The Silver Ghost (7 page)

Bill couldn’t help wincing as he restored the photograph to its file. “In fact, it would be hard to find an early Rolls Royce that isn’t a rarity because there was so much swapping around of body and chassis, and so much custom work done on every car. But I’m rambling. What it boils down to, Chief Grimpen, is that my Silver Ghost was here at noontime and now it’s gone. The car shed was locked and so was the gate. My trusted friend and helper was on guard outside. He’s dead. I do not for one moment believe Rufe committed suicide.”

C
HIEF GRIMPEN BRUSHED THAT
unimportant aspect of the matter aside. “This New Phantom, when did it disappear? Myre, take down the facts.”

“I first missed the Phantom this past Monday evening,” said Bill.

“You didn’t report the theft.”

“I wasn’t sure at the time there’d been a theft. My daughter, Melisande, and her husband, Tichnor Purbody, often take out one or another of the cars.”

“Why, Mr. Billingsgate?”

“For a parade, an antique rally, or a little spin. We see no sense in keeping the Rollses if we don’t get some fun out of them. My son-in-law might also have discovered something wrong with the Phantom and taken it to be fixed without bothering to tell me.”

“Did you ask him?”

“Not then, no. He wasn’t around. He and my daughter have their own place in Shrewsbury, though they’re back and forth a good deal.”

“Did you check with the garage?”

“It was too late in the day. Anyway, I hadn’t the time. I’d barely finished my dinner when I was called out of town on urgent business. As you may know, I own a small chain of radio stations. They’re unpretentious operations by and large, and some of them get along with very small staffs. Monday evening I got a frantic call from our station in Pettibunk, Maine. The station manager, the engineer, and the chief announcer had all walked away from their jobs without so much as an hour’s notice and driven off to New Brunswick because they’d heard the salmon were running on the Miramichi.”

“Surely you didn’t believe such a tale?”

“Why not? Maine people are like that. It’s worse in the deer hunting season. Anyway, this created a crisis situation, so I hopped into the Silver Shadow and nipped on up there. Made it in time to do the ten o’clock news, as a matter of fact. Then I stayed on the job until we managed to transfer a couple of people from other stations. The upshot was that I remained stuck there till Friday.”

“Did you speak to your son-in-law during this time?”

“Oh yes, but always about more pressing matters. Tick, as we call him, is my executive assistant. I stuck him with rounding up the substitutes, which meant he himself had to do some substituting at the stations he took them from. Tick’s one of those multi-talented people who can put their hands to just about anything, and I must say we kept him hopping this week. He also had to rehearse the morris dancers for the revel and help my daughter with mead deliveries. Naturally they got a rush of orders just at the most awkward time.”

“But weren’t you worried about your Rolls Royce?” demanded Grimpen.

“No, I didn’t give the New Phantom another thought until I arrived here and drove the Shadow into the car shed. Then I noticed the empty space and did begin to feel alarmed. My daughter happened to be in the house at the time, helping her mother prepare for the revel, so I asked her. She was quite sure Tick hadn’t even had time to think about the New Phantom, much less take it anywhere. So I asked the Bittersohns to come along and look into the matter.”

“Why them and not the police?”

“Because I still wasn’t sure any crime had been committed. The Bittersohns are private detectives whom I knew to be efficient, honest, and discreet. I could have them here without causing remark because Mrs. Bittersohn is related to several of the other guests who’d be present. You must realize, Chief Grimpen, that a good many people we know have been in and out this past couple of weeks on various errands connected with the revel. Even the workmen who put up the pavilion are old acquaintances. I thought it possible one of them might have borrowed the New Phantom without asking permission.”

“Does that happen often?”

“It’s never happened before, but there’s always a first time. Yesterday, I was only concerned about getting my car back with a minimum of fuss. Today, with Rufus murdered and the Silver Ghost gone, too, I realize more drastic action has to be taken. Though I have to confess,” Bill’s tender conscience forced him to add, “that without Mr. Bittersohn’s insistence, I might not have acted so promptly.”

And a hell of a lot of good the urging had done. Max thought. Chief Grimpen was looking superior again, for no good reason.

