Island in the Sun

by Alec Waugh

  “Because, my dear boy, a journalist is in one respect the most trustworthy person in the world. He will only repeat gossip in a column. He keeps his cards up his sleeve. Bradshaw would not repeat one word I told him, until it appeared in print.”

  “But why did you tell him in the first place?”

  “Because I wanted it in print, after a certain interval. To begin with, as I told you, I didn’t want anyone to know: I wanted to keep the murderer guessing, there was a chance he might give himself away at once; but he hasn’t done so. Then after three weeks or so I thought it would be useful to let him know that we were interested in the watch and wallet.”

  “But he already knows about the wallet.”

  “As it happens he does, but that was unexpected. I couldn’t have foreseen, when I talked to Bradshaw, that we were going to find the wallet. That was a surprise.”

  “I wonder why you told the press about that.”

  Whittingham shrugged. “Possibly that was a mistake. It’s very hard to tell. There was as much to say on one side as the other. As a matter of fact I tossed for it. I’m working in the dark, you see, waiting for a gleam of light. I’m confident that it’ll come. It’s simply a question of keeping my eyes open.”

  “Do you agree with Bradshaw about it?”

  “On what point?”

  “On its being done by someone who wanted to make it look like murder.”

  “Did Bradshaw say that?”

  “I thought he did.”

  “Let’s see the paper. I read the article in a hurry. But I didn’t think he said exactly that.”

  Maxwell handed the paper over. Whittingham looked at the last paragraph.

  “No, as I thought, he didn’t say quite that. I’ll read you what he says. ‘Everything points to the murder having been done by a housebreaker who was interrupted by Carson’s early return, but the police are alive to the possibilities of the murderer having attempted to make it look like a thief’s handiwork.’ Not quite the same thing, is it?”

  “No, no, indeed not. I read it quickly.”

  “Of course, of course.”

  There was a pause. Whittingham appeared to be in no hurry for him to go. Whittingham never seemed to have any work to do. He was always in when you called. The telephone never went. Nobody brought in files. No visitor was announced. It was hard to believe that this office was the center of security in the island. The pause lengthened. It made Maxwell awkward. He had got to say something. He had not had any answer to his last question.

  “Do you yourself think it’s likely that the murderer tried to make it look like theft?”

  “My dear fellow, how should I know? It is a possibility. There are fifteen possibilities. I am in the dark.”

  “But you must have a theory?”

  “Why should I?”

  “When you were enumerating those fifteen possibilities, you must have considered which was the likeliest.”

  “That’s the last thing I’d do.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s a mistake to have preconceptions. You must keep an open mind.”

  “It seems a curious way to track down criminals.”

  “You read too many detective stories, my dear friend.”

  “But…” Maxwell checked, baffled. He had the sense of that warm, soft flabby substance closing suffocatingly round him. He had to hit back against it.

  “I’ve read the Freeman Wills Croft stories. You seem to follow the example of Inspector French.”

  “In what way?”

  “You check on everything. Your inspector’s been making a check in our district.”

  “He’s been making a check in every district.”

  “That sounds like Inspector French thoroughness.”

  “You don’t expect us to sit here idle, do you?”

  “I was wondering after what you said.”

  Again the colonel smiled, that lazy, friendly, basically uninterested smile.

  “You didn’t play rugger football, did you?”

  “I didn’t, no.”

  “I did. I played under two coaches. One had been a three quarter, the other had been a forward. The three quarter coach was always devising new methods of attack, training the forwards to take part in three quarter movements. That was at school. The papers said that we were the best side to watch in England. We ran up big scores, but we got beaten now and again through having gaps in our defenses.

  “The other coach was a forward. He coached our police college. He concentrated on defense. If you don’t let the other man through, he’d say, you can’t be beaten. Sooner or later the other side will make a mistake, jump on it and you’ll score a try. We weren’t a spectacular side to watch but we were rarely beaten and we won more matches than we drew. It was a good training for a policeman. He has to spend most of his time waiting, a spider at the center of his web.”

