CHAPTER X
In accordance with Merrington's instructions, Caldew devoted aconsiderable portion of the morning seeking information among themoat-house guests. But few of them showed any inclination to talk aboutthe murder. Many of the women were too upset to be seen, and the men hadplainly no desire to be mixed up in such a terrible affair by givinginterviews to detectives. Everybody was anxious to get away as speedilyas possible, and Caldew was compelled to pursue his inquiries amongstgroups of hurrying people, flustered servants, and village conveyancesladen with luggage. Most of the departing guests replied to hisquestions as briefly as possible, and gave their London addresses withobvious reluctance; the few who were willing to aid the cause of justicecould throw very little light on the London life of the murdered girl.Even those who had been acquainted with her before her marriage seemedto know very little about her.
Caldew finished his inquiries by midday. By that time most of the guestshad departed from the moat-house and were on their way to London.Superintendent Merrington and Captain Stanhill were in the libraryexamining the servants. Sergeant Lumbe had gone by train to Tibblestoneto sift the story of the suspicious stranger who had descended on thatremote village during the previous night.
It wanted an hour to lunch-time, and Caldew decided to spend the time bymaking a few investigations on his own account before cycling over toChidelham in the afternoon to see the Weynes.
Caldew had not been impressed with Merrington's handling of the case.Subordinates rarely are impressed with the qualities of those placedover them in authority. They generally imagine they could do better ifthey had the same opportunities. Caldew was no exception to that rule.It seemed to him that Merrington lacked finesse, and was out of touchwith modern methods of criminal investigation. He had been spoilt by toomuch success, by too much newspaper flattery, by too many jaunts withRoyalty. No man could act as sheep-dog for Royalty and retain skill as adetective. That kind of professional work was fatal for theintelligence. Merrington had a great reputation behind him, and hisknowledge of European criminals was probably unequalled, but his methodsof investigating the moat-house murder suggested that he was no longerone of the world's greatest detectives, if, indeed, he had ever deservedrecognition in their ranks. Caldew recalled that his fame rested chieflyon his wide experience rather than on the more subtle deductive methodsof modern criminology. It was said in Scotland Yard that when Merringtonwas at the height of his reputation, twenty years before, his knowledgeof London criminals and their methods was so extensive that he could inmost cases identify the criminal by merely looking at his handiwork.
As a modern criminologist, Caldew believed that the less a detectiveintruded his own personality into his investigations the better for hischances of success. He did not think that the loud officialism ofMerrington was likely to solve such a deep, subtle crime as the murderof Violet Heredith, and, consequently, he had the chance for which hehad waited so long. It now remained for him to prove that he could dobetter than Merrington. He had sufficient confidence in his ownabilities to welcome the opportunity, but at the same time he believedthat he was confronted with a crime which would tax all his resources asa detective to unravel.
Like Merrington, he had been struck by the strangeness of the murder.All the circumstances were unusual, and quite outside his previousexperience of big crimes. He had also come to the conclusion that theease with which the murderer had found his way into the moat-house, andafterwards escaped, pointed to an intimate knowledge of the place.
It would be too much to say that Caldew and Merrington reached differentconclusions by the same road. Up to a certain point their independentdeductions from the more obvious facts of the case were alike, as wasinevitable. In every crime there are circumstances and events which areas finger-posts, pointing the one way to the experienced observer. Buttheir subsequent deductions from the outstanding facts branched widely,perhaps because the younger detective did not read so much intocircumstances as Merrington. From the same facts they had reacheddifferent theories about the murder. Merrington, by a process of minuteand careful deductions which he had placed before the Chief Constable,had convinced himself that the key to the murder and the murderer was tobe found in London; Caldew believed that the solution of the mystery laynear the scene of the events, and perhaps in the house where the murderwas committed.
Caldew was aware that he could have given no satisfactory reason forholding that belief, apart from the point that the murder had beencommitted by somebody who knew the moat-house sufficiently well to getin and out of the place without being seen. But that point was open tothe explanation that the criminal might have provided himself with aplan of the house. Nevertheless, the impression had entered his mind sostrongly that he could not have shaken it off if he had tried. But hedid not try. He had sufficient imagination to be aware that intuition,in crime detection, is sometimes worth more than the most elaboratedeductions.
