Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 38, No. 4. Whole No. 215, October 1961

Miss Phipps Improvises by Phyllis Bentley

In which Miss Phipps creates a detective story before your very eyes, thus giving would-be writers a lesson in technique, and readers a lesson in suspense...

It was a wet afternoon in brittlesea. The sea looked like lead and the rain poured from a sky of unbroken gray. Detective Inspector Tarrant had not come home for lunch. Young Johnny was upstairs engaged in his afternoon nap. Mary Tarrant and Miss Phipps sat beside a bright fire, each with a cup of Mary’s excellent coffee beside her. Mary was knitting a pullover for her husband and Miss Phipps held a detective novel in her hand. The general effect was intimate and cosy.

With a sigh Miss Phipps threw down her book.

“Come to the end?” said Mary.

“Only to the end of my interest,” said Miss Phipps.

“Why so?” inquired Mary.

“No suspense,” said Miss Phipps.

“How does one create suspense, Aunt Marian?” asked Mary, beginning another row.

“The best way to create suspense in a detective story,” declared Miss Phipps, “is to employ two characters, each of whose integrity appears to vary inversely with that of the other.”

“I don’t find that as clear as your usual pronouncements, Aunt Marian,” Mary remarked with a smile.

“Let us suppose we have two characters — A and B.”

“Arthur and Bob,” suggested Mary.

“Just so. If Arthur is to be believed, Bob should be a scoundrel. If Bob is to be believed, Arthur must be the scoundrel. For a few pages the reader is led to believe in Arthur. Then some slight but significant incident occurs, which appears to reinstate Bob. Can Bob be innocent after all? If so, Arthur must have been telling lies; therefore he must be the scoundrel. The reader’s suspense is drawn tauter and tauter by these alternate hooks — if you see what I mean.”

“Who is found guilty in the end?” asked Mary.

“Well, there lies the peculiar advantage of that kind of story,” said Miss Phipps, beaming. “There are no fewer than four possible answers to your question. One, Arthur can be guilty. Two, Bob can be guilty. Three, both can be guilty. And four, neither can be guilty. The final choice is open to the author and prevents the solution from becoming obvious until the end, or very late in the story.”

“Certainly a complicated structure would be necessary to maintain the situation in doubt until the last page,” said Mary, counting stitches.

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Miss Phipps confidently. “It would need some skill in invention, of course.”

“Now you’re boasting, Aunt Marian. I challenge you to produce such a story, here and now.”

“But, my dear Mary—” began Miss Phipps.

“Start!” commanded Mary firmly.

“Well, let me see now,” said Miss Phipps, half flustered and half flattered. “Arthur — a rather old-fashioned name. Yes. Arthur, let’s say, was cashier of the Laire Woollen Company, a small but reputable firm manufacturing tweed cloth, in a rather quiet valley outside the city of Laire in Yorkshire.”

“You’ve begun well. A cashier suggests at once the possibility of embezzlement or theft,” said Mary.

“Doesn’t it? Well, Arthur was a man in his late fifties, thin, gray-haired, meticulous, with a habit of looking over his spectacles in a rather crushing style at any younger person who ventured to disagree with him — even, we’ll say, if that person were the junior partner. Slow in his bookkeeping, was Arthur, but sure — at least, the Laire Woollen Company had found him so for upwards of a quarter of a century.”

“But such a man could not possibly be guilty of any crime,” objected Mary.

“That,” said Miss Phipps, “is precisely the impression the reader is intended to receive — at first.”

“Go on,” said Mary.

“It was the custom of the Laire Woollen Company to have the wages of the employees fetched from the bank in Laire on Thursday afternoon. Arthur then prepared the pay envelopes, which were distributed on Friday morning. The money was fetched from the bank by Arthur and Bob—”

“Ah, ready to be stolen,” said Mary.

“Bob being the junior partner of the firm—”

“I thought so,” said Mary.

“—and Arthur and Bob naturally traveled to and from the bank in Bob’s car.”

“Tell me more of Bob,” said Mary.

“Bob’s grandfather, old Mr. Denison, was the head of the firm.”

“Grandfather?”

“Bob’s father was killed in World War II.”

“I see,” said Mary thoughtfully. “A gap of two generations, and a gap in sympathy, huh?”

