A Question of Proof (20 page)

‘And then?’

‘Then? Oh, I see. W-well, I m-mean I didn’t n-nnotice anything once the over b-began,’ stuttered Sims.

Armstrong motioned the bystanders, whose curiosity had led them to draw nearer the protagonists, to move back. He then approached Mrs. Vale. She looked up
at
him, horror still close beneath the surface of her eyes.

‘Now, madam, I’m very sorry to have to trouble you just now. But you realise that the sooner I get all the facts, the quicker we shall find your husband’s – murderer.’ He raised his voice slightly on the last word and glanced keenly about him. The faces were rigid and white, immobile with shock. Like a breeze rippling over a field of corn and dying at its farthest limit, the word ‘murder’ rustled through the crowd, causing a visible tremor in its mass, and communicating itself even to those who waited on the other side of the ground.

Hero moistened her bloodless lips. ‘I don’t know. He spoke to me just before the over began. And when we had won the match I turned to him again. I thought he’d gone to sleep. So I shook him, and he fell off the seat, and I saw –’ Her voice shuddered and broke.

‘Are you quite certain you heard or saw nothing else? I’m sorry, Mrs. Vale, but I must ask you this. Nothing, however unimportant?’

‘When they were running I said, “He’ll never do it” or something, and my husband gave a sort of grunt – answering me. Oh, God, he wasn’t answering me. He was –’ Hero had been speaking in a tense whisper, but such was the concentrated silence of the onlookers that every word reached them. Hero’s body straightened, then collapsed into the arms of Michael standing beside her chair. He held her there, tight, stroking her golden hair.

Armstrong raised the megaphone to his lips and shouted: ‘If anyone saw anything unusual happening here after the beginning of the last over, will he kindly report it to me at once.’ Again the crowd stirred and heaved uneasily, but no one stepped forward. ‘Did any of you touch the body before we came over?’ Nigel asked of the group standing nearest. There was a brief silence, then Sims volunteered: ‘Tiverton and I turned him – it – over, to see if –’ his voice trailed away. ‘And who reached it first?’ ‘Tiverton. I was j-just behind him.’ The superintendent broke in brusquely. ‘And why did you or he remove the weapon? Don’t you know that you should never –’ ‘Oh, but we didn’t. Really, we didn’t. I mean to say, there was no weapon there,’ interrupted Sims, looking bewildered. The superintendent gave Nigel an enigmatic look, then he turned to Evans and said, ‘Would you mind asking Mrs. Vale whether there was a weapon in the body when she saw it fall to the ground.’ Nigel reflected that, though Armstrong was putting up a show of tact and consideration, he seemed to be listening very carefully to the whispered colloquy between Michael and Hero.

‘She says she is certain there was no weapon,’ Michael finally informed the superintendent, then, with a spurt of indignation, he added, ‘If you’ve finished your badgering, perhaps you’ll let her go indoors where these human sheep can’t stare at her any longer.’

‘No one may leave the field till he has been searched.
You
can take her into the tent there, if you like.’

Michael carried Hero into the tent, in full view of two hundred eyes. He could see nothing but her desperate tears, hear nothing but the sobbing of her breath. The tent was empty; the tea had been cleared half an hour ago. Hero clung to Michael like a child; over her shoulder he could see a section of the crowd, waiting, white and silent; he could not see the superintendent, who was standing close to the outside wall of the tent – listening.

Whatever Armstrong may have hoped to hear, he was not given much time for listening. Dr. Maddox arrived, his jaunty walk sobered to the occasion. He nodded to Armstrong and bent over the remains of Percival Vale. ‘Dead, of course. Instantaneous. Can he be moved?’ ‘Yes; it can’t make any difference. Will some of you gentlemen help me to carry him behind the tent.’

The remains of Percival Vale were taken up and put down again. Dr. Maddox bent over the body. After a minute or two he stood up and brushed his knees. ‘Well, sir?’ said Armstrong eagerly.

‘He was stabbed. Some very thin weapon, like a stiletto, for instance. The point entered the body below the left shoulder blade and pierced the heart. I should say it was delivered a little from the left; the post-mortem will verify that. Death, as I say, was instantaneous. There was practically no bleeding.’

