Poison In The Pen (14 page)

“I was coming through to the dining-room. They were talking ever so loud—I could hear their voices, and they sounded ever so angry. And then the door opened sudden and Mrs. Repton come out. I didn’t want her to see me, so I stood against the wall, and she turned right round and looked back into the room. Oh, sir, it was the dreadfullest look you ever saw—and she said to the poor Colonel—oh, sir she said, ‘You’d be a lot more good to me dead than alive,’ she said, and she come away and banged the door.”

Florrie had gone away, shaken but resilient. When the door had shut behind her Randal March said,

“That being that, we had better see Mrs. Repton. In the circumstances, I didn’t think it would be tactful to send a message by Florrie. Perhaps, Crisp, you wouldn’t mind—”

When the Inspector had gone out March said,

“Well, what do you make of it?”

Miss Silver gave the faint cough with which she was wont to emphasize a point.

“It is, I think, too soon to draw any conclusion. We know that there was anger between them, and people do not always mean what they say.”

He was silent. After a moment she said,

“I do not think Mrs. Repton will wish me to remain, in which case—”

“You will have to go? Yes, I am afraid so. But I would much rather you stayed.”

Scilla Repton came into the room with Crisp behind her. She was still wearing the tartan skirt and emerald jumper, but she had taken time to put on fresh make-up, and her hair shone under the ceiling light. It had been in her mind to put on a black dress and play the disconsolate widow, but something in her rebelled. And what was the good of it anyway when there wasn’t anyone in the house that didn’t know that she and Roger were all washed up? He had talked to his sister—he had told her so—and no doubt she would make the most of it to the police, so why not be honest and have done with it? There would be another of those awful inquests, and she supposed she would have to stay for the funeral, but once all that was over Tilling Green wouldn’t see her again in a hurry. So what did it matter what any of these people thought or said about her? She didn’t give a damn.

Observing Miss Silver, she raised her carefully shaped eyebrows and said without anything in her voice to soften the words,

“What is she doing here?”

March said,

“Miss Repton and Florrie Stokes preferred to have another woman present, and Miss Silver was kind enough—”

She interrupted him with a short hard laugh.

“A chaperone! My dear man, how prehistoric! I should have thought Maggie was past wanting one anyhow, but of course you never can tell, can you!”

“If you object to Miss Silver’s presence—”

She drew a chair to the other side of the writing-table, sat down, and proceeded to light a cigarette.

“Oh, no, I don’t object. Why should I? If Maggie wants a chaperone, I’m sure I do.”

She flicked out the match and dropped it among the pens and pencils which Roger Repton would not use again. She drew on the cigarette and the tip brightened. She had quite deliberately turned her back upon Miss Silver, who now as deliberately changed her own position, moving from one corner of the leather-covered couch to the other, an adjustment which gave her a very good view of Mrs. Repton as she sat, her legs crossed, the mesh of the stockings so fine that it hardly seemed to be there at all, the red shoes a little too ornate, a good deal too high in the heel.

If Miss Silver’s own garments were quite incredibly out of date, it was because she liked them that way and had discovered that an old-fashioned and governessy appearance was a decided asset in the profession which she had adopted. To be considered negligible may be the means of acquiring the kind of information which only becomes available when people are off their guard. She was fully aware that she was being treated as negligible now. She thought that Scilla Repton was putting on an act, and she wondered why she had chosen just this pose of callous indifference. She would not have expected good taste, but what was behind these bright colours, this careful indifference? A sudden death in a household must shock even its most indifferent member, and this was Roger Repton’s wife.

Randal March was speaking.

“I believe you had had a very serious quarrel with your husband on Saturday, Mrs. Repton.”

She withdrew her cigarette and blew out a little cloud of smoke.

“Who says so?”

He did not answer this.

“In the course of this quarrel the question of the anonymous letters came up.”

“What anonymous letters?”

