The September Society

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

There was a long, long pause.

Lenox was ambivalent about using guns in his work as a detective-although he loved to hunt-but now his mind kept drifting toward the small pistol in his desk drawer. This stranger was sitting between Lenox and the desk, but he still thought of making a run there. He had a notion of who this fake Dabney actually was, but at the moment he didn’t feel especially confident about his notions. It had taken him long enough to figure out that Dabney was an impostor.

At last the young man said, more curiously than angrily, “How did you know?”

“It was a few things.”

In fact it was three things, each of which had been slightly puzzling: the hair, the ash, and the voice.

“Do you know who I am, then?”

“A friend, I hope.”

“I certainly mean no harm.”

Lenox took a deep, measured breath. He felt the control of the situation was in his hands again, for some reason.

“Are you George Payson?” he asked.

“I am,” said the dead man. He held out his hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Lenox.”

“Dabney, then? Dead?”

“Yes, Bill’s dead.” Payson’s face remained impassive as he said this. Or perhaps it was a mask of impassivity. There seemed to be a kind of hysteria lurking behind it.

“Did you kill him?”

There was a long, almost frightening silence. Then Payson buried his head in his hands and started sobbing. It was then that Lenox knew he was safe.

“I did in a way. I might as well have,” he said, choking back a sob. Looking up, he asked, “What gave me away?”

It had been the voice, in the end. What Lenox had at first mistaken for an Oxford polish in the lad’s accent had in fact been the tones of a cosmopolitan and aristocratic young man. Then there was the puzzling nature of the second line of ash. As they had been discussing it, Lenox had noticed for the first time how genuinely out of key it was. Why would Payson have made the line of ash in the meadow before Dabney died, when he fully expected to stay there? The only solution was that he had left it as a clue after he had first realized the seriousness of his position-that is, after Dabney’s death.

Then there was the hair. Shorn from the entire body, McConnell had said. Why? Because George Payson’s hair was red. It was too easily identifiable. And then, the decomposition of the body had made reliance upon the corpse’s clothing and accessories for identification necessary…

Lenox explained this. Then he said, “You must have shaved Dabney’s head and body after he died. That’s when you would have seen that you were the real target, and that if you died the heat would subside a little bit.”

“It was the hardest thing I ever had to do. Poor Dabs. He was the greatest, noblest friend you can imagine, Mr. Lenox. When I was pretending to be him last night, everything I said was absolutely true in a strange way. I did tell him he couldn’t come, and he did insist on it. But I had to shave his body. Even knowing that it would nearly kill my mother-have you seen my mother? is she bearing up?-and that his parents would have false hope. But it felt as if I was desecrating him, somehow. It was awful.”

“The decomposition?”

Payson looked at him glassily. “There are always foxes out in the meadow at night. I knew that… trusted in it.” A tear dropped from his eye.

“Perhaps we had better go back to the beginning, then,” said Lenox softly. “Or the middle, at any rate. How did Dabney die?”

“As I said I had. I went into town for food-again as I said. I thought of it as an adventure, not anything we would get hurt over. I was scared, to be certain, but I was excited as well. At any rate. I went into town and came back with food, and I saw the man fleeing through the thicket. He looked behind him, but I could only just see his face.”

“What did he look like?”

“In his forties, probably. He had graying hair, and he wore the kind of suit that always looks like a uniform, if you see what I mean. As if he were a waiter or a valet or something like that.”

“What did you do?”

“I chased him, and then-well, you know what I did as well as I do myself, just as you know why I left the clues. I took his body into the middle of the meadow where there would be a great deal of foot traffic and left behind my little clues.”

The lad sobbed again, trying to hold it back, and strangely enough the genuine sorrow that had convinced Lenox that Bill Dabney was innocent now did the same for George Payson. After the initial shock of realizing the lad was an impostor, Lenox could see the brilliance of what he had done. It was much safer at this moment to be Bill Dabney than George Payson, and how could he have known whether to trust Lenox? Stamp had, but Stamp also hadn’t realized the full implications of Payson’s position.

“Take me farther back. Why is this all happening? Who are these men? What did your father do to them? Who is Geoffrey Canterbury?”

With a deep breath to collect himself, Payson told his tale. “Most of those questions I can’t answer, though some of them I can. That’s one of the reasons I’m so anxious to go to this meeting tomorrow evening. I need to find out the truth myself.

“About two weeks ago I received a strange letter in the post from a man asking to meet me at a pub called the Crown in Didcot, a few miles away. The long walks, as you pointed out-I was counting on somebody thinking it was unusual of me to take a long walk when I put out the stick and the shoes. I do love that walking stick, by the way. My grandfather was a terrific chap.

“It was a cryptic and slightly mad letter, but I had to go for a plain enough reason. It made mention of my father, which I simply couldn’t resist. My father died when I was so young, and people have always reacted so strangely to his name, that for me he holds a talismanic fascination. My shame, my pride-I’m not sure what he is. Perhaps it’s the same way with all men and their fathers.”

“What did the letter say specifically?”

“That the author of it-he called himself Canterbury, as you know, though he readily conceded that it was a false name-had known my father when they served together in India.”

“You went to the meeting, then.”

“Yes. The evening after I received the request.”

