Murderes' Houses

by Jennie Melville

  ‘I don’t mean Mrs Ryman’s. I mean this one.’

  ‘But Dusty isn’t dead!’ However she got up and stood aside while Charmian went swiftly and methodically through the drawers. The two top drawers contained official cards and writing paper, the bottom two Dusty obviously reserved for her own use. Charmian turned over a comb and brush, neither very clean and filled with greying hair, an old toothbrush that looked as if Dusty had experimented with dyeing her hair red, and a half-eaten bar of chocolate. There were also a pair of nylon stockings and a silk scarf which April Miller claimed as hers.

  ‘I must say I’m surprised not to see old Dusty today, though. I really expected her.’

  ‘I’ll have to visit her at home.’

  ‘You do that.’

  The girl watched Charmian depart.

  ‘Hard-working girl,’ she said aloud. ‘Wonder if she knows she’s got odd shoes on.’

  It was raining even harder by the time Charmian got to Dusty’s house and she had to step over a great puddle to get to the front door. It looked as though someone had been digging a hole there.

  Charmian rang the bell and waited. No one came. She rang again. Not very far distant someone was banging or hammering at something.

  She rang a third time and finally heard slow footsteps. Even so there was a pause before the door opened. A boy stood there, his shirt sleeves rolled up and a hammer in his arms. He was quite wet, as if he had been working in the rain.

  ‘Can I speak to Miss Butcher?’

  ‘She’s out.’ He sounded indifferent.

  ‘She is?’

  ‘She’s gone to work.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’ He started to close the door, but Charmian managed to stop him.

  ‘Can I come in?’

  He hesitated. ‘There’s only me home.’

  ‘Why aren’t you at school?’

  ‘I’ve got a cold.’

  She studied the wet figure.

  ‘And yet you’re working in the rain?’

  ‘That doesn’t hurt my cold.’

  Charmian looked over his head and out through the window behind him. She could see some sort of wooden structure out there in the garden.

  ‘Are you making a castle?’ Boys, she knew, did build forts and castles.

  ‘No.’ He was contemptuous. ‘That’s my boat.’

  ‘A boat?’ Charmian was surprised. ‘Will it float?’

  ‘It’ll float,’ he said with a kind of grim conviction and pleasure.

  All the time Charmian had been quietly looking round the house and listening. The place was in a fair muddle but it was absolutely still and quiet. If Dusty was there she too was silent and still.

  ‘Can I wait for your aunt?’

  He shook his head. ‘I shouldn’t. She won’t be back. She’s gone. I told you.’

  ‘When did she leave?’

  He looked vague. ‘ Oh, an hour or so ago. ‘Bout the time I should have gone to school if I was going.’

  Charmian looked at her watch: it was almost eleven o’clock.

  ‘You don’t know where she went?’

  ‘Work.’

  ‘No, she didn’t go there.’

  He was silent. There was a small smile on his lips.

  I can’t badger this child, thought Charmian, disappointment creeping into her mind.

  ‘I’ll come back later then,’ she said. ‘And see your mother.’

  He let her out without speaking again, but when the door closed behind her she heard the bolt drawn.

  ‘Why did he do that?’ she thought, as she sat in her car. ‘And why was he so pleased with himself?’

  Chapter Fourteen

  IN Velia’s house the police technicians at work in every room had finished their task and were clearing up.

  ‘She wasn’t really much of a one for housework,’ commented one man. Velia’s house did look squalid and untidy in the grey daylight. ‘ Just a little rub up where it showed, I reckon.’

  ‘Lucky for us. She must have known we were going to come in after her to have a check-up.’

  The first man frowned. He sometimes thought his companion’s sense of humour was a little raw.

  ‘She’s dead,’ he pointed out.

  ‘No one knows that better than me … I took her fingerprints.’