  “It sounds dull.”

  “You say that because you’ve been reading detective stories. It’s fascinating. Things have to happen quickly in a detective story, and in a detective story the policeman is working on one case only. In real life he’s working on a dozen simultaneously; so many pots simmering; I very often know who is the criminal, but I have no proof. I sit here and wait. He probably plays into my hand someday. Very often I don’t know. But I’m in no hurry. Wasn’t I saying this to you before or was it to Bradshaw that I said it? I can’t remember whom I say what to nowadays. Middle age, past middle age, it’s hell. No, it’s not dull, far from it. Look at the steel cabinet over there. It’s full of files. I know at least twenty people in this town who would give ten years to have ten minutes inside that cabinet. I sit and wait and lay my little traps. Nine times in ten they give themselves away.”

  “In what way, give me an example.”

  “Let’s see, can I think of one? It’s usually something very trivial; something that isn’t evidence at all, a look, an intonation, the use of one word rather than another. There was a case now in B.G. a long time ago, I wish I could remember the exact details. I ought to have kept a diary. I shall never be able to write my reminiscences; they’d have been worth reading. This B.G. case now. It was forgery. What put me on to my man was his saying ‘afterward’ instead of ‘after.’ What was the context—no, I can’t remember. The key point was that the word ‘afterward’ gave the suggestion of something happening after a definite event. I wonder if you get the point.

  “Suppose for instance you were telling me that you called round at the tennis club on your way back home. You’d normally say, wouldn’t you, ‘I looked in there after lunch,’ but if you were to say ‘afterward I looked in at the tennis club’ that’s somehow different. It gives the impression that something definite and dramatic happened about lunch time. ‘Afterward’—it’s a powerful word. Do you get my point? No, probably you don’t. I haven’t explained it properly. I’ve forgotten the details. It’s a terrible thing to be old, one by one your faculties desert you, but the use of the word ‘afterward’ instead of ‘after’ did the trick in that forgery case. I wish I could remember the whole story, it would interest you. That ‘afterward’ put me on the scent.”

  The warm, soft flabby substance was closing inexorably on Maxwell. He was being stifled, yet he shivered too. “After,” “afterward”: hadn’t he himself confused those words in this very room three weeks ago? Hadn’t he said “afterward” instead of “after I passed the house”; “afterward” must have given the impression that he had seen that car in the road after some definite event. Wouldn’t it have been normal for him to have said, “after I passed Carson’s turning,” but instead of that he had said “afterward”? Hadn’t Whittingham caught him up, asked, “after what”? He had barely noticed the slip at the time, but now it all came back, vividly, startlingly.

  “We set our little traps. We lay our ground bait. We sit and wait,” Whittingham was repeating.

  His face looked as innocent as a child’s. It was impossible to think of him as a malevolent s
pider, watching from the center of his web. “If you are worried about the people in your district, get in touch with our officer. He’s got his orders. He’ll look after you,” he said.

  5

  “We set our little traps. We lay our ground bait.”

  Maxwell sat at the wheel, trembling, unable to release the clutch. His hands were shaking. “After,” “afterward.” What other slips had he made? The watch, how could he have known about the watch? Whittingham had pounced on that: all that long spiel about Dunne’s theory of Time was a pretense. Whittingham was an astute old bird. He did not let you know when you had made a slip. What other slips could he have made? The Belfontaine Committee, what on earth was that? Why had Whittingham started? He had been suprised then. Why, why, why?

  “We set our little traps, lay out our ground bait.” What traps had Whittingham set for him? The wallet. Had he held it in his hands purposely, to see how he would take it? Had he calculated its position on the desk, so that his victim could not look simultaneously at the wallet and at the policeman? Had Whittingham wanted to see whether he would keep looking in its direction? If Whittingham had, he had been disappointed. I gave nothing away, Maxwell reassured himself. I never looked once at it. Ah, but might not that in itself have been suspicious? A normal person would have looked at it, would have been inquisitive about anything he saw in a policeman’s office, would have made some comment. Mightn’t he have been over clever? And hadn’t he this morning betrayed himself by showing that he had noticed the wallet? He had remarked on its being pigskin, because he had known already that it was pigskin. Had that been a mistake? Could he have known that it was pigskin by glancing at it from three yards off? It had been in the sun and rain three weeks. Whittingham had said he hadn’t known that it was pigskin. He had said it did not matter. But that must have been pretense, said to embarrass him. You couldn’t tell where you were with Whittingham.

