The Bet Doubled
There was no time to discuss the implications of this unexpected
announcement, for the inquest was just beginning, and neither Leyland
nor Bredon could afford to miss it. There was a decayed outbuilding
which adjoined the _Load of Mischief_, the scene, you fancied, of the
farmers’ ordinary in more prosperous times. Here the good men and true
were to deliver their verdict and the Coroner his platitudes.
Brinkman’s evidence need not be repeated here, for it followed exactly
the lines we already know. The local doctor and the Boots corroborated
his account so far as the discovery of the corpse was concerned.
Particular attention was naturally called to the tap and to the locked
door. The doctor was absolutely positive that the tap was turned off
when he reached it; the fumes had blown away a good deal by that time,
and his first action was to put a match to both jets in turn. Neither
gave the least promise of a flame, although the jet on the standard
stood open; there was no doubt, then, that the main tap sufficiently
controlled both outlets. Asked whether he turned the main tap on to
experiment, the doctor said “No,” and was congratulated by the Coroner
on his circumspection. The work of the police would be much
facilitated, observed that prudent functionary, if people would leave
things as they found them. After testing the gas the doctor’s next
action had been to attend to the patient. Much medical detail followed
at this point, but with no results that would be new to us. Asked how
long it would have taken for the gas to cause asphyxiation, the doctor
was uncertain. It all depended, he said, on the position of the
window, which must clearly at some time have blown farther open than
it had been originally. It was his impression that the death must have
occurred about one o’clock in the morning; but there were no sure
tests by which the exact moment of death could be determined.
The Boots, by his own account, entered the room immediately after the
doctor. The door of the room had fallen almost flat when it fell in;
not quite flat, for it was not entirely separated from the lower
hinge. The Boots made his way over this, and helped the doctor by
supplying him with a match. When the doctor went across to the bed, he
himself went to the window to throw the match out. Dr. Ferrers had
joined Mr. Brinkman at the bed, so he devoted himself to examining,
and trying to hoist up, the wreckage of the door. The lock was right
out, and the key duly turned on the inside of the door. It was not
usual for him to call guests in the morning, but he had arranged to do
so on that particular occasion. He noticed the smell of gas even
outside the door, but did not feel sure there was anything wrong until
he tried the door and found it locked. It was not usual for guests to
lock their doors in that hotel, although keys were provided for the
purpose. Yes, he did bend down and look through the keyhole, but it
was completely dark—naturally, since the key was in the lock. He went
and asked Mr. Brinkman what he should do, because he was anxious not
to go beyond his orders.
The barmaid had really nothing to contribute. She had not been into
the room at all after six o’clock or it might be half-past on the
Monday evening, when she went in to put everything to rights. Pressed
to interpret this phrase, she said it meant turning down the corner of
the bedclothes. She had not struck a match, naturally, since it was
broad daylight. She had never noticed any leak of gas in that room
since the plumber had paid a visit in the previous March. There was
nothing wrong, she thought, about the catch of the window; certainly
no visitor had ever complained of its fetching loose in the night. The
Bible, she thought, had been by the bedside when she went into the
room at six or it might have been half-past. She did not move it, nor
did she interfere in any way with the arrangements of the room.
Mrs. Davis confirmed this evidence as far as it needed confirmation.
It was she who had taken the order from Mottram about his being called
early in the morning. He had spoken to her quite naturally, and said
good-night to her cheerfully.
Mr. Pulteney’s evidence was entirely negligible. He had noticed
nothing the evening before, had heard nothing in the night, had not
entered the room since the tragedy occurred.
The Coroner spread himself in his allocution to the jurymen. He
reminded them that an escape of gas could not properly be described as
an act of God. He pointed out that it was impossible to return a
verdict of death from unknown causes, since the cause of death was
known. If they were prepared to give any new explanation of the fact
that the gas was turned off, they might bring in a verdict of death by
misadventure, or by suicide; in the latter case, it was possible to
add a rider saying that the deceased was of unsound mind. If they were
prepared to give any new explanation of the locked door, it was
possible for them to bring in a verdict of wilful murder against a
person or persons unknown.
The jurymen, unequal to the intellectual strain which seemed to be
demanded of them, returned an open verdict. The Coroner thanked them,
and made them a little speech which had not really much bearing on the
situation. He pointed out the superiority of electric light over gas;
in a house lit by electric light this could never have happened. He
called attention to the importance of making certain that the gas was
turned off before you got into bed, and the almost equal importance of
seeing that your window was well and truly opened. And so the inquest
ended, and Mottram, who had expressed no desire in his will as to
where or how he should be buried, was laid to rest next day in the
churchyard of the little town which had seen his early struggles, and
Pullford remembered him no more.
