Читать книгу Seven Dead - J. Jefferson Farjeon - Страница 4

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“Dull times, sergeant,” yawned Detective-Inspector Kendall. “Damn dull times.”

“That’s how I like ’em, sir,” answered Sergeant Wade.

“Yes, theoretically that’s how we all ought to like ’em,” agreed Kendall; “but it doesn’t make for efficiency. How can I teach you your job when nothing happens?”

The sergeant rubbed his large nose. Personally, he thought he had had enough teaching during the past week to last him a year, and he was looking forward to the visiting inspector’s departure. This gingering-up process didn’t appeal to him at all.

“There was a fire on Tooseday,” he murmured.

“Which was out before the engine got to it,” retorted Kendall. “Anyway, that wasn’t your funeral.”

“Well, I expeck something’ll happen as soon as you go.”

“Oh, inevitably. The moment I turn my back Benwick will burst into crime! Meanwhile, what’s that?”

He shoved a paper on which he had been doodling towards the edge of the desk, and the sergeant approached rather gingerly.

“Elephant,” the sergeant guessed.

“An elephant has a trunk,” replied the inspector. “Try again.”

“Hippo.”

“No, it’s an elephant. There’s its trunk. When you’ve formed an opinion backed by conclusive evidence, Wade, stick to it.” His eyes suddenly narrowed as they travelled beyond Wade to the window. “Hallo—something happening at last?”

The sergeant did not turn at once. He thought this might be another trick, and he was still feeling a little hurt over the last one. But when sounds entered the passage he swung round and was just in time to share, with his superior, a strange sight.

A constable was carrying a small ragged man in his arms. The ragged man wore a vacuous expression, and was emitting sounds to match his face. Behind them was a light-haired young man with blue eyes and brown hair, wearing an open flannel shirt, grey shorts, no socks, and tennis shoes.

“What’s the trouble?” exclaimed the sergeant. “Drunk?”

“Dotty, more like,” answered the constable, depositing his burden in a chair. “Seems to have gone off his nut.”

“Oh! Where did you pick him up?”

“He near bowled me over before I picked him up. This fellow was chasing him.”

He jerked his head towards the young man in shorts and then produced a couple of spoons from his pocket with a significant wink.

“Ah, I see,” nodded the sergeant. “Making himself at home with other people’s property. Know where he got ’em?”

The young man in shorts stepped forward.

“I think this is where I come in,” he said. “No, they’re not my spoons. I’m just off my boat—it’s in Havenford Creek—and I was about to ask my way at a house when our spoon-collector bounced out of it.”

He had begun his explanation to the sergeant, but found himself finishing it to the inspector. The inspector, however, did not appear to be paying any attention to him. He was studying the strange crumpled creature in the chair. Ted Lyte’s uncouth noises had ceased; he had passed into a stupor.

“That chap’s had a fright,” said Kendall.

“He met a policeman,” explained the sergeant, a little too kindly.

“He’s met more than a policeman,” replied Kendall. “Hasn’t anybody got anything out of him?”

“Not yet, we haven’t, sir,” answered the constable. “When we questioned him he jest—well—laughed.”

“We did get one ‘My Gawd’ out of him,” added the young man, “and I am inclined to agree with the inspector that there was more in his emotion than met the eye.”

Now Kendall turned to the speaker and, after a swift scrutiny, asked:

“You’re off a boat, you say?”

“Auxiliary yacht. Spray.”

“Yours?”

“All of it.”

“May I have your name?”

“Thomas Hazeldean.”

“Thank you, Mr. Hazeldean. I’m Inspector Kendall. About this house. Where is it?”

The constable butted in: “From what he says, sir, it must be a house called Haven House; there’s no other near it.”

Kendall lifted the receiver of the desk telephone and called sharply, “Get me Haven House. Double quick!” Then, with the receiver still at his ear, he addressed Ted Lyte. “Ready to talk?” he inquired. “This is only a police station—our time’s yours.”

Neither the question nor the sarcasm produced any result.

“Who lives at Haven House?” asked Kendall.

“Man named Fenner,” responded Sergeant Wade, feeling he had been left out a little too long. “With his niece.”

