Surfeit of Suspects

by George Bellairs

  ‘This is hardly the time, is it? I thought the inquest was over.’

  ‘It was deferred, Mrs. Piper. It will be re-opened when the police report is ready.’

  ‘But they won’t keep bothering me, will they? It brings it all back and I can’t stand much more of it.’

  ‘That’s really why I’m here. To save you trouble. Do you feel able to answer a few questions to help us? Please accept my condolences.’

  Mrs. Piper wept a little. Her daughter comforted her as best she could, casting glances full of reproach at Cromwell. Mrs. Flowerdew must have been the child of her parents’ middle age. Her mother looked well past sixty; her daughter in her late twenties. She wore navy-blue jeans and a light blue jumper which didn’t go well with her ample figure.

  ‘I’m sure I’ll do what I can, because it’s not knowing how it happened that is so upsetting. If I only knew how and why they did it to my husband. Why would anybody want to do it? The police said it couldn’t have been an accident.’

  ‘We’re trying to find the answer. Meanwhile, had your husband any enemies… anybody who would wish him ill?’

  Mrs. Piper was overcome and shed more tears at the thought of her husband’s kindly nature and that anybody might wish him harm. Her grief turned to fury at the thought of it and she looked ready to denounce Cromwell for suggesting it.

  ‘He hadn’t an enemy in the world. That’s why I still say it must have been an accident. I told my husband when all this started at the Excelsior that Dodd would never do him any good. But my husband was that way. Always looked for the best in people. Even Dodd. And look where it’s landed him. And me. Every penny we had was locked up in that bankrupt company. My husband always used to say it would turn out all right. This house will, like as not, have to be sold to pay off the bank for the bond my husband signed. I won’t have a roof over my head and I’ll be dependent on a few pounds a week widow’s pension. It’s not fair…’

  Mrs. Flowerdew thought it time to put in her motto before her mother broke down again.

  ‘You’ll live with us, mother, and while I’m alive, you won’t want anything.’

  ‘It’s not the same.’

  Mrs. Piper didn’t seem grateful.

  ‘Did your husband leave a will, may I ask, Mrs. Piper?’

  She bridled.

  ‘I don’t see that’s any business of yours. If he did, it’s worth nothing. He’d nothing to leave.’

  ‘Has the will been found?’

  ‘Whatever you do in the police, it’s not decent worrying ordinary people by investigating a man’s money and how he left it until he’s been properly laid to rest. The funeral’s the day after tomorrow and I’ll thank you…’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs. Piper, but I just wondered where the will was. It’s rather important to us, you see. It may help us in finding the cause of his death. That’s the only reason I asked.’

  He said it in so contrite a way that Mrs. Piper relented. Afterwards, she told her fellow mourners at the funeral what a nice young man Cromwell was.

  ‘He kept it with his private papers in his desk. I’ll have to open it to get at the deeds of the grave. I might as well do it now.’

  She took a bunch of keys from a drawer in the sideboard and with one of them unlocked the top of an oak bureau in one corner. She emerged with a cheap tin box with the label of a well-known brand of biscuits still upon it, and placed it on the table. Then she opened it and began to turn out the contents. She apologised for the box.

  ‘He’d never much in the way of valuables and never took much care of what he had got. I used to tell him burglars wouldn’t have much trouble if they got in here…’

  Her voice trailed away as she took out various items from the box. The will was there with a lot of other papers. It was completely in favour of his wife and on a home-made form. There didn’t seem to be much else of value, as far as Cromwell could see. A gold watch and chain, a locket, a ring or two, a bank passbook, probably with little or no balance.

  Mrs. Piper talked to herself. She seemed to be brooding on past history as one thing after another of the contents of the box came to the light of day and jogged her memory. She flung aside a number of old papers.

