Comes a Stranger (29 page)

“Thinking of Mr. Broast as a possible victim, rather takes us away from suspecting him of the murders.”

“It's nothing but guess work and speculation all round so far,” declared Major Harley. “I'm afraid we've got no further. Look at the time, too. We shall have to make inquiries in Paris. They may be able to give us an idea whether Virtue did actually disappear there, whether that's a fact or whether it was a false trail laid to divert suspicion from what happened here. Not that the French police bother their heads too much about what happens to foreigners. They are a bit inclined to think that if tourists poke their noses into all the most disreputable holes in Paris they can find, then they've only got themselves to thank for what happens. Well, Owen, what's the next step?”

“Well, sir,” said Bobby hesitantly, “about those forget-me-nots…”

“Well, what about them? Are they the next step?”

“Yes, sir, if you agree,” Bobby answered.

Late as it was when Bobby left the village police station, he did not go straight back to the inn and his bed but made his way first to the Lodge, where he wished to leave a note for Olive so that the developments just planned by himself and Major Harley should not come as a surprise to her. For to Bobby's suggestions the Major had now given a somewhat reluctant consent.

“Private property,” he had said gloomily. “Common trespass, that's what it is you want, Owen. Police have no more rights than anyone else, only they've got to be more careful. If they look over the wall ten to one it's called stealing a sheep.”

“Yes, sir,” agreed Bobby sympathetically, more than sympathetically indeed, “but still trespass isn't an offence in itself. The only remedy is an action for damages, and we shan't do any damage to speak of.”

“We can be ordered off the grounds,” said the Major in a depressed voice. “Nice fools we shall look.”

However, in the end Bobby had received authority to make the few arrangements necessary, and now, after pushing the note he had written to Olive through the Lodge letter box, he was returning home to the village, the inn, and bed, when he saw standing by the side of the road a man and woman talking. Immediately the woman slipped away, as though the sound of his approaching footsteps had frightened her, and it seemed to him that on the still night air there was borne back to him a faint and distant giggle.

From the shadows in which they had been standing the man who had been her companion detached himself and came towards Bobby. Bobby saw it was Bertram Virtue. Virtue said to him:

“I was looking for you. There's something I want to say.”

“Yes,” said Bobby. “Well, what?”

“It's this,” Virtue answered, speaking very slowly and deliberately. “I've told you a cousin of mine, James A. Virtue, disappeared on a trip to Europe and we never knew what happened to him. Well, now I believe he was murdered. I believe he was murdered right here, in this village. I believe he was murdered by Broast, the man in charge of the Kayne library. I believe I can prove it.”

“Yes,” said Bobby, non-committally, though inwardly so excited his bed and his need therefor passed quite from his thoughts. “Well, better come along to the police station and make a statement. You understand, of course, you are making a serious charge? You said you had proofs?”

“There's this,” said Virtue. “James A. visited here. We've letters, the last he ever wrote, dated from here. He came specially to show Broast a
Dictes
printed by Caxton he had found. It's a valuable thing, worth real money, worth more than money if you've got the collector's bug. It was in what they call mint condition. James A. found it in a farm down Cape Cod way, Massachusetts. In James A.'s last letter, the one dated from this place, he said Broast was more than excited about it, called it the finest example of Caxton's work he had ever seen. James A. said Broast would give almost anything to get hold of it for his library. Of course, James A. wouldn't part, it meant just as much to him, more, because he was so mighty proud of having found it. Well, after that, nothing more has ever been heard of James, but the
Dictes
is in Broast's library. How did it get there?”

“Are you sure it's the same copy?” Bobby asked. “Can you prove it?”

“Yes. James A. told us. He pricked his initials on the last page.”

“How do you mean? pricked them?”

“With a pin. Pricked his initials in outline—J.A.V. You can't see them unless you hold the page up to the light.”

“Your statement is that these initials, outlined in pricks made by a pin, are on the last page of the copy of the
Dictes
now in the Kayne library?”

