Ten Star Clues

by E. R. Punshon

  “There is nothing more you can tell us?”

  “No. I don’t know that I should if I could. I can’t, but it’s her business. If you want to know more you must ask her. I doubt if she will be much inclined to say anything.” The colonel was of much the same opinion, but he made no comment. Changing the subject, he said:—

  “I haven’t had time to consult the firearms register yet, but I think I remember one of the licences Earl Wych held was for an automatic pistol. We’ve found in one of the drawers here an empty case that seems to have held a point three-two Colt self-loader, but there’s no trace of the pistol itself. Can you tell us anything about it?”

  The countess shook her head.

  “I believe he had a pistol of some sort. We are insured, but some of the heirlooms would be quite irreplaceable. There’s the old silver salt, for instance, said to be a gift from Queen Elizabeth, and things like that. Burglars would probably melt them down. My husband got the pistol some years ago when there was an epidemic of burglaries in the neighbourhood. After that died down, I expect he forgot all about it. I never remember seeing it recently or hearing him speak of it for that matter.”

  Bobby moved over and murmured something in his chief’s ear. The two men talked together in undertones. Lady Wych was beginning to look very tired. The fierce vigour, the dominating air she had shown when she first entered the room had gradually left her. Now she was looking old and feeble. Bobby indeed was growing afraid she might collapse under the strain of so much questioning, bravely as she was bearing up. She had rallied to her aid all the powers, or more, that age had left her, but now they were nearly exhausted. The colonel nodded in agreement to the suggestion Bobby had been making and said to her:—

  “Just one more question. You are convinced that the man calling himself Bertram Hoyle is in fact Bertram Hoyle, and your grandson, and therefore now succeeds to the title and estates?”

  Lady Wych rose to her feet as if with a sudden flash of energy and resolve.

  “My husband publicly acknowledged him,” she said loudly and clearly.

  When she had spoken she swayed and would have fallen had not Bobby jumped forward in time to support her. She leaned heavily on his arm and then seemed to recover to some degree.

  “I am sorry, I am afraid I must go back upstairs,” she said.

  The colonel, alarmed by her looks, rang the bell and then hurried to open the door for her. She went through leaning on Bobby’s arm. One of the maids appeared in answer to the colonel’s ring. She was sent to find Sophy. Lady Wych was still leaning on Bobby’s arm. She was looking better now, the heart attack that had threatened having apparently passed off. She said to him:—

  “Are you still thinking? I wonder what you are thinking?”

  “I am thinking,” he answered, “that when people do not tell us the whole truth, then it becomes very difficult for us to discover any of the truth.”

  “That remark approaches the insolent,” she said haughtily.

  “A police investigation is not bounded by the laws of etiquette,” he told her quietly, “and police are not respecters of persons. Or at least, if they are, they fail in their duty. May I ask you another question? A personal one. I suggested it to Colonel Glynne. He did not wish to put it to you officially, but he said I might ask it if I liked.”

  “What is it?”

  “Why you do not wish to tell us whom you suspect of murdering Earl Wych?”

  “I suspect no one,” she said harshly.

  “I will put it another way,” he told her. “Whom do you suspect we may suspect?”

  “That is another question,” she said looking at him doubtfully. “I do not like your questions, young man.”

  “So you do not answer it. No answer is in itself sometimes an answer. I wonder if you are willing that your husband’s murderer should remain unpunished?”

  “Young man,” she answered again, “when you come to my age you will understand how little punishment matters.”

  “Yet,” Bobby said, “if breaches of the law go unpunished the law will break down, and chaos will result.”

  She was looking at him now with a certain grim amusement.

  “You are an odd policeman,” she said. “Do you want to discuss the ethics of punishment? I have heard two Oxford professors arguing about that. They came to no agreement, but they both got very cross, and I am sure would have liked to punish each other with a week’s bread and water. A severe punishment, too,” she added thoughtfully, “for Oxford professors—especially the water.”

