Except For One Thing

by John Russell Fearn

  “Hello!” he barked, as he whipped the instrument up.

  “Can you hear me, Ricky? Is the line any better? This is Val, speaking, from a different call-box.”

  Richard shuddered. It was definitely Valerie’s voice — !

  “In God’s name, Val, from where are you speaking?” Richard demanded hoarsely. “Tell me, before I go crazy!”

  “Hello?” her voice questioned plaintively. “Can you hear me? I can’t get a word out of this line. It’s blurred and muffled. Ricky, can you hear me?”

  “Of course I can hear you!” he yelled. “Tell me where you are! Tell me — ”

  “No use,” she said, sighing. “I’ll have to come over myself first thing in the morning. Maybe you can hear what I say: I hope so. “Bye for now, Ricky.”

  “Valerie!” Richard screamed.

  The line blanked. Richard’s hand was shaking so violently he could hardly return the phone to its cradle. He tried to think, to decide if this incredible thing really were possible…But such chaos surged in his brain that he had hardly any conception of what he was doing. Abruptly he snatched up the telephone.

  “Operator! Operator!” He joggled the rest viciously.

  “Number, please?”

  “Look here, I’m Circle four-oh-nine-eight. Somebody has called me up twice tonight — a woman. Can you trace where the call came from?”

  There was a pause, then, “Sorry, sir, your number is on the dialling system. It’s impossible to trace dial calls.”

  “Oh — damn!” Richard slammed the phone back and tightened his lips. If it had all been a trick…But the purpose behind such a trick? And if Garth had spoken the truth, the case of Valerie Hadfield was closed, anyway…

  Stupidly Richard sat down on the edge of the bed. He never closed his eyes again that night. He spent the time smoking, pondering, brooding, darting frightened glances about the room now and again. For the life of him he could not see how he could have made a mistake in killing Valerie. No other woman could have been so identical or in possession of so many private facts. And certainly, as far as he was aware, she had not got a twin sister…

  Slowly the memory of her words came back to him — “I’ll have to come over myself first thing in the morning.”

  Richard staggered to the window, drew back the heavy draperies. Grey daylight was just coming into the autumn dawn. To a certain extent it banished the terror of the night. Purely for the sake of something to do he began to dress, shaved, then went downstairs as the hall clock struck seven. He went outside and to the garage, stared at it fixedly, then came back into the house and spent the time until breakfast wandering up and down his study, thinking, wishing his head did not ache so intolerably.

  When he went in to breakfast Mrs. Baxter looked at him curiously. “You don’t look too well, Mr. Richard, and — ”

  “Nothing’s the matter! Get out and leave me alone!”

  Mrs. Baxter tightened her lips, hesitated, then left without further words. Richard stared at the food before him, then pushing the plate on one side irritably he sipped the coffee instead and forced himself to concentrate on the morning paper. Not that there was anything significant in it. No mention at all of the Valerie Hadfield case — even less reference to the return of Valerie.

  He threw the paper on one side impatiently, finished the coffee and lighted a cigarette. The clock on the mantelpiece reminded him that it was nine-thirty and across the turmoil of his mind floated the remembrance that he had promised to call for Joyce at ten o’clock.

  He got up, bracing himself. Then he stiffened suddenly at the sound of the doorbell. Forcing calmness upon himself he went to the door of the dining room and opened it to see the familiar figure of Chief Inspector Garth being admitted by Baxter.

  “Hello there, Dick!” Garth waved a hand cordially. “I’m an early bird, eh?”

  Richard fought to control himself, trying to imagine what Garth wanted at this unearthly hour. “Come in and have a cup of coffee.”

  “Thanks, I could do with it…” Garth thumped his chest, held his hat in his hand, and followed Richard into the room. Silently Richard poured out coffee.

  “Something happened?” he asked casually as Garth sipped the coffee slowly.

  “Yes,” he said, his pale eyes ranging Richard’s sunken face. “And you don’t look too well, either. Been working too hard — ?”

