The policeman winked at Smith.
‘Best be off, sir,’ he said. ‘I’ll settle this. Now, my lad’ – he held Pender firmly by the arms – ‘just you keep cool and take it quiet. That gentleman’s name ain’t Smith nor nothing like it. You’ve got a bit mixed up like.’
‘Well, what is his name?’ demanded Pender.
‘Never you mind,’ replied the constable. ‘You leave him alone, or you’ll be getting yourself into trouble.’
The taxi had driven away. Pender glanced round at the circle of amused faces and gave in.
‘All right, officer,’ he said. ‘I won’t give you any trouble. I’ll come round with you to the police-station and tell you about it.’
‘What do you, think o’ that one?’ asked the inspector of the sergeant when Pender had stumbled out of the station.
‘Up the pole an’ ’alf-way round the flag, if you ask me,’ replied his subordinate. ‘Got one o’ them ideez fix what they talk about.’
‘H’m!’ replied the inspector. ‘Well, we’ve got his name and address. Better make a note of ’em. He might turn up again. Poisoning people so as they die in their baths, eh? That’s a pretty good ’un. Wonderful how these barmy ones thinks it all out, isn’t it?’
The spring that year was a bad one – cold and foggy. It was March when Pender went down to an inquest at Deptford, but a thick blanket of mist was hanging over the river as though it were November. The cold ate into your bones. As he sat in the dingy little court, peering through the yellow twilight of gas and fog, he could scarcely see the witnesses as they came to the table. Everybody in the place seemed to be coughing. Pender was coughing too. His bones ached, and he felt as though he were about due for a bout of influenza.
Straining his eyes, he thought he recognised a face on the other side of the room, but the smarting fog which penetrated every crack stung and blinded him. He felt in his overcoat pocket, and his hand closed comfortably on something thick and heavy. Ever since that day in Lincoln he had gone about armed for protection. Not a revolver – he was no hand with firearms. A sandbag was much better. He had bought one from an old man wheeling a barrow. It was meant for keeping out draughts from the door – a good, old-fashioned affair.
The inevitable verdict was returned. The spectators began to push their way out. Pender had to hurry now, not to lose sight of his man. He elbowed his way along, muttering apologies. At the door he almost touched the man, but a stout woman intervened. He plunged past her, and she gave a little squeak of indignation. The man in front turned his head, and the light over the door glinted on his glasses.
Pender pulled his hat over his eyes and followed. His shoes had crêpe rubber soles and made no sound on the sticking pavement. The man went on, jogging quietly up one street and down another, and never looking back. The fog was so thick that Pender was forced to keep within a few yards of him. Where was he going? Into the lighted streets? Home by bus or tram? No. He turned off to the left, down a narrow street.
The fog was thicker here. Pender could no longer see his quarry, but he heard the footsteps going on before him at the same even pace. It seemed to him that they were two alone in the world – pursued and pursuer, slayer and avenger. The street began to slope more rapidly. They must be coming out somewhere near the river.
Suddenly the dim shapes of the houses fell away on either side. There was an open space, with a lamp vaguely visible in the middle. The footsteps paused. Pender, silently hurrying after, saw the man standing close beneath the lamp, apparently consulting something in a notebook.
Four steps, and Pender was upon him. He drew the sandbag from his pocket.
The man looked up.
‘I’ve got you this time,’ said Pender, and struck with all his force.
Pender had been quite right. He did get influenza. It was a week before he was out and about again. The weather had changed, and the air was fresh and sweet. In spite of the weakness left by the malady he felt as though a heavy weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He tottered down to a favourite bookshop of his in the Strand, and picked up a D. H. Lawrence ‘first’ at a price which he knew to be a bargain. Encouraged by this, he turned into a small chop-house, chiefly frequented by Fleet Street men, and ordered a grilled cutlet and a half-tankard of bitter.
Two journalists were seated at the neat table.
‘Going to poor old Buckley’s funeral?’ asked one.
‘Yes,’ said the other. ‘Poor devil! Fancy his getting sloshed on the head like that. He must have been on his way down to interview the widow of that fellow who died in a bath. It’s a rough district. Probably one of Jimmy the Card’s crowd had it in for him. He was a great crime-reporter – they won’t get another like Bill Buckley in a hurry.’
