The Ponson Case

by Freeman Wills Crofts

  Then with regard to the time at which the prints had been made. On this point the evidence of the butler corroborated Austin’s story. The butler had stated the shoes had been in Austin’s dressing-room in his, the butler’s, charge during the entire time from the Monday on which they were purchased till the Friday, with the single exception of this particular period on Wednesday evening. If this were true it followed that some person other than Austin wore the shoes, and made the tracks during this period. But was it true?

  Tanner recalled point by point his interview with the butler. Invariably he reached his conclusions quite as much from the manner and bearing of the persons he interrogated as from their statement. And in this case he was forced to admit the butler seemed to speak as a perfectly honest man. The Inspector felt he did not possess sufficient intelligence to make his story sound as convincing as it had, unless he himself believed it to be true.

  But might not the man have been mistaken?

  Obviously the liability of humanity to err must be kept in view. At the same time it was difficult to see how a mistake could have occurred. The matter was not one of opinion, but of fact. Was Austin wearing the shoes when he went out and returned on the Wednesday evening? Were they clean before he started and muddy after he reached home? There did not seem to be any possibility of error on these points. More important still, were they worn at any other time? The butler had stated he always knew what shoes Austin was wearing, as all his master’s footwear was in his charge. It seemed to Tanner that if Austin was away from the house for so long as a journey to the Abbey would involve, in dirty weather, the butler would expect a pair of shoes to have been soiled, and would therefore be bound to know if those in question had been worn.

  But there was corroborative evidence which vastly strengthened the man’s statement, and that was the apparent age of the footmarks. Tanner could not tell to an hour when prints were made, but he felt certain he could say to within twelve. And in the case of these particular marks at the Abbey their appearance told him unmistakably they must have been made on or about Wednesday night. That the shoes came in wet and muddy that night, and that on Thursday morning they had dried by just the amount that might reasonably have been expected, was also strongly corroborative.

  The more Tanner pondered over the matter, the more he felt himself forced once more to the conclusion that the footprints at the Abbey were made on that Wednesday evening between the hours of nine and eleven. If Austin was now proved to have been at the boathouse between these hours, who then had made them?

  And again, if so, what shoes had Austin worn at Luce Manor? On that night the butler had gone over all his footwear, and all except the shoes in question were there in Austin’s room.

  Tanner was genuinely puzzled. This whole matter of the shoes seemed so clear and straightforward, and yet, if Potts and Miss Penrose were to be believed, it was all a fake. As he sat smoking after lunch in the corner of a quiet restaurant he kept racking his brains to find the flaw. But he could get no light, and he did not see just where to look for it.

  At last he decided he would try to trace Austin’s movements, from the time of his visit to Luce Manor on the Sunday evening previous to the murder, right up to the time he handed over the shoes to him, Tanner, on the following Friday. If Austin had arranged for a confederate to make the tracks for him he must have had communications with him, and it was possible Tanner might thus learn his identity.

  As he was in London, the Inspector thought he might as well begin with Austin’s visit to town on the Monday previous to the murder. Of that, the only thing of which he knew was the purchase of the shoes. He had noted the maker’s markings, ‘Glimax B 10735 789647 S Hunt & Co.’

  Messrs Hunt’s was a very large firm, with perhaps a score or more of shops in the metropolis, and probably hundreds throughout the three kingdoms. ‘Glimax’ was one of the three or four ‘lines’ advertised in every paper. Tanner borrowed a directory and looked up their head office. Half an hour later he was seated with their manager.

  Having introduced himself as an Inspector from Scotland Yard, he went on to business at once.

  ‘I am endeavouring,’ he said, ‘to trace the movements of a man who, on Monday, the 5th, this day fortnight, purchased a pair of shoes from one of your shops—probably a West End branch. The shoes were marked Glimax B 10735 over 789647S. Now, can you oblige me by suggesting how I might obtain a record of the sale?’

  ‘With the best will in the world, I don’t know that we can give you that information,’ the manager returned slowly. ‘We get weekly statements from all our branches which show the total sales of each class of shoe during the period. But, unfortunately for you, though fortunately for us,’ the manager smiled deprecatingly, ‘many shoes of the fitting in question would almost certainly be sold at each of our branches during each week. If, therefore, you were to go through our returns you would find yourself no further on—it would still mean inquiries at each individual branch. How do you propose to identify your man?’

  ‘I have his photograph.’

  ‘I am afraid you will have to depend on that. Some of the salesmen will probably remember him. Can I help you in any other way?’

  ‘Two things, if you will be so good; to give me, first, a list of your West End branches and second, a note to your managers, asking them to assist me.’

  ‘I will do both with pleasure.’

  Ten minutes later Tanner reached the first branch. Here he saw the manager, presented his note, and explained his business. The official was extremely civil and brought the Inspector to each of the salesmen in turn. All gave him their careful attention, but none could recall Austin Ponson nor recollect the sale in question. With courteous thanks Tanner took his leave.

  The second branch was not far away, and here the Inspector made similar inquiries. But here again without result.

