The Dancing Druids

Chapter Twenty-Four

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‘… so she said he was like a green stick that had been laid to dry over a baker’s oven.’

Ibid. (King Grisly-Beard)

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Laura, meanwhile, had received a reply to her message and gift. She had given the address of the hotel at Welsea to David Battle in case there should be any queries about the portrait of her that he was painting, and here she was rung up on the telephone at about the time that the police, converging on two sides—for the Wolf Cubs had made haste to call the local police constable to the wood—had seen the body of Firman and had taken it, Gascoigne and O’Hara into their charge.

‘Is that you, Miss Menzies?’ came over the line, ‘This is Battle. I say, never mind anything else, but could you sit to me again?’

‘What’s gone wrong?’ enquired Laura.

‘Nothing. Your portrait’s finished. I want to paint you again.’

‘Eh? Why?’

‘I want to. Will you come? I want—I’m sure you won’t disappoint me—I want.to paint you this time. Not just your face and hands and clothes.’

‘What, in the so-and-so?’ said Laura thoughtfully. ‘My young man would have a fit.’ She took the instrument from her ear and stood entranced awhile at this prospect. ‘What do you say?’ she enquired, becoming aware that the telephone was still bleating.

‘I said you must let me. I’m going to call it Atalanta or else Hippolyta. I don’t know yet. You’ve got to come.’

‘Only correctly chaperoned, then,’ said Laura. ’And by somebody with a gun,‘ she added darkly to herself, remembering that he was the son of Toro’s murderer.

‘What? Chaperoned? Oh, any darn thing you like. When can you come?’

‘I’ll ring up and let you know,’ said Laura, with a degree of caution to which ordinarily she was a stranger.

‘And, I say! You wouldn’t marry me, I suppose? I feel I could do great things with you beside me, urging me on, and— ’

‘Waiting until you’ve served your seven years’ stretch!’ said Laura derisively. ‘You forget what’s coming to you, my lad, for defrauding the art-loving public! Well, I’ll let you know about the rudery. I’m not promising, mind! I don’t want the sack from Mrs. B.’

She hung up and went to find her employer. Mrs. Bradley, however, was no longer in the hotel. She had gone to confer with the Chief Constable on matters of public importance, and, to his annoyance, she arrived in time to prevent his enjoyment of his Saturday afternoon golf.

‘Good heavens, Adela!’ he protested. ‘Can’t you choose some more reasonable time?’

‘I thought you might like to know that the dead man is almost certainly Allwright, and that you could learn a good deal about him by circulating a description of him to the banks in Cuchester. He’d become a blackmailer, and has probably paid in a good deal of money somewhere—always in cash, I should imagine. You could also gain something from an examination into the private affairs of Mr. Cassius Concaverty.’

‘We’ve got that in hand. From the account in the name of Concaverty, about fifteen thousand pounds have been withdrawn since the beginning of December, 1946.’

‘Ah! That fits nicely, doesn’t it?’

‘Fits with what?’

‘With the medical theory that the arm in the iron coffin was injured about four years ago. Allwright would have pleaded with and begged from his employers for a bit, and then, when the war was over, he would have begun to blackmail them.’

‘Yes, that all sounds feasible, doesn’t it?’ Sir Crimmond agreed. ‘But, look here, Adela, it will keep until Monday, dash it! Fielding is in charge of the case, and he’s a thoroughly competent fellow. Dash it, I want to play golf!’

‘Well, you can’t, unless I come with you. And if I do, I shall walk round with you and tell you all about the older Battle, and you know how you dislike to carry on conversations on the greens.’

‘You’re a blasted nuisance!’ said the Chief Constable, glumly. ‘All right. Come into the house. I shall have to telephone and put Beauchamp off.’

‘You see,’ said Mrs. Bradley, when this was settled, ‘the trouble is that even if you do catch Battle, and charge him with murder— ’

‘But we can’t! We haven’t a ha’porth of proof! Dash it, the fellow’s laughing at us!’

‘I know. That is why, as I am trying to tell you, you must find some from somewhere. Somebody murdered Allwright, and you won’t get any more out of Cassius. When it comes to the point, and you get the American side of it, he may talk about pictures, but he certainly won’t talk about murder.’

‘I know all that.’

‘Of course you do. I have a fatal habit of recapitulation due to having to lecture to people who won’t read books but have been brought up on a diet of films and the wireless. Well, all that I was going to suggest is this: at Cottam’s there is an old man, very simple, employed on odd jobs in the garden. Why don’t you get him to describe Allwright and Battle? Then, when you arrest Battle, the old man could be brought along to identify him.’

‘That won’t help. It isn’t getting Battle identified that’s going to be the trouble. It’s getting young O’Hara to swear to him. O’Hara is our only reliable witness to what happened at the farm, and— ’

‘I know. But what you don’t know is that— ’

‘Nobody is going to believe—no juryman at any rate—that O’Hara can identify with certainty a man he saw only at night by the light of an electric torch.’

