by Mark Place
‘This is a terrible thing to have happened, Miss Pebmarsh,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid it must have been a great shock to you. I’ll need to get a clear statement of exactly what occurred from you all. I understand that it was Miss—’ he glanced quickly at the note-book the constable had handed him, ‘Sheila Webb who actually discovered the body. If you’ll allow me to use your kitchen, Miss Pebmarsh, I’ll take Miss Webb in there where we can be quiet.’
He opened the connecting door from the dining-room to the kitchen and waited until the girl had passed through. A young plain-clothes detective was already established in the kitchen, writing unobtrusively at a Formica-topped small table. ‘This chair looks comfortable,’ said Hardcastle, pulling forward a modernized version of a Windsor chair. Sheila Webb sat down nervously, staring at him with large frightened eyes. Hardcastle very nearly said: ‘I shan’t eat you, my dear,’ but repressed himself, and said instead: ‘There’s nothing to worry about. We just want to get a clear picture. Now your name is Sheila Webb—and your address?’
‘14, Palmerstone Road—beyond the gasworks.’
‘Yes, of course. And you are employed, I suppose?’
‘Yes. I’m a shorthand typist—I work at Miss Martindale’s Secretarial Bureau.’
‘The Cavendish Secretarial and Typewriting Bureau—that’s its full name, isn’t it?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And how long have you been working there?’
‘About a year. Well, ten months actually.’
‘I see. Now just tell me in your own words how you came to be at 19, Wilbraham Crescent today.’
‘Well, it was this way.’ Sheila Webb was speaking now with more confidence. ‘This Miss Pebmarsh rang up the Bureau and asked for a stenographer to be here at three o’clock. So when I came back from lunch Miss Martindale told me to go.’
‘That was just routine, was it? I mean—you were the next on the list—or however you arrange these things?’
‘Not exactly. Miss Pebmarsh had asked for me specially.’
‘Miss Pebmarsh had asked for you specially.’ Hardcastle’s eye brows registered this point. ‘I see…Because you had worked for her before?’
‘But I hadn’t,’ said Sheila quickly.
‘You hadn’t? You’re quite sure of that?’
‘Oh, yes, I’m positive. I mean, she’s not the sort of person one would forget. That’s what seems so odd.’
‘Quite. Well, we won’t go into that just now. You reached here when?’
‘It must have been just before three o’clock, because the cuckoo clock—’ she stopped abruptly. Her eyes widened. ‘How queer. How very queer. I never really noticed at the time.’
‘What didn’t you notice, Miss Webb?’
‘Why—the clocks.’
‘What about the clocks?’
‘The cuckoo clock struck three all right, but all the others were about an hour fast. How very odd!’
‘Certainly very odd,’ agreed the inspector. ‘Now when did you first notice the body?’
‘Not till I went round behind the sofa. And there it—he—was. It was awful, yes awful…’
‘Awful, I agree. Now did you recognize the man? Was it anyone you had seen before?’
‘Oh no.’
‘You’re quite sure of that? He might have looked rather different from the way he usually looked, you know. Think carefully. You’re quite sure he was someone you’d never seen before?’
‘Quite sure.’
‘Right. That’s that. And what did you do?’
‘What did I do?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why—nothing…nothing at all. I couldn’t.’
‘I see. You didn’t touch him at all?’
‘Yes—yes I did. To see if—I mean—just to see—But he was—quite cold—and—and I got blood on my hand. It was horrible—thick and sticky.’ She began to shake.
‘There, there,’ said Hardcastle in an avuncular fashion. ‘It’s all over now, you know. Forget about the blood. Go on to the next thing. What happened next?’
‘I don’t know…Oh, yes, she came home.’
‘Miss Pebmarsh, you mean?’
‘Yes. Only I didn’t think about her being Miss Pebmarsh then. She just came in with a shopping basket.’ Her tone underlined the shopping basket as something incongruous and irrelevant.
‘And what did you say?’
