Mr Nauck read; and as he did so his broad, bland face was transfigured to a mask of rage. As he finished the last paragraph, he struck the table with an enormous fist and exploded in a seven-syllable German oath; then, curbing his emotion with obvious difficulty, he turned to his visitor.
‘I beg you to excuse me, Mr Trent. Perhaps you don’t see vot a bad business this is. It comes to this: that I am being deceived by a man I haf trusted. It is evident that my chief assistant, Mr Votkin, took that order, and nefer passed it on to me, as he should haf done, for the sending of the necessary letters.’
‘But he might have mislaid it and then forgotten it,’ Trent suggested.
‘Yes, that vas going to be his story,’ Mr Nauck said grimly. ‘If Dr Howland had inquired further about his order, that is vot Votkin vould haf said, and he might expect to get off with a sharp reprimand and a caution. But he did not reckon on Dr Howland doing vot he did, and then writing this – ’ here Mr Nauck appeared to swallow something; probably, Trent thought, a vivid German epithet – ‘this letter. Vot does this letter mean, Mr Trent? It means that the firm has lost an order – a small matter, yes, but it also means that ve haf lost an important client, and that our reputation is compromised. Think vot Dr Howland may haf been saying about us! If I had seen this letter, I should haf sacked Votkin on the spot, and vell he knew it!’
Trent considered a moment. ‘But how could he know anything about it? You say the letter was never delivered.’
‘Oh yes, it vos! I know now vot happened. You see, Mr Trent, my assistants come here in the morning a little earlier than I do, and it is Votkin’s job to open the letters and sort them for my attention ven I arrive. He read that letter. He saw vot it meant for him, and he simply suppressed it.’
‘You think that was it? I see.’ Trent was, in fact, beginning to see somewhat further than did Mr Nauck. ‘But what could have induced the man to act in this way? Why, I mean, should he have ignored that order in the first place?’
‘Vy? Because Votkin is a puffed-up mass of conceit, Mr Trent, and because he has a violent temper. I gif him his due; he is an excellent linguist and a valuable man for our business. His conceit is nothing to me, nor is his temper. He got nasty with me vonce, but he didn’t do it again,’ said Mr Nauck with significance. ‘But I vouldn’t have his touchiness interfering vith business, and more than vonce I haf censured him severely for being disrespectful to clients. Vell, you see vot Dr Howland says here.’ He tapped the letter. ‘He took the trouble to spell the names carefully to the man who took his order. He treated him like some commonplace, ignorant fellow, perhaps.’
Trent called on his memories of the doctor in past years. ‘He had rather a crushing manner at times. Eminent barristers often have.’
‘There you are!’ Mr Nauck exclaimed. ‘He must haf got Votkin into such a raving passion that he would do anything to spite him, and the only thing he could do was to keep him vaiting for his order. It vas an idiotic trick, of course; but’s just the sort of thing these irritable, vindictive fools do. Vell, I don’t lose my temper often, but I am going to haf it out with Mr Votkin as soon as I see him.’
Trent took leave of the seething Mr Nauck, and went out to wait for Inspector Clymer.
‘He went to the St Alban’s buffet,’ the inspector reported, ‘having a drink at the bar first. I sat near him at the counter. He had a ham sandwich for lunch, which he didn’t finish, and two more double whiskies, which he did. That’s a badly frightened man if I ever saw one; his nerves are all to pieces. I left him there when I thought I had seen enough. And now, perhaps, Mr Trent, you will let me know what all this means, and why you wanted me to join you here.’
Trent let him know. He told how the name of a foreign bookseller, where half-sheets from foreign letters with foreign watermarks would be easily come by, had caught his attention. He told of Mr Watkin’s innocent display of his familiarity with French authors, and of his failure to remember Dr Howland’s name, although he had ordered books to be sent to him at his address. He told what Mr Nauck had said of Watkin’s disposition, and the story that Mr Nauck had pieced together from the evidence. Finally, Trent told what he himself now guessed to be a later chapter of that story.