“Yes.”

“You would be prepared to say that on oath?”

“Yes.”

Bobby remembered the woman he had seen slipping away as he came up and that faint sound of a distant giggle borne back to him on the quiet night air. Miss Perkins, he felt certain. It looked as if Virtue had persuaded her to examine the
Dictes
in the Kayne library and ascertain that it did in fact show the private marks described. It seemed good evidence. Virtue went on:

“There's not only that. I can give a full description of the book, the names on the title page former owners wrote in. I've got a copy of the description James A. wrote out after he had found it. It meant a lot to him, the sort of thing that only happens once in a lifetime, and the only to one collector in a thousand. It meant as much to him as being asked to run for President would mean to some folk. James A. would never have parted while he was alive.”

“Sounds like the same copy,” Bobby agreed. “Mr. Broast will have to be asked to account for its possession. But I don't know that it amounts to proof of murder. It's pretty late now, Mr. Virtue, too late to do anything to-night. I think your best plan will be to draw up a full statement and let us have it first thing in the morning. It will be for the chief constable to decide what further steps to take.”

“You mean Major Harley?”

“Yes.”

“All right. I'll do that.”

“Mr. Virtue,” Bobby said gravely, “when I say a full statement, I mean it. I mean everything. I'm thinking of that story you told us about what you said you saw in the library the night of the first murder. I think that needs explaining.”

“Oh, well,” said Virtue, “that was just a yarn.”

“You mean it was a lie?” Bobby asked.

“I suppose so; nothing like talking straight, is there?” Virtue said with a little nervous laugh. “Only a lie means when you want to deceive anyone, doesn't it? and I didn't reckon that yarn would deceive anyone for long, not even British police. I just knew that book was there and I had to get to see it someway.”

“What about the broken glass of the
Glastonbury Psalter
case?”

“Yes, that was me, too,” admitted Virtue. “I used to be quite good with a catapult when I was a kid. I took a shot with one and hit that glass case square. I reckoned, in the excitement, I would get a chance to grab the
Dictes
and have a look. It was a good plan, but it didn't work. All the folk made a rush for where the sound of the smash came from,, all except one old fellow who stayed leaned right up against the case with the
Dictes
in it. His nose was so deep in some other book he was looking at, I don't think he had heard a thing. My big idea had been to force open the case—I knew it was locked, but it didn't look so strong as all that—and grab the
Dictes
. But I couldn't do a thing with him leaning right up against that very case. I asked him if he hadn't heard a smash, and what he thought was happening, and he sort of looked at me and said it was a most interesting variant and the use of signatures was characteristic and decisive, and then he put his nose back in the book and my chance was gone before I could make up my mind to slug him and do what I wanted. Anyway, he was too old to slug, and I couldn't expect him to stand for it if I yanked him out of there and smashed open the case and grabbed the
Dictes
. Even the way he had his nose in that book, he would have been bound to notice something was happening.”

“I expect so,” agreed Bobby.

“So I went away,” Virtue continued, “and tried to think up something else. Not so easy. Then I heard there was a swell Scotland Yard cop down here for the weekend. So I worked it out to frame something, so there would just have to be a search of the library, and I thought if the Scotland Yard folk were so mighty smart as they are let on to be, then they might spot it. I reckoned to be let in on the search. I reckoned if I was, I would get hold of that
Dictes
someway. Well, that didn't come off either. Oh, and I described James A. the way I did because I thought it would give Broast a jolt, if James A.'s body was hidden there and someone said they had seen it lying on the library floor.”

“Mr. Virtue,” said Bobby with more severity than he felt, for it was difficult not to experience some degree of sympathy for this ingenuous young man, “you seem to have behaved very foolishly and in a way to make us doubt your whole story. You should have brought your suspicions straight to us.”

