by J F Straker
‘That’s just it,’ the Sergeant said eagerly. ‘I was thinking he might have sneaked in before ten. Perhaps even before Miss Farling came upstairs at nine-thirty. That’s why she didn’t hear the door open.’
‘But the milk wasn’t there then.’
‘No. But he’d expect it to be. The maid said she usually took it up during dinner. And he wouldn’t want to leave it too late, not knowing what time Russell might be back. When he finds the milk isn’t there he’s in a spot, of course. He knows Doris may arrive at any moment — and so may Russell. So what does he do?’
‘All right, I’ll buy it,’ said Pitt, beginning to be interested. ‘What does he do?’
‘He stays put,’ Maddox said with conviction. ‘It’s safer. Every time he pops in and out he’s in danger of being spotted. If the maid turns up before Russell (he’d recognize Russell’s tread on the stairs; Miss Farling said he always runs up two at a time) he can hide under the bed until she’s gone. But if Russell arrives first — well, he can say he just popped in to borrow a book or something. Nothing suspicious in that. Not that it would matter if there were, since the poison hasn’t been used.’
‘It’s an idea,’ Pitt agreed. ‘What causes that door to stick, by the way?’
‘The wood seems to have swollen. Russell says it’s been like that all the term. He’s still waiting for someone to fix it.’
‘Does it also make a noise when you open it from the inside?’
‘It groans a bit,’ the Sergeant admitted. ‘But not too loud if you take it gently.’
‘I’d like to hear it,’ said Pitt.
The upper corridor was deserted. With Maddox inside Russell’s room and the door firmly closed, the Inspector tapped on Miss Webber’s door. He was surprised when she opened it. He had not expected to find anyone upstairs at that hour.
‘More questions?’ she asked brightly.
‘Not this time, ma’am. We want to try an experiment. May I come in?’
‘Please do.’
The room seemed to overflow with the garments of small boys. They were on the bed, on the chairs, even on the floor. ‘A bit of a mess, I’m afraid,’ Miss Webber apologized, as she cleared a chair. ‘I’ve always had the small sickroom for my mending, but since Miss Connaught moved in I’ve had to make do with this. What’s the experiment, Inspector?’
‘We just sit down and wait. But talk if you like.’
Miss Webber found herself unable to talk to order, and there was silence in the room. Then came the sound of boots creaking along the corridor, and Sergeant Maddox appeared in the open doorway.
Pitt shook his head and turned to the matron. ‘Did you hear anything, Miss Webber?’
‘I heard the Sergeant, if that’s what you mean.’
‘Did you hear a door open?’
‘No. I didn’t hear him come upstairs, either. Where did you spring from, Sergeant?’
‘It’s me fairy feet, ma’am,’ said Maddox, grinning. ‘They’ve got wings on them, like that Atlantic chap.’
‘Atalanta,’ said Pitt. ‘And it’s a she, not a he. And she didn’t have wings on her feet. You’re confusing her with Mercury.’
The Sergeant’s grin grew broader. ‘That’s what comes of working in a school. It gets you, doesn’t it? I’ll be spouting that sort of stuff myself if I’m not careful.’
A gong sounded in the hall.
They left Miss Webber to ruminate on the strange ways of policemen. Pitt slipped quickly into the sickroom to speak to Duke, leaving Maddox on guard against the matron’s possible wrath. As they descended the stairs they looked down on a noisy sea of boys’ faces, and out of the sea Colin Russell came bounding up to meet them.
‘Mrs Latimer has arranged for you to have lunch in the library,’ he told them. ‘If you want to avoid the mob I’ll take you round by the side door.’
They followed him out on to the terrace. Boys were still drifting in from the grounds. The sun had come out, and, although small pools of water twinkled among the uneven flagstones, the air was warm and dry.
‘Hi!’ shouted Colin, so loudly and suddenly that Sergeant Maddox, lost in a delicious dream of promotion, was startled back to reality.
