“A shotgun was heard that night, you know,” said Purbright, carefully, “and all I...”
“Now, now, now—you have had a fair innings, inspector. Let me just put a question to you. No, two questions. What are all those men hoping to accomplish by swarming over my land? And when, pray, are you going to have the courtesy to return the property you saw fit to seize?”
The “swarm”, it had to be admitted, was not accomplishing very much. Some outbuildings had been examined, several yards of gravel sifted in search of shotgun pellets, and tests for blood made here and there. Benton had been asked by Detective Constable Harper to make a statement relative to burglary and gunshots, and had rendered a passable impersonation of a Fijian Islander suffering from amnesia. Areas of undergrowth, explored by zealous PC Phillips, had yielded several trails that might have been caused by a dragged body—or a large foraging dog—or anything. He further established that the nearest point at which the estate afforded access to the river was a quarter of a mile away.
Not until the inspectors’ substantially abortive interview with Mrs Moldham-Clegg was nearly over did anything patently significant reward the searchers.
The find was made by Wilkinson. He had made an excursion of his own into the private avenue, gated at the road end, that Purbright had used on his first visit. Twenty or thirty yards from the house he noticed that the grass between two of the trees flanking the overgrown driveway was flattened and that a patch of soil was scored with wheel tracks. A car had been backed and turned there, and very recently.
Wilkinson returned to the Hall to recruit the aid of PC Johnson, who had been designated the expedition’s plaster man. Thwarted so far by absence of footprints (“What do you expect on bloody gravel?” Harper had observed, unhelpfully), Johnson gathered up bag, bowl, bottle and trowel with new cheerfulness and trotted off with Wilkinson to make casts of tyre marks. They also picked a few late violets for Mrs Johnson.
It was then that Wilkinson saw, trodden into the grass, a rectangular piece of pink paper. It was grimy but unfaded. He turned it over and pressed it flat against his thigh. “Receipt,” said Johnson, looking on.
“Oil,” said Wilkinson. The ticket had been issued by the Century Service Station, Chalmsbury. He frowned at the pencilled date, then saw what it was. “Twenty-seventh—when was that?”
“Thursday.”
Wilkinson was frowning again. “Lot of oil, isn’t it, four litres?”
“I’d have thought so.” Johnson had turned his main attention to the bunch of violets. “Looks as if he splashed some around here. Filthy sod.” Fastidiously, he picked out two of the little flowers and threw them away, Wilkinson put the receipt into his notebook and made another survey of the ground. He nodded once or twice. “Black,” he said. “Must have been leaking from the engine.”
When they got back to the house they found Purbright standing outside by a window that seemed to be the subject of a conversation he was having with the inspector from London.
“He didn’t need to leave fingerprints, poor old Frank,” Bradley was saying. “He really was a rotten burglar.” He pressed his forehead against the glass and peered at the battered bureau. “Oh, God, yes. Typical.”
They turned round on hearing the approach of the detective and the constable. Wilkinson produced his notebook and made something of a ceremony out of extracting the pink sales slip by the very tip of one corner. He recounted their discoveries while Johnson stood by modestly and kept three fingers in the breast pocket of his tunic to ventilate the violets.
Purbright let the two men see him look pleased: occasions for showing encouragement, he suspected, were going to be rare today.
Chapter Twelve
In response to earnest representations by the chief constable, augmented by the advice of Mr Richard Loughbury, Colonel Moldham presented himself at Fen Street police headquarters at four o’clock. Mr Loughbury accompanied him.
Mr Chubb and Inspectors Purbright and Bradley were waiting in the chief constable’s office, to which a tea-tray was borne by Policewoman Bellweather immediately after the guests’ arrival. There were five cups and saucers on the tray, three of them matching. The tea had been brewed from a packet fetched especially from Hobley’s store, on the corner of Priory Lane, which kept open until six on Sundays, and because it was an expensive blend it was very stale.
Greetings were dispensed in accordance with personality and social eminence.
“Good afternoon, colonel,” the chief constable said to the squire of Moldham; then, in parenthesis, but courteously enough, “Afternoon, Richard,” to Rich Dick.
Colonel Moldham responded with a slight inclination of the head and “Afternoon, Chubb.” He acknowledged the presence of the two inspectors by splitting a brief, rather worried, stare between them and murmuring, “Gentlemen.”
They stared back, but without sign of worry. “Colonel,” said Purbright. Bradley said nothing.
For each policeman, the solicitor had brought one of his broadest smiles. Purbright’s was inscribed Don’t-worry-we’ll-get-it-all-sorted-out; and Bradley’s Bit-diferent-from-London-eh? There was even one for Chubb, as well as the sonorous “Good afternoon, Mr Chief Constable,” that Loughbury delivered with every appearance of enjoying it himself.
The chief constable indicated his view of the seriousness of the occasion by breaking with habit and actually sitting down. He addressed the others.
“I regret to tell you, gentlemen, that something has happened in Flaxborough which we have no choice but to regard as a possible case of murder. Naturally, I make no judgment myself at this stage, but you will appreciate, I am sure, that we are bound to make prompt and diligent inquiries into every circumstance that seems relevant.
“My officers have already initiated those inquiries, and, as is only natural, some of them have been received with a little resentment—no, not resentment—a little bewilderment, should I say? Understandably. Oh, yes: understandably. It is always the same on these occasions. And may I say that the police dislike having to ask searching and sometimes embarrassing questions quite as much as members of the public might dislike answering them.”
Rich Dick pursed his mouth and nodded several times. Colonel Moldham gazed without expression at an empty chair on the other side of the room. Purbright wondered flippantly if Mr Chubb were about to propose a vote of thanks to the squire for having turned up.
Instead, the chief constable presented a reasonably succinct account of events at Thursday’s auction sale, of such subsequent movements of O’Dwyer as had been deduced from evidence, and of the recovery of his body from Pennick lock. He offered no speculation as to why O’Dwyer had come to the district and he did not mention the interview with Crutchy Anderson.
Nor did Mr Chubb make any reference to Veronica Moldham-Clegg to which her closest friend, let alone her nephew and her man of law, might object.
Mr Loughbury was quick to cap the chief constable’s resume with the general observation that the matter had been put in a nutshell and that certain previously puzzling aspects either were now plain or would be made so in the course of the next day or so. Whereupon Rich Dick looked across at his client and gave a shall-we-go? lift to his eyebrows.