The Whisper in the Gloom

“Why can’t we go out?” he said.

  “They’ve got to let us out. There’s no spring this side.”

  Bert digested this. “Then, if the police have arrested them, we’ll never—”

  “Don’t be so dumb. I could shoot a hole through the panel. Say, kid, you go to the movies?”

  They began to compare notes. For Bert, it was like that stage in a dream where you know it is a dream and accept it as such, submitting to its weird sequences. At any moment the bare boards beneath him might dissolve into a cloud, or the wall at his back turn into the padded seat of a racing car. Meanwhile, he talked enthusiastically about the latest spaceship film he had seen.

  “Visitors from Mars—guys with legs like the Eiffel Tower and whiskers growing out of their craniums—it’s crazy! I like Westerns, gangsters. The G-man always wins. Like hell, he does! Say, did you see—?”

  There was movement in the adjoining room: the sound of a panel sliding back.

  “O.K. The cops have beat it,” came Tom’s voice.

  Bert was pulled through. Deliberately, he stumbled and fell. Lying on the floor, he dragged the bandage down, for an instant, from one eye. The room was absolutely empty, unfurnished—what Bert could see of it. And Tom was pressing an acorn on the molding of the mantelpiece. As he did so, the panel to the right of the fireplace closed.

  “A washout,” said Superintendent Blount. He had received a report from the Suffolk police, and was summarizing it for Nigel’s benefit. An Inspector and Sergeant from Ipswich, with the village constable, had gone to Stourford Hall, on the pretext of looking for an escaped convict last seen in these parts. They rang the bell several times before gaining admission. They went through every room in the house, and then examined the outbuildings. It was unoccupied, except for the servants’ quarters—a kitchen, a sitting room, two bedrooms, where the caretaker and his aunt lived—and a nursery, at the top of the house, above them.

  “A nursery?” Nigel pricked up his ears.

  “Yes. It was a bit eerie, the Inspector told me. A nursery, all fitted out with tiny garments, books, toys, and the like, all brand new. It gave him quite a turn.”

  “All fitted out for the heir to the Durbar millions.”

  “Just so. There’s a cot in it, and a wee bed. The Inspector thought he was onto something there, for the bedclothes were not clean. But Tom Ryle—that’s the caretaker—explained it. His aunt is soft in the head. She used to be Durbars’ nursemaid, and would have been nurse to his child, if it had lived. He pensioned her off—made her nephew caretaker and lets her live there with him. She’s quite harmless; but she’s got delusions that she has a baby in her charge—Durbar himself, or the baby that died—God knows which. So, when the delusions come on, she sleeps in the bed in the nursery, looking after a ghost child.”

  A sentimental expression came over the Superintendent’s face, normally as bland and noncommittal as a bank manager’s, and he sighed heavily.

  “Aye. It’s vairy pathetic. That accounted for the picture book, too.”

  “The picture book?”

  “Aye. They found a picture book which had been colored, and a box of paints recently used. It was the auld Nanny again, amusing her nonexistent bairn.”

  “You make me weep,” said Nigel rudely. “Did the auld Nanny corroborate this touching story?”

  Blount looked rather shocked. “Och, she’s a havering auld body—they couldn’t get much sense out of her. But she did tell them she had a wee baby boy in the nursery.”

  “A wee baby boy of twelve, with spectacles?”

  “Och now, Strangeways—”

  “You and your dream children! From Blount and James Barrie, good Lord deliver us!”

  “I’m telling you, Bert Hale is not there. He may have been there, but he’s not there now. Nor this Elmer. They searched every cranny of the house and grounds.”

  Nigel was looking profoundly dissatisfied. “If Durbar doesn’t own the place any longer, why is it stuffed with old Nannies and nursery furniture?”

  “No doubt he made some arrangement with the purchaser to keep them on till he took up residence.”

  “Ah. That mythical purchaser. Another of your bonny dream children.”

  “Well, why not ask Durbar yourself?” said Blount, exasperated.

  “That’s just what I will do. I suppose your Ipswich colleagues wouldn’t think to inquire of the local shops whether extra food has been sent to the house recently?”

