Close Quarters (6 page)

He underrated Melchester Close. The first witness was already on her way up the garden path.

Mrs. Judd was a small but immensely penetrative sort of woman, dressed in greens and daffodil yellows, which seemed to suggest springtime and heyday, rather than the autumn of existence; there was, in fact, very little of the sere and yellow leaf about Mrs. Judd, and her speech was as abrupt as her movements.

‘Which is the detective from Scotland Yard?' she demanded, almost before she was inside the door.

Hazlerigg and Pollock introduced themselves and indicated that they both claimed that honour.

‘I have an important statement to make. I am Mrs. Judd, widow of the late Canon Judd.' (This went with rather a defiant look at the Dean.)

‘In connection with the death of Appledown?'

‘Murder,' said Mrs. Judd with some relish. ‘Face facts, Inspector – murder.'

Pollock glanced hastily at his notebook, and Hazlerigg said impassively, ‘Well, ma'am?'

‘I sit,' said Mrs. Judd, ‘in my little front drawing-room in a chair in the window and watch people going backwards and forwards. I see everybody, and if a stranger comes past I ask questions and soon find out who he is. It is very providential that the only pillar-box in the Close should be placed at the corner nearest to my little house.' She said this rather as an elderly tigress might comment on the proximity of the only drinking-pool to the mouth of her den.

‘Nothing escapes me,' she went on. ‘I observe everything. Especially now that I have my telescope.'

‘Your what?' said Hazlerigg, shaken out of his composure.

‘My nephew, Albert, who is in the Royal Marines – I call him a nephew, but he's really a great-nephew – spent some days with me in the spring, and he kindly fixed it for me. It has rather a limited field of vision, of course, extending from the pillar-box on the near left to the front door of dear Canon Malthus' house on the far left. I could see into two other houses, were it not for the west end of the cathedral.'

Hazlerigg had recovered by this time. He agreed with Mrs. Judd that this arrangement indicated a lack of foresight on the part of the builders of the cathedral, and asked her what she had seen on the previous evening.

‘It's not so easy after dark, you know. More interesting, but not so easy.' She collected her thoughts, pursed her lips demurely, and then said: ‘Well, first the dear Dean coming back to his house at a few minutes after half-past six. Then, at least ten minutes later I saw Appledown come from the cathedral, cross the road in front of his house, and go in. Canon Prynne was coming past at the same time, so he must have seen him too. Dear Canon Bloss left dear Canon Trumpington's house a little before half-past seven and went back to his own house. A few minutes later dear Canon Trumpington came out too, and went into Canon Beech-Thompson's house. Between twenty-five and twenty to eight Parvin went out. Oh, I forgot to tell you; he had only come back at seven o'clock. I have no doubt he went straight from the service to some low public-house. Soon after half-past seven he came out again and went along to Appledown's house.'

‘You're sure that was where he went?' said Hazlerigg.

‘Of course I'm sure. I can use my eyes,' snapped Mrs. Judd. ‘He hung around the house for a few minutes, like the shady character he is, and then went in.'

‘What time would that be?'

‘It was a few minutes before a quarter to eight – for I have my own dinner then – so that is all I can tell you. I heard the boys come past at eight o'clock. They might tell you something – sharp, inquisitive little creatures.'

Her mission accomplished, Mrs. Judd got up and made for the door.

‘I'm sure that if you attend carefully to what I've told you,' she said, ‘you'll have no difficulty in catching the murderer.'

‘I'm sure we're very grateful to you for your kind assistance and observation,' murmured Hazlerigg.

Mrs. Judd paused at the door and turned round.

‘That was all that I saw,' she said, and her voice was so altered that it startled the three men. ‘But I've still got good hearing. I can use my ears, and I heard things, wicked things, wicked whispers. Late that night. Much later, footsteps creeping, doors creaking. It's been coming for a long time. I'm very sensitive to these things.'

As suddenly as she had come she was gone.

‘Good gracious,' said Hazlerigg mildly.

‘I'm afraid,' said the Dean weightily, ‘I'm very much afraid that she is getting just a little bit – you know what I mean – odd lately. It's living alone, no proper company or companionship – has that effect on a lot of people.'

‘I wonder how much reliance we can place on all this,' said Pollock helplessly. ‘I really thought we were beginning to get something definite.'