“You say the cars both disappeared from inside this shed, Mr. Billingsgate. Isn’t the shed kept locked?”

“Of course it is, and so is the gate. Our insurance people insist on the tightest possible security, especially now that antique Rolls Royces have appreciated so much in value.”

Grimpen picked up on this point fast enough. “Can you give me some idea what your two missing cars are worth now?”

“I can tell you what they’re insured for.”

Bill did, and Grimpen forget all about looking superior. “That much? This is grand larceny! What are we wasting time for? Give me the photo of the Silver Ghost. What’s the license and serial number? Find me a picture of the New Phantom. Full descriptions, pronto. Myre, take down the details. I’ll get to them later. Where’s the nearest telephone?”

“Right beside you, on the wall,” Billingsgate told the chief somewhat drily. “And here’s the information on the cars.”

Grimpen barked masterfully into the phone, then held out his hand. “I’ll keep those folders, Mr. Billingsgate.”

“I’m sorry, but you can’t have them. We have a strict rule that our records never leave the car shed. I can provide you with duplicate copies of the photographs, if you want them.”

“Better than nothing, I suppose. Now then, Myre, the notes.”

“They’re in shorthand, chief.”

“Then read them to me.”

Myre began to read. Max and Bill wandered off. When they were out of earshot, Bill murmured, “One tries not to pass judgement, but I must say that fellow Grimpen does seem to be rather full of himself.”

“He’s full of something, anyway,” Max conceded. “Who is he, the mayor’s nephew?”

“Cherished only son of the chairman of the Board of Selectmen. I believe his burning ambition is to become Sir John Appleby. Do you think this all-points bulletin will accomplish anything?”

“Let’s hope so. Routine police procedure is often highly effective. Anyway, they have the facilities for it and we don’t.”

Max was restless, prowling around the vast shed, examining the bare concrete walls with more interest than they appeared to warrant. “The car shed backs right up to the stone wall, does it?”

“Actually the shed is part of the wall,” Bill told him. “The stonework simply comes to meet it on both sides. The iron fence on top of the wall goes across the back of the roof. If you’re thinking someone climbed into the yard by way of the shed, I can only say it would be extremely difficult. The fence is electrified, I’m ashamed to admit. The insurance people insisted on that as an added precaution.”

“For which you can’t blame them, considering what these cars are worth on today’s market,” said Max. “What’s behind here?”

“The road that leads out to the bee fields. Hardly more than a path, really. It’s a further extension of the main drive,” Bill explained.

“And where does that come out? Does it just circle around and come back?”

“No, as a matter of fact. We have a number of paths through the bee fields, but this particular one goes on to connect at the far end of our property with a town road that leads eventually to the old turnpike.”

“Is this path wide enough to take a car through?”

“Just about. One would find it rough going at the far end. We leave the ruts unfilled in order to discourage outsiders from entering.”

“How long is the path?” asked Max.

“Just about a mile. You’re thinking the cars must have been taken out that way, aren’t you?”

“Any reason why they shouldn’t have been?”

“Aside from the fact that they’d be awfully visible going through the fields, I can’t see why not. Especially if the driver knew how to work the drawbridge,” Bill added.

“You have a second drawbridge?” Didn’t everybody?

“An apology for one, anyway. It looks like the remains of an old board fence, but actually there’s a steel-plate reinforcement sandwiched between two thin layers of wood. It lets down by a rather ingenious arrangement of wire cables and covers the worst of the ruts so ifs possible to get a car out without too much joggling. Silly, perhaps, but we do get a good deal of fun out of the thing.”

“We meaning your family?” asked Max.

“And a few of our closest friends. Except in the winter when there’s snow on the ground. We couldn’t plow or drive through then, of course, without leaving tracks and giving away our little secret. Other than that, we use the bee field escape, as we call it, quite a lot. It saves our having to make a wide detour to “reach the turnpike. We figure we cut off anywhere from ten to twenty minutes, depending on who’s driving. Tick and Melly make the run a good deal faster than Abigail and I.”

“Can your wife manage the drawbridge by herself?”

“Easily. The fence is nicely balanced and counterweighted so that we can move it up or down with no effort to speak of. The only hard part’s remembering where to find the end of the cable. It’s quite well hidden.”

