by J. V. Turner
‘Admirably so. Did you know Paling’s capacity for money?’
‘Not a fraction of it. I only knew his type. Edgar used to come to me with his troubles from time to time—not as a lawyer, but as a friend; and he told me of some of the payments he had made. That’s what made me advise him to fight Paling. But I hadn’t the ghost of an idea that he’d parted with half his fortune until I began to look into his affairs as executor.’
‘You knew enough to know that he couldn’t keep pace with Paling?’
‘I knew that Paling was a blackmailer, and that it’s the hall-mark of the type to double the demands, and then redouble them.’
‘Have it so. And even if I am to assume that Ferguson is a fool—’
Curtis interrupted with an unusual brusqueness:
‘You are to assume nothing of the kind. It is unfair to say that, or anything like it, about Ferguson.’ He flung his cigarette into the fireplace, and poured out another drink.
‘Oh, I’m not trying to be offensive,’ said Amos. ‘Still, my point is not unimportant. I’ve drawn my own deductions about the lawsuit, even though I know next to nothing about it. You carry your deductions further than I dared go, and your addition is one that I can’t under any circumstance disregard. Let me present you with a personal problem. How is it that a man who can make such a helpful suggestion failed to see the relevance of the information you’ve been giving?’
‘A searching question, Petrie.’ There was something like approval in the nod with which Curtis accompanied the concession. He was no longer irritated. Neither was he embarrassed, nor apologetic for not having seen the point. ‘I think your question disregards the vital importance of what I did not know.’
‘Meaning that you were viewing the whole problem from an angle distorted by partial possession of the facts?’
‘Precisely. But your question has set me delving into my mental processes in a way I find interesting. As the thoughts were mostly unconscious—sub-conscious, if you like—it isn’t altogether easy to reconstruct them now. But let me try.’
Petrie poured some whisky into his glass, and squirted soda to the top. Curtis watched him suspiciously.
‘Trying to drink plain soda water while I take whisky, Petrie?’
‘Not at all. I’m a beer drinker pure and simple. Don’t like short drinks. Now what about this reconstruction?’
‘Here we go. Start with this. During Edgar Reardon’s life I could see that my advice about making a fight of it with Paling was not being taken. Add that when I came to look into his affairs everything suggested that he had yielded to Paling right up to the end. There were quite recent payments, and the aggregate was staggering. Now in the ordinary way I don’t expect a blackmailer to turn murderer. It is against his interest and against his nature. Generally speaking the blackmailing mind does not run to violence. Therefore, the extortion and the murder remain distinct in my mind. There are other things, vague things, in my mind, but those two stand out distinct. The murder and the blackmail are things apart, like this cigarette and this glass of whisky. Am I clear so far?’
‘Definitely. Your legal brain is working well.’
‘Right. Then I hear of the threatened lawsuit. Now that to me does not stand out as a thing apart. Just as the blackmail might be represented by this cigarette, and the murder by the whisky so, to me, does the lawsuit compare with the soda in the whisky. Take the soda. Its neutral tint, its flatness of taste, and, above all, its stillness, make it sufficiently difficult to recognise as the ingredient that gives pungency to this drink. So I associate the lawsuit with the murder.
‘Very well. Next thing I hear is that Paling has been detained on suspicion. That’s a new idea, and it sets things moving inside my head. From the clouds in my brain a streak of lightning leaps, linking things that had previously been separate and distinct. I can’t tell you how that flash started unless it sprang from something I had unconsciously observed. As I look back it occurs to me that I’ve often noticed peculiarities in the people who submit to blackmail. Why they don’t go the sensible way about it and inform the police I don’t know. But they don’t. Generally they stand a terrible lot, and then do something utterly surprising. Mostly they go to the police when they’re utterly ruined, and have nothing else to lose. Reardon, of course, did not do that. I said they act surprisingly. His surprise lay in the recoupment of his losses by an abuse of his position. When he had done that I can imagine him saying to himself, “Now I’ve thrown everything overboard. But I’m going to get away with it. Have I done it for Paling’s benefit, or my own?”’
‘That’s not improbable,’ granted Petrie. He was sitting tensely, following the theory with concentrated attention.
‘It is not improbable. It is just possible that it may be right. But is it obvious? That is what I will ask you, Petrie.’
Curtis smoked while Petrie played with his glass. He seemed disappointed to discover that Amos had no intention of answering the question. The little man started on a new tack.
‘You’ve spoken a good deal about blackmail.’
‘I think that’s the right description although I wouldn’t use it to anyone else. In other circumstances I would not have used it now except that I was instructed—even ordered—before I came in here that I had to speak plainly, that it was an essential condition of our interview.’
‘I appreciate the way in which you’ve opened your mind to me. I am grateful. There is something puzzling me very considerably. I have heard about Reardon’s stay down at Milford. I understand you took dinner with him most nights. Tell me, wasn’t there any sign of this trouble between the pair of them at Milford?’
‘I knew of the trouble, of course. But unless I’m an awful duffer there was nothing special to be seen.’ He paused, stared at his glass, and added: ‘No, I can’t recollect anything.’
