
* A Project Gutenberg Canada Ebook *

This ebook is made available at no cost and with very few
restrictions. These restrictions apply only if (1) you make
a change in the ebook (other than alteration for different
display devices), or (2) you are making commercial use of
the ebook. If either of these conditions applies, please
check gutenberg.ca/links/licence.html before proceeding.

This work is in the Canadian public domain, but may be
under copyright in some countries. If you live outside
Canada, check your country's copyright laws.
IF THE BOOK IS UNDER COPYRIGHT IN YOUR COUNTRY,
DO NOT DOWNLOAD OR REDISTRIBUTE THIS FILE.

Title: Suicide Excepted
Author: Hare, Cyril [Clark, Alfred Alexander Gordon] (1900-1958)
Date of first publication: 1939
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   New York: Macmillan, 1954
Date first posted: 8 February 2015
Date last updated: 8 February 2015
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #1232

This ebook was produced by Alex White, Mark Akrigg
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net


PUBLISHER'S NOTE

Italics in the original printed edition are indicated _thus_,
and bolds are indicated =thus=.

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected;
inconsistencies in hyphenation have been retained.

As part of the conversion of the book to its new digital
format, we have made certain minor adjustments in its layout.
We have also added a table of contents.

Because this is a text-only version of the book, the
floor plan in Chapter Nine has been omitted.






                            SUICIDE EXCEPTED

                             by Cyril Hare





                                  _To_

                                R. de M.





CONTENTS

I. The Snail and his Trail
II. The Trail Ends
III. Family Post-mortem
IV. Uncle Arthur's Will
V. Two Ways of Looking at It
VI. A Visitor at Scotland Yard
VII. Council of War
VIII. Two Sorts of Private Inquiry
IX. Elderson Reports
X. Plan of Campaign
XI. First-Fruits
XII. Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop
XIII. Sunday at the Seaside
XIV. Monday at Midchester
XV. "Something Attempted, Something Done"
XVI. Parbury Gardens
XVII. Mr. Dedman Speaks His Mind
XVIII. An Inspector with Indigestion
XIX. Stephen Decides
XX. Return to Pendlebury
XXI. Mallett Sums Up





                              CHAPTER ONE


                        The Snail and His Trail

                          Sunday, August 13th

As you come over the brow of Pendlebury Hill, just beyond the milestone
that reads "London, 42 miles," you see Pendlebury Old Hall below you. It
lies a little way back from the road, a seemly brick-built Georgian
house, looking from above like a rose-pink pearl on the green velvet
cushion of the broad lawns surrounding it. You will probably think, if
you are the type who has any leisure to think at all at the wheel of a
car, that the owner of the Hall is a man to be greatly envied; and you
must be very much pressed for time indeed if you do not slow down as you
pass the wide entrance gates at the bottom of the hill to glance up the
broad beech avenue at the simple and dignified faade of the house. At
this point you will notice that over the entrance a board in lettering
of impeccable taste announces "=pendlebury old hall hotel=,"
and below, in smaller but still chaster type: "Fully Licensed, Open to
Non-Residents." Charmed by the sober beauty of the house, fascinated by
the seclusion of its setting, your refined taste tickled by the good
manners of the notice-board, you will decide that here at last is the
country hotel of your dreams, where good cheer and comfort await the
truly discriminating traveller. And that is where, English country
hotels being what they are, you will be wrong.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Inspector Mallett of the C.I.D., sitting in the lounge of the hotel,
wondered for the twentieth time, as he put down his coffee-cup with an
expression of disgust, why he had ever been fool enough to enter the
place. He was, he told himself, too old a hand to be caught in this way.
He might have known--he should have known--from the moment that he set
his foot inside the door, that it would be just like any other wayside
motoring hotel, only more so, where the soup came out of a tin, and the
fish had been too long on the ice, and far too long off it, where the
entre was yesterday's joint with something horrible added to it, and
the joint was just about fit to make tomorrow's entre, where tough
little cubes of pineapple and tasteless rounds of banana joined to
compose the fruit salad, where fresh dessert was non-existent--in the
heart of the country, in mid-August! but then it was forty-two miles
from Covent Garden--where bottles of sauce stood unashamed on every
table, and where the coffee--he looked down again at his half empty cup,
and felt for a cigarette to take away the taste.

"Did you enjoy your dinner?" said a voice at his elbow.

Mallett looked round. He saw a sallow, wrinkled face peering up into his
with rheumy grey eyes which seemed to hold in them an earnest, almost
desperate, expression of inquiry, quite out of keeping with the
triviality of the words. Mallett recognized the symptoms at a
glance--the craving for companionship of any kind, the determination to
talk to somebody, no matter who, provided he would but listen--and his
heart sank as he realized that to cap everything, he had fallen, bound
hand and foot, into the power of an hotel bore.

"No, I did not." The inspector answered the question shortly. He did not
really expect to choke the fellow off so easily, but one could but try.

"I thought not," said the other. He spoke in the muffled half-whisper
habitually employed by the English in the public rooms of hotels. "But
_they_ didn't seem to mind it, did they?" He nodded towards the other
guests in the room.

Mallett was roused in spite of himself to reply. The stranger had
touched upon one of his favourite subjects.

"That's the whole trouble," he said. "So long as the public eat this
kind of food without complaint, one can't expect to get anything
different. It's no good blaming the hotels. I suppose these people would
really feel cheated if they were given two good courses for dinner
instead of five nasty ones. As it is--"

"Ah, that's just it!" the stranger broke in. "_And_, of course, with the
best will in the world, you can't serve five good courses every day,
lunch and dinner, in this place. For the simple reason, my dear sir,
that the kitchen isn't large enough. If they had the capital to
modernize it, it might be a different story, but they haven't. And so
they have to resort to the wretched apologies for dishes which we've had
tonight. Every time I come here it gets worse and worse. It's sad."

And looking at him, the inspector saw to his astonishment that he
genuinely looked very sad indeed.

"You seem to know the place pretty well," he observed. "Have you been
here often before?"

"I was born here," he answered simply, and for a space was silent.

He was a man of sixty years of age or thereabouts, perhaps more, Mallett
decided. Very clean, with thin grey hair and a shapeless moustache
stained yellow with nicotine, he was an unattractive figure, but at the
same time queerly pathetic. Mallett was surprised to find himself
becoming interested in his acquaintance, and felt quite disappointed
that he seemed indisposed to say more. He did not, however, care to
break in upon thoughts that were evidently painful.

Presently the stranger roused himself from his reverie, and produced
from his pocket a much-worn Ordnance Survey map of the district. From
another pocket he took a mapping pen and a bottle of Indian ink. Then he
unfolded a square of the map and began to trace upon it with great care
a zigzag course.

"My day's journey," he explained. "I always keep a record."

Looking over his shoulder, the inspector noted that the line which he
had just completed was only one of many, several of them faded with age,
and that all of them appeared to centre upon, or radiate from,
Pendlebury Old Hall. For want of anything better to say, he remarked:

"You are on a walking tour, I take it?"

"Yes--or rather I was. This is my last port of call. It always is, you
see." He indicated the network of lines upon the map. "For many years
I've spent my holidays walking in this part of the world--it's wonderful
country, it really is, when you know it well." He seemed anxious to
forestall any possible criticism. "And since I--h'm--since I retired,
you know," he lowered his voice, as though the fact of his retirement
was in some way shameful, "I have more leisure, can start from farther
afield. Why, one year, sir, I walked here all the way from Shrewsbury!"

"Indeed!"

"Can't do so much now as I should like to, though. My doctor tells
me--but it doesn't do to pay too much attention to doctors, does it? But
wherever I go, I always end--_here_."

He contemplated the map with affection.

"Wonderful how the lines all centre on this place!" he murmured.

Mallett was tempted to comment that there was nothing really wonderful
in the fact, considering that he had made them all himself, but the
pathetic earnestness of the man kept him silent.

"I often think," he went on, putting the map away again, "that if we
left a trail behind us in all our wanderings like--like snails, if you
follow me, mine would be found to be concentrated on this place. It
begins here--for the first twenty years of my life it was here and
hereabouts more than anywhere else--and now I've reached a time of life
when I ask myself more and more often, where will it end?"

It was a thoroughly embarrassing moment for an undemonstrative man such
as the inspector was. He could think of no better comment than to clear
his throat loudly.

"Of course," the stranger pursued, still in the same hushed undertone,
"we have this advantage over the snail--we can make our trail end when
and where we wish."

"My dear sir!" said Mallett, thoroughly shocked, as he realized the full
implication of the words.

"But, after all, why not? Take my own case, for example. No, not for
example, I'm not interested in other cases--take my own case, for its
own sake. I'm an elderly man, I've lived my life, such as it is, and
believe me, I've had enough of it to know that the best of it is behind
me. When my trail ends, I shall leave my family well provided for--I've
seen to that, anyway. . . ."

"You have a family, then?" Mallett put in. "Then surely--"

"Oh, I know what you are going to say," he answered wearily. "But I
don't flatter myself that they will miss me. They may think now that
they will, but they won't. They have their own trails too, and theirs
and mine take different directions. My fault, I dare say. I'm not
complaining, I'm just facing the facts. I shouldn't have married a woman
fifteen years younger than myself. She--"

He broke off suddenly, as some one walked behind Mallet's chair and down
the room away from them.

"Hullo!" he said. "Why that's--no, I must have been mistaken. Thought it
was somebody I knew, but it couldn't have been. Those back views are
deceptive sometimes. As I was saying--my daughter is very fond of me, in
her way, and I'm very fond of her, in my way, but they're not the same
ways, so what's the good of pretending that we are necessary to each
other? I don't like her--her friends, for instance, and that means a lot
at her age."

Mallett had begun to lose interest again. The fellow seemed to be merely
rambling. The way in which after a casual interruption he had suddenly
introduced the subject of his daughter, who had not been previously
mentioned, when he had been in the full flood of discussing his wife,
indicated an ominous lack of grip on his train of thought. But suddenly
he jerked himself alive again, and said in a quite new, determined tone
of voice: "I'm going to have a liqueur brandy. My doctor doesn't allow
it, but damn the doctor! We can only die once. And you are going to have
one with me. Yes! I insist! There's still some of the old stuff in the
cellar that was here when my father was alive. You'll like it. It will
help to digest some of that horrible food you've just been eating."

The inspector allowed himself to be persuaded. He felt that he deserved
some recompense for having listened so patiently. When the drinks were
brought, the stranger said:

"I like to know who I'm drinking with, and I expect you do too."

He extended a card. Mallett read: "Mr. Leonard Dickinson," followed by
an address in Hampstead. He replied by giving his name, but concealed
his rank and profession, which experience told him was apt to produce
either an embarrassing constraint or a troublesome access of curiosity.

"Your very good health, Mr. Mallett!" said Dickinson.

The evening seemed likely to end on a mellower note than that on which
it had begun. But when the glasses were empty, Dickinson reverted to the
same subject.

"That was good!" he said. "It takes me back for a moment or two to the
old days. To my family, Mr. Mallett, this is merely a third-rate hotel.
To me, it is a place of memories--the only place where I have ever been
in any degree happy."

He paused, holding the empty glass between cupped hands, savouring the
bouquet that still rose from it.

"That is why," he added with quiet emphasis, "since my trail must end
somewhere, I should like--I feel sure that it will end--here."

He got up. "Good night, sir," he said. "You are staying the night here,
I suppose?"

"Yes," said Mallett. "My holiday ends tomorrow, and I am making the most
of it. I shall see you at breakfast?"

Dickinson allowed this innocent question to remain unanswered for quite
a considerable time. Then he said softly, "Perhaps!" and turned away.

Mallett watched him walk with the gait of a tired man down the length of
the lounge, saw him stop and say something to the girl at the reception
desk, and then make his way slowly upstairs. He shivered slightly. The
old man's conversation had been too depressing. He felt as though a
goose had walked over his grave. It was high time he too went to bed,
but before he did so, he consumed another liqueur brandy.




                              CHAPTER TWO


                             The Trail Ends

                          Monday, August 14th

Hotels in England, however bad, seldom go very far wrong with breakfast,
and Mallett, fortified by a good night's rest, for which, perhaps, he
owed more to the admirable brandy of the previous evening than to the
somewhat stony comfort of his bed, attacked his imported eggs and bacon
next morning with his usual appetite. As he did so, his mind reverted
more than once to his curious encounter with Mr. Dickinson. A garrulous,
peevish old man, he reflected, with a bee in his bonnet about the hotel,
and probably, if one could have got him to talk on any other subject,
about everything else as well. If his conversation ran on the same
gloomy lines at home, it was not very surprising that his family didn't
altogether love him. At the same time, Mallett could not but feel a
certain sympathy for him. He gave the impression of a man unjustly
treated by fate. It seemed wrong for any one to be so depressed as to
have to confide in a chance acquaintance in the way that he had done.
And when the confidence amounted almost to a threat of suicide . . . !
He shrugged his shoulders. People who contemplated such things didn't
confide their intentions, whether to chance acquaintances or to anybody
else, he told himself. But at the same time, he could not altogether rid
his mind of a persistent feeling of uneasiness with regard to Mr.
Dickinson. The man seemed in some way haunted. Mallett's whole training
rendered him averse from relying on, or even recognizing, any suspicion
that was not founded on tangible facts. Nevertheless, he had to admit to
himself that his companion of the night before had left him in a vaguely
disturbed frame of mind. He seemed to carry an aura of calamity about
him. And Mallett, who was hardened enough to calamities of all kinds,
did not like auras.

As he finished his meal, the inspector glanced round the room. The hotel
was evidently not very full, for only a bare half-dozen of the tables
were occupied. He looked round for Mr. Dickinson, and looked in vain.
For an instant the ominous "Perhaps!" on which they had parted flashed
into his mind. Then his common sense reasserted itself. The old
gentleman was having his breakfast in bed, most probably--at his age he
was quite entitled to it, particularly at the end of a strenuous walking
tour. In any case, it was none of his business. There would be plenty of
genuine problems awaiting his solution at New Scotland Yard that
afternoon.

Some five minutes later, he was walking across the lounge to the
reception desk with the intention of paying his bill, when he saw a
white-faced chambermaid hurry down the stairs and run to the desk in
front of him. There was a hasty colloquy between her and the girl clerk.
The latter spoke into the house telephone, and after a few moments,
during which the maid hung miserably about the lounge, looking sadly out
of place (which indeed she was, at that time of the morning), the
manager, swart, flabby, and irascible, came on the scene. He had a few
angry words with the girl, who seemed on the verge of tears, and the
pair of them disappeared up the stairs together. The clerk applied
herself to the telephone, and seemed to be speaking with some urgency.

When she had finished, Mallett asked for his bill. It was some time in
being prepared. The clerk seemed preoccupied and nervous. Obviously,
something was not as it should be in the hotel, and once again the
inspector felt an unreasoning qualm at the pit of his stomach. Once
again, he told himself that whatever it was it did not concern him.
Accordingly, without comment or inquiry, he settled his account, asked
the hall porter (whom he found, quite irregularly, gossiping with
someone from the kitchen regions) to fetch his bag down from his room,
and went out to the garage for his car.

When he drove round to the front door to pick up his bag, there were two
cars there that had not been there before. From the second of these, as
Mallett drew up, there alighted a man in uniform. He turned to say
something over his shoulder to another who was following him, looked up,
and his eyes met the inspector's. Recognition was mutual. The man in
uniform was the sergeant of police in charge at the local market town.
Mallett had met him a year or two before in connexion with some
inquiries which had resulted in the conviction of an important "fence,"
specializing in the produce of country-house burglaries. He had liked
the man at the time, but just now, as he smiled and nodded, he could
have wished him in Jericho.

"Mr. Mallett!" exclaimed the sergeant, coming across to him. "This is a
coincidence, and no mistake! Are you here on business, sir?"

"I am here on holiday," said the inspector, firmly. "That is, I was
here. Just now I'm on my way back to London."

The sergeant looked disappointed.

"Pity," he said. "It would have been a comfort to have you around, sir,
just in case there did turn out to be anything in this job. Not that
there ever is, in this part of the world."

"And even if there was, Sergeant," returned Mallett, "I am on holiday,
and so remain until I report at the Yard at three o'clock this
afternoon."

"Quite so, sir. Well, I'm very glad to have seen you again, sir, in any
case. I must go and attend to my business now. It'll be quite a
sensation in the neighbourhood, I expect, seeing that it's old Mr.
Dickinson."

"Oh, it _is_ Mr. Dickinson, is it?" exclaimed the inspector, taken off
his guard for once.

The sergeant paused, one foot on the doorstep of the hotel, and looked
at him with renewed interest.

"So you knew Mr. Dickinson, sir?" he said.

"I met him last night for the first time in my life. What has happened
to him?"

"Found dead in bed this morning. An overdose of something or other, so
far as I can understand. The doctor's up there now."

"Poor chap!" said Mallett. Then, conscious of the sergeant's curious
gaze upon him, he added: "Look here, Sergeant, I had rather a curious
talk with Mr. Dickinson last night. There's just a possibility I might
be a useful witness at the inquest. I'd better give you a statement
before I go, and meanwhile--do you mind very much if I come upstairs
with you, purely as a witness, mind?"

                 *        *        *        *        *

Leonard Dickinson's room was at the end of the long corridor which ran
the length of the hotel's first floor. Facing south and east, it was now
flooded with the mellow August sun. On the large, old-fashioned bed lay
the body, the angularities of the wizened features softened in death,
the lines of anxiety smoothed away. Mallett, looking down on the still
countenance, reflected that he looked happier now than he had in life.
The last line had been traced on the map, and the end was where he had
desired.

The map, appropriately enough, lay on the table beside the bed, open at
the section where the Hall marked the centre of the spider's web of
tracks. Also on the table, he observed, was a bottle of small white
tablets, and another, similar bottle, which was empty.

The doctor was just putting away his instruments when they entered. He
was young, brisk, and cocksure.

"Overdose of a sedative drug," he remarked. "I suppose you'll have to
have those things analysed." He nodded at the table. "But I can tell you
what's in them." He muttered some scientific polysyllables and added:
"Analyse him, too; you'll find he's full of it. It's apt to be a bit
dangerous, that kind of stuff. You take your dose--it doesn't work
properly--you wake up in the night, feeling a bit stupid--think, Good
Lord, I never took my dose--take another--wake up again perhaps, if
you've had a drink too much--take two or three more for luck, and you're
in a coma before you know anything about it. Easy as winking."

Something white protruding from beneath the map caught the sergeant's
eye. It was a small card, bearing on it some writing in a firm, clear
hand. Without speaking, he drew it out, read it, and held it up for
Mallett to see.

The words were: _We are in the power of no calamity, while Death is in
our own._

Mallett nodded silently. After the doctor had gone, he said, "_That's_
why I thought I might be wanted as a witness."

He glanced round the room, and then, reminding himself that this was not
his case, left the sergeant to carry on until he was free to take a
statement from him in due form.

When the time came for this, the sergeant, who could not bring himself
to forego the rare opportunity of cross examining so great a man, had a
few supplementary questions to ask. Mallett answered them
good-humouredly enough. Having seen the statement completed to the
other's satisfaction, he had a question of his own to ask.

"I don't want to waste your time, Sergeant," he said, "but I can't help
being a bit interested in old Mr. Dickinson. He seemed rather an odd
fish, to judge by the little I saw of him."

"He was, and all that," the other agreed heartily.

"I wish you could tell me a little about him. He said something to me
last night about having been born in this place."

"You didn't mention that in your statement," said the sergeant severely.

"I'm afraid not. I thought it was hardly relevant."

"Well, perhaps it wasn't. In any case, sir, we hardly needed your
evidence for that. It's what you might call common knowledge in these
parts."

"He was a well-known character, then?"

"Lord bless you, yes, sir! You see, the Dickinsons had this place ever
since it was built, and that was near on two hundred years ago, they
say."

"But they got rid of it some time ago, surely?"

"Thirty years ago come Michaelmas--when old Mr. Dickinson died, that
was."

Mallett laughed.

"I see that memories are long in the country," he said.

"'Tisn't that exactly, sir," the sergeant explained. "Mr. Leonard--the
deceased, I suppose I should call him--he couldn't bear to leave the
house. He's been here and hereabouts off and on ever since. Quite potty
about the place, he was."

"So I gathered from what he said to me."

"Funny, wasn't it, sir? None of the rest of the family felt that way
about it. Mr. Arthur--that was his brother--made a pile of money in
London and could have bought the old place back several times over, but
he never bothered to. But Mr. Leonard, for all he had a wife and family
of his own, couldn't keep away from it. Well," the sergeant concluded
pointedly, "I mustn't keep you any longer, sir."

It was not often that Inspector Mallett had to be reminded that he was
wasting his own time or anybody else's. He was quite ashamed to discover
how interested he had allowed himself to become in what was, on the face
of it, the commonplace suicide of a commonplace, if eccentric, elderly
gentleman. He pulled himself together, thanked the sergeant for his
kindness, and left the hotel. Then he turned his car in the direction of
London, and put the tragedy of poor Mr. Dickinson firmly out of his
mind.




                             CHAPTER THREE


                           Family Post-mortem

                          Friday, August 18th

"Typical of Leonard to want to be buried at Pendlebury! No consideration
for anybody's convenience. Typical!"

The speaker was George Dickinson, the eldest surviving brother of the
deceased; the occasion was, as will have been gathered, the funeral of
Leonard, and the remarks were uttered as George was climbing heavily
into his car after the ceremony. He had been a stout man when his
morning-coat had been made for him, ten years before. In the interval he
had added an inch and a quarter to his girth, and the resulting
discomfort, accentuated by the heat of the day, had put him into what
was for him an unusually bad temper. His temper, it may be added, was
normally a bad one. What was for him an unusually bad temper was
something quite beyond the range of the average adult. It belonged
rather to the type of the ungovernable rages of the three-year-old.
Unfortunately, it could not be dealt with in the same way.

"In August, too! It's really too much!" added George, sitting down
heavily in the back seat, and mopping his forehead where the top hat had
creased it.

"Yes, George," said a thin submissive voice at his side.

Lucy Dickinson had been saying, "Yes, George," for close on thirty
years. If she had got tired of saying it during that time, she kept her
own counsel on the subject. It was certainly the easiest thing to say,
and by confining her observations to those two monosyllables she did, as
she had found by experience, contrive to save a good deal of trouble. At
the present moment, for example, she would have been justified in
pointing out that George himself had stipulated in his will that he too
should be buried in the family vault, that at the present moment he was
badly crushing her new black silk dress, and that it would have been
more becoming, to say the least of it, to wait until they were out of
sight of the churchyard gates before lighting one of the cigars which he
was now, with immense efforts, fishing out of his tail-pocket. But to
have mentioned any of these things would quite certainly have meant
trouble. And trouble, after thirty years of marriage to such as George,
is a thing that one learns the value of avoiding.

"Well! What are you hanging about for? Drive on, man, can't you? We
don't want to be here all day!" was George's next observation, directed
to the chauffeur, who was still standing at the door of the car.

The car, unfortunately, was a hired one, and the driver was a young man
who showed no particular reverence for his temporary employer. Servants
who depended on George for their livelihood soon learned the necessity
of an eager obsequiousness which in George's language was called
"knowing their place." This one merely stared with interest at the
empurpled face confronting him, and remarked, "You haven't told me where
to go to yet."

"Hampstead," barked George. "Sixty-seven, Plane Street, Hampstead. Go
down the High Street till you get to--"

"O.K.," the chauffeur said. "I know it." And he cut off further
conversation by shutting the door rather louder than was necessary.

"Impertinent young swine," fumed George. "They're all like that
nowadays. And what on earth made you tell Eleanor that we would go back
there after the service?" he went on, rounding on Lucy. "Confound
nuisance! God knows when we shall get home." He lit his cigar as the car
moved forward.

Lucy's voice came faintly through the cloud of tobacco smoke. The smell
of a cigar in a confined space always made her feel faint, but that was
one of the things that dear George was apt to forget, and this was
emphatically not an occasion to remind him of it.

"She asked me if we wouldn't come, dear," she said. "It was really
rather difficult to say no. She wants all the help she can get just now,
you know. I thought it was the least we could do."

George grunted. The cigar was beginning to have its customary mollifying
effect on him, and his rage with the world at large was declining to a
merely average crossness.

"Well, I hope she gives us dinner, that's all," he said. "It's the least
_she_ could do."

Lucy said nothing. She had not the smallest expectation that Leonard's
widow would wish them to stay to dinner, but it would be wiser to let
George discover this for himself in due course.

"But why did she pick on us?" George grumbled on. "Couldn't she have
asked any of the others?"

If Lucy had been a woman of spirit she would have retorted that the
reason that Mrs. Dickinson had asked them was that she happened to be
extremely fond of her, Lucy, and that George was included merely as a
disagreeable but necessary appendage to her. But the wives of the
Georges of this world are not women of spirit, or if they are they do
not remain wives for long.

"She has asked some of the others, dear," she said mildly. "Edward is
going back with her--"

"That smarmy parson? Why on earth--"

"Well, after all, George, he is her brother. Then I think some of the
nephews wished to come, too, and of course, Martin."

"Martin?"

"Anne's fianc, dear. You remember, you met him at dinner when we--"

"Yes! Yes! Of course I remember perfectly well," said George testily.
"You needn't treat me as a complete child."

Lucy, who had done very little else for thirty years, was heroically
silent. The mention of Martin presently sent George off on another tack.

"Positively indecent, those children not being at the funeral," he said.

"Anne and Stephen, you mean?"

"Of course I mean Anne and Stephen. They're the only children Leonard
ever had, so far as I'm aware."

"But George, they couldn't be there. They are abroad. Eleanor wrote to
us and explained--"

"Then they ought to have been got back again. It's indecent, I tell you.
I can't see myself, if my father had died--"

But the words had suddenly jerked back to George's mind a recollection
of what had really happened when his father died, and of the nasty,
unforgivable scene that he had made with his mother on the very day of
the funeral. And with that memory embittering even the flavour of his
admirable cigar, he was silent.

"They are in Switzerland, climbing somewhere," Lucy went on, unaware of
the reason for her husband's abrupt silence. "Stephen only went out to
join Anne there just before Leonard died. Eleanor wired and wrote, of
course, but she hasn't had any answer. You know what Stephen is on his
holidays. He'll go off for days at a time, staying in huts and places.
They may not even have heard about it yet. I'm sure they would have come
back at once if they had."

"Silly young fools. I shouldn't wonder if they'd broken their necks."

After this charitable observation, no more was said upon the subject,
and for the rest of the way to London George contented himself with
explaining at great length the measures he had taken, in his own words,
"to squash the newspaper snoopers" who had approached him for
information about his brother's life and sudden death, and with reviling
the Press with the paucity and inadequacy of the obituary notices. That
there could be any connexion between the two facts naturally did not
occur to him.

Just as they were approaching Hampstead, a thought struck him.

"By the way," he said, "d'you think Leonard left Eleanor very badly
off?"

"I don't know, George, I'm sure."

"I was thinking, that will of Arthur's you know. She may be a bit hard
hit. You're sure she didn't say anything to you about it?"

"No, I'm quite certain she did not."

"Um!" said George, turning over in his mind the disagreeable possibility
that he was going to be asked for help. He decided that it would
probably be best not to stay for dinner, after all.

                 *        *        *        *        *

It was certainly a full-blown family assembly. George, with his new-born
fear strong within him, took as little part in it as possible, leaving
it to Lucy to say the proper things to the various people who seemed to
crowd the little room. These included a number of dim cousins, who had
not been able to get to the funeral. Exactly what they were doing there
it was difficult to say. They seemed a little uncertain on the point
themselves. Martin Johnson, Anne's fianc, hung rather miserably about
the outskirts of the family group. In the absence of Anne, his position
was an awkward one. The engagement had never been made public, and
officially even the dimmest of the cousins had a better right to be
there than he. Mrs. Dickinson's parson brother, Edward, on the other
hand, seemed to be quite in his element. His guiding principle in life
was one which he himself had happily described as "Looking on the Right
Side of Things," and his round red face shone with unction--if that is
the proper word for clerical perspiration--as he exploited the situation
to the full. His one regret appeared to be the unavoidable absence of
his wife, laid low by a recurrence of her chronic asthma. It was a
regret shared by none who knew her. Aunt Elizabeth, to her numerous
nephews and nieces, was The Holy Terror--a title which was on the whole
well deserved.

Mrs. Dickinson, meanwhile, sat, the melancholy queen bee in the centre
of the family hive, looking at least every inch a widow. George eyed her
with interest. Lucy, he supposed, would look like that some day. After
all, she was younger than he was, and a better life. What would she feel
like? He averted him mind from the thought and concentrated upon
Eleanor. What, in her heart of hearts, did she really think of it all?
It could have been no joke being married to Leonard. He felt pretty sure
that Lucy would--no, damn it! we are thinking about Eleanor!--he felt
morally certain that Eleanor's widowhood was a relief to her, even if
she didn't know it yet. At the moment, she was everything that one could
expect--calm, subdued, and appealingly helpless.

Presently sherry began lugubriously to circulate, accompanied by small,
dusty-tasting sandwiches. Little by little conversation began to be more
animated. There were even faint approximations to laughter in one corner
of the room, where some of the less responsible of the cousins had
forgathered. But, on the whole, the decencies were preserved, and talk
remained at a low pitch, so that the sound of a taxi being driven up to
the door was distinctly heard by every one in the room.

"Now, I wonder who--" said Edward, who happened to be nearest the
window, peering out anxiously. "I only hope it's not--Bless my soul, but
it's the children!"

A moment later Stephen and Anne Dickinson came into the room. They
looked very much out of place in that funeral company. Except for the
ice-axes and rucksacks which they had presumably just deposited in the
hall, they were equipped as though Plane Street, Hampstead, were a
glacier and No. 67 an Alpine refuge. Their huge iron-shot boots grated
uneasily on the parquet floor, and when Anne bent to kiss her mother it
became only too apparent that her breeches had been lavishly patched in
the seat with some rock-resisting but alien material. From the cousins'
corner came something very like a titter.

"The children," as Edward to their extreme annoyance persisted in
calling them, were respectively twenty-six and twenty-four, Stephen
being the elder. They were both tall, slim, and loose-limbed, but in
other respects there was not much likeness between them. Stephen had
light brown hair and a skin that was ordinarily pale. At the present
moment his whole face was a fiery red, and his rather prominent nose was
beginning to peel in a markedly unbecoming fashion. Anne had been more
fortunate, or more circumspect, in her encounter with the sun of high
altitudes and rarified atmosphere. Her face and throat were burned a
deep mahogany which blended pleasingly with her dark hair and brown
eyes. It was a striking face, handsome rather than pretty, with a firm,
rather too square chin that was at variance with her _retrouss_,
essentially feminine nose. The chin, one felt, would have been better
suited to her brother, whose intelligent brow and eyes were betrayed by
a jaw that lacked character. Stephen had the carriage and expression of
the fluent talker, easily making himself at home in any society in which
he might find himself. In comparison, Anne's quiet and reserved manner
seemed almost gauche. At the moment, it was certainly fortunate that he
was present to carry off a situation that was sufficiently awkward.

"I must apologize for our clothes," he said. "We simply came straight
away in what we stood up in. I hope they're sending on our luggage from
Klosters." He looked round at the black-clad group. "I suppose the
funeral was today?"

"You should have let us know you were coming," said his mother gently.
"Of course, we should have put it off for you, if we had known where you
were."

"Didn't you get my telegram? I gave a couple of francs to a porter at
Davos to send one for me, but the fellow must have pocketed it and the
cash for the wire as well. Too bad! You see, we knew nothing about this
till the day before yesterday, and then it was only a pure fluke that I
happened to see _The Times_."

"It may not be any affair of mine," put in George, in a tone that made
it quite clear that he was satisfied that it was very much his affair,
"but do you think it is quite decent to come home in this way, in those
clothes, on an occasion like this?"

Stephen very ostentatiously did not answer him.

"You see, Mother," he explained, "I actually got to Klosters the
afternoon of the very day it must all have happened. There were the
guides and Anne and everyone waiting, and I made them start out that
very night. I suppose if we'd waited we'd have heard next morning. It
was all my fault, really, but I couldn't have told, could I? We were
absolutely out of touch with everything for three days until we came
down into Guarda, where I picked up an old paper someone had left and
saw the announcement. There was just time to get down to the station to
catch the train. Stopping at Klosters for clothes and things would have
simply wasted a day."

"Of course dear, I understand. Give yourself some sherry. You must be
tired. It is good to have you back again."

Anne meanwhile had quickly gravitated towards Martin, who from the
moment of her arrival had ceased to feel or to appear like an ownerless
dog in the family pack. Stephen, watching them together, wondered not
for the first time what his sister could see in the squat, sandy,
short-sighted young man.

"I have asked Martin to stay to dinner," said Mrs. Dickinson, thereby
tactfully indicating to the company in general that Martin was now to be
regarded as one of the family, and to Anne that she would have plenty of
opportunity of monopolizing him later.

"This business has been a step-up for Martin, at any rate," said Stephen
to himself. "Mother always had a soft place for that little squirt. I
wonder why."

He was wondering how he could contrive to say a few words to Aunt Lucy
without involving himself with Uncle George when he was accosted by the
least dim of the cousins, one Robert, who explained that he had been
managing what he described as "the solicitor's end of the affair,"
pending his, Stephen's, arrival. Pinning him firmly in a corner, he
produced sheafs of documents and began pouring out a flood of detail
concerning matters that would require attention. Stephen was somewhat
overcome by the mass of work which had to be done. He had entirely
forgotten what a complex legal and financial operation dying is apt to
be, particularly when it is carried out at short notice.

He tore himself away from Cousin Robert at last, and began to do his
duty as host with the sherry and sandwiches.

"A pity you weren't back for the funeral," said his spinster cousin
Mabel acidly, as he handed her a glass. Her tone seemed to imply that he
had kept away deliberately.

He felt inclined to point out that he could hardly be blamed for it, but
contented himself with saying mildly:

"Yes, Cousin Mabel, it was unfortunate."

"I was in favour of holding it up, but your mother wouldn't listen to
reason. You'll go and see the grave as soon as you can, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes, Cousin Mabel."

"You mustn't let the inquest verdict distress you, my dear boy," said
Uncle Edward, squeezing his arm affectionately as he pushed past him to
get at the decanter.

"The verdict? I haven't heard anything about it. There was nothing in
the only paper I saw."

"Suicide," said Uncle George with all the relish of the bearer of evil
tidings. "While of unsound mind. 'Pon my soul, if I'd ever imagined that
poor old Leonard would--"

"No, no!" Uncle Edward corrected him. "While the Balance of his Mind was
Disturbed. Not at all the same thing, I assure you, George."

"Same thing absolutely. Difference in wording, that's all. Why on earth
the silly asses--"

"No," persisted Uncle Edward. "You must pardon me, George, but it is
_not_ the same thing. No Stigma, you follow me, no Stigma for the
family. That makes all the difference in the world."

The argument, once under way, showed no signs of ever coming to an end,
but an interjection from Anne stopped it abruptly.

"Suicide!" she exclaimed. "Do you mean to say that they actually think
Father killed himself?"

"While the Balance of his Mind--" Uncle Edward began again, in his
suavest tones.

"I don't believe it! Mother, Stephen, you don't any of you really think
that? Why, it's--it's too horrible for words!"

"But I assure you there's no Stigma--"

"You were not at the inquest, Anne," said her mother quietly.

"No, of course I wasn't. All I've seen was the little obituary in _The
Times_, the one that had the notice on the front page. It said something
about an overdose of medicine. We took it for granted there had been
some horrible accident, didn't we, Stephen? Why shouldn't it have been
an accident? Nobody's going to persuade me that Father--"

She seemed on the brink of tears. Everybody began to talk at once.

"But Anne, dear, your father was always a little--"

"The detective fellow made it perfectly clear--"

"When a man leaves a message behind like that--"

"He couldn't have opened two bottles by accident--"

"I've got a complete record of all the evidence--"

Anne, her eyes swimming, her ears deafened with the sudden babel of
noise, turned to her brother for support.

"Stephen," she said, "you don't believe this, do you? There's been a
horrible mistake somewhere. You've got to put it right."

For the first time Stephen saw himself as the head of the family, the
ultimate Court of Appeal in what concerned himself, his mother and
sister, with whose decisions the uncles and cousins might disagree if
they pleased, but dared not interfere. He squared his shoulders
involuntarily beneath the weight of authority which had descended upon
them.

"Obviously it was an accident," he said. "That is, I don't actually know
anything more about the affair than you do. But I'll make it my business
to find out." He turned to the dimmest of all the cousins, who had
spoken last. "Did you say that you had a record of all the evidence at
the inquest?"

"Yes. In the local paper. It's practically verbatim. They've spelled
some of the names wrong, but you can check that from the other papers.
I've got them all. I keep a press-cutting book, you know."

"All right. Will you let me have all you've got? As soon as you can?"

"Oh, rather. I'll send it round tonight."

"Thanks."

"You'll let me have it back again, won't you?"

"Certainly, if it's any use to you."

"Oh, rather. I mean, there's not much in my book yet, and--"

"I quite understand."

"I don't want to butt in, my boy," said Uncle George, who spent most of
his life butting in, with frequently disastrous results, "but is it
going to make a ha'porth of difference to anyone whether it was suicide
or accident?"

"Not the smallest, _I_ should say," remarked Cousin Mabel.

Uncle Edward's lips were to be seen silently forming the word "stigma."

"Probably not, I dare say," said Stephen wearily. "It isn't a bit what I
expected, that's all." What did it matter what he said to these people?
It was no concern of theirs.

"It makes a lot of difference to _us_," said Anne. Her glance included
her mother, who sat, her hands in her lap, listening and saying nothing.

As if recalled to her surroundings by the words and the look that
accompanied it, Mrs. Dickinson rose from her chair.

"If you will excuse me, I shall go and lie down for a little before
dinner," she said. "Anne, I think you had better do the same. You have
had a long journey. Stephen, will you show Martin where to wash his
hands?"

The rest of the party took the hint and left the house in a noisy,
chattering body, each with a private disappointment that he or she had
not also been invited to stay for dinner. Only George, as he climbed
once more into the hired car, with the cheerful prospect of soon getting
into comfortable clothes again, was relieved that at all events the
dreaded question of financial support for his sister-in-law was
postponed for that evening.




                              CHAPTER FOUR


                          Uncle Arthur's Will

                          Friday, August 18th

Dinner proved to be a good deal more enjoyable than might have been
expected, if only for the absence of the relations. Mrs. Dickinson
strove with a surprising degree of success to make the occasion as much
like a normal family party as possible. Now that she was no longer
coping with the irritability of George, or being exhorted to be cheerful
by Edward, her naturally sunny, equable temperament reasserted itself,
and she contrived to keep the conversation going throughout the meal
without once touching on the subject that hung like a black curtain in
the background of the minds of each of them. Stephen and Anne felt that
they were seeing a new side to their mother's character, and to each the
same thought came, unbidden: that dinner at home was, regrettably but
unmistakably, pleasanter for the absence of the querulous, contradictory
figure who, as far back as they could remember anything, had sat at the
head of the table.

But in the drawing-room, after dinner, Mrs. Dickinson's manner changed.
Her face from being serious became solemn, and she appeared to be
nervously awaiting the moment when the door closed behind the maid who
brought in the coffee. Then she drew a deep breath, patted her hair into
place--a sure sign, in the family, that she was worried--and said:

"Stephen, I have something important to discuss with you. No, don't go,
Martin. It concerns us all, and I count you as one of the family now. I
have had a letter from Jelks, your father's solicitor, which I don't at
all understand, and which rather disturbs me. I haven't shown it to
Robert, as I didn't think it concerned him. You must deal with it,
Stephen."

She fetched a letter from her desk, but did not immediately hand it over
to Stephen. Instead, she continued to talk, holding it in her hand.

"I must explain, first of all," she said. "You all know, of course,
about the very odd and improper will that your Uncle Arthur made?"

"Yes, of course," said Stephen and Anne together.

"Do you know what I am talking about, Martin?"

Martin looked at Anne.

"Do I?" he said. To Stephen, he appeared more oafish at that moment than
he had ever done before, which was saying a good deal.

"Perhaps you don't," said Anne patiently. "I meant to tell you, but I
don't think I did. Uncle Arthur--"

"Perhaps I had better explain," said her mother. "Arthur Dickinson, who
was my husband's eldest brother, and the only wealthy member of the
family, died last year. He was a bachelor, and he left a considerable
amount of money, which he divided equally between his brothers, Leonard
and George, and the children of Tom and of his sister Mary. Those are
the cousins who were here this evening, some of them. We are rather a
large family, I'm afraid, but I expect Anne has told you all about us."

