There Came Both Mist and Snow (24 page)

Lucy had stopped sobbing, but now Anne had begun. It was against the background of her desperately suppressed sniffs that Wale spoke again. ‘It is a comfort,’ he said, ‘to know that he can have experienced only a moment’s pain.’ He nodded his head in a satisfied way and gave a sad and resigned smile which was clearly meant to indicate what should be the correct family attitude. ‘May I ask’ – he turned to Appleby – ‘where, for the moment, they have taken the body?’

Appleby looked extremely distressed. ‘And now,’ he said, ‘if I may suggest–’

But Wale insisted. ‘The body – where have they taken it?’

‘I am afraid – it is a horrible thing to have to explain – well, I understand it hasn’t yet been scraped off.’

We looked at him appalled.

‘Dr Foxcroft fell into a very powerful press, used for stamping out steel bodies. He was instantly crushed. Not to mince matters, the remains can be no more than a few millimetres thick.’

Our horrified silence was suddenly rent by a yell of mingled despair and rage. It came from the hitherto professionally callous Wale. He had sprung to his feet as if possessed and was waving his arms in maniacal fury. Then, as suddenly, he collapsed.

And Appleby was on his feet in turn and pointing. ‘There,’ he said dramatically, ‘is the man.’ His finger was directed straight at Wale’s heart.

I must have been almost stunned; I remember Appleby’s voice coming as if out of a mist a few minutes later. He was speaking rapidly and with extraordinary energy. The absent and occasionally rather diffident young man was gone. I suppose it was during this performance that we all came to realize just how formidable a police officer Basil had brought accidentally beneath his roof.

‘…and you have seen him give himself away. What he worked for, what he almost killed another man for, is gone – irrevocably.

‘Has any of you read a story of Saroyan’s called
Aspirin Is a Member of the NRA
? An ironical sentence in it has stuck in my mind.
Death does not harm the heart
…
doctors everywhere recommend it
.’ Appleby paused. ‘Death does not harm the heart – that is what Wale wanted to ensure.’

I remember a fleeting glimpse of astounded faces, their gaze riveted on Appleby.

‘Wale had to have Cecil Foxcroft’s heart. He had to have it; he is, as you know, a cardiac specialist, and it had come to be his master interest.’

Again a feeling something like giddiness came over me. I recalled – I believe I have set down the fact earlier in this narrative – that Cecil had possessed some sort of odd heart as a schoolboy. I recalled – more powerfully – the strangeness I had felt in the relationship between Cecil and Wale, I recalled – most vividly of all – that interview or consultation I had stumbled upon in the ruins, and the expression on Wale’s face at its termination. That expression had elusively reminded me of something at the time: I now knew what it was. It was the same expression I had seen on the face of a collector in a sales-room when a rival had carried off a unique book he could never hope to see again.

‘But Wale was by a long way the older man – and a sick man at that. He realized that in the normal course of things Dr Foxcroft would cheat him – would cheat his passionate desire to possess and investigate something of unique scientific interest. I believe he realized this particularly keenly during a game of which Mr Ferryman has told me. You were searching for bells in Shakespeare and had collected rather a melancholy crop. When it came to Wale’s turn – or one of his turns – he quoted from
Romeo and Juliet
. He quoted:
This sight of death is a bell That warns my old age to a sepulchre
. And then he left the room in some agitation. He knew that he had not very long to live and that Dr Foxcroft was unlikely to predecease him.’ Suddenly Appleby wheeled on Wale. ‘Is that not true?’

Wale was lying back in his chair, pale and exhausted. He nodded. ‘Yes, it is true. But–’

‘He was determined to kill Dr Foxcroft, but in such a way that the organ he coveted should not be injured. He found a simple plan to lure his victim to the chosen place. Dr Foxcroft had mislaid a book: William Law’s
Serious Call
. Wale found it. He placed it in the study and told Dr Foxcroft that he had seen it there. He so arranged it as to reckon on Dr Foxcroft’s going to retrieve it after he had changed and just before dinner. Unfortunately Dr Foxcroft’ – Appleby hesitated – ‘found something else to occupy him. And by a further stroke of ill luck Wilfred Foxcroft – who has been remarked as uncommonly like his brother – entered the study instead. The rest explains itself. But there remains the curious manner in which Dr Foxcroft hit upon the truth.

