Bleeding Hooks Page 21

  Chapter 34

  The wind blew in a steady gale all through the night, and had not abated by the following morning. The ghillies could not attempt to take their boats out, and gathered in disconsolate groups in the yard of The Fisherman’s Rest, hating the prospect of an idle day.

  Because there seemed so little hope of going out on the lake, Mr. Winkley found that this day, above all others, was the one on which he most desired to kill a fish. At quarter- hour intervals, he shared with the other fishing enthusiasts the task of going outside the hotel to gaze at the scudding sky, as if to give the lie to the gilded weather-vane, shaped like a salmon, which swung in gusty circles above the coruscated cockscomb of the roof.

  Whenever the hall door was opened, the wind swirled round the hall, to the great discomfort of the visitors seated there, and caused Miss Haddox to cling to her elaborate coiffure as if she had reason to suppose that it might be swept off. Nevertheless she remained in the hall long after the others had sought less draughty quarters. Her brother was safely ensconced in the smoking-room, and from where she was sitting she could watch the door, and waylay him when he came out.

  Her concentration so impressed itself upon Mr. Winkley that he forgot to watch the weather, and wandered into the smoking-room himself. Here he found Sir Courtney Haddox sitting alone, and nodding a drooping head over a day-old copy of The Times. He did not waken as the door opened, and Mr. Winkley thought that he had never seen a man more restless in his sleep.

  He tiptoed softly across the thick Turkey carpet towards the window which looked out on to the main road. He could see the cross-roads to the right, and Thomas Lloyd standing on his little mat, with the self-conscious pomposity of a Noah’s Ark figure. He heard, rather than saw, the approach of a powerful sports car humming along the main road, and at the same time caught sight of an open two-seater, which might well have been an entrant for the Old Crocks’ Race, approaching more diffidently along the side road. He recognized the driver as Dr. Rippington Roberts, and wondered why old family practitioners should remain so conservative in their choice of cars, as if to register a permanent protest against the passing of the old horse-and-gig days.

  It was evident that the sports car had both the right of way and the necessary speed to pass the corner before the doctor was ready to cross. Lloyd looked up, but did not make any signal, and the driver took this as an indication of a clear road, and stamped on the accelerator. Neither he nor Mr. Winkley was prepared for the constable’s outflung hand when the car’s front wheels were over the crossing. The driver braked suddenly. There was a squealing of tyres as the big car skidded, missed Lloyd by inches, made a lurching turn, and crashed across the side road into the doctor’s car. With a sudden roar, a sheet of flame shot upwards.

  “Good God!” shouted Winkley. “They’ll be burned to death! That policeman’s a bloody butcher!”

  There came a queer, half-strangled noise from the room behind him, and a thin, high-pitched, unearthly scream that turned his flesh cold. He swung round and saw the General tottering on his feet, with eyes dilated, and trembling hands clutching at his throat. Before Mr. Winkley could move forward, he had fallen in a convulsed heap on to the floor.

  The door burst open, and Miss Haddox rushed in. She shot one glance full of hatred at Mr. Winkley, then ran to her brother. She squatted beside him, lifted his head on to her lap, took a thin wedge of ivory from his waistcoat pocket, and, with the swiftness of long practice, slipped it between his teeth. She chafed his head and hands until the twitchings of his body ceased, then looked up.

  “Brandy,” she said, “and keep everyone out.”

  Mr. Winkley, reflecting that she looked more competent than he had ever seen her before, obeyed the command in her voice, and ran outside. The hall was empty, and he guessed that the accident had drawn everyone out of the hotel, a surmise he confirmed when he found the bar also deserted, and had to help himself to a bottle of brandy. He returned to the smoking-room, poured some of the spirit into a glass, and handed it to Miss Haddox. She took it without a word, and, from time to time, poured little drops down her brother’s throat, until his breathing grew calmer. At last she seemed satisfied, and signed to Mr. Winkley to help her to lift the General into a chair, placing a smaller chair for his feet.

  “He’ll sleep now,” she said.

  “Won’t you take a little brandy?” suggested Mr. Winkley. “It must have upset you, seeing him like that.”

