The Dusky Hour (32 page)

“Give them back, quick, now, or you're getting yours. Hand over or –”

There was a note of finality, of triumph almost and achieved certainty, in that hoarse voice that made it seem the speaker knew success was his at last, that the end had come, and had come as he had wished. But the answer – the instant answer – was a snarl of defiance, and Bobby felt and knew that the reply to that would be the report of a pistol fired at close quarters, fired from so near that to miss would be impossible, death given and received – even in that moment of suspense he wondered, given by whom, by whom received? For that hoarse voice he had heard, distorted by rage and threat and triumph, he had failed to recognise.

But what he actually heard was unexpected. For there sounded no loud summons to death to come, obedient and swift, at the pressing of a trigger, but merely a sharp, snapping sound, as of an ineffective hammer driving home a useless tack.

Then followed an oath, screamed aloud in frantic surprise and disappointment, and hard upon it a sound half laugh, half-sob, full of a wild relief. Bobby realised that the pistol had been empty, its cartridges fired away, its magazine exhausted. The thought came to him that the automatic of our advanced civilisation has, however, its disadvantages when compared with the club or knife of our merely barbarian ancestors. Club and knife do not exhaust their deadliness in their wielder's hands or turn abruptly useless. He heard a voice, apparently that of the man who had just laughed:

“Well, now then, come and get them if you can.”

A curse, a shout, a sound of stamping and of struggling told that the challenge had been accepted. Into the island of light that lay between impenetrable walls of darkness came now two stumbling, interlaced, and struggling bodies, locked in such an ecstasy of hate and combat they had no heed of Bobby, though he, too, was now within that same radius of light. They rolled over each other on the ground, they tore at each other, they clawed, they fought as the beasts fight, with all nature had given them to fight with and with nothing else. Bobby stood for a moment as they rolled and fought at his feet. They knew no more that he was there than they knew aught else in the frenzy of hate and fear that held them in their primeval lust of combat. No sound came from them but their heavy breathing; their limbs were intertwined, their hands clawed at each other's throats. So closely interwoven were their bodies by their hate, it seemed as if nothing but death would part them. One rolled somehow uppermost and with a gasp of triumph got his hands about the other's throat. The next instant they had rolled over again, and now the other was on top and striking wildly down with his clenched fist on his adversary's head.

“Oh, stop them, why don't you?” Molly's voice said at Bobby's side. “You've torn my frock,” she added reproachfully. “Oh, stop them, please.”

Bobby jumped forward, only just in time. The one of the two wrestlers who was now the uppermost had somehow caught up a heavy stone and with it was about to batter out his opponent's brains. Bobby only just managed to grab wrist and stone, wrench the stone away, fling it aside.

“That's enough,” he said.

The man whose blow he had arrested screamed a curse at Bobby and struck out at him viciously. Bobby drew back. The other who had been undermost, whose life Bobby's intervention had probably saved, wrenched himself free, got somehow to his feet. He stood for a moment quite still, breathing heavily, a little bewildered. Bobby recognised him as Thoms. He saw now that the other was Larson. Larson did not seem to recognise Bobby. He was standing close to the car, and abruptly he put back his hand and snatched up a big spanner that had been lying within. His face was distorted with his fury; his eyes were frantic; there was froth and blood dripping from his mouth some chance blow had cut. He seemed to see Bobby all at once, and, lifting the spanner, ran at him, yelling as he ran. Bobby stepped sideways and with one clear, straight, well-delivered blow sent him crashing to the ground.

An instinct made him turn. Thoms was running at him now. Somehow he had picked up the empty automatic. He held it like a club. He, too, blinded with fury and the strange rage of conflict, did not appear to have recognised Bobby, perhaps even did not distinguish him from Larson with whom he had been at such deadly grips. Bobby gathered himself together, meaning to meet that charge with a flying tackle, when Molly stepped between them.

“I'll tell Henrietta,” she said severely. “You wait till Henrietta knows.”

Thoms stopped short in his rush. He looked at her bewilderedly and passed one hand across his face, as if wiping something away.