‘That rather tells against your theory, doesn’t it?’
Dick Curtis waved his hand as an amused protest.
‘Oh, have a heart, Petrie. I never put it forward as more than a guess. Don’t saddle me with all your difficulties. I’m not the leading counsel for the prosecution. You’re giving me his work without fees!’
‘I want to make the most of you while I’ve got you in here.’
Curtis shot another tot of whisky into his glass, and raised it aloft with a smile. Petrie bowed towards him.
‘Since I’m feeling both thirsty, and charitable,’ announced Curtis, ‘I’ll give you until the end of the Prime Minister’s whisky. If you don’t regard that as a gesture of marked generosity I shall regard you as a dissatisfied man.’
CHAPTER XV
A MISSING DOCUMENT
PETRIE looked at his whisky as though calculating how long it would last. His own toll on the bottle had been light. But Curtis had helped himself with a heavier hand, and blood was beginning to suffuse his cheeks.
‘If Paling murdered Reardon,’ said Amos slowly, ‘it seems to me most extraordinary that there should be no row, no noticeable friction even, in those eventful days at Milford.’
‘It would be,’ agreed Dick Curtis, ‘and I don’t say nothing happened. All I can say is that neither Ferguson nor myself noticed any sign of it. Paling dined with us each night, and, so far as we could see, everything was as it had always been. Paling wasn’t exactly the best company in the world. But judging from his attitude while at Milford you wouldn’t suspect him of having anything on his mind.’
‘Would you say the same about Reardon?’
‘He seemed apparently untroubled, and quite cheerful.’
‘To you—with your inside knowledge—they must have seemed an amazingly odd pair.’
‘They did,’ replied Curtis emphatically. ‘I looked and wondered.’
‘What made you wonder?’
‘That there was nothing more to wonder about.’ Curtis’ eyes twinkled as he raised his glass.
‘If you carry on like this much longer,’ said the little man, ‘I’ll be feeling l
ike a white mouse in a revolving cage. My dear Curtis, it is information I want—not mental exercise.’
‘So be it. I can condense what you want to know into a sentence. There was so little restraint between the two that Edgar had the bad taste to get drunk one night at Milford.’
‘That’s better. At least you’ve opened the door of my cage. That certainly doesn’t sound like the action of a man living in fear.’
‘No, Petrie. It did not. I thought that at the time.’ Amos fastened on the change of tense.
‘You think now it might be reconciled with what happened afterwards?’
‘If I guessed hard, I think it might. But you’ll want more than my guesses if ever you go before a jury.’
‘I know, I know,’ sighed Petrie; ‘but we’re not in Court. Fire away.’
For a moment Curtis eyed his companion curiously.
‘You seem to have an unnatural passion for guesses, Petrie. Do you plaster conundrums over everyone you talk to about murder?’
‘To all who might assist me. It helps to straighten out my ideas.’
‘Well, I’ll humour your appetite for guesses. Let me offer three possibilities. Guess One: Edgar Reardon was really frightened, and he drank either to hide or drown his fright. In either case he overstepped the mark. But his condition was exceptional. It wasn’t that he ordinarily drank much, but he usually carried it well. Guess Two: There hadn’t been any breach between them right up to the time they left Milford, and it only occurred in the car on the way home—’
‘Wait one second. Reardon saw Paling in his private room here later on the same day. Work that into your theory.’
Dick Curtis threw his hands in the air.
‘My dear Petrie, it’s for you to judge whether there’s anything or nothing in my guesses. I’m only playing a parlour game because you asked me to. As they say abroad, I overrule your objection as incompetent, irrelevant, and a breach of the rules of the game. But I offer you a third possibility. I suggest that the breach may have occurred, but that for different reasons both Reardon and Paling were both anxious to conceal it. And now, if you’re not satisfied with anyone of my three guesses the Lord help you for I can’t!’
‘Do you think the third guess likely?’
‘I certainly consider it possible.’
‘Why?’
‘Remember the conditions on which these two people had lived for a considerable time—Paling quietly bleeding his victim, and Reardon fighting a losing battle to avert ruin, and save his political position. The one thing on which they were united all that time was to cover everything under a mask of friendship until the time came for the final break. I was told enough to qualify me to give advice. But Mrs Reardon, constantly with her husband, frequently meeting Paling, never knew definitely that there was anything wrong. She’s told me since that she suspected it. But she didn’t know. All she did was to sense it. No outsider could even have done that. Why, when I gave a hint of it to Ferguson he wouldn’t believe me.’
‘I was going to ask you about that. It seems to me extraordinary, almost unbelievable, that you should leave a man like Paling—since you knew his character—in a position in which he could acquaint himself with the contents of the Budget papers. Explanation?’
‘I dare not have done anything, Petrie. It was a terrible position for me. That was why in Reardon’s own interests I was bound to throw a hint to Ferguson. Besides, it wouldn’t have been fair to Ferguson to keep him entirely in the dark. We had been dining with Paling on the night when I dropped the hint—and that was the occasion when Reardon took too much to drink. Everyone knew that we had been in Edgar’s company during the week. If anything had happened as a result of that night we would both have been in the soup. That’s why I had to warn Ferguson.’