‘I don’t think I said anything…I tried to, but I couldn’t. I felt all choked up here.’ She indicated her throat. The inspector nodded. ‘And then—and then—she said: “Who’s there?” and she came round the back of the sofa and I thought—I thought she was going to—to tread on it. And I screamed…And once I began I couldn’t stop screaming, and somehow I got out of the room and through the front door—’
‘Like a bat out of hell,’ the inspector remembered Colin’s description. Sheila Webb looked at him out of miserable frightened eyes and said rather unexpectedly: ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Nothing to be sorry about. You’ve told your story very well. There’s no need to think about it anymore now. Oh, just one point, why were you in that room at all?’
‘Why?’ She looked puzzled.
‘Yes. You’d arrived here, possibly a few minutes early, and you’d pushed the bell, I suppose. But if nobody answered, why did you come in?’
‘Oh that. Because she told me to.’
‘Who told you to?’
‘Miss Pebmarsh did.’
‘But I thought you hadn’t spoken to her at all.’
‘No, I hadn’t. It was Miss Martindale she said it to—that I was to come in and wait in the sitting-room on the right of the hall.’
Hardcastle said: ‘Indeed’ thoughtfully.
Sheila Webb asked timidly: ‘Is—is that all?’
‘I think so. I’d like you to wait here about ten minutes longer, perhaps, in case something arises I might want to ask you about. After that, I’ll send you home in a police car. What about your family—you have a family?’
‘My father and mother are dead. I live with an aunt.’
‘And her name is?’
‘Mrs Lawton.’
The inspector rose and held out his hand.
‘Thank you very much, Miss Webb,’ he said. ‘Try and get a good night’s rest tonight. You’ll need it after what you’ve been through.’
She smiled at him timidly as she went through the door into the dining-room. ‘Look after Miss Webb, Colin,’ the inspector said. ‘Now, Miss Pebmarsh, can I trouble you to come in here?’
Hardcastle had half held out a hand to guide Miss Pebmarsh, but she walked resolutely past him, verified a chair against the wall with a touch of her fingertips, drew it out a foot and sat down. Hardcastle closed the door. Before he could speak, Millicent Pebmarsh said abruptly: ‘Who’s that young man?’
‘His name is Colin Lamb.’
‘So he informed me. But who is he? Why did he come here?’
Hardcastle looked at her in faint surprise.
‘He happened to be walking down the street when Miss Webb rushed out of this house screaming murder. After coming in and satisfying himself as to what had occurred he rang us up, and was asked to come back here and wait.’
‘You spoke to him as Colin.’
‘You are very observant, Miss Pebmarsh—(observant? hardly the word. And yet none other fitted)—Colin Lamb is a friend of mine, though it is some time since I have seen him.’ He added: ‘He’s a marine biologist.’
‘Oh! I see.’
‘Now, Miss Pebmarsh, I shall be glad if you can tell me anything about this rather surprising affair.’
‘Willingly. But there is very little to tell.’
‘You have resided here for some time, I believe?’
‘Since 1950. I am—was—a schoolmistress by profession. When I was told nothing could be done about my failing eyesight and that I should shortly go blind, I applied myself to become a specialist in Braille and various techniques for he
lping the blind. I have a job here at the Aaronberg Institute for Blind and Handicapped children.’
‘Thank you. Now as to the events of this afternoon. Were you expecting a visitor?’
‘No.’
‘I will read you a description of the dead man to see if it suggests to you anyone in particular. Height five feet nine to ten, age approximately sixty, dark hair going grey, brown eyes, clean shaven, thin face, firm jaw. Well-nourished but not fat. Dark grey suit, well-kept hands. Might be a bank clerk, an accountant, a lawyer, or a professional man of some kind. Does that suggest to you anyone that you know?’
Millicent Pebmarsh considered carefully before replying. ‘I can’t say that it does. Of course it’s a very generalized description. It would fit quite a number of people. It might be someone I have seen or met on some occasion, but certainly not anyone I know well.’
‘You have not received any letter lately from anyone proposing to call upon you?’
‘Definitely not.’
‘Very good. Now, you rang up the Cavendish Secretarial Bureau and asked for the services of a stenographer and—’ She interrupted him. ‘Excuse me. I did nothing of the kind.’
