‘Good!’ said Mr Godly.
‘Look here!’ burst out Spring. ‘I mean to say, damn it all!’
‘One moment, sir.’ Pike’s tone was noticeably curter. ‘At 9.30 this evening the body of another murdered person was discovered within the bounds of this town. Acting upon my instructions, delivered at about half-past eleven, the police detained everyone found within the town out-of-doors. I am naturally sorry to cause inconvenience, but I am sure you will agree with me that some such step as I took was absolutely essential in the interests of the public.’
Spring glared. The horn-rimmed spectacles slipped a little on his nose. He thrust them back into position with an impatient hand.
‘But, good God!’ he said, ‘you don’t suspect me of—’
‘Don’t go so fast, sir. Naturally I don’t suspect anybody. And yet to do my duty I suspect everybody. It is possible, you know, to do both.’
Pike looked hard at his indignant prisoner. The gaze of his brown eyes met and held the gaze of the other brown eyes behind the spectacles.
‘I am sure,’ said Pike, ‘that you will agree with me, Mr Spring, that personal inconvenience must be borne in these strange circumstances … May I suggest that you sit down?’
‘But blast it, tell me … Oh, all right!’ Mr Spring sat down so hard upon the chair which Constable Birch pushed forward that he almost rebounded from it.
‘Carefoo!’ said Mr Godly, raising an admonishing finger.
‘Jeffson,’ said Pike, ‘where did that Special report that Mr Spring was taken in?’
‘Junction,’ Jeffson said, ‘of Market Road and Collingwood Road. According to the report Mr Spring was coming up Market Road from Chaser’s Bridge—that’s the bridge over the Railway, sir—and he just got to the corner of Collingwood Road when the patrol stopped him. Just after twelve it was.’
‘The blighters,’ said Spring, ‘grabbed hold of me as if I was a criminal.’ He glared at Pike. ‘God alive, man! Can’t you hurry, I want to go home. I’ve just done a hard day’s work—a harder day’s work, I expect, than you’ve ever done in your life. I’ve been on the go ever since half-past four this morning, and I’m tired, damn tired! So would you damn well be! I’ve been on my feet the whole day. I’m directing a film in which we’re using half the blasted Air Force and as their own officers don’t seem to be able to tell the men what to do, I had to do it for them! Always the same story!’
‘Quite!’ said Pike. ‘I’ll try and see that you get back to your house as quickly as I can, Mr Spring. I’m afraid, however, that I shall first have to worry you with some questions. I can assure you, sir, that the more readily and more concisely you answer these questions, so to speak, the quicker you’ll be off home … Now then, Jeffson, please take notes of the questions and Mr Spring’s answers.’
‘Right, sir,’ Jeffson said. ‘Ready when you are.’
‘Now, Mr Spring, would you please tell me what you were doing when found by the patrol.’
‘Walking home.’
‘Where from?’
‘Garage.’
‘What garage is that, Mr Spring?’
‘Damn it, don’t let’s waste time! There’s only one garage in the place.’ Spring twitched about in his chair as if he would like to jump off it and wave frantic arms and legs. His spectacles kept slipping and the thrusts with which he jammed them back into place grew more and more savage.
Jeffson chipped in. He said to Pike:
‘That’s quite right, sir. There’s only one public garage in Holmdale. It’s down by Chaser’s Bridge.’
‘Thanks,’ Pike nodded. ‘Now, Mr Spring, what were you doing at the garage?’
‘What the bloody hell d’you think I was doing at the garage? Having coffee and cake? … I was putting my car away, of course. I keep my car there. It’s too big to go into the garage at the house. Besides, our other car is always in the house garage.’
‘I see. And am I to understand that you had come straight into Holmdale from outside and gone straight to the garage to put your car away and were walking directly home?’
‘You are.’
‘Where had you been outside Holmdale, Mr Spring?’
‘You must forgive me for saying so—I’m afraid I don’t know who you are—but it does seem to take you a very long time to get an idea into your head … I’d been working. I told you that. All day. And I’ve got to work all day tomorrow and I should be very, very much obliged if I could go home. If you’re looking for this lunatic who calls himself The Butcher, it’s not me, although I’m not at all sure I’m not beginning to sympathise with him.’
