A Medal For Murder (48 page)

‘Yes.’

He pushed a finger under the bandage, to scratch his temple. ‘I don’t remember the accident. The nurse told me someone knocked me off my bike and drove off, but that another cyclist stopped to help.’

‘Matron tells me you refuse offers from the Geerts and from Mrs Gould to take care of you.’

‘I just want to go back to my own room,’ he said stubbornly, refusing to meet my eye.

‘Then it is not because you would feel awkward at being in Mr Milner’s house?’

Now he was on his guard. He glanced at me cautiously before looking away and taking a great interest in the colour of the paint on the wall. ‘I don’t want to be obliged to anyone. I can take care of myself.’

‘But you can’t. That’s the point. Thirteen steps up to that room of yours, with the stained suit hanging on the back of the door, and Rodney’s silk scarf thrown across the bed.’

He stared at me, his lips parting, like a frightened animal in a corner. Then he clamped his lips tight shut.
But he had given himself away. I said, ‘It must have been quite a rush after the performance, picking up the props. Not that you had much to collect, and really it should have been Lucy who took the dagger that was to have been used in the scene where you, as Willie Price, found Mr Price hanging from a beam. But you took that dagger, didn’t you, Dylan?’

‘I can’t remember what I took. I must have picked up Rodney’s scarf by mistake.’

‘Or to cover the mark on your shirt. You had no time to clean yourself up, what with Monsieur Geerts insisting he walk you home, probably complaining about his wife.’

He jumped on this too quickly. ‘Monsieur Geerts was with me all the time.’

‘He found you alone in the gents, being sick. What made you sick?’

‘Something disagreed with me, I expect.’

‘Was that something murder?’

My words hit home. If it were possible, his pale face turned a lighter shade. He was small-boned, delicate almost, a creature half formed, and deeply vulnerable. He did not answer me; ran his tongue over his lips, gulped, but did not speak.

‘You wonder where your cufflink got to. The police did find one, in the gutter near Mr Milner’s motorcar. You will be hard pressed with your arm in a sling and a broken foot to go round tidying up evidence. And it’s too late.’

‘I need to get back to normal, that’s all.’

‘But you never will. The small stain on your good suit is hardly noticeable. I have asked for it to be analysed. I think it will turn out to be blood.’ He gripped the arm
of his chair tightly, but said nothing. ‘Your shirt was also stained, wasn’t it? You had just one dress shirt, and two collars for it. One of them is still in the washstand cupboard. You burned the shirt front because it was bloody, and tossed the collar on the fireback for good measure. You tore up the rest of the shirt and put it in the bag for the cleaner to use as dusters. She’ll think it odd. Starched material does not make a good duster.’

‘It was muddy. My shirt was muddy, from taking Lucy to the tower.’

‘Mud washes. You would not have thrown away a good shirt. And the police have the cufflink that was found by Mr Milner’s motor. Someone will recognise it as yours.’

He pushed his wheelchair to the other side of the room, and flung open the door. For a moment, I thought he would make a dash for it, but he was checking that no one was listening.

Slowly, he wheeled himself back. ‘Lucy’s grandfather killed Milner. The nurse told me he confessed. Everyone knows.’

‘But we know differently, don’t we, Dylan? You see, you and Monsieur Geerts are the two people who had no one to vouch for them. He is in the clear now. You are not. Far from it.’

‘But Captain Wolfendale . . .’

‘The captain knew it was all up with him. He had reasons of his own for wanting to bring an end to his life.’

And part of that reason was me, I thought. I was the one who had unmasked him. I was the one who told him about Dan Root. I was the one who let him know his secret was no longer safe.

It was not cricket, but I bowled Rodney underhand. ‘Have the police taken your fingerprints yet?’

‘No.’

‘Oh they will. You see, there is that little question mark over the captain’s confession. Because the prints on the dagger are not his.’

Finally, he gave in. He lowered his bandaged head and cradled it in his hand.

He moaned but did not speak, so I pressed my point. ‘You left the theatre by the rear entrance, where the loading and unloading goes on. You murdered Mr Milner, and then you went back through that same entrance and up to the dressing rooms. You thought you’d be missed if you ran off, although I expect you wanted to. The white silk scarf that belonged to Rodney, you took it when you went back to the dressing room because you saw blood on your shirt. There’ll probably be a trace of blood on the scarf. Police scientists are very clever these days.’

His lips quivered. He looked wretched. His voice came out as a whisper.

‘You can’t prove any of this.’

‘No? Fingerprints, traces of blood, the torn-up shirt. And someone will recognise that cufflink. It was very convenient that you were asked to provide an alibi for Monsieur Geerts. It gave you one for yourself, but it won’t hold water.’

None of the things I had challenged him with would stand up in a court of law, not if he had a good barrister. To get to the truth, I must make him confess. It was touch and go. Lucy would be the last weapon in my armoury.

‘You killed Milner with the captain’s dagger. Lucy
had brought it for you to do just that.’

‘No! Not Lucy. Don’t say Lucy. She’d forgotten all about the dagger. I got it as a prop when I was at her house, weeks ago.’

‘Then you had better tell me. If you tell me exactly what happened, perhaps I will be able to help.’

He brightened just a smidgen, like a man who has been told he has weeks to live and then the prognosis is lengthened to months.

‘You mean if it was self-defence? Because that’s what it was, truly.’

‘Tell me then.’

