The Threads in the Case
“This hasn't been a tidy case, in the strict meaning of the words,”
Sir Clinton mused, as he chose a comfortable spot on Neptune's Seat
and settled down on it. “It's really an _omnium gatherum_. It began
long before we appeared on the scene; and the inspector has the facts
about the earlier stages, whilst I've nothing better than guesswork.”
“What we're interested in, chiefly, is what you thought about it at
different stages in the game,” Wendover pointed out. “If you start
with the Peter Hay case and go on from there, you can tell us what you
saw and what we missed. And at the tail end you can give us your
guesses about the earlier stage. The inspector can check them from the
confessions he got.”
Sir Clinton agreed with a gesture, and began without more ado. It was
evident that he was by no means eager to recapitulate, and was doing
so merely out of good nature.
“The Peter Hay case was crystal clear so far as one side was
concerned. It required no marvellous insight to see what had happened.
It wasn't by any possibility a one-man murder. At least two men must
have been on the spot to overpower Peter and tie him up. They—or at
least one of them—was a better-class fellow, or Peter Hay would have
been in his shirt-sleeves instead of having his jacket on. And the
jacket implied that he knew they were coming that evening, too.
Further, the fact that they had amyl nitrite ready in their pockets is
enough to prove two things. They weren't casual strangers, for they
knew about his liability to cerebral congestion. And they premeditated
killing him in certain circumstances. We worked out pretty definitely
the course of events which led to his death, so I needn't go over that
again. I suppose we were right in the main points, inspector?”
Armadale, primed with the information he had extracted from Aird, was
able to confirm this.
“They used surgical bandages because they hoped to leave no marks on
the skin, I suppose?” Sir Clinton inquired.
“That was the idea, Aird admitted, sir. He thought they'd succeeded,
and he was surprised to find they'd made a mess of it.”
Sir Clinton smiled, apparently at the thought of Aird's discomfiture.
“Well, if they bungled one side of the affair, they certainly managed
to leave us in the dark about the second side: the motive behind the
murder. It wasn't robbery, obviously. It wasn't bad feeling—everyone
we examined had a good word for Peter Hay. It couldn't be homicidal
mania—not with two of them mixed up in it. That left, so far as I
could see, only one probable motive at the back of the thing. Either
they wanted to force Peter Hay into something he didn't like, or else
he knew something about them which they were afraid of.
“Peter Hay wasn't the blackmailing type, from all we learned about
him. That notion wouldn't hold water for a moment. So, if he had to be
silenced, then the information he had must have been something he'd
come across quite innocently. What it was I couldn't guess. In fact,
the whole idea was very vague in my mind, since there didn't seem
anything definite to support it. That was the stage I'd reached when
we sat in the garden and discussed the thing.
“But there was one thing that seemed to lead on to something fresh—the
silver we found in Peter Hay's drawer. That silver was the murderers'
mistake—the silly thing that gives them away. No sensible person would
ever have tried to throw a suspicion of breach of trust on Peter Hay.
The thing was absurd on the face of it, from what we learned of his
character. But these fellows weren't looking at it objectively. They
would have abused their trust in Hay's shoes; and naturally they saw
nothing _outré_ in faking a petty theft and trying to throw it on his
shoulders. That made me think.
“Why suggest a robbery at Foxhills? For that was what they evidently
intended the police to swallow. As a matter of fact, they'd have been
much better to have left the thing alone. It was a mistake to fake
evidence; it always is. However, they'd done it, and I wanted to know
why they'd done it. So, when the Fordingbridges arrived, we went off
to Foxhills.
“I wasn't surprised to find that the murderers had tried to make the
thing convincing by filling that sack with silver odds and ends. I'd
almost expected something of the sort. But I don't suppose any of us
were misled to the extent the murderers hoped. They thought we'd be
delighted to find confirmation of Peter Hay's dishonesty—stuff ready
packed up for transport. But what one obviously asked oneself was the
question: ‘What's all this meant to cover?’ And the answer was, so far
as I could see: ‘The removal of some inconspicuous object whose
absence won't be noticed in the excitement over the silver.’
