Death in the Tunnel

by Miles Burton

  Next, as to his acquisition of the pistol and cartridges. He must have known that Wardour possessed such a weapon, and where he kept it. He must have been familiar with Wardour’s house, and known of his absence abroad. In fact, everything pointed to his being a friend of Wardour’s. And it was certain that he was intimately acquainted with Saxonby. How did it happen, then, that he was a complete stranger to the staff in Saxonby’s office?

  And then Merrion had an inspiration. Hitherto he had concentrated his attention upon Yates, to the neglect of his accomplice. But what if the accomplice had been the originator of the plot? What if he had made all the arrangements, and supplied Yates with the pistol?

  What was known of this accomplice, B? Next to nothing. Nobody had so much as seen him. But he must have existed, as the arrival at the shaft of the breakdown lorry proved. Could he have been Wardour himself?

  There seemed no practical reason why he should not have been. Yates’ secret, whatever it was, might have been known to him. The two might have agreed to murder Saxonby for the sake of the mysterious object. On the whole, Wardour seemed to fit the bill quite comfortably. He would, obviously, be familiar with his father-in-law’s habits. He would know by which train he almost invariably travelled. He would be sufficiently acquainted with his wallet to provide one exactly similar. But once more the question arose. Would he have provided his colleague with his own pistol?

  The complexities of the problem were maddening. The impersonation of Dredger, for example. That was highly ingenious, but it had been carried too far. Merrion would have been prepared to believe that Dredger had driven his car to the shaft and left it there. That was within the power of a man of his age and infirmity. But to suppose that he had been the passenger in the five o’clock train was ridiculous. He could not have carried out that surprising feat in the tunnel. And since, therefore, he had been impersonated then, he could just as easily have been impersonated in the morning.

  But the impersonation was in itself a clue. For one of the conspirators, A or B, must have been familiar with his habits. Not only that, but he must have known of the existence of those bright lads Harold and Fred, and of Mrs. Dredger’s affection for the former. Who could be imagined to possess this knowledge, in addition to that already stipulated? Only somebody connected with the firm of Wigland and Bunthorne, surely. Mrs. Wardour, for instance, who seemed to take a particular interest in Dredger. Had she not suggested his visit to her husband’s poultry farm?

  Could Mrs. Wardour have organised the affair, and then retired gracefully to the South of France while it was being carried out? It seemed an altogether fantastic idea, though not entirely outside the bounds of possibility. She had known all about the pistol, admitted having spoken of it to her father. She had told Arnold that her husband was not the sort of man to be trusted with a pistol. Was she trying to throw suspicion upon him? They appeared, from all accounts, to be at loggerheads. But, Merrion repeated, she must be the very devil of a woman if she engineered the murder of her father and then did her best to get her husband hanged for the crime.

  Next morning, Merrion called at Scotland Yard, prepared to share his ideas with Arnold. But as soon as he mentioned the breakdown lorry, he found that the inspector had forestalled him. “Oh, that’s a matter of almost automatic routine!” said Arnold. “We sent out a request for information from all the local police forces, days ago, and reports are beginning to come in. Here’s a pile of them which came in this morning. I was just going to run through them. You can lend a hand, if you like.”

  They proceeded to examine the reports, which were disappointingly negative, until they came to one originating from Plymouth. A second-hand breakdown lorry had been purchased at an auction in the town during the month of October. It had been driven away by its new owner on the evening of November 13th, and had not since been heard of. Further inquiries would be made if desired.

  “We’ve heard of Plymouth before,” said Arnold thoughtfully. “It’s where Dredger’s daughter-in-law’s nephew lives. Wonderful how Dredger’s name crops up, whichever way we turn. I’ve half a mind to run down to Plymouth myself and have a look round.”

  “I don’t mind coming with you,” Merrion replied. “If we look sharp we can just catch the 10.30 from Paddington. What about it?”

