The Second Shot (31 page)

‘Exactly. Then I was right. There was no definite appointment. He merely hoped to see someone. Well, if we remember that he had only just become engaged, that his fiancée was bound to pass close to where he was, that she was the only person of the party who was beyond him in the downstream direction and away from the house, and that he actually turned away from Miss Scott-Davies in that direction – well, I think that as an indication of murder the thing simply fizzles out. Eh, Colonel?’

‘Explained in that way, it certainly does.’

‘Precisely. And I suggest that my explanation is not just a counsel’s twist, but the real truth. As to the fourth objection, that it’s inconceivable that a man so used to handling firearms could be so careless – well, one can only reply that such things do happen. You and I, Colonel, must each know of half a dozen just as incredible cases. In this one I think that the explanation which I believe Pinkerton once suggested to you, Superintendent, must be the true one: that Scott-Davies didn’t remember that he had left the gun loaded; he thought he was handling an empty gun. And while we’re on the point it’s interesting to note that there are no less than three pieces of evidence that this is really what did happen.’

‘There are, sir?’ asked the superintendent, not a little sceptically.

‘Certainly,’ Sheringham replied quite sharply. ‘Didn’t you spot them? You should have done. First of all the fingerprints round the top of the barrel; secondly a distinct line on the grass where the blades had been turned over and pressed down (they were beginning to perk up again when I saw it, so the line must have been still more obvious at your first examination), indicating that a narrow object of medium weight had passed over it recently – the stock of a gun, no less, I suggest; and thirdly, there’s a V-shaped stub of root on the edge of the track close to where the stock of the rifle was lying, according to your man – quite enough to cause the sharp obstruction I mentioned, from which of course the recoil of discharge, slight though it would be, together with the convulsive start of the man’s hand as the bullet entered him, would combine to throw it free in the other direction. As I said, three pieces of evidence already. And that’s more than you’ve got to support any of your murder cases. What do you say to that, Colonel?’

‘You’re putting up a very plausible argument, Sheringham, I’ll admit. Eh, Superintendent?’

‘Very ingenious, sir. It’s not much evidence, though I’ll confess I overlooked the track on the grass, but any evidence at all in this case is welcome. But what about the absence of powder marks, sir? I notice you’ve not explained that yet.’

‘No, I’ve been saving that up. And tell me, Superintendent, if I can produce not merely an explanation, but a real piece of evidence to support my explanation, what will you say then? Will you agree with me that it was accident, or will you still hanker after murder?’

‘I’d rather hear the explanation and see the evidence first, if you please, sir,’ returned the superintendent stolidly.

Sheringham laughed and rose to his feet. ‘I’ll go and get the evidence,’ he said, and went out of the room.

He came back a minute later with a twig in his hand on which were several withered and very tattered leaves. With an air of triumph he gave it to the superintendent. ‘Just have a look at that.’

The superintendent examined it closely, and Colonel Grace bent over to look at it too. The rest of us held our breaths.

‘Where did you get this, sir?’

‘I found it in the undergrowth on the right of where the body was lying, just off the path. It’s a sycamore twig. And I found the broken end of the shoot it came off.
And
that broken end is in a direct line between the stub of root and the place in the air where I imagine the red patch on Scott-Davies’ coat would have been as he stood up. I’ll show it you tomorrow.’

The superintendent looked at the chief constable. ‘That’s smoke-marking, right enough. The bullet must have passed either between or through these leaves, and they collected the smoke. The explosion blew ‘em into these shreds, of course. I’m satisfied, sir.’

‘Yes,’ nodded the colonel. ‘That clinches it. May I congratulate you, Sheringham? You’ve saved us a lot of trouble, and possibly a miscarriage of justice. Though in any case I don’t think we could ever have made an arrest. As you said, we’d no real evidence of murder against anyone, except motive and opportunity, and rather too much of that. Counsel could have torn any case we brought into tatters, and of course we can’t afford that sort of thing.’

‘Yes, I don’t think there’s any doubt now. I’m glad you agree with me,’ Sheringham said mildly. ‘I suppose you’ll have a word with the coroner before the proceedings tomorrow morning?’

‘Oh, yes; he’s very reasonable. He’ll see that a verdict of accidental death is brought in, if we put it to him. Besides, it’s inevitable on this evidence. You’ll be wanted as a witness, by the way, to prove the finding of the twig and all that.’