‘He heard his voice, remember. Oh, I agree about the jury, but I was just going to tell you— ’

Before the Chief Constable could hear the rest of the sentence, the telephone rang.

‘It’s Inspector Fielding, dear,’ said his wife, who had taken the call. ‘Will you take it in here?’

‘No, no. I’ll come into the lounge. You stay here and look after Adela. I daresay she’d like a cup of tea. I expect Beauchamp to ring up about a foursome to-morrow. He said, when I put him off to-day, that he’d try to fix something for to-morrow.’

‘Well, how are the patients?’ enquired the hostess, when she and Mrs. Bradley were left alone. ‘I hear you’ve been spending your summer holiday getting my poor old Crimmie’s goat?’

Sir Crimmond’s wife was a bright-eyed woman of thirty; his second wife, in fact, and the apple of his choleric eye. Mrs. Bradley denied indignantly, first, that she had had a summer holiday, since coming to see one’s grandchild christened could scarcely be called that; she added, that, until the birth of the baby, she had been lecturing in Denmark; secondly, she denied that she would ever be wicked enough to get Sir Crimmond’s goat under any circumstances whatsoever unless he turned into a wife-beater.

At this point Sir Crimmond reappeared. He was red in the face and very angry.

‘Damn it, Adela! Do you know what’s happened now?’ he demanded. ‘Those confounded nit-wits have allowed another murder—another murder!—to be committed within my boundaries! A man called Firman has been found shot through the right eye—death instantaneous—in a wood about three miles from Beauchamp’s own place, the Towers, at Little Beddlehampton! The county’s becoming a shambles! Really it is! I’ve got to go and see to it, of course. You’d better come with me. You can give me your views as we go.’

‘I haven’t any views until we have seen the body, and until I am sure those two boys are safe,’ said Mrs. Bradley. ‘Mr. O’Hara and his cousin, Mr. Gascoigne, were out with this man Firman in an endeavour to extract information with regard to the other murder.’

‘Upon my soul! So the two things are connected! You’d better—Oh, no, I remember. Yes, of course. Oh, Lord! I hope young O’Hara’s all right. An intelligent boy. His great grandfather was the young Tim O’Hara who said to Queen Victoria— ’

A long reminiscence followed to which Mrs. Bradley, accustomed to improbable stories about Queen Victoria, scarcely listened. At the end of the narrative, she said :

‘I was going to tell you, just before the telephone rang, that I don’t think Michael O’Hara is in any more danger now than his cousin or Laura or myself or even Denis, and, possibly, George.’

‘Why not? I thought you said— ’

‘Yes, but, you see, when we were pretending to begin some archaeological excavations at the circle of the Dancing Druids, a man came up to O’Hara and asked him why he had left the car on the night when he helped to carry the body.’

‘He did? Point-blank, like that?’

‘Apparently.’

‘So all of you could swear to this man?’

‘Yes, but it wouldn’t help very much with a jury, any more than— ’

‘No,’ said Sir Crimmond, thoughtfully, ‘I can see that. There are no other material witnesses except the body, which isn’t proved to be Allwright’s. It would be young O’Hara’s story against this fellow’s denials.’

‘He might not even deny it.’

‘Eh?’

‘O’Hara may be able to recognize Battle—I call him Battle because that is who it must be—but he could not possibly identify the body he helped to carry.’

‘Oh!’

‘It was wrapped and swathed in such a way that no features were distinguishable.’

‘So?’

‘So all that Battle, who is nothing if not a resourceful and desperate man, would need to do is to provide himself with an accident case—not difficult; the gang he and Cassius have had to employ is fairly large, and one or two of them that I myself have seen must be heavy men—and take you to hospital to see it. The “case” will have been primed with a tale— ’

‘But a hospital would see through a malingerer in half a minute!’

‘The man wouldn’t be a malingerer,’ Mrs. Bradley pointed out in gentle tones. ‘He would be a genuinely wounded man. Battle and Cassius would certainly see to that. In fact, I should say that such a “case” has existed since the day that Firman saw Gascoigne and O’Hara at that farm on the Sunday morning.’

‘Then wouldn’t he give the game away through sheer annoyance at having been victimized? This fellow they crocked, I mean.’

‘Not if he has been told that his life depends upon his compliance, do you think? And, of course, he’s been very well paid. The only thing is that he was not at a local hospital. Still, they will have thought of the time-factor. He will be in a hospital outside the county boundaries.’

‘Then how are we going to get them?’

‘I want you to arrest Battle’s wife and his son David.’

‘I can’t do that!’

‘It’s our only chance, and you must do it at once, and not bother about a warrant.’

‘I won’t do it! Good Lord, what next? Gangster methods, nothing less! I’m surprised at you for suggesting such a way out!’

‘Very well. It’s the only solution, so far as I can see at present.’