"Oh, yes," said Martin, squinting rather doubtfully through his thick
glasses at Anne once more.

"Very well. As I have said, he left his money equally divided, as to the
amount, that is. But in the way in which he left it, he did not deal
fairly so far as we were concerned. Although he was always on perfectly
friendly terms with my husband, he had or pretended to have some
grievance against _us_, I mean against myself and Anne and Stephen. I
need not go into how it all originated--it's an old story, and rather a
painful one, I am afraid--but it seems to have worked upon his mind to
such an extent . . ." She began to be a little flustered, and lost the
thread of the story. "Of course, he was an old man, and not perhaps
altogether--at all events, I have never felt it right to blame him,
because he cannot really have been himself at the time--"

"The long and the short of it is, he cut us all out of his will," said
Stephen impatiently.

Martin absorbed the information slowly.

"Cut you out? I see," he said. Then turning to Anne he said
reproachfully: "I'm quite sure you didn't tell me anything about that.
That was rather a rotten thing to do," he added solemnly. "What made him
do a thing like that?"

There was a pause, long enough to make even as thick-skinned a man as
Martin aware that he had said the wrong thing. Mrs. Dickinson pursed her
lips, Anne flushed, and Stephen looked savagely angry.

"That's neither here nor there," he said. "The point is what he did, and
that's what I'm trying to tell you. He left Father the interest on fifty
thousand pounds--that was his share--for life only. Everybody else had
their bit absolutely, to do what they liked with. But on Father's death
the capital of his little lot was to go to some beastly charity or
another, I forget what. Do you remember, Mother?"

"No. It doesn't matter what charity it was, does it? But as a matter of
fact, only half of it was for the charity. The rest goes to somebody
else--a woman," Mrs. Dickinson explained, lowering her voice. "I'm
afraid rather a disreputable person, altogether."

Martin, to Stephen's disgust, showed a tendency to snigger at this
point. That is to say, while keeping a perfectly straight face, he gave
the impression that he was only doing so with difficulty.

"My husband was of course very much upset at the injustice of the will,"
Mrs. Dickinson went on, "and he decided to do what he could to provide
for his family."

"He insured his life, I suppose," said Martin at once.

Stephen looked up in some surprise. The man was not altogether such a
fool as he had thought. It was difficult to tell what went on behind
those thick glasses. Had he been underrating him?

"Exactly. For twenty-five thousand pounds. The premium was very high, I
understand, in view of his age. In fact, I do not think it left very
much out of the income Arthur had left him. But as most of his other
means consisted of his pension from the Civil Service, which would of
course die with him, he thought it well worth while."

"I see."

"And now that we've had all this ancient history over again for Martin's
benefit," said Stephen, "can we get to the point?"

His voice was impatient, and more than impatient. It seemed to contain a
hint of anxiety, almost of nervousness.

Martin took off his glasses, polished them and blinked upwards at the
light.

"I think that what Mrs. Dickinson is going to tell us is this," he said.
"Since your Uncle Arthur died only a year ago, I presume that the
insurance policy is less than a year old. Most insurance companies have
a thing they call a suicide clause in their policies. What company is
this one, Mrs. Dickinson?"

"The British Imperial."

"H'm, yes, just so," said Martin, replacing his spectacles. "They would
be quite certain to have a suicide clause, and a very strictly drawn one
too. It's a most unfortunate position altogether."

Looking extremely pleased with himself, he pulled from his pocket a
foul-looking pipe, blew through it, and began to fill it. Stephen looked
at him with feelings of disgust. He was disgusted with Martin for
presuming to smoke a pipe in the drawing-room without asking permission,
and still more disgusted with himself for having allowed this interloper
to take possession of the discussion. Before he could say anything,
however, Anne intervened.

"Martin!" she said sharply. "Put that beastly pipe of yours away, and
explain things properly. What is a suicide clause, and how does it
work?"

Martin blushed and put his pipe in his pocket with a mumbled "Sorry!"
Then he said: "It simply means that if you insure your life and commit
suicide within a certain time--usually a year--you don't recover
anything on the policy. That's all."

"You mean," cried Anne, "that there won't be any money for us? Although
Father insured himself?"

Martin nodded, took out his pipe again with an automatic gesture, looked
at it, and put it back.

There was a shocked silence in the room for a moment or two. Then
Stephen, trying to keep his voice steady, said:

"And now, Mother, may I see Jelks's letter?"

The letter was quite short, and only too explicit.

It ran:

    DEAR MRS. DICKINSON,

    I have been in communication with the Claims Manager of the
    British Imperial Insurance Company in connexion with your late
    husband's policy. He writes to me as follows:

    "In reply to your letter of yesterday's date with regard to Life
    Policy No. 582/31647. In view of the finding of the coroner's
    jury, and of the fact that this policy has only been in force
    for eight months, it seems clear that Clause 4 (i) (_a_) of the
    policy applies. I am therefore instructed formally to repudiate
    liability on behalf of the Company. At the same time, I am to
    inform you that the Company would be prepared to consider the
    possibility of making some ex gratia payment to the widow and
    dependents of the assured, provided, of course, that all claims
    under the policy were explicitly withdrawn. Perhaps you will let
    me know when it would be convenient for a representative of the
    Company to call on Mrs. Dickinson in order to discuss this
    matter."

    I should be glad of your instructions as to what attitude I
    should take in the matter. It would be advisable, in my opinion,
    for you to agree to see the Company's representative, without,
    of course committing yourself in any way. But bearing in mind
    that your husband by his will left half his estate between your
    son and daughter and the other half to you during widowhood with
    remainder to them, it would, I think, be only proper for you to
    discuss the position with them before coming to a decision. I
    should, of course, myself desire to be present at the interview,
    to safeguard the interests of the estate.

                                                Yours faithfully,
                                                        H. H. JELKS

Stephen read the letter through twice, once to himself and then aloud.

"Well!" said Martin, when he had finished. "That sounds pretty
definite."

"How many halfpennies are there in twenty-five thousand pounds?" asked
Anne.

"I don't altogether follow you," said her fianc stiffly.

"I do," said Stephen. "Uncle George said: 'Is it going to make a
ha'porth of difference to anyone, whether it's suicide or not?' Well, we
can tell him now."

"Father didn't kill himself," said Anne obstinately.

"How do you know?" said Stephen in a tone of despair. "How does anybody
know?"

"I know _because_ I know," Anne persisted. "He just wasn't that sort of
person. Nobody's going to persuade me that Father did a thing like that,
not if he came and told me that he saw him do it. _Nobody_," she
repeated. "Mother, you feel like that, don't you?"

Mrs. Dickinson shook her head slowly.

"I never understood your father," she said simply. "So far as I'm
concerned, I'm afraid I feel like George about it. I have lost him, and
it doesn't seem to matter very much to me how people say it happened. To
you children, obviously, it makes a great deal of difference. That's why
I asked your advice."

"But Mother, it makes just as much difference to you as to any of us!"
Anne protested.

"My dear, I was badly off before I married your father, and I suppose I
can bear to be badly off again afterwards. Don't let's say any more
about that. But tell me, please, Stephen, what are we going to do? How
am I going to reply to Mr. Jelks?"

"I'll deal with that," said Stephen, rousing himself abruptly from the
stupor into which he had fallen since reading the letter. "You needn't
bother your head about it any more, Mother. We'll see this insurance
animal and tell him just where he gets off. As for abandoning the claim
to the money, of course that's all nonsense."

"Then you do agree with me?" said Anne eagerly. "You think I'm right,
that Father wouldn't have killed himself?"

"Obviously you've got to be right, if we don't all mean to be paupers."

"But that's not the same thing at all!" she protested.

Stephen assumed his most superior and infuriating attitude.

"My dear Anne," he said, "your sentiments do you credit, but they are
not going to cut much ice with an insurance company. Our job--my job,
perhaps I should say--is to prove to their satisfaction that they are
legally bound to pay up. When we've done that we can afford to be
highfalutin about it."

"That's absolutely the wrong way to look at it. It makes the whole
business so sordid, so money-grubbing--"

"Money," Martin intervened in his flat, platitudinous voice, "can come
in very handy sometimes. You shouldn't turn your nose up at it, Annie."

"Annie!" Stephen shuddered. This codfish called his sister "Annie," and
she liked it!

"But what I don't quite see at present," Martin droned on, "is how you
are going to set about proving all this. Insurance companies," he wagged
his head sagely, "take a bit of satisfying, y'know."

Stephen was ready with his answer.

"All that the company has done is to take what the coroner's jury said
as gospel," he said. "Well, we don't. We start from scratch. And to
begin with, we can go over the same ground that they did, only a good
deal more carefully."

"D'you mean, interview all the witnesses all over again, and get 'em to
say something different?"

"We may have to do something like that before we're through. But to
start with, there's the evidence that was actually given at the inquest.
I don't know the first thing about that yet. My little cousin is lending
me the reports of everything that was said. I mean to go through that
with--with--"

"With a small-tooth comb," Martin prompted.

"With the greatest care," said Stephen, glaring at him. "Then I shall
see what we're up against, at any rate. After that, we can set to work
to build up our own case."

"Well," said Martin, "I wish you luck, I'm sure."

"You're in with us on this, Martin," said Anne. "It makes a bit of
difference to us, you know."

Martin turned on Anne a look that might have been a tender one, if his
spectacles had not deprived it of all expression.

"All right, Annie," he said rather thickly, "I'm with you."

And as if ashamed at this display of emotion, he shortly afterwards took
his departure, lingering in the hall only long enough to kiss her
perfunctorily and light his pipe.




                              CHAPTER FIVE


                       Two Ways of Looking at It

                          Friday, August 18th

The cousin with the taste for Press cuttings was as good as his word.
Before he went to bed that night, Stephen was in possession of a thick,
untidy volume, full of irregularly pasted extracts from publications of
every kind. They began with snippets from school magazines,
commemorating such earth-shaking events as that "Dickinson, mi., was a
bad third" in the Junior Hundred Yards, and continued for a few pages to
record the rare occasions when the doings of the owner or his family had
escaped into print. "The short and simple annals of the obscure," was
Stephen's comment as he fluttered the pages. It was not long before he
came to the account of the tragedy at Pendlebury Old Hall, which
absorbed more than twice as much space as the rest of the contents put
together. With ghoulish assiduity the compiler had preserved every scrap
of newsprint that contained any reference to the matter. Headlines and
photographs, paragraphs short and long, all were fish for his net. The
death of Mr. Dickinson, a respectable but not particularly noteworthy
figure, had not, in fact, created much stir in the world, or occupied
much room in the newspapers of the country, and most of the references
were brief, although, when collected, they looked impressive enough. But
it had evidently been an event of the first magnitude in the immediate
neighbourhood of Pendlebury, and, as the owner of the book had said, the
local Press had dealt with it thoroughly. By the time that he had
finished reading its report of the proceedings, Stephen was confident
that he knew as much about the affair as if he had been present at the
inquest.

Stephen went up to his room very late that night. He had had a tiring
day, and his researches had taken him a considerable time. None the
less, he seemed even now strangely disinclined to go to bed. After
wandering up and down the room for a short time, he sat down on a chair
and lit a cigarette, frowning in an attempt at concentration. Had any
observer been present, he would have seen a very different Stephen from
the cocksure young man who over the coffee-cups had so blithely
announced his intention of putting the insurance company in its place.
This Stephen was anything but cocksure. On the contrary he was obviously
acutely anxious, the observer might have even added nervous, at the
prospect of the task which he now saw before him. At the same time, here
was evidently a young man firmly determined in his mind on what he had
to do. If he was different, he was certainly a more formidable person
altogether.

The cigarette finished, he at last began to undress. He had propped the
book of Press cuttings upon the chest of drawers, open at the report,
and from time to time broke off his undressing to consult it again, as a
fresh thought struck him. He was still half clad, poring over the book,
when the door opened quietly. He looked up.

"Anne!" he exclaimed. "Why aren't you in bed? Do you know what time it
is?"

"I couldn't sleep," she said. "I heard you moving about, so I knew you
were still up."

She came in and sat on his bed, swinging her pyjamaed legs meditatively
backwards and forwards. Looking at her, Stephen wondered, not for the
first time, whether Martin really knew just how lucky he was.

"Give me a cigarette," she said.

He did so, and lit it for her in silence. The cigarette was half
finished before she spoke again.

"Stephen."

"Yes?"

"Look here, you meant what you said in the drawing-room after dinner,
didn't you?"

"Yes, of course."

"You still mean it?"

"Of course I do. Why shouldn't I?"

"I dunno. You look so worried, that's all."

"Not surprising. I am worried. Hellishly."

"Because of that?" She pointed to the open book upon the chest of
drawers.

He nodded.

"But the verdict was wrong, wasn't it?" she persisted.

"Yes. As wrong as wrong. We start from that, don't we? But all the same,
I'm damned if I can see what else they could have done on the evidence.
Look here, for instance--"

"No, I don't want to hear about it, not now. I shall have to some time,
I suppose, if I'm to be any use to you. Only, Stephen, I wanted to be
sure that you weren't--weren't weakening about it, that's all."

"Weakening? I like that! Not on your life!"

"That's all right then." She grinned suddenly. "You look quite the
strong man, even in those awful pink underclothes of yours. So long as
you've made up your mind that it's worth going through with it--"

"I should damn' well think it was! Do you realize just how badly off we
are going to be if we don't?"

"Oh, the money, yes! I wasn't thinking about that."

"Well, you can be pretty sure I was."

"You always were keen on money, weren't you, Stephen? Ever since we were
tiny. That's not what's worrying me. It's simply that I can't stand the
idea of people saying about Father--"

"What Uncle Edward calls the Stigma?"

"If you like--but it's more than that, really. Oh, I can't put it into
words, but what I feel is that the poor old parent had a pretty rotten
deal while he was alive, and it would help to make up a bit if we can
stop people telling a lot of nasty lies about him now he's dead. Make up
to him, I mean. Does that sound awful rot to you?"

"Yes."

"Well, I can't help it if it does. I never thought you would understand.
You see, I was really fond of Father, only he never gave me the chance
of showing it, and you really hated him, and never had the smallest
difficulty in showing it. That's just the difference between us."

"I don't agree with you," said Stephen. "So far as my hating the old man
is concerned, I mean. You've no right to say that."

"I'm sorry, Stephen. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings."

"I've got no feelings in the matter, one way or the other. I didn't get
on with Father, I agree, but no more did you. We don't exactly seem to
have a knack of getting on with our seniors. Look at Uncle Arthur, for
example."

"Uncle Arthur doesn't count. He was a maniac. His will proves that. But
Father was different. He did try to do his best for us, but always as if
it went against the grain, somehow. And it wasn't just us, either. He
seemed to have a sort of grievance against life."

"Exactly. That's what the jury found, wasn't it?"

"But he never ran away from life--that's the point. And the less we
succeeded in making him happy while he was alive, the greater our duty
to--to--"

"To make him happy now he's dead?" suggested Stephen with a yawn. "I'm
sorry, Anne, but your doctrine of posthumous reparation does not appeal
to me. Personally, I think that if he is conscious of anything at all,
Father is probably rather glad to be dead, however in fact he came to
die. Luckily, it doesn't matter very much which of us is right."

"No. I suppose it doesn't. I wish we looked at things in the same way,
though. It might make things easier."

"My good girl, do be practical for once. We want the same thing, don't
we?"

"Yes. With me bent on clearing Father's memory, and you with both eyes
firmly fixed on the main chance, we ought to make a pretty strong team.
Not to mention Martin."

"Yes, of course," said Stephen carelessly. "I was forgetting him."

"Well, please don't forget him in future, that's all." Anne's voice had
suddenly taken on a dangerously hard quality. "I've no doubt you'd like
to if you could."

Stephen knew perfectly well that the one way to precipitate a quarrel
with his sister was to cast any aspersions on the man upon whom she had
chosen, for reasons which he could not understand, to fix her
affections. He was, moreover, desperately sleepy and longing for bed. He
had, therefore, every reason to make some soothing reply and get Anne
out of the room as quickly as possible. But some imp of perversity made
him reply, instead:

"I'm not likely to have much chance with you about, am I?"

The mischief was done. Anne's slumberous brown eyes lit up for battle,
her cheeks glowed, her chin was thrust forward.

"Why," she began, "why are you always so perfectly beastly about
Martin?"

Too late, Stephen saw his danger.

"I'm not, really I'm not," he protested feebly.

"Yes, you are, always. If you're not, why don't you sometimes tell me
you like him?"

"But I do like him. I can't always keep saying it can I? I--I admire him
in lots of ways. Only . . ."

Fatal word.

" 'Only!' That's just it. That's always it where Martin's concerned.
'Only' what, may I ask?"

Stephen's temper took command.

"Only that I don't happen to think he's the right sort of man to make
you happy, that's all."

"For God's sake don't talk like a good brother in a Victorian novel! It
doesn't suit you in the least. Why can't you say what you mean?"

"I've said exactly what I mean, so far as I am aware."

"No, you haven't. You've simply hinted at it. What you mean is that you
think Martin is a--what's your choice word for it?--a womanizer."

"Since you insist on introducing the subject, I do."

"Well, please understand once for all that Martin and I have absolutely
no secrets from each other on that subject or any others. I don't care
what his murky past may have been. If you're such a beastly little
puritan as to object to someone for having sown a few wild oats, I'm
not."

Stephen's fatal weakness for scoring a verbal point betrayed him once
more.

"The trouble with these people who sow their wild oats," he said in his
most aggravating manner, "is that they're apt to have a grain or two
left in odd corners of the sack when you think it's empty. As you may
discover in due time."

"I suppose I'm to consider that witty," retorted Anne. "But if you
imagine . . ."

From this point the quarrel degenerated into a mere schoolroom brawl, in
which nothing was too sacred, nothing too trivial, to be snatched up as
a weapon in the fight. The armoury of old grudges and grievances that
every family keeps stored away somewhere was ruthlessly exploited by
both sides. At one point Stephen was pointing out to Anne that she had
hopelessly lost her nerve the year before during the descent of the
Rimpfischorn, and was being reminded in turn how he had been caught
cheating at cards at a children's party twelve years ago. At another,
Anne got in a vicious blow by recalling the fatal misconduct by which
her brother had finally alienated the affections of Uncle Arthur, and
Stephen, white with rage at the mention of the unmentionable, retorted
by disinterring her appalling _faux pas_ at her coming out party. And on
and on the battle raged, with the name of Martin recurring again and
again to provide fresh fuel for fury when the flames showed signs of
being exhausted.

"As I happen to be in love with Martin, and he with me--"

"How do you know he is in love with you, and not simply the money he
thought you'd get?"

"Simply because you're incapable of loving anything except money, you
imagine that everybody's like you!"

"Well, if he's as fond of you as all that, why did he shirk coming out
to Switzerland with us? Or was he afraid of climbing?"

"You know as well as I do that he'd have come if he could. It was simply
that he couldn't get away."

"Very likely! I wonder how he was amusing himself--and who with?"

"I'm not going to answer your beastly insinuations. For that matter, why
did you come out three days later than you said you would, and leave me
hanging about at the hotel by myself after Joyce had had to go home? A
lot you cared!"

"I've explained to you already that I couldn't help it. My firm asked me
to go specially to Birmingham because their accountant was ill and--"

"Yes, you've explained it already. I'm sick of your filthy accountant at
Birmingham, if there is one. Then why couldn't you have come by air
instead of wasting time in a train?"

"If you think I'm going to waste money on aeroplanes to suit your
convenience . . ."

And so on.

"Anyhow," Anne said some time later, "Martin is in this with us, whether
you like it or not. And you can just lump it!"

"Of course he's in it. He knows which side his bread is buttered. Has it
occurred to you, in all your highfalutin reflections, that our
collecting the boodle may make quite a difference to your chances of
getting married?"

"Yes, it has occurred to me. I'm not quite a fool."

"You relieve my mind. Perhaps you remember also that one of the few
things Father and I agreed on was that he couldn't stand the idea of
Martin as a son-in-law at any price?"

"I dare say it was. But it's not the least good your thinking you can
play the heavy father with me, because it won't work."

"I'm not going to. All I say is, that putting those two things together,
namely, that Father wouldn't help you to marry while he was alive and
that you can't afford to marry unless you collect your share of the
insurance money, it seems to me a nauseating hypocrisy for you to
pretend not (_a_) that you lament his death as a terrible blow, and
(_b_) that your only interest in upsetting this verdict is . . ."

But Anne did not wait for the end of her brother's carefully polished
period. Getting off the bed she stalked to the door with as much dignity
as her dressing-gown allowed.

"You make me sick," she observed crisply, as she went out.

Thereafter these two highly intelligent, deeply affectionate, grown-up
young persons went at last to bed, to wake next morning feeling more
than a little ashamed of themselves.




                              CHAPTER SIX


                       A Visitor at Scotland Yard

                         Saturday, August 19th

Stephen was down late to breakfast next morning. Mrs. Dickinson,
following the custom by which the privileges of invalids are always
extended to the recently bereaved, was breakfasting in bed. Anne had
already finished her meal some time before, but was still in the
dining-room. Stephen came in just as she was jabbing the stub of her
third cigarette into an ashtray. She had an air of impatient
exasperation.

"Well?" she fired at him at once.

Stephen did not reply. He went over to the sideboard and helped himself
to coffee.

"Stone-cold," he remarked. "And the milk has a disgusting skin on it.
What a filthy stink you have made in here. It's the first time I've ever
seen you smoking in the dining-room after breakfast."

"Go on! Say it!" said Anne. "If Father was alive I shouldn't be doing
it. That's what you mean, isn't it?"

"Well, there's no harm in looking on the bright side, is there? You're
very pugnacious this morning, Anne."

"I'm very impatient, if you like. I thought you were never coming down."

"Impatient?" said Stephen, buttering a piece of toast with great
deliberation. "What about?"

"About everything, of course. Are you getting on to Jelks today? When
are we going to see the insurance person? What are we going to do first?
There are scores of things I want to discuss with you. And then you ask
what I'm impatient about!"

"The first thing I'm going to do," said Stephen, "is to have my
breakfast, and I wish I could feel that it was more than a forlorn hope
that I should have it in comparative peace and quiet. After that--"

"Yes?"

"After that, I am not going to discuss matters with Jelks, or the
insurance people, or, for the matter of that, with Martin. I am going to
make a few quiet inquiries on my own. Now don't start making a fuss," he
went on quickly before she could speak. "I know quite well what you are
going to say. But I've thought this out, and I've made up my mind. I've
read the evidence and you haven't. There's just one chance for us, as
far as I can see, and I'm going to test it, and see if there's a
reasonable prospect of its coming off. If there is, we go right ahead.
If not--"

"You mean that you're looking for an excuse to back out. It's just the
sort of thing I might have expected!"

"Need we go into all this again?" said Stephen wearily. "I am not
anxious to back out, as I think I explained to you last night. But you
don't understand the position at all. If," he went on with a maddening
assumption of superiority, "you had had the decency to let me eat my
breakfast in peace, I dare say I should have explained it to you. As it
is, I'm afraid you'll have to wait."

Anne got up and went to the door. With her hand on the latch she turned
and said:

"Stephen, this is all very ridiculous. I'm sorry about last night, if
that's what you want me to say. Why on earth should this horrible thing
have made us squabble like two children?"

"Because we look at it from two different angles, I suppose. Not that I
admit for a moment that there is anything in the least childish in my
behaviour, at any rate. So far as you are concerned--"

"Oh, very well!" Anne exclaimed, and flounced out of the room. A moment
later she opened the door again, and did her best to repair the
anti-climax by the sarcastic tone in which she asked: "Will your
lordship be good enough to indicate where he is going to prosecute his
inquiries, and whether he expects to be home to lunch?"

Bowing gravely over his boiled egg, Stephen replied: "I shall not be in
to lunch. And I see no objection to informing you that I am going to
Scotland Yard."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Going to Scotland Yard was simple enough; doing anything when there
turned out to be a difficult matter. The polite but inquisitive
policeman at the entrance made that clear to Stephen. So he wished to
see Inspector Mallett, did he? Precisely. In connexion with what case
was it? Oh, a private matter? Just so. Had he an appointment, perhaps?
No? That was unfortunate. Stephen, feeling uncomfortably warm with
embarrassment and with a growing sensation that his collar was a size
too small for him, agreed that it was unfortunate. No, he did not desire
to state his business to any other officer. Yes, he quite understood
that the inspector was a busy man, but the matter was urgent and would
not detain the inspector long. Yes, here was his card. By all means he
would wait. No, he really would prefer not to explain the position to
the sergeant. No, not at all. . . . Oh, certainly. . . . Yes,
rather. . . . Thanks, if you don't mind. . . . I quite understand. . . .
Yes. . . . No. . . .

These preliminaries occupied about half an hour, and the sojourn in the
waiting-room that succeeded them some twenty minutes more. At the end of
that time, Stephen was informed that the inspector was in conference
with the Assistant Commissioner, and that when the conference was over
he would be at his lunch. The tone in which this latter piece of
information was delivered indicated that Inspector Mallett's lunch was
not a function to be treated lightly. After his lunch, if he was not
otherwise engaged, the card of this importunate visitor would be put
before him, and he might consent to receive him--if he thought fit. The
officer obviously did not think it likely that the inspector would so
think, but he indicated that there would be no harm in trying, and
Stephen, by now thoroughly cowed, promised to return at two o'clock.

He lunched miserably in the neighbourhood and soon after Big Ben had
struck the three-quarters was back again in the dirty brick quadrangle
which seemed by now depressingly familiar. Resigned to another long
period of unprofitable waiting, he was agreeably surprised to be met by
the news that the inspector's conference had finished earlier than was
expected, that the inspector had had his lunch all right (this was a
most important point, evidently), that the inspector had seen Stephen's
card, and that the inspector was free and would see him now, and would
he come this way please?

Somewhat dazed, Stephen suffered himself to be led along many passages
and up many flights of stairs, and finally found himself in a small airy
room which overlooked the Thames, and which at first sight seemed to him
to be distinctly overcrowded. The impression of overcrowding, he soon
decided, was largely contributed to by the great bulk of the man who was
its only occupant, and who now sat behind his desk regarding him with an
expression that was at once genial and inquiring.

"Mr. Stephen Dickinson?" said Mallett in a voice surprisingly quiet and
gentle for one of his large frame. "Won't you sit down?"

Stephen did so, and opened his mouth to explain himself, but the
inspector went on: "Are you the son of the late Mr. Leonard Dickinson?"

"Yes. In fact I--"

"I thought so. You are rather like him in some ways."

The young man flushed.

"Oh, do you think so?" he said, in a tone of some annoyance. "I never
thought there was much likeness myself."

Inspector Mallett chuckled.

"One of my grandmother's rules of conduct," he observed, "was: 'Never
see a likeness.' She had a theory that it was rude. I'm afraid manners
were never my strong point, though. I joined the Force before the days
of courtesy cops. But there is a likeness, all the same," he added.

Recollecting the late Mr. Dickinson's unattractive elderliness, he was
not in the least surprised that his son should repudiate the suggestion
so curtly. It was in any case, he reflected, a likeness of expression
rather than of feature. It was difficult to pin down, as family
resemblances so often are, but the fact remained that with his first
glance at Stephen, his mind had gone back at once to old Mr. Dickinson.
Oddly enough, he had been reminded of the dead man's face, not as he had
seen it pressed close to his own in garrulous confidences after dinner,
but as it had appeared the next morning, silent and still, the lines of
worry and disillusionment smoothed out in death. Then the essential cast
of countenance had been revealed with the removal of the accidental
tricks that life had played with it. In Stephen's case, experience had
not yet had time to spin its web of disguise. And the common factor
was--he fumbled for a definition--that each was essentially the face of
a man who was before all things self-centred. At bottom, he felt, the
likeness between father and son was a good deal more than skin-deep,
though one was a weary pessimist and the other obviously alert and
self-confident to the point of bumptiousness. Had he known it, this
parallel between himself and his parent would have annoyed Stephen
considerably more than the discovery that they possessed a similar nose
or chin could possibly have done.

Meanwhile Stephen was speaking.

"At all events," he said, "it was about my father that I came to see
you."

"Yes?" Mallett was friendly, but showed no inclination to help him out.

"Yes." He hesitated for a moment, braced himself as though for a plunge
into cold water, and then came out with: "I'm not satisfied with the
verdict on my father's death."

Mallett raised his eyebrows.

"The coroner's jury was wrong," Stephen repeated.

"Yes," said Mallett slowly. "I appreciate that that was what you meant.
But in that case, Mr. Dickinson, don't you think you ought to go and see
the police about it? I mean," he went on, smiling at the puzzled
expression on the young man's face, "the Markshire police. This is their
affair, you know. My own connexion with it was purely accidental and
unofficial. Perhaps if I were to give you a note to the local
superintendent--"

"No," said Stephen firmly. "I quite understand what you say, but that
isn't what I want. I came to see you personally, because . . ." He
hesitated.

"Yes?"

"Because you were the person largely responsible for things going wrong
at the inquest."

It was a long time since Inspector Mallett had had a remark of this kind
addressed to him, and he did not take it very kindly. For a moment he
was tempted to deal very severely with this impertinent person, and it
was perhaps fortunate for Stephen that he was still in a post-prandial
mood of kindliness. His momentary look of annoyance, however, did not
pass unnoticed, and Stephen was prompt to apologize.

"Please don't think--" he began.

"Never mind what I think," the inspector interrupted him. "It's what I
did that is in question, isn't it? Let's keep to that. I was a witness
at the inquest on your father--a witness of fact, purely and simply. I
hope I was an accurate witness. I certainly tried to be."

"Exactly. And it was your evidence that caused all the trouble. Although
it was accurate--because it was accurate--it resulted in the coroner and
the jury being hopelessly misled."

Stephen sat back with the air of one who has delivered an ultimatum. But
Mallett showed no sign of being impressed. He merely laid his broad
hands flat upon the desk in front of him, pursed his lips, and looked
into space about a foot above the top of Stephen's head.

"You know, I haven't the least idea what you are talking about," he
murmured. "Now look here--" He suddenly brought his gaze down full upon
the other's face. "Suppose we start at the beginning. It's much more
satisfactory. Mr. Dickinson died from an overdose of Medinal. The
medical evidence was conclusive on that point, to my mind at least. Are
you disputing it?"

"No."

"Very well. On the evidence, of which mine was part, the coroner's jury
came to the conclusion that he had taken his own life. That you say was
wrong?"

"Exactly."

"Apart from my evidence, do you think that the verdict would have been
different?"

"I think there was a very good chance of a finding of accidental death."

"I don't altogether agree with you. As I recollect the evidence--but we
can discuss that later. Do you think that accidental death would have
been a proper verdict?"

"I should have been perfectly satisfied with it."

"But do you think it would have been a proper verdict?"

"No. If by 'proper' you mean in accordance with the facts, I don't think
it would."

A long pause followed these words. Mallett opened his mouth to say
something, evidently thought better of it, and then said: "But you told
me just now you would have been satisfied with that verdict?"

"That's not quite the same thing, is it?"

"You needn't tell me that," said Mallett with some asperity. He looked
at Stephen quizzically for a moment in silence and then said: "Mr.
Dickinson, I don't understand you in the least. You object to the
verdict which was given because you think it was incorrect, but you
would have been perfectly prepared to accept another, equally incorrect.
Evidently you are not concerned about--abstract justice, shall we say?
And at the same time you don't strike me as a person who would worry
very much about any stigma attaching to a finding of suicide. Or am I
wrong?"

"No," said Stephen. "I'm not very strong on abstractions. As to
stigmas," he grinned reminiscently, "some of my family seem to have them
on the brain. Personally, I don't care two hoots about them. But it so
happens that a very large sum of money depends upon my establishing that
my father did not kill himself."

The inspector could not suppress a smile.

"And therefore you have determined that the verdict was wrong?" he said.

Stephen frowned at the imputation.

"No!" he protested. "I knew that the verdict was wrong as soon as I
heard it. So would you, if you had known as much about my father as I
do. But the wrongness doesn't concern me; its consequences do. That is
why I should have been content with a verdict of accidental death. And
that is why, very much against my will, I find myself in the position of
having to prove the truth, which for other reasons it would have been
much better for all concerned not to have bothered about."

To himself Inspector Mallett murmured with satisfaction, "Self-centred!"
Aloud he said, "And what precisely do you mean by the truth, Mr.
Dickinson?"

"That my father was murdered."

The inspector tugged thoughtfully at the points of his fierce military
moustache. If he was at all shocked at the suggestion, he gave no signs
of it.

"Murdered?" he said softly. "Just so! Then in that case, don't you think
my original suggestion was the correct one--that you should put the case
before the appropriate authority, the Markshire County Police?"

"I don't know whether it was correct or not," retorted Stephen with some
impatience. "I do know that it's no sort of use to me. For one thing, I
have at the present moment no evidence whatever to put before the
Markshire or any other police, and for another, I am not interested in
proving that any particular person killed my father. I only want to
show, to the satisfaction of the insurance company, or a court of law if
necessary, that he was killed by somebody."

"I see," said Mallett. "You put the position very clearly. You can
hardly expect a police officer to take the same rather--er--detached
view of crime as you do, but I appreciate your position. I take it that
your object now is to get what evidence you can in order to prove your
case against the insurance company?"

"That is what I am here for."

Mallett made a little gesture of impatience.

"But my dear sir," he said, "we are back where we started from! How can
I help you? Officially--"

"I am here quite unofficially."

"Very good, then. Unofficially, I am simply an individual who was called
to give some evidence which was perfectly accurate, and which the jury
believed and acted upon. If you ever bring any proceedings in which your
father's death is in question, I should probably be called as a witness
again, and should give the same evidence, which would presumably have
the same effect on another jury. What can I do about it?"

To his surprise, Stephen replied airily, "Oh, I can dispose of your
evidence easily enough."

"Indeed!"

"Certainly. I should probably have done so at the inquest, if I had been
there, instead of in Switzerland all the time, out of reach of
newspapers and letters. After all, what did it amount to? You had a talk
to my father the night before he died, or rather, if I know anything of
the matter, he did the talking and you just listened and wished you
could get away from such a shocking old bore. You found him a gloomy old
man--as who wouldn't?--full of complaints about life in general and his
family in particular. That is the main effect of it, isn't it?"

"Yes," the inspector admitted. "But it went a good deal further than
that."

"I bet it did. You didn't enter into very many details, but I expect I
can supply a few for you. He told you that he had made a mistake
marrying a woman so much younger than himself, didn't he? He said that
he had been born at Pendlebury Old Hall and that it meant much more to
him than his family could ever imagine, because it was the only place
where he had been happy in the whole of his life. And finally, he said
that he felt like a snail, dragging its trail about with him wherever it
went, and wondered with an air of deep significance where the trail
would end."

"But I never mentioned that in my evidence," said Mallett. "How did you
know that he used that expression?"

"Because he was always using it, of course. You don't imagine that he
invented it for your benefit, do you? In the home one could expect that
sort of stuff to come up every month or so. The snail and his trail has
been the theme song of my family for ages. In fact, I did actually write
a song about it. It begins like this:

                   _"How doth the melancholy snail_
                      _Invigorate his friends,_
                    _By looking back upon his trail_
                      _And wondering where it ends._

"Not very high-class verse, I admit, but it proves my point, anyhow. So
far as your talk with him is relied on as evidence of suicide, you can
wash it out altogether."

"My evidence was not confined to my conversation of the night before,"
Mallett pointed out. "And I don't think that the coroner relied on that
alone when he came to sum up to the jury."

"No, of course he didn't. What he relied on most of all was the silliest
bit of evidence of the whole lot--not that I blame him, he couldn't have
known. It was simply the most sickening piece of bad luck--a pure
coincidence that nobody could have foreseen. I suppose, by the way, that
we are talking about the same thing--I mean the inscription, motto, or
whatever you like to call it, that was found by his body?"

Mallett nodded.

"_We are in the power of no calamity, while Death is in our own_,"
Stephen quoted. He laughed mirthlessly. "Gosh! Isn't it ridiculous! By
the way, Inspector," he went on, "did you happen to notice what sort of
paper it was written on?"

"Yes. It was on a small slip of white paper of good quality. The ink was
dark, I remember, as though it had been written at least some hours
before I saw it, possibly more. That would depend on the type of ink,
you know. The handwriting, you may remember, was identified at the
inquest by your mother."

"Oh, no question about the writing," said Stephen. "The silly thing is,
it might just as likely have been mine. That would have puzzled the
coroner a bit, wouldn't it?"

"Yours, Mr. Dickinson? How could that be?"

Stephen did not answer the question directly.

"Do you ever read detective stories, Inspector?" he said. "There's a
very good one of Chesterton's, in which a man is found with an apparent
confession of suicide beside him, which is really a fragment from a
novel he is writing. The murderer pinches the sheet he has just written,
and snips off the edge of the paper which has the inverted commas on
it."

"But this was a small slip of paper," was Mallett's practical comment.
"Not a fragment of a book or anything else. And I'm quite certain none
of the edges were snipped off."

"And you may add with equal truth, my father was not writing a novel.
But I'll tell you what he was doing, he was compiling a calendar."

"A calendar?"

"Yes--a calendar of quotations, one for every day of the year. And being
my father, it was, of all things, a calendar of pessimistic quotations.
Incidentally, can you imagine a man who really contemplated suicide
devoting years of his life to selecting and arranging the three hundred
and sixty-five gloomiest observations on life that he could find?"

"This was a quotation, then?"

"Lord, yes! My father wasn't capable of producing a sentiment of that
kind out of his own head. It was written by a gent named Sir Thomas
Browne, about three hundred years ago. Father was fearfully pleased when
he discovered it, or rather when I discovered it for him. I wrote it
down for him a month or two ago, and evidently he thought it good enough
to keep for his permanent collection, as he copied it out on one of his
little slips. He had hundreds of them, you see, and was always shuffling
them about and rejecting the ones that didn't come up to his standard of
depression. He got some perverted pleasure out of it--I can't think
what. That's why his calendar took such a long time to complete. I've
brought some to show you the sort of thing." From his pocket he took
several small slips of paper. "Here's a good example," he said.

           _My Brother, my poor Brothers, it is thus;_
           _This life itself holds nothing good for us,_
             _But it ends soon and nevermore can be;_
           _And we knew nothing of it ere our birth,_
           _And shall know nothing when consigned to earth:_
             _I ponder these thoughts and they comfort me._

"_The City of Dreadful Night_, you know. He got quite a number of his
best quotes out of that. Then this one is rather amusing:

_Howbeit, I do here most certainely assure you, there be many wayes to
Peru._

"I don't quite know how he came by that. It's out of Hakluyt's
_Voyages_. He seems to have thought that Peru was symbolical of the next
world, or something of the kind, whereas as a matter of fact it's a
perfectly straightforward piece of geographical information. Anyhow, he
discarded it in favour of something grislier. Like this, for example--"

"I think that's enough to go on with," said Mallett, who was beginning
to feel somewhat overwhelmed at this display of erudition. "You seem to
have proved your point, Mr. Dickinson. But I don't understand why this
particular passage should have been found by your father's bed after he
was dead. Are you asking me to believe that someone else put it there,
in order to give the effect of suicide?"

Stephen pondered for a moment before he answered.

"No," he said. "No, I've thought of that, and it doesn't hold water. For
one thing how would he have known where to find it? The simple
explanation is that my father took it out of his pocket when he
undressed, along with his other things, and kept it by his bedside to
gloat over. I know that sounds improbable to you, Inspector, and God
knows how I should ever get a jury to believe it, but that happens to be
the kind of odd fish my father was. He got a kick out of this sort of
thing, just as old men of another kind get a kick out of indecent
photographs. And like them, he enjoyed having his pet vice handy."

"It's possible," said Mallett slowly. "Yes, I suppose it's just
possible."

"It's a dead certainty to me, knowing Father as I did."

"Well, assuming--just assuming--that you are right so far, and that your
father did not in fact kill himself. You are still a long way from
proving the rather startling theory which you advanced just now--that
this is a case of murder."

"If he didn't kill himself, then someone else did," said Stephen with an
air of finality.

"That's just the point I want to put to you. Your father died, as we
agreed just now, from an overdose of Medinal, a drug which he was
regularly taking on medical advice. If we exclude the possibility that
he took the overdose deliberately, surely the inference is that he took
it by accident?"