“Who’d be apt to know the hiding place, aside from yourselves?”

“That’s a good question. We’ve taken guests through the bee fields at various times over the years when they’ve had a plane to catch or whatever, and I suppose there’s no reason why somebody from down the road couldn’t have come poking around and hit upon the cable. It’s not so much that we’re anxious to keep the private road a secret, as that we don’t want a lot of youngsters driving in with their flivvers and mopeds and getting the bees upset. It doesn’t take too much to annoy a bee, you know.”

“No, I don’t suppose it would,” said Max. “I should think the bees themselves would keep people out.”

“I’m sure they’re a more effective deterrent than anything else,” Bill agreed. “We do have warning signs posted all around our borders, and outsiders don’t seem much interested in challenging them. About the cable, let’s see. The Tolbathys know, certainly. It was Wouter who rigged the drawbridge for us. He was marvelously inventive, you may remember.”

Max nodded. Tom Tolbathys late brother had been a man of almost appalling mechanical ability. Worse yet, he’d had an imagination for which
untrammeled
would have been a paltry and pitiful description.

“I didn’t know Wouter ever got around to anything so mundane as a drawbridge. Wouldn’t an aerial tramway held up by midget dirigibles have been more his style?”

“He did say something once about trained eagles,” Billingsgate admitted, “but we were afraid we’d run into trouble with the Audubon Society. Dear old Wouter! Never shall I forget his funeral, Jem Kelling reading the eulogy with the Great Chain of the Convivial Codfish around his neck, while Tom walked up the aisle leading that fire-breathing dragon. It was so beautifully fitting, ‘I am a brother to dragons and a companion to owls.’ Job 30:29.”

He paused a moment in fond remembrance. “Too bad Tom didn’t happen to think of the owl. Wouter would have liked an owl. Max, tell me honestly, do you see any tiny gleam of light whatsoever in this dreadful situation? Will the thefts continue? I’m beginning to wonder if I should consider this a chastisement for my foolish pride in earthly possessions. Dear heaven! To think my friend Rufus may have been so foully done to death through my vanity. How could I ever atone? Shall I sell all the remaining cars and donate the money to some worthy cause?”

“This isn’t the time to back down, Bill.”

“I suppose not. ‘No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God.’ Luke 9:62. Thank you, Max. The time to have sold the cars, assuming I were to do so, would have been before this horrible chain of events began. Now I have to see it through. ‘Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.’ Romans 12:21.”

“Which means we have to isolate the evil before we can do any good,” said Max. “What’s this?”

He’d entered an alcove beside the changing room, about eight feet square and none too well lighted. The side walls were of smooth concrete like the rest of the shed’s, but the back was oddly roughened. “Did somebody get into the wet cement?”

“Oh, that.” Bill managed to work up a smile of sorts. “Another of Wouter’s little whimsies. It started one weekend about five years ago. Our grandchildren were still in the pre-teen stage and so were some of the Tolbathys’. Young Dork’s daughter was only a toddler then and had a nanny, so we rounded up all the kids and left them here with the nanny to run after them and Cook to feed them. Rufus went along with us and the other grownups to a big antique car rally. Since there were enough of us to drive all ten Rollses, the shed was left empty, so the children had permission to use it for a playroom.”

“It would be a great place for kids to run,” said Max.

“Yes, and that’s what we’d assumed they’d be doing. Unfortunately, this silly girl believed in self-expression and supplied all the children with colored chalks. By the time we got back, they’d expressed themselves over every inch of the walls and floor.”

“Must have been a cheerful homecoming.”

“Oh, it was. I thought Rufe would go into convulsions. I’ll admit I was none too pleased, myself. But anyway, Wouter offered to stay and help Rufe wash the walls, so Abigail and I went off by ourselves to another rally. In the New Phantom, as a matter of fact. When we got back, we discovered Wouter had got the rest of the place shining but he’d put a skim coat of mortar on this one wall and scratched in his own graffiti. He said he’d always had an urge to deface a wall. Even Rufe laughed. One had to, you know, at Wouter.”

“So you left the wall as it was.”