Roger Takes Up the Cudgels
On the whole Roger was feeling not a little pleased with himself as he
emerged on the top of the cliffs once more after his interview with
Inspector Moresby. That the inspector had one or two facts up his
sleeve (and probably highly important facts at that) was not a matter
for doubt; on the other hand Roger had gleaned considerably more
information than he had really expected. There was too at that moment
reposing in his breast pocket the piece of paper he had picked up
within a couple of yards of the spot where the body had been found,
about the existence of which the inspector had not the slightest
suspicion. Two people could play at the same game of withholding
information! He began to walk rapidly in the direction in which he had
arranged to meet Anthony.
Fifty yards ahead of him the ground rose to form a little hillock;
once over that Roger felt that it would be safe enough to examine his
find without fear of interruption. His hand was actually inside his
pocket as he breasted the rise when the figure of Anthony appeared
suddenly over the top. On seeing him Anthony broke into a run.
“Hullo, Anthony!” said Roger mildly. “You seem in a hurry.”
“Look here,” Anthony began breathlessly and without preamble. “Look
here, I’ve seen Miss Cross and it’s jolly serious. That infernal
inspector’s been up there and nearly frightened the life out of her. I
want you to come along and speak to her. And let me tell you, Roger,
that things are getting a bit thick. Anybody who’s hinting things
about that girl ought to be taken out and shot. The poor kid’s——”
“Here, wait a minute!” Roger interrupted. “Let’s get this straight.
You’ve seen Miss Cross, have you?”
“Yes, and she’s——”
“And she’s a remarkably pretty girl, isn’t she?”
Anthony stared. “How the devil did you know that?”
“Merely a simple piece of deductive reasoning,” replied Roger
modestly. “Now then, start at the beginning and tell me exactly what
happened.”
Rather more coherently this time, Anthony complied. He gave an account
of his meeting with the girl, told how she had broken down (glossing
as delicately as possible over the subsequent proximity of her dark
head and his shoulder) and went on to give his highly interested
listener a detailed synopsis of the story she had told him in order to
spare her the pain of having to recount it a second time. This recital
lasted them almost to the very spot where she was waiting, and Anthony
had only just time to reiterate in a fierce undertone the promise he
had given that they would do all in their power to help her and to
demand that a similar promise should be given by Roger himself within
the first five minutes of the interview, before her black dress sprang
into view on the little ledge just below them.
Roger was conducted down the bank and ceremoniously introduced and the
three of them disposed themselves on the soft turf to discuss the
situation.
“Now I want you to understand, Miss Cross,” Roger said briskly after a
few general remarks had been made, “that my cousin and I are entirely
on your side.” Roger had been as favourably impressed at first sight
with this slender, courageous-looking, proud-spirited girl as had
Anthony, and he was at no pains to attempt to disguise the fact.
“There’s no use pretending that this isn’t a bad business. It is—more
so than you know: and it may become even worse than that in the very
near future.”
“What do you mean, Mr. Sheringham?” asked the girl with anxiety. “How
more so than I know?”
Roger deliberated. “Well I don’t see that there can be any harm in
telling you,” he said gravely. “You’re bound to know sooner or later.
But please don’t tell anybody else just yet awhile.—I’m afraid there
can be very little doubt that your cousin’s death was not an
accident.”
“You don’t mean that—that——?” The girl broke off, white to the lips.
“I’m very much afraid so,” Roger said gently. There was no need to
mention the ugly word ‘murder’; its implication was sufficiently
obvious.
“Good God!” Anthony breathed, aghast. “Has that been definitely
proved?”
“As definitely as matters. She wasn’t alone when she met her death,
for one thing, though it isn’t known who was with her. And there are
one or two other details too into which I needn’t go now, small enough
in themselves but uncommonly convincing in the mass. Anyhow, you can
see that it’s a really bad business. So if I put one or two questions
to you, Miss Cross, you won’t think me unnecessarily impertinent, will
you?”
“Of course not,” said the girl earnestly. “And I can’t tell you how
grateful I am for your kindness. But you won’t—you won’t put too much
about me in the _Courier_, will you?”
“You can rely on my discretion,” Roger smiled. “I’ll see that you’re
not worried in that sort of way so far as I’m concerned at any rate;
and I’ll drop a word or two in season to any others of my kidney who
follow me down here. Well now, first of all I want you to tell me
exactly what happened on this walk you had with your cousin. Can you
do that?”