For the rest, all his speculations about the crime were affected by thetrinket he had found in the bedroom on the night of the murder. But thediscovery and subsequent disappearance of that clue, as he believed itto be, had not led him very far as yet. He felt himself in the positionof a palaeontologist who is called upon to reproduce the structure of anextinct prehistoric animal from a footprint in sandstone. The vanishedtrinket was a starting-point, and no more. It was a possible hypothesisthat the person who had dropped the stone and entered the death-chamberin search of it was the murderer, but so far it was incapable ofdemonstration or proof. As an isolated fact, it was useless, and broughthim no nearer the solution of the mystery. But, on the other hand, itwas an undoubted fact, and, for that reason, was dependent upon otherfacts for its existence. It was his task to find out who had dropped thetrinket in the bedroom and subsequently returned for it during his ownbrief absence downstairs. To establish those essential kindred factswas, he believed, to lay hands on the murderer of Violet Heredith.
Caldew walked thoughtfully from the moat-house down to the village,intent on commencing his own independent investigations into the crime.If the solution of the mystery lay near the scene, as he believed, itwas possible that some clue might be picked up among the villagers, towhom the daily doings of the folk in "the big house" were events of thefirst magnitude, and who might, presumably, be supposed to know anythingwhich was likely to throw light on the obscure motive for the crime. Itwas for that reason he directed his footsteps towards the fountain headof gossip in an English village--the inn. He flattered himself he wouldbe able to extract more local information from the patrons of the placethan any other detective could hope to do. To begin with, he was aSussex man and a native of the village, and since his return, after somany years' absence, he had spent his evenings at the inn renewing oldassociations and talking to the companions of his boyhood.
A week's renewed village life had taught him the ways of the place andthe war-time drinking customs of the inhabitants. Constrained by recentlegislation to compress their convivial intercourse into extremelylimited periods, the village tradesmen, and a fair proportion of thesurrounding farm labourers and shepherds, had fallen into the habit ofassembling at the inn at midday, to discuss the hard times and drink thesour weak "war beer" forced on patriotic Britons as an exigent warmeasure.
Caldew entered a side door which opened into a small snuggery, dividedfrom the tap-room by a wooden partition. It was here that the regularcronies and select patrons of the establishment sat in comfortableseclusion to discuss the crops, the weather, and market prices in thebroad Sussex dialect, which Caldew, from the force of old association,unconsciously fell into again when he was with them.
The room was nearly full, but his appearance threw a marked restraint onthe group of assembled countrymen. The conversation, which had obviouslybeen about the murder, ceased instantly as he entered and seated himselfon one of the forms placed against the partition. The innkeeper, who wasstanding behind the bar in his shirt sleeves, nodded uneasily inresponse to his friendly salutation, b
ut the customers awkwardly avoidedhis glance by staring stolidly in front of them. Caldew attempted todispel their reserve with a friendly remark, but no reply wasforthcoming. It was obvious that the patrons of the inn wanted neitherhis conversation nor company. One after another, they finished theirbeer and walked out of the inn with the slow deliberate movements of theSussex peasant.
Caldew had not allowed for the change the murder had effected on thevillage mind. His familiar relations with the inn customers had changedovernight. He was no longer the former village lad, returned to hisnative village, and welcomed from his old association with the place,but a being invested with the dread powers and majesty of the law, fromwhich no man might deem himself safe.
Caldew walked out of the snuggery and opened a door at the side of thehouse. It opened into a billiard room--a surprising novelty in anEnglish country inn, and the outcome of a piece of enterprise on thepart of the landlord, who had picked up a small table cheap at a sale,and installed it in the clubroom, hoping to profit thereby. Again Caldewwas conscious of the same distinct air of constraint immediately heentered. Two or three men who were talking and laughing loudly became asmute as though their vocal organs had been suddenly smitten withparalysis. The village butcher, who was at the billiard table in the actof attempting some complicated stroke, stopped abruptly with his cue inmid air, and gazed at the detective with open mouth and a look ofapprehension on his florid face, as though he expected instantaccusation and arrest for the moat-house murder.
