Spotted Hemlock

chapter eight

A Lamb to the Slaughter

‘ “Let us set out,” said I, “and prepare for some fatigue, for we shall take a longer road than that by which we came.”

Ibid.

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Dame Beatrice found young Coles unshaven, unkempt and in his dressing-gown. He seemed much more depressed than on the previous occasion when she had seen him.

‘Tell you more about Norah? I don’t think I can,’ he said. ‘There’s only one thing you might like to know, although I don’t see that it has any bearing upon what’s happened. I didn’t want us to be married until I’d done with the art school and she’d finished her college course.’

‘And what caused you to change your mind, Mr Coles?’

‘Force majeure. Norah talked me into it.’

‘Really? How was that?’

‘I don’t know. She was a lot more forceful than I am. Besides, she was afraid of old Biancini. She hated him. I’m not sure she didn’t hate him more than I do.’

‘She objected to her mother’s marrying again, no doubt.’

‘I don’t think it was only that. I think Biancini was a bit of a wolf, and it scared her. She said she would feel safe if we were married. Of course, she was at home as little as possible. She used to stay with an aunt at Harrafield, a very decent type. I stayed there once or twice myself and didn’t have to pay anything, although it was a hotel—well, a sort of glorified pub with a few bedrooms, actually.’

‘I have visited the place. So Mrs Coles talked you into marrying her before you were quite prepared to do so?’

‘She said—and kept on saying it—that until she was legally married she wasn’t safe.’

‘Legally married? What other kind of marriage could there be?’

‘The marriage of true minds, I suppose,’ said Coles, bitterly.

‘And… she wasn’t safe?’

‘I knew he was a wolf.’

‘But I am given to understand that she disliked him and spent as little time as possible at home.’ The conversation appeared to be going round in circles.

‘Well, yes, that’s true enough. But she had to be at home sometimes, for her mother’s sake. She was very fond of her mother,’ Coles explained.

‘The second marriage must have caused her some heartburning, though.’ Dame Beatrice was determined to pursue this point.

‘She was very bitter about it at first, but she got over it. She was really a very well-balanced sort of person. I can’t believe she’s gone. Of course, it’s not as bad as if we’d lived together, but I still can’t realise we never shall.’

He took a packet of cigarettes from the pocket of his dressing-gown, lit one and tossed the packet on to the table as he glanced at the clock.

‘You still cannot suggest any reason why anybody should wish her out of the way?’

‘No, I can’t. She hadn’t an enemy in the world, as far as I know. I keep turning it all over in my mind, but it’s just a blank. The police keep nosing around and asking questions, but I can’t tell them any more than I’m telling you.’

‘She could not possibly have come by some knowledge dangerous to another person, I suppose?’

‘The police keep harping on that. All I can say is that I don’t know, but I shouldn’t think it’s at all likely. I mean, there she was, just a student. You don’t pick up dangerous information in a women’s agricultural college, surely?’

‘But she wasn’t in college all the time, was she? There were the vacations.’

‘Yes, but, except for when she was away with me, or staying with this aunt in the north of England, she was at home. The police, naturally enough, I suppose, are gunning for me and Biancini, as the only two men in her life, but, much as I dislike that greasy Eye-tye, I can’t see him killing Norah and certainly not by poison. Poison’s a woman’s weapon.’

‘Armstrong? Palmer? Crippen? Certain Italian noblemen of the fifteenth century?’

‘Italian? Yes, I see. Then you think Biancini might have done it? I don’t agree at all.’

‘I can imagine both more and less likely murderers. Where did you take your wife for holidays when you went away together?’

‘Oh, all sorts of places. She paid for both of us, of course. I’ve got all I can do to pay my fees at the Art School and buy my canvases and paints and sub. up for these foul digs. I couldn’t manage the kind of holidays Norah seemed to like.’

‘What kind would those have been?’

‘Seaside hotels.’

‘Yes?’

‘We’ve stayed at Bournemouth, Torquay, St Leonards…’ He checked them off on his fingers. ‘Not the most expensive places, needless to say, but well out of my calculations if Norah hadn’t been able to stand Sam. My mother’s a widow, you see. She does what she can, but it doesn’t run to holiday hotels.’

