by Sapper
“Sorry, old lad,” boomed Drummond, coming back into the centre of the room. “Carry on, Ted.”
“One moment,” interrupted Hardcastle. “I’m sure you don’t want to ask my daughter anything, Inspector, and she must be tired. Go to bed, honey: go to bed.”
“Well, if the Inspector will allow me, I think I will,” she said.
“Certainly, miss,” he said. “ If I do want to ask you anything I will do so tomorrow. Now, sir” – he turned to Jerningham as Hardcastle led the Comtessa upstairs – “will you fire ahead?”
He listened to the story, taking copious notes, whilst Drummond studied the third man covertly.
“By Gad! Peter,” he whispered after a while. “Number Three looks, if possible, a bigger tough than the other two. What’s that you say, Inspector?”
“This gentleman says that it was you who identified the man as Morris. How did you know him?”
“By the red scar on his face,” said Drummond. “Two warders this afternoon described him to me. And afterwards he admitted it.”
“And you knew the clothes were the clothes of the murdered man. How?”
“Because I saw them on Marton this afternoon, when he lost his way in the fog and came to Merridale Hall instead of here,” answered Drummond. “They were so obviously London clothes that I noticed them particularly. When you catch him you’ll see what I mean.”
“I guess the Inspector will have to take it on trust,” said the newcomer shortly. “That was the guy right enough: the scar proves it. Say, mister” – he turned to Drummond – “when he bolted was he wearing a hat?”
“He was not,” remarked Drummond.
“Then that settles it. He’s cheated the hangman all right. He went bathing in Grimstone Mire.”
“What’s that?” said Drummond slowly. “You say he fell into Grimstone Mire?”
“Yep,” answered the other. “There can’t be two birds like him loose. I was in the garage tinkering with the car when I heard someone crashing about in the bushes near by. So I went out and flashed a torch around. Suddenly I saw him: a wild-looking fellow without a hat and a great red scar on his face. He bolted like a hare towards the Mire, and I went after him to try to stop him, but I couldn’t do anything in the fog. And in he went – splosh. Let out one yell, and then it was all over.”
“An amazing development, isn’t it, Captain Drummond?” said Hardcastle, who had rejoined them.
“Most amazing,” agreed Drummond. “However, as you say, it saves the hangman a job.”
And at that moment the constable let out a yell.
“Look at the top of the stairs, sir!”
They all swung round and stared upwards. Standing motionless in the dim light was a woman dressed in black. Her hair was grey; one arm was outstretched, pointing towards them. And the only thing that seemed alive in her were her two eyes that gleamed from her dead-white face.
For a few seconds they all stood rooted to the ground; then very slowly, almost as if she was floating on air, the woman receded, and disappeared from sight.
“What the devil?” cried Hardcastle, and the next instant he dashed up the stairs, followed by the others. For a scream of terror had come from the Comtessa’s room.
It was Hardcastle who reached it first, to find that the door was locked.
“Honey,” he shouted. “Honey: open the door. Are you all right?”
There was no reply, and in a frenzy he beat on the door with his fists. But the wood was stout, and it was not until they had all charged it several times with their shoulders that it began to show signs of giving. At last the bolt tore away from its fastening and in a body they surged into the room.
The Comtessa was lying on the bed clad in pyjamas. She was motionless, and Hardcastle rushed to her and picked her up.
“It’s only a faint, boys,” he cried. “Get some brandy.”
But even as he spoke, with a shuddering sigh the Comtessa opened her eyes. For a moment she stared in bewilderment at the group of men; then suddenly they dilated with terror.
“Where is she?” she screamed. “What is she?”
“There, there, honey,” said Hardcastle, “it’s quite all right now. Tell your old Dad what frightened you.”
“Oh! it was horrible,” she moaned. “I was just getting into bed when a hand touched me on the shoulder. A woman was standing there – a woman in black with grey hair. Her arm was stretched out pointing at me – and her eyes–”
She began to shudder violently.