“What did he look like?”

“Not really remarkable in any way. He had dark hair, a scar on his throat, and a military posture. As he had in the letter, he seemed slightly mad.”

It was a dead-on description of Lysander except for madness, which might have been feigned. But why warn the lad? Was Lysander playing both sides against the middle? Did he have some old loyalty to James Payson?

“And what did he tell you?”

“He was very mysterious at first, but in the end it came out that he knew of a group called the September Society, a club of my father’s peers from the army, all of whom were leading respectable, quiet lives, and who he said together were some of the most dangerous men in the country.”

“What? How?” Lenox wondered whether this had been hyperbole or fact.

“He refused to say. All night long his refrain seemed to be ’I wish I could tell you that, young Mr. Payson, but I cannot. For your own sake and mine.’ He must have said just those words six or seven times.”

“Did he mention any names?”

“No, he didn’t.”

“Why did you believe him?”

Payson laughed wearily. “I didn’t, not at first. I asked whether he was after money, perhaps. He only chuckled and took out an enormous pocket watch. It was from a London firm and had my father’s name engraved on the back. Canterbury said that my father had asked him to keep it for me, but that he was only returning it now-had only returned now, in fact, from India-because of the threat of the Society. Because some anniversary was arriving, or something that I had done-something. It was vague.”

Just so, Lenox thought. The pocket watch that the innkeeper who had identified Geoffrey Canterbury had noticed. “That might have been engraved last week, though.”

Dabney shook his head. “I don’t think so. It looked authentic, for one thing-you’ll remember those old watches of the forties-and the inscription was well worn, nearly faded. I have it here.”

He took it from his pocket and handed it to Lenox, who examined it closely.

“In addition to which,” Payson went on, “Canterbury was simply plausible. He spoke familiarly of my father, the way my grandparents once did. Of his temper, of his winning manners when he was in a good mood, of his impetuousness. It didn’t seem at all feigned to me. You may judge my judgment as you will, of course.”

“I see. And,” he said, handing the watch back, “it does look authentic. How did you leave it with Canterbury?”

“He said he was going to go to London to look into matters more deeply and advised me to be ready to run at any moment. We agreed on a system of communication to arrange our meetings-”

“The empty letters you received?”

“Yes! How did you-? But yes, we settled on our next meeting every time we saw each other, and the empty letters indicated that the meeting was still on.”

“How many times more did you meet?”

“Twice more, in different villages outside of Oxford. Until the night before I was forced to leave.”

“That dance card,” murmured Lenox. “You sent it down as a blind, with a separate note explaining that if he signed it Roland Light, your scout’s name, it would appear incidental.”

“Exactly. My, you really are omniscient.”

“On the contrary, I’m as slow as the milk train.”

“Canterbury wrote to me saying that he needed to see me urgently, and we agreed to meet at the Jesus ball. I was too nervous to dance or have anything like fun. We met, and he told me that I had to flee.”

“Did he give a reason?”

“No, he didn’t, but he seemed genuinely panicked.”

“I see.” Was it Lysander? Why? “Why did you meet with Hatch just before you left? At Shotter’s?”

“Ah, there you’ve found one of the small secrets I was concealing, Mr. Lenox. I don’t need anybody else hurt over me or my father.”

(Was there bitterness in this last word? Hopes of some further knowledge of his missing parent dashed?)

“What do you mean?”

“Professor Hatch was the only person I told about Canterbury, except Dabs. I had been sitting with him one morning on the lawns and it had just burst out of me, in fact. Old Hatch was a brick about it, a real brick. He talked me through all of the possibilities. He encouraged me to talk about things-about feelings-that I never had before.”

“And that morning?”

“I was in a panic. I had agreed to meet with him the night before, and I sent a note over suggesting Shotter’s-a townie place, not many students or dons there, which I always rather liked. He met me, and I told him what I meant to do.”

“Then you rushed back to your rooms, saw your mother… tell me, did you kill Longshanks?”

Payson shook his head. “He was dying. We had taken him, Dabs and I, out to one of the country vets round about Oxford, and he had cancer, poor chap. I loved that cat like a brother…”

“So you fed him laudanum?”

“He was in my lap the entire time, as trusting as he could be, the dear thing… you know, it’s funny, but I feel near tears again. All of it’s so bound up in my mind… my father, Dabney… this ridiculous cat.” The lad covered his face.

“And you stabbed the cat with your father’s letter opener, left a message beneath in public school cross-tip-and then you saw your mother in the courtyard?”

“Yes, precisely. I suppose she told you that. I put her off with some excuse. I know it seems cruel, but I knew she would set the alarms, and I needed people to know I was in danger-though what kind of danger I didn’t really know.”

“And Hatch brought you a parcel, later that day?”

“Yes-but how… yes, he did, down south of Christ Church Meadow. He came and said that if I was going to be obstinate I might as well have some help. The parcel had some food in it, a few other necessities, a bit like the packages one used to get in school, you know.”

“Then it might be he who betrayed you.”

“Never! He specifically said he’d keep our secret till the grave. Said a few cheery words, and then wished Bill and me good luck. Bill!”

Here payson stifled a sob. Lenox looked past him toward the sunny streets, lost deep in thought.