“Yah,” he said and spat in the road. “Yah! This bain’t a job fer a village bobby. This be a Scockland Yard job, this be. You and the locals won’t solve him in a month o’ Sundays.”
“I’ll trouble you to be off, Andy Pepperdy, and keep a respec’ful tongue in yer ’ead. Ditchin’s your job, so be about it. Hoff you go, afore I takes yer name.”
“Takes me name, indeed…bah…” snarled the ancient and was led off protesting by his son-in-law, who feared the old chap might become a suspect himself unless he were silenced. The constable hurried indoors, bustled to the telephone and rang up Dr. Codrington of Evingdon and the Police Inspector there. Then, he careered off to the vicarage to investigate the case.
P.C. Harriwinckle was annoyed to find Isaiah Gormley in charge at the scene of the crime. Unable to control the motley crowd of curious onlookers, which had assembled as soon as the news circulated in the village, the old man had sent for reinforcements in the shape of two of his sons, John Henry and George Hackingsmith, the latter called after a wrestler much admired by his sire in early days, but whose name he could not spell. The Gormley trio, all dirty of face, beery in looks and full of importance, were officiously showing-off in their self-appointed vigil. They greeted the policeman like allies. He soon put them in their places.
“Wot are you a-doin’ of there, you Gormleys?” said the P.C., elbowing his way through the crowd.
“Keepin’ the place undishturbed until the police come,” answered the father.
“Well, they are ’ere now and you won’t be required no more. All the same, I’m much obliged to yer. Werry sensible of you it wuz, Isaiah.”
“Won’t it be a pint apiece?”
“No. It will not. I’m surprised at you, thinkin’ of rewards and drinkin’ at a time like this. Now, you’d better leave us in peace to inwestigate. And you others, be off with the lot of yer. You’ve jobs to do, ’aven’t yer? Get to them, then, or I’ll be takin’ a few names for impeding an officer in the discharge of his dooties.”
The crowd melted and made off to the village emitting a collective rumbling noise of discontent and disappointment.
Dr. Codrington, accompanied by Inspector Oldfield of the Trentshire Constabulary, arrived on the spot a few minutes later. The remains were moved from their odious repository and gently placed on the bank. The doctor, a tall, grey-headed, broad-shouldered physician of the old school, made a nimble examination of the corpse. Oldfield, with the help of an assistant, took photographs of the body as found, and again, after removal from the pit. Mr. Claplady stood by, pale faced and wringing his hands. He kept his eyes on Oldfield, for the thought of the poor remains of his eccentric parishioner made him feel faint. The Inspector was a portly, medium-built man, with a red face, large, useful hands, sleepy, grey eyes and a solemn countenance. He was a native of Yorkshire and very highly thought-of by his superiors. His heavy frame and calm eyes concealed a very lively mind and he was agile in spite of his weight. He shook his head dubiously and wrinkled his nose.
“What a confoundedly awkward place to chuck a body in. It’ll have to be sieved, I reckon. Better get some labourer to do it under supervision. Can you suggest anybody, Harriwinckle?”
“There’s Gormley, sir. He was cleanin’ out the place only this mornin’. In fact, he found the corpse.”
“Send for him, then.”
Thus was old Isaiah reinstated triumphantly and his renewed labours laid bare Miss Tither’s umbrella and handbag.
Meanwhile, the doctor, who had finished his provisional examination, rose from his knees and dried his hands on a bunch of leaves plucked from the hedge.
“She’s been dead about two hours, as far as I can see. Probably eleven-thirty or thereabouts. Death might be due to a blow on the back of the head from a blunt instrument, although I suspect, from sounding the chest, that there’s water there. In which case, she was only unconscious when thrown in the tank and drowned in about three inches of water. However, the post-mortem’ll show. And now I’m off. Can I give you a lift, Inspector?”
“No, thanks, doctor. I’d better stay on a bit and see to things for the inquest. The Chief Constable will want a report, too, and I’ll call to see him on the way back.”