As soon as the inquest was over, Leyland and Bredon met by arrangement
to discuss further the bearings of the new discovery. They avoided the
inn itself, partly because the day’s events had left it overcrowded,
partly because they were afraid, since Bredon’s experience the night
before, of speaking to a concealed audience. A slight rain was
falling, and they betook themselves to the back of the inn, where a
rambling path led along the river-bank through the ruins of an old
mill. Next the disused mill-wheel there was a little room or shed,
whose gaping walls and roof afforded, nevertheless, sufficient shelter
from the weather. A “rustic seat,” made of knobby branches overlaid
with dark brown varnish, offered uncomfortable repose. Draughts at the
back of your neck, or sudden leakage in the slates above you, would
cause you now and again to shift your attitude uneasily; but, since
the _Load of Mischief_ did not abound with amenities in any case, they
were content with their quarters.
“I confess I’m a little shaken,” admitted Bredon. “Not that I see any
logical reason for altering my own point of view; but I don’t _want_
it to be suicide now as much as I did. The Bishop is such a jolly old
man; and he could so obviously do with half a million, if only to put
in new wall-paper. He might even give his secretary a rise. I tell
you, I hate the idea of advising the company not to pay up. It can
afford the money so easily. But I suppose I must have a sort of
conscience about me somewhere, for I’m still determined to get at the
truth. This codicil, you say, was put in less than three weeks ago?”
“Just about that. As nearly as I can calculate it must have been just
before, not after, Mottram’s visit to the Indescribable.”
“The thing becomes more confusing than ever. If he did want to endow
the Diocese of Pullford, why did he offer to resign his Euthanasia
claim on condition that we repaid half his premiums? And if he didn’t
want to endow the Diocese of Pullford, why did he take the trouble of
altering his will in its favour?”
“Remember, when he drew up the codicil he may not have seen the
specialist.”
“That’s true too. Now, look here, supposing he hadn’t put the codicil
in, what would have become of the Euthanasia money? Would it have
gone, like the rest, into these silly schemes of his about art
galleries?”
“No; it wasn’t just a vague will, nothing about ‘all I die possessed
of.’ The whole thing was itemized very clearly, and no allowance had
been made at all for the disposal of the Euthanasia money.
Consequently, if he hadn’t made the codicil, the Euthanasia money
would have gone to his next of kin.”
“In fact, to this nephew? Really, I begin to want to see this nephew.”
“You have seen him.”
“Seen him—where?”
“At the inquest. Didn’t you notice a rather seedy little fellow, with
a face like a rat, who was standing about in the porch just when it
was over? That’s your man; Simmonds his name is, and if you want to
get a taste of his quality, nothing’s easier, for he serves in his own
shop. On a plea of braces trouble, shortage of cough lozenges, or what
you will, his time is yours from ten in the morning to seven at
night.”
“Yes, I noticed the little man. I can’t say I was prepossessed. But I
must certainly improve the acquaintance. I suppose it’s not fair to
ask what you make of him?”
“Oh, personally, I can’t say I’ve made much of him. I had a talk, and
his manner and statements seemed to be perfectly straightforward. No
nervousness, no embarrassment.”
“There’s one other thing about Mottram’s will that’s clearly
important. You got it, I gather, from the solicitors; did you find out
from them whether the terms of it were made public in any way?”
“About the main will they thought there was no secret. Mottram seems
to have talked it over with members of the Pullford Town Council. Also
the lawyers were directed to send a full statement of it to young
Simmonds, as a kind of rebuke; Simmonds, you see, had annoyed Mottram
at the time. But this codicil was a different affair; it was extremely
confidential. Brinkman himself—though of course he may have been
lying, or being discreet—professed ignorance of it. I should think it
very improbable that anybody knows about it yet, except you and me and
Mrs. Bredon and of course the lawyers themselves.”
“Then there’s a chance, I suppose, that Simmonds thought, and still
thinks, he is coming in for a windfall from our company? Or do you
think he didn’t know Mottram was insured?”
“He must have; because the Euthanasia policy was explicitly mentioned
in the earlier will, the one which was cancelled. So you are not the
only person who’s interested in young Simmonds. Well, what do you make
of it all?”
“Let me tell you one thing; it wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t. About
three weeks ago Mottram had an argument with the Bishop of Pullford on
a matter of theology. Mottram was trying to persuade the Bishop that
you were morally justified in doing evil in order that good might come
of it.”