With an irritated appreciation of his changed status in village eyes,Caldew left the inn and walked home for a meal before setting forth toChidelham to interview Mrs. Weyne.
There was a strong smell of soap suds in his brother-in-law's house, anda vision of his sister's broad back, in vigorous motion over a steamingwash-tub in the kitchen, indicated that she was in the throes of herweekly wash. She ceased her labours at the sound of footsteps, andturned round.
"Oh, it's you, Tom. Come for a bite to eat? Jest sit you down, and I'llhave dinner on the table in no time. I got something good for you. OldUpden, the shepherd, brought me a nice rabbit this mornin', and I'vestewed it. It's the last one we'll get, I expect. Upden was telling mehe ain't going to snare no more, because the boys steal his snares,which ain't no joke, with copper wire at five shillings a pound."
Caldew took a seat at the table, and watched his sister dish up thedinner. As Sergeant Lumbe's income was not sufficient to permit of allthe refinements of civilized life, such as a separate room for dining,the family midday dinner was taken in the kitchen, which was the commonliving room. Mrs. Lumbe's preparations for the meal were prompt andeffective. She carried the tub of clothes outside, opened the window tolet out the steam, laid knives and forks and plates on the deal table,then put a liberal portion of stewed rabbit into each plate out of thepot which was steaming on the side of the stove. Dinner was then ready,and brother and sister commenced their meal.
Caldew ate in silence, and his sister glanced at him wistfully atintervals. She had no children of her own, and she had a feeling ofadmiration for the brother she had mothered as a boy, who had gone tothe great city and become a London detective. From her point of view hehad achieved great fame and distinction, and she cherished in herworkbox some newspaper clippings of crime cases in which his name hadbeen favourably mentioned by friendly reporters. She hoped he would besuccessful in finding the moat-house murderer. She would have liked toquestion him about the case, but she stood a little in awe of him andhis London ways.
"What's the best way to Chidelham, Kate?" asked Caldew, as he rose fromthe table. "There used to be a footpath across by Dormer's farm whichcut off a couple of miles. Is it still open?"
"It's still open, Tom. Old Dormer tried to get it closed, and went tolaw about it, but he lost. Be you going across to Chidelham?"
"Yes, I shall ride over on my bicycle this afternoon. Do you know wherethe Weynes live?"
"The Weynes? Oh, you mean the writing chap that bought Billing's place.Their house stands by itself a mile out of the village, just afore youcome to Green Patch Hill."
"Thanks. I know Billing's place very well, but I wasn't aware that hehad sold it. I'd better be getting along. It's a good long ride."
"What be you goin' there for, Tom?" asked Mrs. Lumbe, with keencuriosity. "About this case?"
"Yes," replied Caldew shortly.
"Have you found out anything yet, Tom?" pursued his sister earnestly,her curiosity overcoming her awe of her clever brother. "Jem was tellingme before he went to Tibblestone that a ter'ble gre'at detective comedown from Lunnon this mornin', and was stirrin' up things proper. Jemsays he's a detective what travels about with the King, and 'e's gotletters to his name because of that. Is he on the tracks of the murdereryet, Tom?"
"No, and he's not likely to, as far as I can see," said her brother alittle bitterly.
"Dear, dear, that's a pity, for it's a ter'ble thing, and an awful endfor the young lady. Jem came home all of a tremble like last night withthe ghastly sight of her corpse and I had to give him a drop of spiritsto help him to sleep. We was a talkin' about it in bed, and wond'ringwho could 'ave done it. Nobody hereabouts, for I'm sure there's nobodyin the village would hurt a fellow creature. Besides, the folk at thebig house is too respected for a living soul to think of harming them."
"They are popular with everybody, are they?" said Caldew, sitting downagain with the realization that he was likely to gather as muchinformation about the Heredith family from his sister as he could obtainanywhere else.
"Oh, yes," replied his sister. "It's only nat'ral they should be. SirPhilip is a good landlord, and he and Miss Heredith are very generous tofolk."
"Is Philip Heredith well-liked in the district?"
"He's been away so long that folk don't know much about him. But I neverheard anybody say anything against him. He's different from Sir Philip,but he seems gentle and kind."