“Oh, I think you have heard of them. One of them was in evidence at the inquest on Doris Pell. Colonel Repton had interrupted a telephone conversation between you and Mr. Gilbert Earle. During what followed he spoke of having received one of these letters, accusing you of carrying on an affair with Mr. Earle. A very serious quarrel developed, in the course of which divorce was mentioned and he said that you must leave this house immediately. The actual words were that you must get out. Later this was to some extent modified. He had begun to think about the scandal, and said that it would be better if you stayed here till after Miss Brooke’s funeral.”

She said with an accentuation of her usual drawl,

“You were listening at the door?”

“Somebody was,” said March drily. “Voices raised in a violent quarrel do attract attention, and for part of the time at any rate I understand that the door was open.”

She lifted a shoulder in the slightest of shrugs.

“Oh, well, people do have quarrels, you know. Roger and I had lots, but we always made them up again.”

“Do you wish to imply that this was not the first time he had accused you of infidelity?”

“I don’t mean to imply anything of the sort, and you know it!”

“Then do you mean to imply that this particular quarrel was no more serious than others that had taken place, and that it was likely to have been made up?”

She said easily,

“He wouldn’t have turned me out, you know.”

“Mrs. Repton, Miss Maggie Repton has stated that she had a conversation with her brother this afternoon just before three o’clock in which he told her that he had come to the end, and that you must go. Now I think you saw him after that.”

“Who says so?”

“You were seen coming out of the study.”

She drew at the cigarette and let the smoke go up between them.

“All right—so what?”

“The person who saw you states that both you and Colonel Repton were talking very loudly. She received the impression that you were quarrelling. Then the door opened and you were coming out, but you turned back again and spoke. And she heard what you said.”

A little ash dropped on the front of the emerald jumper. Scilla Repton brushed it off with a careless flick.

“Really, Mr. March?”

“She states that she heard you say, ‘You’d be a lot more good to me dead than alive,’ and after that you came away.”

“Quite a good curtain,” said Scilla Repton.

March said gravely,

“And within an hour he was dead.”

“It didn’t mean anything. It was the sort of thing one says.”

“Not, I think, with a reconciliation in sight.”

She leaned over to stub out the cigarette where she had left the match in Roger Repton’s pen-tray.

The action set off a curious spark of anger in him. She had quarrelled with the husband who had found her out, she had wished him dead to his face, she had heard another woman accuse her over his dead body, and here, on the very spot where these things had happened, she could lean over and stub out her cigarette! It was a small thing, but it got him. He said sharply,

“You wished him dead, and he was dead within the hour. You have been accused of having brought that death about.”

She actually laughed.

“You’ve been listening to Mettie Eccles. My dear man, don’t be silly! She was head over ears in love with Roger— always has been, I can’t think why. And she has always been just about as jealous of me as anyone could be, so naturally if there was anything wrong it would be my fault. I should think even a policeman could see that.”

He said abruptly,

“There was cyanide in the gardener’s shed, wasn’t there?”

“Cya—what?”

“Cyanide. I suppose you’ve heard of it?”

“No. What is it?”

“I haven’t had the surgeon’s report yet, but it could have been the poison which caused Colonel Repton’s death.”

She stared at him.

“And what would it be doing in the gardener’s shed?”

“It is used to destroy wasps’ nests.”

She gave quite a natural shudder.

“I can’t sit in the room with a wasp! That’s the worst of the country—all these insects! But if this cya stuff was used for them, how did it get into the house—unless—Oh, do you mean that Roger took it on purpose?”

Randal March said very gravely indeed,

“No, Mrs. Repton, I didn’t mean that.”

About half an hour later March stopped his car on the other side of the Green, lifted the latch of a gate, and made his way with the help of a torch to the sideways-looking door of Gale’s Cottage. His knocking upon it brought a somewhat delayed and reluctant answer. There was no bell and no knocker. He was obliged to switch off his torch and use that, and he was beginning to wonder whether Mr. James Barton could be out, when there was the sound of a slow footstep and the door was opened a bare two inches, and on the chain at that, since an unmistakable rattle came through the gap. A deep breathy voice said, “Who’s there?”