"Yes, it ought to be, but there again luck is against us. I've told you
already I'm not in the least keen to prove that a murder has been
committed, but I'm driven to it. I think the evidence quite clearly puts
an accidental overdose outside the bounds of possibility."

Mallett reflected for a moment.

"I begin to remember," he said. "There were two bottles of tablets
beside the bed, were there not? One nearly full, and the other
completely empty."

"Exactly. Two bottles. Now one can understand a man, having taken his
proper dose, forgetting that he had done so, and taking another one, out
of the same bottle. You could easily get a jury to swallow that. But who
on earth is going to believe that anyone in his senses should go and
open a fresh bottle when the old one is staring him in the face, to
prove that he had taken his proper dose already?"

"Yes. I remember that the coroner dealt with that question."

"And," Stephen added, to clinch the point, "there weren't enough tablets
missing from the full bottle to constitute a lethal dose."

"He certainly died from the effects of a very large overdose indeed. The
doctors were quite clear on that."

"Quite so. Therefore I should fail if I attempted to prove that my
father died accidentally. If I am to dispose of the verdict of suicide,
I must rely on the only other possible cause of death--namely, murder."

"I suppose," said Mallett ironically, "that you haven't considered such
minor questions as who murdered your father, or how, or why?"

"Not yet," answered Stephen with irritating composure. "That will, of
course, be the next stage in my inquiries. And remember, it is no part
of my job to convict anybody. I'm only interested to show that my
father's estate is entitled to collect the cash from the insurance
company. That's where I want your help. You are interested in punishing
crime, I suppose, so I presume you have no objection to giving it."

"I have already explained," said the inspector, "that this case is no
affair of mine. Even if you are right in your suggestion, I can take no
part in any inquiries unless and until I am called in."

"You misunderstand me. I'm not asking you to take any part in the
inquiries. I am sorry to have taken so long to come to the point, but I
had to explain the position first. What I'm after is this: If this was a
case of murder--and I, at any rate, am satisfied that it was--there must
have been something to indicate it. Something fishy--something a little
out of the ordinary, at least. And if there was, you were the person to
notice it at the time. Oh, I know you're going to tell me that you
weren't there on business. I admit that. But after all, you're a
detective by training. You can't get away from that, wherever you are
and whatever you happen to be doing. You can't help noticing things and
remembering them afterwards, even if they don't seem of any significance
at the time."

"If I had noticed anything in the least suspicious," Mallett pointed
out, "I should have mentioned it at once to the local police."

"I didn't say suspicious. I'm after anything you saw that was in the
least unusual. It may not convey anything to you, but it may be of value
to me. Do you see what I mean? Take my father's room, for example. What
did you observe in it?"

Mallett almost laughed out loud. It had so often been his experience in
the past to put a question of this kind to witnesses that it tickled him
to find the tables turned in this way.

"Your father's room," he repeated. "Let me see. The bed was on the right
of the door as you went in, against the wall. By the bed was a little
table. You'll find everything that was on the table set out in the
evidence at the inquest. You have read that, I take it?"

Stephen nodded.

"Furniture," Mallett went on. "A wardrobe, closed. A chair with some
clothes left on it. Two ugly china vases on the mantelpiece. Near the
window, a dressing-table with drawers beneath it. On the dressing-table,
your father's hair-brushes, shaving things, and so on. Also the contents
of his pockets--small change, keys, a note-book. And--yes, this was
unusual--a small plate. On the plate was an apple, with a folding silver
knife beside it. That's all I saw. Of course, I wasn't in the room any
length of time, and I may have missed something."

"Well done!" said Stephen softly. "I'm much obliged, Inspector."

"Have I told you anything useful?"

"You've knocked another nail into the coffin of the suicide verdict,
anyway. The apple, I mean."

"How so?"

"Father believed in an apple a day. He used to eat one every morning
before breakfast, and after shaving. He was a creature of habit, you
see. If he went away anywhere for a week, he'd take seven apples with
him, so as to make sure he wouldn't run short. He took the silver knife
with him too, to cut the apples up with. Before he went to bed, he would
put an apple out for next morning. That's what he'd done this time,
obviously. Not a likely thing for a man to do if he knew he wasn't going
to be alive to eat it, was it?"

"I'm only telling you what I saw, I'm expressing no opinion. But there
was something that happened the night before which you may as well hear,
though I expect there's nothing in it. Your father saw a man in the
hotel whom he thought he recognized."

"What!" Stephen sat bolt upright in excitement. "Where was this?
Upstairs, in the corridor outside his room?"

"No, no. In the lounge, while we were talking after dinner."

"In the lounge? Someone he knew? By Jove, Inspector, but this is really
interesting. What was he like?"

"I didn't see him myself. He passed behind me. I got the impression of
someone who wasn't very tall, from his shadow, that's all. But if you'll
take my advice, you won't build on this. Your father thought he saw an
acquaintance and then decided that he hadn't. That's all. Probably his
second impression was the right one."

"Did he say he was wrong?" Stephen persisted, unwilling to give up the
slender clue. "You don't remember his actual words, I suppose?"

"As it happens, I do. He said: '_I must have been mistaken. Thought it
was somebody I knew, but it couldn't have been._' Then he said something
about the deceptiveness of back views and went on talking. The
interruption made him change the subject, I recollect, without his
realizing he had done so."

" '_Must_ have been mistaken,' " said Stephen. "That's not the same
thing, is it? He thought he _must_ have made a mistake, that it
_couldn't_ have been the person he thought it was, because he didn't
think it possible that person could have been there. You know,
Inspector, my father was an awful old dunderhead in lots of ways, but he
had eyes in his head, and he didn't often make a mistake of that kind.
Suppose he wasn't mistaken, and the person who 'couldn't' have been
there really was there? Suppose--"

"There are a great many suppositions in your case, I'm afraid," said
Mallett, looking at his watch.

"I'm afraid there are. And I'm afraid, too, that I've wasted a great
deal too much of your time, as you have just reminded me." He got up.
"That is all you have to tell me, I suppose?"

"There is nothing else that I can think of at this moment, Mr.
Dickinson."

"Then I will say goodbye and thank you. You've given me something to go
on, anyhow. At breakfast this morning I was half inclined to chuck the
whole thing up."

"I don't see that I have given you very much help," said the inspector.

"You've given me enough to see this thing through, anyhow," was the
answer. And a moment or two later a very determined-looking young man
walked out of New Scotland Yard.

Left alone, Mallett sat thinking for a few moments. He was conscious
that he had shamelessly wasted quite a considerable amount of valuable
official time discussing a theory that was probably entirely without
foundation and was certainly no affair of his. A conscientious officer
should have felt a good deal of regret at the fact. But Mallett, whom
his worst enemies had never called anything but conscientious, did not
feel a single qualm of regret. Instead, to his surprise, he felt
pleasurably excited. Some sixth sense seemed to tell him that this was
only the second chapter, and not the end, of the story which had begun
at Pendlebury Old Hall. From a drawer in his desk, he pulled out an
empty file. Smiling at his own folly as he did so, he solemnly entitled
it "_Re_ Dickinson," and returned it, still empty, to the drawer. Then
he took a sheet of notepaper and wrote a personal letter, in very
guarded terms, to his good friend the head of the plain-clothes force of
the Markshire County Constabulary.

When all this had been done, Inspector Mallett plunged again into his
proper work. Routine reigned once more in the little room overlooking
the river.




                             CHAPTER SEVEN


                             Council of War

                          Monday, August 21st

The front door of the Dickinsons' house in Plane Street closed softly
behind the departing visitor. The parlourmaid who had let him out walked
back through the hall to her own domain below stairs. When the sound of
her footsteps could no longer be heard a perfect silence reigned for a
moment or two throughout the house. Then the little group of people
congregated in the drawing-room looked at one another, drew each a deep
breath and felt free to talk once more.

"Well!" said Anne, with a yawn of sheer nervous exhaustion.

"Stephen," said her mother, "you--you have surprised me very much." She
seemed conscious of the inadequacy of her words. "I mean that . . ." She
gave it up. "Of course, I am sure you only said what you thought was
right," she concluded.

"Extraordinary business altogether!" said Martin solemnly. "Don't know
that I like the sound of it very much. You certainly gave us all a bit
of a shock, Steve. Didn't he, Annie?"

Stephen Dickinson stood in the middle of the room, his face a little
flushed, his hair a little disordered, his expression half triumphant,
half bewildered. He looked rather as an amateur conjuror must look who
has successfully produced a rabbit from his hat and is wondering where
on earth to put the animal. Except for a momentary twinge of pain when
he heard himself addressed as "Steve," he paid no attention to what the
others had said. Instead he turned to the only person present who had
not yet spoken and said:

"What are your views about it, Mr. Jelks?"

Mr. Herbert Horatio Jelks, of Jelks, Jelks, Dedman and Jelks, solicitors
of Bedford Row, did not reply for a moment or two. He had a pale and
placid face, of the type that gives confidence to clients, and his broad
forehead, made broader by incipient baldness, gave him an air of wisdom
and reliability. But baldness, like death, often strikes before its due
time, and he was in fact a quite young and inexperienced lawyer, the
junior partner in his firm and the third and last of the Jelkses reading
from left to right. Just now behind his mask of expressionless sagacity
was a distinctly troubled mind. The exigencies of the long vacation had
left him the sole representative of his firm, and the load of
responsibility was at this moment sitting heavily upon his shoulders.

"My views, Mr. Dickinson?" he said in the plummy baritone that went so
well with his delusive aspect of maturity. "Well, really I--ahem! I
think you are taking a great deal upon yourself, I do indeed."

Anne came quickly to her brother's rescue.

"Please don't think that any of us were going to listen to what that man
said," she put in. "We were all quite agreed about that."

"I quite understand that you are all unanimous in refusing the Company's
offer," Mr. Jelks began.

"I should hope so," Anne interjected.

"And yet it was a very reasonable one, to my mind, generous, even. The
return of the premium plus four per cent--it is quite a considerable
sum, substantially over thirteen hundred pounds." He let the figures
linger lovingly on his lips as he pronounced them. "Thirteen, getting on
for fourteen--hundred--pounds."

"The insurance was for twenty-five thousand," said Stephen shortly.

"Quite, quite. I appreciate that. And as I was saying, the offer was
rejected. You were within your rights to do so, though of course that
may have consequences, serious consequences. And I had already gathered
that that was likely to be your attitude. What I had not appreciated,
and I think it came as a surprise to everybody else in this room, was
that Mr. Dickinson was about to make the allegation that his father
was--that in fact--"

"That he was murdered," said Stephen, in a tone expressive of his
contempt for a man who could not call a spade a spade.

"Precisely. I think I am right, my dear young lady, in saying that the
suggestion came as a shock to you?"

There are, it may be presumed, girls who like being addressed as dear
young ladies by pseudo-elderly solicitors. Anne was not one of them. She
flushed and said awkwardly, "Yes, I suppose it did."

Mr. Jelks felt that he was getting on well. None of the other partners,
he thought, neither his father nor uncle, not even that ferociously
efficient fellow Dedman, could have handled the situation better.

"In that case," he went on, sawing the air impressively with one hand,
"you will appreciate what I meant when I said just now that your brother
had taken--"

"Yes, we all understand that," said Martin. "Point is, it seems to me,
what do we do now?"

There was a pause in which Mr. Jelks struggled to find words. In the
absence of any very definite thoughts, he found the search difficult.

"I mean to say," Martin went on in his thick, unattractive voice, "the
insurance chappie who has just gone out was very positive that it
couldn't be accident. Steve here, who's read all the evidence and we
haven't, agreed with him. We thought he'd sold the pass--didn't we,
Annie? Then he came out with murder and gave us all a bit of a jump.
Can't say I like the idea very much myself. Suicide in the family's bad
enough, but murder's a long sight worse. Personally, I'd be in favour of
giving the whole show a miss. Yes, I would, Annie, honestly. And I'm
sure Mrs. Dickinson doesn't like the notion either. But of course I see
Steve's point of view. Since it can't be accident and it mustn't be
suicide, it's got to be murder. That's how he looks at it, and of course
I see his point. As I've said already."

The solicitor turned to Stephen.

"Does that fairly indicate your attitude?" he asked.

"More or less," was the reply. "And I know what you are going to say.
'The wish is father to the thought.' Well, perhaps it is. But the
thought is there, just the same. You see, we none of us ever really
believed that Father killed himself. Did we, Anne?"

"I didn't, anyhow," said his sister.

"Very good. Therefore, as Martin puts it, it's got to be murder."

Poor Mr. Jelks, whose practice had hitherto lain in the quiet reaches of
conveyances and settlements, felt utterly at a loss.

"In that case--if you really think--" he stammered--"I should have
thought the police--"

"The police are no good to us, at this stage at any rate. I've seen one
policeman already, and I can tell you that. For that matter, we may
never have to get so far as proving the case against anybody. I mean,
criminal proof isn't the same thing as civil proof, is it?"

Mr. Jelks began to feel on firmer ground again.

"You put it inaccurately," he said, "but I see what you mean. If it
should be necessary to sue the British Imperial Company on the policy--"
Thank Heaven! he thought, Dedman is in charge of all the litigation in
the office! "--the burden will be on the Company to prove that the case
falls within the exception of the policy."

"I'm not sure that I understand," Mrs. Dickinson put in. "Do you mean
that in any case we bring against them, it will be for them to prove my
husband's suicide all over again, in spite of what the coroner's jury
has already said?"

"Certainly. Though I must say that on the evidence so far I think they
would succeed in doing so. But if, in some way that I confess I don't
yet understand, you are able to cast doubt upon the inquest verdict, by
setting up a _prima facie_ case of--" again he boggled at the word "--of
the other thing, then you might succeed."

"It makes a big difference," said Martin, "if we haven't got to pin the
crime on anyone. Just show it could have been done, and so on. But how
does one set about finding a primer whatd'ye call it of murder? That's
what I want to know."

Mr. Jelks gave an embarrassed little laugh.

"Well! Really, you know, this is hardly in my line," he said. "What is
it the books say? Means, Motive, Opportunity: those are the three
factors, aren't they? I suppose you have to look about for some person
or body of persons who had all three, and then try to--ah--implicate
them. But you must beware of the law of defamation while you're about
it, you know," he added hastily.

"Thanks," said Stephen. "That's very helpful indeed."

"Oh, not at all, not at all," answered Mr. Jelks, who was happily
impervious to irony. "Well, Mrs. Dickinson, I think I should really be
going now. If I can be of any further assistance--"

"I think you can," Stephen interrupted him. "If we are to get any
further in this business than talking about it, we have got to start
investigating those three factors you mentioned just now. So far as
opportunity goes, it was obviously confined to the people who happened
to be in the hotel at the time."

"Oh, obviously. I take it that this--this committee of detection, shall
I say?"--his little witticism brought no answering gleam from any of the
faces around him--"will begin by adjourning to Pendlebury Old Hall to
inquire into the staff and residents there."

"That's just the trouble," said Stephen. "I've been thinking about that,
and so far as I'm concerned there's every objection to my being seen
nosing around Pendlebury. I don't expect for a moment that the hotel
people will be particularly anxious to help us--this sort of publicity
would obviously be bad for them--and as soon as I gave my name they'd
guess what was up and would shut up like oysters. The same objection
applies to Anne going. I suppose Martin could, but--"

"I shouldn't be any use," said Martin at once. "The hotel people were
all at the funeral, and someone'd be sure to spot me. Anyhow," he added,
"I don't know that I'm so keen on all this investigating business. If
Steve thinks there's been a murder, can't he prove it out of the
evidence he's got already?"

"No," said Stephen. "Quite obviously I can't. I can't even disprove
suicide, which is what we really have to do, though I can throw some
doubt on it. If we're going to do any good, there's a lot of hard work
in front of us. That's why somebody must begin by going down to
Pendlebury, as Mr. Jelks says. In fact, that's where Mr. Jelks comes
in."

"Where I--I beg your pardon, Mr. Dickinson, but it was only a suggestion
of mine. You can't mean that I should--"

"I imagined this sort of thing was just in your line. Surely solicitors
are always having to make inquiries at hotels and places, for divorce
and so on?"

"Divorce?" said Mr. Jelks. "We never touch it! There are firms, of
course, who specialize in that class of business."

"Then I suppose we shall have to put our affairs in the hands of one of
the firms who do."

Mr. Jelks had horrid visions of his partners returning from their
holidays to find that he had lost a client.

"That will not be necessary," he said, hastily. "I think what you want
is a good inquiry agent. This is hardly a lawyer's business at all, you
know. You couldn't expect _me_ . . ."

Stephen, looking at him, privately agreed that he could not.

"You can find me a man of that sort--at once?"

"Oh, certainly, yes. I have the very man in mind. I'll tell him to ring
you up and make an appointment."

Mr. Jelks had not the faintest acquaintance with any inquiry agent, good
or bad; but he was fairly confident that one of the managing clerks in
the office would know where to find one. At the moment he was anxious
above all things to get away from this persistent young man, who, not
content with propounding the most hare-brained plot, was actually
suggesting that he, Herbert Horatio Jelks, should help to put it into
execution. The sooner he returned to the sweet sanities of Bedford Row,
the better.

Before he went, he had one further thing to say.

"You will remember that the Company's offer, thanks, I may say, to my
own intervention, remains open for fourteen days," he said. "I shall
receive confirmation of that in writing, no doubt, but we may take it
that you have fourteen days before you need finally decide to reject
it."

"We have rejected it," said Stephen, tight-lipped. "I don't see what
else there is to decide."

"Wait a bit, though," said Martin. "There is something in this, y'know.
Fourteen days is quite a bit of time--long enough to find out if there
is anything in Steve's idea. I vote we give ourselves that time to prove
our case, and if we can't, then take the thirteen hundred quid and look
grateful. What d'you say, Annie?"

Anne turned to Stephen.

"Do you really stand by what you said?" she asked. "You really think
that someone killed Father?"

"Yes. I do."

She passed her hands before her eyes.

"We seem to go from one horror to another," she murmured. "I think
Martin is right, Stephen. At least, we needn't make a definite choice
until then."

"I must ask you to make up your own minds about it," said Mr. Jelks, in
a hurry to be gone. "It is a point that you should bear in mind, that is
all. I expect Mr. Dickinson thinks nothing of the task of laying bare a
criminal in a fortnight."

And with this last and utterly ineffective witticism, he took his
departure.

                 *        *        *        *        *

"Pompous ass!" was Stephen's comment, as he watched the solicitor's
chubby form recede along the pavement outside the house. "I might have
known he'd be no sort of use."

"Decent sort of fellow, I thought," said Martin. "Of course, it was a
bit of a shock to him; couldn't take it in at first; but no more could
the rest of us. It _is_ a tall order, y'know. Anyhow, I think the idea
of a trial fortnight is a good one. After all, one can do a lot in a
fortnight."

"What seems to have escaped your notice is that we've got to do a lot in
a fortnight. I have four weeks holiday and nearly two weeks of it have
gone already. After that, things aren't going to be so easy."

"Jove, yes! I'm lucky, I've still got three weeks to play with, so I'm
all right. And now I suppose there's nothing we can do till the inquiry
chappie has got to work. Not that I like this business of poking about
in hotel registers. You never know what you might find." He blinked
solemnly behind his spectacles. "I'm short of exercise," he announced.
"Is anybody coming for a stroll on the Heath?"

Nobody else felt inclined to go with him, and he walked out alone. As
soon as he was gone, Anne took Stephen on one side.

"There's something I want to say to you," she said.

"Oh?"

"Yes. It's just that I'm sorry."

"What about?"

"About that beastly row we had the other night."

"Good Lord! That! I'd forgotten all about it."

"Well, I hadn't. You see, it's only just occurred to me that you must
have just made up your mind that moment about this horrible business."

"That Father's death wasn't accidental, you mean?"

"Yes. It was a pretty bad shock to me when you brought it out just now,
and I can understand what it was for you when you tumbled to it all by
yourself. Of course you were all on edge."

"Say no more, sister. We both said some pretty silly things. Let's
forget them."

The telephone bell rang. Stephen answered it. It was Mr. Jelks speaking
from his office.

"I have got the man you want," he said. "The name is Elderson. Will it
suit you to go and see him tomorrow morning?" He added an address in
Shaftesbury Avenue.

"Thank you," said Stephen. He put down the receiver and began to laugh.

"What on earth is the matter?" Anne said.

"I--I'm sorry," he said, struggling with gusts of uncontrollable
giggling. "But it does seem a bub--bloody silly position, doesn't it?"

"I don't see anything funny about it at all."

"Perhaps you're right. I shall be sane tomorrow. Just now I--hoo, hoo,
hoo!"

And so odd is the effect of overstrained nerves, that when Martin came
in from his walk he found Anne also in the grip of mirthless laughter.




                             CHAPTER EIGHT


                      Two Sorts of Private Inquiry

                          Tuesday, August 22nd

"Jas. Elderson, Private Inquiry Agent," said the notice in dirty yellow
lettering on the dirty brown door. Stephen, as he stood collecting his
breath on the landing after his climb up the steep staircase, tried to
picture what manner of man Jas. Elderson would prove to be. He had never
consciously set eyes on a private inquiry agent, but he imagined that a
man could hardly be engaged in such a calling without having something
more or less sleuth-like in his appearance. A lean, ferrety face, a
sensitive nose that quivered slightly at the tip, small, beady eyes and
a generally sly, cunning demeanour made up his idea of what a free-lance
detective ought to be. If he did not expect to find all the features of
his ideal compounded in Mr. Elderson, he did at least look to see some
vestige of what he took to be the insignia of the profession. He would
probably have been extremely nettled to be told, as was the fact, that
his mental image was merely a reincarnation of the illustrations to a
serial in a schoolboy's magazine which he had devoured with gusto some
fifteen years before.

The reality, as might have been expected, was a disappointment. Mr.
Elderson proved to be a large, bluff individual with a loud voice and a
self-confident manner. He had a good-looking face, slightly blurred in
outline, and his general appearance vaguely suggested a policeman gone
to seed. There was nothing particularly surprising in the latter fact,
since it was only a few years ago that he had left the Force; whether
the circumstances of his retirement were in any way connected with the
faint aroma of whisky which made itself felt as soon as he began to
speak was his own secret.

He greeted Stephen in tones that contrived to blend the obsequious with
the hearty, and proceeded, as he put it, "to take Mr. Dickinson's
instructions." Stephen found, however, somewhat to his annoyance, that
Mr. Jelks had already told him in general terms what would be required
of him, and the only instructions that he found it necessary to give
were devoted to confining Elderson's already ambitious programme. The
delight with which the fellow had welcomed an investigation into a case
of suspected murder was ludicrous and even somewhat pathetic.

"This is something like, Mr. Dickinson," he repeated several times,
rubbing his beefy hands together. "This is something like!"

He did not specify what it was like, but it was easily to be gathered
that the attraction of the case to him lay precisely in the fact that it
was utterly unlike the dreary round of private detective's ordinary
activities.

"If there was anything fishy about the people at that hotel," he went
on, "I can promise you I'm the man to find it for you. You've come to
the right place, sir, I can tell you that! And when it comes to a
question of following up inquiries, well, sir, you may not credit it to
look at me, but I can make myself to all intents and purposes
invisible--virtually, morally, in-vis-ible, sir!"

At various points in the monologue Stephen endeavored to interrupt, but
always without success. At last, however, he contrived to interpose:
"I'm not at all sure, Mr. Elderson, whether you understand exactly what
I am instructing you to do for me."

"But surely," Elderson protested, "I'm to be allowed a free 'and in me
plan of campaign? Believe me, sir, when you employ an expert it's the
only thing to do--a free _h_and." (The aspirate emerged triumphantly
this time in an aura of spirits.) "Subject, of course, to your approval
in the matter of exes. And I'm always most careful on the question of
exes, that I can assure you."

Exes? Stephen blinked once or twice before he realized what was meant.

"We can discuss the question of expenses later," he said. "The point is
that I am only instructing you to do one specific thing, which for
various reasons I can't undertake myself. The plan of campaign, if there
is one after you have done it, is my own business."

"Very good, sir," said Elderson, crestfallen, "if you wish it, of
course. Theirs not to reason why, as Shakespeare says. At the same time,
I should have thought--"

"Please don't undervalue what I am asking you to do," said Stephen
swiftly, determined not to relinquish his hardly won grip on the
conversation. "Your work in the first place, Mr. Elderson--I can't
answer for the future--will be confined to ascertaining who was in the
hotel the night that my father died, under what names they stayed, the
addresses they gave, what rooms they occupied, and anything else about
them that can be found out. Also any useful observations you can make
about the staff at the place. I shall want a report on these matters as
soon as possible--"

"Time is of the essence, sir; yes, I quite appreciate that," said
Elderson, smacking his lips over the phrase, which meant no more to him
than it did to his client. "Of the essence--absolutely. I can start
to-day. Now on this question of exes, sir . . ."

That all-important point having been discussed and satisfactorily
settled, Stephen prepared to go. Before he left, however, he was
subjected to one last appeal.

"I do 'ate working in the dark, sir. Don't you think you could let me in
on this a leetle bit more? If you follow what I mean, sir?"

"We are all working in the dark. That's exactly why I have had to come
to you."

"But couldn't you just give me a line, sir, on the way you want things
to turn out? I mean, for instance, Motive. You've considered that point,
no doubt, sir. I presoom there was some motive for somebody to do away
with the gentleman. If you could let me have a wrinkle or two on what's
in your mind, then I should know the sort of somebody I'm wanted to
find, and save us both a lot of trouble."

Motive! It was impossible not to realize that Elderson had put his
finger on the weak spot in the whole project. But if he was to be of any
use, it was clearly inadvisable to make him a present of the fact.

"I can't say anything about that at the moment," Stephen said with his
hand on the door. Then a sudden thought struck him. "One moment," he
added. "There is another matter which I should like you to look into and
deal with in your report. Please be very careful to find out whether
anybody on the night in question, or thereabouts, changed his room."

The speed with which Elderson saw the relevance of the remark did a good
deal to raise him in Stephen's estimation.

"I take your point, sir," he said. "I take your point. If there was
anything of that kind going on, and if the room where the gentleman was
put away was the one that was changed, it does open up vistas, so to
speak, doesn't it, sir?"

After which Stephen walked out into the street. Elderson had been
confident that his report would be ready within three days. It seemed a
short enough time for the work, unless the man was a good deal more
efficient than he appeared, but long enough in all conscience to wait.
He turned into the first cinema he came to, and spent the first
half-hour of those three days aimlessly contemplating records of events
which seemed almost as fantastic and unreal as the mission that had
brought him to Shaftesbury Avenue.

                 *        *        *        *        *

The time passed more quickly and with less strain than any of the family
might have feared. Stephen saw comparatively little of Anne and Martin,
and this was on the whole just as well. Since the interview with the
Insurance Company's representative, he had re-established a _modus
vivendi_ with his sister, and they had relapsed into the easy-going
relationship which had characterized their lives hitherto. A union that
dates from the nursery is not easily dissolved. It can survive quarrels
and explosions calculated to wreck nine marriages out of ten, possibly
if only because the parties to it can take so much more for granted and
are so much more ready to recognize what is forbidden territory. So far
as Anne was concerned, her relations with Martin were clearly labelled,
"Trespassers will be Prosecuted," and while Stephen kept to his side of
the fence no questions were asked. She had not forgotten his attitude
towards his future brother-in-law--it was not in her nature to do
so--but she was quite capable of putting the cause of dissent away at
the back of her mind, and behaving thereafter as if it did not exist.
She gave no indication whether she had ever so much as mentioned the
subject to Martin (what they did talk about when they were alone
together was one of the problems that Stephen could never resolve), and
Martin's manner to him was no more and no less cordial than it had been
before. At the same time, a state of peace that depends on ignoring the
existence of a cardinal fact is at the best an insecure affair and it
was natural enough that the persons concerned should have agreed by
common consent not to endanger it by too close association. Whether at
Anne's instigation or not, Martin had suddenly developed a passion for
what he described as "jaunts" into the countryside. Every morning his
squat, tubby two-seater, looking strangely characteristic of its owner,
would carry her away from Plane Street, to deposit her there again late
in the long August evening, tired but bright-eyed, and with a strong
smell of pipe tobacco clinging to her clothes. It was an arrangement
that solved the problem of filling in the period of waiting very
satisfactorily for two out of the three.

Engaged couples, in any case, are never supposed to feel, or at all
events to admit that they feel, any boredom so long as they are
together. Stephen, who was not engaged or likely to be, had resigned
himself to a period of more or less unrelieved idleness and depression.
But on the day following his call on Mr. Elderson, he unexpectedly found
an outlet for his energies. He was sitting after breakfast, gloomily
running over the financial columns in the morning paper, when his mother
came into the room.

"How are the stocks and shares this morning?" she asked.

"Pretty mouldy," he mumbled.

"Have you been gambling again?" The matter-of-fact way in which the
question was put robbed it of offence. Actually, Mrs. Dickinson disliked
her son's habit, and the dislike was a matter of common knowledge to
them both. They did not refer to it more than was necessary, and the
present inquiry was recognized as a mere request for information.

"A bit, yes," he answered.

"Talking of gambles," she went on, "I rather wanted to talk over this
question with you."

It was unnecessary for her to say which question she meant. Since the
production of the letter from Mr. Jelks on the evening after the funeral
there had been only one question in the family, overshadowing every
other.

Stephen put down his paper reluctantly.

"Must you, Mother?" he said. "And what has it to do with gambling, in
any case?"

"Well, it is a gamble, isn't it?" she answered good-humouredly. "A very
big gamble indeed, with a lot of money at stake. I imagine that is why
it appeals to you. But what I wanted to ask you in particular was this:
Why do you think that anybody should have had any interest in murdering
your father?"

Stephen groaned.

"That's what they all keep on saying! I think that--but look here,
Mother, this isn't a question I feel like discussing with you, of all
people."

"But after all, why not?" said his mother placidly. "If everybody is
asking the question, why shouldn't I? You know, Stephen, you have
started this hare, and you can't complain of anybody else chasing it. As
I told you before I feel that all this concerns you much more than it
does me, and that is why I have allowed you to take your own course in
the matter of the Insurance Company. At the same time, I can't help
being interested in what is going on, and I have been thinking over it a
good deal, just as an abstract problem. I've been glad to have something
to occupy my mind." She smiled at him, and added: "You mustn't be
shocked at me. It's only natural."

"No, I'm not shocked exactly," said Stephen. "Only I--"

"Only you wish I wouldn't talk about it. It seems to me to come to very
much the same thing. Well, I'm sorry, but I intend to talk about it. If
I am to accept, even for the sake of argument, that somebody has
murdered my husband, it is of some importance to me who that somebody
is. You don't feel like enlightening me, Stephen?"

"It isn't that I don't feel like enlightening you, Mother, exactly. But
at this stage, I am a bit in the dark myself."

"Are you, really?"

Something in his mother's voice made Stephen look up sharply. For a
moment he suspected that she was laughing at him. But her face remained
quite serious.

"In that case," she went on, "it might be rather helpful to talk it over
with someone else. Now, for instance, taking a detached view of the
matter, suppose this was a case of murder--a clear case of murder, I
mean, with a verdict of 'person or persons unknown' at the inquest--who
do you suppose the police would begin by suspecting?"

Stephen looked at her vaguely.

"I dunno," he muttered.

"Come, come, Stephen! Where are your wits?" She was speaking to him now
in exactly the same tones that she had employed, years ago, when he was
stumbling over his first reading lessons. "The first people the police
always suspect in such cases are the family."

"But good heavens, Mother, you don't mean--"

"The family," she repeated. It was now, at least, clear that Mrs.
Dickinson was giving her somewhat disconcerting sense of humour free
rein. "Especially, of course, the widow. Seriously, Stephen, I can't
help feeling a little glad that I was away at Bournemouth all the time.
I, at all events, have a very satisfactory alibi."

"Mother, I hate to hear you talk like this!"

"Never mind," said Mrs. Dickinson heartlessly. "It's good for me. After
the widow, I suppose, come the rest of the immediate relations. You and
Anne are safe enough it seems, with Klosters doing duty for Bournemouth
in your case. Then there's Martin. Is he provided with an alibi, too?"

"Really, I've no idea. I haven't asked him."

"Well, I'm not suggesting that you should. It might not make for good
feeling in the family, and I'm old-fashioned enough to think that of
more importance than quite a lot of money. But it is the kind of
question the police would ask, isn't it? Then, I suppose, if Martin
satisfied them, they'd go on to the rest of the family. I'm not so sure
about that," she added doubtfully. "Do they include brothers and
cousins?"

"Where they are like Uncle George or Robert, I should be in favor of
including them every time. Not to mention Uncle Edward, _and_ The Holy
Terror. Would you like me to start round cross-examining them straight
away?"

"Perhaps on the whole it would be wiser not to. Let's suppose, though,
that the police have seen all these people, and asked all those
questions, and found nothing. They are still looking for the person with
the motive to commit the crime. Where do they look next?"

"That depends on the kind of man who was murdered, I should imagine."

"The kind of man--exactly! So they have to set to work to find out what
kind of man he was. They may have a good deal of difficulty doing
that--almost as much difficulty as you would have in asking inconvenient
questions of your Uncle George. Perhaps we have an advantage over them
there, though."

"What is all this leading up to?" asked Stephen, who was evidently now
at last genuinely interested.

His mother, as always, still preferred the oblique approach.

"What kind of man would you say your father was?" she asked.

It was not a very easy question to answer.

"Well, I don't suppose anybody could call him a very friendly bloke,"
Stephen said at last.

"But you wouldn't have thought him the sort of person to have many
enemies--mortal enemies?"

"No, certainly not, so far as I know."

"So far as you know," she echoed softly. "I suppose that's as much as
any of us could say--so far as we know. Perhaps it's rather a reflection
on our life as a family that we can't go further than that. But at all
events one could hardly expect the police to know more than we do on
that point, if as much. They would find that he was retired and living
on his pension, so that there was no question of anybody wishing to
remove him out of rivalry, or wanting his position, or anything of that
kind. They would find no evidence of quarrels or disturbances--outside
the family, and we have dealt with them--to make any one anxious to take
his life, _so far as we know_--that is, so long as we have known him.
That is right, is it not?"

"Yes."

"So our imaginary police," Mrs. Dickinson went on, "would have to go
further and further back in their searches, if they had the means to.
And that is where I say we have the advantage over them."

Mrs. Dickinson pursed her lips and her hand went up in the familiar
automatic gesture to her hair.

"How much do you know about your father's early life?" she asked.

"Nothing at all. Except for a few reminiscences about Pendlebury, and
they seemed to date mostly from his childhood, he never told me anything
about it. That was one of the rather uncanny things about Father--he
seemed to be so self-contained, so to speak. One felt he was living in a
vacuum."

She nodded.

"Exactly. And do you know, Stephen, you may think me a strangely
incurious person, but I knew hardly any more than you did."

"Oh!" said Stephen in disappointment. "I thought you were going to tell
me something useful."

"I am. Something interesting, at any rate. How far it will be useful to
you I don't know, but I fancy that the police we have been imagining
would have thought it worth listening to. The point is, you see, that I
know rather more about it now than I did when he was alive."

She rose and went to her desk. From a drawer she took out a thick bundle
of letters, held together by elastic bands which had grown slack with
age.

"I found these last night," she explained, "put away among your father's
things."

Stephen glanced at them. He noticed that the letter at the top of the
pile was still in its envelope, and that this bore a penny stamp with
King Edward VII's head upon it.

"This looks like ancient history," he observed.

"Very ancient history, some of it. I told you we should have to go a
long way back, didn't I? But if you take the trouble to go through it,
as I have, you may find that it has some bearing on quite recent
history. At any rate, it will be an occupation for you. I'm afraid you
are finding the present rather a dull and anxious time."

"Have you been inventing all this just because you thought I wanted
something to do?" he asked in some annoyance.

Mrs. Dickinson smiled.

"It _is_ good for you to have something to do, you must admit," she
said. "And at the same time these things may be of real help to you. I
think, in any case, that they are matters that you ought to know about.
When you have read them, come and talk them over with me, and I dare say
I shall be able to explain anything in them which you don't understand."

Stephen took the letters away to what had been his father's study. He
sat down at the ugly great desk which loomed over the ugly small room
and began to read. He was still reading when the gong went for lunch.

"Well?" his mother asked when they met at table.

"I've read them nearly all."

"Yes?"

"And this afternoon I'm going to read them again. I think it's all
rather horrible, but I suppose I must go through with it."

Mrs. Dickinson raised her eyebrows at her son's evident disgust, but did
not allude to it.

"Do, dear," she said amiably, then changed the subject.

Late that afternoon she went into the study. Stephen was just putting
the letters back again into the bands that had contained them. He looked
up when she came in but said nothing.

"Well," she said, sitting down in the room's only arm-chair, "did you
find the letters interesting?"

"Interesting?" Stephen made a face. "I thought them disgusting."

"Really, Stephen," said Mrs. Dickinson, "it is a pity that you are such
a puritan. It makes you so--so ungrown-up. This sort of thing is all
perfectly natural, you know. I sometimes think if you were a little more
normal in these ways you wouldn't gamble so much."

"If by normal," said Stephen loftily, "you mean behaving in a thoroughly
beastly way--"

"No, of course I don't. I mean taking a reasonable interest in the other
sex, which is just what you never do. The moment you see a girl becoming
in the least friendly you drop her like a hot potato. There was that
nice Downing girl, for example. However, that isn't what I came in here
to say. Tell me what impression you got from your reading."

"Really, Mother, I'd much rather not discuss these things with you."

"Nonsense! Of course you must discuss them. If you're afraid to talk
about it, I'm not. What do these letters amount to, in any case? Simply
that your father as a young man had an intrigue with a young woman, that
there was trouble about it with _his_ father and that he threw her over
at a rather awkward moment for her. Then she had a child, in the
inconvenient way in which these women always do seem to have children,
and your father duly paid up for him until he was sixteen--which I
believe is as long as the law can compel anyone to pay in such
circumstances." She laughed softly. "It was just like him, you know, to
fulfil his strict legal liability and no more."

"It's a pretty disgraceful story," said Stephen hotly.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Perhaps it is. It is certainly a very old one. The child--it was a boy,
wasn't it?--must be about ten years older than you."

"That means that Father was still paying for him long after he married,
without saying a word to you about it!"

"That was just as well, perhaps. I might not have been quite so
philosophical about it then as I am now. But we've only told half the
story so far. The letters start again quite recently, after a long
interval, don't they?"

"Yes, and this time they are from somebody who calls himself, 'Your
injured son, Richard.' "

"Your half-brother, Stephen."

"Please don't rub it in. I suppose those letters are the reason why you
wanted me to read the whole bundle. They seem to be in the nature of
threats to Father. Apparently he claims that he has only recently
discovered his parentage, that he is down on his luck, and thinks that
he has a right to some assistance from Father."

"Exactly. And he expresses himself somewhat violently when he finds that
he is not going to get any."

"Well, I suppose it is just possible that all this might be of some use,
except for two things. The injured son doesn't give an address, except a
Post Office in London, and we don't know his name. He merely says, in
one of the letters, 'I have taken my mother's name.' And her letters are
signed, not very helpfully, 'Fanny.' "

"That was just where I thought I might be able to help you," said Mrs.
Dickinson.

"Good Heavens, Mother! You don't mean to say that you know this woman?"

"Not exactly. But I have an idea who she is. Do you remember your uncle
Arthur's will?"

"Yes, of course I do. What has that got to do with it?"

"Simply this. The woman to whom half the money was to go after your
father's death was named Frances Annie March."

"But why on earth should Uncle Arthur want to benefit Father's old
mistress?"

"It sounds a peculiar thing to do, doesn't it? But then Arthur was
rather a strange man--as most of the Dickinsons were, I'm afraid. He had
so often said that he meant to keep the money he had made in the family,
that I feel it would be quite like him, when he fell out with us, to see
that it went to the illegitimate branch. He would feel that he was
keeping his word and injuring us at the same time."

"But that's no more than guesswork. Just because the woman's called
Fanny, it doesn't prove that she's the same one."

"No. But if you look at some of the earlier letters, the affectionate
ones, you'll find that they are signed, not 'Fanny,' but 'Fannyanny.' If
you've had the misfortune to be christened Frances Annie, 'Fannyanny' is
just the kind of nickname you would acquire, don't you think?"

Stephen looked at his mother as if he were seeing her for the first
time.

"You ought to have been a detective," he said.