The inspector listened keenly, his face full of a restrained eagerness. ‘One thing’s clear,’ he said. ‘It is my business to interrogate this Mr Watkin, and the sooner the better. Look! There he comes now.’ And with Trent in attendance he left the teashop and hurried after his unconscious prey.
They entered the bookshop, and saw Mr Watkin hanging up his hat and coat in a cupboard under the stairs at the back of the shop. He turned at the sound of their footsteps and came towards them; but the polite inquiry was checked on his lips, and his face turned white and frightened, as he recognised Trent and took in the unmistakable appearance of Inspector Clymer.
‘You are Mr Watkin, I believe,’ the inspector said. The terrified man only stared at him in silence, putting a hand to his throat. ‘I am a police officer, and – ’ Here he broke off, for Watkin had turned and made as if to rush to the stairs. But coming down them at that moment appeared Mr Nauck, wearing a tigerish scowl and holding out in a hand shaking with fury the paper which Trent had given him.
‘Votkin!’ roared the big man. ‘Vot does this mean? I hear this morning that you haf concealed from me a letter addressed to the firm, and not only that, but you haf – ’
‘Oh, let me alone, for God’s sake!’ Watkin staggered to a table and collapsed on to a chair beside it. For a moment he dropped his head on his arms; then looked up with a ghastly face at the inspector. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘You can take me. I shan’t resist.’
‘Now, now! Pull yourself together!’ Inspector Clymer snapped. ‘I haven’t asked you anything yet, you know.’
Again Watkin hid his head on his arms. ‘That be damned!’ he said in a muffled voice. ‘I’ve had enough of it. I want to get it over. A little more of what I’ve been going through would drive me raving mad.’ He got to his feet. ‘If you won’t take me in charge, I’m going round to the police station to give myself up.’
‘I’m taking him down to Bridlemere this evening,’ Inspector Clymer said as they left the station in Chapman Row an hour later. ‘I’m sorry I had to ask you to wait, Mr Trent, but I couldn’t tell what sort of a statement he was going to make, and as it happens, there is a point I would like your opinion on. He has told all about how he went down there, and hung about watching for the old man, and followed him, and how he did it, and how he got away afterwards; but he never said a word about why he did it. As you know, we aren’t allowed to put any questions about a voluntary statement. It seems a large order to try to murder a man because you didn’t like his manner.’
‘It depends on how much insane vanity you have got crammed into your carcass,’ Trent said. ‘That wretched little fellow is stuffed to the gills with it, I should say, and when people like that take offence, they can hate to an extent that’s impossible for nice men like you and me, inspector. But Watkin had another motive, I think. The first time I talked to him it was plain that he was devoted to his job, revelled in it, and fancied himself hugely in it. When he read that letter of the doctor’s he saw it meant his being sacked without a character, and that even if he destroyed it he could never feel safe unless the writer was destroyed too.’
‘I see. That was what he meant when the old man heard him talking about “trying to smash me”. Yes. But what about “think nobody’s a swell but yourself”?’
‘The doctor heard him imperfectly, I believe. The words were “think nobody can spell but yourself”. That was the thing that rankled.’
VIII
The Bad Dog
At the very outset of Trent’s investigation of the Headcorn murder he came to realise that no tears were being shed about the death of James Beadle Hoyt. Americans, as a rule, make themselves very well liked in England; but Hoyt was a marked exception. Plausible at first, he went off rapidly on further a
cquaintance. He drank too hard to be popular outside drinking circles. He was short-tempered, apt to turn sulky, and appeared to be really interested in nothing but whisky, gambling, and himself. Nothing whatever was known about him but his name, that he had been staying at a very expensive hotel in London, and that he had had good clothes and plenty of money to spend.
Hoyt had been one of two guests brought down by Gerald Shelley to his father’s house, South Court, near Headcorn, in the depths of the garden of England. General Shelley, who in his latter years had suffered one domestic tragedy, could refuse nothing to his son and to Helena, his daughter. He had been delighted to receive Gerald’s friends, the American Hoyt and a superbly mannered Italian gentleman, Signor Giulio Capazza, who was understood to be engaged in some form of commerce – to judge from his appearance and style, a profitable form.