  ‘The fingerprint pattern is pretty clear in the house anyway. Not much doubt about what went on. Just as well she wasn’t a polisher. Perhaps you’re right to think it was providential.’ He was a man who believed in Destiny and Gods in Machines and Plans. He believed in precognition and telepathy and had dabbled in Buddhism, but been put off by the fact that he couldn’t fit himself and his family and his ambitions into that particular plan for the universe.

  ‘I could solve this murder myself. If I was asked.’

  ‘You won’t be asked.’

  Their eyes met.

  ‘It was the Man.’

  ‘Yes, it was the Man,’ the other agreed.

  Rupert Ascoll was established in a room in the police station, taking over a room that had previously been an annex to Inspector Pratt’s office. The newspapers had carried the story of Velia Ryman’s death and there were now plenty of onlookers to watch comings and goings at the station. Rupert Ascoll was soon seen and recognised. He bore his position equably. He wasn’t a popular figure and he knew it; he was powerful, though, and he knew that also.

  By the time he had been in Deerham Hills twelve hours he had a clear picture of what had gone on in Velia Ryman’s house before she was killed. It was clear that only one person was involved in the killing of Velia. This person had taken some care not to leave any fingerprints but had not been entirely successful. On the letter which Dusty had found had been discovered three sets of fingerprints: Velia’s own, Dusty’s, and a third set, so far unidentified, but large and masculine.

  ‘We’ll have to get hold of Daniels’ prints,’ said Ascoll. ‘ Preferably without her knowing … But when you come to think of it, there’s nothing easier.’ He smiled.

  ‘The whole picture really stands out, doesn’t it?’ he said to his subordinate, not to Pratt, who was not present. ‘Mrs Ryman was killed in the room where she was sitting, almost certainly by someone she knew and had admitted to the house herself, and she was probably expecting to be killed. And it looks as though Daniels is in the clear. All the prints upstairs belong to a man. There are none of hers. And there is one print of his on the letter of accusation.’

  But this did not mean however that he was not aware of the great problem presented by the picture of the last hours of Velia Ryman.

  Velia had written the letter accusing Charmian Daniels herself and there was absolutely no sign in the composition or handwriting of any force having been used. As far as it was humanly possible to see, Velia had written as she did freely and voluntarily.

  Whatever that might mean, thought Ascoll, no mean expert in weighing up human behaviour. Freely and voluntarily? he thought, this time making the phrase a question?

  Grizel had found half an hour to call into the offices of the Deerham Hills Courier, which was a weekly paper, to go on with her enquiries about the Master to Pupil advertisements which had appeared. This was really not part of her job at the moment, her energies having been summarily directed by the powers above toward two complaints from shops about tills broken into and robbed, which seemed to implicate Tony Foss; when anything like this happened in Deerham Hills the police always tried Tony Foss before anyone else and they were often right. For his years Tony had achieved a surprising range and variety of offences. After a brief call in the two shops Grizel was able to decide this did indeed look like Tony Foss at work; he had stuck chewing gum on the counter, a habit which had brought Tony into trouble before now. She called on his mother, told her she was looking for Tony and to keep him home when he next appeared and departed herself for the Deerham Hills Courier offices. Mrs Foss would get Tony lined up; she always did.

  Grizel�
�s idea was extremely simple, and she had no doubt it would occur to Rupert Ascoll too, and in a purely automatic kind of way (Grizel did not think she was being brilliant), as soon as he recalled she had been checking the advertisements in the Personal Column and trying to relate them, on the suggestion of the Manchester police, to Morgan-Marley.

  There was one young man in the office when Grizel entered. He recognised her as a policewoman and looked up hopefully.

  She showed him the record she had made of the Master to Pupil advertisements and their dates.

  ‘I remember those. I thought they were a joke. Don’t tell me you’re interested? Will there be something we can use?’

  ‘May be.’ Grizel was non-committal. ‘Tell me, have you kept the letters inserting these advertisements? They weren’t done in person, I take it.’

  ‘No, they came in the post. Oh, we have them. We keep them for a year, in case.’ He didn’t say in case of what, but presumably Grizel’s enquiry supplied a reason.