‘He was a decent sort, too. Great old sport. No end of a legpuller. Remember his great stunt about sulphate of thanatol?’
Pender started. That was the word that had eluded him for so many months. A curious dizziness came over him and he took a pull at the tankard to steady himself.
‘. . . looking at you as sober as a judge,’ the journalist was saying. ‘He used to work off that wheeze on poor boobs in railway carriages to see how they’d take it. Would you believe that one chap actually offered him—’
‘Hullo!’ interrupted his friend. ‘That bloke over there has fainted. I thought he was looking a bit white.’
THE FOUNTAIN PLAYS
‘Yes,’ said Mr Spiller, in a satisfied tone, ‘I must say I like a bit of ornamental water. Gives a finish to the place.’
‘The Versailles touch,’ agreed Ronald Proudfoot.
Mr Spiller glanced sharply at him, as though suspecting sarcasm, but his lean face expressed nothing whatever. Mr Spiller was never quite at his ease in the company of his daughter’s fiancé, though he was proud of the girl’s achievement. With all his (to Mr Spiller) unamiable qualities, Ronald Proudfoot was a perfect gentleman, and Betty was completely wrapped up in him.
‘The only thing it wants,’ continued Mr Spiller, ‘to my mind, that is, is Opening Up. To make a Vista, so to say. You don’t get the Effect with these bushes on all four sides.’
‘Oh, I don’t know, Mr Spiller,’ objected Mrs Digby in her mild voice. ‘Don’t you think it makes rather a fascinating surprise? You come along the path, never dreaming there’s anything behind those lilacs, and then you turn the corner and come suddenly upon it. I’m sure, when you brought me down to see it this afternoon, it quite took my breath away.’
‘There’s that, of course,’ admitted Mr Spiller. It occurred to him, not for the first time, that there was something very attractive about Mrs Digby’s silvery personality. She had distinction, too. A widow and widower of the sensible time of life, with a bit of money on both sides, might do worse than settle down comfortably in a pleasant house with half an acre of garden and a bit of ornamental water.
‘And it’s so pretty and secluded,’ went on Mrs Digby, ‘with these glorious rhododendrons. Look how pretty they are, all sprayed with the water – like fairy jewels – and the rustic seat against those dark cypresses at the back. Really Italian. And the scent of the lilac is so marvellous!’
Mr Spiller knew that the cypresses were, in fact, yews, but he did not correct her. A little ignorance was becoming in a woman. He glanced from the cotoneasters at one side of the fountain to the rhododendrons on the other, their rainbow flower-trusses sparkling with diamond drops.
‘I wasn’t thinking of touching the rhododendrons or the cotoneasters,’ he said. ‘I only thought of cutting through that great hedge of lilac, so as to make a vista from the house. But the ladies must always have the last word, mustn’t they – er – Ronald?’ (He never could bring out Proudfoot’s Christian name naturally.) ‘If you like it as it is, Mrs Digby, that settles it. The lilacs shall stay.’
‘It’s too flattering of you,’ said Mrs Digby, ‘but you mustn’t think of altering your plans for me. I haven’t any right to interfere with your beautiful garden.’
‘Indeed you have,’ said Mr Spiller. ‘I defer to your taste entirely. You have spoken for the lilacs, and henceforward they are sacred.’
‘I shall be afraid to give an opinion on anything, after that,’ said Mrs Digby, shaking her head. ‘But whatever you decide to do, I’m sure it will be lovely. It was a marvellous idea to think of putting the fountain there. It makes all the difference to the garden.’
Mr Spiller thought she was quite right. And indeed, though the fountain was rather flattered by the name of ‘ornamental water’, consisting as it did of a marble basin set in the centre of a pool about four feet square, it made a brave show, with its plume of dancing water, fifteen feet high, towering over the smaller shrubs and almost overtopping the tall lilacs. And its cooling splash and tinkle soothed the ear on this pleasant day of early summer.
‘Costs a bit to run, doesn’t it?’ demanded Mr Gooch. He had been silent up till now, and Mrs Digby felt that his remark betrayed a rather sordid outlook on life. Indeed, from the first moment of meeting Mr Gooch, she had pronounced him decidedly common, and wondered that he should be on such intimate terms with her host.
