dr. Morelle had already dropped the gloves in the drawer and closed it.

  ‘Saying nothing about it for the moment, eh?’ Harvey Drummer asked, leading the way back into his office.

  ‘I think we can allow the subject to await later discussion,’ Dr. Morelle said, he and Miss Frayle following the other. They heard Pearson come into the outer office and say:

  ‘Wait just a moment, please.’

  ‘All right,’ a woman’s voice answered.

  The secretary appeared at the door. ‘Mrs. Huggins is here.’

  ‘Show her in,’ Drummer said.

  The woman who came into the room couldn’t have been less like the mental picture Miss Frayle had conjured up of her. Her name, combined with the knowledge that she was the housekeeper, had created the impression of a middle-aged soul, typical of the popular conception of a woman in her job.

  Instead, Miss Frayle found herself staring at an extremely attractive woman no more than thirty years old, whose dress showed off to advantage a charmingly rounded figure. She was a red-head, with a pleasantly pretty face and nice eyes. She gave Dr. Morelle and Miss Frayle a friendly smile. Turning to Drummer she said, with a slight Cockney accent:

  ‘Mr. Pearson said you wanted to see me.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs. Huggins. This is Miss Frayle and Dr. Morelle.’

  ‘Oh!’

  Mrs. Huggins had obviously heard something of Dr. Morelle’s exploits. Her eyes were bright with interest as she stared at him.

  ‘They were at the party,’ Harvey Drummer went on, ‘and the Doctor unfortunately lost something — he’ll tell you about it, Mrs. Huggins.’

  She turned to Dr. Morelle and said conversationally:

  ‘It’s an awful name, isn’t it? Not Rosie; personally I rather like that. Huggins. It was my husband’s fault, though I suppose he couldn’t help it either.’ Her eyes clouded for a moment, and she added with a little sigh: ‘Poor Bill.’ Dr. Morelle regarded her questioningly. ‘He died, you see,’ she explained. ‘Drowned when he was out in a rowing-boat fishing during his holidays. They never found him.’

  ‘How long ago was this unfortunate occurrence?’ Dr. Morelle asked her quietly.

  ‘Just on a year ago,’ she replied. ‘About two years after we’d come here.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘I employed both Mr. and Mrs. Huggins,’ Drummer explained. ‘He was my manservant.’

  The woman turned to Drummer with a little smile. To the Doctor she said:

  ‘Mr. Drummer was marvellous to me.’ She spoke with simple sincerity. ‘That’s why I stayed on. If it had been anybody else I’d had to have got a job somewhere else.’

  Drummer made a deprecating movement with his pipe.

  ‘You were much too good to let go, if I could possibly help it,’ he said.

  ‘I’m sorry you lost something at the party,’ the woman said to Dr. Morelle. ‘If there’s anything I can do to help find it —’

  ‘I assume you were about while the party was in progress?’ Dr. Morelle asked.

  There was a slight pause before Mrs. Huggins’s answer: ‘I wasn’t.’

  Did she, Miss Frayle wondered, detect a sudden gleam in the Doctor’s eye at this unexpected admission? She stared at the woman with quickening interest.

  ‘Indeed?’ Dr. Morelle made no attempt to disguise the hint of surprise in his tone. Harvey Drummer was about to say something, but Mrs. Huggins went on:

  ‘It was my afternoon off. The arrangements for the party were in the hands of Fortune’s. So there was nothing for me to do, anyway.’

  ‘No,’ Drummer said. ‘Fortune’s did the whole thing. The bits and pieces to eat, drink, and a couple of men to serve.’

  Dr. Morelle pounced on him like a cat on a mouse.

  ‘Your secretary,’ he snapped, ‘gave me to understand that the on
ly people present on the occasion with whom you and Miss Drummer were not acquainted, were a press-photographer, three journalists and two literary reviewers. It would now appear there were two other complete strangers also present.’

  ‘Afraid Pearson and I forgot that,’ Drummer said. ‘But I really don’t think those two were of any importance.’

  ‘I should have thought I was the best judge of that,’ was the sharp retort.

  Harvey Drummer gave Dr. Morelle a glance. He was beginning to receive practical demonstration that the Doctor suffered neither fools nor people who forgot things, gladly. ‘I’m sorry,’ he found himself apologising.

  ‘To return to you,’ Dr. Morelle said, eyeing Mrs. Huggins. ‘You were not in the house at all during the party? At what time, may I inquire, did you leave the house last evening?’

