Crime at Christmas

by C. H. B. Kitchin

  He paused, and as I looked at him, with his black eye and strong hands which he kept clenching and unclenching, I felt somewhat uneasy. Suppose he really were the murderer of Dr Green and Mrs Harley! At all costs I must not show any suspicion of him, still less any timidity in his presence. The bell-switch was hanging near my pillow. I could ring for help if the worst came to the worst. But why should it – unless the fellow were a homicidal maniac? He looked so repulsive in his nervous state that I almost thought he might be.

  ‘Well,’ I asked, ‘what’s really worrying you? The stick?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ he said, ‘though it’s a beastly nuisance.’

  ‘I suppose,’ I said unwisely, ‘you can get your friend Charlesworth to come and support your story?’

  ‘You suppose so, do you!’ he replied angrily. ‘What does that mean? You think I’m a liar, do you, and have made the whole business up? I’d have you know I’m not used to being called a liar!’

  ‘For God’s sake be sensible!’ I said. ‘I’m only trying to help you – if you want help. I don’t really know why you’ve told me all this yet. I’m very tired and not at all at my brightest. I wish you’d get to the point.’

  ‘Sorry, Warren. I suppose I’m a bit upset too. This is the point. I’m worried about those notes the doctor made when I was talking to him on the Heath – all the figures he jotted down and certain names and so on. I see now I was a BF to gas away like that. He folded up the paper and put it in the notecase. What I want to do is to get hold of the paper – nothing else, mind – before any harm’s done. The Inspector was as close as an oyster with me. He got me talking all right, but he wasn’t giving anything away. Now, you’ve been a bit behind the scenes. Did you see or hear anything of the notecase?’

  ‘Yes, I did. When I left the body on the Heath I took the notecase with me, for fear it should be stolen. I gave it to the Inspector afterwards.’

  ‘Damn! If I’d only reached home sooner instead of jawing away to Ma Charlesworth I’d have got it by now!’

  I felt somewhat annoyed by his assumption that it would have been quite easy to make me part with the paper. However, nothing was to be gained by showing my resentment.

  ‘I suppose,’ I said with docility, ‘you didn’t mention the notecase to the Inspector?’

  ‘Of course I didn’t, directly, but I led him up to the subject rather smartly I thought.’

  (‘You poor boob!’ I said to myself.)

  ‘I asked him,’ he went on, ‘whether robbery could have been the motive, and he said he couldn’t say, but that it rather looked, when the police found the body, as if the pockets had been gone through. The old devil! And you’d given him back the notecase the whole time!’

  ‘There may have been other things missing apart from the notecase,’ I said. ‘A watch and chain, perhaps, or loose money.’

  ‘Anyhow,’ he answered savagely, ‘I’m in a rotten hole if the Inspector’s got the notecase.’

  ‘Come, come,’ I said, in rather an unnatural voice, I fear, ‘things aren’t so bad as all that. You haven’t done anything so very dreadful. We all become a little unguarded sometimes. I dare say once or twice I’ve let out things about my clients’ investments that I ought to have kept to myself. If I were you, I should speak quite frankly to the Inspector, and I’ve no doubt he’ll see that your indiscretion doesn’t lead to any harm.’

  My observations, somehow, seemed neither to satisfy him nor to comfort him. Then what did he expect me to say, I wondered? Did he think I had the notecase somewhere in the room? Again I became nervous of a violent outbreak. How could I get rid of him?

  ‘I’m sorry I can’t say any more,’ I went on, as he made no reply. ‘We must have a talk to-morrow if you still feel uneasy. Meanwhile, I think I ought to go to sleep. So ought you.’

  He walked up and down the room with his hands in his pockets. Then suddenly he came to the bed and said ungraciously: ‘Well, many thanks for listening to my story and all that. You might keep it to yourself, will you? I don’t want to worry Amabel about it. Good night.’

  He went out before I had time to answer.

