Hardcastle's Quandary

by Graham Ison

  Gerald Walker arrived at a quarter past nine and was shown straight up to Hardcastle’s office where Marriott was already waiting with the DDI.

  ‘I’m sorry to drag you back so soon, Mr Walker,’ Hardcastle began, ‘but I needed to think whether to pose my next question.’

  ‘You make it all sound very mysterious, sir.’ Walker stood in front of the DDI’s desk with his hands linked in front of him.

  ‘Do sit down, Mr Walker.’ Hardcastle signalled to Marriott to get a chair. ‘We have found a body—’

  ‘Oh no! Are you suggesting that Celine has met with an accident?’

  ‘We are not sure if it is your wife, Mr Walker, but if it is, I’m sorry to tell you that she was murdered.’

  ‘May the good Lord have mercy on her soul!’ said Walker, with a sharp intake of breath that sounded almost like a sob. For a moment or two it appeared that he might break down completely.

  ‘We are by no means sure that this is your wife, Mr Walker,’ said Marriott hurriedly. ‘That is why Mr Hardcastle asked you to come in.’

  Walker stared at Marriott for what seemed to be an endless period of absolute silence. ‘It can’t be true,’ he said eventually. ‘It can’t.’

  ‘If you’re willing to view the body at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, Mr Walker, that would resolve the matter one way or the other. But I appreciate that it might be too much of a shock for you.’

  ‘How do I get there, sir?’ asked Walker plaintively.

  ‘Sergeant Marriott and I will take you by cab,’ said Hardcastle.

  The mortuary attendant at the hospital had been instructed by Sir Bernard Spilsbury to arrange the parts of the unidentified woman’s remains so that they presented the semblance of a complete body beneath the shroud. The task was made slightly easier for the attendant in that the woman’s head remained attached to the torso.

  ‘Are you still willing to go through with this, Mr Walker?’ asked Marriott, one last time.

  ‘Yes, sir, I am,’ said Walker reluctantly. ‘It is my duty.’

  The attendant drew back the shroud, sufficient to reveal the head.

  ‘It’s her. May the Lord have mercy on her soul.’ With that repeated appeal to the Almighty, Walker collapsed to the floor in a dead faint.

  ‘Excuse me, gents,’ said the attendant, as he bustled officiously towards the recumbent Gerald Walker. ‘It happens all the time, you know.’ He knelt down and held a small phial under Walker’s nose until the man began to show signs of recovery.

  ‘What’s that you’re giving him?’ demanded Hardcastle, concerned that the attendant might be administering some noxious substance.

  ‘Ammonium carbonate,’ said the attendant, without looking up. ‘Better known as smelling salts. It irritates the nose and lungs and sets off a reflex action that makes the patient inhale.’

  ‘All right, I don’t want a lecture,’ said Hardcastle testily, as the attendant, aided by Marriott, helped the unsteady Walker to his feet and took him out to the anteroom, where they sat him on a chair. The attendant fetched him a glass of water.

  ‘I have to ask this question formally, Mr Walker,’ began Hardcastle. ‘Can you identify the body you just saw?’

  Walker stared at the DDI with a baleful expression on his face. ‘It’s my wife, Celine,’ he said, the tears welling up in his eyes. ‘I’m sure it is.’

  ‘We’ll take you back to the police station, Mr Walker,’ said Marriott, ‘and once you feel a bit better, I’ll ask you to make a short statement.’

  ‘I dare say you could do with a cup of tea, Mr Walker,’ suggested the DDI once the three of them were settled. ‘Marriott, ask Mrs Winstanley if she would bring in three cups of tea.’ Agnes Winstanley was the police station matron who had replaced Bertha Cartwright. A year or so after the end of the war, Mrs Cartwright had retired and gone to live in Aldershot where her son Jack, now a major in the Royal Artillery, was stationed.

  ‘I’ve prepared a short statement in which you identify the body you saw as that of your wife, Celine Walker née Fontenau, Mr Walker,’ said Marriott. ‘Perhaps you’d read it while we’re waiting for the tea and tell me if you disagree with anything it contains.’

