Trent's Own Case

by E. C. Bentley

  ‘And then, Phil, I looked at the first page of the bundle of manuscript. Can you imagine what I found it to be? You can’t, of course; yet it was the text of a book you have told me about more than once. It was that thing of Wetherill’s.’

  ‘What!’ Trent exclaimed. ‘Do you mean The Broken Wing? And he had it in that safe—of course, that is just where it would be. And what happened to that, Bryan? Did you take it? The police didn’t find it.’

  Fairman nodded with a lowering face. ‘I took it—yes. Stole it, if you like, for that at least was Randolph’s legitimate property, I suppose, though how he came by it I cannot think. Or perhaps he had borrowed it from the repulsive brute who wrote it. I didn’t care. I only knew I wasn’t going to leave that infamous thing lying about for anyone else to see. So I put it under my arm and carried it off; and at the present moment it is at the bottom of the Channel, tied up in a bundle along with the other papers.’

  ‘Good!’ Trent said with keen satisfaction. ‘And what then, Bryan?’

  ‘Why then, handling those packets of letters, as most of them were, I was reminded of something. I thought I would send a farewell note to yourself, Phil, as my best friend, saying a few of the things that one leaves unspoken as a rule, before I took the final step. I meant to write it in the boat-train. I had pen and pencil on me, stamps in my note-case; but I had no paper. There was none to be seen in the bedroom, and I hurried downstairs thinking I would forage for some in the living-room before I left the place.’

  Fairman had entered the front room on the ground floor, and switched on the lights. He saw the writing-table at once, and upon it the open-fronted cabinet with its ample choice of what he was seeking. He helped himself to a number of sheets of blank paper and some envelopes; and as he was doing so, his eye was caught by the names written on the visible leaf of the engagement-block that stood on the top of the cabinet. He gazed in bewilderment at the neatly pencilled record that would speak so plainly to those looking for light on the matter of Randolph’s death.

  ‘1:15, Eunice, Porter’s,’ he read. ‘6, Trent.’ And at the bottom of the page, ‘7:45, Tabarders’,’ followed by a printed sentence from one of the Epistles.

  The name of Eunice in this context was quite unmeaning to Fairman. The mere name was a stab to his sensibilities; and for an instant he wondered hazily how this note of an appointment with Randolph could be reconciled with what he had heard of her resentment at the old man’s attempts to win her favour. But, what fixed his attention was the name of his friend, put down for a visit that had preceded by little more than an hour his own unappointed appearance on the scene of a fatal crime.

  ‘You can see for yourself, Phil,’ Fairman said, ‘how it might look to anyone in a state of mental incoherence. Muzzy as I was, I simply wasn’t capable of thinking straight. The nearest I could get to putting my ideas together was something like this: “Here is Randolph shot dead—Phil was here with Randolph only a short time ago—Phil came here intending to have a row with Randolph—Phil may be suspected, whether he did it or not.” And at that point, you see, I had my brilliant inspiration.’

  Trent looked fixedly at his friend. ‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘I begin to see.’

  ‘If I was going to make an end of myself, as I very certainly meant to do in any case, here was the chance of doing it to some purpose. You have saved my life, which is the sort of thing a man doesn’t forget—’

  ‘A man might try,’ Trent said impatiently. ‘Anyone who happens to be a good swimmer is not a hero because he rescues someone who isn’t; if he didn’t, he ought to be drowned himself. I would have done the same for anybody; you know that.’

  Fairman laughed gently. ‘Yes, I know that. But it happened to be me, through no fault of yours, and it is one of those little trifles that stick in one’s memory, as I was saying. And so, when I saw your name written there, inviting the attention of anyone looking into the matter of Randolph’s murder, my mind was made up in a moment. Then I just did the first things that came into my head. I tore off the leaf from the block and stuck it in my pocket. I went out into the passage and ripped the label with my name on it off the bag, and chucked it into a corner. Then, just as I was going, I thought about fingerprints; so I went upstairs again to the bedroom, where I had noticed the water-bottle and glass, and took a drink.

  ‘After that I cleared out as quick as I could, and hailed a taxi in Bullingdon Street. I had been much longer at Randolph’s than I had ever anticipated, and I had only just time to book a passage and catch the train—as you saw. That was another little jolt for me.’ Fairman closed his eyes with a reminiscent smile. ‘There you were, as cool as Christmas, and evidently with not the least idea of fleeing the country—in fact, looking a little bit bored, I thought—and there was I, flustered and feverish and right at the end of my tether, feeling far worse than I should have done if I had shot the old man myself.’

  After this brief glimpse of his friend, Fairman said, he had taken his seat at the table in the Pullman and begun to consider what he should do. He had already settled it with himself that he would leave behind him a letter to the police stating that he was guilty of the murder of Randolph. Deciding on the form of the letter was not so easy. He began and then abandoned first one, then another; in the end he came to see that the more of detail he put into the story, the more chance there was of its being discredited by some small, unrealized error. The final letter satisfied him as being the barest possible form that could be given to his false confession; and he had posted it at the station office at Newhaven.