After a long time staring at his bandaged foot, he said, ‘Mr Milner was leaving the bar. I was waiting for Lucy and Alison in the doorway. Mr Milner said, “Don’t hang about, lad.” He said, “
I’m
taking Lucy home. I’m fetching the motor round.” He went sauntering off, in that way he had . . .’

I could picture Milner’s style of walking very well, like a man who owned the world, a man used to getting his way. ‘Go on.’

‘Lucy had asked me to help her. I knew if Mr Milner barged in he would manage to get his way. Lucy relied on me. I thought if I can do something to his motor engine, break something, he would have to attend to that while we dodged him. I had the knife in my pocket – that was the only prop I had to pick up, that and my Sunday school bible. I knew he parked on Cheltenham Parade, so I went out the back way. But I don’t know anything about cars, how to damage them so they won’t run. So I went for the wheels.’

‘And?’

‘It’s not as easy as you think to rip at a tyre. I was still
at it when he came running at me like a mad man, diving on me, pulling the knife from me. I was scared. I ran up the alley, to get away. He came after me, saying he’d show me who was boss. We struggled. He pulled me into a doorway, I think so we would not be seen, so no one could come to help me. He was trying to cut my face. He did, just here.’ He pointed to the spot under his chin that I thought had looked like a shaving cut when I had questioned him that Saturday morning.

‘Go on.’

‘I thought he would cut my throat. Because he is taller than me, when I twisted and turned and tried to get free of his hold, I must have forced him to turn the knife towards himself. He went still, and sort of slithered down. He lay there, in the doorway, the knife in his chest. I leaned down. There was a trickle of blood. I knew he was dead.’

‘What did you do?’

‘I went back into the theatre, to the dressing room. I didn’t know whether I had blood on me or not. I picked up Rodney’s white scarf, just as he was coming along the corridor. The girls were in their dressing room. I could hear them talking. Rodney said something like, “I knew you had your eye on that scarf. You can have it if you want.” Then I made a dash for the washroom. I was sick. Mr Geerts came in. He thought I was poorly.’

I stared at him. Three people had confessed to murdering Mr Milner. Dan Root, the captain, and now the mild and lovelorn Dylan Ashton.

A nurse put her head around the door. ‘Matron said to ask, would you both like tea?’

‘Yes. Thank you.’ I did not want tea, but it would
give me longer with Dylan, time to think.

‘Does she know?’ Dylan asked.

‘Do you mean matron?’

‘Lucy. Does she know I killed Mr Milner?’ He was crying, like a little boy. ‘I was only trying to help Lucy. I never meant to kill him. But it’s murder all the same, isn’t it? I was going to say what I’d done, but I let Mr Geerts walk me home. When Lucy came to be cycled up to the tower, I just did it, as if I were some machine without a mind of my own.’

‘Lucy does not know. No one does.’

‘Not the police?’

‘No.’

Dylan’s mouth fell open. He looked like a cod writhing and gasping in the bottom of a boat.

My dint of pity came not in a drop but in an avalanche. Dylan Ashton would have to live with this forever.

As I left the infirmary grounds, I recited a mantra.
Must grow a second skin. Must grow a second skin
.

But not today.

 
 

It was early evening when I returned to my house in Headingley. I parked my car in a converted stable that belongs to the big house just up my road. I stayed inside the garage for a few moments, not wishing to be spotted by the neighbour who wants to draw me into conversation about dandelions in the professor’s garden.

When the coast was clear, I walked the few yards home. On the wall to the left of the front door was fixed the neat house name on its block of English oak:
Pipistrelle Lodge
.

Mrs Sugden was sitting at the kitchen table, absorbed in the
Evening News
. After we exchanged greetings, I asked, ‘Who put up the sign young Thomas Sykes made?’

‘Mr Sykes came round this morning, asking after you. He said he might as well put it in place.’

‘Ah. And how did he seem?’

‘His usual self,’ she said enigmatically, folding the newspaper carefully.

So he had decided not to take his ball home over my failure to pursue Meriel Jamieson and have her boiled in oil.

Over a cup of tea, I caught up with the post. One item was a confidential hand-written note from the manager of Marshall & Snelgrove. He asked for help in detecting a suspected shoplifter or shoplifters who were costing the store a great deal of money. Mr Moony had recommended me.

I passed the letter to Mrs Sugden. ‘What do you make of this?’

She adjusted her spectacles and read it, twice. ‘The blighters. Makes me sick that crooks get away with such villainy, when honest folk have to pay every inch of their way.’

The following morning, I discussed the letter with Mr Sykes. He was willing enough to take on the task, but pointed out an obvious truth.

‘It will be very well me going into furnishings and male attire departments. I’d be a sore thumb in ladies’ wear and haberdashery.’

Mrs Sugden was outside, emptying the teapot in the garden. I looked at Sykes, he looked at me, and nodded.

When Mrs Sugden joined us, I asked, ‘How would it suit you to work with Mr Sykes in spotting shoplifters – to be a store detective for a short time?’

She grew in height. Her shoulders moved back several inches. ‘It would suit me very well.’

I pulled out a chair for her. ‘Mr Sykes will lead this operation.’

‘Now the thing is, Mrs Sugden . . .’ He propounded his theories about how to approach the work. ‘And when you collar a thief, he or she will always squeal out a tale to break your heart. But it must not wash. These are criminals. We will be in the store to enforce the
law. We must give no quarter.’

‘Absolutely not,’ Mrs Sugden said, with utter conviction. ‘A thief is a thief, a villain is a villain.’