  Recognising that his quest was going to be tedious, he engaged a taxi and settled down to work systematically through the list. Progress was slow, and it was approaching six o’clock by the time he had reached the ninth branch. But here, just as he had decided, he would visit no more that evening, he had some luck.

  In this shop, the second salesman he spoke to instantly recognised Austin’s photograph, and recollected the purchase of the shoes.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I remember the man perfectly. What drew my special attention to him was the very peculiar way he conducted the purchase. He came in and said he wanted a pair of Glimax B10735 over 789647S. He did not look at the shoes I brought him, except to check the number. I remarked that few gentlemen knew what they wanted so precisely as that, and he said he had had a pair of the same before which had suited him, and he simply wanted to replace them.’

  ‘About what time was that?’

  ‘Shortly after four, I should say.’

  ‘And did he give his name?’

  ‘Yes. I forget what it was, but I sent the shoes to the parcels office at St Pancras.’

  In reply to a further question the man said he recalled the names of Ponson and Halford.

  The Inspector was considerably puzzled by what he had heard, and that evening he lit a cigar and settled down to consider it. In the first place, Austin’s statement that he had bought the shoes on that Monday was true. But how did he know their number? The butler, Tanner remembered, had said that his master had never had a similar pair. For a long time he pondered over the problem, but the only thing that seemed to him clear was that some trick had been played. But at last a possible solution occurred to him. What if there were two of them in it—Austin and an accomplice? The accomplice buys a pair of shoes and sends Austin the number so that he may get a precisely similar pair. Then on the Wednesday night while Austin, wearing one pair, is at Luce Manor, the confederate, wearing the other, is making the tracks at the Abbey.

  At first this seemed to Tanner to account for the facts, but then he recollected that the dent on the sole of one shoe proved that the pair which made the tracks
at the Abbey was Austin’s pair—the pair which had been in the butler’s charge till he, Tanner, received it. Unless, therefore, Austin and his accomplice had exchanged shoes at the end of the excursion, this theory would not work.

  Suddenly another idea came into the Inspector’s mind, at which he slapped his thigh, and smiled to himself. ‘Guess I’m on to it this time,’ he muttered, as he went up to bed, well pleased with his day’s work.

  To test the soundness of his new supposition, he continued next morning the inquiry he had been making on the previous afternoon—interrogating the shoe shop salesmen for information as to Austin’s purchases. He began with the tenth branch, as if he had discovered nothing at the ninth. But here his efforts met with no success. Nor did they at the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth. But at the fourteenth, with a feeling of pleased triumph, he discovered what he had hoped to find.

  At this shop he inquired, as before, if any of the assistants recollected a man like that of the photo he showed having purchased a pair of shoes of the given number. At once he had an affirmative response. One salesman remembered Austin having called on the Monday in question, and after having been carefully fitted, having bought the shoes. The salesman had according to his usual custom handed Austin a card bearing the number of the shoes. He had offered to send the parcel, but Austin had said he was running for a train and would take it with him. The transaction had occurred about three o’clock.

  ‘Bully for me!’ thought Tanner as he drove to St Pancras, en route for Halford. ‘See what a little imagination does!’

  The theory he had evolved on the previous night now seemed not unlikely to be the truth. According to it, Austin had gone to town on the Monday and purchased two identical pairs of shoes. The first he had had fitted in the usual way in one shop; the second had been selected in another shop as being of the same number as the first. This had been rendered possible by carrying out the purchases in two different branch shops of the same firm. One pair he had bought openly giving his name and having the parcel sent to St Pancras; the other transaction he intended to remain a secret.

  Arrived at his home, Austin had carried out the same tactics. One pair he had spoken of and given into his butler’s charge; the other he had locked away privately. No one was supposed to know, and no one did know, that he had purchased more than one pair.

  Let us call these two the known pair and the secret pair. On the evening of the murder, then, Austin puts on the known pair which the butler had in his charge, goes to Luce Manor, commits the murder, walks home through some muddy ground, gets the shoes wet, changes them on returning home, where they dry during the night and are cleaned by the butler next day, all exactly as the latter had stated. But at some other time, probably in the dead of Wednesday night, Austin gets up, puts on the other pair—the secret pair—and slipping out of his house unnoticed, makes the tracks at the Abbey. To make the deception more convincing he has previously dinted the sole of one of these ‘secret’ shoes, so that this dint will show on the prints at the Abbey. At some convenient opportunity when the butler is out of the way he himself cleans the secret pair, and then changes them for the others. The dinted pair which made the tracks at the Abbey thus become those in the butler’s charge; the others, in which the murder was committed, are locked away by Austin, who doubtless takes an early opportunity of destroying them.

  Tanner had to admit the ingenuity of the plan. To anyone not knowing there were two pairs of shoes in question, the alibi would be overwhelming.

  But completely to prove this theory it would be necessary to show that Austin was at the Abbey at some time other than that he had stated. It was with this object Tanner was returning to Halford,

  He made most persistent inquiries, but was unable to find any evidence on this point. None of the cottagers nor farm hands in the vicinity of the Abbey had seen Austin, either on the Wednesday evening or at any other time. Nor had any other stranger been observed. If, however, Austin had been to the Abbey in the middle of the night, as Tanner suspected, the failure to see him was not surprising, and did not invalidate the main conclusion. On the contrary, Tanner believed he had solved his problem. Austin, he felt, was guilty beyond a shadow of doubt.