Pike smiled at that. ‘All right, sir. But we can’t help being slow, you know. We’ve got to be careful. I’m afraid I’m still not clear on this point. Where exactly do you work?’
The tight and somehow fish-like mouth of Mr Spring opened in amazement. He shut it again with a decisive click so loud as to betray the origin of his splendid teeth.
‘Good God!’ he said, and then: ‘Sorry! I’m a film producer. I’m at present working outside Holmdale at the Empire Studios in Enswood. You may have heard of the picture. It’s called “Death in the Air.” I’ve got half the Air Force out on the job—’
‘Yes. Yes. And you finished work at Enswood Studios, Mr Spring, at what time?’
‘I don’t clock off but I should say that when I finally got away it must have been about … let me see … I came home at a steady eighty and it’s about seventeen miles from Enswood … You can say I left Enswood at between twenty and ten to twelve, getting to the garage at about twelve and getting hauled in by your busybodies at just after midnight. I was going home, and, I might tell you, looking forward to a whisky and soda and some food.’
Pike nodded. ‘I see. Was there anyone in the garage, Mr Spring, when you put the car away? Any night porter or anything?’
Spring was silent for a moment. Behind the horn-rimmed spectacles his hot brown eyes were veiled under heavy lids. He said:
‘Can’t remember … Let me see … No, don’t think I saw anyone. I’ve got a special private lock-up there. All I did was just to ram the bus inside, lock the door and start off for home.’
‘I see. Did you happen to notice whether you passed anyone, Mr Spring, between your entrance to Holmdale from the main road and your arrival at the garage?’
‘Couldn’t say.’ Spring shrugged. The black felt hat which had been balanced on the back of his chair fell to the ground with a soft plop. ‘I wasn’t looking, of course.’
‘I shay,’ said Mr Godly, ‘I shay!’
‘Did anyone, Mr Spring,’ said Pike, ‘happen to see you leave the Studios at Enswood. I suppose there’s a gate-keeper there or someone?’
‘I shay,’ said Mr Godly indignantly, ‘the chap’s dropped hish hat. Hatsh on the floor. Shome one might have the deshenshy pick it up.’
‘Yes, there’s a gate-keeper,’ Spring said. He paused a moment. ‘Half a minute though, he wasn’t there tonight, I remember noticing, and the gates were open. I say, though—’
‘Well, that doesn’t matter, sir. There’s sure to have been someone on your staff about when you left the studio building.’
Spring laughed—an awkward little sound. ‘Funny thing, but I’m pretty certain there wasn’t now I come to think of it. I sent them all home about half an hour before I left myself. I was going with the others and I suddenly remembered some notes I had to make for the morning. I went back to my room and jotted them down … Now I come to think of it, I don’t suppose there was a soul saw me from the time my assistant went till I was pulled in by your men.’
‘I shay, ol’ chap,’ said Mr Godly, ‘I shay, d’you know your hatsh on the floor.’
Again Spring laughed. He was staring hard at Pike. ‘Makes it a bit awkward, doesn’t it? I mean the whole thing’s perfectly absurd …’ His tone was noticeably milder.
Pike leaned near to Jeffson and said something to him in a voice so low that it did not carry to any ot
her ears in the room.
Jeffson nodded. ‘Yes, they did, sir. Nothing.’
Pike sat back in his chair again and once more looked at Spring.
‘If shome one,’ said Mr Godly suddenly, ‘doeshn’t pick that hat up, I’m going to. Can’t shtant hatsh on the floor. Get dushty.’
‘I think,’ said Pike, ‘that if you’d like to get along home now, Mr Spring, we could arrange it. No doubt we can get hold of you at any time if we want any further information.’
Behind their shields of glass and tortoise-shell Spring’s eyes for a moment looked astonished. But he said, after a moment’s pause: ‘Thanks … Thanks … Very good of you.’ He stood up—a short, cheeky little figure rather offensively sure of itself. He stooped and picked the black felt hat from the floor.
‘Thank God,’ said Mr Godly. ‘Can’t shtand sheeing hatsh on floor.’
Constable Birch opened the door. With a jerky, bouncing walk, Spring went to it. He paused on the threshold; half turned and flung a ‘Good-night’ over his shoulder.
There was a murmur in answer and he was gone.
‘You’re sure,’ Pike said to Jeffson, ‘that they went right over him?’