  Gerald Walker produced a pair of spectacles from an inside pocket and placed them carefully and precisely on his nose. Accepting the single sheet of paper from Marriott, he gave it but a cursory glance. ‘Yes, sir, that’s it exactly. Do I sign it?’

  ‘Just there,’ said Marriott, leaning across to indicate the exact place on the official form. ‘Do you have a pen?’

  ‘I do, sir, thank you.’ Walker produced a fountain pen, unscrewed the cap and signed the form.

  ‘I presume that your wife gave up working at the Twilight Cabaret Club when you were married, Mr Walker?’ suggested Hardcastle casually.

  Walker did not answer immediately, as though unwilling to admit the truth, but eventually he said, ‘No, sir, she carried on. She loved her job, and it seemed a shame to deprive her of so much enjoyment. Apart from which,’ he admitted, with apparent reluctance, ‘it helped with the finances. After all, women worked in the war, and we even had some female staff at the factory working on the shop floor.’ He continued in his attempt to justify his decision. ‘Mind you, they’ve all gone now, but to my way of thinking it seems a shame. Some of the ladies we had were very good at the jobs they were doing.’

  Hardcastle made no comment about that. Despite his objections, his own daughter, Kitty, had worked as a conductorette for the London General Omnibus Company during the war. But such were his outdated views that he firmly believed that, after the war, women should have returned to their peacetime occupations of bringing up children and keeping house. Events, however, were overtaking his old-fashioned ideas of what women should do.

  ‘May I come in, sir?’ Mrs Winstanley had opened Hardcastle’s door with one hand while balancing a tray on the other.

  ‘Of course, Mrs Winstanley.’

  The matron placed the tea tray on the edge of Hardcastle’s desk and handed a cup of tea to each of the people in the room.

  ‘Very kind of you, miss,’ murmured Walker.

  ‘It’s a pleasure, sir,’ said Agnes, and left the room, closing the door behind her.

  ‘Mrs Winstanley’s predecessor always wanted to talk about her son who was in the army, Mr Walker,’ said Marriott, giving the impression of making banal conversation while they were drinking their tea. But there were deeper reasons. ‘Were you in army or the navy during the war?’ he asked casually.

  ‘No, sir, unfortunately I wasn’t privileged to be allowed to go. On two counts, as a matter of fact. I suffer from asthma, which apparently could be fatal in the event of a gas attack, and secondly, my employers, Hudson and Peartree, switched from making bakers’ ovens to manufacturing field kitchens for the army. Consequently, sir, I was deemed to be in a reserved occupation.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Marriott refrained from saying that a lot of men died from gas attacks, whether they had asthma or not. ‘I hope you don’t mind me asking you one or two personal questions, but we need to know as much as possible about your late wife, and that can only happen by discussing matters with you.’

  ‘I quite understand, sir.’ Walker stirred his tea absent-mindedly.

  ‘Had you been married before you met Celine?’

  ‘No, sir. I never met the right young woman. I have to say I thought a miracle had come to pass when Celine agreed to become my wife. She was such a beautiful girl that I couldn’t believe my luck. And now fate has snatched her away from me.’ Walker took a sip of tea, before continuing. ‘You said she’d been murdered, sir,’ he said, directing the comment at Hardcastle.

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘Where did you find her body?’

  ‘I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to say at the moment, Mr Walker; not until we have completed our enquiries. It’s the coroner’s decision.’ The truth had nothing to with the coroner but was simply that Hardcastle had no wish to go into t
he sordid details of where, and in what condition, Walker’s late wife had been found. ‘You may rest assured that we’ll find whoever was responsible, and he’ll be dancing on the hangman’s trap at eight o’clock one morning.’

  Walker nodded sagely. ‘It’s God’s will, sir. An eye for an eye.’ He paused. ‘I make no excuse for my frequent references to the Almighty, sir, but it’s become something of a habit. I’m a lay preacher, you see, and I even considered taking holy orders at one time, but the war put paid to that, as it put paid to so many things. But in a strange sort of way, the war strengthened my belief in God.’

  ‘Well, I think that’s all, Mr Walker,’ said Hardcastle, who had no great belief in religion of any sort. ‘We’ll be in touch with you once we have further details. And we will, of course, let you know the moment we make an arrest.’