"At all events, if the imaginary police we were discussing just now had
found out what we have done, I think they would consider it a clue worth
following up. So I can only suggest that while you are waiting for any
information that that man in Shaftesbury Avenue can collect for you, you
should do what you can to investigate the identity of Frances Annie
March."

Stephen rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"These letters establish the date of Richard's birth, more or less," he
said. "I suppose Somerset House will do the rest. I'll go there first
thing tomorrow. Meanwhile, we'll keep this to ourselves. We needn't say
anything to the others unless there turns out to be something in it."

So it was that after all Stephen found plenty of business to occupy him
during the ensuing two days.




                              CHAPTER NINE


                            Elderson Reports

                         Saturday, August 26th

The three days which Jas. Elderson had allowed himself to complete his
inquiries at Pendlebury were past. The first post on the morning of the
fourth brought only bills and circulars to Plane Street. Stephen and
Anne looked at each other silently and disgustedly across the
breakfast-table. There was no need for words. The fellow had let them
down. The moment when they would be able to do something towards the
investigation of the mystery was once more postponed, and for how long?
Each of them realized for the first time how great the strain of waiting
had been, and how insufferable was the prospect of bearing much more of
it.

"Of course," said Anne, speaking for the first time that morning, "I
always thought three days was rather a short time to allow himself. But
if he found it wasn't enough, he ought to have given us an interim
report--something to go on with, at least."

"Um," said Stephen, and said no more.

Immediately after breakfast he went out, asking Anne to await his return
at the house. The weather had broken, and a gusty south-west wind was
driving thin showers of rain before it. The skirts of his mackintosh
wrapped themselves around his trouser legs in an embrace that became
progressively damper and more affectionate as he walked. It was a
depressing day, and even the warm synthetic air of the Underground was
welcome in contrast to the outside world.

Stephen had to ring twice at the door of Jas. Elderson's office before
receiving any answer. When at last the door was opened, he found himself
looking into the large grey eyes of a totally unknown young woman. She
was undeniably good-looking, tall above the average, and somewhat
dauntingly self-possessed. For a moment, recollecting the uncouth and
grimy office-boy who had received him on the last occasion, he wondered
whether he had stopped at the wrong landing, and he endeavoured to look
past her to reassure himself by reading the name upon the door. He was
aware as he did so that she was observing his embarrassment with a
certain calm amusement.

"Do you want anything?" she asked, just as he had made up his mind that
he was right after all. Her voice, without being particularly cultured,
was quiet and pleasing.

"Is Mr. Elderson in?" said Stephen.

"I'm afraid he's not available today," was the reply. "Monday, I expect.
In fact, I'm sure he'll be available all Monday."

"I particularly wanted to see him today," Stephen persisted. "Do you
know where I could get hold of him, perhaps?"

She shook her head.

"Not today," she repeated. "Perhaps I can help you. What name is it?"

"Dickinson."

Her face cleared.

"Oh, Mr. Dickinson! Have you come about the Pendlebury matter?"

"Yes. Mr. Elderson promised me his report this morning, and I haven't
had it. He knew that it was extremely urgent, and I--"

"Will you come inside?" she said, and stood on one side to let him pass.
She closed the door behind him and then said: "If you don't mind waiting
here a moment, I'll see whether it is ready for you."

Stephen waited in the narrow little hall while she went through into the
passage within. Presently she returned, with an odd expression on her
face which he tried in vain to interpret.

"I'm afraid you'll have to come in here to help me," she observed, and
led the way into the office.

Mr. Elderson was sitting at a table littered with sheets of paper. His
arms were spread out in front of him and his head was pillowed on his
arms. He was breathing deeply and from time to time uttering a loud
snore. A completely empty whisky bottle was beside him and a glass lay
broken on the floor. The stench of spirit and stale tobacco smoke lay
heavy upon the air.

"You see," said the young woman, calmly, "the trouble is that he's
sitting on a lot of the papers. And he's too heavy for me to move. If
you wouldn't mind lifting him up a bit, I could slide the chair out from
underneath him and get them, and then put it back again."

Under her tranquil influence it seemed the most ordinary operation in
the world. With his left hand pressing on Mr. Elderson's back and his
right hand heaving at Mr. Elderson's fleshy thighs, Stephen contrived to
shift him upwards and forwards just enough to allow her dexterously to
disengage the chair, sweep from it the warm and crumpled papers upon the
seat and replace it before Stephen's aching muscles gave under the
strain. During this process, Mr. Elderson muttered a few inarticulate
words of protest and as soon as it was completed was sound asleep once
more.

"Thanks," she said. "I think I've got it all now." She gathered up the
sheets from the table and added them to those recovered from the chair.
"I'll just arrange them in order. Luckily he always numbers his pages.
Shall I put them in an envelope for you?"

"Yes--please do," Stephen gasped. "But is it--I mean, how do you
know--is it all right, I mean?"

She paused in the act of licking the flap of a large square envelope.

"All right?" she asked. "Oh, the report, you mean. Yes, that will be all
in order, you'll find. He never starts on _that_"--she nodded towards
the bottle on the table--"until he's finished the job. It's a kind of
reaction, you see. The only trouble is that when he starts he never
knows where to stop. That's why . . ." She shrugged her shoulders and
left the sentence uncompleted. "He got back pretty late from Pendlebury
yesterday and must have been working here nearly all night." She held
out the envelope to him. "Here you are, Mr. Dickinson," she said, in a
tone that seemed to indicate some haste to be rid of him. "I'm sorry
you've had the trouble of coming down here."

Stephen took the envelope and stuffed it into the pocket of his
mackintosh.

"Thank you," he said. "But"--he looked once more at the sprawling
creature at the table--"are you going to stay on here alone? I can't get
you any help or anything?"

Her mouth straightened into a hard, narrow line.

"No, thank you," she said. "I shall be quite all right. Let me show you
out."

On the doorstep, Stephen said: "Well, goodbye, and thank you for helping
me, Miss--er--Miss--"

"Elderson," she said sharply, and shut the door.

                 *        *        *        *        *

As he had expected, Stephen found Martin with Anne when he returned
home. They were in the study, Martin deep in the arm-chair in a cloud of
acrid smoke, while Anne crouched at his feet on a foot-stool in an
attitude of adoration.

"Morning, Steve," said Martin without getting up. "Nuisance about this
detective feller. Annie's just been telling me."

"Did you manage to see him?" Anne asked.

"Oh, yes. I saw him all right," said Stephen.

"What had he got to say for himself?"

"He hadn't exactly a great deal to say for himself. But I've got his
report."

Martin, as Stephen feared he would do, greeted the news with "Good egg!"
and added, "Does it amount to much?"

"That," said Stephen, "is what we are now going to see."

He produced the envelope, still sealed, and began to open it. To his
extreme annoyance he found his fingers trembling as he did so and for a
moment or two he fumbled helplessly with the flap.

"Yes," observed Martin, watching him. "It is rather an excitin' moment,
isn't it?"

Stephen, once more caught unawares by his prospective brother-in-law's
penetration and annoyed by finding himself its victim, frowned hideously
and at last succeeded in tearing the envelope and removing the contents.
Written in a large copper-plate hand that flowed generously over sheet
after sheet of ruled foolscap paper, these proved at a glance that Miss
Elderson's account of her father's habits was correct. There could be no
doubt that they were the work of a man who, at the time of writing them,
was stone-cold sober. He smoothed out the pages where they had been
crumpled by the pressure of their author's large posterior, cleared his
throat, and began to read.

The document was headed in the starchy official manner that was no doubt
a relic of the author's police service: " '_To_ Stephen Dickinson, Esq.
_From_ Jas. Elderson, private inquiry agent. _Re_ Occurrence at
Pendlebury Old Hall Hotel, Markshire.' " It continued, in numbered
paragraphs:

" '1. Pursuant to your instructions of the 22nd inst., I proceeded
forthwith to Pendlebury Old Hall Hotel, arriving there at approximately
8.30 p.m. I registered in the name of Eaton, and, the hour being
somewhat late to commence prosecuting inquiries, occupied myself during
the evening with familiarizing myself with the hotel staff and
ascertaining the geography of the place.' "

"Funny phrase, that," remarked Martin. "I don't suppose he means the
same thing as we generally mean by it, eh, Steve?"

"Shut up, you ass," said Anne softly.

" '2. During the succeeding two days, I succeeded in interviewing all
the members of the hotel staff who appeared likely to be of any
assistance, in inspecting the hotel register and obtaining their
comments upon the same. I prolonged my stay at the hotel for the purpose
of taking a statement from one important witness, the waitress Susan
Carter, who was on her holiday and only returned to work on the morning
of the 25th inst. I found all the persons interviewed quite willing to
give me all the information within their power. The explanation of this
fact, which was contrary to my anticipation and to past experience in
like matters, appeared to be due--'

"Lord! What English this blighter writes!" said Stephen, breaking off.
"Damn all board schools!"

"Don't be a prig," said Anne. "Go on."

" '--appeared to be due to their mistaken belief that I was acting in
the interests of the British Imperial Insurance Company. It transpired
that a representative of that concern had already visited the Hotel and
made inquiries with a view to possible litigation. By representing to
the persons concerned that the interests of the establishment coincided
with those of the Company in suppressing any further publicity attaching
to the death of the late Mr. Dickinson, and, as I have reason to
believe, by a lavish disbursement of funds, the representative had
succeeded in securing their whole-hearted co-operation. I thought it
wise not to undeceive the persons in question as to my identity and was
accordingly able to secure the maximum of information with the minimum
of outlay (as to which, see Exes sheet, forwarded to Messrs. Jelks &
Co., pursuant to instructions).

" '3. The only other preliminary matter which I should mention is that
on the last day of my residence at the Hotel an individual whom I have
reason for thinking to be a plain-clothes detective of the local
constabulary also arrived and commenced to make inquiries, which I was
able to ascertain were related to the matter in question. In consequence
of the facts set out in Para. 2, above, the personnel of the Hotel were
unwilling to give the individual whom I have mentioned any assistance,
but I am unable to state precisely what form his inquiries took or how
far the same were successful.' "

"The insurance blokes haven't wasted much time, have they?" Martin
observed. "But what are the police poking about for? I thought you said,
Steve, that they wouldn't touch this thing with a barge-pole?"

"I hope I never said anything so banal," answered Stephen curtly,
preparing to read on.

"But wait a bit," said Anne in some excitement. "This is important,
isn't it? If the police are making inquiries, doesn't that look as if
they weren't satisfied with the inquest verdict after all?"

"Whether it's important or not," said her brother crossly, "do you want
to hear what this man has to say? Or shall I take it away and read it to
myself?"

After which little display of temper, the reading continued without
further interruption:

" '4. The hotel consists of three floors only, having been originally
constructed as a private residence. The guests' bedrooms are all
accommodated on the first floor, the ground floor rooms being
sitting-rooms and the second or attic floor comprising the apartments of
the chambermaids and waitresses. There is also an annexe for additional
accommodation. I formed the impression that business at the
establishment was not brisk, for the annexe was wholly unoccupied at the
time in question, and of the eleven bedrooms in the main building two
were vacant. I append a sketch-map showing the position of the various
rooms, all of which, it will be observed, open off a central corridor,
which runs the length of the house.

[Illustration:  _Sketch Plan of the First Floor of Pendlebury Old Hall,
Markshire_ ]

" '5. On the night of the 13th August, to which I was directed to
confine my attention, the following rooms were occupied, as under:

" '_No. 1._ Mr. & Mrs. E. M. J. Carstairs, of 14 Ormidale Crescent,
Brighton. Arrived on the 12th August by car; left on the 14th after
lunch. A middle-aged couple. The only details that I was able to obtain
concerning them were that Mr. Carstairs was interested in local
antiquities, and delayed his departure in order to obtain a rubbing of
the brasses in Pendlebury church.

" '_No. 2._ Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop, of The Grange, North Bentby, Lincs.
Arrived on the 5th August; being met at the station by the hotel
conveyance, left on the 19th August. An elderly lady, presumed to be a
widow. Well known in the hotel, where she makes a habit of staying for a
fortnight in each year, though not always at the same time of year.
Mention of her name caused some amusement to the staff. I gathered that
her character was in some degree peculiar, and the head housemaid went
so far as to say that "she acted unusual for a lady." So far as I was
able to determine, the imputation was that her behaviour was not
altogether consonant with her social status, but I could find nothing
against her character.

" '_No. 3._ Mr. P. Howard-Blenkinsop, of the same address. A young man,
understood to be the son of the above. He seems to have been of a quiet
and retiring disposition. The head waiter expressed the opinion that he
was "a natural," which I ascertained to be a local expression,
reflecting on his mental qualities and not on his legitimacy: I gathered
that during his stay he did little or nothing all day, beyond keeping
his mother company and reading light literature.

" '_No. 4._ Mr. & Mrs. M. Jones, of 15 Parbury Gardens, London, S.W. 7.
Arrived on the evening of the 13th August by car; left on the morning of
the 14th. A young couple. Opinion in the hotel seemed divided as to
whether they were on their honeymoon or not married at all. It was
agreed that their behaviour was "lover-like." The reception clerk
recollected that the girl giggled a good deal while the register was
being signed. I could not obtain any exact description of either, except
that she was, in the words of the chambermaid, "a flash little thing"
and he was "nothing much to look at, but acted like a gentleman." I
formed the opinion that this referred to the size of her gratuity. I
ascertained that they reached the hotel at about 8.30 p.m. while dinner
was being served, and had some cold food sent up to their room on a tray
about 9.0 p.m. The waitress who served them remembered the occasion
particularly well, because of the extra trouble involved. She also
recollected that they breakfasted in bed next morning, at about the time
that the disturbance occasioned by the death of Mr. Dickinson was at its
height.

" '_No. 5._ Vacant.

" '_No. 6._ Mr. J. S. Vanning. See as to this gentleman, remarks re Mr.
Parsons, below.

" '_No. 7._ Mr. J. Mallett. I am instructed that this individual is
already known to you.

" '_No. 8._ Vacant.

" '_No. 9._ Mr. Robert C. Parsons. Arrived for tea on the 13th by cab
from the station; left on the morning of the 14th. A middle-aged man. He
is particularly well remembered by the office staff for the reasons
following, viz.: He had reserved accommodation by letter, asking for a
room with two beds and a single room, adjoining if possible. Room 9,
which is a double room, and No. 11, next to it, had accordingly been
reserved for him. Some surprise was therefore expressed when he appeared
by himself. He explained that he suffered very badly from insomnia, and
had found that he could obtain some relief by changing from one bed to
another during the course of the night; hence his desire for a double
room. The other room, he said, was for a friend who would be joining him
later. The reception clerk remembered that when she asked the name of
the friend he was unable or unwilling to give it, but merely said that
he would be mentioning his (Mr. Parson's) name. Mr. Parsons was shown
his room and No. 11, adjoining, which is the best single room in the
house. He expressed himself as pleased with them. A little later,
however, Mr. Leonard Dickinson arrived at the hotel, on foot. He was of
course well known to the management, having stayed there on numerous
occasions. It was also understood that whenever he visited the hotel,
room No. 11, if not occupied, should be kept for him. Indeed it had
happened in the past that guests had been asked to change their rooms to
suit Mr. Dickinson, who was, it is alleged, apt to make difficulties
when crossed in any way. In this instance, No. 11 not being actually
occupied, Mr. Dickinson was installed there, and on Mr. Parson's guest
arriving (by car, shortly before dinner), he was put into No. 6, being
the only vacant single room. The guest registered in the name of J. S.
Vanning, and the only address given was London. Mr. Parsons similarly
gave no address, other than the town of Midchester. I was, however, able
to get a sight of his letter reserving the rooms, and this was written
on the note-paper of the Conservative Club of that city. There seems no
doubt from what I was told that Mr. Parsons was in poor health. More
than one witness remarked on his pallor and nervousness. As to Mr.
Vanning, I could obtain no particulars whatever. He does not seem to
have had any noticeable features at all. I should add that the two
persons in question did not leave the hotel together. Mr. Vanning
breakfasted early and left soon after 8 a.m. Mr. Parsons did not come
down till later and seemed surprised and upset that his friend had
already gone. It was pointed out to him, however, that Mr. Vanning had
settled his own account. I was unable to ascertain whether this fact
reassured him or not.

" '_No. 10._ Mr. Stewart Davitt, of 42 Hawk Street, London, W.C. Arrived
the 10th August, by train and hotel conveyance; left on the 14th by the
same. This gentleman was described to me by one of the staff as "the
mystery man." It appears that from the time of his arrival up to his
departure he did not go outside the hotel, and, indeed, only rarely left
his room. He is said to have explained that he was engaged upon work of
a vitally important character and needed absolute rest and quiet. All
his meals were served in his room. I was told that he was "a
nice-looking young man," but could obtain no further particulars of his
appearance. On the evening of the 13th, he asked for his account, and
said that it would be necessary for him to catch the earliest fast train
to London from Swanbury Junction, some eight miles away. This involved
his leaving the hotel at approximately 6.30 a.m. the next morning, which
he duly did, being driven to the station by the car attached to the
hotel. In view of the decidedly unusual circumstances attending this
person, I endeavoured to obtain further particulars concerning him, but
without success. I was unable to ascertain anything _re_ his work, about
which, it seems, he was extremely reticent. It is to be presumed that it
was of a literary nature.

" '_No. 11._ Mr. Leonard Dickinson.

" '6. The above information comprises all that I was able to ascertain
_re_ the matters to which my instructions were confined. I took the
liberty, however, of pursuing my investigations somewhat further, with a
view to discovering any matter which might throw light on the death of
the deceased. I therefore venture to append the following.

" '7. The deceased retired to bed on the night of the 13th August, at
approximately 10.45 p.m. Before doing so, he went to the reception
office and asked (_a_) that a pot of china tea with a slice of lemon
should be sent up to his room in about a quarter of an hour's time, and
(_b_) that his breakfast should be served to him in bed the next morning
at 9.0 a.m. (_a_) was duly performed; it was when he was called next
morning prior to (_b_) that his death was discovered. Death was found to
be due to the deceased having swallowed a quantity of Medinal overnight.
These matters were, I am given to understand, investigated in the
ordinary way at the inquest, the assumption being that the deceased took
the fatal dose in the tea. This remained an assumption only, due to the
fact that the teapot and cup had been removed and washed before the fact
of death was discovered. It seemed to be a reasonable one, however, and
I deemed it desirable to proceed upon the basis that it was correct, the
question being whether anybody other than the deceased could have
inserted the poison in the tea.

" '8. I accordingly proceeded to question the two persons who seemed
most likely to assist on this question, viz. Miss Rosie Belling,
chambermaid, and Miss Susan Carter, waitress (whom I have already
mentioned, _supra_, Para. 2). Miss Belling was not very helpful. All
that she could say was that at approximately 8.15 a.m. on the morning of
the 14th August she went into room No. 11 and removed from it the tray
with the teapot and cup upon it. Mr. Dickinson having given orders for
breakfast in bed at 9.0 a.m., she would not normally have gone into his
room at that hour, but for the fact that, several other guests having
demanded tea in the morning, there was a shortage of tea-sets, following
an accident on the staircase two mornings before. On this occasion,
seeing the deceased apparently still asleep, she merely removed the tray
and went out again without attempting to disturb him. On returning,
shortly before 9.0 a.m., to inquire whether he was ready for breakfast,
the fact of his death was ascertained, by which time the teapot and cup
had been washed and used by another guest.

" '9. Miss Carter's evidence at the inquest was confined to the fact
that she took a tray up to the deceased's room on the night in question.
In answer to my inquiries, however, she was able to describe her
movements in very much more detail. It appears that this particular
evening was an unusually busy one for her, so far as work upstairs was
concerned. For besides taking the tea-tray to No. 11, she also had to
take up dinner as usual to Mr. Davitt (No. 10), supper to Mr. and Mrs.
Jones (No. 4) and hot water, sugar, lemon, and whisky to Mr. Vanning
(No. 6). In fact, she had somewhat of a grievance _re_ the amount of
fetching and carrying that had to be done, especially in regard to No.
4, for it appears that these persons, having originally ordered a meal
downstairs, changed their minds at the last moment. So far as I was able
to ascertain, she visited the bedroom floor of the hotel four times
during the course of the evening, as follows:

" '8.15 p.m. Taking dinner to No. 10.

" '9.0 p.m. Taking supper to No. 4, and removing dinner-tray from No.
10.

" '10.0 p.m. Removing supper-tray from No. 4.

" '11.0 p.m. Taking tea to No. 11 and hot water, etc. to No. 6.

" '10. I asked Miss Carter whether she had observed anything unusual in
the manner of the deceased on bringing him his tea, and in reply she
stated that on that occasion she had not seen him at all, but had only
heard his voice. She explained that from her previous experience of the
deceased, upon whom she had waited during several former visits of his
to the hotel, she knew him to have a particular distaste to the presence
of anybody, particularly any female, in his bedroom when he was, or
might be, incompletely attired. Accordingly she merely knocked at the
door, informed him of the fact that his tea was awaiting him and went
away, leaving the tray in the corridor. Asked whether she had followed
the same procedure in the case of Mr. Vanning she professed difficulty
in recollecting the same, but finally stated that she was of opinion
that on her knocking at his door he had himself opened it and taken the
tray from her hand.

" '11. In view of the obvious significance of the facts stated in Para.
10 above, I deemed it advisable to inquire as to who of the residents in
the hotel were in their rooms at the time when the tray was left outside
No. 11. Miss Carter, having ascended to the first floor from the kitchen
premises by the service staircase, was unable to state who was still in
the lounge or smoking-room on the ground floor, and apart from Mr.
Vanning, she saw nobody on the first floor at that time. One of the
bathrooms was being used as she passed along the corridor, but she was
unable to say which it was. The remainder of the staff were uncertain in
their recollection on the point, but by collating all the evidence
available, I was able to arrive at the conclusion that the following
were at 11.0 p.m. almost certainly in their rooms:

                           Mr. Vanning.
                           Mr. Dickinson.
                           Mr. Davitt.
                           Mr. & Mrs. Jones.
                           Mr. Parsons.

" 'The following were in all probability in their rooms:

                         Mr. Howard-Blenkinsop.
                         Mrs. Carstairs.
                         Mr. Mallett.

" 'As to the remainder, Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop sat on in the lounge
after her son had gone to bed, endeavouring to finish a game of
patience, and Mr. Carstairs, after retiring at the same time as Mrs.
Carstairs, shortly returned again to the lounge, where he gave some
assistance to Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop in her game. I was able to
ascertain positively that the lights were extinguished before midnight,
and that these two individuals were the last to retire.

" '12. With regard to the management and staff, I was unsuccessful in
obtaining any information to the detriment of these. The deceased
appears to have been regarded as an asset to the establishment rather
than otherwise, and I could not find any evidence suggesting that a
motive was present for procuring his death so far as they were
concerned. They appeared to be a respectable body of individuals, though
in some respects deficient from the viewpoint of efficiency.

" '13. The above concludes my inquiries at Pendlebury Old Hall Hotel,
and I await further instructions.

                                                       " '(Signed)
                                                   " 'JAS. ELDERSON.' "




                              CHAPTER TEN


                            Plan of Campaign

                         Saturday, August 26th

Stephen finished his reading and looked round at his audience. Anne,
from her foot-stool, was regarding the carpet with an air of intense
concentration. Martin was making notes with a stubby pencil on the back
of an old envelope. He continued to do so for some moments after
Stephen's voice had ceased, and then looked up.

"May I have a look at the blighter's plan of the course, Stevie, old
son?" he asked.

Stephen handed him the plan, and Martin gave it a cursory glance through
his thick spectacles.

"Thanks," he said, giving it back. "Well, we've got all the doings now,
haven't we? I plump for Davitt, myself. Room next door and all, he'd
have heard the girl knock on your guv'nor's door. Then all he had to do
was to pop out and bung the stuff in the tea-pot. It's an open and shut
case, _I_ think. Don't you think so, Annie?"

Anne said, without looking up:

"There seem to have been a lot of odd people in that hotel. What about
Vanning and Parsons? Parsons was a bad sleeper--he may very well have
had Medinal with him. And then there are the Joneses--"

"Nothing odd about them. Just a couple out loose on the spree. It would
have been much odder if there hadn't been a pair like that in a country
hotel at the week-end. No, put your shirt on Davitt, the man of mystery,
first favourite in the murderer's stakes. What do you say, Steve?"

"I think you will be making a great mistake if you start theorizing at
this stage," said Stephen pedantically. "To begin with, you have got to
consider all the evidence, and not simply what I have just read you."

"But that is all the evidence, ain't it?" said Martin.

"Not entirely. There are two other matters which may have some bearing
on the problem. To begin with, here is a bit of ancient history which
Mother told me the other day. Rather a nasty bit of history, I'm
afraid."

He bit his lip and coloured slightly.

"Come on, Steve, don't be shy!" Martin guffawed. "Out with the old
family skeleton!"

Stephen related, as briefly as he could, the gist of the letters which
his mother had shown him two days before.

"I may add," he concluded, "that Mother's guess turned out to be
perfectly right. I have been to Somerset House, and there is no doubt
that the woman in question is this same Frances Annie March."

During the recital, Anne remained silent, still apparently in
contemplation of some private problem of her own. Martin, however, was
regrettably vocal. His appreciation of Mr. Dickinson's lapse was quite
unrestrained in its expression.

"Who'd have thought the old man had so much blood in him?" was his final
comment on the disclosure. "That's Shakespeare, or something like it.
But seriously, Steve, does this get us any forrarder? Unless you're
going to say that Frances Annie and the injured Richard are really Mrs.
Whatnot-Blenkinsop and her son. Is that what you're after?"

"At the moment I'm merely after facts," said Stephen stiffly. "That
happens to be one of them. Now here's another. Perhaps you'll think it
more important. There was someone in the hotel that night whom Father
thought he recognized."

He repeated what he had learned from the inspector of the man whose
appearance had interrupted their conversation in the lounge. Martin
showed little interest.

"That doesn't cut much ice with me," was his verdict. "Lots of chaps
make mistakes like that. Only the other day I slapped a bloke on the
back in the street, and it turned out I didn't know him from Adam. Most
embarrassing. Besides, if this fellow was somebody staying in the hotel,
why should your father have only seen him that once and not before or
after? It was probably just a local who had blown in for a drink."

"Or," said Anne slowly, "or it was somebody who didn't want to be seen
again. Somebody who had ordered a meal downstairs and changed his mind
when he saw that Father was in the place. Mr. Jones, in fact."

"Um," said Martin, visibly impressed. "Um!" He relit his pipe and said
no more for a moment or two. "All the same," he added, after reflection,
"I still think Davitt is the man. With Jones as runner-up, perhaps. But
I don't for the life of me see why a fellow should want to take a girl
with him on a murdering expedition. I'm dam' sure I shouldn't--not even
you, Annie."

"Perhaps--" Anne began, but Stephen interrupted her.

"This is getting us nowhere," he said impatiently. "We haven't a
ha'porth of evidence to put before the Insurance Company to convince
them that any of these people are guilty of the murder. All we have
shown so far is that, as Anne says, there were an odd lot of people in
the hotel. Also that there was an opportunity for somebody to put an
overdose of Medinal in the tea-pot before it reached Father. And that's
not enough, by a long way."

"Perfectly right," said Martin. "No use wasting time gassing about these
chaps. We've got to follow them up and try to find out something about
them. This is where the sleuthing starts. Give us our marching orders,
Steve."

"To begin with," said Stephen, "we've got some addresses to go on. Two
of them are in London--Davitt and the Joneses. Then there are the
Howard-Blenkinsops in Lincolnshire, and the Carstairs at Brighton.
Vanning's address we don't know, except that he's somewhere in London,
and Parsons is somewhere in Midchester. Presumably we could get at him
through his club."

"If my club porter gave my address to a casual inquirer, I'd have his
hide off," Martin observed parenthetically.

"When we find Parsons, we can find Vanning," Stephen went on. "If he is
willing to help us, which he may very likely not be."

"Need we bother about these people?" Martin asked. "When we've got
Davitt and Jones sticking out a mile? It seems to me obvious that these
other chaps couldn't have had anything to do with it."

"It is anything but obvious," Stephen retorted. "I agree that we know
nothing about them at all. That doesn't mean we ought to leave them out
of account altogether. As for Parsons and Vanning, there is one very
significant fact about them, which you seem to have overlooked."

"Meaning?"

"Simply this. Parsons booked both rooms. The room he booked for Vanning
was the room that, as it turned out, Father slept in. It was next door
to his own. Can we be sure that Parsons knew of the change? Father had
something sent up to his room last thing at night. So did Vanning--do
you remember the report says he was surprised to hear next morning that
he had got up and had breakfast?--isn't it quite possible that he
poisoned Father by mistake, thinking--"

"Thinking that a pot of tea was a bottle of whisky, I suppose," Martin
interrupted with a horse laugh.

"If you're going to make a silly joke of the whole thing--" said Stephen
crossly.

"I'm not, really, old man. I think it's all too frightfully subtle for
words. Just exactly what you called getting us nowhere just now."

At which point the tension was mercifully relieved by the gong sounding
for lunch.

                 *        *        *        *        *

In the afternoon the conference was resumed in a quieter mood.

"Obviously, we want to start with the nearest people," said Martin.
"That is, Davitt and Jones. First question: Do we try our own hand or
get Elderson to do the dirty work for us?"

"We employed Elderson only because I didn't want to be seen at
Pendlebury," said Stephen. "So far as the start of our inquiry goes, I
think we should keep it in our own hands. We can fall back on him if the
business looks like getting beyond us."

"Right. Second question: What line exactly do we take? I mean, it's all
very well to talk about making inquiries, following people up and so
forth, but unless you're a bobby, you can't just go to a chap's house
and say: 'Oh, Mr. So-and-so, I'm told you were staying at Pendlebury the
other day. Did you by any chance happen to murder an old gentleman
called Dickinson while you were there, because if so, I want your
blood?' At least, I don't see myself doing it."

"I propose to use my own common sense in the matter, and take whatever
line seems best in the circumstances. I certainly don't intend to
interview any of these people directly, until I have found out something
about them, unless there's absolutely no other line of approach."

"I see--just nose around a bit, make oneself sweet to hall porters and
landladies and so forth. Then get an interview by pretending you want to
sell something, or that you're a long-lost brother from Fiji, or
something of that sort. It ought to be rather a lark. Now, third and
last question: Do we go out in a pack after the stuff, or do we split
up, one lion to a Christian, so to speak?"

Anne broke her silence to say: "For goodness' sake, Martin, don't let
you and Stephen go out on this business together. You know you'd simply
be bickering the whole time."

"I think we had better see what we can do individually, to start with,
at any rate," said Stephen. "We can join forces later if necessary."

"I dare say you're right. It'll save time, too. Then all we have to do
now is to split up our quarry. Can I have first stab at Davitt? After
all, I spotted him first."

"I'd rather thought of trying Davitt myself first," said Stephen at
once.

"But hang it all, he was my selection! Look here, give me Davitt and you
can have the Joneses, both of them."

"I think," Stephen answered very quietly, "that I'd better have Davitt,
if you don't mind."

"Toss you for it!"

"You are a hopeless pair of idiots," said Anne wearily. "Look here, I've
got it all worked out for you. Stephen will begin with Davitt and Martin
with Jones. Then if neither of those leads to anything, Martin will
drive me down to Lincolnshire and I shall see what can be done with Mrs.
Howard-Blenkinsop. She sounds as if she might amuse me, and anyway that
will be a woman's job. While we are doing that, Stephen can go down to
Brighton to find out what he can about Mr. and Mrs. Carstairs. We can
leave Parsons to the last, because Midchester is such a long way off.
Now for Heaven's sake go away and get on with it, and try not to make
greater asses of yourselves than you can help."

"Thanks for these kind words," said Martin. "But what about you, Annie?
Aren't you going to come along with me and help stir up the Joneses?"

"No, I am not. I've got other things to do here."

"What other things?"

"It doesn't seem to have occurred to either of you that the quickest way
to find Vanning's address may be simply to look him up in the telephone
directory. It's an out-of-the-way name, and it oughtn't to take long to
make a list of all the Vannings. Then we can try them out and see if we
can spot the right one."

"Not a bad idea, that," said Martin. He squinted at her for a moment and
then added: "That's not all, Annie. You've got something else up your
sleeve."

"I never said so."

"What is it?"

"Just something that occurred to me, that's all. Something very obvious,
really, but not at all pleasant. I want to think it out."

"Well, you might give a fellow an idea--"

"Oh, why can't you let me alone!" she flashed out suddenly, and then, as
suddenly, her anger evaporated. "I'm sorry, Martin, but this business
has really got me down."

"Of course, old girl, I understand," Martin said. He patted her shoulder
clumsily. "I vote we get going straight away," he said to Stephen.

"We'd better keep a record of what we're doing," Anne remarked.

She went to the desk and, taking a piece of paper, wrote down the list
of names from Elderson's list, leaving a space opposite each which it
was hoped would be filled by the details ferreted out by each
investigator. When she had done so, she sat for a moment staring at her
own work.

"Funny, that!" she murmured.

"What is funny?" asked Stephen.

"Nothing. Only . . ." She came out of her abstraction suddenly. "Oh, do
get out, both of you!"

They went, Stephen silently shrugging his shoulders at his sister's
moods and fancies, Martin apparently unimpressed, and humming under his
breath what he conceived to be the tune of "We've Got to Keep Up with
the Joneses."




                             CHAPTER ELEVEN


                              First-Fruits

                          Saturday August 26th

Anne had once, to her extreme discomfort, spent a Christmas holiday in a
sporting household in the West of England, where, Sundays apart,
non-hunting days were shooting days, and vice versa. She could not ride
and had a violent dislike for shooting. Moreover, if while she was there
the rain ever stopped for a single moment during the hours of daylight,
it must have been when she was not looking. In consequence, while she
had succeeded in forgetting most of that disastrous holiday, and in
living down what could not be forgotten, one impression remained
ineffaceable. It was the memory of long afternoons in the drawing-room,
watching the rain splash against the windows, listening to the click of
her hostess's knitting needles as they inexorably compiled yet another
pair of sensible shooting-stockings, waiting for tea until the men came
in.

She had an absurd sensation of being back in Devonshire just now, as she
lay curled up on a sofa, trying to read a book. Despite the fact that
there was no fire in the grate and that outside was full daylight
instead of the gloom of a winter afternoon, she could not rid herself of
the feeling that she was once more "waiting for the men to come in" from
the day's sport, and that at all costs, tea must be kept for them. They
might be in at any moment now, their silly white breeches splashed all
over with mud, and with a sickly certainty she foresaw that Johnny would
be still utterly absorbed in that ghastly Bendish girl, discussing
saddle-sores and overreaches, eternally, eternally, and never once
noticing . . .

"Damn! Am I going quite off my head?" she said to herself, and sat up on
the sofa. It is humiliating to find oneself so vividly remembering what
has been so firmly forgotten. She was alone in the house, her mother
having gone out soon after lunch. There was not the smallest reason to
suppose that Stephen would be home before dinner, if then, and Martin
might not choose to come back at all. Detection--if this absurd amateur
business could be called that--didn't keep fixed hours like pheasant
shooting or fox hunting, and it was ridiculous to imagine that anything
worth speaking of could be done in an afternoon.

At all events, it was time to think of getting herself tea. She got up,
and as she did so, noticed lying on the floor the paper recording the
results of her investigations in the telephone directory. She picked it
up, and reflected somewhat guiltily that it was not very much to show
for an afternoon's work. She put it away with the list of suspects
compiled at the end of the conference and then stood quite still for a
full half-minute, thinking. That half-minute was the sum total of time
given that day to the consideration of the matter which she had told
Martin needed thinking out. When it had elapsed, the fact was still
there, unchanged--perfectly obvious, perfectly inexplicable--a solid
little chunk of reality lodged uncomfortably in her mind. And she
remained as perversely determined as ever that for the present it should
be shared by nobody else.

She was finishing her first cup of tea when a loud pounding on the door
knocker made her start. So the men were back already, or rather one of
them. Martin, of course. Stephen had his latchkey, and any other visitor
would have rung the bell in the ordinary way. Martin preferred the
knocker. Merely to put his finger on a bell push was too tame a method
of announcing his presence. She ran to the door to let him in.

"Any tea left? Good!" were his first words, as he plumped down on the
sofa beside her.

As she poured him out a cup, it was all that she could do not to ask him
whether they had had a good day and where they had killed.

"You're back earlier than I expected," she said. "Have you--did you
manage to find out anything, Martin?"

Martin popped a small scone into his mouth. He looked thoroughly
self-satisfied.

"Depends what you mean by finding-out," he said with his mouth full. He
chewed, swallowed, and then observed, "I've seen Mr. Jones, anyway."

"What?"

"Rather. Charming old gent with a beard. He was very friendly. Wanted me
to stay to tea. But I thought I'd rather come back here."

"Martin, what on earth are you talking about?"

He laughed expansively.

"It was really rather fun," he said, "and as easy as falling off a log.
I'll tell you exactly what happened. I beetled off to Parbury Gardens,
and it turned out to be one of these big blocks of flats, with the names
of all the tenants written up in the hall below, just to make things
easy for the chap who tells the maid he's an old friend of the family
and then when he's inside tries to insure your life--you know the sort
of thing. Well, I looked at the list of names and the first thing that
my eagle eye spotted was that the name opposite No. 15 wasn't Jones at
all. It was Peabody--Mrs. Elizabeth Peabody. I always think there's
something a bit bogus about any woman who calls herself Mrs. Elizabeth
anybody, but that doesn't necessarily prove that she goes about in
hotels under the name of Jones. Still, one never could tell, and there
was always an odd chance that the Peabody might have let the place to
Jones and nobody had bothered to alter the name. So I decided on a spot
of finesse. I rang a bell marked 'Caretaker,' and after a longish time a
small boy appeared. I asked him whether Mr. Jones lived at No. 15. He
looked at me rather as if I was half-witted and said that Mrs. Peabody
lived there. He didn't actually ask me whether I could read, but that
was what he seemed to imply. I said, oh, I was sorry, but I thought Mr.
Jones lived there. Then he seemed to take pity on my innocence and
volunteered that a Mr. Jones lived at No. 34, on another staircase. I
said Thank you so much and he said Not at all and that was that."

He devoted himself for a few moments to his tea. Anne poured him out a
second cup and murmured, "Yes, darling?"

"Well," Martin went on, vigorously wiping crumbs off his face with his
handkerchief, "there were still two possibilities, of course, (_a_) Mrs.
Peabody might have been staying at Pendlebury as Mrs. Jones. (_b_) The
detective fellow might have made a mistake in the number, and our Jones
might be the one living at No. 34. (_a_) looked rather a stinker. I was
loitering on the doorstep, wondering how I could lead the conversation
round to Peabody, after all my interest so far had been in Jones, when I
had a bit of luck. The boy was just going to slink back into his
cubbyhole, after pointing out the way to No. 34, when a delivery van
stopped at the door, and a fellow got out with a heavy-looking parcel in
his arms. And it was addressed, very plainly, to Mrs. Peabody. Just for
something to say, I remarked to the boy, 'Ah! A parcel for Mrs.
Peabody!' It must have sounded a pretty imbecile remark to make, but it
turned up trumps. He said, 'That'll be one of her books.' I said, 'It
looks a jolly heavy book,' or words to that effect. Then he said, 'She
has to have special sorts of books,' and suddenly I saw the light.
'Braille?' I said. 'That's right,' he said. 'Books for blind people, you
know.' Just to make sure, I asked him, 'Is Mrs. Peabody blind?' and he
said: "That's right. It's a shame, ain't it?' Well, I thought after
that, I needn't worry about point (_a_) any more, so out I went."

"Darling, that was frightfully clever of you!"

"Well, it was luck as much as anything, of course," said Martin
modestly.

He waited for her to contradict him, but with feminine perverseness she
merely said: "Well, that left point (_b_). He turned out to be the old
gentleman who asked you to stay to tea, I suppose?"

"Yes. It was all rather amusing. What happened was this . . ."

But Anne seemed indisposed to listen to further details.

"He wasn't even 'M. Jones' at all, I suppose?" she interrupted.

"As a matter of fact, he was T. P. M. Jones. I thought there was just a
chance he might be the right chap, so I--"

"Anyhow, he obviously wasn't. And I don't expect Elderson would have
made a mistake about the number."

"Oh, yes. So what we are left with is that the address in the book was a
fake, and for all we know, the name, too. It's odd, though."

