Settling Scores Page 10

  “Frankly, I can’t,” admitted Edward Cleyne. “I put it down myself to money difficulties.”

  “So did the local police,” nodded Crook. “But I could not accept that view. You see, as Miss Holt herself informed me, Peter Holt had mended his ways. His future was assured, and he no longer troubled money-lenders, or allowed them to trouble him.”

  “Very well—perhaps that’s right,” interposed the young man quickly. “But why did the local police believe he had got into money trouble?”

  “Aha!” chirped the little solicitor, anxious to be in on any turn. “Tell us that!”

  “The local police,” responded Crook, “acted upon the assumption that, since Peter Holt had left a note implying suicide, he must have got into trouble, and they somewhat hastily concluded that the trouble surrounded a certain money-lender named Hubert Bowersby, of 69 High Street, Tarrant, who was seen in this neighbourhood a few days ago. I anticipated their inquiries myself and interviewed Mr. Bowersby yesterday. He has had no transactions of any kind with Peter Holt.”

  “But, damn it, there must have been some other reason then!” snapped the solicitor. “There’s the poor boy’s note! P’r’aps you’ll suggest, sir, it was forged?”

  “No. He wrote it.”

  “Ah! For a lark, eh?”

  “No. He intended to commit suicide afterward. But—”

  A sharp rat-tat on the front door interrupted him, and he paused. In a few moments, an apologetic, anxious-faced butler entered the room with a telegram in his hand.

  “For me?” queried Miss Holt, as the butler walked toward her hesitatingly.

  “Er—no, miss,” he stammered. “It’s—it’s for—for Mr. Holt.”

  The discussion, for the moment, was forgotten. A telegram addressed to a dead man was somewhat more interesting. Miss Holt held out her hand.

  All eyes were upon her when she tore open the orange envelope and took out the pale pink form. The next moment she gasped, and the form slipped from her hand. Edward Cleyne darted to her side.

  “What is it?” he asked anxiously.

  He stooped and picked up the form; then he, also, gave a gasp of astonishment.

  “Good Heavens! It’s from Peter!” he exclaimed. “From Peter! Good Lord—then, after all, he’s not— Listen!” He read the wire out:

  Please forgive me. I couldn’t do it when the time came. I am leaving today for Canada.

  Peter.

  Detective Crook glanced round the room. For a second there was dead silence. Then a sharp voice cut through the silence and, hardly knowing why, two or three of the company shivered at the sound of it.

  “I tell you—it’s impossible!” cried the voice. “Impossible!”

  Now all turned their eyes toward Arthur Cleyne, startled by his involuntary utterance. Bright flushes had appeared upon his cheeks. It was the detective who answered him.

  “Why impossible?” he inquired quietly, but with a new note of sternness in his voice. “Many a man on the verge of suicide has hung back on the brink. And besides, in this particular instance, Peter Holt’s impulse had had plenty of time to cool.”

  “What do you mean?” demanded Arthur Cleyne.

  “I mean that the note he assumably left behind him was written two years ago,” said the detective. “I realised that the ink was not recent as soon as Miss Holt showed it to me yesterday, and I have since had this point verified by an expert.

  “And two years ago, Mr. Cleyne, Peter Holt was in financial difficulties and his father refused to help him.” He paused. “On the verge of suicide, Peter drew back. He could not go through with it. His father weakened, also, and matters were patched up. But, unfortunately, the tragic note was not destroyed. Some one got hold of it.”

  “Look here, I don’t understand this,” exclaimed Edward Cleyne, facing the detective. “You suggest that Peter never contemplated suicide when—when he last disappeared. Well, if that’s so, why in Heaven’s name has he sent this telegram?”

  While he flourished the pale pink missive still in his hand, the little solicitor, who did not know where he was and strongly resented it, repeated his formula:

  “Aha! Tell us that!”

  “I can tell you very simply,” answered Crook, “and so can Arthur Cleyne—Peter Holt never sent that telegram—”

  “But that’s nonsense, sir!” interposed the solicitor, who had been peering at the wire. “It was handed in at Liverpool this morning—”

  “By a young assistant of mine who travelled up to Liverpool last night, on my instructions, with the one object of sending that wire. Its purpose has been achieved, I think. Have you anything to say, Arthur Cleyne?”

