The Key (5 page)

Janice went back to her seat. This time she did not have to brush past the professor, because he was already striding up the aisle. By the time she was facing the platform once more Mr Madoc was refusing to be sworn. The coroner was looking at him in a detached manner but with a certain interest, and the village was frankly agog.

‘You are an agnostic?’

No question could have led more perfectly into Mr Madoc’s hand. In his best lecturing voice he replied ‘Certainly not. I read my Bible. If you were to read yours you would be aware that the taking of an oath is forbidden – “Let your communication be yea, yea, and nay, nay. Whatsoever is more cometh of evil” – Matthew, verse 37’

There was one of those pauses. The coroner coughed, and said rather drily, ‘You may affirm, if you wish it.’

Evan Madoc’s chin went up.

‘I have no desire to participate in any of these perfectly meaningless forms. Do you suppose they would prevent me from perjuring myself if I had made up my mind to do so?’

The coroner straightened up.

‘Am I to understand that you have some objection to answering truthfully the questions which will be put to you?’

‘Certainly not. I am a truthful man – my yea is yea, and my nay nay. They will be neither more nor less so because I have or have not recited any of this gabble.’

‘Mr Madoc, I must ask you to respect the court.’

‘I respect what is worthy of respect. I respect justice. Honour to whom honour is due. I have made my protest, and am now willing to affirm.’

The village listened spellbound whilst he did so. Gwen Madoc said, ‘Oh, dear!’ under her breath.

Having completed the meaningless form, Mr Madoc flung himself into the chair set for Janice, thrust his hands into his pockets, and leaned back. This attitude presented him in profile to the hall – black hair, nobby brow, jutting chin, and one light baleful eye. To questions as to Mr Harsch’s position in the household he replied briefly that he had lodged at Prior’s End for four years. He was on the footing of a friend, but he paid his way. They met at meals, and occasionally spent the evening together. Their work was widely different, and each had his own laboratory.

This information was flung out in short, abrupt sentences, and with an air of complete indifference. He was then asked whether there had been any change in Mr Harsch’s manner on the Tuesday evening, to which he replied with the utmost brevity, ‘No.’

‘He was just as usual?’

‘Certainly.’

‘He was in the habit of going for a walk after supper?’

‘He was.’

‘Did he say in your hearing that he was going to play the organ?’

‘I believe he mentioned it.’

‘He was in the habit of playing the organ?’

‘I don’t know what you call a habit. He liked playing. He was a musician. He played when he had time.’

The coroner took up one of the papers before him.

‘Did Mr Harsch possess a pistol?’

Evan Madoc took his right hand out of his pocket and hitched the arm over the back of his chair. He said with a kind of angry force, ‘I haven’t the slightest idea!’

‘You never saw one in his possession?’

‘Certainly not!’

‘He might easily have had one without your knowing it?’

There was an offensive edge on Madoc’s voice as he replied.

‘He might have had a dozen. I am not in the habit of rummaging in other people’s boxes.’

A constable laid something down upon the table and removed a paper wrapper.

‘This is the pistol, Mr Madoc. Have you ever seen it before?’

‘I have not.’

‘Do you know what make it is?’

‘German, I should say.’

‘You know something about firearms?’

‘I disapprove of them. I am a pacifist. I spent some time in Germany a few years ago. I have seen pistols of this make there.’

‘Mr Harsch might have possessed such a pistol?’

‘Anyone who had been in Germany might have possessed one. As to whether Michael Harsch did or did not, your guess is as good as mine.’

He was again called to order, and appeared to consider himself dismissed. His chair made a rasping noise as he pushed it back and got to his feet. The coroner stopped him.

‘I have not finished with you, Mr Madoc. What were your relations with Mr Harsch?’

A curious flicker passed over the crooked face. It might have been a nervous twitch, it might have been a smile. He said jerkily but without anger, ‘Host and guest – fellow scientists.’

‘You were on friendly terms?’

Evan Madoc straightened up. He said, ‘Friendship is a big word. I do not use it lightly.’

The coroner rapped sharply on the table.

‘You are begging the question, sir. I must ask you to answer it. Was there any quarrel between you and Mr Harsch?’

‘There was no quarrel.’ The words dropped slowly, almost mournfully into the silence.