The girl frowned in an effort of memory. “Yes, I think so. It was
quite simple. We walked along the cliffs about a mile toward Sandsea
and then turned round and came back; just before we got as far as this
Elsie said she wanted to go over and speak to a Mrs. Russell, a
neighbour, about some treat for the village children that they were
getting up between them. She knew this was a favourite place of mine,
so she asked me to wait for her here, and we could go back to the
house for tea together.”
“One minute,” Roger interrupted. “Where does Mrs. Russell live?”
“About half-way between our house and the village.”
“I see. So it was really out of her way to come back and pick you up
here?”
“Yes, it was a little; but Elsie always liked walking along these
cliffs. She nearly always went into the village this way instead of by
the road.”
“The road lying on the other side of the house from here, of course.
Then is the Russells’ house on the same road?”
“Yes, but the road winds toward the cliffs farther along, so it
wouldn’t take her so much out of her way to come back to me here as if
it didn’t.”
“No, I see that. Yes?”
“Well, she didn’t come back. I must have waited for nearly an hour and
a half. Then, as it was past tea-time, I walked over to the house
alone.”
“Now, sitting down here, you couldn’t see anybody walking along the
cliff top, or they you, unless they happened to walk right over the
top of this bank at the back here?”
“No.”
“As a matter of fact, _did_ anybody pass while you were here?”
“No, not a soul.”
Roger frowned. “That’s a pity. That means you can’t actually prove
that you were here during that time, can you?”
“If Miss Cross says she was here,” Anthony put in warmly, “then she
was here. That ought to be good enough for anyone.”
“Except a court of law, Anthony. Courts of law are nasty, suspicious
things, I’m afraid. By the way, did Mrs. Vane ever get to the
Russells’ house, Miss Cross?”
“No, she didn’t; that’s the extraordinary thing. In fact nobody seems
to have seen her at all from the time she left me to the time her body
was found.”
“It’s a nasty gap,” Roger commented thoughtfully. “Isn’t it rather
curious that she should have been about here all that time without
being seen? Aren’t there usually plenty of people in the
neighbourhood?”
“No, as a matter of fact there aren’t. It’s usually fairly deserted up
here. Ours and the Russells’ are the only two houses out this way, you
see. And there’s another point about that; anybody walking along the
edge of the cliff can’t be seen from the road except in one or two
places, because of the high ground between, if you remember noticing
it.”
“Yes, that is so; you’re right. Hullo, what’s that bell?”
“That will be our dinner-bell,” said the girl with a faint smile. “A
most efficient one, isn’t it?”
“Highly. Well, Miss Cross,” Roger said, scrambling to his feet, “I
don’t think there’s any need to keep you any longer just now, though
there are one or two more things I shall want to ask you. Could you
meet us here at say half-past ten to-morrow morning for more
cross-examination, do you think?”
“Of course, Mr. Sheringham. I shall be only too pleased. And you will
try to—to——”
“To throw a little fresh light on that hour and a half?” Roger
suggested as he shook hands. “I promise you I will. That’s the crux of
the whole thing, isn’t it? I’ll do all I can, Miss Cross, you can be
sure.”
They climbed the little bank and Anthony, by a curious lapse of
memory, appeared to forget that he had already shaken hands on the
lower level; at any rate he did so again, even more warmly than
before.
“It’s a nasty business,” Roger remarked as the two of them set out on
their walk back to the inn. “Nastier than I let out. I didn’t tell the
little lady that the other person with Mrs. Vane was a woman, by the
way.”
“Was she?” said Anthony gloomily. “Hell!”
“Yes, I’ll tell you what I managed to find out down there. Not much,
but decidedly interesting. Mrs. Vane must have— By jove, I was nearly
forgetting!”
“What?”
“Something I picked up near where the body was found—a bit of
writing-paper. I haven’t been able to look at it yet. It may be
nothing, but on the other hand it may be something uncommonly
important. Anyhow, let’s have a look at it.” And digging into his
breast-pocket, Roger drew out his handkerchief and its precious
contents.
“Looks a bit sodden,” Anthony remarked, as the little ball of
bluish-grey paper emerged from its covering.
“Naturally, as it’s been in the water off and on for sixty odd hours
or so,” said Roger, straightening out the sodden little tangle with
infinite care. It was a ticklish business, for the least false move
would tear the flimsy stuff and it had to be unwrapped half-an-inch at
a time.
“Can you make anything out?” Anthony asked eagerly, as the sheet was
at last laid out flat on the palm of Roger’s hand.
“It’s a bit of ordinary notepaper,” Roger murmured, peering down at it
intently. “Good quality. Watermark a big crown and some kind of
inscription. Ought to be easy enough to trace.”
“Yes, but is there any writing on it?”