"I don't see anything odd about it. Just what I expected. Simply a
couple out on the loose--"

"I know. That isn't what I meant. I've never done it, so I'm not sure,
but do couples out on the loose usually put real addresses in the hotel
book?"

"Of course not, silly! They put in a fake address, just as this one
did."

"But that's just the point. It was a real address--not their own, of
course, but somebody else's. It seems such a funny thing to do. Or
perhaps I'm wrong. Tell me, Martin--you've had lots of experience. What
used you to put in hotel registers?"

Martin had gone a warm pink.

"Oh, I dunno," he mumbled. "Just anything that came into my head, I
suppose."

If Anne noticed his embarrassment, she was cruelly unfeeling about it.

"Anything that came into your head," she repeated. "Yes. I suppose that
is what one would do. And the anything might be either a purely
imaginary address or a real one. But if it was a real one, there must
have been something to make it come into one's head--some association,
don't you see, that made one think of that particular address rather
than any other. So I can't help feeling that we haven't disposed of the
Joneses just by finding out that they didn't live at 15 Parbury Gardens.
If they didn't, one of them, at all events, probably had some reason for
writing it down in the hotel register rather than--than Plane Street,
Hampstead, for instance."

"This is all a bit deep for me," Martin observed.

"Oh, no, it isn't. You're quite sharp, really, and you know it."

"Anyhow, I don't see that we can do any more about the Joneses."

"Neither do I. But it's unsatisfactory, because of course we haven't
really eliminated them at all."

"Personally, I don't think they were ever worth troubling about. They
were simply a couple out--"

"Yes, Martin darling, you've said that already. You do repeat yourself a
lot, you know."

"Sorry, Annie. Let's forget them. Do you know, I can think of quite a
lot of things I haven't repeated nearly enough lately."

And Martin proceeded to repeat them, with a warmth and variety that did
him credit.

At the end of a quarter of an hour, a key was heard in the latch of the
front door.

"That'll be Mother," said Anne, disengaging herself. "Martin, you've
made my hair in a foul mess. And do go and wipe that powder off your
coat."

But it was not Mrs. Dickinson, but Stephen. He came into the room
looking bored and tired. From experience, Anne knew better than to start
firing off questions at a man who had obviously not "had a good day."

"Would you like some tea?" she asked. "It won't take a minute to make a
fresh pot."

Stephen shook his head.

"Is there any whisky in the house, d'you think?" he asked.

"There's half a decanter in the dining-room, if you haven't drunk it
already. It's all there is, because I know Mother said she wasn't going
to order any more till--"

"Till we touch the insurance money, I suppose. What a hope!"

"Well, why don't you order in some for yourself? After all, you're the
only one who drinks it."

"Oh, yes, I can order it, all right. Only my credit happens to be a bit
low just now."

"_I can call spirits from the vasty deep_," remarked Martin
unexpectedly. "_But will they come when you do call for them?_ I say!
That really is rather neat, don't you think?"

Stephen gave him a disgusted look and went out of the room. He returned
a moment or two later with a full glass. Sitting down, he drank off
about half of it in silence. Then he said abruptly:

"Well, I've got rid of Davitt, anyhow."

"Got rid of him?" Anne asked.

"Eliminated him, expunged him, wiped him out. Do I make myself clear?"

"Don't say that, Stevie!" Martin protested. "Davitt, the man of mystery,
my own selection! I can't bear to see him go!"

Stephen took no notice of him.

"So far as I can see the man is perfectly genuine and has no more to do
with Father's death than--than the Archbishop of Canterbury."

He emptied his glass, and put it down beside him.

"How about Jones?" he said, turning to Martin.

Martin was opening his mouth to repeat his history, when Anne cut in.

"But Stephen, aren't you going to tell us about Davitt?"

"I've told you. He's a wash-out."

"But you can't leave it just like that. What did you do? How did you
find out? You must tell us something!"

Stephen frowned in a bored manner which, in Anne's experienced eyes,
concealed an excited awareness of the interest he was creating.

"Well, if you won't take my word for it," he said grudgingly, "here
goes."

He leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, and addressed the
picture-rail on the opposite side of the room.

"Hawk Street is a depressing place. How anybody can contrive to live
there I can't imagine. It's tucked away behind Garmoyle Street, and
that's tucked away behind Theobald's Road. It's all little two-and
three-storied dirty brick houses with aspidistras and lace curtains in
the ground floor windows. You know the sort of thing. Practically every
house lets apartments, and a good proportion of the lodgers are
foreigners, I should say--students, refugees, and so forth."

"Funny that a chap living in such a poor-class neighbourhood could
afford to stay at Pendlebury," said Martin.

Stephen nodded.

"Just what occurred to me," he said. "Well, I found No. 42, and it was
just like all the others, only perhaps a little dingier. It had the
usual card in the window, impinging on the vegetation, to say that there
were apartments, or at any rate an apartment, to let. That made it easy,
of course. I rang the bell and an amiable old body came to the door. She
was what I believe is known as 'motherly'--not my type, exactly, but I
shouldn't be surprised if she was the answer to the lodger's prayer. I
shall never know for certain, unfortunately. You see, I thought if the
worst came to the worst, and Master Davitt seemed worth while
investigating, I could take a room in the house and try a little
sleuthing at close quarters. I asked the old dame if I could see her
apartment and in I went. The room was pretty grisly, but I suppose it
might have been worse. It was perfectly clean, anyway. Then I asked her
if she hadn't a front room to let--the one she showed me looked out on
the catrun at the back. No, the front room was let. I didn't ask her
outright who it was let to, but she was the nice, gossipy sort of
landlady--quite a good type for the learner-detective to practice
on--and in next to no time she told me that the room had been occupied
these last two years by a steady young man of the name of Davitt. From
then on she proceeded to disgorge without any prompting all that she
knew of the said steady young man. Which was quite a lot."

Stephen paused dramatically. His air of boredom had disappeared and he
was evidently enjoying his own recital.

"Disregarding inessential details, what it amounted to was this: He is a
clerk in a big City firm--she is a bit vague about it, but they appear
to be stockbrokers. He is all alone in the world, except for an aged
mother in Glasgow, whom he goes to see every Christmas. Very quiet, very
shy, no girl friends, and pays his rent regular. (That, of course, was
the most important thing about him. There was a sort of Go Thou And Do
Likewise look in her eyes when she said it that impressed me a lot.) The
only thing that distresses her about him is that he never goes out
anywhere in the evenings, but sits indoors all the time writing. And
that is the clue to the whole of the great Davitt mystery. He's by way
of being an author of genius. Whether his genius runs to epic poetry or
plays or soap advertisements, she couldn't tell me. Personally, I think
a man must have genius of a remarkable order if he can find anything to
write about, sitting in a front room in Hawk Street and never poking his
nose outside to see what the world is like. But that's by the way. Of
course, his genius isn't recognized as yet, not completely recognized, I
should say, because a month or two ago he did achieve a bit of
recognition. He won a prize. Naturally, my thoughts turned at once to
Football Pools, but it was nothing so banal. It was a prize offered by a
literary magazine--quite a lot of money, she told me. I imagine it was
ten or twenty pounds. And what did I think he did with it? By this time,
I could have told her but it seemed more satisfactory to let her tell
me."

"You mean he spent his prize money on staying at Pendlebury?" Anne
asked.

"No less. It seems a pretty footling thing to do, doesn't it? His only
use for what he had won by his writing, apparently, was to go away
somewhere quiet and do yet more writing. He had a week or so of holiday
due to him about then, and he couldn't do anything better with it than
that. Rather pathetic, I thought. It seemed to me that he might just as
well have saved his cash and stopped at Hawk Street all the time, but I
forgot to mention among the charms of the neighbourhood that it's a
favourite by-pass for heavy stuff going to and from the big railway
stations, and I quite appreciate what she meant by his wanting somewhere
quiet. So there he stayed, right up to the last minute of the last day
of his holiday, and came back, I was not surprised to hear, looking as
pale and tired as when he started."

"But why did he have to take all his meals in his room?" Anne asked.

"Same thing. He didn't want to be disturbed in his writing, or the
meditations incidental to his writing. Time and again Mrs. Thing--I
never found out her name--had to drag him downstairs by the scruff of
his neck to his supper, he was that taken up by his work, you wouldn't
believe. I suppose to have his meals--even Pendlebury meals--brought up
to his room three times a day must have been the seventh heaven to him.
Poor devil! I don't expect he's ever heard of _cacoethes scribendi_, but
he's got it pretty badly."

He ended his story, and then added after a pause: "Well, that's all
there is to it. I shook the dust of Hawk Street off my feet as soon as I
could, once I'd got what I wanted. I said I'd let the old woman know
about the back room. She'll have to wait a long time before she catches
me down there again, though."

Nobody said anything for a moment or two, and then Martin said: "You
didn't get hold of the name of the stockbrokers, I think you said?"

"No. It didn't seem to matter much."

"I was just wondering. Suppose it turned out that Vanning was a
stockbroker--"

"Well--" Stephen began, with a shrug that showed what he thought of the
suggestion.

"He's not," Anne put in. "At any rate, if he is, he doesn't live in
London, or anywhere near it."

"Lots of stockbrokers live at Brighton," Martin said.

"My good Martin," said Stephen, exasperated, "if you want to pursue this
ridiculous hare, why don't you get hold of a list of members of the
Stock Exchange and find out for yourself?"

"Quite right, Steve, I hadn't thought of that. Silly of me. Apologies
and all that."

"And now," said Stephen, turning to his sister, "who is Vanning, what is
he? I hope the Directory has been useful."

"It all depends what you call useful," said Anne. "This is what it
says."

She fetched the little document which she had compiled and handed it to
him. Stephen read:

Vanning, Alfred & Co., Ltd., Fruit Mrchts., Covt Gdn.  W.C.2.

Vanning, Alfred E., Osokosi, Watling Way, Strthm.

Vanning, Chas. C., Grngrcr, 42 Victoria Ave., S.W.16.

Vanning, K. S. T., Barrister-at-Law, 2 Nisi Prius Row, Temple, E.C.4.

Vanning, K. S. T., 46 Exeter Mans., S.W.11.

Vanning, Mrs., 94b Grosvenor Sq., W.1.

Vanning, Peter, Artist, 3 Hogarth Studios, Kingfisher Walk, S.W.3.

Vanning, Thos. B., Grngrcr, 85 Brick St., N.1.

Vanning, Waldron & Smith, Chtrd Acctnts, 14 Gossip Lane, E.C.3.

"Quite amusing in its way," he remarked. "Observe how Alfred E., no
doubt the big noise of the firm at Covent Garden, establishes his
younglings in the retail trade to the north and south of him! Wait a
bit, though--perhaps they're only nephews. He seeks higher things for
his son, and sends him to the Bar."

"Where does the artist come in?" said Anne.

"Oh, he's obviously a sport from the parent stock, who sickened of the
sight of whole oranges in crates, and went off to paint half ones on
dishes instead. But I can't quite work in Mrs. Vanning. Grosvenor Square
clashes rather with Osokosi, don't you think? Perhaps--"

"The point is, it seems to me," said Martin heavily, "does any of this
help us to find J. S. Vanning?"

"Not in the least. I suppose we could solemnly go through everyone on
the list and try to find if any of them is harboring a son or brother
with the initials J. S., but it seems a waste of time when we've got
another line on him through Parsons."

"Just what I thought. Well, the upshot of the day's work is, we've
knocked Davitt off the list--subject to what I said about
stockbrokers--and Vanning and Jones are left much where we found 'em."

"Jones!" said Stephen. "I forgot. You haven't told me about him yet."

And Martin did tell him, with all and more than all the elaboration with
which he had already told Anne. Soon the two men were comparing notes on
their experiences and arguing like old hands as to the merits of
different methods of detective inquiry. To Anne, sitting bored and tired
between them, it was all very reminiscent of after-tea conversation in
Devonshire. . . . "What you want to do, old man, is to drive the Long
Wood first, and put three guns forward, with a stop in the
hollow."--"It's no good, my dear chap, with the wind in the South--they
simply break back over the boundary fence every time."--"'f course, if
you'd only taken my advice last year and cut another ride through the
larch plantation. . . ." If it hadn't been for the consciousness of that
nagging little fact, ever present at the back of her mind, she would
have gone fast asleep.




                             CHAPTER TWELVE


                         Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop

                          Sunday, August 27th

"That looks like the place," said Martin.

Anne peered through the window of the car.

It was a house of medium size, square and plain, standing back from the
road, to which it was connected by a curving drive. There was nothing in
the least remarkable about it--it was the type of house that might be
found in almost any country district of England. One could guess that
inside there were at most two bathrooms, rather antiquated, and that
somewhere in the background was stabling for at least three hunters. But
the very fact that it was so ordinary in appearance made it seem all the
more daunting to one of the investigators at least. Anne's heart sank as
she gazed at the somewhat shabby placidity of the Grange. These people,
she reflected, had been there for years, probably for generations. They
barely acknowledged the existence of anybody who had not lived in the
neighbourhood for at least ten hunting seasons. As for visitors from
London, unknown and unannounced, they would be regarded as no better
than tramps. She smiled wryly as she remembered how simple the whole
arrangement had seemed when she planned it in the study at Hampstead.
Only one thing remained to give her any hope of success--the brief
description of Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop's character in Elderson's report.
Obviously the woman was an eccentric, and with eccentrics anything was
possible.

She had said nothing, but Martin, as usual, seemed to divine her
thoughts.

"I dare say things'll look a bit easier after a feed," he said. "I vote
we try the village pub. It's only just down the road."

They lunched alone in the front room of the Black Swan. The food was
more than tolerable, and by the time they had finished their meal, Anne
was disposed to take a more cheerful view of life, though she seemed no
nearer to ascertaining anything about the owners of the Grange than
before. She had made one or two efforts to get into conversation with
the landlord's wife, who served them, only to find that she was both
hard of hearing and incomprehensible of speech. A Sabbath calm brooded
over the village, broken only by the hum of voices from the adjacent
taproom and by the intermittent barking of dogs from the opposite side
of the street. This latter sound attracted Martin's attention. Going
across to the window, he stared out for some time, sucking noisily at
his pipe, and then called Anne.

"Here's something worth trying," he remarked.

Anne saw that he was pointing at a notice which hung over a yard gate
almost immediately opposite the inn. It read:

                             BENTBY KENNELS
                         PEDIGREE PUPS FOR SALE
                     SCOTTIES, CAIRNS, FOX-TERRIERS
                  Dogs Boarded        Expert attention

"I think a puppy would make rather a nice present for you," said Martin.
"Would you like a Scottie or a Cairn?"

"Neither," said Anne. "I'm not very fond of dogs."

"You ought to be," said Martin, seriously. "There's something about a
dog which you don't get in anything else." He puffed silently for a
moment or two and then added: "Anyhow, you could always inquire about
boarding a dog. That won't commit you to anything."

"What on earth are you talking about?"

"About the Kennels, of course. It's the best place to try any snooping
in we could find. To start with, it's the only place that's likely to be
open on a Sunday, it's almost certain to be kept by a female--these
places nearly always are--and with any luck it'll be a centre for
gossip. I can look at the dogs, while you get to work on the
woman-to-woman stuff. If you can get a line on the old lady up at the
Grange, I can always amuse myself in the kennels while you are trying to
break in there. I think it's rather a good spec, taken all round."

Anne had said from the first that interviewing Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop
was woman's work. Rather to her annoyance, Martin had taken her at her
word, and resolutely refused to take any part in the job himself, except
the highly enjoyable task of driving her to the scene of action. It was
therefore quite an agreeable surprise to find him planning a campaign on
her behalf.

"Of course," Martin went on meditatively, still staring out of the
window, "it may take a bit of time to get hold of _la belle_ Blenkinsop.
It's rather a pity, in a way, we didn't allow ourselves a bit longer. If
I was on my own, I should certainly want to spend the night here, and
give myself a full day tomorrow, so as not to have to rush things. Of
course, as it is, that's out of the question, I suppose--unless . . ."

He left the sentence unfinished, and looked over his shoulder at Anne
with an air that was at once malicious and appealing.

"No," she answered. "I'm sorry, Martin, but I'm not going to sleep here
tonight. In the first place, I have no intention of losing my virtue
without so much as a toothbrush to sustain me--"

"As a matter of fact," said Martin with an air of unabashed innocence,
"I do happen to have a few odd things in the back of the car--including,
as it happens, a new toothbrush."

"In the second place, I promised Mother I'd be home before she went to
bed tonight."

"Oh, well--"

"And in the third place, my darling, I'm not allowing any liberties
until I've got my marriage lines. Sorry and all that, but I'm funny that
way."

"Righto!" said Martin, with the air of one who was used to taking such
rebuffs in good part. "In that case, I'd better pay our bill, and then
we'll see what is to be seen across the way."

                 *        *        *        *        *

A tall young woman, dressed in a dirty kennel coat and corduroy breeches
was walking across the yard when they entered. A cigarette depended from
her mouth, and her short black hair would have been the better for some
expert attention. She put down the pail which she was carrying and
slouched in their direction, a predatory gleam in her eye.

"Good afternoon," said Martin politely. "We wanted to look at the
Kennels."

The girl nodded.

"That's what we're here for," she said. "What are you interested in?
Cairns? Scotties? We've got rather a nice litter of Dandies you might
like to look at, but--Get down, Sheila!"

The last observation was directed to a fox-terrier bitch, in the last
stages of pregnancy, which was fawning round her boots.

"Well, as a matter of fact we hadn't quite made up our minds," said
Martin. "We just thought we'd have a look round first, didn't we,
Annie?"

The girl's interest in them waned perceptibly.

"Oh, I see," she said. "Well, you'd better come along and see if there's
anything you'd care for."

She led the way to a long range of kennels, the occupants of which set
up a furious barking as they approached.

"Nice place you've got here," Martin observed. "I wonder whether--"

"Not bad. We're apt to have trouble about the water-supply, that's all.
Now these Scotties might interest you--six months old, guaranteed
through distemper. Dogs, eight guineas; bitches, seven and a half. The
sire got two reserves at Crufts and the dam was by Champion Watmough of
Wakerly. You can see the pedigree if you like."

"They look very sweet," remarked Anne, who felt that it was about time
she said something.

"Jolly little chaps," chimed in Martin, with considerably more sincerity
in his voice. "By the way, I suppose in this village--"

"Now these two are all that we've got left of Sheila's last litter.
House-trained. Three and a half guineas, or you can have the pair for
six. It's a bargain, really."

"Awfully jolly," said Martin. "I wanted to ask you, what is that
house--"

"These are the Dandies I was telling you about," the young woman went on
remorselessly, and once more the proper words of non-committal
appreciation had to be found. Clearly it was not going to be a simple
business to get any gossip from the Kennels. The whole affair began to
seem to Anne more and more unreal and nightmarish as they trailed on
from one noisy, bounding family to another. At last it seemed that they
had reached the end of their tour. Only one compartment remained, and
this was tenanted by a solitary red setter. He had a dejected
appearance, and something about him made Anne, who did not care for
dogs, feel that she had found a kindred spirit.

"What a darling fellow!" she exclaimed.

"Not one of ours," said her guide in a chilly tone. "Just a boarder.
He's been convalescing after gastritis. His coat's pretty bad still,
isn't it? I expect he'll be going home in a day or two."

"Has he far to go?" Anne asked, stifling a yawn. But her boredom
vanished instantly at the reply.

"Oh, no. He's only going up to the Grange."

Trying not to seem too excited, Anne said: "Is this Mrs.
Howard-Blenkinsop's dog, then?"

"Yes. Do you know her?"

"Yes--I mean, no--that is--"

"I expect she'll be down here directly to look at him. She looks in most
afternoons."

Here was good fortune indeed! Hardly knowing what she was saying, Anne
gasped out: "Really! How awfully nice!"

Her companion looked at her in surprise.

"Well, she's not a bad sort really," she said. "For all that she's my
landlord."

Pulling herself together, Anne said: "I'd like to have another look at
the Scotties, if you don't mind," and walked back to the kennel nearest
the entrance to the yard, determined at all costs to keep within the
precincts until her quarry should appear. Martin had left them. From the
corner of her eye she saw him half hidden by an angle of the wall,
apparently engaged in deep conversation with the two young fox-terriers.
Anne cursed him bitterly in her heart and grimly prepared to talk dogs
for the rest of the day, if need be.

Luck was with her. She had barely reached the litter of Scotties before
somebody who could only have been Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop appeared upon
the scene. She was a fairly stout woman of early middle age, who looked
as if she owned the earth she walked on--which in fact she did. Anne was
rather taken by her face. It looked sensible. The same adjective might
have been applied to everything about her. She wore sensible low-heeled
brogue shoes, sensible thick stockings, and a tweed coat and skirt which
could certainly only be justified by an appeal to reason, so rigorously
had all the allurements of fashion been excluded. In one particular only
did she show a certain lack of intelligence. She had elected to bring
with her to the kennels a timid and elderly dachshund, who, evidently
warned by previous experience, skulked miserably behind her skirts. This
did not save him from repeated and savage assaults from Sheila, and
conversation was continually being interrupted to placate or separate
the unequal combatants.

"Good afternoon, Mary," Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop began, as she hove in
sight. "I came to see how my poor Rufus is getting on. (Now don't be
silly, Fritz, you know she won't hurt you.)"

"Good afternoon," said the young woman. "Sheila! Come away from him! I'm
so sorry, Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop. I'm afraid she is rather a nuisance.
Rufus is quite--_Sheila!_ Come to heel!"

"Come along, Fritz! It's only that she knows he's frightened of her, you
know. Of course, she's really--I'm so sorry, Mary, I shall have to ask
you to take her away. I shouldn't have brought him with me, only he does
miss his walkie-walks on Sundays, don't you, darling?"

Rather sulkily, Mary grabbed the bitch by the scruff of her neck and
dragged her indoors. Fritz, relieved of his fears, sat down and began to
scratch himself. His mistress bent down to reprove him and then looked
up to see Anne for the first time.

"Oh!" she said. "I must apologize. I suppose you've come to buy
something and I've interrupted the deal. I didn't see you were here."

Face to face with the object of her coming to Lincolnshire, Anne found
herself completely tongue-tied. Fortunately Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop was
evidently quite accustomed to finding younger women speechless in her
presence, and proceeded to put her at her ease by doing all the talking
herself.

"Fond of dogs?" she inquired, as she led the way towards where the red
setter was barking a welcome in the distance. "But of course you are!
Every nice person is, I think. Well"--she looked over her shoulder at
Mary, who was following in their wake--"Mary's a very nice girl, though
she can't always pay her rent, and I'm out to help her all I can. All
the same, don't pay what she asks. You can always beat her down half a
guinea or so! But don't tell her I said so! Well, Rufus, my pet! Here's
your old missus come to see you! How's the poor old fellow! There's a
poor mannie, then!" and she broke into a flood of the infantile
endearments which the most intelligent people always seem to find
necessary when conversing with the friend of man.

Martin appeared from nowhere and took Anne by the arm. He led her away a
few paces and whispered, "Who is this?"

"Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop," said Anne in surprise.

Martin looked puzzled.

"Surely not," he said.

Anne stared at him for a moment before she guessed to what he was
referring. Then she began to understand, and her bewilderment grew.
There was no doubt that this woman was quite different to anything that
Elderson's report had led them to expect. Without any pretence to fine
airs or graces, she was obviously a woman of breeding. She was of the
type that might cause some amusement in Hampstead, but in a country
village she was perfectly in the picture. And nobody--least of all such
keen judges of social distinctions as hotel servants--could possibly say
of her that she "acted unusual for a lady."

"There must be some mistake," she said at last.

"This wasn't the woman at the hotel," said Martin positively. "It
couldn't have been."

"Perhaps she's quite different when she's away from home," Anne
suggested faintly.

But a moment later Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop settled the question herself.
She ended her colloquy with Rufus, dusted her skirt where his eager paws
had marked it, and observed: "Well, I'm a silly old woman, I suppose, to
make such a fuss about him. But I can tell you this, Mary: when you're
my age and haven't any children of your own, you get to depend a lot on
your dogs."

So that left the son also to be explained! thought Anne. She was burning
with curiosity and at a loss as to how to set about satisfying it. And
all the time the precious minutes were slipping away, as Mrs.
Howard-Blenkinsop exchanged a few last morsels of canine gossip with
Mary before leaving the Kennels. Anne would have given anything to
scrape acquaintance with her, and had not the least idea how it should
be done.

It was Martin, unexpectedly, who came to the rescue. Evidently the
mystery had whetted his appetite also, for he entirely abandoned his
declared policy of leaving the investigation to her. At precisely the
right moment, he injected into the ladies' conversation a supremely
shrewd piece of doggy knowledge--it was, he afterwards confessed to
Anne, almost the only scrap of kennel-lore he possessed--and in next to
no time he was one of the party. Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop was delighted
with him, and demanded his name and Anne's. The name of Dickinson
evidently set her fumbling in her memory.

"Dickinson!" she repeated. "That reminds me of something--I heard the
name lately--oh, of course!" She looked at Anne doubtfully. "Girls don't
wear much mourning nowadays," she ventured.

"That was my father," said Anne.

"Dear, dear!" She clicked her tongue in sympathy. "Well, it's quite a
good idea to buy a dog at a time like that. It takes your mind off
things."

How Martin managed it, Anne did not precisely know, but ten minutes
later they were walking up the village street towards the Grange with
her, having somehow escaped from the Kennels without having committed
themselves to a purchase. She proved to be good company, and before they
had reached the gates of the house Anne had learned a considerable
amount about the agricultural depression, the vagaries of the vicar and
the idiosyncrasies of the late Colonel Howard-Blenkinsop. But of
Pendlebury Old Hall, not a word.

They were invited to stay for tea in the shabby, comfortable old house,
which was much as Anne had pictured it, except, quite unaccountably, for
a fine collection of Whistler etchings, probably worth as much as the
rest of the contents put together. After tea they were taken out to
admire what little a hot summer had left of the herbaceous border. At
this point, Anne felt that they were on sufficiently good terms for her
to take the plunge.

"Excuse my asking you, Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop," she said, "but were you
ever at Pendlebury?"

"Where did you say, my dear? Pembury? Where's that?"

"No--Pendlebury. I mean Pendlebury Old Hall. It used to be in our
family, but it's an hotel now. It's where my father--died."

"Oh, dear me, no! What makes you think that?"

"Well, you may think it very odd of me to ask, but you see, your name
and address are in the visitor's book there."

"God bless my soul! My name? Are you quite sure?"

"Oh, yes; there's no doubt about it."

"But this is most extraordinary! When am I supposed to have stayed
there?"

"About the beginning of this month--for a fortnight. You and a young man
who was supposed to be your son."

"A young man!" Her face went purple. For a moment Anne thought she would
have a fit. Then suddenly she cried: "A fortnight! The beginning of this
month! Oh, my stars! But this is rich!"

And Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop, throwing back her head, let out peal upon
peal of laughter.

"The impertinence!" she exclaimed when she could speak again. "For
sheer, cool impertinence! Oh, my dear," she went on, wiping her eyes
with a man's-sized silk handkerchief, "how I wish now I hadn't
quarrelled with the vicar! How he would have enjoyed it!"

She stuffed the handkerchief back into the pocket of the sensible coat,
and said soberly: "Well, I'll be blowed! Now come indoors, both of you.
You must have seen quite enough of the garden. I'll give you both a
glass of sherry before you go, and tell you all about it."

                 *        *        *        *        *

"There's not much to tell, really," she said, when the sherry had been
poured out. "And if you didn't know her, you wouldn't see the joke.
That's why I regret the vicar so. But I must tell somebody. You see, I
had a cook."

"Do you mean to say that your cook stayed at Pendlebury under your
name?" said Anne.

Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop nodded.

"That's all," she said. "It sounds very bald, put like that, doesn't it?
But if you could only have seen her! Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop, indeed!
Really, I'm very cross about it. It's just as well she isn't here to get
a bit of my mind. But"--she began to laugh again--"she _was_ a
character! I can just see her flaunting it in an hotel in her best
clothes--old clothes of mine, incidentally! She always gave herself such
tremendous airs, though I will say she was a good cook."

She sighed a tribute to the departed.

"When did she leave you?" Anne asked.

"Why, only a week ago, as soon as she came back from her holiday. It was
really a most extraordinary--but I'm telling this very badly. Let me
start at the beginning."

But instead of starting at the beginning, Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop
suddenly looked narrowly at her guests and said: "Really, this is a very
odd situation! Why should I tell you all this? What business is it of
yours?"

"Please, Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop," said Anne. "Please tell us. It really
is a matter of importance to us, though it would take much too long to
explain."

"We've come here the whole way from London simply to ask you about this
entry in the hotel books," Martin put in.

"What? I thought you came here to look at Mary's dogs!"

Martin shook his head.

"Simply a blind. I don't know much about them, and Anne here hates the
sight of them."

Anne, who saw her hostess's brow darken ominously, hastily interjected:
"Oh, that's not true, Martin. You know I simply fell in love with poor
Rufus!"

"I really don't know whether I'm standing on my head or my heels," said
Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop. "What is all this about?"

"I can tell you this much," said Martin. "There's a great deal of money
involved."

"Money? You don't mean Mrs. March's money, do you?"

"Mrs. _Who?_"

"Mrs. March--my cook. Of course, I forgot, you don't know her."

"Golly!" said Martin.

Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop looked at him with an expression so dubious that
Anne felt it was time for her to intervene.

"I'm sorry," she said, "but you really must tell us all about this Mrs.
March. It seems awful cheek on our part, I know, but it is most
frightfully important to us. We are--we're quite respectable people,
honestly, but we're in a great difficulty and you are the only person
who can help us."

Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop looked her up and down. Then: "Help yourselves to
some more sherry," she said. "You both look as if you needed it. I don't
know what all this is about, but if you can take Mrs. March's money
away, perhaps she'll come back as my cook again and that will be
something. Now, what do you want to know?"

"Everything," said Martin, gulping his sherry.

"Well, then, Mrs. March has been my cook for the last ten years--ever
since her husband died, in fact."

"Oh! Then March was her husband's name?" asked Anne.

"Certainly. He was a local man, a builder in a small way. There are a
lot of Marches in these parts, you know."

"I see," said Anne disappointedly. "Then she wasn't . . ."

"You don't know her maiden name, I suppose?" Martin asked.

"Good gracious! Do you children want to go back into all that ancient
history? She was a March too--she married her cousin."

Anne breathed again. "Please go on," she said.

"She had one son, who lived with her. She was devoted to him, but he was
a little--you know, not quite right in the head. I used to give him odd
jobs on the farm to do, but he was really not worth his keep. Doctors
can say what they like, but cousins ought not to marry. Dogs are
different, of course."

"Excuse me, but are you quite sure he was a child of the marriage?"
Martin asked.

"Really, what a question! Certainly he was. She and her husband were
always--And anyhow, Philip is a March all over, and the image of his
father to look at."

"But there was another son, wasn't there?" Martin persisted.

"Now what on earth made you say that? I really didn't expect people from
London to come down here and rake up our village scandals. It isn't even
a village scandal, for that matter. The Marches kept very quiet about it
and nobody here knew anything about it, except the vicar, and he very
properly told me when I proposed taking her into my service. The child
wasn't born here, you know. Her parents had moved to Markshire, and then
when this thing happened they sent her to live with her uncle and aunt
because she couldn't face the people there any more. You know what they
are like in villages, among the respectable classes. Then, later on, she
married Fred March, who was a good deal older than she was, and a very
good wife she made him."

"But the child?" Anne asked. "What became of him?"

"He was brought up somewhere--I never asked her any questions about it,
though she knew I knew about him. The father paid something for his
maintenance, and I rather fancy that old Fred, who was a broad-minded
sort of man, contributed a little too. She used to go and see him
sometimes, and I do know that in later life he caused her a lot of
anxiety with his wild ways. That didn't prevent her making a terrible
to-do when he died, though."

There was a pause, in which Anne heard herself echoing stupidly, "When
he died?"

"Yes. About six months ago. I gave her two days off to go to the
funeral, I remember. It was very inconvenient, because I had arranged a
dinner-party just then."

Feeling a little dazed, Anne reached for her handbag.

"Thank you very much," she contrived to say. "I really think that is all
we wanted to know."

"Wait a bit, though!" Martin broke in. "You haven't told us, why did
Mrs. March leave you?"

"I should have told you a quarter of an hour ago, if you hadn't kept on
interrupting," answered Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop tartly. "She left because
she had come into money. No notice--she even offered to pay me a month's
wages. Me! Well, perhaps it wasn't quite as ridiculous as it sounds. I
dare say she is a richer woman now than I am, though it was difficult to
make head or tail of what she was saying."

"You mean, the money seemed to come as a surprise to her?" Martin
suggested.

"A surprise? For a cook when she inherits a fortune? Think, my boy,
think! I never saw a woman more flabbergasted in my life. It was a bit
of a shock for me too, as you can imagine. Of course, she was always a
bit better off than most women of her class. Old Fred didn't leave her
penniless, and she used to give herself airs about it. But I think that
most of that money went on her holidays. She had a fortnight every year,
and used to take Philip away with her."

"Yes," said Anne. "You are reputed to have stayed at Pendlebury several
years running."

"Tchah!" snorted Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop. "Don't remind me of it! I
suppose it tickled the old ruffian to go back there and pass as a lady,
where she had been--But that reminds me. Of course! Pendlebury! Now I
remember! My dear girl, why didn't you tell me before? It was at
Pendlebury that--That's why I recognized your name. I had read about it
in _The Times_, just a short paragraph, you know, it made no particular
impression on me, and then when Mrs. March came back, in addition to all
the excitement about her legacy--the lawyer's letter was waiting for her
when she returned--she had some fantastic rigmarole that I couldn't
fathom, which seemed to have something to do with it."

"Do please try to remember what it was," Anne urged her.

"Let me think, now. You know when you are suddenly losing a cook who has
been with you ten years, you're in no state to pay much attention to
anything else. . . . Yes--I think I've got it. It was something to the
effect that an old friend--only she didn't put it quite like that, I
forget the expression--an old friend had been staying in the same place,
and she had never known it, he was so changed. And then he had killed
himself, and she had been at his funeral, and now she had all this
money--it was an inextricable jumble, you know, what one might expect
from an uneducated woman. But that was the gist of it. Of course, I
didn't understand then that it was he who had left her all this
money. . . ."

She looked inquiringly at Martin and Anne, but they kept their own
counsel.

"Ah, well!" she said at last. "If you do manage to upset the will, or
whatever it is that you're after, it will be a consolation to me to have
Mrs. March back, even if she did behave so badly on her holidays!"

After which, there was clearly nothing to be done but to thank her for
her forbearance and drive back to London.

                 *        *        *        *        *

"Well," said Martin, as they got into the car, "that disposes of
Fannyanny, anyway."

"Yes," said Anne. "And of Richard too. We seem to be getting through our
suspects pretty quick."

"Parsons, Vanning, and Carstairs left. I wonder whether old Steve will
have brought home the bacon from Brighton?"

"The Carstairs people seemed the most innocent of the lot, so far as I
could gather. But don't forget, we haven't really disposed of the
Joneses yet."

"Oh, them! They were nothing but a couple out on the--"

"Shut up!"




                            CHAPTER THIRTEEN


                         Sunday at the Seaside

                          Sunday, August 27th

Stephen walked out of Brighton station among a throng of holiday makers.
He allowed them to carry him with them in the direction of the front.
The beach was a mass of warm, untidy humanity, the sea scarcely audible
above the clamour of thousands of chattering, laughing, screaming
voices. To a philanthropist the spectacle would have been a pleasing
one. It made Stephen feel slightly sick. He was reminded of pictures he
had seen of a colony of nesting gannets. The same ridiculous herding
instinct, the same insensate noise, the same abominable mess that would
be left behind them when they were gone. The only difference was that
their droppings were newspapers and cigarette cartons, and in that
respect the advantage seemed to him all on the side of the birds. Guano
was of some use, at all events. . . .

He remained for some time staring at the crowds. He told himself more
than once that he was wasting his time--that he had not come down there
to watch a crowd of fools enjoying themselves. None the less, a full
quarter of an hour had gone by before he could bring himself to leave
the front, and when he did so he walked away with lagging footsteps. He
felt a very decided reluctance towards his task, not that he had any
particular qualms at invading the privacy of strangers, but simply
because he felt morally certain that this particular line of inquiry
would prove fruitless. But it obviously had to be investigated, and his
one hope now was that Mr. and Mrs. Carstairs would prove to be at home
and amenable to his blandishments. Otherwise he might find himself faced
with the necessity of spending a night away from home, and he grudged
the expense.

As he went, he nervously fingered the little manual on medieval English
brasses in his pocket. The one clue to Carstairs' interests or character
was the chance reference in Elderson's report to the fact that he had
delayed his departure from the hotel in order to obtain a rubbing from
Pendlebury church. Stephen remembered a contemporary at school with a
passion for this odd amusement. He was the only boy in the school to
possess this interest, and, being unique, was naturally enough regarded
as to that extent contemptible. His study was hung with long sheets of
paper, bearing smudgy black figures, the fruit of long and solitary
bicycle expeditions to distant churches. Stephen had never paid the
smallest attention to them, except once, when an exceptionally acute
phase of dislike for the young antiquarian had inspired him and half a
dozen others to smash up the study furniture and destroy most of the
rubbings. Having thus spurned the opportunity to acquire knowledge, he
had now been reduced to mugging up the subject as best he could in the
train. If Carstairs turned out to be a real expert, his ignorance would
be exposed in no time.

Ormidale Crescent proved to be a street of respectable Regency houses,
not very far from the sea, but a world away in spirit from the
charabancs and trippers of the front. It was a positive shock to see a
bathing-dress hanging out to dry on one of the elegant wrought-iron
balustrades. The thing looked as much out of place there as a clothes
line in Belgrave Square. No such incongruity defaced the narrow front of
No. 14. On the other hand, the house hardly came up to the standard of
its neighbours in the matter of cleanliness. Its windows were opaque
with dirt, its doorstep was a sooty grey, and the condition of the
door-knocker showed that the household's interest in brass did not
extend to the secular work of the nineteenth century.

A sullen and slovenly maid came to the door after Stephen had rung the
bell two or three times. Asked whether Mr. Carstairs lived there, she
answered grudgingly that he did. Was he at home? No, was the reply, he
was at the church. The tone in which this was said clearly implied that
the questioner was a fool for expecting him to be anywhere else. When
would he be back? The maid couldn't say for sure. As an afterthought she
observed that he would not be home for his lunch. And Mrs. Carstairs?
She was at church too. And the door slammed.

Stephen walked away up the Crescent feeling decidedly annoyed with
himself. He had completely failed to take account of the fact that it
was Sunday, and that there were still people who went to church on
Sunday mornings. Now he would have to kill time until Mr. Carstairs
should have come back from his lunch, whenever that might be. He had
gone some way before the significance of something said by the maid
struck his mind. He had noticed at the time that she had said, "Mr.
Carstairs is at the church," and not "at church." There might be nothing
in it, but it seemed an odd phrase to employ. It had an almost
proprietary air. She had said it in just the same way that a
stockbroker's servant would have told him, "Mr. Smith is at the office."
Was that the explanation? Was Mr. Carstairs at the church for the same
reason that Mr. Smith would have been at the office--because it was his
job? True, there was nothing in Elderson's report to indicate that he
was a parson, but it remained a possibility.

At this point he passed a telephone kiosk, and it occurred to him to do
what any moderately efficient detective would have done in the first
place; namely, to turn up Mr. Carstairs' entry in the directory. Sure
enough, it ran: "Carstairs, Rev. E. M. J." So that settled the point!
Clergymen were comparatively approachable people, at all events, and if
he could once get into touch with this one, he had little doubt that he
would be able to make him talk. But he still cursed his luck in having
to hang about until the afternoon before he could begin.

A little further on a pinched Gothic faade in grey stone broke the
suave frontage of stucco. Was this "the" church? he wondered. It was
worth trying, at all events. With a vague idea of assuming the role of
an earnest inquirer in the vestry after the service, he made his way in.
At the worst, it was as good a way of getting through the next half-hour
as any other.

The service had been in progress some time. He entered just as a portly
old gentleman was declaiming from the lectern, "Here Endeth the First
Lesson." A verger emerged from somewhere in the shadows and propelled
him into a seat as the congregation rose for the Psalms. He was placed
well at the back of the church and was striving to get a view of the
face attached to the surpliced figure at the other end, when he was
aware that his arm was being squeezed by his neighbour in the pew.
Glancing round, he found himself looking into the face of his Aunt Lucy.