Nigel glanced at the superintendent. It was easy to imagine which way his thoughts were tending.
Hero
had been sitting on the left of her husband. He strolled round and inspected the chair on which Vale had been sitting; the canvas was pierced at the back, just below the bar. A group of masters were standing near, speaking in undertones.

‘God!’ Gadsby was saying, ‘it’s amazing – incredible. Killed in full view of every one. Why, damn it, it’s impossible.’

‘Well, it’s been done, anyway,’ said Wrench. ‘I guess the murderer’s feeling pretty sick, too.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Sims.

‘The police are going to search every one. And presumably he’s still got the gory blade concealed amongst his underwear.’ ‘Really, Wrench,’ protested Gadsby, ‘this is not the time or place for your rotten cynicism.’ ‘Nor the time or place for a murder,’ returned Wrench: ‘damned bad form, I call it – in front of all the parents.’

It was not long now before the police from Staverton arrived. Sergeant Pearson, several constables, a police matron, and with them the chief constable, looking flustered and ill at ease. Armstrong went straight up to the latter, saluted and spoke quickly. Nigel edged nearer; he was only able to catch the last words, but these were quite enough:

‘… search warrant for Evans’ rooms, sir.’

‘Are you sure it’s absolutely necessary. I mean –’

‘It’s essential, sir, and the sooner the better.’

‘Very well, Armstrong.’

The superintendent sent constables to relieve the
plainclothes
man and the amateur sentries. As the former came over he whispered to him, ‘Was Mr. Evans carrying anything?’

‘Yes, sir, a tumbler of water.’

‘Don’t be a damned fool. When he left the field, I mean.’

‘Sorry, sir. No, sir, he didn’t appear to be.’

Armstrong now summoned the sergeant and the police matron. He addressed the latter first: ‘I want you to search all the women, in that tent. You can start off with Mrs. Vale; she’s there already. You’re looking for some kind of very thin pointed blade. You will also, in Mrs. Vale’s case only, examine the clothing carefully for bloodstains.’ He turned to the sergeant. ‘Pearson, your job is to search all the boys and the gentlemen who were playing in the match. You won’t find anything but it must be done. Take the visitors’ room in the pavilion. I shall do the rest of the men myself.’ Armstrong moved towards the crowd and bellowed the necessary directions through his megaphone. The crowd began to break up into two streams, the women moving towards the tent and the men over to the pavilion. Many of them were too dazed by the tragedy to protest, but there were a good number who stuck in their heels and made scenes. The chief constable nibbled his moustache uneasily in the background; he foresaw an unpleasant correspondence on his breakfast table tomorrow. Armstrong, however, like a large sheepdog, barked and manoeuvred and threatened to bite, rounding
up
the recalcitrants and putting them in their place.

A constable was left to picket the actual site of the crime, and Armstrong began his search. ‘Mr. Evans, please.’ Michael came into the room in the pavilion and Nigel entered uninvited with him, looking faintly puzzled. ‘Will you please undress, sir.’ Michael lifted one eyebrow, but obeyed; a curious use this changing room is being put to, he thought. The superintendent minutely examined each article of clothing as it was removed. His expression at the end of this was far from pleasant. ‘No bloodstains, after all?’ said Nigel mildly. Armstrong glowered at him and paced once or twice across the room. ‘Just a minute, Mr. Evans,’ he said, as Michael was about to depart, ‘you took a long time about that glass of water, didn’t you?’

‘No longer than I could help.’

‘Hm. Where did you get it?’

‘My bedroom.’

‘Do you mean to say there’s no tap nearer than that?’

‘No, there are lots. But not glasses.’

‘Wouldn’t it have been quicker for you to get a glass from the kitchen?’

‘I don’t think so. It might, perhaps. But I knew there was one in my bedroom; I went there naturally.’

‘That will be all, then, for the present. I must ask you, though, not to return to your rooms till I give you permission.’

