The Hog's Back Mystery (17 page)

French followed it along, and as he did so his excitement grew. The joints around a complete panel of some twelve by eighteen inches were clean!

French was immediately tempted to indulge in an orgy of pressing, pulling, shoving, squeezing and twisting, but he restrained himself. Before touching anything he got out his powdering apparatus and dusted a large area of the panelling for fingerprints.

His forethought was rewarded. Certain portions of the panelling bore prints. But as French examined them he became conscious of something even more interesting.

Practically none of the prints were whole. There were half-prints and quarter-prints and narrow strips of prints. Little round or oval patches of the markings had been wiped out, and French had no difficulty in guessing the cause. Gloves! Someone who wore gloves had been feeling over the panelling!

There seemed little use in photographing such prints as remained, but French was taking no chances, and he made records of all the marks. Then he gave himself up to manipulation. For a considerable time he worked upon the area covered by the prints, but without result. Then it occurred to him that many secret panels were opened by a simultaneous pressure on the panel and on another point perhaps four or five feet away. He therefore began searching with his lens for clear joints at some other part of the wall.

At last he found a decoration on the oak mantelpiece which also was surrounded by clean joints. At once he began a new orgy of pressures and twists.

And then a wave of delight shot over him, for the decoration moved. Moreover, pressure on the panel now had its effect. It slid backwards and then to one side, revealing in the brick wall behind a small steel safe!

French felt that at last he was on to something material. This was what the murderer had come for! This probably was what Ursula had seen him operating, and for her knowledge she had paid with her life!

The safe was locked. French remembered, however, having seen a number of keys in Earle's desk. He took these out and tried them one after another. None of them would enter the lock.

He wondered if Julia knew of the safe. Without a search warrant he daren't break it open, but Julia might give him permission. He stepped out into the hall and called her.

Her amazement when she saw the safe was so obviously genuine that French couldn't doubt it. She emphatically denied ever having seen or heard of it before.

“It's his book!” she exclaimed. “You were asking where he kept it and I didn't know. He was very secretive about his book. Except that it was about some medical subject, he never would give any information. Certainly you may have it opened. Indeed, if you don't, I shall do it myself.”

“When was it put in, Mrs. Earle?” French asked.

“It must have been when we took the house and before we moved in,” she answered. “The panelling of this room was done then at all events. I remember I wasn't very pleased about it. It seemed a waste of a lot of good money. If all the sitting-rooms had been done I shouldn't have said a word. But only this study! Dr. Earle said it was because of the damp. It never occurred to me to doubt that, but now I remember that I was in this room before it was done and I never saw any damp.”

When Julia had gone French telephoned to the Yard to send down an expert to open the safe. Then he returned to the study, determined not to leave the room till he had seen the contents.

While waiting he had another orgy with his dusting powder: with the same result. Obviously the last person to open the safe had worn gloves.

Scotland Yard put its best foot forward and in five minutes less than two hours a car drove up with two efficient-looking men and a formidable kit of tools. A short inspection told them that the lock could not be forced, and they rigged their oxy-acetylene plant and began playing a high temperature flame on the plates. Presently the hard steel burned away and soon a small circle of plate was lifted out. Then came a delay while the remaining metal cooled sufficiently to be touched; but eventually, working through the hole they had made, the experts were able to disconnect the lock and the little door swung back. Eagerly French gazed in.

Julia Earle was right! Here was the book! There were scores, probably hundreds, of quarto sheets covered with Earle's rather untidy handwriting: these sheets—and nothing else!

French turned them over. Yes, they were about medical subjects: so far as he could see in a rapid glance, the production of disease from cultivations of bacilli.

He swore bitterly. Seldom had he had so great a disappointment. This discovery of the safe, reached by a process of reasoning and investigation which he felt did him immense credit, should surely have led to something really helpful. And what had he gained from it? Nothing!

Less than nothing! It had removed from the possibilities one theory of the crime and one criminal! French had never very seriously suspected Campion of stealing the book, but now here was proof that the doctor had done nothing of the kind. So much time wasted!

Automatically French worked on, testing the inside of the safe for fingerprints: again with the same result. Gloves had been at work within as well as without. Then he sat down at Earle's desk and gave himself up to thought.

There was in this whole matter something which he was quite unable to understand. A secret safe was a very unusual thing. What was it for? It could not have been put in because of anything which had recently happened. Obviously the panelling had been undertaken as a mask for its installation; six years ago; before the Earles moved into the house. Had Earle's disappearance, then, to do with some long-standing secret?