"Stephen! What a surprise finding you here!" she whispered.

Stephen smiled, nodded and hastily fumbled for his place in the greasy
Prayer Book which the verger had provided. Here was a complication!
There was nothing particularly surprising about the meeting, now he came
to think of it, for he recollected that Aunt Lucy had mentioned when
they last met after the funeral that she and George were thinking of
going for a few weeks to Brighton; and the chances of finding Aunt Lucy
in church on a Sunday morning might be safely computed at odds on.
Stephen's private opinion was that she went there to get away from Uncle
George. And if he had to meet any of his family here she would certainly
have been his first choice. But he had not come to Brighton to meet her,
but Carstairs. Now there would have to be explanations, chatter, and
more time wasted. And Uncle George would be certain to make a nuisance
of himself if he possibly could. . . .

"Will you come back to lunch with us afterwards?" hissed Aunt Lucy as
the doxology ended.

He shook his head.

"Sorry. I don't think I can manage it," he whispered back.

"Oh, do! You'll help me out with the Carstairs," was the astonishing
rejoinder.

"Good Lord!" Stephen exclaimed almost out loud.

Aunt Lucy shot a reproachful glance at him as she sat back in her pew,
while "Here Beginneth" boomed out from the lectern.

So it came about that after all his apprehensions Stephen found himself
being introduced in a perfectly normal way to Mr. and Mrs. Carstairs. He
had returned with his aunt after the service to their hotel. There they
had found Uncle George, hot and peevish after an unsuccessful morning's
golf. The account of his misfortunes and the catalogue of his partner's
short-comings sufficed to fill up the interval before the arrival of the
guests, and Stephen was able without difficulty to stave off any
inquiries as to the reason for his presence in Brighton.

The Reverend E. M. J. Carstairs proved to be a fleshy, beetle-browed man
of middle age. He was not, Stephen learned from his aunt, the regular
incumbent of the church which he had attended that morning, but was
merely "taking duty" during the absence of the vicar on holiday. Aunt
Lucy, with her passion for all things ecclesiastical, had collected him,
as she always collected parsons, as naturally as a child picking wild
flowers. He lived in Brighton, whither he had retired two or three years
before on giving up a missionary post abroad. He was a fluent talker on
many subjects, but principally about himself, and his tones were loud
and self-important. Evidently in his own eyes he was a person of
consequence. It was some time before Stephen so much as noticed Mrs.
Carstairs. Beside him, she was not a particularly noticeable person. She
was small, mousy and ill-dressed, with a thin little mouth and very
bright eyes. But it soon became apparent that she was very far from
being in awe of her husband. She gave a taste of her quality quite early
in the proceedings.

"I've met you before, haven't I?" said Mr. Carstairs to Stephen as they
sat down to lunch.

Stephen denied having ever had that pleasure.

"Seen you before, anyhow."

"I think not."

"My husband," observed Mrs. Carstairs to the table in general, "is
always saying that sort of thing to perfect strangers. He has in fact a
shocking memory for faces. It really used to be very awkward when we
were living out East, where one native looks exactly like another in any
case. So you mustn't mind what he says, Mr. Dickinson."

Mr. Carstairs looked extremely uncomfortable and said no more. Aunt Lucy
shot a look of admiration at the courageous wife, who continued to eat
her lunch with perfect _sang-froid_.

By the time they had reached coffee she had twice corrected anecdotes of
her husband's about his experiences in the missionary field, and once
flatly contradicted Uncle George when he ventured on a generalization on
the subject of China. Otherwise she had contributed little to the
conversation. Mr. Carstairs was meekness itself under her corrections,
while Uncle George was so astonished at her temerity that by the end of
the meal he had become gloomily silent. Stephen derived a certain
amusement from the spectacle, but apart from that it did not seem as if
the afternoon was going to show much profit after all. The atmosphere,
however, changed completely after lunch, when Aunt Lucy inveigled Mrs.
Carstairs up to her room on some pretext or another. With undisguised
relief Uncle George led the way to the smoking-room, cigars were
produced, and the comfortable illusion of masculine predominance was
re-established.

"What you'll never get people to understand about China--" said Uncle
George, and proceeded to restate with emphasis the fallacy which Mrs.
Carstairs had exposed ten minutes before.

"I absolutely agree with you," said Mr. Carstairs heartily.

The two he-men nodded their heads in concert, and the feast of reason
proceeded harmoniously, to the complete exclusion of Stephen.
Presently--

"Would you care for a liqueur, Carstairs?"

"Well--er--it's very good of you. I hardly care to, just at present." He
fingered his clerical collar. "It was different the other day. I was in
mufti then. Ha, Ha! As a matter of fact I never wear this unless I am
actually--"

"Don't talk so much. Go on, a liqueur can't hurt you."

"Well, well . . ."

Over his liqueur Mr. Carstairs became quite confiding.

"My wife--" he said haltingly. "I don't think you've met my wife before
today, Mr. Dickinson?"

"No," said Uncle George, his cigar clenched between his teeth, "I
haven't."

"She's been in London all the week. I've been quite a grass widower down
here. Ha, Ha!" For some incomprehensible reason this simple statement of
fact was apparently expected to be regarded as humorous. "She's a very
remarkable woman in many ways."

"I dare say." George's rudeness would have been obvious to anyone not
gifted with an unusually thick skin.

"She is, I assure you. She doesn't spend her time in London amusing
herself, I can tell you that! Ha, Ha!"

From the look on George's face it was apparent that he was quite
prepared to believe it. He made no comment, and it was left for Stephen
to keep the conversation going.

"What does she do, exactly?" he asked.

"She works," replied Mr. Carstairs complacently. "Work is the very
breath of her nostrils. Naturally I miss her. A house without a woman's
guiding hand is only half a home. But I am an old campaigner, and,
though I say it, I make shift very well by myself."

Stephen remembered the dilapidated aspect of the house in Ormidale
Crescent and shuddered.

"My own interests are mainly of a more scholarly character," the parson
went on. "Since my retirement I have busied myself in antiquarian
pursuits--of an ecclesiastical nature, of course. I don't know whether
you are at all interested in our grand old medieval brasses, sir?"

He addressed George. But George, his cigar gone out, was dozing in his
chair.

"As a matter of fact, I am rather interested--" Stephen began, but Mr.
Carstairs was off again.

"But my wife remains heart and soul in her work," he went on. "Work that
I am happy to say does not go unrewarded, in the material sense, I mean.
And what splendid work it is! She is Organizing Secretary of the Society
for the Relief of Distress amongst the Widows of Professional Men--the
S.R.D.W.P.M. Rather a mouthful that, eh? We call it the R.D. for short.
Perhaps the initials are more familiar to you in another connexion, my
young friend? Ha, Ha!" (Stephen was furious to find himself flushing at
this point. They were, indeed, sickeningly familiar.) "A wonderful
organization, but ill-supported, alas! Indeed, had it not been for a
fortunate windfall the other day, it might have--"

He stopped abruptly, and the sudden ceasing of the soothing flow of
words awakened George, who opened his eyes and sat up.

"Where the devil's your aunt?" said George to Stephen, crossly,
struggling stiffly to get up. "Time we went out to get up an appetite
for tea."

"Dear me," said Mr. Carstairs, "it's getting quite late. I wonder where
my wife has got to."

Fortunately the ladies appeared at this point, and the party broke up.
Stephen took his leave as soon as he decently could, and made his way
back to the station. He wondered as he went why the name of the Society
for the Relief of Distress amongst the Widows of Professional Men seemed
familiar. It was not until his train had nearly reached Victoria that he
remembered.

On the whole, he reported to Anne when they met, the day had not been
completely wasted.




                            CHAPTER FOURTEEN


                          Monday at Midchester

                          Monday, August 28th

Martin and Stephen were having tea in the Palm Lounge of the Grand
Hotel, Midchester. It was not, they agreed, a very exhilarating
experience. Built in the spacious days of Queen Victoria, and
redecorated in the yet more spacious days of the post-war boom, the
Grand Hotel, like the rest of Midchester, had fallen on evil days. The
decorations were cracked and faded, the big rooms, designed for the
leisure hours of tired and prosperous business men, were an echoing
emptiness. A couple of gloomy commercial travellers, evidently comparing
notes on the impossibility of doing business in Midchester, were the
only other occupants of the lounge.

"Rather a depressing place, don't you think?" said Martin.

It was the third time at least that he had said the same thing or words
to the same effect, since they had driven into the town that afternoon,
through acres of derelict factories. Stephen this time did not trouble
to reply. He was studying a local directory, and presently called for
the waiter.

"Whereabouts is Chorlby Moor?" he asked him.

"About two miles south, out of town, sir," he was told. "What you might
call a suburb, sir. A tram will take you there."

"Is that where this chap lives?" Martin asked.

"Apparently so. I can't find any business address for him in this book."

"We passed Chorlby Moor coming in. Just where the tramlines started.
Didn't you notice it? Rather superior little houses with gardens and
garages. You know, Steve, I don't somehow fancy bearding a chap in a
suburb. They're not inclined to be matey. Think an Englishman's home is
his castle and all that. Which," he added solemnly, "it ought to be, of
course."

"No doubt. It's not a very suitable article of faith for detectives,
unfortunately."

"But seriously, Steve, do you propose to go off and beard this chap?"

"I wish," said Stephen, irritably, "that you wouldn't use such perfectly
foul expressions, or having used them, repeat them over and over again."

Martin took off his glasses and polished them thoughtfully.

"I know I'm a lowbrow," he observed. "All the same, I do want to know.
Do you want to--do what I said?"

"I don't know," Stephen answered crossly.

"That's just it. Fact is, we've neither of us the least notion what to
do or how to set about doing it. We've come up to this place, which, as
I said just now, is distinctly depressing, because Annie told us to,
really. And now we're here we don't really know what to do."

"As you've said once already."

"I will say this for you, Steve, you do listen to a fellow. You always
seem to spot when I say anything, even if it's only once. Well, there we
are. Short of bearding--I'm sorry, but what else can you call it?--short
of that, I suppose we shall have to hang about Midchester and Chorlby
Moor until we can scrape acquaintance with this Parsons person. It may
take us ages. Of course, we had a great stroke of luck at Bentby
yesterday, and you clicked in very quick time at Brighton, so perhaps
our luck will hold, but you never can tell. Just chuck me that
directory, would you?"

Stephen passed it to him.

"You won't find anything else about Parsons in it," he remarked. "But--I
wanted to look at something else."

Martin turned the pages over, found the entry he wanted and closed the
book.

"Think I'll go out and sniff the breeze for a bit," he observed.

"Do," said Stephen. "You'll find it very enjoyable. In spite of the
depression, there are two or three tanneries still working here, I
fancy."

Martin went out and Stephen was left to his own devices for nearly half
an hour. He spent the time reading a guide to Midchester, published by
the local Chamber of Commerce. It was two years out of date--he could
well believe that they had lost heart trying to publicize that moribund
town--but none the less it had some useful information. He had just come
to the end of it when Martin returned, evidently highly elated about
something.

"A snip, my boy, definitely a snip!" he exclaimed as soon as he entered.

"Where have you been?"

"At the Conservative Club--in Hay Street, just the other side of the
Market-Place. You remember, Parsons wrote his letter to Pendlebury from
there."

"Yes, of course I do."

"Well, I've found out something rather useful. He's the secretary of the
City Conservative Association."

Nothing ever gave Stephen more pleasure than scoring off his
brother-in-law elect, all the more so because the opportunity did not
often arise. Nobody, however, could have divined the fact from the
casual tone in which he now answered.

"Oh? Yes, I know. He's an alderman too, or was a couple of years ago."

Martin looked as disappointed as Stephen hoped he would.

"How did you find out?" he asked.

"It's all in this little book here," said Stephen indicating the guide.
"Much better way of getting information, you know, Martin, than running
about and calling attention to yourself by asking questions."

"Sorry and all that," said Martin. "But as a matter of fact, I didn't
ask any questions. Anyhow, that isn't the real snip I meant to tell you
about. The point is--there's a meeting at the Club to-night. I found out
about Parsons from the advertisement of it hanging up outside."

"I don't quite see where what you describe as the snip comes in,"
Stephen said.

"Well, the meeting--it isn't a meeting exactly, but a Rally--d'you think
there's much difference?--is being addressed by the Conservative
candidate, and all are welcome. It occurs to me that all includes us."

"Do you really suggest that we should go to a political meeting?"

"Well, after all, why not? It's all in the day's work. You went to
church yesterday, didn't you? This can't be half as dull--in fact it
might be quite amusing. Besides, I'm a Conservative myself, anyway.
Everybody ought to be, I think, if he cares for his country. But that's
not the point. Don't you see, Parsons is bound to be there, as secretary
of the blooming show, and we can get a good squint at him."

"There is something in that," Stephen admitted. "I don't see what good
it's going to do us looking at the fellow at a public meeting, but it
will be one way of spending an evening in this God forsaken place, at
all events. What time does it start?"

"Eight o'clock. It's a foul time, I know, but I expect the chaps in
these parts mostly go in for high tea. I suppose there's quite a chance
of our dropping in for a row at the meeting," he went on hopefully.
"This place must be pretty red with all the unemployment there is
about."

                 *        *        *        *        *

If Martin had looked forward to grappling with embattled Bolsheviks at
the Conservative Club, he was disappointed. True, Midchester was "red,"
in the sense that it had returned a Labour member time out of mind, but
this very fact made the majority less disposed to pay any attention to
the activities of their opponents. If Sir Oswald Mosley himself had
visited Midchester, he would have been greeted with not more than a few
languid brickbats. The Conservative Rally proved to be a dull, decorous
function. It was poorly attended, so that Stephen and Martin were able
to pick seats with a good view of the platform. Evidently the good party
men of the locality rated their chances of success as low as did the
Socialists, and the proceedings opened with the reading of an impressive
list of those who apologized for their absence. There was a sprinkling
of unbelievers present, pale, shabby men in whom even the instinct of
revolt had been all but extinguished by years of unemployment and what
politicians have agreed to disguise beneath the polite word
"malnutrition." Quite plainly, they did not believe a word of what was
being said from the platform, but they were too listless to heckle, and
even an incautious reference to the Government's work for the unemployed
produced no more than a few sniggers, which were meant to be sarcastic,
but sounded merely melancholy. It was difficult to understand why they
should have troubled to attend a political meeting, except from sheer
force of habit, so clear was it that nothing that could be said from any
platform would ever raise them to hope or even credulity again.

By contrast, the men and women on the platform looked almost indecently
well fed. The chairman was bald and pink and round--the eternal type of
chairman all the world over. The candidate was a vigorous young man of
obvious ability, who had been selected to contest this hopeless
constituency on the excellent principle that reserves safe seats for
those who can afford them. The others were a nondescript collection,
bearing one and all the self-righteous look of those who are enduring
boredom for the sake of duty. Stephen did not have to look at them long
before he found the man he sought. One does not have to be an expert
detective to recognize the honorary secretary at any sort of gathering.

To make sure, he said to his neighbour before the speeches began: "Is
that the secretary, sitting on the chairman's left?"

"That's right, Mr. Parsons. And that's the agent he's talking to, Mr.
Turner. A good sort, he is."

"He looks ill," Stephen remarked.

"Who, Turner?"

"No, Mr. Parsons."

"Oh, him! Yes, he does look queer, doesn't he? Sort of worried, he
looks--has been some time. I don't know what _he's_ got to worry him,
considering . . ."

But at this point the chairman rose, not more than a quarter of an hour
after the advertised time, and the proceedings began.

Stephen devoted most of the rest of the evening to studying Mr. Parsons.
There was no doubt of his looking ill. His face was pale, as pale as
those of the unemployed at the back of the hall, but it was a pallor of
a different quality--the type that goes with too much work rather than
with none at all. His forehead and cheeks were deeply creased and there
were ugly dark patches beneath his eyes. But what was particularly
striking about him was his restlessness. He seemed unable to control the
movements of his hands, which were forever playing with his gold
watch-chain or alternatively ruffling and smoothing his sparse grey
hair, while his eyes wandered incessantly about the hall, scanning it
from floor to ceiling and back again. Altogether, he appeared to be
paying considerably less attention to the speeches than was becoming to
the secretary of the association.

That he had his wits about him, none the less, became evident when, at
the close of the candidate's speech, and a half-hearted sputter of
irrelevant questions, he was called upon by the chairman to propose a
vote of thanks. This he did briefly and wittily, in the manner of an
experienced public speaker. It seemed however, to one observer at least,
that his mind was hardly on the task which he was accomplishing with
such ease; and the instant that he sat down he resumed his former air of
abstraction.

Stephen made use of the occasion to observe to his neighbour as they
were preparing to go out, "Good speech, that."

"Yes," the man replied. "He's not half a bad candidate."

"I meant Mr. Parsons' speech."

"Oh, yes, that was good enough. But after all, it's no wonder with all
the practice he's had. Been in politics here a long time, y'know. Well,
I must be going now. Good night."

And he took himself off, leaving Stephen's curiosity as to Mr. Parsons'
business and position in life still unsatisfied.

Martin, meanwhile, had been following the proceedings of the meeting
with every semblance of enthusiasm. He had clapped vigorously, "hear
heared" loudly, and shown a face of disgust and scorn at the rare
interruptions from the dissidents. When the audience dispersed, Stephen
found him eagerly talking to a man at the door who was distributing
forms of enrolment in the Association.

"My good Martin, what on earth--" Stephen began in disgusted tones.

"Just a minute, old chap. I'm coming," Martin answered over his
shoulder. He took two of the forms and a bundle of political pamphlets
with one hand, while he warmly wrung the organizer's hand with the
other. "I say, Steve," he went on as he rejoined his companion, "wasn't
that a grand speech? I thought he fairly gave the Socialists hell,
didn't you? Pity there wasn't a better audience."

"Really? I didn't listen to it myself."

"Great mistake," said Martin as they made their way out into the street.
"You'd have learnt something if you had; you really would. I know _I_
did, anyway."

"You seem to forget that we didn't go to the meeting to learn about
politics. I flatter myself that I have learnt something this evening,
rather more useful than the Tory propaganda you've been listening to."

"Oh, yes, of course." Martin's spectacles gleamed up in his direction,
as if groping for enlightenment. "Did you find out much? I spotted you
trying to pump the fellow on the other side of you. Rather dangerous, I
thought. Chap might have been a friend of the quarry's. Put him on his
guard and all that."

"I took very good care to do nothing of the sort," said Stephen coldly.
"In any event, one must take certain risks in an inquiry of this kind. I
can't see that offering to join the Conservative Association is going to
get us any further."

"Did you find out what sort of job Parsons has got?"

"No, as a matter of fact, I didn't manage to get so far, but--"

"That reminds me," Martin interrupted him. He stopped under a street
lamp and held one of the papers in his hand close up to his nose.

"Damned small print," he muttered. Then: "I've got it! Central
Buildings, Westgate Street."

"What are you talking about?"

"Parsons' business address. You see, I knew they'd be bound to have the
secretary's address on the enrolment forms, or how would anyone know
where to write to get enrolled? Then it was long odds that they'd put
his business address, as chaps don't care to be bothered with letters
about that sort of thing in the home. At least, I was secretary of a
Rugger club once and I know I didn't. You can always sweat the office
typist to do the donkey work, if you know how to manage her. So, you
see, I--"

"I see. Now we might as well be going home."

"Wait a sec. Westgate Street ought to start somewhere about here. I
thought I noticed it on the way to the meeting. Might as well go and
have a squint at Central Buildings, don't you think?"

Stephen felt too humiliated to protest, and a few minutes later they
found themselves opposite a tall, soot-blackened range of offices in
what was evidently the business centre of the city.

"Classy-looking offices," Martin observed. "Wonder whose they are?"

They crossed the road and read the names outside the main entrance.

"An architect, a solicitor and the local income tax extortioner," Martin
said. "All on the top floors. The rest of the palace seems to be the
property of the Midchester and District Gas Company. Well, if friend
Parsons is in that, he's presumably on a fairly good thing."

Stephen remembered the remark of his chance acquaintance at the meeting.
"I don't know what _he's_ got to worry about, considering . . ."

"I should think that is his job, in all probability," he said. "And in
view of his public position in the town, he's probably fairly high up in
it."

"Humph," said Martin as they made their way back to the hotel. "There's
something done this evening, anyway. You had a good look at him, Steve.
Tell me, do you think he's beardable, so to speak?"

"I shouldn't wonder," said Stephen, remembering Parsons's strained and
nervous manner. "We'll sleep on it."

But the most important discovery of the day was still to be made. They
were in the lounge of the hotel, drinking a last whisky and soda before
going to bed. Martin had recurred once more to the arguments which had
so impressed him at the meeting and was now regurgitating them with
enthusiasm and emphasis. Stephen, thoroughly bored, was only prevented
from being extremely rude to him by the reflection that if he insulted
him, he could hardly in decency allow him to pay for the drinks. Finding
the strain of listening to Martin's political views too much to bear, he
compromised by picking up the first piece of reading matter at hand,
which happened to be a copy of the _Midchester Evening Star_.
Automatically, he turned to the City page, and was about to read the
Stock Exchange closing prices when his eye caught something in an
adjoining column of greater moment. He read it to the end, and then cut
Martin's periods short with an excited exclamation.

"What's the matter?" asked Martin. "You know, Steve, I may be a lowbrow,
but I do think about politics, and if you'd only listen to me, you might
learn something. After all, nowadays--"

"Damn politics! Just look at this, you chump!" said Stephen, and thrust
the paper under Martin's nose.

"Oh! Sorry! Is it anything important? Look here, Steve, you've been had.
This paper's three days old."

"That doesn't matter in the least."

"Doesn't it? Oh, I see now what you're getting at. 'Annual General
Meeting of the Midchester and District Gas Company.' M'm. Extraordinary
time of the year to have an Annual General Meeting. Just shows what
these chaps in the provinces will do, doesn't it?"

"What the hell does it matter? Read it!"

"Oh, Lord, have I got to read it all? It looks as dull as hell. I
suppose I can skip a bit. . . . Aha! Parsons is the assistant manager, I
see. Hell, that's worth knowing, I suppose. Anything else about him in
this?"

"No. But just look down at the bottom of the column."

"What? That's the balance sheet. No good expecting me to understand
figures, you know. Not got the head for them, somehow. I can't--Oh, wow;
oh, wow; oh, wow! Steve, I apologize. This _is_ a snip, and no mistake!
I nearly missed it altogether. Right at the bottom of the page, as you
said. 'Vanning, Waldron and Smith, Chartered Accountants.' Who'd have
thought it?"

They were both silent for a moment.

"When the assistant manager of a firm in the Midlands," said Stephen
slowly, "meets a partner in that firm's London accountants at a quiet
hotel in Markshire on a Sunday just before the Annual General Meeting,
what's the inference?"

"Dirty work," said Martin promptly, and drained his glass.

"The only question is," Stephen went on, "do we tackle Parsons now on
what we've got or ought we to go back to London first and reconnoitre
the Vanning end of the conspiracy?"

"One thing I can tell you," answered Martin. "You won't find Vanning if
you do."

"Eh?"

"There's no such person--in the office of Vanning, Waldron and Smith,
anyway."

"How do you know?"

"I looked 'em up in the official list. You remember when I suggested he
might be a stockbroker, you told me I could find out by looking at the
list of members. I took your tip and then thought it would do no harm if
I checked up on the accountants as well. And there wasn't a Vanning in
either of them. Not a solitary one. And so far as this crowd goes, the
partners now are Waldron, Smith and some one called Cohen. I take it
that Vanning has been gathered to his fathers and they keep the name on
the door for old sake's sake."

"I see. Then why--Damn it all, Martin, it can't be simply a
coincidence!"

"Not on your life! That'd be a bit too thick. Tell you another thing.
Parsons couldn't give the hotel the name of his friend until he turned
up. Reason--the blighter was travelling under an alias and Parsons
didn't know what it would be. And he had the cheek to take the name of
his firm's late senior partner. Pretty cool that, don't you think?"

"Lord, I'd forgotten that!" Stephen lit a cigarette and reflected for a
moment or two before he went on. "Let's work this out properly," he said
at last. "What is our theory about the whole affair?"

"Parsons has been monkeying with the Gas Company's accounts," Martin
began. "The clerk or whatnot sent down to audit them smells a rat."

"Instead of showing him up," Stephen chimed in, "he keeps the knowledge
to himself--"

"--And uses it to do a spot of blackmailing on the side."

"Which would explain the fact that Parsons has not been sleeping too
well at nights lately."

"You bet your life it would! Then just before the accounts are due to be
passed, the chap from Vanning's summons Parsons for a nice confidential
little chat about how much he's to cough up and so on."

"They quarrel on that all-important point. I wonder, by the way, Martin,
whether Parsons has been embezzling for some time?"

"And paying tribute to the blood-sucker in Gossip Lane? (Appropriate
address that, by the way!) I shouldn't be surprised. Anyhow, a point
comes when he tells him that he can't go on. No use trying to get blood
out of a stone, you know."

"Yes, I expect that's just the sort of expression Parsons would use on
that occasion."

"Is it? Well, I dare say you know. No offence meant, and all that. Where
are we? Yes--they quarrel, as you said just now. Vanning--we'll have to
call him that--goes up to bed first. Parsons comes up later feeling
pretty murderous about him, sees the tray with the pot of tea outside
what he thinks is his room--sorry I laughed at your idea when you
suggested it the other day, Steve, but I see there is something in it
now--"

"Being a bad sleeper, he has some drugs with him," Stephen suggested.
"For that matter, a man in his position might well have been
contemplating suicide."

"Right you are! It's all working out beautifully. He says to himself:
'Why shouldn't this hellhound take the medicine instead of me?' So he
pops the stuff into the tea-pot, and goes to bed feeling that he's made
everything all serene so far as Vanning is concerned."

"And next morning--"

"Good Lord, yes! Next morning he gets a really nasty one in the eye when
he finds that the corpse has quietly got up and had his breakfast and
mizzled off. Steve, I really believe we've got to the bottom of this!"

"I wonder," said Stephen slowly. "Somehow, it looks almost too good to
be true."

Martin rubbed his hands together gleefully.

"Rot, it looks good because it is true. What's the catch in it?"

"Well, there's one thing. How do we know that Parsons had any of this
particular dope with him?"

"He must have. That was what your guv'nor died of, wasn't it?"

"But that's begging the whole question!"

"I don't see that. If he didn't do it, who did? Can you answer that
one?"

"No, of course I can't."

"All right! Then so far as I can see the only question is, how do we
deal with this thing tomorrow?"

"I think that's a question we had better decide tomorrow," said Stephen.
"I don't know about you, but I feel distinctly tired."

"Same here. It's been a long day, but a good one. I only wish . . ."

"Yes?"

"I wish," said Martin regretfully, "there had been a bit of a row at
that meeting."




                            CHAPTER FIFTEEN


                 "Something Attempted, Something Done"

                          Tuesday, August 29th

"Are we all set?" said Martin.

Stephen said nothing, but nodded. His face was pale, his lips drawn in a
thin, straight line. Martin, on the other hand, seemed no more than
pleasantly excited. He chatted happily as they left the hotel and walked
the short distance that separated them from Westgate Street.

"I think with a chap like this we can afford to do a bit of bluffing,
don't you?" he said.

"Yes, I suppose so."

"I mean, in the state he's in already, he'll probably cave in all at
once as soon as he sees that we know something."

"Perhaps he will."

"Do you think we could get him to write a confession? That'd floor the
insurance blighters absolutely, wouldn't it?"

"It certainly would."

"Well, do you think he's the sort of chap who would make a confession?"

"I don't know."

"Mind you, Steve, I shall leave all the talking to you. You're a lot
cleverer at that sort of thing than I am. I shall just sit around and
weigh in where I think you want any support, and so forth, but by and
large I shall leave all the talking to you."

"Then for God's sake stop talking now, and let me think in peace for a
moment!" Stephen exclaimed, stung to sudden fury.

Martin apologized as amiably as ever, and contented himself with
whistling loudly to himself, until Stephen was compelled to ask him to
stop.

"I'm sorry," said Martin once more. "You see, the fact is, Steve, that
I'm just as worried and excited about this show as you are, really, only
it takes me differently. You go all sick inside, and pale outside, and I
feel frightfully pepped up and go about feeling like one of those
fellows in the advertisements. You know, the chaps who take whatever it
is every morning."

"Yes, I do know. I read the papers too, as it happens."

And from then on Stephen gave up the attempt to silence him and let him
express his excitement in his own way.

At the office Stephen asked for Mr. Parsons.

"Have you got an appointment, sir?" asked the clerk who received them.

"Yes."

After much discussion, Stephen and Martin had decided that it would be
safer to telephone and make an appointment. The nominal excuse for their
visit was "a matter arising out of the meeting last night," and this had
proved sufficient to procure them an interview.

They were taken through a vast hall, loud with the clatter of
typewriters, into a small waiting-room, and here, after a short delay,
Mr. Parsons joined them. In the light of day his face did not look
nearly so ghastly as it had done under the crude glare of the lamps in
the Conservative Club, and he seemed comparatively self-possessed.

"Good morning, gentlemen!" he began. "I understand that you wanted to
see me?"

"Yes," said Stephen. His face was almost as pale as Mr. Parsons', and he
seemed in some difficulty in finding words to open the conversation.
"Er--I don't think you know my name," he went on. "My name is
Dickinson--Stephen Dickinson."

"Yes?" Mr. Parsons smiled politely. If the name conveyed anything
whatever to him, he was an uncommonly good actor.

"My friend and I wanted to ask you . . ." Stephen lost track of his
sentence and stopped. Out of the tail of his eye he could see Martin
drawing breath to speak, and he plunged on hastily: "I think, Mr.
Parsons, you know the Pendlebury Old Hall Hotel?"

Mr. Parsons raised his eyebrows.

"Pendlebury Old Hall?" he said, in a voice that was perhaps a semitone
higher than was usual for him. "Why, yes, certainly. I have stayed
there."

"That's just the point," said Martin loudly and unexpectedly.

Mr. Parsons spun round and looked at him in a somewhat startled manner,
and indeed, Martin's abrupt incursion into the conversation was enough
to make any one jump.

"Really--" he began, but Stephen did not give him time to go on.

"As my friend says," he proceeded smoothly, "we are interested in the
circumstances of your recent stay at Pendlebury. We are making
inquiries--"

"One moment!" Mr. Parsons held up a hand which Stephen observed was now
perfectly steady. "You tell me you are 'making inquiries.' Please let me
ask you before you go any further, whether from that rather official
phrasing I am to take it you are connected with the police?"

Martin was about to say something, but once more Stephen forestalled
him.

"No," he said. "We are making private inquiries on behalf of--of an
interested party."

Mr. Parsons smiled. There could be no doubt of it; he positively smiled!

"Then you may take it that I am not an interested party in your private
inquiries into my private affairs," he said, and while he was speaking
he pressed a bell.

Almost at once, a commissionaire opened the door of the room.

"Will you show these gentlemen out, please, Robertson?" said Mr.
Parsons.

"But look here!" cried Martin. "How--"

"This way, gentlemen, if you please!" said the commissionaire. He was a
very large commissionaire.

                 *        *        *        *        *

If Stephen had complained of Martin's talkativeness on the way from the
Grand Hotel to Central Buildings, he would have given anything for him
to have said something on the way back from Central Buildings to the
Grand Hotel. As for uttering a word himself, it was out of the question.
But Martin did not come to his aid. They trailed back through the
loathly streets of Midchester in the silence of the utterly defeated,
and though in the course of the morning some words of a sort did
contrive to pass between them, it looked as if they were going to return
the whole way to London without once mentioning the topic of Mr.
Parsons.

It was lunch that restored them to comparative normality. Restored
Martin, at all events, to the point that he was suddenly enabled to
discuss the whole incident with philosophic detachment.

"Y'know, Steve," he began abruptly, "it just shows how one can be
mistaken about a chap. If ever I saw anybody who looked really beardable
it was that one. And then . . ."

Stephen said nothing.

"Of course, I dare say it was a mistake trying it on in his office. My
fault, I know and all that, but I didn't fancy Chorlby Moor somehow. All
the same, there aren't any commissionaires in the suburbs."

Stephen still remained silent, and the monologue continued:

"Not but what I dare say he'd have been a pretty tough nut anywhere.
That is, if there was ever anything to the whole business. . . . It's
funny to think we never even got round to mentioning Vanning's name to
him, when you come to think of it."

"Wouldn't have made any difference," Stephen muttered.

"P'raps not. Tell you what, though. If we'd bluffed a bit and said we
were policemen when he asked us--I wanted to, you know--"

"I know you did. And if we had, he'd have had us both arrested straight
away."

"Good Lord, d'you think so? Well, we're well out of that, anyhow. All
the same, it's pretty sickening to think we've been all this way and
taken all this trouble and then got absolutely nothing to show for
it. . . ."

His voice trailed away. Clearly there was no more to be said.

To add to their miseries, when about twenty miles short of London the
car choked, spluttered, recovered itself, spluttered again, and finally
stopped. Stephen, who knew nothing whatever about the insides of
motor-cars, sat patiently inside while Martin did mysterious things to
the engine with an adjustable spanner. It was quite a simple job, he
explained, simply the old carburettor playing up again. He wouldn't be
half a jiffy. He knew the old bus's tricks backwards.

In the end it took him nearly an hour and a half, and thereafter for the
rest of the way their speed was reduced to a precarious fifteen miles an
hour. It seemed to be the last touch necessary to make their failure
complete. They had aimed at reaching home in time for tea, but it was
nearly seven before they entered Hampstead High Street. Just before the
turning to Plane Street, Martin pulled up with a jerk. Stephen, who had
been dozing, opened his eyes and said irritably:

"What's the matter now?"

"Look!" said Martin, and pointed across the street.

Opposite, some newspaper-sellers had their pitch. It was a day of little
news, as was evidenced by the fact that each placard bore a totally
different legend. The first that Stephen noticed ran:

                              LIBYA TROOP
                                MOVEMENT
                             RUMOURS DENIED

Next to it was:

                               TWO GASSED
                                   IN
                                SWANAGE
                               LOVE-NEST

Then a little farther down the street, in huge letters of black on
yellow, he read:

                                MIDLANDS
                              GAS MANAGER
                               FOUND DEAD

Before Stephen had properly taken it in, Martin was out of the car and
dodging among the omnibuses across the road.

He was back, waving a paper, long before the shops and houses had ceased
to be a confused blur before Stephen's eyes. He climbed into the car,
his face pink with excitement, threw the paper across to Stephen, shut
the door, and engaged the gear.

"It's him all right," he said in a hushed voice, as if he were speaking
in the very presence of the dead.

Stephen found voice to say: "Did he use Medinal, by any chance?"

"No. Shot himself. In the office."

"Oh!"

Shortly before they reached Mrs. Dickinson's door, Martin, looking
straight in front of him, murmured, "Just as well we didn't give our
names at the office, Steve."

"Yes."

"Funny I was complaining just now that we hadn't done anything on the
trip."

"M'm."

At the house, Stephen got out and Martin remained in the car.

"Think I'll go straight home and turn in early," he said, apparently to
the mascot on the radiator cap. "Feel a bit tired. Will you explain to
Annie?"

"Right," said Stephen, looking at his boots. "Good night. Oh, and thanks
for driving me up and all that."

"That's all right," answered Martin without shifting his gaze. "Good
night."

In the hall, Stephen looked at the newspaper for the first time. He was
still there when his mother came out of the drawing-room to greet him.

"Well, Stephen, what sort of day have you had?" she asked him.

He did not answer. He was reading:

"The deceased leaves a wife and three children. Interviewed today in the
pretty drawing-room of her Chorlby Moor home, Mrs. Parsons told our
representative . . ."

"What's the matter, Stephen? You look quite pale."

"Oh, I'm all right, Mother. A bit tired, that's all. It's been rather an
exhausting day. Do you think there's any brandy in the house?"




                            CHAPTER SIXTEEN


                            Parbury Gardens

                          Tuesday, August 29th

On the second day of the absence of her brother and fianc at
Midchester, Anne could stand inaction no longer. Waiting for the men to
come in was all very well, but waiting prolonged over two days was too
much of a good thing, particularly when the strain of waiting was
aggravated by the presence of an obstinate something at the back of her
mind, which refused to be exorcised. At first that something had seemed
like a tiny grain of solid matter lodged somewhere in the cogs of a
well-oiled machine, giving no evidence of its existence except now and
then, when there would be a faint jar in the process of her thought. She
could ignore it by turning her thoughts elsewhere, by letting that part
of the machine lie idle. But now it had taken on a different aspect. She
pictured it no longer as an inert obstruction in her smoothly working
brain, but as a living, malignant growth, sending out its ramifications
in every direction, proliferating, breaking down the resistances she had
built against it. . . .

She went out on the Heath and walked about until she was tired. For the
first time, she envied all the people who had dogs with
them--quarrelsome, excitable dogs, disobedient, runaway dogs, dogs that
were embarrassingly friendly with the dogs of other people, dogs that
were incessantly requiring balls or sticks to be thrown for them--each
one of them something that had to be called, to be whistled to, cursed,
put on the lead, dragged away from somebody or something, or at least
continually watched over and thought about. For the first and only time
she yearned for a Scottie, six months old, guaranteed through distemper.
There was, as Martin had said, something about a dog you didn't get
anywhere else.

After lunch, her restlessness persisted. She went out again, and, too
tired for any more walking, got on a bus. Any bus, she told herself,
would have done. Since the particular one she was on had happened to
come past, there was, after all, no reason why she should have taken it.
But the fact remained that she had let two go by before she finally
mounted this one.

The bus rattled her down the hill, down into the sticky heat of London.
She bought a sixpenny ticket--there was no point in not having a long
outing while she was about it. She might have tea somewhere, or go to a
flick, or look up Ruth Downing, only she would be sure to be still away.
And when the bus drew up at the fare stage opposite the corner of
Parbury Gardens, she told herself that she was genuinely surprised to
find herself there.

She alighted and crossed the road. After all, why not? There was nothing
in the least disloyal in what she was doing. She was simply checking up.
It was an obvious precaution. Martin would quite understand. In fact,
she meant to tell him all about it when she got home. He would probably
be rather amused. None the less, though she told herself all this, she
felt her knees tremble ever so slightly as she walked up to the ugly
brick block of flats.

What was so particularly absurd, as she admitted in her own mind, was
that she had not really any idea what she expected to find. But this
circumstance did not make her relief any the less genuine when, opposite
number 15, she found in the narrow vestibule the name of Mrs. Elizabeth
Peabody, precisely as Martin had said. With a lighter heart and a
growing sense that she had been making herself ridiculous, she walked on
to No. 34. There, sure enough, was Mr. T. P. M. Jones, and the sensation
of reassurance at once deepened. She walked out into the sunlight,
feeling that it was hardly worth while attempting to verify the fact
that Mrs. Peabody was blind, or that Mr. Jones wore a beard.

Instead of walking away at once, however, she took a turn round the
square of which Parbury Gardens formed one side. Under the plane-trees
shading the little green patch in the middle of the square was a
perambulator. In the perambulator, presumably was a baby, and beside it
a cross-eyed nurse squatted on a stool and knitted. Anne paused in her
walk and watched them vacantly. The baby belonged to one of the flats,
she mused. Surprising that they hadn't sent it to the seaside at this
time of the year. Perhaps they couldn't afford to. Curious, you'd have
thought they were well enough off, though--it looked a fairly expensive
kind of pram. Hire purchase, very likely. . . . All the same, if it was
mine, I'd have found a way to . . . But that nurse! Surely it can't be
good for a child to be looked after by any one with a squint as bad as
that? I should be terrified of the baby picking it up. Of course, very
likely the real nurse is on holiday and this one is only a
temporary. . . .

She dragged herself away and resumed her walk. This won't do, my girl,
she said to herself. You're a deal too scatter-brained, that's what's
the matter with you. You didn't come down here to moon over babies but
to investigate something. Think, girl, think! And I'm going to keep you
walking round this blasted square until you've something to show for it!

Fifteen, Parbury Gardens, Anne repeated to herself as her feet dragged
slowly along the pavement. Fifteen, Parbury Gardens. That was the
address the Joneses gave at the hotel, and the Joneses weren't Joneses
at all, but a couple out on the loose. So Martin said. Several times.
And when you're a couple out on the loose, you don't put your real name
and address in the book. Martin says so, and Martin knows. I suppose if
I had spent the night at Bentby with Martin we'd have put . . . I wonder
what sort of name and address we'd have put?

