by Alan Hunter
I slid down from the cannon and crossed the footway to lean on the rails guarding the cliff-edge. Below, the beach was composed of large shingle, not very inviting either to strollers or bathers. Nobody there. A long way to the south I could see three figures walking on the sand-dunes, but to the north the beach stretched vacantly till the view was interrupted by the pier. Wolmering was a puzzle. An investigation at a seaside resort is usually bedevilled by an overplus of possible witnesses. Up the coast a bit at Starmouth the beaches and promenades would still be crowded with visitors and trippers. Here there might have been a curfew, or a plague-flag limply hanging from the coastguard’s flag-pole. And I didn’t think the fact that Vivienne Selly had died was in the least way responsible. No. This was how it was. This was the evening peace of Wolmering. The affluent elderly had settled in their drawing-rooms and left such spots as the Guns to odd peasants like me . . .
I turned from the rails in a moment of sympathy for Eyke: to find I was no longer so conspicuously solitary. A woman had appeared from behind the look-out and was firmly striding towards me. An elderly woman. She was dressed in soft tweed and flourished a stick with a silver knob. I had a flash of premonition: this woman had been spying on me. Then another: she was Mrs Lake. I waited at the rail. She came on briskly, her eyes facing rigidly before her. I stepped forward to intercept her: and found the stick thrusting suddenly at my face.
‘Stand back!’
‘I beg your pardon!’
‘You had better keep your distance, my man.’
I certainly did that! There was nothing tentative in the way the brass ferrule was cocked before my eyes. ‘I merely wish to speak to you. Are you Mrs Lake?’
‘Yes. But I don’t think I know you.’
‘I’m a police officer.’
‘That’s easily said. If you’re a policeman, produce your warrant.’
I did produce it. Mrs Lake stared at it, then at me, then again at the card. Finally the ferrule dipped away from my eyes, though the stick was still held handy.
‘Well, if that’s the case, I’m sorry. But one daren’t take chances with strangers up here. I’m hoping I shall spot him, you know. And he won’t find me as easy as he did Mrs Selly.’
My turn to stare! ‘Do you think that’s wise?’
‘Oh, I’m not a fool,’ Mrs Lake said. ‘I wouldn’t tackle him. That’s not my idea. But perhaps he’ll come back here, and then I’ll report him.’
‘Do you think he’s a local person?’
‘Sure to be.’
‘Have you a reason for thinking that?’
‘Mrs Selly knew him, I’m convinced of that. And he knew his way around Wolmering, too.’
She spoke with confidence. A formidable lady! Perhaps the murderer wouldn’t have found her a push-over, either. Standing there so squarely with her alert stick and determined, watchful grey eyes. She was in her sixties, had a broad, weathered face and short silver hair, tightly waved. She was the widow of a Trinity House official. She lived alone in a cottage a few doors from Vivienne’s.
‘Why do you think it was easy with Mrs Selly?’
‘To start with, she was only a slip of a thing. Then she probably didn’t know what he was up to until it was too late. The paper said she didn’t struggle.’
‘Wouldn’t her dog have protected her?’
‘I didn’t see the dog.’
‘I’d like to go over exactly what you did see.’
‘Of course. I’ve done it before with Inspector Eyke, but there may still be some small thing I’ve overlooked.’
I scored more points to Mrs Lake. One didn’t often receive such intelligent co-operation. I walked back with her to the far end of the green, beyond the look-out and the flag-pole. Now, turning about, one looked past the row of cannons to the foot-way where it ascended to the green, and immediately ahead to the last of the terrace villas and the slope leftward to the Town Green.
‘I’d come from the Common, my usual walk, but I was going back the town way to post a letter. That’s why I wasn’t on the path. I was cutting across to Town Green.’
‘Just a moment. Where did you go on the Common?’
‘Nowhere near where you found her. I skirted along quite close to the houses. There’s a fine view, looking down the coast.’
‘Did you meet anybody?’
‘Two people sitting on a bench, but too far off for me to recognise them. A girl riding a pony, ditto. Some people, strangers, fetching a car from the park.’
‘Do you know George Selly by sight?’
‘Yes.’ She turned to me. ‘Why haven’t you questioned him?’
‘We will,’ I said. ‘Carry on. Try to remember if you saw anyone else on the way here.’
‘Well, I left the Common by the stile, and a car passed me, coming from the harbour. Then round the bend, looking towards the harbour, I saw a man walking in that direction.’
‘Did you recognise him?’
‘No. But there’s the caravan site down there.’
‘You can’t describe him.’
‘He was too far off. I think he was dressed just in shirt and trousers.’
‘And he was the last person you saw?’
‘Yes. Then I turned up here to the Guns. I leant on the rails there and smoked a gasper, trying to see the packet-boat that comes out of Harwich. If the horizon is clear you can just see her superstructure going along out there. She looks huge. But Tuesday was hazy. There was only a France, Fenwick boat, heading north.’
‘Nobody passed while you watched the ships.’
‘No.’
‘Up here – or on the beach.’