“Exactly. Bob had been sent to a good public school, and then to the textile department of Laire University.”

“I suppose he was rather wild there, and got sent down without taking his degree.”

“On the contrary — and who is inventing this story, Mary? Bob wasn’t especially brilliant, but he took a good solid second-class. He also played rugby for the University.”

“Oh, no!” said Mary. “We can’t have the criminal being good at football.”

“Who said Bob was the criminal? He was — or appeared to be — a nice ordinary young man, strong though stocky in build, with brown hair and brown eyes. Quite knowledgeable about textiles, and fond of athletics and amateur dramatics.”

“That last item strikes a rather suspicious note,” commented Mary. “The ability to act is often found in a criminal plot.”

“Oh, he never took leading roles,” said Miss Phipps reassuringly. “Only minor parts — one of the two policemen at the end who arrest the villain, and that sort of thing, you know. What he really enjoyed was building the set — whacking about with a hammer and so on. He had a good deal of physical energy which had to be expended somehow.”

“He still sounds quite innocent,” said Mary.

“Moreover, he was in love with Arthur’s daughter.”

“The plot thickens! Was she a nice girl?”

“Both Arthur and Bob thought so. She worked with the Laire Woollen Company as old Mr. Denison’s secretary.”

“Pretty?”

“Yes, certainly. Very fresh and neat, with those attractive legs and full skirts one sees about so much nowadays. I haven’t worked out yet whether she was a blonde or a brunette,” said Miss Phipps thoughtfully. “Blonde, I think. Yes, fair hair, very well cut. Fine gray eyes. She was not a fool, you know. Intelligent. Sensible. Full of go. Kind to her father and mother.”

“The heroine, in short.”

“Exactly.”

“Had she any other admirers?”

“Oh, yes, one or two.”

“I think you ought to be more specific,” objected Mary.

“Very well. Let’s say, two. One of the clerks in the outer office, and a childhood friend, the boy next door. Her name was — let’s see, Catherine?”

“Agreed. Her father calls her Kitty in private?”

“I prefer Cathy. Arthur was a trifle old-fashioned, you remember.”

“In that case he’s probably rather strict with Cathy about dates and young men and coming in late, and doesn’t approve of Bob’s attentions.”

“I agree. Now we come to the day of the crime. A bright, pleasant day in October.”

“Thursday or Friday, no doubt.”

“Thursday afternoon, just after working hours. Arthur was just completing the preparation of the week’s pay envelopes when the mill buzzer sounded.”

“Buzzer?” queried Mary.

“Well, a hooter, a siren — whatever you like to call it. Some loud noise used to mark the beginning and ending of the work day.”

“Proceed.”

“The mill rapidly emptied of its employees, who poured out of the gate. Arthur finished his task and was just placing the pay envelopes in the office safe when a man came in and asked for work.”

“But don’t men in this country usually obtain employment through a Labour Exchange?”

“Exactly Arthur’s reaction. ‘You’ll have to go to the Labour,’ he said. ‘Any way we haven’t any vacancies here. Try so-and-so’s,’ he said, giving the name of a neighboring firm. ‘I did not,’ said Arthur when giving his evidence later — you understand, this is Arthur’s account of the affair — ‘I did not altogether like the appearance of the man. He didn’t look very respectable to me, and he held a handkerchief to his face in an unbecoming manner.’ ”

“Unbecoming is good,” said Mary with relish. “Just the right word for Arthur. What happened then?”

“The man said, according to Arthur, ‘I’d like to see old Mr. Denison, all the same.’ To which Arthur replied stiffly, ‘Mr. Denison has left.’ He looked into the inner office, and added, ‘Mr. Bob is not here either.’ ‘Good enough,’ said the man with the handkerchief, and drawing some implement from his pocket he whacked poor Arthur hard on the back of he head. Arthur fell down, but in falling grabbed hold of the man so that they rolled about together on the floor. The man disentangled himself, treading on Arthur in the process, and rushing to the window, shouted, ‘Come on in!’ and waved his arms, clearly beckoning to an accomplice. He then sprang back to the dazed Arthur, wrapped a scarf round his head, and sat heavily on him, holding him face down to the ground. Arthur passed out — I believe that is the expression. When he came to some time later and tore off the scarf, he found the safe empty and the men gone. Fortunately, some of the wage envelopes were still lying on Arthur’s desk — the men had overlooked these, or perhaps found them too scattered to collect in their haste. Arthur rang the police and old Mr. Denison, and very soon an able and conscientious Detective-Inspector — shall we call him Tarrant?—”

“Why not?” said Mary, smiling.