“All right, Inspector. I’ll probably have performed the autopsy by noon to-morrow and I’ll advise you right away. See you later.” And the doctor drove off.
The remaining party, consisting of the Inspector, the vicar, P.C. Harriwinckle, P.C. Drake of the Evingdon Force, and Gormley, broke up. The parson who, as yet, had taken no lunch, found his appetite unimpaired by the morning’s tragedy and invited Inspector Oldfield to take a bite with him. Refreshment was sent out to the constables in the garden and Gormley, who stated that the only sustenance he craved was a pint of ale, had his wish, if not his appetite satisfied.
Inspector Oldfield obtained, over lunch, plenty of background concerning the character, ways of life and peculiarities of the late Miss Tither and spent the rest of the afternoon in attempting to amplify it in the village. He felt that he would have his work cut out to manage the affair, especially as he had others on his hands; cases of theft from a local munition works, two country house burglaries and a conscientious objector, who had disappeared on being removed from the register and called up for service. He told Sir Francis Winstanley, the Chief Constable, as much when he called to see him at Hilary Hall, between Hilary Magna and Evingdon, later that day.
“I quite agree with you, Oldfield,” said Sir Francis, as they discussed the case together over tea, which the considerate Chief had provided. “This murder has come at a most awkward time. Not that you can’t handle it, Inspector, but there are limits to what a man can do. Furthermore, there’s going to be a lot of work in this case. It’s a whole-time job for a first-class man. So far, you say, it might be any one of a score of people this woman seems to have hounded and harried. And those are people whose connections with her are known. How many others are there who feared her without letting a soul know about it and who, driven to desperation, might have finished her when the chance came?”
Oldfield nodded, his mouth full of toast.
“Now, I’m not taking this step without your good will and full concurrence, Inspector,” went on Sir Francis, “but I think it will be as well to call in Scotland Yard. You can co-operate with their man, he’ll take the burden from your shoulders and, what is most important, you’ll have a first-rate colleague with you, instead of a subordinate. What do you say?”
Inspector Oldfield was an ambitious man, but he was eminently reasonable. He had worked with Scotland Yard before and knew that his career would in no way suffer by bringing them in on the case. In fact, it was to his advantage at the present time of pressure to aim at a quick solution of the Hilary crime, and the best means of obtaining this was with the help of the Yard. He, therefore, cordially agreed with his chief.
Later, Sir Francis rang up Scotland Yard and spoke to the Assistant Commissioner, who was an old friend.
“Now look here, Freddie, this is a country case, so don’t be sendin’ down one of your smart town lads. He’ll rub the village the wrong way and shut the locals up like oysters. Let us have a genial, easy-to-get-on-with feller, a countryman himself if possible.”
“Don’t worry, Frank,” came the reply. “I’ve got the very man for you. He’ll be along to-morrow. You’ll like him and so will all the villagers, except the one who’s done it.”
And that is how it was that Inspector Thomas Littlejohn of the C.I.D., caught the noon express from London to Leicester the following day and, changing at the latter place, boarded a slow little train, which, like the rivers of those parts, wandered leisurely into the heart of England. The second journey took so long, with innumerable halts and a jogtrot pace, that the Inspector fell asleep half way. The guard, who seemed to know where each of his customers was bound for, shook him awake at Evingdon.
Chapter III
Opening Moves
When the railway company proposed, almost a century ago, to run the line through Evingdon, the local bigwigs, scared lest smoke-vomiting locomotives should sully their fair town, raised a storm and mustered influential opposition. The track was, therefore, made to avoid the place, with the result that when it dawned on a new generation that a train-stop would be highly desirable, the railway company, anxious to please, but unwilling to make a bulge in the permanent way or construct a branch line, compromised by erecting a station two miles from the High Street. Littlejohn alighted from the train and found himself in open country and with nobody there to meet him. The stationmaster hailed the driver and fireman of the engine in friendly fashion, passed a joke with the guard, intimated that the train might get under way again, and hurried to collect Littlejohn’s ticket.