  “No, thank you, Mr. Winkley,” she replied. “I’m not in the least upset. I’m far too much accustomed to these turns, unfortunately. But what happened? It’s usually some shock.”

  Mr. Winkley explained.

  “Yes, I see. It would be the fire, of course, and you shouting about someone being burned. It’s just a relic of the last War To End War,” she said bitterly, and her voice sounded even harsher than usual. “Even Regular Army men didn’t become generals for nothing, you know. I’ve been expecting this for some days.”

  “Ever since Mrs. Mumsby died, in fact,” remarked Mr. Winkley.

  Miss Haddox looked startled.

  “Yes. How did you know?” she asked. “She never was much to look at – of course she was no lady – but she looked particularly revolting when she was dead. I thought that Courtney might have one of these attacks if he saw her looking like that.”

  “So that’s why you pretended to have hysterics, and why you stopped as soon as the doctor arrived,” remarked Mr. Winkley.

  She nodded.

  “It was the only thing I could think of to take his attention off her,” she said. “I know I did them badly, because I’m not by nature a very hysterical woman, as you may have noticed, and it’s a good thing that I’m not, or I don’t know what would have happened to Courtney by now. I know you all think me a fool, and despise me for running after him all day long, but I hardly dare let him out of my sight. At any time of day he’s likely to have a sudden shock like this, and he expects me to be with him when he comes round from one of his attacks. The doctor said it might be dangerous if he found himself among strangers, and he’s been so much worse lately that I didn’t like to let him come away without me. You don’t suppose I enjoy giving up my own holiday to stay in this bleak hotel, do you? The only time I get to myself is when he’s out fishing. It soothes him, and he doesn’t seem to mind killing the fish, although I’m sure I don’t understand how anyone can touch the horrid slimy creatures.”

  “I thought that perhaps you’d come here this year on account of Mrs. Mumsby,” said Mr. Winkley.

  “What do you mean?” she asked sharply.

  “I mean that you may have heard that she was setting her cap at him,” he replied calmly. “You wouldn’t have liked him to marry her, I suppose.”

  “Marry her!” She glared at him vindictively. “How could he be allowed to marry anyone? What woman would ever have the patience to look after him as I have done? Marry her! What nonsense!”

  “Exactly,” replied Mr. Winkley. “But what could you do to prevent it?”

  Her eyes blazed at him.

  “Do? I should have killed her!” she cried, and Mr. Winkley believed her.

  Chapter 35

  Mr. Winkley went in search of Mrs. Evans.

  The office was locked, but he found her, as he had expected, outside the hotel looking at the damaged cars. The flames had been extinguished, and Thomas Lloyd was making futile measurements with a foot rule, and entering them into his notebook. Dr. Rippington Roberts was talking to the driver of the sports car, who had not yet recovered from his pale fury, and Mr. Winkley walked over to them.

  “Well, Winkley, you’re not the only murderer in the village,” was the doctor’s greeting. “I’m trying to explain to this gentleman that his only excuse is to plead guilty, and hope to get off with a fine. Lloyd will explain to the Court that he was holding him up because he knew that I was trying to get to an urgent case. He will swear that the man was driving to the danger of the public, and that althoug
h he saw the signal, he was unable to stop, and nearly killed the poor doctor. What’s more, he’ll have plenty of witnesses to prove it.”

  “But it isn’t true,” protested Winkley. “You know that it was Thomas Lloyd who caused the accident. You’ll have to tell the truth.”

  “I shall,” laughed the doctor, “but no one will believe me. They will say that I’m too kind-hearted to get the man into trouble. There’ll be a headline in the local paper, ‘Doctor pleads for his attacker’. Lloyd has the gift of the gab; besides, he’ll give his evidence in Welsh, and it doesn’t translate well. This gentleman is one of the hated Sassenachs, and therefore a rich goose to be plucked. He doesn’t stand an earthly chance of winning his case. It will be a heavy fine, man, and I shouldn’t be surprised if they promote Lloyd.”

