Step in the Dark

by Elizabeth Lemarchand

  A few minutes later Pollard watched them go, Evelyn rendered slightly flustered and awkward by unaccustomed male attentiveness. Before leaving she had thanked him personally, with a warm sincerity he found touching, and had also spoken courteously to Toye.

  ‘You miserable old truffle hound,’ Pollard remarked amicably, as Toye closed the door behind the departing pair. ‘Sniffing out improbable romances a mile off. I suppose it’s dawned on you that, in spite of the lady’s breath-taking disclosures, we’re really no further on?’

  Toye looked surprised. ‘Well, Y’s out of it,’ he protested.

  ‘Fair enough. But we knew all along that Y couldn’t have been directly involved in Brown’s death, whatever he or she was up to. And we still don’t know if Brown slipped and fell accidentally or was given a helping hand, do we? Let’s reconstruct. Brown goes home and discovers that the packet of stamps isn’t in her handbag. She assumes that it has fallen out and, on thinking back, decides that the most likely place for this to have happened is the yard at the Athenaeum, when she took her ignition key out of the bag. She hares back on foot to search for it... Why are you looking so ruddy disapproving?’

  ‘The wheel marks in the gravel showed that she parked near the doors, nowhere near as far back as the boiler house,’ Toye objected. ‘So why should she go searching there, and notice that the door was open? If it was, that is.’

  ‘Easy,’ Pollard replied. ‘The packet was very light and could have been blown down the yard. We don’t know offhand what the weather was like at about half-past six on Wednesday evening; but it was cooking up for a filthy night, so there would almost certainly have been some wind. As to whether the boiler house door was open or not, well, just think yourself into X’s skin. If we’re right about his digging in in the boiler house, earlier on, he couldn’t have known that Mrs Habgood had opened the yard doors again after Brown had left. He’d picture them shut and assume that there was no risk of anyone’s barging into the library from the yard. But there was always the chance of one of the Habgoods coming in from the hall or the flat: he probably wouldn’t have known that Mr H. was out of action. X’s instinct — the standard one for a breaker-in — would have been to have a quick, quiet getaway lined up. Remember that the yard doors have a Yale lock: he could get out through them fast enough.’

  Toye reluctantly conceded these points.

  ‘Well, then,’ Pollard went on, ‘the evidence points to Annabel Brown’s discovering the open door, deciding that somebody is up to no good inside, and watching from behind the oil tank with blackmail in mind. After X has pushed off she goes in and searches under the librarian’s table with her torch. She draws a blank but discovers the bust-open cupboard. Being an opportunist, she decides to cash in and help herself to some saleable first editions. And here we are again at the brick wall. What happened next?’

  They sat in heavy silence for a couple of minutes. Finally Toye suggested that X might have returned for a second lot of books. Brown, on hearing him come in, would have crouched down in the gallery, and either been spotted or unwisely challenged him. He could have gone for her near the top of the staircase and scarpered after her fall. The door Ernie heard closing would have been the bookshelves swinging to after X had gone through.

  Pollard agreed that this reconstruction was a possibility, but pointed out that X’s return visit to the library would be a major hazard for the chap. Abbot’s Green might be deserted on a winter evening but, if anyone did happen to be around, a bloke carrying a fairly heavy case of some sort would be noticeable — and probably remembered. Besides, where would he have dumped the first lot?

  ‘Car,’ Toye replied without hesitation. ‘Parked somewhere near, all nice and handy.’

  ‘I knew you’d say that. Cars and romance are your things, aren’t they? No, but seriously, all this gives us something to work on. Now, then, I haven’t had a chance to tell you about a conversation I had with Inspector Harris just now. I got some quite suggestive gen about Peter Escott...’

  Toye listened, immobile and attentive.

  ‘Of course, a case against the chap’s pure speculation at present,’ Pollard concluded, ‘but there are these pointers.’

  ‘His knowing the building, and going up to the flat with the Professor,’ Toye said thoughtfully. ‘How would it have worked out for time, if he’d been up to funny business over the key?’