  “I?” cried the man addressed. Anger blazed from his eyes. “I could say a great deal, but, for the sake of peace, I shall refrain from saying it! Who is this man?” he demanded, turning to the others, “and why is he allowed to interfere with our conference? I’ve had enough of him. I’m going!”

  “I am Detective X. Crook,” replied the detective grimly, “and I do not think I would go just yet, if I were you. Peter Holt is dead, but not by his own hand. He was murdered at Lydd Water, to which spot the murderer has been trying to entice a local angler in order that some one, not himself, might discover the body of the supposed suicide.” His eyes bored into Arthur Cleyne’s soul.

  “It would be natural, would it not, for the only man who knew that Peter Holt’s body lay dead at Lydd Water to be the only man, also, who knew that the Liverpool wire—as you yourself knew, Arthur Cleyne—was impossible?”

  There was a tense silence. For a full half minute no one spoke. Then Arthur Cleyne smiled suddenly, and regained his composure.

  “I take off my hat to you, Detective Crook,” he said. “I killed Peter Holt. I suppose I really have to thank our mutual friend, Mr. Hubert Bowersby, for finally confirming your suspicions.”

  “When I learned that you owed him over three thousand pounds, I discovered the motive for your action, which Peter Holt lacked,” replied the detective dryly, and paused. “Will you step outside with me, Cleyne? We shall find some one waiting for us in the hall.”

  “With pleasure,” nodded Cleyne, “though it will not be necessary for him to officiate. I swallowed my quietus a minute ago.” He swayed slightly. “Mug’s game. Your way’s best, Detective Crook. Congratulations to you on having chosen the wise path in time!”

  Crook slipped his arm round the swaying murderer and led him gently from the room.

  “Bless my soul!” murmured the solicitor, pink with unaccustomed emotion as he stared at Miss Holt and Edward Cleyne. “Then the—ah—contingency has arisen, after all!”

  ‌The Football Photograph

  ‌H. C. Bailey

  The literary career of Henry Christopher Bailey (1878–1961) fell into three distinct phases. In his early twenties, he published his first novel, My Lady of Orange, and proceeded to establish himself as an assiduous purveyor of historical and romantic fiction. But his breakthrough as a writer came after the First World War when he created the detective Reggie Fortune, who appeared in a long series of short stories and—eventually—novels which received widespread acclaim. In the early years of the Golden Age of detective fiction, Bailey’s fame was at least equal to that of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. He also created a second-string series character, a crafty solicitor who rejoiced in the name Joshua Clunk.

  Bailey’s storylines were often powerful and compelling, but his mannered prose was very much a product of its time, and his style of writing began to fall out of fashion. By the time the Second World War was over, his reputation was already in decline and it is fair to say that it has never recovered, although his work has retained a small band of devoted admirers. Yet Bailey does not deserve to be forgotten. Quite apart from the historical importance of his detective fiction, the best of his stories are compelling and often memorable for their unflinching exploration of the nature of evil. Sport crops up occasionally in his work, and “The Football
Photograph” was included in Mr. Fortune Explains (1930).

  The shop of Durfey and Killigrew sold jewellery to Queen Anne. Perhaps it was a little dowdy even then. Its low-browed windows are not for the smart or the millionaire, but for people who want value for money. Yet Durfey and Killigrew show some perception of the progress of mankind since Queen Anne’s death. The doors and windows of their shop are closed with rolling steel shutters.

  It was a Monday morning in August. Mr. Fortune was explaining to Mrs. Fortune without hope that duty would prevent his going to the house in Scotland to which she had promised to take him. In grouse he has no interest till they are dead; in venison, none, dead or alive. He does not care to kill anything or to see it killed except in the way of his profession. A place in which there is nothing to do but take exercise he considers bad for his constitution, and the conversation of country houses weakens his intellect. All this he set forth plaintively to Mrs. Fortune, and she said, “Don’t blether, child,” and the telephone rang.