  Arnold agreed. They took a taxi, and were just in time to catch the train. During the journey Merrion mentioned the other points which had occurred to him, without producing any very great impression upon Arnold, who seemed to have Dredger on the brain. “He holds the key to the whole affair,” he said. “It’s all very fine to say that somebody else impersonated him, but you’ve got to find that person. I’ve half a mind to arrest the chap on suspicion, and see if a taste of the cells won’t make him speak.”

  “You must please yourself,” Merrion replied. “It doesn’t strike me as very good policy, though. Have him watched, by all means. But, if it turns out that he really was in the plot, his arrest will be the sequel for everybody else concerned to make themselves scarce. Better see where this clue of the lorry leads to before you decide.”

  On arriving at Plymouth they called upon the local constabulary, where they were informed that the information forwarded had been obtained from the manager of the Celtic Garage. They found this to be a large establishment on the outskirts of the town, which seemed to be doing a prosperous trade. The manager, to whom they introduced themselves, offered them every assistance. “I’m anxious to find the fellow who drove that lorry away, for my own reasons,” he said. “He’s got a set of my trade number plates, and he’s never returned them. But I’d better tell you the whole story.

  “For some years now we have held a quarterly sale by auction of used cars on our premises. As I dare say you know, when we sell a new car we nearly always have to take an old one in part exchange, and the problem of getting rid of these is enough to drive one to drink. The best of them we manage, sooner or later, to sell privately, but there’s always a lot of junk left over. And these we sell by auction without reserve, simply for the sake of getting them out of the way.

  “Now, as it happened, last October we had a breakdown lorry to dispose of. It was our own and had been in use for a couple of years, but we found it hardly powerful enough for our purpose. In a hilly country like this we wanted something with more guts in it. So we bought another and advertised the old one for sale. But nobody seemed to want it, and I decided to put it into the auction with the rest.

  “It fetched quite a good price, rather more than I expected. And when the sale was over, the young fellow who had bought it came to see me. He told me that he owned a garage in a small way near London, and had found it time to get a breakdown lorry. But he had nowhere to put it until an extension which he was having built was finished. Would I mind storing the lorry for a week or two? He would be quite ready to pay any reasonable sum for the privilege. He seemed quite a decent young fellow, and I told him the lorry could stay where it was until he was ready. And, if he had no objection to our using it in case of emergency, if we got an urgent call when the new lorry was out, for example, we wouldn’t charge him anything. He was perfectly satisfied with this arrangement, and he gave me his card. I’ve got it in my pocket now.”

  The manager produced the card and gave it to Arnold. Upon it was printed:

  The Blackdown Garage,

  London Road,

  Blackdown.

  Mr. William Figgis.

  Arnold made no comment, but passed the card to Merrion, with a triumphant glance. Then he turned to the manager. “Mr. Figgis collected the lorry later, I understand?”

  “He came here on the evening of Wednesday, November 13th, and told me he had come to take his lorry away. And then a difficulty cropped up. The lorry wasn’t registered. We had never registered it, for whenever it went out it did so with our trade number plates. Figgis ought to have realised this when he bought it, but apparently he hadn’t. So th
ere we were. The lorry couldn’t go out unregistered, and it was too late then to take out a registration. Figgis was terribly upset. He said it was absolutely necessary that he should be in Blackdown by the following morning. At last, since he was in the trade, and we all try to help one another as much as we can, I took pity on him. I said that he could drive the lorry home under a set of our trade number plates, on the strict understanding that he sent back the plates by passenger train the first thing next morning. This he promised to do. But the plates have never turned up, and from that day to this I’ve heard nothing of Mr. Figgis.”

  “You must have communicated with him, surely?” Arnold asked.

  “I’ve tried to. I wrote to him on Thursday morning, telling him that the plates had not been received, and asking him to send them back without delay. I sent the letter to the address on his card, and it came back ‘Not known.’ Apart from my being short of a pair of number plates, it strikes me that there is something pretty queer about all this.”