  “I have always thought of punishment as society’s act of self-defence—-justifiable homicide, so to say,” Bobby answered. “No doubt a better society would find a better means of defending itself. Will you tell me now whom you suspect?”

  “No,” she answered.

  They had reached the hall. Sophy was running down the stairs towards them. She had only just received the housemaid’s message. Bobby and Lady Wych waited at the foot of the stairs, by the portrait of that ancestress of earlier days of whom the tale was told that she had sacrificed her son to the honour of the family. Lady Wych saw that Bobby was looking at it. She said:—

  “Well? what are you thinking now?”

  “That the honour of the Hoyle family,” he answered slowly, “would seem to demand many sacrifices.”

  “You think too much,” she told him frowningly, and then Sophy came up.

  To her Bobby relinquished the care of the countess and went back to join Colonel Glynne, whom he found looking very worried and disturbed.

  “Well,” he asked as Bobby re-entered the room, “what do you make of all that?”

  “For one thing,” Bobby answered, “that she knows a good deal more than she told us.”

  “I thought that, too,” agreed the colonel. “But what can we do? An old woman like that—one moment all fire and energy. The next on the point of collapse. Impossible to press her too far. Owen.”

  “Sir?”

  “You don’t think she can be guilty herself? Jealousy or something like that, if she knew the old man had been trying to fool about with this Longden girl.”

  “It might be,” Bobby said thoughtfully. “To save her honour, the honour of the family, his honour perhaps.”

  “She’s a remarkable old woman,” muttered the colonel discontentedly, as if he felt it unfair he should have to do with remarkable old women. “She had me quite scared at times. She would go through with anything. What can she be holding back?”

  “I am sure of one thing,” Bobby answered. “There is certainly something odd about Bertram Hoyle. Yet she still wants to acknowledge him. So she must be willing to see him take the title and estates.”

  “Difficult to understand,” the colonel agreed. “If he is an impostor, what possible reason can there be for acknowledging him? or for the countess being still willing to accept him? One might suspect blackmail, only with Earl Wych—well, you can’t take that idea seriously.” Bobby was less sure. The life of any man may hold strange secrets. His imagination played with various ideas. An early bigamous marriage perhaps somewhere in the family that made all acknowledged issue illegitimate. But what was the use of guessing? The colonel interrupted his thoughts by saying abruptly:—

  “We’ll have him in next. Thank goodness we needn’t handle him so tenderly. He isn’t a girl and can’t start crying, and he isn’t an old woman and can’t collapse on our hands.”

  “No, sir,” Bobby agreed, “but he can lie. He may prove good at the job.”

  They had to wait for a few minutes while the message reached Bertram. The barking of dogs outside attracted Bobby’s attention. He moved to the window to see what was exciting them. Anne was walking across the lawn below the terrace. She was accompanied by two or three dogs. She was hurrying, almost running. The dogs were leaping and barking at her side, evidently demanding that she should stop and play with them. Bobby had only a passing glimpse, but he noticed that the coats of the dogs were wet. She had
apparently been giving them a swim in the ornamental pond that was one of the features of the castle grounds, Bobby watched thoughtfully as they disappeared from view. The colonel said impatiently:— “What are you staring at?”

  “Miss Anne Hoyle has been giving her dogs a swim,” Bobby explained, “and stopped too soon for their liking.”

  “Well, never mind that,” the colonel snapped. “We can’t waste our time on trifles. What’s worrying me is this automatic that belonged to Earl Wych. We’ve got to find it. We’ve got to.”

  “Yes, sir,” agreed Bobby obediently.

  “There’s one thing it seems to show. You see it?”

  “I can’t think of anything special at the moment,” Bobby confessed.

  “Well, to my mind, if the earl’s own pistol was used, then that means the murder was the result of a quarrel. It wasn’t premeditated.”

  “Yes, sir,” agreed Bobby. “I see that. Only until we find the pistol we’ve nothing to show it was the weapon actually used.”

