Dead to the World

by Francis Durbridge

  To avoid the pitiful and embarrassing scene, Holt rose quietly, took the copy of the New Feature, and discreetly said his farewells. ‘I’ll do what I can with regard to this Prospero business,’ he promised.

  Scranton accompanied him to the door. His tone was low and serious as they shook hands. ‘Think my offer over, Mr Holt. You can go places where the police can’t – you’re an outsider, an unknown, a sort of lone agent, if you see what I mean. If it’s money you’re worried about, just name your own price. Mother and I will go to any lengths to find out who did this terrible thing to our son.’

  Awkwardly Holt released his hand from the American’s powerful grip. ‘I’ll make no promises, but I’ll certainly think it over. You’ll hear from me very soon.’

  ‘Thanks a million, Mr Holt!’

  Chapter Two

  Inspector Hyde settled himself comfortably at his desk and lit his pipe. ‘I’m very glad that you’ve decided to come in on the case, Mr Holt,’ he said between puffs. ‘You were a great help to us last time and your assistance would be very welcome, certainly.’

  ‘Well – I haven’t finally decided,’ Holt told him. ‘My chief reason for coming here this morning is to hand you this copy of the New Feature I mentioned on the telephone. The poison-pen insinuation is on page eighteen.’

  The Inspector took the magazine and with the aid of a large magnifying-glass examined the sentence written in green ink. Then he took something from a file on his desk and made a further study of that through the glass. From where Holt sat, it looked as if it might be a greetings card of some kind.

  ‘H’m … Yes …’ Hyde mumbled to himself. ‘There’s certainly a similarity. Of course, I’m not an expert in these things but I should think we’re on to something there.’

  ‘On to what?’

  ‘M’m …?’ the Inspector murmured absently, locking the file in a drawer. Holt fidgeted in his seat. ‘Now come off it, Inspector!’ he said with a smile. ‘Don’t try that hoary old cat-and-mouse game with me.’

  ‘I thought you hadn’t decided to come in on the case, Mr Holt.’

  ‘I hardly know anything about it yet,’ Holt protested.

  ‘Quite so … Now why not listen to a short summary of the facts as we’ve so far been able to assemble them, and then – well, let us say, favour me with your observations?’

  ‘Fair enough!’

  ‘Good! We’ll begin with the murder itself. Last Monday, some time between ten o’clock and midnight, or maybe a little after, an unknown assailant walked into the study where Vance Scranton was sitting at his books and shot him at very close range with a weapon of heavy calibre. The boy must have been killed instantly; most of his head was blown off. There were two unused glasses and an unopened bottle of port lying on the carpet near him.’

  ‘Unopened?’ Holt interrupted. ‘And the glasses were dry? It sounds as if he’d been expecting someone – either the murderer or a friend.’

  ‘There’s a third possibility: that the murderer was a friend. Whoever it was must have known that Vance was studying late and been reasonably sure that all the other students’ rooms in the passage – they call it Scholars’ Row – were empty. So chance murder, or an assailant unknown to Vance, can be ruled out almost entirely. There were no signs of violence other than the ghastly effects of the gunshot – the room wasn’t ransacked, the boy’s wallet was intact. The only thing that appears to be missing is a signet ring which he generally wore on his left hand. We’re checking up as to whether he’d been wearing it at the time or whether he’d simply lost it.’

  ‘I see,’ said Holt. ‘Now if I may pop in a question – what was he studying at the time of the murder? I mean, what was on his desk?’

  ‘That’s an interesting point,’ Hyde said with approval. ‘He was writing a piece of fiction, a short story I should imagine. He was supposed to be reading History and Economics but his inclinations seem to have been on the literary side. Some of his stories have even been accepted, by rather avant-garde magazines. Frankly, I can’t make head nor tail of them myself, but a chap on the Assistant Commissioner’s staff tells me they belong to the “stream of consciousness” school, whatever that may be.’

  Holt nodded. ‘I know what you mean. I’m afraid it’s not my cup of tea, though. Let’s get back to Monday night. How did the murderer get into the College?’

  ‘It was simple. The wing they call Scholars’ Row is never locked. We imagine that the murderer just walked in, opened Vance’s door, and as the boy straightened up from getting out the port and glasses for his visitor our murderer fired at point blank range. Then the murderer had only to pocket the gun, walk out of Scholars’ Row, and disappear into the fog.’

