The Second Shot (28 page)

Needless to say, however, the shadow of anxiety still hung over us. No sooner had the three women left us than I put the question to Sheringham which had been burning on my lips all through dinner: had he discovered anything fresh?

‘Oh, yes and no,’ Sheringham replied carelessly.

‘At any rate,’ said John, ‘he’s been extremely busy. We’ve hardly seen anything of him.’

‘What have you found, Sheringham?’ I asked anxiously.

Sheringham sipped his port. ‘A number of curious things, Tapers. The father of old Morton’s daughter’s illegitimate child, for one instance; how a bullet travelling at an angle to the ground can make a horizontal wound, for another; that Miss Verity and Scott-Davies got engaged not on the morning of his death at all but on the previous evening, for a third; that a board in the passage just outside Mrs de Ravel’s room creaks when stepped on, for a fourth; and, most interesting of all, that Scott-Davies himself took the gun that killed him from the rack that morning.’

‘Precisely as I told the police myself!’ I cried.

‘You did?’ Sheringham said quickly. ‘How did you know?’

‘I didn’t. They asked me if I could account for the accident, and I gave them my theory: that he had taken down the gun in the morning, left it there, retrieved it and forgotten he had left it loaded, handled it carelessly in consequence, and the thing had gone off.’

‘Into his back,’ said Sheringham thoughtfully. ‘Well, there may be something in the idea after all.’

‘You’ve really come round to the theory of accident, then?’ John asked respectfully.

‘I didn’t say so. All these curious new facts have got to be examined, you know, and the relevant ones correlated first.’

‘But the inquest is to be resumed tomorrow morning,’ I said apprehensively.

‘And the verdict will be “accidental death”,’ Sheringham smiled with the utmost confidence. ‘Hillyard and I are taking steps to assure it.’

‘You’ve taken steps, you mean,’ said John. ‘And very grateful to you we shall all be if it is so. But – ’

‘What steps?’ I asked.

John looked at his watch. ‘Colonel Grace has promised to bring Superintendent Hancock over here this evening (they’re due in ten minutes) for a conference. Sheringham has something to say to them, and, I believe, to us. What it is I haven’t the faintest idea, except that, as I understand, Sheringham is going to clear the case up.’

‘Really, Hillyard,’ Sheringham had to protest. ‘It’s not so simple as all that. I’m not one of those people who can come down, take one look at a case, and then tell the blundering police exactly where they’re making their silly mistakes. No; all I can undertake to do is to put things before the colonel and the superintendent in such a way as may make them drop a hint to the coroner that a verdict of “accidental death” is more than advisable. And of course I can’t in the least guarantee that they’ll do even that.’

‘But do you mean that such a verdict represents your idea of the truth?’ I persisted.

‘What is truth?’ Sheringham said mockingly. ‘Is it what might have happened, is it what was meant to happen, is it what ought to have happened, or is it only what prosaically did happen? That’s one of the things we’ve got to thresh out this evening.’

I shrugged my shoulders. If Sheringham was determined to be mysterious, certainly I would not press him.

John held up his finger. ‘Hullo, there they are. I hear a car.’

‘No,’ said Sheringham, ‘I don’t think that’s the colonel. But I fancy I know who it is.’

‘Who?’

‘Come out and see.’

We trooped out into the hall, and Sheringham himself opened the front door. Two indistinct figures were coming up the path.

‘Why,’ said John in surprise, ‘it’s the De Ravels.’

‘Of course it is,’ said the peevish voice of Paul de Ravel. ‘Considering you wired us to come back at once – ’

We stood aside from the door, and Mrs de Ravel swept in as if making a long-awaited entrance in the third act, followed by her husband.

John stared at them. ‘But I never wired to you.’

‘Let me explain,’ Sheringham remarked. ‘I sent the wire, and I’m afraid I put your name to it, Hillyard. You see,’ he added pleasantly, ‘I’m about to accuse De Ravel publicly of murder, so I thought he really ought to be here to hear it.’

‘Of course, Colonel,’ said Sheringham, settling himself more comfortably in his chair, ‘you realize that this is nothing more than an informal discussion?’

‘Certainly,’ agreed the chief constable.

Sheringham cast a faintly speculative eye around the room.

