The colonel took no notice of this renewed threat. He was turning over the papers before him. Bobby was idly jotting down his impressions on a scrap of paper. Why he did so he hardly knew, and when he had finished he tore the paper into small scraps and threw it into the waste-paper basket. What he had written ran much like this: “Strong emotions. Confiding. People with strong emotions generally are. If he trusted any one, would do so to the limit. Generous, hot-headed, truculent, sensitive. Interesting sort of chap. Eat out of your hand or fly at your throat, and a toss up which.”
It may be added that if Ralph had ever had an opportunity to read this summing up of his character, he would have read it with bewilderment and declared that almost the exact reverse was true in every single detail. He did become aware that Bobby was once again regarding him with a deep and searching intentness. He returned the scrutiny with an angry glare.
“Well?” he said with a truculence that fully justified one item at least of Bobby’s jottings. “Well?” he repeated, this time still more truculently.
“Yes?” said Bobby amiably.
This interchange of interjections was hardly a promising conversational opening, and in fact conversation ceased therewith. The colonel was still busy with his papers. Ralph turned his defiant stare to the window as though wishing his challenge now to embrace the whole outside world as well. Bobby continued to tear into very small pieces the jottings he had been putting down. The colonel gave a preliminary cough as a warning that he was now ready to begin again.
“The dispute with your uncle,” he said, “I suppose was about the return of the man claiming to be Bertram Hoyle and now therefore succeeding to the title and estates.”
“You may as well understand at once,” Ralph interrupted, “that I don’t admit for a moment that the fellow is anything but a bare-faced fraud.”
“His grandparents accepted him?”
“Yes, I know,” Ralph admitted, frowning heavily. “I can’t make it out. I’ll swear uncle knew well enough the fellow’s an impostor. He must have known it. He as good as admitted as much when we were rowing at each other last night. He started talking about the honour of the family. I asked him what the devil the honour of the family had to do with accepting as a Hoyle, as the next Earl Wych, a fellow who hadn’t a drop of Hoyle blood in his veins. He doesn’t even look a Hoyle. He’s no more a Hoyle than the first tramp you meet on the road or the first Irish labourer who comes over here to make a bit digging potatoes and goes home to pay his subscription to the I.R.A. to buy bombs for murder. And uncle had the cheek to tell me he was doing nothing in any way to affect my rights. It was none of my business, nothing to do with me, he said. Kicking me out to put a fraud in my place wasn’t supposed to be any business of mine. That made me madder than ever.”
Bobby said thoughtfully:—
“It seems a curious remark. I mean, saying it was no business of yours. Can you suggest what it meant?”
Ralph only answered by a gesture of helpless and angry bewilderment.
“Did you ask your uncle for an explanation?”
“Well, what do you think?” retorted Ralph. “I did nothing else.”
“I’m asking,” Bobby explained, “because our information—it’s in one of these statements—is that your first reaction was to call your uncle a liar.”
“Well, so he was, lying like blazes,” answered Ralph, though now a little on the defensive.
“Not exactly asking for an explanation, though,” murmured Bobby. “You see, from what I gather about Earl Wych he was very conscious of his—well, his rank and position. Proud of being Earl Wych. I suppose any one would be. So I was rather wondering if calling him a liar was quite the best way of getting him to explain. Especially when the word was used from a young man to a much older man, from a nephew to his great-uncle, indeed from any one at all to the Earl Wych.”
“Rubbing it in a bit, aren’t you?” grunted Ralph sulkily. “All the same, if you don’t want to be called a liar, you shouldn’t tell lies.”
“You see,” explained Bobby as gently as before, “what I’m really trying to get at, is:— Did your talk with your uncle last night run on the same lines? I mean, did you start off by calling Earl Wych a liar?”
“I suppose I made it pretty clear what I thought of the whole business,” Ralph admitted. “I don’t think I called uncle a liar again. Not that I remember. I may have said it was all a blasted lie or something of that sort.” He paused for a moment and seemed to be reflecting. “Oh, well,” he said, “I suppose really I didn’t give uncle much chance to explain. I felt too sore. I suppose I might have gone a bit slower. I think he must have gone the way old people do sometimes—second childhood, that sort of thing.”
