The next morning was fine and the country was showing a delightful suggestion of spring, as French turned his car off the Guildford road at Ockham Common and inquired his way to Forde Manor. At the lodge he parked, and calling on Mrs Relf asked if he could have a word with her husband.
‘He’s down at the lake, sir,’ she answered, ‘where the stream runs out. He’s been having trouble with the weir.’
This was just what French wanted. He set off, considering himself accounted for and free to look at anything which interested him.
He was at once struck by the beauty of the place and in particular by the magnificence of the trees. He was fond of trees and those under which he now walked were patriarchs of their respective families. They arched high across the drive like the vaulted roof of a skeleton cathedral. Then coming to the open ground he gazed down in admiration over the sloping lawns to the lake beyond. The water looked cold and forbidding, but it was relieved by a broad band of gilding across its widest part, a gift from the sun which shone beyond it, low down in the sky. At the end was the tiny figure of a man, digging on the bank. French walked down.
‘Good morning,’ he called. ‘Are you Relf?’
‘Yes, sir,’ the man returned as spade in hand he slowly approached.
‘Having trouble here?’ French went on to show interest and create a propitious atmosphere.
‘Yes, sir,’ Relf repeated. ‘The water’s been undermining this here end of the weir and I’m making it up. You have to keep on top of a job of this kind. If I let it go too far it wouldn’t be long till the lake was emptied.’
‘Is the lake artificial then?’
‘Made in King John’s time, they tell me. I’ve heard the old master say so more than once, that was Sir Howard before the present man, Sir Geoffrey, came over from America.’ The words were correct, and yet the man’s contrasting feelings towards his two employers were as clear as if he had delivered a lecture on the subject. French congratulated himself that Relf should be not only talkative but transparent. He chatted on about the repairs, then turned to business.
‘I called to get some help from you, Relf. I’m Chief Inspector French from Scotland Yard, and it’s nothing about yourself or Sir Geoffrey or this place or the fire. It’s about Mr Barke.’
Relf’s expressive countenance registered increasing surprise as he listened to this gambit. ‘That’s the gentleman what was down to see Mrs Stanton the day before the fire? I don’t know nothing about him, sir.’
‘No,’ French agreed, ‘but I think you can help me all the same. I’d better tell you in confidence,’ he went on with an air of great candour, ‘that Mr Barke has disappeared. No one knows what has happened to him. I’m trying to find out everything he did recently in the hope of tracing him.’
Relf shook his head. ‘I’d be sorry to hear there was anything wrong with him,’ he declared. ‘A nice gentleman, pleasant spoken and all that, though,’ he added as if from an afterthought, ‘he’d be bound to be all right if he was a friend of Mrs Stanton’s.’
French smiled. ‘I agree with you, though I’ve seen less of her than you. However, that’s not the point. I want you to tell me exactly what took place on that Monday afternoon. Did Mrs Stanton ask you to show Mr Barke the pictures?’
‘No, sir, he spoke to my wife and she sent him down to me. I was giving the boats a go-over, for though there was no one in the house, everything had to be kept right in case there would be a sale. Mr Barke said he was an artist and that Mrs Stanton had been going to let him see the pictures, but as she couldn’t do so and he was down here specially for the purpose, he hoped I would.’
‘And you did?’
‘Yes, sir. I thought it would be doing the right thing to oblige him.’
‘I’m not suggesting it wasn’t. I only want to know what happened.’
‘Well, we went in and I soon saw he had been there before. “Where’s the Gorah?” he asked. “You had a fine Gorah here and it seems to be gone.” Well, sir, I couldn’t tell him, I didn’t know nothing about those pictures, you understand. And then he said something about a dyke. I couldn’t make out what it was.’
‘A Van Dyck,’ French suggested.
Relf nodded. ‘That’s right,’ he admitted. ‘A picture, I suppose?’
‘A picture painted by a man of that name.’
‘That so? Well, he seemed to miss two pictures, the Gorah and the Dyke one.’
‘Yes?’ French encouraged.
‘Then he looked round and found what he wanted. He went over to a picture. “The Gorah,” he said. “Hell!” he said, but sort of to himself. I don’t know what it was all about, but it seemed to upset him and he went on muttering.’
‘What did he mutter?’ asked the puzzled French.
‘One word I heard was Van something. Not Van Dyck as you mentioned, but something else. Then he said, “That’s private ownership for you!” I heard that clearly. Then he sort of turned to me and said, “Fools rush in.” I thought for a moment he was off his chump, if you will excuse me saying so.’
‘That word wasn’t “Vandal”, I suppose?’
‘“Vandal” it was, sir: that’s right.’
‘And what then?’
‘The same thing happened before a lot of other pictures. He saw something he didn’t like, but he didn’t explain to me what it was. He found the Van Dyck and it was the same with that. I couldn’t make out what was wrong.’
