Half-Mast Murder

by Milward Kennedy

  Guest had a vision of the key flashing round the opened casement and swinging back until by chance it landed on that little table. Then the thrower gently releases one end and draws the other. The key lodges behind the book, and the book is gently moved by the pull on the cord.

  And then of course that loose end, when it clears the key, falls to the floor and is drawn across it—through that stream of blood. The thrower is winding it into a ball, and the end jerks like a wounded snake and jumps and flicks against the wall below the window—those little splashes were explained.

  He draws it across the sill of the window and then across the top of the railing behind which he is standing. And across his own finger.

  But not cord. Thin fishing-line, wound on a thin spool. That would accord with all the evidence.

  No wonder that young George Shipman had not been anxious for Cynthia Paley to attend to his “cut” finger ; and no wonder that the cut had vanished so completely and so swiftly that there was no sign of it on his hand when he talked to the Superintendent.

  Guest reflected for a few moments more. What corroborative evidence could he get ? What about the coat which the young fellow had been wearing ? He might have slipped the fishing-line into the pocket, to carry it up to the house unnoticed, and if so there would in all likelihood be a trace of blood in the pocket.

  Good : that was one possible check. And what else? Of course : that photograph of Mr. Trent. Its purpose was obvious —if, of course, it had really been taken that fatal afternoon. But hadn’t Mr. Trent talked about the Professor’s saying there were two photographs to take to finish the film ? If so, it was only a matter of fixing the day when the four first photographs on the film were taken.

  Guest felt confident that those last two photographs had indeed been taken that afternoon. And the purpose of the photograph of Trent was obviously to try to create the belief that the Professor was alive at 4.1 5, when really he was dead at—well, long before that. By a quarter to three, most likely.

  Shipman, in that case, must have had the camera in his pocket when he helped to break down the door of the summer-house, and must have contrived to thrust it, unobserved, on the sofa.

  The Superintendent swore aloud and felt thoroughly alarmed. That fool of a Sergeant who had so brightly had the film developed had omitted to report on the finger-prints on the camera case ; if no record had been made of them, a bad blunder had been made. And he, Guest, was responsible.

  He was so thoroughly shaken by this thought that without more ado he sprang out of bed and proceeded to bath, shave, and dress, grateful for the domestic appliances which make it possible for a man to get his water really hot and when he wants it, and, furthermore, to shave in haste and nervousness without grave injury.

  He paused to frown severely at the reflection of his face, adorned with puffs of lather bordering the mown expanses of cheek.

  “How the devil could he have taken the photograph at 4.15 ?” he muttered, remembering that at that hour Shipman had been sitting with Mrs. Arkwright on the terrace. He had confessed to peeping into the walled garden and to seeing Trent asleep there, but that must have been something like an hour earlier.

  And not only that. If the flag was half-mast at a quarter to three, it surely meant . . . or had the position of the flag nothing to do with murder at all ?

  The Superintendent mopped his face with a sponge, and as he did so discovered yet another snag to his theory. If Shipman was the man who fingered the safe in gloved hands, why on earth had he not kept his gloves on till the whole job was over ?

  These disturbing thoughts made him the more anxious to get down to the station and test—if it still were possible—one fairly decisive point: whose finger-prints were on the camera case ? Fortunately he possessed one specimen of Shipman’s, on the print of the snapshot of the tennis player which he had shown him.

  He heaved a sigh of tremendous relief when he discovered that all was well. The camera-case had not been forgotten : only the Sergeant had omitted to give the Superintendent the report on it. It was discovered, and Guest promised himself that when the Sergeant also put in an appearance he would have something to say to him, in return for the panic he had caused in his superior’s breast. He read the report, and with something like satisfaction. There were the dead man’s finger-prints on the case, and those of another man ; and in no case were the professor’s the uppermost prints. In other words, someone had handled it after the Professor.