“They seemed to shine like balls of fire. And then, while I was looking at her in amazement, she just vanished. She was standing just where you are, Captain Drummond, and she disappeared.”
Hardcastle looked significantly at the other men; then he turned soothingly to his daughter.
“Perhaps you imagined it, honey: maybe it was a trick of the light.”
“But it wasn’t,” she cried wildly. “And Mr Jerningham said this room was haunted, didn’t you?”
She appealed to him, and he nodded.
“That’s right, Comtessa,” he agreed.
“It was a ghost,” she went on. “It must have been a ghost. It must have been her the convict saw. Oh, let me get out of this room! I can’t stop here another moment. And never again after tomorrow will I set foot inside this house.”
“Honey, don’t take on so,” implored her father. “Even if it was a ghost, the poor thing didn’t do you any harm. Come into your Dad’s room, and he’ll stop with you till you’re all right again.”
He put his arm round her waist, and led her gently out, whilst the others, after a brief pause, trooped down into the hall again.
Well, if that don’t beat cock-fighting, gentlemen,” said the Inspector, scratching his head. “I take it we all saw the woman or the ghost or whatever it was.”
“Very clearly,” agreed Drummond.
“And, gentlemen, the lady’s door was locked. Locked on the inside. It must have gone clean through the wood.”
Slingsby lit a cigarette with a puzzled frown.
“I guess,” he said, “that I’m a converted man. Up till now I’ve regarded any guy who got chatting about ghosts as dippy. And now, damn it, I’ve seen one with my own eyes. Gosh! it gave me the creeps.”
“She is quieter now,” said Hardcastle, coming down the stairs. “I’ve given her a dose of sleep dope. And the first thing that I guess I owe is an apology to you, Captain Drummond, for my sneering remark about ghosts earlier in the evening.”
“Don’t mention it, Mr Hardcastle,” answered Drummond. “We are all of us wiser and more tolerant men, I trust, after the amazing escapade of psychic phenomena we have just witnessed.”
Darrell glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, but his face was expressionless.
“Moreover, as my daughter says, it does seem to bear out part of Morris’ story,” went on Hardcastle. “If we saw it, so may he have done.”
“That’s so, sir,” said the Inspector. “But there’s one point we mustn’t forget. A ghost can go through a closed door: we’ve seen it happen. But a ghost can’t carry a suit of clothes through a closed door: a ghost can’t carry anything at all.”
He glared round the group as if challenging anyone to contradict him.
“That being so,” he continued, “we still have not accounted for Morris having on the murdered man’s clothes.”
“That’s very true,” agreed Hardcastle. “Don’t you think so, Penton?”
The third man rolled his cigar from one side of his mouth to the other before replying.
“I guess I don’t know what to think,” he remarked at length. “I’m with Jake in what he said. The whole thing is a new one on me.”
“Anyway, gentlemen,” said the Inspector, “clothes or no clothes
, one thing is certain: no ghost can murder a man, certainly not by bashing his head in.”
“I suppose that’s a fair assumption,” said Penton.
“Very well, then: let’s disregard the ghost for a moment, and I think we can reconstruct what happened. Morris broke in, and in all probability thought the place was empty. All you gentlemen were out: only Mr Marton was in the house. Maybe he came downstairs, thinking it was one of you returning, and Morris attacked him. Marton fled and Morris pursued him, finally doing him to death in the room above. Then he changed clothes, came down and found the supper spread out. While he was in the room he suddenly saw the ghost, which terrified him so much that he daren’t leave. And there you other gentlemen found him. To his dismay, you recognised his clothes, and the blood on the ceiling showed him the game was up. Half tipsy with beer, and with the thought of the ghost in his mind, he said the first story that came into his head.”
“That sounds very feasible,” said Hardcastle: “very feasible indeed.”
“Another point that goes to prove it,” continued the Inspector, “was his great reluctance to go upstairs and look at the body – a well-known characteristic of murderers. That’s what happened, gentlemen, or as near to what happened as we are ever likely to get now the man is dead. I don’t wonder, sir” – he turned to Drummond – “that you were taken in for a bit. You didn’t know that there wasn’t a caretaker in the house: besides, it’s amazing the yarns these old lags will spin.”