French was by now completely mystified. What could Barke have seen in another man’s collection, with which he himself had nothing to do, to cause him annoyance or distress? He wondered if Betty Stanton knew, and made a note to ask her.
He bade good day to Relf, but before leaving the grounds he decided to walk up to see what was left of the house. The ruins looked tragic enough from the lake, but it was not till he got closer that he realized how complete was the destruction. Never had he seen such catastrophic devastation. As he gazed at the gaunt blackened walls with their starkly staring windows and cracked stonework he shivered. The place seemed a symbol of death and it cast its dreadful shadow over all its surroundings.
He walked along the ruined front, then turned round the gallery wing to have a look at the rear. As he did so he stopped suddenly and stared. There approaching him was someone he knew. With an exclamation of pleasure he stepped forward, his hand outstretched.
‘Shaw, by all that’s wonderful!’ he exclaimed. ‘Are your people interested in this?’ He jerked his thumb towards the ruin.
‘I might ask the same of you,’ the newcomer answered, ‘and with more reason. How did your lot get in on it?’
They shook hands, smiling genially at one another.
‘In on it?’ French repeated. ‘We’re not in on it—if there’s anything to be in on. I’m down here on another case: a disappearance. Artist called Barke. Director of the Crewe Gallery and so on.’
‘Oh that,’ rejoined Shaw casually. ‘Has he not turned up yet?’
‘Look here,’ French said firmly, ‘how did you know he had gone? What do you know about it all?’
Shaw took his cigarette case from his pocket and held it out. ‘Well,’ he answered slowly, ‘it’s this fire, you know. The Thames & Tyne have got stung over it and they’re sitting up and taking notice. They’ve sent me down to see that everything’s O.K.’
‘I twigged that, strange as it may appear,’ declared French as he selected a cigarette. ‘What I asked was, how you got on to the Barke affair?’
‘You might have twigged that too. I went to see our local heroine, Mrs Stanton, and found her mourning Barke R.A.’s apparent defection. But you haven’t told me how you got drawn in.’
‘The Sûreté rang us up. Barke arrived in Paris from London about four o’clock last Friday afternoon, went to his hotel, booked his room, sent his luggage up, said he had to pay a call and walked out of the hotel. He’s not been heard of since.’
‘Very pretty vanishing act. What is it? Another woman?’
French shook his head. ‘Looks more like murder to me, though of course I don’t know yet.’
‘That’s bad. What’s the motive?’
French hesitated. ‘I’m not sure,’ he answered presently. ‘But it’s your turn now. You don’t suspect this fire’s not all O.K., do you?’
‘I don’t say that. It’s what I’m supposed to be looking into, you know.’
‘You don’t seem very satisfied. Look here, Shaw, I’d like a chat with you about all this. Suppose we have a walk round the top of the lake? It looks attractive under those trees.’
‘Suits me. I’ve been wanting to do it, as a matter of fact, but I’ve not taken the time.’
‘Now,’ said French as they set off, ‘suppose you begin at the beginning. What is it all about?’
Shaw made a gesture. ‘Oh, well, I’d have come in any case, you know. I always examine the site of a fire before we pay.’
French grinned. ‘Very good: now get on to it.’
Shaw smiled in his turn. “There’s not very much to it,’ he answered. ‘We hold the insurance of this place, have done for years. Then about a year ago the former owner, Sir Howard Buller, died and for a time they weren’t sure who would succeed him. Then they discovered this present man, Sir Geoffrey, in America. He came home, took the title, and settled down here. He is unmarried, and he engaged Mrs Stanton to run the house for him.’
‘Where in America was Sir Geoffrey?’
‘Chicago, I believe. Then Sir Geoffrey decided he didn’t like England—and that he’d sell and go back to the States. I’ve heard a whisper that he didn’t get on with the people here, but I don’t know if it’s true.’
‘Easy to find out.’
‘Yes, but I’ve not had time. Shortly after coming over Sir Geoffrey approached our people to revise the insurance. He said be couldn’t find any details about it and didn’t believe the place was properly covered. He was quite right. Our people knew the policy wasn’t satisfactory, but Sir Howard wouldn’t move in the matter. A complete new valuation was therefore made and the premium adjusted accordingly.’
‘Well?’ French encouraged him.
‘Well, he wasn’t able to sell, and then,’ Shaw paused, adding a trifle grimly, ‘there was the fire.’
French thought over this. ‘Not absolutely conclusive, you know,’ he remarked presently.
‘Haven’t I said so!’ Shaw retorted. ‘But a case for investigation and so—here I am.’
‘And Barke has disappeared and Barke paid a call here just before it and so—here I am. By the way, I’ve just been asking Relf about his visit, and it seems he saw the pictures and was greatly upset about them. Any theory to cover that?’
