Take No Farewell - Retail

by Robert Goddard

  I was breakfasting with the Pombalhos in the dining-room of the Green Dragon this morning shortly after nine o’clock, trying and failing to find some words with which to lift their spirits, when, to my surprise, I saw Hermione Caswell threading through the tables towards us. There was an urgency to her progress and an edge to her expression that told me something remarkable had happened before she had even spoken a word.

  At Hermione’s insistence, I left the Pombalhos and accompanied her to a small writing-room at the rear of the hotel. There, waiting for us, was the sort of man whom the staff of the Green Dragon would normally turn away at the door: malodorous and raggedly dressed with matted grey hair and a beard; clearly, a tramp. Hermione introduced him as Ivor Doak. Geoff having told me all about him, I wondered what on earth he could want with me. The answer was that he had something to tell me, something he had already told Hermione and which she considered to be of quite startling importance.

  Doak spent last night in a quiet doorway near the cathedral – one of his regular bolt-holes. This morning, whilst crossing the cathedral green, he noticed a discarded newspaper lying on the bench and picked it up to read. It was yesterday’s special edition of the Hereford Times, reporting Victor Caswell’s murder and Geoff’s arrest on suspicion of having poisoned him with arsenic. Doak read of this with something amounting to glee, since a painful death is exactly what he would have wished on the man who took Clouds Frome Farm away from him. But he was sorry to learn that Geoff might be made to answer for it, grateful as he has always been to him for his generosity of former times and ashamed that it was not put to better use.

  Doak’s sorrow was also tinged with incredulity. Here we came to the crux of his account. He is evidently a frequent visitor to the grounds of Clouds Frome, partly out of nostalgia, partly to prove he does not accept that the land has ceased to be his. Victor’s recent measures to deter intruders he viewed with scorn and negotiated with ease. He frequently spends a night bedded down in one of the out-buildings, usually one of those in the kitchen garden. (He suspects Banyard has long known this, but has turned a blind eye to it.) His choice, on Monday night of last week, was the fruit house, where food as well as warmth is to be found. His slumbers, on this occasion, were disturbed. He has a keen ear and the light sleeping habits of a man used to being turned out of his bed. It was not, he emphasized, the first time he had been roused by suspicious comings and goings at Clouds Frome.

  Somebody was moving around stealthily outside the fruit house. Doak edged open the door and, in the moonlight, saw a figure standing a few yards away by one of the lean-to sheds which run along the north wall of the kitchen garden. As Doak watched, the figure opened the door and entered. Once inside, he removed the lid from a tin – Doak heard the distinctive sound – and, a few moments later, replaced it. Then he reappeared, closed the shed and stole away.

  Curious, Doak waited until all was quiet, then went over and looked in the shed. There were two identical tins of Weed Out standing near the entrance. It was one of these the fellow had opened, presumably for the purpose of removing some of the contents; contents used, as Doak well knew, in the poisoning of Victor, Marjorie and Rosemary Caswell last September. Nevertheless, he decided to do nothing about what he had seen. What business was it of his? If somebody wanted to make a second attempt on Victor’s life, Doak only wished them luck. He was delighted to read this morning of their success. All that worried him was the thought that a man who had once done him a substantial kindness should take the blame for it. Because Geoff is assuredly innocent. Of that Doak had no doubt. He hastened to Fern Lodge and told Hermione so (she being the only member of the Caswell family for whom he has any respect). The poisoner had to be the man he had seen that night in the kitchen garden: John Gleasure.

  As soon as Doak named Gleasure, my thoughts were assailed by a riot of responses ranging from elation to despair. At last we felt we knew who the murderer was. Consuela’s innocence was proven. And so was Geoff’s. How I regretted the doubts I had entertained about him. Then, all too swiftly, came the misgivings. Would the authorities believe Doak? Even if they did, would they agree that his evidence justified a reprieve for Consuela? Was it really good enough – or simply that worst of all possibilities, too little too late? Alas, I still do not know.

  At the time, one thing at least was clear to me. We had to make the most of what Doak had told us and we had to do so straightaway. We explained the significance of his account to the Pombalhos, then, leaving Dona Ilidia at the Green Dragon, hastened to Hereford police station, arriving shortly before ten o’clock. And there the delays and obstructions that have dogged us all day began.

