Читать книгу Murder by Matchlight - Edith Caroline Rivett - Страница 10

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Macdonald read through the statement which Bruce Mallaig had signed, and then studied Wright’s brief but admirably legible notes giving the gist of Claydon’s statement: this latter document he handed to an attendant constable to be typed. Just then a sergeant came in to report. He had been sent to the address on the dead man’s Identity Card, and had returned with what information he had been able to collect. John Ward had lived at 5a Belfort Grove, Notting Hill Gate. This house was divided up into six self-contained single-room flatlets, of which John Ward had rented the topmost—and cheapest. On the same floor lived the resident caretaker, a talkative and ancient charlady whose erstwhile occupation had been that of lavatory attendant. This body, who gave her name as Mrs. Maloney and her age as sixty-five (the sergeant guessed that eighty was nearer the mark) said that she was employed as “house-keeper,” her duties including answering the front door, cleaning the stairs and landings and the bathrooms shared by the tenants, as well as rendering such “service” as her other duties permitted to those tenants who wished to employ her. She had identified the dead man as Mr. John Ward of 5a Belfort Grove. He had lived at this address for six months, occupying the room of a Mr. Claude d’Alvarley, an actor, now in His Majesty’s Forces. Mr. d’Alvarley still paid the rent of the flat, and Mr. Ward occupied it on a basis of friendly agreement.

Concerning Mr. Ward himself, Mrs. Maloney could—or would—give no information. “ ’E was a gentleman—which is more’n I’d say of some,” she volunteered, “and ’e kep’ ’isself to ’isself and caused no bother.”

“Relations?”

How was she to know? Mr. Ward wasn’t one of those who made confidences not asked for, and she’d got too much to do to gossip. “I did out ’is room once a week by arrangement—Tuesday’s my day for ’im, and ’e always obliged by going out so’s to leave me free to get on with it. And I’ve never ’ad no dealings with the police, nor don’t want to, and I say so straight. I’ve me character for twenty-five years since me ’usband was took, and never been in no trouble at all.”

When this ancient lady had retired, Sergeant Phillips grinned at Macdonald.

“I went and found her in the local—the Duke of Clarence—and she was properly annoyed. No lady likes to be inquired for by the police, she told me, accident or no accident. The landlord says she’s highly respectable and to be trusted. Drinks like a fish but she’s never any the worse for it, and all the tenants say she’s as honest as the day—so the pub people say. The tenants are mostly in the profession—variety folk. There wasn’t a soul in the house this evening.”

When Wright came back he said, “Claydon couldn’t identify him—but I didn’t expect him to.”

Macdonald nodded, and then said: “These two statements—Mallaig’s and Claydon’s—tally remarkably well over the events at the bridge. Remembering their relative positions, there isn’t a single discrepancy. Mallaig said he saw another man’s face in the matchlight—but both men agree that they heard no other footsteps after deceased came on the bridge. That’s a bit remarkable. Claydon did not say that he heard Mallaig approach the bridge, and Mallaig states that Claydon, to the best of his belief, was below the bridge when deceased was struck. Since it doesn’t seem probable on the face of it that there’s any collusion between those two witnesses, we’re faced with the probability that another man arrived on the bridge unheard by the man immediately beneath it.”

“You accept these two statements without doubt, sir?”

“No. I never accept any statement until I can prove it, but the fact that these two independently narrated identical facts makes me believe that both statements are true so far as they go. They both told exactly what they saw and heard—though that’s not to say that they told all that they saw and heard, or that they are truthful and innocent people.”

“How do you suppose that the man Mallaig says he saw got on to the bridge—since Claydon, immediately underneath, didn’t hear him?”

“Mallaig didn’t hear him either. He says that he saw a face. It might have been an optical delusion—matchlight is very confusing. However, we have the one objective fact we can’t get away from: deceased had his skull smashed in by a whacking great blow which was probably struck by that coal hammer your man picked up from the lower path which goes under the bridge.”

Wright pondered. “If both Mallaig and Claydon are speaking the truth, it beats me how anyone else got on to the bridge without either of the other two hearing footsteps. Do you think there could be any other possibility: could the hammer have been thrown, for instance?”

Macdonald replied: “I always hesitate to say that a thing’s impossible, and I’m quite willing to experiment, but I feel very doubtful. If you throw a hammer it tends to revolve in the air owing to the fact that the two ends are unequal in weight, and it would be very difficult to throw it in such a manner that the weighted end would hit its objective with the necessary force. I was playing about with a similar idea in my own mind. I thought of a catapult, but again I doubt if any projectile from a catapult could have struck with the force that was used in this case, not merely cracking but smashing the skull. In addition to this, there is the evidence from Mallaig that he saw another face in the matchlight—a face which he says he could recognise again. Of course I haven’t seen Mallaig myself—what was your own opinion of him and of his evidence?”

“He was a good witness, and he seemed a sound, trustworthy sort of fellow,” said Wright, “but I don’t feel disposed to take either of these witnesses at their face value. Both of them told stories which it would be difficult to disprove—but both stories could have been made up in advance, just to account for the witnesses’ presence at the spot.”

“That’s perfectly true,” agreed Macdonald, “but it’s worth bearing in mind that Mallaig could have got away without attracting any attention at all, and that he chose to give the alarm quite deliberately. Had he been concerned in the murder, I doubt if he would have shouted for the police.”

“Maybe not,” said Wright, “though it’s an old trick to pretend to discover a body when you’ve just committed the murder yourself.”

Macdonald nodded. “Admittedly—and I don’t want you to think I’m accepting either statement without reserve. Both men’s careers will have to be looked into very carefully. However, I should like to spend a little time considering that bridge where the murder took place. Have you got a man posted there?”

“Yes, sir. I thought there might be some other evidence to be found in daylight. The ground is soft between the park gates and the bridge, and it’s just possible we may get some footprints which might help. We’ve got a fair idea of the prints Mallaig and Claydon made this evening. Bond had a look at their shoes as they came in. Mallaig had crepe rubber soles—size nine. Claydon wears size eight, and there’s a hole in the sole of his right shoe.”

“Good man!” said Macdonald. “You’re one of the fellows I like to work with.”

Wright grinned happily. “Thank you, Chief. A word like that from you makes the day seem a good one—but I’m afraid my efforts with the shoe soles won’t be worth much to you. The ground’s been trampled over a lot. Still, I’ve had a cordon put round, just in case.”

“Again—good for you. Co-operation in the early stages is often worth a lot more than brain-waves later,” said Macdonald. “I’ll have a look at deceased, and see what he had in his pockets, and then I’ll go and glance around in Regent’s Park.”