The Riddle at Gipsy's Mile

by Clara Benson

  ‘Oh, didn’t you know, darling?’ said Marguerite. ‘The engagement was Lady Alice’s idea in the first place.’

  ‘No!’ said Cynthia.

  ‘Oh, but yes. It’s true enough that she and Lucy can’t stand each other, but Lady Alice was shrewd enough to see that Lucy was the ideal wife for Gil. After all, she herself is not getting any younger, and she hated the thought of dying without first seeing the estate secure. Lucy is from one of these old families, you know,’ went on Marguerite to Angela. ‘Some people attach great importance to that kind of thing, although I don’t myself—personally, I think a dash of mongrel blood improves a line—but Lady Alice wanted only the finest pedigree stock for the Blakeney estate.’

  ‘Are the Blakeneys a titled family, then?’ said Angela.

  ‘No,’ said Marguerite, ‘although Lady Alice was a daughter of the Duke of Stoke. There were six daughters, I believe, and none of them had a penny to their names as their father was a dreadful old profligate who spent all his money and his wife’s and died in debt. Lady Alice was cast out upon the world to make her own way, and had the good fortune to attach herself to Gilbert Blakeney père, who was much older than she. Gil was their only child. In recent years, though, she seems to have developed a kind of mania for carrying on the family and seeing to it that the Park is passed on to the next in the Blakeney line. It’s odd, really, since the place is only really hers by marriage.’

  ‘Perhaps it is a kind of vicarious interest,’ said Angela, ‘since her father lost his own property.’

  ‘And people do tend to go a bit dotty when they get old,’ said Cynthia.

  ‘I should hardly call Lady Alice dotty,’ said Miles. ‘Why, she seems perfectly sane to me.’

  ‘Oh those ones are often the worst,’ said Herbert darkly. ‘The ones who seem the sanest are quite often complete lunatics when you dig beneath the surface.’

  ‘Is Gilbert as keen on making a good marriage as his mother is for him?’ asked Angela.

  ‘Well, he and Lucy are coming over later, so you shall ask him for yourself,’ said Miles.

  FOUR

  Gilbert Blakeney was a large, fair man of about thirty-five whom nobody would ever accuse of being too clever for his own good. What he lacked in brains, however, he made up for in geniality and eagerness to please. On being introduced to Mrs. Marchmont he clasped her hand in an iron grip and wrung it energetically, beaming and blushing as though he had wanted nothing more in life than to meet her and could now die happy.

  ‘I’ve read all about you in the newspapers, of course,’ he said. ‘I must say, this detecting thing all sounds very exciting. How do you go about it? Do the police call you in?’

  Angela patiently explained, as she had many times before, that she was not a detective and that, far from the police calling her in, they were much more likely to view her as a tremendous nuisance. He nodded, but she saw that he was not listening. People rarely did.

  ‘Will you be investigating this latest one?’ he asked, sure enough. ‘It was you who found the body, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes—or rather, it was my driver who saw her first.’

  ‘I gather she was completely unidentifiable,’ said Lucy. ‘Who did that, do you suppose?’

  ‘Presumably the same person who killed her,’ said Angela.

  ‘Rather careless of him to leave her where she would be found so quickly.’

  ‘He wasn’t really careless,’ said Angela. ‘As a matter of fact, it was pure chance that she was ever found at all. The undergrowth grows thickly on both sides of the ditch at that spot, so she couldn’t be seen either from the road or from the field on the other side of it. Why, if we hadn’t gone off the road she might well have lain there forever, completely undiscovered.’

  ‘It’s jolly bad luck for the murderer,’ observed Freddy, ‘especially now Angela is looking into it.’

  ‘I’m not looking into it,’ said Angela. ‘It’s nothing to do with me—I just happened to stumble upon the body. I dare say the police will catch the fellow who did it quickly enough, once they identify the woman. I wonder who she was.’

