The second call had been longer and more difficult, and had dealt with the vexed question of how an unofficial investigation into anonymous letter-writing could be turned overnight into an official investigation into a murder. However, Pollock had eventually trusted to the good offices of the Chief Constable, and rung off.
He had then, after a great deal of heart-searching, transferred his belongings to the Bear Hotel. The Dean had taken this official gesture in very good part and approved the thought that underlay it.
‘After all,’ said Pollock, ‘murder’s different.’
And for some time after he had gone the Dean sat at his study staring at the Italian triptych which had once belonged to Canon Whyte. Yes, he thought, murder was different. He was just beginning to realise that.
The doctor was on the point of going when Pollock remembered something he had meant to ask him. ‘Whereabouts is the torus?’ he said. ‘Or is it just another name for the skull? You know, when you were talking about the blow—’
‘Scientific accuracy,’ replied the doctor, ‘is my middle name. I said the torus and I meant it. It’s another name for the occipital bone, which is what your hat sticks on at the back if it’s rather too small for your head.’
‘I see,’ said Pollock. ‘But look here, how could Appledown get a blow like that if he was wearing a bowler hat?’
‘That’s for you to work out,’ said the doctor. ‘I hadn’t considered it. I don’t think it’s impossible, if you presume that the blow which did the trick also knocked the hat off. But it must have been a sideways swing; not so likely, I agree. But since you found his hat lying beside him he may have been carrying it all the time.’
‘Or perhaps,’ suggested a thick square man with a brick-red face, who had inserted himself into the room at that moment, but appeared to have picked up the thread of the conversation, ‘he raised his hat out of sheer politeness when he saw the murderer was ready to begin.’
The doctor looked a little surprised at this interruption, and Pollock introduced him to Chief Inspector Hazlerigg.
‘So that’s that,’ said Pollock, extinguishing the stub of his third cigarette.
It had been a long story, starting over an excellent mixed grill in the dining-room of the Bear Hotel; Pollock talked and ate, Hazlerigg ate and listened. A noble Stilton cheese came and went. Pollock consulted his notebook occasionally. Coffee was taken in the lounge. Hazlerigg smoked and listened. Pollock talked and smoked.
‘Do you think,’ said Hazlerigg, breaking a long silence, ‘that the writer of the letters is the murderer of Appledown?’
‘Yes,’ said Pollock, so firmly that he surprised even himself. ‘I do. I know that there’s an almighty difference between a practical joker and a killer, but if the two aren’t connected in some way I shall be very surprised.’
‘Three possibilities,’ said Hazlerigg. ‘We’d better have them all before we start getting prejudiced. First, a man with some crazy obsession; he starts in by slating Appledown anonymously. This doesn’t seem to be having quite the desired effect, so he lays for him and bashes him. Second, someone wants to kill Appledown for good but extraneous reasons and sees this anonymous campaign as useful cover. Third, the two things are quite unconnected, but I must say that I agree with you, on the whole, that that is unlikely on the grounds of probability alone. However, we mustn’t sit here gossiping and wasting the ratepayers’ money. Let’s go and have a look at Appledown’s cottage.’
“Artful” Appledown opened the door to them himself. He was, thought Pollock, a disreputable parody of his brother. The family likeness was striking, but where the head verger’s white hair had lain in smooth and venerable respectability, Artful’s stood in untidy wisps. His eyes were bloodshot and lips petulantly clenched. In deference to the conventions he had torn a strip from an old black umbrella and bound it round his upper arm, but apart from this striking piece of mourning he appeared to be sustaining the death of his only brother with some fortitude.
‘Poor old Dan,’ he said, as soon as Hazlerigg had introduced himself, and before he had had time to ask any questions. ‘Poor old Daniel. Little did I think, when I left him at two p.m. yesterday afternoon, that when I returned, to hearth and home at twenty-five minutes after ten precisely this morning I should find him cold and dead. Not that I did find him myself – to put the matter in exact words – but I heard the sad news very shortly after my return. It’s a dreadful warning to us all.’