‘Yes, that may be important. I’ll tell you. It seems that Sir Geoffrey had been getting a lot of pictures cleaned: fifteen to be accurate. Now Barke has a complex about that, normally the very idea sends him off the deep end. There can be no doubt that that was what he didn’t like.’
‘That would fit in,’ French returned. ‘Relf saw he was upset about it.’
‘That’s it.’
French made a gesture of exasperation. ‘But was he right?’ he asked. ‘What’s the truth of this cleaning business?’
‘Well,’ Shaw answered cautiously, ‘doctors differ, you know. But there are two things which may be suggestive: first, the pictures he had done were valuable. There was a Van Dyck, a Goya, a Muril—’
‘Goya!’ French exclaimed with sudden enlightenment.
‘What’s that?’
‘Gorah was what Relf said. I couldn’t place it.’
‘He meant Goya. Well, that was the first thing: fifteen of the best pictures done. The second was that Wilberforce, our artist who valued the pictures for insurance, tells me that in his opinion none of them wanted cleaning, or not badly at all events.’
French’s interest grew keener. This new fact, added to the two he had already known, made a suggestive trio. First, one expert considered that a number of pictures had been cleaned unnecessarily and a second (obviously) that the work had been a disastrous mistake; second, the collection containing these cleaned pictures had been burnt, and third, the expert who had seen what was done had disappeared.
French knew little about pictures. But in the course of his career he had come across more than one case in which cleaned and renovated pictures had been mysteriously burnt. It was an old trick. You own a good picture, and are short of cash. Very well, have it valued and insure it for its full worth: all perfectly correct and above board. Then get it copied. Sell the original secretly to some collector, put the copy in its place and burn down the house. This gives you nearly twice the value of the picture. And if there are many pictures in a like case and your house is also insured for its full value, the profits grow correspondingly. Dangerous if the sales become known? Yes, but only slightly. You have chosen your purchaser carefully and given him something more than a hint of the truth. If you are prosecuted, you will see that he is too. He will keep the transaction dark till you have had time to move elsewhere and adopt a new personality.
But if a qualified judge of pictures has seen your copies before your fire, where do you stand? Your future welfare depends on his discretion, and if you fear this may be inadequate, a certain compulsion is undoubtedly indicated.
‘Tell me,’ French said earnestly, ‘were all those cleanings genuine?’
‘No reasons to suppose they weren’t, you know. If we could only ask Barke, he could tell us.’
‘That’s—just it.’
Shaw stared. ‘Oh,’ he said presently, ‘that’s what is worrying you, is it? You think he saw too much?’
‘The idea passed through my mind,’ French admitted. ‘But then I have a suspicious nature.’
Shaw stopped and faced round. ‘Easy to settle it,’ he declared. ‘Barke saw the pictures on Monday afternoon and the fire was that night. Then he went to Paris on Friday morning and disappeared on arrival there. That O.K.?’
‘Correct.’
‘Then if you’re right, Sir Geoffrey was in Paris on Friday.’
‘Presumably.’
‘Easy to find out. But look here, French, suppose your suspicion’s right; how would Sir Geoffrey know that Barke wouldn’t have told someone what he saw? He’d never have been able to keep it to himself all that time.’
‘What matter if he had talked?’
‘What matter?’
‘It couldn’t be used.’
Admiration shone in Shaw’s eyes. ‘By Jove, I hadn’t thought of that! Of course it would be hearsay evidence and inadmissible!’
‘So that if Sir Geoffrey had been trying it on, the elimination of Barke would have meant his safety.’
Shaw nodded. ‘You’re right. Then what about finding out if he was in Paris on Friday?’
‘I’ll see to it first thing.’
‘You, know,’ Shaw went on slowly, ‘I’m as much interested in all this as you are. If there was any hanky panky, it might save my companies anything up to half a million. And you might get a murderer!’
French lit another cigarette. ‘The question of the murder must be settled for both of our inquiries. What about working on it together?’
Shaw, old and hardened as he was, coloured with pleasure. ‘Suits me,’ he said warmly. ‘What do you suggest we should do?’
French considered. ‘As a matter of fact, before moving I’d like to be clearer about motive.’
‘The motive’s simple enough; want of cash.’
‘Ah, but how do you know? Can you prove it?’
‘No; we’ll have to go into it. But apart from the cash he can’t have been happy here. Else why did he close down and try to sell?’
‘I daresay Mrs Stanton could answer both questions, but I’m not sure if she would.’
‘Tell you what I propose,’ Shaw declared. ‘Gossip in the local pub. A few pints will usually get you what you want.’
‘I’m game for that,’ French grinned. ‘A lot pleasanter than most of my work. Do you suggest waiting till the evening?’