  Mr. Winkley did not attempt to follow these curious workings of the Welsh mind.

  “I hope you’re not hurt,” he said. “You had a narrow escape.”

  “Oh no. I slipped out of the car before it was hit. I’ve seen death too often to want to experience it before my time.”

  “I must say you sound cheerful enough,” remarked Mr. Winkley.

  “Cheerful? Of course I’m cheerful, man,” replied the doctor, slapping him on the back. “I shall get a new car out of the insurance company at last. I’ve been hoping to get into an accident for years.”

  He went off, swinging his worn, leather bag, and chuckling to himself.

  Mr. Winkley stared after him.

  It was very odd, he thought. If ever an accident had been deliberately arranged, surely this one had. It was difficult to believe that any sane man would do anything so criminally careless merely to hasten his promotion in the force. And surely it was strange that two people who had been so conspicuously close at hand when Mrs. Mumsby had met with her death, should now be involved in an accident, which, but for extraordinarily good luck, must have resulted in another death. Yes, certainly he had been lax in overlooking these two as potential murderers...

  He made his way to the office, where Mrs. Evans was making arrangements for the unfortunate driver to continue his journey in the hotel car. He waited until the man had gone out and then told her what had occurred in her absence.

  “Why, thank you, Mr. Winkley,” she said. “The girl had no business to leave the bar, but you know what it is in a small village like this – they all feel that they must join in any bit of excitement that crops up. I’m as bad myself, indeed. So the General had one of his turns, did he, the poor man? I can’t say that I’m surprised. I’ve been expecting something of the kind ever since poor Mrs. Mumsby died.”

  Mr. Winkley stared at her in surprise.

  “You don’t mean to suggest that he had anything to do with her death?” he asked.

  Mrs. Evans looked mildly shocked.

  “Oh dear me, no!” she said. “And if you’re thinking of that old piece of scandal about them, I’m sure there was nothing in it. I don’t deny that he was seen coming out of her bedroom that night, but that was only because he knew there was a fire there. Of course, we all knew what she was like, poor thing, and the idea of having a man in her bed-room tickled her to death, though Major Jeans always said she’d die of shock if any man made love to her. But that was just his idea of a joke, and I’m sure that the General is too much of a gentleman to behave like that to any woman.”

  Mr. Winkley looked puzzled.

  “Do you mean to say that General Haddox used to go into Mrs. Mumsby’s bedroom at night to warm himself in front of the fire? I’m not much of a scandalmonger, but that sounds fishy even to me.”

  Mrs. Evans bit her lip.

  “Oh dear!” she exclaimed. “Didn’t you know? I never ought to have mentioned it, but I thought that you knew all about the General and his little ways as you’d been helping Miss Haddox today.”

  “It will seem much worse if you don’t explain now,” Mr. Winkley pointed out.

  “I’m afraid it will. Well, I can’t see that there’s much harm in explaining. After all, a good many visitors know about it already, and you’re one of our regulars. It was the war, you know. He was nearly burned to death in a dugout, but his batman managed to drag him clear before the whole thing went up in flames. Three other officers were killed, and he can’t forget it. They talk about shell-shock lasting a lifetime, so I suppose you could call this fire-shock. When anything upsets him, he gets this fear that he will be burned alive. He can’t sleep at night until he knows that all the fires in the place have been let out. He waits till everyone is in bed, and then goes round the hotel, looking at all the grates. He carries some chemical stuff with him that’s supposed to douse the flames. Then he goes to bed, and sleeps quite soundly.”

  “Has he always been like that?”

  “Ever since I’ve known him, and he’s been coming here every year since the Armistice. He caught a chill once when he was out fishing, and the doctor ordered him to stay in bed, and told me to put a fire in his room. You never saw anything like the job we had to keep him in bed. He kept getting up to see whether the fire was all right, and in the end we had to let it out.”

  “I must say I can’t see why he should be so much upset by Mrs. Mumsby’s death,” said Mr. Winkley.

  Mrs. Evans studied him through serious, light-blue eyes.