“So it seems,” answered Drummond. “By the way, has the weapon with which Marton was murdered been discovered?”
“Not yet. He probably threw it out of the window, and I’ll have the ground searched thoroughly tomorrow morning. Then we’ll have his fingerprints and absolute proof.”
“Look here, Mr Inspector,” said Hardcastle in a rather hesitating voice, “I don’t know if what I’m going to suggest is very irregular, but if it is you must put it down to my ignorance of the law. Now I take it we are all agreed that Morris murdered Marton in some such manner as you described, and then blundered into Grimstone Mire. At any rate, Morris can never be brought to trial. Wal – I’ve just obtained a lease of this house; I’m engaged in certain scientific researches, and I must frankly admit I don’t want to be disturbed. Now what I want to know is this: is it necessary to say anything about this ghost? I quite understand that if Morris wasn’t dead it would be impossible not to allude to it: he would tell the same story he told Captain Drummond. But now that he is dead, are we defeating the ends of justice in any way if we keep our mouths shut about it? It can do neither Morris nor Marton any good, and the only result that is going to happen is that this house will be surrounded with swarms of journalists and sightseers.”
A faint smile twitched round Drummond’s lips, but his face was in the shadow.
“In addition to that,” Hardcastle continued, “though naturally such a thing will not deter us if it is our duty to speak, I’m sadly afraid we’re all of us going to have our legs pulled nearly off. We have seen it – we know; but that’s a very different thing from convincing somebody else. If we hadn’t been here tonight, would we have believed it if we’d been told it? Your police are second to none in the world, but they’re a hard-headed body of men. And I can’t help thinking, Inspector, that you’re going to come in for the hell of a lot of chaff from your brother officers. What do you say, Captain Drummond?”
“Don’t you think,” Drummond murmured, “that in a case of such remarkable psychic interest we ought to get in touch with that jolly old society that goes spook-hunting?”
“I do not,” said the other firmly. “If, in the interests of justice, the Inspector considers we must speak – that’s one thing. But I flatly refuse to have bunches of people sitting all over the place on the chance of seeing something.”
“I quite see your point,” agreed Drummond pleasantly. “I believe most of ’em are trained to the house, but it would be deuced boring to have an ancient professor permanently in the bathroom. Well, well – the Inspector must decide. Do we burble of ghosts or do we not?”
The Inspector cleared his throat. Until Hardcastle’s remarks, that aspect of the case had not struck him. Now it did – forcibly. No one knew better than he did that there was an enormous amount in what had been said. He could imagine the headlines in the papers: “Police Inspector sees Ghost. New Scope of Activity for Scotland Yard.” And even nearer ahead, the thought of telling his own Chief Constable – a retired Major of unimaginative temperament – was not one that he relished. If only the constable wasn’t there it would be so much easier. And then a sudden inspiration came to him – a perfect way out of the dilemma. He cleared his throat again.
“I think we can look at it this way, gentlemen,” he remarked. “The crime we are investigating began with the death of Morris in Grimstone Mire. Nothing that has happened subsequent to that can have any bearing on the crime. In other words, the fact that we saw this ghost has nothing whatever to do with the matter. It lends a certain air of truth to part of Morris’ rigmarole, I agree: and, as you said, Mr Hardcastle, if he were still alive it would be our duty to say what we had seen. But as he isn’t, it is a thing which it seems to me does not come within the scope of enquiry. Naturally, Captain Drummond will have to state what was said by Morris to him and his friends, but at that I think we are entitled to leave it. It is no part of the duty of the police to cause inconvenience to law-abiding citizens, and I quite understand that you, sir, would find it most annoying to have crowds of inquisitive people all round the house.”