Her incorrigible mind wandered away into other paths for a moment until
conscience, striding after, pulled it back with a jerk. You're as bad as
those dogs on the Heath, conscience told mind severely. Meekly, mind
took up the trail again, as Anne completed her first circuit of the
square.

_But_ if you have to put down a sham address on the spur of the moment,
what you put down has probably some association with you. Martin said
so. No, he didn't. I said so, and Martin just looked glum and pretended
to be stupid, because he knew all about the technique of sham addresses.
But he didn't contradict, anyway. If you invented an address that didn't
exist, it might be different, though even then there would probably be
some unconscious--subconscious? I never can remember the
difference--some association, anyhow, which directed your mind in making
that particular invention. But where you chose a real address, one that
was sham only in the sense that it wasn't yours, the odds were that you
had some reason for your choice.

And that's as far as I got three days ago, talking to Martin. And now
that I am in Parbury Gardens, where do we go from here? Fifteen, Parbury
Gardens _means something_. It's a kind of code which we haven't got the
key to. And the key was in the mind of the Joneses, or one of them, when
they wrote down those words in the book at Pendlebury Old Hall. Wait a
bit. Try and picture them standing there, with the book open in front of
them, and the reception clerk staring at them in that vacant superior
way they always do. . . . Damn difficult to picture anyone when you
don't know what their faces are like. But there is a picture all the
same, an impression anyway. Now why?

Of course! Anne stopped suddenly in her stride as she came abreast of
the cross-eyed nurse for the second time. Elderson's report said
distinctly that the girl was giggling while the register was being
signed. That was it! The address was a joke, then. Ha, Ha! Let's have a
good laugh, even if we can't see it just yet. Fifteen, very funny.
Parbury, an absolute scream. Gardens, we all roared! It's enough to make
you drop a stitch, isn't it, nurse?

Anne's mind went once more to the Black Swan at Bentby, and this time
conscience made no move. She tried to imagine herself in the smelly
little hall there, standing behind Martin and sniggering at the name and
address he was writing. The effort made her nearly sick, but she
persisted. What sort of address could have made her snigger, if she had
been the sniggering kind? Obviously, there was no joke in something that
didn't mean anything to you at all. If you enjoyed cheap jokes--and _ex
hypothesi_ you did--there were two possible ones that might appeal to
you. First, you put down somebody else's address, because to your dirty
mind it seemed exquisitely funny that that particular person, in all
probability the pink of respectability, should be in some way connected
all unconsciously with your furtive goings on. Or alternatively, in a
spirit of bravado you chose one that was near your own, and got a sort
of kick out of the quite imaginary risk you were running. That seemed
sound psychology, anyhow.

We are getting on, Anne thought, as she came round to her starting point
for the third time. Now let's see how it works out. (_a._) The joke was
that they knew blind Mrs. Peabody, and thought it was a real stroke of
wit to put her flat, of all places, in a hotel register. If that's the
right answer, I'm sunk. I simply can't face the prospect of rummaging
into Mrs. Peabody's private life and trying to find out which of her
acquaintances might possibly play a trick like that on her. (_b._) The
joke was that the address was as near as possible the true one.
Fifteen--Parbury--Gardens. Three ingredients. And to make a really good
joke of it, two of them should be genuine and one only false. So you
get--Fifteen, Parbury Place, or Terrace, or Street, or whatever it may
be. Or Fifteen, Something-or-other Gardens, or finally, Umpteen, Parbury
Gardens.

She pondered the alternatives gravely. Between three such crass
imbecilities, which to choose? On due consideration, she struck out the
second. To start with, among all the scores of "gardens" in London, it
would obviously be hopeless to try to find the right one. In the second
place, the name of the gardens was the really essential part of the
address. Change that, and you change its identity. And with the
identity, the whole feeble joke disappeared. Surely the most cretinous
nit-wit could not possibly have thought it funny, or risky, to say,
Fifteen, Parbury Gardens, when the real address was Fifteen, Daylesford
Gardens, for instance! Remained the other two possibilities. More from
laziness than from any rational motive, she preferred the theory of
Fifteen, Parbury Something. There could not be more than a limited
number of streets in London called after Parbury, whoever he or it might
be, and there were, she had noticed, one hundred and ten flats in the
gardens. Following the line of least resistance, therefore, instead of
completing her third circuit of the square, she turned down a side
street to where she had noticed the post office.

The lady behind the grill seemed deeply incensed when Anne asked if she
could see a Directory. Such things, apparently, were unknown in post
offices. From her expression it might be gathered that it was more than
a little indelicate to mention them. She did, however, go so far as to
admit that improprieties of this nature could be seen in the local
public library; and when Anne asked where that was to be found, she
ejaculated:
"Turn-to-y'r-right-at-bottom-of-th'-street-'n-'s-on-y'r-left," with a
speed that showed how often she must have given the direction to other
seekers after the forbidden fruit.

Five minutes later, Anne was in the public library with the directory
open before her. It did not need more than a glance to explode her
theory. Parbury Gardens was positively the only Parbury in London, the
county suburbs included. There was, it was true, one other thoroughfare
with a name that closely resembled it, Parberry Street. But Parberry
Street, after inspection, proved to be in the Isle of Dogs, and she felt
quite positive in her mind that wherever the Joneses came from, it was
not the Isle of Dogs. So that was that! It really simplifies matters a
lot, she thought, exhaustion making her positively lightheaded. The
answer is simply Something, Parbury Gardens. Somewhere in those flats
lives or has lived Mr. M. Jones--or Mrs. Jones. Mrs. Jones, I think.
So-called. I don't know why, but I'm sure the address he chose to fake
was hers and not his. Positive. Woman's instinct and all that. And only
a hundred and ten numbers to choose from. Hooray!

She set herself to read, slowly and methodically, the names of all the
inhabitants of the flats as recorded in the Directory. Not one of them
conveyed anything to her whatever, and there was not the smallest reason
to suppose that any of them would. None the less, she ploughed grimly
on, and had almost come to the end, to No. 87, to be precise, when a
round-shouldered, spectacled young man approached her and said
mournfully, "The library is closing now, Madame."

Anne abandoned the book and hurried out into the sun again. She was
astonished to see by the clock in the post office window that it was
already six o'clock. She must have been very much longer in the library
than she had imagined. She had had no tea, and was ready to drop from
fatigue. All the same, her legs carried her back, seemingly of their own
accord, back to Parbury Gardens, there to take up again her
circumambulation of the square with the persistence and much about the
enthusiasm of a convict in the exercise ground of a prison.

Fifteen, her thoughts ran. We've got down to that now, simply the bare
numeral. Why choose fifteen, of all the numbers going? Because the
proper number was five? Or twenty-five? Or for that matter, any sort of
five, up to a hundred and five? Pity they didn't go up to a hundred and
fifteen. That would have been a sure guess. Think of a number and double
it. That gave you thirty. She shook her head, gravely. Somehow she did
not fancy thirty. Of course, there were lots of things you could do with
numbers. Add, subtract, divide, transpose. . . . Transpose. _Transpose!_
She stood still, staring across the railings at the spot where the
perambulator had been and was no longer, while a wholly irrational
feeling of certainty flooded in upon her. In that moment, she was
convinced that she had solved the problem of the Joneses' address in the
register at Pendlebury.

Invisible trumpeters blew a triumphal march before her as she walked
over to the entrance from which access was gained to number Fifty-one.
Their music flagged a little when she realized that it was the top flat
of all and that there was no lift. It had ceased altogether long before
she had dragged herself up the long flight of stairs. The name, she had
noticed before beginning her climb, was Miss Frances Fothergill. It was
repeated on a rather dingy visiting card on the flat door itself. The
door itself had a slightly rakish air, with its pale green paint that
must have once been jaunty and was beginning to flake off where hearty
Bohemian boots had kicked it. Just below the card was the knob of a
bell. A decidedly violent bell. The kind that rings just inside the door
and makes enough noise to wake the dead. Anne rang it three times before
she gave it up.

It seemed almost more exhausting climbing down the stairs than it had
been going up. It was like that in the Alps, she remembered, seeing
again an endless zigzag path winding down through the woods from the hut
to the valley below. She reached the ground floor at last and came out
into the open air, her eyes momentarily dazzled by the sunlight. As she
did so, she was aware of a strong scent of frangi-pani, a blurred vision
of lipstick and silver fox, and a high-pitched voice saying: "Oo! Excuse
me! But it's Miss Dickinson, isn't it?"

Anne prided herself on her memory for faces, but she had to blink two or
three times before she recognized her. Then something familiar in the
tilt of her nose and her odd, angular smile enabled her to place her.
Miss Fothergill--and though Anne had never heard her name, she was quite
certain she was Miss Fothergill--was the assistant who had more than
once sold shoes to her in one of the big shops. It was not surprising
that recognition was difficult, for dressed for the street and with her
full war-paint on, this glamorous creature was altogether different from
the quiet young woman whom she remembered flitting about the shoe
department of Peter Harker's.

"Oo, Miss Dickinson! It's quite a surprise seeing you here, it reely
is!" Miss Fothergill was saying.

"Yes," said Anne faintly. "I was looking for a friend, but she doesn't
seem to be in."

"It is always like that, isn't it, when you've come a long way? So
provoking, I always think. But won't you come up to my place and have a
cup of tea?"

"No, thank you very much."

"Oo, but do, Miss Dickinson. You'll excuse me saying so, but you look
quite done up, you do reely. It'll be no trouble at all to me, honest it
won't. I always have a cup meself when I come home. It does pull you
together ever so. I've got the kettle and all ready and waiting on the
ring. Do come up just a minute, Miss Dickinson, it'll do you good."

Anne did not feel equal to resisting. She allowed herself to be led once
more up the stairs (with many apologies for their length and steepness)
and through the battered green door into the flat beyond.

"I'm afraid it _is_ in rather a pickle," said Miss Fothergill with a
giggle, as Anne sank gratefully on to the shabby divan which almost
filled the untidy little room. "If you'll excuse me, I'll go and get the
tea. I won't be half a jiffy. Do put your feet up, Miss Dickinson, if
you're feeling tired. And I expect you'd like to take your shoes off a
bit," she added with a professional glance at Anne's footwear.

She disappeared into the kitchenette beyond and presently came back with
a tray.

"I reely must apologize for the service," she giggled. "But I never seem
to be able to get them matched up somehow. You know how it is when a cup
gets broken and you've only just time to pop round to Woolworth's. Do
you take sugar, Miss Dickinson?"

Anne gulped her tea gratefully. It was not Peter Harker's best brand by
a long way, but it was warm and invigorating. She refused the solitary
slice of cake which Miss Fothergill pressed upon her.

"Oo, but do, Miss Dickinson," she persisted. "I don't want it meself,
honest I don't. I never eat anything with my tea. And it's lucky to take
the last bit, they always say, don't they? I know a girl friend of mine
told me before she was married she was sure it was all along of her--not
that _you_ need bother about that sort of luck now, need you, Miss
Dickinson? Oo, perhaps I didn't ought to have said that?"

"That's quite all right," Anne reassured her. "I expect it will be
announced any time now."

"I'm sure I hope you'll be ever so happy. I'm sure you ought to be. You
know one gets quite interested, if you know what I mean, when any of our
customers get married. Any of our regulars, I mean. And of course, we've
seen Mr. Johnson in with you lots of times. He's ever so nice, I think."

"Thank you," said Anne. "And now I think I must be going. It was really
kind of you to give me tea."

"You're welcome, I'm sure, Miss Dickinson. I dare say we shall be seeing
you round our place again soon? There's some lovely new autumn styles
we've just got in, you would like them, reely you would. Well, goodbye,
Miss Dickinson."

"Goodbye."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Throwing economy to the winds for once, Anne went home by taxi. In spite
of Miss Fothergill's tea she felt more tired than ever, but it was the
exhaustion of the mind rather than of the body. She leaned back in her
seat and tried not to think, but found that she might as well have tried
to prevent the taximeter ticking up the fare. But unlike the figures on
the meter, her thoughts remained obstinately unprogressive. I've got no
proof, she kept saying to herself, no proof about the matter at all. All
this juggling with figures seemed very clever at the time, but meeting
that girl there may have been just coincidence. May have been--if only I
didn't know in my bones that it wasn't!

I liked her, too, she reflected. I can't imagine why, but I positively
liked her. She was vulgar and overdressed but she obviously had a kind
nature. She "took to me," as she would say. Damn you, Miss Fothergill,
why can't I hate you as I should? And where am I going to go for my
shoes after this?

And all the time, at the very back of her mind, remained another thought
altogether, so very much more disturbing that she preferred not to
examine it at all.




                           CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


                       Mr. Dedman Speaks His Mind

                         Wednesday, August 30th

Things were moving in the office of Jelks, Jelks, Dedman and Jelks.
Clerks came and went with an air of busy purposefulness, even on routine
matters. Typewriters clicked and jangled at a speedier tempo. Office
gossip was a thing of hurried half-sentences instead of long, delicious
confidences. For Dedman, the mainspring of the firm, had returned to
work, keyed up to a higher pitch of efficiency by his holiday, and was
gathering into his capable hands all the strings that had been allowed
to fall slack and tangled in his absence.

By midday he had already cleared away the mass of arrears which had
accumulated on his desk and had, in addition, put straight half a dozen
minor matters which the junior Jelks, now on his holiday, had left in a
state of happy confusion. As the clock struck twelve he finished
dictating a letter, nodded dismissal to the typist and pressed the bell
on his desk.

To the clerk who answered it he said, "Is Mr. Dickinson here yet?"

"Just arrived, Mr. Dedman. Miss Dickinson is with him, and another
gentleman--Mr. Johnson, I think it is."

"Humph! I only wanted to see Mr. Dickinson. You'd better show them all
in, though."

Stephen, Anne, and Martin, ushered into the presence, found themselves
confronted by a short, compact man of early middle age, with a
pugnacious jaw and a round head covered with close-cropped black hair.
He acknowledged their appearance with an awkward bow, plumped back into
his chair and plunged immediately into business.

"Unusual, I know, for a solicitor to summon his client in this way," he
began, addressing Stephen. "For that matter, you're not my client. Your
father's estate is. But you are one of the executors, and I want to get
to the bottom of this. While I've been away things have been allowed to
slide."

"On the contrary," said Stephen stiffly. "We have all been doing a very
considerable amount of work."

"The position now is," went on Mr. Dedman, disregarding the
interruption, "you have just four days in which to accept or refuse the
Insurance Company's offer. Actually, the time expires on Sunday. Mr.
Jelks overlooked that fact when he made the arrangement. Sunday being a
_dies non_, I have claimed that it should be extended to the close of
business hours on Monday. I have put that to the Company and made them
agree it. After Monday it will be a case of suing on the policy if
you're going to get anything. Well?"

"Of course we don't accept," said Stephen.

"Very good. What's your case?"

"What it always has been. That Father was murdered."

"Precisely. Who by?"

"Perhaps," said Stephen, "I had better explain what we have been doing."

"Perhaps you had."

"In the first place, I obtained a report from an inquiry agent--"

"Have you brought it with you?"

"Yes."

Stephen handed it across the desk into Mr. Dedman's strong, hairy hands.
It seemed to take him rather less than a minute to read it. When he had
done so, he leaned back in his chair, nodded thoughtfully and said, "I
presume that you have treated all the people mentioned in this as
possible suspects?"

"Yes."

"Have you found any reason to connect any one of them with this alleged
crime?"

"Yes."

"Good. Which?"

"Parsons."

"Tell me."

Stephen handed it across the desk into Mr. Dedman's and, with some
assistance from Martin, went through with it to the end. Mr. Dedman
heard him out without interruption. Towards the end of the recital he
closed his eyes, but the impatient drumming of his fingers on the desk
proved that he was far from being asleep. When Stephen had finished, he
opened his eyes again, and said, "Is that all?"

"Yes."

Mr. Dedman made no further observation for a full half-minute. Then he
picked up Elderson's report again, glanced at it and said:

"These other people here--have you any suspicions against any of them?"

"Some of them, yes."

"Which?"

"To begin with, Mr. Carstairs and his wife. Mrs. Carstairs and her
husband, I should say, because she is the one that counts. Actually, he
is a parson, though he hasn't a parish." He described his experiences at
Brighton and went on: "They are not too well off, I should say, and she
works as secretary to a charitable concern called the Society for the
Relief of Distress amongst the Widows of Professional Men. Now it's an
odd coincidence, but that Society happens to be the one--"

"The one that your Uncle Arthur's money goes to on your father's death.
I know the terms of the will--naturally. Well?"

"Well," Stephen went on. It was somehow difficult to put very much
conviction into his theory under Mr. Dedman's cold gaze. "Well, it's a
fact that the Society is, or was, rather, in very low water. From what I
can gather, Mrs. Carstairs' job was in great jeopardy. If she knew the
terms of the will, and after all as secretary she would be almost
certain to, she had the strongest possible motive to secure this very
large sum of money for the Society."

"I see. Which are your other suspects?"

"The Howard-Blenkinsops. This is really a rather extraordinary story,
and rather--rather an unpleasant one. To begin with, their name isn't
Howard-Blenkinsop at all, but March. A Mrs. March and her son."

"Is that the Frances March to whom your father paid a weekly allowance
up to some twenty years ago?"

"You know about it, then?" Stephen asked in surprise.

"Certainly. All the payments were made through this office, and I came
across the receipts in clearing up your father's papers this morning.
Nothing very remarkable about it. It happens to scores of our clients.
Then the son mentioned here was your father's illegitimate child?"

"No. That's just the point. He wasn't. That son is dead."

"Oh? Who told you that?"

"Actually, I wasn't told. My sister and Mr. Johnson were. Perhaps it
would be more satisfactory if they gave you the whole story."

"Perhaps it would."

Mr. Dedman turned to the other two and, Anne remaining silent, it was
Martin who related the story of the discoveries at Bentby Grange.

"I see," said Mr. Dedman again when he had done, and made no other
comment. "There are still four other names on the list. I take it that
you do not consider them as probabilities?"

"No," said Stephen. "Vanning we have dealt with already. Mallett was a
detective from Scotland Yard on holiday. Davitt turned out to be a
perfectly innocent stockbroker's clerk with a passion for literature,
and Mr. and Mrs. Jones--"

"Were simply a couple out on the loose." It was Anne who spoke, for the
first time since they had come into the room. "I've spoken to Mrs.
Jones, and I know."

Mr. Dedman looked at her in astonishment. So did Martin and Stephen.
Dedman noted that her remarks seemed to be as surprising to them as they
were to him, and the fact afforded him a momentary gleam of amusement.

"Very well," he said, and turned again to Stephen. "As to Davitt, you
have seen him, I suppose?"

"No. But I had a long talk with his landlady."

"That was even better, I dare say. Few people have any secrets from
their landladies. I certainly had none in my younger days. So that
represents the sum of your researches, does it?"

"Yes, it does."

"Then," said Mr. Dedman with a smile that seemed to make his pugnacious
jaw look fiercer than ever, "I have only one piece of advice to give
you. Accept the company's offer."

It was some time before Stephen found words.

"Do you mean to say you really think--" he began.

"Accept the company's offer!" repeated Mr. Dedman in louder tones. "And
think yourselves lucky. It's more than you deserve, anyway."

While his visitors remained in stunned silence at the undisguised
rudeness with which he spoke, Mr. Dedman pushed his chair back from the
desk, clasped his hands and crossed his legs. Had any of his staff been
present they would have readily interpreted the movements as signs that
he was about to "let himself go." And they would not have been wrong.

"You people," he began, "took upon yourselves to prove that the late Mr.
Dickinson was murdered. I dare say he was. Far more people are murdered
every year than the average person suspects. In any case, from my
knowledge of him, I should not say that he would have committed
suicide--in the first year of a life policy, at any rate. He knew that
much about insurance, I have no doubt. Having adopted that course, you
have gone about it in a way that I can only truthfully describe as
imbecile. Your object was, or should have been, to collect evidence,
_evidence_, that would convince a Court of law that the probability of
his having been murdered was substantially higher than the probability
of his having died by his own hand. By what you have done, and by what
you have failed to do, you have made it virtually impossible to do
anything of the kind."

He paused to take breath. Martin opened his mouth to say something but
Mr. Dedman forestalled him.

"I gather from what you have told me," he went on, "that you have come
to the conclusion that Parsons in all probability poisoned Mr. Dickinson
by mistake in an attempt to rid himself of a blackmailer whom we have
agreed to call Vanning. I dare say you are right. Speaking between these
four walls, as an ordinary individual, I consider it quite possible that
he did kill your father, in the way that you have suggested. But what
have you done? You took no advice--you made no inquiries--you simply
walked in on this wretched Parsons creature and killed him. And with him
you killed whatever chance you ever had of proving your case. Do you
imagine that it will be possible now to prove that Vanning ever had a
penny from him--the very first step in your case? Of course, as the
result of his death, all Parsons' defalcations will come out--quite a
sufficient motive for suicide without adding blackmail and murder to it.
Can you visualize what sort of case you've got left now? I can, and I've
been in charge of all the litigation in this office for fifteen years
and I know what I'm talking about. You'll be reduced to accusing a dead
man of murder. That will be bad enough--'blackening the memory of the
deceased,' and so forth. But you'll have to do more than that--you'll
have to accuse another man of blackmail, a man very much alive and able
to defend himself, without a shred of evidence to support you. You'll
simply be laughed out of Court, if you ever get there--which you won't,
so long as I'm solicitor to the estate. With Parsons alive, with a
charge of embezzlement pending against him, it might have been possible
to do something. Very carefully handled, I can visualize negotiations
with the Company coming to a successful conclusion. As it is--the thing
is a wash-out."

He slapped his hand on the desk to emphasize his words.

"Then, the Carstairs. Your theory there, I gather, is that this parson
and his wife, or the wife without the parson, encountering Mr. Dickinson
accidentally in this hotel, seized the opportunity to murder him for the
good of this charity and more particularly of its secretary. Well, I'll
make you a present of this--the S.R.D.W.P.M. is not one of the charities
that solicitors of good standing care to advise their clients to
remember in their wills. What your uncle Arthur's motives were, I don't
know. His will was not drawn up in this office. I had occasion to look
at the Society's accounts some time ago, and I didn't like them. I
estimated that approximately thirty per cent of the money contributed by
the public reaches the widows of professional men. The rest goes into
the pockets of the whole-time salaried organizers--people like Mrs.
Carstairs. But because the woman's a parasite on public benevolence,
does that prove that she's a murderess? Of course the Society was hard
up. That sort of concern always is. Of course the falling in of the
reversion was a very useful windfall. But so far, all you've got is the
word of Mr. Carstairs--of all people!--to support your extraordinary
theory. And has it occurred to you that if this so-called charity was
really in such desperate straits, they could have sold the reversion to
the bequest, not for the whole amount, of course, but for a good round
sum? A much safer method of raising the wind than murder, I can assure
you. The whole idea is simply too preposterous for words.

"But what I simply cannot forgive you," Mr. Dedman proceeded with
unabated vigour, "is the way you have handled the March business. Here
you've got the almost ideal suspect. A discarded mistress, with a
fortune in prospect! And has it occurred to you also that she was the
only person in the hotel who would have been in the least likely to
penetrate into your father's room with his knowledge and consent?"

"But," Martin protested. "She didn't even know who Mr. Dickinson was
until after he was dead!"

"So she told her employer. Or rather, so her employer told you she had
told her. And on that third-hand evidence you believed it! Well, it may
have been so. I'm not suggesting that it isn't possible. I'm looking at
the possibility of using facts to persuade the Insurance Company to
cough up the policy moneys. If you had gone to them and said: 'You are
proposing to rely on suicide as a defence to this action. We can prove
the presence in this hotel of a woman with the opportunity of murdering
the deceased, and an overwhelming motive for doing so. Now what about
it?' If you had said that--I think they would have been ready to discuss
matters with you."

"But we can still say that to the insurance people," Stephen put in.

Anne said: "But Mr. Dedman, I believe what Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop told
me. You don't want us to accuse an innocent person, do you?"

The solicitor disregarded Anne, and answered Stephen.

"Of course you can," he said. "But do you think they are going to listen
to you after next Monday? And don't forget, after the time limit for
taking their offer has expired, you'll have nothing to fall back on.
It'll be all or nothing then, with tremendously heavy litigation in
front of you."

"I can approach the insurance people tomorrow," Stephen objected.
"Today, for that matter."

"Do, by all means, and see what sort of answer you get. They will say:
'Indeed? And who was this Mrs. March? We have a list of people staying
in the hotel and her name doesn't appear there.' What's your answer?
'Well, it must have been Mrs. March, because Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop told
me so.' 'Quite so,' they'll say. 'And how can you produce Mrs. March?'
And you'll be reduced to saying: 'As a matter of fact, Mrs. March isn't
here. I don't know where she is, but I believe she's abroad.' Then the
Insurance Company will look down its collective nose and inform you that
it doesn't believe a word you are saying and the offer remains open till
Monday, good morning. Well, you can take the risk if you like, but if
you do, you do it against my advice, that's all.

"Incidentally," he added, by way of afterthought, "have you troubled to
test in any way the truth of the assertion that Mrs. March's eldest son
is dead? No? I thought not. For all you know this rather remarkable cook
may have invented his death as an excuse for getting a couple of day's
holiday out of her employer. He may be alive still. He might have been
one of the waiters at Pendlebury Old Hall. He might--oh, well, there it
is," he concluded pettishly. "I'm afraid, taking it altogether, I can't
congratulate you on your efforts at detection. And my advice remains as
I have stated."

Mr. Dedman completed his tirade, handed Elderson's report back across
the desk to Stephen and at the same instant made it clear in some
indefinable but unmistakable way that he had lost all interest in the
subject. So much so that when a moment later they rose to go he sounded
genuinely surprised to see them there at all. It was Anne who led the
retreat. Stephen seemed capable of sitting sulkily in his chair forever,
and Martin was always unable to take a hint.

"Thank you so much, Mr. Dedman, for taking such trouble about our
affairs," she said in a voice of apparently sincere gratitude. "You have
put everything very clearly. We will let you know what we want done in
good time."

She went out of the room, the men following meekly in her trail. Mr.
Dedman gave her his jerky little bow as she went. Before she was out of
the office he was dictating like mad. The letter was on a totally
different subject. A fresh point had occurred to him while Stephen had
been talking about Parsons. The ability to think of two things at once
was what had made it possible for Dedman to get through approximately
twenty-four hours of work in a normal day. It had never occurred to him
to wonder why he was not popular in the office. Even he could not think
of three things at once.




                            CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


                     An Inspector with Indigestion

                         Thursday, August 31st

It would be inaccurate to say that Inspector Mallett had forgotten his
interview with Stephen Dickinson. It was never safe to assert that the
inspector had forgotten anything. But it was certainly the fact that
since the interview had taken place he had scarcely given the matter a
further thought. It was only an accident that brought it to his
attention again--an accident that was to have important consequences.
Admittedly it was a very rare and therefore unexpected occurrence, and
as such worthy of record for its own sake. To Mallett at the time it
seemed positively overwhelming.

The truth was that on this particular morning he, of all people in the
world, was suffering from an acute attack of indigestion. So unfamiliar
to him were the symptoms that he actually spent some time wondering what
was the matter with him. He spent a good deal longer speculating in vain
what could have caused the trouble. He ran over in his mind the gigantic
meals which he had consumed during the past day and could find no
solution. There had been nothing out of the ordinary in any of them, for
Mallett, incontestably the heartiest trenchman of the force, liked his
food plain and plentiful. True, the exigencies of the service had
compelled him to lunch, comparatively sparingly, at noon and to postpone
his enormous supper till two in the morning. But that was nothing out of
the ordinary, and he had dispatched his usual breakfast at seven-thirty
without a qualm. But there it was--the odious, inescapable fact that he
was now reduced to as pitiful a condition as any dyspeptic that ever
swelled the profits of the pill manufacturers.

By half-past ten, he could stand it no longer. Something would have to
be done to stay the griping pain which was making existence unbearable
and work impossible. He was, naturally, completely ignorant of the
proper treatment of a malady with which he was so utterly unacquainted;
and his first instinct was to turn to someone else for help. At this
crisis, his mind went to one Sergeant Weekes, whose indigestion was
almost as celebrated in New Scotland Yard as was Mallett's own appetite.
Weekes was a man who never went anywhere without a little box of
wonder-working tablets, changing in character according to the season of
the year or the vagaries of his complaint, but invariably described by
their owner in confidential tones as, "The only thing that keeps me
going, old man." The inspector had often laughed at poor Weekes with all
the unconscious cruelty of ignorance. Now he put his pride in his pocket
and, bent double with pain, made his way to the other's room in search
of advice and assistance.

Thus it came about that the inspector was at Weekes's elbow at the
precise moment when a message was put through to the sergeant from the
borough police at Midchester. If Mallett had been slightly more or
slightly less stoical in his attitude to pain he would not have been
there to hear it. Indeed, if the message had come through as little as
two minutes earlier his intense preoccupation with his own affairs would
probably not have allowed him to give it any attention. But at the
critical moment it so happened that one of the famous tablets had been
administered just long enough to secure, if not the instant relief
claimed for them on the label, at least an intermission from agony
sufficient to permit him to be conscious of what was going on around
him.

The telephone conversation, from the London end at least, was not
particularly interesting at first. It consisted mainly of the word,
"Yes," several times repeated, and varied at intervals--for the sergeant
prided himself on being up to date--by "O.K." Meanwhile he was jotting
down notes in an illegible shorthand of his own devising on a pad. Near
the end of the call, Weekes paused in his hieroglyphics and said: "Just
a minute, old man. Will you repeat the names? I want to get them O.K."

The voice at the other end evidently complied and the sergeant
confirmed, writing as he spoke, in longhand capitals this time: "Stephen
Dickinson and Martin Johnson. Yes, thanks, old man, I've got the
descriptions. We'll let you know what we can do. Yes. . . . Yes. . . .
O.K. . . . 'Bye."

He hung up and turned to the inspector with a grin.

"Feeling better?" he asked. "They're pretty wonderful, these little
fellows, aren't they? They say it's the charcoal in them that does the
good work. Now, if you keep quiet for half an hour or so, you'll be as
right as rain, I give you my word. Of course, a big man like yourself,
it might take a bit longer. Perhaps you'd like to take another one away
with you, just in case. Might come in handy after lunch." He looked at
Mallett severely. "That is, if you have any lunch."

"Thanks," said the inspector. "I am much better already. As to
lunch--we'll see. But tell me, what was that matter you were discussing
on the telephone?"

"Witnesses wanted for an inquest on one Parsons at Midchester," said
Weekes. "It seems the coroner there is getting all het up about it."

"And one of them is called Dickinson, I gather."

"That's right. Stephen Dickinson of London. Useful, ain't it?"

"It may be. I'd like to hear the description they give of him."

Wondering at this display of interest in Midland inquests, the sergeant
read from his notes a description which, vague though it was, was
perfectly recognizable.

"The other individual is named Martin Johnson," he went on.

"I don't know him," said Mallett. "But Stephen Dickinson I do know. This
may be interesting. What has he to do with the late Mr. Parsons at
Midchester?"

"That's just what the Borough Force there would like to know. It seems
that these two young men spent the night in Midchester, two nights ago.
They made an appointment to see Parsons next day on the telephone. They
didn't give no names, but they were traced through the hotel afterwards.
The phone call was made from the hotel, see?"

"I see. Go on."

"Well, this man Parsons was an official of the local Gas Company, and
quite an important figure in the town, see? He saw these two. He wasn't
in the room with them above five minutes, and then off they went. And an
hour later he's found in his room with his head blown to bits and a
letter to explain that he's been robbing the Gas Company right and left
for donkey's years."

"Very interesting. Very interesting indeed."

"D'you think so? Anyhow, the coroner seems to want to get hold of this
couple. Bit of luck if you know one of them. I don't see that there's
much chance of tracing them otherwise."

"Stephen Dickinson," said Mallett, "lives at 67 Plane Street,
Hampstead."

"That's all right, then. I'll notify the station there, and they can
serve the witness summons on him."

Mallett took two steps towards the door and then turned.

"On the whole," he said, "I think I'll go round and see Mr. Dickinson
myself about the matter. There's always a chance I may be mistaken."

"Go round yourself?" said the sergeant in surprise.

"Yes. This Parsons business may be important. When is the inquest, by
the way?"

"It's been adjourned till today week."

"Plenty of time, then. I'll let you know if this is the right man and
anything I can find out about Mr. Johnson. Meanwhile, you needn't do
anything about the Midchester police until you hear from me. Thanks for
the pill."

And the inspector returned to his room, leaving behind him a sadly
puzzled Sergeant Weekes.

Back at his desk once more, Mallett pulled out the file labelled "_Re_
Dickinson," which had reposed there since his unconventional talk with
Stephen nearly a fortnight before. During the interval it had received
one addition only; namely, from the Markshire police to the letter which
he had written on the same day. The only matter of interest which this
letter contained was a list of the residents at the hotel on the night
of Mr. Dickinson's death and a note of the times of their arrivals and
departures. This he examined afresh with rather more attention than he
had done when he first received it. He ran his broad forefinger down the
list until it reached the name of Parsons.

"That'll be him," he said to himself. "Well, it seems simple enough. The
boy sets to work to trace all the possible people who could have killed
his father, and in due course goes to see Parsons. Parsons has a guilty
conscience, thinks he's come after him in connexion with his
embezzlements, loses his head and kills himself. I'm afraid young
Dickinson will find himself in an awkward position when he has to
explain all that at the inquest, though. Not to mention Mr. Martin
Johnson. I haven't heard of him before. Friend of the family, I
suppose."

In the ordinary way he might well, at this point, have put the matter
from his mind altogether, but whether it was the after effect of
indigestion or some other cause, his thoughts continued obstinately to
revolve round the question. He remained for some time brooding over the
list of names, trying to fit them to the faces which he dimly remembered
having seen at the hotel.

"But _did_ Parsons kill himself simply for fear of his thefts being
exposed?" he murmured. "The confession only relates to that, it's true,
but perhaps that's only natural. Was there something else which the lad
has found out--some connexion between him and his father, for instance?
Well, he'll be able to tell me that. It can't have been a very obvious
one, or he'd have gone for him straight away, instead of waiting for
nearly two weeks. Parsons' death has made it a good deal harder to prove
the case, unless he's left something tangible behind him in the way of
papers. It might be worth while asking the Midchester police. . . ."

Almost without realizing it, the inspector had completely changed his
attitude of mind towards the riddle of Leonard Dickinson's death. His
talk with Stephen must have impressed him far more deeply than he had
known at the time, for now that his attention was once more focused on
the problem he found himself accepting almost as a matter of course the
theory which he had then refused to entertain.

"Let me see, now. . . ." Mallett tilted his chair back and closed his
eyes. He saw once more the face of old Mr. Dickinson, heard his low,
depressed tones. He reviewed again the short and apparently conclusive
evidence at the inquest. There was nothing new in what he remembered,
but this time he looked at it from a different angle altogether.

"But . . ." he added. "_But_ . . . there are objections to the son's
theory all the same. Or if not objections, limitations. If the old man
was murdered in this particular place, in this particular way, that
implies two or three things." He enumerated them to himself. "Now, if I
had been conducting this investigation in his place, I should have gone
on those lines, in any case. It would have narrowed things down
considerably. But I wasn't conducting this investigation," he concluded
with a sigh.

Then Mallett performed a feat which was quite usual for him, but of
which he was none the less justifiably proud. Taking up his pen, he
proceeded to write down from memory the heads of the conversation which
he had had with Stephen twelve days before. He had made no notes at the
time, and during the interval his brain had been occupied with a dozen
other matters, many of them of urgent importance. Nevertheless, when he
had done, the salient points of their discussion were recorded on the
paper before him, as accurately and completely as though they had been
written down contemporaneously.

He contemplated the result with satisfaction. Then he marked with a
pencil certain points in it which struck him as important. Finally, he
looked from it to the type-written sheet supplied by the Markshire
police and back again, tugging thoughtfully at the ends of his
moustache. At last, he pulled himself together.

"This is theorizing without the facts, if you like!" he told himself.
"And a most irrational theory at that. All the same, assuming that young
Dickinson was right--just assuming. . . . It might be worth looking
into. . . . It ought to be worth looking into. . . ."

He put the list into his pocket and returned the file to the drawer with
his new page of notes as its only contents.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Despite his airy assurance to Sergeant Weekes that he would look into
the matter of Stephen Dickinson himself, it took the inspector some time
to persuade the Assistant Commissioner who ruled his days to allow him
to leave his regular work in order that he might follow an investigation
of his own. But Mallett was a man who had earned the confidence of his
superiors and when he had asked for an indulgence in the past it had
usually been justified by the event. So it was that on this occasion he
found himself free to devote at least the afternoon to an inquiry on his
own lines, and thereafter, if it seemed likely to bear fruit, to pursue
the matter to a conclusion.

Nothing ever pleased him more than the prospect of working on his own.
He came back from seeing the Assistant Commissioner with a broad smile
on his face. Sergeant Weekes, whom he encountered on the way, saw in his
expression merely another triumph for the tablets.

"They've done the trick, I see," he said.

"Eh?" answered Mallett, absent-mindedly.

"That indigestion of yours--it's gone?"

"Indigestion? Oh, yes, I'd quite forgotten. I had a twinge of something,
didn't I? Yes, thanks, it's all right now. I suppose it's because I've
been too busy to think about it. Well, I must hurry now, I want to get
out to my lunch."

There was, the sergeant reflected gloomily, no such thing as gratitude
in the world.




                            CHAPTER NINETEEN


                            Stephen Decides

                         Thursday, August 31st

"Mind you," Martin was saying, "that solicitor fellow was pretty
definite about it. And I'm bound to say, he struck me as a pretty
knowing sort of fellow. I mean, he seemed to know what he was talking
about."

Stephen groaned.

"I seem to have heard you say that at least half a dozen times since
yesterday afternoon," he said.

"We've all said everything over and over again," Anne pointed out. "And
we're no nearer deciding anything than we were yesterday. My mind's made
up, anyhow. What on earth is the good of beating about the bush any
longer?"

"We've got till Monday, anyway," said Martin. "That gives us three clear
days. Counting Sunday, of course."

"Your arithmetic is wonderful," Stephen remarked.

"Stop bickering," commanded Anne. "Mother, you're as much concerned in
this as any of us. Don't you agree with us? You've heard everything
that's been done, and how futile it's all been. Don't you think it would
be sheer folly not to take what we can get now, while we can get it, in
view of what Mr. Dedman says?"

Mrs. Dickinson had been a more or less silent auditor of the discussion
that had raged almost without interruption the whole morning. Appealed
to now, she seemed reluctant to speak.

"My dear," she said at last in her low, musical voice, "I gave my
opinion about this a long time ago, I have been poor before, and I'm not
afraid to be poor again. I don't think that either you or
Stephen--particularly Stephen--would enjoy it very much. That is why I
left the whole matter in your hands in the first place. Now, I
understand, it is a choice between taking a small amount of money at
once and gambling on getting a large sum in the future. I know quite
well which I should do, if the choice was mine, but then I have never
been particularly fond of gambling. You must make up your own minds
about this."

"Just a minute," said Martin. "In point of fact, Mrs. Dickinson, you and
Steve are the two executors of the will, aren't you?"

"Yes, that is so."

"Well, I may be wrong, but I suppose the executors are the people who
will have to make the claim on the insurance chaps, if anybody does. In
that case, the people who have to make up their minds about what's to be
done are you two, and not us at all."

"And what happens if the executors don't agree?" Stephen asked.

"Heaven knows! I suppose Dedman could tell us."

"I don't think that question will arise," said Mrs. Dickinson. "As I
have said, I am not making any decision about this. I shall agree with
whatever my fellow executor says."

"Then that settles it!" said Stephen resolutely.

"No, it doesn't!" cried Anne. "Look here, Stephen, I don't care what the
lawyers may say, but we are all in this together. You've simply got to
listen to me!"

"I seem to have done quite a lot of that lately," was Stephen's comment.

"You've not heard everything yet, by a long way." She looked at her
mother as she spoke.

Mrs. Dickinson accepted the glance as a hint and rose to her feet. "I
don't think I can help you any further," she said. "Besides, there are
two or three things I must attend to before lunch. Let me know what you
have decided and I promise that I shall not quarrel with it."

She went out. The door had hardly closed behind her, and Martin had not
had time to begin filling a pipe which automatically appeared in his
hand upon her departure, before Anne rounded on Stephen. She stood in
the middle of the room, leaning on one arm against a table. Her fingers
were trembling slightly and her face had gone quite white.

