Mr. Bathurst Listens to a Little Local Gossip
Anthony motioned Bannister to lean over the table in his direction.
Bannister needed no second bidding. He had noticed that Mr. Bathurst
had displayed a more than ordinary interest in the two gentlemen and
he guessed that there must be good reason for this interest.
“Friends of young Warburton, behind,” he whispered. “It’s just
possible we might pick up some information if we handle them
judiciously. What do you think?”
Bannister nodded vigorously. He had only a few months to run before
reaching a well-earned retirement and it was far from his intention,
if he could help it, to complete his career with an unsuccessful
“case.” Everything that touched upon the affair at all—he meant to
investigate with the utmost thoroughness—even though it might appear
at first blush to be of the most unimportant and trivial nature.
“Good idea,” he muttered. As he spoke the door of the room opened
again and a shout, jovial-faced man entered and crossed the room. He
came straight to Bannister’s table.
“Good evening, Inspector,” he said with outstretched hand.
“Good evening,” replied Bannister, rising quickly. “you are Mr.——?” He
paused.
“Falcon,” announced the newcomer.
“Why—you’re the——?”
“Proprietor of the ‘Grand Hotel,’” came the answer. “What is it
this——?”
“Just the man I wanted,” interjected the Inspector, cutting short his
sentence. “This is a friend of mine—Mr. Anthony Bathurst.”
Falcon smiled across at Anthony. Mr. Bathurst bowed his
acknowledgement. Bannister motioned Falcon to a seat beside him.
“Something you can tell me. Who are the two young fellows at the table
behind?”
Falcon indulged in a sharp sidelong glance. “Two young ‘commercials,’”
he declared. “They’re frequently here. They come in here pretty
regularly towards the end of the week.”
Bannister pulled the hotel-proprietor towards him. “Did you see any
news in the paper this morning about a tragedy at Seabourne?”
“Can’t say that I did,” said Falcon. “As a matter of fact I’ve had a
downright busy day and haven’t had too much time to spare for actual
newspaper-reading. I looked at the sporting news, it’s true—but I
think that was about all. What about it?”
Bannister dropped his voice to its lowest possible pitch. “We have
reason to suspect,” he announced very gravely, “that the murdered lady
is an inhabitant of these parts.”
“By George,” cried Falcon with excitement, “I remember now. You’ve
refreshed my memory. I heard a couple of customers discussing it in
the bar early this evening. I remember I heard the name Carruthers
mentioned.”
“That’s the case,” continued Bannister capturing an elusive olive,
“and a Miss Carruthers _was_ originally believed to have been the
victim.”
“Major Carruthers’ niece that would be?” interrupted Falcon.
“Yes—Daphne. But latest information that we have managed to pick up
proves that that is not the case. There has been a confusion of
identity. The murdered girl turns out to be another young lady.” He
crumbled a piece of bread on to the white table-cloth. “In the
greatest confidence, Mr. Falcon, I’ll tell you what we have discovered
and what brings me on the hunt to Westhampton. The murdered girl is a
Miss Sheila Delaney of ‘Rest Harrow,’ Tranfield.” He paused to watch
carefully the effect of his somewhat curt announcement upon Falcon’s
jovial face.
“Sheila Delaney?” he cried. “Colonel Dan’s daughter—oh, but that’s
bad—is there any chance that you’re mistaken?”
“None—I’m afraid,” replied Bannister gravely.
“What a dreadful business! Dreadful! Dreadful!” He wiped his forehead
with his handkerchief. “Everybody liked Sheila Delaney.”
“Now, Mr. Falcon. These two young men here—your two ‘commercials’—I’m
coming to my point. I have reason to believe that they are acquainted
with a Mr. Warburton—a Mr. Alan Warburton of Crossley Road,
Westhampton.”
“Sir Felix’s nephew, Inspector,” intervened Falcon. “_The_ Sir
Felix—the Mutual Bank——”
“So I understand—now could you arrange for me to have a little chat
with them? Don’t tell them who I am.”
Falcon’s face wore a new horror. “Surely you aren’t going to tell me
that Alan Warburton’s the murderer? I can’t believe that. Why——”
“Why—what?”
Falcon shifted uneasily in his chair and knew that despite all he
himself could achieve to the contrary, Bannister meant to have his
question answered. He caught the Inspector’s eyes fixed unwaveringly
on his own and realised that there was going to be no escape for him.
“Well,” he said eventually—semi-apologetically—“what I was going to
say exactly was this. Miss Delaney and Alan Warburton were, a short
time ago by way of being very great friends—that was all.” As he spoke
his eyes sought Bannister’s again in the hope that the Inspector would
be able to find satisfaction in his statement. But Bannister had by
this time scented his quarry and refused to be in any way denied the
swift exultation of the hunt.
“What do you mean exactly by the expression ‘great friends’?”
Falcon’s tongue played round his lips nervously before he answered.
“Well, Inspector, let me put it like this, they were seen about
together a rare lot. Went to dances together, went motoring
together—theatres—you know—the usual companionship of a young fellow
and a young girl. People began to look for one with the other.”
“Did that state of affairs exist what you might term recently?”
“That’s a question I couldn’t properly answer, Inspector. Certainly, I
believe they were nothing like as intimate as they had been in the
past. That’s what I’ve been told—and from what I’ve been able to see
for myself it was perfectly true. It was noticeable.”
“Had the lady other admirers or formed other attractions?”
Falcon shrugged his ample shoulders. “I couldn’t put a name to one,
Inspector, if that’s what you mean—but I should think it extremely
likely.”
