Gin and Murder

by Josephine Pullein-Thompson

  The children had gone to church. Nan couldn’t say where Mr. Broughton was; he’d gone out in the car, with all the dogs, about ten minutes ago. So much Flecker had elicited before Browning joined him. Had Mr. Broughton had a letter? he asked. Had he telephoned anyone? Had anyone telephoned him?

  ‘Letters on a Sunday?’ said Nan, ‘Never.’ But she thought she had heard some talk of a note.

  ‘We’ll try the office,’ said Flecker.

  There on the desk, spread out flat in the middle of the blotter and weighted by a pencil at either end, lay the note. Without touching it, Flecker and Browning read:

  ‘If you would like information re the death of your wife meet me at Crossways barn at 11 a.m. Sunday. Come alone or I shall not appear.’

  ‘He meant us to see it,’ said Flecker. He hurried to the door and called loudly, ‘Can you tell me where Crossways barn is, Miss Hatch?’

  ‘I don’t know, I’m sure,’ said Nan. ‘You’d better ask Codding or Mr. Philips out in the stable.’

  ‘Never mind.’ Flecker swung round and pointed to the large-scale map pinned to the wall of the office. ‘Here,’ he said to Browning, ‘this is the West Wintshire Hunt country. Come and give me a hand; it’s bound to be here somewhere.’

  Browning picked up something from the desk. This note’s in his own handwriting; it’s a bit disguised, but look.’ He held up Mark’s engagement diary for Flecker to see.

  ‘Never mind about that,’ answered Flecker sharply. ‘Come and look for Crossways barn; you take the right half.’

  ‘Supposing it’s a blind?’ protested Browning as he looked. ‘Ten to one he’s nipped off in the opposite direction.’

  ‘Here it is; up above Rollhurst Farm. Come on, we’ll take this with us.’ Flecker tore the map from the wall and looked at his watch. Five minutes to eleven.’ He was in the hall before he had finished speaking.

  ‘Turn left at the top of the lane and then it’s the first on your right,’ he said as Browning started the car. Rollhurst was higher than Lapworth and more remote. The road which led to it was very narrow and climbed steeply with many sharp turns. At last they reached the top of the hill, emerging suddenly through the belt of trees.

  ‘Straight through the village,’ ordered Flecker. A few scattered cottages comprised the village and then they were out in the open. On both sides of the tiny road stretched arable land, an unfenced patchwork of stubble and plough that crowned the whole of the windswept hilltop.

  ‘Any moment now there should be a right turn,’ said Flecker. ‘There it is.’

  ‘Poor ruddy tyres,’ said Browning as they screamed round into the lane.

  ‘That must be Keeper’s Cottage. In a minute we’ll see the barn ahead — if we’re right.’

  The lane continued stony as far as the hollow which sheltered Keeper’s Cottage but beyond that it became a cart track and where it rose to join the fields again the car baulked, its wheels spinning ineffectively as they tried to climb the slope.

  ‘Leave her,’ said Flecker, jumping out. He glanced at his watch and began to run. It was seven minutes past eleven.

  Once he was out of the hollow he could see the barn standing in the open at the junction of four grassy cart tracks which met among the plough. Beyond was a wood; he wished that he had known the way through the wood. Browning caught up with him. ‘Lucky it looks the other way,’ said Flecker. ‘Will you take the left side?’ Browning, who was no stayer, could only nod.

  As they reached the barn they both slowed to a walk and Flecker’s heart lifted with relief as he heard the sound of angry voices from within. Browning appeared round the front of the barn at the same moment as Flecker, and, from opposite sides of the great door, they peered in. Mark Broughton, revolver in hand, stood in a threatening attitude. Cringing back against the bales of straw was Colonel Douglas Holmes-Waterford.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Flecker.

  Both men jumped round in surprise. Holmes-Waterford spoke first:

  ‘My God, I’m glad to see you, Chief Inspector,’ he said. ‘Broughton seems to have gone raving mad.’ He laughed shakily. ‘I thought my last moment had come.’

  Mark just stood and stared, an expression of disbelief on his stunned face.

  ‘I’ll have that gun, please sir,’ said Browning, and took it from his unresisting hand.