‘Hotels? Yes, I see. No, a student’s finances would scarcely run to those. Did you never try—say—Youth Hostels?’

‘No. Norah was an open-air type, but she hated hiking or cycling. After all, as she used to point out, she had the money and so it had to be an hotel or nothing. Otherwise, as I say, she preferred to stay with her aunt, and, of course, that was an hotel, too, in its way.’

‘I see. An hotel or—nothing.’ She gave him every chance to repair what seemed to her a serious, and therefore a very important, omission, but he merely repeated, with another agonised glance at the clock:

‘That’s right. An hotel or nothing.’

‘Well, I had better leave you to dress and get round in time for the beginning of the Sunday licensing hours,’ said Dame Beatrice, with her crocodile grin. He laughed awkwardly, and got up as she rose from her chair.

‘Sorry if I made myself obvious,’ he said. ‘But, as a matter of fact… promised to meet some chaps for a game of darts. If you don’t get there when they open, you miss the chance of the board. Popular game, darts, you’d be surprised.’

‘Not at all,’ replied his reptilian visitor. ‘I throw quite a pretty dart myself when called upon to play, although not, at my age, in a public house.’

‘Really?’ He went to the mantelpiece and picked up three beautiful darts. ‘These are mine. Rather nice, I think.’

Dame Beatrice took one from his hand and balanced it in her palm. Then she went to the back wall of the room and studied a mark in the wallpaper. As she had suspected, it was a small hole made by a nail which, no doubt, had once supported a picture, but both picture and nail had disappeared. She retired to the hearthrug, flicked the dart, and said:

‘What did I tell you?’

‘Well, I’m damned!’ He spoke with awe. The dart was firm in the nail-hole.

‘ “But, being in, see that the opposed may beware of thee,” ’ quoted Dame Beatrice solemnly. ‘Nothing but hotels? Really? Wouldn’t you like to think again?’

Coles looked thoroughly bewildered.

‘Think again? Why should I? I’m telling the simple truth.’

Dame Beatrice eyed him narrowly. He met her gaze defiantly and then strolled across the shabby room and pulled the dart out of the wall.

‘The simple truth?’ she repeated, on a warning and questioning note. Coles swung round on her, his eyes kindling and his face flushed with anger.

‘Just exactly what are you getting at?’ he demanded. ‘If you’re trying to catch me out, you’ll be disappointed. I’m not hiding anything. I’ve told you I know nothing about Norah’s death, and I’ve told the police the same thing. What is it you expect me to come clean about? You’ve shown me you can play darts. What about cards? What about putting yours on the table?’

‘Very well. Did you not take your wife to a holiday camp at Bracklesea this summer?’

Coles stared.

‘That I most certainly did not.’

‘Well, her aunt thought you did.’

‘What! Did she tell you so?’

‘She most certainly did.’

‘Well, I’m damned! I wonder where she got that idea from? You don’t mean that Norah went to one without me? She’d never do such a thing. She had a strong dislike of hordes of people and of any sort of herd-holiday. She wouldn’t even go on a motor-coach tour because she said the sight-seeing was all regimented and arranged and you couldn’t even choose your own hotels. She—it was the one grouse she had against college—that you had to do things by rule and time-table and what-not, and could never get away from other people. A holiday camp is the last place you’d ever get Norah to go to, I do know that. So, if her aunt thought we went to one, she must be bats.’

‘It is just on twelve o’clock,’ said Dame Beatrice, glancing at her watch, ‘so I must not keep you longer. No doubt your friends will be waiting for you.’

‘Yes, they soon will be. I generally go along on Sunday mornings. A game of darts and a pint don’t cost very much, thank goodness. You don’t blame me, I hope, for not sitting in sackcloth and ashes because I’ve lost my wife?’

‘Certainly not. Enjoy yourself while you can. Did Mrs Coles leave a will?’

‘If she did, I know nothing of it.’

As there was no means of proving the truth of this assertion, Dame Beatrice accepted it at its face value and took her leave. She had food for thought, and, by this time, one very strong conviction.