  One disconcerting thing had happened during the change from the train to the steamer at Newhaven. Without his perceiving it, the leaf torn from Randolph’s engagement-block had dropped from among his papers to the floor of the carriage; and it had been picked up by an old lady, who afterwards tried to restore it to him. Confused at first, he had quickly reflected that there was nothing on the leaf that could tell a story, and had simply denied all knowledge of it. In mid-Channel he had watched his opportunity to go to the side of the vessel, unseen, and drop overboard the parcel he had made of the documents taken from Randolph’s bedroom.

  Arriving at Dieppe about two in the morning, he took a room at a hotel, and passed a few hours in drug-induced, yet broken, sleep. He then rose, and asked to be directed to the Impasse de la Chimère. After several times renewing his inquiries, he came at length to that remote neighbourhood. There was no mistaking the house when he came to it—a typical château—but it was, to all appearance, deserted. Repeatedly he rang the bell at the somewhat dilapidated outer gateway without result, and no sign of habitation was to be seen about the house itself. The smaller house whose grounds adjoined those of the d’Astalys mansion, and which bore the name of which he had heard—Pavillon de l’Ecstase—was silent and deserted too.

  Worn out and distraught as he was, Fairman had not failed to notice that he was being curiously observed from the windows of the large, old-fashioned inn that occupied the end of the Impasse. This was evidently the place to yield information about the whereabouts of the people of the big house; and thither Fairman now betook himself, ordering coffee and brandy to be served to him in the room looking out on the quiet street. But he found there was nothing to be learned at the Hôtel du Petit Univers. The huge man who kept the place avoided his eye when questioned, and mumbled that he had enough to occupy him without keeping watch on the comings and goings of his neighbours—if the comte was not at home, that was none of his, the innkeeper’s business; nor did he know of any other address at which the comte might be found.

  After such a reception, Fairman had not energy enough for any further pursuit of his attempt to regain touch with the Comte d’Astalys. Weary, sick, and engulfed in the blackest despair of the soul, he had dragged his footsteps back to the harbour and booked a passage by the one o’clock boat back to Newhaven. ‘It was,’ he said to Trent, ‘the only thing I could think of. I meant to destroy myself; and by that time I was too far
gone to think of anything the least little bit out of the way. Do you know what I mean? I mean that I had crossed over by sea, and naturally I had thought about drowning when I looked into the water, and when I threw those papers overboard; and now, after failing in the crazy business I had set out on, I came back to that, and never thought of anything else.

  ‘And what happened afterwards I expect you know. I did try to jump overboard, when I thought nobody was paying the slightest attention to me; and the first move I made, a large and powerful man, whom I had been watching scratching his head over a crossword puzzle, was on me like a cat on a mouse. If I hadn’t been such a wreck as I was,’ Fairman added regretfully, ‘I would have given him a lesson against interfering with other people’s private business.’

  ‘You didn’t do so badly, at that,’ Trent assured him. ‘I am told that Sergeant Hewitt’s appearance has been simply ruined for the time being.’

  ‘Oh, well!’ Fairman said. ‘If I did anything of that sort, I’m sorry. I didn’t really mean what I said about giving him a lesson—it’s the sort of thing one says without thinking. Of course I soon found that he was a police officer, doing his infernal duty; but at the time when he tackled me, I would have torn his heart out with all the pleasure in the world.’

  ‘Never mind,’ Trent said. ‘I don’t suppose Sergeant Hewitt minds. The sort of marks you gave him don’t last long, and the sort he has got added to his record for pinching you will do him plenty of good. And so you were run in as a suicide; and then, according to what I hear, you crumbled into ruins. Now, look here, Bryan; we have got to think about the best way of getting you let loose again. The only thing for you to do if you will take my advice, is that whenever anybody asks you, you give the whole story, without any reservation whatever—including your reason for stacking it all up against yourself.’

  ‘All right,’ Fairman said. ‘I was thinking I would do that in any case. If you are out of it, there’s no point in keeping my mouth shut any longer. But they won’t believe me. There is a good enough case against me.’

  ‘Though you say it as shouldn’t, eh? Well, never mind about that; it may not be as good as you think. You haven’t been tried for murder yet, you know, and if you ever are, it may not be in the precise form that you expect. You know what they are holding you for at present, of course.’

  ‘Of course. Suicide.’

  ‘So I thought; but I am told that the official way of putting it is rather more ornamental. A captious critic might even call it laboured. The way the law looks at it is that when you tried to jump overboard, you did it with intent then feloniously, wilfully, and of your malice of aforethought, to kill and murder yourself. It is possible that that is the only murder charge you will have to meet, and I don’t think it should worry you. When you are taken to court again, which will be quite soon, the evidence as to your state of health, both before and after the rash act that didn’t come off, should be quite enough. What will happen—so I am told—is that if you consent to be dealt with summarily, you will be bound over to come up for judgment when called upon; which will be never, if you behave yourself. And now I must leave you, Bryan, before they throw me out. The next time I see you, I hope and believe, you will be at liberty again—at liberty to dine with me, in the first place.’

