by Vernon Loder
Chapter XII
Traces on the Sleepers
WHEN Inspector Parfitt turned in for a few hours’ sleep, a party of police were up at the mountain tarn, dragging the little lake for further evidence.
Already photographs had been taken of the position of the car, and finger-prints recorded from the door handles, wheel and gear lever. After that the car was driven down to Cwyll, and the sergeant in charge of the operations had an excited conference with an attendant constable.
“I suppose we couldn’t say exactly where it was lying?” he remarked. “I never noticed where you were dragging.”
“Wonder it came up at all, yes, indeed,” said the policeman. “But it wouldn’t be where the body was whatever.”
“That’s the funny part of it,” the sergeant observed. “When it should be on her finger, look you.”
“Perhaps it was her mother’s,” said the constable.
“Look you here now,” said the sergeant with scorn. “Her mother had no new ring. The Inspector will get a start when he sees it.”
“It shows she wasn’t robbed.”
“Well, who said she was robbed? But who took it off her finger? If you are going to kill yourself would you take off your ring?”
“Often they take off their clothes, or their hat, when they do it, sergeant.”
“And put them on the bank. Yes, yes. But they don’t take off their hats and throw them in the water.”
The constable had nothing to say about that. He changed the subject.
“There’s that stone that was round her neck. I’ve looked all round and no stone has been lifted near here, and it is not likely she would bring a stone from the farm.”
“Likely? Is it likely she would come here, to throw herself in the water when she could have gone into the Cwyll in the lower field at home?”
The constable lived near Pengellert, and had been up to the hill-farm more than once.
“And I have been mistaken, after all,” he said suddenly, “for the Inspector said that stone was rubbed and scraped one side, and there was a stone at the farm, rubbed and scraped, outside the door.”
The sergeant expressed scornful surprise that his subordinate should have spent his time looking at stones at the farm. In defence, the constable explained that he had once been there on a wet and muddy day, and saw Miss Tysin’s herd scrape his boots on this stone.
“Had it a kind of nick in it?” asked the sergeant, more impressed now.
The constable described it as well as he could. He had not been present when the stone was taken from the tarn, but what he said of the improvised boot-scraper at the farm convinced his companion that it was the same one which had weighted down Blodwen Tysin’s body.
They spent another hour in a final search of the surroundings, and then dispersed for the night, some on cycles to their homes, and the sergeant and another to their homes, and the sergeant and another to Cwyll in the old Ford car.
The former did not disturb Inspector Parfitt, who was at home in bed. He wanted a few hours’ sleep himself, and after garaging the car in the yard of the police station, he too went home, and set his alarum clock for six.
Three hours later the alarum went, and he dressed hurriedly and went to the station. Parfitt had just turned up, and was smoking a pipe, and turning over some reports and notes he had made. He received the sergeant’s two pieces of news with some surprise.
“You are sure the stone came from the farm?” he asked.
“Williams says it did, sir. It sounds like it what he said.”
“Well, that was an odd thing for her to do. A determined suicide, if it was suicide at all. But the ring is stranger still. Have you got it?”
The sergeant produced it, a gold ring set in a cluster shape with what looked like medium-sized diamonds. “You were in bed when I came back, sir. I didn’t like to wake you up.”
“That’s all right. I have a long enough day before me.”
Parfitt examined the ring carefully. “I don’t think this was got locally,” he added. “It’s nicely set, and came out of some good shop. Well, I’ve a job for you. You’d better go to the girl’s farm, see if that stone has gone from the door, and then search the house inch by inch for a case for this ring. It looks good enough to have had a case.”
“I’ll go at once, sir.”
“On your way, you might ask leave to have the girl’s finger-prints taken. We must compare them with those on the car.”
When the sergeant had gone, Parfitt put the ring in soft paper, found a small box that fitted it, and looked at the clock. It was too early to knock up the jeweller in the town, so he found a constable, gave him the ring in its box, and some instructions for dealing with it.