Gerald Shelley, as junior partner in a flourishing business, lived the life of the City and acquitted himself well in it. He had a weakness for high play at cards; but as he won – by his own account – more than he lost, it had led to no trouble hitherto.
Gerald had come down from London for a short holiday, with Hoyt and Capazza for company; and for the first time in his life he had looked seriously worried and depressed. There had been an interview with his father which had left the general in no better condition.
The three men had travelled down to Headcorn in Gerald’s car on a Tuesday. The next Saturday afternoon had been fixed for a Garden Fête at a country house close by; one of those junketings to which District Nursing Associations, Women’s Institutes, or Church Funds look for occasional support. After luncheon the servants at South Court, having permission to attend the Fête, had all left the house. Miss Shelley and Signor Capazza had gone off soon afterwards with the same purpose. Gerald Shelley, before joining them at the Fête, had driven over to Maidstone to borrow an extra fishing-rod from a friend, for Capazza, whom everyone liked, had begged to be instructed in the sport which was Gerald’s favourite. General Shelley had retired as usual to his study for a rest, which meant as a rule at least an hour of refreshing slumber; and Hoyt had gone to sleep off his potations in a room on the ground floor, known as the gun-room, which Gerald Shelley and his friends used as a sitting-room of their own. The American and his host were thus the only persons left in the house that pleasant summer afternoon.
At six o’clock the servants had returned, and the parlourmaid had gone to put on a table in the gun-room some letters which had arrived for Gerald during their absence. She had been heard to shriek wildly; and the others, crowding into the room, had seen the dead body of Hoyt lying on its face in the middle of the floor, a knife driven into the back below the left shoulder-blade.
When, an hour later, the Shelleys and Capazza returned from the Fête, the police were already well advanced in the first stage of investigation. A statement had been taken from the general, who had seen or heard nothing unusual, and had not left his study until the house was roused by the parlour-maid’s screams. No traces whatever appeared to have been left by the murderer. The weapon was of the hunting-knife type, bearing the mark of a Pittsburg firm. Its blade, some ten inches long, was straight and single-edged, curving on the sharp side to a dangerously fine point; the handle was of coarsely cross-cut deerhorn, on which no fingermarks could show.
As for the means by which the murderer could have gained admission to the house, the matter was simple enough. The doors at the front and back were locked only at night, and could be opened by turning a handle. Any prowling thief who had seen the servants and the others leave, and might have assumed that the place was deserted, could have got in without any difficulty. But nothing had been taken from any room; Hoyt’s watch and well-filled note-case were in his pockets. The mystery was complete, and the Italian’s suggestion of a murder for hatred or revenge – he called it a vendettazzia – seemed as reasonable a guess as any.
These facts, which appeared in an expurgated form in Trent’s first dispatch to the Record, were gathered by him partly from the police, largely from Miss Shelley, who was very ready to give information, as she said, where it was likely to do any good. She was a handsome, self-possessed brunette, who had just been, in her own words, ‘having a shot at her Mus. Bac.’ at Oxford, and was now at home waiting to learn her fate at the examiners’ hands. She had talked to Trent as they paced a narrow lawn at the back of the house, separated from it by a gravel path and a flowerbed that skirted the wall. Miss Shelley was escorted by a recently barbered black poodle.
‘It’s no use to pretend,’ she said, ‘that any of us liked Mr Hoyt. I couldn’t stand him myself. He began by paying me offensive compliments; and when I let him see I didn’t like it, and especially after I took Signor Capazza for a run in the car without asking him to join us, he was like a bear with a sore head. He drank more whisky in a day than father gets through in a month. He was insolent to the servants; and once when he wanted to go out in Gerald’s car by himself, and our chauffeur told him plainly he wasn’t in a fit state to drive, he shouted at him in the most disgusting language I have ever heard. Then again, I knew he had been ill-treating my dog Harlequin, beating him or kicking him on the sly; because after the first day Hoyt was here, Harlequin was scared to death of him – you know, dumb and shivering whenever he was about, though Harlequin is naturally a spirited and friendly sort of dog.