‘You did not ring up the Cavendish Secretarial Bureau and ask—’ Hardcastle stared.
‘I don’t have a telephone in the house.’
‘There is a call-box at the end of the street,’ Inspector Hardcastle pointed out. ‘Yes, of course. But I can only assure you, Inspector Hardcastle, that I had no need for a stenographer and did not—repeat not —ring up this Cavendish place with any such request.’
‘You did not ask for Miss Sheila Webb particularly?’
‘I have never heard that name before.’
Hardcastle stared at her, astonished.
‘You left the front door unlocked,’ he pointed out.
‘I frequently do so in the daytime.’
‘Anybody might walk in.’
‘Anybody seems to have done so in this case,’ said Miss Pebmarsh drily.
‘Miss Pebmarsh, this man according to the medical evidence died roughly between 1.30 and 2.45.
Where were you yourself then?’
Miss Pebmarsh reflected.
‘At 1.30 I must either have left or been preparing to leave the house. I had some shopping to do.’
‘Can you tell me exactly where you went?’
‘Let me see. I went to the post office, the one in Albany Road, posted a parcel, got some stamps, then I did some household shopping, yes and I got some patent fasteners and safety pins at the drapers, Field and Wren. Then I returned here. I can tell you exactly what the time was. My cuckoo clock cuckooed three times as I came to the gate. I can hear it from the road.’
‘And what about your other clocks?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Your other clocks seem all to be just over an hour fast.’
‘Fast? You mean the grandfather clock in the corner?’
‘Not that only—all the other clocks in the sitting-room are the same.’
‘I don’t understand what you mean by the “other clocks”. There are no other clocks in the sitting-room.’
Chapter 3
Hardcastle stared. ‘Oh come, Miss Pebmarsh. What about that beautiful Dresden china clock on the mantelpiece? And a small French clock—ormolu. And a silver carriage clock, and—oh yes, the clock with “Rosemary” across the corner.’
It was Miss Pebmarsh’s turn to stare. ‘Either you or I must be mad, Inspector. I assure you I have no Dresden china clock, no—what did you say—clock with “Rosemary” across it—no French ormolu clock and—what was the other one?’
‘Silver carriage clock,’ said Hardcastle mechanically.
‘Not that either. If you don’t believe me, you can ask the woman who comes to clean for me. Her name is Mrs Curtin.’
Detective Inspector Hardcastle was taken aback. There was a positive assurance, a briskness in Miss Pebmarsh’s tone that carried conviction. He took a moment or two turning over things in his mind. Then he rose to his feet. ‘I wonder, Miss Pebmarsh, if you would mind accompanying me into the next room?’
‘Certainly. Frankly, I would like to see those clocks myself.’
‘See?’ Hardcastle was quick to query the word.
‘Examine would be a better word,’ said Miss Pebmarsh, ‘but even blind people, Inspector, use conventional modes of speech that do not exactly apply to their own powers. When I say I would like to see those clocks, I mean I would like to examine and feel them with my own fingers.’ Followed by Miss Pebmarsh, Hardcastle went out of the kitchen, crossed the small hall and into the sitting-room. The fingerprint man looked up at him. ‘I’ve about finished in here, sir,’ he said. ‘You can touch anything you like.’
Hardcastle nodded and picked up the small travelling clock with ‘Rosemary’ written across the corner. He put it into Miss Pebmarsh’s hands. She felt it over carefully.
‘It seems an ordinary travelling clock,’ she said, ‘the leather folding kind. It is not mine, Inspector Hardcastle, and it was not in this room, I am fairly sure I can say, when I left the house at half past one.’
‘Thank you.’
The inspector took it back from her. Carefully he lifted the small Dresden clock from the mantelpiece.
‘Be careful of this,’ he said, as he put it into her hands, ‘it’s breakable.’ Millicent Pebmarsh felt the small china clock with delicate probing fingertips. Then she shook her head. ‘It must be a charming clock,’ she said, ‘but it’s not mine. Where was it, do you say?’
‘On the right hand side of the mantelpiece.’
‘There should be one of a pair of china candlesticks there,’ said Miss Pebmarsh.
