From the police-station he went on to Castle Manor, taking the mallet with him in a dispatch-case. At Castle Manor he did not go to the house, but walked round to the outbuildings behind, where Livia had her studio. There he was a little relieved to see that the studio door was open, so that presumably she was not indulging in one of her nudist sessions. He knocked, got no answer, pushed back the door and entered. Livia did not seem to hear him. She was absorbed in contemplating an odd contraption of wood and wire surrounding and surmounting a kind of miniature dome in clay through which protruded what sculptors call a ’bust-stick’. Apparently it served as a central support.
“Good morning,” Bobby said. She still seemed oblivious to his presence, so he coughed, and then said another and a louder, ‘Good morning’.
“Hullo,” she said abstractedly, and then it seemingly dawned on her that some one was there and she looked round. “Oh, it’s you,” she said, and again bent her attention to the weird structure on the ‘banker’ before her.
“I’ve brought back your mallet you lost,” Bobby said.
“Oh, good man!” she exclaimed, but without showing any undue interest. “Save buying another. Put it down somewhere, will you? What do you think of it?” and her gesture indicated that she meant the structure of wire and wood before her.
“Well, it looks to me,” Bobby answered cautiously, “like a surrealist’s dream of a rat-trap.”
“Does it?” she asked thoughtfully. “I’m going to call it ‘January Apples’. Really it’s a study in curves and angles, and it’s rather good, I think. Only if I call it ‘January Apples’ the Arts Council may buy it, and then I shall be famous. Abstract,” she mused. “Abstract so—comforting. You get away from reality, from everything human.”
“Is that what you want?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said with sudden passion, and then, rather hurriedly, as if a little sorry she had said that one word with such force, she said: “It’s all through you.”
“Now, look here,” said Bobby, with some heat, “don’t you try to father that nightmare on me.”
She turned round to look at him, so that now for the first time he saw her clearly. Her face was drawn and haggard, her eyes red and inflamed and bloodshot, her face had the pallor of death, and Bobby knew instinctively that all this that had so changed her was the result and outcome of that one brief moment the day before when she and her mother had stood and faced each other. Now the tension was evident that she was so fiercely trying to control by absorbing herself in her work.
“Nightmare?” she repeated. “Well, that’s all right. I think you often give people nightmares, don’t you?”
“Only when people know of bad things done to give them cause for bad dreams,” he answered, still watching her closely.
“Well, a bad thing has been done near here,” she said, and went on, with a wave of her hand towards her work: “I meant because of your giving me a guinea for that bust I did. What made you? It was like a flash of light showing me how to make money. I’ve always wanted to, and now I must.”
“Why?” he asked.
“I’ve been up all night,” she told him, ignoring his question. “Working on that.”
“You would have done much better to go to bed,” he retorted.
“Bed is only for sleep,” she said heavily. “I feel as if I shall never sleep again.”
“Why not?” he asked once more, and he wondered if this were an echo of Macbeth.
But again she did not answer. She had turned back to her work and was bending over it.
“I’m going to do a companion piece,” she announced. “Look.” She showed him a sketch which to Bobby seemed no more than a random jumble of squares and lines. “I’m going to call it ‘Dawn Before Creation’.”
“What for?” Bobby asked.
“To make people try to think what it means,” she explained. “But of course they can’t, because it doesn’t, so then they feel it may be because it’s too deep for them, so then they’re awfully impressed, and then they make sure everyone else is awfully impressed, too, and they are, because they’re afraid not to be. Abstract. That’s what matters.”
“How do you mean—matters?” Bobby asked curiously.
“With the critics—the best critics,” she told him. “Those that count.” She pointed to that shelf on which, amidst various small clay figures of cocks and hens and other birds, all carefully observed, stood other such odd fantastic forms as he could make nothing of. Pointing at one of the oddest of them all, she added: “One of my Emily forms.”