“Good,” said Drummond. “The oracle has spoken: ghosts are off. And that being so, I think we might go home, Ted, and hit the hay. My kindest regards, Mr Hardcastle, to the Comtessa, and I sincerely hope that the little wanderer is laid for tonight, at any rate. But you must certainly rope her in for the cinema work your daughter tells me you are interested in. Damned good performer, and no screw to pay. Night, night, souls: we shall doubtless hear, Inspector, when and where our presence is desired.”
And it was not until they reached the main road that he spoke again.
“There’s no doubt about it, boys,” he said, “that that little bunch of beauties is pretty high up in the handicap. It’s a pleasure to have met them. There’s a calm nerve about their doings which beats the band. It’s gorgeous. And having shown us the damned old ghost, the subtle way Hardcastle got round the Inspector was a delight. The actual suggestion to say nothing about it came much better from the police than from anyone else.”
“I gathered from your face you were a bit sceptical about the spectre,” said Darrell.
“Sceptical!” laughed Drummond. “I should say. For a moment I admit I was taken in: the thing was staged so well. And I’d been going on the assumption that there was only one female in the house. But then I went back to our one basic idea – that Morris was speaking the truth. And that being so, the Inspector’s profound statement that a ghost can’t carry a suit of clothes on its arm assumes a rather different complexion from what the worthy warrior intended. That was the woman whom Morris saw, and who gave him the clothes. And having done her little piece at the top of the stairs, she backed into ‘honey’s’ room, who then bolted the door and let out an ear-splitter. Meanwhile, the ghost vanishes through some secret panel, and that’s that.”
“Probably you’re right, old boy,” said Jerningham. “But for the life of me I can’t see their object in doing it.”
“That’s what I was trying to get at, Ted, all the time we were in the hall. And I think it’s this way. Their original plan miscarried owing to our being there, and so they had to amend it. They knew the police would arrive shortly, and that from then on there would always be at least one constable in the house. They knew also that we should mention the woman, which would cause awkward questions. So the first thing they do is to send the Comtessa along after us – I saw the marks of footstep
s leaving that panel in the hall – partially to find out what we were going to say, and partially to sustain the bluff that she had been in Plymouth. Now, since that cry we heard was almost certainly Morris in Grimstone Mire, the sweet thing must have known of his death before she saw us. And, incidentally, I wonder if he fell or was pushed: his death was a godsend to them. However, to continue – back we go with the lady, who is suitably greeted by dear Dad, once more registering her absence in Plymouth. Then what about the other woman? If ‘honey’ was in Plymouth, what about the female Morris said he saw? Where was she? Or was it a complete invention? Great idea – stage her as a ghost; and, as I said before, they staged her damned well.”
“Do you really think we ought to let them get away with it?” said Darrell.
“How can we prevent it, old boy? If Morris wasn’t dead, I’d agree with you: he may have been a swine, but we couldn’t have let the poor blighter swing without making an effort to save him. But now he’s dead, what’s the use of worrying? Put it how you will, the only thing we can say is that we believed his story. Who cares? We should merely be regarded as gullible mugs. No, our line is to pretend that we are in complete agreement with the theory put forward by the Inspector, and once the inquest is over set to work from the other end. I’m inclined to think that if there are any survivors left at all of the firm of Marton, Peters and Newall, we might be able to get on to something.”
“I’m just wondering,” said Jerningham, “if by chance that is one Dick Newall with whom I’ve played a lot of golf. As far as I remember, he is a legal bird of sorts.”
“The rum thing, to my mind, is what they’re doing down here at all,” said Darrell, as they turned in at the gate of Merridale Hall.
“The solution of that little problem, old lad,” cried Drummond, “may possibly prove to be the solace of our declining years. But don’t forget that the one essential thing is to make that bunch believe that they’ve fooled us. We’ve got to do a bit in the acting line ourselves. For, unless I’m much mistaken, the situation is this at the moment. They know they’ve bluffed the Inspector: they’re not certain about us. And it therefore behoves us to allay their maidenly fears. Even as the trout swallows the mayfly, so must we swallow their little effort. And that is going to entail a certain discretion at the inquest: I should loathe to get it in the neck for perjury.”