  He got out a series of folders and produced a letter.

  It was typed on blue lined paper.

  ‘Here’s one.’

  ‘Can I take it away? I’ll give you a receipt. Oh come on, you’ve got nothing to lose.’

  Triumphantly Grizel bore off the letter to the fingerprint expert. If Morgan had written these letters and left a print, as surely he must have done unless he wore gloves to type (very difficult surely) then these prints could be matched to those which the grapevine had told her were being found in Velia Ryman’s house.

  And for once, they would have given another dimension to Morgan, because typewriters could be traced, postmarks followed up, and writing paper investigated.

  Feeling pleased with herself, she tried to telephone Charmian. She tried several times, but either Charmian was out or else she was once again not answering the telephone.

  Rupert Ascoll saw the significance of the information Grizel had brought in to him. He read the advertisements and at once their wording opened a door in his mind. He was used to dealing with the odd and the mad.

  ‘It adds up,’ he said. ‘The Master-Pupil touch.’ He thought for a moment and then put aside his natural taste for playing cat and mouse which made him such a good policeman and said, ‘I want to do this straight and not play it for tricks. Get Daniels and tell her she’s off the hook.’

  So he too was telephoning Charmian, who did not answer her telephone.

  All this time Charmian had not noticed the loss of her pocket-knife. Nor could she have put the right interpretation on its loss if she had.

  Chapter Fifteen

  AS soon as Charmian got back to her house she knew that someone was in it. There was no. sound, no movement, but there was the smell and indefinable presence of another human being.

  She went through into the living-room.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said in relief.

  ‘Yes,’ Coniston stood up. ‘ I was waiting.’

  ‘How did you get in.’

  ‘I’ve got a key. You left it behind in my place one day.’

  ‘Oh, that one,’ Charmian glanced at it lying on the table. ‘ I thought I’d lost it.’

  ‘You had.’

  For the first time in their relationship she looked at him without pleasure.

  ‘I know why you’re here … Grizel, or someone, has got hold of you and told you to come.’ She went over to the table and took a cigarette. ‘They’ve told you I want help. Well, now I’m telling you different. I don’t want help.’

  He was silent for a while, observing Charmian smoking, then said, ‘No, she didn’t say anything. It was my own idea.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘You don’t believe me?’ He got up and stood beside her. ‘I didn’t come to help. No, I don’t think you could say I came to help. I came on business of my own.’

  ‘At least you understand me then, better than the others.’

  ‘No, I don’t know that I do understand. I don’t believe I’ve ever understood a woman in my life, I think they’re not to be understood. Not reasonable creatures.’

  ‘I see you don’t like us very much,’ said Charmian dryly.

  This is the man I have been obsessed by, she thought. Why do I feel nothing now except coldness, awkwardness and shyness?

  Shyness? Was it shyness? Wasn’t the emotion she was feeling too strong and fresh for shyness, and more like aversion, a striving against?

  She put her hand to her head because it ached. She began to wonder what was affecting her.

  ‘I think I’ll make a cup of tea.’

  Coniston followed her out into the kitchen.

  ‘Doing any more modelling with the new clay I got you?’ she asked, not looking at him.

  ‘Not at the moment.’

  ‘Oh well, there’s plenty of time.’ She turned away, wishing he’d go.

  ‘Don’t move away, Charmian.’

  ‘Oh, I’m just putting the kettle on.’ You can behave exactly and absolutely like a bitch, she told herself. She was not much surprised. She had already perceived that she was capable of all seven deadly sins, given the right provocation. Pride, envy, anger, covetousness, greed and sloth (the fine Kirk upbringing had not been altogether forgotten by Charmian), I’m capable of them all, she decided. Except perhaps lechery, I don’t seem capable of that at the moment. ‘Now I’ve hurt his feelings. No I haven’t,’ she decided later, catching sight of his face in the mirror. ‘He didn’t mind at all. He’s relieved too.’

  She watched him in the mirror while she was making the tea. Their eyes met and he smiled.