  ‘It’s exactly what the funny business could have added up to that’s bothering me. Suppose he left the old boy doodling away in the Habgoods’ sitting room, nicked the key, went back to the gallery and down the staircase. Well, as you’ll remember, Westlake thought this just wasn’t on. It’s only his opinion, of course, but he knows how people react at these parties, and I’m inclined to give it a good deal of weight.’

  They relapsed into silence. Pollard, frowning heavily, began to doodle a spiral staircase on a sheet of blotting paper. Quite suddenly an idea took shape in his mind with startling clarity.

  ‘Damn it!’ he shouted. ‘Just how dim can you get? Escott needn’t have gone back to the library at all! He could have left the flat by its front door, gone down the stairs into the hall, and out into Abbot’s Green. The yard doors would have been open for people at the party to park inside. Escott only had to slip into the yard and unlock the boiler house door from the outside. Anybody seeing him coming or going through the main front door of the Athenaeum would simply think he was fetching something from his car, or had gone to put on a parking light, or whatever.’

  ‘You’ve got it, sir,’ Toye said, gazing at him with ungrudging admiration.

  ‘About time, too, And if that’s the way it was done, we’ve still got to find out how he got into the boiler house from the library, and unbolted the door on the inside. Of course, the fact that Evelyn Escott didn’t notice him around on Wednesday isn’t conclusive. She’s obviously crazy about the place and this history she’s writing, and could have been dead to the world outside her reference books. We’d better contact the other people who used the library during the day, even if Habgood’s prepared to write them off.’

  Toye, looking like a meditative owl, came up with a suggestion born of considerable experience of church socials.

  ‘There’s always the heck of a lot of clearing-up to do after one of these get-togethers,’ he said with feeling. ‘Could it be that this young Escott stayed behind to lend a hand, so that he could slip the bolt back then?’

  Pollard stared at him.

  ‘Neat,’ he said. ‘I wonder. From what Harris said about Escott, I should expect him to fade out at the first signs of a job to be done, but we can check up with Mrs Habgood. She’ll have been directing operations. If you’re right, it solves the problem of how Escott got in, of course. He could have turned up from the yard just a short time before five-thirty when the library closed, and the Habgoods or Annabel would shut the yard doors. Then he’d have waited quite a while, I think, to make sure that the library had been locked for the night. Hence the stacking chair drawn up to the boiler, leaving those helpful marks. But we’ve simply got to keep our eye on the ball and find out, first of all, if Escott left Professor Thornley for long enough on Tuesday evening to do that unlocking job. If he didn’t, all these bright ideas about keys and bolts are just no go.’

  ‘Ring the Professor?’ Toye asked.

  ‘Yeah. They’ll have their members’ addresses and telephone numbers round at the Athenaeum. Let’s go.’

  Chapter 9

  Abbot’s Green was an unexpected backwater off a busy street near the town centre of Ramsden. Originally, there had been a pleasant garden in the middle, exclusive to the residents. The national demand for scrap-iron in 1940 had uprooted the protective railings; now there was merely a dispirited area of rank grass and straggling shrubs, often ravaged by marauding children and haunted by stray cats. The houses, square and solid early nineteenth-century, stood on the outer side of the encircling road — the distinctive façade of the Athenaeum being diametrical
ly opposite the entry to the Green from the street.

  A preservation order had prevented architectural outrages, but the houses, like the former garden, had a forlorn air. The well-to-do families had all departed, driven out by the changing economic climate and the disappearance of domestic help. There had been a takeover by professional and business interests. Nearly all the houses were now in non-resident multiple occupation by doctors of consultant status, dentists, architects, insurance companies and others. The new landlords appeared to be more concerned with their rents than the maintenance of their properties, judging from patched roofs, flaking paintwork and derelict front gardens mainly in use as car ports.

  ‘Dead as a doornail after working hours,’ Pollard commented, as Toye drove slowly round towards the Athenaeum. ‘Still, somebody might have been working late last Wednesday, and run into X or A.N. Other when he came away. If X turns out to be young Escott, he might even have been recognized. I think it’s worth asking Cook to put on a house-to-house inquiry.’

  ‘There’s the chap with the briefcase Ernie Dibble says he saw,’ Toye said.

