The Nine-Spoked Wheel, page 17
The photographs were brought in, and Revers laid them out on top of the map. It was a perfectly ordinary, and yet somewhat unusual hammer, with its exceptionally deeply rounded claw. Who knew about hammers?
Real ironmongers have been largely superseded by chain stores except in old market towns. Generations of Brighouses had run the ironmongery in Marlborough, and if anybody knew about hammers, old George Brighouse would. The shop would be closed now, but Mr Brighouse was a magistrate, and Revers knew him slightly. He telephoned his home and asked if he could call there. Yes, of course he could – Mr Brighouse would be pleased to see him.
‘Have you ever come across a hammer like that?’ Revers asked, handing him the photographs.
‘Oh yes,’ said the old ironmonger, ‘but there aren’t many about now. This is what we used to call a “Telegraph Hammer” – years back, no carpenter around here would use anything else. I asked my Dad once – that’s going back some way, you know – why it was a “Telegraph” hammer, and he said it was before the electric telegraph, when “telegraph” – you find the old name sometimes in places called “Telegraph Hill” – meant a semaphore. The claw of a “Telegraph Hammer” was supposed to look like the arm of a semaphore, or so my old Dad said. Where would this hammer have come from?’
‘That’s what I’m trying to find out. I wondered if by any chance you ever sold any.’
Mr Brighouse shook his head. ‘Haven’t had any for years,’ he said. ‘Can’t get them now – wish we could, for it was about the best hammer going, and people still ask for them sometimes. But it was only a small firm that made them, and it went out of business. That claw needed a deal of hand forging, and they couldn’t get the labour.’
‘If this was bought fairly recently, have you any idea where it could possibly have come from?’
Mr Brighouse thought deeply. ‘Well, it can’t be new stock, because you can’t get it,’ he said. ‘Have you tried Spindrell and Tothurst in Swindon? They’ve got stuff there going back a century or more. There isn’t any Spindrell now, but I often chaff old Ben Tothurst about it – I tell him that he’s probably got tools that Noah used to build his ark.’ Mr Brighouse laughed at his own wit.
*
Revers drove to Swindon first thing in the morning. There was only a youngish assistant in Spindrell and Tothurst’s shop. ‘No,’ he said, after looking at the photographs, ‘we haven’t any hammers like that, though I think we may have had some once. But you’ll have to see Mr Tothurst, and he’s away until Friday afternoon. You’d get him if you came here lateish, about half an hour before we close. He’s been away on holiday, but he’ll look in to check over things before he goes home.’
When Revers got back to his office, there was a message asking him to telephone the laboratory at Oxford. He did so at once, and was put through to the pathologist who had examined the hammer. ‘Most of the hammer seems to have been exposed for some time, and there’s nothing significant on it, except rust,’ the pathologist said. ‘But it’s got a curiously deep claw, and under the claw there are identifiable traces of blood. It is undoubtedly human blood, but a puzzling feature is that there is blood from two distinct blood groups: they couldn’t have come from the same person.’
‘Can you say what the groups are?’
‘Yes.’ The pathologist told him.
*
Revers looked up the autopsy reports on Paul Clayton and Jan Korsky. Clayton’s blood was in one of the groups mentioned by the pathologist, Korsky’s in the other. The link between the hammer and the killings now seemed to him certain – the chances against its showing traces of blood from their two separate groups which had not come from them would be astronomical. But he was still no farther forward in the case – there was still nothing to link the hammer with any particular user.
*
Without much hope, Revers called at Spindrell and Tothurst’s shop late on Friday afternoon. Mr Tothurst was there, and Revers showed him the photographs. ‘That’s a real old “Telegraph Hammer”,’ he said, ‘don’t see many about nowadays.’
‘Have you ever stocked them?’
‘Lord, yes. They were always a bit expensive, but woodworkers who’d used them wouldn’t use anything else. Haven’t got any more, though – sold the last in the shop some time ago. Pity they went out, really – they’re not made now.’
