Crow's Inn Tragedy (8 page)

The barrister nodded. “Thompson had been with the firm for many years.”

“Eighteen, I believe,” assented the inspector. “He seems to have been a great favourite with Mr. Bechcombe, but it is astonishing how little his fellow-clerks know of him. Only two of them have ever seen him out of the office, and none of them appear to have the least idea where he lives.”

Mr. Steadman did not speak for a moment, then he said slowly:

“The fact that so little is known seems in itself curious. Is there no way of ascertaining his address?”

“One would imagine that there must be a note of it somewhere at the office,” the inspector remarked, “but so far we have not been able to find it.”

“How about the woman visitor?” the barrister inquired, changing the subject suddenly.

“We haven't been able to identify her at present.” The inspector opened the top drawer at his right hand, and took the white glove that had been found by the murdered man's desk from its wrapping of tissue paper. The most cursory glance showed that it was an expensive glove, even if the maker's name had not been known as one of the most famous in London and Paris. About it there still clung the vague elusive scent that always seems to linger about the belongings of a woman who is attracted by and attractive to the other sex.

Mr. Steadman handled it carefully and inspected it thoroughly through his eyeglasses. “Yes. We ought to be able to find the mysterious woman with the aid of this.”

“Ah, yes. We shall find the wearer,” the inspector said confidently. “But will that be very much help in solving the mystery of Luke Bechcombe's death?”

The barrister looked at him.

“I don't know that it will. Still, why doesn't she come forward and say ‘I saw Mr. Bechcombe the morning he was murdered. My business with him was urgent and I saw him by special appointment.' She is much more likely to be suspected of the crime if she refuses to come forward. Mrs. Bechcombe seems certain of her guilt, and women do have intuitions.”

“I'm not much of a believer in them myself,” remarked Inspector Furnival, shrugging his shoulders. “I would rather have a penn'orth of direct evidence than a pound's worth of intuition. And I don't believe that Mr. Bechcombe was murdered by a woman. A woman doesn't spring at a man and strangle him. She may stab him or shoot him, the weapons being to hand, but strangle him with her hands—no. Besides, this was a premeditated crime. There was an unmistakable smell of chloroform about the body, faint, I grant you, but unmistakable. No, no! It wasn't a woman. As to why she doesn't speak—well, there may be a dozen reasons. In the first place she may not have heard of the murder at all. It doesn't occupy a very conspicuous place in the morning's papers. It will be a different matter to-night. Then, she might not want her business known. And, above all, many a woman—and man too—hates to be mixed up in a murder case, and won't speak out till she is driven to it.”

“Quite so!”

The barrister sat silent for a minute or two, his eyes staring straight in front of him at nothing in particular. Inspector Furnival took another glance at his notes.

“Spencer, the only person we have been able to trace so far who has seen this mysterious woman, fancies that her face is familiar to him, but does not know in what connection. I have suggested to him that she is possibly an actress, and he is inclined to think that it may be so. I have sent him up a quantity of photographs to see if he can identify any of them. But don't you see, Mr. Steadman, Mr. Spencer's evidence tends rather to exonerate Thompson. Spencer went out after Thompson and met this woman on It therefore appears probable that Thompson was off the premises before the woman came on.”

Mr. Steadman shook his head.

“It isn't safe to assume anything in a case of this kind. We do not know that Thompson went off the premises. We do not know where he went or where he is.”

“Very true! I wish we did,” asserted the inspector. “At the same time—”

The telephone bell was ringing sharply over his desk. He took up the receiver.

“That you, Jones? Yes, what is it? Inspector Furnival speaking.”

“Thompson's address has been found in one of Mr. Bechcombe's books. There are several other of the clerks' addresses there all entered in Mr. Bechcombe's writing, and all the others we have verified.”

“What is it?”

“Number 10 Brooklyn Terrace, North Kensington.”

“Um! I will see to it at once.” And the inspector rang off sharply.

“Can't hear of Brooklyn Terrace anywhere, sir.” The speaker was Mr. Steadman's chauffeur.

