“Look,” he said, and the three men regarded them gravely.
“Looks to me like three point two stuff,” Bell said. “Same as those we found.”
“Yes,” said Bobby.
“Does that mean … ?” began Mr. Fielding and paused. He began again: “Do you think … ? I don’t believe it,” he said firmly. “I can’t believe I’ve had a murderer in my employ.”
“He wasn’t a murderer then,” Bobby said.
“That’s true,” agreed Fielding. “Perhaps he never meant to be.”
“Someone playing all right,” Bell said, as faint strains of music entered by an open window. “Who is it?”
“I’m inclined to think it was like that,” Bobby said. “Biggs was putting in time, looking round, waiting for an opportunity.”
“Opportunity for smash and grab raids?” Bell asked. “A chauffeur’s job might have its uses.”
“That music,” Mr. Fielding said irritably, and he went across to close the open window.
“For that or for some other reason,” Bobby answered Bell.
CHAPTER XV
THEORY AND DOUBT
The garage was left under the care of the newly arrived relief constable; Mr. Fielding returned to the house, still shaking his head over this discovery of ammunition in his chauffeur’s possession; Bell went off alone to see how his assistants were getting on; Bobby smoked a meditative cigarette, or rather, took it out to smoke, and then held it unlighted in his hand for so long that he had only just got it going when Bell returned. He had for him an unusually satisfied air.
“They’ve found a pistol,” he said. “In the hedge. Point three two automatic, same as the ammo. Biggs had. We’ll have to send to Hendon for expert report, but conclusive, eh?” Bobby nodded an assent but Bell began to look less cheerful. “You know,” he said with a depressed air, “it’s always when things seem conclusive that the snag comes in.”
“Too true,” agreed Bobby, “and there’s a lot to fit in yet. That opal ring, for instance, and why the vicar found it, and about half a hundred other things.”
“What about,” Bell suggested, “forgetting all the rest of it and just concentrating on Biggs shot the chap, and that’s that and all we need.”
“Yes, provided that that is that,” Bobby said, “but I think you’ll find you need the whole picture. Or there’ll be too many gaps for the defence to slip through.”
“I suppose there might be,” Bell agreed, more dispirited than ever. “Good enough to put out a general for Biggs, do you think?”
“Oh, yes,” agreed Bobby.
“There’s that piano going again,” Bell said, listening. “Sounds like she was asking … asking like us.” He went on: “I’ve sent our dabs man to see what he can find in the garage. Ought to be plenty. There should be some of Fielding’s as well. I said to get them, too. Just as a check up.”
“Worth trying,” Bobby said, “but no good all the same. As soon as Fielding knew I was a cop he started talking about fingerprints and put his own on a cigarette case by way of illustration. Plenty of people know about fingerprints and like to talk about them. But he wouldn’t have done it if his own had been on record.”
“It was only an idea,” Bell said deprecatingly. “I didn’t expect it to get us anywhere. What about having a chat with this musical lady of yours?”
They set off accordingly and as they left Middles they were met by a dispatch rider from county headquarters with a report just received from Scotland Yard. Earlier in the day, almost the first thing done indeed, the dead man’s fingerprints had been taken and sent to London where they had at once been identified as those of a man named Myerson who had served two or three terms of imprisonment for unlawful possession and other similar offences, and who was known to be connected with the Burden gang, though never as an active participant. He was more, to adopt a current expression, a ‘back room boy’, a kind of general scout, intermediary, and hanger on. The gang itself, known by the name, real or assumed, of its leader, was more than suspected of having been involved in other similar raids, but so far sufficient evidence had not accumulated for effective action. Their speciality lay in producing convincing alibis, and it was in this department that Myerson was said to have been so remarkably efficient.
“Seems to bring the smash and grab business to the front again,” Bell observed. “Biggs was in it and he and Myerson quarrelled over the share out, so Biggs did Myerson in. Makes it simple.”
“So it does,” agreed Bobby.
“Leaves out a lot,” said Bell.