“It wasn't long before I got an inkling of what that inconspicuous
object was. Miss Fordingbridge was able to tell us. But, notice, if
Miss Fordingbridge hadn't happened to come up to Foxhills when we paid
our visit, we'd never have known that the diary was missing. We'd have
missed the main clue in the whole affair. That was where we were
really lucky, and where Aird & Co. had very hard lines.
“There was the diary gone a-missing, anyhow; and the obvious question
to ask was: ‘_Cui bono?_ Who stands to score by its removal?’
“You heard the story of the missing nephew and the power of attorney
given to Paul Fordingbridge. You could hardly help drawing the obvious
conclusion that here at last was a possible motive appearing behind
the Peter Hay case. The stake on the table was the assets of the
Fordingbridge estate; and that was quite big enough to make murder
worth while, if you happened to have a turn for that sort of thing.
“But when you come to ask: ‘_Cui bono?_’ you find that the problem's
like one of those quadratic equations we used to get at school, where
there are two answers and one seems just as good as the other.
“Suppose the claimant was an impostor, and see where that leads you.
Derek Fordingbridge had spent a lot of time with Peter Hay in earlier
days. The chances were that Peter Hay was the only man who could give
evidence about their joint doings, and that evidence might form the
basis of a damaging examination of the impostor. Further, the diary
would be a priceless thing for an impostor to lay his hands on. It
would supply him with any amount of irrefutable evidence which he
could draw on for his sham recollections. Clearly enough, if the claim
was a fraudulent one, then the theft of the diary and the silencing of
Peter Hay would fit in very neatly.
“On the other hand, suppose the boot's on the other foot. Assume that
Paul Fordingbridge had some very strong reason for wishing to retain
control over the funds, and see where that leads you. Remember that he
showed no desire whatever to investigate this claim. He simply denied
straight off that the claimant was his nephew, without waiting for any
evidence on the point. That seemed to me a curious attitude in a
trustee; perhaps it struck you in the same way. And he appeared to be
very little put out by Peter Hay's death, if you remember—treated it
very much as a matter of course. It doesn't take much thinking to see
that what holds good for a fraudulent claimant would hold good for a
fraudulent trustee also. The diary and Peter Hay would be two weak
spots for him too. They'd help a genuine nephew to establish an almost
irrefutable case if he could pass tests applied both by the diary and
by Peter Hay's recollections.
“So, whichever way one looked at it, there seemed to be something to
be said. And, consequently, I got no further at that stage than being
able to say that three things were possible. First, the claimant might
be a fraud, and Paul Fordingbridge merely an obstinate old beggar.
Second, the claimant might be genuine, and Paul might be a dishonest
trustee. Or, third, both the claimant and Paul might be wrong 'uns.
“Miss Fordingbridge had known her nephew intimately, and she had
identified him straight off, it's true. But we've heard of that kind
of thing before. You remember how Roger Tichborne's mother identified
Arthur Orton as her son, and stuck to it through thick and thin.
Hallucinations of that sort do occur. And one couldn't help noticing
Miss Fordingbridge's talk about spiritualism and so forth, all tending
to show that she had a sort of fixed idea that her nephew would turn
up sooner or later. That discounted the value of her identification a
good deal, but it didn't discredit it completely, of course.
“Now go back a stage. The thing was a two-man job at Peter Hay's.
Therefore, whether the claimant or Fordingbridge was our man, we had
to find a second fellow for the accomplice's part. The claimant we
knew nothing about at that stage; and I proposed to look into his
affairs later. If Paul Fordingbridge was one of the murderers, on the
other hand, then, who was his accomplice? ‘_Cui bono?_’ again. If the
claimant could be kept out of the succession, who was next on the
list? Stanley Fleetwood's wife.”
Careless of the inspector's feelings, Wendover broke out at this
point:
“You won't persuade me you were such an ass, Clinton, as to suppose
that young Fleetwood helped in a murder merely for the sake of cash or
any other reason?”
“It wasn't my business to make pets of anyone, and exclude them from
suspicion merely because I liked them in private life, squire. Many
murderers are most amiable persons—Crippen, for example. ‘A fair field
and no favour’ is the only motto for a conscientious detective.
