Читать книгу The Solution of a Mystery - J. S. Fletcher - Страница 9

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The violent banging of that door prefaced a moment’s silence; then Mr Radford turned on me and snapped out a question.

‘What are you going to do?’

‘It can’t rest where it is, Mr Mayor,’ I replied. ‘It’ll have to be investigated—fully. You see in what mood your son is! If he’s innocent——’

‘He’s told you he knows nothing about either murder or robbery,’ he interrupted. ‘He’s not a liar!’

‘He didn’t tell you the truth, sir, about his supposed visit to Mr Verrill,’ I retorted. ‘If he’s absolutely innocent why doesn’t he tell us where he was last night, and why he was in the wood about ten o’clock, and where he got that marked sovereign? Why——?’

‘I asked you—what are you going to do?’ he said. ‘That’s what I want to know—at present.’

‘I shall have to consult my superiors, Mr Mayor,’ I answered. ‘I suppose I ought to arrest your son now! But—will you try to get some explanation out of him? And will you give me your word that you’ll keep an eye on him until to-morrow morning?’

He looked at me for a time as if pondering over what I had said. Then he began to walk up and down the room again. Several minutes passed; he seemed to be thinking hard. At last he turned to me, and I noticed that his face had grown stern—and stubborn.

‘No!’ he said. ‘I won’t give you any word, or any promise. You must do what you please. But I’ll say this—you’ll make a mistake if you fix on him as either murderer or thief in this case. Of course he’s innocent! Do what you please. And now, will you go away? I told you I could only give you a few minutes.’

I went away, sorely upset and puzzled, and walked slowly back to my office. My clerk met me at the door.

‘There’s that young man that came with the young woman waiting for you, sir,’ he said. ‘James Collier. He wants to see you again. He’s in your room—I told him you wouldn’t be long.’

I went into my room—Collier sat on the edge of a chair, twiddling his cap and staring about him. At sight of me he rose, grinning sheepishly.

‘Well, Jim?’ I said. ‘What now?’

He dropped into his chair again, and making an effort spoke.

‘Ellen,’ he said. ‘Ellen, she didn’t tell all there was to tell. Left a bit out, like. So I thought——’

‘What did she leave out?’ I asked.

‘Come to think of it, I did, after we’d been here,’ he continued. ‘But she’d gone, then. So I concluded to come myself. Thinking it might be important.’

‘Quite right, Jim; much obliged to you,’ I said. ‘And what is it?’

It required a minute or two of severe mental effort on Jim’s part to bring himself to the arduous task of accurate statement. As Ellen had remarked, he was not a great hand with his tongue. His memory, however, seemed to be in excellent condition.

‘It was like this here,’ he began. ‘Ellen, she forgot to tell about something else we saw. About—him, you know.’

‘Young Mr Richard?’ I suggested.

‘That’s it! Him!’ he assented. ‘When he come into the wood, through the gate, and shoved his bike atween the hedge and them shrubs—I can show you the place—there was something that Ellen didn’t tell about.’

‘Yes?’ I said, patiently. ‘What was it, Jim?’

‘He took a stick off his bicycle—strapped along the centre bar, it was,’ he continued. ‘A walking-stick! Thick ’un—I saw it plain.’

‘How could you see it?’ I asked. ‘It was ten o’clock at night and dark.’

‘Aye, but he’d a bit o’ difficulty with the strap or cord it was fastened on with,’ he answered. ‘He took the lamp off the front of the bike to look at it. I saw the stick, plain enough. And the parcel.’

‘What parcel?’ I asked.

‘He’d a parcel, tied on behind,’ he replied. ‘He took that off too.’

‘Big parcel?’ I inquired.

He held out his hands.

‘About that square,’ he said. ‘Brown paper parcel.’

‘Well?’ I went on. ‘What did he do then? With the stick and the parcel?’

‘Carried ’em off with him into the wood, after he’d turned his lamp off,’ he answered.

‘What did there seem to be in the parcel?’ I asked. ‘Any idea?’

‘No, I’ve no idea,’ he said. ‘Squarish sort o’ parcel. In brown paper.’

‘You’re certain about this—especially about the stick?’

‘I’m certain! It was a strong lamp, that. Saw everything.’

‘Do you think you’d know that stick if you saw it again, Jim?’ I asked.

But he shook his head at that.

‘Ah, I dunno as I would!’ he answered. ‘Good thick ’un, it was. But one stick’s uncommon like another. ’Twasn’t one o’ your fancy walking-sticks. Plain stick.’

‘Heavy enough to stun anybody, eh?’

‘Oh, aye, it ’ud be strong enough for that,’ he said. ‘As I said, a thick ’un. Tied on to the bike it was. Likewise the parcel. Ellen, she forgot that bit.’

I sent him away, again bidding him to hold his tongue, and looked at my watch. It was not yet half-past two and there were several hours of daylight left. I already had a whole posse of men searching in and about Hagsdene Wood, but now I gathered together some more, all that I had available, and, going there with them myself, set to work on a thorough search of the undergrowth, the rabbit-warrens, the banks and hedgerows. For it seemed to me that the murderer would, in all probability, have thrown away his weapon (in the opinion of the doctors, a blunt one of some sort) as soon as he had made use of it.

At half-past five that afternoon one of my men, searching near Hebb’s cottage, found a stick thrust into a rabbit’s burrow. It was a plain, very heavy oak walking-stick, formidable enough—as my sergeant observed, you could have felled an ox with it. He and I returned to the town with it wrapped in his cape. Near the entrance to the wood we met Mr Radford’s managing clerk, Hebb, returning to his home and his wife at the conclusion of his day’s labours. A sudden impulse prompted me to show him the stick, and to ask him if he’d ever seen it before. I saw at once that he recognized it.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It’s a stick that I gave to Dick Radford last year, when he and I went on a bit of a walking tour. Certain of that. Dead certain!’