‘No, no,’ replied Mr Spiller. ‘No, it’s not expensive. You see, it uses the same water over and over again. Most ingenious. The fountains in Trafalgar Square work on the same principle, I believe. Of course, I had to pay a bit to have it put in, but I think it’s worth the money.’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Mrs Digby.
‘I always said you were a warm man, Spiller,’ said Mr Gooch, with his vulgar laugh. ‘Wish I was in your shoes. A snug spot, that’s what I call this place. Snug.’
‘I’m not a millionaire,’ answered Mr Spiller, rather shortly. ‘But things might be worse in these times. Of course,’ he added, more cheerfully, ‘one has to be careful. I turn the fountain off at night, for instance, to save leakage and waste.’
‘I’ll swear you do, you damned old miser,’ said Mr Gooch offensively.
Mr Spiller was saved replying by the sounding of a gong in the distance.
‘Ah! there’s dinner,’ he announced, with a certain relief in his tone. The party wound their way out between the lilacs, and paced gently up the long crazy pavement, past the herbaceous borders and the two long beds of raw little ticketed roses, to the glorified villa which Mr Spiller had christened ‘The Pleasaunce’.
It seemed to Mrs Digby that there was a slightly strained atmosphere about dinner, though Betty, pretty as a picture and very much in love with Ronald Proudfoot, made a perfectly charming little hostess. The jarring note was sounded by Mr Gooch. He ate too noisily, drank far too freely, got on Proudfoot’s nerves and behaved to Mr Spiller with a kind of veiled insolence which was embarrassing and disagreeable to listen to. She wondered again where he had come from, and why Mr Spiller put up with him. She knew little about him, except that from time to time he turned up on a visit to ‘The Pleasaunce’, usually staying there about a month and being, apparently, well supplied with cash. She had an idea that he was some kind of commission agent, though she could not recall any distinct statement on this point. Mr Spiller had settled down in the village about three years previously, and she had always liked him. Though not, in any sense of the word, a cultivated man, he was kind, generous and unassuming, and his devotion to Betty had something very lovable about it. Mr Gooch had started coming about a year later. Mrs Digby said to herself that if ever she was in a position to lay down the law at ‘The Pleasaunce’ – and she had begun to think matters were tending that way – her influence would be directed to getting rid of Mr Gooch.
‘How about a spot of bridge?’ suggested Ronald Proudfoot, when coffee had been served. It was nice, reflected Mrs Digby, to have coffee brought in by the manservant. Masters was really a very well-trained butler, though he did combine the office with that of chauffeur. One would be comfortable at ‘The Pleasaunce’. From the dining-room window she could see the neat garage housing the Wolseley saloon on the ground floor, with a room for the chauffeur above it, and topped off by a handsome gilded weather-vane a-glitter in the last rays of the sun. A good cook, a smart parlourmaid and everything done exactly as one could wish – if she were to marry Mr Spiller she would be able, for the first time in her life, to afford a personal maid as well. There would be plenty of room in the house, and of course, when Betty was married—
Betty, she thought, was not over-pleased that Ronald had suggested bridge. Bridge is not a game that lends itself to the expression of tender feeling, and it would perhaps have looked better if Ronald had enticed Betty out to sit in the lilac-scented dusk under the yew-hedge by the fountain. Mrs Digby was sometimes afraid that Betty was the more in love of the two. But if Ronald wanted anything he had to have it, of course, and personally, Mrs Digby enjoyed nothing better than a quiet rubber. Besides, the arrangement had the advantage that it got rid of Mr Gooch. ‘Don’t play bridge,’ Mr Gooch was wont to say. ‘Never had time to learn. We didn’t play bridge where I was brought up.’ He repeated the remark now, and followed it up with a contemptuous snort directed at Mr Spiller.
‘Never too late to begin,’ said the latter pacifically.
‘Not me!’ retorted Mr Gooch. ‘I’m going to have a turn in the garden. Where’s that fellow Masters? Tell him to take the whisky and soda down to the fountain. The decanter, mind – one drink’s no good to yours truly.’ He plunged a thick hand into the box of Coronas on the side-table, took out a handful of cigars and passed out through the French window of the library on to the terrace. Mr Spiller rang the bell and gave the order without comment, and presently they saw Masters pad down the long crazy path between the rose-beds and the herbaceous borders, bearing the whisky and soda on a tray.
