by Alan Hunter
‘Willow Street’ from the landward side presented a different picture to ‘Willow Street’ seen from the broad. It was not entirely a high-built bungalow. The land at this point dropped down to the carrs in a knoll, so that while the front of the building was piled the rest of it was niched into the slope, and the floor was at ground level where the drive came sweeping out of the rhododendrons. It was built in the traditional timber and white plaster, its reed thatch humping over semi-circular loft-windows. A golden vane surmounted the high cone of thatch rising at the broad end.
Hansom had already arrived from Norchester. His car stood parked near the capacious garage and he was to be seen chatting to a tiny dark woman who scarcely came up to his elbow. A Constable stood at a little distance. Gently parked and went over to them.
‘Chief Inspector Gently, ma’am, in charge of the case … this is Mrs Lammas.’
Gently extended his hand.
She was a woman of forty or a little more, but so delicately beautiful that her age seemed to adorn rather than detract from her. Slight in build, her features were pale and small, like those of a Dresden figure, her brown eyes appearing by contrast large and curiously penetrating. She wore a plain black dress too simple to be cheap and on her finger a ring of diamonds and emeralds. Her voice, when she spoke, was low but ringingly clear.
‘I am pleased to meet you, inspector … Inspector Hansom has just been telling me about you.’
‘We are sorry to have to intrude upon you, ma’am, at a time like this.’
‘It cannot be otherwise, inspector … I do not wish it otherwise. Will you come into the house?’
They followed her up the steps and down a wide, parquet corridor.
‘This is the lounge. I trust it will suit your purpose?’
It was a large room overlooking the broad, with French windows giving on to a veranda. Gently cast a speculative eye around the furnishings. Expensive, also feminine. There was nothing in that room to suggest a man had ever lived there.
‘You have a beautiful home, ma’am.’
‘Thank you, inspector.’
‘Your husband must have been in a substantial way of business.’
‘My husband—’ she began and then checked herself, her small lips pressing tight. ‘This is my own house. I built it and furnished it myself.’
‘It does your taste credit.’
She rang the bell and ordered coffee to be brought. Hansom arranged his short-hand Constable at a card-table and made other official dispositions. Mrs Lammas watched him coldly.
‘I suppose you will begin with me?’
Gently shrugged. ‘Would it upset the domestic economy if we started with the servants?’
‘Not really. Do you want the cook or the maid?’
‘We’ll take the maid … she’ll be along with the coffee.’
‘What do you think of her?’ inquired Hansom leeringly when Mrs Lammas had retired. ‘Can you imagine a man turning up a dish like that for his secretary!’
‘It’s surprising what men do.’
‘And money with it – Lammas must have been crackers!’
‘I daresay he has his point of view if you could get round to it.’
The maid came in, bearing the coffee on a silver tray. She was a square-boned, moon-faced girl in her twenties. When the coffee was served Gently bade her be seated and took his place with Hansom at the table opposite.
‘Your name, please?’
‘Gwyneth Jones, it is.’
‘You don’t belong to these parts?’
‘Oh no! I come from Wales, like Mrs Lammas.’
‘Mrs Lammas is Welsh?’
‘Indeed she is – and good Welsh too, at that!’
Gently nodded and dropped lumps of sugar into his fragile coffee cup.
‘Now Miss Jones … we’d like you to tell us exactly what happened on Friday evening from, shall we say, tea-time.’
‘But I’ve told it already, I have—’
‘We’d like to hear it again, if you please.’
The maid gave herself a little shake and then began, as though it were a lesson: ‘The cook and me were sitting in the kitchen, we were, talking about old times at Pwllheli—’
‘Whoa!’ interrupted Gently. ‘What time was this?’
‘Oh, about eight o’clock, or it might be later.’
‘But I want you to tell what happened before that.’
‘There wasn’t nothing happened – it just went on as it always does go on!’
‘Never mind – I’d still like to hear about it.’