She didn’t reply at once, then she said: ‘I think there was someone right down near the jetty.’
‘That’s the harbour way again.’
‘Yes. It could have been caravanners, anyone. But nobody passed me up here, and the beach was the way you see it now.’
‘Right. So you finished your cigarette.’
‘Come along. We’ll go over the same ground.’
I went with her across the green: not in a diagonal, but straying over to the brambles and the garden walls. Mrs Lake had a light, youthful step and seemed in little need of the stick. We reached a gate in one of the walls. It was just at the Town Green corner. Mrs Lake took two more steps, glanced across at the footway, and halted.
‘Here.’
It was roughly seventy-five yards from where the footway dipped to the boat haul-up. There the path seemed to vanish into a cleft beyond which appeared nothing but grey sea.
‘You’d be on the point of turning towards the town.’
‘True, but not before I’d caught sight of her.’
‘Would you swear to the identification?’
‘Yes, I’d swear. If you remember I was able to describe her dress.’
‘You waved to her, did you? One of your neighbours?’
Mrs Lake regarded me for a moment. ‘I think you know the answer to that. I had no acquaintance with her. Mrs Selly could have had few friends in this town.’
‘Not a passing word.’
‘None.’
‘But you looked across. Your eyes met.’
‘I looked across from curiosity, to see who it was. Then as soon as I recognised her I looked away.’
‘Yet you took in the dress with that one look.’
‘Let’s say it was the dress that helped me to recognise her. I’d seen her wearing it several times before, so as soon as I saw that I guessed who she was. But then of course I looked at her face and our eyes did meet very briefly. There was no mistake. I think she tossed her head: it was her usual reaction when she met me.’
‘In addition you noticed she had no dog with her.’
‘I have tried my best to be frank about that. I didn’t notice it. But if it was off the lead, it could have been following her and I wouldn’t have seen it.’
‘You didn’t see a dog up here at all?’
‘No. And I am familiar with Mrs
Selly’s. It’s an all-white wire-haired fox-terrier, a bitch. It has a limp in the right hind-leg.’
I nodded. ‘So then you turned towards the town.’
‘I posted my letter and went home.’
‘You can add nothing to that.’
‘I’m afraid I can’t. It really is everything I remember.’
I thanked her: she was an excellent witness. But I suggested she should drop her project of watching for the murderer. She frowned and made some obscure motions with her stick.
‘But you see . . . in a way . . . I feel responsible.’
And that was it: our last certain knowledge of the movements of Vivienne Selly. When I left the Guns I would have nothing to follow but my nose and dead reckoning. Her body had been found over a mile away, but almost certainly had been taken there by the murderer: a few faint signs of car tracks were visible in rough grass near the holm oaks. Where had she died? There was no due, unless something could be read into the fact of her nakedness. Between the Guns and the holm oaks stretched a blank which so far we had been unable to fill.
Mrs Lake went her way. I decided I dare assume that Vivienne had continued her walk along the footway. After passing the look-out it turned inland and descended to join the road from the town to the harbour. Here stood a bench which commanded a view of the road, the river, the marshes, the caravan site: the latter having been relegated to a distance from the town which placed it out of earshot, if not out of sight. And here Vivienne had the choice of two directions: to the town (and the Common), or to the harbour. The first made an obvious round for an evening stroll: the latter extended the distance, and perhaps suggested an object.
I paused by the bench and tried to balance probabilities. She had been found on the Common, but that need have no significance. On the other hand we knew of no connection with the harbour or the caravans, and Eyke’s ferreting there had provided no enlightenment. The one way she may have met some people (probably strangers) at the car park, a girl riding a pony, two people on a bench; the other, a strolling man who wasn’t wearing a jacket and a person unspecified on the beach near the jetty. Likelihoods here? The car park was suggestive. It occupied a roadside strip beside the Common. Here Vivienne’s murderer may have made contact and persuaded her (and the dog?) to get in his car. But the murder could not have taken place in a car (please accept this for the moment), and if he had driven Vivienne elsewhere, why return with the body? There were heaths and woods enough in the district to make such a risky proceeding unnecessary (one had to drive through the town to get access to the Common, and there was only a single road into the town). Thus it seemed to follow the murder occurred in the town, from which the Common would be the readiest place to dump a body; and this made the car park a less interesting proposition – contact might as well have been established where I was standing.
But still on this line (where the body was disposed): didn’t it slightly favour the harbour? There was in fact a return road from the upper harbour which crossed the Common to the town. That road, a narrow one, was not much used, and it passed within half a mile of the holm oaks: was actually the road chosen by Eyke when he had driven me on to the Common. Against this, what need to dump the body on the Common if the crime had taken place in the harbour area? It could more easily have been slipped in the river, where the current would have taken it straight out to sea . . .
Logic at an impasse! When that happens, you turn your back and sniff the wind. I grunted to mark this stage in the proceedings and began to walk towards the harbour.