‘The Special assured me of that, sir. It’s written down in these notes here. They went through all his pockets. There’s nowhere he could be carrying a weapon.’ Jeffson’s jaw suddenly dropped. ‘Unless …’
‘The car, you mean?’ Pike said. ‘Tell you what: Send this man down to the garage now. He’d better knock up the watchman or whoever’s there and go over the car. He’ll have to do it without a warrant, but he should be able to if he’s sensible.’
‘The best man I’ve got,’ Jeffson said.
The round, childlike face of Constable Birch warmed to a rich red flood of colour.
‘And now,’ said Pike, ‘what about this?’ He was looking at Mr Godly.
Mr Godly, still upon his chair, was, by this time, fast asleep. His head lolled so that his left cheek lay cosily upon his left shoulder. His mouth was wide open. He looked like a stupid but happy child.
Jeffson got up, took two heavy strides and stood over the sleeper. Jeffson’s finger and thumb, each as big as a sausage roll, clamped themselves upon Mr Godly’s right ear and twisted.
‘Wow!’ said Mr Godly, awake. ‘I shay, dam’ shilly thing to do.’
Jeffson went back to his chair.
‘Mr Godly,’ said Pike. His tone was very different from that which he had used to Wilfred Spring. It was the tone of a just but stern parent. ‘Mr Godly,’ he said, ‘I must ask you to pull yourself together. I want you to answer as best you can the questions I am going to ask you. Just a few simple questions. Do you understand?’
‘Not,’ said Mr Godly, ‘one little bit.’
‘I am going to ask you,’ said Pike, pausing long between each word, ‘to answer a few questions.’
‘’S not,’ said Mr Godly, ‘a bit of ewsh. Can’t ansher ’em.’ He smiled beautifully, first at Pike, then at Jeffson and lastly over his shoulder at Police Constable Birch.
Jeffson coughed. He said to Pike:
‘If you’ll excuse me, sir, the boy’s right himself. He’s been three parts canned all his time and now he’s right under, if you follow me.’
Pike’s mouth twitched to a half smile. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Best thing we can do is to keep it here till the morning. Got anywhere to put it?’
‘It’ll do anywhere,’ Jefferson said.
‘Isn’t it about time,’ Pike said, frowning, ‘that that other catch was up here?’
Jeffson looked at his watch. He pursed his lips and a little whistle came from them. ‘I should just say it was, sir.’ His glance travelled to the telephone and then, as if actuated by that glance, the telephone bell rang shrilly. He crossed to it in two strides and plucked off the receiver.
‘Hallo!’ he said. ‘Yes, Jeffson speaking … I was just going to ring you … Where is ’e? … What d’you say? Well, it doesn’t matter a damn who ’e is, ’e ought to have been up here by this time, even if ’e was the Archangel Gabriel … Eh! what’s that? I can’t hear you … And who the hell told you to do that? Oh! … All right!’
Jeffson slammed back the receiver on to its hook with a jar that might have broken it. He turned a frowning face to Pike.
‘Look here, sir,’ he said, ‘that third man was a doctor. Dr Reade. Practises ’ere. They’re just bringin’ him up ’ere when they get stopped by Colonel Grayling—’
‘Who the flop,’ said Pike, ‘is Colonel Grayling?’
‘Head of our branch of Specials. Colonel Grayling knows Dr Reade very well, as we all do in fact. Well, Colonel Grayling tells the patrol—who, very unfortunatelike, were Specials and not our men—it’s sheer foolishness to arrest Dr Reade and that you won’t want to see ’im. And then they go and loose him at once!’
Pike’s brows met together in a harsh, deep-cut frown. ‘Where’s this Reade live?’ he said.
‘Marrowbone Lane, sir. 172. Big house on the left at the Market Road end. Maybe you’ve seen it.’
‘Come on!’ Pike said. He nodded at Police Constable George Birch. ‘And you,’ he said, ‘look after that.’ He nodded again, this time towards Mr Godly, once more asleep.
II
It was ten minutes past one when the blue police Crossley pulled up outside No. 172 Marrowbone Lane. Pike switched off lights and engine.
‘This the place?’ he said.
‘That’s right, sir. Empty or all asleep by the looks of it.’
They stood at the gate looking through the darkness at the dim bulk of a low-built, verandahed house.
Pike leaned his elbows on the gate. ‘This Reade married?’