  The officers on duty agreed that only Superintendent Weaver could help us. I remembered him from the trial as a slowly spoken, even-tempered model of a fair-minded policeman and my hopes rose at the mention of his name. But he was in conference with the Chief Constable and could not be disturbed. We reasoned, we pleaded, we demanded. But they would not yield. Eventually, Hermione announced that either Weaver was summoned to see us or she would interrupt his meeting herself; they would have to restrain her physically to prevent her. At this, they agreed to send in a note.

  Weaver emerged, clearly annoyed. But he listened patiently to Doak’s account. Then he questioned him at length. Time marched on. It was gone eleven before he conceded that the matter warranted further investigation. His problem, he freely admitted, was that conduct of the case had passed to Scotland Yard. It would be difficult for him to act without their approval, but the officer in charge, Chief Inspector Wright, was in Nice. He went away to consult the Chief Constable. He came back and said he would telephone Wright for advice. This seemed to take an age and resulted only in a French policeman telling him in fractured English that Wright was not available. He returned to the Chief Constable. Noon approached.

  Weaver’s mood had changed when he next appeared. Notwithstanding his reservations on the point, he was prepared to conduct a search of Gleasure’s room at Clouds Frome in the hope of turning up traces of arsenic or some other evidence to corroborate Doak’s statement. He had no search warrant, but was confident Danby would not stand in his way. Leaving Doak to dictate and sign a formal statement, we set off with him at once.

  Thus my first visit to the house Geoff designed took place in circumstances which drove all architectural considerations from my mind. Gleasure’s modest bed-sitting room was subjected to the meticulous attentions of Weaver and two assistants whilst Hermione, Pombalho and I looked on. The room did not seem likely to yield many secrets, for it was apparent that the occupant was a man of neat habits and few possessions. I frankly did not expect anything of an incriminating nature to be found. Nor, in all probability, would it have been but for Pombalho standing on an exceptionally squeaky floor-board. When the carpet was pulled back, two saw-cuts, enabling a short section of the board to be lifted out, became visible. In the cavity beneath, wedged between the joists, was an old biscuit-tin. It contained an assortment of greetings cards – birthday, Christmas, Valentine – and a letter. The cards were still in their envelopes, written in the same hand and bearing postmarks covering a period from the autumn of 1910 to the summer of 1911. They were addressed to Gleasure and signed (if at all) ‘L’, accompanied by expressions of fondest love for ‘dearest John’. The letter, by contrast, was addressed to Peter Thaxter, care of Gloucester Prison; it had been posted on 19 July 1911. I knew it at once from the forged version Geoff had shown me, but this – as the handwriting on the cards confirmed – was the genuine article: Lizzie Thaxter’s farewell note to her brother.

  Weaver could remember Lizzie’s suicide very well. Now, at last, he learned the reason for it. He also learned that Victor Caswell was in large measure responsible for it and that Gleasure and Lizzie had been secret sweethearts. Thus, at a stroke, a motive for murder presented itself: revenge for a lost love. All the fragments of the mystery were re-assembling themselves before us. Malahide must have sold Lizzie’s letter to G
leasure, thus acquainting him with the ugly truth about Lizzie’s death. The man he had served faithfully for years had driven his beloved to suicide. Small wonder he had resolved to kill him.

  We were back at Hereford police station by half past two. From there Weaver telephoned Wright again and this time succeeded in speaking to him. Wright undertook to question Gleasure immediately and to search his room at the Villa d’Abricot. With the superintendent’s proposal to contact the Home Office he was in complete agreement. ‘It’s settled then,’ said Weaver. ‘We’ll recommend a reprieve in the strongest possible terms.’ If only it had been settled, genuinely so. But the superintendent, as we were to discover, had spoken too soon. He went into conference with the Chief Constable once more, emerging at length with the news that the Permanent Under-Secretary of State was prepared to consider new evidence if it could be laid before him by seven o’clock that evening. There was nothing for it, then, but a dash to London.

  Before setting off, I telephoned Windrush and explained the situation to him. He undertook to alert Sir Henry and to meet us at the Home Office. Hermione elected to remain in Hereford, where she thought she could most usefully be employed in calming Jacinta and Dona Ilidia. Doak, meanwhile, was enjoying a slap-up meal in the police canteen. But he had completed and signed his statement and that was all we thought we needed. By four o’clock, we were on our way.

  It was a strange journey. Weaver instructed the driver to go as fast as possible, and so he did, yet our progress still seemed agonizingly slow. Dusk – slow to advance at first, then hideously swift – seemed to press in upon us. Little was said. Pombalho exhibited only bewilderment at what had occurred. Weaver, I suspect, was secretly appalled at how close he had come to contributing to the death of an innocent woman. And we were all painfully aware that we had yet to avert the ultimate catastrophe, that any hint of jubilation might yet prove premature.