“In residence now?”

“Ah, that I can’t say, sir.”

“They was two days ago,” said the constable. “I know, because I see Miss Fenner in the butcher’s.”

The telephone operator’s voice sounded in Kendall’s ear.

“No reply,” it called. “Their receiver’s still off.”

“Still?” queried Kendall.

“It’s been off since yesterday.”

“Oh, has it? You’ve tried the howler?”

“There’s no response.”

“What made you try it? Someone trying to get through?”

“Yes.”

“When was that?”

“I’ll find out.” Then, after a short pause: “Yesterday afternoon.”

“Do you know the time?”

“Between 4.30 and 5.”

“Was it a local call?”

“No, a London call.”

“Between half-past four and five on Friday—yesterday—someone tried to phone Haven House from London, but the receiver was off, so they couldn’t get through. You put on the howler, and no notice was taken of it. Is all that correct?”

“Quite correct.”

“Know what part of London?”

“I can find out.”

“Do. Find out all you can about that call, and keep the information by you in case I want it. Maybe I won’t. Have you put the howler on since?”

“Twice.”

“When?”

“Once last night and once this morning.”

“Without result, of course?”

“Nothing at all.”

“Right. Get me Dr. Saunders. Five-nine. Then try the howler again. If they answer, connect up at once and put them through to me the moment I’m finished with my next call. Otherwise, don’t worry me till I worry you. Right.”

While waiting, he caught the sergeant’s expression and smiled. He guessed what the sergeant was thinking. The sergeant was thinking: “Showing off before an audience!” It didn’t worry the inspector in the least.

“I hope that boat of yours isn’t in a hurry, Mr. Hazeldean,” he said.

“It’s got all the time you want,” answered the yachtsman. “I wouldn’t miss this for a farm.”

“Something to write home about, eh?”

“Well—you seem to think so.”

“It was you who first suggested, Mr. Hazeldean, that there was more in this than met the eye,” Kendall reminded him, “and since then we’ve got a receiver that’s been left off, and the complete collapse of the only person here who might tell us something. Do stop prodding him, constable—that really won’t help. Are we keeping anybody waiting, Mr. Hazeldean, besides yourself?”

“Only my crew,” replied Hazeldean.

“A big one?”

“A big one and a small one. You don’t lose any time, do you, inspector? You’re finding out all about me. I like your methods.”

“Then perhaps you’ll mention them in that letter home,” said Kendall dryly. “Ah!... Dr. Saunders?”

“Speaking,” came the voice over the telephone.

“This is Kendall, police station. Can you come along right now?”

“Well, in about ten minutes.”

“I’d rather you made it five.”

“I dare say you would, but my car’s out of commission.”

“We’ll send ours.” The sergeant vanished from the room. He was learning. “You can walk to meet it, if you like,” added Kendall. “It’s a nice morning.”

“What’s the trouble?” inquired the doctor.

“I haven’t any idea,” answered Kendall, and replaced the receiver.

Then he rose from his chair and walked over to the prisoner.

Ted saw him coming through a mist. Since the original moment of horror he had passed through a succession of nightmares and a succession of mists, till at last life had become so unbearable that he had tried to assist nature and wipe himself out. That unbelievable moment, the chase to which the moment had given an added terror, the policeman, the laughter (was it his own?), and now the police station—what was there in existence worth holding on to? So he held on to nothing, and let his mind totter.

But this new policeman standing before him had a disturbing and menacing solidarity. He was like a doctor, bringing a dying patient back to pain. As the mist began clearing, Ted closed his eyes, substituting his lids for the fog. He opened them, however, when the new policeman said quietly:

“So it isn’t only theft—it’s murder, too, eh?”

For a few moments Ted stared into Inspector Kendall’s eyes, held by their steadiness. Then, the words drawn from him, he whispered:

“I didn’t do it.”

“Do what?” asked Kendall.

The ragged man began to cry.

“ ’Ow could I?” he whimpered. “Orl that lot?”

And then a too-rapidly-filled stomach and a too-violently-shocked mind produced their delayed result, and he was sick.