Miss Patterson, it will be recalled, had strayed away from a party held at Hill Manor House, just outside the now notorious and fateful village of Hill, and was found battered and bathed in blood at round about three o'clock in the morning.
Her cruel death was and remains a mystery. It is clear that Hill village must house an undetected homicidal maniac. He has now claimed another victim in the person of a quiet, inoffensive, elderly man said to have been related to the chatelaine of Hill Manor, Mrs Emilia Kempson, the Great Lady of the village and the hostess at what has become known as the fateful birthday party. The facts relating to this second apparently motiveless murder are obscure. For two nights Mr Ward had not slept in his bed or returned to his lodgings for his supper. Interviewed by us, his landlady, Mrs Christine (Kirstie) Landgrave, told us:
'Mr Ward was not the sort to make enemies. Whoever killed him must be a madman. I do not know any more about Mr Ward than what Mrs Kempson told me, which was that he had lived many years in Canada and the States and had come back to England to find work, but was too old, she thought, to fend for himself and as he was a distant relative-that is how she described him-she was prepared to pay me to look after him and would provide him with his bit of spending money.
'That is all I know about Mr Ward. He was not one to talk about himself. If you got as much as a good morning from him it was quite a surprise. I had a terrible shock when I heard he was dead, especially when I heard where he was buried. I did not want to go to the mortuary, but my husband lost half a day's work to come with me and Mrs Kempson made that up to us, seeing that, if we had not gone, it would have had to be her, I suppose.
'Yes, I have my sister's children staying with me. No, I won't let you talk to them. They can't tell you anything you don't know, and the police have questioned them already and more than once. It is true they were at the cottage where the body was found. No, I don't suppose you can get much sense out of poor Poachy, but I won't allow Maggie and Ken to be questioned again and I shall tell the police if you try. No, I don't want your money. The children knew there had been a hole dug in the floor of that cottage, though why they wanted to go and play in such a dirty, tumbledown old place, when they'd got so many other places to play in, I don't know, but that's children, isn't it?
'No, I have never seen the young lady that was murdered down at the sheepwash, but it must have been the same man as killed Mr Ward, mustn't it? It stands to reason. You couldn't have two murderers in a village this size.
'Oh, yes, the children are going home as soon as their father can come down here to fetch them. No, they haven't had a shock. They never stayed to see Poachy actually dig up the body, you see. They come running back as soon as they saw a bit of Mr Ward's suit and one of his hands. He had a signet ring with a big stone in it and you couldn't mistake his clothes. The coat was a sort of a dirty mustard colour. Nobody else in the village has one like it, and the children recognised that and they found one of his boots in the garden.'
So much for Mrs Landgrave. We respected her wishes concerning the children, but we have made other enquiries among the inhabitants of Hill, although the veil of mystery surrounding the two apparently motiveless murders seems to be impenetrable.
We may add that although they do not admit outright to holding a council of despair-we put it like that because we hear that Scotland Yard will have to be involved sooner or later and we would suggest that preferably it ought to be sooner-there is no doubt that at present the local police are completely baffled.
This appears to be a classic case of a murderer whose lust for killing may be disguised under an exterior as bland and innocent as yours or mine, dear reader. He may be a Neill Cream or a Jack the Ripper, planning already where he will strike again. That possibility cannot be ruled out. This maniac must be apprehended and that right speedily.
The police are attempting to find some connexion between the two deaths, but there appear to be very few points of resemblance. Consider the known facts. Here we tabulate them side by side for purposes of comparison.
1. A girl aged twenty.
1. A man of middle age.
2. Gently nurtured.
2. Possibly a rough diamond.
3. A loving family and plenty of friends.
3. One known relative sends him to lodge with strangers and never sees him again, not even after his death. (We do not intend any criticism. There must have been good reasons.
4. Murdered after leaving a birthday party, ostensibly to go out for a breath of air.
4. Murdered after having been absent from his lodgings for no known reason.
5. Wearing fancy dress which could have acted as a disguise.
5. Wearing clothes which were readily identifiable by anyone in the village.
6. Came from London and knew nobody in the village except the persons present at the party.
6. Came from America, but known by sight to everybody in the village.
7. Sociable and lively.
7. Unsociable and non-communicative.
8. Body left by sheepwash although probably killed nearer Hill House.
8. Body buried in hole he had dug, probably from boredom with his uneventful existence.
9. Head smashed in. Fancy dress torn off.
9. Head smashed in. Boots taken off.
10. Found by search-party sent to look for her.
10. Found by accident.
11. Gypsies suspected but cleared.
11. No obvious suspects, certainly not gypsies who never passed cottage en route to sell or beg in town.
12. Children accustomed to play down by sheepwash.
12. Children knownto have played in ruined cottage.
13. Killed at approx. eleven p.m. on the Saturday. Body found at three a.m. on following morning.
13. Killed possibly on the Friday. Body found some days later.
14. Connected with Hill Hill House (festivities).
14. Connected with Hill House (relationship).
And so, for the time being, the matter rests. It has to be borne in mind that whereas Mr Ward's death could have been premeditated-there is a theory that he may have been slaughtered somewhere else and taken to the cottage for burial-it hardly seems likely that Miss Patterson's murder was previously planned. Readers will remember that she had not been invited to Hill House, but was taking her brother's place. Did the murderer-since she was wearing a bulky and not very attractive fancy dress-mistake her for her brother?
We think the police might give this point more serious consideration than, so far, they appear to have done. To our mind this matter needs far more probing into than it has yet received.
* * *
Hill Manor House
The manor itself is mentioned in Domesday Book and seems to have been of moderate wealth. The entry, part of which, by courtesy of Professor Donald Cuttie who translated the abbreviations for us, we reproduce, states that 'William de Gyffe holds Hill. It was always assessed for forty hides. The land is twenty-five carucates. In the demesne there are three hides and a half. There are two ploughs there. Among the free men and the villeins there are fifteen ploughs and five more could be made.'
And so on and so forth. The entry goes on to list the tenants' various holdings, mentions the fact that the manor had a mill-some distance from the present village if it was a water-mill, we would think!-and notes that the value of the property had dropped since it was valued in the reign of Edward the Confessor, although how that value was arrived at seems to be speculative.
The historians tell us no more of Hill until the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, when the property came into the hands of a wealthy clothier from Somerset, who built the present Hill Manor House. It is a moderate-sized mansion erected in pleasant, mellow, Cotswold stone. It came into the hands of Mrs Kempson's grandfather by purchase towards the end of last century. The original gatehouse fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1906 to make way for a lodge which, owing to the shortage of domestic staff, is now untenanted, and past which it seems probable that Miss Patterson strayed on the night of her death.