Corpse Path Cottage

by Margaret Scutt

  ‘This anonymous letter business, Super — poison pen in a peaceful village — any lead there?’

  ‘We’re working on it, naturally. I’d be grateful if you didn’t headline it too much as yet.’

  ‘Making bricks without straw to write up anything after an inquest like this,’ said a gentleman in a very dirty raincoat, closing his notebook with a snap. ‘I’m sure I don’t know why I left my little home for Fleet Street. Had the coroner well and truly in his place, didn’t you, Super? All most remarkable for what was left unsaid.’

  ‘That’s as may be,’ replied the Super, unruffled. ‘And as to making bricks without straw, as soon as I’m in the position to give you any straw, I promise I’ll do so. Fair enough?’

  ‘Fair enough,’ they admitted sadly, and drifted away. The Super turned to Endicott.

  ‘Sorry to keep you, sir, but they’re very persistent.’

  ‘What are you going to do — arrest me?’

  ‘Not at the moment, sir.’ The Super chuckled indulgently, as if to say that Mark would have his little joke. ‘I only wondered if you would care for a lift back to the cottage.’

  Mark gave him a hard stare.

  ‘Very nicely put, I’m sure. I take it that what you actually mean is that you’re keeping me under observation.’

  The Super gave him a look of dignified reproof.

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t put words into my mouth, Mr Endicott. That wasn’t my meaning. Naturally we shall keep in touch with you until this affair is cleared up.’

  ‘You think it will be cleared up?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said the Super gently. ‘I think so. In time. But I assure you that the lift was offered for your sake, and not for that of my investigations.’

  Mark flushed darkly. ‘You mean . . . ?’

  ‘I mean that there’s a certain amount of local feeling against you, Mr Endicott. It’s to be expected, really, and you needn’t take it too hard. You see, they’re what they are, and you’re what they call a foreigner. Added to that, it seems you made some rather foolish remarks on the bus, which have been remembered, and probably magnified to use against you, and now this murder happens almost on your doorstep, so to speak . . .’

  ‘Very unfortunate, wasn’t it? I should have planned it better. All the same,’ said Endicott savagely, ‘I don’t fancy I stand in need of police protection just yet.’

  ‘I wasn’t suggesting that you did. This isn’t a mob, you know — only a crowd of villagers, very excited by recent events, who may have taken a notion against you. There might be a few remarks and unfriendly looks which I thought you might prefer to avoid. That’s all.’

  Mark smiled suddenly. ‘Thank you. Super, I don’t know what this touching care for my wellbeing implies, but it’s very good of you. Sorry I was terse.’

  ‘That’s all right. Quite understandable, I’m sure. Are we ready, then? The car’s outside.’

  ‘As I said, it’s very good of you,’ repeated Mark. ‘All the same, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll walk.’

  The Super looked at him steadily, without sign of anger or reproof.

  ‘It’s up to you, sir,’ he said.

  * * *

  When Amy, with Dinah, left the hall, her colour was still burning brightly. Looking at her, and in the midst of her own preoccupations, Dinah was as conscious of the change in her as the Super had been. Why, despite an, as always, deplorable hat, the little creature was almost pretty. Strange that it should have taken a murder to shake her from the drab anonymity which had enfolded her for so long. Though that, reflected Dinah, was hardly fair, it was not the fact of the murder which had changed Amy, but that all her loyalty had been roused in defence of the grim-faced Endicott. Rather pathetic, really — the first man to take notice of her, and he could bring to life all this. And he would need all the loyalty he could get, too.

  She looked at the waiting, whispering groups outside the doorway with a little chill at her heart. Endicott, whatever he might mean to her surprising housemate, was little more than a name to herself, but from childhood she had known a horror of crowds. A book containing a mob chase, a film with a lynching sequence even now had power to trouble her through sleepless hours of the night. This was no mob, she told herself, unconsciously echoing the Super’s words; only a group of country folk, quiet, decent, but just now shaken from the even tenor of their way, waiting for the ‘furriner’ — the stranger within their gates. One would think that his name, and no other, had been coupled with that of the dead woman. After all, she felt the chill, the sensation of coming evil again, but this time it was not due to the crowd.