  Reggie contemplated that instrument with a loving smile. “How wonderful are the works of science, Joan. What a beneficent invention.” He jumped at it. “Yes, Fortune speaking. What? Durfey and Killigrew? Of course I know ’em. My grandmother bought me studs there. Like warming-pans. Burglary? Yes, I’ll come if you want me. Not much in my way, is it? Oh, all right.” He turned to Mrs. Fortune. “Well, well. Duty, Joan, ‘Duty, stern daughter of the voice of God’; thou dost preserve the stars from wrong—me too, darling.”

  “Pig,” said she. “You are a fraud, Reggie.”

  “Oh no. No deception. Some poor beggar’s been killed.” He kissed her hair. He departed.

  The roll shutters of Durfey and Killigrew were still down when his taxi came to the shop. A large man met him and took him round the corner. In a narrow side-street the shop has another window and an entrance, and over these also the shutters were drawn. But in the shutter at the entrance was a small steel door, and that stood ajar.

  The lights were on inside. Some men were crowded into a corner, talking softly, watching others who moved about the shop. From behind the counter rose the square form of Superintendent Bell. Reggie came to his beckoning finger. It pointed down to the space between the counter and the unrobbed showcase of silver on the wall. A man lay there in what had been a pool of blood. He wore a long coat of olive green with purple cuffs and collar. “It’s the porter, sir,” said Bell.

  Reggie crouched over the body. Its brow was torn and bruised, but the blood came from a wound in the throat. He worked upon both… The clenched hands and the blood on their knuckles interested him… From the man’s coat he scraped something sticky and shapeless and put it in a specimen box. He opened the dead mouth.

  Then he stood up and gazed round the shop. “Well, well,” he murmured. “Too many people.”

  “That’s the manager and the assistants, sir.” Bell nodded at the group in the corner. “Waiting to check what’s been taken. And we’ll have to check them off, too.”

  “Oh yes. Yes. But there must be an office or something. Shut ’em up there.” So the staff of Durfey and Killigrew’s was removed while Reggie contemplated the dead man with large and dreamy eyes.

  Bell came back briskly. “Well, sir, what about it?”

  “Has he been moved?” said Reggie.

  “They say this is where they found him.”

  “Yes. It could be,” Reggie murmured. He wandered away, bent and poring over the floor. He dropped on hands and knees. His finger-tips moved upon the linoleum. He stooped close, he cut some small pieces out of it. “Yes, blood, I think. I’ll verify it. But I should say this is where he was knocked on the head.” Reggie sat on his heels and looked up at Superintendent Bell with plaintive wonder.

  “What was he doing here at all?”

  “Ah. If we knew that we’d know something. He didn’t live here. Nobody lives here. He wasn’t the watchman. They don’t have one. He doesn’t lock up. There’s always two of ’em do that together, manager and one of the assistants. He was just the porter. He pulled down the shutters and made ’em fast one o’clock Saturday and went off home. That’s the routine. Then the other chaps went out through the side-door there. Come and have a look, sir. See? The shutter comes down over the entrance and is fastened to the floor with those bolts inside. That little door in it lets ’em out and when they’re outside they lock that up. Well, they went off like that on Saturday and the manager swears there was nobody left in the shop. When he came this morning, the door was still locked all right, but as soon as he got inside he saw the place had been robbed. Then he found the porter lying dead behind the counter.” Bell put his head on one side and looked at his Mr. Fortune with a paternal smile. “Now, sir, the place was still locked up safe, but the porter had got inside and been killed and somebody had gone off with a bag full of jewellery. Do you see how it was done?”

  “Not wholly. No.”

  Bell chuckled. “Ah. It beats Mr. Fortune! Then I’m going to get some of my own back for once. Look here, sir.” He bent to the bolts which should have held the shutter to the floor.

  “Oh, that,” Reggie murmured. “I saw that when I came in. Some fellow’s cut through the bolts. From outside. There’s a mark or two on the base of the shutter. What was the tool? I don’t do much burglary myself.”

  “Thank Heaven there’s something you don’t know,” Bell growled. “Yes, it was a queer tool. A cold chisel uncommon long and thin—they slid it under the shutter and hammered it through the bolts. And that’s pretty queer, too. These fellows knew just what they needed to make a short cut into this funny old shop; they got their tool made and they had the almighty cheek to stand in the street and hammer at the door.”