“Cut round to Mr. Evan Jenkins, the jeweller, before nine, with this,” he said. “Tell him I want him to have a good look at it, let me know what it is worth, and ask him if he knows who might have manufactured it. A great deal of this sort of stuff is made in Birmingham, though it may be sold in London, or elsewhere. Bring it back, and see that it is put in the safe when you have done with it. You might ask him, too, if he sold it. I don’t think it came from him, but you never know.”
“Are you going over to Pengellert then, sir?”
“I’m going at once. The sergeant is gone to the farm. I shall be at the Horn Hotel, if the Chief Constable or anyone asks for me.”
“Shall I tell them about the ring, sir?”
“Yes; you might do that, too. Explain that, as far as you know, the ring was not found where the body was, but at least some yards away in the llyn.”
The man went to the next room. Parfitt packed some papers, put them in his pocket, and went out to get his sidecar combination.
By leaving so early, he failed to receive a letter which arrived by the first post. It came from Hoad, and would have interested Parfitt very much. It had been written late the night before, and was collected at a quarter to seven that morning by the mail-van on its way to Cwyll.
He was driving up the road along the river bank, reflecting on the case, when a man hailed him. It was Edward Bow, and he had a rod in his hand, though he did not wear waders.
“Just been trying a cast before brekker to keep the boredom away,” he said. “May I come along in your jigger. I want to ask you if I am to stay in this damn place for ever.”
He clambered into the sidecar, adjusted his rod, and grinned at Parfitt, who started the machine again before he spoke.
“I don’t think I can manage it just yet, sir. But I’ll see the Chief Constable and put it to him.”
“All right. Do your best for me. By the way, there’s a rumour that Miss Tysin’s hoofed it. Is that right?”
“She was found drowned yesterday in the lake at Llynithen,” said Parfitt, staring round at him.
Bow seemed horrified, and said he was, with some sincerity. “That’s pretty rotten. Poor little devil! I should stick Hayes down as responsible for that.”
Parfitt began to drive very slowly. “You think she was in love with him?”
Bow nodded. “I’m not a psychologist, and I only saw her once. But you could tell she hadn’t an atom of vice in her. Pretty, but no vamp. Not an inch of her.”
“Then you think it was suicide as a result of his death?”
“D’ye mean I think she killed the rotter, and then repented? Jove she may have done. The decent, innocent kind take it hard. What do you think?”
“I don’t think so, sir, but my thoughts aren’t worth a penny yet. I don’t suppose you would notice, but did Mr. Hayes get any small parcel while you were here? It might be within the last few days.”
“He did get a small minnow or something, in a box,” said Bow. “I know because the postman saw me, and asked would I sign for it. Oh, hello!”
“Hello, indeed!” Parfitt exclaimed, stopping the bicycle this time. “Precious sort of minnow, Mr. Bow!”
“Funny, I never thought of it till now,” said Bow. “Registered letter! No
; fishermen don’t register half-a-crown’s worth yet.”
“Box about this size?” asked Parfitt, shaping space with his hands.
“Round about; perhaps a mite bigger. Why, are you on to something?”
Parfitt made the engine suddenly roar, and started jerkily.
“I am not sure,” he said. “Keep it dark for the present, sir.”
“Oh, curse!” said Bow, after a hundred yards. “Here’s Mr. Hoad. He’s going to weep! Let me out and away. The place is depressing enough without him. He wants about an ounce of bromide; kill or cure.”
Parfitt stopped the machine. Bow got out quickly, and clambered over a wall into a field, waving his rod. The Inspector lit a cigarette, and waited for the melancholy Hoad to come up.
The young man’s face was a study in dejection, shame, and imperfectly concealed fear.
“I thought you would be over early to see me,” he said anxiously.
Parfitt frowned. “Why is that, sir?”
“Didn’t you get my letter?”
“No, sir. What was it about?”
Hoad did look almost ready to cry now. He had been frightened into a confession, worked himself up to write it, and now had to explain over again in cold blood.
