There Came Both Mist and Snow (20 page)

‘And you would say, sir, that a bogus assault can be staged in that way?’ Leader paused with heavy irony. ‘That a man can successfully stun himself on the back of the head: your experience bears out the possibility of that?’

It was only momentarily that Geoffrey looked uncertain. ‘If one were Basil – yes. He’s no end of an athlete and a clever chap. A climber too, with joints like a contortionist. And quite abnormal resolution. Yes, Basil could do it all right.’

‘You say’ – Appleby spoke for the first time – ‘that Sir Basil is an athlete. Would you also say that he is a good shot?’

Geoffrey grinned. ‘Very good, indeed.’

‘In fact, about as good as you yourself are bad?’

Geoffrey’s grin broadened; he plainly felt that he had something up his sleeve. ‘Just about that.’

‘Then how do you account for the fact that at what can have been no more than a few paces Sir Basil failed to kill his man? The bullet, as we know, got the right lung. Do you suggest that this remote and ruthless person – as you describe your uncle – was so agitated that he was unable to take proper aim? Or why was Mr Foxcroft so imperfectly shot?’

The last phrase made me start: it had been used by Anne or by Geoffrey himself when Appleby and I were spying on them in the ruins. And I remembered, too, something that Appleby had said of them immediately after: he had spoken of them as having penetrated to the heart of the mystery. And just as I recollected this Geoffrey spoke again. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘why was Wilfred so imperfectly shot? The core of the thing is in that.’

It was a queer scene. Geoffrey was still standing up in the middle of the library – slightly flushed, perhaps slightly nervous, like a child put up to recite. And scattered about the room was the quite sizeable auditory of family and police. The purpose for which we had been brought together before the attack on Basil seemed vanished or in abeyance; in his extremely ill-considered attempt to expedite the winding-up of the mystery Geoffrey was being given his head. And he went into a full gallop now.

‘Basil has changed early. He has been working in his study. He comes out and finds Wilfred emerging from the library here, unable to write a letter because Lucy has made away with all the note paper. Basil sees his chance, he tells Wilfred to go into the study and write the letter at his desk. Then he gets a gun.’

Leader had applied himself to his notebook. Some of us cast uneasy glances at each other about the room. There was something peculiarly macabre in Geoffrey’s brisk statement that then his uncle got a gun.

‘What is the position? Wilfred, sitting down to write his letter, will be facing the window. Basil will have left the curtains a foot or two apart: it is his habit. Now one of two things may happen. Wilfred, who doesn’t much care for the cold, may draw them to before he sits down. In that case Basil has only to step through the window, part them an inch or so and fire. But suppose Wilfred happens to have left the curtains undisturbed? Then there is a difficulty. Arthur, you went poking round with these people last night. If Wilfred was sitting at the desk with the curtains a foot or two apart just what could he see?’

The question was suddenly pitched at me and I hesitated. Not unnaturally. I was wholly indisposed to assist this wanton attempt to convict Basil of the shooting. But Appleby’s eye turned to me in mild inquiry and I felt bound to reply. For a moment, however, I fenced. ‘What do you mean: just what could he see?’

‘What could he see of someone on the terrace – standing out there, moving about, approaching the window?’

‘If someone were walking up and down near the balustrade he would see no more than an uncertain figure taking a stroll.’

‘Unidentifiable?’

‘I think so. In a dinner-jacket, certainly. But if the person faced the house and approached the window–’

‘Exactly!’ Geoffrey swept a triumphant glance round the company. ‘Common prudence would dictate that Basil should fire without revealing his identity to Wilfred. However good the shot, Wilfred might be able to gasp out the truth if help came quickly. Basil therefore could stroll up and down by the balustrade. He could stand by the balustrade looking over the garden. Under these conditions he would be no more to Wilfred than an unknown member of the household taking the air before dinner.
Basil could not safely turn round and approach the window
.’

The library was suddenly very still; fidgeting noises had ceased; the only sound was the click of a coal in the grate.

‘So consider,’ said Geoffrey, ‘just what was going on at the range yesterday morning. Just what sort of trick-shooting.’ He wheeled abruptly round. ‘Cambrell, are you wearing that watch now?’