  And then Tanner saw that this solution cleared up another point by which he had been somewhat puzzled, namely, Austin’s readiness, indeed almost eagerness, to tell of his visit to the Abbey. That, he now saw, had been a trap, and he, Tanner, had walked right into it. He saw Austin’s motive now. From the latter’s point of view it was necessary that Tanner should inspect the footprints while they were still fresh. If some days passed before suspicion was aroused, the marks would have become obliterated, and the alibi worthless. Austin was a cleverer man than the Inspector had given him credit for. By his manner he had deliberately roused the latter’s suspicions so that his alibi might be established while the footprints were clear.

  That evening Tanner made careful notes of the evidence he had accumulated against Austin Ponson. When the document was completed, it read:

  1. Austin never got on with Sir William.

  2. Though Sir William allowed him £1000 a year, this was a small sum compared to what he might equally easily have paid.

  3. Austin could not be making more than two or three hundred a year, so his total income could not much exceed £1200.

  4. He was living up to, or almost up to, this figure.

  5. Austin had become engaged to a girl to whom, as a daughter-in-law, there was every reason to believe Sir William objected. This girl had no dot.

  6. Unless he got an increased allowance Austin would find himself very pinched after marriage.

  7. Sir William had threatened that if the marriage came off, he would not only not increase the allowance, but might alter his will adversely to Austin.

  8. Austin would therefore be faced with the alternative of having his prospects ruined if his father lived, or, if he died, of receiving £150,000. Thus not only his own position and comfort were at stake, but that also of the girl he loved—a terrible temptation.

  9. Austin had an interview with Sir William on the Sunday night previous to the murder, at which; the two quarrelled about a lady—presumably Miss Drew.

  10. Austin had the requisite knowledge of Luce Manor and Sir William’s ways to have accomplished the deed.

  11. Austin had on that Wednesday night rowed down the river and met Sir William at the Luce Manor boathouse.

  12. Austin had denied having been in the neighbourhood at the time.

  13. Austin had invented and carried out an elaborate plant with the object of proving an alibi. This alibi was a deliberate falsehood from beginning to end, and was prearranged.

  As Tanner read over his document he felt that seldom had he investigated a clearer case, or got together more utterly damning evidence.

  ‘The man’s as good as hanged,’ he said grimly to himself.

  Next morning he laid his conclusions before his chief, with the result that an hour later he was again on his way to Halford, armed with a warrant for Austin Ponson’s arrest.

  He took the sergeant and a constable with him to the house, but left them waiting in the hall while he was shown into Austin’s study. The latter was writing at his table.

  ‘Hallo! Inspector,’ he cried cheerily. ‘And how are you getting on?’

  Tanner ignored his outstretched hand, and as the other saw his visitor’s face, his expression changed.

  ‘Mr Austin Ponson, I am sorry to inform you I hold a warrant for your arrest on a charge of murdering your father, Sir William Ponson. I must also warn you that anything you may say may be used against you.’

  Austin shrank back and collapsed into his chair as if he had been struck. His face grew ghastly, and little drops of moisture formed on his forehead. For some moments he sat motionless, then slowly he seemed somewhat to recover himself.

  ‘All I can say, Inspector,’ he answered earnestly, ‘is that, before God, I am innocent. I am ready to go with you.’
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  The news spread like wildfire, and that evening the people of Halford had a fresh thrill and a new subject of conversation.

  CHAPTER IX

  LOIS DREW TAKES A HAND

  JUST about the time that the arrest of Austin Ponson was taking place, Miss Lois Drew entered her drawing-room, and sitting down at the old Sheraton desk near the window, became immersed in her household accounts.

  The low ceilinged, green-tinted room was pleasantly cool on this hot, dusty morning. The bow window faced west, and so was shaded from the glare of the sun. The casements stood invitingly open to the warm, scent-laden air, which streamed gently in over the fragrant masses of colour in the flower beds without. The faint hum of honey-seeking insects fell soothingly and companionably on the ear. Now and then a sudden crescendo marked the swift passage of a bee, busily intent on its own affairs, while butterflies flitted aimlessly by with erratic, dancing movements. Beyond the garden a meadow stretched down to the river, in which cattle, immersed to the knees, stood motionless, enjoying the cool of the water. The surface of the reach was still and unruffled, and reflected as in a mirror the tree-covered slopes of the opposite bank. Restful and pleasant was the prospect without, and within, the whole atmosphere of the room breathed an equal contentment and peace.

  And no less pleasant and restful to the eye was the figure of the girl at the desk. Though hardly anyone would have called her beautiful, she had what was of much greater importance—that elusive indefinable quality called charm. There was charm in her graceful movements, in the steady glance of her dark, lustrous eyes, in the ready smile which lit up her expressive face, and in the low, mellow tones of her musical voice. She bent over her task, working rapidly, carrying out the business of the moment as she did everything she undertook, quietly, unobtrusively, and efficiently.