“Before we had time to delve further into the Peter Hay case, however,
the Staveley murder occurred. There's no need to go into the whole
business; it's fresh in your minds; but I'll tell you the main points
that struck me when we'd finished our examination of the scene of the
murder.
“First, Staveley had banged his wrist and stopped his watch at 11.19.
But, of course, that didn't prove he'd been killed at that moment.
Second, his clothes were wet under his rainproof; and, he'd been shot
through both rainproof and jacket, it must have rained before he was
shot. Third, since the car-tracks had gone back on a dry road for a
while before the rain came on and made them clearer, Staveley was
killed after the car had gone off; and the people in the car weren't
mixed up in the actual killing. Fourth, there was only one
cartridge-case to be seen—the one on the rock. There was no
cartridge-case at the groyne when I searched the place. Besides, that
track at the groyne belonged to the man in the car, and he was cleared
completely by the rain question. If I was right in my inferences, then
the murder must have been committed by one of three people: the woman
with the neat shoes, Billingford, _or someone who had left no tracks
on the sand_.
“The letter we found in Staveley's pocket showed the business; and you
worked up the case against them that Mrs. Fleetwood had been to meet
him on the previous night at the rock; and, as she was acting in
conjunction with a man, there wasn't much trouble in inferring that
young Fleetwood might have been on the spot also, as soon as we heard
that the Fleetwoods' car had been out all night: You, inspector,
jumped to the conclusion that the Fleetwoods were at the back of the
business; and you worked up the case against them very convincingly.
But, as I told you at the start, the case wasn't sound. I wanted all
the data I could get, of course, so I didn't discourage you too much;
and you eventually dragged out a lot of interesting material about the
events of the night.
“Meanwhile, we'd come to a blank end with the Fleetwoods and had
turned to Billingford. My impression was that he seemed genuinely
surprised by the news of Staveley's murder; but he might have been
acting, for all one could tell. What we did get out of him was the
general impression that Flatt's cottage was inhabited by a gang of
rogues. How many were there? Three, if one took Billingford at face
value; four, if one believed the story the claimant blurted out when
we questioned him at the cottage.
“Anyone could see that the fourth man was a dark horse. He might be
the murderer whom they were shielding, possibly. But there was another
explanation of his disappearance; he might be someone well known to
the local people, and whom it was desirable to keep under cover. How
would that fit in with things? Suppose the claimant was an impostor;
he wouldn't be very anxious to meet the villagers more than he could
help, for fear of dropping on someone who might trap him and expose
him. The less he saw of his neighbors the better; and his
disfigurement gave him a fair excuse for keeping indoors in the
daytime. Staveley was well enough known to the villagers also; and
perhaps he had good reason for not wishing his presence known. If the
fourth man was in the same boat, then none of them would care to go
shopping and so forth, and yet supplies had to be got daily. Hence it
might be convenient to have a man like Billingford as the nominal
host, to act as go-between for them in their public transactions.
That's how it appeared to me. Naturally, I was curious about the
fourth man, and I got you, inspector, to set a watch and see if he
could be recognised.
“That left me with a fair suspicion that these fellows were hatching
some devilment or other at the cottage. Then I noticed the card-index;
and I saw light to some extent. A card-index implies the need for
ready reference. The claimant, if he were a fraud, would need to cram
himself with all the available facts about the doings of the real
Derek Fordingbridge—just as Arthur Orton crammed up all the facts
about Roger Tichborne. And a card-index would be the handiest
repository of all the news they could collect. As you saw for
yourself, squire, that guess of mine was right.
“Assume that state of affairs—I had no certain knowledge then—and
things begin to fall into their places. I've given you my notion of
why Billingford was needed. What about the other three?
“The claimant was obviously needed to represent Derek Fordingbridge;
and he'd been cast for the part on two grounds. First, his face was so
much damaged that no one could swear to his original appearance. He
might quite well have been Derek or anyone else, so far as that went.
Then the loss of his fingers made him invaluable also, because he
couldn't be expected to write like the real Derek nowadays, with a
mutilated hand. All that was wanted in addition was a good memory to
cram up the immense amount of facts that they needed in order to meet
questioning.