This was sensation. I felt a cold trickle of horror travel down my spine. And Cambrell jumped much as if he himself were being accused. Then he nodded, fumbled at his left wrist and laid something on a table before him. It was a watch on a bright metal bracelet.

Geoffrey continued what had become his speech for the prosecution. ‘I was interested in the trick – the trick of shooting backwards that we heard of afterwards – and I managed to make out how it was done. Cambrell faced away from the target, tucked the barrel of his revolver under his left arm, and took his pipe from his mouth with his left hand. That was the key. The left wrist goes up, the cuff slips down and – if the light is right – the polished bracelet serves as a little mirror. With practice one can no doubt make a very fair shot.’

Horror grew upon me. I remembered the words with which I had myself heard Basil greet Cambrell’s trick: ‘A gunman’s trick: I think I could do it myself.’ Giving way to an irresistible impulse, I cried out: ‘It’s nonsense; it can’t be true!’

Curious glances were directed on me only for a moment: then everyone turned back to Geoffrey as I sank back in my chair. Whatever was to be thought of the plausibility of his story he had his auditory gripped.

‘So there you are, Basil stands by the balustrade, as if watching the garden or Cudbird’s beastly bottle. Then he takes a few paces backwards – it is a natural action if one is getting a view – and plays Cambrell’s trick on Wilfred. But he isn’t quite up to it and he muffs’ – Geoffrey paused slightly and looked round him almost defiantly – ‘he muffs the killing.’

For perhaps twenty seconds there was silence. Then a voice spoke quietly from the door. ‘An interesting theory indeed.’

We all turned round. It was Basil himself.

‘But it breaks down at the start.’

Basil was very pale and had a light bandage round his head; he advanced somewhat unsteadily as he spoke and lowered himself cautiously into a chair. Wale had risen hastily; this appearance was evidently against orders. But Basil peremptorily waved him back.

‘I shall be right enough. And I agree with Geoffrey in one thing: that this affair had better be cleared up at once – however painful that clear-up may be. And the first thing to establish is that Geoffrey’s case breaks down at the start. The motive does not exist.’

Appleby had settled back in his chair with the appearance of a man who expects that matters will now work themselves smoothly out. Leader was applying himself steadily to his notebook, for all the world as if he were reporting the most humdrum of political meetings. The Voice was looking at us each in turn with evident and deepening disapproval. My own eye was all for Basil. He was indeed a person somewhat cold and remote; that he might – as Geoffrey averred – be ruthless on occasion I was not at all disposed to doubt. I awaited what he had to say with a good deal of nervousness. And this was increased when I realized that beneath his calm Basil was angry – angry as I had never known him before.

‘The suggestion is that I shot Wilfred because I overheard him declare that he knew who could prevent my selling Belrive. But if Geoffrey were at all a man of affairs he would realize what nonsense that is. I am proposing to organize a scientific expedition to the financing of which I am at present giving virtually my whole time and thoughts. I have gone some way towards negotiating a sale of this property. Is it likely that I am incompetent to discover any possible legal impediment that there may be? Is it conceivable that at this stage Wilfred should be able to step in, waving some forgotten deed or paper, and stop the whole thing? Such an idea could only be evolved by a person’ – Basil paused and seemed to turn a shade paler – ‘by a person under the strongest promptings to evolve…something.’

It was at this point, I think, that most of us grasped the unpleasant truth that Basil was concerned with rather more than exculpating himself. I saw Horace Cudbird stir warily in his chair and look speculatively at Cambrell; I saw Lucy shiver and Mervyn Wale lean forward to throw a log on the fire. Then Basil’s level voice claimed all my attention again.

‘It is true that I heard what Wilfred said at tea. I went back to my study and thought about it. Wilfred is a person with a great deal to say for himself – the sort of person, in fact, to whom one does not always greatly attend. Nevertheless he holds a position of responsibility and has not the habit of talking at random in matters of this sort. What he had said was virtually this: that he himself could prevent my going forward with my particular plan for disposing of this estate. After careful thought I found that I could attach only one significance to such a statement. It surprised me.’