“Did he give that impression to you or to any one else apart from his recognition of his grandson?”
“No, he didn’t,” admitted Ralph. “Not in the least. Vigorous as any one half his age—especially when he was telling me things. None of my business, he told me. That’s what made me so mad. But I didn’t call him a liar again. At least I don’t think I did. Anyhow, he called me much worse things.”
“In fact,” suggested Bobby, “a somewhat undignified slanging match on both sides?”
“Well, if you like to put it that way,” Ralph admitted again. “What you are getting at is that I was a blasted fool to lose my temper; and if I had had the sense of a year-old baby, I might have got a reasonable explanation?”
“The words are your own,” said Bobby gravely, “but the meaning is more or less mine.”
“All very well for you to talk,” grumbled Ralph. “If someone came along and kicked you out from where you belonged you mightn’t be quite so calm and cool and reasonable and all that. Besides, old Clinton did try to get an explanation. If any one could have talked uncle over, he could. He didn’t, any more than I did, though of course they didn’t row at each other. Clinton just got shown the door. That was all. Clinton didn’t quite like it when I said I would have a try. He said it would only make things worse. He was right enough all right. He generally is. Got quite huffy with me about it, and said he hoped I would take his advice another time or he would chuck the whole show. So I suppose next time I shall have to. I suppose you are thinking it’s a pity I didn’t this time.”
Both Bobby and the colonel assured him with some emphasis that that was exactly what they did think. If Clinton’s advice had been followed, this unfortunate and violent quarrel, just before the occurrence of the murder, would never have taken place.
“There’s one other question I want to ask,” the colonel went on. “I understand an automatic, point three-two, was kept in a drawer of this writing table. Can you say when you saw it last?”
“I haven’t the least idea. I expect I knew it was there —or was there at one time—but I haven’t seen it or thought of it for years. Not that I remember. It didn’t figure in the row last night, if that’s what you’re getting at. We didn’t get as fair as threatening each other with automatics.” He was silent for a moment and then said, shuddering slightly, as though the question brought home to him more vividly what it was that had happened:— “Do you mean it was the one used to kill uncle?”
“We can’t tell that yet,” the colonel answered. “No one seems to know what has become of it.”
“Does any one know if it was there recently?” Ralph asked. “Uncle may have got rid of it or put it away somewhere.”
“There seems proof it was in its case in the top drawer of this table a day or two ago,” the colonel answered. “The empty case is there still.”
“I see,” said Ralph gloomily. “You know I left about half-past ten? I suppose you think I could easily have come back. I could. I didn’t.”
“Will you tell us what you did after leaving here?”
“I went straight back home.”
“Did you meet any one on the way?”
Ralph shook his head.
“No,” he said. “I’ve no proof—no—w
hat do you call it?—alibi. I walked back as fast as I could, thinking of all the things I wished I had said to uncle—and all the things I wished I hadn’t. I walked pretty fast, trying to walk off my temper. You know where I live? It’s the house built for old Anderson. He was estate agent till he died and I took it on. It’s much too big a place for me, but there isn’t anywhere else. When I got back I didn’t feel like turning in at once. It was a fine night and I sat down in the garden and smoked a pipe and thought of some more things I wished I had told uncle—and some more things I wished I hadn’t. And I thought how old Clinton would rub it in next time and remind me he had warned me what would happen and tried his best to stop me. Only all he said only made me more determined.”
“In what way?” Bobby asked. “Why was that?”
“Oh, I suppose I am an obstinate beggar. Clinton’s a real lawyer. He trotted out all the ‘pros’ as he called them, and then all the ‘cons’, and all he said only made me more pig-headed. I wasn’t scared of what uncle said or of his giving me the sack right away and making this sham Bertram agent in my place. When I let myself into the house I stayed up for a time and made some notes for a talk I ought to have had to-day with the Argentine bloke I was to have seen in Liverpool—a thousand-pound deal washed out, probably. He won’t wait. Well, I suppose that doesn’t matter much.”