  ‘There was fog? Don’t forget, I was out of the country at the time.’

  ‘Oh, yes, it was a filthy night. No one was about. Traffic along the coast between Hastings and Brighton came to a complete standstill, so the reports say.’

  ‘I wonder if that affected our murderer. Did he drive away from the scene of his crime, or leave on foot?’

  Hyde shook his head. ‘That line of inquiry is a dead loss, we’ve tried it. By the way, don’t be too sure the murderer was masculine. There’s absolutely nothing to confirm that. It could just as easily have been a woman.’

  ‘I’d have thought Deanfriston would be out of bounds to women; it’s an all-male College.’

  ‘So it is. But Monday night was an exception. There was a piano recital and some of the students had invited their girlfriends along for the evening. The sight of a girl in Scholars’ Row wouldn’t have been especially remarkable.’

  ‘Did Vance Scranton have any girlfriends?’

  ‘Two, apparently. And they both hated each other! He had two girlfriends but he doesn’t appear to have had any real friends amongst the young men at the College. This strikes me as rather unusual. We haven’t had time yet to check on all possible alibis, but on the face of it it looks as though Vance’s fellow-students were all at the concert. That he was alone and still working seems to be rather typical of his character – an odd ball, a “loner” as I think the Americans put it. A loner and an intellectual.’

  ‘I wonder why he had no friends. Was he unhappy over here? I suppose he didn’t commit suicide, by any chance?’

  Inspector Hyde shook his head. ‘You forget – no weapon was found.’

  ‘Of course. Stupid of me.’

  ‘No, I don’t think there’s any evidence to show that Vance was unhappy. It seems more likely that his manner tended to repel friendship. As far as I can make out, he was a rather arrogant sort of fellow. Two or three students I questioned called him an intellectual snob, and his Professor described him as a neo-Fascist. No, I think Vance Scranton was a loner because he wanted to be, because he just didn’t care for the company of his fellow-men.’

  ‘But he did have two girlfriends?’

  ‘Yes. Julie Benson and Antoinette Sheen.’

  ‘Have you met them?’

  ‘Yes. They were called to identify the body. Julie Benson fainted. She’s a blonde – pretty, fluffy little thing, about eighteen or nineteen. She was engaged to Vance at one time; it seems he discarded her rather brutally.’

  ‘Which she didn’t like at all, I suppose?’

  ‘When I could get her between fainting fits she seemed pretty bitter about the affair, yes.’

  ‘Well, that has been known to be a motive for murder … But surely a fluffy little blonde given to fainting couldn’t be capable of a gruesome shooting like this?’

  Hyde shrugged his shoulders and a tiny smile played at the corners of his mouth. ‘When I was a young man, Mr Holt – when I was a young man, it was often my experience that the fluffy, blue-eyed little blondes were the most cruel and calculating wenches of them all!’ Holt laughed, and Hyde hastened to add, ‘Now don’t misunderstand me – at this stage I’m definitely not suggesting anything other than keeping an open mind about all possibilities and a sharp look-out for a motive.’


  ‘Fair enough. Why was the engagement broken off?’

  ‘Antoinette Sheen,’ Hyde replied succinctly.

  ‘I see. And what is she like – also blonde and fluffy?’

  The Inspector smiled, broadly this time, and rolled his eyes in an unexpectedly frivolous gesture. ‘She’s neither! She’s about as different from Julie as chalk from cheese. Very beautiful, very poised, and will definitely not see twenty-five again.’

  ‘Antoinette Sheen …’ Holt mused. ‘That name rings a bell, but I can’t quite place it.’

  ‘By profession she’s a novelist,’ Hyde explained. ‘Somewhat lurid historical romances, I gather.’

  ‘Ah, yes, of course. Are they successful?’

  ‘That would appear to be the case. At any rate, she supports herself by her writing. She has a mind of her own, she knows what she wants out of life, and I should guess she gets it. By hobby she’s a painter. She says her friendship with Vance was based purely on their common interest in the Arts. Myself – well, I’m a staid old married man, of course, but I must say if I’d been in Vance’s shoes I’d have been interested in other aspects of Miss Sheen’s personality! To be perfectly frank, she’s really rather stunning!’

