Death of a Commuter (2 page)

“I have just discovered in the car park of the Great Ring a frozen-over car with a dead man in it.”

“How do you know he's dead?”

Brophy tried to keep his temper. “He was cold,” he said sulkily.

“So would you be if you'd been out at the Great Ring all night What's he look like?”

“I didn't wait to take notes on his appearance…”

“You should have. Young or old?”

“Middle-aged, I should say. I came to report the matter at once.”

“Better get back there and wait till the van comes. Shouldn't be left even for a moment. You may find it gone when you get back, so don't waste time now.”

Mr. Diggs shook his head in sympathy.

“That's what they're like,” he said. “Going to have a quick one?”

“It must be quick then,” said Brophy who knew that Mr. Diggs had allowed some customers to stay in the back room till nearly midnight.

“Short, you mean?”

“Have to be.”

“Scotch?”

“Gin. With a drop of pep in it. Anyone in last night, unusual, I mean?”

“Not to say unusual. No, there wasn't. You mean about this you were phoning about? No, nothing I noticed. We had one or two in. Nothing special.”

“I expect you'll be interrogated later.”

“Me? What for?”

“Nearest habitation. It's my opinion there's something dodgy about this. Very dodgy, if you ask me. Shouldn't be surprised if we had a big case on our hands.” Then, somewhat
inconsequently, “He was as stiff as a poker. Must have been there all night.”

“We never heard anything,” said Mr. Diggs. “You'd think we would have, wouldn't you? It can't be more than a quarter of a mile away. You don't mean you think it was murder or anything like that?”

“I'm not giving any opinion at the moment. I must be getting back.”

Police Officer Brophy was able to freewheel back to the side road which led to the Great Ring and was relieved to see that the car was where he left it. Moreover as he saw by peering in, the corpse was still at the driving seat. There was nothing to do now but wait for the van.

It was twenty minutes before he saw the cavalcade approaching—an ambulance and two cars.

“Looks to me like murder, Sir,” he ventured to remark to Sergeant Beckett.

The sergeant did not bother to answer this, but giving Brophy what is aptly called a withering look he strode forward to the red car. Brophy prepared to watch the intricate proceedings which he knew would follow, doctor's examination, photographs, fingerprint check, a search of the car and of the dead man's pockets and person before the body would be sent in for more careful examination. But he didn't see all this.

“Go down to the road, Brophy, and don't let anything up here at all,” said Beckett heartlessly, and Brophy turned to obey. You had to be a long time in the police, he reflected bitterly, before you were good enough to handle a corpse.

News, when it reached him in the canteen from a police officer younger than himself who had had nothing to do with finding the cadaver, was disappointing. The body was that of a man named Felix Parador who had not been home since he left for London on the previous morning. His wife had not expected him home last night as he had telephoned to say he would stay in town, but the man in charge of the car park at the station had seen him drive away after the train in at 6.45.

It appeared that he had driven out to the Great Ring for some
reason and there quietly taken an overdose of antibiotic sleeping pills called Opilactic, since an empty bottle which had contained these was beside him and one of the pills was even found on the floor. He also had in his right hand a silver drinking-flask which had contained whisky and it was thought that he had used this to help him swallow the pills. It was impossible to say at what time he had died last night but medical opinion put it somewhere between eight and eleven. The official police opinion was, Brophy heard from his friend who confided it in a low voice, that the man had committed suicide. No reason for it had as yet been hazarded but there had been some talk in Brenstead about his wife.

Police Officer Brophy felt indignant at having been left out of this.

“Who found the bloody thing? That's what I should like to know!” he exclaimed rhetorically. “That's what you get for being conscientious. Next time I shall let them find it themselves!”

His friend looked serious.

“How do you know there'll be a next time?” he asked, and his words were remembered later.

The evening papers carried a short account of the event, part news paragraph, part obituary. Mr. Felix Parador of The Old Manor, Brenstead … company director (that useful term used for any petty criminal or for millionaire initiators of take-over bids) found early this morning … the Norsex police say foul play not suspected … A few lines of shrugging and impersonal reading matter while even then preparations were being made for a post-mortem.

The Norsex police might not suspect foul play but the people of Brenstead considered themselves less simple-minded. ‘It stands to reason,' they said, and ‘Who's going to believe?' they asked. There was a certain amount of wishful thinking in this for little is more teasing than to have a promising piece of sensational scandal dashed before it was fairly started. There must have been more to it than that, they said. Why, they had seen Mr. Parador only that morning or the previous day and he had
said nothing
then.
And what about Mrs. Parador? Everyone knew about her. And if he wanted to commit suicide why should he go out to the Great Ring? That was the question.

Perhaps the inquest would tell something. It was held two days later in the ballroom of The Royal Oak. The coroner, a dignified but shrewd individual who asked searching questions, heard the medical evidence unmoved. Death had been caused by an overdose of the drug which was the basic ingredient of Opilactic. The doctors who had carried out the post-mortem had no doubt of that. As to the time of death they admitted uncertainty. The dose must have been a massive one, so many grammes of so and so and a lot of technical terminology about ‘the organs'. The widow, who was offered every consideration and the sympathy of the court, had no explanation of her husband's conduct. He had been in excellent spirits when he left her that morning. No, she had not been surprised when he telephoned from his office to say he would not be home for the night. He had done that on previous occasions, though not lately. She
was
surprised to hear he had come down on his usual train after all without letting her know. He was very punctilious in such matters.

His brother, Magnus Parador, had been more truculent. His brother's affairs had been in excellent order and he for one did not believe that Felix would ever have committed suicide, unless he had become suddenly deranged, which was most unlikely. He was the sanest man Magnus Parador had ever known. But had he not been a prisoner of the Japanese for two years? Yes, but there were no ill effects of that noticeable now.

