White Priory Murders

CHAPTER TWENTY June Over Whitehall

Above the small severe name-plate reading, "Sir Henry Merrivale," the door was inscribed with staggering letters, splashed in white paint, "Busy! No Admittance! Keep Out! " And below, in an even angrier script, it added, "This means You!" The old hallway was musty and warm at the top of Whitehall's ancient rabbit-warren; through a crooked window on the stairs they could see the moving green of trees.

Katharine looked at the door and hesitated. "But it says!" she protested.

"Nonsense," said Bennett. He pushed open the door.

Both windows were open to the lazy June air; there was a smell of old wood and paper in the dusky room, and a hum of traffic from the Embankment below. H. M.'s big feet were on the desk and entangled with the telephone. His big bald head was hung forward so that the glasses slid down his nose, and his eyes were closed.

Bennett rapped on the inside of the door. "I'm sorry to interrupt, sir," he said, in the middle of a whistling snore, "but we thought..”

H. M. opened one eye. He seemed to be galvanized. "Go 'way! Out! I won't be disturbed, dammit! I sent you that report on the accordion-player yesterday afternoon; and if you wanta know why the key of G had anything to do with Robrett's dyin', then you, look in there and you'll see. I'm busy! I — who's there, hey?" He sat up a little, and then scowled savagely. "Oh, it's you two, hey? I might 'a' known it. I might 'a' known somebody like you would interrupt when I'm engaged on a very serious business. What are you grinnin' at, curse you? It is seriousl It's the Dardanelles matter, only I forget the chief part of it now. It's somethin' to do with the peace of the world." He sniffed, and looked at them in a disgruntled fashion. "Humph. You look sorta happy, and that's bad. "

"Happy?" roared Bennett, with an explosive affability. "Sir, let me tell you '

"Sh-hh!" said Katharine. "Be dignified. Whee!"

H. M. looked sourly from one to the other. "You practically light up this office. Gives me a pain, that's what it does. Well, I suppose you'd better come in. You two are goin' to get married, ain't you? Haaah! Just wait till you do; that'll fix you. You see if it don't. Haaah!"

"Are you telling me," said Bennett, "that you don't remember we were married a month ago today? I suppose you've also forgotten you gave the bride away? And that Kate stayed with your daughter after good old Uncle Maurice tossed her out of the house?"

"Old Maurice," grunted H. M. His eye twinkled. "Sure, I remember now. Ho ho. Well, now that you're here I suppose you'd better sit down and have a drink. Ho ho. Look here, I certainly put the wind up you two, didn't I? I bet you thought old Uncle Maurice was guilty of that funny business down at the White Priory. How's Paris?"

They sat down on the other side of the desk. Bennett hesitated.

"It's about the funny business," he admitted, "that we wanted to talk to you-in a way. That is. well, we're sailing for New York in a couple of days, and we've got to take back some complete account of it, you know. We've never had the details on account of all the uproar and fuss that happened after Emery's arrest. We know he died in the hospital two days after he fell-or threw himself — down those stairs…"

H. M. inspected his fingers.

"Uh-huh. I was hopin' he'd do somethin' like that. He wasn't a very bad sort, Emery wasn't. Point o' fact, I might 'a' been inclined to let him go after all; I was a bit hesitant about the thing until he murdered Rainger just because Rainger had spotted him. That was mucky. The whole thing was mucky. I didn't hold it much against him for killin' Tait in hot blood. I didn't want to see him hang for that. But the nastiness came out in the other thing… "

"Anyhow, sir, what everybody seems to know is that he killed her with that heavy silvered-steel figure he had on the radiator-cap of his fancy automobile; that is, the one he did have there the first time I saw the car. When he drove out to the White Priory next day, he'd changed it for a bronze stork. I remember noticing that at the time, although it didn't register fully. But what's got everybody up in the air is how you knew all this, how you got on to him in the first place-"

"And," said Katharine, "why you put on that little show with us reconstructing the attempted murder, when all the time you actually suspected him?'

H. M. blinked. His dull eyes took in a flushed and radiant couple who had, after all, no tremendous interest in the affairs of the dead.

"So," said H. M., "you still don't see it, hey? I hadda trap him, and it was the only way I could prove it on him. I don't like to talk about this kind of thing, much. Funny. Wait a minute. I got Emery's statement, the statement he made before he died, here in the desk somewhere."

Wheezing, he bent over and ransacked drawers, muttering to himself. Then he produced a blue-bound sheaf of paper; he brushed off some tobacco-ash and weighed it in his hand.

"That's human tragedy. I mean, son, it was human tragedy. Now it's File Number Umpty-Umph, so many lines of type, so much `I-did-and-I-suffered' stuck down so formally on a piece of paper that you can hardly believe anybody did suffer. I got stacks of 'em here in the desk. But this man Emery did suffer. Like hell. There were a couple of nights when I kept seein' his face. And I like the chase and the chess-gambits; but I don't like to see anybody take the three-minute-walk to the rope when that man might 'a' been me. Son, that's the last and only argument against capital punishment you'll ever hear. Emery's trouble was that he loved that empty good-lookin' leech Tait far too much."

He stared blankly at the blue-bound sheets, and then pushed them away.

"What were you askin'? I get kind of absent-minded these days, when it's summer again.

"Oh, yes. I'll let you have the thing as I saw it. I didn't suspect him at first: not at all. I'd have chosen him, when I got to the house at the beginning, as one of the few who didn't kill her. Y'see, I'd heard about that box of poisoned chocolates — I knew he hadn't any intention of killin' her when he sent 'em. He hadn't. It was a press-agent's stunt, exactly what he said and what I thought. That threw me off. I figured him as the nervous, hopping type who, if he had committed a crime, wouldn't rest till he'd told about it and got it oft his chest. I was right in that; I figured him to break down in one way or another, and he did. He never meant to kill her (that's what he says, and I believe it) even when he drove to the White Priory that night, until — but I'll tell you that in a minute.

"All the same, I was sittin' and thinkin' about the evidence, and there was two or three things that bothered me.

"I told you, didn't I, my idea about Tait comin' back up to the house to John's room? Uh-huh. And when I outlined that idea, did I say to you that, if she came up and planted herself in John's room, she'd take one precaution? Uh, I thought I had. I asked you to think what that would be. Y'see, there I had no evidence at all; not a limpin' ghost of proof; but, if I'd decided she'd dole the rest of it, I had to follow my idea through to its psychological conclusion. She's alone in that room, now; John ain't back; but she don't want anybody walkin' in there and findin' her. Well, what would she be likely to do?"

"Lock the door on the inside. I mean, lock the door to the gallery," said Katharine, after a pause. "That's what I'd have done."

"Yes. And that bothered me. She probably wouldn't answer that door, or sing out, or let anybody in, no matter who tried to get in from the gallery. Well, if she did lock the door on the inside, you instantly hadda rule out as possible suspects everybody who could come from that direction.- That's a sweepin' sort of idea, you see. I couldn't do it just yet. It would force me back on the theory that John had come home and killed her, because apparently he was the only one who fitted the facts. Every fact fitted; but, burn me, I wouldn't accept John's guilt!

"There were several reasons why I wouldn't, aside from the pretty thin one I told you when I was sketchin' the theory before. To begin with, the idea that a man who's rushin' home with a murder already on his conscience; puzzlin' frantic plans to escape arrest; full of terror at what he's already done, and shakin' in every joint for fear they'll catch him; — well, is it likely that such a man, near on nervous prostration, will do the murderous job that was done on Tait?

"I doubted that. I also doubted it from this factor: that the murder occurred too soon after the time John had apparently got back. Y'see what I mean? He's not in a murderous rage with Tait. On the contrary, he thinks she'll be in a murderous rage with him, and he's nervous about that. Well, the car is heard coming into the drive at ten minutes past three. The murder takes place at fifteen minutes past. Is it reasonable to suppose that he'll rush up and kill her (especially as he hasn't got the slightest idea she's in his room) simply off-hand, with no reason, instantly after he returns? Neither of 'em could have had much of a chance to say anything whatever. Does any part of that sound like the conduct of John Bohun, who confessedly thought he had just killed Canifest?"

"Steady, sir," interposed Bennett. "Suppose he hadn't known Marcia was married. And Canifest, who had been told by Emery, in turn told him. Mightn't he have been exactly in that rage when he returned?"

H. M. took away the hand with which he was shading his glasses.

"Now!" he said. "Now you're hittin' on a point that began to strike me pretty strongly. Point is, why should he? He was the woman's lover. There was no talk of marriage between them; never had been. Not only did he accept that status, dye see, but he helped her jolly Canifest along in the hope of marriage. If he'd really had any objections to the idea, and didn't know she was already married, wouldn't he have said in either case, 'Look here, do you mean business by Canifest?' And if any jealousy of a mere husband came into it, he'd have had a devilish sight more jealousy of a wealthy, powerful man like Canifest than some inconspicuous figure who was always content to keep in the background. Not havin' any aspirations towards bein' her husband, and content to be the preferred stock, why should he flare into a wild fury about a husband at all? I thought to myself, `Rage, hey? This thing don't sound like the rage of a lover who finds his mistress is married; that's rather thin stuff. It does sound devilish like a husband who's suddenly discovered his wife has a genuine lover."'

"You mean Emery really didn't know-?"

"Wait a bit, son. We're only lookin' at the evidence as yet. That's what struck me. As I say, I was sittin' and thinkin', and there jumped up another thing I didn't like. What about this mysterious figure with blood on its hand, blunderin' round in the gallery and runnin' into Louise Carewe. How did they happen to run into each other? You know by this time that little Louise, with too much of a sleeping-drug turned wrongways, had put a huntin' crop into her pocket and was goin' down to the pavilion to mess up Tait's face (you could tell it was drug-fog because she intended to walk straight out through that snow in thin slippers) — she was goin' out there when she collapsed. How did this killer run into her? Surely, he could have ducked back somewhere, and would have done that, with that damnin' evidence in his hands; if — if he had known where he was goin'. If, in other words, he hadn't been blunderin' around in the dark in search of a place to wash his hands, and didn't know the house at all.

"That wasn't evidence either, but suddenly I remembered something that was. Emery was the only person in the whole lot who wouldn't believe Tait had been murdered at the pavillion. Don't you remember? Rainger had to yell at him over the 'phone, insistently repeatin': `At the pavilion, at the pavilion, I tell you.' Even then he thought Rainger was only drunk. And, when he spoke to us, he still said it was nonsense! — In a blindin' afterthought it came to me that of all the dead give-aways I've ever heard mumbled out by a guilty person, that was one of the most blazin'.

"So I thought, `Here, now! What have you got? You've got a lot of indications, and things you think are indications.

You've got a theoretical locked door leadin' to the gallery, so that the murderer came from another direction. But you don't believe it was Bohun. You've got a theoretical man who don't know the house, who came from outside, who had a car. You've got a practical flesh-and-blood man who fulfills these requirements and also declares the woman was not murdered at the pavilion.'

"Now, what are the objections to that? First objection, which seemed so strong as to put the whole thing out of court, is this: How could Emery, rushing down in the middle of the night to a house he didn't know, unerringly pick out the room where this woman was — especially as she hadn't intended to be in that room at all?

"For a second, that was a poser. And then it struck me that this apparent difficulty might, just might, be the answer to the riddle of the whole murder! Here's Tait, waitin' for Bohun up in that room, not darin' to go back to the pavilion. But John had been told to go down to the pavilion when he came back; she supposed he would, and wanted to head him off. Suppose he went down there, discovered she'd disappeared, and maybe raised a row… Well? If you were in her position, what would you have done?

After a long silence Katharine said:

"I suppose I should have waited at the window until I heard his car come in. Then I might have gone down to the side door and called to him that I was in his room…"

She stopped.

"Uh-huh," said H. M., nodding sombrely. "And, I think you've noticed, the roof of the porte-cochere hides the whole drive except the end of it leadin' down to the stables. I tested that out and looked for myself. From King Charles's Room, you can't see any except a very little of the drive. Hey? You hear a car come in. You're, expectin' a car, and you don't suppose that in a lonely community at three o'clock in the mornin' any car will come in but the one you're expectin'. Right. So in your very fetchin' negligee you either lean out the window and whisper, or sneak down to the staircase-door and whisper to a supposed John Bohun that you're not at the pavilion at all; you're in his room. Listen!'

He flicked open the blue sheets.

"On my oath here, and as I hope to answer for it before God, I never meant to kill her. I never thought Carl was right. I only thought I had to go down to that place and see for myself, or I'd go crazy. It happened like this. When I was in that hospital after I had ate (sic) that candy with the poison in it, Carl came to me and said, `Well, I've proved to you Canifest is their angel, so now if you got any guts at all you'll walk over and tell him you're married to her. Great Christ, he says, is everybody going to make a sucker out of you? Are you ever going to act like a man? This guy Bohun,' he said, and then he told me all over again what he'd told me before, only I didn't believe it. She swore it wasn't true; she always swore it wasn't true. She said, if I let her alone to have her career, she'd never in the world look at another man except me.

"And Carl said, 'Do you know why he's taking her down to this place in the country?' And he said, 'Well, if I didn't believe it, all I had to do was go down and see for myself.' He said to go down there late. He said to surprise everybody. He said she'd be in that marble house out at the back, and all I had to do would be walk around the grounds, and I'd see it. Then he said to go down there, and they'd be there; both of them would be there…

"And I couldn't rest, I couldn't do anything until I did. But I was having a lot of trouble with my car, because the fan-belt was loose and the engine would get so hot; and I think the radiator leaked or something like that…"

"Did you notice," said H. M., looking up sharply, "how the bonnet of that car was smoking when we saw it in the drive next day?"

"So I came in the drive, and I noticed my car didn't make any tracks afterwards, because there's trees so close over it that there wasn't much snow at all. And I stopped the car in that driveway under the roof. And I was wondering where this marble-house place was that they were talking about, and I saw the engine shooting up steam again. So I thought I'd get out and stick some snow in to cool it. And I got out and took off that big heavy silverthing that's on top of the radiator cap. It was hotter than hell, but I had my gloves on. And it was dark there, but all of a sudden I heard somebody whisper out behind me, up on the porch..'

"Now use a little imagination," said H. M. rather curtly.

"Even then she didn't know who it was. I kept my head down. And I didn't know where I was going, but I just followed her. And we went up some steps with her ahead, and everything was dark and she kept talking, until we got up to the bedroom and she turned around and saw who I was.

"I didn't know what I was doing. I hit her, and hit her again with that thing in my hand. I don't know how many times I hit her.

"I don't remember much what I did, because right after she was all quiet and didn't move I knew I shouldn't have done it. I tried to revive her, and talked to her, but she didn't move. And I had to take my gloves off to see what was wrong with her, so when I saw my hands were all over blood I knew she was dead.

"And I don't remember what I did after that, except I had sense enough to see if I could wash my hands. I was afraid that when I drove back to London some Limey cop would stop the car and maybe ask me for my license or something like that, and I'd have blood on me. So I went out and tried to find a bathroom, but I couldn't because it was dark. And I ran into somebody, and that scared me.”

"I think this was a long time afterwards, because just after I hit her all those times I sat down and whispered to her for a while. But after I ran into somebody in the dark I got scared and came back. I had sense enough to stick the gloves and that radiator-cap in my pocket. So I came back and went down those steps to the porch again. And I knew if they heard the engine on the car they'd come out maybe, because I thought that woman I'd run into would set up a yell. But the drive slopes down to the road from there, so all I had to do was give her a push and let her coast backwards out of gear till I got to the main road."

"Which was why," said H. M., "a car was heard to go in, and none come out, which confirmed Thompson's idea that it was John Bohun. As a matter of fact, John didn't get back you know that now — until five o'clock, when Thompson had dropped off to sleep. You may remember, I asked him about that..

"But we'll go back again. You've realized by now that the little piece of silver, the little triangle that's the key to the whole affair, was broken off that radiator-cap ornament when Emery used it. John found it; he didn't know what it was, but it was the only clue he had. When he took Tait's body out to the pavilion, he thought he was safe. Then he got the wind up when he saw Potter measuring the tracks, and-"

"He's well enough now," said Katharine quietly.

"Uh-huh. Well, he still wasn't willing to admit what he'd done; but in that insane, nervous way of his he put it in his own hand before he pulled the trigger. D'ye see? He heard the great Chief Inspector Masters, the all-seeing eye of Scotland Yard, was there; and he hoped Masters would see through the brick wall and understand what it was and who had left it.

"Now, then! I had already, when Maurice spun out his yarn for us, a faint glimmer of suspicion about Emery. But I didn't know what weapon he'd used; Masters hadn't said anything about the piece of metal yet. Having absolutely nothing in the way of evidence against Emery, dye see, I couldn't say Boo to him. All I wanted to do was keep him under my eye as long as I could. He was in the house for the moment — but as Rainger's friend, he'd speedily be shot out of the house by Maurice unless Maurice were kept in a good humor. And then we'd lost him. He wasn't even on the scene of the crime, apparently, when it was committed; and I couldn't even keep him as a witness for the inquest!

"The only thing to do was to intimate to Maurice, `Give Rainger and Rainger's friend a treat. Keep 'em here, be poisonously pleasant to 'em, and see how they both act when you release your bomb.' That struck Maurice as one of the more delectable ideas. I had to pretend to half-believe his theory. Also, I didn't dare risk havin' Rainger get sober again. Because, if he really had an alibi as he said he had, both Rainger and Emery would have been thrown out when Maurice found he couldn't have the pleasure of hangin' Rainger. And in the meantime, son, I had to have a lead; I had to work fast, and either prove or disprove my lurkin' idea about Emery. Son, I was in a bleedin' sweat, and that's a fact; until Masters popped out with that information about the bit of metal."

H. M. took a deep breath. He reached after Emery's statement again.

"I noticed right away that there was a big piece broken off the radiator-cap, and I knew where it must be. Then when I learned they thought she'd been killed in the pavilion I figured if they found that I might be sunk or I might not be, depending on whether they got wise to her really being killed in that funny room.

"But I figured I better have a look for it if I could, only I didn't know how I could until that funny old guy comes out and asks me to take care of Carl and says he'll get that Miss Nancy Bohun to invite me to eat dinner there. I knew something was phony about it, but I didn't know what and he said he didn't have any suspicion of me. And when he says to keep Carl drunk I didn't know what the hell, but I said I'd do it because I was afraid Carl had got wise to me. I gave myself away to him when I talked to him on the phone, because I didn't' know there'd been funny work about taking her some place else. But I thought maybe Carl was too drunk to remember and I hoped he was.

"But he wasn't, because when I thought he'd passed out, after it was dark, I sneaked down to that big room and tried to look around after the piece off the radiator-cap. And Carl followed me. And I turned around and seen him, and he says, `What are you doing here?' And I said, `Nothing.' He said, `You're a liar,' and started to shout out that I'd killed her, so I grabbed him by the neck.. ”

"And just after I'd pitched him down the steps they almost got me. They couldn't hear anything, because there was a lot of reporters coming out of the house and motors back-firing just then. But in comes the old fat guy, and the other cop named Masters, and young Jim Bennett and that good-looking girl. And they come in one door while I was behind the door to the stairs. But I couldn't run down and out the lower door and in the house again, because there was cops and reporters there, and I thought I was caught…"

"And," growled H. M., suddenly bringing his fist down on the table, "if I'd had any sense, I'd have caught him then!"

"Caught him? But you didn't know "

"Oh, yes I did. Now we're comin' to the last of it, and here's what happened. I sat down in that chair, I opened the drawer. And I knew what that piece of silver was. And I was sittin' and thinkin'-hot engine that smoked; I saw his car that afternoon-and it began to sort of swim and twist round in my mind what might have happened. Then was when I saw him."

"Saw him?"

"His eye at that keyhole. Ain't you noticed how big that keyhole was? I was afraid I gave away that I saw him. How was I to know he'd killed Rainger, or that he could be caught then with his victim? Al! I saw was somebody behind that door. If I'd opened it and said, 'Heyl' I'd have had him in a bad position, only I didn't know it. It'd have looked suspicious, his conduct would (I thought) if I merely found him hanging about on the other side of the door, but what would it have proved? Not a blinkin' thing!