"He used to be a quiet and solitary little chap years ago," remarkedCaldew. "I remember climbing a tree in Monk's Hill wood for a bird'snest for him. He couldn't climb himself because of his lameness."
"It doesn't seem like a Heredith to be small and lame," said Mrs. Lumbethoughtfully. "I've heard those who ought to know declare that MissHeredith never forgave his mother for bringing him into the world with alame foot. The servants at the big house say Mr. Phil has always beenter'ble sensitive about his lameness. That's what made him so lonely inhis ways, though he was rare fond of animals and birds. We was all takenaback when we heard of his marriage. He always seemed so shy of theyoung ladies. The only girl I ever knowed him to take any notice of wasHazel Rath. I have met them walking through the woods together."
"Who is Hazel Rath?"
"The daughter of the moat-house housekeeper. She came to the moat-housewith her mother nearly ten years agone. She was a pretty little thing.Miss Heredith was very fond of her, and sent her to school. Mr. Philipwas fond of her too, in his way, though, of course, there could nevera'been anything between them. But nobody hereabouts ever expected him tomarry a London young lady."
"Why not?" asked Caldew.
"The Herediths have always married in the county, as far back as can becounted. It was thought Miss Heredith would make a match between Mr.Philip and the daughter of Sir Harry Ravenworth, of the Wilcotes. TheRavenworths are the second family in the county, and well-to-do. 'Twoulda'been a most suitable match, as folk here agreed. But 'twas not to be,more's the pity."
Caldew nodded absently. His original interest in his sister's talk wasrelapsing into boredom because it seemed unlikely to lead to anything ofthe slightest importance about the murder.
"The young lady he did marry was not a real lady, so I've heard say,"continued Mrs. Lumbe, placidly pursuing the train of her reflections."She didn't come much into the village, but when she did she walkedabout as though she were bettermost, and everybody else dirt beneath herfeet. But I have heard that she had to earn her own living in Londonbefore Mr. Philip fell in love with her pret
ty face. If that's thetruth, she gave herself enough airs afterwards, and did all she could tomake Miss Heredith feel she'd put her nose out of joint, as the sayingis."
"What do you mean by that?" asked Caldew sharply, with all his sensesagain alert.
"Well, you know, Tom, Miss Heredith has been the mistress of themoat-house and the great lady of the county since Lady Heredith died.But when Mr. Philip brought his young wife down from London that was allchanged. The young lady soon let her see that she wasn't going to beruled by her, and didn't care for her or her ways. They do say it was agreat trial to Miss Heredith, though she tried not to let anybody knowit."
"Where did you learn this?" Caldew asked abruptly.
"Lord, Tom, how short you pick me up! Milly Saker, who's parlourmaid atthe moat-house, told me in the strictest confidence, because she knew Iwouldn't tell anybody. And I wouldn't tell anybody but you, Tom. Shetold me from the very first that she didn't think the two ladies wouldget on together. They were so different, Milly said, and she was certainMiss Heredith didn't think the young lady good enough to marry into theHeredith family."
"Did she tell you if they had ever quarrelled?"
"I asked her that, and she said no. Miss Heredith is always the lady,and she wouldn't lower herself by quarrelling with anybody, least of allwith anybody she did not consider as good a lady as herself. But Millysays she was sorely tried at times. Milly thought it would end up in herleaving the moat-house and marrying her old sweetheart, Mr. Musard,who's just returned from his foreign travels. Perhaps you've seen him."
"Yes, I've seen him," said Caldew. "So he is her old sweetheart, is he?"
"So folk used to say," returned Mrs. Lumbe. "I remember there was sometalk of a match between them when I was a girl, but nothing came of it.It's my opinion that Miss Heredith must have refused him then because ofhis wild days, and he took to his travels to cure his broken heart. Butthey still think a lot of each other, as is plain for everybody to see,and go out for walks together arm in arm. So perhaps it will all comeright in the end."
With this comfortable doctrine of life, based on her perusal of femaleromances, Mrs. Lumbe got up from her seat to clear the table.
"I trust it will," said her brother, but his remark had nothing to dowith the triumph of true love in the last chapter.
He left the room to get his bicycle to ride to Chidelham.