“Oh, well,” he said, “she can jaw till doomsday, but I've got 'em all right.” He looked at Bobby as if seeing him clearly for the first time. “Oh, Lord, it's the cop,” he said, and turned and ran.

“Here, come, I say,” protested Bobby.

From the darkness a voice floated back:

“I say, Molly, don't be a sneak.”

“Yes, I shall,” said Molly determinedly.

Bobby turned to help Larson, who was slowly getting to his feet, still more than a little dazed from that tremendous blow with which Bobby had sent him flying.

“Hold up. All right now?” Bobby said to him, and then added to Molly: “Does that mean your brother's got the bonds?”

Molly did not answer. Instead, Larson said:

“My bonds... bearer bonds... he's got them, robbed me... fifteen thousand pounds' worth. He robbed me, got me down and robbed me.”

“You've been robbed?” Bobby asked.

“That's right,” Larson said. “It's my head. A tree fell, or something... I can't remember.” He felt gingerly the spot where Bobby's fist and his skull had made contact. “No, it was him, I suppose. He must have had a club or something.”

“Think so?” said Bobby, flattered to the very depths of his being. One could almost hear him purr. Ambitious schemes flashed through his mind of entering for the next police boxing championships at the Albert Hall. “It was a bit of a whack,” he admitted modestly. “The timing does it,” he explained.

Mr. Larson was in no mood to appreciate technicalities of the ring. He was in fact still finding some difficulty with an earth that seemed much less firm than usual; inclined, indeed, to tie itself up in knots under his feet. He sat down on the footboard of the car, though even that seemed less steady than are well-conducted footboards as a general rule. All the same, he felt safer there. He said:

“Why aren't you doing something? What are police for? Get after him. Why don't you?”

“You mean you intend to charge him with theft?” Bobby asked.

“Yes; robbery, assault. Couldn't you see for yourself?” retorted Mr. Larson indignantly. He felt his aching head again. “Violent, brutal attack,” he complained. “Theft and robbery; highway robbery.”

“Oh, it isn't,” interposed Molly indignantly. “I don't know how you can say such things! If he means the bond things and Teddy's got them,” she explained to Bobby, “then they're ours – mother's, I mean. Teddy's got them back, that's all. He said he would.”

“Sounds more like a civil action,” Bobby remarked. “Ownership disputed, apparently. Of course,” he added to Larson, “if you can prove ownership and forcible removal from your custody, no doubt you could proceed criminally.”

“So I will, so I will,” declared Larson. “I'll see he gets penal servitude for this.”

“They're mother's. You can't. They aren't yours; they never were,” protested Molly. “You tell the most awful stories,” she added gravely.

“In the meantime,” Bobby said, “you might explain what you are doing here and what all this is about.”

“Doing your job; helping you out,” Mr. Larson told him sternly. “This is what I get for it. Robbed and assaulted.” He paused for sympathy. None came. In an even angrier tone he went on: “I could see you were just blundering along, doing nothing, getting nowhere, just as you are now. I tell you I've been robbed of £15,000 and all you do is to stand there with your hands in your pockets and talk. Police, indeed. Same with the murder. Doing nothing; getting nowhere; hopelessly incompetent. I felt I had to do something.”

“Yes?” said Bobby as he paused.

“I felt I had to do something,” Larson repeated. “I don't choose to remain under even the faintest touch of possible suspicion of being connected with such an affair in any way whatever. There are some people in the City only too ready to whisper stories. Get some gossip started about me and they might have a chance to get some of the business I handle. I couldn't afford it. I knew perfectly well where there was hidden conclusive proof of the guilt of the real murderer. I knew your out-of-date, incompetent, muddled official methods would never get it, and I knew it might be destroyed any moment. I decided to act. I entered the house where I knew it was hidden.” He put his hand in one of the pockets of the car and brought out an envelope. “If you look at what's inside there,” he said, “you'll find something to interest even your slow official mind.”

“Photographs?” asked Bobby meekly.

