‘I’m tough as doctors go, Nigel, but that got me down. I tried to forget it, but I couldn’t. The chap getting sacked on top of it was the last straw. I went to see Joe—Eustace’s brother, you know: he runs the transport side. I as good as told him he was a murderer. He took it damned well—we’ve been friends ever since, actually; said he’d told his brother again and again it was asking for trouble making his drivers run to a schedule like that, but it hadn’t had any effect. Poor Joe is a damned good sort, but Eustace always had him where he wanted him. However, this time Joe thought that—if he had a doctor’s statement behind him (my name wasn’t going to be brought in, of course)—he might be able to make some impression on Eustace. I thought I might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb, so I got Joe to show me over the brewery—I wanted to see exactly how far people had been exaggerating over the conditions there. Believe me, there hadn’t been much exaggeration. I gave the place a pretty thorough look-over, from the hygienic point of view. I won’t bother you with details: but the ventilation was appalling, and one didn’t have to be a technical expert to see that the machinery and apparatus were nearly worn-out and thoroughly dangerous. Bunnett was the sort that has to squeeze the last ounce of work out of his machines as well as his men.’
‘But surely there are government inspectors who——?’
‘There are ways and means, young Nigel, of dealing with that difficulty. Eyewash and palm-grease, applied in equal proportions, will work wonders. And Eustace was an expert at applying them, I’ve no doubt. Well, I sent in a detailed report to Joe—about the conditions in the brewery, their effect on the health of the employees, etc., as well as about the lorry schedule. He was as keen as I to improve conditions all round. And he bearded brother Eustace with it. The next thing that happened, as far as I was concerned, was a note the day after requesting me to go round and see Eustace at the brewery. Eustace was sitting at the end of the long table in the boardroom, straightening a piece of blotting-paper in front of him. At least, I imagined it must be a piece of blotting-paper till he took it up in one hand, tapped it with his pince-nez, and said, “I take it you are the author of this—er—document.” It was my report! Typed and unsigned, but he’d tumbled to it quick enough.
‘After that, of course, there was hell to pay. He asked me by what right I interfered in another man’s business. I told him that it was every citizen’s duty to see that the laws were not broken. He asked me to state any laws he had broken. I quoted parts of the factory acts. Then he asked what I proposed to do about it. So I told him that, unless some changes were made pretty quick, I’d raise such a stink that even he, the omnipotent Eustace Bunnett, would have to knuckle under. He sat there for a while, fidgeting with a paper-knife and darting an occasional glance my way out of those cold little lizard’s eyes of his. Then, to my surprise, he caved in. Said that I didn’t look the sort to accept a handsome remuneration in return for a policy of non-intervention in the future—here he made a significant pause, but I was not nibbling at the bait. “Very well, then,” said he, “you win. Give me six months to make the alterations suggested in your report, and then I think you’ll be able to come back and give us a clean sheet—hem, ha, sniff”—you know the sort of noises he made. I pointed out that it did not take six months to revise a lorry-running time-table. He hemmed and sniffed a bit, but finally promised to see to that at once. And he did. When Joe told me that the schedule had been altered, I felt convinced that I’d really put Bunnett on the spot. But—’
‘But you found out the great truth,’ interrupted Nigel, ‘which inexperienced troops always have to learn—and pay for—that veterans are never so dangerous as when they give ground.’
‘Yes. Served me right for thinking I could run the whole show single-handed. Six months later, to the very day, Bunnett asked me to come and see him again. As I went through the brewery up to his private office, I looked around me—and it didn’t look as if reconstruction had been done at all. So you can imagine I was not in too good a temper when I arrived in the Presence. Bunnett sat at his desk, pursing up his fat little mouth at me and rubbing his hands—they made a noise like a lizard’s tail slithering over a stone wall. “Ah, doctor,” he said, getting down to business at once, “if I remember rightly, on your last visit here you said that it was every citizen’s duty to see that the laws are not broken. Now I am sure, Dr Cammison, that—as I prophesied last time you came here—you will see your way to giving us a clean sheet.” Even then I didn’t know what he was driving at. He leant back in his chair and said, “Kate Alpace.” Then I knew I was done.’