‘Even if untrue,' pronounced Hazlerigg judicially, ‘that statement of hers is likely to prove very useful, if it only starts a hare or two. And once the hares start running'—he raised an imaginary gun to his shoulder—'Bang! Bang! Over they go.'

He looked, thought the Dean, like a jolly red-faced farmer out for a day's sport.

‘When I first heard of Appledown's decease,' said Dr. Smallhorn, joining the tips of his fingers and looking severely at Pollock, ‘I made it my business to institute a discreet inquiry amongst my boys. I did this for a reason. It is my firm intention that whatever investigations may be set on foot, the scholars under my care shall not be subjected to unpleasant cross-examination.'

Pollock refrained from pointing out, as he might have done, that in the last resort the majesty of the law might override even the wishes of a headmaster. He himself had a profound mistrust of boys as witnesses and was quite prepared (for the time being) to collect his information at second hand.

‘You should understand,' pursued the headmaster, ‘that on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays we have what we call “late practice” nights. Full choir practice takes place in cathedral, of course, but these evening practices are for the boys alone. Rather late, you will say, but we find it difficult to fit everything in.'

Pollock had the impression that the headmaster had forgotten for the moment that he was addressing a police officer and not a prospective parent.

‘On these evenings the choir, after finishing Evensong at six-thirty, return to the school for an evening meal of cocoa and bread and buttAfter this orgy it appeared that the choir marched over to Mickie's house for practice, arriving there at about seven o'clock, returning to the school on the stroke of eight to retire to their virtuous slumbers. As the headmaster rolled forth his leisurely periods, Pollock made an occasional note and allowed his eye to rove. The photographs of classical statuary on the wall and a modern filing cabinet in the corner. A methodically arranged desk – on top of it, photographs of boys, three calendars, and a model in compressed paper of the Duomo at Florence.

‘In the past,' Dr. Smallhorn was saying, ‘I have had to take a firm stand on the subject of the punctuality of their return. Ten hours' sleep is essential to the growing boy. I have usually found that choirmasters have little sense of time. The artistic temperament, one supposes. Mickie, however, is very good in that respect. Very good indeed. You will appreciate, therefore, that I can say with absolute accuracy that Appledown was still alive at one minute to eight yesterday evening. The boys passed him on their way back from practice.'

Pollock came back to mental attention with a jerk.

‘Passed him? Let me see. He was going towards the main gate then?'

‘He was not, as I understand it, going anywhere; when I used the word “passed,” I intended to imply that the boys were moving whilst Appledown was static. In point of fact he was standing on his own doorstep, apparently engaged in pinning a slip of paper to his doorpost. As to what the paper contained I cannot, of course, speak—'

‘Thank you,' said Pollock, ‘we know about the paper.' He added casually, ‘I wonder if you could let me know roughly what you were doing yesterday evening?'

‘With the greatest of pleasure,' said Dr. Smallhorn. ‘I did not attend Evensong. Morgan, our junior verger, also does odd jobs about the school and garden, and I was talking to him for the greater part of that time and watching him dismantling and cleaning the dining-room stove. As I recollect, we discussed calceolarias. Then the boys came back (that would be about half-past six), and I superintended their tea-time. At five minutes to seven, they left for Dr. Mickie's, and I sat here in my study, correcting Latin exercises until they returned.'

‘No one disturbed you during that time,' suggested Pollock.

‘Fortunately, no,' replied Dr. Smallhorn courteously. But Pollock, as he took his leave, was wondering whether or not it would prove so fortunate; of course, it was a ground-floor window – it might have been open. He went in search of Morgan.

‘Talk!' said Morgan. ‘He'd talk the hind leg off a donkey. Him and his calceolarias. Still, I've known worse in that line of business, and the boys like him. Yes, he's quite right; I raked out the stove after the boys left for evening service. That would be about twenty past five, and so soon as it had cooled down I got to work on the back damper joint. One of the screws had come adrift and the damper was jammed open, and that made the stove draw too hot and used up a lot of coal, which wasn't to the liking of the doctor, and seeing as he has to account for every penny he spends to the Chapter you can hardly blame him, can you? I worked at that joint for the best part of an hour, and whilst I was working he was talking in a haughty cultural way – not that I can remember very precisely what he said, but now that you mention it I do recollect the calceolarias. Then the boys came back and went home. I have my tea and supper together – high tea you might call it. And when I'd finished that I set to mending my wireless – never happier than when I'm patching or fiddling with something. My front window – you'll see when we go indoors – looks right into the doctor's study across the road, and all the time that I was working at my old wireless I could see him doing the same – working, I mean, at his desk. I often watch him in the evenings correcting the boys' books, and I can tell whether they've done well at their work or not … that surprises you! When a boy does well the doctor never lifts his pencil off the book but writes slow and smooth. But if he spots a mistake up comes his pencil and … jab! Down on the paper, like as if he was digging a hole in it. So just by watching his pencil I can almost mark the work myself.'