  She could not help picturing the crumpled heap of clothing and limbs that had once been a person. The smart but cheap blue coat and the worn shoes. The battered mess that had once been a face, surrounded by a halo of golden hair. What had she been like in life? Had she been beautiful? Who had loved her? Loved her and then presumably tired of her and conveniently disposed of her? No doubt it was the usual story, and the man who had killed her would soon feature in a few sorry paragraphs in the Clarion when he went on trial. It was all terribly sad.

  The two visitors stayed for drinks and the party became rather silly and noisy, and the household did not retire until well past midnight. Angela slept badly that night and came down late the next morning to find the others having breakfast, all apart from Freddy, who was presumably still in bed.

  ‘Hallo, darling,’ said Marguerite. ‘Do help yourself to coffee and eggs. Herbert has eaten all the muffins, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Sorry, Angela,’ said Herbert. ‘You’ll just have to get up earlier tomorrow.’

  ‘Sergeant Spillett telephoned a few minutes ago,’ said Miles, who was buttering some toast. ‘He is coming here to talk to you about the woman in the ditch. I dare say he’ll want to speak to your man too.’

  ‘But you must tell us all about it,’ said Cynthia. ‘It will give marvellous colour to my piece for the Clarion.’

  Angela’s heart sank at the thought. It was clear that she would not be able to escape Cynthia’s clutches, but she was determined to give as little away as possible. Indeed, the mere thought of having her life history spread all over the papers filled her with horror. She said nothing, but helped herself to coffee and began idly to concoct a few useful lies which would be suitable for consumption by the public and which, she hoped, would spare her too much embarrassment.

  She was just finishing breakfast when she was informed that the police had arrived and would like to speak to her at her earliest convenience. She rose immediately.

  ‘See what you can find out!’ hissed Cynthia as she went out.

  When Angela entered the little parlour she found William already there, looking uncomfortable in a stiff-backed chair, together with two policemen in uniform: a grey-haired sergeant with a bushy moustache and a pimpled youth brandishing a notebook as though not quite sure what to do with it. The three of them rose as she came in.

  ‘Mrs. Marchmont, I believe?’ said the elder of the two policemen. ‘I am Sergeant Spillett, and this here is P. C. Bass.’

  P. C. Bass gave a strangled utterance that might have meant anything, and they all sat down.

  ‘I understand you have come to ask us about the poor woman in the ditch,’ said Angela. ‘I’m not sure we can tell you anything useful, however.’

  ‘P’r’aps not,’ said Spillett comfortably. ‘We’ve still got to ascertain all the facts about the matter, though, and you never know—you might have seen something you didn’t think was important but might turn out to be an important clue.’

  ‘I take it the body has been removed?’

  The sergeant nodded.

  ‘Yes. We did that straightaway. Wouldn’t have done to have left her there overnight, now, would it? It wouldn’t have been respectful. She’s in the mortuary at Littlechurch.’

  ‘Had she been lying there long? From the glimpse I had of her it looked as though she had been placed there quite recently—perhaps even that same day.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Spillett. ‘She can’t have been there too long, to judge by the condition of her. Her clothes were in a decent state too, always allowing for the mud she collected on her tumble down the bank.’ He took out his own notebook and consulted it. ‘Now, then, I’d like you to tell me under exactly what circumstances you found the dead woman. I gather from Mr. Harrison that you had a bit of a mishap on your way here yesterday.’

  He looked up at them both inquiringly. Angela nodded
to William, who described, with some embarrassment, the incident with the sheep in the fog and the discovery of the body.

  Spillett nodded sympathetically.

  ‘So that’s how you ended up in the ditch. You have to watch out for the fog in these parts—it’s a treacherous beast. Nobody hurt, I hope?’ he said.

  ‘Not at all,’ said Angela. ‘We just got a shock.’

  ‘Well, that’s all clear enough,’ said the sergeant. ‘Have you found anybody to come and fetch your car?’

  ‘Mr. Harrison has spoken to a Mr. Turner in Littlechurch, I believe.’

  ‘That’s your man,’ agreed Spillett. ‘He’ll see you right.’

  ‘’S my uncle,’ put in the young constable, then blushed.

  ‘Now then,’ went on the sergeant, ‘do you remember whether you met or saw anybody on your way here? Another car, for example? Or perhaps a man walking along the road?’