“Oh, yes, yes,” Bobby said, interested as ever in the mental processes of those he had to question. “Yes. What are Emily forms?” he asked.
“It’s when,” she explained, “everything is abstracted from something and then anything left is nothing but its own essential thingness.”
“Eh?” said Bobby. “Oh,” he said, struggling to find his way through this jungle of thinginess. “Didn’t Rodin say that an artist can only copy what he sees?”
“Did he?” she asked, surprised that a policeman had not only heard of Rodin, but could even quote him. She poked doubtfully at the same weird form. “Well, that’s what I saw,” she declared. “Or thought I saw. A cauliflower. Might have been just indigestion. Or brandy. Anyhow, like that you get away from crude outerness, the crudeness of mere realness. That’s what I wanted.” She put the thing down and gave a specially violent twist to a bit of wire she had been doing something with. “You can quote Rodin, too?” she said. “Is that what you’ve come for? Shoddy art talk?”
“Well, no,” Bobby admitted. “It was just that I thought what you said sounded a bit mad. That’s all.”
“Perhaps I am,” she told him, now untwisting again the bit of wire she held in her hands—large, strong hands. “Mad, I mean. Why shouldn’t I be mad? Plenty are.”
“Why should you?” he asked and repeated: “Why?”
“Why not?” she retorted. “I shall be if I stay here, and I must have money to go away. Unless I go so far I shan’t need any.”
“What do you mean by that?” he asked uneasily, for he liked neither the words nor the tone in which she had uttered them. “What’s on your mind?”
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she demanded, staring back at him. “Isn’t that enough to be on any one’s mind?” She indicated ‘January Apples’ with a wave of her hand. “And ‘Dawn Before Creation’ as well.”
“Have you had any breakfast?” he asked.
“Brandy,” she said. “There was some milk left I had with it. I felt much better. I expect I’m a little drunk. How clever of you to find out! But that’s what you are here for, isn’t it? Only you never will. Find out, I mean. Don’t you like ‘January Apples’? I expect you think it’ll be turned down. You’ll see.”
“Oh, I don’t know about turned down,” Bobby said. “If you could get away with the Festival Hall at the South Bank Exhibition, you can get away with anything. But I’m no judge. Just know what I like, the ultimate badge of the very last Philistine. I came here to ask you some questions, but I don’t think you are in a fit state to answer them. You had better come back to the house with me, and then you can go to bed.”
“Bed for the little drunken girl?” she asked mockingly. “Go away now, please. I want to get on with my work.”
He left her then, and went back to the house. One of the maids saw him and came out, and looked at him. She had not known of his presence. He beckoned to her.
“I want to ring up Mrs Holcombe,” he said. “She will be at her office, I suppose? Show me where the ’phone is. Some one had better go at once to Miss Livia. She is in her studio. She would be better in bed. Or she’ll be breaking down.”
“But she is in bed still,” the maid answered, in a surprised tone. “She didn’t come down to breakfast, and her door’s locked. I tried it.”
“Well, she is in her studio now,” Bobby said shortly. “I’ve been talking to her. Bed is wh
ere she ought to be, and the sooner the better. Show me where the ’phone is first.”
The maid, though with a slightly mistrustful air, did as he directed; but when he got through to the Longlast office—there was a slight delay—it was to be told that Mrs Holcombe had gone to town for some business conference. He asked then for Mr Henry Holcombe, and presently a woman’s voice told him that Mr Henry was in the factory but had been sent for. The delay was only short, and then he heard the young man’s voice.
“What’s up now? What’s the matter?” it was saying. “What do you want Mrs Holcombe for?”
“I have been talking to your sister,” Bobby said. “I don’t think she is in a fit state to be left alone. I’ve told the maids so. I think myself her mother should know and should be here.”
“No, she shouldn’t, not here,” Livia’s voice interrupted suddenly from behind. “Or else I shouldn’t. I don’t know. I wish you wouldn’t interfere. That’s all. But it has to be, hasn’t it?”