Certainly the proceedings so far had been informal enough. Colonel Grace and his superintendent had duly arrived, been taken into the drawing room where the rest of us were waiting, and furnished with chairs and drinks. For a few minutes the conversation had been anything rather than the death of Eric Scott-Davies, though it was noticeable that the chairs formed a rough circle with Sheringham at its head. Besides the two police officials and Sheringham there were present Ethel and John, the De Ravels, Armorel, and myself. Elsa Verity was not with us; the conversation, it was understood, would not concern her personally and could only be painful.

‘And I want to make the stipulation,’ Sheringham proceeded now, ‘that anything said by anyone except myself is not to be taken as evidence, or used later as such.’

‘Can hardly agree to that, sir,’ said the suprintendent, who was sitting on the extreme forward edge of his chair and looking extremely uncomfortable.

‘Oh, I think we can, Superintendent, eh?’ Colonel Grace said persuasively.

‘Most irregular, sir,’ replied the superintendent obstinately.

‘But so is this conference itself,’ Sheringham pointed out. ‘Most irregular. Police and suspects meet face to face in drawing room and talk things over. What could be more irregular?’

‘I’m afraid I couldn’t agree to tie myself to the extent you mention,’ repeated the superintendent, and looked very hot and mulish.

‘Then you destroy the whole object of my idea, which involves a frank discussion of all points in question. You can hardly expect people to talk freely, you know, if they know their words are going to be thrown up at them in the witness box afterwards. – Anyhow,’ Sheringham added carelessly, ‘please yourself, Superintendent. If you don’t agree to that condition, I don’t say a word. No doubt it won’t matter to you one way or the other.’

‘Excuse me a moment, Mrs Hillyard, please,’ said the Colonel, and, bending forward, engaged in a low-toned conversation with his subordinate.

Mrs de Ravel yawned charmingly.

The colonel sat back in his chair and nodded to Sheringham. ‘We agree,’ he said briefly.

‘Excellent! Then I’ll begin. And the first thing I want to say is this: excluding for the moment the possibility of accident, and assuming that we are examining a case of murder, before we can fix the responsibility on any one person three things must first be quite definitely proved: opportunity, means, and action; in addition to which it is advisable but not legally essential to prove a fourth, motive. We’ll consider opportunity first.

‘Now remember the circumstances. Everyone had left the plateau at the bottom of the valley. For three minutes at least the path along the stream was unobserved, until Pinkerton made his second visit. Anyone could have come along it from the upstream direction during those three minutes; anyone could have come along it from the other direction at any time. The only person whose alibi during the critical time is confirmed by more than one person is Mrs Hillyard. She is the only one whom we can definitely rule out here and now from any possibility of having been near the scene of death at the time when it took place.

‘As to the rest, Mr and Mrs de Ravel confirm each other’s alibis. Pinkerton did not know he had one till Mrs Pinkerton supplied it. Mrs Pinkerton hasn’t – ’

‘I beg your pardon,’ interrupted the colonel. ‘Did you say Mrs Pinkerton?’

‘Yes,’ Sheringham replied easily. ‘Miss Scott-Davies who was. They were married yesterday. Didn’t you know?’

‘No, I can’t say I did.’

‘Oh, yes. They got engaged the evening before. And as neither of them believes in long engagements they very sensibly got married the next day. However, that’s neither here not there. Mrs Pinkerton, I was going on to say, has no alibi at all, because her husband, most unfairly, refuses to give her one.’

‘Really, Sheringham,’ I had to protest uneasily, ‘I didn’t – ’

‘You denied on oath that there was any truth in her story, didn’t you? And if that isn’t refusing to confirm her alibi, I don’t know what is. Anyhow, never mind that now; I’ll argue that point out with you later if you like. Hillyard again has no alibi at all, and – who else is there? Oh, yes; Miss Verity. Well, she hasn’t either. So on opportunity we have a nice wide choice.

‘As to means, exactly the same persons who had opportunity had means, because I’m satisfied that there’s very little room for doubt that Scott-Davies himself took the gun that killed him down to the neighbourhood of the stream earlier in the day. Miss Verity is prepared to swear that when they went for a stroll together soon after breakfast, Scott-Davies had a gun under his arm; she is almost sure a rifle, because he said something about rooks. They went down to the stream by the swimming pool and walked along the path beside it nearly as far as Bluebell Wood, when they turned up the hill. On the way they sat down several times. Before returning to the house they went to the garage, where Scott-Davies wanted to make one or two small adjustments to his car before going into Budeford. Miss Verity isn’t ready to swear that he had not got the gun with him when they reached the garage because she says she isn’t certain, though very nearly so. I think we may call it a safe assumption that the rifle was left behind at one of the spots where they stopped to rest.

