Clouds of Witness Page 6

  ‘Ugly, isn’t it?’ agreed Parker.

  ‘Poor devil!’ said Peter. ‘He made a determined effort to hang on here. That explains the blood by the conservatory door. But what kind of a devil drags a corpse that isn’t quite dead?’

  A few yards farther the path ran into the main drive. This was bordered with trees, widening into a thicket. At the point of intersection of the two paths were some further indistinct marks, and in another twenty yards or so they turned aside into the thicket. A large tree had fallen at some time and made a little clearing, in the midst of which a tarpaulin had been carefully spread out and pegged down. The air was heavy with the smell of fungus and fallen leaves.

  ‘Scene of the tragedy,’ said Parker briefly, rolling back the tarpaulin.

  Lord Peter gazed down sadly. Muffled in an overcoat and a thick grey scarf, he looked, with his long, narrow face, like a melancholy adjutant stork. The writhing body of the fallen man had scraped up the dead leaves and left a depression in the sodden ground. At one place the darker earth showed where a great pool of blood had soaked into it, and the yellow leaves of Spanish poplar were rusted with no autumnal stain.

  ‘That’s where they found the handkerchief and revolver,’ said Parker. ‘I looked for finger-marks, but the rain and mud had messed everything up.’

  Wimsey took out his lens, lay down, and conducted a personal tour of the whole space slowly on his stomach, Parker moving mutely after him.

  ‘He paced up and down for some time,’ said Lord Peter. ‘He wasn’t smoking. He was turning something over in his mind, or waiting for somebody. What’s this? Aha! Here’s our No. 10 foot again, coming in through the trees on the farther side. No signs of a struggle. That’s odd! Cathcart was shot close up, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Yes; it singed his shirt-front.’

  ‘Quite so. Why did he stand still to be shot at?’

  ‘I imagine,’ said Parker, ‘that if he had an appointment with No. 10 Boots it was somebody he knew, who could get close to him without arousing suspicion.’

  ‘Then the interview was a friendly one – on Cathcart’s side, anyhow. But the revolver’s a difficulty. How did No. 10 get hold of Gerald’s revolver?’

  ‘The conservatory door was open,’ said Parker dubiously.

  ‘Nobody knew about that except Gerald and Fleming,’ retorted Lord Peter. ‘Besides, do you mean to tell me that No. 10 walked in here, went to the study, fetched the revolver, walked back here, and shot Cathcart? It seems a clumsy method. If he wanted to do any shooting, why didn’t he come armed in the first place?’

  ‘It seems more probable that Cathcart brought the revolver,’ said Parker.

  ‘Then why no signs of a struggle?’

  ‘Perhaps Cathcart shot himself,’ said Parker.

  ‘Then why should No. 10 drag him into a conspicious position and then run away?’

  ‘Wait a minute,’ said Parker. ‘How’s this? No. 10 has an appointment with Cathcart – to blackmail him, let’s say. He somehow gets word of his intention to him between 9.45 and 10.15. That would account for the alteration in Cathcart’s manner, and allow both Mr Arbuthnot and the Duke to be telling the truth. Cathcart rushes violently out after his row with your brother. He comes down here to keep his appointment. He paces up and down waiting for No. 10. No. 10 arrives and parleys with Cathcart. Cathcart offers him money. No. 10 stands out for more. Cathcart says he really hasn’t got it. No. 10 says in that case he blows the gaff. Cathcart retorts, “In that case you can go to the devil. I’m going there myself.” Cathcart, who has previously got hold of the revolver, shoots himself. No. 10 is seized with remorse. He sees that Cathcart isn’t quite dead. He picks him up and part drags, part carries him to the house. He is smaller than Cathcart and not very strong, and finds it a hard job. They have just got to the conservatory door when Cathcart has a final haemorrhage and gives up the ghost. No. 10 suddenly becomes aware that his position in somebody else’s grounds, alone with a corpse at 3 a.m., wants some explaining. He drops Cathcart – and bolts. Enter the Duke of Denver and falls over the body. Tableau.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Lord Peter; ‘that’s very good. But when do you suppose it happened? Gerald found the body at 3 a.m.; the doctor was here at 4.30, and said Cathcart had been dead several hours. Very well. Now, how about that shot my sister heard at three o’clock?’