  ‘Let’s face it,’ Pollard replied. ‘If that chap was X and had done the break-in, he’d had nothing to do with Brown’s fall. Ernie didn’t hear the crash and the door closing until quite ten minutes later, by the time he’d got to the Athenaeum and messed around.’

  ‘So we’d be back with Mrs Habgood as the only suspect?’

  ‘This is it. And even if we unearth a motive, I don’t see a hope in hell of charging her.’

  ‘If we get X there’s a fair chance of getting the books back,’ Toye pointed out.

  ‘Small beer, seeing we’re down here to clear up a death under highly suspicious circumstances, old chap. Better than nothing, I suppose. Lord, what a stink it’ll raise if X really is this Escott chap: great-great-grandson of the old boy they call their Founder in bated breath, as if he were the Almighty. Well, here we are. We ought to be on to Thornley soon, anyway.’

  They were greeted by a complete change of atmosphere on going into the Athenaeum. The stuffy deadness had vanished in the bustle of a vigorous cleaning operation. The library door was propped open, and the whine of a vacuum cleaner and women’s voices were audible within. There was a strong smell of furniture polish.

  Pollard advanced on the office and looked through the glass panel of the door. Alastair Habgood was typing at his desk, surrounded by a confusion of papers and books that suggested a breakdown of normal routine. On catching sight of Pollard he beckoned him to come in, and began to lever himself up out of his chair.

  ‘Don’t get up on my account,’ Pollard urged him. ‘We’re sorry to bother you when you’re busy, but there’s a bit of information you could give us quickly, I think: Professor Thornley’s telephone number.’

  With a fleeting look of surprise, Alastair Habgood pulled forward a small card index box.

  ‘That’s an easy one,’ he said, flicking through the cards. ‘All our members’ addresses and telephone numbers are here. I’ll jot it down for you.’

  Pollard watched him shift his position and wondered if he were in pain. He certainly looked drawn and in some way mentally dislocated, as though unable to adjust to the sudden irruption of violence into his tranquil academic world. You’d expect a chap with his war experience to be tougher, Pollard thought. But it was a long time ago and he’s managed to forget it. All this must be a beastly sort of resurrection.

  ‘I suppose one doesn’t ask if you’re getting anywhere?’ Alastair Habgood inquired tentatively, passing a slip of paper across.

  ‘Thanks,’ Pollard said, putting it into his wallet. ‘One almost invariably does, you know, and gets a dusty answer. But I can’t see any harm in telling you that we’ve at least cleared quite a bit of ground. And, by the way, we do realize how extremely unpleasant all this if for you, personally.’

  ‘Decent of you to say that.’ Alastair Habgood pushed the typewriter to one side and rested his folded arms on his desk. ‘I feel so hideously responsible for this mess, you know. I mean, if Annabel was a wrong ’un, surely I ought to have spotted it? I’ve been damned casual about locking the gallery door into the flat, too. And then there’s the loss of the books. The library’s in my care and I’ve fallen down on that as well.’

  Over-developed sense of responsibility, Pollard thought. Probably a hangover from the war, too. That’s what getting him down. The possibility of his wife’s being involved in Brown’s death doesn’t seem to have entered his head. He looked, with sympathy and liking, at the despondent figure in front of him.

  ‘As we see it, you’ve nothing to reproach yourself with, Mr Habgood,’ he said. ‘And it’s early days, you know. We’ve hopes of getting those books back. Meanwhile, it must be heavy going without an assistant. Any chance of some temporary help till you can find another?’

  ‘I’ve had offers from several of our members, but explaining what wants doing, then checking up on the job afterwards, is really more bother than it’s worth. I’ll have to face it, though, once we reopen. By the way, that list of people at the party you wanted is nearly complete. I’m actually typing it now.’

  Pollard thanked him. ‘Can we have a word with Mrs Habgood before we go? Just an idea we’d like to put to her.’

  ‘Certainly. She’s getting the library straight with Clare, but they’re nearly through. Come and have a look. You’ve never seen it in its normal state.’

  Clear winter sunlight was filtering down from the domes. To Pollard the library seemed much larger and more colourful than on his earlier visits. It was bright with fresh flowers and newly-polished furniture.