At the far end of the terrace two small boys were furiously engaged in a mock battle. At Colin’s shout they lowered their weapons, after a final cut and thrust, and walked sheepishly towards the three men. One boy held an old cricket stump, the other what appeared to be an iron bar.
‘Yes, sir?’ Iron Bar asked innocently.
‘You know perfectly well that you are not allowed to fence with sticks,’ Colin said sternly. ‘It’s dangerous. If you’d caught Stewart with that iron bar, Locking, you might have killed him.’
‘It’s not iron, sir — it’s wood. That’s just black paint on it.’
‘Oh! Well, you were still disobeying the rules. Now give them to me and get indoors. You’ll be late for lunch.’
As the boys departed Colin threw the two sticks into a shrubbery and then led the detectives round to the front door and into the library, where a table was already laid for lunch. He was curious as to what they had achieved, but Pitt refused to discuss it.
As the young man reluctantly turned to leave them Pitt said, ‘Exactly where was the cat when you first noticed it, Mr Russell?’
‘Half under the bed. No, more than that. I could just see its hindquarters.’
‘Could it have been in that position when you went into the room?’
‘I suppose so. But I didn’t shut the door until I’d hung up my coat, so it could have come in after me. I should say that’s more likely. I put the milk on the floor, out of the way, while I wrote a letter to the scholastic agents; and it was after I’d done that that I looked under the bed for my slippers and saw the cat. It was dead then.’
‘I suppose it was you who put the glass back on the dressing-table?’
‘Yes.’
And effectively messed up any likely prints, you clot, thought the Inspector irritably as the door closed behind Colin. And on the door-handle. The poison bottle would be about the only important thing you couldn’t get your big mitts on — and that, of course, is missing.
He ate his meal in silence, allowing Sergeant Maddox to drift happily back into his dream of promotion. That brainwave of his about young Moull had been a masterpiece. The only cloud on the sergeant’s visional horizon was the Inspector himself. He had never worked with Pitt before. How much credit, he wondered anxiously, would Pitt allow him when he came to make his report? Would he be generous, or would he hog all the glory for himself?
He came out of his reverie to hear Pitt say, ‘That kid in the sickroom told me he did call out last night. But Miss Webber didn’t hear him — and she didn’t hear you this morning either. So we can’t place much reliance on her. That throws it all on Miss Farling. Well, that’s fair enough — if it were not for one little snag.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Russell says Moull is sweet on the girl, but that she doesn’t reciprocate his affection. But he may be wrong there; the young lady strikes me as having her emotions well under control. Not the demonstrative, clinging type. And if she is keen on Moull — well, you see where that leads us?’
Sergeant Maddox said he wasn’t sure that he did.
‘It means that if she had the least reason to suppose that Moull was the poisoner her evidence is as valueless as Miss Webber’s,’ Pitt said sorrowfully.
8 - Man With a Bicycle
Few of the staff had been able to hold the interest of their respective forms that morning. But if mental control was difficult physical control was even more so. During the breaks between lessons boys thronged the corridors and the hall, pestering every one for information, darting to the library door each time it opened in the hope of catching sight of one or other of the detectives. Mr Latimer and the duty-master shooed them away with threats of punishment if they returned, but neither shooing nor threats were of lasting avail. The tide momentaril
y receded and then flowed back again. It was not until nearly the whole staff was on permanent duty downstairs that curiosity was baulked and order restored.
During lessons it appeared that the school had suddenly become afflicted with incontinence. The procession from classrooms to lavatory (and always via the hall) seemed never ending until the more hardened and experienced members of the staff adopted a complete and callous disregard of even the most importunate pleas. The weaker members, however, such as Anne and Chris, could not resist the dervish-like antics and agonized expressions with which they were confronted on refusing to allow a boy to leave the room. The procession was checked, but there were always a few boys missing from their classrooms.
Lunch at the staff table was therefore in the nature of an impromptu council of war.