‘Another thing – Hoyt was often rude to my brother; and when I spoke to Gerald about it he confessed that he had lost much more than he could pay to Mr Hoyt, playing poker with him and Signor Capazza. Gerald said Hoyt had won a lot from Capazza too, but he had paid up, being quite well off, apparently. Gerald admitted, too, that he had asked father to help him; and that must have been a dreadful shock to father, because he can only just make ends meet keeping up this place. You see,’ Miss Shelley went on with the candour of her generation, ‘my poor mother went out of her mind two years ago, and keeping her in a home over at Smeeth costs more than you would believe. Father has never been the same man since that disaster, because he was devoted to her; and now this new trouble over Gerald, with a man murdered in the house to follow it up, has simply broken him, poor dear.’
Trent hoped he did not look his embarrassment at being so frankly taken behind the family scenes. He had asked Helena Shelley to give him all the details she could think of about the crime; and she was taking him at his word. He spoke some words of the sympathy that he felt; then added, ‘I believe you and Signor Capazza were the last members of the household to see Hoyt alive.’
‘I was going to tell you about that. About an hour after lunch, Capazza and I came out into the garden, because I was going to take him over to the Garden Fête in Sir Gilbert Tregelles’ meadow, which is just next to father’s land – only two minutes’ walk from here. Capazza was interested, because I had entered Harlequin for the Bun Race at the Fête, and it was a new idea to him.’
‘So it is,’ Trent said, ‘to me.’
‘It’s rather fun. The owners run with their dogs on the lead, and when they get to a point a hundred yards away each owner and each dog has to eat a bun, and when both buns are finished – not before – run back to the starting-place. The first couple to get back wins the prize. As Harlequin is the greediest dog I know, and I can bolt my food when I like, I hoped we should win; and so we did, by a short head, amidst fearful excitement. It was a great day for Harlequin, because he also won the prize in the Dog-with-the-Most-Pathetic-Eyes class at the Comic Dog Show. You can see if you look at him… Now where,’ Miss Shelley broke off, perching a pair of thick-lensed spectacles on her pretty nose, ‘has that animal got to?’
Trent pointed. ‘There he is, straight in front of you, in the middle of that flower-bed, looking at you – very pathetically indeed.’
‘Come here, sir!’ his owner called. ‘How dare you go in that border? Well, as I was saying – bad dog! – we came out through the drawing-room, and were walking over this lawn to get to the other end of the garden, where ther
e is a gate leading towards the Tregelles’ place.’
She took a few steps and paused before a small circular bed of roses in the midst of the lawn.
‘That window just opposite us now is the window of the room where Hoyt was at the time. It was open, and as we came near it Capazza asked if he might have a flower for his coat. I said yes, of course, and at that moment Hoyt appeared at the window. He gave a sneering sort of laugh and said, “That’s right, Miss Shelley, the white flower of a blameless life for him, he surely has it coming to him,” or something like that; and he added, looking at Capazza, “I’m going to keep my promise.” His manner was most offensive, and I was so disgusted I turned my back on him and began cutting a rose with the scissors out of my bag. After I had pinned it in Capazza’s buttonhole we went on our way.’
‘And that was the last you saw of Hoyt?’
‘Well, very nearly. When we got to the gate – you can see it down there, in the holly hedge – he shouted after us, and as I glanced back he waved his arm. Harlequin began barking and dragging at the lead, trying to run back, and I thought the noise might wake my father, so I said something peevish about the way Hoyt was behaving, and Capazza said in his quaint accent, “I think he wish us to return. Poor fellow, he dooes not know what he doos. Do you wish to return, Miss Shelley?” I said, certainly not, that I shouldn’t dream of it; and we went on to the Fête.
‘That was actually the last that any of us saw of Hoyt before he was murdered. The police asked us if it sounded as if he was shouting for help – hoping to fix the time of the murder, I suppose. Well, it didn’t sound like that. He certainly didn’t shout “Help!” It was just a “Hi!” as if he was trying to attract our attention; and I believe that’s all it was.’
Trent looked down to the gate in the hedge, some seventy yards. ‘Yes; if he had shouted anything articulate I suppose you must have heard it. And your father, I understand, heard nothing at all.’
Trent Intervenes and Other Stories Page 14