“—very soon Detective-Inspector Tarrant was at the Laire Woollen Mill, conducting a vigorous and detailed investigation.”

“How much money had been stolen?” asked Mary.

“Fifteen hundred pounds.”

“Not a big haul, as hauls go.”

“No. Inspector Tarrant noticed that immediately. The criminals were either small-time thieves, or they were—”

“Somebody in desperate need of such a sum.”

“Exactly. You’ve learned a good deal from your husband, my dear.”

“It seems to me, too,” said Mary thoughtfully, holding up the pullover to judge its length, “that a good deal of local knowledge was required for this robbery.”

“Just what the Inspector said, my dear.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t listen any more for a minute or two,” said Mary. “I have to narrow now, for the armhole.”

“I’m delighted to hear it — it gives me time to plan the next development,” chuckled Miss Phipps.

Presently Mary said, “I’m ready now.”

“Old Mr. Denison and Bob have now joined Arthur in the Laire Woollen Company’s office and are listening to Arthur’s evidence.”

Miss Phipps coughed to clear her throat and began to act her various characters.

“ ‘I suppose the two thieves went out by the side door,’ said Bob thoughtfully.

“ ‘They can’t have done that — I locked it when I left,’ said old Mr. Denison.

“ ‘But they can’t have left by the front door,’ exclaimed Bob.

“ ‘Why not?’ said the Inspector sharply.

“ ‘Because I was standing at the gate, with the front door in full view, for at least ten minutes after the buzzer sounded,’ said Bob.

“ ‘What were you doing there all that time?’ said old Mr. Denison.

“ ‘I was waiting for Catherine, and when she came I was talking to her,’ said Bob.

“At this both Mr. Denison and Arthur scowled at him, and the Inspector gave him a searching look... How do you think it is developing, Mary?” Miss Phipps inquired.

“Arthur is certainly under my suspicion,” said Mary firmly. “That business about the second man — the accomplice — struck me as rather unconvincing. Why have an accomplice? Why not just knock Arthur out yourself and take the cash?”

“You would need to hit Arthur much harder to carry out that plan,” said Miss Phipps. “As it was, a tap that merely stunned and a muffling scarf sufficed.”

“That’s exactly what I mean,” said Mary. “Arthur had to invent some reason for his lack of severe injury — so he concocted this thin story of the second man.”

“And how did he get rid of the money, if he stole it himself?”

“He had a few minutes alone, while he was supposed to be lying unconscious on the floor, you remember. And also while he was waiting for the police. However,” said Mary, “you are telling this story, Aunt Marian, not I.”

“At present, then, your suspicions rest on Arthur?”

“They certainly do.”

“So did Inspector Tarrant’s. Until he found the scarf in which Arthur had been muffled, lying in a corner of the office. It was what you would call a collegiate scarf, Mary — a scarf with huge stripes in pink, black, and gray. It was a Laire University scarf. In fact, it was Bob’s scarf.”

“I don’t see that proves anything,” objected Mary. “Those young men drive about in sports cars wearing huge gloves and enormous woollen collegiate scarves, I grant you. But Bob could easily have left his scarf hanging on a peg in the office. In fact, he must have done so, and the thief simply snatched it up to muffle Arthur.”

“Unfortunately,” said Miss Phipps gravely, “the evidence seemed to indicate that Bob left the office just before the buzzer went, wearing the scarf.”

“Whose evidence?”

“Arthur’s.”

“I don’t believe it. He was simply trying to implicate Bob and support his weak story about the accomplice.”

“And Catherine’s.”

“Catherine’s?” exclaimed Mary. “You mean Catherine said Bob was wearing the scarf?”