With that she turned and went away. Bobby followed her into the hall and saw her dragging herself up the stairs on her way to her room. It seemed as if all the fatigue of her long, sleepless night had come suddenly upon her. A scared-looking maid was close behind. Bobby left the house and walked away, back to the village.
CHAPTER XVII
“AS LIKE AS TWO PEAS”
FROM CASTLE MANOR, Bobby’s way led him by the old parish church. He remembered the half-sheet of paper found in the copse with on it a reference to a Biblical verse. Not likely there could be any connection, but all the same he thought it might be as well to look up the verse and see what it really was. No doubt there would be available somewhere in the church a bible to which he could refer.
Like many other village churches—those epitomes in stone of the story of the land—this one was a mixture of many styles, for here had stood a church all through the centuries; and all through the centuries priest, squire, and villager had made their own additions and repairs according to their own taste, wish, will. The result was a pleasing harmony, a natural growth such as no careful planning from a clever architect’s office would ever have achieved. From Saxon, Norman on to early Victorian and late Georgian it was all there. The interior showed, too, three or four mediæval tombs of high interest and one from Tudor times with a fine alabaster effigy, Italian work probably, of a Sir John Yeo who had died at an early age in the reign of Henry VIII. The inscription recorded that he was the younger son of the Earl of Westshire of the time, and lamented in somewhat obscure terms the sad misfortune of his untimely decease.
At the west end of the church were piled a number of prayer-books, hymn-books, and bibles, and Bobby had just found and read the verse he was in search of, when he heard some one emerge from the vestry. It was Mr Duggan. He saw Bobby, and came with his swift, impatient step to where Bobby was standing. It was with a glance of evident approval that he noticed what book Bobby had open in his hand. Bobby said:
“A bit of paper with a reference to a verse in St Luke was found in the copse.”
He pointed it out to Mr Duggan, who read it and looked puzzled.
“You surely don’t think this could have anything to do with what happened, do you?” he asked.
“Well, I was rather wondering,” Bobby answered. “One has to think of everything. A clue may turn up in the most unexpected ways. It did occur to me that it might be a note of your own—a suggestion for a sermon or something like that.”
“I don’t think so,” Mr Duggan answered, shaking his head. “I don’t think that’s at all likely. I could tell my writing possibly if you care to show it me. It’s not likely it would be in the copse if it is any note of mine.”
“It is in block letters,” Bobby said. “There’s only the one word ‘Luke’, and the chapter and verse in Roman numerals.”
“I don’t think I ever use block letters,” Mr Duggan said. “Very rarely anyhow. I daresay I could tell if I saw it.”
“The verse has no associations for you?” Bobby asked.
“None that I can think of,” Mr Duggan assured him, “and none, I fear, to what has happened. The unfortunate victim in this most distressing affair will not be raised again.”
“No,” Bobby agreed. “No—and yet . . .”
He did not continue with what had been in his mind, but, to change the subject, began to talk about the church. He soon found that the Vicar, like so many country clergy, was an enthusiast for his church, and knew by heart—one might almost say ‘literally by heart’—nearly every stone and brick and beam of wood. He drew Bobby’s attention to various points that otherwise Bobby might well have overlooked, and Bobby said how much he admired the alabaster effigy on the tomb of Sir John Yeo.
“I can’t quite make out the inscription,” he remarked. “I’m afraid I’ve almost forgotten my Latin. I thought it rather oddly worded, though.”
“Discreetly worded,” Mr Duggan corrected him. “A tragic story. The young man killed his elder brother in a quarrel in which a good many people took his part, apparently. About a woman. It so often is. Probably it was she who was really to blame. He tried to flee the country, but was surrounded, and rather than be captured, committed suicide—or so it is said. It seems that was hushed up so that there could be burial in consecrated ground.” Mr Duggan paused, lost in thought as he stared moodily at the effigy, almost as though he were questioning it. “A violent and a hasty race,” he said. “Prone always to be swift in anger.”