  There was then the immediate job of comparing those unidentified fingerprints with those of Mr. George Shipman, and whilst this was in progress the Superintendent might as well take a short stroll in the fresh morning air and get some breakfast. And where better than at the hotel which had the honour of housing both Mr. Julian Paley and Mr. Quirk ?

  To breakfast at the hotel was easy and pleasant enough, but, as neither Mr. Quirk nor Mr. Paley was an early riser, the meal was perforce a solitary one, and in consequence the Superintendent found himself back at the station before the comparison of the finger-prints had been completed.

  Clearly it would be rash to put all his eggs in one basket, and to assume because his theory seemed to account for some of—indeed, a good many of—the puzzling features of the case, it was necessarily the right one. He decided to despatch a message to Major Dillon to say that on reflection he felt that it was advisable to try to identify the armament firm of which Sir Guy Rogers had spoken, and to ask whether the Chief Constable could undertake the enquiry ; he clearly had easier sources of such information.

  Then there was that sliver of wood from the railing at Cliff’s End. Guest discovered that here he was to blame—he had overlooked a brief note informing him that, as he had believed from the outset, the mark on it was human blood.

  But after this there seemed little to do but to wait. Further evidence about the movements of Messrs. Quirk and Julian Paley on the afternoon of the tragedy, about the vanished and bogus doctor, and about the time when·the flag had been lowered, was not likely to be forthcoming until later—indeed, it might be days before anything conclusive came to hand.

  Guest chafed at the delay. Would it be over-rash to question Mr. Shipman forthwith ? He glanced at his watch, and saw that it was past nine o’clock. He would risk it. He sent for a car, and, accompanied by a plain-clothes man, drove up to Cliff’s End.

  Yes, said Richards, opening the door to him, breakfast was over. All the household were down except Miss Cynthia, who evidently had been badly knocked up by the tragedy. Guest sent a polite message to ask Mrs. Arkwright if he might speak to her for a moment.

  He was ushered into her private sitting-room.

  “It’s only a small point, ma’am,” he said, after she had bidden him a kindly good morning. “I want to make absolutely sure about the times when things happened that afternoon.”

  “What things ?” she asked, with raised eyebrows.

  He explained his meaning in a few words.

  “I want to be absolutely certain—as certain as it is possible to be—that between half-past three and the time when tea was served you and Mr. Shipman were together on the lower terrace.”

  “Yes, we were. I can’t say exactly to a second, but——”

  “Quite so, ma’am, and you’re sure you both sat there and would have seen anyone who went to the summer-house ?”

  “Oh, yes. And who could have done ?”

  “You don’t think your attention was distracted ?” Guest ignored her question. “For instance, if Mr. Shipman had got up and strolled about—to the walled garden, for instance—you might have followed him with your eyes——”

  “Oh, but he didn’t. He sat with me all the time. I thought it was so charming of him.”

  “Not at all, ma’am, I’m sure,” Guest replied gallantly. “Ah, and one other small point, if I may. Did you happen to notice whether Mr. Shipman had a book or a camera with him ?” Mrs. Arkwright looked very surprised.

  “Why, no,” she said, “I can’t im
agine what you’re after, but I can assure you that he had only a tennis-racquet.”

  “And a box of tennis-balls ?” he suggested, on a sudden inspiration.

  But Mrs. Arkwright shook her head.

  “No, they were down on the tennis-lawn,” she replied.

  “You don’t think he had something that sort of shape or size in his pocket ?”

  This time she smiled.

  “Impossible,” was her reply. “Mr. Shipman, as you must have noticed, is a most elegant young man. I should certainly have observed it if he had stuffed anything like that into his pocket.”

  The Superintendent rose to his feet, and thanked her for the help she had given.

  “I expect you’ll see me up here again,” he added. “And I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I trouble you like this from time to time.”

  “Of course, Superintendent. Only I can’t imagine why you want to know what Mr. Shipman had in his hand. And why not ask him if you want to know ?”