  ‘Thank you, sir, you’ve been very considerate.’ Walker stood up, put his cup and saucer on Hardcastle’s desk, and accepted his raincoat and bowler hat from Marriott.

  Once Marriott had shown Walker the way out, he returned to the DDI’s office.

  ‘Poor devil. You can’t help feeling sorry for him, can you, sir?’

  ‘He must’ve thought his luck had changed when he found Celine,’ said Hardcastle, ‘but then she was murdered. He’s a bit like a man who thinks he’s won the football pools only to find his coupon had got lost in the post.’ After a moment’s thought, he added, ‘Horace Boxall, the newsagent at the bottom of my road used to take the coupons for the pools companies. Saved them getting lost. Still, old Horace is dead now … I don’t know if his daughter still takes them.’

  ‘What’s next, sir?’ asked Marriott who, after all the years he had worked with Hardcastle, had never quite grown accustomed to his cynicism. But what worried him more was Hardcastle’s recent habit of rambling on about irrelevancies.

  ‘The one thing we’ve not established, Marriott, is whether Celine Walker is the same woman who Stoner was carrying on with – at least, according to Holroyd.’

  ‘But surely, sir, the fact that both bodies were found at the same site indicates that Celine was the girl.’

  ‘Not necessarily, Marriott. I gather from talking to Holroyd that Guy Stoner was a bit of a ladies’ man. He was apparently good-looking, had plenty of money – at least until Holroyd emptied his bank account – and frequented nightclubs. I reckon he had the pick of available women. And even some who weren’t really available on account of ’em being married.’

  ‘Like Celine Walker, sir,’ said Marriott, determined not to let the DDI have the argument all his own way.

  ‘Even so, Marriott,’ continued Hardcastle, leaning forward to take his pipe from the ashtray, ‘we’re no nearer finding out who killed her and Stoner. And that reminds me: have we heard from the police in Norfolk?’

  ‘Yes, sir, they confirm that they informed the Reverend Percy Stoner of his nephew’s death, but they did not tell him that he’d apparently been murdered.’

  Hardcastle lit his pipe and leaned back in his chair. ‘I suppose we’ll have to go up there again and tell him the truth, Marriott. It’s possible he might be able to throw some light on our investigation. He might even know more about the business with young Stoner bedding this here showgirl Celine. If he did.’ He placed his pipe in the ashtray. ‘On second thoughts, I think I’ll send you up there. You can take Catto. Be good experience for you as you’re very nearly an inspector.’ He glanced at his desk calendar. ‘Tomorrow’s Thursday,’ he said, uttering a truism. ‘Be as well if you set off nice and early. Warn Catto.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Marriott had mixed feelings about the assignment. On the one hand, he liked Norfolk no better than Hardcastle did, but to go out without Hardcastle breathing down his neck the whole time was a bonus. An example of that overbearing and constant advice was the implication that Marriott needed the experience. He determined, not for the first time, that once he became an inspector he would never treat a sergeant like that.

  It was half past eleven the following morning when Marriott knocked on the door of the Southfork vicarage.

  Once again, the door was answered by Mrs Rudge, the vicar’s housekeeper.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ Mrs Rudge said, making it sound like an accusation. ‘I s’pose you’m come to see the vicar.’

  ‘Yes, we have,’ said Marriott.

  ‘You’m better come in, then. His reverence is in the drawing room. The death of the captain’s took him bad.’ Without offering any more homespun comments about Stoner’s mental state, she led the way through the house to a room at the rear. ‘Them policemen’s come again, sir,’ she announced.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Rudge.’ Percy Stoner rose from his armchair and took a pace towards the two detectives. ‘Mr Marriott, it’s good to see you again. I hope you had a pleasant journey.’

  ‘Yes, thank you, sir. This is my colleague, Detective Sergeant Catto.’

  Stoner shook hands with each of them. ‘I dare say you wouldn’t be averse to a drop of whisky, gentlemen. It does help to keep out the cold.’ Without waiting for confirmation, he crossed to a cabinet and poured three tumblers of Scotch.