“That will be the family from which Colonel Yeo-Young descends?” Bobby asked.
“Yes,” answered the Vicar. “The title is extinct now—in abeyance, rather. Colonel Yeo-Young has a claim to it he thinks he could prove, but of course that would be a very expensive business.”
“So I imagine,” Bobby agreed, “and then a title without money to back it up is always a bore,” and he asked himself if this vision of a claim to a peerage her money might help to establish had anything to do with the apparent intimacy existing between Mrs Holcombe and the colonel. If her money served for that purpose, was it also destined to support the peerage in due style when the claim had been admitted? And was all that to be taken into account in considering possible motives for the crime he was investigating? He went on: “Where does the ‘Young’ come in if the family name is ‘Yeo’?”
“Some money was left at one time on condition that ‘Young’ was added to the ‘Yeo’,” answered the Vicar. “That’s what I’ve been told.”
Bobby said it was all very interesting, and added the platitude that it was always a pity when old families and old names died out. He went on:
“I’ve come across one or two things that make me think I shall have to pay more attention to the idea you mentioned—that something of the nature of a ‘Peeping Tom’ activity may be at the root of what’s happened. But I can’t see where what we know of Winterspoon comes in. There’s his name, of course.”
“His name?” the Vicar repeated in a very surprised, questioning tone.
“Well, we do know it, don’t we?” Bobby said. “It’s a starting point. A rather unusual name. Not that we know much about him. But all we do know shows him a decent, inoffensive little man. But, then, decent, inoffensive little men in appearance may be very much the reverse in reality. I expect his neighbours all thought Charles Peace a decent, inoffensive little man.”
“Charles Peace?” the Vicar asked. “Who is that?”
“Oh, a notorious criminal,” Bobby explained. “Not that I ever had anything to do with him personally. Before my time. But he and his exploits are still remembered. Are you sure, Vicar, there is nothing more you can tell me? I can’t help feeling there is more at the back of your mind than you have said.”
“You are very acute, Mr Owen,” Mr Duggan said reluctantly, rather indeed as if he did not quite approve, did not think it altogether suitable. “But you are wrong. Nothing at least that I can—or dare—put into words. I have thought of little else, day and night, since it ha
ppened. I feel it is too easy to suspect too readily, and that to utter such suspicions may do much harm.” He paused frowning as if at unpleasant thoughts, and now Bobby wondered with some surprise if what Annie Mars had said the evening before had struck home to a conscience certainly sensitive, perhaps even morbidly sensitive, but again possibly sensitive in the wrong way and the wrong places. “One thing I will say,” Mr Duggan added abruptly. “If I have wondered—not suspected, wondered about any one person—it is one of those whom you know and to whom you have talked. I must say no more except that I think there may possibly be occasions when the motive justifies the deed.”
“That is not for me,” Bobby said sternly, “or, I think, for any private person. A policeman’s duty is to ascertain the facts. Then it is for judge and jury in open court to consider motive.”
“I am neither, neither policeman nor jury,” Mr Duggan said, and now his voice was hard and stern, as Bobby’s had been. “So I can consider both—facts and motive, too. Tell me, did that girl last night mean anything when she said you were taking her up?”
“Well, no,” Bobby answered. “All I told her was that I might have to question her further and to warn her that she would be obliged to answer.”
“She won’t unless she chooses to,” Mr Duggan said, this time with some asperity. “I have had experience of her obstinacy—a dangerous, unfortunate characteristic in any one, especially in a young girl. What she knows she will never tell unless she wishes to. She means well, no doubt; I don’t deny that for a moment. But ideas are no substitute for common sense and respect for reason and authority. A disturbing influence,” he declared, and walked away with those long, angry, impatient strides of his.
The Attending Truth: A Bobby Owen Mystery Page 13