“Where’s the police station here?” asked the detective.
The stationmaster eyed him suspiciously. He wondered if the train, the company, or himself had committed a penal offence.
“’Ope nothin’s wrong, sir,” said he.
“No. I’m calling to see my friend Inspector Oldfield, that’s all. What’s the quickest way to him?”
The stationmaster pawed his short, white beard.
“Police station’s in the High Street and we be two miles from it ’ere. Ezra Fewkes did bring a passenger for the train in his cab and if he’s not gone back, he’ll take you along with him. Short o’ that, you’ll ’ave to walk, sir.”
The old man tottered through the small booking hall and out into the station approach. He blew his whistle feebly, like a football referee who has run twice round the field, and was answered by a jingling of harness and the clop-clop of hooves. Littlejohn, following in the wake of the obliging official, found a four-wheeler of ancient design, driven by an elderly man with a red face and a huge, rambling moustache, drawing up before him. He hesitated. The cab was bright yellow, recently painted, and supported between its shafts the laziest, fattest horse he had ever seen. As though reading his thoughts, the Jehu spoke, his voice gruff and muffled by his whiskers.
“Aw, don’t you think you’m arrivin’ in the back o’ beyond, mister. Petrol shortage have brought the owld cab out agen. Time was when I had a bobbydazzler of a taxi, but as the old cab was good and the old hoss eatin’ me out of ’ouse and ’ome on pension like, I sez to myself, Ezra, I sez, ’tis in the national interest fer yew to sell that there taxi, make old hoss work fer ’is keep, and save the petrol fer better things. So ’ere we be…”
“All right, cabby,” said Littlejohn, thinking that he could have walked to town and back again during the long rigmarole, “drive me to the police station.” And before the man on the box could question him, he plunged into the interior, smelling of straw, new paint and old leather, and was borne off at a dignified pace towards his destination. The Inspector was considering paying-off the slow-moving vehicle and walking the rest of the journey, when it pulled-up of its own accord beside a trim two-seater. The car-driver, who was in police uniform, climbed out and poked his head in the cab.
“Are you Inspector Littlejohn?” he asked.
“I am. Are you Inspector Oldfield?”
“Yes. How are you? I’m sorry I wasn’t at the station to meet the train. The mayor’s wife has lost her favourite pomeranian and turned up with a ‘calling all cars’ demand just as I was setting out to find you. You managed to get a lift, I see.” And his eyes twinkled.
“I was bundled into this thing and protests seemed of no avail.”
The two men shook hands, the cabby was paid his dues and left behind to pursue his leisurely way home.
Evingdon is a small market town of about 10,000 people and the main road is there called High Street and widens to hold a market-cross which is the bane of motorists, a stately parish church, a street market, held once a week, and a score or more cattle-pens for the weekly cattle-fair. Narrow streets filled with old houses, many of them gracious, picturesque places, over which trippers burst into raptures, straggle from the main thoroughfare. There are a few banks, a hideous multiple store or two, a labour exchange and a modern cinema surrounding the Cross, and between an ivy-covered doctor’s house and a horrible chromium and tile “Maison de Coiffure” stands the police station behind a barricade of sandbags. The police car drew up at the door and soon the two Inspectors were sitting smoking in Oldfield’s room.
“I don’t know whether we ought to have trailed you down here on the Hilary murder case, Littlejohn,” said Oldfield, “but our Chief is a hustler and keen on the most up-to-date methods. We’ve a number of local burglaries and the like on hand and half the men are away on A.R.P. courses and such. This case will probably be a hard nut to crack and I think you’ll find it interesting. I’d better just outline it.”
He thereupon gave Littlejohn a résumé of the crime, its nature and details of its discovery.
