The Longer Bodies (25 page)

Hilary frowned thoughtfully. Then his brow cleared.

‘Together,' he said. ‘You mean when that fool—when somebody tried to hoof the gate down?'

‘Yes. What happened next?'

‘Nothing. The row stopped.'

‘Do you know why?'

‘Yes. We both bellowed, “Shut up your row, Anthony! Someone's coming with the key.” A sort of combined roar.'

Mrs Bradley leaned forward.

‘Who made up the form of words you both used?' she asked.

‘Oh, I don't mean we settled on the exact words first and then bellowed them out like a college yell. No, we just shouted, and that's about what it amounted to, both yelling together.'

‘I see.' Mrs Bradley leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. A pity, she thought, that the inspector was making such a mess of it.

‘And now, Mr Yeomond,' she went on, ‘what happened when you had shouted to the person at the gate?'

‘To Anthony?' Hilary frowned at the carpet.

‘I did not say that,' said Mrs Bradley very gently.

The inspector sat up with a jerk.

‘What's that?' he said.

‘We have had no evidence yet to show that the person at the gate
was
Anthony,' said Mrs Bradley, in a peculiarly expressionless voice.

‘But—but look here!' cried Bloxham—‘if—er—go back into the library one moment, Mr Yeomond, if you don't mind—see you again in just a minute—' He turned excitedly to Mrs Bradley. ‘But if it were
not
Anthony who made that noise at the gate at eleven forty-three p.m. it would upset all my ideas about the time of the murder!'

‘Exactly,' said Mrs Bradley, smoothing out the creases in the sleeve of her violently coloured jumper.

‘But, I say, you know!' Bloxham was seriously perturbed. ‘Now you've raised the point it must be cleared up at once. Of course, I think the probabilities are that it
was
Anthony who made the noise. You see, there's the javelin which was flung through Amaris Cowes's bedroom window.'

‘Ah, yes, that peculiar bedroom window,' said Mrs Bradley drily.

‘Exactly.' Bloxham took up the new point with vigour. ‘That's where we get back to the previous crime.'

‘Crime?' said Mrs Bradley, with a faint, cynical grin.

‘The murder of Jacob Hobson,' the inspector austerely explained.

Mrs Bradley's cynical grin widened slowly.

‘Well, you know what I mean!' said Bloxham, somewhat exasperated. ‘Crime in the technical sense. It takes us back to the night of April eighteenth, anyhow.'

‘Agreed,' said Mrs Bradley absently. ‘So curious about Herring,' she added, as though to herself. The inspector leapt upon this as a terrier leaps on a rat.

‘Ha!' said he in a short, sharp bark. ‘Yes! Herring. Let's have him in. I'll get the truth out of that man if I have to roast him alive!'

The wretched Joseph was called. He came in as though he were going to his execution, and sagged visibly at the knees as the inspector pointed a finger at him.

‘Now, then!' said Bloxham, with a fearful relish which won Mrs Bradley's admiration for his histrionic talent. ‘
Sit
down, and let's have it
first
time, if
you
please!'

Joseph sat down and gazed agonizedly at Mrs Bradley, who grinned like the Fiend himself and clasped her hands in enjoyable anticipation of what was to come.

‘Who stole the rabbits?' bellowed Bloxham.

‘I—I did,' said Joseph, feebly licking his lips.

‘
Your
rabbits!' roared Bloxham. ‘Not Colonel Digot's!'

‘I—I worked it out to me own satisfaction it was Mr Timon, pore young chap,' whined the Scrounger miserably. ‘'E was the one as wanted to frighten 'em all away. Though it were Miss Cowes planned to set Mr 'Ilary's 'ut afire.'

‘Go on.' Bloxham scowled fiercely. ‘I'll hear about the hut later.'

‘I reckon as 'ow 'e killed 'em and dipped that there javelin in the blood, and frightened Miss Yeomond, I reckon 'e did, and everythink. But I can't prove it, may I drop dead if I can. But Miss Cowes 'erself told me about the 'ut, because it was 'er I see that night.'

‘Cut that bunk! You'll drop dead all right. From the end of a hemp rope if
I
know anything about it. And shut
up
about that hut!'

A moan of anguish from Joseph preceded his passionate denial of all knowledge of the crimes.