  “Why, Mr. Winkley! To hear you talk, anyone would think you had no feelings,” she said. “The General has met Mrs. Mumsby every year for the last five years. They were great friends, and it’s only natural that he should feel upset. You must miss her yourself. Now, own up.”

  “I’d certainly prefer her to be alive,” replied Mr. Winkley, somewhat untruthfully, for any regret he may have felt originally was by now entirely submerged in the excitement of his self-imposed chase after her murderer. “You make us feel so much at home here that when one of the family goes, we feel a personal kind of loss. Look how badly young Mr. Weston took her death.”

  “That seems to me much stranger than the General’s way of taking it,” said Mrs. Evans. “You see, Mr. Claude had never set eyes on her before.”

  “Are you sure of that?” asked Mr. Winkley. “I had an idea that they knew each other well.”

  “No, they didn’t, though I’m sure I don’t wonder at you thinking that, for she fairly doted on that boy, and all within a few weeks. I used to tell her that she couldn’t have made more fuss of him if he’d been her own son, but she only laughed at me, poor dear. You know that hearty way she had of laughing.”

  Mr. Winkley had thought it more of a bellow than a laugh, and shuddered even now when he caught an imagined echo of it.

  “Weren’t you annoyed to find that she hadn’t kept her promise to remember you in her will?” he asked. “You know, I suppose, that she left her money to charity, and it was a considerable amount.”

  Mrs. Evans, luckily, did not ask whence he had obtained his information.

  “I never knew what she was worth,” she replied, “but I know that Mr. Mumsby was a very rich man. She used to tell me about her house. Twelve servants she kept, and she had satin bedspreads and a different coloured telephone in every bedroom. It must have been a big change to come to live here so quietly, but she liked it. No, I never thought any the worse of her for forgetting me. She left it too late, but she always meant to leave me some money. She had a kind heart.”

  There was a pause.

  “I forgot to give you the brandy,” remarked Mr. Winkley, lifting the bottle on to the counter. “By the way,” he added inconsequently, “what was Mr. Evans doing on the morning that Mrs. Mumsby died?”

  Mrs. Evans flushed crimson, and a sudden fierce light blazed in her eyes.

  “That’s no business of yours, Mr. Winkley,” she said, and, swinging the bottle off the counter, she turned and went into her sitting-room, banging the door behind her.

  But Mr. Winkley smiled. He knew very well what Mr. Evans had been doing.

  He sauntered out of the office just as the front door opened. The win
d catapulted into the hall a short stocky figure, barely recognizable in black fishing hat, waterproof, and boots.

  “Good lord, man!” exclaimed Mr. Winkley. “Do you mean to say that you’ve been out fishing again in this gale? You must be mad.”

  The figure, holding one hand beneath the bulky folds of his coat, strode mysteriously into the centre of the hall. Then, with much rolling of the eyes, and twisting of the mouth, he suddenly produced from under the coat, the long, emaciated body of an old bull-headed, black-scaled salmon.

  “Meet Cuthbert!” said the Major.

  Chapter 36

  Just before luncheon that day, Mr. Winkley received a second letter from London. It did not bring to his face any visible signs of the thoughts which it induced in him. The smile of understanding which the information might have brought to the thin lips of Sherlock Holmes, or the gleam which it might have induced in the eyes of Sexton Blake, were not apparent. Mr. Winkley merely shuffled his feet in his old slippers, and felt uncomfortable. He pondered upon it with an air of indecision, untouched by that aura of satisfied alertness which should surround the detective at the successful solution of his case. He pondered upon it as he walked slowly to the dining-room for lunch. He pondered upon it during the meal, so that all Major Jeans’ wit evoked no response from him, and he was voted a dull dog by the bachelors’ table. He pondered upon it in the hall after the meal, and scarcely noticed the presence of Gunn, who sat with his long legs stretched out towards the fire, with Pussy balanced on his knees.

  “Hullo! What’s biting you?” asked Pussy.

  Mr. Winkley hesitated for a moment, then said slowly:

  “I’ve been following up the life of Mrs. Mumsby, as you suggested, and I don’t quite know how best to deal with the results. You see, I still have to guess at the motive.”