  ‘Look here, old man,’ said Parker, ‘I don’t want to appear rude to your sister. May I put it like this? I suggest that that shot at 3 a.m. was poachers.’

  ‘Poachers by all means,’ said Lord Peter. ‘Well, really, Parker, I think that hangs together. Let’s adopt that explanation provisionally. The first thing to do is now to find No. 10, since he can bear witness that Cathcart committed suicide; and that, as far as my brother is concerned, is the only thing that matters a rap. But for the satisfaction of my own curiosity I’d like to know: What was No. 10 blackmailing Cathcart about? Who hid a suitcase in the conservatory? And what was Gerald doing in the garden at 3 a.m.?’

  ‘Well,’ said Parker, ‘suppose we begin by tracing where No. 10 came from.’

  ‘Hi, hi!’ cried Wimsey, as they returned to the trail. ‘Here’s something – here’s real treasure-trove, Parker!’

  From amid the mud and the fallen leaves he retrieved a tiny, glittering object – a flash of white and green between his finger-tips.

  It was a little charm such as women hang upon a bracelet – a diminutive diamond cat with eyes of bright emerald.

  3

  MUDSTAINS AND BLOODSTAINS

  ‘Other things are all very well in their way, but give me Blood . . . We say, “There it is! that’s Blood!” It is an actual matter of fact. We point it out. It admits of no doubt . . . We must have blood, you know.’

  DAVID COPPERFIELD

  ‘HITHERTO,’ said Lord Peter, as they picked their painful way through the little wood on the trail of Gent’s No. 10’s, ‘I have always maintained that those obliging criminals who strew their tracks with little articles of personal adornment – here he is, on a squashed fungus – were an invention of detective fiction for the benefit of the author. I see that I have still something to learn about my job.’

  ‘Well, you haven’t been at it very long, have you?’ said Parker. ‘Besides, we don’t know that the diamond cat is the criminal’s. It may belong to a member of your own family, and have been lying here for days. It may belong to Mr What’s-his-name in the States, or to the last tenant but one, and have been lying here for years. This broken branch may be our friend – I think it is.’

  ‘I’ll ask the family,’ said Lord Peter, ‘and we could find out in the village if anyone’s ever inquired for a lost cat. They’re pukka stones. It ain’t the sort of thing one would drop without making a fuss about – I’ve lost him altogether.’

  ‘It’s all right – I’ve got him. He’s tripped over a root.’

  ‘Serve him glad,’ said Lord Peter viciously, straightening his back. ‘I say, I don’t think the human frame is very thoughtfully constructed for this sleuth-hound business. If one could go on all-fours, or had eyes in one’s knees, it would be a lot more practical.’

  ‘There are many difficulties inherent in a teleological view of creation,’ said Parker placidly. ‘Ah! here we are at the park palings.’

  ‘And here’s where he got over,’ said Lord Peter, pointing to a place where the chevaux de frise on the top was broken away. ‘Here’s the dent where his heels came down, and here’s where he fell forward on hands and knees. Hum! Give us a back, old man, would you? Thanks. An old break, I see. Mr Montagne-now-in-the-States should keep his palings in better order. No. 10 tore his coat on the spikes all the same; he left a fragment of Burberry behind him. What luck! Here’s a deep, damp ditch on the other side, which I shall now proceed to fall into.’

  A slithering crash proclaimed that he had carried out his intention. Parker, thus callously abandoned, looked round, and, seeing that they were only a hundred yards or so from t
he gate, ran along and was let out, decorously, by Hardraw, the gamekeeper, who happened to be coming out of the lodge.

  ‘By the way,’ said Parker to him, ‘did you ever find any signs of any poachers on Wednesday night after all?’

  ‘Nay,’ said the man, ‘not so much as a dead rabbit. I reckon t’lady wor mistaken, an ’twore the shot I heard as killed t’Captain.’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Parker. ‘Do you know how long the spikes have been broken off the palings over there?’

  ‘A month or two, happen. They should ’a’ bin put right, but the man’s sick.’

  ‘The gate’s locked at night, I suppose?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Anybody wishing to get in would have to waken you?’

  ‘Aye, that he would.’

  ‘You didn’t see any suspicious character loitering about outside these palings last Wednesday, I suppose?’

  ‘Nay, sir, but my wife may ha’ done. Hey, lass!’

  Mrs Hardraw, thus summoned, appeared at the door with a small boy clinging to her skirts.