  Guest murmured something about difficulties of identification, and went on quickly to say that he proposed to take her suggestion and. talk again to Mr. Shipman.

  “In fact, I’ll go and look for him now,” he said.

  Mrs. Arkwright advised him to try the summer-room, and he found her advice reliable. But on the way he paused in the hall and whispered to the detective who was waiting there.

  Mr. Shipman greeted him with the off-hand heartiness which appeared to be natural to him.

  “Well, Superintendent, how are you getting on ?”

  Guest’s manner was markedly cold by contrast.

  “I thought that perhaps you would be prepared to answer a few further questions, Mr. Shipman,” he said.

  “Of course. Fire ahead. I don’t know that I’ve anything more that I can tell you, but——”

  “It isn’t very convenient to talk up here, Mr. Shipman,” Guest replied. “Would you mind coming down to the station with me ?”

  The Superintendent, watching him closely, observed that his expression changed rapidly to one something like consternation. But in a flash the old buoyancy returned, and he agreed with a laugh.

  “Not under arrest, I hope ?” he said.

  “Certainly not, sir,” Guest replied, though his tone was hardly reassuring.

  They walked out of the front door and entered the back of the car. The seat next the driver was empty. The driver waited for the Superintendent’s instructions.

  “Well, let’s get on,” said Shipman impatiently. “What are we waiting for ?”

  “Won’t be a minute,” said Guest. “Ah, here we are !”

  The detective, who had not been in the hall when they passed through it, appeared from the front door and entered the car, seating himself beside the driver. He carried a brown paper parcel under his arm.

  “Station,” Guest ordered laconically, and the car started.

  “What’s the parcel ? Washing ?” Shipman asked with somewhat forced levity.

  The Superintendent looked at him with sudden severity.

  “Better wait, Mr. Shipman,” he said. “I told you you’re not under arrest. You’re not. But I want to say this too : that you’re not to answer any question if you don’t want to. And I must warn you that anything you say may be——”

  “Taken down, and used in evidence against me ? Isn’t that the full quotation ?” Shipman interrupted. “Well, I must say, I think you came pretty near a white lie, with your invitation to the police station.”

  The drive was completed in silence. Mr. George Shipman sat with frowning brows beside the watchful Superintendent.

  CHAPTER XVI

  FUSSES A FUTURE FIANCÉ

  “Now, Mr. Shipman,” the Superintendent began when he was seated at his desk, with the other reclining somewhat uncomfortably in an armchair beside it and facing him. “I’ve warned you, and there’s no need for you to say anything at all if you’d rather not. But I think it’s fair to give you an opportunity of—er —explaining one or two things.”

  “Very kind of you, I’m sure,” said Mr. Shipman sarcastically. “And I take it that your colleague there proposes, if I do say anything, to take it down in shorthand and all that ?”

  “You shall see and initial it,” he was assured, but seemed to derive little comfort from that assurance.

  “All right. Let’s hear your points. I don’t propose to say anything.” He spoke slowly and deliberately. Guest took him briskly at his word.

  “Very well, Mr. Shipman. Then I’ll just give you my idea of how the door of the summer-house came to be locked and the key inside.”

  “That’s easy. The Professor locked it himself,” Shipman retorted.

  “And then took a sleeping-draught and stabbed himself under its influence ? I think not, Mr. Shipman.”

  George Shipman was clearly taken aback by these words.

  “Sleeping-draught?” he muttered. “But I don’t—wasn’t——”

  “Take it from me, that’s the fact,” Guest interrupted. “So that the problem we have to consider is how did someone or other—call him Mr. X., shall we ?—manage to lock the door of the summer-house from outside, and get the key inside. Now my notion is this. That morning there were two new fishing-lines in the summer-house, but after the murder there was only one.”

  He watched Shipman Closely while he spoke and saw the jaw suddenly tighten.

  “Shall I go on ?”

  The other nodded for reply ; and Guest proceeded to explain how the key had found its way to the little table, and how the book on the table had been shifted, and how the end of the line had been trailed through the pool of blood. “And there you are,” he concluded his exposition.