  ‘Very kind of you, sir.’ Marriott thought that the vicar had been imbibing already that morning, if the slight slurring of his speech was anything to go by. He wondered if he was drowning his sorrow.

  ‘I’m not quite sure why you’ve come all this way, Mr Marriott,’ said Stoner, once the three of them were settled in the comfortable armchairs with which the drawing room was furnished. ‘I had a policeman from the Norfolk Constabulary call to tell me that Guy had been killed, although he didn’t know the circumstances.’ For a moment or two, the vicar stared into the blazing fire. ‘I think he was more upset at having to break the news than I was at receiving it,’ he said, looking up once again. ‘But he was very young. Probably the first time he’d had to do it.’

  Waiting until Stoner had put down his glass, Marriott said, ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you that your nephew was murdered, sir.’

  Rather than appear shocked at this news, Stoner just nodded. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised, Mr Marriott. I thought it would be something like that. It’s ironic when I think about it. Guy went right through the war without a scratch, only for this to occur. What happened to him?’

  Without elaborating, Marriott went on to tell the vicar about the garage, the arrest of Holroyd for fraud, the finding of the bodies and the discovery that the other body was that of a young married Frenchwoman. He thought it unnecessary to mention that the bodies had been dismembered.

  Once again, Stoner just nodded. ‘I think it must be something to do with the war, Mr Marriott. All the standards of common decency seem have gone to the winds. The survivors of that terrible conflict appear to think that they can behave just as they like. I’m not suggesting that liaisons with married women didn’t occur before the war; of course they did – but discreetly. This almost flagrant display of unashamed adultery is something quite new. I shouldn’t say this really, being a staunch royalist, but I do believe that the Prince of Wales has much to answer for with his quite blatant carryings-on with married women.’

  ‘You said just now, sir, that you weren’t surprised that your nephew had been murdered, and that you thought something like that may have happened. Did you mean that his death was something to do with a woman?’ asked Catto.

  Stoner scoffed. ‘He always had a girl on his arm, Mr Catto. He used to tell me in his weekly letters that he’d just met a wonderful new girl, but it was a different girl each time, and, as far as I was aware, most of them were single young women. You see, he had plenty of money,’ he said, confirming almost word for word exactly what Holroyd had told the police about Guy Stoner. ‘I met one or two of them, when he brought them up to Norfolk, and I had high hopes of him marrying and settling down, but then I realized that he was little more than a philanderer and that these women were merely playthings.’ He took another sip of whisky and spent a few seconds staring, once again, into
the fire. ‘You said just now that you’d arrested this chap Holroyd. Are you charging him with Guy’s murder?’

  ‘He’s only been charged with fraud, sir, but we’re keeping an open mind,’ said Catto, ‘and we’re confident of finding the killer of both Captain Stoner and the young lady.’

  ‘I have no wish to teach you your job, Mr Catto, but it seems to me that if Holroyd defrauded my nephew, and my nephew took him to task over it, surely that’s a very good motive for murder.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you know the names of any these young women your nephew was friendly with, do you, sir?’ asked Marriott, not wishing to say that Holroyd had been ruled out of the investigation, mainly because, in his view, Holroyd was still a suspect.

  ‘He mentioned one,’ said Stoner. ‘She was called Lavinia Quilter. I think Guy said that she was the daughter of an earl, so she would’ve been correctly styled Lady Lavinia Quilter.’ He paused for a moment. ‘He said he’d met her at a party, but I don’t know if it ever went any further.’

  Marriott decided that he had obtained all that he could from the Reverend Percy Stoner, and he stood up, followed by Catto. ‘Thank you for the whisky, sir, and I’m sorry that we had to be the bearers of bad news. Rest assured that when we make an arrest, we’ll inform you.’

  Stoner struggled to his feet, carefully avoiding the tabby cat asleep on the hearth rug, and shook hands. ‘Thank you for coming all this way, Mr Marriott, and you too, Mr Catto. It’s much appreciated,’ he said, as he opened the drawing-room door. ‘I’ll show you out.’

  TEN

  On Friday morning, the day after their visit to see the Reverend Percy Stoner, Marriott and Catto reported the result of their meeting to Hardcastle.