  ‘H’m …’ Holt said, raising his eyebrows. ‘And what does Julie Benson do for a living?’

  ‘She’s secretary to Professor Harold Dalesford, lecturer in Political Economy up at the College.’

  ‘Does that mean Vance was one of his students?’

  ‘Yes, he was.’

  ‘What about their alibis? The two girls, I mean.’

  ‘Well …’ Hyde paused and fiddled with the orderly row of pencils lined up on his neat and impersonal desk. ‘As you may remember, I prefer to proceed cautiously in these matters; it never pays to jump to conclusions. But I’ll commit myself so far as to say that I don’t like either of their stories. Julie Benson claimed that she was working late for Professor Dalesford on the night of the murder – which he denies. He was at the piano recital. Julie’s the sweet-voiced, English rose type, but I’m afraid that doesn’t prevent her from being a very bad liar.’

  ‘Interesting,’ observed Holt. ‘And Miss Sheen?’

  ‘She was at the College that night too. She attended the piano recital.’

  ‘Alone, or with someone?’

  ‘With Professor Dalesford.’

  ‘With her rival’s boss? Funny set-up. One more question: how far from Scholars’ Row is the room or hall where this piano recital was held?’

  Hyde said, completely wooden-faced, ‘It would take you about four or five minutes to get from one to the other.’

  A silence followed, whilst the Inspector cleaned and refilled his pipe and Holt pondered on the problem. The younger man was obviously intrigued, and Hyde judged that very little more would be needed to succeed in trapping his interest entirely.

  ‘The boy would have celebrated his twenty-first birthday if he’d lived another day. I think it shows what a loner he was, that on this day of all days there were only two birthday cards for him.’ He got out the Scranton file once more. ‘Perhaps you’d like to have a look at those greetings cards?’

  Holt examined them carefully. ‘From Antoinette … My, what a lot of flourishes! The card’s in good taste, though. And Julie … a forlorn attempt to attract her ex-fiancé’s attention maybe?… But wait a moment! I wonder … Could I have a look at the …’

  The Inspector was already sliding his magnifying glass and the New Feature, opened at page eighteen, across the desk.

  Holt compared the signature on Julie Benson’s card with the handwriting at the foot of the Prospero article. ‘You’re right,’ he said after a moment. ‘I should think we’re definitely on to something there! It’ll be interesting to see what your calligraphy experts have to say.’

  ‘And while they’re at it,’ Hyde said, holding out a postcard, ‘they can take a look at this too.’

  It was a plain postcard of the type that can be bought in a sixpenny packet at any stationer’s. It was postmarked Harrogate and had been sent to Vance Scranton at the College. The message, printed in neat, well-spaced block capitals, was simple; all it said was:

  HAVING A WONDERFUL TIME.

  REGARDS FROM CHRISTOPHER.

  ‘Well, at least Vance had a friend somewhere.’

  Hyde shook his head. ‘That’s just where the mystery starts. There is no Christopher – or at least, we can’t trace him.’

  ‘That’s odd.’

  ‘Nobody we’ve questioned – and we’ve been through just about the entire student body – has ever heard him mention anyone by the name of Christopher. Julie Benson doesn’t know him, nor does Miss Sheen; we drew a blank with all the professors and lecturers on the teaching faculty, and his parents can’t throw any light on the matter either.’

  ‘That’s strange. Do you think it’s important?’

  ‘It’s too early to say. We’ll have to wait for the lab’s report on the postcard.’

  ‘You begin to intrigue me, Inspector.’

  ‘I was hoping I would. To be quite frank, I’d be very glad of your help. The Scranton case isn’t the only one I have on my plate at the moment. We’re just about snowed under.’ He paused for a fraction of a second, then went on, ‘I don’t want to ask for too much of your time; you’re a very busy man, I know. But – well, there is one specific job – a very small job – it shouldn’t take up a great deal of …’

  ‘Perhaps you’d tell me what it is?’

  Now that he had reached the point in the conversation at which he had been aiming, the Inspector became surprisingly hesitant. Clearing his throat he muttered, ‘This is all very unorthodox, of course, and if you should get into trouble there’s no guarantee that the Yard would be able to …’

  ‘What do I have to do, Inspector?’