‘Oh, get out!' snarled Bloxham. ‘And stay in the library. I may want you again.'

‘Anthony, you see, began practising with the javelin before old Mrs Puddequet finally cut him off,' he went on to Mrs Bradley when Herring had disappeared.

He called to the sergeant.

‘Send Kost back here a minute. Oh, Mr Kost,' he added, as the trainer entered through the narrow opening, ‘how good was Anthony with the javelin?'

‘Not so bad,' said Kost. ‘Surprised, though, he should throw so true right through that bedroom window. Very erratic, perhaps, Mr Anthony, with the javelin.'

‘Who else could throw the javelin besides Mr Anthony?' asked Mrs Bradley.

‘Miss Cowes. Very good, that lady, perhaps. I think could train on for a championship. Then Mr Malpas Yeomond, and, of course, there is myself. It is not my event, of course, but I throw not so bad.'

‘You're still hanging on to the idea that it may not have been Anthony at the sunk garden gate?' said Bloxham. ‘It's an interesting notion, you know. Mr Kost, haven't you any idea what Anthony did when he left you at the public house the night of his death?'

But Kost was unable to help him.

‘I'll have old Mrs Puddequet back,' said the inspector. ‘No, I won't. Get Miss Caddick again,' he yelled to the sergeant.

Miss Caddick, horribly nervous at being recalled, received Mrs Bradley's encouraging grin with gratitude, and forgot her former animosity towards the shrivelled, yellow-clawed old lady.

‘Miss Caddick,' said Bloxham, ‘how did you know it was Mr Anthony who was making all that noise at the gate?'

‘Well, Mrs Puddequet
said
it was,' squeaked Miss Caddick.

‘Yes. But apart from that? Everybody appears to be so certain that it
was
Anthony who kicked up that fearful shindy, and yet I haven't received what I can call definite proof of the matter.'

‘Well, but we can
account
for everyone else at that time, inspector, can't we?' said Miss Caddick, advancing the theory timidly.

‘Well,
can
we?' said Bloxham mildly. ‘If we can, then it must have been Anthony or some outsider, but if we can't—' He paused significantly. ‘So come along, Miss Caddick. This is going to be very helpful. Look here, I'll call out the name and you tell me how you account for that person. Ready?'

Thus encouraged, and much fortified by the inspector's undoubtedly kindly demeanour, Miss Caddick sat on the chair with much the same expression on her face as people assume who are resolved to play the game called ‘Truth' in strict accordance with the rules, and gazed at the window curtains.

‘Malpas Yeomond,' said Bloxham, watching her keenly.

‘Oh, inspector!' Miss Caddick came to earth. ‘What an unfortunate first choice!'

‘Why?' Bloxham grinned wickedly.

‘How
can
I account for his movements? He was not even in the house!'

‘Well, there you are, you see,' said the inspector. ‘I can't account for his movements, either; neither can Mr Cowes, for he was up at the house instead of where he should have been—in his hut with Mr Malpas; neither can I account for the movements of Mr Francis Yeomond or of Mr Brown-Jenkins, or of Miss Brown-Jenkins. What about Miss Cowes?'

‘Well, it was through her bedroom window that the dreadful javelin crashed, so I was not at all surprised when she came and spoke to me through the crack of my bedroom door. Her voice was shaking with the shock, inspector.'

‘No wonder,' said Mrs Bradley, ‘when a javelin had just sailed in through her bedroom window. Did you hear the breaking glass?'

‘I should think we did,' exclaimed Miss Caddick. ‘Such a crash! Just the kind of silly, dangerous,
alarming
trick that poor foolish young man
would
have played!'

The inspector turned to Mrs Bradley.

‘Certainly underlines the theory that it
was
Anthony out there,' he said, grinning. Mrs Bradley looked dubious.

‘Don't lose sight of the fact that it may have been to the murderer's advantage to make you think so,' said she. ‘And the doctor was very cautious about giving a definite opinion as to the time of death.'

‘They often are nowadays,' grunted Bloxham discontentedly. ‘
Rigor mortis
isn't what it used to be. All right, Miss Caddick. Thank you. Send in Miss Cowes,' he said to the sergeant, as Miss Caddick walked out.

‘You occupy the bedroom which was first allotted to Miss Yeomond, I believe,' he went on, immediately Amaris appeared.

