Purbright intervened hastily.
“I suggest, sir, that Colonel Moldham be charged and taken into custody this afternoon. I believe his solicitor has already advised him to be ready to make himself available.”
Mr Chubb looked momentarily surprised. Then he frowned. To Malley he said: “Would you mind leaving us for a moment, sergeant?” Malley, totally unoffended, lumbered off.
“I suppose you are satisfied that no other interpretation can be placed on this affair?” the chief constable asked Purbright. “Bruce Moldham is not a man to evade responsibility once it is firmly established. He won’t run away, you know.”
“I’m sure that you’re right, sir,” replied Purbright. “On the other hand, the colonel has already made an admission that tallies with the post-mortem findings. It would be unfortunate if any undue delay in arresting the gentleman were to be construed by the defence as a sign of uncertainty.”
“Or of partiality,” threw in Bradley, with a perish-the-thought face, before Purbright could forestall him.
The chief constable gazed with icy concentration out of the window at the distant cupola of the municipal buildings. During the ensuing silence, Purbright sought a topic that might restore some measure of mutual communion.
“There is another, less important, piece of unpleasantness, sir,” he announced. “It isn’t without relevance to the man’s death at Moldham.”
And he related the discovery of what promised to be Veronica Moldham-Clegg’s long-lost necklace.
“Tell me if I read your suggestions aright,” said Mr Chubb, when he had given the story thought. “Do I understand that Dr Gule tricked the actual thief while he was a patient in his care, and then gave the necklace to this girl with whom he appears to be cohabiting?”
“The evidence does point that way, sir. A little earlier today we found a technician in the orthopaedic department of the General who recalled Dr Gule’s having asked him for a little plaster of Paris about three weeks ago.”
The chief constable looked down at the picture, turned it over and rubbed his little finger on the uneven surface. “He’d want it to fill the hole he’d made in this, presumably.”
“That might well have been his intention,” Purbright said. Mr Chubb nodded sagely. He held the picture to his ear and shook it.
“Psychiatrist, isn’t he—Gule?”
Purbright said that he was, knowing that Mr Chubb would be less inclined to discount the possibility of infamous conduct on the part of a practitioner in so outlandish a discipline, as distinct from those who rated the chief constable’s description as “proper” doctors.
“Of course, it may well be,” said Mr Chubb, “that our unfortunate friends at Moldham feel they have sufficient trouble to cope with as it is, without rushing about identifying jewellery. And unless it is identified, I cannot see that there would be any case for Gule to answer.”
Bradley was looking very sympathetic. He first glanced deferentially at Chubb, then addressed Purbright.
“I do see the chief constable’s point. If I explain it to my divisional chief, he may well agree to be accommodating.”
“Accommodating, Mr Bradley? I do not quite take your meaning.” Mr Chubb looked as if he would rather take hemlock.
Bradley gave the shrug of a reasonable man. “You see, sir, when my superintendent agreed to my giving you assistance—insignificant as it has proved—it was because the felonious Mr O’Dwyer was, in a sense, our responsibility. He was on parole. Therefore, I do owe my superintendent an explanation of O’Dwyer’s having contrived to be murdered so far from home. His intention to steal jewels did seem a proper, as well as a demonstrable excuse. However, if you feel that a blind eye should be turned upon minor, even though relevant, misdeeds, in order to spare local people embarrassment...”
Purbright realized, with something akin to panic, that for the first time in his life he was witnessing Mr Chubb in a state of real anger. He looked on helplessly as the pale cheeks become mottled with dark red; and the silvery eyebrows, usually elegantly arched, began to lower and contract into tufts of bristle.
“Mr Bradley, I do not know and I do not very much care what is considered proper by policemen in London; but I assure you that there will be no turning of blind eyes in Flaxborough while I am its chief constable.”
Having listened with grave attentiveness, his head a little on one side, Bradley allowed the statement to be rounded with a short silence. Then he nodded, gazed admiringly at the still transfigured features of Mr Chubb, and declared: “May I say that I count it a privilege to have known you, sir.”
The chief constable offered no further comment. He stepped away from the window, tossed Whippy Arnold’s painting on to Purbright’s desk and left the office, silently closing the door behind him.
“Rather like Hamlet’s father’s ghost,” suggested Bradley, with no sign of discomposure.
It was one of those moments when, had he still been a smoker, Purbright would have lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, scratched his chin, and said: “Mmm...” Deprived of such means of release, he sat at his desk and moved things around.
Bradley watched. “I say, you don’t think I’ve...” He glanced at the closed door.
“No, no,” Purbright said hastily, “he’ll settle down.”
Bradley looked satisfied. “Good. One tries to be diplomatic with the Chubbs of this world, but the effort does seem to be wasted sometimes.”
Purbright did not hear him. He was examining, at first with mild annoyance, then with increasing absorption, part of the frame round the Cottage at the End of Life’s Lane.
Whether by careless handling on the part of an unwontedly agitated chief constable, or as a result of its having been thrown brusquely on the desk, the plastic had split along what now appeared to be a glued seam.
Purbright pulled the seam further apart. Within the hollow frame was revealed something white. A roll of paper, about six inches long. It came out quite easily.
Bradley had noticed Purbright’s preoccupation and was now standing beside him.
Purbright unrolled the paper and smoothed it flat. It was slightly yellowed and grubby, but the red print and the entries in spidery black ink were perfectly legible.
Not until they both had read every word of the writing did either speak.
“Well, well,” said Purbright, softly.
“And who,” added Bradley, “is going to tell the good news?”
Chapter Seventeen
The family solicitor was already in the drawing-room of Moldham Hall when Purbright and Bradley, accompanied by Sergeant Love, were ushered in by the colonel.
Mr Loughbury set down his sherry glass and rose to acknowledge the policemen with a nod and a single, grave “Morning”. He helped to find them chairs, then resumed his own.