‘Yes,’ said Hardcastle, ‘there is a candlestick there, but it’s been pushed to the end.’
‘You say there was still another clock?’
‘Two more.’
Hardcastle took back the Dresden china clock and gave her the small French gilt ormolu one. She felt it over rapidly, then handed it back to him. ‘No. That is not mine either.’ He handed her the silver one and that, too, she returned. ‘The only clocks ordinarily in this room are a grandfather clock there in that corner by the window—’
‘Quite right.’
‘—and a cuckoo on the wall near the door.’
Hardcastle found it difficult to know exactly what to say next. He looked searchingly at the woman in front of him with the additional security of knowing that she could not return his survey. There was a slight frown as of perplexity on her forehead. She said sharply:
‘I can’t understand it. I simply can’t understand it.’
She stretched out one hand, with the easy knowledge of where she was in the room, and sat down. Hardcastle looked at the fingerprint man who was standing by the door. ‘You’ve been over these clocks?’ he asked.
‘I’ve been over everything, sir. No dabs on the gilt clock, but there wouldn’t be. The surface wouldn’t take it. The same goes for the china one. But there are no dabs on the leather travelling clock or the silver one and that is a bit unlikely if things were normal—there ought to be dabs. By the way, none of them are wound up and they are all set to the same time—thirteen minutes past four.’
‘What about the rest of the room?’
‘There are about three or four different sets of prints in the room, all women’s, I should say. The contents of the pockets are on the table.’ By an indication of his head he drew attention to a small pile of things on a table. Hardcastle went over and looked at them. There was a notecase containing seven pounds ten, a little loose change, a silk pocket handkerchief, unmarked, a small box of digestive pills and a printed card. Hardcastle bent to look at it.
Mr R. H. Curry,
Metropolis and Provincial Insurance Co. Ltd
7, Denvers Street,
London, W2.
Hardcastle came back to the sofa where Miss Pebmarsh sat. ‘Were you by any chance expecting someone from an insurance
company to call upon you?’
‘Insurance company? No, certainly not.’
‘The Metropolis and Provincial Insurance Company,’ said Hardcastle.
Miss Pebmarsh shook her head. ‘I’ve never heard of it,’ she said.
‘You were not contemplating taking out insurance of any kind?’
‘No, I was not. I am insured against fire and burglary with the Jove Insurance Company which has a branch here. I carry no personal insurance. I have no family or near relations so I see no point in insuring my life.’
‘I see,’ said Hardcastle. ‘Does the name of Curry mean anything to you? Mr R. H. Curry?’ He was watching her closely. He saw no reaction in her face.
‘Curry,’ she repeated the name, then shook her head. ‘It’s not a very usual name, is it? No, I don’t think I’ve heard the name or known anyone of that name. Is that the name of the man who is dead?’
‘It would seem possible,’ said Hardcastle.
Miss Pebmarsh hesitated a moment. Then she said: ‘Do you want me to—to—touch—’ He was quick to understand her. ‘Would you, Miss Pebmarsh? If it’s not asking too much of you, that is? I’m not very knowledgeable in these matters, but your fingers will probably tell you more accurately what a person looks like than you would know by description.’
‘Exactly,’ said Miss Pebmarsh. ‘I agree it is not a very pleasant thing to have to do but I am quite willing to do it if you think it might be a help to you.’
‘Thank you,’ said Hardcastle. ‘If you will let me guide you—’
He took her round the sofa, indicated to her to kneel down, then gently guided her hands to the dead man’s face. She was very calm, displaying no emotion. Her fingers traced the hair, the ears, lingering a moment behind the left ear, the line of the nose, mouth and chin. Then she shook her head and got up.
‘I have a clear idea what he would look like,’ she said, ‘but I am quite sure that it is no one I have seen or known.’
The fingerprint man had packed up his kit and gone out of the room. He stuck his head back in.
‘They’ve come for him,’ he said, indicating the body. ‘All right to take him away?’
‘Right,’ said Inspector Hardcastle. ‘Just come and sit over here, will you, Miss Pebmarsh?’