“Then there was Staveley. What was he doing in the affair? Well,
obviously, he had a lot of information about the Foxhills people which
he must have picked up while he stayed there with the real Derek on
leave, and also some more facts which he must have learned from Mrs.
Fleetwood from time to time.
“And, finally, there was the fourth man. I suspected that he might
turn out to be a second information-mine; and when I heard the report
you gave me, inspector, about the fishermen and Sapcote having
recognised him as an ex-valet at Foxhills, I felt I was getting on to
fairly sure ground.
“Well, there were four of them to share in the loot if they pulled it
off. But a third's better than a quarter-share any day. If they had
pumped Staveley dry of his information, and had got notes of it all on
that card-index, what further need had they for friend Nicholas? None
whatever.
“And suppose they could involve the Fleetwoods in a murder case and
get them hanged, wouldn't that remove one possible set of objectors to
the claimant dropping into the funds? So I didn't exclude the
possibility that they knew—although they denied it—that Staveley was
going to meet Mrs. Fleetwood at Neptune's Seat that night. When I say
‘they,’ I really mean the faceless fellow and Aird.
“There was a further long shot possible. I'm not sure if it really
entered into their plans; but I give it you for what it's worth.
Suppose they suggested a walk along the sands to Billingford that
evening, and arranged matters so that he would reach the rock just
after the murder had been committed and they had cleared out. Wouldn't
that have been a tight corner for Master Billingford? With any luck he
might have been hung for the murder, since he'd no evidence but his
own to rely on to prove he wasn't on the spot when the shot was fired.
And then there would be only two of them, instead of four, to share
out the loot if they got it.
“You see now how I was beginning to look at the affair. But I was
considerably worried by the woman with the neat shoe. Her part in the
business would have to be cleared up eventually; but for the moment I
had to put it aside.
“And then our friends made their second blunder—trying to prove too
much, as usual. Friend Cargill came on the scene, innocently going
down to bathe. He sat down on the groyne and proceeded to dig up a .38
cartridge-case, which he presented to me like an honest fellow anxious
only to help the police. Well, all three of us had been over that
particular bit of sand and had seen no cartridge-case before he
arrived on the scene. Also, as I pointed out to you, squire, an
automatic ejects its cartridge-case sharply and jerks it well behind
you, especially on hard sand where the thing can jump along. It was
obvious that no one could fire a shot from Fleetwood's position at the
groyne and leave his ejected shell lying close under the groyne, where
Cargill assured me he'd kicked it up. So naturally I began to look at
Mr. Cargill with more than common interest; and, as you saw
yourselves, he's got a build rather like the claimant's, so I wondered
if they were related.
“Then our friend Cargill told us his yarn about meeting Derek
Fordingbridge in the war; and off he went to meet his dear old friend.
And later on he volunteered eagerly that he'd had a talk with the dear
old fellow. By that time I was more than a bit suspicious of the dear
old friend; and naturally some of that suspicion spilled over on to
Cargill. If the claimant was an impostor, then the man who recognised
him was a liar; and, as I had no use for aimless liars in a case of
this sort, I inferred that Master Cargill was one of the gang, posted
at the hotel for intelligence purposes—to keep an eye on the
Fordingbridge group. And that cleared up one of the main difficulties
I'd had—namely, how the murderer had known to use a .38 automatic so
as to match the Fleetwood pistol. Of course, if you assume that
Cargill had taken the opportunity of rummaging in Fleetwood's room, or
had drawn him into talk about pistols, they would be sure of their
ground on that point. That had been a troublesome point to me; for I
didn't like to stretch coincidence to the extent of assuming it was
mere accident that made the Fleetwood pistol and the bullet in the
body both of the same calibre.
“It remained to check Billingford's story as far as possible, and you
know how the runnel helped us in that. What the facts of the case
proved beyond any reasonable doubt was that at 11.19 p.m. Billingford
was about three-quarters of a mile from Neptune's Seat. With the sound
of the sea in his ears, it's most unlikely that he could hear a
pistol-shot at that distance. And his tracks showed him walking along
quite steadily there. Then, at a point far nearer the rock—a point
that I suppose he may have reached about 11.35 p.m.—the trail showed
that he began to run. Now that fitted in with his story. At that
second point he might quite well have heard a shot fired on the rock,
just as he said he did. He couldn't possibly, on the facts we
established, have reached the rock before about 11.37 or 11.38; and by
that time the murder was done and the murderer had got away.