Basil made a long pause – less for effect, I imagine, than because the effort of talking was considerable. ‘In the present temper of this household other explanations are possible. I can see a certain type of mind’ – and Basil’s eye went fleetingly to his sister – ‘which might suppose that Wilfred was proposing to come at me with a gun. No doubt that would do the trick. But the actual explanation was less sensational. I say it surprised me. For Wilfred’s attitude to Belrive has always been somewhat off-hand; he has adopted the appearance of thinking the place an anachronism – an encumbrance on potentially valuable industrial land. For this reason – and perhaps because there was a residual coolness between us – I had held no direct communication with him on my plans. But now it was perfectly clear to me that in this I had been acting wrongly. It was perfectly clear that Wilfred, who is a very wealthy man, was prepared to buy Belrive himself. I took the opportunity of speaking to him, therefore, before going upstairs to change. It was as I thought. He said simply that he was interested in the project of a meteorological station and would buy Belrive at the highest figure I had so far been offered. And just as I preferred Cudbird’s proposal to Cambrell’s so I prefer Wilfred’s to Cudbird’s. And I know that you, Cudbird, will not suggest that anything had been concluded between us.’

Cudbird made what appeared to be a cordial affirmative reply. It was drowned however by the crisp voice of Anne. ‘Then I suppose it was Mr Cudbird who shot Wilfred. Geoffrey, why didn’t we think of that?

‘Yes,’ pursued Anne; ‘that is it.’ She turned a bright smile and a hard eye upon the Voice – having divined in him, no doubt, the most readily outraged person in the room. ‘How very
clear
. Mr Cudbird hears what Wilfred proposes to do, so he walks in at the window and shoots him. The situation is then as it was, and Mr Cudbird bottles Belrive. Belrive Beers are Best. Try our Priory Entire.’ She turned to Cudbird. ‘You do see,’ she asked with innocent earnestness, ‘how my explanation has the grand virtue of
simplicity
?’

Cudbird contemplated her impassively. ‘Perhaps, Miss Anne, you will tell us how Sir Basil came to be attacked just now in the ruins. Maybe I have just formed the habit of guns and bludgeons?’

Anne shook her head. ‘That I leave to the police.’ Again she turned her smile on the Voice. ‘It would be nice that they should be left
some
explaining to do. Don’t they remind you of a row of powerful locomotive engines laid up in a yard? I can see the beginnings of a film of rust over Mr Appleby already. Inspector Leader is quite a Pacific type. And on this gentleman here’ – and Anne bowed gravely to the Voice – ‘one feels it is only necessary to pull a piece of string to get the most magnificent hoot.’

The constable sniggered; the Voice breathed hard – thus unwittingly giving point to Anne’s comparison; the rest of us attempted to maintain what is called a frozen silence. Presently Leader spoke. ‘Miss Grainger’s suggestion,’ he said, ‘will be considered in its place. If it
has
a place, that is to say.’ He paused as if calling our attention to this repartee. ‘And now, Sir Basil, there is a most important point. Mr Foxcroft, as you know, is unable to answer questions, and one can’t tell what turn his condition may take. So we want some sort of independent testimony to this resolution of his to buy Belrive. You will realize–’

‘Quite so.’ Basil was impatient and I could tell from this that he was angrier than before – Anne’s conduct being no doubt the cause. ‘There is, I believe, something like evidence. Wilfred remarked that it was a big thing and he would have down his solicitor. And he scribbled out a telegram for Richards to send off there and then. It specifically mentioned the conveyancing of the estate.’

‘Thank you. That is most satisfactory.’

Appleby stirred in his chair as if he did not think it satisfactory at all. It seemed to be his policy that the locomotives should remain as long as possible idling in their yard. ‘Sir Basil,’ he said, ‘has something further to tell us – or so I imagine.’

‘I have.’ Basil squared himself in his chair. ‘And I begin with what has been called the core of the thing. In Geoffrey’s phrase: why was Wilfred so imperfectly shot? We have had one explanation: Wilfred was only badly wounded because a difficult piece of trick-shooting was involved. But we have seen that for this there is no basis whatever.’

Leader raised his eyes from his notebook. ‘Hardly that, Sir Basil. We have seen that a particular motive for your shooting Mr Foxcroft will not hold. But the trick-shooting remains on the carpet just the same. And I must say it seems not a bad explanation of a very puzzling feature of the case. Logic, sir – we must stick to logic.’