She was silent. The Chief Constable glanced at her once or twice, but her witch-like countenance was as calm as the face of a Chinese, and her brilliant eyes were closed, displaying long black lashes against cheeks the colour of old ivory. Her ungloved, claw-like hands were gently clasped in her lap, and the September sun glinted suddenly on the jewels in her rings, giving the Chief Constable a start, as though a dagger had been flashed before his eyes.

‘Well, suppose I did do it?’ he said presently.

‘I think that the birds might fly,’ said Mrs. Bradley, opening her eyes. ‘You can, I imagine, find some reason for arresting Battle and Cassius for trying to leave the country?’

‘Ah,’ said the Chief Constable, looking happier. ‘And you think the wife and son will give us all the evidence we want?’

‘Yes, and you will obtain more from the death of Firman. There is nothing very secret about that. But— ’

‘Don’t you think that as a result of that—if they did it! We’ve no evidence, mind!—they will cut and run before we arrest the wife and son?’

‘I don’t know whether they can.’

‘We can have the ports watched, just in case— ’

‘They won’t leave from a port,’ said Mrs. Bradley. ‘They will leave from their smugglers’ hole. They’ve got their own ship, remember! The one which they used to carry the pictures. But they will have to get in touch with her, and, if you act quickly, they won’t have very much time.’

‘Which of them did kill Firman, do you suppose?’

‘Cassius, I should say.’

‘But Battle—if that’s who it is!—is surely the killer, from what you’ve told me.’

‘Yes, but I expect he wanted to have Cassius as deeply implicated as he is himself. Besides, although we’ve no evidence that Cassius is a killer, there’s not much doubt that his son is a murderous little brute.’

‘Yes, but— ’

‘I always think the Copper Beeches is one of the best of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and, in my own profession, you know, we learn a good deal about parents from a careful study of their children.’

‘But I’m going to have a warrant, all the same,’ said Sir Crimmond suddenly. ‘I had to call on Beauchamp, anyway.’ He lay back in his seat, looking pleased. ‘What was that last “but” of yours?’ he asked suddenly.

‘No,’ said Laura decidedly. ‘I’m not going to be a decoy duck for anybody! If I sit for the bloke it’s to be because he wants to paint me, and not just to keep him busy while the police come along to arrest him. You can keep me out of it.’

‘I only asked! I only asked!’ said Sir Crimmond, annoyed. ‘What on earth a respectable young woman is thinking about to be painted like that by a fellow who is no better than a common criminal, I don’t know. If you were my daughter—!’

Laura put out her tongue at him, and went out, humming a tune.

‘Confound this new-fangled morality,’ growled the irate man. ‘Imagine a girl willing to be painted in the nude and yet not willing to assist the police in the execution of their duty by keeping the fellow busy until we can get along to arrest him!’

‘Speeches on morality from a man who is willing to persuade a girl to act like a Judas, and yet himself won’t do a simple, illegal little thing like arresting a man without a warrant, gives me food for thought,’ said Mrs. Bradley. ‘I am on Laura’s side.’

‘Oh, you women always stick together!’ said the Chief Constable pettishly.

‘If we did, we should have ruled the world long ago,’ Mrs. Bradley retorted. ?Arrest the man, and don’t keep cackling about it. But, if I were you, I’d arrest the woman first. Send your police to Newcombe Soulbury, to Cottam’s and to the farm simultaneously. She’s sure to be at one of them, unless they’ve spirited her away.’

But Mrs. Battle—a name she confessed to as soon as she saw Inspector Fielding, who came (armed with a warrant), to arrest her, had not been spirited away.

‘She says she doesn’t know a thing about Battle,’ said the Chief Constable peevishly to Mrs. Bradley, later, ‘except that he belonged to a Fascist organization and had to “disappear” as a precautionary measure. She affects to believe that it’s in connection with pro-Fascist activities that we want to arrest him now, but swears she knows nothing about that side of his life. She says he’s been a good husband, and that’s all she cares about. She also reminded Fielding that we can’t use her evidence against Battle. So that’s your precious idea gone west, as I knew it would! Now what do you suggest?’

‘That you try your luck with David Battle,’ said Mrs. Bradley, unperturbed by these slurs upon her theories. But David Battle’s reactions were not more helpful than those of his stepmother. He would answer any questions the police liked to ask, he would go to prison, he would be hanged if necessary, so long as he was allowed to paint Laura Menzies as Atalanta, Hippolyta, or, as he now thought likely, Artemis Orthia.

‘Did he really say that?’ Mrs. Bradley immediately enquired.

‘What?’

‘Artemis Orthia.’

‘Yes, he did. The sergeant’s shorthand is impeccable. If he wrote Artemis Orthia, then that’s what the fellow said. ’

‘I’ll tell Laura,’ said Mrs. Bradley. ‘You may find her less scrupulous this time.’