  Instead of replying the woman said:

  ‘If you’d tell me what happened, perhaps it would make it easier for me to help you.’

  ‘It’s some notes of the Doctor’s,’ Miss Frayle said helpfully. ‘He thinks he lost them during the time he was here. He’s wondering if somebody might have picked them up and not bothered to return them. Or perhaps ‘borrowed’ them — they were in his pocket — as a sort of joke.’

  ‘Since my assistant,’ and Dr. Morelle’s voice had a biting ring, ‘has so thoughtfully offered you an explanation for my questions, if you would be kind enough to answer them I should be most grateful.’

  ‘You were asking me what time I left,’ the woman said. ‘It was after lunch. About three o’clock — I was a little late, as a matter of fact, owing to preparations for the party.’

  ‘And you returned at what time?’

  ‘About ten.’

  ‘You will appreciate,’ the Doctor went on suavely, ‘the object of my questions. I merely wish to ascertain whether you observed anything suspicious which might be connected with my missing notes. However, as you say you were absent during the time in question, there is little purpose in our pursuing the matter further.’

  ‘I’m afraid I’m not much help,’ the woman said with a slight frown. ‘I went out after lunch, did some shopping, had tea, then went to the Oriental Cinema just in time for the big picture, about five-thirty.’

  ‘That’s got the film ‘Midnight,’ hasn’t it?’ Miss Frayle said quickly. ‘With John Dacre; I thought it was lovely.’

  Dr. Morelle rolled his eyes heavenwards.

  ‘I feel sure you can find other opportunities to discuss with Mrs. Huggins the merits of the film concerned,’ he snapped.

  ‘I loved it,’ Mrs. Huggins, deliberately ignoring the Doctor’s outburst, said to Miss Frayle. ‘I love the films though, don’t you? The theatre as well. Stage-struck as a kid I was, had ideas of going in for it, as a matter of fact. Did a bit of amateur acting, children’s shows, of course. They always made me play the men’s parts, because I could put on a deep voice.’

  ‘If,’ Dr. Morelle interposed, his tone razor-like, ‘you would return to the topic under discussion!’

  ‘So sorry, Doctor,’ Mrs. Huggins beamed at him genially. ‘Where was I?’

  ‘You were in the Oriental Cinema, enjoying the featured film.’

  ‘That’s right. There was a lovely film with it, too. The second picture, I mean. I forget what it was called, but it was all about one of those mad doctors. Lovely scene there was where this doctor straps the heroine on to the operating-table —’

  Dr. Morelle snorted impatiently and Harvey Drummer, unable to keep a touch of amusement out of his voice, put in:

  ‘I’m sure it was most entertaining, Mrs. Huggins.’

  ‘You were unaccompanied all the time?’ the Doctor put in.

  ‘Yes, I was alone all the time.’

  Dr. Morelle eyed her for a moment before he asked: ‘What time did you leave the cinema?’

  ‘About nine o’clock. I sat on a bit, you see, and saw some of the beginning of ‘Midnight’ over again. On my way home I had a meal at the Half-Way House. As I said I was in by ten o’clock. I’m so sorry,’ she went on, ‘I can’t be more helpful. I do hope your notes will turn up all right.’

  She smiled sympathetically at Dr. Morelle, then gave a look at Drummer.

  ‘All right, Mrs. Huggins,’ he said. ‘Thank you very much.’

  At the door she turned.

  ‘Funny about doctors, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘You’re always reading in the papers about them losing things, leaving poisons in cars, and that.’

  And with a beaming look directed at Dr. Morelle, Mrs. Huggins went out.

  ‘Still not much progress, I’m afraid, Doctor,’ Harvey Drummer murmured.

  ‘She’s rather a pet, isn’t she?’ Miss Frayle said.

  ‘Doone is very fond of her,’ the other nodded, then his face clouded over as if reminded that his daughter was missing. Dr. Morelle lit a cigarette and stared silently at Harvey Drummer who continued in lowered tones: ‘What about Pearson?’

  Still Dr. Morelle silently puffed a spiral of cigarette smoke ceilingwards.

  ‘Yes,’ Miss Frayle whispered to him urgently. ‘Aren’t you going to tackle him about those black gloves?’

  Dr. Morelle quietly asked Drummer:

  ‘Might Miss Frayle telephone the box-office of the Oriental Cinema?’

  The other looked at him in surprise.

  ‘Surely you don’t suspect Mrs. Huggins was lying?’ Miss Frayle squeaked.

  ‘Why, of course,’ Drummer told the Doctor. ‘If you think it’s an idea.’

