“I’ve only seen the Mother Superior so far. And the Sisters who were with the body when I got here. She says that the Principal had arranged for all three students to come across with him to say they were sorry for Wednesday’s escapade but that Tewn just didn’t turn up. Ranby was a bit put out apparently and said he would send Tewn over on his own later.”
“No wonder he didn’t come.”
“Yes, sir. I’m going straight round there as soon as I’ve seen Dr. Dabbe. I’m going to need all the information he can give me…”
It wasn’t a great deal.
Sloan stood beside the pathologist out in the shrubbery.
“Strangulation,” agreed Dabbe. “Not manual. I think it’s a bit of fuse wire but I can’t be sure. The skin’s too engorged. Over your head in a flash, a quick jerk and that’s that.”
“Vicious.”
“Neat and clean,” said Dabbe‘. “And certain. Quiet, too. No time for a shout, you see. Not that there’s anyone to hear out here, is there?”
They looked round the silent grounds.
“Convent, that way,” said Sloan. “The Institute, the other. Neither in earshot.”
“No nuns about at the time?”
“They’re not let out until twelve. For their constitutional. There’s Hobbett, their gardening factotum. He would have been out in the grounds somewhere…”
That wasn’t the pathologist’s concern and he was soon back with the body.
“Killed on this path, would you say, and dragged into the bushes by the armpits? You can still see where the jacket has been pulled up. His heels made a couple of scuff marks, too.”
Sloan peered down at the last pathetic imprints made by one William Tewn, student.
“A good place really,” went on the pathologist. “He only had to be pulled a yard or two and he’s practically invisible in all this growth. And whoever did it remembered to stand on that dead wood. Doubt if you’ll find a footprint there, and the path’s too hard.”
“Crosby’s tried,” said Sloan, “and he couldn’t pick up anything. When did it all happen?”
The pathologist looked at his watch. “Not more than two hours ago—say three at the very outside…”
“After half past nine then…”
“And not less than an hour ago—an hour and a half more likely.”
“It’s not half past twelve yet. That would make the outside limits somewhere between half past nine and half past eleven, only he wasn’t available just after eleven when the Institute party set out, so that makes it earlier than eleven, doesn’t it?”
But abstract speculation wasn’t of interest to the pathologist either. Of all men his work was to do with fact, with demonstrable fact.
“Perhaps I’ll be able to narrow it down for you later,” he said cautiously.
Sloan nodded and asked the question on which everything hung. “Any clue—any clue at all as to who could have done it?”
Dr. Dabbe considered the body. “He’s not very big, is he? Anyone could have dragged him that short distance. As for whipping a length of fuse wire round someone’s neck—that’s not strength so much as strategy. You could only do it at all if it was totally unexpected. If you were to insist on some indication as to the person who could have done it…” Sloan remained silent, which was as good as insisting.
“… then all I could tell you with any certainty,” offered the pathologist, “was that they were probably as tall or taller than Tewn—and you could work that out for yourself. I can’t tell you if it was a man or a woman but I can tell you that it wouldn’t have been impossible for a woman—especially a tallish one. A quick flick of the wrist and it’s all over.”
“And you wouldn’t suspect a woman,” said Sloan slowly, “would you? I mean your defences would be down, you would tend to trust her…”
Dr. Dabbe gave a short, mirthless laugh. “My dear chap, I’ve no doubt you would, but then we do do very different jobs, don’t we?”
The news had gone before Sloan to the Institute. There was that in the urgent way the porter hurried Sloan and Crosby to the Principal’s room, in the curious stares of those students who just happened to be hanging about the entrance hall and in the manner of Marwin Ranby himself that told the policemen that they knew.
The Principal was visibly distressed. “I’ve just been trying to get in touch with the parents, Inspector, but I can’t get a reply. It is Saturday lunch-time when not everyone’s about—I was going away for the weekend myself as it happens—they may have done the same. They’re farmers in the West Country, you know, Mr. and Mrs. Tewn, I mean, which is quite a way for them to come, I fear.”
“A shocking business, sir.”
“Terrible. The last few days have been quite bad enough, but this is a nightmare.”
“Perhaps if you can tell us what happened, sir…”
“That’s just it, Inspector. Nothing happened. I’d arranged to go over this morning to call on the Mother Superior to make the three of them apologise for their incursion into the Convent and for taking away the habit, which may have been old but which was doubtless of great significance to them. Celia—Miss Faine, you know—tells me that these garments are held to be very precious to the Sisters—they’re handed down from one nun to another. I understand quite a number of them actually kiss each article of their habit before they put it on and so forth—and I felt it only right that these young men should say they were sorry in person. It’s no use telling the young that these things don’t matter, because they do.”
Sloan jerked his head in agreement. “I thought eleven-fifteen would do nicely. They only have two study periods on Saturday mornings and they finish at eleven and anyway that seemed to be as good a time as any for calling on the Mother Superior. I told them they were to present themselves here at five minutes past eleven to allow us time to walk over there…”
“One moment, sir. Whom did you tell to come then?”
Ranby frowned. “Bullen, Parker and Tewn, of course.”
“Ah, I didn’t mean quite that. To which one of the three did you give the message about the time?”
“Oh, I see. Bullen, it was. I told him to tell the other two. But only Bullen and Parker turned up. I must say, Inspector, I was more than a little cross at the time. And surprised. I wouldn’t have said Tewn was the sort of man to back out of an interview like that, however unpleasant. It’s horribly clear now, of course, why he didn’t come.”
“You just went off to the Convent without him?”
“Not at all. I sent Parker to his room to see if he was there and Bullen down to the Common Room. They both came back and said they couldn’t find him and we then went off without him.”
“How long did it take, sir?”
“Saying we were sorry? About five minutes. The Mother Superior was very gracious, thanked them for coming and more or less wrote it off as high spirits which—if I remember correctly—Bullen said was ‘jolly decent of her in the circs’.”
“The dead Sister—did she mention her?”
“Not at all.”
“She tells me she had to keep you waiting.”
“That’s right. She was seeing another man. Largish, with grey hair. Town clothes, too. He came out of the Parlour as we went in.”
Parker and Bullen were taking Tewn’s death badly. They were sitting together at one end of the deserted Common Room. In the distance Sloan could hear luncheon being served, but it seemed Bullen and Parker were not hungry.
“I was sitting next to him at breakfast,” said Bullen in a bemused way. “It doesn’t seem possible, does it, that someone went and murdered him since?”
“When did you give him the message about going over to the Convent?”
Bullen stirred slowly. “I’d have to think. You know, I don’t seem able to think straight, not now. Funny, isn’t it?”