‘I am afraid there can be neither rest nor relaxation for any of us while the police are here,’ said Mr Latimer. He looked worried and harassed, but Colin could not help suspecting that this statement must have given him some satisfaction. Mr Latimer liked to get his money’s worth. ‘I cannot allow this morning’s disgraceful exhibition to be repeated. The boys must be kept away from the hall and, as much as possible, out of the corridors. And I want you all to discourage any discussion on this wretched business. I believe some most extraordinary rumours are circulating in the school.’
‘They can’t be more extraordinary than the truth,’ said James. ‘Or perhaps I should say, what we are allowed to know of the truth.’
Colin was silent. Silence, he had decided, should shroud him in council and discussion — at least in the presence of the headmaster. He had been conspicuous in bringing them to the present crisis. Now that it was upon them he preferred to remain inconspicuous.
‘You can’t avoid rumours,’ Smelton said peevishly. He had reached an age when the solace of rest and a cigarette between classes had become almost an essential in the daily routine. The prospect of unrelieved duty appalled him. ‘They’ll get worse, too, unless the boys are given a reason for the police being here. Incidentally, their letters home on Sunday should make interesting reading.’
James gave a low whistle. ‘Yes, that’s a point. We’ll have to censor them. Parents will be swarming here on Monday like bees if we don’t.’
Mr Latimer frowned, but made no comment; and for some time there was little talk at the staff table. The boys, however, made up for the silence of their elders. Never before had they had such a topic for discussion. The rumours which had already reached the ears of the headmaster were as milk and water compared to the fiery brews now being concocted.
For once Mr Latimer took no account of the noise. He was deep in thought. But with the sweet he reached a decision.
‘We cannot censor the boys’ letters,’ he said weightily, but speaking in a low tone so that those furthest from him had to crane their necks to listen. ‘Apart from being wrong in principle and purpose, it would merely heighten the tension and delay the scandal. It would be equally wrong ...’ He paused, considered again, and then plunged. ‘No, there is no alternative. I shall send the boys home.’
‘The parents won’t think much of that either,’ said James. ‘It’s only half-term now.’
‘I can’t help that. It may be possible for them to return when this business has been settled, but I will not accept the responsibility for keeping them here under existing conditions.’ Mr Latimer looked angrily to where a group of shrill voices rose suddenly above the general din, reached a crescendo, and then subsided as one of the culprits caught the headmaster’s look. ‘You had better send the notices out this afternoon, Miss Farling.’
‘Will you tell them the reason?’ asked Smelton.
‘I shall give them a reason. Duke has measles. The doctor confirmed it this morning.’
‘That won’t pacify the parents,’ said James. ‘A few moments alone with their precious offspring and they’ll know there is a hell of a lot more to it than measles. You’ll have to do better than that, Dad.’
Smelton agreed. Only an official announcement, he said, could counteract the lurid stories likely to be invented by the boys. The headmaster listened, uncertainty writ plain on his usually poker face. Anne thought she knew why he hesitated. He was wondering whether there was still some slight chance that the affair might be hushed up, that the truth need never come out. If he told the truth now he would be burning his bridges behind him.
Diana’s cool voice broke into the discussion for the first time. ‘What is there to tell?’ She asked simply. ‘Nothing has actually happened, has it?’
It was too much for Colin.
‘Thanks very much,’ he said, with a poor attempt at sarcasm. ‘Somebody tries to poison me and you call that nothing!’
‘But the attempt didn’t succeed,’ the girl answered, smiling at him. ‘That’s the point. There’s no corpse, no one is missing. As far as the boys are concerned, therefore, nothing has happened.’
Mr Latimer did not heed Colin’s renewed protest. He clutched eagerly at the proffered straw.
‘Miss Farling is right,’ he said. ‘Apart from the presence of the police, there is no visible evidence to support any tales the boys may choose to tell their parents. We can deny them all with a clear conscience.’
‘Apart from the presence of the police!’ mimicked James. ‘And how do you propose to explain that insignificant item?’