“There are servants in the house?”
“Housekeeper and maid. It’s a big place. Old Anderson had a large family and got it built to suit himself.”
“Did they hear you come in?”
“I don’t suppose so. Why should they? Fast asleep probably, and I didn’t make any awful amount of noise.”
The colonel was looking at his papers again.
“You and Miss Anne Hoyle are understood to be engaged,” he remarked.
Ralph stiffened perceptibly.
“I don’t think there is any need to discuss our private affairs, is there?” he said.
“I mentioned it,” explained the colonel, “because it may help us to know how all you people stand to each other, and because Miss Hoyle told us the engagement has been broken off.”
“It is for her to decide,” Ralph answered as stiffly as before. “I think you must ask her if you want to know anything more.”
“I am sorry,” the colonel continued, “if you think I’m intruding on private matters, but there may be some kind of bearing on your uncle’s murder. I’m afraid I must ask if the engagement was broken by Miss Anne’s wish? If so, is there any reason you know of or is it a result of Bertram’s return? If so again, does that mean that she believes he is the genuine Bertram, and therefore now the rightful Earl Wych?”
“You must ask her yourself what she thinks,” Ralph retorted. He went on angrily:— “I daresay she is like every one else and thinks the old people ought to know. Every one seems to think that settles it. Every one,” he added with a sudden softening of his expression, “except Miss Longden.”
“Miss Longden,” repeated the colonel, surprised, “why, what does she know about it?”
“As much as any one else, I suppose,” retorted Ralph. “Got a right to her opinion, hasn’t she? She seems to be about the only one who thinks I’ve any business to stand up for myself. She told me she would fight it out till she dropped.” He smiled again, and his smile had the effect of altering his whole expression in the oddest way—of changing him from a scowling, angry combatant likely to be at your throat at any moment, into a grinning, friendly school-boy likely at any moment to confide to you the last piece of fun he had enjoyed. ‘Two men in him,’ Bobby said to himself, ‘only which is fundamental?’ and Ralph went on:—“She’s a quiet little thing, and you would think she was scared of her own shadow, but she’s got guts all the same. Once she has made up her mind to a thing, I don’t believe she would ever budge.”
The colonel didn’t say anything. But privately be agreed. He knew because he had tried. She had made up her mind—not to answer his questions—and nothing had made her budge. Suspicious, the colonel thought darkly. Unless she knew more than she ought to know, why had she taken up that attitude, that defiant attitude? He went on:—
“We know the murderer used a point three-two automatic pistol. We have heard of two. The one that ought to be in this drawer, and isn’t, and no one seems to know what has become of it. Then there’s the one generally kept in the Wych estate office, the one you were cleaning yesterday. Mr. Longden and Mr. Clinton Wells were present, and both say they saw you lock it up in the estate office safe.” Fumbling amidst the mass of papers before him, he found the account of the incident and read it aloud. “That is correct, is it?” he asked. “In every detail?”
“Very correct and very detailed,” Ralph agreed. “You don’t suppose that it was used last night, do you? I don’t think that’s possible. I don’t suppose you suspect Mr. Longden, do you? He had the key of the safe in his possession till next morning apparently. But not the office door key. My typist was there till after five, and after she had gone the housekeeper cleaned up, bolting the door on the inside when she had finished. After that, no one could have got in except through her kitchen, and she was sitting there till she went to bed at eleven. I’ve taken the trouble to make sure of all that because I remembered about the pistol. And you’ve had a man there watching the safe nearly all day, haven’t you?”
“Yes, that’s so,” agreed the colonel. “Mr. Longden seems an absent-minded gentleman. Could any one have got the key from him and then returned it somehow?”
“Difficult, I should think,” commented Ralph. “Anyhow, you must ask him that. If any one did, how did he get into the office?”
“Perhaps it would be as well,” suggested Bobby, “if we made sure first if the pistol is still in the safe. If it is, we can soon be certain whether it was used last night or not.”
“Is that correct?” Ralph asked a little doubtfully. “I’ve been told that’s possible, but can you be certain?”