About a quarter of a mile. The road was level, with dunes on one side and marsh on the other. Passing at first a ribbon of drab chalets that ended at a café (closed). The sun had gone and we were in the long twilight. Some slants of smoke-mist hung over the ditches. Across the river I could see a huddle of buildings, one a shambling old timber place, painted white. Then, on my left, the stout skeleton of the jetty thrusting out towards the sea, and on my right, preluded by a toilet, the pastel-coloured ranks of the caravans.
Even here there seemed nobody about. That curious reticence extended everywhere. A few of the vans had lighted windows, but the others might easily have been empty. There was a light, too, in the harbour-master’s office, a small brick hut near the jetty; and over the river, in the timber building, where I could vaguely see someone working at a drawing-board. I walked to the quayside, which was lined with iron stanchions. Below me the water was running out fast. A small rusty coaster, equipped with dredging gear, creaked softly at moorings in an angle made by the jetty. A short distance upstream lay a raffle of wooden piers with a row of squat, tarred sheds behind them; above reared the spars and rigging of long-shore boats, while across the river were moored three yachts.
I glanced towards the jetty. Human interest at last! A man was lounging on the rails, smoking a pipe. He was dressed in jeans and a fisherman’s navy jersey, and staring at me as I was staring at him. Had he lounged there on Tuesday . . . ? He perhaps belonged to the little coaster, though the vessel had a deserted, locked-up air; but however he seemed my only prospect, so I began walking towards the jetty. Then I stopped: I’d seen something else. An animal was loping across from the sand dunes. An off-white, halting, smudge of an animal: a wire-haired fox-terrier. With a limp.
I knew at once it was the right dog, even before the limp registered. I’d felt that sudden click one experiences when instinct jumps ahead of reason. The dog was tousled, rough-looking, had clearly been living out of doors; was trailing a bit of broken lead on which it now and then stumbled. It was trundling along self-intently, as though quite content to be its own master. Then it saw me and pulled up short: stood deciding if I were friend or enemy.
I made conciliatory noises. I am no dog-man, though I can usually get along with animals (I have been long convinced that even fish have unsuspected intelligence and personality). I could feel this animal’s suspicion, its quick impulse to stay aloof from me; I tried to conquer it by smiling, stooping low, making friendly sounds. No go. The dog growled a soft warning. It was not minded to make my acquaintance. Having established this point it backed off once or twice, then turned and loped away from me, towards the jetty.
The jetty was a cul-de-sac. I followed up eagerly, working to the left to cover the sand dunes. The smoker on the jetty seemed to fathom my intentions since he put away his pipe and took some steps from the rails. At first the dog didn’t seem to notice him. It padded on to the jetty with complete unconcern. Then the man spread his arms and began covering movements and the dog yelped and skittered on the sandy concrete. I moved up quickly. Now the dog realised that we had it in a trap. It cowered between us, showing its teeth, growling, dripping saliva.
‘Watch him,’ the man said. ‘I think he’ll bite.’
I felt a moment of surprise when I heard his voice. But the dog had begun feinting from one to the other of us, snarling angrily and snapping its teeth.
‘Go for his collar!’
The dog made its decision. It came my way, on the side opposite to the rails. There it was a ten-foot drop into the water and I daren’t lunge confidently in that direction. The dog judged things nicely, but as it scuttled by it tripped on the tag-end of the lead: yelped, came down on its shoulder, and disappeared over the side.
‘Hell – that’s it!’ the man exclaimed.
We hastened to the edge and stared down. The dog had surfaced, but the swirling ebb was carrying it seawards at a good six knots. Beyond the mouth of the river stretched a broad fan where the fresh water mingled with the salt, and through it the current hurried unchecked as far as eye could trace its movement.
‘The poor bastard!’ the man jerked at me. ‘That’s the dog you’ve been looking for, isn’t it?’
‘Is there a boat—?’
‘It’s no use. He’ll be gone before you can get to him.’
He added something, I couldn’t hear what: it sounded like ‘Might as well!’ – and the next moment, before I could lay a hand
on him, he’d jumped off the jetty after the dog.
Sheer madness!
I raced along the jetty bawling: ‘You bloody fool – come back!’ But if he heard me he paid no attention, and there was very little prospect of him coming back. The current was rushing him out to sea as fast as I could keep pace on the jetty, and he was assisting it with long, confident strokes in the direction of the dog. I reached the end of the jetty. A lifebuoy hung there. I grabbed it, shouted, pitched it in ahead of him. He brushed it aside with an irritable gesture and continued to launch himself towards Holland.
‘You fool. You bloody fool!’
I was chattering with anger, shock and helplessness. But if the fool was to be snatched from his folly it couldn’t be done from the end of the jetty. I bolted back again. The harbour-master’s office was only a dozen yards from the jetty. I threw open the door and burst in panting, to find an elderly man writing at a desk.
‘A man has just jumped off the jetty!’
The harbour-master (I assumed) stared at me over half-glasses. Then he picked up the phone beside him, said: ‘Get me Fred, will you?’ – and tucked the instrument under his chin.
‘Who was the man?’
‘How should I know!’