‘Do you mean,' asked Pollock, ‘that you can't actually see Dr. Smallhorn from your front window?'

‘I told you,' said Morgan, aggrieved. ‘I can see his hand and his pencil. What more do you want?' To this Pollock could find no suitable answer.

6

POLLOCK ASKS QUESTIONS

Sergeant Pollock was walking back towards the deanery when he observed two girls; one was fat and the other was thin, and they were sitting side by side on the precinct wall. As he came up he heard one say urgently to the other, ‘Don't be such a sneak.' To which the other answered in a piercing undertone, ‘It's not sneaking, it's murder. Murder's different.'

Both then stopped talking and glared at Pollock who tried at the same time, and unsuccessfully, to make it appear that he had not heard what they were saying, that he had no idea what they were talking about, and that even if he had heard he would have been far too well mannered to have taken any notice of it.

He was spared further embarrassment in this complicated deception by the stout one, who said, ‘I'm Miss Bloss. This is Miss Prynne. I take it you're the GLD. We were wondering what those soap-boxes and flower-pots were for?'

‘Not me. I wasn't. Speak for yourself,' muttered Miss Prynne, who appeared to be in the worst of tempers.

‘We supposed that they must be covering up some footprints,' continued Miss Bloss placidly.

‘Well,' said Pollock guardedly.

‘We only wondered,' said Miss Bloss, with a glance at Miss Prynne which met with no response, ‘why you should trouble to cover up Dr. Mickie's footprints?'

‘Sneak,' said Miss Prynne audibly.

‘And what makes you think they are Dr. Mickie's?'

‘Well, of course they are. Didn't you know that?' said Miss Bloss with such round-eyed surprise that Pollock nearly laughed. ‘Look at them! They come straight from his house to the organ shed – and anyway, he's always fiddling about with that blessed old engine. Besides, he's the only man I know who runs with his feet straight in front of one another – like a horse on a tightrope,' she added graphically. ‘We've watched him sprinting across that grass hundreds of times when he's been late for service, haven't we, dear?'

Miss Prynne said nothing, but annihilated a hurrying ant viciously with the heel of her broad and sensible shoe.

Pollock, studying the line of the prints, noted this idiosyncrasy for the first time. It was quite true; they were not like an ordinary set of prints which alternate, first to the right and then to the left – they lay in a straight line. He admitted to himself that this point had escaped him, and being a generous and fair-minded young man he decided to thank his informant.

‘Sharp eyes you've got, Miss Bloss,' he said genially. ‘If you notice anything else of that sort be sure to tell me, won't you?' He passed on his way.

‘You've made a conquest,' said Miss Prynne acidly.

Sergeant Pollock, as has been explained, had been on his way back to the deanery, but now he altered his course. It occurred to him that he would like a word with the organist and choirmaster of Melchester Cathedral.

He found Mr. and Mrs. Mickie, as it were, “drawn up to receive him” in the dining-room. Pollock was, in fact, peculiarly sensitive to “atmosphere” in the people he interviewed, and he would have needed to have been very dull indeed not to have noticed the sense of restraint and anticipation which greeted him as he came into the room.

He introduced himself briefly and said in his most noncommittal voice, ‘I have a few questions to ask you, Dr. Mickie, as a matter of routine. I dare say you can guess in what connection.'

‘Yes,' said Dr. Mickie.

‘Well, if you wouldn't mind … let me see. You were at Evensong, of course, and saw Appledown there—'

‘When I left the cathedral after locking up the organ,' said Dr. Mickie, ‘Appledown was still in the vestry – I pass the door on the way out. That would be quite normal, since he always stayed behind for some time after everyone else had gone – counting the collection, tidying up, and turning out the lights, and so on. When I left the cathedral I came straight back to my house—'

‘When you say straight,' interrupted Pollock, ‘I suppose that your quickest way would be along the path to the north-west gate – or do you find the north-east gate quicker?'