‘Yes.’ Jeffson dropped his voice. ‘But Mrs Reade’s away. Been away for some months now. Besides Dr Reade, there’s a housekeeper and a maidservant. Oh! and of course, there’s the dispenser; but I don’t think she sleeps in. She’s a Holmdale girl—Marjorie Williams.’
Pike put his hand to the latch of the gate, passed through and went up the path. His boot-soles rang out a brisk tattoo upon the frozen path. He made no effort to dull their sound. Jeffson followed. They came to the end of the path and three steps which brought them up to the verandah. They crossed the verandah and were at the door. There were two bells on it, one with ‘Night’ written above it in bold letters of brass. There was also a heavy iron knocker wrought like a snake. Pike set his thumb on the bell marked ‘Night.’ From somewhere within the house came to their ears a steady peal. He took his thumb away. They waited. After two minutes waiting, he once more pressed the bell. This time he held his thumb upon it. The pealing went on within, steady and insistent, but they could hear no other sound. Pike lowered his hand.
‘Knock!’ he said.
Jeffson knocked.
‘Knock harder!’ Pike said.
Jeffson knocked harder.
Pike pressed both bells … And then a light shone out above their heads and there came the sound of a window violently flung open and a voice which said:
‘What the devil’s all this row?’
Pike nudged Jeffson. Jeffson went back off the verandah and stood in the path looking upwards.
‘I’m Sergeant Jeffson,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid we must trouble you to come downstairs and let us in.’
There was a muttering from the window, its words indistinguishable. Jeffson came back up the steps on to the verandah and stood beside Pike at the doorway. They heard movement within the house and then footsteps descending the stairs and coming along the hallway towards them. Bolts were drawn and there was the clanging of a safety chain. The door opened and the lantern above the door sprang into light.
‘Dr Reade?’ said Pike. He was looking at a thickly-built, broad-shouldered, man in the middle thirties, with a white heavy-jowled face under wiry and crisply curling jet-black hair. The black brows were a straight bar across his face and from under them bright almost black eyes darted flickering glances.
‘Th
at’s me,’ said the man in the door. ‘What do you want?’
Pike put a foot across the threshold. For a moment it seemed that Reade was going to bar his entrance but almost at once he drew back.
‘Come in!’ he said.
Behind Pike came Jeffson. Reade moved away from them. They could hear him near them fumbling at the wall. There was the click of a switch and three wall lamps shed a soft gold glow over the hall. Pike looked about him. He said:
‘Can we talk here, sir?’
Reade’s eyes darted glances this way and that; everywhere except at the faces of his two visitors.
‘No,’ he said. ‘Better come into my surgery.’ He led the way to a door in the right-hand wall, opened it and stood while they passed through before him.
Jeffson, burly and blue-clad but helmetless, stood with his back to a fireplace in which there flickered an electric fire. Pike, in answer to unspoken invitation, sat in one of the red-leather armchairs. There was a small, square, oaken table in the centre of the room and upon the edge of this its owner sat himself. He looked from one of his visitors to the other, quickly and almost furtively.
‘We understand, sir,’ said Pike, ‘that you were taken up by one of the patrols this evening at some time after midnight. Mistakenly and against my orders—’
‘I’m not clear,’ said Reade, ‘exactly who you are.’ The dark head was bent until only the top of it was presented to Pike’s gaze. The deep voice was querulously angry.
‘I am from Scotland Yard, sir,’ Pike said. ‘At the present moment, I am, as you might say, in charge of the police activities.’ His tone was bland and there was a smile upon his mouth but his eyes did not smile. He paused a moment. At last, as if he could bear the silence no longer, Reade lifted his head. For the first time Pike saw his eyes; then spoke again: ‘I must inform you, sir, that at about nine-thirty this evening we were informed that another of these murders had taken place. Immediately I had verified this, I gave word to all the patrols that any persons found in the streets of this town should be held, pending investigation of their movements. Mistakenly and against my instructions, the patrol let you go. In these circumstances, Sergeant Jeffson and I came round to have a word with you and to ask you to explain to us where you had been this evening. This is a matter of form, of course, but, I am afraid, one which must, in the interest of the whole community, be carried out … I am sure that after a moment’s thought, Dr Reade, you’ll see the necessity of carrying out investigation like this, utterly irrespective of persons.’
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