  “I’m inclined to agree with you,” said Arnold. “Are you quite sure that Figgis left Plymouth with the lorry that evening?”

  “He started, anyhow, for I sent one of my chaps with him to show him the best way out of the town. And also, for that matter, in case one of the local police should see a stranger driving under our number plates.”

  Merrion had an idea. “Is that chap of yours about?” he asked.

  “Yes, I’ll send for him,” the manager replied. In due course the chap appeared, round-faced, and betraying no marked symptoms of intelligence.

  “Do you remember going out with the gentleman who took away the old breakdown lorry, Tom?” the manager asked. “Wednesday evening last week, you know.”

  “Aye, I mind it well enough,” Tom replied. “I went with him out to the Plough, on the Exeter road. And then he said he could find his way all right, and I came back by bus.”

  “Always a good plan to stop at a pub,” Merrion remarked brightly. “He stood you a drink for your trouble, I hope?”

  Tom gazed at him sulkily. “I won’t deny we had a drop of cider,” he replied.

  “Of course, perfectly natural,” said Merrion softly. “And what else did he give you, Tom?”

  The other seemed to resent this question. “I don’t know what business that might be of yours,” he replied.

  It was clearly time for Arnold to take a hand. “Then I’ll tell you,” he replied sternly. “I am an inspector from Scotland Yard, and I’ll trouble you to answer the questions put to you, without any nonsense.”

  At the very mention of Scotland Yard, Tom’s face went pale. He seemed to imagine that he was liable to be clapped in gaol for the rest of his life, without chance of appeal. “I’m sure I beg pardon, sir,” he stammered. “I wouldn’t think for a moment of hiding anything from you. It’s quite true that the gentleman did give me something else. It was in the Plough, while we were having our cider. He said that he had just remembered that he had a telegram which he meant to send before he left the town. And he asked me if I would send it for him first thing next morning on my way to work. I said I would, and he gave me the telegram and the money for it, and half a quid.”

  “Did you read the telegram?” Arnold asked.

  “No, sir. I shouldn’t have thought of doing that. Besides, the gentleman said it was private, and asked me not to say anything to anybody else.”

  “Oh, he did, did he? And what did you do with the telegram?”

  “I told the gentleman that there would be plenty of time to hand it in that evening, when I got back to the town. But he said no, he didn’t want that. So I handed it at the General Post Office next morning on my way to work.”

  Arnold turned to the manager. “Can you describe this man Figgis?” he asked.

  “Fairly tall and rather slightly built. Fair, clean-shaven, with rather a pleasant face which might be called good-looking. Quite young, not more than thirty at the most. And very well dressed. In fact, that was the first thing I noticed about him. In the course of conversation he told me that he had been an actor, but that there was no money in it. So, having come into a little capital a couple of years ago, he had opened a garage and was doing very well.”

  Tom corroborated the manager’s description, adding the further particular that Figgis “spoke like a real gentleman.” Arnold and Merrion, having secured minute particulars of the lorry, left the garage and went back to the police station. It had occurred to both of them that Figgis might turn out to be Dredger’s relative Harold, or perhaps his comrade-in-arms, Fred. With the help of the local police they ran these two young gentlemen to earth. But they had no difficulty in proving, beyond possibility of doubt, that neither of them could be the wanted man.

  On their way back to London in the night train Arnold and Merrion discussed the lorry and the identity of the elusive Figgis. “It’s no use trying to pretend now that Dredger isn’t in some way mixed up in this,” Arnold maintained doggedly. “Look at this chap Figgis, who gives the address of a garage which doesn’t exist. What address does he give? London Road, Blackdown! Dredger lives in London Road, Blackdown? Do you mean to tell me that’s sheer coincidence? Nonsense!”

  “I didn’t tell you anything of the kind,” replied Merrion mildly.

  “No, but you thought it. Besides, how did Figgis know about Harold and Fred, if Dredger didn’t tell him, eh?”