  “That’s all being done. Don’t fuss. They’re keeping an eye on the place, and interviewing people right and left in the locality. But it’s a vairy—e’eh—secluded place. It might take days, or weeks, to find witnesses of goings-on there, if there were any goings-on.”

  And we haven’t got days, let alone weeks, thought Nigel as he returned to Chelsea—not with a gunman at large, and two boys kidnaped. Sir Edward was moving heaven and earth to trace the leakage of information: but, until it had been traced, there was no certainty that the change of plan for the Russian Minister’s departure would not come into the hands of the enemy.

  Worse still, ever since his conversation with Clare yesterday, Nigel had been growing more and more uneasy about the value of his discovery at Gray’s flat. Clare had touched it off with her account of Gray’s peculiar state of mind on the previous night. The inner excitement; the impression of one just passing the time till something happened; and then Clare’s odd simile of the anglers on a pier, “not even holding their rods—just leaving them propped up against the railing.” It could be a detestably illuminating analogy. Gray leaving the bait in his flat and going off for a jolly evening; giving his opponents plenty of time to search the flat; making the crucial object extraordinarily difficult, but not impossible, to find.

  Why had Gray agreed to take Clare out for the evening at all, after she had made her dislike of him so plain, if not because he realized it was a ruse to get him out of the flat—a ruse he could turn to his own ends? And why leave so incriminating a document in his pocket, unless he wanted it to be found? Of course, criminals do slip up and make these elementary errors; but it is never wise to take such an apparent error at its face value.

  Suppose Gray had planted the Harwich message as bait, what did this imply?—that he had extracted from Bert the words written by Dai Williams on the newspaper margin, and from Foxy the information that the police now knew what these words were. Then why leave in his pocket, for the police to find, a full, unabbreviated text of Dai Williams’ message? Obviously, to mislead. “Bert Hale 12,” luckily for the conspirators, could be made to expand into a sentence derived from their illicit knowledge of the plans for the Russians’ departure. But, if their blow was really to be struck at Harwich, the last thing they would do would be to let the police know about it. Therefore the blow was not to be struck at Harwich; and the piece of paper Nigel had found was a brilliantly ingenious device for directing the authorities’ attention exclusively upon Harwich, while the stroke was planned for elsewhere. And perhaps for an earlier date. At any moment now the finger might squeeze the trigger.

  With consternation, Nigel realized that he was back where he had started. All along, both the police and Bert’s own friends had suspected that “Bert Hale 12” might be a fabrication of the boy’s, not the original message at all. Gray’s men had presumably got it out of Foxy, when he was kidnaped last Sunday, that he had told the police about this “message.” So Gray could have been stringing the police along, fixing their attention upon “Bert Hale 12,” when Dai Williams’ real message had been quite a different one. More than ever now, it was imperative to find Bert Hale and get the truth from him.

  Nigel had rung up Hesione Durbar, to make an appointment. She had to be out till six P.M., but would be glad to see him then. She was alone in the drawing room when Nigel was announced. After warm inquiries about his health—she was surprised and pleased to find him out of hospital so soon—Hesione poured drinks for them both. Her husband, she said, would be back soon; he’
d been a bit poorly last night—the effects of a smoke bomb at a political meeting.

  “Political meeting? I didn’t think he—”

  “Oh well, it was a peace meeting. Rudie was asked to speak, at the last minute. He’s getting quite public-spirited in his dotage,” she said gaily.

  Nigel remembered how, last time he had been in this house, she had expressed such astonishment at her husband’s accepting an invitation to a reception for the Soviet Minister. He said,

  “What an indefatigable man he is! Doesn’t he ever take a holiday?”

  “We go abroad a good deal. And occasional week-ends in the country.”

  “At Stourford, I suppose?”

  “Oh no. We don’t go there any more. Rudie’s sold it.”

  “What a pity! It’s a beautiful house, I’m told.”

  Hesione grimaced. “I suppose so. But talk about the back of beyond! Nothing to do all day but feed the ducks and listen to the damned peacocks screaming. Give me the bright lights! Besides, we haven’t happy memories of the place.”