“Yes. While waiting for the police to arrive, Arthur telephoned his home to explain to his wife that he would be late and she was not to worry. Hearing the agitation in his voice, she asked what was wrong. He told her in general terms that there had been a robbery and he was awaiting the police. As soon as Catherine reached home and heard this news, she came straight back to the Laire Woollen Company. The Inspector saw her hurrying across the yard, intercepted her, and asked about her talk with Bob at the mill gate.”

“She probably thought Bob had been hurt.”

“Probably — let’s say he aimed at some such impression.”

“Then it was mean to trap the poor girl like that,” said Mary.

“ ‘Do I understand you and Mr. Bob left the mill together, Miss Catherine?’ said the Inspector.

“ ‘No. He left before I did and was waiting for me at the gate.’

“ ‘And you stood there and talked for several minutes?”

“ ‘Yes.’

“ ‘And then what happened?’

“ ‘I walked away towards the bus stop at the top of the road.’

“ ‘And Mr. Bob?’

“ ‘I don’t know what he did then. I presume he walked towards the right of the mill where his car was parked.’

“ ‘Still wearing his muffler?’

“ ‘Yes, of course. Is he hurt, Inspector?’

“ ‘No, no. I take it that he did not offer to drive you home, then?’

“ ‘He did offer to do so, but I declined,’ said Catherine.

“ ‘Was there a quarrel between you, Miss Catherine?’

“ ‘There was a slight disagreement,’ admitted Catherine. ‘But why do you want to know all this, Inspector? What has happened? Is Bob hurt? Is my father hurt? Has there been a robbery?’... And so on.” Miss Phipps paused. “Poor Catherine was very much upset.”

“No wonder!” exclaimed Mary. “This is dreadful, Aunt Marian! It would seem that Bob is guilty.”

“If Arthur’s evidence is truthful, perhaps so. Do you think Bob was the unseen accomplice, then?”

“Presumably. Yes. Yes,” said Mary. “He did not wish to be seen in the act of robbery by Arthur, so he remained outside until Arthur was knocked out. His guilt would explain, too, why Arthur was not severely injured — Bob did not wish to hurt Catherine’s father.”

“Bob gave his scarf to the young thief who had first entered the office, then?”

“I suppose so,” said Mary, but there was a doubtful note in her voice. “It seems a silly thing to do, I must admit. What did Bob say about the scarf?”

“At first he could not account for its presence in the office at all. Then he remembered that he had found the battery of his car run down, and had had to use the starting-handle. It seemed to him that he probably threw off his scarf while using the handle, but he could not remember with certainty.”

“Foolish, misguided young man,” said Mary sadly. “Why did he ruin himself by committing this crime? He was in debt, I suppose.”

“The Inspector investigated that matter promptly. Bob was not in debt at all. The date was shortly after the beginning of the month and all his bills — garage and so on — were paid.”

“You mean he didn’t do it?” asked Mary. “Then Arthur must have done it. He’d been stealing from the firm — fiddling the books, you know — and he stole this money to make gool his shortage.”

“A very possible solution,” agreed Miss Phipps. “The Inspector, however, had the firm’s books closely investigated by a chartered accountant. They were in perfect order.”

“So we’re thrown back again to Bob. What about that quarrel between Bob and Catherine? Another girl, perhaps? He had seduced her and needed the money to pay her off?”

“Again a possible solution. Arthur, I may say, hinted at it. By this time he was in a towering rage against Bob and swearing he should never marry his daughter.”

“The Inspector investigated the ‘other girl’ possibility?”

“He did. There was no such girl.”

“What about Grandfather Denison? Could he be involved somehow?”

“Oh, he had an unbreakable alibi. He was being driven home by his elderly chauffeur during the entire period of the robbery. No, he definitely does not come into the mystery.”

“I wonder if Arthur and Bob could have been in it together?” suggested Mary thoughtfully. “Perhaps the Laire Woollen Company’s finances were unsound. Maybe the money wasn’t there at all, and Arthur and Bob faked the theft to conceal its absence.”

“The money was withdrawn from the Laire bank that afternoon,” replied Miss Phipps. “Inspector Tarrant investigated the Laire Woollen Company’s finances and found that the firm, though not a gold mine, was solidly prosperous.”

“Aunt Marian,” said Mary with determination, “will you please tell me at once who committed this robbery, and why? I can’t stand this suspense any longer. I’m on tenterhooks.”

