“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 fiancé.”
“Your sister’s fiancé?” The inspector seemed surprisingly interested in this piece of information. “Your sister’s fiancé?” 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.