Or was the safe simply to hold the manuscript of the book? French did not think so. An ordinary safe would have held it all right. It was not as if there had been any secret about the book itself. Everyone knew Earle was writing it. Was there something more in Earle's life than he had yet suspected? Things were beginning to look very like it.

French, having obtained Julia's permission, parcelled up the manuscript to send to a doctor who sometimes did police work for the Yard and who had become rather a friend of his own. He did not think it was important, but it would be well to be sure it could have had no bearing on the affair.

Apart from its
raison d'être
, the existence of the safe did certainly clear up some of the detail of Ursula's murder. It seemed obvious that she had in some way become suspicious and come down and discovered the thief in the act of burglary. In self-defence he had killed her—defence, that is, from the legal consequences of his act. But if so, why had he not removed the book?

Then French saw that he was being stupid. Why limit the contents of the safe to the book? The book didn't fill it. Had there not been something else more vital to the thief?

At once French's previous idea recurred to him. Was it something which, if found, would prove that the thief had murdered Earle? It might well be. Even it might prove that he had murdered Nurse Nankivel also. French was puzzled and for the moment he didn't see how he was to settle the point. The whole affair was confoundedly exasperating.

Then still another idea flashed into his mind. What if the space in the safe had been filled, not with proof of the murder of Earle, but with
money
? What if here had been what he had so long sought under the guise of a second banking account? What if Earle had not been murdered at all, as he, French, had just been supposing? What if, taking from this safe a large sum of money or negotiable securities, Earle had after all gone away with Helen Nankivel? Was there any evidence for his death? There was not. French had assumed it, partly because Ursula had been murdered, but principally because he had taken no money with him. Suppose he
had
taken money with him. How would the question then stand?

Again, was there any evidence of Helen Nankivel's death? There was not. Was there any motive for it? None. Why had he ever thought of such a thing? Simply because he had been driven to assume Earle's death. Now was that assumption not invalid?

French swore. Instead of clearing up the case, this discovery of the safe was making it a hundred times worse confounded! Its foundations were cracking. He now knew no more what had happened to Earle than on the day of his first visit. And if this idea of the money were correct, what had the thief been after, and why had Ursula been killed? Damn it all,
had
Ursula been killed? For all the evidence there was, she might merely have been rendered unconscious in the study and then kidnapped. She mightn't be dead at all.

Overcome with exasperation and disappointment, French rode dejectedly back to Farnham.

Chapter XVI

French Arranges an Experiment

French's mood lasted all evening and all evening his thoughts remained busy with the case. What was to be his next move? Rack his brains as he might, he couldn't think of any line which he had not already explored.

Worried beyond measure, he sat smoking in his room, where he had lit the gas fire, gazing vacantly into space and pondering on the eternal problem of what was truth.

Idly he wondered which of the two phases of his work—one or other of which he was usually up against—was the more exasperating: to have to make endless wearying repetitions of some small enquiry with consistently futile results, or not to see the way ahead at all. “Ough!” he groaned in disgust. “Who would be a detective?”

Carefully he began to go over for the thousandth time the facts of the case. Was there nothing that he had missed? No line of research still unexplored? No stone—he smiled whimsically to himself at the pompous
cliché
—still unturned?

Mechanically he got out his notebook and began more seriously and systematically than ever to review the entire circumstances.

The thing had got on his nerves, and his bedtime came and went, leaving him still seated in his armchair turning over the pages of his notebook, reading an item, remaining motionless as he considered it from every point of view, reading another item.…But nowhere could he get any light.

Again and again he told himself that he must give up for the night, but his mind was so restless that he could not do so. Surely to goodness there
must
be something that he had missed? There was necessarily a complete and satisfying explanation to the whole affair. Why could he not find it? What men had imagined, men could imagine again. What had gone wrong with him lately?

He sat in his chair. He paced the room. He threw himself on his bed. He paced the room again. He sat in his chair and bent forward. He sat in his chair and leant backward. But no change of position helped him. He could think of nothing fresh.

It was past one o'clock. He must really go to bed. This sort of worrying over the affair just upset him and didn't lead anywhere.

He was refilling his pipe for one last smoke when suddenly he paused and sat motionless, while an expression, first of interest and then of actual excitement, grew slowly in his eyes. Was it possible that he had missed something after all; something which might well be vital?

He put down his pipe and began whistling softly under his breath. That clay in Slade's car! Was not that his clue? Was it not the most important thing he had yet discovered, or was he merely being more silly than usual? That clay: where had it come from?

He recalled exactly what he had seen. In the pile of the carpet before the driving seat were traces of yellow clay: evidently from the shoes of the driver. Where had it come from?