  ‘No,’ replied Angela. ‘The only person we met along the way was Miss Syms on her horse. We took a wrong turning and she gave us directions.’

  ‘Miss Syms, eh? Make a note of that, Sam. We’ll have to speak to her. Maybe she saw somebody. Now,’ he continued, ‘you say you just had a glimpse of the dead woman, and that’s as may be, but I will say that people in general are curious by nature, and there’s not a few would have gone up close and taken a good long look—for the best of motives, mind you. Are you quite certain that neither of you touched her at all? Perhaps you wanted to take her pulse to make sure in your mind that she was dead, for example—and I’m sure nobody would think the worse of you if you did.’

  Angela shook her head firmly.

  ‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘It was quite clear that she was dead as soon as we saw her.’

  William nodded in agreement.

  ‘It did occur to me to wonder whether we ought to carry her up to the road,’ he said. ‘I didn’t like leaving her there. But Mrs. Marchmont said that we must leave her where she was, so as not to disturb any evidence.’

  ‘And she was quite right,’ said Spillett approvingly.

  ‘I did look at her for a moment or two, wondering who she was,’ said Angela, ‘but I should hardly call it “taking a good long look,” since it wasn’t the pleasantest of sights, all told.’

  ‘Then you didn’t recognize her at all?’

  ‘No. I have no idea who she was.’

  ‘Me neither,’ said William.

  ‘Whoever did it certainly took care to make sure she was unrecognizable,’ said Spillett, ‘presumably because her identity would lead us straight to him.’

  ‘Didn’t she have a handbag with her?’ asked Angela.

  ‘No handbag that we could find, and nothing in her pockets,’ said Spillett. ‘She wasn’t even wearing a hat.’

  ‘No, she wasn’t, was she?’ said Angela thoughtfully. ‘I wonder why.’

  ‘Perhaps her killer took it. At any rate, all we have to do now is find out who she was, and then I dare say we’ll have our man.’

  ‘Do you know how she died?’ asked Angela. ‘There wasn’t much blood, so I guess she must have been dead already when the murderer smashed her face.’

  ‘We can’t say yet,’ said the sergeant, ‘but the police surgeon will be able to tell us something shortly, no doubt. Did you get all that down, Sam?’ he said to the young constable. P. C. Bass nodded.

  ‘Well, then, I think that’s all we need for the present,’ said his superior. ‘We’ll be off now, but you will let us know if you think of anything that might help us, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Angela.

  She returned to the sitting-room and found the others all there waiting for her.

  ‘Well?’ said Cynthia as soon as she entered the room. ‘What did they say? Did you get any dirt out of them?’

  ‘None at all,’ said Angela. ‘It looks as though it’s exactly what we thought. The police still don’t know who she is, but they seem to think that once they have discovered her identity it will be easy enough to trace the culprit.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Marguerite. ‘No doubt there’s a husband or a jilted lover behind the whole thing. Now then, darlings, we all drank a little too much last night, so I propose a walk in the fresh air to blow away the cobwebs. What do you say to that?’

  The proposal was agreed to and they all went off to change into their outdoor things. Angela was just about to follow them when Freddy drifted into the room, having been finally roused from his bed by the advancing sun.

  ‘I say, what the devil is all this noise?’ he said, stifling a yawn. ‘How on earth is a chap supposed to get any sleep?’

  ‘It’s nearly eleven o’clock,’ said Angela.

  ‘Exactly,’ he said. ‘Far too early to be getting up. I must say, I don’t think much of this country life if it requires one to rise before noon. By the way, was that the police I just saw out of the window?’ Angela replied in the affirmative, and he went on, ‘What active fellows they are. I suppose they came to ask you lots of terribly impertinent questions, did they?’

  ‘Not at all,’ said Angela. ‘They were very polite.’

  ‘Well, I must say that this whole affair is disrupting my weekend, rather,’ he said, ‘although I imagine Mother is absolutely thrilled at finding a dead body on her doorstep, so to speak. One doesn’t wish to speak disrespectfully of one’s parents, but she is rather vulgar, don’t you think?’