  ‘He’d accumulated a lot of rubbish in the box that he didn’t seem to wish to get rid of for sentiment’s sake. There’s an empty envelope my husband must have kept because it’s got his father’s handwriting on it. The deeds of his father’s house were in it. The house was in the country in those days. Now it’s been pulled down and a chain store put up in the main street of the new town, where the house used to stand. My husband inherited it from his father and sold it for £800 and put the money in the Excelsior. Not long after that the new town developed and land went up in price like mad. I remember Bob, that’s my husband, saying it would have brought in five or six times what he sold it for if he’d only known about the new town scheme.’

  ‘Who did he sell it to?’

  ‘A friend of John Willie Dodd’s. Dodd kept pressing Bob to invest in the Excelsior. He said it was a gold mine. He was a good talker and persuaded my husband, who was no businessman at all. So Bob sold his father’s cottage. It had been let and Dodd had said he could get double or treble what he got in rent by investing the money in the Excelsior. I put £300 of my own in the firm, too. It’s all gone. Every cent of it.’

  ‘This friend of Dodd’s. Who was he?’

  ‘I don’t remember, if I ever knew. Bob did all the business. Dodd said he knew someone who wanted a house in that neighbourhood, so one night my husband went off and sold it. A few weeks later he came home with proceeds in cash. Eight hundred pounds in one-pound notes.’

  ‘Cash!’

  ‘Yes. It seemed funny. We were both a bit surprised. My husband also was surprised that instead of a private person, the house had been sold to a company. My husband had asked Dodd about that and he said that his friend was employed by the company and that he was starting to work for them in Evingden and the company was buying the house for him to live in. It seemed reasonable.’

  ‘Did you ever know the name of the company?’

  ‘No. I was more interested in them paying in cash. It seemed funny. But there it was, in good pound notes and every cent of it went in the Excelsior.’

  Cromwell made notes in his black book and Mrs. Piper and her daughter were much impressed.

  ‘Can you tell me what your husband was doing at the Excelsior office on the night of the accident, Mrs. Piper?’

  ‘I don’t know. I only wish I did. I expect it was Dodd again, wanting more money for wages. Things had been going from bad to worse and Dodd had asked my husband a time or two if he couldn’t raise any more money to save the company. Dodd made promises to repay all the extra he’d borrowed, temporarily, he said, when some bills had been paid by those who owed money to Excelsior. We never got it back. He was for ever pestering Bob. The night of the accident, he came to my husband as the works closed for the day and asked him to meet him at the office at seven-thirty. I don’t know what it could have been about. Another of those silly directors’ meetings where Dodd and old Tom Hoop did all the talking and ordering about, and my husband and Dick Fallows simply agreed to what the others said and made themselves responsible for it. It was a scandal the way things were run.’

  ‘You knew Dodd well?’

  ‘Yes I did and I never liked him. It was a funny thing, but my husband seemed to trust him. I used to tell him he was no judge of character, trusting and believing all that a fellow like Dodd said and did. A man of no honour and shocking morals… I could tell you a thing or two. But we mustn’t speak ill of the dead. My husband used to laugh at me when I complained about Dodd. He used to say he knew his way about the joinery trade and that what he did outside was his own business. My husband thought everybody was as honest as he was himself…’

  ‘Well, Mrs. Piper,
I’ll not detain you any further. Thanks for your help. I’m very sorry about it all…’

  He left the bewildered woman, with the open box still in front of her, poring over papers, stirring up old memories.

  It wasn’t far to the home of Richard Fallows, another director and victim of Excelsior; his house was two streets away from that of the Pipers, similar in construction, semi-detached with a long slope to the front door and a neglected garden in the front.

  According to Cromwell’s notes, Fallows was an old man, who had lost his wife a couple of years before and lived with an elderly housekeeper. He wondered if he’d find anybody at home. He needn’t have worried.

  When Cromwell beat on the knocker, there seemed to be a scrimmage as to who should answer the door. About three people at once sounded to be struggling to admit him. Then, the door burst open revealing what looked like the meeting of some private religious sect going on. The room inside was full of people in black clothes, men and women and children, all with their eyes fixed on the doorway.

  Cromwell’s black book said that the old housekeeper was called Henniker.