Sheringham nodded. ‘Yes, of course. Well, and so that’s the end of the Mystery of Minton Deeps.’

‘And what a relief!’ Ethel sighed thankfully. ‘Mr Sheringham, I don’t know what we owe you, or how we can ever repay you.’

‘I do, Mrs Hillyard,’ Sheringham said lightly. ‘With a drink this very minute. You simply can’t think how thirsty I am after all that talking.’

‘Good gracious, yes,’ said John guiltily. ‘I should think so. A whisky-and-soda?’

‘Whisky-and-soda?’ Sheringham echoed reproachfully. ‘I’m
thirsty.’

‘Sorry,’ John grinned. ‘Yes, there is a cask outside. Will you have it in, or would jugs do?’

‘It’d be a pity to disturb the cask. A jug will do nicely, thank you.’

And so the conference broke up into general conversation. An air of elation fell on everyone at the thought of the lifting of the cloud that had been pressing on us so long and the disappearance of mutual suspicion and distrust. Ethel and John were of course delighted and did not hide it, De Ravel became positively boisterous (fancy, I had never had the faintest idea that the De Ravels had suspected each other!), and even Mrs de Ravel became more like a human being that I had ever seen her before. The chief constable was told, amid much amusement, how everyone had at first suspected me of the shooting, and my reception of the different accusations was grossly burlesqued for the general entertainment. But I did not care. Such was my exhilaration that I was almost ready to burlesque myself.

In due course Colonel Grace and Superintendent Hancock drove away, and the party began to drift towards its respective bedrooms.

‘Don’t go up for a minute or two, Pinkertons,’ Sheringham remarked carelessly. ‘Come and keep me company on a moonlit stroll. I shan’t be able to sleep after all that tensity without a little soothing moonlight.’

I was by no means reluctant, and though I suggested that the night air might be chilly for Armorel, for it was now long past midnight, she pooh-poohed the idea and insisted on coming with us.

Sheringham led the way along the lane, and in a few minutes we were out of sight, as well as out of sound, of the house. I perceived that Sheringham was making for a rough bench which John had erected under a clump of beech trees a few hundred yards away, from which in the daytime a fine view was obtainable over the valley and the distant sea. We reached it and seated ourselves.

On the way I had been turning over in my mind a few fitting phrases of thanks to Sheringham for the magnificent manner in which he had rescued us both from our terrible predicament, and I was beginning to deliver these when he cut me abruptly short.

‘Yes, yes, Tapers,’ he said, quite impatiently. ‘That’s all right. Now listen, you two. I’ve brought you here for a purpose, because I think you ought to know the truth. I’m telling it to no one else, not even Hillyard, but in a way I do think it’s owed to you, considering that you laid down the conditions under which I’ve worked and under which I propose to keep silent. Not that I want you to share the responsibility for silence; I’m quite prepared to take all of that, and after tonight you can forget entirely what I’m going to tell you now.’

‘The – the truth?’ I repeated in astonishment. ‘What truth?’

‘Who shot Scott-Davies,’ Sheringham replied shortly.

‘But – I thought you’d proved it was an accident?’

‘So I did – on faked evidence.’

I must have uttered an exclamation of dismay, for Sheringham laughed. ‘Yes, I faked that evidence of the smoke-blackened twig. I shot at it myself, yesterday. It was half-broken already, and the leaves withered, so there won’t be a fresh-looking break to give me away. And as for the track on the grass, I invented it completely.’

‘But – why?’ I stammered.

Sheringham’s voice became serious. ‘Because if ever a man deserved shooting, Scott-Davies did – though he was your cousin, Armorel. And I for one am not going to give away the person who very rightly did it. What’s more, I’m prepared to fake evidence and commit perjury tomorrow to ensure that no suspicion ever so much as touches her.’

‘Her!’ I repeated.

‘Yes, of course,’ Sheringham said, quite testily. ‘Isn’t it obvious, after what I told you before dinner? Scott-Davies and Elsa Verity got engaged, I said, not that morning at all, but the evening before.’

‘You don’t mean that – that
Elsa
shot him?’

‘Of course I do.’

‘But – but – ’

‘Be quiet, dear, and let Roger tell us,’ Armorel said gently, but she gave my hand, which she was holding, a tight squeeze which said more than her words.