  We had reached the outskirts of London by half past six, and had driven like fury to do so. But patchy fog slowed us from that point on, though mercifully it did not thicken into a pea-souper. Even so, it was gone seven o’clock by the time we raced up the stairs of the Home Office. Windrush was waiting for us, as was Sir John Anderson’s secretary, who issued a tart reminder that we were late before ushering us into his presence.

  Sir John is a lean, lantern-jawed, dark-haired man with deep-set eyes, in manner and bearing the very quintessence of the inscrutable civil servant. He received us with distant politeness, then listened quietly while Weaver said his piece. Also present was Sir John’s deputy, Blackwell, an altogether less restrained and tolerant character, who frequently interrupted to ask pointed questions. He laid great emphasis on the superficiality of our evidence and the irregularity of some of the steps Weaver had taken. Weaver countered with one doggedly expressed argument: he was only acting in such haste because of the imminence of an execution which he believed subsequent investigations would show to be unjust.

  After about half an hour, we were asked to withdraw whilst the two mandarins deliberated. At a quarter past eight, we were recalled. Blackwell announced that, in our absence, he had spoken to Wright by telephone in Nice. Gleasure had now been questioned and his belongings searched. He had admitted nothing. Nor had anything of a suspicious nature been found on him. In the circumstances, said Sir John, they had concluded the ‘so-called new evidence’ would not justify them recommending a stay of execution to the Secretary of State.

  I was too dumbstruck by the bland finality of this answer to speak. Windrush alone seemed in command of his faculties, pleading with them to re-consider. But they refused. A hint of something far nastier than inflexibility emerged when Blackwell grumbled that the production of ‘last-minute evidence’ amounted to ‘the tactics of coercion’, to which he did not propose to bow. Then Sir John cut him short. They were grateful for our efforts in the pursuit of justice, he said, but were unable to agree that what we had told them exonerated Mrs Caswell. She had been convicted after an exhaustive examination of all the available evidence and their confidence in that conviction was undimmed.

  We were, I sensed, rapidly approaching the point of being asked to leave when Sir John’s secretary came in to announce the arrival of Sir Henry Curtis-Bennett, hot-foot from Norwich. He stood next to me, breathing hard while Blackwell reiterated their decision. Then, without betraying any disappointment or anger, he asked if he might clarify certain points with them. Sir John assented. At this, Sir Henry suggested that Pombalho and I might like to wait outside. His smile of re-assurance left us no choice; we left.

  Within ten minutes, we were joined by Windrush and Weaver. The superintendent excused himself, saying he wanted to see if anybody over at Scotland Yard had spoken to Wright. Once he had gone, Windrush revealed that the discussions had taken a disputatious turn. Sir Henry was deploying his courtroom virtuosity, thus far to little effect. But the battle was not lost until it was done. So long as it continued, there was hope.

  Shortly before nine o’clock, Blackwell emerged with a face like thunder and vanished into the bowels of the building. That left the two knights to argue it out. And argue, ever since, they have continued to do. Windrush has muttered darkly about old differences re-surfacing, about the ghosts of other clients whom Sir Henry has lost to Anderson’s severity seeming still to stand between them. So much that should not affect such a decision now seems bound to. Anderson may suspect trumped-up evidence is being used to panic him into recommending a stay of execution, knowing how difficult it is to re-impose a death sentence once it has been lifted. He may be reluctant to appear irresolute so early in a new Secretary of State’s term of office. He may be unable to differentiate between stubbornness and caution. He may simply be incapable of admitting that he is wrong.

  I have no way of telling, of course, for I do not know the man. He is a stranger to me, as Consuela is to him. According to Windrush, his nickname within the Home Office is ‘Jehovah’. Never can it have been more appropriate than tonight, when he holds in his hands what, to my mind, no human should ever hold in relation to another: the power of life and death.

  The long night passed in a sleepless trance. I lay on the thin mattress in my cell, staring into the blackness above my head, thinking, imagining, visualizing – until I almost believed I could really see – Consuela, calmly counting away the final hours. But I could not see her. I could not hear or touch her. She was out of reach and would never again be within reach.