French considered the country soils, so far as he knew them. There were large areas of sand—black sand, white sand, yellow sand. There was on the Hog's Back ridge chalk, white and greasy. There was a light brown loam. There was a kind of peat. But yellow clay?…

There was only one place in which French had seen it, and it was the memory of this which had given him so furiously to think. On the by-pass! When he had walked up towards the Hog's Back along the Compton road on his visit to Polperro he had had a look at what was going on, and he had seen yellow clay passing in the contractor's little trucks. Yellow clay on the by-pass! Yellow clay in Slade's car! Was there any connection?

For a time French was filled with excitement. Then came the natural reaction. The thing must, of course, have some quite natural explanation. Perhaps Slade knew the engineers, or was merely having a walk over the workings to satisfy his curiosity. It might be so. And yet French didn't imagine that dull and humdrum engineering of the cut and fill type would have appealed to Slade.

While determined not to be disappointed if nothing came of it, French decided that unless he thought of something better in the meantime, he would have another look at that clay on the by-pass. If it did no good, it could at least do no harm.

Next morning his enthusiasm had waned still further—waned indeed till nothing was left of it. However, he took a bus along the Hog's Back, and alighting at the by-pass bridge, set off to walk towards Compton. As before he penetrated to the right at frequent intervals, examining the workings. There at all events was where the yellow clay was coming from. Beneath the summit of the Hog's Back the cutting had been through chalk, but here on the south side of the ridge the chalk ran out and was succeeded, a dozen feet or more below ground level, by yellow clay. This clay was being loaded by a steam shovel into wagons, and run along a narrow-gauge line to be dumped lower down.

Full of interest, French walked along the side of the cut. He wanted to see again where that clay was being unloaded, and presently he came to the place, not so far away. As he had noted before, the work was being carried out very similarly to that of the Whitness Widening. A bank was being formed across some low-lying ground; a bank some fifteen feet high. In some way which was not now obvious, a narrow strip of banking of the proper height had first been made along the centre line of the new road, and this was now being widened by side tipping. Yes, there was where the yellow clay was going to all right.

French walked up and down the bank, first on one side and then on the other. On the right side, facing towards the Hog's Back, the by-pass kept fairly close to the road, though it was screened from it by shrubs. On the left side the bank ran through a field in which were straggling clumps of bushes and small trees. Across the field and at some distance were isolated houses.

For an hour French continued to move about, sighting the directions of the various houses and clumps of bushes. Finally he walked up to the foreman of one of the gangs of workers and asked for the address of the chief engineer.

“'E's to be dahn 'ere on Monday morning,” the man replied. “You be 'ere abaht ten an' you'll see 'im.”

This suited French admirably. It was now Saturday, and the fact that an appointment for Monday morning had been made would secure him a free week-end.

He walked up again on to the Hog's Back and took the first bus back to Farnham. There he saw Sheaf, explained his ideas, obtained the necessary local backing for his plan, lunched, and took the next train to Town. His week-end passed all too quickly and at ten o'clock on Monday he was once more with the foreman.

“There 'e is,” said the man when he saw French, pointing to a little group at some distance along the workings. “The big man in the grey coat an' 'at.”

With the engineer were three men, one obviously the foreman of a squad, the others young fellows in waterproofs and big boots and with plans under their arms. French waited till they had finished discussing their business and were turning away, then he went forward.

“I should like to have a word with you, sir,” he said, handing over his official card.

The engineer smiled when he read it. “What you want is an international conference,” he declared. “My name's English and my assistant's here is Welsh. Unfortunately this other gentleman is Bradbury and not Scott, as would be seemly.”

“That's a pity,” French returned. “We have a sergeant at the Yard called German, and we get ragged. They call us ‘The Foreigners' and pretend we can't understand English. Often we can't too,” and French smiled in his turn.

“Yes, I dare say that would happen more often in your job than in mine. You wanted to see me?”

“Yes, sir, I wanted two things from you. I should explain that I'm down here looking into the disappearances of Dr. Earle and Miss Stone from Hampton Common.”

English was interested at once. He had read the case in detail, so much as was known to the papers, and seemed full of theories about it.

“Gone off with that nurse,” he said, with a knowing wink. “What do you think, inspector? Or is it part of your religion not to say?”

French laughed. “I'm glad to discuss any case with anyone,” he declared. “There's always the chance of my getting an idea.”

“Well, there's an idea for you.”

“It certainly is,” French admitted. “But I'm afraid it's not what one might call exactly new. It has been discussed, I should say, several hundred times.”