  Flecker turned to Duggie. ‘Colonel Holmes-Waterford,’ he said in an official voice, ‘I would like you to accompany me to the police station. I have some questions to ask you about the murder of Mrs. Broughton and this incident.’

  ‘Don’t be a B.F., Chief Inspector. Mark’s your man,’ answered Duggie.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Flecker. ‘But anyway you can still make a statement. Where’s your car, Mr. Broughton? Ours has stuck in the mud.’

  ‘On the far side of the copse,’ Mark answered.

  ‘Then perhaps you’ll take us down to Melborough? We’ll come back for ours later.’

  ‘Anything you like,’ said Mark vaguely. ‘But I’m afraid it’s full of dogs.’ Then he asked, ‘Did you know that the Colonel here intended shooting me? He dam’ near did too; I only just saw him in time.’

  ‘We had our suspicions,’ said Flecker. ‘How did you get the gun away from him?’

  ‘We had a bit of a scrap,’ Mark answered and, reminded that he had been rolling on the barn floor, began to pull the straws out of his hair and brush them from his clothes.

  ‘That’s your story,’ said Duggie. ‘But you can’t get away from the fact that it’s your revolver. He telephoned me last night, Chief Inspector, and asked me to meet him here. You must have seen for yourself that he was just about to shoot me when you came in.’

  ‘I think,’ said Flecker, ‘that, if you have no objection, we’d better make sure there are no more guns concealed on your persons.’

  ‘No objection whatsoever,’ answered Duggie. ‘In fact I shall feel happier when I know that all our friend’s teeth are drawn.’

  Flecker ran his hands over Duggie’s pockets, while Browning did the same to Mark. There were no ominous bulges, but Flecker had felt an envelope in the pocket of Duggie’s hacking jacket, and, satisfied that there were no more guns, whipped it out.

  ‘Give that back at once,’ commanded Duggie. ‘I gave you permission to search me for offensive weapons, not to take possession of my private correspondence.’

  ‘As it is addressed “To whom it may concern” and appears to be written in Mr. Broughton’s handwriting, I hardly think it can be described as your private correspondence,’ Flecker answered as he opened the envelope. ‘I, Mark Broughton,’ he began and then finished reading in silence. ‘It’s your confession,’ he told Mark, ‘to the murders of Vickers and your wife.’

  ‘Look out!’ shouted Browning, as Duggie made a dash for the door. Flecker stuffed the confession in his pocket and joined in the pursuit. Browning had already drawn level with his quarry, who wheeled round and took to the plough land to avoid him. Flecker closed in; he had not played rugger for the police for nothing, and, tackling low, he deposited Duggie face downwards among the furrows. Browning produced his handcuffs. ‘We don’t want to take any more chances, sir, do we?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ Flecker agreed. And Browning handcuffed himself to Duggie, before helping Flecker yank him to his feet.

  Flecker said, ‘Colonel Holmes-Waterford, I am arresting you for the attempted murder of Mr. Broughton. You are not obliged to say anything in answer to this charge, but whatever you say will be taken down in writing and may be used in evidence.’

  Duggie didn’t answer, he had not yet regained his breath. His face and clothes were now covered in mud as well as in straw and he looked quite unlike his usual immaculate self. They led him back to the barn.

  Mark read through the confession with slow concentration. ‘This is diabolical, Duggie,’ he said. ‘Now I understand why you were trying to shoot me in the face from a range of two feet. He was lying on those straw bales,’ he wen
t on, turning to Flecker, ‘and he’d fixed up the door so that it would only open a couple of feet. He’d have got me right in the face, only my coat caught on the latch and I stopped and turned away to pull it free; that spoiled his calculations. He moved and I saw the gun and ducked as he fired. If he’d got me you would have taken it as suicide — my revolver, a note in my writing.’

  ‘That’s your story,’ said Duggie, producing a handkerchief and attempting to wipe the mud from his face with his free hand. ‘And anyone with a grain of intelligence could tell that it was merely the fabrication of a mentally disturbed mind. If the Chief Inspector chooses to believe you, let him, but my God, I shall get my own back if he does. I shall raise Cain. I’ve got friends in high places, Chief Inspector. I shall sue and it won’t just be for wrongful arrest. I shall extract retribution for this indignity; retribution in full and with interest.’