‘There's very little in it. Of course the quickest of all is to come straight across the grass, but I don't take that way often because it leads to an awkward scramble over the wall.' He started to laugh, failed, and cleared his throat.

‘Of course,' said Pollock. ‘Well, now, which way did you come this time?'

‘The north-west gate. I remember I had a letter to post. I must have been home by twenty-five to seven. We have a very early meal on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, because of choir practice. The boys arrived over here on the stroke of seven and left a minute or two before eight.'

‘And were you here during the whole of that time?' said Pollock, turning to Mrs. Mickie, who looked a little surprised, and said, ‘I think I slipped down to the town for a few minutes … yes, that must have been yesterday – I had a book to change at Smiths. But I wasn't away for very long. Our maid has the evening off on Tuesday, and I usually make the coffee myself. We have a cup together when the boys have gone. Then Charles goes to his study to finish—'

‘I think Dr. Mickie had better tell me about that himself.'

‘Why,' said Mickie, ‘there's really nothing very much to tell. We had coffee in the drawing-room, and then, at about a quarter- past eight, I removed myself to my study – no, not actually composing, it's a little book on plainsong that I'm writing. I rejoined my wife in the drawing-room at about ten o'clock, and shortly after that we went to bed.'

Mrs. Mickie concurred in this statement with a nod, and there was a short interval of silence whilst Pollock debated tactics.

He felt that what he had heard was not all true. Most of it was true – the arrival and departure of the choir were fixed times and capable of being checked. But there was a constraint in Mickie's manner which told him that he had not heard the whole truth. He tried a direct approach.

‘What shoes were you wearing yesterday?' he asked.

The tension was unmistakable now.

‘I have two pairs of black shoes and one pair of brown shoes. I wear the black pairs alternately during the week.'

‘So that the pair you wore yesterday—?'

‘They would have been cleaned this morning and put in the cupboard in the hall.'

‘I should like to see them, please.'

In silence Mickie led the way out, and after some fumbling under the stairs produced a pair of well-worn black shoes. They were spotlessly clean.

‘A well-trained maid,' observed Pollock.

‘As a matter of fact,' said Mrs. Mickie sharply, ‘I cleaned them myself. I try to save Eva as much trouble as possible. We've only the one maid, you know, and she has enough work to do about the house.'

Very reasonable, again thought Pollock. But he also knew a tag about ladies protesting too much. He decided to advance his siege-works a yard or so nearer to the fortress.

‘Someone,' he said, ‘ran across the cathedral lawn last night in the direction of your house.'

‘Well,' said Mickie steadily.

‘It has been pointed out to me,' said Pollock, ‘that these prints have one peculiarity. The runner who made them has a habit – a rather unusual habit – of throwing his feet down one in front of the other in a straight line. I may add in fairness also that though the prints are not distinct enough to be accurately measured they might easily have been made by a shoe of this type and size.' He weighed the black shoe carefully in his hand and looking at it rather than at Mickie said, ‘You are quite sure that you haven't forgotten anything that happened last night? You wouldn't care to add to your statement at all?'

There was a moment of silence, and then Mickie said, ‘No, I can add nothing to what I have told you.'

Pollock replaced the shoe and took a thoughtful departure.

When he got back to the deanery his uncle was out.

The house was quiet, but from the kitchen quarters at the back came a rumble of conversation, in which male voices predominated. Pollock moved quietly down the passage, guided by the sound, and found himself outside the kitchen door. Opening it he peeped in.

‘After all we'd been through,' Hubbard was saying, ‘I can't hardly say as I was surprised. When it comes to messages being writ up by night on a man's own garden wall – well, you can imagine what I felt; a man has his feelings, and messages on the garden wall are wounding to same. Huge, staring letters, a foot high – Letters of Blood.'

On this dramatic note he paused, and the two young men at the kitchen table (clad in dirty motor-cycling coats and with faces like intelligent Cairn terriers) nodded pleasantly and scribbled hard. At this moment the house-maid, who had been an enthralled listener to Hubbard's recital, caught sight of Pollock, and the meeting broke up in disorder.

‘Now, boys,' said Pollock, ‘that's hardly playing the game, is it, questioning a man's servants behind his back?'