His head was hot and his feet clammy. His mouth was dry, and his tongue stuck to it. But he began with a rush, and kept going until in three minutes, he had explained the anonymous letter; gulped, stopped, and looked fearfully at the Inspector. Parfitt took it more calmly than the boy had expected. He was not unused to investigating cases where anonymous letters cropped up, and he had found their authors almost uniformly ridiculous. Even more weak people than blackguards seemed to be afraid of their names. And more than half of them were inspired by the most respectable emotions. It needed no complicated psychology to tell him that the boy beside him was a timorous soul, full of pride, and desperate resolutions he would never have the courage to justify—or put into effect.
“I see,” he said, with an almost sympathetic dryness. “I am glad you told me, for it might have complicated matters for someone else. Did you hear that Miss Tysin was found drowned yesterday?”
Hoad turned white, and shook visibly. He stuttered something about being dreadfully sorry, and hadn’t heard, and was sure if she had killed Hayes it was Hayes’s fault.
Parfitt looked at him with affected severity. “Don’t say that sort of thing, sir! I should imagine you would have learned a lesson over being too free with your conclusions already.”
“You mean she didn’t kill him, and then drown herself?” said Hoad. “But I know she met Hayes by the river, as her car went by that night.”
“Look here, sir,” observed Parfitt, starting his engine again. “I advise you to keep quiet about that. Get your rod, and fish a bit. You will find that will do you more good than meddling in this case.”
He was off with a buzz before the dejected youth could reply.
As he approached the hotel, he decided to let the business of the anonymous letter remain in abeyance for the moment. Hoad had acted on a jealous, youthful impulse, and it was unlikely that the letter had acted as a spur to the murderer. It could be kept as a rod in pickle if it became likely that more was to be had out of it later on.
He parked the combination outside the hotel, and entered the lounge. It seemed to him that morning that people lay in wait for him at every turn. It was still early, but Wint jumped up from where he had sat smoking in a corner of the lounge, and made signs suggesting silence.
“Can you come out with me for a few minutes, Inspector?” he whispered, “I have something to tell you.”
Parfitt nodded, and went out hastily. Wint joined him a moment later, and the two walked through an open gate into a field, and so for fifty yards till Wint spoke.
“Miss Powis and I went fossicking ourselves last night,” he began. “You haven’t had time to look at tunnels yet, have you?”
Parfitt explained what had kept him busy the previous evening. Wint was shocked. He forgot his own discovery for the moment, until the Inspector reminded him that he had volunteered some information.
“Yes,” said Wint. “I was going to tell you we found something. It looked to me dashed like a bloodstain on one of the sleepers.”
“Where was this?”
“One of the short tunnels.”
“Can you take me there now?”
“Of course. Run me down on your bike, and we can cross the bridge and work up from there. By the way, I found since that Hayes smoked ‘Bulbul’ cigarettes. But I’ll tell you as we go down.”
They hurried back to the hotel, and got off with a rush, as Mrs. Hayes appeared in the doorway to stare at them. Wint shouted explanations against the roar of the engine as they went.
“If he and the girl met in the tunnel, we may trace it by that,” he shouted, as they whirled across the bridge. “He was a great smoker.”
They left the combination in the road, and followed the path Joan and Wint had taken the night before. Neither of them had a torch, but when they came to the spot in the tunnel where the stain showed on the sleeper, Parfitt expended half a box of matches, and rose convinced.
“That’s blood,” he said. “Come out of this into the light. We’ll go back for torches and lamps.”
Wint followed him out of the intense dark into the glaring sunlight that was now flooding the gorge, and gilding the pools of the river.
“Then we know that he wasn’t killed on the bank,” he said, offering his cigarette-case to the detective. “The job was done up here, and he was taken down. That ought to help you a bit.”
“It would if it were true, sir. Unfortunately it isn’t, or I miss my guess. What it does mean is another matter.”