Bannister turned to Anthony, “Very much on all fours, Mr. Bathurst,
with what Ross told us just now. This much seems to be plain. If Miss
Delaney had decided to turn young Warburton down in favour of another
lover, nobody here seems to be able to give the successor a name.
Nobody seems to have seen him.”
Anthony lit a cigarette and tossed the match into an ash-tray.
Bannister, however, had not yet finished his inquiries with Falcon.
“I suppose you see quite a fair amount of this Alan Warburton,
don’t you, Mr. Falcon? I suppose he’s a pretty prominent figure in
Westhampton—eh?”
“Not so much since the Sir Felix business, as you may guess,
Inspector—that seemed to put the family under a bit of a cloud—still—I
can own to seeing a good deal of him.”
“Quite so,” purred Bannister, “now tell me this. Did the sudden change
in Miss Delaney’s attitude affect him to any extent? Did he seem upset
at all over it?”
Falcon extended a protesting hand. “Now you’re travelling too quickly,
Inspector! I told you just now that I didn’t know what had happened. I
think you’re assuming something. I don’t know if any definite
understanding ever actually existed between the two young people. I
don’t know what happened at all. If I said that Warburton was upset at
the change that came over the young lady, I should be exceeding my
duty as a fair-minded citizen and I don’t want to do that.” He rose
from his seat and walked over to the table behind. Anthony saw a flush
of annoyance pass over Bannister’s distinguished features but it soon
passed and the Inspector flicked an imaginary crumb from his
immaculately-creased trousers with a grim smile. Falcon quickly
returned with the two young commercial travellers.
“Mr. Rogers and Mr. Davidson,” he announced, “Mr. Bathurst and _Mr._
Bannister.”
Bannister signalled to a waiter and ordered drinks.
“I understand from Mr. Falcon here,” said the elder of the two young
men, “that you gentlemen want to get in touch with Alan Warburton.”
“Yes—that is so,” said Bannister, “could you let me have his present
address?”
“I haven’t his address,” said Rogers. He looked at Davidson
inquiringly.
“I can’t help you either,” replied his companion, “but I think I could
put you on to somebody who——”
“Never mind—don’t trouble—it’s of no special consequence to-night—I
can get it quite easily to-morrow, I’ve no doubt. I thought perhaps
though that you knew Mr. Warburton very well.”
Rogers shook his head. “Not well. We’ve only met him on the several
occasions when we’ve stayed in Westhampton on business. But we run
across him so regularly then that we’ve got into the habit of looking
out for him every time we come. By the way, talking about Westhampton,
that’s a terrible thing in this morning’s papers—that murder at
Seabourne. I hear in the town to-day that the lady murdered—a Miss
Daphne Carruthers—was the niece of Major Carruthers. I met Major
Carruthers some years ago on my first visit to Westhampton. He was a
splendid fellow—a ‘pukka’ gentleman.”
“I understand then,” Anthony interjected quietly, “that you haven’t
seen Mr. Warburton during your present visit?”
Rogers and Davidson shook their heads energetically.
“Devil a glimpse of him,” said Davidson. “We haven’t run him to earth
anywhere—and we’ve called at more than one shrine where he’s wont to
worship.” He grinned cheerfully at his friend and Rogers found the
grin infectious.
“And we haven’t confined ourselves to one call at some of the
extra-special places, either,” he added in support of his statement.
“Have we, Rodge?”
“I should say not.”
“Last time we were in Westhampton,” went on the irrepressible
Davidson, “we had a proper old ‘binge’ with Warburton. We fairly hit
the high spots that night.” He chuckled at the gratifying reminiscence
with such profound amusement that Rogers took up the thread of the
narrative with an exuberant gaiety.
“You’re right! I remember. We had a hot time in the old town that
night. Old Warburton was properly down in the mouth too when we blew
in. I can remember that perfectly. In a regular Slough of Despond he
was, poor old blighter. He seemed to have turned ‘Bolshie’ or
something. Absolutely shouting Red Revolution. Goodness knows what had
upset him—don’t know whether it was the sequel to his uncle’s trouble
or what? Anyhow when we drifted in on that particular evening in
question old Warburton was blowing off a lot of hot air about
exterminating Royalty and a lot of proper silly ass tripe of that
kind. Quite the soap-box thumper style. Can you remember him, Davey?”
“You’ve said it,” said Davidson, “you’ve brought it all back to me. I
can remember how he was going off the ‘deep end.’ He’d got a
particular grouch against some Foreign Johnny—some Prince of God knows
where—he wouldn’t let on why when we pulled his leg about it—in fact
he was inclined to turn sulky—but from what I could gather he fairly
ached to present this Prince-person with something lingering with bags
of boiling oil in it.”
Bannister sat transfixed in his chair as Davidson concluded his
remarks and Anthony could almost see a question trembling on his
tongue. Davidson, however, was sublimely oblivious of the fact. He
rattled merrily on. “Can’t think of the particular merchant’s name,”
he murmured with an air of attempted, but abortive reminiscence, “but
it reminded me at the time of geraniums.”
Inspector Bannister leaned over the table and held him lightly by the
fore-arm. “Think very carefully,” he said quietly, “was it by any
chance the Crown Prince of Clorania? Was that the name?”
Davidson sat back in open-mouthed astonishment. “’Pon my solemn soul,”
he exclaimed with a look of complete mystification, “you’ve holed in
one. You’re sure some little laddie—what?”