  “No, I know, that’s why we’ve got to find it somehow,” declared the colonel. “It can’t be far away.”

  Before Bobby could answer the door opened and Bertram came into the room and stood there in the doorway, looking at them sulkily.

  CHAPTER XI

  BERTRAM

  Sulkily the man who, by the recent tragedy, succeeded to the ancient title of Wych, the castle with all its treasures accumulated through the centuries, lands that still stretched far around, came slowly forward. With his hands thrust deep into his pockets, his shoulders hunched, he stood there looking at them scowlingly, and Bobby thought:—

  “He’s angry. He’s frightened. He’s very frightened. Why?”

  The stenographer was thinking:—

  “Gabbler or mumbler?”

  He soon knew, for Bertram burst into a torrent of angry complaint. They had asked him plenty of questions already. Why did they want to start again? He knew nothing about it. Nothing he could tell them. He had never left his room all the night. Slept all the time. He had heard nothing. Slept like a child. He wasn’t going to answer any more questions without having a lawyer present. Clinton Wells was hanging about somewhere. He wouldn’t say another word unless Clinton Wells were present.

  “My lord,” began Colonel Glynne formally, “if your lordship will permit me—”

  But the young man interrupted him even more angrily.

  “Don’t lose any time, do you?” he snarled. “They all started ‘my lording’ me right away. Can’t they wait till the old man’s in his grave?”

  “You succeed to the title immediately,” the colonel told him, looking somewhat puzzled. “There is no interregnum.”

  “No—what’s that?”

  “I mean there is no interval,” the colonel explained. “The moment the holder of a title dies, the next in succession takes it. You become Earl Wych automatically.”

  “Not,” interrupted Bertram roughly, “not if that guy Ralph can stop me.”

  “He can, of course, challenge your claim,” agreed the colonel, “but I suppose, as you satisfied the late earl of your identity, you will have no trouble in proving it. In any case, that has nothing to do with us. Not a police matter. We are only here to conduct an investigation into a murder. I take it for granted, since you were accepted by the late earl, that you are his grandson, and therefore the present earl. And I do hope you will just answer a few questions. There are one or two things we are not clear about, minor points. You see it’s important we should know exactly every one’s point of view and what every one thinks.”

  “Oh, all right, go ahead,” the young man answered, and flung himself into a chair, looking now a little less sulky but still wary and uneasy.

  Bobby was reflecting that he made no display of grief or even ordinary concern at his grandfather's shocking death. Perhaps not so very surprising after so long an absence. More surprising that he showed no excitement and even little interest in his inheritance. Yet surely it was no small thing to succeed to so ancient a title, such large possessions and responsibilities. Even if, in spite of the recognition accorded him by his grandparents, he were an impostor, one would have expected him to betray some exultation or satisfaction at the prospect of securing so glittering a prize. Yet he seemed merely sulky and worried.

  “I believe,” the colonel was saying now, “there was some sort of scuffle after dinner last night. Between you and Ralph Hoyle?”

  “He got me when I wasn’t ready,” complained Bertram. “He’s sore with me. He was sore with the old man. What about asking him a few questions? Clinton Wells says now he can go into court. Put in a petition or something. He couldn’t before, because there wasn’t anything to petition about. That’s why.”

  The colonel blinked. He didn’t quite follow. Bobby said:—

  “You mean you think Ralph Hoyle murdered his uncle in order to bring matters to a head and allow your claim to be tested in court?”

  “That’s right,” Bertram said. “That’s why he did it. Or perhaps it was just they started scrapping, and that’s the way it ended. Anyhow, he’s got it fixed now so the old man can’t testify. Only when he’s hanged for it, that won’t do him much good, will it?”

  “There is no proof at present of the guilt of any one,” the colonel said, a little stiffly. “I would like to mention another matter. I understand you said in the course of the scuffle with Ralph Hoyle that Miss Anne Hoyle possessed an automatic pistol?”