  Why should he have tried to fuss me with the wallet? Maxwell asked himself. It was my first visit. I hadn’t made any mistakes then. Perhaps he had had that wallet on view for every visitor. Another of his traps and I fell into it.

  He shivered. He was in a fog. He did not know what was being plotted against him, nor by whom. But I’m safe, I’m safe, he told himself. I left no clue. There’s nothing they could find out now. Even if he suspects, even if he knows, there’s nothing that he can do. He must have evidence. This isn’t Russia or Nazi Germany where you can torture a suspect into a confession. This is a free country. He must have evidence. Even though my subconscious trips me. As it did today, as it did twice today. Once over the watch, once over the Belfontaine Committee.

  You could not control your subconscious any more than you could control your dreams. Any moment it might betray him into some admission. The more he worried, the more he brooded, the more likely it was to trip him. He must clear his mind, think of other things, of the elections, of Sylvia, of the estate, of Jocelyn’s marriage; banish that dark chapter from his memory. He would go to the club, stand a round of drinks, swap some off-color stories, behave as though he hadn’t a trouble in the world.

  The club was crowded. Twenty-five to thirty members. There seemed to be some celebration.

  “What’s this in aid of?” he inquired.

  “Bradshaw’s farewell party.”

  “Is he going back to America?”

  “No, round the islands.”

  “Then he’s not leaving for good.”

  “I don’t think he is, you never know.”

  Maxwell looked round him: it was the usual group; only one person’s presence suprised him, David Boyeur’s, but perhaps he wasn’t here as Bradshaw’s guest but as a member who had happened to have looked in that morning.

  The sight of Boyeur roused his irritation. He could never forget how Boyeur had strolled on the evening of his humiliation into that path of light. He had a score to settle there. As he stared at Boyeur, his temper mounted. Boyeur was so sleek, so smooth; his jacket fitted so snugly over his shoulders. It was one of those new corded suits, with a thin blue stripe. When anybody else wore that kind of suit it looked exactly what it was, something that had been bought off the peg for thirty dollars, but worn by Boyeur it had the air of having been tailored in Saville Row. A white flowered bow tie caught up the blue of the coat. He looked fresh and cool on this sultry morning.

  Boyeur turned his head and met Maxwell’s stare. He smiled, a familiar, patronizing smile. Maxwell clenched his fists. It embarrassed him that Boyeur should have seen him staring; it would make Boyeur feel important. Never mind, he could afford to wait. He’d settle his score with him one day. He’d have his chance when the Leg. Co. met. He turned away, a club waiter was at his side.

  “Mr. Bradshaw’s order, sir.”

  “Pony rum and ginger.”

  He crossed over to his host.

  “I’d no idea that you were leaving; isn’t this very sudden?”

  “Journalists always operate at a moment’s notice.”

  “You’ve got tired of us so soon.”

  “It isn’t that. I need to see the other islands. I’m told that every island is a little different: I shall understand this island better when I’ve seen the others.”

  “That’s very true.”

  But that was only in part Bradshaw’s reason for setting out upon this trip. He had come to the conclusion suddenly that he had overstayed his welcome, or at least was less welcome since his article on the color question. He had been congratulated on the article. Everyone had agreed that he had said something that had needed saying, but as individuals they were apprehensive about what he might have to say about themselves. He was aware that conversation tended to cease when he joined a group.