  It was a quarter past one. For a time I sat, propped up against the pillow, with my light burning. Why had Dixon come to see me? Quite probably, because he wanted to let off steam and talk to someone. Did he really imagine that I shoud be able to help him to get the notecase? Did he think, making a lucky guess, that I had been through the pockets of the corpse? I felt thankful, indeed, that he had not come in a few hours earlier while I still had the notecase in my keeping – even if it was in the pocket of my overcoat downstairs. And what did he really want with the notecase? What really was this paper of which he was making so much fuss? I could not believe his story to be entirely false. It contained too many circumstantial details. Yet if it were true, why so much ado about nothing? The one point which had struck me as being rather grave was the finding of his stick by the body. And that hadn’t seemed to distress him much. The fact that he was comparatively light-hearted about this, made me tend to absolve him from any major share in the crime; for he was clearly not clever and not a good actor. My thoughts turned once more to the notecase. How lucky I had given it to the Inspector, though I could not help wishing I had taken a glance at its contents. Then suddenly I remembered that, when I had taken the case out of the breast pocket of the dead man’s coat, it had bulged with papers not properly stowed away in the compartments. When I took it out of my overcoat pocket it was relatively slim, and I could not recall any loose papers protruding from it. What had happened to these papers? Unless they were entirely the product of my imagination they must still be in my overcoat pocket.

  I jumped out of bed, locked the door, took my overcoat from the chair where the Inspector had laid it, turned out the left-hand pocket and found amongst a débris of bus tickets, concert programmes, receipts and fluff, two clean sheets of typewritten paper folded into four. I venture to say I should not have been human if I had not read them.

  A. B. Detective Agency,

  33 Baring Street,

  Baker Street, W.1.

  Re L. D.

  Probably the illegitimate son of Admiral Netherfield. Brought up by Miss Purvis (? his mother) at 99 d’Avigdor Road, Panham, near Gosport.

  Educated at local grammar school. Expelled for gross bullying.

  Joined Littlewood & Sons, big firm of horse-dealers.

  Served with distinction during the War (MC and bar).

  Shortly after the War went to Ceylon in employment of Messrs Watts & Wisney. Lived with native woman, who had a child by him. Scandal. Intemperate in habits. Struck one of the firm’s agents and dismissed.

  Returned to England three years ago. Became traveller for a firm manufacturing wireless components. Dismissed after six months. Had serious breakdown (drink) and was sent to institution.

  Discharged, cured, two years ago and obtained re-engagement with firm of horse-dealers. No trace since then of relapse into intemperance.

  Affairs, locally, with girl in sweet-shop, governess and chemist’s daughter.

  Kept in touch with War friends, among them being Captain Drew of Hampstead. Since leaving institution has paid several visits to London.

  Admiral Netherfield died last April, and it is thought that he left Miss Purvis a legacy of two thousand pounds. He had almost certainly been paying her an annuity for some years past.

  So that was Dixon’s dossier, I thought. In the face of such a testimonial, would Mr Quisberg consider him a fit husband for Amabel? No wonder Dixon had been eager to secure the paper in the notecase. Indeed, for a man of his temperament, it was almost a motive for murder. But there was his unconcern over the stick. Unless assumed, this did much to show him innocent. Had he assumed it? Again, I felt sure he had not. Though, no doubt, he had told me many lies, he had small gift for deception. Indeed, it was strange to find so crooked a nature accompanied by so small a gift for self-protection.

  I unlocked the door, put the docu
ment under my pillow, and turned out the light for the third time that night. Now should I sleep?

  ‘I am being carried,’ I began, ‘in a sedan-chair over the mountains of Thibet. Amongst the primulas in the valley is a snake, which coils its sleek body in and out of the green shoots, towards the edge of the cataract. All I can see is a waving of the golden flower-heads and a streak of dark blue passing, passing and repassing – for the snake has reached the cataract, quivers, and turns again – passing right down to the depths of that far valley . . .’