The maid gave herself another little shake. ‘Well, there was Miss Pauline had her tea early to catch a bus—’
‘How early?’
‘At half-past five it was, she was catching the quarter-past six.’
‘Does she usually travel by bus?’
‘Oh yess! She’s wonderfully independent is Miss Pauline – not like Mr Paul in that respect, mark you. In the mornings she would go to the office with her father, but when it came to her own affairs it was different.’
‘She was going to a rehearsal in Norchester, I believe.’
‘Indeed – she has always been a one for acting.’
‘Did she usually have tea early when she was going to a rehearsal?’
‘– No, not that I know of. It was the ten-to-seven bus as a rule.’
‘Very well … go on with what you were telling me.’
‘Why, then the mistress and Mr Paul has tea here, in the lounge, and very quiet they were – not the usual chatter at all. And while we were washing the dishes I heard Mr Paul starting up his motorcycle – “Look you,” says I to Gwladys, “there has been a row, or something very much like one”—’
‘What time was that?’
‘Oh, about seven o’clock I’d say, either more or less. “If there has been a row,” says Gwladys—’
‘Did you actually see Mr Paul leave?’
‘Oh yess, I did – the kitchen looks out that way.’
‘And Mrs Lammas – what time did she leave?’
‘Some minutes later – I was going to tell you!’
Gently sighed and resigned himself to be told.
‘“If there has been a row,” says Gwladys, “a quiet one it has been, I tell you,” and while we were talking about it, out comes the mistress and has a word with Joseph. Then Joseph gets her car out, and off she goes, and it was after that he comes into the kitchen.’
‘And he was in the kitchen until he was called out?’
‘Yess – all the time. He often came to sit there. But mark you, as a rule he liked to gossip, and Friday night he hardly said a word. And then the phone rang. “It’s like for me,” he said, and goes to get it.’
‘He was expecting the call?’
‘I would have said so.’
‘The telephone is in the corridor, Miss Jones. Is the kitchen near there?’
‘Indeed, it’s right beside it.’
‘Then you were in a position to hear the conversation?’
‘Oh yess – every word.’
‘Can you remember anything of it?’
‘I can, though not exactly. He was asking how to get to where it was.’
‘And anything else?’
‘No – nothing I remember.’
‘You wouldn’t have been close enough to have heard the voice of the person at the other end?’
She shook her head.
‘Or whether it was, in fact, Mr Lammas?’
‘No, I would not.’
‘But that was your general impression?’
‘Indeed yess, he sounded just as though he were speaking to Mr Lammas.’
‘Thank you, Miss Jones … please continue your account.’
The maid stroked down her lace-edged apron and paused before going on. There wasn’t any nervousness about her, Gently noticed; the authority of the mistress descended to the servant.
‘Well, Joseph hung up and told us he had to go to Ollby to fetch
Mr Lammas. – “You’ll miss ‘Take It From Here’,” says Gwladys, looking at the clock, “it’s just on half-past eight, mun, why not go a little later? You can always say you’ve had some trouble with the car.” But he would not stay, not even for a cup of tea.’
‘He mentioned Mr Lammas, did he?’
‘Oh yess, he did.’
‘Go on.’
‘Why, then he goes, and me and Gwladys has our tea and toast, and listen to the wireless, we do, until it’s getting quite late. At last we hear Mr Paul come back on his motorcycle. He hasn’t been back five minutes when the mistress follows him and when they get together in the lounge there are words, I can tell you, though they keep their voices low.’
‘About what?’ inquired Gently eagerly.
‘I didn’t hear – and if I did, I might not tell you.’
‘This isn’t idle curiosity, you know …’
‘I know it isn’t – but then, I didn’t hear.’
Gently shrugged regretfully and motioned her to proceed.
‘An hour it goes on, if not longer. I never heard the like before between them. And then Miss Pauline comes in off the bus, and look you, it’s all over, just like that. The mistress rings for malted milk and biscuits, and then to bed without another word.’