  ‘Wednesday?’ said she. ‘Nay, I saw no loiterin’ folks. I keep a look-out for tramps and such, as it be such a lonely place. Wednesday. Eh, now, John, that wad be t’day t’young mon called wi’ t’motor-bike.’

  ‘Young man with a motor-bike?’

  ‘I reckon ’twas. He said he’d had a puncture and asked for a bucket o’ watter.’

  ‘Was that all the asking he did?’

  ‘He asked what were t’name o’ t’place and whose house it were.’

  ‘Did you tell him the Duke of Denver was living here?’

  ‘Aye, sir, and he said he supposed as many gentlemen came up for t’shooting.’

  ‘Did he say where he was going?’

  ‘He said he’d coom oop fra’ Weirdale an’ were makin’ a trip into Coomberland.’

  ‘How long was he here?’

  ‘Happen half an hour. An’ then he tried to get his machine started, an’ I see him hop-hoppitin’ away towards King’s Fenton.’

  She pointed away to the right, where Lord Peter might be seen gesticulating in the middle of the road.

  ‘What sort of a man was he?’

  Like most people, Mrs Hardraw was poor at definition. She thought he was youngish and tallish, neither dark nor fair, in such a long coat as motor-bicyclists use, with a belt round it.

  ‘Was he a gentleman?’

  Mrs Hardraw hesitated, and Mr Parker mentally classed the stranger as ‘Not quite quite.’

  ‘You didn’t happen to notice the number of the bicycle?’

  Mrs Hardraw had not. ‘But it had a side-car,’ she added.

  Lord Peter’s gesticulations were becoming quite violent, and Mr Parker hastened to rejoin him.

  ‘Come on, gossiping old thing,’ said Lord Peter unreasonably. ‘This is a beautiful ditch.

  From such a ditch as this,

  When the soft wind did gently kiss the trees

  And they did make no noise, from such a ditch

  Our friend, methinks, mounted the Troyan walls,

  And wiped hts soles upon the greasy mud.

  Look at my trousers!’

  ‘It’s a bit of a climb from this side,’ said Parker.

  ‘It is. He stood here in the ditch, and put one foot into this place where the paling’s broken away and one hand on the top, and hauled himself up. No. 10 must have been a man of exceptional height, strength, and agility. I couldn’t get my foot up, let alone reaching the top with my hand. I’m five foot nine. Could you?’

  Parker was six foot, and could just touch the top of the wall with his hand.

  ‘I might do it – on one of my best days,’ he said, ‘for an adequate object, or after adequate stimulant.’

  ‘Just so,’ said Lord Peter. ‘Hence we deduce No. 10’s exceptional height and strength.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Parker. ‘It’s a bit unfortunate that we had to deduce his exceptional shortness and weakness just now, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh!’ said Peter. ‘Well – well, as you so rightly say, that is a bit unfortunate.’

  ‘Well, it may clear up presently. He didn’t have a confederate to give him a back or a leg, I suppose?’

  ‘Not unless the confederate was a being without feet or any visible means of support,’ said Peter, indicating the solitary print of a pair of patched 10s. ‘By the way, how did he make straight in the dark for the place where the spikes were missing? Looks as though he belonged to the neighbourhood, or had reconnoitered previously.’

  ‘Arising out of that reply,’ said Parker, ‘I will now relate to you the entertaining “gossip” I have had with Mrs Hardraw.’

  ‘Humph!’ said Wimsey at the end of it. ‘That’s interesting. We’d better make inquiries at Riddlesdale and King’s Fenton. Meanwhile we know where No. 10 came from; now where did he go after leaving Cathcart’s body by the well?’

  ‘The footsteps went into the preserve,’ said Parker. ‘I lost them there. There is a regular carpet of dead leaves and bracken.’

  ‘Well, but we needn’t go through all that sleuth grind again,’ objected his friend. ‘The fellow went in, and, as he presumably is not there still, he came out again. He didn’t come out through the gate or Hardraw would have seen him; he didn’t come out the same way he went in or he would have left some traces. Therefore he came out elsewhere. Let’s walk round the wall.’

  ‘Then we’ll turn to the left,’ said Parker, ‘since that’s the side of the preserve, and he apparently went through there.’

  ‘True, O King! and as this isn’t a church, there’s no harm in going round it widdershins. Talking of church, there’s Helen coming back. Get a move on, old thing.’

