'At 6 p.m., Reginald will arrive. He will be seen by Jordan and Dyer. Dyer takes him to the study. Then Dyer will be sent to fetch the car. Dyer will probably linger at the study door for a couple of minutes; he's been warned the visitor is not to be trusted, remember. Dyer will leave the house, say 6.5. He should be back with the car between 6.10 and 6.15. Between 6.15 and 6.20, Amelia Jordan will be drivin' away in it to the hospital.
'It's only a short drive from Grosvenor Street to Praed Street, near Paddington. Amelia Jordan arrives at the hospital, say 6.22. She will hand the suitcase to Spencer, who will discover that his whatever-it-is is missin', and they will drive back. They will arrive back between 6.27 and 6.30.
'By this time the stage is all set. Avory Hume will cut up a row, bring Dyer bangin' at the door - open the door to show the results of a frantic struggle in the study. Reginald, groggy and wild-eyed with the inertia that follows a maniacal outburst, won't be able to say much. The doctor will arrive, clucking his tongue. While the excitement is still high and handsome, Fleming will arrive and be the last witness. So.'
H.M. puffed out smoke and waved it away.
'Only it didn't work out like that,' I said. 'Someone took advantage of that scheme - and murdered the old man.'
'That's it. Now I've told you what was meant to happen. Next, to help you along, I'll show you what did happen. I'm goin' to give you a time-table for that whole evening, because it's very suggestive. Most of the official times, like the arrival of officers or the times centrin' directly round the fact of the murder, you've already heard in court. Others weren't important as direct evidence, and weren't stressed. But I've got 'em all here, taken down from the police notes; and I've got the comments I wrote opposite 'em after I'd interviewed Answell and Mary Hume. I suggest to you (gor, how I'm beginnin' to hate that expression!) that, if you study 'em with a little cerebral activity, you'll learn a good deal.'
From his inside pocket he took out a large, grubby sheet of paper, worn from much pawing-over, and spread it out carefully. It was dated over a month before. The time-schedule, in the left-hand column, had evidently been typed by Lollypop. The comments, in the other column, were scrawled in blue pencil by H.M. Thus:
Table
6.10 Answell arrives, and is taken to study.
Delay by mist,
6.11 Avory Hume tells Dyer to go and get the car; study door is closed, but not bolted.
6.11- 6.15 Dyer remains in the passage outside the study door. Hears Answell say: 'I did not come here to kill anyone unless it becomes absolutely necessary.' Later hears Hume speaking in sharp tone, no words distinguishable; but ending loudly; ‘'Man, what is wrong with you? Have you gone mad?' Hears sounds like scuffle. Taps on door and asks if anything is wrong. Hume says: 'No, I can deal with this; go away.'
No mention of stealing spoons,
'Have you gone mad?' Very fishy; look into this, 'Scuffle' Answell's fall?
Was door bolted at this time? No, or Dyer would have heard sounds made by stiff and unused bolt shot into socket,
Very brave of Hume; unco' fishy
6.15. Dyer goes to get car.
Obedient. Arrives at garage 6.18.
6.39. Amelia Jordan finishes packing own valise and suitcase - Dr Hume has asked her to pack for him.
Shocking.
Suppose she left something out? ?
6.30-6.32. Amelia Jordan comes downstairs. Goes into passage towards study door. Hears Answell say: 'Get up, damn you !' Tries study door, finds it is bolted; or locked in some way.
Must be bolted. Lock is stuck at 'open' position.
6.32. Dyer returns with car.
6.33-6.34. Amelia Jordan tells Dyer to stop them fighting or get Fleming; she goes after Fleming.
1.
Finds Fleming coming down steps of own house to go next door.
1.
Rather early; but what of it?
1.
Fleming accompanies her. They all knock at study door.
6.36. Answell opens study door.
6.36-6.39. Examination of body and room. No doubt of door and windows being locked on inside. Answell's cool and dazed behaviour commented on. 'Are you made of stone?' Answell says: 'Serve him right for drugging (or doctoring) my whisky." Enquiries about whisky. Bottle and syphon found full, glasses untouched; Answell still declaring business a frame-up. Piece of feather found torn off arrow.
Drug still working. Brudine?
How did Hume get rid of original syphon? Original decanter too? Answell says nothing put into glass; must have been in decanter?
N.B. - No hocus-pocus about locks. Door inch-and-a-half thick; big heavy knob and panels; tight-fitting frame; no keyhole. Shutters have bar; no slits; windows also locked.
Gobble gobble.
Phooey.
6.39. Fleming sends Amelia Jordan to get Dr Hume. Fleming wants to take Answell's finger-prints. Dyer says there is ink-pad in Spencer Hume's suit.
Why? Officious busybody?
6.39-6.45. Dyer cannot find ink-pad or suit. Remembers old Ink-pad in desk in study. Answell objects to having his finger-prints taken; knocks Fleming across room, finally seems to become dispirited and agrees.
Was that desk searched? (N.B. It was, I find.) Then where is missing piece of
feather?
6.45. Dyer goes out into street and calls Police-Constable Hardcastle.
At this point Evelyn interposed. 'I say I Does this mean, in actual times, that it was only nine minutes between the time they went into the room and the time Dyer went out to get the policeman? By the way they talked in court, it sounded much longer, somehow.'
H.M. grunted sourly. 'Sure. It always sounds longer, because they've got so much to tell. But there's the actual record, as you could 'a' worked it out for yourselves.'
'The one thing that's most puzzling here,' I insisted, 'is why so much rumpus in general is being kicked up on the subject of ink-pads. Ink-pads would seem to have nothing to do with the case. What difference does it make whether Fleming did or didn't take Answell's fingerprints? The police could always do it, and match them with the ones on the arrow. Yet even the prosecution made a point of bringing it up and hammering it home.'
Exhaling a cloud of smoke, H.M. leaned back with rich satisfaction and closed one eye to avoid getting smoke in it.
'Sure, they did, Ken. But they weren't concerned with ink-pads. What they wanted to hammer was that, when Fleming tried to get Answell's finger-prints, Answell - far from bein' torpid - flared out murderously and threw Fleming clear across the room. Same kind of attack as he launched on the deceased, d'ye see? But I'm glad they brought it up; if they hadn't, I should have. Because I am most definitely interested in one particular ink-pad. It's pretty well the key to the whole business. You see that, don't you?'
XIV
Time-table for Archers
THAT argument, up in the little low-raftered room at the 'Milton's Head', while we waited for the afternoon session of the court, will always remain a kind of vignette as vivid as anything in the case. The firelight shone on rows of pewter tankards, and on H.M.'s enormous shoes, and on his glasses, and on a face wreathed with fantastic jollity. Evelyn sat with her legs crossed, leaning forward with her chin in her hand; and her hazel eyes had that amused annoyance which H.M. inspires in every woman.
' You know perfectly well we don't,' she said.' Now don't sit there chortling and rocking and making faces like Tony Weller thinking what he'd like to do to Stiggins. You know, at times you can be the most utterly exasperating man who ever - ee!