Who Pays the Piper? (22 page)

“Look here, you've got to tell me—I've got to know. We're all groping round in the dark, and I can't bear it any longer. If one of us did it, I've got to know who it was. No—don't say anything yet—you've got to listen. Mr. Abbott came here yesterday evening and looked at all our shoes. Someone left a muddy footmark on the study floor. My brown shoe fits it. Cathy, I cleaned those shoes on Friday, and I haven't worn them since. I cleaned them and I polished them, and I haven't worn them since. But somebody has. When I turned them out for Mr. Abbott to see, they had been worn, and wiped—not cleaned or polished. And the left one had trodden in clay—you can see the mark quite plainly. That's what he was looking for—a shoe that had stepped in that clayey puddle up the garden and then made that footprint on the study floor.”

“Anyone might step in that puddle—I'm always doing it.” Cathy's voice came quick and frightened.

“I don't—ever. Besides I wasn't wearing the shoes—I haven't worn them since Friday. But somebody wore them. Somebody wore them, and trod in that puddle, and made the foot-mark on the study floor, and dropped one of my handkerchiefs by Mr. Dale's body. And I've got to know who it was.”

Cathy said “Your handkerchief?” in a trembling voice.

“One of the set you gave me for Christmas, with my initial. Fibs has got it.”

The colour came faintly to Cathy's face.

“I though you meant the police!” She got the last word out with a gasp. “He won't tell them, will he? He—oh, we've laughed at him, but we've always been quite friends—he won't tell.”

Susan bit her lip—hard.

“Not if I make it worth his while not to. Fibs has his price. I'm to take Mr. Dale's money and pay him the legacy which he thinks he ought to have, and then I can have my handkerchief again, and he'll forget he ever saw it.”

“He said that?”

“No, he didn't say it, but that's what he meant. It was all most beautifully wrapped up, but that's what he meant. And that's why I've got to know who wore my shoes, because if it was you or—or Aunt Milly, I can't just tell him to go and drown himself.”

Cathy broke in with surprising energy.

“Susan, you're mad! No, darling, I don't mean that of course—but you're not well—it's all the strain. Only you mustn't drag Mummy into it. Why, if it wasn't so serious, we should laugh at the idea of her going out on a cold, damp night, when she hasn't been out of the house for months. Just think what you're saying. And, darling, do lie down and have a rest. You've been doing far, far too much, and it's all my miserable selfish fault.”

Susan's eyes burned blue. She looked at Cathy and said,

“They think Bill did it—they'll arrest him any time now. They'll think I was there—they'll arrest me too. Don't you see I've got to know where we are? If one of us did it, I've got to know who it was. I can't let them arrest Bill—I
can't.”

There was a silence. Then Cathy said in a small, shaking voice,

“If they knew that someone else had worn your shoes, would it stop them arresting Bill?”

Susan threw out her hands.

“I don't know—I think it would. I can't really think at all, but if someone else was there it means someone else might have shot Mr. Dale, or—no, I didn't mean that, but they might have seen something or heard something—oh, don't you see, if there was anyone else there at all, it would make things better for Bill.”

Cathy made a wringing motion with her hands and said,

“I didn't shoot him.”

Susan found herself on her feet without any notion of how she had got there. She was on her feet. She had Cathy by the shoulders and she was saying,

“Was it you? Did you wear my shoes? Did you—
did
you?”

“I didn't shoot him.”

“But you wore my shoes—you went up to King's Bourne.”

“Yes——” The word was practically inaudible.

“Why?”

“To tell him—to tell him—you couldn't—marry him.”

“What happened—
Cathy
——”

“He was dead——” It was just a sighing whisper.

“What did you do?”

“I went in—and I looked at him—then I came away——”

“Did you hear the shot? Did you see anyone?”

Cathy shook her head.

“I didn't see anyone.”

“But you heard the shot—you must have heard the shot.”

Cathy shook her head again. It was the same mournful gesture.

“I didn't hear anything at all.”

CHAPTER XXXII

“That's what she says.”

