Death Comes to Cambers (3 page)

Young Ray Hardy sank his voice to a whisper. It seemed he was afraid of his own voice, of his own words. He said: ‘It's murder... murder all right.... I don't know who did it... none of us knew anything, not till Mr. Bowman came and told us.'

‘You've seen yourself... you're sure...?' Bobby asked.

‘I helped carry her to Eddy Dene's shed over there,' answered Ray. ‘Looks she's been throttled – strangled.' He gulped. ‘I know nothing about it, but murder that would be – murder.'

‘It was burglars she was afraid of,' Farman interrupted, in a queer, high-pitched voice. ‘Burglars. If it's murder – well, who did it?'

‘Yes, that's it. Who did it?' Ray repeated. ‘That's what they're all saying, and no one knows. God knows I don't!'

He was evidently badly shaken, and that perhaps was little wonder. There was a heavy sweat on his forehead, and he wiped it away with the sleeve of his coat. Bobby, looking at him with close attention, did not find himself very favourably impressed. His eyes were bloodshot and heavy, his mouth loose, his chin seemed to run away from it. A weak face, Bobby thought, and with a suggestion in those bloodshot eyes of too great a fondness for beer and for strong ale; no lad of his apparent age should have eyes like that. But one had to make allowance for the shock of such a happening, and he continued in the same hurried, jerky voice: ‘It's our field, but we didn't know, none of us, till Mr. Bowman came running and shouting to us to come and help. Awful he looked, and running like all, he was, and you've only to look at her to see it must be murder. Jordan says so, too. He's sent to Hirlpool for help. Dad says it did ought to be Scotland Yard up in London by rights, but Jordan says it's Hirlpool first and Scotland Yard afterwards as required. Dad said he had a good mind to ring up Scotland Yard himself, only Jordan's police, and he ought to know. It's our field where she was, but none of us knew a thing about it till Mr. Bowman came running and calling across the turnips.'

All this came tumbling out in one breathless spate of words. It was how the boy's terror and excitement found relief. That Jordan was the name of the local sergeant of police, Bobby already knew. With one constable, a man named Norris, to help him, he guarded the King's peace in this part of the country, and as a rule had nothing much more serious to deal with than the theft of a stray hen or the disputes of two quarrelsome neighbours. Bobby knew, too, that Hirlpool was the county town and the headquarters of the county police, of which the head was a Colonel Lawson. It was quite recently that Colonel Lawson had been appointed to his position by a Watch Committee convinced that discipline and organization were the chief things to consider in police work, and, though Bobby recognized that there was much to be said for that belief, he also thought that probably the newly appointed chief constable was not likely to have done much as yet to improve a detective department known to be somewhat old-fashioned in its methods and ideas, or, indeed, even so far to have realized that that task was of any great or pressing importance. Nor was he altogether sure how the county police authorities would be likely to regard any action he himself might take in this emergency. But he was on the spot; he was a sworn officer of police; he felt he could not divest himself of responsibility. He said to Farman: ‘I think you had better go back. Let them know what has happened. Better ring up Sir Albert, too. Lock the door of Lady Cambers's room; make sure, if you can, nothing has been touched. Look after her sitting-room, too; see that's locked as well. And don't let anyone move about in the gardens. There may be footprints.'

Farman, used to obeying orders, returned accordingly to carry out these he had just received, and Bobby, telling young Hardy to come with him, hurried on towards the scene of the discovery.

At one point the little stream running down the centre of the valley was crossed by a rough bridge of wooden logs, though, indeed, in most places one could easily have stepped across it. Here, too, was a gate in the wire fence that followed the bed of the stream and divided the different fields. Through this Bobby and his companion passed, though not till Bobby had given a moment or two to a close examination of the logs forming the bridge, without, however, being able to find that they showed anything of interest.

‘Anyhow, she almost certainly came this way,' he thought. ‘And most likely her murderer was waiting for her over there. Only what brought her out so late at night?'