“By that time I felt fairly sure of my ground; and I got that digging
in the sand started, just on the off-chance that we might get hold of
the shell of the cartridge which really did kill Staveley. It wasn't
absolutely necessary for the case; but, if it turned up, then it would
help to confirm my notions. As it was bound to be below tide-mark,
there was no point in trying to locate its exact position, since it
might have been washed about by the waves in the falling tide after
the shot was fired. So I simply had the whole strip of sand dug up and
dumped down above the high-water mark for future examination.
“Meanwhile, I'd been on the hunt for the dame with the neat shoe—a No.
4, as you remember. There were several of the guests wearing shoes of
that size; but I picked out Mme. Laurent-Desrousseaux first of all
because she seemed likeliest. Staveley had served in France; she was a
Frenchwoman; she was at Lynden Sands Hotel, where she most obviously
was out of place and knew no one. It seemed best to find out something
about her.
“I talked to her. She was a bit lonely, it seems, and quite ready to
go for a walk now and again. I know my own length of pace; so, by
counting hers in a given distance and comparing with the numbers of my
own, I made a fair guess at her step-measurement. It fitted in with
the prints of the neat shoe on the sands. Gentle treatment did the
rest, as you saw. She told us her story quite honestly, and it threw a
good deal of light on the affair. I inferred from it just what you
yourself inferred later on, squire: the shot fired by Mrs. Fleetwood
at 11.19; Staveley's fall on the rock; and the bolt in the car to the
hotel. And, in turn, this checked Billingford's story quite neatly,
because he couldn't have heard the shot at 11.19, being so far away.
It was the second shot, about 11.35, that he heard.
“Now, let's reconstruct what really happened; and remember that,
although it was full moon, it was a cloudy night, and the light was
bad all through. We'll begin with Staveley leaving the cottage. He's
in a bad temper; been drinking as well as playing poker. He gets to
the rock and waits for Mme. Laurent-Desrousseaux. She's late; and his
temper gets worse. She arrives and tells him she wants to get a
divorce arranged. Between his temper and the chance he sees of making
her pay sweetly for the favour she asks he treats her brutally, and
sends her off both pained and angry. Then Mrs. Fleetwood arrives, and
that meeting culminates in the shot she fired at 11.19 by accident.
Then you get the talk between the Fleetwoods at the car, overheard by
Mme. Laurent-Desrousseaux; their drive back to the hotel; and her
hurry to get away from what she thinks is the scene of a murder. That
leaves Staveley on the rock, stunned by his fall; and Billingford
sauntering across the sands towards the runnel. In the meantime, Aird
and the gentleman without a face have got out the boat belonging to
Flatt's cottage and are rowing for Neptune's Seat, which is just above
tide-level.
“Down comes the rain. Staveley gets soaked; and perhaps the chill
revives him. He staggers up and puts on his rainproof. Then in comes
the boat, and they shoot him without having to land on the rock at
all. The ejector jerks the cartridge-case into the water, where it
sinks into the sand and gets covered up by the wash of the waves. The
murderer and his pal row off into the dark. Meanwhile Billingford has
heard the shot, and he, not knowing anything about this little plot,
rushes up—rather pluckily—to see what it's all about, and he finds the
body on the rock. That explains the two shots and the general
chronology of the affair.
“Now, by this time friend Cargill had made his second error. He'd been
keeping his eye on things at the hotel, and he'd got hold of that
envelope which Mme. Laurent-Desrousseaux addressed to Staveley and
dropped in the waste-paper basket. He thought he could give me a fresh
scent to follow up, and he was just going to produce it when he
realised that Mme. Laurent-Desrousseaux herself was with us; so he
suppressed it then and handed it over later on. All it did was to
confirm me in the idea that he was one of the gang.