“I’m very much obliged for the information, old man, but I’m not much
interested in these speculative questions. I’m concerned to hunt out
the people who do evil, whether good comes of it or not.”
“But the information doesn’t impress you?”
“Not much.”
“Very well, then. Will you double that bet?”
“Double the bet? You’re mad! Why, I was just going to make the same
offer, feeling sure you’d refuse. It’s taking your money.”
“Never mind that. Are you on?”
“On? Why, I’m prepared to redouble if you like.”
“Done! That’s twenty pounds each way. Now, would you like to hear my
reading of the story?”
“By all means. And then I shall have the pleasure of putting you
wise.”
“Well, from the first, the whole thing smelled of suicide to me. Every
step Mottram took seemed to be the calculated step of a man who was
leading up to some deliberate _dénouement_. He was mysterious, he was
excited, when he went round the other night to the Cathedral house.
When he came here, he made the most obvious attempts to try to behave
as if everything was going on just as usual. He made fussy
arrangements about being called in the morning; he pretended to have
left a letter half-finished; he put a novel down by the bedside, wound
up his watch, put studs in his shirt—he did everything to create the
surface impression, good enough (he thought) for the Coroner, that
whatever else was the truth suicide was out of the question. He made
one or two slips there—writing down his name in the visitors’ book
with a blank for his date of departure, as if any guest ever did that;
putting the flies ready on his rod, but (so Pulteney tells me) the
wrong kind of flies. To make sure that there was not a verdict of
suicide, he even made arrangements—through Brinkman, through Mrs.
Davis, I don’t know how—to have the gas in his bedroom turned off
again after it had done its work. Then he tossed off his sleeping
draught, turned the gas on, and got into bed. I was sure of all that,
even before I went over to Pullford, before you got the telegram from
London. What I couldn’t understand was the motive; and now that’s as
plain as daylight. He was determined to endow the Pullford Diocese
with half a million, so as to be sure of having his nest well lined in
the next world. He knew that Christian morality doesn’t permit
suicide, but he thought he was all right, because he was only doing
evil in order that good might come of it. And so he got rid of the
spectre of a painful death from disease, and at the same time made
sure, he thought, of a welcome on the other side, if there should
prove to be an eternity.”
“Well, that’s your idea. I don’t deny it hangs together. But it comes
up against two things—fatally, I think. If Mottram was so set upon
endowing the Pullford Diocese, why did he bequeath most of his fortune
to a footling Town Council and only leave the diocese the one bit of
money which, if a verdict of suicide was given, could never be
touched? And granted that he was at pains to get some one to turn off
the gas for him, so as to avoid the appearance of suicide, why did he
tell that person to lock the door, and leave the key on the wrong
side? That’s the problem you’ve set yourself.”
“Oh, God knows, I don’t see my way clear yet. But there’s the outlines
of the thing. Now let’s hear the _proxime accessit_ solution.”
“I feel inclined to apologize. I feel ashamed of being so right. But
you’ve asked for it. Look here, the thing which has complicated this
case so badly is the appearance of bluff. At one moment it looked like
suicide pretending to be accident or murder; at another time it looked
like murder pretending to be suicide. But the great mountainous fact
that stands out is the turning off of the gas. In the event of
suicide, that was impossible; in the event of murder, it was curiously
needless. For it entirely removed the possibility of a suicide
verdict. It was only as I was getting into bed last night that the
truth flashed upon me. The gas was turned off by a murderer
deliberately, and, mark this, in order to shew that the murder was not
suicide. It was a deliberate protest, an advertisement. Make what you
like of this case (it seemed to say); but do not call it suicide; that
at least is outside the scheme of possibilities.”
“Well, my solution was rather by way of allowing for that.”
“To be sure. But, you see, you involve yourself in a hopeless
psychological improbability. You make a man commit suicide, leaving
behind him an accomplice who will turn off the gas. Now, it’s an
extraordinary thing, our human love of interference; but I don’t
believe it possible to have an accomplice in suicide. Except, of
course, for those ‘death pacts’ which we are all familiar with. Tell
any one that you mean to commit suicide and that person will not only
try to dissuade you but will scheme to prevent your bringing the thing
off. Suicide here would involve an accomplice; therefore it was not
suicide. It was murder; and yet the murderer, so far from wanting to
make it appear suicide, was particularly anxious to make it clear that
it was _not_ suicide. There is a strange situation for you.
“The strange situations, the mysterious situations, are not those
which are most difficult to unravel. You can proceed in this case to
look for the murderer in the certainty that he is some one who would
stand to lose if a verdict of suicide were brought in. Puzzling it
over last night I was unable to conceive such a person. Between you
and me, I had been inclined to suspect Brinkman; but there did not
seem to be any possible reason why he should want to murder Mottram;
and, if he did, there was no conceivable reason why he should want to
make it appear that Mottram did not commit suicide. Brinkman was not
the heir; the Euthanasia policy did not affect him.