  She had asked herself the question so many times since the moment when the news had first reached her. Once again it beat its way through her weary brain. Why, why, why, had Brian, who had wanted none of her for so long, Brian, who had loved Laura Grey, or had been bewitched by her — why must he needs choose that evening, of all others, to come in search of herself? And what had made him look so strangely stricken, so utterly unlike himself?

  She hated herself, but this insidious thought had made a home with her, and once there could not be dislodged. Could it be possible that she herself had been used as a covering for Brian’s movements? If Laura had been killed, as seemed possible, before ten, suspicion would surely be diverted from the man who had come to drive another girl home just after the hour. It was not possible, it would be too horrible, she told herself, almost more horrible than the murder itself. She hated herself for thinking of it, but it all came back to the same weary question: why had Brian looked as he had that night?

  A hand touched her arm. With a violent start she looked up into the face of the man who was troubling her thoughts.

  ‘I wanted to see you,’ said Brian.

  Dinah found that her mouth was dry. As always, whatever reason she had to mistrust him, his nearness had power to affect her, however she might despise herself for the weakness.

  She said, rather coldly, ‘Well, here I am.’

  He glanced around him, his lip curling with disgust.

  ‘Do you suggest a conversation here, amidst this pleasing crowd of harpies, with their ears flapping in the breeze? Thank you so much.’

  This sounded so like the old superior Brian that she was vaguely comforted.

  ‘Why don’t you walk on together?’ suggested Miss Faraday.

  Dinah, who had entirely forgotten her, turned in surprise.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m waiting,’ said Amy briefly, with the light of battle in her eye.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Dinah doubtfully. ‘Then I think I had better wait with you. I can see Brian later.’

  She had suddenly become uncomfortably conscious of the glances cast at the small champion of the oppressed and could guess the subject matter of the muttered remarks. Alone with the feller until after ten at night — ought to be ashamed of herself, no fool like an old fool, more in it than met the eye . . .

  ‘You go on. You needn’t worry about me,’ said Amy.

  Dinah marvelled yet again. She said reluctantly, ‘Very well. We’ll go as far as the corner and wait for you there.’

  ‘Yes, do,’ agreed Amy absently, her eyes fixed on the door through which Mark Endicott must emerge.

  ‘I feel I ought to stay with her,’ repeated Dinah as she and her companion moved away.

  ‘Why? She told you to go, and surely she’s old enough to take care of herself.’

  ‘That’s a pretty foul tone to take,’ said Dinah crossly.

  ‘Sorry. As I may have mentioned before, I quite realize that you don’t like anything about me. Entirely my own fault, of course. Only that doesn’t stop it from hurting.’

  His voice broke suddenly. He turned away from her, laying his arms along the top of the gate, as if his interest was in the sleek brown cows contentedly going about the business of their day. The sun made a dappled pattern through the leaves of a solitary oak just inside the gate. Away from the buzz outside th
e hall, it was very still.

  ‘What did you want to say to me, Brian?’ asked Dinah. Her voice sounded coldly repressive in her own ears. She was torn between pity and fear — pity for Brian who, whatever he had or had not done was certainly suffering now, and fear lest that monstrous suspicion of hers should prove to be founded in fact. Oh God, prayed Dinah, don’t let it be that. Not that. I couldn’t bear it.

  Brian had turned as she spoke, looking down at her as she stood with the sunlight on her dark head. He looked rather puzzled.

  He said gently, ‘What’s wrong, Dinah?’

  The note of sympathy was her undoing. Her face twisted suddenly, like that of an angry baby. Enormous tears welled into her eyes.

  ‘Oh, I say,’ said Brian, who had never seen her cry.

  Dinah found, quite naturally, that her face was pressed against his coat, and his arms around her. For a luxurious moment she sobbed whole-heartedly, finding an actual pleasure in giving way at last.

  ‘Is it because of me?’ asked Brian above her tumbled head. ‘Don’t cry, Dinah. I’m no good . . .’