  Breakfast – stale bread and a bowl of brackish coffee – arrived while it was still dark. From then on, it became impossible to pretend that the sky was not lightening. Dawn came, then full and implacable morning. The sun rose, stark and glaring, over Nice. The day gathered itself, pounced and rendered irretrievable what had merely been inevitable. I had no way of telling when it happened. I could neither sense nor calculate the moment of commission. Yet, at length, I realized that the counting must have stopped.

  I had ceased to care whether it was morning or afternoon, had ceased indeed to think at all, when I was taken from my cell later that day and led to the interview room. Chief Inspector Wright was waiting for me. As ever, he was smiling.

  ‘Hello, Mr Staddon.’

  ‘What time is it?’

  ‘The time?’ He looked at his watch. ‘Why, it’s nearly twelve o’clock.’

  It was over, then; long over. Already, they would have buried her in the prison graveyard and pinned a typewritten notice to the main gate, announcing what they had done. We, the undersigned, hereby declare that judgement of death was this day executed upon Consuela Evelina Caswell. ‘I hope you’re satisfied,’ I muttered, as much to those signatories I had never seen as to the man standing opposite me.

  ‘Oh, I am, Mr Staddon, I am.’ Still he was smiling. ‘Please sit down. I’ve something to tell you.’

  Thursday, 21 February 1924 (11 a.m.)

  I was too tired last night to write this postscript to yesterday’s events. Indeed, I am still tired now – more so, pe
rhaps, than I should have allowed myself to become so soon after a bout of bronchitis. But I do not care, for my heart is lighter than it has been in months, my mind intoxicated with pure reviving joy.

  Shortly before ten o’clock last night, Sir Henry entered the room where we were waiting at the Home Office, smiled broadly and said: ‘Gentlemen, I have good news.’ Sir John had surrendered. He had telephoned the Home Secretary to recommend a stay of execution. Mr Henderson had given his consent. And, even as Sir Henry was speaking, a messenger was en route for Holloway Prison.

  There was much shaking of hands and slapping of backs. Pombalho even went so far as to kiss Sir Henry. We were smiling and laughing. The miracle we had expected to be denied had been granted.

  Within minutes, my companions had set off for Holloway to share their jubilation with Consuela. I did not go with them. For me it was enough to walk out into the silence of Whitehall, to glance across at the Cenotaph and to know that the state would not be adding Consuela’s name to its list of victims. In that glad issue I rejoice.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  FOR A MINUTE or more after Chief Inspector Wright had finished his explanation of Consuela’s reprieve, I stared at him in silence, disbelief tinging my delight. Then I said: ‘When did you know about this?’

  ‘Last night. Superintendent Weaver telephoned me from Scotland Yard with the news just after eleven o’clock.’

  ‘And you didn’t tell me? You just let me think it was going to happen – that it had happened?’

  ‘Yes.’ He smiled sheepishly. ‘I’m sorry to have left you in the dark. But it was necessary.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because of Gleasure. We brought him in yesterday afternoon. As soon as I started questioning him, I knew he was our man. I’d thought you were, granted, but that’s all it had been: thought; guesswork; a balance of probabilities. With Gleasure it was different. It sometimes is, you know. You can just sense it, halfway between the brain and the nose. I suppose it ought to make a policeman’s job easier when that happens, and so, in one way, it does. But, in another way, it makes it more difficult. Because you have to do more than sense guilt. You have to prove it. And if you can’t, when you know in your bones it’s there, why, that’s the very devil, take it from me. All I had on Gleasure was what Weaver had: one pretty dubious witness to what might have been the theft of arsenic and a cache of letters providing a sort of motive. Too flimsy by far. But good enough, I’d assumed, for calling off the execution. When Weaver ’phoned me and said the bigwigs were digging in their toes, I was astonished. It meant we could be about to hang an innocent woman. So, I had Gleasure in again. It was late by then. Gone ten. Gone nine in London. He was still saying nothing. I tried the ploy I’d used on you about the guillotine and how he could dodge it by admitting to both murders. It didn’t wash. I didn’t expect it to. I realized from the first he was one of those it’d take days to wear down. But we didn’t have days. So, I told him we’d found arsenic in the turn-ups of his trousers. He knew I was lying. He’d been too careful to make a mistake like that. But he knew we could make it stick, knew – because I as good as told him – that I’d twist every rule in the book to nail him if he let Mrs Caswell hang. He was in two minds. I could see that. It’s what I’d hoped for. But he’s an obstinate blighter. I was asking for too much too soon. He was still recovering from the shock of being rumbled. He wasn’t ready to throw in his hand. In the end, I had to send him back to his cell.’