The field Bobby and young Hardy now entered was laid down in pasture, as was that they had just traversed. In its centre there stood a small shed, apparently of recent construction. At various other points near-by, digging had evidently been going on – as though for some reason it had been desired to sink a number of wells or possibly shallow-depth mining shafts. Beyond was a road leading to the main London highway, a mile or two on the further side of the village. Near the shed a number of people were clustered, or going in and out, and others were hurrying towards it from the direction of the village. Bobby said to his companion: ‘Who did you say found her?'

‘Mr. Bowman,' Ray repeated. ‘He lives over there with Miss Bowman, only she's gone now.' As he spoke he pointed vaguely to where, above the shoulder of the rising ground, the chimneys of a house or two were visible. ‘He goes to get the train for Hirlpool every morning, and he saw her. He said first he thought it was someone sleeping out, and then he thought it was funny, so he went to look. It's a wonder he saw her. I never did, only it just happens there's a gap in the fence right in line where he was, and he saw her through it, lying there, and so he went to look.'

‘Do you mean you had been that way this morning?' Bobby asked.

‘Yes, along the top of the field by the road over there, but I never saw her. You wouldn't unless you looked, and I never did. Why should I?'

‘You were out early,' Bobby commented.

‘You've got to on a farm,' the other retorted. ‘We aren't townsfolk. And I do a bit of rabbiting, too, on our land, so I go round the traps as often as I can – seeing the fuss that's made by some if they're heard crying out, as can't be helped always. Of course, I'm particular to keep to our own land, and we never knew, none of us, what had happened, till Mr. Bowman came running like I told you. Dead-white he was, and father sent at once for Jordan, and the doctor, too. Like dead himself Mr. Bowman looked – upset all right. Shock, you know – the shock did it. Look, that's where she was lying,' he added, pointing.

The spot indicated was about half-way between stream and shed, in a direct line from the gate in the fence by the rough bridge over the stream to the shed, and just about where the long, slow rise in the land to the grassy crest ahead first became noticeable. A glance told Bobby that much trampling and running to and fro had already quite certainly destroyed all chance of finding any helpful or significant tracks. He asked Ray to point out the exact spot where the body had lain, but evidently the young man's idea of precision resembled that of most other people, and for him meant merely ‘there or thereabouts'. Then, too, when Bobby tried to question him he grew confused, and presently pronounced for another spot nearly three yards away from that he had first pointed out. It was only too certain that the exact spot, in the sense in which Bobby understood ‘exact', was not to be discovered from him, though the point was of less importance in that the long, damp grass preserved few signs, and even those it might otherwise have shown had been confused by so much trampling and running to and fro.

‘She was lying on her back, straight out,' Ray said, ‘but Mr. Bowman said she was on her face when he found her, and he turned her over and she was so stiff and cold she must have been lying there all the night.'

He went on to give a few more words of description that showed the characteristic signs of strangulation had been present, but added that Mr. Bowman had been very clear that no piece of cord, or anything else that could have been used by the murderer to effect his purpose with, had been left on the spot. Bobby, looking round about carefully himself, decided the whole field would have to be thoroughly searched to make sure of this. His shoes and trouser-ends got very wet in the long grass the previous night's rain had so thoroughly soaked, and Ray made some passing reference to the storm and how glad he had been, as he lay in bed and heard the rain coming down, that he was not out in it. He was very amused, too, when Bobby presently discovered a match-stalk. It was of the kind called ‘book' matches, and printed on the flat stalk were the words: ‘Hotel Henry VIII'. Bobby knew the name for that of an hotel recently opened with a great flourish of trumpets in the Mayfair district of London. The thing might be of importance or might not, and he put it carefully away, again to the amusement of his companion. One of the party, Ray explained, had been a good deal affected by the unfortunate woman's appearance and had lighted a cigarette to steady his nerves.

‘That was Mr. Bowman – him that found her,' Ray explained. ‘Miss Bowman's his sister. Funny like it should be him found her.'