`But all of a sudden I got my plan. He was probably, I thought, in that room huntin' the bit of metal I had in my hand. Maybe, maybe not. It was worth a risk. Anyway, I held it up carefully so's he could see it; I emphasized that I was puttin' it back in the drawer. Meanwhile, I knew he couldn't get away, because Potter and the rest were down on the porch. Even if he left that door, he could hear me because of the big space under the door where the draught comes through.

"Well, I said I didn't know what the metal was. But I said I'd put it back in the drawer and take it up to London tomorrow for a silversmith to tell me. Son, it dawned blazin' in the old man's mind that that little triangle was the one piece of evidence I could use against him-but not unless I could bring it home to him by his own admission. He could have said it came off anybody's radiator cap. But, if I could maneuver him into stealin' that piece of silver out of the drawer; so he had it on his person when I charged him with it… how was he goin' to deny that?"

Katharine sat up straight.

"Then the whole business," she said, "wasn't directed at us? You didn't need to reproduce that business on the stairs?"

H. M. grinned. "You got it, my dear. Exactly. All I needed was an excuse to get everybody into that room, shove 'em where their attention would be occupied, emphasize to Emery that their attention would be occupied, and pretend to let him into my scheme. He had to fall for it, or it wouldn't work. And, with Rainger's body at the foot of those stairs, he'd figure that in the confusion nobody would see him. That was what I wanted. After one attempt to find that silver, he wouldn't try another until he was certain he could do it safely. And I pretended to play straight into his hands.

"I outlined a part of my plot while he was listenin' behind the door; pretended I thought the silver was of no importance; and when he'd got some idea of my scheme I deliberately opened the window and yelled to Potter to come upstairs — so he could escape safely.

"He went down, through the side-door, and up through the house again. Beryl Symonds dropped in on him immediately…. but, Lord, wasn't the man wild when Masters walked into that room! Notice his expression, son? Notice how he acted then? Actually, I'd sent you and Masters down to see whether Emery was there; not Rainger. He burst out, I understand, with some sort of wild story about somebody tappin' at his door. That was obviously hogwash, because he said the gallery was dark; and yet Masters and I had turned on the lights when we came up. He was thinkin' about himself turnin' out the lights when he went down to King Charles's Room, and that gave him away. He called on the girl to support him, knowin' perfectly well she was so hysterical she would have agreed to anything.

"I could have cut my own throat," said H. M. savagely, "when I found Rainger's body. If I'd had sense enough to challenge him then! But I thought, by God, I will get him now. So I came back and deliberately pretended to take him into my scheme. It destroyed his last suspicion. He walked into the trap as neat as you please. Masters — I'd told him Masters was to be downstairs. - Masters was actually in the gallery behind, and saw him sneak over and take the silver from the table-drawer when the lights were out. I knew I had him at any time I wanted him. So I called an end to my experiment, and…"

H. M. made a dull gesture. He stared at the blue-bound sheets and put them away in the desk. The drawer closed with a snap.

"That's all," he said.

For a long time nobody spoke. The honking of traffic floated up in a lazy afternoon. Then H. M. hauled himself to his feet. He waddled over to the iron safe and took out of it a bottle, a syphon, and glasses. His big slovenly bulk showed against the window, high above the green Embankment, the glittering river, and the mighty curve of London.

"So now," said H. M., "you can forget it. You've had some nasty times and hours with that family of yours, ma'am; but you're free now, and your husband ain't a half bad feller. If ever you need the old man to break any more curses, sing out. In the meantime…"

"In the meantime?"

H. M. peered at the glasses. He looked round at the ancient room with its stuffings of crazy books and crooked pictures; of dust and the trophies of one man's deadly brain. He glanced down at the scattered lead soldiers on one table where a problem of human beings was being worked out..

"Oh, I dunno," he said, and made a vague gesture. "I'll go on, I suppose. Sittin' and thinkin'…"