‘You were on friendly terms?’

Again that curious flicker, as swift and elusive as a shadow passing over water. It came, and it was gone again. Evan Madoc said, ‘He was my friend.’

MR MADOC WAS dismissed. He came striding to his seat and flung himself down upon it with a complete disregard for the fact that in so doing he had driven the chair forcibly against Mrs Thomas Pincott’s knees. Her muffled exclamation of offence and pain produced no visible effect. He scowled, thrust his hands into his pockets, and once more proceeded to cross his legs, only this time it was left over right, left ankle well hitched up over right knee.

At the grating sound of the chair Garth looked sideways, and found himself presented with an excellent view of the sole of Mr Madoc’s left shoe, a well worn surface to which a Phillips rubber sole had been affixed. This too bore signs of wear. Some of the rubber had broken away. Glistening against this broken surface, a sizeable splinter of glass took the light, and Garth Albany’s eye. He could have jumped, and was thankful that Aunt Sophy had removed her hand from his arm in order to apply a handkerchief to her eyes.

After an interval, cold reaction followed. Broken glass may be picked up anywhere. It is no good saying you don’t believe in coincidences, because they happen. On the other hand even complete scepticism would have to admit that a man might walk through the Church Cut and pick up a piece of glass on his shoe without its having any particular significance. Against that stood the undoubted fact that the Church Cut did not lie between Prior’s End and the village. It was difficult to conceive of any reason why Mr Madoc should have passed that way. If, for instance, he had business at one of the houses served by the Cut, the more natural approach would be by the road which bordered the Green.

He had got as far as this, when he became aware that Bush was giving his evidence, sitting very upright with a hand on either knee, his natural air of melancholy intensified to the point of gloom.

It was Janice’s name that had caught Garth’s attention.

‘Miss Janice, she came knocking at the door. I come down, and she said she was afraid of Mr Harsch being taken ill in the church, and would I bring my key and come along over. So I come. And there he was, poor gentleman, fallen down and dead, and the pistol lying a matter of six inches from his hand like as if it had dropped when he fell. And Miss Janice, she said “Oh, Mr Harsch!” and took him by the hand. And I took hold of the torch and held it up, and I said, “It’s no good, miss – he’s dead.” ’

‘You did not touch the pistol or move it in any way?’

‘There wasn’t anything touched, sir, except that Miss Janice she had hold of his hand and she put her other hand on his wrist to feel for the pulse.’

‘You are sure that the pistol wasn’t moved at all?’

‘Yes, sir.’

The coroner put up a hand and smoothed back his hair. Then he looked down at his notes.

‘You have a key to the church?’

‘Yes, sir. I’m sexton and verger.’

‘What other keys are there?’

‘The old rector, he had three. The one I’ve got is the one my father had before me.’

‘That would be one of the three?’

‘No, sir. There was four keys in all. The rector had three of them – the old rector that was. Miss Fell, she kept one of them after the Rector died – she used to go in and do the flowers. Miss Brown that lives with her and plays the organ for the services, that’s the key she uses. Mr Harsch’s key, that was the one that did used to belong to the organist, but when he was called up the rector had it back and loaned it out to Mr Harsch.’

‘I’d just like to be sure I’ve got that right. There are four keys. The rector has one, you have one, Miss Fell has one which is used by Miss Brown, and Mr Harsch had one. Is that correct?’

‘Yes, sir.’

There is no other key?’

‘No, sir.’

The coroner leaned forward and wrote. Then he looked up again.

‘Where do you keep your key, Mr Bush?’

‘Hanging on the dresser, sir.’

‘It was in its place when Miss Meade came for you?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘When had you last seen it before that?’

‘At a quarter after ten o’clock, when I locked up for the night.’

‘You saw it then?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘The church door was locked when you went there with Miss Meade?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Do you know whether Mr Harsch was in the habit of locking the door?’

‘Oh, no, sir – he wasn’t.’

‘You know this for a fact?’

‘Yes, sir. I’ve often been in when he was playing and stood there to listen.’

‘Have you ever known him to lock the door?’

Bush took time to think. Then he said, ‘Well, sir – once or twice – if he was there late. But you wouldn’t call it a habit.’