  She lifted her head, and pulled herself away, mopping fiercely at her disfigured face. She said bitterly, ‘Here we go again.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean I’m sick of hearing you pity yourself. All that’s done — let it go. You make me tired, Brian.’

  There was a pause. Dinah, who knew well enough what grief could do to her countenance, kept it steadily averted. Brian was probably now too furious with her for words; after all, it was rather much to howl all over a person and then accuse him of self-pity. Oh dear, she thought, I’m all muddled up.

  She said, apprehensively, ‘You still haven’t told me what you wanted me for.’

  ‘I’m half afraid to say anything, after those few kind words,’ said Brian. He sounded faintly amused. ‘Oh, don’t apologize — quite justified, no doubt. I only wanted to tell you I was sorry.’

  ‘Sorry?’ echoed Dinah, catching her breath on the ghost of a sob.

  ‘For the way I behaved to you. It was unforgivable. I knew it all along, I suppose, but I only realized it fully the other night.’

  Dinah forgot that her face would be best hidden. She looked straight at him, her swollen eyes burning.

  ‘Which night?’ she whispered.

  Brian started. He looked at her in surprise.

  She said, still in a whisper, ‘Would it be the night that Laura Grey . . . died?’

  At once she knew with a cold certainty that she had voiced her dread as clearly as if she had put it into words. She saw Brian stiffen, and his blue eyes grew dark. He looked as if he had never seen her before. She tried to speak, to break the silence, which was dragging on and on, but for the life of her could not find words.

  ‘I suppose I deserved that,’ said Brian at last, in a completely expressionless voice. ‘All the same, I didn’t expect it. I would never have believed that you could think that of me, Dinah.’

  He turned and walked slowly away. She did not follow him or try to call him back.

  * * *

  Mark stood in the doorway of the hall and deliberately filled his pipe. His hard gaze took in the waiting groups and the many eyes turned towards him and did not waver.

  ‘He be coming out by himself,’ said a disappointed voice, clearly audible above the prevailing buzz. ‘What did I tell ’ee?’

  So that was it, thought Mark. Obviously they had seen the Super call him back and hoped to see him reappear under arrest — a Eugene Aram walking for their pleasure, with gyves upon his wrists. Too bad to disillusion them.

  He came slowly down the three steps which led from the hall, his face utterly unmoved but with his heart beginning to beat in quick, sickening throbs. Not a mob, indeed; he did not know that a mob would not have been easier to face. A man assaulted by blows might at least go down fighting — a warm blooded affair, with the satisfaction of crashing your fist into a face or two before the end came. To this coldly inimical stare from a now completely silent crowd there could be no retaliation. A poor devil in the pillory must have felt something like this, thought Mark, stepping on with his head held high.

  He recognized a face here and there. Two men with whom he had played a friendly game of darts at the Ring and Book; their faces were not friendly now. There stood Mrs Hale and Mrs Cossett, side by side, their eyes fixed unblinkingly upon him with a certain satisfaction, as if they were two soothsayers who had seen their words proved true. There was the benevolent face of Jimmy Fairfax; Mark slowed up suddenly. That old twister at least should speak to him. But Mr Fairfax had other ideas; his face, like a conjuring trick, flickered, and was not. Mark walked on.

  A small figure crowned by a shapeless hat emerged from the crowd and confronted him. In the utter silence her voice rose clearly.

  ‘As we are going the same way, Mr Endicott, I thought we might walk along together.’ She drew a gasping breath. ‘It’s — it’s pleasanter, don’t you think, to have company than to go alone.’

  Mark halted. Amy looked up at his forbidding countenance, quivering but undaunted. For a long moment they stood silent, as if they were alone together, and the people of God’s Blessing had melted into space. Then Mark smiled, half quizzically, but with a certain tenderness, such as one might show to a child. Amy heaved a sigh of relief. She had thought it quite possible that he might turn and rend her. It had not been a mistake, after all.