‘By the way, Superintendent,’ Sheringham added rather unkindly, ‘how was it that you didn’t establish that from Miss Verity? She says you never asked her anything about the rifle at all, or she could have told you so much at once.’

‘Well, no, sir, I didn’t,’ mumbled the superintendent unhappily. ‘You see, I had to be very quick; the poor young lady was still very upset.

And somehow I never did think of it being Mr Scott-Davies himself who took the gun out of the rack. I knew it couldn’t have been the young lady herself, you see, sir, so I just didn’t think to ask her about him, or about the gun at all.’ This was said less to Sheringham than to his own superior, who pulled at his white moustache and looked officially stern. I guessed that a reprimand was being meditated, and from the unhappy expression on his large face the superintendent guessed the same.

‘Well, however that may be,’ Sheringham continued, ‘means gives us just as wide a net as opportunity. Anyone could have found the gun.

‘Conversely, action gives us absolutely nothing. I may be wrong, but I don’t know of the slightest evidence of action at all.’ He looked inquiringly at the colonel.

‘No direct evidence, certainly,’ conceded the latter.

‘Direct evidence! Well, hardly. But no circumstantial evidence either. No, it’s in regard to action that we have to rely on conjecture to indicate not only our murderer, but even the very way in which we’re going to prove our case against him – or her.

‘And lastly motive. Well, I don’t want to go into that too closely here. It’s enough to say that every single person of those who had the opportunity had the motive. Except of course Miss Verity. And in all cases it was a powerful one, except Pinkerton’s. His we must admit to be weak. One doesn’t go to the length of murder in revenge for a ducking; unless perhaps at the very moment, if quite insane with rage.’

‘If I might make a suggestion there, sir,’ remarked the superintendent, ‘I think you said this was to be a frank discussion?’

‘Quite. Do, Superintendent.’

‘Well!’ The superintendent eyed me grimly. ‘You’ve told us that Mr Pinkerton and Miss Scott-Davies have just been married, which was a very interesting piece of news, I’m sure. That gives him the same motive as her, doesn’t it? We’ve made inquiries, of course, and confirmed that Miss Scott-Davies – Mrs Pinkerton, I should say – benefits very considerably by her cousin’s death.’

‘You mean there could have been a conspiracy between them?’ Sheringham said easily. ‘Exactly. I was going to touch on that later myself.’ I caught my breath. ‘In the meantime we’ll admit the point that, if marriage had already been agreed on between them, Pinkerton has just as strong a motive as anyone else.’

‘It’s just an idea that occurred to me,’ said the superintendent, almost apologetically. He seemed a little surprised that Sheringham had agreed with him so readily.

‘Of course. And to me too. In fact, it’s fairly obvious. However, to proceed. I want to put Pinkerton before you as the person who really did shoot Scott-Davies. And I’ll tell you exactly how he did it.’

I could scarcely believe my ears. Did Sheringham really intend to deliver me, with all the prestige of his reputation, into the hands of the very police from whom I had summoned him to rescue me? A cold apprehension grew on me as I listened.

‘He had found the rifle which Scott-Davies had left behind him, and concealed it for the purpose. During the play he made an opportunity to whisper to Scott-Davies that he wished to speak to him alone after the others had gone up, on an extremely important matter, and suggested the smaller glade where they could meet and talk privately. He let Professor Johnson and Bradley go on ahead, and the chance shot fired by Hillyard afforded him an excellent excuse to leave Mrs Fitzwilliam on the pretence of warning the unknown firer, though any other pretext would have served just as well – the cigarette case which he had purposely left behind, for instance. He then had no difficulty in shooting Scott-Davies in accordance with his plan, and, wishing to leave the appearance of accident and being a person of extremely limited imagination, copied exactly the details from the play in which he had just been performing the very same task and so had them at his finger-ends.

‘Miss Scott-Davies suspected him, and perhaps more than suspected him, but being in love with him came out with that story at the inquest with the intention of exonerating him. I suggest that her story was completely false from beginning to end, that she was on the hillside all the time, and that the reason for Pinkerton denying the story was that he realized that in shielding him she had brought herself under suspicion of having committed the murder, and, being just as much in love with her as she is with him, would rather take all the consequences of his own crime than let her be involved in them. That, I suggest, Colonel, is the real truth, and why you don’t arrest Pinkerton I can’t understand.’