The Sittaford Mystery

Chapter 5 Evans

They found Evans waiting in the dining-room. He rose respectfully on their entrance.

He was a short thick-set man. He had very long arms and a habit of standing with his hands half clenched. He was clean shaven with small, rather piglike eyes, yet he had a look of cheerfulness and efficiency that redeemed his bulldog appearance.

Inspector Narracott mentally tabulated his impressions.

‘Intelligent. Shrewd and practical. Looks rattled.’

Then he spoke:

‘You’re Evans, eh?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Christian names?’

‘Robert Henry.’

‘Ah! Now what do you know about this business?’

‘Not a thing, sir. It’s fair knocked me over. To think of the Capting being done in!’

‘When did you last see your master?’

‘Two o’clock I should say it was, sir. I cleared away the lunch things and laid the table here as you see for supper. The Capting, he told me as I needn’t come back.’

‘What do you usually do?’

‘As a general rule, I come back about seven for a couple of hours. Not always—sometimes the Capting would say as I needn’t.’

‘Then you weren’t surprised when he told you that yesterday you wouldn’t be wanted again?’

‘No, sir. I didn’t come back the evening before either—on account of the weather. Very considerate gentleman, the Capting was, as long as you didn’t try to shirk things. I knew him and his ways pretty well.’

‘What exactly did he say?’

‘Well, he looked out of the window and he says, “Not a hope of Burnaby today”. “Shouldn’t wonder,” he says, “if Sittaford isn’t cut off altogether. Don’t remember such a winter since I was a boy.” That was his friend Major Burnaby over to Sittaford that he was referring to. Always comes on a Friday, he does, he and the Capting play chess and do acrostics. And on Tuesdays the Capting would go to Major Burnaby’s. Very regular in his habits was the Capting. Then he said to me: “You can go now, Evans, and you needn’t come till tomorrow morning.” ’

‘Apart from his reference to Major Burnaby, he didn’t speak of expecting anyone that afternoon?’

‘No, sir, not a word.’

‘There was nothing unusual or different in any way in his manner?’

‘No, sir, not that I could see.’

‘Ah! Now I understand, Evans, that you have lately got married.’

‘Yes, sir. Mrs Belling’s daughter at the Three Crowns. Matter of two months ago, sir.’

‘And Captain Trevelyan was not overpleased about it.’

A very faint grin appeared for a moment on Evans’s face.

‘Cut up rough about it, he did, the Capting. My Rebecca is a fine girl, sir, and a very good cook. And I hoped we might have been able to do for the Capting together, but he—he wouldn’t hear of it. Said he wouldn’t have women servants about his house. In fact, sir, things were rather at a deadlock when this South African lady came along and wanted to take Sittaford House for the winter. The Capting he rented this place, I came in to do for him every day, and I don’t mind telling you, sir, that I had been hoping that by the end of the winter the Capting would have come round to the idea; and that me and Rebecca would go back to Sittaford with him. Why, he would never even know she was in the house. She would keep to the kitchen, and she would manage so that he would never meet her on the stairs.’

‘Have you any idea what lay behind Captain Trevelyan’s dislike of women?’

‘Nothing to it, sir. Just an ’abit, sir, that’s all. I have seen many a gentleman like it before. If you ask me, it’s nothing more or less than shyness. Some young lady or other gives them a snub when they are young—and they gets the ’abit.’

‘Captain Trevelyan was not married?’

‘No, indeed, sir.’

‘What relations had he? Do you know?’

‘I believe he had a sister living at Exeter, sir, and I think I have heard him mention a nephew or nephews.’

‘None of them ever came to see him?’

‘No, sir. I think he quarrelled with his sister at Exeter.’

‘Do you know her name?’

‘Gardner, I think, sir, but I wouldn’t be sure.’

‘You don’t know her address?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t, sir.’

‘Well, doubtless we shall come across that in looking through Captain Trevelyan’s papers. Now, Evans, what were you yourself doing from four o’clock onwards yesterday afternoon?’

‘I was at home, sir.’