“Up to that point everything seemed plain sailing. I had, as I
believed—and as it turned out in the end—got the thing cut and dried
against the gang at the cottage. The case wasn't complete; but, short
of getting some direct evidence from one of the two actual murderers,
I didn't see how I was to make it absolutely water-tight. They'd been
a bit too clever for a jury, I feared. And, of course, the Peter Hay
case was getting clearer also, once you could assume that these
fellows would stick at nothing.
“Then, out of the blue, came the shooting of Cargill. That wouldn't
fit in with the rest of the business. Cargill wasn't a pawn like
Staveley and Billingford. He was watching one end of the business for
them—keeping an eye on us for one thing; and, besides, I was becoming
more and more sure that he was a brother of the faceless fellow, and
possibly the brains of the gang. They had a use for him; they wouldn't
shoot him. But, then, who did?
“And at that point I took a long cast back and raked up again a
possibility I'd dismissed at an earlier stage. Suppose that both the
claimant _and_ Paul Fordingbridge were wrong 'uns, what then? Suppose
friend Paul had been at some hanky-panky with the funds he held in
trust for his nephew. Then, whether the claimant was an impostor or
not, it would be very convenient for friend Paul if the claimant left
this vale of tears. And the claimant and Cargill were much alike in
build; and Cargill was shot after leaving the cottage. There might be
something in it. And when I found that friend Paul carried a pistol in
his pocket, and didn't care who knew it, by the look of his jacket, I
began to think furiously.
“I didn't blame Paul for carrying arms. In his position, with that
gang at the cottage in the offing, I think it was a wise precaution;
for he must have known that he was the main stumbling-block in the
claimant's road. But I don't think that he kept within the limits of
precaution. I think he decided to get ahead of them by knocking out
the claimant—and after that he would be able to live in peace as
heretofore.
“However, I never had time to probe that matter any further, for the
next business was the disappearance of friend Paul. I think I have a
fair notion how that was managed.
“They approached him and asked for an interview. He sent the claimant
a scrap of paper:
‘Meet me at the Blowhole to-night at 11 p.m. Come alone.’
The last two words give you the key to friend Paul's feelings about
them. One man he could keep an eye on, and he didn't propose to have
any more present. Of course, they filed that note and used it again
later, as you'll remember.
“Probably the claimant met him at the Blowhole and suggested a walk
over the open sands as a good way of avoiding eavesdroppers. Paul
would feel safer in the open. By the time they reached the old wreck
the claimant would have got him interested, or else his natural fears
would be dissipated. At the hulk the claimant obviously turned, as
though to go back across the sands, and Paul turned with him. Then,
from behind the hull, Aird stole out and did _le coup du Père
François_.”
“What's that?” Wendover demanded. “You talked a lot about Père
François and Sam Lloyd's ‘Get off the Earth’ puzzle, I remember.”
“If you happen to be in Paris late at night, squire, and a
rough-looking customer asks you the time or begs for a match, you'd
better look out for his friend—_le Père François_, they call him—who
may be coming up behind you with a long strip of flannel in his hand.
While the first man holds you in talk, the Père François lassoes you
with his flannel rope and pulls the two ends so that it catches your
throat. Then he sinks down suddenly and turns his back to you,
slipping the rope over his shoulder as he turns. This pulls you down
back to back with him; and when he rises to his normal height again,
there you are on his back like a sack on a coal-heaver's back, with
your feet off the ground. The first man then goes through your pockets
at his leisure, and if you choke to death before he's done, so much
the worse for you. You can't struggle with any effect.
“That I suspect, was how they caught friend Paul; and Aird just
carried him on his back to the quicksand and dumped him in. From
Aird's footmarks it was clear he'd been carrying a heavy weight; the
prints were deep and the feet almost parallel after he'd done his Père
François trick. See now what I meant by ‘Get off the Earth’? Naturally
there were no signs of a struggle, since all the struggle was off the
ground. And, of course, they'd take care to wear shoes that left no
clue—common type and largest size. And they got away either in a boat
or by wading along in the water, so as to leave no tracks. I could see
no way to bring the affair home to them. The only sure method depended
on our wringing evidence out of one of them somehow; and I didn't see
how it could be managed just then. Also, I hadn't much of a case
against Cargill beyond suspicion; and I wanted him too, if it could be
managed.
“The next thing was the arrival of the Fordingbridge lawyer; and from
him I learned that we might get on the track of any malversations by
Friend Paul if I went up to London. I wanted to know definitely where
I stood in that matter, because, if I was wrong there, then the whole
latter part of my notions would collapse. So I made up my mind to go
to town.
“But I was very uneasy. Now that Paul Fordingbridge was out of the
road for good, Mrs. Fleetwood was the only person between the claimant
and the cash. If she disappeared in her turn, then Miss Fordingbridge
would have welcomed her long-lost nephew with pure joy and gratitude
for his preservation, and there would have been no one left alive to
object to his coming into Foxhills and the rest. Therefore, I was
inclined to take some steps to see that she came to no harm while I
was away.
“The obvious thing to do would have been to warn her. But that would
have meant giving my case away to the Fleetwoods; and I don't feel
inclined to chuck confidences around if it can be avoided, as I've
pointed out before. Further, the police were not altogether in good
odour with the Fleetwoods; and I wasn't sure if I'd make much
impression on them by a mere warning, with nothing to back it. So I
hit on the notion of putting a man on to watch Mrs. Fleetwood; and, as
a further precaution, I fixed up that code-wire so that if I wanted it
I could have her arrested at a moment's notice, and then she'd be safe
in police hands and out of reach of the gang.
“I went up to London and found, as I'd expected, that friend Paul had
been playing ducks and drakes with all the securities he could handle
without exciting too much suspicion. He seems to have been speculating
right and left, most unsuccessfully. So I'd been right about his
motives, anyhow.
“But I couldn't get out of my mind the risk I was letting that girl
run; and at last—I suppose Miss Fordingbridge would say it was
telepathy or something—I got the wind up completely, and wired to have
her arrested. After that I felt safer.
“As you know, they'd been too quick for me. They fished out the note
that Paul Fordingbridge wrote to the claimant and they sent it to her
as if it came from Paul himself, after altering the hour on it. She
thought her uncle was in trouble; went to help him; dodged the
constable; and fell straight into the trap they'd set for her. You
know all the rest. And probably by now you understand why I was quite
content to let Mr. Aird have his full dose in the funnel of the
_souffleur_. There's nothing like a confession for convincing a jury,
and I meant him to hang if it could be managed. I didn't want to run
any risk of his getting off merely because it was all circumstantial
evidence.”
“Thanks,” said Wendover, seeing that the chief constable had finished
his outline. “To quote from that favourite detective story of yours:
In one moment I've seen what has hitherto been
Enveloped in absolute mystery.
There's just one point I'd like to hear you on. What about Staveley's
resuscitation after his being killed in the war? Did you get to the
bottom of that by any chance?”
Sir Clinton hesitated a little before answering.
“I don't much care about pure guesswork, squire; but, if you'll take
it as that, then I don't mind saying what I think. Suppose that is
what happened. Staveley and Derek Fordingbridge went into action
together; and Staveley was under a cloud at the time. He'd probably
had enough of the war, and was looking for a way out. Derek
Fordingbridge gets killed in that battle, and is probably badly
damaged in the process—made unrecognisable we may suppose. Staveley
sees him killed, and grasps at the chance offered. He takes Derek's
identity disc off the body and leaves his own instead. Probably he
takes the contents of the pockets too, and puts his own papers into
the dead man's pockets. They were friends; and, if anyone saw him at
work, he'd have his excuse ready. No one would think he was robbing
the dead. Then he goes on—and simply hands himself over to the enemy.
He's a prisoner of war—under Derek's name.
“He manages to escape, and the escape is put down to Derek's credit.
But, of course, Derek never turns up again; and naturally people
suppose that he must have died of exposure in his last attempt, or
been shot at the frontier, or something of that sort. Meanwhile
Staveley, once out of Germany, drops his borrowed identity, probably
changes his name, and disappears. I suspect he was in very hot water
with the military authorities, and was only too glad of the chance to
vanish for good.
“After the war, he evidently got in amongst a queer gang, and lived as
best he could. Billingford's evidence points to that. And somewhere
among this shoal of queer fish he swam up against our friend Cargill.
My reading of the thing is that somehow Staveley gave away—perhaps in
his cups—something of what I've given you as my guess; and Cargill,
remembering his disfigured brother, saw a grand scheme to be worked by
putting forward his brother as claimant to the Foxhills property.
“It wasn't half so wild a plan as the Tichborne business, and you know
how that panned out at the start. So the three of them set to work to
see the thing through. Staveley, I suspect, got hold of Aird, who had
invaluable information about all the affairs at Foxhills in the old
days. Then they went to work systematically with their card-index and
noted down everything that Aird and Staveley could remember which
would bear on the case.
“That accounts for the delay in the claimant turning up. It probably
was quite recently that Staveley fell in with Cargill. And evidently
the delay points to the fact that Staveley wasn't the originator of
the notion, else he'd have got to work much earlier. It was only when
he fell in with Cargill, who had a brother suitable to play the part
of the claimant, that anything could be done. Then they must have
spent some time in unearthing Aird.
“Well, at last they're ready. They come down to Lynden Sands with
their card-index handy. Now, the claimant doesn't want to appear in
public more than he can help, for every stranger is a possible danger
to him. He might fail to recognise some old friend, and the fat might
be in the fire. Nor does Staveley want to show himself; for his
presence might suggest the source of the claimant's information.
Aird's in the same position. And when they learn that the
Fordingbridges are at the hotel, Cargill is detached there to keep an
eye on them. Thus they need a go-between; and Billingford is brought
down to serve that purpose. Also, as soon as the claimant makes his
first move there will be sure to be a lot of gossip in the village,
anecdotes of the claimant's history floating round, and so forth; and
Billingford will be able to pick them up and report them to the rest
of the gang. They'd have been safer to leave Staveley and Aird in
London; but I suppose they were afraid something might be sprung on
them and they wanted their references handy.
“Peter Hay, I suspect, they fastened on as being the most dangerous
witness. Probably Aird made an appointment for the claimant, and they
called at the poor old chap's cottage at night. He evidently refused
to have anything to do with them; and he was too dangerous to leave
alive; so they killed him. Then they went after the diary—probably
Aird knew about that, or else Peter may have let the information out
somehow—and they took Hay's keys to get into Foxhills. The silver
plant was an obvious muddle. They hadn't Cargill at the back of them
at the time, and they made that mistake on the spur of the moment.
“By that time they'd got in touch with Miss Fordingbridge. Aird would
know all about her spiritualistic leanings, and they played on that
string. But soon they learned they were up against Paul Fordingbridge;
and they began to see that it would be easiest to put him out of their
road.
“Meanwhile Staveley took it into his head to work on his own by trying
to blackmail the Fleetwoods. And you know what came of that. The rest
of the gang thought they could kill two birds with one stone—at least,
the gang minus Billingford, for really I don't think Billingford was
much more than a tool.
“Now, inspector, how far does that square with all the confidences you
extracted last night from that precious pair of scoundrels? Do I get a
box of chocolates or only a clay pipe in this competition?”
The inspector made no attempt to suppress the admiration in his tone.
“It's wonderfully accurate, sir. You're right on every point of
importance—even down to what happened in the war.”
“That's a relief,” the chief constable admitted with a laugh. “I was
rather afraid that I'd
. . . Summed it so well that it came to far more
Than the witnesses ever had said!
And now I think I'll go back to the hotel and try to make my peace
with the Fleetwoods. I like them, and I'd hate to leave a false
impression of my character on their minds. Care to come along,
squire?”
The End
Transcriber’s Note
This transcription follows the text of the Grosset & Dunlap edition
published in 1928. The following alterations have been made to correct
what are believed to be unambiguous printer's errors.
* “Laurent-Desrousseux” has been changed to “Laurent-Desrousseaux”
(Ch. XI).
* “tha” has been changed to “that” (Ch. XI).
* “Stavely” has been changed to “Staveley” (Ch. XVII).
* “coudn't” has been changed to “couldn't” (Ch. XVII).