Death on Allhallowe’en, page 11
‘And do you think they found what they wanted?’
‘I’ve thought about that. If it was just written papers they were after you’d have said they had them, from the state of the study. Then why didn’t they hop off quick? If they’d got what they wanted, why look upstairs? They even turned out Mavis’s cupboards and that. I think there was two things—Horseman’s papers and something else. Something valuable, perhaps. They got the papers all right, but I don’t know about the other.’
‘How do you feel about it, Trotter? You were in that house soon after the intruders. You might have a sort of instinct about them.’
‘Here, you’re not one of these black magic merchants, are you? No, I can see you’re not, and I think I understand what you mean by instinct. I had a funny feeling in that house, as though someone was watching me. It may have been, as you say, because the thieves hadn’t long gone when I got there. I should say they’d had to hurry at the last. There was a bit of a look of panic about those rooms. I don’t know if you understand what I mean?’
‘I do. Exactly. What you’ve said is very helpful. One other thing. You didn’t see anyone about the village after you’d left there, did you?’
‘Couple of chaps coming back from night work, but I see them every morning. I saw Bert Gunning, but he’s always up at that time. I didn’t see Rutters, if that’s what you mean. He was fast asleep after the exertions of last night. It took his wife half an hour to get him down to hear my report about Horseman’s. No, there was no one unusual about the village.’
‘You didn’t notice any cars?’
‘Not one. No one stirs much, early Sunday morning. Not till about nine, when old Fred Dixon brings the Sunday papers in. I bet this will make headlines next week.’
‘I doubt it.’
‘Not with all this black magic lark?’
‘That’s pretty corny now.’
‘So it may be. But if you can see how a man could have been shot in front of a whole crowd of people, with no one seeing anyone use a weapon…’
‘We don’t know that no one saw the weapon used. From what I know of Clibburn people they could be very close about it if it suited them. Surely you don’t think there was anything supernatural about the murder, do you?’
‘It’s not what I think. It’s what’s being said. I’ve already heard talk of a bolt from the blue. I’m not saying I go for any of that stuff. But people hereabouts…’
‘I’m rather tired of hearing about people hereabouts. Murder’s murder wherever its committed and however it’s done. Horseman was shot through the heart. The experts will soon know from what sort of gun and the exact direction from which the bullet came. There’s nothing supernatural about a bullet.’
’Of course not. Don’t think I believe any of that.’
‘No. No. And thanks for telling me about your discovery.’
‘That’s all right. Tell you what. I shall be in the White Horse presently. Generally look in there Sunday lunch-time, if you’d care to drop in. You’ll hear a bit more about it then.’
Carolus thanked him for the invitation, but decided to wait to hear what Mavis Horseman had to say after her interview with the police.
Plenty, he discovered.
‘Really, I don’t know!’ she began indignantly. ‘You’d think the police had no interest at all in protecting property. They questioned me again and again about Connor, who were his friends and enemies, what he was writing, even what time he went to bed and got up, most of which I could tell them nothing about, and when I asked them why no precautions were taken to protect the house last night they simply could not answer. When I said, did they realise my mink coat had cost over a thousand pounds and wasn’t even entered yet as a special item on the insurance policy, they said it was there and “in good condition”, and went on to ask about Connor’s manuscripts, which I know nothing about.’
‘Have you been round to the house, Mrs Horseman?’
‘Yes. They drove me round. Thank heaven it’s all right. It had been thrown rather carelessly on a bed but it didn’t seem to be damaged. And my pearls were still there, by a miracle.’
‘What about your husband’s papers?’
‘I couldn’t tell them anything about them, except that some seemed to have gone. The cupboard in which he locked them had been broken open. They didn’t get my bangle, though. It wasn’t of any very great value but I had a dress to go with it. I’d had it quite a long time—I believe my first husband gave it to me. I found it turned out of the drawer where I always keep it. In fact, as I told the police, nothing of any real importance has disappeared, but they kept on about those papers.’
‘Did you tell them what you told me, about your suspicion that your husband had some object that someone was trying to take away from him?’
‘I did, but they had no time for that. It might have been a magic crystal for all they cared. How much of Connor’s book had he written? Was there any typewritten copy of it? Did he keep it locked up? These were the things they wanted to know. I nearly screamed at one point. “Do you realise,” I said, “that these burglars might have taken all my clothes and left me not a stitch to wear?” ‘
‘What did they say to that?’
‘I should still have had what I was wearing yesterday evening, one of them told me, and went on about whether my husband had a revolver and whether he seemed afraid of anyone.’
‘No sense of proportion, in fact?’ suggested Carolus, suppressing a smile.
‘Oh, none. When I told them the house ought to be guarded day and night they said, if I wasn’t going to move back, I had better hire a caretaker. They had no more interest. I asked them what about my mink coat, and they said that was my responsibility. They had learned all they could from the house. I think it’s absolutely disgraceful. The callousness of the police is beyond belief.’
‘They are trying to find out who killed your husband.’
‘Then why ask me whether he had a revolver? What has that to do with it?’
‘Had he?’ asked Carolus mildly.
‘Of course he had. I didn’t tell them that because it would only have started them on a lot more questions.’
‘That was really very wrong of you, Mrs Horseman. You can’t expect the police to discover things if you are not frank with them. What kind of a revolver was it?’
‘I don’t know what kind, but he had it in the Army.’
‘Probably a .38. Any ammunition?’
‘Oh, I expect so. Wouldn’t there be?’
‘Did he carry it on him?’
’Just lately he did. Since he was shot at.’
‘You don’t mean he had it on him last night?’
‘More than likely. It wasn’t in the drawer where he usually kept it. I happened to notice after he had left for the hall. He probably slipped it in his greatcoat pocket.’
‘You really must report this to the police at once, Mrs Horseman. It is of the greatest importance.’
‘I can’t see why. He didn’t shoot anyone.’
‘But he may have left it in his coat in the cloakroom. It may be the revolver used to shoot him.’
‘I shouldn’t think so. But if you insist I’ll phone them up after lunch. I’ll say I forgot about it when they asked me.’
‘I think you would be well advised to do so. They may know already.’
‘How?’
‘They may have found the revolver in his overcoat.’
She seemed quite undisturbed by the incident.
‘I shan’t move back to the house. I don’t like the thought of it after it has been broken into. I shall take my things and go and stay with friends.’
‘I wonder if I might have your address? In case I need to get in touch with you again.’
‘Certainly. C/o Mrs Milbanke, Mornington, Mermaid Lane, Rye, Sussex.’
Carolus made a note of it and then, since it was only just noon, decided to accept Trotter’s invitation to meet him at the White Horse.
How many times during his score of investigations, he reflected, had the local pub provided him with just that scrap of information, that piece of gossip, that trifling incident which had made his case? Publicans and barmaids, conversation-loving folk for the most part, threw out information often carelessly and nearly always unconsciously, and their customers talked unprompted of the things he wanted to know.
This morning, twelve hours after the village had been shaken by a startling murder carried out in front of a large number of them, the gathering at the White Horse should be worth watching and listening to. It was on such occasions as this that Carolus, who could adapt himself to most company, had an advantage over the police. The presence of one of them was enough to silence tongues however innocent.
Yet when he entered the bar of the White Horse he found only a few customers in desultory conversation with Harry Mason, the proprietor, who was, Carolus remembered, the father of Billy Mason, John Stainer’s nocturnal informant.
Harry Mason was a thin, alert-looking man with glasses, who seemed somewhat highly strung for his traditionally good-fellow profession.
‘Yes?’ he said to Carolus.
‘Has Billy Trotter been in?’
‘He’s in the snuggery with George Garries. What can I get you?’
Carolus ordered a pint of bitter. He did not feel that, in spite of the blood-curdling threat with which George had left him on his own ground, he would be hostile now. A murder made the whole world kin, and behind George’s rather over-masculine manner Carolus sensed a rather weak and easily influenced character. His devotion to his father, whom Carolus had angered, was, after all, understandable. He took his pint and went through the door which Mason had indicated as that of the snuggery.
The two young men were in armchairs. Billy Trotter said, ‘You know George, don’t you?’ and Carolus smiled and said he did.
‘He’s our band leader,’ Billy went on, ‘as I dare say you saw last night.’
George, in order to say something and show there was no ill-feeling, added, ‘I play the trumpet.’
‘He’s good,’ said Billy. ‘He ought to be a pro.’
This was getting nowhere.
‘You must both have been quite near Horseman when he collapsed.’
’Just under the lectern,’ agreed George.
‘It didn’t half give me a shock when he slumped over. I thought at first he’d just passed out.’
‘You didn’t hear the shot then?’
‘No. That’s the funny part,’ said Billy. ‘No one seems to have heard it. Of course, those fire-crackers were going off at the time.’
‘Do you think that was a coincidence?’
‘I simply don’t know. I can’t believe young Drummer Sloman can have shot Horseman.’
‘He didn’t. I was standing right beside him,’ Carolus said.
‘Then why have the cops taken him in?’ George asked.
‘Stands to reason,’ said Billy. ‘He’d got a gun. A shot had been fired from it. No one else was found with a gun. His young brother was raising hell with fireworks at the time. He’s known to be a good shot. What else can they do? But we don’t know what the experts will say about the angle of fire, type of bullet and that. They’re pretty hot on all that sort of thing nowadays. I think they’ll have to let Drummer go. You can’t hold anyone more than a certain time on suspicion, you know, unless you’ve got some evidence to back it. What evidence is there against Drummer, when it comes to it?’
‘See what you mean.’
‘But if it wasn’t Drummer,’ went on Billy, ‘who the hell was it? And how come no gun was found on anyone?’
‘I think I might be able to account for that,’ said Carolus quietly. Both young men looked up at him intently. ‘You see, while Rutters kept anyone from going out of the front of the hall, I went round to the back, where there’s that sort of vestry or committee room.’
They nodded. As members of the band which often played in the hall they knew it well.
‘I got there pretty sharply, but there was still time for someone to have come out of the hall to the door, thrown the gun out of sight, and got back before I reached it. No one could have got away entirely—I should have seen him as I came round. But he could have thrown away the gun, and then when everyone was let out come round and picked it up.’
Carolus, who had seen this chance at the time and searched the ground within easy throwing distance of the door, watched the effect of his theory. Billy was sceptical.
‘But surely someone would have seen the bloody thing lying there? Or else seen whoever it was picking it up?’
George, however, liked the idea.
‘I don’t see why. There’s no light round there except from the door. And who thought to notice what anyone did when we were all let out?’
‘I just mentioned it as a possibility,’ said Carolus modestly, and called for another round.
‘I’m afraid I rather shouted you out the other day,’ George said to Carolus when they had their pints. ‘Only you’d upset the old man, and I don’t like to see the old man upset. He’s a bit touchy, I know, but there was no call to ask him a lot of questions like you did.’
‘I know. It’s a vice of mine.’
‘Specially about the Beacon, and that. Dad hates the Beacon. He won’t even go that way since that little boy was found there last year.’
‘Oh, well,’ said Carolus pacifically.
‘Dad’s trying to sell it. He doesn’t want it on his land. He says the soil round there’s good for nothing. Rocks and that. You can’t even put sheep out there—they’d starve. Might keep a few goats, I suppose.’
‘Goats,’ said Carolus. ‘Do you keep goats?’
George did not seem to like the question and evaded it.
‘What’s the good of them? Milk’s only good for cheese and there’s no time for that sort of thing on a farm today. I believe, years ago, there was quite a lot of goats on Guys. But not nowadays.’
‘Strange animals,’ said Carolus. ‘They’re said to be the devil’s familiars.’
‘You don’t want to talk of the devil here, you know,’ said Billy with mock solemnity. ‘It doesn’t do. Guys people are supposed to be in league with him. You’d believe it if you could have seen Horseman’s place when I got there this morning. You’ve never seen such a mess in your life.’
It was Billy’s turn at last. He had waited a long time to take the floor with the story of the burglary at Horseman’s, on which he was an authority. George good-naturedly encouraged him.
‘Go on. Was it really? Who do you think had done it? Same person as fired the shot?’
‘Very likely. But I wouldn’t be sure. It was taking a risk after getting away with the other, wasn’t it?’
‘They should catch this one, anyway,’ George considered. ‘Fingerprints, and that. I suppose we shall all have to have them taken. Rutters will be running round like a dog with two tails.’
A noisy group, with two women among them, came in from the other bar and George and Billy rose to leave.
‘I suppose you didn’t do that job at Horseman’s?’ Billy asked George with a grin. ‘You could have got the stuff away in your old car easy.’
George took this in good part.
‘I should have made a real job of it if it had been me,’ he said. ‘Besides, I hadn’t got the car. The old man was in a flaming temper at being kept hanging about and cleared off in the car without waiting for me. I had to walk home.’
‘Poor old George! Well, I must run. The wife told me if I was late again this Sunday she’d give my dinner to the dog. So long, Mr Deene. Cheerio, George.’
Twelve
The official who would conduct the inquest on Connor Horseman was a friend of John Stainer and came to dinner one evening not long before the occasion. He was a solicitor named Barfinney, a precise and dry little man. Clearly he would say nothing about the matter; on the other hand, he seemed quite ready to hear it discussed by John and Carolus. Perhaps he hoped, without committing himself or his office as coroner, to learn a little that might enable him to ask searching questions when the time came—a perfectly legitimate objective. Carolus was thus enabled to set him on the track of information he himself hoped to gain.
Whether or not Mr Barfinney profited from the occasion, Carolus certainly learned several things from the inquest itself. In the first place, the ballistics expert was closely questioned.
Carolus by temperament was an investigator who depended more on psychology than forensic science, but in this case, in which the actual shooting of a man in public was so puzzling, carried out as it had been without the knowledge of most if not all of those present, he was anxious to learn everything he could from an expert.
The bullet, it appeared, had been fired from a .38 revolver from within the hall. There had been some wild theorising about telescopic sights and firing from some distance through the top parts of the long windows which were open. This now seemed out of the question, however good a target Horseman had been, illuminated at his lectern. It appeared rather that someone on the floor of the hall had killed Horseman, and according to minute calculations the shot had come from the front part of the hall. It was surmised that a silencer had been used and the fire-crackers were remembered, but even then the basic problem remained—how could anyone have aimed a revolver and fired it without attracting attention? From under a table? From behind cover of some kind? Concealed by an elaborate costume? It was a complete mystery.
Drummer Sloman was closely questioned. Enough evidence was produced to save him from being suspected of firing the shot himself, but as the coroner pointed out, there was only his own testimony to say that the pistol had been in his holster at the time. Having introduced it to the hall as an inconspicuous part of his cowboy’s get-up, he could have passed it to an accomplice and have received it back before he had appeared so confidently before the police. It was undeniable that a shot of the calibre which had killed Horseman had recently been fired from it.
There was breathless attention when Drummer was asked where he got the revolver. Before answering, he glanced at the police as though seeking guidance on whether or how he should answer, but their faces remained impassive.