The other four played on till 10.30, when, a rubber coming to an end, Mrs Digby rose and said it was time she went home. Her host gallantly offered to accompany her. ‘These two young people can look after themselves for a moment,’ he added, with a conspiratorial smile.
‘The young can look after themselves better than the old, these days.’ She laughed a little shyly, and raised no objection when Mr Spiller drew her hand into his arm as they walked the couple of hundred yards to her cottage. She hesitated a moment whether to ask him in, but decided that a sweet decorum suited her style best. She stretched out a soft, beringed hand to him over the top of the little white gate. His pressure lingered – he would have kissed the hand, so insidious was the scent of the red and white hawthorns in her trim garden, but before he had summoned up the courage, she had withdrawn it from his clasp and was gone.
Mr Spiller, opening his own front door in an agreeable dream, encountered Masters.
‘Where is everybody, Masters?’
‘Mr Proudfoot left five or ten minutes since, sir, and Miss Elizabeth has retired.’
‘Oh!’ Mr Spiller was a little startled. The new generation, he thought sadly, did not make love like the old. He hoped there was nothing wrong. Another irritating thought presented itself.
‘Has Mr Gooch come in?’
‘I could not say, sir. Shall I go and see?’
‘No, never mind.’ If Gooch had been sozzling himself up with whisky since dinner-time, it was just as well Masters should keep away from him. You never knew. Masters was one of these soft-spoken beggars, but he might take advantage. Better not to trust servants, anyhow.
‘You can cut along to bed. I’ll lock up.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘Oh, by the way, is the fountain turned off?’
‘Yes, sir. I turned it off myself, sir, at half-past ten, seeing that you were engaged, sir.’
‘Quite right. Good-night, Masters.’
‘Good-night, sir.’
He heard the man go out by the back and cross the paved court to the garage. Thoughtfully he bolted both entrances, and returned to the library. The whisky decanter was not in its usual place – no doubt it was still with Gooch in the garden – but he mixed himself a small brandy and soda, and drank it. He supposed he must now face the
tiresome business of getting Gooch up to bed. Then, suddenly, he realised that the encounter would take place here and not in the garden. Gooch was coming in through the French window. He was drunk, but not, Mr Spiller observed with relief, incapably so.
‘Well?’ said Gooch.
‘Well?’ retorted Mr Spiller.
‘Had a good time with the accommodating widow, eh? Enjoyed yourself? Lucky old hound, aren’t you? Fallen soft in your old age, eh?’
‘There, that’ll do,’ said Mr Spiller.
‘Oh, will it? That’s good. That’s rich. That’ll do, eh? Think I’m Masters, talking to me like that?’ Mr Gooch gave a thick chuckle. ‘Well, I’m not Masters, I’m master here. Get that into your head. I’m master and you damn well know it.’
‘All right,’ replied Mr Spiller meekly, ‘but buzz off to bed now, there’s a good fellow. It’s getting late and I’m tired.’
‘You’ll be tireder before I’ve done with you.’ Mr Gooch thrust both hands into his pockets and stood – a bulky and threatening figure – swaying rather dangerously. ‘I’m short of cash,’ he added. ‘Had a bad week – cleaned me out. Time you stumped up a bit more.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Mr Spiller, with some spirit. ‘I pay you your allowance as we agreed, and let you come and stay here whenever you like, and that’s all you get from me.’
‘Oh, is it? Getting a bit above yourself, aren’t you, Number Bleeding 4132?’
‘Hush!’ said Mr Spiller, glancing hastily round as though the furniture had ears and tongues.
‘Hush! hush!’ repeated Mr Gooch mockingly. ‘You’re in a good position to dictate terms, aren’t you, 4132? Hush! The servants might hear! Betty might hear! Betty’s young man might hear. Hah! Betty’s young man – he’d be particularly pleased to know her father was an escaped jail-bird, wouldn’t he? Liable at any moment to be hauled back to work out his ten years’ hard for forgery? And when I think,’ added Mr Gooch, ‘that a man like me, that was only in for a short stretch and worked it out good and proper, is dependent on the charity – ha, ha! – of my dear friend 4132, while he’s rolling in wealth—’
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