“My discoveries of this morning put me on an entirely different track.
There was one man in the world, and only one, whose interest bade him
murder Mottram, and murder him in such a way that no suspicion of
suicide could rest over the event. I mean, of course, young Simmonds.
It was in his interest, as he must have thought, to murder Mottram,
because if Mottram lived to be sixty-five the Euthanasia policy would
run out. This was Simmonds’s last chance but one, assuming that
Mottram’s yearly visits to Chilthorpe were the best chance of doing
away with him. In two years from now Mottram would have turned
sixty-five and the half-million would have vanished into the air.
Moreover, there was much to be said for haste: who could tell when
Mottram might not take it into his head to draw up a new will? As it
seemed to Simmonds, he had only to get rid of this lonely, crusty old
bachelor by a painless death, and he, as the next of kin, would walk
straight into five hundred thousand. Meanwhile, there must be no
suspicion of suicide, for any such suspicion might mean that your
company would refuse to pay up and the half-million would have
disappeared once more.
“To young Simmonds, as he let himself in by the ground-floor casement
into the _Load of Mischief_, only one fear presented itself—the fear
of a false verdict. He was of the type that cannot commit cold-blooded
murder. The more civilization advances the more ingenious does crime
become; meanwhile, it becomes more and more difficult for one man to
kill another with his hands. Simmonds might have been a poisoner; as
it was, he had discovered a safer way: he would be a gasser. But there
was this defect about the weapon he was using—it might create a false
impression on the jury. Imperative, then, not merely to kill his man
but to prove that he had killed him. That is why, after turning on the
gas in the sleeping man’s room, he waited for two hours or so outside;
then came back, flung open the window to get air, and turned the gas
off again, only pausing to make sure that his victim was dead.
“How he worked the door trick I don’t know. We shall find out later.
Meanwhile, let me tell you that one of the friends I made last night
in the bar parlour told me he had seen Simmonds hanging round the
hotel just after closing time, although (for the fellow is a
teetotaller) he had not been drinking there. This was on the very
night of the murder. That was a point in which I was in a position to
score off you. There was another point, over which you had the same
opportunities of information, but neglected them. You remember the
letter which Mottram left lying about in his bedroom? It was in answer
to a correspondent who signed himself ‘Brutus.’ I took the trouble to
get from the offices of the _Pullford Examiner_ a copy of the issue in
which that letter appeared. It is a threatening letter, warning
Mottram that retribution would come upon him for the bloodsucking
methods by which his money had been made. And it was signed ‘Brutus.’
You’ve had a classical education; you ought to have spotted the point;
personally I looked it up in an encyclopædia. Brutus wasn’t merely a
demagogue; he led the revolt in Rome which resulted in the expulsion
of his own maternal uncle, King Tarquin. The same relation, you see,
that there was between Simmonds and Mottram.
“Well, I’ve applied for a warrant. I’m in no hurry to use it; for, as
long as Simmonds is off his guard, he’s all the more likely to give
himself away. Meanwhile, I’m having him watched. If you go and talk to
him, just to form your own impressions, I know you’ll be careful not
to say anything which would give away my suspicions. And I can wait
for that twenty pounds too.”
Bredon sat spellbound. He could see the whole thing happening; he
could trace every calculation in the mind of the criminal. And yet he
was not convinced. He was just about to explain this, when a fresh
thought struck him and interfered with their session. “Leyland,” he
said, in a very quiet voice, “you aren’t smoking, and I’ve had my pipe
out these last ten minutes. Can you tell me why there should be a
smell of cigarette smoke?”
Leyland looked round, suddenly on the alert. It was only as he looked
round that he noticed how insecure was their privacy. The rain had
stopped some time since, and there was no reason why an interloper
should not be standing outside, listening through one of the numerous
chinks in the wall behind them. Gripping Bredon’s arm, he darted out
suddenly, and rounded the corner of the building. There was nobody
there. But close to the wall lay a cigarette-end, flattened and soiled
as if it had been trodden by a human foot. And as Leyland picked it up
a faint spark and a thin stream of smoke shewed that it had been
trodden on only a moment before, not quite successfully. “Callipoli,”
he read, examining the stump. “Not the sort of cigarette one buys in
the village. It looks to me, Bredon, as if we were on the track of
something fresh here. We’ll leave that cigarette-stump exactly where
we found it.”