  As he came in with Toye, escorted by Alastair Habgood, Clare Fenner appeared from one of the bays with a duster in her hand, and smiled recognition. She went to Laura — who was hoovering the carpet, with her back to the door — and touched her on the shoulder. Laura turned her head, caught sight of the three men and for a brief moment went completely rigid. Against the formal background of books and portraits, the two women formed a striking picture: the one young and confident, the other bearing the imprint of life’s exigencies and frozen in the grip of fear.

  In less than a second the scene dissolved. Laura switched off the Hoover and came forward in the sudden silence, her normal brisk and cheerful self.

  ‘So sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t hear you come in. This thing makes such a row.’

  Pollard apologized for arriving at an inconvenient time. ‘We won’t hold you up for more than a few minutes,’ he told her. ‘It’s simply that we’d like you to give us as complete a picture as you can of the clearing-up on Tuesday night when the party was over. It may seem quite beside the point, but one can’t have too much detailed background information in an inquiry of this sort.’

  This time, he was quite sure that Laura Habgood relaxed at what was obviously an unexpected turn in the conversation.

  ‘I’ll do my best,’ she said, ‘though I can’t imagine that anything we did is likely to interest you. Let’s sit down, shall we?’ she added, glancing in her husband’s direction.

  They all found seats and sat in an informal group, Clare perching on the arm of her uncle’s chair. Nox, who had emerged from under the sofa when the Hoover was switched off, leapt on to his knee and began to knead it purposefully. Laura leaned back, making her characteristic gesture of trying to flatten her resilient hair.

  ‘Now let me think.’ She shut her eyes for a moment. ‘Eight members stayed to help. Miss Escott and two other women collected up the remains of the eats and took them along to the kitchen. The little kitchenette down here, I mean, not ours upstairs. The men packed up the glasses — we hire from our wine merchant for parties — and the empties and the sale-or-return, unopened stuff. Various people got the heavy pieces of furniture back into their usual places. I remember being astonished at seeing Peter Escott rounding up the stacking chairs and putting them away in the store behind the trompe-l’oeil: I’ve never known him lend a hand before, t
he young blighter.’ She hesitated briefly. ‘It seems rather offbeat to mention it after what’s happened, but Annabel was hanging round him at once stage. Getting no change, though, and I think she must have decided to slope off. She certainly wasn’t with the last lot of people I let out. That was at about half-past nine.’

  ‘Thanks very much, Mrs Habgood,’ Pollard said, carefully excluding any sign of satisfaction from his voice. ‘That fills in our record nicely. Now we’ll remove ourselves. I must say, the library’s looking fine after all the hard work you and Miss Fenner have put in.’

  ‘The Trustees are very keen for members to start coming in as usual tomorrow, aren’t they, Alastair? We want everything to seem perfectly normal.’

  ‘I’m surprised how our members seem to be taking it in their stride,’ Alastair said. ‘They’re being awfully decent to us, too. Ringing up, sending flowers for Laura and asking us to meals. We had lunch with the Escotts yesterday, and young Peter took Clare out on Friday night to give her a break. Today we’re due to lunch with the Chairman.’

  Glancing at Clare Fenner’s pleasant, rather serious face, Pollard had an uneasy qualm. What was the blighter’s game, he wondered?

  ‘I must say it’s been a help not having to cook this morning,’ Laura was saying. ‘And you always get a super meal at Mr Westlake’s.’

  ‘You certainly mustn’t be late for it, then,’ Pollard replied, as he rose to leave.

  His eyes fell on the Founder’s portrait over the fireplace and he suddenly understood why Evelyn Escott’s face had seemed familiar.

  Once they were safely clear of the Athenaeum he turned to Toye. ‘That idea of yours was a winner, old chap,’ he said. ‘All your humping of trestle tables and whatever after binges in your parish hall has paid off.’

  Toye looked modestly gratified. ‘You might say we’re closing in on young Escott,’ he replied cautiously, ‘but it all hangs on what this Professor Thornley says. We’re moving. I feel it in my bones. Towards pinpointing X’s identity. I mean, and as you said just now, possibly getting the books back. After that — full stop? Anyway, let’s drive like hell to the police station, and we’ll ring Oxford.’