Crow's Inn Tragedy (6 page)

The sweat broke out afresh on Mr. Walls's forehead.

“I don't know anything about it.”

“You know that Mr. Collyer came,” the inspector said with some asperity. “Why did you not mention it?”

Walls glanced at him doubtfully.

“There wasn't anything to mention. Mr. Anthony wanted to see Mr. Bechcombe, and he couldn't, so he went away. He talked to Mr. Thompson, not to me.”

“You did not hear what he said when he went away? Your desk seems to be most inconveniently placed, Mr. Walls.”

“I heard him talking a lot of nonsense to Mr. Thompson.”

“Such as—” The inspector paused.

“Oh, well, he said he must see Mr. Bechcombe and he said he would, and Mr. Thompson—”

“Be careful!” warned the inspector. “Don't make any mistakes, Mr. Walls, I want to know what Mr. Anthony Collyer said.”

“He said—he said—if Mr. Thompson didn't let him in he would go round to Mr. Bechcombe's private door,” the man said, then hesitated. “But it—it was just nonsense.”

“Did he try to get into the room through the private door?”

“I don't know,” Walls said helplessly. “I didn't see him any more.”

The inspector drew a small parcel wrapped in tissue paper from his breast pocket and, opening it, displayed to the clerk's astonished eyes a long, white
suede
glove.

“Have you ever seen this before?”

John Walls peered at it.

“No. I can't say that I have. It—It is a lady's glove, inspector.”

“It
is
a lady's glove,” the inspector assented. “Where do you imagine it was found, Mr. Walls?”

“I'm sure I don't know,” Walls said, staring at him. “It—I think a good many ladies wear gloves like that nowadays, Mr. Furnival. I know Mrs. Walls—”

“This particular glove,” the inspector went on, “I found beside Mr. Bechcombe's writing-table this afternoon.”

“Did you?” Mr. Walls looked amazed. “Well, I don't know how it came there. All Mr. Bechcombe's clients were men that came to-day.”

“Except perhaps the one that came to the private door,” suggested the inspector.

“I don't know anything about that,” Walls said in a puzzled tone. “I never heard anything of a lady coming to-day.”

The inspector folded the glove up and put it away again.

“That will do for the present, Mr. Walls. I should like to see Mr. Thompson if he returns, and now please send Miss Hoyle to me.”

Walls looked uncomfortably surprised.

“Miss Hoyle?”

“Yes, Miss Hoyle—Mr. Bechcombe's secretary!” the inspector said sharply. “I suppose you know her, Mr. Walls?”

“Oh, yes,” Walls stammered. “At least, I couldn't say I know her. I have spoken to her once or twice. But she didn't make any friends among us. And her office was quite apart. She didn't come through our door, or anything. She is a lady—quite a lady, you understand, and her office is next to Mr. Bechcombe's own.”

“Indeed!” For once the inspector looked really interested. “Well, I should like to see Miss Hoyle without delay, Mr. Walls.”

“Very well, I will tell her at once.”

Miss Hoyle did not keep the inspector waiting. He glanced at her keenly as he placed a chair for her.

“Your name, please?”

“Cecily Frances Hoyle.”

“How long have you been with Mr. Bechcombe?”

“Just over a month.”

“Where were you previously?”

“At school. Miss Arnold Watson's at Putney. I stayed there until I was nineteen as a governess-pupil. Then—I hadn't any real gift for teaching—I took a course in shorthand and typing. Mr. Bechcombe wanted a secretary and I was fortunate enough to get the job.”

“Um!” The inspector turned over a new page in his notebook. “Now will you tell me all you know about Mr. Bechcombe's death?”

Cecily stared at him.

“But I don't know anything,” she said helplessly. “I never saw Mr. Bechcombe after he called me into his office about a quarter to twelve.”

“A quarter to twelve!” The inspector pricked up his ears. “You saw Mr. Bechcombe at a quarter to twelve?”

“At a quarter to twelve, she confirmed. “He sounded the electric bell which rings in my office, and I went in to him. He told me that he should have some important work for me later in the day, but that at present there was nothing and that I could go out to lunch when I liked. When I came back there were some letters to be attended to, and then he said I was to wait until he rang for me. That was all.”