  ‘Talk to Curly,’ was the unexpected reply.

  ‘Curly? Who’s Curly?’

  ‘He’s an old lag. If he or any of his pals saw me coming they’d take off faster than a space rocket from Cape Kennedy! But he owes me a good turn. He was up on a charge of receiving stolen goods some years ago, and I didn’t feel it was entirely his fault so I used my influence to get him off a very stiff sentence. I’ve never asked a favour in return, and he isn’t one of our regular informers.’

  ‘But you think he might be of some use in this particular case?’

  Hyde raised his hands and made a grimace of despair. ‘What is one to do? There has to be a starting point somewhere. And Curly was caught in the net.’

  ‘What net?’

  Hyde crossed to the window, which commanded a somewhat cheerless view of an inner courtyard. ‘Look at it from the police point of view, Holt. A perfectly innocuous American student gets his face blown off and the murderer slips out unseen into thick mist, leaving no clues. No fingerprints, no weapon, no witnesses, no motive. There are some shaky alibis on the part of two girls, but otherwise there’s absolutely nothing for the police to go on. But we’ve got to start our investigations somewhere, so we throw out a net and haul into it all the dubious characters who were within a short radius of Deanfriston on the night of the murder. Naturally, not one in a hundred actually has anything to do with the crime, but they talk – they talk amongst themselves, little splinters of information pass from mouth to mouth … Now, in that net there are one or two characters with a foot in both camps.’

  ‘Your informers?’

  ‘Quite so.’

  Holt nodded. ‘So Curly, who owes you a favour from times gone by, was caught in the net the night Vance Scranton was murdered, and you have an idea that he knows something about the case?’

  ‘Correct. Unfortunately, Curly is sitting on his tongue. He refuses to talk. But they tell me he looks very uncomfortable whenever anyone mentions Vance Scranton or Deanfriston College.

  ‘And what’s Curly’s alibi?’

  ‘Oh, he’s too much of a professional to let us catch him out. His alibi’s no better an
d no worse than that of twenty others we pulled in. But he knows something, I’m certain.’

  ‘And you’d like me to find out what it is – by jogging his memory and reminding him that he’s still morally in your debt?’

  ‘Exactly. You see how unorthodox it is – you see why it’s something I can’t undertake myself?’ There was a pause. ‘Will you do it?’

  Holt nodded. ‘I’ll do it!’

  ‘Right! I’ll give you the details of Curly’s background in a moment,’ Hyde said briskly. ‘Now, how to find Curly and how to recognise him. His passion is horse racing. He spends most of his time in racing circles – stables, pubs favoured by jockeys and trainers, betting shops, and so on. On the night after the murder we picked him up in Brighton, but he’s back in London now, so the grapevine has it. I don’t think he’ll be hard to find, but he may be devilish hard to pin down. He’s as slippery as a weasel, and he can move incredibly fast despite his size.’

  ‘He’s a big man, I gather. How else can I recognise him?’

  For answer Inspector Hyde produced a yellow envelope and extracted three photographs: full face, left profile, and right profile.

  ‘Good grief!’ Holt exclaimed. ‘Now I know why he’s called Curly!’

  Chapter Three

  No one looked up or paid them any attention as they entered the betting parlour in Tottenham Court Road. Holt wore his oldest flannels and a faded sports jacket repaired with leather at cuffs and elbows, and Ruth had taken special pains to look dowdy, which was no easy task for one of her bright colouring and sparkling personality.

  When they had started their tour of the betting parlours they had felt acutely self-conscious and as a result had attracted much unwanted attention. But now, at their fourth attempt, they had grown accustomed to the seedy, half-feverish and half-weary atmosphere of a betting shop, to the smell of stale cigarette smoke and body-sweat, the petty triumphs and minor tragedies, the raucous clerks in shirt-sleeves, and the incessant jangling of the telephone. With the nonchalance of seasoned gamblers they strolled in, pulled crumpled newspapers from under their arms, and leaned against the wall, alongside unshaven taxi-drivers, barrow boys, shop assistants, petty crooks, and aimless drifters. Folding their newspapers into professionally neat squares, they took out pencils and ‘studied form’.