‘There’s very little to tell,’ Sheringham said moodily. ‘And it’s not a nice story. Somehow or other Scott-Davies must have persuaded her that evening that he had acted only from the best intentions, Tapers, in throwing you into the pool, and got her promise to marry him. She admitted that to me, but didn’t seem to realize its importance. And she told me as well that he seemed very anxious to keep the engagement secret for a few days. She hadn’t told anyone else these two facts, she said, because she didn’t want to talk about the thing at all and anyhow they didn’t matter. I agreed, of course, but added that having concealed them so far she had better continue to do so, which she said she would. I couldn’t make too much of a point of secrecy in case she realized that I’d seen the truth, but I don’t think she will tell anyone else.

‘Well, the reason for Scott-Davies’ insistence of keeping the engagement secret is clear enough, isn’t it? He was afraid of what Mrs de Ravel might do. He was sure she had something up her sleeve for him, but didn’t know what; he wanted to find that out before the engagement could be announced. And that same evening Mrs de Ravel obligingly informed him. She was going to stage that extremely awkward scene in front of her husband.

‘Your cousin was no fool, Armorel. He knew that Elsa’s eyes would infallibly be opened both to the sort of man he really was and to the fact that he wanted to marry her merely for her money. He had one night in which to ensure that however wide the girl’s eyes were opened, marriage would be inevitable; her feelings of course didn’t matter. And he took the obvious method. Mrs de Ravel, who had developed almost a sixth sense where Scott-Davies was concerned, heard a board creak in the passage that night. She got out of bed and opened her door a fraction – and saw Scott-Davies disappearing into Elsa’s room.’

‘Oh!’ said Armorel, in a low tone of distress. ‘But why didn’t she stop him, or go and tell Ethel, or
something
?’

‘I don’t think Mrs de Ravel is a very nice person,’ Sheringham replied levelly. ‘She had a rod in pickle for Eric, which she was certain would bring him to heel, and she hated Elsa. It amused her own brand of cat-and-mouse cruelty to use Scott-Davies in order to achieve that particularly horrible revenge on her rival, even though it meant her lover’s own temporary amusement. She must have suffered agonies of jealousy that night, but she bore them because her reason told her that it was the most effective revenge she could have on Elsa. Like most self-centred people, however, she underestimated both her opponents. Eric did
not
come to heel the next day; instead he threw his engagement slap in her face. And Elsa Verity did
not
give him up in distressed disgust when she realized the truth about the man; she exacted the value which she very properly put upon herself, and shot him.’

‘And Sylvia told you all this?’ asked Armorel.

‘She admitted, under pressure,’ Sheringham replied carefully, ‘that she saw Scott-Davies going into Elsa’s room. I asked her why she took no steps immediately, and she shrugged her shoulders and yawned and said why should she have done, it wasn’t any business of hers, she saw no reason to interfere in other people’s amusements. Her real reason, of course, was plain.’

‘But it never occurred to her that Elsa – ’

‘Shot him? Oh, no. She had begun by underestimating her, and she went on. She was quite sure that her husband had shot Scott-Davies in a fit of Latin exuberance.’

‘And how do you imagine Elsa went about it?’ Armorel asked calmly.

‘Isn’t it obvious? Elsa was the person Scott-Davies was waiting to meet; Elsa knew where the rifle had been left; and it was Elsa, Tapers, who stood at that bend in the path, as you very acutely suggested, and waited. Did you know about those footprints, Armorel?’

‘Yes.’

‘I admit that I suspected at one time that they were yours. Your shoes fitted my outline exactly. Then I found that Elsa’s do too.’

‘Yes, we take the same size,’ Armorel nodded.

‘Armorel,’ I said suddenly, ‘I don’t think – ’

‘What?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ I said feebly. Armorel had squeezed my hand so hard that I could not mistake her meaning. I was not to interrupt.

‘So that’s that, is it?’ Armorel said slowly. ‘And now all three of us forget all about it, and not another soul ever knows?’

‘Yes. And tomorrow a verdict of accidental death is returned, and that will be the end.’

‘Yes.’ Dimly I could see Armorel’s profile as she stared ahead into the darkness. ‘Oh, Roger,’ she said softly, ‘thank God he’s dead. Such men ought not to be allowed to go on living. I think it’s wonderful that anyone should have the courage to accept that and – act on it.’