“You saw and heard nothing more of Mr. Bechcombe until you came on the scene when the door was broken open by the clerks?”

“I did not see anything.”

The slight emphasis on the verb did not escape the inspector.

“Or hear anything?” he demanded sharply. “Be very careful please, Miss Hoyle.”

“I heard him speak to some one outside very soon after I had gone back to my office, and I heard him moving about his room after I came from lunch,” Cecily said, her colour rising a little.

The inspector looked at her searchingly. “To whom did you hear Mr. Bechcombe speak?”

Cecily hesitated, the colour that was creeping back slowly into her cheeks deepening perceptibly.

“Some one was knocking at the door,” she stammered. “I think Mr. Bechcombe spoke to him. I heard him say he was engaged.”

“Who was he speaking to?”

The girl twisted her hands together.

“It was his nephew, Mr. Anthony Collyer.”

“How do you know?” The inspector fired his questions at her rather as if they had been pistol shots.

Cecily looked round her in an agony of confusion.

“He came to my office—Mr. Anthony, I mean.”

“Why should he come to your office?”

“He asked me to go out to lunch with him,” Cecily faltered. Then seeing the look on the inspector's face, she gathered up her courage with both hands and faced him with sudden resolution. “We are engaged,” she said simply. “We—I mean it hasn't been announced yet, but his father knows; and we shall tell mine as soon as he comes home—he is abroad now—we are engaged, Anthony Collyer and I.”

The inspector might have smiled but that the thing was too serious.

“Did Mr. Bechcombe know?”

The girl hesitated a moment.

“I think he guessed. From the way he smiled when he mentioned Mr. Collyer in the morning.”

The inspector looked over his notes. He was inclined to think that Cecily Hoyle's evidence, if it could be relied on, would put Anthony Collyer off his list of suspects. Still, he was not going to take any chances.

“I see. So you went out with Mr. Anthony Collyer. Where did you lunch?”

“I said he asked me,” Cecily corrected. “But I didn't say I would go. However, we were talking about it and walking down—the passage together when Mr. Bechcombe called Tony back—‘I want you a minute, Tony,' he said.”

“Well?” the inspector prompted as she paused.

“Tony did not want to go back,” the girl said slowly. “But I persuaded him. ‘I will wait for you in St. Philip's Field of Rest,' I said. He ran back, promising not to keep me waiting for a minute.”

“Field of Rest,” the inspector repeated. “What is a Field of Rest?”

“At the back of St. Philip's Church—just over the way. It is the old graveyard really, you know,” Cecily explained. “But they have levelled the stones and put seats there, and it is a sort of quiet recreation ground. I often take sandwiches with me and eat them there.”

The inspector nodded. There were many such places in London he knew.

“And I suppose Mr. Anthony Collyer soon overtook you?”

“No. He didn't. He—I had to wait in the Field of Rest.”

“How long?”

“I don't really know,” Cecily said uncertainly. “Perhaps it wasn't very long. But it seemed a long time to me.”

The inspector looked at her.

“This is important. Please think, Miss Hoyle. This is very important. How long approximately do you think it was before Mr. Anthony Collyer joined you in the Field of Rest?”

“Twenty minutes perhaps—or it might have been half an hour.”

The inspector looked surprised.

“Half an hour! But that's a long time. What excuse did Mr. Collyer make for being so long?”

“He said he couldn't find the Field of Rest. He hadn't been there before, you know.”

The inspector made no rejoinder. He turned back to his notes.

“What time did you come back to the office, Miss Hoyle?”

“We were a little over an hour,” Cecily confessed. “After half-past one, it would be.”

“Did Mr. Collyer go back with you?”

Cecily shook her head.

“Oh, no. He walked as far as Crow's Inn—up to the archway with me.”

The inspector was drawing a small parcel from his pocket. Laying back the tissue paper he slowly shook out the white glove he shown to John Wallis.

“Have you ever seen this before, Miss Hoyle?”

The girl leaned forward and looked at it more closely.

“No, I am sure I have not.”