“So it does,” agreed Bobby again.
“Not satisfied, are you?” said Bell. “Some people never are,” he complained.
“Well, there’s that alibi Fielding gives Biggs,” Bobby pointed out.
“Couldn’t Fielding be in it, too?”
“Not likely, not the type,” Bobby said. “Quiet, respectable and well-to-do. That’s Fielding.”
“In my view,” Bell declared, “we’ve enough to hang Biggs—or at least enough to make him talk to save his neck, supposing it was really someone else did in Myerson and Biggs has done a bunk because of being scared. Got to find him first, though.”
“I’m beginning to think,” Bobby said slowly, “that when you do find him it won’t be to hang him or even to make him talk.”
“Oh, well,” Bell replied, “I see what you mean but I do always try to look on the bright side of things.”
Bobby left it at that and they went on to the Bellamy cottage, both of them conscious of many confused and troubling thoughts. As they drew near, Bell remarked:
“Thank goodness, the piano isn’t going. I’m no hand at music, no time for it, but it sounded funny stuff she was putting over. Reminded me somehow of questioning a suspect.”
“I think,” Bobby said, “her playing makes you think of what you are already thinking, even if you didn’t know it.”
“I don’t get that,” Bell announced after a pause. “Beyond me. I’m not educated like you.”
“You mean,” said Bobby severely, “that by sheer good luck and no merit of your own, you dodged the dead hand of the tutor and the don. I,” he added, a little proudly, “escaped by an innate inability to pass exams. Just a gift,” he explained.
“Oh,” said Bell puzzled, but there was no time to say more for now they had reached the cottage where Miss Bellamy was busy in the small front garden.
When they paused at the gate she stood up, putting down the trowel she had been using. They entered. She watched them gravely from those dark, deep-set eyes of hers, as if she saw them and yet saw them not, was aware of them but only as on a plane of existence other than her own. An aloof and hidden figure, Bobby thought her, and he wondered what experience it was that seemed to have cut her off so completely from everyday humanity. Motionless she waited as they entered and Bell raised his hat and said:
“I think it is Miss Bellamy, isn’t it? I hope you’ll excuse our troubling you like this—”
“Is there anything fresh?” she asked, cutting him short, but with no air of interrupting him, more as if she had not even known he was speaking.
Bell said he didn’t think so. Not what you could call fresh. But it was important, necessary, to gather every possible piece of information. People didn’t always understand that. They complained of unnecessary questioning. He hoped Miss Bellamy wouldn’t feel that way. There were one or two little things perhaps Miss Bellamy could tell him about, if she wouldn’t mind. Miss Bellamy said they had better come inside if they wanted to talk and led the way into the cottage, into that front room which the big grand piano at one end made seem even smaller than it was. She sat down before it and pointed to two chairs. Bell asked if he might see her identity card and asked also a few preliminary and unimportant questions. She answered indifferently, and then he said:
“Can you tell us anything about Mr. Biggs?”
“Mr. Fielding’s chauffeur? Is it true he can’t be found?”
&n
bsp; “No one seems to know what can have become of him,” Bell answered.
“Isn’t Mr. Fielding the person to ask?” she suggested.
“We’re asking everybody,” Bell said.
She remained silent, staring at them, but still with that odd effect of seeing not so much what her eyes were so intent on but something quite other. The two men waited but she made no effort to speak and her silence seemed to them to be full of meanings they could not understand. She was sitting on the stool before the piano, her back to the instrument. She swung round suddenly, as if to ask from it counsel and guidance, and Bell was afraid for the moment that she was about to play. But she turned back and said:
“What do you think there is that I can tell you?”
“Well, ma’am,” Bell answered, “that’s what we’re asking. Is there anything you know about Biggs, or have noticed about him, or have heard even?”
“No,” she said. “Why do you come to me? Mr. Fielding was his employer. Ask him.”
“Why do you say ‘was’?” Bobby asked.
“I understood that he had gone away,” she answered. Then she said abruptly: “I like your wife.”
“Oh, yes,” Bobby said, slightly taken aback. He nearly said ‘So do I’, but thought the remark sounded superfluous. He said instead, rather feebly: “I’m very glad.”
“But I think there is much cruelty in you,” Miss Bellamy said.
“I hope not,” Bobby said, “but I do what must be done.”
“That’s what I mean,” she told him.
Bell, who was beginning to have a puzzled air, intervened.
“When did you see Biggs last?” he asked.
“I think I saw the car go by yesterday morning, was it?” Miss Bellamy answered. “I often do. I think Mr. Fielding was inside and Biggs was driving. I didn’t notice. The car often passes. Mr. Fielding doesn’t drive himself as a rule. He says why keep a dog and bark yourself. Mr. Fielding likes making little jokes like that.”
“Does he?” said Bell, vaguely aware that it was a little joke Miss Bellamy had not much liked herself. But then Miss Bellamy did not impress him as being very fond of jokes at any time—either little jokes or big ones. He went on: “Can you tell us the last time you spoke to Biggs?”
“I’m not sure. Perhaps it was when he brought me some flowers from Mr. Fielding. That was two or three days ago. I’m not sure. Mr. Fielding has been very kind, sending me flowers from his garden. Fruit, too. He says it’s only payment for my playing. He is trying to help me with it.”
“From what I’ve heard of your playing, Miss Bellamy,” Bobby said. “I don’t think you need much help. I’m no great judge, I suppose, but at least I know how it makes me feel.”
“How does it make you feel?” she asked.
“Well,” Bobby answered doubtfully. “I … I don’t know. I think I could only tell you by music like your own playing.”
“You have never heard me really playing,” she told him, and now there seemed more of human warmth and feeling in her voice than ever he had heard before. “All you’ve heard is when I’m strumming to amuse myself, to pass the time, like talking to yourself when you’ve nothing else to do.” With a gesture she seemed to abolish her ‘strumming’. “I’m working on an opera,” she explained. “An opera of Peace and War.”
“Coming back to Biggs,” Bell interposed, thinking there had been enough of this irrelevant interlude about music. “Please understand, Miss Bellamy, that what I’m repeating is merely what we’ve been told. Information received. In a case like this when a man has been killed we can’t ignore any gossip, however ill-natured or spiteful or unfounded. We have to ask.”
“Why don’t you?” Miss Bellamy said.
“Don’t we?” Bell repeated, puzzled for the moment.
“Ask,” she said.
“Oh, yes,” he said, slightly disconcerted. “Yes. Well, our information is that Biggs has several times been seen visiting your cottage late at night.”
“Who told you that?” Miss Bellamy asked, aloof and indifferent as before.
“Is it true?”
“If it were, you would expect me to deny it,” she replied. “I don’t admit it, if that’s what you mean. I might even think it was my own business and nothing to do with anyone else. I’ll give you a formal denial if you like. Who was it told you?”
“We never gives names,” Bell said.
“It would be Rhoda, I expect,” Miss Bellamy remarked. “Rhoda Rogers, wasn’t it?”
“No, it wasn’t,” Bell said hastily. “I’m not going to say who else it wasn’t but it definitely wasn’t Miss Rogers.”
She gave him a hard smile.
“A formal denial,” she said. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll ask her myself.”
“I hope you won’t,” Bell protested. “It would only make bad blood and it wasn’t Miss Rogers, I do assure you.”
With a faint gesture she both accepted and repudiated his denial.
“It’s by way of being a coincidence,” Bobby remarked, “that a man I thought at the time strongly resembled Biggs vanished near here. You remember?”
“I remember,” she agreed. “You thought he might have got inside and be hiding in one of the rooms. I didn’t know why you thought so but I was very glad you came to look. I should have been dreadfully frightened if I had found a strange man hiding here—even though it wasn’t late at night.”
CHAPTER XVI
DOUBTFUL FOUNDATIONS
Since it seemed that Miss Bellamy was either unwilling or unable to say more, the two police officers took their leave.