The only evidence which seemed to help the coroner was that of a clerk in Parador's office, Philip Dukes. Yes, he thought Mr. Parador had behaved oddly that afternoon. He had taken the wrong hat and finding it far too small for him had larked about in it before returning it to its hook. What did he mean by larking about? Well, he had put it on his head, grinned to him, Dukes, and seemed to make a joke of it. No one else had noticed this, but it was enough for the coroner. The verdict was Suicide While the Balance of his Mind was Disturbed. Foul play, it was seen, was not suspected and the post-mortemised body of
Felix Parador was buried in an honourable grave. The five men who travelled daily with him looked out for a candidate for his seat in the compartment. Slowly and unwillingly the people of Brenstead turned to other matters.

O
N THE
L
AST
D
AY OF THE
S
PRING
T
ERM
C
AROLUS
D
EENE, THE
senior history master of the Queen's School, Newminster, returned gratefully to his small house in the town. Not for four weeks would he hear the booming voice of his headmaster whose speech was full of platitudes and pomposity, nor have his class disturbed by awkward questions from a difficult boy named Simmons. In spite of what he considered a vulgarly large private income he took his work as a schoolmaster seriously. He had been grateful for the chance of filling his time and his mind when he had first been released in 1946 from his war service with the Commandos, for his young wife had died during the war. He was grateful to it still. But he was not above having what is common to boys and masters—an end-of-term feeling.

His hobby—he insisted that it was no more—was the investigation of crime and he had been astonishingly successful in disentangling the evidence in a number of sensational cases. He worked anonymously, both because he preferred to do so and because the headmaster of his school insisted that he should, lest, as he put it, ‘the fair name of The Queen's School should
become sullied'. But from the point of view of investigation it had been an uneventful term. Nothing had happened to rouse his curiosity for several months.

Two people, he knew, were delighted at this, the headmaster, Hugh Gorringer, and his housekeeper, Mrs. Stick. The headmaster had gone so far as to say so when they had parted today. A large man with immense red hairy ears and a far too evident belief in his own importance, he had unbent to address Carolus privately.

“I cannot but admit, my dear Deene, that I have felt considerable relief of late to note that your unfortunate hobby has not been in evidence. As you know, it is a matter of concern to me when you become involved in some sordid investigation far better left to the proper authorities. It is some months, if I mistake me not, since we have heard the tocsin.”

As for Mrs. Stick, she expressed her pleasure quite openly.

“I was only saying to Stick,” she had told Carolus a week ago, “it's a long time now since we were mixed up in one of those nasty murder cases. It's been quite a relief. I don't have to wonder what my sister in Battersea's thinking half the time or have my heart jump in my mouth every time the door bell rings.”

But when Carolus had sunk into his favourite arm-chair that afternoon and Mrs. Stick had set the tea-tray beside him, he felt far from relieved. The holiday that stretched out in front of him seemed dull in prospect. He wanted something to do. A nice neat little murder, perhaps, with a bevy of promising suspects or even one of those clumsy loutish ones which were often, in his experience, the most puzzling. He ate a couple of crumpets spread with anchovy paste and finished his cup of China tea thoughtfully. There was nothing to interest him in the evening paper.

When Mrs. Stick came to get the tray, however, he saw that the little woman had something on her mind. Her thin lips were tightly set and her steel-rimmed glasses seemed to flash ominously.

“Stick wants a word with you,” she said.

“Stick
does?” It was a fatuous question but the situation was unprecedented. Stick never wanted a word with anyone. If he
had any desires or interests at all they were interpreted by Mrs. Stick.

“That's what he says. It's nothing to do with me,” Mrs. Stick continued. “I've told him to let sleeping dogs lie, but there you are.” She turned to the door. “You better come in and tell Mr. Deene what you want,” she called to her waiting husband.

Stick entered.

“Yes, Stick?”

“It's like this,” said Stick, and stopped.

“It's about the gentleman he used to work for,” said Mrs. Stick.

“That's it,” corroborated Stick.

“There's been something about him in the papers,” Mrs. Stick explained unwillingly.

“Ah,” said Stick.

“I don't know why he wants to bother you with it, sir, but he would have it you must know. Tell Mr. Deene what's happened.”

Stick made an effort.

“He's dead,” he managed.

“Well, we've all got to die,” said Carolus profoundly.

“That's what I told him. Only he's very obstinate about it. This gentleman's done for himself. There's been an inquest and everything.”

“That's where it is. I don't believe it,” said Stick. “Not Mr. Parador.”

“Parador?” said Carolus. “Yes. I read that case. You used to work for him, did you?”

“Yes, and knew him well. He wasn't the man for anything of that sort. What's more his brother doesn't think so either.”

“How do you know?”

“I've seen him. He lives over Latchfield way. I've been over to see him.”

“You see?” said Mrs. Stick. “Once he gets something into his head there's no stopping him. It's not as though it's any business of his.”

“But it is, in a way. There's something for me in his will Mr. Magnus told me so.”

“All the more reason to keep out of it You'll find yourself a suspect next.”

“Why are you so certain about this?” asked Carolus gently.

“Stands to reason, doesn't it? Found in his car with an empty bottle of these sleeping tablets. Who put them there, that's what I'd like to know.”

“Coroners are no fools,” said Carolus, feeling himself grow more and more sententious. “If there had been the slightest reason for suspicion …”

“I'm suspicious, anyway,” said Stick obstinately. “I knew the gentleman. I'm not saying he couldn't have been driven to it by his wife. That could happen to anyone.”

“You better be careful what you're saying,” put in Mrs. Stick.

Stick continued as though he had not heard.

“But in this case his brother, that's Mr. Magnus Parador, says she was a very nice woman. He knew them both. Didn't nag him or anything.”