“It is not yours?”

Cecily shook her head.

“I could not afford anything like that. It is a very expensive glove—French I should say.”

“That glove was found beside the writing-table in Mr. Bechcombe's private room this afternoon,” the inspector said impressively.

Cecily looked amazed.

“What an extraordinary thing! I don't believe it was there when I was in this morning. I wonder who could have dropped it?”

“Possibly the murderer or murderess,” the inspector suggested dryly.

Cecily shivered back in her chair with a little cry.

“It cannot be true! Who would hurt Mr. Bechcombe? He must have had a fit!”

“Miss Hoyle”—the inspector leaned forward—“it was no fit. Mr. Bechcombe was certainly murdered, and Dr. Hackett says that death must have overtaken him either a few minutes before twelve or a few minutes after.”

“What!” Cecily's face became ghastly as the full significance of the words dawned upon her. “It couldn't—” she said, catching her breath in a sob. “He—he was quite well at twelve o'clock, and when I came back from my lunch I heard him moving about.”

“Could you hear what went on in his room in yours?”

“Oh, no. Absolutely nothing. But as I passed his door when I came back from lunch I distinctly heard him moving about. I was rather surprised at this, because I don't remember ever hearing any sound from Mr. Bechcombe's room before.”

“What did you do after you went back?”

“I finished some letters that had to be ready for Mr. Bechcombe's signature before he went home. I was still busy with them when I heard them breaking into Mr. Bechcombe's room.”

“Now one more question, Miss Hoyle. Did you notice anything particular about Mr. Anthony Collyer's hands when you first saw him?”

Cecily stared.

“Certainly I did not. Why?”

“He did not wear gloves?”

“Oh, dear, no!” Cecily almost smiled, “I should certainly have noticed if he had. I have never seen Tony in gloves since I knew him.”

The inspector's stylo was moving quickly in his notebook.

“You are prepared to swear to all this, Miss Hoyle?”

“Certainly I am!” Cecily said at once. “It is absolutely true.”

“Your address, please.”

“Hobart Residence, Windover Square. It is a club for girls,” she added.

“But your permanent home address,” the detective went on.

There was a pause. The girl's long eyelashes flickered.

“My father is away on some business abroad; when he comes back we shall look for a cottage in the country.”

“Oh!” The inspector asked no more questions, but there was a curious look in his eyes as he scrawled another entry in his book.

“That is all for the present, then, Miss Hoyle. The inquest will be opened to-morrow, and you may be wanted. I cannot say.”

He rose. Cecily got up at once and with a little farewell bow went out of the room.

The inspector stood still for a minute or two, then he opened the door again.

“Call Mr. William Spencer, please.”

Ordinarily Mr. Spencer was a jaunty; self-satisfied young man, but to-day both the jauntiness and the self-satisfaction were gone and it was with a very white and subdued face that he came up to the inspector.

“Well, Mr. Spencer, and what have you to tell me about this terrible affair?” the inspector began conversationally.

“Nothing; except what you know. I heard the governor tell Mr. Thompson not to let anyone into his room, and I heard no more until Mr. Walls asked me to go round to the private door.”

“You were the first to see the body, I understand.”

“Well, looking through the keyhole, I saw a heap and I told Mr. Walls I thought it was the governor.”

“Exactly!” The inspector looked at his notes. “You were right, unfortunately. Now, Mr. Spencer, have you ever seen this?” suddenly displaying the white glove he had previously shown.

Mr. Spencer's eyes grew round.

“I—I don't know.”

“What do you mean by that?” the inspector questioned. “Have you any reason to suppose you have done so?”

Spencer stared at it.

“I met a lady with long gloves like that coming up the stairs when I went out to lunch.”

“What time was that?”

“About half-past twelve, it would be, or a little later, I think,” debated Spencer.

“Ah!” the inspector made a note in his book. “What was she like—the woman you met?”

“Well, she was tall with rather bright yellow hair and—and she had powder all over her face. The curious thing about her was,” Spencer went on meditatively, “that I had an odd feeling that in some way her face was familiar. Yet I couldn't remember having seen her before.”