“There _has_ been, but that’s about as much as one can say. See these
faint pen-marks? But I should think it’s pretty well impossible to
make out what was written on it.”
“Then it’s no use?” Anthony asked disappointedly.
“I wouldn’t say that. An expert might be able to make them out. I
suppose there _are_ ways of testing this sort of thing. We’ll see,
anyhow. But we mustn’t build any hopes on it. Ten to one it had
nothing to do with Mrs. Vane at all, and even if it did it’s another
ten to one that it had nothing to do with what we’re after. However,
we’ll take it back and see if it’s possible to do anything with it.”
Roger took off his hat and laid the paper carefully inside to shield
it from the wind, and they resumed their journey.
“What did you think of Miss Cross?” Anthony asked very airily, gazing
at the easy feats of a neighbouring gull with an appearance of intense
interest.
“Oh, all right,” Roger said with malicious indifference. “Perfectly
ordinary sort of girl, I thought, didn’t you?”
“Personally, she struck me as being rather an exceptional one,”
Anthony said coldly.
“Did she? Ah, well! Bit long in the nose, wasn’t she?”
“Long in the nose!” exclaimed the indignant Anthony. “Why, her nose is
absolutely——” He caught sight of Roger’s grin and broke off abruptly.
“Damn you!” he growled, flushing vividly.
“Ah, you young people!” Roger continued to grin. “Ah, youth, happy
youth! Ah——”
“Roger, you ass, be serious for a minute. Do you think that girl’s in
any danger?”
“I do indeed,” Roger said with a quick change to gravity. “At least, I
don’t know about danger, but I certainly think she’s in a very awkward
position. Very awkward indeed.”
“But you don’t think—you don’t think there can be anything in—well,
what the inspector seems to be thinking, do you?”
“You mean, that she pushed her cousin over the cliff?” amplified
Roger, who was not a person to mince matters. “No, I don’t think I do.
I liked her, I must say—though that isn’t anything to go by, is it?”
“It’s a devil of a lot. And you really will do all you can to help
clear her, Roger?”
“Of course I will. Haven’t I told her so half-a-dozen times over?”
“Thanks, old man,” said Anthony simply.
It was a slightly awkward moment. To tide it over Roger embarked upon
a voluble account of his conversation with Inspector Moresby, what he
had discovered and what he had not, which took them right up to the
door of their inn.
“And that’s the first thing we’ve got to discover, fair coz,” he was
saying vehemently as they crossed the threshold. “What old Moresby’s
got up his sleeve. And that’s what I’m jolly well going to get out of
him somehow, by hook, or even, if it comes to the point, by crook. And
what’s more, I think I see a way of going about it. So now for our
four bedrooms and a little cold water. By Jove, Anthony, it’s hot
isn’t it? What about a tankard apiece before we go upstairs?”
“How you do think of things!” was Anthony’s strongly approving
comment.
They adjourned briskly into the cool little bar.
“Mr. Moresby back yet, do you know?” Roger asked the landlord in a
casual voice as he set the mighty tankard down on the counter after an
initial gulp at its contents.
“No, sir,” replied that mountainous man. “He said he’d be back for ’is
supper round about eight o’clock.”
“Well, we shall be ready for ours about that time too. You might as
well serve all three in our sitting-room. And send me up a bottle of
gin, half-a-dozen bottles of ginger-beer, a bottle of whisky, a couple
of syphons of soda and a corkscrew. Can you manage that?”
“Yes, sir,” said the landlord benevolently. “That I can.”
“Excellent! I suppose it would be too much to ask if you’ve got any
ice as well?”
“I have an’ all, sir,” replied the landlord with conscious pride. “I
gets it three times a week from Sandsea in this ’ot weather. There’s
some come in this morning you can have, and welcome.”
“But this is sheer epicureanism!” Roger cried.
“Yes, sir,” said the landlord. “There’s been two gents in this evening
asking for rooms. London gents, by the look of ’em. I told ’em I
’adn’t got any.”
“That’s right, landlord,” Roger said with approval. “Speak the truth
and shame the devil, you know.”
“Yes, sir,” said the landlord, and turned away to serve another
customer.
“I say,” Anthony asked hopefully as they climbed the stairs a few
minutes later, “I say, are we going to make old Moresby tight?”
“Certainly not,” said Roger with dignity. “I’m surprised at you,
Anthony. Do I look the sort of person to interfere with the sobriety
of the police in the execution of their duty?”
“Well, what’s all that gin and stuff for, then?”
“To pour libations to the great and _puissante_ Goddess of Bluff! Now
then, Anthony, how many bedrooms would you like to sleep in to-night?
One, two or three?”