Wint stared. “Now how can you tell that?” he asked rather impatiently. “I believe there are scientific ways of distinguishing one person’s blood from another, but no one could do it at a glance.”
“Common-sense can tell me all I want to know, sir. Trouble with some of you amateurs, if you don’t mind me saying so, is that you see clues and make conclusions at the same time. We look at them three ways—time, place and quantity. You know how Mr. Hayes was killed, don’t you?”
“Gaff cut the jugular, wasn’t it?”
“It was. Now, if you cut yours by accident, if that is all that happened, you wouldn’t lose your life, would you?”
“I’m an ass!” Wint said with decision. “It’s a big vein, of course. It would be a beastly business.”
“Yes; anywhere but in the water.”
“Could he have been killed nearer Cwyll, and the body brought up on one of those rail trolleys?”
“No. They are kept in the station at Cwyll, and they make the deuce of a rumble. If one had been taken out, the railwaymen who have cottages beside the line would have heard. Look here, Mr. Wint, if I go back with you we’ll have the whole village on top of us. Could you sneak back, eat your breakfast in the ordinary way, say you met me, and I said I had gone to Cwyll again?”
“I could. Why?”
“You could telephone to Cwyll from the box here, if you have your A.A. key, and ask them to send three men with lamps and torches. And try, when you get back, to prevent anyone from fishing this way. Tell our men to come right through the long tunnel, so as not to be seen on the road. Will you?”
Wint agreed, and set off. He would be out of the hunt, but that would not matter. He thought of the drowned girl as he hurried home. Poor thing! It was to hoped that others of Hayes’s victims had not taken it so hardly. Unlike Hoad, he did not suspect her of the murder.
Curiously enough neither Bow nor Hoad appeared to have mentioned their meeting with the detective. Mrs. Hayes, who had seen him ride away, said nothing either, though she eyed Wint with studious attention as he took his seat for breakfast.
Since he had been down to the tunnel with Parfitt, someone had passed on a trade motor-van from Cwyll who knew of the tragedy at the lake. The tables were buzzing with the news, an
d Celia Mason in high excitement was talking of it to a white-faced, sickly Hoad, who listened with his head on his hand.
Joan was as shocked as the rest. At the bottom of her heart she felt that there was something ineradicably romantic about a girl who could kill herself for love.
“I wonder what Mrs. Hayes thinks of it?” she said, after a little. “She keeps wonderfully calm.”
“Why shouldn’t she?” he murmured. “That sort of thing is an old experience with her, I expect. I mean to say, Hayes’s peccadilloes are not new.”
After breakfast Joan asked him to come out and smoke in the garden. They sat down in a rose-arbour, lit up, and said nothing for a little. Then Joan leaned forward.
“Harry, I don’t know if I’ve simply made a bloomer, or come on something very important. I feel pretty certain I’m right, but it was such a small thing, that I may be wrong.”
“Let’s hear it anyway,” he said eagerly. “You mean something to do with the murder?”
She did not reply for a few moments. Celia Mason and Hoad appeared on a neighbouring path, and they heard Celia’s voice.
“Yes, the stone came from the farm, they say. The Boots went out to see what was up. She tied it round her neck.”
Wint glanced at Joan. When the two had passed on, she began: “I got up early. I think that boy Hoad wakened me. He has the room next to mine, and made a noise getting up. When I was ready to get a bath, I peeped out of my door. You see, I wanted to look if Hoad had a towel. I’d have had to wait then. But he had slipped out somehow, and the door farther down on the other side opened.”
“Who was it?” he asked.
“Mrs. Hayes. She had a bath-towel over her arm. I was just going to shut my door, when I saw Mr. Bow open his. He didn’t see me, but he looked for a second at Mrs. Hayes, and then closed his door. She made some sort of quick gesture. I am sure of that, and his face made me sure he knew her.”
“Before of course. Your face is different when you know people. I mean if I saw you in the passage you would know by my look that—well, I mean that anyone else would.”