‘I do,' said Amaris, giving him a long stare. She sat down and smiled equably at Mrs Bradley.

‘Except for the—er—passage of the javelin through the window on the night Anthony was killed, have you had cause to complain of the room in any way?'

‘I have no cause to complain of the
room
at all,' said Amaris, in her large, calm way. ‘It was the fact that the javelin broke the window when it could so easily have been directed through the opening at the top which annoyed me. I had the window wide open—the top sash was pulled right down. Of course, it would have damaged the wallpaper a bit over the head of the bed, I dare say'—she paused to think it out—‘but I felt awfully vexed about the glass being smashed. So unnecessary, that . . . Inartistic. The javelin should have come sailing through. I shouldn't have minded then.'

‘You heard the shouting and kicking at the gate, I presume?' said Bloxham.

‘Who could help it? A great deep voice bellowing like that, and all the kicks on the woodwork, as you say, and then that ass Richard and young Hilary shouting and yelling—it was enough to waken the Seven Sleepers.'

‘But not quite enough to waken the dead,' said Mrs Bradley, to herself.

‘Mrs Bradley has some idea that it was not Anthony who made the noise and threw the javelin,' said Amaris. ‘She thinks he had conked by that time. It's quite a tenable theory, of course, isn't it?'

The inspector grunted. Suddenly a thought occurred to him.

‘I suppose it
was
Miss Caddick's voice which replied to you through the crack of her bedroom door?' he said.

Amaris smiled lazily.

‘Poor old Caddie,' she said. ‘You don't think
she
put one over our late lamented relation, do you, inspector?'

‘Answer the question!' snapped Bloxham.

Amaris raised her eyebrows and glanced whimsically at Mrs Bradley.

‘Of course it was Miss Caddick's voice,' she stated. The inspector grunted again, and made a short entry in his notebook. He then dismissed her and sent for Clive Brown-Jenkins. Having listened to the young man's tale of woe, he turned to Mrs Bradley.

‘Nothing I can do with all this'—he tapped the copious notes he had made—‘until I've been to Southampton and checked this yarn. What I've heard about the time of this gentleman's return with his punctured bicycle absolutely tallies with the other evidence, so that's something, of course.'

Celia followed her brother. Here the inspector was faced with the same kind of delay. Her story of the dance in London must be checked. He obtained the names of the friends she had met and their addresses, and smiled in avuncular manner upon the youthful gadabout as she took her departure in the same optimistic manner as she had effected her entrance.

‘And that leaves Miss Yeomond,' said Bloxham thoughtfully. ‘Bring her in, sergeant. I expect she's sick of hanging about.'

Priscilla had a sorry tale to tell.

Yes, she had heard all the noises. Yes, she had been terribly scared. No, she was afraid she had not got up to investigate. Yes, she was horribly nervous at night. Yes, extraordinarily so, she would agree. It was frightfully cowardly, but there you were. No, she had done nothing except put the bedclothes over her ears and hope for the best. Oh, no! She knew it couldn't be Celia making all
that
noise. Yes, she had thought of the murderer. Yes, she would have shrieked had the javelin been flung into
her
bedroom. Yes, she had heard the cry of ‘Fire!' No, she had stayed in bed. No, it was not carelessness for her own safety. She was terribly afraid; it was just sheer funk. She seemed paralysed by fear, and had not felt equal to getting out of bed.

‘But you know, Miss Yeomond,' said Bloxham very gravely, ‘this looks rather bad.'

He turned to Mrs Bradley with a slip of paper in his hand.

‘I'll let you go for the moment, Miss Yeomond,' he said, ‘but don't go away from the library. I may want you again in a minute.'

Priscilla, her face very pale and her heart thumping until she felt sick, groped her way back into the library. Amaris, who was still seated in the front row of chairs, looked up in amazement.

‘My
dear
child!' she said. ‘Whatever is the matter?'

‘I don't know!' Priscilla's lips were dry. Her hands trembled. ‘I—I think they're trying to—to fix the murders on me! I can't think what the inspector is going on! I—I—well, I just mean I didn't do it! I
know
I didn't! I—I couldn't forget a thing like that! I mean you
don't
forget things—horrible things—oh, I
didn't do it
! I
didn't
do it!'

And she sank into an armchair and hid her face.