Mr Tothurst shook his head sorrowfully over the transience of things. Then he looked at one of the photographs again. ‘Need my other glasses,’ he said. Then, ‘It’s a funny thing, Inspector, but I could swear that this is the very hammer I sold.’ He pointed to the small split at the foot of the handle. ‘See that? I remember now, quite clearly. A customer came in, asking for a hammer. I showed him one or two, but he said they were too light. Then I remembered that I had this old chap in a drawer, so I got it out. He said it seemed about the right sort of hammer, but he jibbed at the price. Then he noticed that little split in the handle, and asked, Could he have a reduction for that? Well, I was getting a bit tired of him, you’ll understand. It didn’t seem any use keeping old stock that I couldn’t replace, so I said I’d knock 50p off the price, if that suited him. It did, and he took it. I’m sorry now, because the little split wouldn’t affect the hammer, and someone who wanted a “Telegraph” would have paid the full price, and been glad to.’
With his heart in his mouth, Revers produced a photograph of Dr Arbolent. ‘Have you ever seen that gentleman?’ he asked.
‘Why yes,’ said Mr Tothurst. ‘That’s the very gentleman I sold the hammer to.’
*
Explaining a little of the extreme importance of Mr Tothurst’s recollections, Revers asked if they could go into the office. Telling his assistant to shut up the shop, Mr Tothurst took Revers behind the counter into a little room full of box files and trade catalogues. Careful questioning enabled Mr Tothurst to recall that the date of the sale was between two and three months ago, a date which he was able to confirm by looking through an old-fashioned cashbook, where the sale of the hammer was recorded. He was prepared to swear that the purchaser of the hammer was the gentleman whose photograph he had been shown, and Revers thought that he’d make a good witness. Sitting at Mr Tothurst’s desk he drafted a statement which he asked Tothurst to sign. Urging the ironmonger to keep everything that had been said in the strictest confidence, Revers left him and went back to Marlborough.
Macleod had gone home by the time Revers reached the office, so he went to the Superintendent’s house. Macleod listened to him in complete silence, then he stood up and held out his hand. ‘Not much I can say, John, except that it’s a remarkably fine piece of work. Do you want me to get hold of a magistrate and ask for a warrant tonight?’
‘I think so. The man’s got a boat, and he’s supposed to be sailing off tomorrow.’
‘Yes, but he’s only going to Bristol. It will be such a sensational case that I’d really like a word with the Director of Public Prosecutions first.’
‘I don’t think there’s time. How do we know he’s going to Bristol? I’d be far happier to pick him up before he sails. I know it’s asking a lot, Super, and you’ll have to carry the can if anything goes wrong. But you know and I know that we’re right. We’ve got to take risks sometimes. We haven’t had a chance of putting him through any serious questioning yet. Now we have. And we’ve just got to do it straight away.’
‘OK, John. So be it. Friday night’s a rotten time, though, to get hold of anybody. Still, we’ll manage. I take it you won’t want a warrant backed for bail?’
‘No.’
X
The Bishops and Clerks
JULIET FELT LIKE crying. She had not greatly enjoyed her week at Fishguard: the hotel was nice, and it was fun to have all these newspaper people around, but she missed Marryat more than she liked to admit, even to herself. She had been interviewed twice for the CBS network at home, and the thought of all the folks back at Milman gathered round their television sets to watch her was exciting, but where was Tony, and why wasn’t he here? He’d said he was sailing his boat up to Fishguard, and that he’d be around to see her off, but he wasn’t. She’d got up that morning with the wonderful feeling that something really nice was going to happen, and now she was on board Lady Penelope waiting to sail off, and it hadn’t happened. There was a fleet of small boats milling around the bay, assembled to see the start of Lady Penelope’s voyage – one of them must be Tony’s. But which? And why didn’t he sail near and wave, as everybody else seemed to be doing? She stood at the rail, feeling more and more unhappy.
There was nothing in particular for her to do. The sailing crew were running around, tying and untying ropes and looking busy, but the archaeologists were passengers. True, at a briefing earlier in the week they’d all been allotted tasks – hers was to be nursing orderly in charge of the First Aid Box. She’d checked and rechecked the box, but nobody had so much as a cut finger, and nobody seemed to want her, anyway.
George Armitage came and stood beside her. ‘Good moment, isn’t it?’ he said. Juliet did not agree but she didn’t want to be a spoilsport, so she nodded as brightly as she could. But where was Tony?
After the good weather they’d had all through the week, it wasn’t nearly such a nice day. There’d been a little rain earlier in the morning, and it was still grey. The sailing crew didn’t seem to mind. ‘Maybe up to Force 5 when we get outside, but she’ll go better with a bit of wind,’ she’d heard that nice Roger Freemantle say. Now they really did seem getting ready to leave harbour. They were due to leave at 11.00, and it was getting on for that. Dr Arbolent was standing on the steering platform, being photographed with one hand on the steering oar. He was waving his other hand at the crowd lining the quays. Four of the sailing crew were getting up the sail. Roger Freemantle was shouting something. The rope that had held them to a buoy went slack, and one of the girl sailors was hauling it on board. Juliet noticed suddenly that the gap between them and the harbour was widening. The big ships in port let off sirens, people in the little boats blew foghorns and shouted good wishes through loud hailers. They were off.
The wind was still in the south-west, but there was more of it than there’d been on the day of Lady Penelope’s one experimental sail. Freemantle was not exactly worried, but he wished that he knew more of what Lady Penelope was likely to do. The big sail seemed setting well for the moment, and Freemantle decided to harden the sheets a little as they got out into the bay. Dr Arbolent had insisted on being at the steering oar as they went out, but Freemantle had persuaded him to have an experienced helmsman beside him. Freemantle was relieved to see that this man was actually doing the work.
They were not allowed chart or compass, but Freemantle had taken the precaution of memorising the chart as far as he could. He’d had a navigational session with Dr Arbolent the night before, and the archaeologist had explained his plans. He had a board with a circle with nine radii drawn on it. The board was fastened to the deck, beside the steering oar, aligned so that one of the nine radii pointed straight ahead over the bow. Dr Arbolent proposed to stand out to sea from Fishguard Bay until what he called the seventh radius was in line with Strumble Head. Then he proposed to turn west to round the Head, and to continue west until one of the other radii (precisely which would depend on the time of day) was in line with the sun, or a particular star at night. When the sky was overcast, the position of sun or star would have to be estimated. ‘These people knew the heavens, they were wonderful practical astronomers – far better than we are, with none of their incentive. Also, they had a remarkable facility for estimating time. I have practised, and I can estimate elapsed time with an error of no more than two minutes in the hour – just over three per cent. With more practice I could do better still. In antiquity, there were specialists in time-keeping – probably a class of priest. Every ship’s crew would have its time-keeper, but I shall not do badly.’ Freemantle was so impressed by Dr Arbolent’s reputation that it never occurred to him to ask what evidence there might be for all these statements. He did not begin to understand the navigation, which, he felt, was far beyond him. But that didn’t matter – his job was merely to sail the ship. Privately, he did not rate high anybody’s chance of estimating the position of the sun in fog without a compass, and he was comforted to know that he was permitted to have a compass in his box.
He was impressed by Lady Penelope’s sailing qualities as they stood across the bay. She went better with twelve tons of rock on board; it gave her a better grip of the water. He was not looking forward to going on the wind when they turned south-west after clearing Strumble Head. His own view was that they’d do better to stand on until they were about halfway across to Ireland, and then try to make a course a little east of south. But for the moment that was not his business: all he had to do was to get the best he could out of the boat.