“My name is March. I am the Chief Constable of the county, and I would like to have a word with you.”

The voice from within said, “Why?”

“Because you were one of the last people to see Colonel Repton.”

There was a gasp, the rattle of the chain which held the door, and the sound of the door creaking back upon its hinges. There was no light in the narrow passage, but a door on the right stood half open and enough light came from it to throw up the figure of a tall man standing back about a yard from the threshold.

“What’s this about Colonel Repton?”

“I believe you were one of the last people to see him.”

Barton repeated the words almost in a whisper.

“To see him?”

March said, “Mr. Barton, if Colonel Repton was a friend of yours, I’m afraid you must be prepared for a shock, because he is dead.”

James Barton said, “Oh, my God!” And then, “But he can’t be—I was talking to him—Oh, come in!”

The room with the half open door was the kitchen, and it was warm and comfortable, with an oil lamp on the dresser, a bright fire, and thick red curtains at the window. There was a table covered with a crimson cloth, an old leather-covered armchair, and a strip of carpet in front of the fireplace upon which lay seven large tabby cats.

In the light Mr. Barton was seen to be a thin and rather stooping person with a good deal of grizzled hair and a straggling beard, but even the beard and the bushy eyebrows did not hide the terrible scar which ran across his face. Before March had taken in these particulars he was saying,

“Colonel Repton-—what has happened? I was up there— he wasn’t ill.”

“Yes, that is why I have come to see you. He wasn’t ill, and he is dead. I believe that he was murdered.”

“Murdered—”

There were a couple of plain wooden chairs in the room. Barton sank down on one of them and leaned forward over the table, folding his arms and dropping his head upon them. His breathing quickened into sobs. After a minute or two he straightened himself.

“He was a very good friend to me. It’s knocked me over. Will you tell me what happened?”

“He was poisoned—we believe, with cyanide.”

“That’s the stuff they use for wasps?”

“Yes.”

“Who would do such a thing?”

March had taken the other chair. He said,

“I hope you can help us to find out.”

Barton raised a hand and let it fall again.

“Isn’t that what the police always say when they’re talking about the chap they’ve got it in for?”

“If you mean have we any special reason to suspect you at present, the answer is no. But since you were one of the last people to see Colonel Repton alive—By the way, just when did you leave him?”

“It would be four o’clock, or a little later. I don’t carry a watch.”

“Do you mind telling me why you went to see him, and what passed between you?”

“I went to pay my rent.”

“I see. And just what do you pay for this cottage?”

Barton was leaning on an elbow, staring down at the red tablecloth. He jerked his head up at that and said roughly,

“What’s that got to do with the police?”

“Is there any reason why you should mind answering the question?”

“Oh, no—no—I just wondered why you should ask it, that’s all. If you must know, it was what is called a peppercorn rent.”

“You mean you didn’t pay him anything at all?”

“No, I don’t. I mean I paid him a peppercorn—one a month—and we’d sit talking for a bit. He was about the only one I ever did talk to, and I suppose you’ll try and make out I did him in.”

“Will you tell me what you talked about this afternoon?”

Barton went back to staring down upon the red tablecloth.

“Most times I’d go up after dark, but I didn’t today.”

“Why was that?”

“I don’t know. I’d a fancy to go when I did, that’s all. I’d been thinking of things, and I’d got to the point where they didn’t bear thinking about, so it came to me I’d go up and see the Colonel.”

March’s memory produced a date. He wouldn’t have sworn to it in court, but short of that he was as certain of it as makes no difference. This was the thirteenth of October, and on the thirteenth of October some thirty years ago… He said,

“Well you went up to see Colonel Repton. What did you talk about?”