Shaw shook his head. ‘No, too many there then. No better time than the present.’ As a younger man with less authority than he now possessed, French had on countless occasions used this very plan, though latterly he had favoured the official approach, saying who he was and asking directly for the information he required. But Shaw, he could understand, would have to retain the earlier method, as he was usually working a lone hand, without having behind him, as French had, the backing of the entire British realm.
They retraced their steps to the lodge, and driving to Ockham, went into the bar of the Three Musketeers. It was a cosy room with a big fire blazing on the hearth. Two men were sitting over the latter, while an elderly butler-like man in a pullover and shirtsleeves, leant across the counter. A conversation between the three was evidently in progress, but it closed down as they entered.’
‘Afternoon, gentlemen,’ Shaw greeted the company, ‘Cold today.’
‘But not in here,’ added French. ‘You’re very snug, landlord. What’ll you have, George?’
‘Pint of bitter.’ Shaw answered, looking at the fire and rubbing his hands.
‘Two pints, please,’ said French, also looking at the fire.
The two men seated before it politely took the hint, moving over to make room.
‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ French answered the movement. ‘A very attractive fire on a day like this. Won’t you join us? What’ll you have?’
The men murmured about pints of bitter, and French went on, ‘You too, landlord. I hope you’ll join us in your preference?’
The atmosphere grew more cordial. French and Shaw drew chairs to the fire and began a desultory conversation about the last test match which had been played at Melbourne and which England had lost. Presently they wanted more beer. ‘This,’ said one of the original customers heavily, ‘is on me.’ They thanked him, drank, and presently ordered a third to go all round.
Up to this they had carefully kept off the subject of the fire, but French now thought the time ripe for a démarche.
The two original customers had evidently been drinking for some time, for their tongues were now moving much more freely. Even the landlord had grown unprofessionally mellow.
‘That was a nasty fire you had last week,’ French therefore essayed. ‘We’ve just been past the place and saw the house all burnt out.’
‘Terrible affair,’ one of the originals returned, ‘but it might have been a lot worse.’
‘A lot worse?’ Shaw repeated. ‘It looked bad enough to me as it was.’
‘He doesn’t mean that. You don’t mean that do you Mr Henson?’ put in the other original. ‘He means it was a good thing the house was empty.’
‘Well, it was, and then again maybe it wasn’t,’ remarked the landlord. ‘It’s true when it was empty there could be nobody burnt, but if there’d been someone in it they might have got the fire out.’
‘What I mean,’ declared the first original ponderously, ‘is that if anyone had been burnt it would have been a lot worse. And so it would,’ he added as if challenging dissent.
‘I fancy we’ll agree to that,’ French answered. ‘It’s astonishing,’ he went on reminiscently, ‘how many of these fine country houses have been burnt in this country within recent years. And many of them empty too. You’d wonder how they’d get alight.’
‘Rats at the electric mains,’ Shaw suggested.
‘I shouldn’t be surprised,’ the first original pronounced, though looking as if the idea was both new and strange.
‘So they say at all events.’ Shaw renounced responsibility for the opinion. ‘What was supposed to start this one?’
‘They don’t rightly know,’ answered the landlord, appealed to generally as the proper source of local knowledge. ‘Some say it was an electric short and some the flue of the central heating, but no one really knows.’
French thought the time had come for another step. ‘Hard lines on the owner anyhow,’ he said sympathetically. ‘Buller, I saw his name was from the paper. Is he a local man?’
This drew the reply he had hoped for, and they were presently discussing Sir Geoffrey with avidity. Shaw’s forecast had been correct; they knew all about him, or pretended they did. From the two original customers, backed up with occasional support from the landlord, they learnt that Sir Geoffrey was English, descended from a junior branch of the family, and that he inherited only because of three unexpected deaths having occurred almost simultaneously in the succession. He came home from somewhere in America (‘Chicago,’ interjected the landlord. ‘Told me himself sitting in that chair.’) and as he wasn’t married, he got Mrs Stanton to run the house for him. (‘A nice lady: well spoken of,’ from the landlord.) But the whole thing had been a mistake from his own point of view. He hadn’t liked living at Forde, for he hadn’t hit it off with his neighbours. (‘“Damned mountebank!” that’s what I overheard Lord Brabazon call him to Mr Cheyney on one occasion. “Damned mountebank,” he said, and Mr Cheyney said: “Confounded impertinence! He’ll be trying to get into the hunt next!”’) No, no one had liked him and he had liked no one. And he was also supposed to be hard up. He had begun by subscribing to the local charities and what not, but later that had dried up and nothing more could be got out of him. These statements were all strongly expressed, and lacked neither in substance nor detail.
However, it was clear to French that if even half of it were true, Sir Geoffrey had a motive for arson. How strong that motive might have been was doubtful, but it was at least certain that the matter could not be left where it was and that further investigation must be carried out. Taking care not to leave the Three Musketeers too abruptly, the two detectives regained their respective cars and drove back to London.