‘I can see that quite clearly. I agree with you. But what I want to know is the effect of your warning on Ferguson. After you had convinced him that your statement was true how did he respond?’
‘Very effectively—by rushing back to the hotel and grabbing all the papers he could lay his hands on. He took care of them that night. Precious good care too!’ Curtis smiled reminiscently.
‘You seem to have created quite a commotion in this little hotel.’
‘Not more than we could help.’
‘But because you couldn’t help yourself you told Ferguson that Paling was a blackmailer?’
Curtis made a gesture of deprecation, raised his glass, and smiled broadly as he looked at Amos over the top of it.
‘I see that even now,’ he said, ‘you do not realise the damnable awkwardness of my position. I was Reardon’s confidant—or thought I was. I had to keep the balance fair. It wouldn’t have done to give him away completely. That would have been doing exactly what Edgar feared Paling might do. It would have ruined him. Besides, it wasn’t necessary to use such a word as blackmailer.’
‘You just dropped a broad hint, and Ferguson’s fears did the rest?’
‘That’s just about the size of it. I tried to use tact.’
‘I must be dense. To me it all seems a most curious mix up. Still, I think I’ve got the position more clearly in my head than I ever had before. I suppose I’m right in thinking that Paling’s power to blackmail arose solely out of the existence of the French wife?’
‘That—and the attitude the English wife might take up if she knew. You must take the two together. They’re inseparable.’
‘Mrs Lola Reardon never knew about that first marriage?’
‘I think not. It wasn’t only the fear of a bigamy charge that scared Edgar. He had a vision of being hauled through the Divorce Courts. That would have been as bad for him as anything. In any case, no Cabinet could work with a man under suspicion of bigamy.’
‘I have heard very strong doubts expressed about the validity of that French marriage.’
‘No doubt you have. For what it’s worth to you that was the view taken by Edgar Reardon himself.’
‘Had he anything on which to base that view?’
‘Counsel’s opinion.’
‘I take it that you didn’t think much of that opinion?’
‘Oh, I don’t say that. I’m not a divorce lawyer. Also, I thought the point worth trying in a court of law. An opinion, after all, is only an opinion, and however good it might be Reardon couldn’t take advantage of it without facing a scandal.’
‘He might have used it as a weapon to keep Paling at bay.’
‘He might.’ Curtis threw back his head and laughed heartily.
‘Apparently you don’t think that Paling would have been impressed?’
‘Only with the need for haste. Why, man, he got eight thousand out of Reardon in the first three months of this year!’
The size of the figure, and the short space of time during which it was paid, made Amos blink.
‘That’s good going, Curtis. By itself it seems to indicate that a crisis was approaching. Don’t you think so?’
‘I’ve no doubt about it at all. In fact, you know, and I know, that it did cause a crisis of one kind. The question is. Did it also produce a determination to revolt? On that point I’ve helped you all I can. As I’ve told you before, it’s your pigeon after all.’
‘You think there is nothing to be deduced from his attitude towards the validity of the French marriage?’ persevered Petrie.
Curtis shook his head, and lit a cigarette.
‘No. I’m afraid not. What I saw was equally consistent with a determination to stave off the fight until his party went out of office. As a matter of fact, I sometimes thought that was his game.’
‘You mean he’d lost interest in the point of law?’
‘Not at all. Quite the contrary He spoke to me about it on the day of his death, and if he hadn’t died we’d have had another meeting to discuss the whole affair more fully. What I meant was that there was nothing more in existence at the time of his death than there had been before to suggest that he meant to make immediate use of it. Rather
complicated, but that’s the best I can do.’
‘Then why did he want to see you that day?’
‘Oh, he was always preparing for the fight, or persuading himself that he was. He said he had just received an opinion for which he had been waiting.’
Amos bent forward more eagerly, and fingered his handkerchief.
‘A favourable opinion?’ he asked.
‘So I understood. But you’ll have found it somewhere while the Yard men were searching his stuff. I hadn’t time to read it then, and I’ve never had an opportunity since.’
‘Sure it wasn’t at Milford he spoke to you about this opinion?’
‘Quite certain. He hadn’t got it then.’
‘And you are equally certain that he had it with him when you saw him on Budget Day?’
‘Absolutely, Petrie. I had the thing in my own hands, and I handed it back to him when we parted at the end of the Ministers’ Corridor.’
‘Do you happen to know who gave that opinion?’
‘Yes. Quiller.’ He stopped while Amos made a note of the name.
‘Carry on,’ said the little man. ‘That’s just the sort of thing I want to know. Tell me more.’
Curtis revolted at last. ‘Not me,’ he exclaimed. ‘I’ve talked myself dry because I thought you’d practically finished. But if you’re off on a new tack—’ He reached over for the whisky, poured a strong tot out for Petrie, another for himself, and lit another cigarette. Then he lolled back in his chair, tried to blow a smoke ring, and turned tolerantly to Petrie.
‘From your interest in the devastating Quiller I assume that his opinion has vanished?’