The police inspector was then called to testify that Mr Harsch’s key had been found in his left-hand jacket pocket. There was a very much smudged fingerprint on it. This print closely resembled the forefinger print on the pistol, which was similarly blurred, the print of the thumb and of the other three fingers being clearly those of the deceased.

‘You mean that there was only the one blurred print on the key, and one blurred but four clear prints on the pistol?’

The inspector said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and gave place to the spare ascetic figure of the rector.

‘I would just like to ask you about your key to the church, Mr Cavendish. It was in your possession on the evening of Mr Harsch’s death?’

‘Certainly.’

‘May I ask where you keep it?’

The rector delved into his trouser pocket and produced a bunch of keys depending from a chain. From these he separated an ordinary-looking door-key and held it out.

The coroner observed it.

‘This is the key?’

‘Yes. As you see, it is neither really old, or exactly up-to-date. The church is an old one. The original keys were found too cumbrous to be convenient, and my predecessor had a new lock fitted to this side door. The two main doors are bolted on the inside. The old keys are no longer used.’

‘So that access to the church must be means of one of the four keys of which the sexton spoke?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did you go down to the church at all yourself on Tuesday evening?’

‘No.’

‘But have you on other occasions visited the church whilst Mr Harsch was playing the organ?’

‘Oh, yes. He played very well. I have gone in to listen to him.’

‘Did you ever find the door locked?’

Like Bush, the rector paused.

‘I don’t think so. I cannot recall any such occasion.’

‘Thank you, Mr Cavendish, that will be all.’

As the rector returned to his seat, the coroner inclined his head in Miss Fell’s direction, and spoke her name.

Garth took her up to the platform. She pinched his arm very hard indeed, and looked a good deal as she might have looked if she had been ascending the scaffold. Much to her relief, she was first asked about the key. The coroner heard her answers, because he wrote them down, and Garth could hear them in the second row, so presumably the jury heard them too, but as far as the rest of the hall was concerned there was merely a fooffle.

What the coroner wrote down was that Miss Fell kept her key in the unlocked left-hand top drawer of the bureau in the drawing-room, and that Miss Brown, who had very kindly been acting as organist, took it whenever she had occasion.

‘Are you sure that your key was in the drawer on the night in question?’

Miss Fell was understood to say that it was always there unless Miss Brown had taken it.

‘When did you actually last see it?’

Miss Fell had no idea. She had had to give up doing the flowers in the church – she really never used the key now.

She had begun to feel more at home. She remembered meeting the coroner a good many years ago when he was a young solicitor. Ingleside… Yes, that was the name – Ingleside. Her colour came back, and her voice became much more audible.

‘Now, Miss Fell – you have made a statement to the effect that you heard a shot fired on this Tuesday evening. Your house is next to the church? It is in fact the Rectory?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where were you when you heard this shot?’

‘Well, I was in the drawing-room, but I had opened the glass door into the garden and gone down the steps. There are three steps—’

‘Why did you do this?’

‘I wanted to smell the night-flowering stock, and I wanted to know whether Mr Harsch was still playing the organ.’

Something like a faint rustle went over the hall. Garth thought that everyone within hearing must have moved a little.

The coroner went on with his questions.

‘You knew that Mr Harsch was playing the organ in the church?’

‘Oh, yes. It was a warm night, and the window was open behind the curtains. I can always hear the organ when the window is open – not the soft bits of course, but when anyone is using the swell.’

‘How did you know that it was Mr Harsch who was playing?’

Miss Sophy looked surprised.

‘Miss Brown is the only other person who plays the organ, and she was in the drawing-room with me.’

‘And was she with you when you heard the shot?’

‘No – I don’t think so – I think she had gone to bed… Oh, yes, I know she had, because I remember putting out the light in the hall.’

‘What time was it when you heard the shot? Do you remember?’

‘Oh, I remember perfectly. It was a quarter to ten – because I had just looked at my watch and thought it was rather early to go to bed, but since Miss Brown had gone up I had better go too.’

‘Miss Fell – when you heard this shot, did you think it came from the church?’

‘Oh, no – indeed I didn’t!’

‘What did you think?’