‘Quite so,’ said Hazlerigg. ‘Now if you could tell us exactly what you did yesterday, and when you saw your brother last, it would be a great help to us, as you’ll appreciate.’
‘It’ll be an important statement, I suppose?’
‘Most important,’ Hazlerigg assured him.
‘Then,’ said the old man with an apologetic leer, ‘it’ll be better to have no mistakes about it,’ and he pulled a greasy notebook from an inner pocket. ‘Two o’clock – that’s yesterday afternoon – left house, having previously prepared evening meal of cold viands and left same handy in the kitchen. Two-fifteen – depart in charabanc with other members of Brotherhood.’
‘Brotherhood?’
‘Christian Works and Self-help (Melchester Lodge),’ explained Appledown rapidly. ‘Our fortnightly outing, every other Tuesday. Went to Windsor this time, to see the historic sights. Arrived in Windsor three-thirty. Observed sights, such as castle, celebrated Etonian College, deer park, etc. Started back five-thirty. Arrived Melchester eleven forty-five.’
‘How on earth,’ said Pollock, ‘did it take you an hour and a quarter to get to Windsor and over six hours to get back?’
Appledown looked at him pityingly, and Hazlerigg, who had understood that Christian Works and Self-help did not necessarily imply total abstinence, contented himself with saying, ‘But you didn’t come home to sleep.’
‘I was not wishful,’ said Artful Appledown virtuously, ‘of disturbing my old friend Sergeant Brumfit. I, therefore, slept with a friend in the town, as is my custom on such occasions.’
‘So you’ve made the trip more than once before?’
‘The Brotherhood arranges an outing on the second and fourth Tuesday of every month,’ agreed Appledown. ‘I make every effort to support them – very often I am late in returning and thus spend the night in the town.’
‘And does your brother sit up for you?’ asked Hazlerigg.
Artful looked a little confused at this simple question; he scratched his head for a moment or two, and then contented himself with saying, ‘Daniel was a very good brother to me, very thoughtful. If he was to go out himself when I was away, he’d always leave a note saying when he was coming back. Most thoughtful and kind-hearted.’
‘I suppose he didn’t leave a note yesterday?’ asked Pollock eagerly.
‘Of course he did,’ said the old man, turning a beady eye in his direction, ‘as you could see if you had eyes in your head. Pinned up beside the front door. I left it there when I came in – as I said to myself, ‘Never touch anything when the police are about, and then you can’t go wrong.’’
Disregarding this fresh exponent of detective-procedure, Pollock hurried to the front door. Sure enough, pinned to the lintel was a half-sheet of notepaper; on it, in an untidy scrawl, the laconic (and under the circumstances, singularly untruthful) message.
‘Back soon.’ The signature was D. Appledown. Pollock unpinned it carefully and took it back to Hazlerigg.
‘Of course it’s my brother’s writing,’ said Artful scornfully when they questioned him. ‘No one else writes as badly as that.’ He hunted out some other specimens of the late head verger’s vile calligraphy, and Pollock was inclined to agree with him. Hazlerigg pocketed both note and specimens and piloted the old man back to the main thread of the discussion.
‘You left your brother’s evening meal ready for him?’
‘Ham, lettuce, gherkins, military pickle, prunes and cold shape,’ interjected Artful rapidly.
‘And it was al
l eaten when you came back this morning?’
‘Every crumb,’ said Artful, ‘except for three prunes,’ he added conscientiously. ‘Poor Daniel always had a good appetite. He never had no tea, you see. He’d be over at cathedral getting ready for evening service. Left the house every day at four o’clock regular as clockwork, and back by a quarter to seven. Then we’d sit and smoke and talk until, perhaps, half-past seven, when we could relish a nice supper.’
Hazlerigg consulted Pollock with a glance, but Pollock could think of nothing further.
‘His papers and effects will have to be searched,’ said Hazlerigg, ‘though the Lord knows whether we shall find anything helpful. If it comes to that, I don’t yet know what we’re looking for. I think the local force might do that. I want you to look up Sergeant Brumfit. Make a copy of all the entries in the register yesterday evening. Then find out about the keys of the gates and ask him exactly when he locked up last night and at what time he was on duty himself. And whilst you’re about it you might sound him as to his opinion about people climbing in and out of the Close – if anyone really knows whether it’s possible he will. I want to see your uncle. You’ll probably find me there when you’ve finished.’
Brumfit made a good witness, and it took Pollock less than a quarter of an hour to collect the information he wanted – mostly of a negative character. The sergeant was positive that no one could possibly get in without him knowing. As to keys, there were only three in existence. There was the same lock on all three gates – a fine new seven-lever Maxwell-Gurnet, fitted less than a year previously. Two of the keys were held by the local police. The Chief Constable had charge of one; the other was entrusted to the policeman whose night beat took him through the Close. The sergeant had the third. The sergeant had locked the gates as usual on Tuesday. The last one (the main gate) he had locked at perhaps two or three minutes after seven. No stranger had come in or out. After seven (Pollock guessed that the upsets of the week before had tightened up regulations in the Brumfit household) the sergeant himself had been on duty the whole time except for twenty minutes when he had been at supper – that would be ten minutes to eight until ten past.
Pollock found Hazlerigg with the Dean, and passed this information on to him, together with a copy of the “in” and “out” entries in the lodge-book. The Chief Inspector glanced at these with an unusually expressionless face and pushed the paper into his capacious inner pocket.
‘Your uncle,’ he said, stooping to tickle Benjamin Disraeli, who seemed to have taken a great fancy to him, ‘has kindly offered us the use of the Chapter House; it will be very handy for interviewing possible witnesses.’
‘And you want me to make a statement after Evensong this evening?’
‘Nothing very much,’ said Hazlerigg. ‘Just that Appledown has met with an unfortunate accident.’
‘And asking everyone who spoke to him or saw him after Evensong on Tuesday to come to the Chapter house?’
‘That’s right,’ said Hazlerigg. ‘It’ll sound better coming from you. People are always a bit shy at first about making statements to the police.’
He underrated Melchester Close. The first witness was already on her way up the garden path.
Mrs. Judd was a small but immensely penetrative sort of woman, dressed in greens and daffodil yellows, which seemed to suggest springtime and heyday, rather than the autumn of existence; there was, in fact, very little of the sere and yellow leaf about Mrs. Judd, and her speech was as abrupt as her movements.
‘Which is the detective from Scotland Yard?’ she demanded, almost before she was inside the door.
Hazlerigg and Pollock introduced themselves and indicated that they both claimed that honour.
‘I have an important statement to make. I am Mrs. Judd, widow of the late Canon Judd.’ (This went with rather a defiant look at the Dean.)
‘In connection with the death of Appledown?’
‘Murder,’ said Mrs. Judd with some relish. ‘Face facts, Inspector – murder.’
Pollock glanced hastily at his notebook, and Hazlerigg said impassively, ‘Well, ma’am?’
‘I sit,’ said Mrs. Judd, ‘in my little front drawing-room in a chair in the window and watch people going backwards and forwards. I see everybody, and if a stranger comes past I ask questions and soon find out who he is. It is very providential that the only pillar-box in the Close should be placed at the corner nearest to my little house.’ She said this rather as an elderly tigress might comment on the proximity of the only drinking-pool to the mouth of her den.
‘Nothing escapes me,’ she went on. ‘I observe everything. Especially now that I have my telescope.’
‘Your what?’ said Hazlerigg, shaken out of his composure.
‘My nephew, Albert, who is in the Royal Marines – I call him a nephew, but he’s really a great-nephew – spent some days with me in the spring, and he kindly fixed it for me. It has rather a limited field of vision, of course, extending from the pillar-box on the near left to the front door of dear Canon Malthus’ house on the far left. I could see into two other houses, were it not for the west end of the cathedral.’
Hazlerigg had recovered by this time. He agreed with Mrs. Judd that this arrangement indicated a lack of foresight on the part of the builders of the cathedral, and asked her what she had seen on the previous evening.
‘It’s not so easy after dark, you know. More interesting, but not so easy.’ She collected her thoughts, pursed her lips demurely, and then said: ‘Well, first the dear Dean coming back to his house at a few minutes after half-past six. Then, at least ten minutes later I saw Appledown come from the cathedral, cross the road in front of his house, and go in. Canon Prynne was coming past at the same time, so he must have seen him too. Dear Canon Bloss left dear Canon Trumpington’s house a little before half-past seven and went back to his own house. A few minutes later dear Canon Trumpington came out too, and went into Canon Beech-Thompson’s house. Between twenty-five and twenty to eight Parvin went out. Oh, I forgot to tell you; he had only come back at seven o’clock. I have no doubt he went straight from the service to some low public-house. Soon after half-past seven he came out again and went along to Appledown’s house.’
‘You’re sure that was where he went?’ said Hazlerigg.
‘Of course I’m sure. I can use my eyes,’ snapped Mrs. Judd. ‘He hung around the house for a few minutes, like the shady character he is, and then went in.’
‘What time would that be?’
‘It was a few minutes before a quarter to eight – for I have my own dinner then – so that is all I can tell you. I heard the boys come past at eight o’clock. They might tell you something – sharp, inquisitive little creatures.’
Her mission accomplished, Mrs. Judd got up and made for the door.
‘I’m sure that if you attend carefully to what I’ve told you,’ she said, ‘you’ll have no difficulty in catching the murderer.’
‘I’m sure we’re very grateful to you for your kind assistance and observation,’ murmured Hazlerigg.
Mrs. Judd paused at the door and turned round.
‘That was all that I saw,’ she said, and her voice was so altered that it startled the three men. ‘But I’ve still got good hearing. I can use my ears, and I heard things, wicked things, wicked whispers. Late that night. Much later, footsteps creeping, doors creaking. It’s been coming for a long time. I’m very sensitive to these things.’
As suddenly as she had come she was gone.
‘Good gracious,’ said Hazlerigg mildly.
‘I’m afraid,’ said the Dean weightily, ‘I’m very much afraid that she is getting just a little bit – you know what I mean – odd lately. It’s living alone, no proper company or companionship – has that effect on a lot of people.’
‘I wonder how much reliance we can place on all this,’ said Pollock helplessly. ‘I really thought we were beginning to get something definite.’
‘Even if untrue,’ pronounced Hazlerigg
judicially, ‘that statement of hers is likely to prove very useful, if it only starts a hare or two. And once the hares start running’—he raised an imaginary gun to his shoulder—’Bang! Bang! Over they go.’
He looked, thought the Dean, like a jolly red-faced farmer out for a day’s sport.
‘When I first heard of Appledown’s decease,’ said Dr. Smallhorn, joining the tips of his fingers and looking severely at Pollock, ‘I made it my business to institute a discreet inquiry amongst my boys. I did this for a reason. It is my firm intention that whatever investigations may be set on foot, the scholars under my care shall not be subjected to unpleasant cross-examination.’
Pollock refrained from pointing out, as he might have done, that in the last resort the majesty of the law might override even the wishes of a headmaster. He himself had a profound mistrust of boys as witnesses and was quite prepared (for the time being) to collect his information at second hand.
‘You should understand,’ pursued the headmaster, ‘that on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays we have what we call “late practice” nights. Full choir practice takes place in cathedral, of course, but these evening practices are for the boys alone. Rather late, you will say, but we find it difficult to fit everything in.’
Pollock had the impression that the headmaster had forgotten for the moment that he was addressing a police officer and not a prospective parent.
‘On these evenings the choir, after finishing Evensong at six-thirty, return to the school for an evening meal of cocoa and bread and buttAfter this orgy it appeared that the choir marched over to Mickie’s house for practice, arriving there at about seven o’clock, returning to the school on the stroke of eight to retire to their virtuous slumbers. As the headmaster rolled forth his leisurely periods, Pollock made an occasional note and allowed his eye to rove. The photographs of classical statuary on the wall and a modern filing cabinet in the corner. A methodically arranged desk – on top of it, photographs of boys, three calendars, and a model in compressed paper of the Duomo at Florence.
Close Quarters Page 7