Michael looked inquiringly at him; he had no idea
what
all the fuss was about, which was fortunate for his peace of mind. The moment he went out Armstrong signalled to a policeman and told him not to let Evans leave the field till further orders. Armstrong now began the tedious business of searching the rest of the men. He started with the masters who had been standing near the victim; their clothing, too, was searched for blood as well as for a weapon. Nigel stood unnaturally still during these operations. It was too much to hope for, he thought. God knows what the murderer has done with it, but he’s a sight too clever to be found with any traces of the crime on him. And Nigel was right. After what seemed an interminable period, the last person was searched and dismissed. Not an inch of steel, not a drop of blood had been discovered. The police matron entered and informed Armstrong that she had found nothing. ‘Mrs. Vale?’ he said sharply. The woman shook her head. ‘Very well,’ said Armstrong, ‘we can’t keep her out here any longer. Will you take her into the house, Miss Gilray, and don’t let her out of your sight.’ Sergeant Pearson came in to report. ‘Nothing?’ said Armstrong. ‘Take Jones and search Mr. Evans’ rooms. Colonel Humphries will give you the warrant; you may find a bloodstained handkerchief or something as well; he must have contrived somehow to keep the blood off his clothes.’ Nigel raised his eyebrows, but said nothing. He was busy with his own thoughts. Michael and Hero had not done this – that was his major premise – therefore the weapon could not have
been
taken off the field. The weapon had not been found on anybody, therefore it must have been hidden on the field. They would have to search there in the end, for it would not be found in Michael’s rooms, but the delay was intolerable.

He stepped out of the pavilion. The superintendent had given his orders. The boys had been sent in with Griffin. The visitors were straggling off the field in a mute, funeral sort of procession, the fine feathers of the women seeming to droop upon them. The masters had been told not to leave the ground yet; they were collected in a group around Tiverton, upon whose shoulders the responsibility for carrying on the school had presumably fallen. Somewhere in that bleak great building its late lord and master was lying; no longer a scholar, a gentleman, an absolute ruler: only a body with a hole in it.

It was not long before Sergeant Pearson came out. There are few possible hiding places in the bare rooms of masters. He had ransacked Evans’, and there was nothing to be found. The superintendent bit his lip, but he was not beaten yet. He divided up his little force and sent one half to search the school. ‘The common room first, Pearson; when you’ve done that, let me know and I’ll send these gentlemen in there. See that they stay there, too. Then go over the whole blasted building; that weapon can’t have vanished. Interview the servants yourself, and find out if any of them saw Mr. Evans after he went in for that glass of water or knew anything at all about the murder. Not
much
hope of their having seen anything; that infernal tent stands right between the windows and the place where Mr. Vale was sitting. Off you go!’

As Armstrong turned aside to give his own men their orders, Nigel spoke to him in a low voice, ‘There’s always Wrench and the megaphone.’

‘I’ve not forgotten that, Mr. Strangeways. Like to help me search the pavilion?’ The other men received their instructions and began moving slowly about the field, radiating from the place where the body had lain. It did not look as if a pin could escape them. Nigel and the superintendent crossed the deserted pitch and entered the pavilion. Nigel left the burden and heat of the search to his companion. Armstrong was a thorough man, he reflected; he might jump too quickly to conclusions, but he gave every possibility a good run for its money. After quarter of an hour the pavilion had been turned inside out, and there was nothing to show for it.

‘I suppose he couldn’t have hidden it here and taken it away again after you’d searched him?’ Nigel suggested tentatively.

‘Not he. I had a man watching every one as they left the changing room. They had to move off double quick.’

‘You think of everything,’ said Nigel, not without admiration.

At this moment Sergeant Pearson came up. ‘We’ve been over the common room, sir. No good.’ Armstrong frowned. ‘Very well, the school next. I’ll come across
and
help in a minute.’ Pearson doubled off and Armstrong approached the little group of masters.

‘You gentlemen may go in now. But I’m afraid I must ask you all to stay in the common room for the present. We’ve searched that and there only remains the rest of the building to do.’

The masters presented a woebegone and shattered appearance. Tiverton’s lean, sunburnt face was twitching spasmodically; Evans stood by himself, gazing over towards the school as though he expected any moment to hear another call for help from Hero; Gadsby, Sims and Wrench were clustered together, conversing in jerky undertones; Gadsby’s face was mottled; Sims and Wrench looked white and sick.

‘S-searched the common room?’ repeated Sims dully.

‘Yes, sir. The weapon must be hidden somewhere. But we’ve found nothing so far.’

Sims moistened his lips and stared uncomprehendingly at the superintendent. ‘Nothing so far,’ he repeated. Armstrong thought he was going to collapse, and put a hand under his elbow, saying, ‘Hold up, sir. This tragedy has been too much of a shock for you. Just you go indoors and I’ll send in some whisky for you. Perhaps one of you gentlemen would be so kind as to –’