  ‘Well, let’s get down to the police station, then you can make a statement,’ said Flecker equably. ‘I’ll have that document back, please, Mr. Broughton.’

  ‘That document’s another of his fiendish tricks,’ Duggie spoke with acrimony. ‘Obviously he planted it in my pocket while we were scrapping. He meant to shoot himself if he found the game was up. Can’t you see it, Chief Inspector? He was prepared for every eventuality. My God, it’s a nice situation. And I thought he was my best friend! It would be a bitter pill to swallow if it wasn’t all too obvious that the poor fellow’s raving mad.’

  ‘Come along now, Colonel,’ said Browning, as Flecker led the way out of the barn. ‘I don’t know about anyone else, but I could do with a nice cup of tea.’

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  IT TOOK Flecker and Browning a couple of days to tie up the loose ends of the case. Then, on Tuesday evening, they drove to Lapworth for the last time. They had promised to have an off-duty drink with Mark, before returning to London.

  The detectives were rather surprised by the warmth with which they were welcomed, both by the Broughtons and by the Chadwicks, who had also come in to drinks. Mark produced champagne. ‘We’re not celebrating,’ he said; ‘it’s just that we can’t face gin.’

  It was Elizabeth who brought the conversation round to the murders and when she did so Mark, ignoring their arguments and indignation, sent the children to feed the dogs.

  ‘Now,’ said Elizabeth, drawing closer to the fire, ‘I’ve got several questions to ask you, Chief Inspector. You don’t mind, do you? Charlie says that it’s contrary to the ethics of your profession to tell the laymen anything, but we’re hardly laymen, are we? We’re sort of amateurs now; we’ve been so heavily involved.’

  Flecker grinned. ‘Let’s have the questions,’ he said, ‘before I say whether I’ll answer them or not.’

  Elizabeth thought for a moment before she spoke. ‘What I really want to know,’ she said, ‘is how you knew that it was Duggie. I hadn’t the least idea and though now, people are beginning to say that he always had peculiar eyes or gave them the creeps, I’m sure it had never previously entered their heads he might be the murderer.’

  Flecker pushed back his hair. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it wasn’t very difficult because there were so few real suspects. But, I admit that the Colonel didn’t seem a very likely murderer of Vickers. That was what put Hollis off. In fact, I never could see how Vickers was murdered. You all told me that it couldn’t have been done at the party, and really, sometimes I felt like believing you. It seemed likely that Mrs. Broughton was involved in some way. And when Mrs. Chadwick told me she’d heard her told not to have more than one drink, I began to make wild guesses about what might have happened to the second drink. The right one evaded me for some time. There were various other oddities; there was Mrs. Broughton’s extra and unexplained supply of gin; there was the Colonel’s insistence that he was Mr. Broughton’s oldest friend and his strange habit of dropping damning hints. His comment on the childless state of his “oldest friend” was an error. I didn’t notice it at the time, but later when Anstruther, our pathologist, told us that Mrs. Broughton had borne a child, I realized that the Colonel’s choice of words implied that he knew she could bear one. I also remembered that Mrs. Broughton had only really despaired after her failure to rescue the small child from the river at Langley. That reduced my suspects to four; I knew that if I was on the right track, the murderer was a man other than Mr. Broughton who had been present at the cocktail party.

  ‘I had made my choice, but I must admit that I was hardly in a position to make an arrest, when Mr. Broughton precipitated me into it. However, now that our colleagues in Manchester have got Mrs. Basset, the foster-mother of the child, talking, everything has become a great deal clearer. Mrs. Basset knew that Mrs. Broughton was the mother, but she never learned the name of the father. She said that Mrs. Broughton was attached to the child in a rather unbalanced way and that she had insisted on the child being brought to Langley for a holiday, so that she would be able to see more of her without the risk of raising suspicion by constant visits to London. Mrs. Basset understood that the father lived locally and that he strongly disapproved of this holiday. Then, on the day of the child’s death, Mrs. Broughton told Mrs. Basset that she had persuaded the father to come over and see his daughter in the hope that he would agree to some sort of arrangement; an adoption, Mrs. Basset thought. But apparently the child bore a likeness to her father and, though there seemed to be little doubt that if Mr. Broughton were told he would agree to adopt, there were difficulties confronting the father. A wife who must be deceived at all costs and, at the bottom of it all, money — that was what Mrs. Basset understood.’