*
Marryat was as unhappy as Juliet. He enjoyed his first night in hospital: he’d had no sleep the night before, and it was delicious to lie between clean sheets and to feel that there was no need to be on watch. He felt less pleasure in the morning, when the hospital doctor told him that he would have to stay in bed for at least two more days. That meant that he couldn’t leave Wexford until Friday – and he wanted to be in Fishguard on Friday. The passage from Wexford to Fishguard was only about sixty miles but he couldn’t safely reckon on much less than twelve hours sailing. However he looked at it, he’d have to enter at night, he didn’t know the place, and it would almost certainly be too late to try to see Juliet. He’d heard on the radio that Lady Penelope was due to sail at 11.00, so there’d be precious little time on Saturday morning.
As things turned out, it was even worse than he’d feared. He had not broken anything again, but there was severe bruising and inflammation around the old break. The doctor talked gloomily about the risk of infection round the scarcely-healed bone, and really wanted to keep him in hospital over the weekend. Marryat revolted. He explained that it was imperative for him to be in England on Saturday morning, that he took full responsibility for his own condition, and that if anything went wrong it would be the English health service and not an Irish hospital which would have to put it right. If the worst came to the worst and he died, at least it would be the English who would have the trouble of burying him.
The Irish doctor had a sense of humour. He was also a good doctor, and a kindly man. He gave Marryat some massive doses of antibiotics, and saw that his shoulder was padded and well-bandaged against further possible damage. Even so, it was late on Friday afternoon before Marryat managed to get free. Then the tides were wrong, and it was getting on for 02.00 on Saturday morning before he motored Clio out of her berth.
The night passage was sheer hell. The wind was all right, but there was a lot of shipping about, and with his unreliable left arm he couldn’t risk having to take in sail in a hurry. He’d taken on fuel before leaving Wexford, but there wasn’t any point in using the engine: Clio could do rather better under sail, and also she rode more easily, and threw him about less. But he just couldn’t do it in the time. At 11.00 he was still a mile or so off Strumble Head, and as Lady Penelope used the south-west wind to run out of the bay on the Dinas Head side of it, he missed her altogether.
It was well after midday before he found a mooring and tied up. By the time he had inflated his dinghy with one arm and rowed ashore using his left arm as little as he could, it was getting on for one o’clock. The crowds had gone, and he was wondering disconsolately where to look for lunch, when a police car that seemed familiar drove up to the quay. To his astonishment, who should get out but Inspector Revers!
‘Good Lord!’ said Marryat.
‘I suppose I should say good afternoon,’ said Revers.
‘I’ve only just got in. Have you any idea where Dr Arbolent might be?’
Marryat waved his good arm towards the bay. ‘Somewhere at sea,’ he said. ‘I’ve missed him, too.’
‘Hell,’ said Revers, and added, ‘I have a warrant for his arrest.’
*
Everything had gone wrong for Revers, as it had for Marryat. Superintendent Macleod had duly got him his warrant on Friday night, but then Diana had put her foot down. There was no earthly point, she said, in rushing off at once. Using the motorway and Severn Bridge to Newport, it couldn’t take much more than six hours to get to Fishguard. He simply must get some sleep. Sergeant Grey was going to do the driving, was he? Well, he needed sleep, too. If they left at 4 a.m. they would be in ample time.
But they weren’t. All had gone well as far as Newport, but an attempted shortcut on mountain roads after that had led to disaster. Not only did they get lost, but they had a puncture. Revers cursed himself for not having telephoned Fishguard police and asked them to detain Dr Arbolent until he arrived. He had the slightly reasonable excuse that there didn’t seem to be any telephones, but he knew in his heart that the real reason was that he wanted to make the arrest himself. Well, what was done, was done. What was to be done now?
‘We can go to Bristol and get him when he comes in,’ said Sergeant Grey, adding ‘if we do that we can have a couple of nights at home first.’
‘I don’t like it. He’s on a boat, and the Lord knows where he’ll go, or what he’ll try to do.’
‘Go after him in a boat, then,’ said Marryat.
‘But I haven’t got a boat. Oh, I suppose I could get hold of the Navy, but it’s Saturday afternoon, and by the time we got a boat out of them he could be in Spain.’