English laughed in his turn. “Well, if I can't help you with ideas, what can I do for you?”

“Two things, as I said. First, I want to know whether you, or any of your assistants or underlings, are acquainted with a man called Slade, living at Hampton Common, or whether such a man has been having a look over the workings?”

“Never heard of him,” English returned. He drew a whistle from his pocket, blew a piercing blast and waved his arm. Messrs. Welsh and Bradbury, who had been strolling away slowly, turned and began to approach.

“Either of you know a man called Slade?” English asked when they came up.

Neither knew him. Nor had Slade, so far as they knew, ever been on to the workings.

“It's in this particular stretch that I'm interested,” French explained. “If you've had any men working just here, perhaps you'd ask them?”

Detailed enquiries revealed the fact that Slade had never been about the place, at least not in working hours.

“That is what I rather expected to hear,” French went on, “and it leads me to my second point, which I'm afraid may give rather more trouble. I'd like to explain, but first I must ask you to keep what I say as strictly confidential. If my suspicions were to leak out, it might be a very serious matter.”

This beginning was not calculated to damp the engineers' interest, and all three gave the required undertaking.

“I want,” French went on, “the toe of this bank opened at certain points,” and he explained his idea. “It may cost a bit of money, but I'm authorised to say that the Surrey police will stand for that.”

The three men showed an interest almost approaching excitement.

“I'm sorry,” said English, “that I can't be here personally to see it done, but Bradbury will do all you want. Better let's have some further details.”

“Certainly. If you gentlemen will come down to the toe of this bank, I'll show you what I mean.”

Rain had fallen during the night and the heavy clay was greasy from the water. As with some difficulty they climbed down the rough slope of the dump to the “toe” or bottom edge, French went on explaining.

“You understand, of course, that at best this whole affair is only a guess. My entire idea may be a washout. But there's a chance of its coming off and I daren't neglect the chance.”

The engineers grinned. They fully appreciated French's point. Indeed, their looks of admiration indicated something more than mere appreciation.

Having reached the surface of the field on the side remote from the road, French led the way to the place he had already selected.

“Here,” he said, “is the only part of this entire piece of banking which is out of sight of houses. As you see, it stretches for about a hundred feet. Its being hidden is due to those clumps of bushes. And of course from the road it's screened by the bank itself.”

“Yes, that's right enough,” English admitted. “Then it's here you want the toe opened?”

“Yes, sir. But not the toe of the bank as it is now. I want it where the toe was on Sunday week.”

“Naturally: I follow that. Well, we'll do our best. Let's see now.” English turned to his assistants. “You measured this up for the certificate, didn't you, Bradbury? When was that?”

“We both measured it,” Bradbury answered. “I took the levels and Welsh the measurements. That was last Friday week.”

“That should give it to us, inspector,” English declared. “Cross sections were taken on the previous Friday, and there would be little change between Friday and Sunday.” He turned back to his assistants. “I want you to peg off where the toe was on Friday week. It'll be as near Sunday's position as doesn't matter. Understand?”

They understood and would get at it at once.

“Then cut back to it. The stuff can simply be thrown forward into the field. You have to widen a good deal here, haven't you?”

“About twenty feet.”

“Exactly; anything you do will be covered. Then carry on as the inspector wants, not forgetting to charge him. He's paying for it, so it doesn't matter how long it takes. That right, inspector?”

“That's right, sir. But I'm afraid it may have to be opened for the whole hundred feet.”

“Doesn't matter so long as we can charge you the damage. But you'll have to get me a chit about it before we start. Not that I doubt your word. It's just a matter of business. That is, Bradbury, if I'm not here, you mustn't begin any work till you get an official letter promising to pay, and if there's a maximum sum mentioned, you must see that no more than that sum is spent. Warn the ganger to keep the time separate. Well, we must be getting along if we're to see Bridge 15 before I go back. That everything, inspector?”

“Yes, thank you, sir. Where can I find you, Mr. Bradbury?”

“I have an office about half a mile farther on. A note there'll find me if I'm out.”

French, having obtained from Sheaf the necessary undertaking to bear the cost of the experiment, returned to the workings and sought the engineer's hut. The visit brought back once again his experiences on the Whitness Widening. These engineers' huts were all alike, except in the matter of size and fittings. As the Whitness Widening was an enormously bigger job than this by-pass road, so the huts of Bragg and Carey and Lowell were bigger than this one of Bradbury and Welsh. But they had the same atmosphere, and these two young men were of the same type as Ashe and Pole.

Bradbury was in the hut when French arrived. “The chit Mr. English wanted,” said French, handing over his letter.