  Then the story came out. The child who had died at birth, Sir Rudolf’s bitter disappointment, the nursery, preserved as a sort of shrine to his dead hopes.

  “I think he minded much more than I did,” she said, brooding. “Funny, I’d never have thought he had a soft streak in him like that.”

  Nigel asked more questions about the house. Hesione routed out a photograph album, and sat down with him on the sofa to show pictures of it, her shoulder rubbing against his, her deep blue eyes glancing at him with a look half provocative, half almost childishly innocent. She retained the actress’s gift for using her physical charms without inhibitions and yet without committing herself.

  “This is the oldest part of the house,” she said, turning a page. “It originally belonged to one of the old Catholic families. Rudie’s father bought it from them.”

  Nigel felt a wild excitement welling up in him. “Catholic families? Did you have a priest’s hole?”

  “Oh yes. All the proper accessories. There’s even a room which used to be their private chapel.” She turned over some more pages. “You see that sprig of oak leaves and acorns on the mantelpiece? You push one of the acorns and that panel there slides back. I found it, quite by accident, one rainy Sunday. Life was one long rainy Sunday down there.”

  It was as simple as that. Or was it?

  “By accident, you say? How thrilling! You didn’t know about it before?”

  “No. There must have been a tradition in the family not to mention it, even after they’d stopped persecuting the Catholics. The guide books don’t say anything about it.”

  So that was why the police had overlooked it during their search. Nigel knew he must get away quickly and communicate with Superintendent Blount; but, if he left too abruptly, it would seem odd to Hesione, and her husband would her about it.

  “Well, Nigel, you didn’t come to discuss stately homes, I’m sure.”

  A few minutes were wasted, while Nigel made a pretext for his visit. He was just rising to go, when the door opened and Sir Rudolf entered.

  “Ah, Strangeways, very glad to see you up and about again.” He shook hands vigorously. The dark, lively eyes held Nigel for a moment, then turned to Hesione on the sofa, with the album still open beside her. “Well, my dear,” he said, and bent down to kiss her. Then, to Nigel, “Will you excuse me a moment while I wash my hands?”

  “Actually, I was just going.”

  “You must stay a little longer. Hess, you persuade him.”

  “Please, Nigel. You haven’t even finished your drink.”

  “Well, a few minutes more,” he said, thinking that it would put sir Rudolf on his guard if he rushed out straight away. His host had already left the room. The invitation to stay on had been thrown out so lightly, it was absurd to imagine—yet there was the open album, and the dark eye which missed so little.

  Sir Rudolf was back in a couple of minutes. As he poured himself a drink, Nigel noticed that a small ink stain, which had been on his index finger, was gone. Sir Rudolf had washed his hands then. No time for that, and a trunk call; of course, there was always that discreet, anonymous-looking secretary.

  “I see you’ve been looking at photographs of Stourford Hall,” said his host pleasantly.

  There was nothing for it now, thought Nigel, but to set an attacking field and try a few bumpers.

  “Yes. We’re interested in the place just now.”

  “We? The police?”

  Nigel nodded. Hesione’s eyes opened wide.

  “Oh, Nigel,” she said reproachfully.

  “Yes. I’m sorry. I was pumping you a bit! I’ve got a secretive mind—it loses me all my friends, sooner or later.”

  “But what’s the mystery about?” she asked. “We don’t own the house now.”

  “That’s the trouble. We can’t find out who does.”

  Sir Rudolf broke in, at his most incisive. “Let’s get this straight. Why are you interested in the place?”

  “Because,” said Nigel, unleashing his first bumper, “there’s a good deal of evidence been accumulating that the kidnaped boy, Bert Hale, was taken there.”

  Hesione gave a little gasp. Her husband, putting down his drink, asked, “Surely the police have investigated the possibility, then?”

  “Oh yes. They went all over the place this morning. Found nothing. But of course they didn’t know about the priest’s hole.”

  “Well, my dear chap,” said Sir Rudolf, “hadn’t you better ring Scotland Yard straight away? If there’s the remotest chance that the boy’s been hidden there? Use my telephone.”