Susan and Bill were in the drawing-room, standing close together at the French window which opened upon the garden. Two steps led down to a paved place where Mrs. O'Hara sometimes sat in very hot weather. Beyond the paving there was a border with snowdrops and crocuses just pushing up through the dark soil. And beyond the border and a little to the left the ground began to rise and the path went up the hill to King's Bourne.

“She must have heard the shot,” said Bill. “And I don't see why she didn't bump into us either going or coming, unless——” He stopped on the word, took Susan by the shoulder, and pulled her round so that they faced each other. “Look here—did Cathy shoot him?”

It marked the distance they had travelled that Susan made no real protest. She said in a tired voice,

“Oh, no—she couldn't—not Cathy.”

Bill frowned deeply.

“I don't know—I don't think you can cut it out like that. She'd had a bad shock—she was in a queer state—she'd heard him blackmailing you. By her own account of it she woke up and felt she had to tell him that she wouldn't let you marry him. She didn't dress. That shows that she wasn't normal. She took a coat and your shoes. Now why did she take your shoes? They must have simply slopped about on her feet.”

“I don't know. Hers may have been downstairs. I suppose she was dazed.”

He gave an emphatic nod.

“There you are. She was dazed. She went up there with the idea that she'd got to stop him marrying you. She wouldn't have shot him if she had been herself. But that's the whole point—she wasn't herself. Suppose she went up there and he wouldn't listen to her—laughed at her—perhaps threatened her——”

All Susan's colour was gone. She said “No” in a kind of horrified whisper.

“It's no good saying ‘No'. It might have been that way, and if she had run out on to the terrace at once she could have got away before I got there—I don't know——”

Susan shook her head.

“You've forgotten about the glass door. It was shut, or nearly shut, when you came up the steps and went along to the side window. It must have been, or you would have noticed it, because the first thing you did notice when you came back was that the glass door was open. Someone must have opened it in the time between your leaving the terrace and coming back again.”

He said, “I had forgotten. But if someone opened that door—why, then it fits. Don't you see how it fits? Cathy was there between the curtain and the door. She may have seen me look in at the window, and when I turned away she pushed the door and ran out. If she went down the far steps she wouldn't meet you.”

Susan said “No” again, and this time her voice was strong. “It couldn't have been Cathy—I can't believe it. Don't you see it's all wrong? He wouldn't have got that pistol out to frighten Cathy—he had plenty of other things to frighten her with. And you can't believe that Cathy went right round the table and got the pistol out, and then got behind him and shot him while he just sat there and did nothing. It doesn't begin to make sense. No, I think she came up after we had gone and saw him lying there. There was plenty of time for her to come and go before Raby found him at a quarter to seven. And that would explain why she didn't hear the shot. She mightn't have heard it if she was still in her room—the windows were shut—Aunt Milly didn't hear anything——” Her voice trailed away.

She said suddenly and sharply,

“That doesn't help you. Oh, Bill, it doesn't help you at all.”

“No.” He laughed. “We had our exits and our entrances, hadn't we? They might have been timed. Perhaps the counsel for the prosecution will take hold of that—I shouldn't wonder. Anyhow the moral dilemma is off. We haven't got to make up our minds to be noble and let me be hanged in order to save Cathy, because so far as I'm concerned I don't see that her story makes a pennorth of difference. She may have been there before me, or she may have been there after me, but unless she's going to say she did it, this story of hers is neither here nor there, and she'd better keep her mouth shut. Rub that into her good and hard. There's absolutely no sense in dragging her in—absolutely none. What you can do is to press her just as hard as you can about whether she was behind the curtain when I looked in at the window. You can just see the window from that door.”

“Then you could see the door from the window.”

“I suppose I could. Yes, of course I could. And the curtain was drawn—yes, I'm sure about that. She must have been there. Press her as hard as you can.”

Susan shook her head.

“It's no good—she says the same thing every time. She stood just inside the door and saw him lying on the floor. She went right up to him and saw that he was dead. She must have dropped my handkerchief then. She was dreadfully frightened and she ran away. She says she came down the near steps. If she was behind the curtains when you were looking in at the window she would have passed me going down the garden. No, it wasn't Cathy behind that curtain. If there was anyone there, it wasn't Cathy, and we've got to find out who it was.”

