Death of a Beauty Queen

by E. R. Punshon

  ‘Well, anyhow,’ observed Penfold, ‘no hole or corner here where even a mouse could hide.’

  Mitchell seemed to come out of his trance of contemplation.

  ‘Bit nightmarish,’ he remarked. ‘Wonder who chose it – and why!’

  ‘Why?’ repeated Bobby, puzzled by something he seemed to detect in his chief’s voice.

  Penfold wandered, a little ostentatiously, towards the door. Discussions on wallpaper patterns did not interest him, and all creation knew there was enough hard work waiting, and no chance of rest or sleep till it had been attended to.

  ‘You know,’ he remarked, over his shoulder, ‘what I say, sir, is they’ll bring it in homicidal mania.’

  ‘Not so sure of that,’ Mitchell answered.

  ‘Oh, well, sir, an old lady like her,’ protested Penfold, ‘three murders one after the other... it’s not natural.’

  ‘No more than a wallpaper like this in an attic,’ observed Mitchell. ‘And what is not natural should always be explained.’

  Penfold looked as if he thought the superintendent was suffering from some sort of mania himself. Bobby was inclined to make a little joke about such a pattern being above all explanation, but then told himself that neither the time nor the circumstances nor yet Mitchell’s manner invited pleasantry.

  ‘There’s a recess on one side of the fireplace,’ Mitchell was saying, ‘but not on the other.’

  Penfold cast one uninterested glance towards fireplace and recess, and another, much more alert, towards the door. Bobby gave a little gasp. Dimly he groped for what was coming, and dimly guessed. Mitchell went on:

  ‘Both boys had the knack of handling tools – first class professional work they turned out. Boys often have a fancy for secret hiding-places, hidden dens – all that kind of thing. Old Mr Irwin kept them under strict discipline, and perhaps it was handy, too, to have a safe place to keep things – or themselves – away from him. I can imagine, for instance, Maddox hiding up here ready to join Leslie in secret excursions at night, or perhaps when returning from them.’

  ‘Yes... but... hide... where?’ Penfold stammered.

  Mitchell put out a hand, and knocked heavily on the wall by the fireplace where no recess showed.

  ‘Sounds hollow,’ he said. ‘And all that muddle of line and angle and whatnot on the wallpaper would go a long way towards hiding any crack that could betray a concealed door.’ He struck again upon the pseudo wall – a heavy and resounding blow. ‘Like to come out, Mr Maddox?’ he called.

  There was a pause, a hesitation, and then a door opened in what was in reality a partition of stout wood put up to enclose a recess corresponding to that on the other side of the fireplace. Very slowly Maddox stepped out.

  ‘I’m almost glad you’ve found me,’ he said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Conclusion

  In the hospital the nurse, watching by Paul Irwin’s bed, reported signs of returning consciousness. But the doctors gave no hope.

  ‘The injuries are too serious,’ they said. ‘Even a much younger man would hardly have a chance.’

  Indeed already there were symptoms of pneumonia, and the doctors advised that the sick man’s relatives should be warned. The few that he possessed, however, were resident in the north country, and there would have been little chance of their arriving in time. But, when he was able to speak, it was not for them the dying man asked, but for Bobby.

  ‘That young policeman,’ he managed to murmur. ‘A boy called Owen... can he come?’

  A message was accordingly sent to Scotland Yard without delay, and Bobby was at once dispatched.

  ‘It’ll be a case of taking his depositions, from what the hospital says,’ Inspector Ferris told him. ‘You had better see Penfold first. He knows what to do – he was warned to be ready.’

  But though it was therefore in the company of various important official personages that Bobby arrived at the hospital, it was only Bobby himself who was allowed access to the dying man.

  ‘He’s in no condition to be argued with,’ one of the doctors said. ‘Any excitement, even the least, might be fatal on the spot – probably would. It’s a Bobby Owen he is asking for, and no one else. Afterwards he may be strong enough to see some of you others, if he wants to. I won’t take the responsibility of allowing anyone else; even the effort of explaining who you are and what you want might easily be too much for him.’

