There's a Reason for Everything: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  Payne was beginning to open his eyes very wide.

  “I suppose…” he said slowly, “I reckon—I mean—I think I see…”

  “Just so,” said Bobby. “Quite plain now you’ve thought it out. But never mind saying so. I don’t want even the slightest chance of so much as a look giving Bailey a hint why he’s here. If it comes at all, I want it to be entirely spontaneous.”

  “Yes, sir, I see, sir,” said Payne, now very impressed. “Very smart and clever, sir, if I may say so.”

  “Very obvious, I should have thought,” retorted Bobby; who always hated being told he was clever, because he knew how difficult it is to live up to any such reputation.

  “Yes, sir, obvious, sir,” agreed Payne, “that’s what I meant”; and indeed-to recognize and to use the obvious is as rare a gift as any.

  “By the way,” Bobby added, as Payne was retiring, “there is something you could do to help, if you would. Not an order, though, not even asking. But if you could get someone—the station sergeant by preference—to stand on his head where Bailey could see him, it might help.”

  “On his head—the station sergeant,” repeated Payne, and looked awed, and so did Bobby then, for now they both remembered that the station sergeant then on duty was full fifty years old, with a waist-girth of fifty and one inches. But Payne rallied. Not for him to shrink when the path of duty showed. “Very good, sir,” he said and retired.

  “Good old Payne,” Bobby murmured. “I believe he’s for it himself.”

  And it was so, and, when Bailey reported, one item, made without comment, was: ‘Inspector Payne stood on his head in the corner at a quarter to four, but saying nothing.’

  At which Bobby gave a satisfied nod, satisfied now that his wife had made Bailey understand.

  It was the next afternoon when Mr. Parkinson appeared in response to a message he had received. He had been grumbling about the request made that he should remain for the time either in Midwych itself, or at some address where he could be found at short notice, if it became necessary, as Bobby put it with all possible politeness, ‘to ask for his further assistance’. He had hoped this summons to the county police headquarters meant that his release from any such obligation had been decided upon, and he was disappointed to find that apparently all Bobby wanted was to say how sorry he was that in view of the incomplete nature and so far unsatisfactory result of the inquiry release was not yet possible.

  “By the way,” Bobby added, “Mr. Tails is complaining about some dispute you and he seem to have had over a taxi fare. Not a police matter. If he really wants to take action, he’ll have to go to the county court. Silly waste of time if he does.”

  “Perhaps I was a trifle high-handed,” Mr. Parkinson agreed, and he looked quite pleased with himself. “I was so annoyed I felt—well, I really felt as if…” He paused. “It’s happened before. It’s not that I lose control of myself, it’s as if something not myself took control. Not my ordinary self, I mean. A deeper self, I suppose. An experience of the sort was what first interested me in psychical research. Still, I’m sorry about Tails. I heard he had some difficulty in getting back—and more difficulty in getting something to eat when he did.” Parkinson paused and smiled, gently at first and then more broadly and more broadly still. “But I made up my mind I ought to call at his hotel, offer to pay my full share of the fare, and tell him I was sorry it had turned out quite as it did. I thought that ought to make everything all right.”

  “Did it?” inquired Bobby.

  “Oh, I think so. Yes, I think so. Tails seemed in a highly excited mood. He would hardly listen. He bustled me out in such a hurry I left my walking-stick behind again—a new one I had just bought in place of the one you’ve got. And when I rang up to ask him about it he was quite short. Said he knew nothing about it. But I’m sure I left it there.”

  “Bit unlucky over your walking-sticks, aren’t you?” Bobby asked with a touch of suspicion in his voice, for was this simply an attempt to make seem more probable that earlier tale of another forgotten walking-stick.

  “Umbrellas and walking-sticks,” agreed Mr. Parkinson. “Umbrellas necessary in this climate, but walking-sticks very old-fashioned, I suppose. Only old fogies like myself carry them nowadays. I’m sure I left mine with Tails. By the way, I saw the man who stopped our taxi that afternoon hanging about near the hotel as I went away. I wondered if he was waiting for a chance to see Tails again.”

  “Oh, indeed,” Bobby said, more interested than he chose to show; and then a message came that Claymore, who also had been asked to call at headquarters, had now arrived.