He had been going slowly the last few minutes, making ineffectual inquiries of the passers-by. Inside the car Mr. Steadman had Inspector Furnival seated beside him.

“Better drive to the nearest post-office and ask there. They will be sure to know.”

“Call this North Kensington, do they?” the barrister grumbled, as the car started again. “Seems to me in my young days it used to be called Notting Hill.”

The inspector laughed. “Think North Kensington sounds a bit more classy, I expect. Not but what there are some very decent old houses hereabouts. Oh, by Jove! Is this Brooklyn Terrace?” as the car turned into a side street that had apparently fallen on evil days. Each house evidently contained several tenants. In some cases slatternly women stood on the doorsteps, shouting remarks to their neighbours, while grubby faced children played about in the gutter or crawled about on the doorsteps of their different establishments. It scarcely seemed the place in which would be found the missing managing clerk of Messrs. Bechcombe and Turner's establishment.

No. 10 was a little tidier than its neighbours, that is to say, the door was shut and there were no children on the doorstep.

The chauffeur pulled up.

“This is it, sir.”

Mr. Steadman eyed it doubtfully.

“Well, inspector, I expect this really is the place.”

“It is the address in Mr. Bechcombe's book right enough, sir. As to whether Mr. Amos Thompson lives here—well, we shall soon see.”

He got out first and knocked at the door, the barrister following meekly. The car waiting at the side was the object of enormous interest to the denizens of the street. There was no response to the knock for some time. At last a small child in the next area called out:

“You'll have to go down, they don't never come to that there door!”

Mr. Steadman put up his glass and peered over the palings. A slatternly-looking woman was just looking out of the back door.

“Can you let us in, my good woman?” the barrister called out. “We want Mr. Thompson.”

The woman muttered something, probably scenting a tip, and presently they heard her clattering along the passage.

“Mr. Thompson, is it?” she said as she admitted them. “His room is up at the top.”

“Is he at home?” Inspector Furnival questioned.

The woman stared at him. “I don't know. If you just like to walk up you will find out.”

The stairs were wide, for the house had seen better days, but indescribably dirty. Up at the very top it was a little cleaner. There were several doors on the landing but nothing to show which, if any, was Thompson's. As they stood there, wondering which it could be, an old man came up behind them.

“Were you looking for anyone, gentlemen?” he asked, in a weak, quavering voice that told that, like the house, he had fallen on evil times.

The inspector turned to him. “I want Mr. Amos Thompson.”

The old man pointed to the door just in front of them.

“That is his door, but I doubt if you will find him in. I haven't seen him since yesterday morning. I don't think he slept here.”

“Do you often see him?” the inspector questioned as he applied his knuckles to the door.

The old man looked surprised at the question.

“Why, yes, sir, I have only been here a month, but I have found Mr. Thompson a remarkably pleasant gentleman. He always passes the time of day with me and often stops for a word over the day's news. An uncommonly nice man is Mr. Thompson. It has often crossed my mind to wonder why he stayed here, where there is no comfort to speak of for the likes of him.”

The inspector and Mr. Steadman wondered too, as they waited there, while no answer came to the former's repeated knocking.

A room in No. 10 Brooklyn Terrace certainly seemed no fitting home for Amos Thompson with his handsome salary.

“We must get in somehow,” the inspector said to Mr. Steadman. Then he turned to the old man opposite who was watching them with frightened eyes. “Has anyone else a key to these rooms, a charwoman or anybody?”

The man shook his head.

“We all do for ourselves, here, sir. We don't afford charwomen and such-like. As for getting in—well, I expect the landlord has keys. He is on the first floor. But I do not think he would open Mr. Thompson's door without—”

“Is this landlord likely to be at home now?” the inspector interrupted.

“He is at home, sir. I saw him as I came upstairs.”

The inspector took out his card. “Will you show him this and say that Mr. Thompson cannot be found. He disappeared under peculiar circumstances yesterday and, since he is not here, we must enter his room to see whether we can find any clue to his whereabouts.”