“Quite certain,” Bobby assured him. “It really seems that the universe is of an infinite variety—no two things are ever identical. Everything can always be distinguished from everything else, and the bullets fired from one pistol from those fired by any other pistol in existence.”
“Well, we’ll go and have a look,” said the colonel briskly. “Will you come, too, Ralph?”
“I will,” Ralph answered with considerable emphasis, “though I’m certain the thing is still there because it can’t possibly be anywhere else, and so it can’t have been the one used last night. That’s rather a cracked idea.”
“Oh, well,” Bobby explained, “most detective work is trying out cracked ideas. By the way,” he added after they had started, “can you tell me why it always seems to be Earl Wych and not Earl of Wych, like Earl of Derby and so on. I know there’s no place actually Wych by itself. Is that the reason? There’s Midwych, of course, Brimsbury Wych, Wychwood, half a dozen other Wychs, but no single Wych, is there?”
“Not that I know of,” Ralph answered briefly and without replying to the first question.
“Is that why the title is Earl Wych and not Earl of Wych?”
“Might be,” grunted Ralph, and added somewhat irritably:— “What do you want to know for? some more subtle detective work?”
“Might be,” Bobby answered good-humouredly. “I was just wondering. British titles are a bit complicated, you know. I’ve heard of a British baronet and when he went to the States, because of the ‘Bart’ after his name, he got called either ‘Bart’ under the impression that that was his surname, or else ‘my bart’, on the analogy of ‘my lord’.”
Ralph stood still and stared at Bobby suspiciously.
“What’s the idea?” he demanded. “What are you getting at? Trying to be funny? I don’t think this is the time, if that’s it. Not now. Or trying to pull my leg? I don’t like that idea either. Not just now.”
“I assure you,” Bobby said earnestly, “it’s not that. I’m asking a serious question a
nd I have a serious purpose. Will you answer it?”
“Can’t,” Ralph replied, “because no one knows. I can tell you the family legend, but there’s nothing to support it. The story is that when the Baron Hoyle of that time was created an earl he meant to be Earl Wych of Wychwood. He owned part of the forest and meant the title to sort of make a claim to the rest of it. But he was so pleased about getting his earldom that he wanted every one to celebrate and sent round a cask of wine to the chaps who were making out the patent. The result was that they all imbibed a bit freely, and the ‘of Wychwood’ got left out. So the title went through as ‘Earl Wych’ and Earl Wych it has been ever since. That’s the yarn. But there’s no real authority for it. Interested?”
“I find it very interesting,” Bobby answered; and then they arrived at the estate office where, when the so carefully guarded safe was opened with the key that had been so long in Mr. Longden’s possession, they found indeed the case for the automatic. But it was empty.
Of the automatic itself, there was no sign.
CHAPTER XV
SUMMING UP
The closest investigation, the most prolonged inquiry, threw no further light on the disappearance of the estate automatic. Three witnesses, the vicar, Clinton Wells, Ralph himself, were all prepared to swear they had seen the weapon locked up in the office safe. Yet now it wasn’t there, but only—as in the library at the castle—an empty case that once, no doubt, had held a pistol and that, again, as at the castle, bore no finger marks upon a polished surface eminently suitable for taking such impressions. Miss Higson, the estate office typist, who liked to call herself secretary, had been at work in the outer office till half-past five and no one could possibly have entered the inner office without her knowledge. No one had even, as it happened, with the exception of herself, been in the outer office between Ralph’s departure and her own. At half-past five she had locked up and gone home, taking the office key with her as usual, so as to be able to let herself in in the morning. During the evening Mrs. Gregson, the housekeeper, who occupied rooms above the offices, had cleaned and swept and tidied as usual. There were only three ways of reaching the inner office where was the safe. Through the outer office, its door locked by Miss Higson on her departure; through Mrs. Gregson’s kitchen, where she was sitting all evening; by the front door admitting to stairs that led to the upper floor occupied by her. But that way led also through the kitchen. She had locked up carefully at night as usual and there were no signs of any forcible entry.
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