“Hilary Magna is one of two villages—Hilary Parva’s the other—which stand side-by-side about four miles from here on the Leicester Road, or rather, just off it. Actually, Hilary Parva’s a small offshoot of Magna. About a hundred years ago, the two bachelor brothers at Hilary Hall quarrelled and the younger went off and built himself a place about a mile away. Put up a church, too, and a few houses, just to make a village of his own. The pair of them started a sort of competition as to who could build the most magnificent church, because the one left behind in Magna wasn’t going to be outdone and started renovating and adding to his own. The result was they ruined themselves, left two derelict halls and two fine churches, with few to use them and no money to keep ’em up. There’s one parson for both now. A decent chap called Claplady. The body of the victim was found at the bottom of his vicarage garden in Hilary Magna.”
He produced the photographs he had taken the day before. “Not pleasant to look at, are they? You see, the body was found in the vicar’s cesspool. My own view is that somebody thought it a good place for the purpose. It’s cleaned out every six months and that happened on the morning of the crime. In the normal course, nobody would open it up again for another half-year; it’s the latest type which disposes of its own rubbish and there wouldn’t be much left of a body at the end of that time. Unfortunately for whoever planned it, the old chap who was on the job of cleaning out the septic tank left off half-way, went on strike as a protest against something the vicar said to him, closed the thing and adjourned to the local pub. Then, he repented, probably because he’d not been paid, and returned to his work, only to find he’d had visitors with something gruesome in his absence.”
“But what about the victim, Oldfield? Who is Tither? What is she?”
“I was coming to that. She’s an old maid who lives in Hilary Magna and about the biggest paul-pry in the county. Nothing goes on that she doesn’t know about, or rather didn’t. She lived at Briar Cottage with a maid, who’s been with the family since Ethel and Martha Tither were children. Martha died a couple of years ago. Now, the peculiar thing about the victim is, that there was some method behind her peeping and prying. She was hot on the track of sin with a view of plucking brands from the burning. Very religious, anxious to save souls from destruction by converting them from their evil ways. She was a sort of female Peeping Tom, but when she’d seen what she was after, she didn’t sneak off, satisfied. Oh, no. She was after the culprits with tracts and entreaties. It didn’t do a bit of good, of course. Only made enemies for her, because she unearthed quite a lot of secrets and skeletons in closets and people were either afraid of what she knew, or else hated her for knowing all there was to know about ’em. As far as I can see, there’s no hint at blackmail, but if she’s kept filing-cabinets full of her ‘cases’, she was a dangerous woman and many’s the one who’d probably like to murder her.”
Inspector Oldfield opened a drawer of his desk and passed over a folder of papers on the case.
“There’s the police surgeon’s report on the P.M. You’ll see that she was hit on the back of the head with a blunt instrument, might even have been a stone, and then pitched into the cesspit. But she wasn’t quite dead when thrown in and the real cause of death is drowning. Drowning in four inches of drainage water in which she was found, face down! Can you beat it?”
“What an abominable end, Oldfield.”
“Yes. I had a good talk with the vicar yesterday. She was hanging around at the bottom of his orchard about an hour before she was killed, he says. He got up late at ten o’clock or thereabouts, and saw her earnestly conversin’ with a chap called Haxley, a retired man who lives at Hilary. The vicar says she was very excited and thrusting papers, apparently tracts, as usual, in his face. We found a bunch of them in her handbag, which was beside the body. ‘Prepare to Meet Thy God’, they said. Terribly appropriate, don’t you think?”
“Was the vicar or Haxley the last man to see her alive?”
“As far as I know, as yet, Haxley was. I haven’t been all round the village. Hadn’t the time yesterday. I had a talk with the maid, however. Sarah Russell’s her name. A pleasant sort of woman, about fifty, same age as the deceased. She came to the family as a young girl from an orphanage and has been there ever since. She said Miss Tither left home about ten and said she’d be in for lunch around twelve-thirty. She didn’t know where she was going, although she seems to know all her mistress’s business. Miss Tither was a rare one for talking and, living with only one other in the house, she seems to have let off steam to Sarah pretty often.”
“What about Miss Tither’s money, Oldfield? Has she any relatives and is there a Will?”
Death of a Busybody Page 3