  Elizabeth said, ‘Yes, I can see that. Alicia isn’t a forgiving sort at all, and, of course, she did keep Duggie in great comfort.’

  ‘Mrs. Basset never knew exactly what happened on the day of the child’s death,’ Flecker went on. ‘Mrs. Broughton was so distraught afterwards that she never managed to get a coherent account. Apparently Mrs. Broughton took the child to a comparatively quiet spot along the riverbank and there met the father. He refused to agree to any of her plans, he said that the child was to be taken back to London and brought up there and a violent argument ensued. While they were arguing they forgot the child and she fell into the river. Mrs. Broughton went straight in after her, but she wasn’t, I gather, much of a swimmer; the father, determined not to be involved at any cost, hurried away. According to Mrs. Basset, his defence was that he thought Mrs. Broughton had got hold of the child and would be all right, but Mrs. Broughton never really believed him and never forgave him. Mrs. Basset received a substantial sum to perjure herself at the inquest and we have been able to trace that payment and a monthly sum paid for the child’s upkeep. It was actually paid to Mrs. Basset in cash, through a third party, but we have managed to identify the third party and he has admitted that he received the money by cheque from the Colonel.

  ‘After the death of the child, Mrs. Broughton seems to have exercised a sort of despairing blackmail over the Colonel. Only a drunken oblivion was bearable and as this was his doing, he must supply the gin. We don’t know, of course, exactly what passed between them, but we do know that far more gin was delivered to Lapworth Manor than was ever consumed there, that the Colonel was always in trouble with his wife for overspending his pension and the personal allowance she made him, and that, recently, the trouble between them had been coming to a head.’

  ‘Where did he keep the poison?’ asked Elizabeth. ‘I’m sure that if Charlie was hiding jars of arsenic all over the place I’d find them.’

  ‘He brewed it in the wine cellar,’ Flecker answered. ‘He’d set himself up as a great authority on wines; no one was allowed to touch any of the cases that were delivered or to enter the cellar on any pretext; they didn’t even know where he kept the keys. That had been necessary for the concealment of the gin supply, and it came in very handy when he decided that murder offered a way out of his difficulties. He brewed a fairly strong arsenical solution by soaking a certain brand of f
lypapers — those old-fashioned sticky ones that hang from the ceiling. Luckily for us he left a supply in the cellar, I suppose he was keeping it for future use; with it was the writing pad he’d used to write to Mr. Broughton and also a small bottle with traces of the solution still in it. You remember, Mr. Broughton, how in your confession he makes you describe the way in which you poisoned Vickers? Well, I imagine that that was precisely the method he used in his first attempt on Mrs. Broughton. “I eased the cork from the little bottle while it was still in my pocket. I took it out still concealed in my handkerchief and turned away as though to sneeze. I poured the arsenic into the half empty glass, which I had previously taken from my wife.” It would have been easier than that for him, he would simply have drunk half his own cocktail, poisoned the remainder when no one was looking, and then changed glasses with Mrs. Broughton. Mrs. Denton seems to have been the only person who saw the deed. She thought she saw Mrs. Broughton upsetting her drink over the Colonel, but I’ve no doubt that it was the Colonel who engineered the collision and that the steadying hand and the mopping up operation, which Mrs. Denton now remembers, masked the changeover of glasses. However, Mrs. Broughton had been told not to have more than one drink and she decided to give the lethal one away. As we know now, she actually offered it to Mrs. Denton before giving it to Vickers.

  ‘Though, in a way, Vickers’ death confused the issue so much that it was in the Colonel’s favour, at the time of the murder he must have had to resort to some quick thinking. For, if Mrs. Broughton had sobered up, she might have realized what had happened and told Mr. Broughton or the police. He acted that same night. He told his wife at dinner that he had to see the secretary of the local Conservative Association, and he did visit him, but only for a few minutes of the hour and a quarter during which he was out. The rest of the time was spent in delivering a bottle of poisoned gin to the Broughtons’ summerhouse.’