"Look here!" she began in a low voice. "This thing has got to stop! Do
you understand me, Stephen? It's got to stop!"

"You're very earnest, all of a sudden," said Stephen coldly.

"Earnest? My God, can't you understand? Can't you see what a horrible
thing we've been meddling with all this time? And now, when there's a
chance of getting out of it you still want to go on, all for the sake
of--"

"For the sake of twenty-five thousand pounds. I must say, it seems quite
a consideration to me."

"Oh, damn the money!" Anne exclaimed bitterly, stamping her foot on the
floor. "It's all you ever think about!"

"Very well, damn the money by all means, if you really feel inclined to.
But what about you? Who was it who always insisted that Father hadn't
killed himself? What about your wonderful notion of putting things right
with him by clearing his memory? I must say you are about the last
person to--"

"Just as you like. I know I'm responsible for this as much as anybody. I
didn't know then just what a thing like this led to, that's all. I do
now. And that's why I say we've got to drop it. Lord, what fools we've
been with our bungling amateur detection. Here we've been talking of
suspects and clues, nosing about ever so pleased with ourselves, and
what's been the result?"

"Very little, I admit."

"Little? You've driven one man to his death already, and you call that
little? Stephen, I tell you this. Unless we bury the whole of this
business as quickly and decently as we can, something perfectly horrible
is going to happen. Of that, I feel absolutely certain!"

She turned suddenly to Martin.

"You understand what I'm talking about, don't you, Martin?" she appealed
to him. "Don't you see how fearfully important this is for all of us?
Please, _please_ help me to persuade Stephen to be sensible."

"Just a minute, before you answer that one, Martin." Stephen's voice,
with a raw edge to it that told of strained nerves, cut across his
sister's plea. "I don't profess to know all about all your affairs, but
just tell me this: Are you prepared to marry Anne on what you've got,
_plus_ her share of the insurance company's offer?"

Martin took two deep puffs at his pipe before he answered.

"No," he said at last. "I'm not."

"Very well, then--"

"I don't care," cried Anne. "I'd rather not be married at all than go on
like this!"

There was a long pause before Martin spoke again.

"I think Annie's right," he said.

"You mean--" Stephen left his question unfinished.

"I mean that we've done enough harm already. And after all, if I get on,
we can always get married some time--if Annie will have me, that is."

Anne said nothing. She was looking at Stephen. Stephen looked at neither
of them. He remained for a short time staring straight in front of him,
and then said slowly: "I see. Well, I suppose I must agree, then."

"You mean it?" said Anne, all her relief showing in her face.

"Of course I mean it," Stephen answered in an irritated tone. "Otherwise
I should not have said it."

"Will you let Mr. Dedman know he's to accept the insurance people's
offer?"

"Certainly. I'll do it now, if you like."

The telephone was in the study, where this conference had taken place.
Stephen went towards the instrument, and as he put out his hand to take
up the receiver the bell began to ring.

"Curse!" he said perfunctorily, and answered the call.

"Yes," he said. "Yes. Speaking. Who? Oh, I see. Yes. I'll hold on. Yes.
Yes, I say, this is Mr. Dickinson speaking. What? No, I hadn't seen this
morning. I say, I didn't look to see this morning. Have they? _What?_
But look here, that's impossible! Oh, no, I take your word for it, but
. . . Anyhow, that's obviously only a temporary reaction. Oh, you think
so, do you? Yes, of course I understand it's pretty serious. I know, I
know. But you see, just at the present moment I . . . Well, I shall have
to arrange something, that's all. But don't you think you could . . ."

The conversation went on a good deal longer. Various words kept on
recurring again and again. "Contango" was one. "Carry over" and
"Account" were others. "Margin" and "options" also occurred more than
once. At last, the call came to an end. Stephen put down the receiver
and turned round to display a very pale face.

"And that," he said, "is that."

"What has happened?" Anne asked him.

"Nothing very much. Simply that I am broke, that's all. Completely and
absolutely broke. Unless"--he set his teeth--"unless I can find a very
considerable amount of money in a very short space of time."

"Rotten luck," murmured Martin.

"Yes, isn't it? And it's going to be dam' rotten luck for somebody else
too, I can tell you that!"

"What do you mean?" said Anne sharply.

"I mean that I'm going on with this show."

"But, Stephen, you can't! Not after what you've just said! You
promised--"

"Promised, hell! Can't you understand plain English? I've got to lay my
hands on more money than I'm worth by next Monday, or I shall be made
bankrupt. That's the long and short of it. And I'm not going to be
jockeyed out of the chance of it by you or anyone else. That's final."

"Stephen--you can't--you can't!" Quite suddenly Anne's self-control
broke down altogether. Bursting into tears, she made for the door.
Martin tried to stop her, but she pushed him on one side and ran from
the room.

After she had gone, the two men looked at each other in silence for a
moment or two. Then Martin said, "On the whole, I think perhaps I'd
better not stay for lunch."

"Perhaps not."

"I'll call round after tea. I dare say a spin in the car then might do
her good."

"Yes, do."

In the result, Stephen lunched alone with his mother. Anne remained
upstairs in her room. Consequently, she was not present when Inspector
Mallett called in the afternoon. It was perhaps just as well.

                 *        *        *        *        *

The inspector was at his most genial during the interview. Sitting in
the big arm-chair in the study, he resembled nothing so much as a very
large cat, purring contentedly in the sun. Unlike a cat, however, he
seemed to be genuinely apologetic for his presence.

"I am really sorry to bother you, Mr. Dickinson," he began. "But
somebody had to do it, and in all the circumstances, I thought it had
better be me. It all arises out of this event at Midchester. You were at
Midchester on Monday night, were you not?"

"Yes, I was."

"I thought it must have been you. You and a Mr. Johnson?"

"Yes, that's my sister's fianc."

"Your sister's fianc?" The inspector seemed surprisingly interested in
this piece of information. "Your sister's fianc?" he repeated. "Just
so. That would explain it, of course."

"Explain what?" asked Stephen, somewhat provocatively.

"I mean, explain his presence in this affair. I suppose I am right in
thinking that your visit to Midchester was in connexion with the
inquiries you were proposing to make when we last met?"

"Certainly. And I suppose I am right in thinking that your visit here is
in connexion with the same business?"

"Not exactly. Not in the way you might imagine, that is. You see, Mr.
Dickinson, as you may know, rather an unfortunate thing happened just
after you and Mr. Johnson left Midchester on Tuesday morning, and your
names have been associated with it."

Stephen sat bolt upright in his chair.

"Good God!" he said. "Does anybody imagine that Martin and I killed the
blighter?"

"No, no!" Mallett assured him with a rumbling laugh. "It's not so bad as
that. The position simply is that it has been ascertained that you two
had an interview with the deceased shortly before he met his death, and
the coroner appears to think that you may be able to throw some light on
it."

"I see."

"I learned that inquiries were being made for somebody of your name in
London, and thought it would simplify matters if I found out whether you
were the individual referred to. Now all I need do is to have the
Midchester police notified, and you will get a witness summons in due
course. The inquest has been adjourned for a week, I understand."

"I see," said Stephen again. Then he added: "I shall have to go, I
suppose?"

"I am afraid so. Indeed, it would be very inadvisable for you not to go.
I can see that the position may be a little difficult for you, all the
same, and I dare say you might consider the possibility of being legally
represented."

"Thank you very much." Stephen paused, and then added: "By the way,
Inspector, you haven't told me how it was that you guessed why I went to
Midchester."

"Well, it wasn't exactly difficult. You see, after our little talk the
other day, I got a friend in the Markshire police to supply me with a
list of the people who had been staying at Pendlebury at the same time
as your father, and I noticed the name of Parsons on it."

"Then you were interested in the case, after all?"

"To that extent only. And I wouldn't go so far as to call it a case,
exactly."

Stephen stroked his chin thoughtfully for a moment or two before he
spoke again. Then he said: "Look here, Inspector, I've been a bit of a
fool about this Parsons business. How much of a fool I didn't know until
it was pointed out to me yesterday. The more I think about it, the more
I feel convinced that I was on the right track about Parsons. Is there
any chance of the police helping me now to prove what I still believe to
be the fact--that Parsons actually murdered my father?"

"Well," said Mallett slowly, "where there has been no crime officially
known to the police and where the proposed suspect is dead in any case,
there's very little we can do. All the same, in the very special
circumstances here, entirely unofficially . . . Perhaps you could tell
me just what your theory about Parsons is?"

Stephen plunged once more into the narration of the events which had
taken place at Midchester and the theory Martin and he had built up upon
their discoveries there. The inspector listened to him with grave
attention. At the end of the recital he nodded slowly.

"Well, Mr. Dickinson, your theory is decidedly interesting. I wouldn't
put it higher than that, but it is interesting, and if I may say so,
ingenious. I see no reason why discreet inquiries should not be made,
both in Midchester and London, and if anything comes of them, I shall,
of course, let you know."

"If only the time wasn't so desperately short!" Stephen said. "I must, I
simply _must_, have something to go upon by Monday at the very latest."

"I shouldn't despair of getting information by Monday," the inspector
reassured him. "If there is any information to get, that is. We move
pretty quickly in the Force, you know."

Sitting there in his arm-chair, he looked as solid and immovable as the
Sphinx.

"As you are so short of time," he went on, "it was perhaps rather
unfortunate that you didn't investigate the position of Parsons a little
earlier in the day. I suppose that was because he happened to come at
the bottom of your list?"

"We left him and Vanning to the end because they seemed the least
likely."

"Just so. And before you got to them, I suppose you had sifted out all
the other people on this list of mine?"

"Yes."

"Without any results?"

Stephen hesitated. With the recollection of Mr. Dedman's bitter sarcasm
fresh in his mind, it was not surprising that he should be unwilling to
expose his and Martin's short-comings in the art of detection to a
professional.

"Without any tangible results," he said, at last. "If there had been
any, I should not have bothered about Parsons, of course."

"But there were results of a kind?"

"In two cases there was apparently something to go on, but it didn't
amount to very much when you examined it afterwards."

Mallett shrugged his shoulders.

"This is your affair, of course, Mr. Dickinson," he said. "But I rather
gathered that you would be glad of any help, official or otherwise, that
I could give you. Besides, if you have any grounds for suspicion against
anybody, I'm not sure that it isn't your duty to reveal them."

So encouraged, Stephen put to the best of his ability the case against
Mr. and Mrs. Carstairs and Mrs. March. If he feared a repetition of the
contemptuous reception which he had met from Mr. Dedman the day before,
he was quickly reassured. The inspector proved to be a courteous and
attentive listener, although it was impossible to tell from his face
what impression the story was making on him.

"I'm afraid you'll think we have made a bad bungle of the whole affair,"
Stephen concluded.

"Not at all," Mallett assured him. "Not at all. I think, if I may say
so, that you have been remarkably thorough in your investigations, all
things considered. I shall remember what you have told me and follow it
up so far as I can. There is only one aspect of the case which I am
surprised that you have not taken into account," he added.

"What is that?"

"I seem to recollect at our first meeting your being somewhat impressed
by one little fact which I brought to your notice. I mean, the curious
little incident of the man whom your father thought he recognized while
I was talking to him at the hotel. Have you considered that at all?"

"No. I admit I have not."

"Considering it now, do you think that any of the people we have been
discussing could be identified with that person?"

"I don't think so."

"There may be nothing in it, of course, though I remember that at the
time I first mentioned it to you, you seemed to attach some importance
to it."

"I'm afraid I had forgotten all about it until you mentioned it just
now."

"We are all of us liable to forget things," said the inspector, with the
air of a man who was quite confident that he, personally, never forgot
anything. "But it does seem to leave rather a hole in the inquiry so
far, doesn't it? If you don't mind taking a word of advice from me,
you'll devote a little time to filling that hole--if it can be done."

Stephen nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, I will," he said.

Mallett looked at his watch and rose to his feet.

"This has been a very interesting little talk," he said. "I don't mind
telling you, Mr. Dickinson, that this affair has aspects which puzzle me
quite a lot--entirely unofficially, of course, but I am puzzled. How far
I shall be able to help you, I can't say, naturally. A lot depends on
what, if anything, we can find out about Parsons and the gentleman who
called himself Vanning. Meanwhile, have you considered the advisability
of employing a private inquiry agent? They are not a class of people I
care for very much, as a general rule, but there is one I know of who is
quite reliable--when he is sober, that is."

"Do you mean Elderson?"

"That's the man. Don't let it get out that I sent you there, though."

"I have been to him already. In fact, it was on his investigation at the
hotel that we based everything we have done since."

"Indeed? You sent him down there and he made you a report, I suppose?"

"Yes."

"Would you mind very much if I looked at it for a moment? One never
knows, it might give one some ideas."

Stephen fetched it, and Mallett glanced through it. His inspection was a
good deal less cursory than Mr. Dedman's had been, but it was none the
less quick enough. As he was in the act of handing it back his features
were suddenly convulsed in a spasm of pain.

"Is anything the matter?" Stephen asked.

"It's nothing," said the inspector faintly. "A touch of--of indigestion,
I'm afraid." (Was it imagination, or did he blush as he made the
confession?) "I think I must have eaten something poisonous," he went
on.

"You don't look at all well," said Stephen. "Don't you think you should
see a doctor?"

"Perhaps I should," said Mallett. "I dare say it's nothing to worry
about, but I--I'm not used to this sort of thing. Do you know of any
good doctor handy?"

"Our own man is only just down the road. He's pretty useful." He gave
the name and address.

"Thank you. I'll look in there on my way. Goodbye."

He shook hands, and then added: "I had quite forgotten--Mr. Johnson will
have to get a witness summons too. Will you let me have his address
also?"

Stephen wrote it down for him.

"No doubt you will be seeing him soon," Mallett said, "and can let him
know what to expect."

"I will, of course. As a matter of fact, I am expecting him here about
five o'clock."

"That's all right then. Goodbye once more, Mr. Dickinson."

And with the best speed he could, the inspector made his way down the
street to the doctor's house.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Soon after five, Martin's little car clattered up to the front door of
the house. Stephen and his mother were finishing tea in the
drawing-room.

"I'm afraid Anne won't be able to come out with you after all," said
Mrs. Dickinson. "She seems to be in a thoroughly nervous state and I'm
keeping her in bed."

"Sorry about that," said Martin. "Bit of a strain and all that, I'm
afraid. Perhaps you'll tell her I looked in--if you think she'd like to
know, that is. No thanks, I've had tea. I think, if you don't mind, I'll
be toddling off now."

Stephen went out with him into the hall, and told him of the forthcoming
summons to Midchester. Martin's sole comment was, "Bad show."

"Annie seems dreadfully wrought up about things," he added.

"Yes," said Stephen. "Do you know why, exactly?"

"No, I thought perhaps _you_ would."

"I should think in some ways you know her better than I do."

"Well, she is sensitive and all that sort of thing," said Martin
vaguely.

"You can't think of anything in particular that she should be sensitive
about, so far as this show is concerned?"

"No--o, I don't think so. All the same, I can't help thinking it would
be a good thing if you could let things drop altogether."

"I can't," said Stephen with an air of finality. "And, as a matter of
fact, even if I could, I wouldn't--now."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that I've just got an entirely new slant on the whole affair
that may make all the difference."

"Well, I wish you luck, that's all," said Martin, opening the front
door.

"I shall want you to help me, you know, Martin," Stephen told him,
following him on to the pavement.

"Me? But I'm with Annie on this, you know."

"I dare say you are. But doesn't it seem to you that the quickest way to
put her mind at rest will be to finish the business in the way we've
always wanted to?"

"'M, yes, I suppose so, in a way."

"Anyhow, I can't do this job properly without you. I want your car, at
least. You can just be chauffeur if you like. Come round tomorrow
morning. It will be the last time, Martin, I promise you that."

"All right, then. Shall I be round about tennish?"

"Ten o'clock will do. So long!"

"So long!"

Stephen turned to go back into the house and Martin settled himself in
the driving-seat of his car. On the pavement opposite stood a shabbily
dressed man. Martin observed casually that he had not seen him there
before, and that he was supporting a tray of bootlaces and collar-studs
for sale. He could be excused for not observing that attached to his
waist coat was a rather more intricate object which was not for sale.

"Full face _and_ profile," murmured the shabby man to himself when he
was alone in the street once more. "Good enough, I think."

As he went back to the motorcycle which he had left at the police
station, he reflected that in an instant of time, by the pressure of a
finger, he had done something permanent and irrevocable. It was like
pulling the lever that opens the trapdoor of the scaffold.

He was, for a policeman, a dangerously imaginative man.




                             CHAPTER TWENTY


                          Return to Pendlebury

                         Friday, September 1st

"How's Annie this morning?" were Martin's first words when he arrived at
Plane Street next day.

"She's better," said Stephen shortly. "Had her breakfast in bed and
isn't down yet. We'd better be getting off, hadn't we?"

"You know, Steve, I've a sort of notion you're not very keen on my
seeing Annie this morning," Martin remarked, peering doubtfully at him
through his thick glasses.

"My good Martin, do you want a repetition of yesterday's scene? Because
if you do, I don't."

If Martin objected to being addressed as "My good Martin" by his
prospective brother-in-law, he did not show it. He merely blinked at him
and said:

"You don't think she'd like my coming out with you on this show?"

"She'd raise hell's delight, I should think."

"In that case," said Martin uncomfortably, "I think perhaps it would be
best if I didn't come after all."

"You're coming, all right," answered Stephen in a tone of such unusual
authority that Martin, to his own surprise, found himself submitting
quite meekly.

"Where are we going?" he asked when they were settled in the car.

"Oh, go through Hemel Hempstead. I'll explain as we go along."

Martin nodded and said nothing until they had covered some thirty miles.
From time to time Stephen gave a direction, but otherwise he remained
equally silent.

"Look here," Martin said at last, "I wish you'd tell me where we're
going."

"Doesn't the road seem familiar, Martin?"

"I know most of the main roads about London, as a matter of fact. I
don't know that there is anything specially familiar about this one. The
last time I came down it was the day of your guv'nor's funeral,
actually."

"Oh, yes, of course, coming back from Pendlebury. Well, as it's on our
way, we might as well look in there."

"At the churchyard, d'you mean?"

"No, I meant at the hotel. (I wish you wouldn't swerve all over the road
like that, Martin.) That is, unless you're nervous of going there."

"Why should I be nervous?"

"Why, indeed? After all, if you're investigating a murder, it's the
natural thing to go to the place where it was done, isn't it? Are you
feeling the heat, by the way?"

"No, why?"

"I thought you were sweating a bit, that's all. As I was going to say,
it's an odd thing that all this time we've been hunting all over the
country for clues, but none of us has ever thought to look at the hotel
itself."

"Why should we? We paid Elderson to do it for us."

"Very true. It struck me at the time as rather odd that you were so keen
not to go down there when we were first discussing this business."

"You didn't want to go down there yourself, for the matter of that."

"I had a very good reason. (I wish you'd look where you're going,
Martin. You nearly had us into the ditch that time.) Your reason was, so
far as I can remember, that you were afraid of being recognized by the
people at the hotel--as a result of having been at the funeral."

"Yes. That's absolutely right. And a jolly good reason too."

"Of course, at the funeral you'd be one of the crowd of relations. I
shouldn't have thought there was much risk. Anyway, that reason has gone
now, hasn't it?"

"Yes, if you say so."

"I tell you another thing that has occurred to me lately, Martin. When
you and Anne went off to Lincolnshire, I remember that you were very
insistent that she should be the one to interview Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop
and that you should merely drive her down there."

"I don't know what you're driving at. You know as well as I do that I
did see Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop and had a glass of sherry off her."

"I wish you wouldn't turn round to talk to me like that, Martin. It's
very dangerous. I can hear you quite well when you're looking ahead, you
know. Yes, you talked to Mrs. Howard-Blenkinsop all right, but that was
after you knew that she wasn't the woman who stayed in the hotel. It was
awfully clever of you, Martin, to spot that so quickly."

"I wish you wouldn't go on saying 'Martin' every other word. It gets on
my nerves."

"Never knew you had any, Martin. Sorry, but the name seems to have a
fatal fascination for me. By the way, what do you think M stands for?"

"M?"

"Yes, M in M. Jones. In the hotel register, you know."

"How the hell should I know?"

"I just thought you might, that's all. You see, it has just occurred to
me (funny what a lot of things keep occurring all of a sudden!) that if
you are out on the loose--I think that is the accepted expression, isn't
it?--there is always the suitcase problem to be got over."

"Now what on earth--"

"Come, come, Martin, you're not as dense as that, you know. In fact,
I've always looked on you as pretty smart. You were fearfully clever at
Midchester, I thought. For instance, your notion of having a good look
at Parsons at the meeting before you decided that it was safe to go and
see him--"

"Safe?"

"But I was forgetting. We were talking about the great suitcase problem,
weren't we? What I had in mind was that if your suitcase was marked,
say, 'M.J.' in letters large as life, it wouldn't do to go and register
as Thomas Smith, for instance. It might make the man who took it up to
your room just a bit suspicious. So you'd decide that the J. stood for
Jones, just for that night, and M., I suppose, would be Michael or
Matthew or Melchisedeck. . . . Do you really want to stop at Pendlebury,
Martin?"

"Damn you! Why shouldn't I?"

"Just as you please. I thought perhaps you might be afraid of someone
recognizing you--from having seen you at the funeral, of course. And
talking of recognition, it is a bit awkward when you are recognized when
you're out on the loose, isn't it, Martin?"

Martin did not answer, except by putting his foot down more firmly on
the accelerator. The car was travelling at its highest speed now, and in
the roar of the air past the wind-screen Stephen had to raise his voice
to be heard.

"Of course, it would depend on who recognized you, I suppose," he went
on. "For a man who is wanting to get married I should think his
prospective father-in-law is about the worst person to run into.
Especially if it's a father-in-law who doesn't like him in any case."

Stephen put his mouth very close to Martin's ear so that there was no
chance of a word being lost. His voice had suddenly dropped entirely the
ironic tone which it had held until then.

"You wanted Anne, and you knew your chances of getting her were
absolutely gone if he saw you there," he said. "You wanted money, and
you thought he had plenty to leave. You knew that life in our family was
hell so long as he was alive, anyway. So you took your chance then, you
murdering swine! And it's no good your thinking you can serve me the
same way you did him. I'm ready for you--there's a gun in my pocket and
if you don't do just what I tell you--_Martin!_" His voice rose to a
scream as his gaze shifted momentarily to the road ahead. "Look out, for
God's sake!"

But Martin was past all heeding. Red-faced, stammering, his wide eyes
grotesquely magnified by his thick glasses, he turned to face his
accuser. The car swung dangerously on to the offside of the road as it
reached a sharp left-hand bend. The heavy lorry which was coming down
the steep eastern slope of Pendlebury Hill had no chance whatever of
avoiding it. It crashed into the side of the little car and rolled it
completely over, a tangled heap of steel and glass.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Mallett's car had left New Scotland Yard at about the same time that
Martin's had started from Hampstead. It had to traverse the whole of
Central London before getting on to the open road and consequently, in
spite of its superior speed, it was some twenty minutes later that it
arrived on the scene of the accident. A police constable was taking
particulars from the white-faced lorry driver and an ambulance was drawn
up by the roadside. As Mallett got out of his car, the first-aid men
were lifting two limp bodies on to stretchers. One of them was groaning
feebly and turning his heavily bandaged head from side to side. The
other was ominously still. The inspector looked at them. His face
expressed neither sympathy nor horror, only a mild surprise. He said a
word to the driver of the ambulance and went back to his car.

"We'll go on to Pendlebury Old Hall," he said to his driver.

"There's nothing we can do here, I suppose, sir?"

"Nothing at all. It's an unfortunate business, but--perhaps it
simplifies things on the whole."

At the hotel he asked for the manager. The man was inclined to be
unhelpful at first, but under Mallett's gentle pressure soon became
amenable enough. He looked with interest at the photograph which the
inspector showed him but shook his head doubtfully.

"I think so, but I couldn't be sure," he said. "Not to swear to, I mean.
I dare say some of my staff could, though. Shall I ask Miss Carter?"

"Would you know him again if you saw him?"

"Oh, yes, I'm certain of that. A photograph's one thing but the living
face is another."

"Then if you don't mind coming along in my car, we needn't bother Miss
Carter. I'm not so sure about the _living_ face, though," Mallett added,
sardonically.

His premonition was right. At the hospital they were directed not to the
accident ward but to the mortuary. They were conducted there by an
attendant, who was as cheerful as only those whose daily business is
with death and disfigurement can be.

He whistled jauntily as they walked along the echoing corridor, breaking
off to observe:

"Funny things, these car crashes! Here's this chap, multiple injuries
all over the place. Simply smashed to bits. He might just as well have
stopped a charge of H.E. And the other fellow sitting beside him gets
away with a couple of scalp wounds and concussion. Dirty work, isn't it?
Well, here we are! You'll find his face is O.K. luckily. It's about the
only thing that is."

He drew aside the sheet that covered the face of the dead man. The hotel
manager craned forward to see. Mallett stood in the background, anxious
neither by word nor sign to influence him in any way. In silence they
left the mortuary and when they were outside, Mallett said, "Well?"

"That's him, all right," was the answer.

Confident though he had been, the inspector breathed a sigh of relief.

"Thank you for your help," he said. "And now I'll drive you back to your
hotel."

"Am I likely to hear any more of this matter?" the manager asked him, as
he deposited him at his door. "It's very bad for business, you know."

"You won't ever be troubled with it again," was the confident reply.

"I'm very glad to hear that. But won't you stay to lunch as my guest,
Inspector?"

"No, thank you," replied Mallett with great emphasis.




                           CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


                            Mallett Sums Up

                         Monday, September 4th

Mallett was about to begin his report on the Dickinson case when the
house-telephone rang.

"There's a Mr. Dedman wants to see you," he was told. "He says it is
urgent."

The inspector sighed. The file labelled "_Re_ Dickinson," now bulging
with papers, yawned balefully at him. He was anxious to be rid of it
once for all, and he grudged any interruption.

"Ask him if he'll kindly come back tomorrow," he said. "I'm very busy
just now."

There was a pause and then the voice said: "The gentleman says he must
see you this morning, sir. Tomorrow will be too late. He is most
insistent." Then, in an undertone, "He seems perfectly genuine, sir."

"Very well," said Mallett, in a resigned tone. "Tell him to come up."

A moment or two later Mr. Dedman bounced, rather than walked, into the
room. He wasted no time in greetings but came straight to the point.

"I'm a busy man, Inspector," he said, "and so, I have no doubt, are you.
I shouldn't be here if it wasn't vitally necessary in my clients'
interests. My firm are the solicitors to the estate of the late Mr.
Leonard Dickinson. The deceased had insured his life for the sum of--"

"Oh, Mr. Dedman, but I know all about that," Mallett murmured.

"You do? Good! Then I needn't waste any time explaining. The point is,
that today is the last day of which I can secure any payment from the
Company on the basis of suicide. I understand that you have been
investigating this case. All I want from you is a clear
indication--murder or suicide--which?"

"Oh," said Mallett quietly. "Murder, undoubtedly."

"Excellent! I'm much obliged to you. You shall hear from us if
litigation proves necessary." And Mr. Dedman shot out of his chair and
made for the door.

"Good Heavens!" said the inspector in astonishment. "Do you really mean
to tell me that you don't want to hear any more? Aren't you interested
to know who murdered your client?"

"Naturally I am, but that can wait. I'm a solicitor, not a policeman.
Besides, they told me downstairs that you were extremely busy."

"I assure you, they told you the truth. All the same, in your own
interests, I should advise you to make yourself acquainted with all the
facts of the case before you go to see the Insurance Company. There is a
little point of law which you might like to consider first."

"A point of law?" echoed Mr. Dedman, sitting down again.

"Precisely. Do you mind telling me, how did the late Mr. Leonard
Dickinson dispose of his estate?"

"One half to his widow for life, with remainder to the children in equal
shares, the other half divided between the children absolutely."

"And of that estate the insurance moneys form a part?"

"Of course--by far the larger part."

"Is there not a rule of law, Mr. Dedman, that a murderer is not allowed
to profit by the will of his victim?"

Mr. Dedman stared at the inspector silent and open-mouthed. His brisk
and business-like manner seemed suddenly deflated.

"Inspector," he said at last, "who murdered my client?"

"His son, Stephen."

"Good God!" said Mr. Dedman, and mopped his forehead with his
handkerchief. "Good God!" he repeated. "But--but--Are you serious about
this, Inspector?"

"Perfectly serious."

"But I tell you, this doesn't make sense! Stephen! Why it was he who was
so insistent all along that--"

"That his father had been murdered? Exactly. It is the only case in my
experience where a murderer found himself in the position of having to
prove that the crime had been committed, in order to attain the result
for which he had committed it."

Mr. Dedman looked at his watch, replaced it in his pocket, and then
crossed his legs and settled back in his chair.

"Please tell me all about it," he requested, in tones that were for him
positively humble.

Mallett was only too glad to comply. If he had a weakness, it was that
he loved an audience. The circumstances of the present case had
compelled him to work entirely alone, and he was pleased with the
opportunity. Preparing a written report was always irksome to him, but
he thoroughly enjoyed an exposition by word of mouth.

"Stephen Dickinson," he began, "was an inveterate gambler on the Stock
Exchange. He was at all material times, as you lawyers say, hopelessly
in debt. He was thoroughly unprincipled, like many gamblers, except,
oddly enough, where sex was concerned. I haven't been able to trace that
he ever had anything to do with women. In that respect, he seems to have
been positively puritan. He was, of course, extremely conceited and
entirely selfish. I have yet to meet a murderer who wasn't. In
particular, he disliked and despised his father, and having met the old
gentleman myself, I can believe that he must have been an extremely
tiresome person to live with."

Dedman nodded his emphatic agreement.

"About the middle of the summer," the inspector proceeded, "Stephen,
whose financial position began to be really difficult, appears to have
first formed the idea of murdering his father. He was, of course, well
aware of the existence of the insurance policy which had been taken out
after the death of Mr. Arthur Dickinson. He was also familiar with his
father's habit of taking Medinal tablets under medical advice."

"How do you fix the date?" Mr. Dedman asked.

"It was about this time, as I learned from the family doctor whom I saw
the other day, that the father purported to write to the doctor
suggesting that as an experiment he should try taking the drug in powder
form. The doctor duly prescribed, and shortly afterwards received a
letter saying that the powder did not suit the father, and that he would
prefer to continue with the tablets. Both letters were, of course,
forgeries, and the son intercepted the prescription and so secured the
means of carrying out his design.

"Having done this, he waited until his father went on his annual walking
tour before putting his plan into execution. There may have been some
reason against attempting the murder in his own home. Perhaps he had
some sentimental feeling about it. I don't know. In any case, he decided
that it should be done at Pendlebury Old Hall Hotel, where he knew that
his father, a creature of habit if ever there was one, would infallibly
end his holiday. He was in this difficulty, however, that he did not
know precisely on what day his father would arrive there. At the same
time, he had to make provision for as conclusive an alibi as possible.

"He got over it in this way: He arranged to go to Switzerland with his
sister for the holidays and then at the last moment invented some excuse
for not joining her at the time arranged. (We have been to some trouble
over the week end to find out from the hotel details as to how his room
was cancelled at short notice.) Then he went to stay at Pendlebury until
such time as his father should come along. He took the name of Stewart
Davitt--the initials were the same as his own, naturally enough, so that
he should not be given away by his luggage, which, no doubt, was marked
'S.D.' more or less prominently."

"Talking of initials," said Mr. Dedman, "have you observed--"

"I shall come to that presently," said Mallett. He went on: "He gave an
address in Hawk Street, which, I have since ascertained, is in fact a
lodging-house and was until the other day the address of a clerk in the
office of the stockbrokers through whom he carried on his speculations.
He was on close terms of acquaintance with this young man, who has, by
the way, since been dismissed by his employers for gambling in shares on
his own account. At the hotel, he selected the room next to the one
which he knew his father always occupied. (I expect he was familiar, to
the point of boredom, with every detail of the old man's life at his
beloved Pendlebury.) He made an excuse for keeping out of sight of all
the other residents in the hotel, and bided his time.

"In due course, Mr. Dickinson came to the hotel. As he always did, he
ordered a cup of tea to be sent up to his room. As he always did, when
it arrived, he told the maid to leave it outside until he was ready for
it. All that the son had to do was to slip out of the room adjoining,
empty his packet of Medinal powder into the tea-pot (the stuff dissolves
quite quickly and is almost tasteless, I am told) and slip back again.
The father came out, took in the tray, added his usual dose to the
already poisoned tea and went to sleep, never to wake up again. Early
next morning, having made his arrangements overnight, Stephen Dickinson
left the hotel, caught the express to London, took the eight o'clock
aeroplane for Zrich, and met his sister in Klosters that afternoon, no
doubt telling her that he had travelled out by boat and train in the
usual way. He immediately carried her off on a long climbing expedition,
sleeping in various mountain huts, until he knew that it would be too
late for him to be in time for the inquest or the funeral, at either of
which he might be recognized. (The Swiss authorities, by the way, have
been very helpful in tracing the guide whom they took with them.)

"So far as he could tell, everything had gone according to plan. His
father would be found dead of an overdose of his usual medicine, a
sympathetic coroner would find that death was accidental and no
questions would ever be asked. And that, no doubt, was what would have
happened, but for three unfortunate accidents--firstly, the presence of
a remarkably apt quotation by the bedside; secondly, the fact that
having just come to the end of one bottle of tablets the deceased had
opened another to make up his usual dose; and lastly, the very peculiar
manner in which the old gentleman had talked to me on the eve of his
death. And the son had put it out of his power to correct these
misconceptions at the inquest! Whether he realized at once how fatal a
finding of suicide was to his hopes of reaping the reward of his crime,
I don't know. At all events, he learned it soon enough. It put him in a
very nasty position." Mallett chuckled. "A very nasty position indeed!
Having taken the appalling risk of committing murder, he had to take the
yet more terrible risk of proving that a murder had been committed--by
someone.

"And so Stephen Dickinson, the gambler that he was, decided on the
greatest gamble of his life. And before taking any other step, he came
round to see--_me_, of all people. I suppose he thought that I might be
able to give him some useful facts, that would help him in disproving
suicide, but I fancy that his real motive was to see whether he could
get away with an interview with me without arousing any suspicion in my
mind. If he could do that, no doubt he felt that he would be safe in
carrying out the inquiries which he proposed. And he certainly
succeeded! I never gave the matter a thought. It wasn't until the other
day, when the suicide of that man at Midchester brought the whole affair
back into my mind again, that I ever seriously considered the question
of whether Mr. Dickinson had been killed and if so, by whom.

"Of course when you come to look into it," the inspector confessed with
a shrug of his shoulders, "the whole affair becomes startlingly simple.
There is the question of motive for one thing. But over and above that,
the principal clue, as you no doubt have realized, Mr. Dedman, is the
perfect knowledge that the killer must have had of his victim's habits.
Consider: he must have known, in the first place, that he would be at
this particular hotel, and sleep in this particular bedroom. He must
have known that he was accustomed to this particular drug, and to taking
it in this particular way. He must even have been familiar with his
insistence that the tea should always be left _outside_ the door. Now
who on earth could have had such a combination of knowledge except a
member of the deceased's own family?"

"Something of that sort had occurred to me," remarked Dedman. "That was
why I favored the theory that the murderer had made a mistake and that
the deceased had taken the poison intended for someone else."

"Instead of which," Mallett rejoined, "if Vanning--whose real name is
Purkis, by the way, a nasty little blackmailer--if he had slept in the
room that was originally intended for him, he would have been murdered
in place of Mr. Dickinson!

"Well, the rest of the story is no news to you, I think. After his
interview with me, young Dickinson spent the next two weeks scouring the
country trying to fix the responsibility for his own crime on to the
shoulders of some innocent person, aided and abetted by his equally
innocent sister and her fianc. They investigated the antecedents of
every person staying in the hotel, except, of course, the mythical Mr.
Davitt."

"He reserved the case of Davitt for himself," Mr. Dedman put in. "And
invented a purely imaginary interview with an equally imaginary landlady
to account for him."

"That is just what I expected. The attempt to find a scapegoat for his
own crime was a forlorn hope, of course, but it came perilously near to
success twice. The first time, was in the case of Parsons."

"I told him that properly handled, the Parsons affair might have
produced a favorable settlement from the Insurance Company," said Mr.
Dedman in vexation. "It was really pitiful to see how he and young
Johnson bungled that business! I beg your pardon, Inspector, I was
forgetting. Please go on."

"The second time," said Mallett, his moustache points twitching as he
tried to suppress a smile, "the result was very nearly more serious than
it had been in Parsons' case. I think he was prepared to throw up the
sponge after you had pointed out to him that he had failed to prove
Parsons' guilt; but the news that his last speculation had ruined him
drove him to make one last despairing effort. And I am afraid I was
really responsible. As a last resort, he tried to put the guilt upon
Martin Johnson. You see, Johnson really had something to hide. He was no
murderer, but he did happen to be in the hotel on the night of the
murder, and he was almost recognized there by Mr. Dickinson.
Incidentally, Mr. Dickinson was talking to me at the time, and I
remember noticing that immediately afterwards he suddenly switched the
conversation to his daughter, who had not been mentioned before. I saw
the significance of that only when I had learned that Johnson was his
daughter's fianc."

"I knew it!" exclaimed Mr. Dedman. "Jones!"

"Exactly. The suitcase point over again."

"But not that point only. I knew it as soon as I saw Miss Dickinson's
face when the name of Jones was mentioned in my office."

"She knew that he had been there, gallivanting with another young lady
of his choice?"

"Undoubtedly. And I am very much afraid she knows a good deal more than
that."

"I am sorry to hear it. So far as Stephen Dickinson is concerned, he
does not seem to have guessed it until at our last meeting I put it into
his head. I did it to test his reactions, but I confess that I did not
think they would be as violent as they proved to be."

"That is a question that is puzzling me," said Mr. Dedman. "How did
young Dickinson hope to be able to represent that Johnson was guilty, in
the face of the violent denials he would be sure to make, and what was
his object in getting him to drive down to Pendlebury?"

"We can only guess at that," the inspector replied. "But I have not the
smallest doubt what the true answer is. He intended to kill Johnson."

"But this is terrible!" said Mr. Dedman.

"Why not? One murder often leads to another, and a pistol was found on
him when he was picked up. I think that his design was to kill him, and
represent it as suicide brought on by remorse acting on a guilty
conscience. The point of taking him to Pendlebury, no doubt, was to give
colour to the theory. He would be able to say afterwards that he charged
him with the crime and that he had then confessed. It would have been
very difficult to disprove. Possibly he did actually go so far as to
accuse him. That would account for the erratic driving of the car.
Johnson will be able to tell you that when he is better. How is he, by
the way?"

"Almost recovered. But he has no recollection of anything that happened
for half an hour before the accident. On the whole, I think it is just
as well."

"As you say. He seems to have got off very lightly. I never saw a more
completely smashed car in my life. But of course the passenger's side
took the brunt of the collision."

"And how did you come to be on the spot so very opportunely, Inspector?"

"I was going to the Old Hall myself, to see whether the people there
could identify Stephen Dickinson from the photograph which I had had
taken of him the afternoon before. As it turned out, I was able to get
the identification from his body instead, which was much more
satisfactory."

The two men sat in silence for a few moments, and then the solicitor
rose to his feet.

"Thank you," he said. "I shall be making my claim on the Insurance
Company for the full amount of the policy moneys today. So far as
Stephen Dickinson's share is concerned, I don't think there will be any
difficulty. It will naturally fall into the rest of the estate and be
divided between his mother and sister. The one thing that concerns me
now is to see that Mrs. Dickinson never learns the truth. Goodbye."

The inspector turned to his writing. For an hour there was no sound in
the quiet room except the gentle scratching of his pen on the paper. At
last, even that ceased. The record was complete. The file of "_Re_
Dickinson" returned for the last time to its drawer in the inspector's
desk.

                 *        *        *        *        *

At his mother's insistence, Stephen was buried in Pendlebury churchyard
next to his father. There was a full attendance of the family at the
funeral. It was observed by all that Uncle George was in far better
humour than usual. The reason, as Aunt Lucy could have told them, was
that since the settlement with the Insurance Company there was no longer
any ground for fearing that he would be called upon to contribute
anything to the support of his brother's family.






[End of Suicide Excepted, by Cyril Hare]