  ‘Is Mrs. Henniker in?’

  The man between Cromwell and the rest of the black throng wasn’t going to be put off by that. He looked like a boxer in his Sunday clothes. He even had a cauliflower ear. He seemed to have elected himself doorkeeper by sheer muscular strength.

  ‘What’s she wanted for? I’m the late Mr. Fallows’s nephew. I’m in charge.’

  He couldn’t have used a worse opening gambit with Cromwell.

  ‘Are you? Well, I’m here to see Mrs. Henniker. Is she in?’

  Most of the throng behind the pugilist seemed delighted. He’d been throwing his weight about and though the rest resented it, none seemed prepared to challenge him.

  ‘Yes. But…’

  The boxer raised a huge hand.

  ‘I want to see Mrs. Henniker. I’m from the police. Will you please stop arguing and ask her to show herself?’

  There was a commotion as the police were mentioned. They invited Cromwell inside unanimously, the pugilist backed indoors defeated and was absorbed by the crowd, and an old woman in black with an apron over her skirt was thrust forward.

  ‘Who wants me? As if I hadn’t enough troubles without more people worryin’ me…’

  For all her lamentations, she was a white-haired motherly sort of woman. Cromwell felt like addressing her as ‘Ma’, but thought better of it.

  ‘Might I have a word with you in private, Mrs. Henniker? I’m from the police.’

  She gave him a scared look as though instinctively imagining he’d come to arrest her, and then closed the door of the vestibule, cutting him off from the crowd indoors, silent, listening to catch a word or two of what was going on. As soon as the door closed, shutting Cromwell and Mrs. Henniker in a receptacle little larger than a sentry-box, a hubbub immediately started in the rooms behind as the assembly exchanged views about why Cromwell was there at all and the ethics of the situation. To the intruder, it all sounded like a queer danse macabre.

  ‘There’s nowhere private in this house now. We’ll have to talk here if you insist.’

  ‘Who are that lot?’

  She explained rather breathlessly that whereas Fallows and his wife had been childless, the good Lord had seen fit to more than compensate his two brothers, who had seven children and fifteen grandchildren between them. These two great families were rival factions for what they were sure was a wealthy birthright from their uncle. Scenting a will and money for distribution, they were now eagerly seeking their dues. The present gathering had arisen because each member of each family jointly and severally mistrusted the others to enter their uncle’s house alone. ‘It’s easy to pick up odds and ends if you’re not watched,’ one had said.

  There was only one of Fallows’s brothers still alive and he had stolen and smoked one of his brother’s cigars, for lack of anything else to filch. Unaccustomed to such strong luxury, he had collapsed half-way through it and had been carried upstairs and cast upon a spare bed to recover.

  Having thus forcibly eased her feelings by the rigmarole, Mrs. Henniker asked Cromwell what he wanted to know.

  ‘Did Mr. Fallows leave a will?’

  She grimly jerked her head in the direction of the human cockroaches behind the closed door, which she had now locked to maintain privacy.

  ‘If you know where it is, you’d better tell them and put them out of their misery. They’ve turned the place upside down and can’t find one. I told them he often said he’d better make one, but never brought his mind to it. Which means that after all I’ve done for him since his wife died, I’ll not even get a pound or two to remember him by. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m nearly seventy and work at my age is hard to find.’

  Cromwell was very sorry for her and he told her so, but he had a feeling that at any time the door behind them might burst open and erupt the mob of greedy relatives into the street.

  ‘What was he doing at the Excelsior offices when the accident happened?’

  ‘That Dodd sent for him. More money wanted, I suppose. It was like pouring it down a drain. I’m sure Dodd stole most of what he got out of Mr. Fallows.’

  It was strange that everybody fitted Dodd’s behaviour into the same pattern. Thieving, cheating, lying, lechering. He didn’t seem to have a friend in the world except Bella Hoop. Remembering what old documents had revealed at Piper’s house, Cromwell asked if Fallows had a store of old business papers indoors.