Miss Sophy put her head on one side, as she always did when she was considering anything. Then she said quite briskly, ‘I thought it was Mr Giles. His fields run right down to the church on the other side of the Cut. I knew that he had been losing some of his fowls – the foxes are terrible now that there is no hunting.’

From his seat in the fourth row on the left of the hall Mr Giles, a rubicund elderly farmer, was seen to nod emphatically, and heard to ejaculate, ‘That’s right!’

Miss Fell having been released, he was called to the table and asked whether he had in fact been out with his gun on Tuesday night, to which he replied that he had been up until midnight with a sick cow and much too busy to trouble his head about foxes.

Miss Brown was the last witness. She was so pale in her deep black that she might have been the chief mourner. It passed through Garth’s mind to wonder whether she was. If he had ever seen a figure of tragedy in his life, he thought he saw one now. And Aunt Sophy talking about happy gifts, and how much ‘My dear friend Miss Brown’ had brightened her life! There seemed to have been a slip-up somewhere. Of course she might have been in love with Harsch – he supposed middle-aged people did fall in love. Somehow he didn’t find the idea convincing.

He listened to the deep voice taking the oath in a kind of husky whisper. Then the coroner was asking her about Aunt Sophy’s key.

‘You were in the habit of using it?’

Still in that husky whisper, Miss Brown said, ‘Yes.’

The hall had plain windows set rather high up on both sides. Through the second window on the left, the sun came slanting in, to touch the edge of Miss Brown’s hat, her shoulder, the hand which hung at her side. Garth, watching attentively, saw the hand clench upon itself. There was no glove upon it. The knuckles were as white as bone. Under the brim of the black felt hat the cheek muscles were tense, the skin was bloodless. Between the heavy black hair and the curving arc of the eyebrow there was a gleam of sweat. In some apprehension he thought, ‘Good lord – she’s going to faint!’

The coroner put his next question.

‘Had you occasion to use this key on the day of Mr Harsch’s death?’

Miss Brown did not faint. She said, ‘I used it in the morning. I went to the church to practise between eleven and twelve. I put the key back in the drawer. I did not go to the church again.’

‘Thank you, Miss Brown.’

The words dismissed her. Garth saw the tense muscles relax, the clenched hand fall limp. She got up, came through the shaft of sunlight to the steps, and back to her seat. She had to pass him on the outside of the row, and Miss Sophy next to him. Unlike Mr Madoc, Garth stood up to make way for her, stepping out into the aisle between the rows. As she went by, he heard her take a low sighing breath. To his mind, there was no doubt at all that Miss Brown was very much relieved. He thought her emotion at her release a good deal overdone – much ado about nothing in fact. She had only to answer a couple of harmless questions about Aunt Sophy’s key, and she had been within an ace of passing out. Odd, because she hadn’t struck him as a swooner.

He began very carefully to consider those two harmless questions, both about the key. ‘You were in the habit of using it?’ – ‘Had you occasion to use this key on the day of Mr Harsch’s death?’

Nothing in question number one. Everyone in the village knew she was in the habit of using Aunt Sophy’s key. Yet it was immediately after this question that she began to look as if she was going to faint. Quite obviously, she had the wind up.

Why? Again quite obviously, she didn’t know what was coming next. She was waiting for question number two exactly as a man might wait for a bullet. But when it came it wasn’t a bullet after all – just a harmless blank cartridge. So far from swooning when it hit her, she was able to get quite a lot of unsolicited information off her chest and depart heaving sighs of relief. Yet this second question in one form or another was just the one question which was bound to be put – inevitable, unescapable. He came back on the words in his own mind – ‘in one form or another’. She had known – she must have known – that she would be asked whether she had used the key. That was why she had the wind up. There couldn’t be any other reason.

Suppose the second question had been, ‘Did you take the key out of Miss Fell’s drawer on that Tuesday evening?’ Would her hand have unclenched and those tense muscles relaxed? He wondered. But the Coroner had asked, ‘Had you occasion to use this key on the day of Mr Harsch’s death?’ and Miss Brown had replied, ‘I used it in the morning. I went to the church to practise between eleven and twelve. I put the key back in the drawer. I did not go to the church again.’ A very comprehensive answer for a lady who looked as if she was going to swoon.