  So Parkinson was allowed to depart, and Claymore appeared, very much on the defensive, pale, sullen, and anxious-looking, his countenance not yet fully restored to normal. To Bobby’s inquiry as to how Miss Betty seemed, he answered that a doctor, sent, he understood, by the police, had been to see her, and had agreed that she was still in a very nervous condition.

  “Yes, I have his report,” Bobby agreed. “But doctors are cautious, and I’m wondering if, with a little effort and goodwill, she couldn’t manage to answer a few questions without any very serious risk?”

  “What’s the good of sending a doctor if you don’t believe him?” Claymore demanded aggressively.

  “I have to believe him,” Bobby answered, “but a very little goodwill can make a very great deal of difference. It’s got to happen, you know. The questioning, I mean. I can’t go against doctor’s orders, but it’s holding up things badly. In any case, I would like you to know yourself, and to tell Miss Anson as soon as you can, that I’ve got to know what really happened that night on the Barsley footpath. I think I could make a good guess, but I would much rather she told me—she and you, for I think you know?”

  He paused, giving Claymore a quick, sharp glance. Claymore stiffened, drawing in his breath with a sharp hissing sound, but did not speak, either to confirm or deny. Bobby continued:

  “I want to know, also, what she can tell me about a painting, possibly a hitherto unknown Vermeer. It seems there is some reason to believe it was sold at the Nonpareil sale as part of a job lot. Unrecognized of course. Or possibly not sold at all. Miss Anson went to the sale, I believe. Did she buy anything?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I shouldn’t know a Vermeer if I saw it,” Claymore said. “I know he was an old Dutch painter. That’s all.”

  “I wasn’t saying you did know,” Bobby answered. “But perhaps Miss Anson does. You might tell her, also, that I think I know what became of it, and where it is now.”

  “Is that true or a try on?” demanded Claymore sharply.

  “That suggests you do know something about it,” commented Bobby dryly. “Well, never mind. Thirdly, there’s a possibility that the young man you told me about and tried to catch, is a Mr. Frank Hardman, a nephew of Major Hardman’s, though I gather disowned by his uncle. He seems to have been present at the Nonpareil sale. Do you think Miss Anson can suggest why he seems to be hanging about the bungalow?”

  “It’s no good asking me,” Claymore repeated. “I don’t know anything about any Vermeer or any Frank Hardman either.”

  “At any rate you can tell Miss Anson, or ask Mrs. Anson to tell her, what it is I want to know. It’s got to be cleared up, and I think she could help me if she would. Only I would very much prefer a spontaneous statement made freely by her to having to drag it all out by close questioning. I don’t at all want to detain Miss Anson for inquiries, as we say. But I may have to. Well, think it over, and talk it over. I’ve an idea Miss Anson may feel up to seeing you, even if she won’t me.”

  With that Claymore was allowed to depart, and Bobby went to find Payne.

  “The fellow we want,” he told Payne, “the man who may be Lovey Doors and the dead man’s brother—or may not—and anyhow is probably the same I saw at the Anson bungalow window, and the same who stopped Tails’s taxi, has been visiting Tails again, at his hotel. And wasn’t spotted.”

 
“Which, I suppose,” said Payne indignantly, “is what those city fellows call efficient help. A fat lot of good asking them to pick up any one.”

  “Well, don’t rub that in when you see them,” Bobby said. “No good crying over spilt milk, and they’re as short-handed as we are. Put it to them as a rumour we’ve heard, and do they think it’s true? And of course they’ll say it’s impossible, and you’ll have to say, of course, you know, only that’s our information and could they warn their chaps to keep their eyes even more open than usual? Wrap it up well in the best Danish butter, pre-war butter. And ask them if they would mind if we put on one of our men to tail Tails. That,” explained Bobby, “is a joke, and nothing like a joke to smooth things down when the other fellow’s a bit on his dignity.”

  “Joke indeed,” grumbled Payne. “I would a deal rather tell them what I think of them—letting our man slip through their fingers like that. Don’t you think, sir, it would be better to have a description broadcast?”

  But Bobby shook his head.