  ‘She seems to have a good nose for a story,’ said Angela pointedly, ‘which is a very useful thing to have in the newspaper business.’

  ‘She’s a mere amateur,’ said Freddy grandly, ‘but she’s certainly got her hooks into you, hasn’t she? She’s simply dying to write about you and prove to old Bickerstaffe that she’s got the talent to be a real reporter.’

  ‘I don’t know why,’ said Angela. ‘I’m not at all interesting.’

  ‘Oh, come now!’ said Freddy. ‘Why, everybody knows you have a dark and thrilling past that you have sworn to keep hidden until your dying day.’

  ‘Do they, indeed?’ said Angela.

  ‘Of course. You still haven’t told anyone what you were doing in America all those years. Mother is convinced it was something shady.’

  ‘Shady? Do you mean drug-running, organized murder, something of that sort?’ said Angela with a laugh. She was intrigued, wondering what rumours had been flying around about her.

  ‘Well, perhaps not as shady as that,’ said Freddy uncomfortably, ‘but something jolly mysterious all the same. She’s sworn to worm it out of you, so you had better watch your step.’

  ‘There’s nothing to worm,’ said Angela. ‘My life in the States was very dull and ordinary, for the most part. I shall tell her about all the Committees of Good Works I sat upon in New York. Then she will regret ever having asked me for an interview.’

  She went to change into a pair of stout shoes, then returned downstairs to find the others waiting for her.

  ‘Aren’t you coming, Freddy?’ asked his father.

  ‘Good gracious, no,’ said Freddy in horror. ‘I haven’t had breakfast yet. I can’t face the day until I’ve had two cups of coffee and three cigarettes at the very least. No, you go on, and I shall stay here to receive any callers.’

  ‘Angela, darling,’ said Cynthia as they went out. ‘You simply must talk to me as we go. Our readers want to know all about your life in America. I’ve heard you carry a gun. Tell me, is it true that Buffalo Bill wanted you to join his show?’

  She grasped Angela’s arm firmly. Angela glanced back to see Freddy smirking on the doorstep. He gave her an ironic salute and shut the front door.

  FIVE

  Inspector Alec Jameson sat at his desk and frowned. He was writing a report about a case which he had recently brought to a successful conclusion and feeling rather grumpy about it, since he disliked paper-work in general. Still, he had done rather well in this latest case, he reflected—well enough even to bring a smile to the face of his bad-tempered superintendent, perhaps,
so he supposed the report-writing would be worth it in the end, even if he had had to give up his Saturday morning for it.

  He finished the report and signed his name with a flourish, then read through it carefully. It was only then that he noticed to his annoyance that he had mixed up the name of the gang leader and that of the chief witness throughout the report, which was a long one. He swore to himself, then began laboriously scratching out each name and replacing it with the correct one, but after a paragraph or two it was starting to look very messy. The super would not be pleased. Jameson sighed, pulled a blank sheet of paper towards him and began copying out the report again, this time with the right names.

  He had almost finished the first page when the telephone on his desk rang. He picked it up.

  ‘Jameson speaking,’ he said. His sergeant, Willis, had just entered the room to deliver a file, and Jameson motioned to him to remain as he listened. Willis hovered politely.

  ‘Where’s that? Littlechurch?’ said the inspector. ‘Can’t they deal with it there? It doesn’t sound as though it’s in our line. Oh, I see. Really? Who found it, did you say? Well, I’ll be—no, no, it was nothing. Very well, then. Willis and I shall start immediately. We’ll be there as soon as we can.’

  He put down the receiver and swung round to the sergeant, whose eyebrows had been rising gradually up his forehead during this conversation.

  ‘We’ve got to go down to Kent,’ said Jameson. ‘Do you know the Romney Marsh at all?’

  ‘I’ve been to Hastings once or twice,’ said Willis, ‘but that’s about it. What’s the story?’

  ‘They’ve found a woman in a ditch with her head bashed in.’

  ‘Not our usual sort of thing, is it?’ said the sergeant.

  ‘There seems to be some mystery as to how she died,’ said Jameson. ‘The blow to the head was done after death.’