“Him.” Barton stared at the cloth. “I went round to the study window and knocked on it because they’d got company—a lot of women visiting Miss Repton for a sewing-party. Miss Wayne from next door, she was there, and the one that’s staying with her. I’d forgotten about it, but I wasn’t going to let it put me off. I knew he wouldn’t be having any truck with it anyway. So I went round by the far end of the Green and got in over the wall and round to the study window. I’d done it before.”

“And when you got there Colonel Repton asked you if you’d come to pay your peppercorn rent and offered you a drink.”

He got a startled sideways look.

“If you know all the answers you can find them for yourself.”

March was made to feel that he had been clumsy. He hastened to make amends.

“Mr. Barton, please do not be offended. It would be a natural way for Colonel Repton to receive you, wouldn’t it? And I am really anxious to know about the drink, because, you see, the cyanide—we are practically sure that it was cyanide—was in a small decanter of whisky on his writing-table, and I would like to know whether you saw the decanter there.”

He was staring at March now.

“Oh, yes, I saw it. And he offered me a drink out of it all right, but that was just a joke between us—he knew I wouldn’t take it. It’s devil’s stuff, and I don’t use it. He knew that well enough. It’s always the same when I go up—he says, ‘Have a drink,’ and I say, ‘No,’ the same as he knows I’m going to.”

“Well, that being over, you say you talked about him.”

“Yes—about him and about women—he knows what I think of them. He talked about his wife.”

“What did he say about her?”

“Said she’d done the dirty on him and he was going to divorce her. I never spoke to her in my life—I don’t have any truck with women—but I could have told him she was that sort right from the word go. I could have told him, but it wouldn’t have been any good. That’s the sort of thing you have to find out for yourself. Cats and dogs, they go after their nature, and you know what that nature is—it’s the way they’re made. And women are just the same, but they’re not honest about it the way an animal is. They lie, and creep, and go round corners, pretending to be holy angels—angels of light, and not the drabs and sluts they are.”

March broke in.

“Are you perfectly sure that Colonel Repton spoke of divorcing his wife?”

“Of course I’m sure. Why should I make it up? He said he was all through with her and she’d be clearing out just so soon as Connie Brooke’s funeral was over. He said he’d been telling his sister, and once the funeral was over everyone would know.”

“That was a very confidential way for him to talk.”

The hand that was resting on Barton’s knee moved and clenched. He said in his deep hoarse voice,

“Sometimes it eases a man to talk. I’ve had troubles myself.”

March waited for a moment before he spoke again. Then he said,

“Well, he talked to you in this confidential way. Did he say anything—anything at all to suggest that he had the thought of suicide in his mind?”

He got a quick angry look.

“No, he didn’t!”

“Because that would be a possible alternative to murder. A man who had, or thought he had, discovered that his wife was unfaithful might have taken his own life.”

Mr. Barton brought his fist down upon the table.

“Not if it was Colonel Repton, he wouldn’t! And I’ll take my Bible oath he wasn’t thinking of any such thing. He talked about getting rid of her—said it oughtn’t to take so long to get a case through the courts now. Well, if he was planning about that, he wasn’t thinking of killing himself, was he?”

“Not then.”

“When did it happen?”

“He was seen alive at half past four, and found dead at his desk just after five o’clock.”

“That means the stuff was there in the decanter when I was with him. He’d never have offered me a drink the way he did if he knew there was poison in it.”

“He might have if he was sure you wouldn’t take it.”

The fist came down on the table again.

“Not on your life! It’s not what any man would do—not to a friend! Cyanide? That’s the stuff that kills you dead in a minute. There’s something in a man that would turn at offering it to a friend.”

“He knew you wouldn’t take it—you said so yourself.”

Barton shook his head.

“He’d not have done it. Just thinking of it would have turned him. And he wasn’t thinking about suicide—I’ll swear he wasn’t.”