  “If we do that,” he said, “he’ll vanish into hiding. At present we know he is knocking about the neighbourhood, and we hope he doesn’t know we’re looking for him—or even know of his existence. Gives us a chance.”

  A little later on Major Hardman appeared, for he, too, had received a note asking him to call at his earliest convenience. He seemed more than a little surprised to know that Bobby was still seeking an interview with his nephew, Frank, and declared that to the best of his knowledge and belief the young man had returned to London some days previously. He believed his niece, Frankie, had had a letter from him.

  “Probably asking her for money, and probably she sent it,” he grumbled. “No good my saying anything.”

  So Bobby thanked him, and was sorry he had troubled him, and Major Hardman was very amiable about it, and departed in his turn. Later on Bobby received Bailey’s report, as dictated by him to the station sergeant, since Bailey was not much accustomed to the pen. Bobby read it with interest, reminded the station sergeant that for the present it was confidential, and then showed it to Payne.

  “What we both expected, you see, from what we knew,” he said gravely, “and how much farther forward does it take us?”

  CHAPTER XXVII

  EX-CONVICT

  At the Midwych Central Hotel, however, when, following the instructions Bobby had so promptly given, there arrived there a plain-clothes man, no trace was to be found of Mr. Tails. All that was to be learned was that Mr. Tails had gone out. He had not said where he was going, or when he was likely to return. He had not been seen to take a taxi. Anyhow, most likely there wouldn’t have been a taxi to take. Nothing, in fact, was known as to where he had gone, or why, nor was it any business of the hotel—this last said with a touch of resentment—to be informed concerning the comings and goings of guests. But as to the ‘why’ Bobby thought he could make a good guess. On the track of the possible, and indeed, now, almost probable Vermeer, he supposed.

  “What do we do now?” Payne asked when the plain-clothes man brought back this information, or rather lack of it. “Wait till Tails turns up again and then put him through it?”

  “Easier said than done,” commented Bobby gloomily, not seeing much hope in the suggestion. “Tails is as smart as—well, as smart as an art dealer, and can you say more? Knows all the ropes, and then some. It’s as certain as can be that the Vermeer is the key piece, and that all these people in turn are circling round it. So am I for that matter. All we really know is that Dr. Jones was killed at Nonpareil while keeping an open eye on the chance of the picture being there, and that about the same time another man was killed and his body thrown into the Midwych canal. We can show no positive link between the two murders, though I think Miss Betty Anson could help us there. As soon as the doctors allow it we’ll have to make her talk.”

  “Makes me wonder if it’s a lost picture we’re looking for or a murderer, and at that we don’t even know if there is a picture at all, and very likely there isn’t,” lamented Payne, and then he cheered up considerably as he added: “Anyhow, Vermeer or not, we’ve got a couple of corpses, and that’s something to be thankful for.”

  “So it is,” agreed Bobby gravely, “and I rather think we had better take a hand in the Vermeer hunt ourselves, or the thing may vanish for good. It looks to me as if Tails were negotiating, and if it’s like that we had better get hold of it first. Take it into protective custody. If it gets into Tails’s hands, we’ll have a job getting it out again.”

  “You feel sure that if there is such a thing at all, it’s where you said?” Payne asked, somewhat doubtfully.

  “Oh, yes,” Bobby answered. “Deduction from observed facts, of course, I admit that, and so subject to error. ‘E. and O. E.’, as they used to say on a bill when they knew they had overcharged. But I’m not saying there’s necessarily a first-class, long-lost Vermeer. It may be anything. All the same, I feel the time has come to act.”

  “Well, anyhow,” Payne remarked, “there’s one thing now we do know for certain about Major Hardman. That ought to help.”

  “Yes, so it ought,” agreed Bobby, though not with any great assurance. “Another snag is that so far as I can see there’s nothing to show who is the legal owner. I suppose we can ask for proof of rightful possession. But suppose it turns out to be a fake. Not a Vermeer at all, or spoilt by rough handling, or only a copy. It may be worth all these people seem to think, or it may be worth just nothing at all.”

  “I take it they think the gamble’s worth while,” Payne answered. “Two dead men to show, anyhow. If you ask me, sir, I’m not all that happy about the caretaker—Bailey, I mean. He may be playing a double game.”