  So Bobby went alone to the small private ward where Paul Irwin lay, and there was greeted with a faint smile of recognition. For, though death was plainly not far distant, the injured man’s strength seemed greater than the doctors had appeared to think. Though that it might be only a last effort, was plainly evident.

  ‘You’re so young – like Leslie – that’s why I wanted you,’ he murmured, in a voice that was certainly feeble enough and yet was fully audible. ‘When you’re old, youth seems a lovely thing.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Bobby, who did not understand this, for though he knew he was young and couldn’t help it, ‘lovely’ was about the last epithet he would have thought of applying to himself. ‘You were wanting to say something?’ he hinted, afraid the other’s strength might not last.

  ‘Like Leslie,’ Paul murmured again; and then more clearly: ‘You thought he was innocent – you knew it before I did; better than I did. I saw him coming out of the room, I thought, but that was wrong. He had only been about to go in when he saw me, and then he went away, and he never knew at the time what was there. But, when I went in and found her, that was my first thought – that he had done it.

  ‘I knew already about the cheque – that’s what I wanted to say to her. I thought he had forged the cheque for her and then she had turned on him. And then he thought the same of me when he knew you had found my hat there.’

  ‘You left it here on purpose, didn’t you?’ Bobby asked.

  ‘To make you think it was me, not him,’ Paul answered. ‘I don’t know if it deceived you, it did him, though I never thought of that. Funny, to make Leslie think it, but not you. And we never spoke or asked each other anything – not once. We daren’t. I daren’t because I was afraid what he might say; and he was afraid, too, because of the cheque he forged. That made him afraid... bad, bad, when a son’s afraid of his father.’

  ‘That’s all over now, sir,’ Bobby said gently.

  ‘Yes, all over now. It was Maddox I wanted to ask you about – Claude Maddox.’

  ‘We got him all right,’ Bobby answered, with satisfaction. ‘Found where he was hiding before he had a chance to get away.’

  He said it with full confidence that the news would ease the dying man’s last hours, even that it might serve as a tonic to rally his strength still further. But to Bobby’s astonishment he almost visibly drooped and shrank as he lay there in his bed, propped up on pillows. What faint show of colour had come into his cheeks ebbed away again, his breath fluttered. Bobby had the sensation of having dealt him a cruel, a violent, an unexpected blow.

  ‘I thought... I hoped... I believed... he might have escaped,’ Paul whispered. ‘I prayed... you wouldn’t... find... never–’

  ‘You didn’t want him to get off, did you, sir?’ Bobby asked, utterly amazed.

  ‘I hoped... I tried... I hoped... I couldn’t do more...’ Paul answered in his stammering, uncertain voice. ‘He was afraid... fear... like Leslie, too... fear spoils all... fear not, we are told and we do... I taught it... fear I mean... Claude, too.’

  ‘Do you mean you knew he was hiding up there?’ Bobby asked.

  ‘From the first night,’ came the faint response. ‘Years ago... he and Leslie... they made that place to hide in... they thought we didn’t know... Miss Temple and me... she was housekeeper then... we never said anything, but we knew... there was nearly a week once when Claude hid there and Leslie fed him... they thought no one knew... it’s so easy to think no one knows... that night you went to arrest him and he got away... Claude, I mean... barefooted, in pyjamas, no mo
ney... alone, no friends... and you hunting for him everywhere... then I suppose in his despair he thought of that secret cupboard he and Leslie made to hide in when they were boys... he had the key to the house he had kept all those years... he went straight there... he let himself in that night within ten minutes of his escaping you... less, five minutes, if he ran, and I expect he did... of course I knew at once... the only possible refuge... in the only house in all the world no one could have thought of... that first night I took back the money I had given Mrs Knowles and left it for hint... and food... I used to leave my supper out on the tray for him every night... he used to slip out sometimes, when he thought we were in bed and it all seemed quiet... and then crept back before it was light... he daren’t show himself in the daytime... I left the evening papers where he could see them... he took a suit of Leslie’s to wear... I told Mrs Knowles she wasn’t to touch Leslie’s things, so as to stop her noticing any were missing... but I knew it couldn’t last... I cashed a cheque to get money to help him get away... abroad somewhere... I waited till I heard him slipping down the stairs... for food... or to go out... I opened the door... silly... I only wanted to give him the money and explain, but he thought he was discovered... he thought I would tell he was afraid... fear... fear ruins all... he was carrying something, and before I could make him understand he was hitting out with it... over and over again... frenzied, mad, panic, that’s all... Mrs Knowles heard... she came running and crying out... it was dark in the hall, and I suppose when Maddox heard her screaming he hid behind the banisters or in a corner somewhere and then ran back upstairs... I thought if you hadn’t found him he might still have a chance to get away... I meant to lie and say it was a burglar... I thought the first lie of your life when you’re dying and have never lied before... I thought perhaps it wouldn’t matter so much... but if you’ve found him, that’s no good... lies never are... but it was only panic... not murder.’

  Bobby was writing all this down as quickly as he could. He said, still very much puzzled:

  ‘You wanted him to escape... you meant to help...’

  ‘With five hundred pounds he might have managed it,’ Paul murmured. ‘And there’s no worse use you can put a man to than hanging him.’

  Bobby wrote that down too. He said:

  ‘Will you sign this, sir?’

  But Paul did not answer, and the nurse in attendance leaned across the bed, and said:

  ‘He’s gone... it’s not often they go so quietly as that, so quietly you couldn’t tell.’

  THE END

  About The Author

  E.R. Punshon was born in London in 1872.

  At the age of fourteen he started life in an office. His employers soon informed him that he would never make a really satisfactory clerk, and he, agreeing, spent the next few years wandering about Canada and the United States, endeavouring without great success to earn a living in any occupation that offered. Returning home by way of working a passage on a cattle boat, he began to write. He contributed to many magazines and periodicals, wrote plays, and published nearly fifty novels, among which his detective stories proved the most popular and enduring.

  He died in 1956.

  Also by E.R. Punshon

  Information Received

  Death Among The Sunbathers

  Crossword Mystery

  Mystery Villa

  Death Comes To Cambers

  The Bath Mysteries

  Mystery of Mr Jessop

  The Dusky Hour

  Dictator’s Way

  The next title in the Bobby Owen Series

  E.R. PUNSHON

  Death Comes to Cambers

  Police officer Bobby Owen is a weekend guest at Lady Cambers’s majestic country pile, there to advise on security following recent burglary scares. But when the lady of the house disappears, her bed unslept-in, it’s a case of murder not burglary – for Bobby discovers her ladyship, strangled, in a nearby field.

  One of the finest of the early Bobby Owens novels, Death Comes to Cambers combines wit and excellent characterization in a satisfying and classic whodunit, featuring an eccentric creationist, a superior archaeologist and an inventive cipher.

  Death Comes to Cambers is the sixth of E.R. Punshon’s acclaimed Bobby Owen mysteries, first published in 1935 and part of a series which eventually spanned thirty-five novels.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Empty Room

  At the foot of the stairs, Farman, the butler, and Amy Emmers, Lady Cambers’s maid, met each other. Amy was carrying a tray with the cup of tea and the tiny square of dry toast it was her duty first thing each morning to take to her mistress. She was looking a little flurried and disturbed. She said: ‘Her room’s empty. She’s not there.’

  Farman had no need to ask to whom the ‘she’ referred. In the language of domestic service, the unrelated personal feminine pronoun means always and invariably the mistress of the house. Farman knew, therefore, at once Amy meant that Lady Cambers was not in her room. But the fact did not make much impression on him. As was not unusual with him in the early morning, he was in a bad temper. Besides, he disliked Amy, who, he considered, was tending to secure much too influential a position in the household—one, indeed, incompatible with the unquestioned authority that in his opinion should be wielded by the butler. That was always the worst of a house where there was no master, and ever since things had come to an open breach between Sir Albert and Lady Cambers, and Sir Albert had departed to London, the influence of Amy, as her ladyship’s personal maid and chief channel of communication between her and the rest of the staff, had been steadily increasing. A ‘favourite’, in fact, she was becoming, and Farman didn’t like it, and liked it all the less that Amy was so plainly trying to be conciliatory and friendly to him and to the others. But both her own position, and also the keen interest in Eddy Dene, Amy’s cousin and fiancé, and his archaeological researches Lady Cambers had been showing of late, gave Amy a certain intimacy and consequent authority with the mistress of the house that the rest of the staff, egged on perhaps by Farman, were a little inclined to resent. So there had been a good deal of satisfaction and nodding of heads when rumour spread of a violent scene of mutual recrimination supposed recently to have taken place between the mistress and the maid. And all that the butler said now in response to Amy was an ill-tempered: ‘Mind you don’t let her tea go cold.’

  The remark was hardly relevant, but it tended to put Amy in her place and to remind her of her duties, and, having made it, Farman was passing on his way—on his morning tour of supervision—when, in the same worried and bewildered tone, Amy added: ‘Her bed’s not been slept in.’

  Farman only caught the words imperfectly, and paid them no attention. He went on along the passage to the garden door that according to routine he unlocked and unbolted. It was a lovely morning after the heavy rainstorm of the evening before, and, even in his present mood of sleepiness and bad temper, Farman felt something of its peace and beauty and of the soft loveliness of the early sunshine. A recollection of Amy’s last remark stirred uneasily in his mind, as though in contrast to the scene without. He went back along the passage. Amy was still standing at the foot of the stairs with the tray in her hands, evidently not quite knowing what to do next. He said to her: ‘What’s that you said?’

  ‘Her bed’s not been slept in; her room’s empty,’ Amy repeated.

  Farman considered this. His was not a very quick mind; its tendency was always to reject the unfamiliar, the unexpected. He said at last: ‘Don’t talk silly. She’s not been sitting up all night, has she?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ answered Amy helplessly.

  ‘Well, she must be somewhere,’ declared Farman. ‘You had better find her,’ he added. ‘Her tea’ll be cold.’

  ‘It’s cold already,’ said Amy.

  Farman sniffed, as if to indicate that from Amy he had expected nothing better, and then, what she had told him beginning to sink into his mind, he so far departed from his usual routine of next
unlocking and unbolting the front-door, as to proceed instead to the small morning-room that was Lady Cambers’s favourite sitting-room—her ‘den’ she had been used to call it sometimes, in opposition to the library Sir Albert had appropriated to himself and his special pursuits and interests wherein books and reading had no place whatever. That, of course, had been before the final breach, but Lady Cambers had continued her habit of using this small room as her own special domain—it was snug and quiet, she said, and she liked it, and gradually a convention had been established that when she was sitting there she was not to be disturbed except for urgent cause. Farman, opening the door, had a vague expectation of finding her there now. He supposed she might have got up early for some reason and come downstairs to sit here. But the room was unoccupied. The morning light, struggling through the still shuttered and curtained windows, showed that, and showed, also, on the table a tray with an empty tumbler on it, and a plate on which were still some crumbs. Glancing over his shoulder, to remark to Amy that anyhow her ladyship wasn’t there, Farman noticed with uninterested surprise that the girl’s former expression of bewilderment had given way to one that seemed to show uneasiness and alarm—even terror. Though what there could be to alarm her or anyone else in this unoccupied room, Farman had no idea. He left the problem unconsidered, and said: ‘Well, she isn’t here.’

  ‘I’ll clear those things away,’ Amy said, advancing into the room, putting down the breakfast-tray she was still carrying, and making to pick up the one on the table before them.

  Again Farman was vaguely puzzled by a certain haste and uneasiness her hurried nervous action seemed to show. But it was plainly her duty, since she was responsible for the room, to clear away this tray that had apparently been left from the night before.

  ‘Ought to have been done before,’ he said severely, and then sniffed at the glass from which a faint odour had reached his expert and practised nostrils. ‘Brandy,’ he exclaimed. ‘Well, now, and I thought she never touched it. That young Eddy Dene was here last night, wasn’t he? Been standing him a drink, I suppose.’