‘It happened when Wale came back from the hospital after Wilfred Foxcroft had been operated upon. Dr Foxcroft was in the hall and asked for news of his brother. By a very odd chance the terms in which Wale briefly replied almost brought together the words ‘serious’ and ‘call’. And at once Dr Foxcroft’s mind leapt to the truth of what had happened. Wale was his physician and the one man who understood his condition; he depended on him absolutely. But this must have made him all the more aware – subconsciously at least – of the extraordinary species of covetousness with which Wale regarded his supremely interesting patient. And now the truth leapt up: the information about Law’s book being in the study had been given for a profoundly sinister purpose. Perhaps Dr Foxcroft had already been suspicious; perhaps Wale had been clumsy in giving the information. Be that as it may, Dr Foxcroft suddenly saw his physician transformed into a Shylock of a peculiarly horrible sort, eager not for a pound of flesh but for several pounds of human heart.

‘I do not think it disrespectful to the late Dr Foxcroft to say that he was not a courageous man. The circumstances were unnerving to an extreme, and he is not to be blamed if he lost his head. His one idea was to preserve himself from Wale. He hit upon what must be admitted an ingenious plan. He sent for a solicitor and proposed to make a will – or something between a will and a manifesto, for the document was to be made public immediately. However he should come to die – this was in effect his wish – there was not in any circumstances to be a post-mortem examination. If he could achieve this, and Wale were to know it, he would be safe. When he was assured by the solicitor that he had no power to make a legally binding disposition of the sort he abruptly left Belrive – with the unhappy result that you now know.

‘All this might be difficult to substantiate. But, as it happens Dr Foxcroft set down most of what I have told you in a document written early this morning, and this document he gave to Mr Cotton, the solicitor, with instructions that it should be transmitted to the police in the event of his death.’ Appleby paused for a moment and then turned to Wale, who was still sitting huddled in his chair. ‘Sir Mervyn Wale, I arrest you–’

‘Stop!’

The voice had rung through the room. It was my own.

‘Stop, I say! This perversion of justice – this monstrous ingenuity – it must not go on. I have withheld the truth too long. Hubert shot Wilfred. That is the truth and I have known it from the start.’

Hubert looked up as I pronounced the last words, and I saw that his face wore its laziest smile. ‘I didn’t expect this,’ he said. He sighed and the smile vanished. ‘It was Arthur. Arthur was the fool who did it. And now the police must know.’

Appleby glanced from one to the other of us. ‘Mr Ferryman,’ he said gravely.

I looked steadily at Hubert. ‘You will all realize that I didn’t mean to do this. When Cudbird produced his penetrating explanation of why Hubert shot Wilfred as he did I intervened with a case against Cambrell. I hope Cambrell will forgive me. Hubert seemed about to confess and I rushed in with the first diversion I could think of. For I was desperately anxious that Hubert should not be publicly convicted of this horrible act. It was a momentary madness, I felt sure, and best forgotten. I tried to get from Hubert in a veiled way an assurance that he could be trusted not to act in so wicked and foolish a way again. His response was not very satisfactory; he is a wilful creature; still, I felt the slight risk had better be borne than that the family should have to figure in a criminal court.

‘But then there came this sudden and frightful complication. The police, who had appeared baffled amid a welter of our conflicting theories, hit on one of their own: this diabolically clever construction of Mr Appleby’s against Wale. Before we resumed this strange conference after luncheon Mr Appleby told me that he had a case, and that it concerned none of us in the family. I told Hubert of this at once: the imminent prospect of some positive miscarriage of justice clearly presented both of us with a formidable moral problem. But his attitude was again very unsatisfactory. He implied that any problem was wholly mine. It must be supposed that he was already preparing the fantastic accusation against me which he made a minute ago.

‘And now there is nothing for it but the truth. I don’t know how many actual lies I have told; I think not many. What I have done is to suppress something vital.’

Appleby had once more taken up his position before the window. Now he interrupted me. ‘The gun,’ he said. ‘You can produce that?’

I nodded and moved to the door. ‘In less than a minute.’ And I went out into the hall. ‘I hid it,’ I explained on my return, ‘in one of those Egyptian pots. It startled me rather to find poor Cecil poking about them in his inquisitive way later last night. Here it is.’ And I laid the gun before Appleby.

He looked at it thoughtfully for a few moments. ‘As I thought,’ he said. ‘An automatic pistol. Will you all excuse me?’ And leaving the weapon on a table beside him he rose and left the room.

It was an uncomfortable interval. We all looked at the gun; we none of us looked at each other. But after a minute’s silence Hubert spoke. ‘Arthur, why didn’t you beat it when he let you out of the room? You don’t think this yarn of yours is going to be any good?’

I did not reply. The silence prolonged itself. Appleby by disappearing in this unexpected manner, had hung up my statement in the most awkward way. And it must have been a full eight minutes before he reappeared. ‘Go on,’ he said.

‘I was saying that with the object of protecting Hubert I had suppressed something vital.’

Hubert stirred in his chair. ‘Would it be interrupting too rudely,’ he asked, ‘if I returned the compliment? I had no wish to see Arthur in gaol. So I said nothing about seeing him come out of the study and slink away with that gun. If that isn’t vital, what is?’

There was a murmur of bewilderment. Geoffrey Roper, who had been uncommonly subdued since his performance before luncheon, turned to his father. ‘I say, Dad, aren’t you going for something a bit steep? I don’t see what motive Arthur could have–’

Hubert shook his head. ‘There have been some imaginative motives flying about. But not the authentic imaginative motive. Whenever any of you claims that Basil was to be shot because of his proposing to sell Belrive the motive is given in terms of pounds, shillings, and pence. But can’t you see another? Poor old Arthur is crazy about the Priory, and always has been. He lives in the past. He would do anything to prevent the place from being broken up. And he guessed that if Belrive came to me there would be no sale. Rather a compliment that, considering that I never have a bean. So I’m sorry, as I say, to have to give him away. But when he tries to plant the thing on me–’

Appleby interrupted firmly. ‘I think we had better begin with the vital matter which Mr Ferryman says he concealed.’

I nodded and braced myself. ‘It is this. Before dinner, as everyone knows, I went out for a stroll. I saw somebody on the terrace: I had to admit that to Mr Appleby, being taken rather by surprise. Let me try to remember just what account I gave of myself. I was down by the lily pond when a flash from a tram showed me this figure. I think I said I waited for another flash which didn’t come. That is true. Then I said that a few minutes later I turned away from the house and entered the park. That again is true. What I suppressed was something that I did in those few minutes.

‘I was curious and for some reason slightly alarmed. I retraced my path, climbed the steps and moved along the terrace. There was a chink of light from the study window and by this I could just see that the figure was Hubert’s. He was standing right back by the balustrade, where he could not be recognized or distinguished from within, and he was gazing intently into the room. He moved slightly and I saw that he had a gun.’

Hubert stood up. ‘That,’ he said – and I knew that for the first time he was angry – ‘is a lie.’

I turned to him. ‘Do you deny that you were there?’

‘I was there – and I was a fool not to admit it to the police at the start. No doubt I was staring in intently. I have the habit of staring intently: it is part of my job and a lighted window can be a fascinating thing. But that I had a gun is a lie.’

‘Go on,’ said Appleby.

‘Very well.’ I thought for a moment. ‘It may sound strange, but I persuaded myself that nothing was wrong. Or rather I must instantly have forbidden myself to believe that anything could be seriously wrong. I had an idea that some foolish joke was going forward – a mock hold-up or something of the sort. These parties are occasionally high-spirited. But certainly I didn’t want to be involved in any foolery of the kind, and I turned away. But this blanketing of the sinister quality of what I had stumbled upon did not last for long. I walked about, increasingly uneasy, and finally I returned to the terrace near the study window. Hubert had disappeared, but the pistol was there still, lying on the balustrade. In something like sudden panic I picked it up, stepped through the window, parted the curtains, and walked into the room. I saw the body huddled on the floor and in an instant saw the truth. Hubert had shot his brother Basil – whether fatally or not I could not tell. My one instinct was to avoid a scandal if that might be. I ran out to the terrace, pocketed the pistol, and hurried round to the front door. It was my intention to go straight to the study and appear to come upon the disaster for the first time. But my plan was upset by the appearance of Mr Appleby and I had to dissimulate my alarm. The news that it was Wilfred who had been shot dumbfounded me. But I was committed to concealing Hubert’s ineffective crime.’