His father did not answer. Anne wondered whether, if the police were not in evidence when the parents called, he would deny that they had ever been there. She had always regarded him, with some awe, as a tin god lording it, in his metallic, unfeeling way, over a little world of paper subjects — a tin god who if he did wrong could do it with impunity. Now she knew that he was as vulnerable as they were. If he were made of tin he was either buckling or melting. And if he were a god, then there were other and more superior gods to whom he was answerable. He was no longer the master of his own fate and of his own world. His world had been invaded.
Colin, having once broken his resolution to keep silent, broke it again.
‘You’ll have to let the Inspector know that you want to send the boys home, sir,’ he said.
Mr Latimer glared at him. Since he must, he would accept this interfering young jackanapes; it did not follow that he would forgive him. ‘I imagine it is no concern of the police how I run my own school,’ he said icily.
‘But you’ll have to get their permission,’ Colin persisted. ‘The Inspector may want to question some of them.’
That, thought the headmaster, was a very good reason why the boys should go. Still glaring, he rose to say grace.
As they stood watching the now silent boys file from the dining-hall Diana said, ‘What happens to us? Are we to be sent home too?’
James laughed. ‘You’re a bigger optimist than the old man,’ he said. ‘We stay put. The Inspector won’t let any of us out of his sight until he discovers who prepared Russell’s nightcap for him. It seems a pity,’ he went on, with a backward glance at Colin, ‘that we should suffer all this inconvenience for nothing. Now, if only Russell had drunk the ruddy stuff ...’
Anne, for one, had not realized that they were virtually prisoners. Upstairs in her room after lunch she wondered about it. Surely the police could not keep them at Redways indefinitely? The atmosphere in the common room had been unhappy enough before. With the boys gone and nothing to occupy their time it would become unbearable.
The boys were resting on their beds, and for a little while the staff were at liberty. On the drive in front of the house Diana and Chris were walking together. Still busy with her thoughts, Anne watched them idly. They were of equal height, and Chris never took his eyes from his companion’s face. He seemed to be pleading with her; but to no avail, for the girl shook her head repeatedly. Once she turned to leave him, but the young man caught her arm and held it, still pleading. Poor Chris, thought Anne; he’s terribly in love, and Diana so obviously cares nothing for him. Obviously to every one but Chris, that is
. Now and again she seems to soften a little — through boredom, perhaps, or because she can’t help feeling sorry for him; but that only makes it worse — it makes him see hope where there is none. If she doesn’t want him she should tell him so, cut out all this blowing hot and then cold. Chris would get over it in time, thought Anne. Men always do.
Sergeant Maddox appeared from under the jutting eaves and walked across the terrace to the couple on the drive. After a moment’s conversation he and Chris went back to the house. Diana hesitated, started to follow them, and then, apparently changing her mind, went off in the direction of the kitchen.
Poor Chris, thought Anne again. If Colin is right in suspecting he had something to do with J.C.’s death he is going to hate the next half-hour or so. She wondered how she could feel sorry for a man who might have murdered her grandfather, and decided it was because, no matter how black the evidence might appear against him, she could not visualize Chris Moull as the cold-blooded monster that the killer of J.C. must have been. He might kill — but not like that.
As she turned away from the window she wondered if Inspector Pitt would be more successful than Colin at prising the truth out of Chris.
***
Inspector Pitt was wondering much the same thing. Apart from exonerating Miss Farling and Miss Webber from the attempt to poison Russell, the evidence he had so far collected did not amount to much. But there were still the Latimers, father and son — and Christopher Moull. And Moull, Pitt had decided, looked like being his best bet.
But Chris, despite a certain wariness at odds with his cherubic countenance, did not at first seem perturbed by the Inspector’s questions. He knew nothing of the poison, he said. He had gone upstairs to his room almost immediately after dinner, had read for some time, and had then retired to bed and to sleep.
‘Miss Connaught left the milk in Russell’s room at ten o’clock. I dare say you already know that,’ said Pitt. ‘Now, your room is next to Russell’s. If anyone entered his room either before or after ten you should have heard him. Did you?’