“A fat lot of good that would have been,” retorted Virtue. “Thank you. I've had some, British cold water I mean. And it's sure a colder brand than any other ever known. I got an introduction to one of your swell lawyers. He went all up in the air. Said if I didn't watch my step, I should be in for an action of libel, heavy damages, too, said a libel action in this country—well, it was a libel action, said making suggestions of that sort against a scholar of Mr. Broast's standing was mighty serious, said on my own showing James A. had been traced to Paris and his baggage was found there, and so how could anything have happened to him here? I tried to say it wasn't so difficult to fake a trail, but he wouldn't have it. I tell you I crawled away after that talk feeling I was mighty lucky not to be going inside for the rest of my life and a million dollar fine as well. All the same I had my own ideas still, and I meant to find out what had happened to James A. and if that
Dictes
was his. It didn't work out the way I expected, and you may call me a fool from the last house in Foolsville, but then I wasn't reckoning on two fresh murders. What I say is, Broast put them through, too, and you can call that libel or slander or any darn thing you like.”

“At any rate, I wouldn't say it to anyone else,” remarked Bobby dryly. “It's not wise to throw around accusations like that.”

“That's the way the London lawyer talked,” Virtue said. “All the same, now I know the
Dictes
is the one belonging to James A., I want that library searched. I want it gone over from roof to cellar. I've been in that cellar. It's lined with packing cases. Parts of it have been concreted—to keep out rats. I asked about that. First they tried to poison them with putting down strychnine because the concrete wasn't any good. Maybe it wasn't for rats, maybe it was for—for something else.”

“It will be for the chief constable to decide,” Bobby repeated. “You may be sure you statement will receive full investigation. Let us have it as early as possible. You know the inquests on both Mr. Nat Kayne and Sir William Winders are to-morrow? They will only be formal, won't take more than a few minutes, but it all means a good deal of work and time taken up. So the earlier we get your statement the more chance there will be to consider it at once.”

Virtue promised to have it ready first thing in the morning and in fact by nine o'clock it was in the hands of Major Harley, who read it with a frowning brow and then sent for Bobby to question him about some of the details.

“Broast will have to be questioned, that's clear,” he said. “If this book can be identified, and apparently it can be—” He paused, frowned. “Do you think the identification satisfactory, Owen?” he asked. “There seems no proof on the face of it when these pricks were made.”

“No, sir,” agreed Bobby. “I thought of that, and if Virtue is in touch with Miss Perkins, he may have induced her to make them and he may have got the description he talks about from her.”

The Major nodded.

“That'll have to be gone into,” he said. “We'll see what Broast has to say first. Busy day ahead. One thing, the Perkins girl is such a little fool that even if Virtue has been getting at her, I don't suppose there'll be much trouble in inducing her to tell the truth. She'll soon be contradicting herself, and then we'll get it all. Virtue's a good-looking youngster, got a way with him, too. Sex appeal,” said the Major suddenly; “the Perkins girl would most likely do anything for any good-looker in trousers. But she'll soon break down if she's questioned.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bobby mechanically, his thoughts elsewhere.

“I don't know,” the Major went on, “that I much like Virtue's story. It's such a mixture of simplicity and—well, not simplicity.”

“I feel that, too, sir,” agreed Bobby. “But he is quite a youngster; it's all a bit like how an imaginative schoolboy would act. Of course, there's the alternative and he's guilty; but there's no doubt, I think, that he really believes his cousin was murdered.”

“If he does, it may be he shot Winders in revenge because, as he says, he didn't mean them to get away with it, and he thought Winders was responsible. But why Kayne?”

“Well, sir, I have thought it possible Kayne was mistaken for Winders. Winders often walked through the wood to the Lodge. Kayne never did. And they were much about the same build and height, and it was dark as well.”

“That would mean,” mused the Major, “that Virtue invented the yarn he told, so as to give himself an alibi. A good deal will depend on the result of this trespass on private property you've talked me into.” He added gloomily: “What it comes to is that instead of solving the two cases we have on hand, we've got a third to deal with.”