‘Why?' Bobby asked quickly, remembering that this was the second time Mr. Bowman's sister had been mentioned.

‘They say it's on account of her Sir Albert left her ladyship,' the young man answered; and Bobby remembered that his grandmother had talked vaguely about some unfortunate dispute between husband and wife, though she had not mentioned any names, and Bobby had not been greatly interested at the time.

But now he thought it might be as well to bear the fact in mind, even though very likely it was only one of hundreds having no connection with what had happened. Also he was beginning to think that Ray Hardy was showing even more distress and excitement than even so dreadful a tragedy would appear to warrant – as well as a somewhat odd desire to emphasize that neither he nor anyone on the farm knew anything of what had happened till Mr. Bowman came to tell them. Since there was no reason to suppose they had had any means of being aware of it, why was the young man so eager to protest their ignorance? But no doubt allowance had to be made for the excitement and general disturbance produced in him by such an event; very likely the shock had made him loquacious and his flow of talk was merely his way of reacting to it.

On the point of moving on again, Bobby gave this patch of ground one final glance as he thought how he would have measured, mapped, described it in every detail down to the last tuft of grass, the last buttercup or daisy, had the case been his, and then in one of those tufts of long lank damp grass he caught sight of something black and shining. He stepped forward quickly, and, seeing that it was a fountain-pen, looked at it attentively, without at first touching it. Then with extreme care, using his handkerchief so as to avoid leaving finger-prints himself and so confusing any that might be already on its polished surface, he picked it up. It was of a well-known and expensive make, and it was mounted in gold, as if intended for purchase as a Christmas or birthday gift.

‘Someone must have dropped it,' observed Ray, much more impressed than he had been by the discovered match-stalk, and even a little envious that such a find had not been made by him. ‘I wonder who?'

Bobby wondered, too, as he busied himself hurriedly building up a tiny pyramid of small stones to mark the exact spot where the pen had lain.

Round the shed in the middle of the field, a temporary wooden building with a corrugated-iron roof, a small crowd had collected, for already the news of a tragedy so startling, so incredible indeed, had spread through the neighbourhood, as the tale of an accident that has happened will run up and down a crowded street. From all sides people were hurrying to hear and see for themselves, to gape and gossip and deny and wonder. Among them, following a converging path to that which Bobby and Ray Hardy were pursuing, was a tall, thin, long-legged, long-armed personage in clerical attire, with a large, round, almost perfectly bald head that gave him an odd, and even slightly grotesque, appearance.

‘There's vicar,' Ray said. ‘He'll call it a judgement, same as he said in his sermon there would be.'

‘Mr. Andrews?' Bobby asked, for though he had not attended the church during his stay, and had never chanced to meet the vicar, he had heard a good deal about him and knew his name. It was, indeed, a name that had acquired some notoriety, for more than once the Anglo-Catholic fervour of its bearer had carried it into the papers – as, for example, when he had attempted to exclude from his church any woman not obeying St. Paul's injunction to keep the head covered, or when he had wished to refuse communion to other women guilty of any kind of ‘make-up'.

Then, too, he had quarrelled with the bishop of the diocese over some question of vestments, and in the same connection had publicly identified the diocesan chancellor with Antichrist, though this he had subsequently been persuaded to withdraw on the ground, not of inaccuracy, but of Christian charity. But if this fanaticism of his was more than a little embarrassing to his ecclesiastical superiors, and if at times it excited general ridicule, none the less his sincerity and the austerity of his life made him universally respected, even by those who found his zeal most trying. There were even, probably unfounded, stories current that he kept a private scourge for not infrequent use, and that he always wore a hair shirt – an article not too easy, perhaps, to procure in these days; and it was certainly true that he smoked even to excess four days a week, and on three days, Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays, abstained entirely – on Sundays because he hadn't the time, on Wednesdays and Fridays because they were fast-days. It was, he explained, his way of taming the natural man by encouraging him to take full liberty and licence and then checking him abruptly.