‘Kate Alpace?’ asked Nigel, mystified.
‘She is my sister,’ said Mrs Cammison. ‘It was before we came here: when we were living in the Midlands. She had a lover and became pregnant. She asked Herbert to perform an abortion.’
Herbert Cammison said, ‘I don’t approve of abortion, as a general rule. But I happened to discover that there was insanity in Kate’s young man’s family. So of course I did it for her. Well, as you know, it’s a criminal offence—penal servitude if you get found out.’
‘And Eustace Bunnett had found out?’ said Nigel.
‘Yes. He must have spent the six months I’d given him to improve his own business in making inquiries about me. Some shady private-inquiry agent, no doubt. That gives you an idea of what Bunnett was like, doesn’t it? Heaven knows how his agents discovered it; it’s irrelevant, anyway. The point was, if Bunnett had broken the law, so had I.’
‘Sort of stalemate,’ said Nigel.
‘Worse. Exposure would have cost him pretty heavily in fines: but it would ruin my whole career. He was really in a strong position. Well, I generally have pretty good self-control, but that time I lost my temper. I told Bunnett exactly what I thought of him. Unfortunately, I also told him that people like him ought to be exterminated.’
‘Unfortunately?’ asked Nigel. ‘You mean——?’
‘Yes,’ said Cammison. ‘One of Bunnett’s pleasant little practices—I forgot to mention it before—was to have one or two spies on the premises: it’s not unknown in big business: the employer pays one of his employees to report to him any dissatisfaction, strike rumours and so on, he may hear in the shop. I’m terribly afraid that one of Bunnett’s spies was listening-in on my little outburst.’
‘It looks as if I’d better stay on,’ said Nigel.
‘You certainly had,’ said Dr Cammison grimly. ‘Unless by any chance you were sitting outside my bedroom door all last night.’
Nigel glared at him perplexedly.
‘You see, otherwise there is no proof that I didn’t visit the brewery last night and liquidate Bunnett.’
‘It will be awkward if the inspector turns up that row you had with Bunnett, certainly. Still, no doubt there are plenty of other people who had equally strong motives for doing him in.’
‘Very comforting you are, I must say.’
‘Oh, do stop talking about it as though it was a chess problem!’ exclaimed Sophie Cammison. ‘Don’t you realise that——’
‘It’s all right,’ her husband said gently; ‘I realise everything, don’t you worry. And, by the way, young Nigel—as I am incriminating myself, I’d better do it thoroughly. Since that interview with Bunnett, Sophie and I had been living in—to put it mildly—a state of considerable uncertainty. For some time, he did nothing. But a few months ago, he started getting uppish with Sophie again. He as good as told her that he could ruin my career if he liked—and would, if she was not a bit more forthcoming. Yes, I know, it all sounds like a threepenny novelette; but there it is: Bunnett was not distinguished for literary good taste, anyway—as you discovered at the meeting. The point is, when Sophie told me about it I went to see Bunnett and informed him that—career or no career—I’d see him dead before I let him get away with that sort of thing.’
‘And now you have—er—seen him dead,’ said Nigel meditatively. ‘Yes, the situation is certainly a trifle daunting. However; courage, me
s enfants. I will apply the gigantic resources of the trained mind. You reconstruct the anatomy, Herbert, and I’ll reconstruct the crime. And then, Sophie,’ he added, ‘you can start knitting a wardrobe for your own children.’
V
July 18, 9.15–11 a.m.
Watchman, what of the night?
ISAIAH (xxi, 11)
AT EXACTLY 2.17 the next morning Nigel had woken up with a bizarre, a wildly fantastic idea in his head. After breakfast he drew Herbert Cammison aside and said:
‘Look here, I had an idea last night. Supposing that skeleton isn’t Eustace Bunnett at all.’
‘Well, we don’t know it is yet. But all the evidence points to it. Where is Bunnett, anyway, if it wasn’t him in the copper? And why shouldn’t it be?’
‘It just struck me that it was a curious—an unnecessarily elaborate way of getting rid of him. I mean, why not just kill him and be done with it? Why go to all that trouble to destroy his identity—and yet leave his clothes and watch and ring and everything on him?’
‘That’s very simply explained. By putting the body in the copper, the murderer would succeed in effacing anything that would give us a clue to the method of the crime—that is, unless it was a blunt instrument affair. All traces of poisoning, say, or strangling, or even stabbing probably, would be destroyed.’
‘Oh, heavens!’ groaned Nigel. ‘Of course. These midnight inspirations always look cock-eyed in daylight. I don’t know why that didn’t occur to me at once, though.’
‘Besides,’ continued the doctor, ‘if the remains were not Bunnett, yet are dressed up to make us believe that they are him—I’m getting ungrammatical—the deduction would be that it was Bunnett who did the murder. Unless there is a third party, X, who killed Y, and then persuaded Bunnett to exchange clothes with the corpse. And why should X do that—or Bunnett, for that matter?’
‘X might have killed Bunnett as well.’
‘Now you’re just asking for complications.’
‘That’s true. Well, then, suppose for the sake of argument that there’s no X. Bunnett would be the murderer then.’
‘But, my dear good Nigel, why? Why should he want to kill anyone—and kill himself in the process, which is what he’d be doing by dressing up the body to look like himself?’
‘Search me!’
‘I should think so! But seriously, Eustace Bunnett was the last chap to commit murder. Murder—even most unpremeditated murders included—is the last resort of the person who can’t get his own way by any other means. Now Bunnett wielded, in his business, his personal relationships, and in this whole town, almost absolute power. He could get what he wanted, when he wanted, without killing anyone in the process—beyond an occasional lorry-driver. The only thing here he didn’t get was Sophie: I was the obstacle to that: are you going to suggest that it’s really me who was boiled in the copper?’
‘All right, old boy, all right! Pax!’ Nigel’s irregular and somewhat discoloured teeth showed in a placatory grin. ‘As a matter of fact, I hadn’t much confidence in my midnight inspiration all along; I was just wondering idly whether it could be put across on the inspector, supposing that he——’
‘Supposing he started to get after me? Well, you could try it on him; but——’
Herbert Cammison grimaced and made a thumb-down gesture. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I must be off to try and put Humpty Dumpty together again. Good hunting!’
‘Good jig-saw!’ responded Nigel politely.
As Nigel was walking down town towards the brewery half an hour later, he perceived Miss Mellors forging in his direction with purposeful strides. He glanced round furtively to see if there was any shop door into which he could retreat: no, nothing but private houses: he stood his ground, with the dour fatalism of the prairie-dweller who beholds the thundering herd galloping down upon him and can only hope for a speedy and conclusive kick on the head. At a distance of twenty yards Miss Mellors, raising simultaneously her ash-plant and her bull-like head, bellowed:
‘Hoy! Mr Strangeways! I want a word with you. Don’t run away now!’
Nigel submitted to a handshake which nearly wrenched his arm out of its socket.
‘Now, what’s all this I hear about an accident down at the brewery, eh?’
‘A—er—body was discovered there yesterday evening. It seems likely that it is Mr Bunnett’s.’
The effect of this communication was devastating. Miss Mellors’ huge and sanguine face grew suddenly pale. She seized Nigel’s arm and exclaimed in an absurd, croaking little voice:
‘But that’s ridiculous. He’s away cruising. In a boat,’ she added rather unnecessarily.
‘Not Joe. Eustace Bunnett—that is, as far as we can tell at present.’
Miss Mellors recovered herself very quickly. ‘My dear man,’ she expostulated in her ordinary, booming, loudspeaker voice, ‘my dear man, either the body is Eustace Bunnett or it isn’t. There’s no use making a mystery about it.’
‘I’m not making the mystery. It’s the body—I mean, there isn’t a great deal left of it, you see.’
‘Come along! You needn’t be mealy-mouthed. I’m not a green girl, you know. You mean, the body was battered out of all recognition,’ said Miss Mellors, not without relish. ‘The work of a maniac, eh?’
‘Not battered,’ replied Nigel, slightly irritated by the accusation of mealy-mouthedness: ‘boiled to rags, if you want to know.’
‘Really, now, that’s most interesting,’ she boomed affably. ‘Tell me all about it.’
Nigel gave her a short and guarded résumé of events. ‘A pretty ghastly business,’ he concluded.
‘Ghastly business? Tripe. Don’t be so conventional, young man. That Bunnett was a scoundrel, and had it coming to him. I’d have horse-whipped him long ago myself, only he was below my weight. I will say nothing about his private life’—Miss Mellors proceeded to discourse on that subject for a good ten minutes—‘but apart from all that, the fellow was a poisoner.’
‘A poisoner?’ ejaculated Nigel, considerably shaken. ‘Dash it all, I can’t quite believe that.’
‘Strong drink, young man, is poison. You may not be aware of it, but——’ Miss Mellors gave an outspoken and exceedingly physiological lecture on the effects of alcohol. She concluded by reciting, in sombre but penetrating tones, emphasising the metre with taps of her ash-stick:
‘Ha! see where the wild-blazing Grog-Shop appears,
As the red waves of wretchedness swell,
How it burns on the edge of tempestuous years—
The horrible Light-House of Hell!’
‘Well,’ said Nigel, ‘that may be so. But killing an odd brewery proprietor here and there is not going to have any effect on the drink trade. Presumably Joe will be carrying on the business, and——’
‘Indeed he will not. Not if I have any say in the matter.’
‘And what say will you have in the matter?’ Nigel was emboldened to ask. If it were possible for a Goddess of Public Works to blush, one might say that Miss Mellors did blush. She changed the subject quickly, saying:
‘What was Bunnett doing in the brewery in the middle of the night, anyway? Snooping around, I’ll be bound. Serves him right. Live and let live, I say,’ she added, somewhat inconsistently. ‘Well, cheerio!’
But that, of course, was the question, Nigel reflected as he proceeded on his way. How did the murderer get Bunnett into the brewery? The answer was to be supplied very soon. Nigel was stopped by a constable at the brewery gates. On giving his name, he was told that the inspector would like to see him in Mr Bunnett’s private office.
‘Pursuant to Dr Cammison’s suggestion, I got into communication with the Yard last night. Sir John Strangeways vouched for you personally, so your position in respect to this case is now regularised,’ said the inspector. Nigel wished he would not talk this bogus sort of officialese: no doubt, it was meant to impress him with Tyler’s superior education; oh, well, the main thing was that he now had some offic
ial standing.
‘Well, how’s things?’ he said.
‘We have just opened Mr Bunnett’s private safe. We found this, which may be of interest to you, sir.’ The inspector handed across a sheet of cheap, lined notepaper, on which was written, in block letters:
Dear Sir,—If you want to know where your bottled beer and sugar goes to, go to the brewery tomorrow night about 12 and ask the night watchman.
A WELL-WISHER
‘Oh,’ said Nigel, ‘so that’s what took him to the brewery. I was wondering. Envelope there, too?’
‘Yes, sir. Postmark, Weston Priors—that’s a village about fifteen miles away. Dated July 15th, 7.30 p.m.’
‘I take it that the bird who wrote this is the murderer: which implies that the murderer had a pretty fair knowledge of the workings of the brewery—though we could have told that without this letter.’
‘Just so, sir,’ said the inspector, with a complacent superiority that Nigel found exceedingly irritating. ‘But there’s one possibility that you’ve overlooked. And what is that possibility? This, Mr Strangeways—the letter might be a bonerfidee anonymous letter; Mr Bunnett, acting upon it, might have gone to the brewery and caught the night watchman pilfering; that might have led to an affray in which Lock—that’s the watchman—killed Mr Bunnett; whereupon, to conceal the evidence of his crime, he disposed of the body in the copper.’
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