“But yes, yes...both teeth pieces, top and bottom, they are sticky—gummy, how is it? He would be eatink sweets, that fellow.”
“Soft, white sweets?”
“Exactly so.”
“Thank you, doctor. You’ll let me have the full report as soon as you can. The inquest will be adjourned, by the look of things; you needn’t bother to turn up tomorrow unless you hear.”
As Purbright put down the telephone, Love gave him a questioning look. “Why the morbid interest in diet?”
“Because,” said Purbright, “I have yet to find a man of Gwill’s age who can clamber up towers in the middle of the night with his mouth full of marshmallows. Because I have never encountered a suicide who has been in the mood for confectionery at the last moment. And because I cannot believe that any newspaper owner would be anxious, even in sudden insanity, to court the kind of publicity he has caused to be inflicted on others.”
“You don’t think he was electrocuted, then?”
“Oh, yes, he was. Heineman may imagine you wash your face in carbolic, but he doesn’t make mistakes with corpses. Anyway, there were signs of burning, I believe; we’ll know for sure when the P.M. report comes in.” He paused. “Have you ever had anything to do with the nephew?”
“George Lintz? I’ve run across him occasionally.”
“A close gentleman.”
Love shrugged. “Careful, certainly. Do you think he knows anything?”
“Hard to say. You might have a go at him. He resists the suave approach. Try your bike-without-lights manner.”
“What times do you want him to account for?”
“Last night from sixish until whatever time he says he went to bed. He is married, isn’t he?”
“That’s right.”
“In that case, try her as well. See if she has the Lady Macbeth touch. Cocktail cabinet catalogues on the kitchen table: that sort of thing. Before you go, you might take a look at his statement to Malley. There are one or two other things I’d better tell you, although they amount to very little so far.” He described the interview with Lintz and his visit to The Aspens.
“Don’t you think there might be something behind the ghoulies and ghosties business?” Love suggested.
“I wouldn’t write it off,” Purbright replied. “Mrs Poole obviously believes in ‘the withering touch of tomb-escaped avenger’. She’s been frightened, undoubtedly, but she’ll not say by what or whom.”
“She may be a bit touched, of course.”
“Yes, but there are other tales than hers, apparently.”
Love pouted. “Will you get an adjournment tomorrow?”
“Oh, certainly. Not for long, though. Gwill was a fairly important fellow. There’ll be some pressure to have him put under without any unseemly inquiries. We shall have to produce a convincing argument within the next week or so.”
“There’s the point about the marshmallow, or whatever it was.”
Purbright waved his hand contemptuously. “I can just hear old Albert on that...‘Eatin’ sweets, was he, eh? And why not, eh? Better than drinkin’ himself silly.’ ”
The inspector’s opinion of Mr Albert Amblesby was well founded. Flaxborough’s coroner was an ancient of such obtuseness that the inquiries over which he presided were liable to deteriorate into ill-tempered games, with Mr Amblesby inventing new rules and breaking old ones, deriding what he couldn’t understand and generally playing hell until he could glare around his court and judge from the silence of the other angry, unhappy or bewildered contestants that he had won.
“You’d better ask Malley to come in. He might know something that will give us a lead.”
Love returned with the outsize Coroner’s Officer, breathing hard.
Sergeant Malley seemed pleased rather than surprised by Purbright’s suspicion. “Murder,” he observed, “wouldn’t half be a nice change.”
“What do you know about Gwill’s affairs?” Purbright asked him.
“Not a deal. He kept very much to himself. Rather a gloomy chap, I always thought. He was supposed to be carrying on with that Carobleat woman, you know. Not that that would have set anyone on fire, I expect. Anyway, not once her old man had upped and died. He had plenty of money, of course—Gwill, I mean. Or so they say.”
“But he didn’t collect jealous husbands?”
“Not as you’d notice.”
“Did he have any other kind of enemies, do you know?”
Malley pursed his lips. “Well...put it this way. Nobody liked him. Does that help?”
“Enormously,” said Purbright. “I do like a big field.”
Love spoke. “But he had a circle of friends, surely?”
“Oh, yes,” said Malley. “Circle is the word.”
“Exclusive?”
“Like the reptile house.”
“Come now,” protested Purbright, “we must try to be objective about this. The list the wild-eyed housekeeper gave me was respectable enough. Wait a minute...” He took an envelope from his pocket. “Yes, there’s a doctor for a start. Hillyard—you know him?”
“Dipsomaniac,” retorted the unrepentant Malley.
“Medical Officer of Health-elect,” said Purbright, comfortingly. “Then there’s Bradlaw the burier. Blameless, surely. We’ve nothing on Nab Bradlaw, have we?”
Love shook his head. Malley grunted.
Again Purbright glanced at the list. “Rodney Gloss, man of law.”
“Straight as an acrobat’s intestines.” This from the stout sergeant.
Purbright sighed. “I think,” he said, “that we can start from the sound assumption that people seldom get themselves murdered by complete strangers. At the same time, we shall need to begin inquiring into what, if any, were Gwill’s departures from the normal and legitimate. Also, I propose to have a word with the Chief Constable and try and persuade him—God give me strength—that there is good reason to suspect that Gwill was done.
“And we needn’t hope to be spared trouble by old Chubb deciding to ‘call in the Yard’, as I believe the phrase goes. For one thing, he likes to keep misfortune in the family. For another, he’d probably be hesitant to bother such a busy man as Sir Robert Peel.”
Chapter Four
While Purbright was fortifying himself with food against the approaching ordeal by Chief Constable, Mr Harcourt Chubb, himself—a slow thinker and late eater—listened to a lawyer’s tale.
It was Mr Rodney Gloss who had called upon him.
The Chief Constable, silver-haired, composed and misleadingly aesthetic-looking, regarded his visitor with polite attention and a perpetual half-smile.
Gloss had put himself at a disadvantage by accepting a seat before he remembered that the Chief Constable habitually remained standing, even in his own drawing room. He was, therefore, obliged to crane a bull-like neck in order to keep Chubb in the focus of his little fierce eyes.
The solicitor spoke quietly and carefully.