  They crossed the drive, passed the cottage, and then, leaving the road, followed the paling across some open grass fields. It was not long before they found what they sought. From one of the iron spikes above them dangled forlornly a strip of material. With Parker’s assistance Wimsey scrambled up in a state of almost lyric excitement.

  ‘Here we are,’ he cried. ‘The belt of a Burberry! No sort of precaution here. Here are the toe-prints of a fellow sprinting for his life. He tore off his Burberry! he made desperate leaps – one, two, three – at the palings. At the third leap he hooked it on to the spikes. He scrambled up, scoring long, scrabbling marks on the paling. He reached the top. Oh, here’s a blood-stain run into this crack. He tore his hands. He dropped off. He wrenched the coat away, leaving the belt dangling—’

  ‘I wish you’d drop off,’ grumbled Parker. ‘You’re breaking my collar-bone.’

  Lord Peter dropped off obediently, and stood there holding the belt between his fingers. His narrow grey eyes wandered restlessly over the field. Suddenly he seized Parker’s arm and marched briskly in the direction of the wall on the farther side – a low erection of unmortared stone in the fashion of the country. Here he hunted along like a terrier, nose foremost, the tip of his tongue caught absurdly between his teeth, then jumped over, and, turning to Parker, said:

  ‘Did you ever read The Lay of the Last Minstrel?’

  ‘I learnt a good deal of it at school,’ said Parker. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because there was a goblin page-boy in it,’ said Lord Peter, ‘who was always yelling “Found! Found! Found!” at the most unnecessary moments. I always thought him a terrible nuisance, but now I know how he felt. See here.’

  Close under the wall, and sunk heavily into the narrow and muddy lane which ran up here at right angles to the main road, was the track of a side-car combination.

  ‘Very nice too,’ said Mr Parker approvingly. ‘New Dunlop tyre on the front wheel. Old tyre on the back. Gaiter on the side-car tyre. Nothing could be better. Tracks come in from the road and go back to the road. Fellow shoved the machine in here in case anybody of an inquisitive turn of mind should pass on the road and make off with it, or take its number. Then he went round on shank’s mare to the gap he’d spotted in the daytime and got over. After the
Cathcart affair he took fright, bolted into the preserve, and took the shortest way to his bus, regardless. Well, now.’

  He sat down on the wall, and drawing out his note-book, began to jot down a description of the man from the data already known.

  ‘Things begin to look a bit more comfortable for old Jerry,’ said Lord Peter. He leaned on the wall and began whistling softly, but with great accuracy, that elaborate passage of Bach which begins ‘Let Zion’s children’.

  ‘I wonder,’ said the Hon. Freddy Arbuthnot, ‘what damn silly fool invented Sunday afternoon.’

  He shovelled coals on to the library fire with a vicious clatter, waking Colonel Marchbanks, who said, ‘Eh? Yes, quite right,’ and fell asleep again instantly.

  ‘Don’t you grumble, Freddy,’ said Lord Peter, who had been occupied for some time in opening and shutting all the drawers of the writing-table in a thoroughly irritating manner, and idly snapping to and fro the catch of the French window. ‘Think how dull old Jerry must feel. S’pose I’d better write him a line.’

  He returned to the table and took a sheet of paper. ‘Do people use this room much to write letters in, do you know?’

  ‘No idea,’ said the Hon. Freddy. ‘Never write ’em myself. Where’s the point of writin’ when you can wire? Encourages people to write back, that’s all. I think Denver writes here when he writes anywhere, and I saw the Colonel wrestlin’ with pen and ink a day or two ago, didn’t you, Colonel?’ (The Colonel grunted, answering to his name like a dog that wags its tail in its sleep.) ‘What’s the matter? Ain’t there any ink?’

  ‘I only wondered,’ replied Peter placidly. He slipped a paper-knife under the top sheet of the blotting-pad and held it up to the light. ‘Quite right, old man. Give you full marks for observation. Here’s Jerry’s signature, and the Colonel’s, and a big, sprawly hand, which I should judge to be feminine.’ He looked at the sheet again, shook his head, folded it up, and placed it in his pocket-book, ‘Doesn’t seem to be anything there,’ he commented, ‘but you never know. “Five something of fine something” – grouse, probably! “oe – is fou” – is found, I suppose. Well, it can’t do any harm to keep it.’ He spread out his paper and began: