A Medal For Murder (47 page)

Alison need not have worried about Meriel’s tagging along to the Queen Hotel. Meriel took Miss Fell’s arm and they headed for the lichgate.

Dan Root fell into step with me. We waited by the gate, and in turn shook Rodney’s hand. I would have liked to ask Rodney whether he gave the captain Meriel’s account of our having found Milner. But now was not the time. Besides, I felt sure I knew the answer.

Dan and I watched Rodney, Alison and Mrs Hart
being driven off in the mourners’ carriage. Others set off walking to the nearby Queen Hotel.

My only difficulty in questioning Dan was that he, like me, doubted the veracity of the captain’s confession. He may guess what I was driving at. But I would take that risk.

He gave me an opening, saying, ‘I thought I would leave Harrogate, but I have decided to stay a while longer, and be a big brother to Lucy for a short time at least, if she will let me.’

‘I’m glad to hear it. But you may have to do that in Manchester, if Meriel gets her way.’

‘Oh?’ He looked a little put out. ‘Lucy said she would have the attic cleared for me. That I could move up there.’

‘Good.’ It was now or never. There was a slight noise behind, and I turned. Already the gravediggers were at work, shovelling soil back into the grave. ‘Dan, there is something I wanted to ask you, about the play.’

He groaned. ‘What now?’

‘Just a small thing. There were some scenes Meriel tried out and then discarded.’

‘She cut a couple of scenes, yes.’

‘The scene where you played Mr Price, when he committed suicide, I believe that was one.’

He laughed in spite of himself. ‘Do not remind me, please. You mean the one where I hanged myself.’

‘And your son Willie found you, too late.’

‘Yes. Both Dylan and I dug in our heels over that. It would have brought the house down in gales of laughter. Even Meriel had to agree. She said it was a mite too Lear and Cordelia. He was to have cradled me in his arms!’

‘Was there a prop involved, to cut you down?’

He paused. A butterfly landed on the gate, realised its mistake and made off in a ray of sunshine. Very quietly, Dan said, ‘There was a prop, yes. We all brought props of various kinds. Not all were used. We took them home afterwards, when they weren’t needed.’

‘Who brought the knife to cut you down?’

A late straggler came from the churchyard. We parted, to let her through.

‘I can’t remember who brought the knife.’ He took out a cigarette.

‘This prop. Was it an African dagger?’

Not looking at me, he lit his cigarette. ‘I can’t remember what it was. As I say, we never used it.’

So there had been a knife among the props to be gathered up from the dressing rooms after the performance. Dan was lying. It was the African dagger that Marcus had shown me, taken from the attic at number 29 St Clement’s Road. Four people would have had reason to see and handle that knife. Lucy, who brought it, Meriel as director, Dan as the chap to be cut down, and Dylan Ashton.

 
 

A fresh light breeze fluttered the leaves as I left the churchyard and walked to my car. There was one person whom I had been busy suspecting of aiding and abetting Lucy but had not considered as the murderer. I drove back through the now familiar streets and parked near the police station, so as to be at a little distance from Croker & Company.

I cut through Princes Street, ignoring my surroundings, desperately hoping to be wrong about Dylan Ashton. He seemed such an unlikely candidate, unassuming, a bit of a weakling, and with an alibi. Monsieur Geerts had latched onto him after the party, and had walked him home. But why would a young man need walking home?

It was time to take a closer look at young Mr Ashton. I would start by searching his room, above the house agent’s premises, keeping my fingers crossed that Mr Croker had gone to the funeral breakfast.

I was not sure what I would find. A cufflink matching the one in the gutter would be far too much to hope for. But as I pictured the cufflink left behind at the scene of
the crime, I felt sure I was right in thinking it had not belonged to the captain. It was too modern for a man who had probably not shopped for himself in a couple of decades. Marcus had been remiss not to bring it with him to show to Lucy. Perhaps my inspector friend’s attention to detail was not as good as it ought to be.

The notice on Croker & Company’s door read: “Closed Friday morning – funeral”. After counting the number of shop premises, I walked round to the back alley, and counted again.

An imperious cat watched from the roof of next door’s outside lavatory. What excuse could I come up with if caught entering premises in broad daylight? ‘Thought I spotted an intruder, your honour.’

Once again I brought out my trusty penknife. The inventor of sash windows bestowed a boon on private detectives. The catch shot back with ease.

Carefully, I closed the window behind me. I stepped into the shabby downstairs back room of Croker & Company, with its sink, cupboards, oilcloth-covered deal table and battered filing cabinets.

The door to the upstairs accommodation was shut, but not locked. I climbed the stairs, noticing that the third stair creaked.

Dylan Ashton’s room bore the reasonable tidiness of a person who did not have sufficient belongings to become untidy. There was a washstand, a bedside chair, but no wardrobe. On a hook behind the door hung a dress suit, the one Dylan had worn after the play, the trouser bottoms muddied. A little shabby, the jacket had been skilfully mended under the right arm. A slight stain by a button hole could have been anything. But if it were blood, it could be analysed and identified. A pair
of good black shoes was tucked under the bed, still marked with clay from Dylan’s nighttime trip to the tower with Lucy when he had crossed the field.

The green candlewick bedspread had been hastily pulled up to cover the pillow. A couple of threads of white cotton lay on the bedspread, along with an expensive white knitted silk scarf that a house agent’s clerk could ill afford. I remembered a gesture from the play when Rodney, playing the businessman Henry Mynors, threw the scarf across his shoulder in an easy gesture. If I were right, Dylan had helped himself to the scarf. He could have taken the scarf when collecting props because he coveted it, or because wearing it would allow him to hide something, such as a bloodstain on his jacket.

On the washstand there was an ashtray, a twist of tobacco in a jar, and a finely painted Potteries dish that held collar studs and a pair of cheap enamel cufflinks. The absence of shaving kit and hairbrush made me guess that Mr Croker had been in here, and delivered these to Dylan in the infirmary.

The washstand cupboard contained nothing remarkable: undervests and writing materials; two shirts, five collars, one of them a dress collar.

On the landing, a closet held broom, dustpan and brush, mop and cleaning cloths. It was the smell of starch that made me pick up one of the dusters, which turned out to be a shirt sleeve. I pulled out all the cloths. A dress shirt had been ripped up for rags. Either the front had already been used, or not been put there in the first place. Why? The obvious answer was that it had been splashed with blood. The clapper on the shop door sounded, halting my search.

I froze. Unsure whether to go up or down, I stayed put. Coming in through a downstairs window was one thing. Getting out through an upstairs window and shimmying down the drainpipe in broad daylight was altogether a different caper. Slowly, I came down, step by step. The telephone rang. Mr Croker answered it. How miserable of him to rush back to work and miss the funeral breakfast.

His telephone conversation gave me the chance to escape the way I had come. I hurried down the stairs into the back room, and across to the window. Just as I was about to push it open, Mr Croker said ‘Thank you’, and replaced the receiver. Confound the man for having no conversation.

And now he was on his feet and walking into the back room. Trying to still my heart, I fled across the room and stood behind the inner door as he entered. He walked towards the filing cabinet. As he bent his head to flick through folders, I quickly moved round the door, into the outer office, to the main door, and opened it to make my escape. The clapper sounded, but I was gone before Mr Croker could reappear.

 
 

At the infirmary, I was shown into the matron’s office, a bright south-facing room. The matron greeted me warmly. ‘Yes, sister mentioned you, Mrs Shackleton. You’re the lady who identified Mr Ashton.’

She sat across from me at a desk that held a vase of white roses and a framed photograph.

‘How is he, matron?’

‘Better than expected. That’s youth for you. As well as the wrist and the bruises, he broke a couple of bones in his left foot. He took a bad bump on the head. We cannot be sure whether he will suffer from that in the days to come, but he quickly recovered from concussion.’

‘I wonder if I might see him, before I leave Harrogate?’

‘Yes indeed. Perhaps you may be able to help.’

I braced myself for a plea to contribute to the upkeep of the hospital, but it was not that.

‘The thing is, Mrs Shackleton, Mr Ashton needs time to convalesce. We can keep him here if needs be. I cannot discharge him to go back to a room above business premises.’

‘I believe his family is in Staffordshire.’

She frowned. ‘Too far for him to travel. Local people have kindly offered to take him in and allow him to recuperate, but he flatly refuses. He is insisting on going back to his own room, which is out of the question.’ She pulled a folder from her drawer and looked for the names. ‘Here we are, Mr and Mrs Geerts have offered to take him.’ She ran her finger down the page. ‘Mrs Gould also called. She is housekeeper to the Milners. What a horrific crime that was. Mrs Gould believed it would do Mr Rodney Milner good to have another young person in the house, that it would take his mind off the tragedy of his father’s death. Now would you not expect Mr Ashton to say yes in that situation? I hope you may be able to convince him.’

‘That is difficult,’ I said, avoiding the question. My mind raced. Was Dylan reluctant to accept hospitality out of shyness, to avoid answering awkward questions, or did he desperately need to return to his own room to check that he had not left evidence that would connect him to the murder? After all, he had not had a great deal of time to cover his tracks.

Matron stood up, satisfied to have got her point across with such force. ‘I will have Mr Ashton taken into our small private room. I hope you will have more success with him than I.’ She gave me a meaningful look as though expecting after a five-minute interview I would request a wheelbarrow to take him off her hands.

Dylan, wearing hospital pyjamas and dressing gown, sat in a wheelchair, one leg raised. He looked up as I entered the room, his face pale, head swathed in bandages, arm in a sling. A flicker of a glance told me that
he had hoped the footsteps along the corridor would be Lucy’s.

‘You’ve been in the wars, Dylan.’

‘Yes.’

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Bit of a headache. But I think that’s because my bandage is too tight. I told the nurse, but they know best.’ He smiled weakly.

‘Do you remember what happened, where you were going?’

He blushed. ‘I was coming back from seeing Lucy. Is she all right?’