The man visibly paled as he read the name on the card. Then he rapidly disappeared down the stairs. Mr. Steadman looked across at the inspector.

“Queer affair this! What the deuce does the fellow mean by putting up at a place like this?”

“Well, he isn't extravagant in the living line!” the inspector said with a grin.

John Steadman raised his eyebrows. “Not here!”

At this moment the landlord arrived with the keys. Quite evidently his curiosity had been excited by the advent of the visitors to his lodger. Probably he had been expecting his summons. He held Inspector Furnival's card in his hand.

“I understand I have no choice, gentlemen.”

“None!” the inspector said grimly.

The landlord made no further demur, but unlocking the door he flung it open and stood back. The others waited for a minute in the doorway and looked round. At first sight nothing could have been less likely to give away the occupier's secrets than this room. It was quite a good size with a couple of windows, and a small bed in a recess with a curtain hung over it, an oil lamp stood before the fireplace. The floor was covered with linoleum, there was no carpet, not even a rug. A solid square oak table stood in the middle of the room and there were three equally solid-looking chairs. The only other piece of furniture in the room was a movable corner cupboard standing at the side of the window. The inspector went over and threw the door open. Inside there was a cup and saucer, a teapot and tea-caddy, a bottle of ink, and a book upon which the inspector immediately pounced. He went through it from end to end, he shook it, he banged it on the table; a post card fell from it; the inspector stared at it, then with a puzzled frown he handed it to Mr. Steadman. The barrister glanced at it curiously. On the back was a portrait of a girl—evidently the work of an amateur.

“Do you know who that is?” questioned the inspector.

Mr. Steadman shook his head. “It is no one that I have ever seen before. Do you mean that you do?”

“That is a likeness—very badly taken, I grant you—but an unmistakable likeness of Miss Hoyle, the late Mr. Bechcombe's secretary.”

Mr. Steadman was startled for once. “Good Lord! Do you mean that he was in love with her too?”

“Oh, I don't know,” said the inspector, taking possession of the post card once more. “Elderly men take queer fancies sometimes, but I haven't had any hint of this hitherto. However, I will make a few inquiries with a view to ascertaining whether Mr. Tony Collyer has a rival.”

“Poor Tony!” said the barrister indulgently.

He took up the book which the inspector had thrown down. It was a detective novel of the lightest and most lurid kind, and it bore the label of a big and fashionable library. He made a note of it at once. The inspector went on with his survey. Beside the bedstead, behind the curtain, there stood a small tripod washing-stand with the usual apparatus. The bed in itself was enough to arouse their curiosity. Upon the chain mattress lay one of hard flock with one hard pillow, and an eiderdown quilt rolled up at the bottom. Of other bedclothing there was not a vestige, neither was there any sign of any clothing found about the room, with the exception of a pair of very old slippers originally worked in cross stitch, the pattern of which was now indecipherable. The inspector peered round everywhere. He turned over the top mattress, he felt it all over. He moved the wash-stand and the corner cupboard, he looked in the open fireplace which apparently had not been used for years, but not so much as the very tiniest scrap of paper rewarded him. At last he turned to the barrister.

“Nothing more to be done here, I think, sir.” He took up the book and the slippers and moved to the door.

John Steadman followed him silently. His strong face bore a very worried, harassed expression.

Outside the landlord stopped them.

“Gentlemen, I hope it is understood that I have no responsibility with regard to this raid on Mr. Thompson's property?”

“Quite, quite!” assented the inspector. “Refer Mr. Thompson to me if you should see him again.”

“Which I hope I shall,” the landlord pursued, following them down the stairs. “For a better tenant I never had; punctual with his rent, and always quiet and quite the gentleman.”

Inspector Furnival stopped short. “How long has he lived with you?”

The man scratched his head. “A matter of four years or more, and always brought the rent to me, I never had to ask for it. I wish there were more like him.”

“Did you see much of him?”