  “To hell with how I look!” Richard blazed. “What do you want?”

  Garth smiled faintly and set the cup down. “This is hardly the place to tell you. Let’s go into your laboratory. Quieter there, and we can’t be overheard.”

  “Does it matter if anything is?” Richard asked deliberately. “And I have an appointment at ten o’clock — ”

  “With Miss Prescott?”

  “Yes, if you must know. I’ve squared things up with her.”

  “Before you go,” Garth said, “you’d better hear what I’ve got to say. Come along to the lab.”

  Richard hesitated, then he led the way out of the room, Garth following him. When they reached the laboratory Richard shut the door turned.

  “Well? And make it short. I’m in a hurry.”

  “No you’re not, Dick.” Garth’s face was expressionless as he put down his hat on the bench. “You can’t continue your association with Joyce Prescott because Valerie Hadfield is alive.”

  The last trace of colour went out of Richard’s face.

  “Then — it’s true?” he whispered. “True?” Garth looked surprised. “What is? Why look so staggered, man? It was never proved that she died, remember: simply that she was presumed murdered. Now it seems she merely stepped out of town, and the revue. Sudden impulse, and for reasons of her own. Never can tell what a woman’ll do next!”

  Richard said nothing. He turned away slowly, pressing a hand to his eyes. He stopped finally beside the bench and looked up again to find Garth’s pale eyes fixed on him unwaveringly.

  “She rang me up twice — during the night…” Richard gestured helplessly. “I heard every word she said, but she seemed as if she couldn’t hear me. I tried to convince myself that I dreamed it, but…Now you know about it, too.”

  “But why should you wish to convince yourself that you dreamed it?” Garth asked. “You couldn’t know any more than I whether she was dead or alive…could you?”

  To Richard the laboratory seemed intensely quiet. A sense of intense pressure was upon him — strangling pressure, and it seemed to be emanating from Garth.

  “When — did Val contact you?” Richard inquired haltingly.

  “First thing this morning. She walked into my office as large as life, demanding to know what all the fuss was about. Wanted to know where the silly story about her being murdered had come from. Seems she’s been out of touch with things and had only just heard…” Garth took out and lit a cheroot. “Matter of fact she’s in my car at the front. That’s why I’m here. I thought you’d like to see her, just to reassure yourself after all the fuss there was. She said she’d decided to come and see you this morning.”

  “And — what about her chauffeur?” Richard muttered.

  “I dunno — that’s still a problem. I’ll sort it out.”

  “And — and she’s here…? Outside?”

  “I’ll have her come in,” Garth said. “Just a moment.”

  Richard watched him stupidly as he went to the driveway door and opened it, then signalled down the drive to somebody in the roadway. Motionless, Richard waited, conscious of perspiration trickling down his forehead. The laboratory seemed blurred and far away. Garth was standing at the outer doorway, cheroot smouldering fragrantly, his merciless eyes staring across the gap.

  There were sounds — light, obviously feminine footsteps, coming along the driveway. They came nearer. The sunlight caught a slender silhouette as the girl hesitated in the doorway just out of Richard’s line of vision. Richard watched the shadow as an animal watches a striking snake…

  Then the girl came i
n — slim, in a neat costume, blonde hair to her shoulders.

  “No!” Richard shrieked, everything within him exploding. “No, you can’t be Valerie! You’re dead — dead! I killed you! Destroyed you! Bit by bit…You can’t be Valerie!”

  The girl came nearer and Richard’s pounding heart nearly choked him as he realised now it was not Valerie. There were subtle differences, but the general figure, the make-up on her face, and his own crashing mind had caused his momentary leap at the obvious. The girl waited, then turned as Garth took her arm and led her outside. He came in again, closed and locked the door.

  “You mean that you dismembered Valerie’s body, immersed the pieces in liquid air, pulverised them, and then added them to the ingredients for the garage outside. Don’t you?”

  Garth’s ice-cold voice came from far away.

  “I never said that!” Sweat was pouring down Richard’s face. “Leave me alone, Garth — for Christ’s sake! Leave me — ”

  “You’ve already admitted that you murdered Valerie!”

  “I — I didn’t! You tricked me into saying so!”

  “Don’t lie,” Garth breathed, walking forward slowly. “I know the whole foul story, Dick! I’ve untied your perfect crime knot by knot. I know you were Rixton Williams. I know you disposed of Valerie…The hacksaw blade had human protein on it.”

  Richard stared across at the tool-rack dully and shook his head.

  “Your garage ceiling had a single hair protruding out of it. Valerie Hadfield’s hair! Since then I’ve had the remains of the cement and concrete analysed — the stuff you returned to Rothwell. Doc Winters found tiny shards of bone in the cement powder — scraps which had escaped ultimate freezing and pulverisation. Maybe you hurried the job and ruined your plan for that reason. You’ve been clever — damned clever — even to knowing the blood at that temperature could never be detected…But you have not been quite clever enough.”

  With an effort Richard straightened and drew the back of his sleeve over his dripping forehead.

  “All right, I did do just that,” he whispered, smiling crookedly. “And I killed the chauffeur too — and fixed an alibi. You have no corpus delicti for Valerie and in the case of the chauffeur there are no witnesses here to listen to what I am saying to you. What was the idea of all that piffle in recreating Valerie?”

  “To get this confession out of you, Dick — and it worked. You broke under the unbearable tension, just as I’d hoped.”

  “And no witnesses,” Richard repeated, laughing softly. “You are a bigger fool than I thought, Garth. I admit everything and you neglect the precaution of a witness. While that bogus Valerie was in here I merely said I’d murdered Valerie — but without her identifiable corpse that confession means nothing, not even though that woman heard me say it. She was not here when I admitted I murdered Peter Cranston. Only you! Galling, isn’t it?”

  “That girl is Valerie Hadfield’s understudy,” Garth said. “Last night I heard from Dr. Prescott that he had suggested to you that confession was your only way out. That gave me the idea that under stress you might blurt out the truth. I had a talk with Valerie’s manager, and several of her speaking parts, on recordings, were dug out and transported to my office. There we had an expert policewoman mimic study them and use her powers on you during the night, imitating Valerie’s voice. The telephone disguised whatever imperfections there were and your mind was too harassed to be analytical. I softened you up, Dick, and topped it off with the understudy this morning. Her make-up is identical to the late Valerie’s and physically she very much resembles her. That’s my part of the story…”

  “You dirty, scheming swine!” Richard breathed hoarsely. “Pretending to be my friend, pretending you’d given up the case, and all the time you — ”

  “I had a job to do, Dick, and I’ve done it!”

  “Like hell you have! I keep telling you — no witnesses to what I have said, and —”

  “But I have,” Garth’s voice was so quiet it stilled Richard’s outburst. “I have the aid of that very science at which you sneered so heartily. During the night sergeant Whittaker and I came in here and fixed a microphone under the bench there. Look for yourself…”

  Richard stared unbelievingly for a moment, then ducked down and gazed at the small service microphone under the bench against the outside wall.

  “Its wires pass under this outside door here” — Garth nodded to it — “and then are buried in the soil among the trees at the side of the drive. Well concealed, so you’d never notice. This morning we had only to connect them to the radio transmitter in the car. I came out early just to make sure you’d have no chance of perhaps discovering the dodge. Every word you have said since you came in this lab — our words now, in fact — are being relayed into the office of Assistant Commissioner Farley at Scotland Yard by short-wave radio, and at the same time being recorded for reproduction in Court…”

  Garth stopped, dropped his cheroot to the floor and trod on it. “We’ve got you, Dick! And we can produce the body of Peter Cranston!”

  For a full half minute Richard stood by the bench, his chest rising and falling.

  “Clever, aren’t you?” he blazed. “Where’s your warrant?”

  “That’ll be taken out — ”

  “Will it? Perhaps!” Richard straightened up again, his dark hair dishevelled. “I’ve a last trick to play yet before anybody can get in here from your car outside — ”

  He whirled, dived his hand at a bottle from long accustomedness and snatched it from the shelf. In a split second he had the cork out. Garth watched narrowly.

  “It’s nitric acid,” Richard explained, grinning, raising it over his head. “Eats steel, you know. I’m going to give you something to remember me by for the rest of your life, even if I am caught!” Suddenly Garth flung himself forward as he saw Richard hurl the bottle straight at him. Flinging himself to one side he missed it by a fraction and it splintered on the wall, splashing its sizzling, fuming contents to the concrete floor. Hardly had it landed before Garth found himself fighting for his life. Richard’s hands were clawing at his throat, dragging him forward towards that searing corrosive. Garth staggered, drove his first up into Richard’s stomach. Richard doubled up, then straightened at a bone-cracking impact under his jaw. He tottered backwards, recovered his balance, and saw Garth diving for him.

  With every ounce of his strength and despairing fury Richard drove with a piston-rod blow into Garth’s face. It rocked him on his heels. He felt blood salty in his mouth. Again Richard’s hands were tearing at his throat. With a supreme effort Garth forced himself round, tore away from the grip and swept up an uppercut that jerked Richard’s head back. Helplessly he crashed into the central bench, his flailing hands clutching at jars and bottles. He glanced at one in his right hand, smashed the bottom off it, and retained the viciously sharp jagged-edged neck in his grip.

  Murderously he flung himself forward, his terrible weapon swinging down towards Garth’s unprotected face in a gouging movement. Garth held his ground until the last second, then jerked his head to one side and flung out his foot. Richard staggered and tripped, helped on his way by a blow to the base of the skull which knocked half the senses out of him. He crashed forwards and downwards against the wall — clean into the midst of the Dewar flasks with their stoppered necks!

  “Richard!” Garth shrieked — and flung himself away from the smashing of glass and cascading of searingly cold liquid. He heard one unholy scream and saw the pale blue fluid flooding down Richard’s head and shoulders…

  Blindly Garth fought his way to the outer door and opened it. He stood breathing hard, motioning Sergeant Whittaker and the two constables coming hurriedly up the drive.

  “My God!” Whittaker gasped, staring into the laboratory. “He got it himself!”

  Garth wiped a streak of blood from under his nose. Sudden unexpected light footsteps made him glance up. The slender figure of Joyce Prescott was coming up the drive. He went forwa
rd towards her, caught her arm and stopped her.

  “What in the world’s going on, Inspector?” she asked blankly. “You’ve hurt yourself, haven’t you? Your nose is bleeding…Where’s Ricky?” Her voice slowed. “Has anything happened to him?”

  Garth led her as far as the road before he spoke.

  “Go home, Miss Prescott, and don’t think any more about him,” he said, levelly. “Just catch the News and read the evening papers, and then…Well, a girl as pretty as you is worth something much better.”

  “What do you mean?” Her dark eyes searched him.

  “I insist. Please go — for your own sake.”

  Joyce hesitated, looked at the blonde in the police car, then with a puzzled frown she began to move up the road. Garth watched her go, turned as Whittaker came hurrying down the drive.

  “Shall I phone for the ambulance, sir?”

  “Naturally,” Garth said. “Stay here until it comes. I’m going back to headquarters. Don’t let the Baxters know too much.”

  “Looks like the perfect crime came unstuck, sir, after all!”

  “The poor, damned fool!” Garth gave a sigh. “Summing it up I do believe he made more mistakes than the old masters themselves. Well, there it is…”

  He took out a cheroot, lighted it. All of a sudden the autumn morning seemed intensely quiet. The fragrant blue smoke hung on the still air…

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