  ‘No, he hadn’t. I think he kept them in a box either at the bank or else at the office. I don’t know really. He’d nothing here, if what the family say is true. They’ve been rummaging about like a lot of hungry ferrets. There’s nothing come to light except two or three premium bonds, his savings bank book with four pounds, nine and fivepence in it, and next week’s football pools forms. Some people take to drink when they’ve lost all they had, others take to the pools.’

  These were the men who had been directors of a company and had tried without success to run it. No wonder it had failed and Dodd had had all his own way about matters.

  ‘Perhaps he kept some papers with him in his pocket-book?’

  ‘The police have taken that. Harry has been to the police station enquiring about that already and they sent him off with a flea in his ear. Harry’s the one who was once a boxer. Battling Fallows, he called himself… Hé!’

  The single exclamation expressed quite a lot.

  There seemed little else to ask.

  ‘Did Mr. Fallows say what Mr. Dodd wanted him for?’

  ‘No. But I guessed. The usual.’

  Cromwell was now eager to get back to the police station and examine the wallet taken from Fallows’s dead body. Not that he expected to find much. If there had been any clues, the local police would have told him. So, he bade Mrs. Henniker good-day.

  ‘You’ll have a lot to do, Mrs. Henniker…’

  ‘As soon as the funeral’s over, I’m going to my sister’s at Sittingbourne and leaving the lot of them to take the place apart and fight over any money that’s left. Good-day to you.’

  She quickly threw back the door to reveal a knot of listening relations, caught in the act, and now trying to look as if they were innocent. That was the last Cromwell saw of them and he wasn’t sorry. Battling Fallows called something after him, but he hurried on without even turning round.

  The charred clothes of the dead men had been removed and deposited at the police station. Fallows must, somehow, have been farther away from the explosion and fire than the other two. His suit was hardly damaged, although badly stained, and his wallet was intact, lying on the desk with his money, keys, pipe, watch and other trifles from the pockets. The police had examined the wallet and listed the contents, but Cromwell opened it again and turned out the enclosures on the table.

&nb
sp; Nothing out of the ordinary. Two pounds ten in notes; a trade union membership card; a snapshot of a man and woman in what must have been holiday clothes with a background of the sea…

  ‘That was Fallows and his wife,’ said a constable who had been breathing down Cromwell’s neck as he worked.

  A few more odds and ends. Stamps, Excelsior trade cards, a receipt from the local savings bank for a ‘sealed envelope marked “will”’.

  So that was where it was.

  Fallows had been particularly short of all financial and sentimental ties if his private papers were anything to go by and seemed to have been living on the edge of poverty thanks to the claims of Excelsior.

  There were ample reasons on every hand for the murder of Dodd; but not for those of Fallows and Piper.

  There was one other item. A small envelope with Excelsior Joinery Co. Ltd. printed on the flap. It had been unused and there were one or two pencil words on it.

  ‘He was holding that in his hand when we came to examine the body at the mortuary. He must have been writing on it and have clutched it sort of convulsively, like, when the explosion happened.’

  Cromwell looked at the writing. An illiterate scrawl, but legible. Fallows must have been making notes in pencil.

  O/d……… 4100

  Takeover £5,000

  Loans 1800…… 10/- in the pound.

  Polydore I & P.

  ‘I’d like to take this with me, if you please.’

  The policeman looked surprised.

  ‘I can’t make head or tail of it. It says something about a takeover. Who’d want to take over a bankrupt business like the Excelsior?’

  ‘We’ll have to find out, won’t we?’ said Cromwell and he put the envelope carefully in his black notebook.

  ‘Where would I be likely to find Mrs. Dodd? She was at the seaside, I hear, when Dodd met his death. I suppose she came home.’

  ‘She came back, but I don’t know where she is at present. Her father is Alderman Vintner, a would-be big-shot of the town and a member of the council watch committee. So you’d better be careful. I can’t think Mrs. Dodd would go back to her father’s place. He quarrelled with Dodd and, from what I hear, cut off Mrs. Dodd with a shilling because she came down on Dodd’s side.’