  ‘It’s true, you know, that if you can see someone in a mirror then they can see you.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ agreed Charmian, discomfited. She was discomforted too, come to that, she thought: I would like to give a loud scream of anger and despair.

  ‘You’re in a bad way, Charmian,’ he said, as if he’d read her mind. ‘I don’t think a cup of tea will do it, do you?’

  ‘You’re quite right.’ She set the tea-pot down on the table. ‘Strange how one flies to food or drink for comfort, though.’

  ‘I don’t,’ he said in a quiet voice.

  ‘I’m in bad trouble.’

  He nodded.

  ‘You guessed, I suppose … It wouldn’t be difficult. Probably everyone in Deerham Hills is doing it.’ She was bitter.

  ‘No, I think you’re wrong there.’

  ‘Anyway, there’s plenty you don’t know. Or perhaps you do?’ she said staring at him. ‘Perhaps nothing is secret, perhaps everything is known.’ She took a grip on herself and lowered her voice. ‘No, forget it, forget I said anything.’

  ‘Yes, I knew about the letter and the police allegations … I know, I’d be a fool not to.’

  The sentence was quietly spoken.

  ‘What are you saying?’ asked Charmian in a whisper that almost shrieked.

  ‘You can do better than that,’ returned Coniston. ‘That isn’t enough of an answer.’

  ‘It’s not an answer, it’s a question,’ cried Charmian in agony.

  ‘I mean I thought you would have been quicker to have guessed what is happening,’ he said in a detached neutral voice.

  He had been interested in islands, in mazes and in cages. And now he was interested in torture.

  Charmian stared at him. She had upset the tea-pot and the hot water was trickling on to her knees and on to the floor.

  ‘You, you, you,’ she stuttered.

  ‘Yes, I’m Morgan, I’m your friend Velia’s lodger. Her husband also. But perhaps you know that by now.’

  ‘But Alec Livesey—’ began Charmian.

  ‘I never knew Alec Livesey. You supplied that name yourself, to Velia. I merely made use of it. You really do believe that anyone who comes from your home town must be respectable, don’t you.’

  Charmian pushed the table away and tried to get up, but he took her wrist in his hand and forced her back. She was strong herself but he was much stronger.
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  ‘Well, don’t bother to answer then, I’m not really wanting an answer.’

  He was still holding her wrist. She began in the back of her mind to notice something about his hands.

  ‘I came down here originally after a woman called Butcher. Velia found her for me. I always need a woman to find me a woman. But Butcher started to get suspicious of Velia and then I heard about you, and saw you, Charmian, and you were so exactly what I was after that I couldn’t resist you …’

  Charmian remembered how she had summed up the sort of woman who would attract Morgan: a successful woman, a woman with a little bit of money, a woman without a man. How ideally she herself had fulfilled all these conditions – even to considering having her hair dyed to look more attractive, she recalled with a tight feeling in her throat.

  ‘You might be surprised that I married Velia,’ he said, staring at her with his big brown eyes and moving his hands up and down her wrist.

  ‘No, there’s always a woman like Velia in the background of men like you,’ she said dully, ‘ and they usually end up by getting killed too.’

  ‘There speaks the policewoman, that’s the note I like to hear,’ he said gleefully.

  ‘You wanted money from me like all those other women?’

  He shook his head. ‘No, for you it isn’t money. For you, it is reserved to die, my darling,’ he said, almost as if he loved her.

  He’s killed two women already, said Charmian to herself.

  ‘Reserved?’ she said aloud.

  ‘Oh, the other two you mean? But yours will be – extra … The whole set-up has been different this time.’

  He spread his hands out on the table in front of her, palms upward. She looked down. They were covered with horny nodules, a sort of excrescence covered by very hard skin, scaly and tough. It was more like the skin of a lizard than anything else, except in its colour, which was darkish and dull.

  ‘The sickness of Siegfried,’ he said bitterly. ‘He had it too. The great lover.’

  Charmian stared.