‘Where’s home?’

‘Just round the corner, sir, 85 Fore Street.’

‘You didn’t go out at all?’

‘Not likely, sir. Why, the snow was coming down a fair treat.’

‘Yes, yes. Is there anyone who can support your statement?’

‘Beg pardon, sir.’

‘Is there anyone who knows that you were at home during that time?’

‘My wife, sir.’

‘She and you were alone in the house?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Well, well, I have no doubt that’s all right. That will be all for the present, Evans.’

The ex-sailor hesitated. He shifted from one foot to the other.

‘Anything I can do here, sir—in the way of tidying up?’

‘No—the whole place is to be left exactly as it is for the present.’

‘I see.’

‘You had better wait, though, until I have had a look round,’ said Narracott, ‘in case there might be any question I want to ask you.’

‘Very good, sir.’

Inspector Narracott transferred his gaze from Evans to the room.

The interview had taken place in the dining-room. On the table an evening meal was set out. A cold tongue, pickles, a Stilton cheese and biscuits, and on a gas ring by the fire a saucepan containing soup. On the sideboard was a tantalus, a soda water siphon, and two bottles of beer. There was also an immense array of silver cups and with them—a rather incongruous item—three very new-looking novels.

Inspector Narracott examined one or two of the cups and read the inscriptions on them.

‘Bit of a sportsman, Captain Trevelyan,’ he observed.

‘Yes, indeed, sir,’ said Evans. ‘Been an athlete all his life, he had.’

Inspector Narracott read the titles of the novels. ‘Love Turns the Key’, ‘The Merry Men of Lincoln’, ‘Love’s Prisoner’.

‘H’m,’ he remarked. ‘The Captain’s taste in literature seems somewhat incongruous.’

‘Oh! that, sir.’ Evans laughed. ‘That’s not for reading, sir. That’s the prizes he won in these Railway Pictures Names Competitions. Ten solutions the Capting sent in under different names, including mine, because he said 85 Fore Street was a likely address to give a prize to! The commoner your name and address the more likely you were to get a prize in the Capting’s opinion. And sure enough a prize I got—but not the £2,000, only three new novels—and the kind of novels, in my opinion, that no one would ever pay money for in a shop.’

Narracott smiled, then again mentioning that Evans was to wait, he proceeded on his tour of inspection. There was a large kind of cupboard in one corner of the room. It was almost a small room in itself. Here, packed in unceremoniously, were two pairs of skis, a pair of sculls mounted, ten or twelve hippopotamus tusks, rods and lines and various fishing tackle including a book of flies, a bag of golf clubs, a tennis racket, an elephant’s foot stuffed and mounted and a tiger skin. It was clear that, when Captain Trevelyan had let Sittaford House furnished, he had removed his most precious possessions, distrustful of female influence.

‘Funny idea—to bring all this with him,’ said the Inspector. ‘The house was only let for a few months, wasn’t it?’

‘That’s right, sir.’

‘Surely these things could have been locked up at Sittaford House?’

For the second time in the course of the interview, Evans grinned.

‘That would have been much the easiest way of doing it,’ he agreed. ‘Not that there are many cupboards at Sittaford House. The architect and the Capting planned it together, and it takes a female to understand the value of cupboard room. Still, as you say, sir, that would have been the commonsense thing to do. Carting them down here was a job—I should say it was a job! But there, the Capting couldn’t bear the idea of anyone messing around with his things. And lock things up as you will, he says, a woman will always find a way of getting in. It’s curiosity, he says. Better not lock them up at all if you don’t want her to handle them, he says. But best of all, take them along, and then you’re sure to be on the safe side. So take ’em along we did, and as I say, it was a job, and came expensive too. But there, those things of the Capting’s was like his children.’

Evans paused, out of breath.

Inspector Narracott nodded thoughtfully. There was another point on which he wanted information, and it seemed to him that this was a good moment when the subject had arisen naturally.

‘This Mrs Willett,’ he said casually. ‘Was she an old friend or acquaintance of the Captain’s?’