  “Yes, quite bold. But I suppose it wouldn’t take long.”

  “Matter of minutes, sir. Still, hammering at a jeweller’s door in the open street! It is so blooming impudent. Once they cut the bolts, of course they had a soft job. Ran the shutter up a little, came underneath and—”

  “And brought the porter in to kill him. Yes. All very clear, Bell.”

  “I don’t know what the porter was doing, sir. That beats me.”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” Reggie murmured. “I think I know what he was doing, Bell. But why did he come inside? And why did they kill him? Not according to plan. Some error. I should look into the porter.” He gazed at Bell dreamily. “By the way, what are you looking into?”

  “Everything, as you might say. We haven’t got a line yet. No finger-prints. Glove job. Professionals, of course. We’ll have to put some work in. It’s a kind of insult to the police, breaking in in this barefaced way. When I told Mr. Lomas he said it was the most infernal impudence of his wretched career.”

  “Yes. Yes. It is cheek.” Reggie nodded. “I feel that. I don’t like being ignored myself. I’ll go and sympathise. When you’ve looked up the porter’s record you might come along.”

  The Hon. Sidney Lomas at his desk was surprised by the touch of a gentle hand.

  “Alas, my poor brother!” Reggie sighed.

  “Ha, Reginald! Bell said he would get you on to it. Good man!”

  “I am. But unrecognised. Treated as negligible. Same like you, Lomas. I resent this.”

  “Deuced impudent, isn’t it? Burgle a West End jeweller’s from the street with a hammer. Damme, it’s defying the whole police force.”

  “Yes. Not respectful. I think there were precautions, you know. Still, not nice of ’em. But they’ve behaved shocking to me. Killing a poor wretch crude and casual in the course of the job as if they could get away with a murder as easy as nothing. My only aunt! I exist, I suppose; I am still extant.”

  “My dear fellow,” Lomas chuckled, “highly extant.”

  “Yes. Yes, I think so. I resent being ignored by an elementary person with a cold chisel.”

  “By all means. And what are you going to do about it, Reginald?”

  “Well, I was going to provide some work for our active intelli
gent police force. There are one or two little points left lying about by our nasty friend with the cold chisel. Hallo, here’s Bell, nice and quick.”

  “Got the outlines, sir. Pretty well all the jewellery in the place is gone, except some things in the safe. That’s not been touched. The silver and gold plate seems all there. You might say they cleared out the light stuff. The manager puts it at ten thousand pounds provisional.”

  “And very nice, too.” Lomas smiled. “All anywhere by now. Looks easy, doesn’t it, Bell? Mr. Fortune says he has some work for you.”

  “I thought he had,” Bell said gloomily. “I can see plenty of work myself. But nothing that leads anywhere. What’s your line, sir?”

  “It’s the porter, you know,” Reggie murmured.

  “The manager says he’d answer for him absolutely. Been employed a dozen years. Always straight.”

  “Poor beggar,” Reggie sighed. “And how does the manager think he came to be inside, Bell?”

  “The idea is, he saw something wrong at the side-door and came inside to see what was up and the burglars killed him.”

  Lomas nodded. “Reasonable enough. We’ve had cases like it before. What’s the matter, Reginald?”

  “Well, you haven’t, you know. Not cases like this. Think again, Lomas. At one o’clock Saturday the porter went off duty. The first thing he ought to do is to get out of his highly coloured livery. By the way, where is his home? What about his people? Nobody’s reported him missing and he’s been dead since Saturday.”

  “Has he, though?” said Lomas quickly.

  “Oh yes. Yes. Forty hours or more. His blood’s been drying quite a long time.”

  “Nobody reported him missing because he lived alone,” said Bell. “Rooms in workmen’s dwellings, Clerkenwell. No family.”

  Reggie sighed. “We don’t have much luck. Well, well. He didn’t go home and change on Saturday. He hung about. The burglars couldn’t begin to work till everybody was well away from the shop. Nevertheless, when they did begin the porter was handy in his livery all complete. What about it, Lomas?”