“Yes. I've only had time to give them the merest glance, but you'll find snaps taken by Hayes of Mrs. O'Brien and Bennett in Battling Copse that afternoon. You remember a lipstick was found there? Hers. You remember a bit of film wrapper – wasn't it? – was found there, too? Hayes dropped it. I dare say he hadn't intended murder then. He wanted the snap for proof Mrs. O'Brien's husband was still alive and that she was meeting him on the quiet. That divorce of hers wasn't even near valid; wouldn't have held water even in American courts, or Mexican either. Hayes thought that snap would let him out of any promise of marriage she might have wheedled out of him. Most likely there was some sort of row afterwards. Perhaps Bennett tried to get the snap away. I don't know.”

“How can you prove the photo was taken that day?” Bobby asked, studying it intently.

“Because of the hat Mrs. O'Brien is wearing, quite plainly shown,” Larson answered. “You can easily get proof it was only delivered that morning and only worn by her that afternoon. She never wore it on any other occasion, and her movements can easily be checked. And you can soon satisfy yourself that that snap comes from a type of camera Hayes has and no one else owns about here. Proof absolutely convincing that Hayes was there that afternoon watching Mrs. O'Brien and Bennett just before the murder was committed, and with no one else near. Good enough?”

“Seems good enough,” agreed Bobby, putting away the photograph with great care.

They heard someone else coming. It was Hayes, pale and excited, uncertain on his feet, wiping the blood from his face. He shouted to Bobby:

“I've been robbed – knocked down and robbed.”

“You too?” Bobby said. “Bearer bonds to the value of £15,000?”

“You knew? You've got them back?” Hayes cried. Bobby shook his head.

“Oh, no,” he said.

“Then I'll lodge a complaint,” Hayes told him angrily. “I'll see what your superiors think of this. I'll sue them. You were there for protection and this is what happens. Disgraceful. I'll take it into the courts. I'll see my solicitors. Gross negligence. Or worse.”

“Worse, if you ask me,” Bobby agreed. “Who do you think robbed you?”

Hayes pointed to Larson.

“Him,” he said. “He did it; planned it and all. He's got them.”

“I don't think he has,” Bobby said, “and, if you accuse him of theft, he has just accused you of murder.”

As he spoke he took from his pocket a pair of handcuffs. “That's right,” said Larson approvingly.

Hayes gave a kind of strangled gasp.

Bobby fitted the handcuffs neatly to Larson's wrists.

“It's you I'm going to charge,” he said.

Attendance at his office was still forbidden Colonel Warden, who, indeed, had not yet been allowed to leave his room. But, doctor or no doctor, wifely anxieties or none, he had insisted on receiving in person Bobby's report. Now he was sitting up in bed, looking more than a little worried, when Bobby was shown in. He said to him:

“Are you sure we can hold Larson? It's proof we want – proof, evidence, something a jury can see for itself, not just logic or reasoning or anything like that. Something they can touch and handle.”

“That's what we've got, sir,” Bobby answered. “I think myself the case would have been good enough without, but there it is, proof anyone can touch and handle as much as they want, and the odd thing is, Larson himself gave it us.”

“Larson?” exclaimed the colonel, startled. “You mean – Larson?”

“Yes, sir. But for him we might never have got it. This photo, sir.”

He produced the photograph Larson had given to him and handed it to the colonel.

“And then, too,” Bobby said, “we've traced the lady's cycle he bought and had in readiness for his escape from Battling Copse after the murder. Pegley and Hayes have both been talking as well. I've had chats with them both, and I've paid another visit to the Towers Poultry Farm. Pegley is badly scared and pretty sick, too, at the way Larson knocked him out when they found the bonds where they were hidden in Hayes's study. He's told as much as he thinks won't incriminate him in the conspiracy he and Larson were engaged in to get hold of Mr. Moffatt's money. Hayes has talked a bit, too, but he's more cautious, more dangerous altogether. Pegley's only the jackal type. He knew nothing of the murder at the time, but he suspected Larson and was afraid of being implicated with him. That's why he was so relieved when he thought after our visit that it was Noll Moffatt who was guilty.”

But the colonel was hardly listening. He was intent on the photograph Bobby had given him.

“Bennett and the O'Brien woman talking together, isn't it?” the colonel asked, studying it. “In Battling Copse? Is that someone else behind those bushes?”