  “Oh, yes,” agreed Bobby, “though I don’t think so. Apart from everything else, I don’t believe Mrs. Bailey would let him do anything to risk the little home she’s built up. Now she’s got a home and a man of her own, she jolly well means to keep ’em. But I’m not easy about Tails. He may be running a bigger risk than he knows. The game he knows and is good at is a smooth game, played within the rules. He’s taking a hand now in a rougher game, played without any rules at all, an all-in game.”

  “Only hope,” grumbled Payne, “he doesn’t mean to get himself knocked on the head. Two murders are quite enough to handle at one time.”

  “Two too many,” Bobby said. “I think you had better wait here and I’ll push on to Hardman’s by myself. Just as well for me to tackle him alone. It’s a bit irregular. There’s not much to go on, and even if he has the Vermeer he may be able to claim rightful possession. I’m not too happy about it.”

  “It’s that alibi of his sticks in my throat,” Payne sighed. “If it hadn’t been for that I should have said long ago—pull him in. But how can you, with one of our own men he can call as a witness?”

  “Better be sure than sorry,” Bobby told him. “A waiting game—waiting for the suspect to make a false move. They generally do sooner or later. Anyhow, I’ll go and see him. I may find Tails there, and I rather hope I do. Alibi or none, I think the time has come to ask Hardman a few questions.”

  Accordingly Bobby, lucky enough this time to find a car none of his juniors was using, drove off to The Tulips. Arrived, he was admitted by Miss Frances, whom he found in the garden, hanging out some of the family washing she had apparently been doing herself.

  “The laundries are getting so difficult,” she explained. “The one we go to is talking about rationing customers.”

  Bobby agreed that the laundry question was indeed getting very difficult. Every woman her own laundry-maid apparently. Total war even or very much in the laundry now. And was Major Hardman at home?

  Miss Frances said no, he wasn’t. Nor did she know when he would be back, and, as she said this, there issued from within, from behind the partially open drawing-room door, a loud, reverberating sneeze. So Bobby said he thought perhaps Major Hardman must have returned without Miss Hardman’s knowledge, and Miss Hardman, without tur
ning a hair—not that it would have been easy for any one hair to turn in that hairdresser’s masterpiece, her coiffure—agreed that it seemed like it.

  “Uncle, is that you?” she called; and forthwith Major Hardman appeared, bland and smiling, radiating welcome, more than delighted to see the Deputy Chief Constable again, and perhaps this time they could have a drink together, and what were the prospects of bringing to justice those guilty of the two atrocious murders that had so shocked and alarmed the neighbourhood?

  “Well, the position,” Bobby explained, “is that we have got together a mass of evidence, but there are still links needed before we can take action. By the way, have you seen anything of Mr. Tails?”

  “Tails, the art dealer?” Hardman asked. “He called the other day, and I heard that his taxi drove off and left him behind. Some dispute with another man sharing the taxi, I understand. He wanted me to put him in touch with Frank. I had to explain I knew nothing about Frank’s movements. You don’t think Tails has anything to do with these murders, do you?”

  “I hope not,” Bobby answered. “He seems to be prolonging his stay in Midwych rather longer than one would have expected, and he has been seen talking to a man we are anxious to interview. We have no very good description of him—no one appears to have had more than a passing glimpse. But he does seem to bear a close resemblance to the dead man found in the canal. Might be brothers—twins even. Odd how often twins turn up in this affair. A minor complication, but interesting, all the same.”

  “Like my nephew and niece, Frank and Frankie,” Major Hardman remarked. “But if this man and the dead man are brothers, you don’t suspect him of being the murderer, do you? Or could it be that they were both mixed up in the murder of Dr. Jones, and one of them got killed doing it? That would mean that actually there’s been only one murder.”

  “A very ingenious theory,” agreed Bobby, regarding the Major admiringly. “It must be considered. Even a peaceable, respectable, elderly citizen like Dr. Jones will defend himself if attacked; and, as he was visiting a deserted old house at night, he might have taken it into his head to go armed. Certainly if anyone else was put on trial, it’s a theory the defence would raise. And argue that it was, perhaps Dr. Jones himself who began it. I suppose you can’t tell me anything about him the man Tails has been seen talking to, I mean?”