  Moreover he had come to suspect that nothing very dramatic was likely to happen in Santa Marta for several weeks. The stage was set, the characters were in the wings, each had his script, but the curtain was not likely to rise till after the elections. When the new Leg. Co. was elected under universal suffrage, then sparks would fly. How would young Boyeur comport himself? That would be worth watching, but until then a state of suspended animation would prevail. He might as well be somewhere else. He would see Santa Marta with new eyes on his return. He was also curious to know how the other islands were reacting to events here. Were they even interested? He needed to get current events here into focus. If you stayed in one place too long, particularly if it was a small place, you lost your sense of proportion. You became parochial. His stateside readers would soon be feeling that. He had in mind a couple of general articles with the title “So Many Volcanoes.”

  “I’ll be away about ten weeks,” he told Maxwell. “That’ll give me a week in each of the smaller islands, and a couple of weeks in Barbados; no, I shan’t attempt Jamaica. It’s too big, too complicated. I shall finish with a day or two in Trinidad. As perhaps you know there’s a meeting there of the Caribbean Tourist Board. Several American reporters will be there. I’m persuading a few of them to come on here. I want them to write up Santa Marta as a summer resort: a bargain Paradise; that’ll be the line. I’ll collect them there and bring them back with me. They might do something for the island. I don’t see why not.”

  He was in a benign, expansive mood, excited about his trip.

  “Have you heard anything about the Belfontaine Committee?” Maxwell asked him.

  Bradshaw started as Whittingham had done.

  “I shouldn’t have thought that you’d have heard anything about that,” he said.

  “Why not?”

  “Do you know what it is?”

  “As a matter of fact I don’t.”

  “Where did you hear about it?”

  “I can’t remember now. I heard it mentioned somewhere. I asked what it was, and people laughed.”

  “I’m not surprised. People can be very indiscreet. It’s meant to be a secret.”

  “As I’ve heard so much, you’d better tell me the rest.”

  “I suppose I might.”
Bradshaw paused and looked about him.

  “A fund’s being raised to give your father a present; it’s ostensibly because he’s going on the Leg. Co. as a nominated member. Actually it’s a tribute to all that he’s done, one way and another, for the island. It’s intended to be a complete surprise for him: everyone’s been told to be very careful about referring to it when the family is about. So you see…”

  Maxwell saw all right. No wonder Whittingham had started. Had his knowing made Whittingham suspicious? How could it have? Why should it occur to Whittingham that he had heard it from Carson on that fatal evening? His knowledge of the committee could not possibly suggest that he had learnt of it from Carson and on that day. Unless … a sudden alarming thought had struck him.

  “Who’s the chairman of the committee?”

  “The Archdeacon, as of now.”

  “What do you mean by ‘as of now’?”

  “Originally it was Colonel Carson.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  1

  Bradshaw’s eyes were heavy. In another hour he would be in Trinidad. He was on the last leg of his trip. For ten weeks he had been island hopping, and his attaché case bulged with travel folders. He was well content. He had dispatched one article and had accumulated the material for a second. He was well documented now about the Caribbean. If any of these small volcanoes were to erupt—St. Lucia, St. Vincent, Nevis, or Antigua—he would have his material ready. It was very true that each island had its own special characteristics, the outcome of history and geography. In some, St. Kitts in particular, the color bar was marked; in others, Grenada for example, it was practically nonexistent. Some were prosperous and some depressed. In some wealth and power were in the hands of a few feudal families, in others the land was divided among small peasant proprietors. In some there was political unrest, in others there was a working, workable basis of democratic government. Some islands were Catholic, some were Protestant. Some, such as Barbados, owed a deep loyalty to England, while St. Lucia was more excited over the arrival of a French than of a British battleship. He had tabulated the separate differences; he had met the officials and notables in each island. He would be able to follow their news through the papers. While he was in Barbados an idea had occurred to him. For half the year he could make this island his headquarters. He could spend the fall and early winter in New York, come down at the start of Lent, and keep the paper posted about the social currents in the Caribbean. He would have to take in Jamaica; but there was so much in the press already about Montego Bay and so little about the American colony in Antigua, at Milreef. He would have no lack of material, and Barbados would be his base.