  “Never mind about Dredger for the moment. He won’t run away. Let’s see if we can make anything of this lorry business. To begin with, we have evidence that the crime was planned some time ago. Figgis bought the lorry as early as last month. That may turn out to be a useful piece of information. Next, Figgis did not collect it until the day before it was wanted. Clearly, I think, because he did not want to be seen in possession of such an unusual vehicle as a breakdown lorry. Whatever he may be by profession, I don’t suppose he’s a garage proprietor. And for anybody else to own such a thing might excite remark.

  “Then that dodge of borrowing a set of trade number plates from the Celtic Garage. That was a pretty cute move. It saved him the necessity of registering the lorry, also from providing a clue by which he might have been traced. And I haven’t a doubt that he was still using those number plates on Thursday evening. If any one had seen him, and made a note of the number, this would have been traced to the Celtic Garage, and we should be no further than we are now.”

  “And that’s not very far,” Arnold grumbled. “We know where the lorry came from, and quite a lot about its past history. All very interesting, no doubt, but it doesn’t help us to lay hands on the man who murdered Sir Wilfred. Where is the lorry now? That’s what we want to know.”

  “Not very far from Blackdown, I expect,” replied Merrion thoughtfully.

  “And Dredger knows where it could be found, I’ll wager.”

  “Oh, darn Dredger! Can’t you try to forget him for a minute or two? I’ve two reasons, entirely unconnected with him, for supposing that either A or B live near Blackdown. The first takes us back to that dodge of the lights in the tunnel. Before that could even have been thought of, the existence of the shaft must have been known. And that presupposes local knowledge, for it is not in any way conspicuous, and is most unlikely to be discovered by a stranger.

  “And then, when it had been decided to make use of the shaft, a lot of research must have been necessary. Somebody must have made a lot of very careful observations. I need only mention a few. He would have to find out what time the five o’clock from Cannon Street ran through Blackdown station. Since it does not stop there, that is not mentioned in the ordinary time-table. He would also have to observe the time taken by the train to travel from the entrance of the tunnel to the shaft. He would have to make sure that no up train ran through the tunnel at the same time. These are only a few of the things he had to find out, and he could only do so by local observation.”

  “Dredger could
have…” Arnold began, but Merrion stopped him peremptorily. “If you mention that man’s name again, I shall do something rash. I don’t say that there isn’t the possibility that he had something to do with it. But can’t you keep an open mind, without trying to twist everything to that conclusion?

  “Now for my second reason. Plymouth, I suppose, is approximately two hundred and forty miles from Blackdown. Figgis, we are told, left Plymouth about half-past five on Wednesday evening. Naturally, he would not be anxious to parade the lorry before the eyes of the public during the hours of daylight. And that raises rather an interesting point. He would not want the lorry to be on the road between, roughly, the hours of sunrise and sunset on Thursday.

  “We are told that he reached the shaft round about five o’clock on Thursday afternoon. Now, if he didn’t want to drive in daylight, he can’t have come very far. The sun set that day at 4.11 p.m. That gave him three-quarters of an hour, more or less, for his journey. Considerably less, I expect, for he would not want to start until it was really dusk. Therefore, there is reason to believe that, during the hours of daylight on Thursday, the lorry was hidden in some spot within ten miles of the shaft. That spot could have been reached during Wednesday night and the early hours of Thursday morning, even if the average speed during the journey from Plymouth was not more than twenty miles an hour.”

  “That sounds reasonable enough,” Arnold remarked, rather grudgingly.

  “It’s perfectly reasonable. I won’t make guesses about the situation of the spot, beyond suggesting that it would probably be waste of time to look for it in the centre of a town. The next point is this. Who is Figgis? You know as well as I do that a man who sets out to spin a tissue of lies very often shoves in a word of truth here and there, just to make his story more plausible. I wonder if Figgis was telling the truth when he told the manager of the Celtic Garage that he had been an actor?”