  “That’s right,” Bertram agreed. “She showed it me. A colt automatic three-two. Knew how to use it, too. You could see that. Bossy that girl is. Bossy. Thinks she ought to run the show here, only she can’t, because she’s a girl, so she thinks she’ll run it all the same, and every one else as well. Bossy,” he repeated moodily.

  “Did you ask her why she had it, or where she got it from?” the colonel asked.

  “No. I don’t ask her things,” Bertram answered, sulky again. “She does all the asking necessary. And more. But she had that three-two automatic all right, handling it like she knew how.” He stopped and stared. A new idea had evidently occurred to him. “You mean you think it’s her?” he said. “I wouldn’t put it past her. She’s tough.”

  “Good heavens,” exclaimed the colonel, extremely startled by this unexpected suggestion. “Why on earth —well, why should she? I mean murder, her grandfather?”

  “Well, that makes me earl right away, don’t it?” Bertram replied slowly, “and then if she picks me up, then she’s countess and runs the show and me too, she reckons. Bossy, she is, that girl. Bossy. I know it.”

  “My lord,” began the colonel, profoundly shocked, for in his scheme of things, one did not suspect young ladies of the aristocracy of that sort of thing. Girls might to-day be a bit inclined to kick over the traces, but they did draw the line at shooting their grandfathers. At least he hoped so. “Really, really,” he protested, while Bobby resumed his abstracted contemplation of the ceiling above his head.

  “Well, why not?” asked Bertram, looking quite eager. “Old man was bumped off about half-past eleven. Well, she wasn’t in her room at half-past eleven or thereabouts.”

  “Are you sure of that?” the colonel asked doubtfully.

  “Dead sure. The door of her room was open. I wondered why. I had a peep. Just peeped in. She wasn’t there. Where was she?”

  “That will be inquired into,” the colonel said stiffly. “She will be asked.”

  Bertram looked alarmed again.

  “You won’t let on it was me told you?” he asked earnestly.

  “Nothing will be said that is not necessary,” the colonel answered. “Your lordship may be asked to give evidence, of course. Apart from that, nothing will be said that is not essential to the inquiry.”

  “She'll have it in for me if she gets to know it was me told you,” Bertram muttered, and did not look as if he found much comfort in the colonel’s assurances.

  Bobby and the colonel engaged in a whispered
conversation. Bobby received permission to ask a few questions on his own account. To the surprise of Colonel Glynne, these began with a long speech of congratulation to Bertram on his succession to so splendid a position.

  “A position the Earls Wych have always so worthily upheld,” Bobby went on smoothly. “To-day, with war upon us, there will be so many opportunities. It was when Napoleon threatened invasion that the Earl Wych of that day raised the Wychwood Yeomanry. He was the first colonel. They are mechanised now, and they will be very proud to have once more in their ranks an Earl Wych. The late earl was honorary colonel, you know.”

  “Yes, but, steady on,” interrupted Bertram, “what are you getting at? I’m no colonel. I don’t know a thing about soldiering.”

  “It will have all the more effect,” Bobby explained, “when you join up as a private.”

  “Me?”

  “You’ll just be in time,” Bobby told him. “The Wychwood Yeomanry will be among the first to go to France. Light mechanized troops will be badly wanted for scouting and to head the advance.”

  “Kidding, aren’t you?” Bertram asked doubtfully. “Earls and lords and such like aren’t privates. Stands to reason.”

  “Every one is liable under the new Conscription Act,” Bobby explained smoothly. “Dukes and dustmen, earls, lords, and tramps, all of us.” He added slowly:— “An Earl Wych who wasn’t the first to come forward—why, people would hardly believe he was an Earl Wych at all.”

  “Oh, that’s it, is it?” Bertram growled.

  Then he was silent. Bobby continued to watch him closely. Colonel Glynne was looking more and more puzzled. The stenographer seized the opportunity to sharpen his pencil. Bertram said presently:—