  Nigel experienced the sensation of a fast bowler whose most intimidating delivery has been hooked off the batsman’s eyebrows to the boundary. Almost, at this moment, he believed that his suspicions of Sir Rudolf must be delusions. But he remembered what had happened to him last time he let down his hair in this house. It was too risky for the only person who knew about the priest’s hole at Stourford Hall to go to the telephone: he might never reach it.

  “Time enough for that,” he said, wondering the next instant if he had seen, or only imagined, a faint relaxation in Sir Rudolf’s pose. “Do you know the present owner personally?”

  “No. It was all done through agents and solicitors.”

  “Rudie just wanted to get rid of the place,” said Hesione.

  “The solicitors are apparently being rather sticky. You know what these needle-noses are like. Of course, the police can compel them to divulge the purchaser’s name, if they prove good reason. But—”

  “My dear fellow, I’d tell you like a shot, if I knew it. But I was interested in his money, not his name. A fair price was offered, and I was advised to accept it. Look here, do have a drink, your glass is empty.”

  Nigel accepted, rose with alacrity to help himself. There were about fifteen bottles on the tray, and they couldn’t all be drugged. But Sir Rudolf had made no attempt to rise; he remained in his habitual posture, sprawling back against one end of the settee, his hands clasped high on his chest. Nigel through wryly—he’s got me on the jump: ridiculous; Durbar would no more pour out a drugged drink than he’d personally conduct the negotiations for selling a house. He’s the Big Boy, the Disposer Supreme, the Prime Mover.

  “Did Alec Gray ever stay with you up there?”

  “Did he, Hess? We had so many visitors. But it was before his time, I should say.”

  There was the barest perceptible unsheathing of a claw in the last phrase. Hesione looked quickly at her husband, and away, flushing, as she answered, “No. He never came there. But, Nigel, surely you’re not suggesting—?”

  “Did either of you ever tell him about the secret room there?”

  “No,” said Hesione without hesitation. “Rudie had a fancy for keeping it a secret.”

  “What about the caretakers? your old nurse, and her nephew? Are they reliable?”

  Hands locked behind his head, Sir Rudolf lay back on th
e settee, utterly relaxed. “As far as I now. Old Eva is a bit potty, but I don’t see her kidnaping anyone. And the nephew had good references, I believe. I made an arrangement through the soliciters that she should stay on; and I understand the new owner may keep the nephew on as house man when he moves in. No, I honestly don’t see how either of them could be mixed up in this affair.”

  There was no getting at this man, enthroned on his own superb self-confidence, cushioned by his army of underlings, secretaries, agents, contact men. Nigel found himself succumbing to the hypnotic normality of it all—Hesione’s beauty and forthright manner, the exquisite yet homely room where they were talking, Sir Rudolf’s friendly, resonant voice. One seemed to be insulated here from the ruder shocks of life—from kidnapings, violence, treason, all the raw realities.

  “Poor old Nanny,” Hesione was saying. “She always treated you as if you were still in the nursery.”

  “Yes. They get that way. Bossy. Proprietorial. Can’t afford to let anyone grow up—hot with the stake they’ve put into childhood. Permanently unfulfilled mothers, I suppose.”

  Hesione winced a little, but her husband went on ruminatively, not noticing. “Of course, Eva always was a bit potty about some things. Full of old wives’ tales and superstitions. She wouldn’t kill a spider. She thought a crack in the ceiling meant the Devil was trying to get in. Never put butter on her bread, only jam. I’ve seen her push buttered bread aside, and she refused to brush her hair when it rained because of lightning, and she’d never touch a box of paints because her little sister had poisoned herself with paints thirty years ago or some such.”

  16

  The Battle of Stourford Hall

  “WHAT’LL WE DO with the nipper?” said the third man.

  “Tie a stone round his effing neck and sling the effer in the effing Thames,” suggested Fred.

  “Eff that!” the hulking Clydesider roared. “Big Boy’s orders—got to take him with us. Where’s me glim?”

  “In yer sky, yer silly berk.”

  “What I say, I don’t like it.”

  “You got a touch of the seconds? The Big Boy’ll steer us. And two grand to carve when the job’s done. It’s all sewn up.”