  ‘Thank you, Miss Faraday,’ he said gravely. ‘It’s very good of you to have waited. I shall be glad of your company.’

  They moved away, hearing a buzz of indistinguishable comment. Above the sound a voice cried tauntingly, ‘Why don’t she go arm in crook wit un, the dirty murderer!’

  Mark swung round. His face was white, but a fierce joy moved him. Something definite at last — something he could answer.

  He said clearly, ‘If the gentleman who made that remark cares to come forward, I shall be most happy to give him what he deserves.’

  There was a kind of swirling movement in the crowd, but of a backward rather than a forward nature.

  ‘I see,’ said Mark, with a short laugh. ‘You haven’t even the courage of your convictions. In future, if any of you wish to speak to me, I should be obliged if you would do so to my face, and not behind my back.’

  He paused hopefully, but the silence was complete. With Amy at his side, he walked slowly away. God’s Blessing broke into speech again.

  CHAPTER XIX

  ‘OF COURSE,’ SAID THE Chief Constable bitterly, ‘it had to happen now.’

  ‘Very bad luck at any time, sir. Particularly now, as you say,’ the superintendent agreed in a soothing rumble.

  The two men were in session not in the familiar surroundings of police officialdom, but in a private ward of Lake hospital. Sir Henry’s face, for an invalid, was surprisingly red and angry against the white pillows; under the coverlet a long hillock told of the cage surrounding his leg. The Chief Constable, who fancied himself as a horseman, had bought and attempted to ride an animal which fancied him as a rider not at all. A fall and a fractured leg had followed swiftly, and Sir Henry was out of action at the moment when he least desired it.

  ‘Those miserable fellers and their women who must go picnicking all over the country as soon as the sun shines,’ he grumbled obscurely. ‘A curse, they are.’

  ‘Picnickers, sir?’

  ‘Littering the whole place with their filthy bits and pieces, when they aren’t lighting fires for other folk to put out. I had the brute well under control, and mind you, he took some handling, when a damned great paper bag blew under his nose. Naturally, that, was that.’

  Mr White, cleverly hiding a certain gratification, felt by himself for reasons of his own, murmured sympathetically.

  ‘Well, don’t waste time,’ snapped his superior, ‘let’s get down to it for God’s sake. Now, touching this alibi business—’

  ‘Alibi? Neither of them have one. On the other hand, there’s n
o proof that they are not speaking the truth. But of course, watertight alibis are not necessarily a sign of innocence.’

  ‘Don’t quite follow you there,’ objected Sir Henry, moving slightly and muttering under his breath.

  The Super leaned forward and pointed a finger at him. ‘It’s like this, sir. Take it, for the sake of argument, that you planned a murder, what would your first thought be? To protect yourself from the consequences of the crime, which is to say, have an alibi well and truly prepared.’

  ‘That’s all very fine. You’re talking about a premeditated crime. You don’t know that this one was planned.’

  ‘I don’t think it was, sir,’ said the Super.

  ‘Then why the devil are you bringing in all this stuff about prearranged alibis?’

  ‘I must have expressed myself badly, sir,’ said the Super sadly. ‘I only meant that the lack of a suitable alibi is not in itself a sign of guilt.’

  Sir Henry snorted loudly and regarded him without pleasure. ‘You’re talking a lot of poppycock. All that you say may be true, but when you have lack of an alibi plus motive plus opportunity, surely that adds up to something. Even you must see that.’

  The Super stiffened slightly. ‘Even you’ struck him as being unnecessarily rude. That’s what you get with these trumpery puffed up jacks in office, he thought bitterly.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he said in a subdued voice.

  ‘There you are then,’ said Sir Henry triumphantly. He warmed to his theme. ‘Let’s run through that and clear our minds.’

  ‘Sure it won’t be too much for you, sir?’

  The Chief Constable looked at him sharply but was reassured by the stolid countenance. No hint of a hidden insult there. Probably the feller hadn’t the brains for it. He had made a mistake in the first place, and now this had to happen. With himself laid by the heels and Old Slow and Sure taking his imperturbable way, the affair might drag on and on.