“I expect she’ll start off playing again now,” Bell said gloomily as they walked away. “Telling that piano of hers all she wouldn’t tell us.”
But that didn’t happen. The silence remained unbroken, and if to both men it seemed a pregnant silence, full of the tale of things that were yet to come, that was probably only because of the impression her sombre and remote personality had made upon them. When they reached the Fern Cottage gate, Bell said again:
“Gets on your nerves, doesn’t it? I mean, that playing of hers. I’ve never heard anything like it.”
“I haven’t either,” Bobby said.
They parted then. Bobby was due to deliver a lecture that evening to newly joined C.I.D. men, and he knew, too, there would certainly be correspondence waiting for him and needing attention. Rather to his own surprise, he was finding his lectures very successful, and in considerable demand. Still more to his surprise, for he had always regarded speaking in public as the worst form of torture known to man, he had also developed both aptitude and liking for the job. But then, of course, there was considerable difference between talking to your own people about a job you knew through and through, and talking to stranger on some subject concerning which you were almost certainly ill-informed.
“When I’m talking to our own chaps,” Bobby used to say with quiet satisfaction, “the poor devils daren’t yawn, daren’t go to sleep, or walk out of the room or anything. I’ve got ’em and they know it and that’s a great help.”
Olive said it sounded more like taking a mean advantage and Bobby was hurt, and asked what was the good of being senior if you couldn’t take mean advantages when you wanted to? Now he got out the car and started for town, while Bell went to see how the investigations was getting on and to attend to all the innumerable details requiring the decision of the officer in charge. One confession had already been received, and valuable time and energy had had to be expended in ascertaining beyond doubt that the half wit who had made it could not possibly be guilty. He had merely been caught up in the prevailing excitement and had been unable to resist the impulse somehow to thrust himself into it. It is a psychological phenomenon familiar in murder cases.
Not till late was Bell able to feel that he had done all that for the time was possible. Not till later still did Bobby return to partake of the light supper that, not without difficulty, Olive had been able to get ready.
But Bobby shook his head.
“All the time I was talking,” he said, “all this business was going round and round in my head. The odd thing is the lecture came out all right all the same. I had a sort of feeling it was Biggs and Myerson, and the motor cyclist who perhaps was Biggs and perhaps he wasn’t, Mr. Fielding and Cann, Miss Bellamy and Miss Cann, the Rogers brother and sister, even the vicar with his opal ring, I was really talking to, and yet I don’t think any of the fellows noticed it and they asked just the same questions as usual.”
“What you want,” Olive declared, “is bed. As soon as ever you’ve finished your supper.”
“What I want,” Bobby said, “is to get things sorted out so they’ll stop buzzing. Take the beginning of it all.”
“The smash and grab raid?” Olive asked.
“Oh, no, that’s a thing apart, complete in itself,” Bobby answered. “No, our getting this house just when we wanted it so badly.”
“Bobby,” said Olive in a panic, “don’t you dare go bringing this lovely house into it. I just simply couldn’t bear it if you did.”
“I won’t,” Bobby promised. “Not unless it’s there already. But did we get it because by pure chance Mr. Fielding picked your letter out of a pile of others, or because it was necessary for some reason either that I should be here or else that I should not be somewhere else? And, if so, which?”
“I suppose,” admitted Olive, “perhaps to get you here. There wasn’t any reason why we should be somewhere else rather than anywhere else, if you see what I mean.” She went on bravely: “It might have been just luck. Why shouldn’t we have a little bit of luck sometimes?”
Bobby agreed that anyhow they deserved it. But the question was, had they had it?
“Take them all in order,” he said.
“Must we to-night?” asked Olive, wistful now.
“Against,” Bobby went on, “the background of physical fact that, thank goodness, is just simply fact. The raid, the opal ring, and my chase that led me here and only ended at Miss Bellamy’s cottage. She was still playing when I drove past just now.”
Music Tells All: A Bobby Owen Mystery Page 12