‘Oh no, sir, she was quite a stranger to him.’

‘You are sure of that?’ said the Inspector, sharply.

‘Well—’ the sharpness took the old sailor aback. ‘The Capting never actually said so—but—Oh yes, I’m sure of it.’

‘I ask,’ explained the Inspector, ‘because it is a very curious time of year for a let. On the other hand, if this Mrs Willett was acquainted with Captain Trevelyan and knew the house, she might have written to him and suggested taking it.’

Evans shook his head.

‘ ’Twas the agents—Williamsons—that wrote, said they had an offer from a lady.’

Inspector Narracott frowned. He found this business of letting Sittaford House distinctly odd.

‘Captain Trevelyan and Mrs Willett met, I suppose?’ he asked.

‘Oh! yes. She came to see the house and he took her over it.’

‘And you’re positive they hadn’t met before?’

‘Oh! quite, sir.’

‘Did they—er—’ the Inspector paused, as he tried to frame the question naturally. ‘Did they get on well together? Were they friendly?’

‘The lady was.’ A faint smile crossed Evans’s lips. ‘All over him, as you might say. Admiring the house, and asking him if he’d planned the building of it. Altogether laying it on thick, as you might say.’

‘And the Captain?’

The smile broadened.

‘That sort of gushing lady wasn’t likely to cut any ice with him. Polite he was, but nothing more. And declined her invitations.’

‘Invitations?’

‘Yes, to consider the house as his own any time, and drop in, that’s how she put it—drop in. You don’t drop in to a place when you’re living six miles away.’

‘She seemed anxious to—well—to see something of the Captain?’

Narracott was wondering. Was that the reason for the taking of the house? Was it only a prelude to the making of Captain Trevelyan’s acquaintance? Was that the real game? It would probably not have occurred to her that the Captain would have gone as far as Exhampton to live. She might have calculated on his moving into one of the small bungalows, perhaps sharing Major Burnaby’s.

Evans’s answer was not very helpful.

‘She’s a very hospitable lady, by all accounts. Someone in to lunch or dinner every day.’

Narracott nodded. He could learn no more here. But he determined to seek an interview with this Mrs Willett at an early date. Her abrupt arrival needed looking into.

‘Come on, Pollock, we’ll go upstairs now,’ he said.

They left Evans in the dining-room and proceeded to the upper story.

‘All right, do you think?’ asked the Sergeant in a low voice, jerking his head over his shoulder in the direction of the closed dining-room door.

‘He seems so,’ said the Inspector. ‘But one never knows. He’s no fool, that fellow, whatever else he is.’

‘No, he’s an intelligent sort of chap.’

‘His story seems straightforward enough,’ went on the Inspector. ‘Perfectly clear and above board. Still, as I say, one never knows.’

And with this pronouncement, very typical of his careful and suspicious mind, the Inspector proceeded to search the rooms on the first floor.

There were three bedrooms and a bathroom. Two of the bedrooms were empty and had clearly not been entered for some weeks. The third, Captain Trevelyan’s own room, was in exquisite and apple-pie order. Inspector Narracott moved about in it, opening drawers and cupboards. Everything was in its right place. It was the room of a man almost fanatically tidy and neat in his habits. Narracott finished his inspection and glanced into the adjoining bathroom. Here, too, everything was in order. He gave a last glance at the bed, neatly turned down, with folded pyjamas laid ready.

Then he shook his head.

‘Nothing here,’ he said.

‘No, everything seems in perfect order.’

‘There are the papers in the desk in the study. You had better go through those, Pollock. I’ll tell Evans that he can go. I may call round and see him at his own place later.’

‘Very good, sir.’

‘The body can be removed. I shall want to see Warren, by the way. He lives near here, doesn’t he?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘This side of the Three Crowns or the other?’

‘The other, sir.’

‘Then I’ll take the Three Crowns first. Carry on, Sergeant.’

Pollock went to the dining-room to dismiss Evans. The Inspector passed out of the front door and walked rapidly in the direction of the Three Crowns.