  *

  But though I slept at last, the night was not yet over. I awoke, quite suddenly, about four – that dismal hour when all the horrors of life and death crowd to the bedside – with a feeling of panic. Suppose, I thought, with a flash of instantaneous lucidity, Clarence James denies my story altogether. Suppose he declares that he was miles away from the Heath all the afternoon and produces a perfect alibi. What will happen to me then? Shall I not be the chief suspect – I, who led the police to the body in the traditional manner, with a trumped-up story? Suppose I never really saw Clarence at all, mistook a stranger for him, had a hallucination! Even if I were not convicted on the score of my extraordinary evidence, what kind of figure should I cut in after-life when it became known that I had tried, quite wantonly, to implicate my hostess’s son in the crime?

  I felt hot with horror. It seemed impossible that when Clarence had his interview with the Inspector, he would say: ‘Yes, Warren is quite right. I directed him to the body.’ That was altogether too simple, too easy an escape for me. Would the morning never come? In my desperate agitation, I even thought of wandering about the house in my dressing-gown and trying to find Clarence’s room on the top floor. ‘You were there, weren’t you?’ I would say to him. ‘Promise me that you were and will tell the Inspector.’ He would think me mad. Or he might murder me, concealing crime with crime – for there was no doubt he was the murderer. Had he come in yet? Or was he hiding, still running wildly to Chinatown or the Docks? Gradually, as I thought of him in mad career through narrow streets and over riverside quays, he became a dark blue snake gliding among the primulas of Thibetan valleys. Fearfully, from my sedan-chair, I watched the wavy line of its curved progress, while the golden flower-heads bent and recovered in the bright mountain sunshine, and the cataract roaring over the crag drenched me with its clear spray.

  XV. Whitewashed Windows

  Sunday – 8 a.m.

  At eight Edwins brought me a cup of tea. I drank it, fell asleep and woke again three-quarters of an hour later, when he appeared with my breakfast.

  ‘Is Mr Clarence in?’ I asked, after I had said something about the weather.

  ‘No, sir. He never came home last night.’

  ‘And Mr Harley?’

  ‘Mr Harley got back about eleven, sir.’

  ‘And how is Mrs Quisberg?’

  ‘I’m told she’s no worse, sir. At least, I hope not. She was up with the master half the night, I hear.’

  ‘Oh, dear! I’m afraid that means he must be ill.’

  ‘I think it’s more worry and nerves than illness, sir, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Well, I mustn’t keep you any longer, Edwins. I really think I shall be able to manage for myself this morning. My wrist seems almost well again. I shall be quite ready for the Inspector if he wants to see me.’

  ‘Very good, sir. I’ll bring him up as soon as he asks for you.’

  *

  The sobering influence of morning had routed some of my more fantastic nightmares, and I ate my breakfast not without pleasure. Indeed, now that I thought the crisis near at hand, I felt detached from it as if I were following it in the newspapers. As to my own position, I felt more assured. The fact that Clarence James had been away all night seemed to show that my meeting with him on the Heath was not a hallucination on my part. Yet, if he confirmed my story, would he be suspect? Murderers, we are told, often have charming characters. I was not very sensible to the charm of Clarence James, but I could not conceive him as a murderer, and was even distressed at the thought of his being one. Then there was Dixon. My imagination was again becoming unpleasantly feverish when the Inspector came in.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said urbanely. ‘I do hope you slept well.’

  ‘Not at all well,’ I answered. ‘I’m a mass of nerves. I look to you to soothe me.’

  He smiled.

  ‘I’ll try, though my time is terribly short. In fact, you may find me almost brusque. Perhaps, in order to emphasise the confidential relations that I want to exist between us, I may begin by giving you a piece of news. For the time being, it must go no further. If you tell anyone, I shall know! It’s about Mrs Harley. I had the body re-examined last night, and it is now quite established that she sustained injuries which could not have been caused only by her fall.’

  I can’t whistle, but I made as if to do so.

  ‘What injuries were these?’

  ‘Her neck was broken, but not by impact on the balcony or balcony railing.’

  ‘You mean, it was broken before she fell?’

  ‘Yes. Unless someone chose to break it for her afterwards – but that is hardly reasonable, is it?’

  ‘Then she was murdered?’

  ‘That is what I am indicating.’

  ‘But why? What motive? Of all the innocent and nondescript persons . . . Does Harley inherit anything on her death?’