‘What time would that be?’
‘Oh, half-past eleven at the soonest.’
‘The bus gets in when?’
‘Eleven o’clock, it does.’
‘Hmn.’
Gently leaned back in his chair and seemed to be studying the white sails which turned and drifted on the broad below.
‘Miss Jones … have you been very long with the Lammas family?’
‘I have been here four years and three months, come Michaelmas.’
‘Would you say it was a … happy family?’
‘I daresay there are worse, when you look about you.’
‘And what would you mean by that?’
She hesitated and then drew herself up with a flash of agression. ‘I mean she was too good for him by far – that’s what I mean! And if you’re asking me, I’d say that nobody will shed many tears now he’s gone!’
Gently nodded his mandarin nod.
‘That’s all, Miss Jones … will you send in the cook as you go through, please?’
Gently had tapped a source of peppermint creams in Wrackstead and he produced his bag now and offered it to Hansom. Hansom took one suspiciously to sample.
‘I never could see what was so damned special about these things!’
Gently tossed one to Dutt and another to the short-hand Constable. ‘They soothe the nerves, you know, and keep the brain clear.’
‘There must be something in it – you seem to get results on them!’
‘Try one the next time things are getting sticky …’
Hansom munched noisily a few moments and then said: ‘What was all that about the voice on the phone?’
Gently hoisted a non-committal shoulder. ‘I just like to know the minor details.’
‘You got an idea it was someone else – like the secretary?’
‘I keep ideas at a distance this early in a case.’
Hansom grunted and kept working on the peppermint cream.
‘Then there’s that row with the son … maybe that ties in somewhere. Yeah – and the way they went out and came back! It looks as though Paul’s ma was trailing him, and she must have known where he was going to keep five minutes behind.’
‘Could have known what the shover was up to, sir,’ put in Dutt brightly. ‘Might have been the son what finds out where Lammas is and gives the tinkle.’
‘Yeah – and it’s the son who’s sweet on the secretary; how about that for a hunch?’
Gently held up a restraining hand. ‘And you ask me what’s special about peppermint creams …! But getting off theory for a moment, what do you see in the garden, Dutt?’
Dutt cast his intelligent eye downwards.
‘Well sir, there’s a bloke tying up some sweet-peas.’
‘Just so, Dutt … we’ll assume he’s the gardener. Go down and have a chat with him, will you?’
‘Yessir. Directly, sir.’
‘Especially touching the incidence of jerricans in the garage …’
‘I get you, sir.’
‘And what other things your police-training suggests.’
Dutt clicked his heels smartly and descended to the garden by the veranda steps. At the same moment there was a confident knock at the door and the cook entered.
The cook was a dumpy middle-aged Welshwoman with a comfortable face and lively grey eyes. She came in with an expression of anticipation on her countenance, as though an incursion of policemen was something that brightened up her day, and took her seat before being asked.
‘Your name, please?’
‘Gwladys Roberts, spinster, look you.’
‘You are Mrs Lammas’ cook, I believe?’
‘I am too, but my father was in the Force and my brother is a sergeant at Cwmchynledd.’
‘Indeed? Then you will be familiar with the routine of interrogation, Miss Roberts …?’
‘Why should I not, when I was brought up at a Station?’
Gently took her over the same ground as had been already covered with the maid. Her answers were full and to the point, and confirmed what they had heard before. She could add nothing to the maid’s account of the conversation on the phone.
‘And you have been long with the family, Miss Roberts?’
‘Long, you say! They’ve never been without me.’
‘Mrs Lammas engaged you when she got married?’
‘Yess, and the first time. She’s been married twice, though through no fault of hers.’
‘Would you explain …?’
‘Why, first she married Geoffrey Owen of Bangor. A gentleman he was, come of good family, and a Major in the Guards. But he didn’t last long, poor fellow. He went to Aden and died there of cholera. Poor Mrs Phyllis! I thought she would have followed him … so bad she took it.’