  Trent got up to go, then checked himself. ‘Oh, I forgot one thing,’ he said. ‘You have heard me mention my aunt, Miss Yates, haven’t you? I had a letter from her this morning, to say she is returning soon from Rome, where she has been making a short stay with friends. She describes an odd experience she had on the way there, between London and Dieppe.’

  Fairman looked a little mystified. ‘Well?’ he said.

  ‘She enclosed a little document which she thought would interest me. I thought it would interest you.’ He drew from his letter-case a slip of thin paper, which he handed to his friend—a printed leaf, with a few words of handwriting upon it as follows:

  At Scotland Yard a few hours later, Inspector Bligh succeeded, after several attempts, in getting speech by telephone with Trent at his house. His words were brief and guarded. ‘I’ve got your letter,’ he said, ‘and I believe you have got hold of the right end of the stick. As for what you propose, I’m willing to try it. But we can’t talk about these things over the wire. How soon can you see me here?’

  ‘In about half an hour.’

  ‘Right. Come along.’

  ‘There’s one thing,’ Trent said, ‘that I didn’t mention in my letter. You might think it over while I am on my way. Those fingerprints on the razor-blade—you haven’t traced them, have you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I thought not. They were mine.’ And Trent hung up the receiver.

  CHAPTER XX

  A GOLF MATCH

  IT was a bright and lively April afternoon when Verney travelled in Trent’s car to the scene of their pre-arranged golf match at Molesworth. The secretary was a different man indeed from the distressed and shaken being of the day after the murder of his employer; in better trim, too, than he had seemed to be when Trent had seen him at the Randolph Institute four days ago. The fresh, clean air, and the prospect of a little freedom from the bonds of duty, had put some colour in his firm, aquiline face. If it looked still a little drawn, and if in his clear blue eyes there was still something of a brooding expression that had not been there when Trent met with him first at Brinton Lodge three months before, he was certainly in better spirits as he talked of indifferent things, or discussed golf with that earnest gravity which Trent always found so impressive in the true votaries. He noted that Verney never said a word about his own game, or any successes that might have fallen to him; but Trent had never placed him among the numskulls of the fraternity.

  Verney enlarged upon his happy memories of the course they were about to visit, the details of which he seemed to recall as readily as if it had been not years, but days, since he last played there. As the car cleared the remoter northern outskirts of London, he took off his cap, breathed deep, and came nearer than Trent had yet seen him to looking satisfied with the world we live in.

  The prospect for the Institute, he said in answer to a discreet inquiry, was quite uncertain still; but he had received more than one offer which showed him that there were better opportunities than he had thought for one of his peculiar experience. The administration of charity seemed not to be an overcrowded profession; which was fortunate, he said simply, as he had come to care for nothing else.

  ‘Not only fortunate, but natural,’ Trent suggested, ‘as there is no more than a bare living to be made by it as a paid job, I suppose. And it leads to nothing, does it?’

  ‘Only to itself,’ Verney said.

  He began to talk of the work to which he had devoted himself; and Trent was an interested listener. Verney had inside knowledge of the working of almost every known kind of organized philanthropy, from the maintenance of Nonconformist pastors’ retiring funds to the provision of lifeboats; and he showed himself to have a keen, if cold, eye for the absurdities occasionally to be met with when those concerned have least idea of being amusing. There was, he assured Trent, a small fund, recently created by will, for the annual provision of twelve pairs of knickerbockers for poor little boys in a certain parish; it being carefully laid down by the testator that the knickerbockers should be fastened below the knee, so as to avoid the repulsive impropriety of the garments known as shorts.

  He mentioned also the case of an elderly benefactor who had, at great expense, presented a certain orphanage with an up-to-date gymnasium. This gentleman, being invited to perform the ceremony of opening the building, had been transported with rage on finding that no arrangement had been made for his being presented with a golden key in honour of the event; and this had had to be provided for him, by a committee struggling with money difficulties, under the threat of his removing his name from the list of the institution’s supporters.

  By this time they were nearing their destination; and Trent noted with
relief, as they passed by the opening of a lane leading towards the course, that a small canary-coloured car was parked some distance down it.

  ‘I never have a caddie—d’you mind?’ Verney said in the dressing-room, as they prepared themselves for the fray. ‘I can’t allow myself any luxuries, for one thing; and for another, the work I do among boys doesn’t make me much in love with any employment of that kind.’

  ‘I think you mentioned it before,’ said Trent, who in fact had borne this principle of Verney’s very clearly in mind. ‘It makes no difference to me. I won’t have one either. Shall we have anything on the game? Some people always like to. I am just as happy whether we do or not.’

  ‘I’d rather not,’ Verney said. ‘If one’s always carrying on a fight against betting among other people, I think one ought to avoid it oneself. It’s a good enough game without that, if one’s at all keen.’

  It was close on three o’clock when they went to the first tee, and Verney, who was giving three strokes, opened the match. He swung with an easy perfection of style, and there was a sting in his drive that moved Trent’s admiration. There were no other players near them, before or behind; for Trent had deliberately chosen the day of the week when the average attendance at the course was least. The conditions were in every way ideal; and both gave themselves up to the pure pleasure of a keenly contested game. During the first half of the round the match was an even one, and the position as they quitted the ninth green was all square.