  ‘How wicked you are! I don’t know, but I shouldn’t think it would be very much. Her life, of course, might have been insured. But surely Harley was away in London during the whole night?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s almost a rule to suspect all alibis, isn’t it?’

  The Inspector laughed, and then went on seriously: ‘You were present, weren’t you, when he heard the news?’

  ‘Yes, it was a painful scene.’

  ‘Did his grief strike you as assumed?’

  ‘Far from it.’

  ‘Then I think we can take it as genuine. I refuse to believe that ordinary people can simulate really deep emotions – at all events, before an intelligent audience. No, I don’t fancy somehow that Mrs Harley’s little savings, or her insurance money, were the motive of this crime.’

  ‘Then what could it have been?’

  ‘I don’t know yet. It’s not impossible that you will discover it yourself. If so, I rely on you to confide in me.’

  ‘Me? I?’

  ‘Yes – with your quickness of perception and your close relations with this family, you have chances that I haven’t got.’

  ‘I’m a bad spy.’

  He laughed, perhaps to hide a momentary annoyance.

  ‘Oh dear, this amour-propre of yours! However, I am quite content to leave it to your conscience – or, if you’re too modern to have a conscience, to your good taste and sense of propriety. So much for that. Now what secrets have you to tell me?’

  ‘When you had gone last night I remembered that when I gave you Dr Green’s notecase it was quite thin, while, when I took it from the body, it had bulged with some loose papers. I searched in my overcoat pocket and found this document.’

  I took the folded sheets from under my pillow and gave them to the Inspector, who read them without comment.

  ‘Thank you. Anything more?’

  ‘No other papers. I had a visitor during the night – Leonard Dixon. He gave me a long account of his doings from the time he set off for his walk with Dr Green, and seemed most anxious to get possession of some private memoranda which the doctor had made as a result of their talk.’

  ‘Well, that’s plain sailing, isn’t it, in view of the contents of this letter?’

  I felt grateful to him for assuming that it had been quite proper for me to read through the document before handing it over.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Dixon had a strong motive . . .’

  ‘For murder?’

  ‘I meant for trying to get the paper back.’

  ‘And for murder?’

  ‘N
ot strong enough for murder in cold blood, perhaps, but—’

  ‘For a sudden blow with that heavy stick of his, you mean?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Don’t worry. You’re not convicting any fellow creature. My own mind is not entirely without agility. Well, I must leave you, refreshing though this conversation is.’

  ‘One little point, Inspector. Suppose Clarence James does not corroborate my story?’

  ‘Oh, but he will! Don’t distress yourself about that.’

  ‘I’m told he didn’t come back here last night.’

  ‘No. We know where he is, though. He spent the night with an artist friend in Bloomsbury. The friend rang us up. I’m going to pay them a visit soon. Now, I should get up if I were you, and take a stroll in the garden. Don’t worry, but think intelligently. We’ll have another talk later on. Good-bye.’

  *

  By the time I had bathed, shaved and dressed, it was half past ten. As I crossed the landing to go downstairs, I heard loud voices in the drawing-room and, quite shamelessly, did my best to overhear. The first words I caught were spoken by Amabel.

  ‘You,’ she shouted, ‘calling yourself a nurse! You’re nothing but a common little gold-digger!’

  There was such an ill-bred anger in the reply that I could hardly believe it was the nurse who spoke.

  ‘Who are you, Miss Amabel, to talk like that, I should like to know? What about the stick that was found by the body? Whose was that? You ask your precious boy friend! A fine pair you are, the two of you, racketing about together all night, coming home drunk and letting off fireworks at two in the morning, with illness in the house! You’ll cut a pretty figure in the witness-box, you will.’

  ‘At any rate,’ began the answer, ‘I’m not a common—’ The rest was, perhaps, luckily, drowned, for the nurse interrupted, and for a moment or two the whole house seemed to be filled with recriminations. Then suddenly the door opened and the nurse, pale with rage, rushed on to the landing and upstairs, without seeing me, while from the drawing-room came the sound of angry sobs.