“A very textile metaphor, my dear. So you admit that my recipe for suspense — two characters each of whose integrity appears to vary inversely with that of the other — is a valid one?”

“Yes, yes, I agree.”

“And that it is valid because there are four possible solutions? You have already advanced three of the four — that Arthur is guilty, that Bob is guilty, that Arthur and Bob are both guilty.”

“The fourth possible solution is that neither Arthur nor Bob is guilty,” Mary remembered. “I’d prefer that to be the correct answer, Aunt Marian, if it is at all possible. I’ve grown quite attached to these people, and I certainly want that nice Catherine to be happy. She can’t be happy if either her father or her future husband is guilty.”

“Well, let us see what we can do,” said Miss Phipps, smiling. “Let us assume that both Arthur and Bob are telling the truth.”

“Hurrah,” said Mary.

“Arthur is a slow, precise elderly man; Bob is a vigorous impetuous young one. The sense of time could vary considerably between two such persons. I suggest that Arthur was a good deal longer in finishing his pay envelopes than he thought. On the other hand, Bob had a few sharp words with Catherine; she whisked away in a pet; he hurried across the yard, tried the self-starter of his sports car, leaped out, threw off his scarf, finally started the car manually, and drove off, all in a fury. By that time the mill yard was empty, the thieves arrived, and the scarf, forgotten by Bob, lay on the ground.”

“Oh, quite,” said Mary. “I can accept all that. But it doesn’t give us a clue to the identity of the thieves.”

“I think it does,” said Miss Phipps.

“Really?”

“Yes. Remember that this scarf was very noticeably striped in the colors of Laire University. Nobody in the mill was likely to have a similar scarf. Everybody in the mill would know the scarf as Bob’s.”

“You mean that whoever took the scarf into the office did so to implicate Bob?”

“I do.”

“But who could that be? Surely not Arthur?”

“No, of course not. Arthur was a good man, a little too strict perhaps — a nonsmoker and teetotaler and all that kind of thing — but thoroughly honorable.”

“Then who? I don’t see anybody else in the story.”

“My dear,” said Miss Phipps with something of a smirk, “it is not required of a detective-story writer that she thrust the guilty person into view. The man is there, however. You can find him if you think back to one small incident in the story — an incident which you dismissed too casually after a single question.”

Mary paused. At length she said, “The quarrel between Bob and Catherine.”

“Exactly.”

“What was it about?”

“What indeed?”

“Did the Inspector investigate it?”

“Eventually.”

“Was it about Arthur?”

Miss Phipps shook her head.

“About Bob’s old grandfather? He disapproved of the match?”

“No. The grandfather was a rather fine old man, saddened by having lost his son in the War, a little perplexed by the strange modern world, but anxious only for Bob’s happiness.”

“Then who — oh!” cried Mary suddenly, dropping her knitting. “I’ve got it! Of course! Catherine’s other suitors. The clerk in the outer office. Bob was jealous of his attentions and said so rather too possessively to Catherine, who tossed her head and walked off. It all happened just as you said — about Bob and the scarf and the car — and this clerk, who of course knew all about the pay envelopes in the office — by the way, what was his name? Did you ever mention it?”

“No — but let’s call him Eric.”

“A name I’ve never had a fancy for. Eric picked up the scarf and gave it to his confederate in the office, deliberately intending to implicate Bob. Eric must have planned the theft beforehand.”

“Oh, yes, he had.”

“Gambling debts?”

“Dogs. And then a money-lender.”

“I see. Tight trousers and a mop of hair?”

“No, older than that. Sideburns and a fancy waistcoat.”

“And his partner in crime?”

“A bad companion from Laire’s underworld, I’d say.”

“Would they be caught?”

“Yes — you know that detective stories are the most moral of all stories. The numbers of the notes were known to the Laire bank — quite a customary precaution.”

“So Arthur and Bob and Catherine and Grandfather Denison were able to live happily ever after.”

“Yes. After a good deal of suspense, I hope you agree?”

“Oh, I agree. You win, Aunt Marian. Heavens, there’s Johnny moving already How time flies!”

She ran upstairs to her little son. Miss Phipps, with a sigh, picked up her book again.

“No suspense,” she murmured.