He made a sudden movement. His voice was heavy with discouragement.

“Susan, it's no use—we're trying to make bricks without straw. The curtain was drawn, and there isn't a scrap of proof that there was anyone behind it.”

“The door,” said Susan urgently—“the door! It wasn't open when you passed it to go to the window, but it was open when you came back. Someone opened it.”

“I don't know—I couldn't swear to all that about the door. I've thought about it till I can't think straight. It didn't amount to more than an impression. You go over and over a thing like that until you don't know what you thought at the time. The fact is you don't notice things because you don't know they're going to be important. They just slide by you with the thousand and one other things which you're not particularly noticing all day long. They're part of a pattern, and you notice the pattern, but you just don't notice the details. And then quite suddenly one of those details is so important that you've got to remember it, and you can't. That's where I am. It's a matter of life and death about that door, and for the life of me I can't remember. It was too unimportant at the time, and it's too important now. I can't get it into focus, and the more I try the less certain I am about anything. By the time it comes to standing up and being cross-examined I shan't be able to open my mouth without getting tied into knots. And if you get down to rock bottom, there's no more in it than this—I didn't actually notice whether the door was open when I went past to the window.”

“But you
would
have noticed.”

“Would I? I don't know. You see that's what we come back to every time—I don't know.”

Susan caught him by the arm.

“Wait! Bill, when you came back and found the door was open and went in, was the curtain still drawn?”

“I think so. Yes, it was. I remember I had to pull it back before I could see into the room. And that would account for my not noticing whether the door was open. If the curtain had been pulled back, I should have seen the light. I did see the light from the window. That's why I went there—I thought I would look in and see if he was alone. But there wasn't any light from the door—I'm quite sure about that. It may have been open all the time.”

Silence came down between them. There was no more to be said. Presently he threw up his head and laughed.

“I took my shadow a good deal farther than he wanted to go this morning. He's that young Lane from Ledcott, and he's much better on a motor-bike than he was up the Quarry hill on his own flat feet. He may get his own back by arresting me, but I can give him points and a beating when it comes to a rough climb. I took him up through the gorse, and he wasn't loving me much.”

“I wondered where you were.”

He laughed again.

“I found a flat, sandy place and roughed out a pretty good plan for old Gilbert Garnish. I expect Lane thought I was crazy, but he didn't mind having a rest. I came down the steep side over the rock, and I believe he had thoughts about suicide. Anyhow he'll have taken off the best part of half a stone, and that's all to the good. Actually, I've had a brain-wave about the Garnish affair——” He stopped suddenly, put his arms round her, and said with suspicious lightness, “I'm afraid I'll get the sack if I'm arrested—and it's a pity, because it was coming out a treat.”

Susan said “Don't!” in a muffled voice, and all at once she was holding him as he was holding her, and they were kissing with a desperate, straining passion—with blinding tears. Their world had broken round them and there was no protection anywhere, no safety and no help. The only happiness and comfort they could know was in this embrace which might be their last.

They clung together without words.

CHAPTER XXXIII

Lily Green had her afternoon and evening out on Wednesday. Since William Cole would not be free until after five, she would put in a little gossip with Annie Gill or Florrie Pipe and then come home to tea. Mrs. Green had an old cottage right on the village street. It was picturesque, insanitary, and quite destitute of modern conveniences. Mrs. Green still pumped water from a well in the back garden, and everything else was to match. The rooms were dark, the floors uneven, the bedroom ceilings sloped to catch an unwary head. But when Lily came into the kitchen there was a nice clear fire with some buttered toast on the hob, and an excellent currant cake of Mrs. Green's baking on the table, which was covered with a bright checked table-cloth. A well trimmed wall-lamp diffused a warm yellow light and a perceptible odour of paraffin. On the dresser, and only used upon state occasions, was the pink-flowered china tea-set which had been a wedding present from Mrs. O'Hara's mother. There was also a figure of Red Riding-hood stroking an affectionate wolf, a King George V jubilee mug, two copper candlesticks, and a Dick Turpin in a blue coat and sprigged waistcoat on his famous mare Black Bess. He had very long black moustaches and rode in a peculiar manner with both hands on the same side of the mare's neck.