  Miss Frayle crossed to the telephone on the wide, flat desk. She was about to lift the receiver when she wheeled round and exclaimed:

  ‘But this is ridiculous. Surely Mrs. Huggins wouldn’t lie about something which she must know could be so easily checked?’

  ‘I must say, that’s what occurred to me,’ Harvey Drummer agreed.

  ‘If, when you obtain the number,’ Dr. Morelle unmoved instructed Miss Frayle, ‘you would be kind enough to ask if the film in question was showing at five-thirty, I should be obliged.’

  ‘Of course it was showing then,’ she protested impatiently. ‘I saw it myself at that very time only three days ago —’

  Miss Frayle broke off and bit her lip as Dr. Morelle directed a baleful stare at her.

  ‘Would that be the occasion,’ he observed, ‘when you gave me to understand you were visiting a woman friend at Notting Hill who had been taken ill?’

  Miss Frayle’s face flamed a bright pink, and she bit her lip again. Then she said defiantly:

  ‘As a matter of fact what happened was that I rang her up on my way there. She was feeling better, and so we met at the Oriental instead. And I still think it’s wasting time ’phoning when we ought to be getting on about him.’ Lowering her voice and indicating the outer office.

  The Doctor glared at her dangerously, and with a shrug she lifted the receiver and dialled the number. After a few moments she spoke into the mouthpiece:

  ‘The box-office? I just wanted to confirm that you were showing ‘Midnight’ yesterday evening at five-thirty as usual.’

  There was a pause. Miss Frayle’s jaw visibly slackened.

  ‘You’re sure?’ she gulped. ‘A sneak pre-view of a new film instead. Oh . . .’

  Limply Miss Frayle replaced the receiver. She turned, bracing herself to meet the sardonically triumphant gaze of Dr. Morelle.

  Chapter Eleven – The Reply

  Harvey Drummer was staring as if thunderstruck at Miss Frayle, then he found his voice. ‘So she has lied.’

  ‘It would appear so on the face of it,’ Dr. Morelle replied.

  ‘Fetch her back,’ Drummer choked. He advanced on the Doctor, his face contorted. ‘Fetch her back and drag the truth out of her! She’s mixed up in Doone’s disappearance. She can identify the kidnapper.’

  Dr. Morelle regarded him calmly over his cigarette.

  ‘We should be ill-advised to take any precipitate action.’

  For a moment Harvey Dru
mmer stood, fists clenched, and Miss Frayle had a sudden fear that he was about to throw himself violently upon the Doctor. She moved forward instinctively with a muddled idea of stepping between the two men; Drummer lowered his clenched hands, however, and swung away.

  ‘If you won’t fetch her back,’ he flung over his shoulder savagely, ‘I will.’ And he marched quickly to the door.

  Dr. Morelle made no move to stop him. Calmly tapping the ash off his cigarette he asked, without raising his voice:

  ‘Of what will you accuse her?’ At the Doctor’s words the other hesitated for a moment. Dr. Morelle continued smoothly. ‘Do you propose to denounce her merely for stating she was at a certain cinema when she was in fact not?’

  Drummer’s hand was on the door-handle, but he turned and faced the Doctor.

  ‘It’s — it’s more than that,’ he said.

  ‘That is a matter of surmise.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Drummer released his grip on the door-handle, his face clouding with perplexity.

  ‘All we know about Mrs. Huggins,’ Dr. Morelle pointed out, ‘is that she lied to us about her movements yesterday. Why she lied remains at the moment a mystery. If we accuse her of lying because she is concerned in the disappearance of your daughter she may deny it resolutely. What shall we have gained?’

  ‘We can prove she’s a damned liar,’ exclaimed the other angrily.

  ‘One point appears to have escaped your notice,’ Dr. Morelle said patiently. ‘Your housekeeper was enjoying time off from her work to which she is entitled. You have no jurisdiction as to how she amuses herself. She is not required to say how she employs her free hours and if she chooses to lie about it, what remedy have you?’

  ‘She’s lying,’ Harvey Drummer grumbled obstinately, ‘for a reason.’

  ‘All of us lie for a reason,’ Dr. Morelle replied. ‘Even Miss Frayle here lied about her visit to a friend at Notting Hill.’ Miss Frayle gave him a tiny grimace and shrugged her shoulders. ‘But that Mrs. Huggins’s lie is connected with the kidnapping is, so far as we know, only guesswork. Furthermore,’ he went on, ‘I must point out to you the danger of accusing her at this stage.’