  “Meaning that I did that ?” asked Shipman, his voice remarkably well under control.

  By way of reply, the Superintendent lifted on to his desk the parcel which had been brought down from Cliff’s End, and slowly undid it, revealing a grey flannel coat.

  “Recognise this ?” he asked Shipman, rather grimly.

  “Looks like mine, from here,” said the other, “but——”

  “Anyway, it’s got your name on it,” Guest retorted. “And if my information’s correct, it’s the coat you were wearing that afternoon.”

  “Indeed ?” Shipman commented airily. “I really forget.” But he watched the Superintendent intently as he turned first one and then the other pocket carefully inside out, and minutely examined through a lens one or two small stains on the lining of one of them.

  “H’m. We shall have to have that analysed,” he said, almost as if speaking to himself. “But I haven’t a doubt but it’s human blood. And not been there many days, either.”

  There was a silence.

  “Care to say how those stains got there, Mr. Shipman ?” he asked suddenly.

  After another silence, “Probably a cut finger,” came the answer, rather defiantly.

  Guest nodded two or three times, then looked at his victim with a peculiar half-smile.

  “The cut you wouldn’t let Miss Paley see to for you, perhaps ?” he suggested, and stared at the hands which were clasping the two arms of the chair. Shipman followed the direction of his gaze, looked up, and apparently was about to speak.

  “No, you needn’t say anything,” Guest forestalled him. “I had a look at your hands next morning—not a sign of a cut. Funny kind of cut—to wash off.”

  A scornful but rather shaky laugh was the answer.

  “Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Shipman went on to observe. “I can’t possibly say when those stains got there, but—well, a cut finger struck me as a likely cause, assuming they are blood-stains.”

  “Come now, Mr. Shipman,” Guest returned to the attack. “Here’s the point. You had what looked like a cut on your finger, and it had gone next day. The mark was just what I’d expect from winding up that fishing-line. And the fishing-line found its way from the summer-house to the hall of the house itself, and if it travelled in your pocket that” (h
e pointed to the coat) “is just the kind of mark I’d expect. Added to which,” he concluded, “you’ve no sort or kind of alibi for about twenty minutes of the afternoon. You admit you were alone, and you say you never left the terrace, but——” And he shrugged his shoulders.

  “Sorry,” Shipman returned stoutly. “I daresay it all sounds very awful, but there it is. Your evidence strikes me as pretty slender. And, anyhow, why on earth should I want to do in the poor old Professor ? That’s what you’re suggesting, isn’t it ?”

  “No, you go too fast, sir. Not but what some people might see a motive. After all, under the will a goodish sum goes to—Miss Cynthia.”

  Shipman started visibly, but recovered his composure in a flash.

  “First I’ve heard of that,” he said. “And, anyway, I’m pretty comfortably off, you know. Oh, yes, no doubt about that—I can prove it easily enough, if I must.”

  “I see, Mr. Shipman,” said the Superintendent, almost menacingly. “You don’t want to say anything. I daresay you are wise. Still, you may as well think things over for a minute or two.”

  “May I smoke during the period of meditation ?” was his rather flippant reply. He was told that he might, and, drawing out a handsome cigarette-case, he took out a cigarette and tapped it on the arm of his chair. He was just about to put back the case when he paused, as if struck by a sudden idea.

  “So sorry,” he said, “won’t you ?” and he held out the case to Guest, who declined with icy politeness.

  Mr. Shipman shrugged his shoulders, put away the case, lit his cigarette, threw the match delicately into the fireplace, crossed his legs, looked up at the ceiling, and slowly exhaled a cloud of smoke. The Superintendent looked at him in annoyance. Silence fell on the room.

  The Superintendent broke it by pressing a bell-push on his desk, which brought a constable promptly into the room.

  “That report on the finger-prints. The one I asked for this morning,” Guest demanded sharply.