‘And after that she married Lammas?’
‘Yess, after that.’ The cook’s face had become melancholy. ‘We went to Torquay – Mrs Phyllis was poorly. She met him at Torquay, right on the rebound, and in a week they’d done it.’
‘It wasn’t too … successful?’
‘No, mun, it wasn’t. Though mark you, Mr Lammas wasn’t all to blame. He did his best at first to make it go. But there, they wasn’t suited, that’s the answer. She couldn’t forget poor Mr Geoffrey and he didn’t like having Mr Geoffrey thrown up at him at every turn. Ah me! It was a bad day when we went to Torquay.’
‘The children … they didn’t improve matters?’
‘No, not a bit. When Mr Paul came he was all his mother’s, and so he still is. Miss Pauline was her father’s.’
‘Would you say there was animosity between father and son?’
‘Oh yess! They had some quarrels, I can tell you.’
‘About anything in particular?’
‘No, not at first. Mr Paul was just obstreperous and above himself – his head is full of poetry and nonsense. He used to say his proper name was Owen.’
‘Would that have been possible?’
‘Not on your life! He knew it wasn’t, too.’
‘What else did they quarrel about?’
‘Oh, Mr Lammas wanted his son in the business, that was the big trouble. And Mr Paul, he wouldn’t hear about it. If you ask me, Mr Paul doesn’t think much of the university either, but then he only went there to spite his father.’
‘That would be somewhere about two years ago?’
‘Indeed it was. You never heard such rows!’
‘And of course, it worsened the relationship between Mr Lammas and his wife?’
‘Oh yess, she took her son’s part, all the way. Some bitter things were said. It was Mrs Phyllis who sent Mr Paul to Cambridge and pays his fees. I don’t think Mr Lammas ever properly got over what happened
two years ago.’
Gently paused to criss-cross some lines on his scribbling pad before his next question.
‘You will have heard by now, Miss Roberts, that Mr Lammas was enjoying certain relations with Miss Brent, his secretary. Was there any suspicion of this before the present juncture?’
The cook gave a little giggle. ‘Oh no, I shouldn’t think so. Though Miss Pauline works at the office with him – I wouldn’t put it past her to know what was going on.’
‘But you don’t think it was suspected by Mrs Lammas?’
‘Well there, I couldn’t say. But if she suspected, she didn’t know or there would have been more made of it.’
‘Mr Lammas gave an excuse of business for his absence last week. Had he done so before?’
‘Once or twice he had lately, but only for a day or so.’
‘What do you mean by “lately”?’
‘Why … he didn’t use to go off much. It was only these last two or three months.’
‘And Mrs Lammas accepted the excuse without comment?’
‘If she didn’t, I never heard about it.’
‘Can you remember if these absences occurred at the weekend, or was it during the week?’
‘He was always here at the weekend.’
Gently nodded. ‘And now, Miss Roberts, we should like to hear what you can tell us about the chauffeur, Hicks …’
The cook folded her plump arms and cogitated a moment, as though passing the subject under review. Then she frowned and said:
‘Well, you know … he’s not the person I should have thought of to go and do a thing like that …’
Gently clicked his tongue. ‘Perhaps you could tell us a little more?’
‘Oh yess! I was just saying! But really it came as a surprise when I heard about it. I’ve known Joe to lose his temper, and once for certain Mr Lammas would have sacked him if Mrs Phyllis had permitted. But there wasn’t no spirit in the man, he didn’t have the go in him to up and kill somebody.’
‘He was also a servant of long standing?’
‘Indeed he was. Mrs Phyllis engaged him when she was having Mr Paul and apart from the war, when we got along without a chauffeur, he has been with us ever since. Very attached he has always been to Mrs Phyllis, besides being one of the few people Mr Paul hits it off with. Taught him to drive, he did, and likewise to fish. You could hardly drop on a man less likely to stick his neck out.’