‘I was granting an interview to the press,' said Hubbard loftily. ‘There's nothing to be ashamed of in that, I suppose?'

Pollock turned to the intruders.

‘You ought to have come to us, you know; we'll always give you a statement.' At the sound of the word statement the eyes of both reporters gleamed, and two pencils were poised. ‘Now you come round to the Bear Hotel this evening and you shall have all the facts. It'll do you no good pestering these people, so run along like good chaps. They don't know anything, anyway – you shall have everything this evening.'

He shepherded them out of the back door, talking hard, and took the precaution of seeing them clear off the premises before he returned to the study, where he found that the Dean had returned.

‘Hubbard,' he said, when Pollock told him, “has been presuming for years on the fact that he is the only man in Melchester who really understands chrysanthemums. Some day he will go too far.'

Since Hazlerigg had not yet returned, Pollock set forth once more on his round of interrogation. The next on his list was Vicar Choral Halliday. His house appeared to be slightly tidier than it had been the previous day, and since Biddy had by this time made up her mind that he was not an insurance salesman, hawker, or circular, he was admitted at once. Halliday was with his sister in the drawing-room, and with a good deal of heart-searching and mutual prompting they produced a schedule of their movements on the previous evening. Halliday had come straight back from cathedral, and had then, as was his custom, spent a few minutes at his private devotions, after which he had helped his sister to unpack and they had sat down to dinner at seven o'clock. Seven sharp – perhaps a little before, as the Foxes were coming to play bridge later in the evening and they wanted to get tidied up before they arrived. After dinner Miss Halliday was upstairs tidying up, whilst Halliday set out the card-table. The only exact time he could fix was when he had been talking to Biddy in the hall, and they had both heard eight o'clock strike. Shortly after – at about ten past eight, say – the Foxes had arrived, and they had stayed until about half-past ten.

Pollock, who had already detected that the critical moment in the affair was eight o'clock, asked for further details, and Biddy was called in. She was able to add some valuable evidence. She had been in the kitchen washing up, and had thought she had heard a bell ring. Fearing it might be the Foxes arrived before they were due, she had tied on her best apron and hurried out into the hall. However, she must have been mistaken, because when she opened the front door there was no one there. It was then that Mr. Halliday had come out into the hall and they had heard eight o'clock striking.

Pollock asked, ‘Could you see Appledown's front door?'

‘No,' said Halliday, ‘our own door opens out to the left, and neither of us went outside.'

‘But you could see down the south side of the cathedral. Can you remember if anybody crossed the lawn or went down the path whilst you were standing by the open front door?'

Neither Biddy nor Halliday had seen anyone. Pollock thought rapidly.

If Smallhorn's timing was correct, then Appledown had been at his front door a minute before eight, yet at eight o'clock Halliday and Biddy had commanded a clear view of the south side of the cathedral and had not seen him. Therefore, he must have turned left outside his front gate. Why, then, had Mrs. Judd not seen him? Of course! She was having dinner – just at the one time when she might have been useful.

But if Appledown was heading in that direction he might have been going to see Parvin. According to Mrs. Judd's evidence Parvin had been at Appledown's house sometime between seven-thirty and eight, and possibly he was returning the visit. Anyway, Parvin was clearly the next person to see.

The second verger Pollock recognised as the smaller of the two he had noticed in cathedral on the previous evening. He was a small, dark, rather unprepossessing man with a face like an intelligent rat, and it did not need his speech to tell Pollock that he was a native of the principality. He greeted the detective effusively and showed him into a shabby and overcrowded sitting-room. When he had seated his guest safely on a tubby red plush sofa he shut the door (thereby partially excluding the ruling aroma of stale cabbage) and placed himself at the disposal of the law.

Pollock withdrew his gaze with difficulty from the leer of a dropsical kitten whose portrait adorned the southern wall of the Parvin living-room, and put his cautious opening query.

‘What did I do last night, you are wanting to know,' said Parvin. ‘Well, and that's not such a very great time back to remember.'

Marking time, thought Pollock uncharitably.

‘I finished my duties in the cathedral at half-past six and then I went along to meet a friend in the town.' He looked a little embarrassed. ‘I won't deceive you, Sergeant Pollock – it was a public hostelry that I went to; I like a small half pint in the evening to clear the cobwebs out of my brain, as they say.'