After the Exhibition: A Jack Haldean 1920s Mystery (A Jack Haldean Mystery) (16 page)

‘Oh, I know
that,
sir,’ said the landlady dismissively. ‘That’s all round the village, that is, and her no better than she should be, I’m sure. Foreigners,’ she added with a sniff. ‘No, it was with you mentioning the chantry. I’m sorry, I’m sure, but I couldn’t help overhearing.’ She leaned forward across the mahogany-stained bar. ‘There are rumours that it’s haunted.’

‘Garn,’ said Mr Stroud in disgust. ‘Some folks are frightened of their own shadows.’

‘Who says it’s haunted?’ asked Jack.

‘Kids,’ opined Mr Stroud. ‘Kids and,’ he added with a sideways look at the landlady, ‘women who should know better.’

‘I’ve seen some strange things in my time, Gilbert Stroud,’ said the landlady. ‘Things that can’t be explained.’ She gestured across the bar to a table where a burly man was sitting, newspaper propped in front of him, a grey-muzzled lurcher curled up under the table beneath him, chomping his way stolidly through a ham sandwich. ‘Sam Catton wouldn’t agree with you. Sam! Have you got a minute?’

Man and dog made their way heavily to the bar. Jack leaned down to let the dog sniff his hand. The dog inhaled warily before letting Jack scratch the top of his head, then licked his hand and flopped to the floor.

‘Can I get you a drink?’ asked Jack hospitably.

‘I don’t mind if I do,’ said Mr Catton, evidently approving of his dog’s acceptance of Jack.

‘These are gentlemen from London,’ said the landlady. ‘Annie Hatton knows them. They’re asking about anything odd up at the chantry.’

‘There’s plenty that’s odd there,’ said Sam. ‘I’ll have a Worthington White Shield, if it’s all the same to you, gents.’ The landlady took a bottle off the shelf and started to pour the White Shield carefully into a glass. ‘There’s lights,’ continued Sam. ‘Lights at all hours.’

‘That’s that mad old artist geezer,’ said Mr Stroud. ‘Cadwallader. He’s always up there.’

Sam weighed up Jack and Bill thoughtfully, as if calculating the chances of being believed. ‘There’s more’n Cadwallader, if you ask me,’ said Sam eventually. He picked up the White Shield and held it up to the light.

‘You’ve got to be careful with the sediment,’ said Jack conversationally.

‘You have,’ said Sam, pleased at this evidence of fellow-feeling. ‘There’s plenty who don’t understand a White Shield. That’s well poured,’ said Sam, nodding to the landlady in approval.

‘That’s only what you’d expect in this house,’ said the landlady, accepting the praise as her due. ‘These gents were asking if anyone had seen a car or a lorry near the chantry on Saturday night.’

Sam Catton took a sip of his White Shield. ‘I don’t know about no car, but I was near the chantry on Saturday night. It would be about quarter past one, I reckon. I heard the church clock strike a bit before.’

The landlady leaned forward and lowered her voice portentously. ‘The thing about the chantry is that it’s not a
normal
place.’

‘I couldn’t agree more,’ said Jack fervently.

‘How come no one hardly ever goes in?’ demanded the landlady. ‘It’s not a proper church, that’s why. There’s a tomb there. And treasure, so I’ve heard. They do say,’ she added, lowering her voice, ‘as how the old man comes looking for his treasure.’ Mr Stroud made another dismissive noise which she ignored. ‘It’s because he weren’t buried properly where he wanted to be. Sam heard
noises
, didn’t you?’

‘On Saturday night?’ asked Bill sharply.

Mr Stroud laughed. ‘Oh yes? What was it? A ghost going “Woo” and clanking its chains?’

‘Of course not, you daft old beggar,’ said Sam. ‘No.’ He hunched his shoulders and breathed stentoriously. ‘No, this was
knocking.
You can laugh, Gilbert Stroud, but I know what I heard. As I say, that was gone one in the morning.’

‘And what was you doing up at the chantry at gone one in the morning?’

Jack let his eyes flicker to the cut of Sam’s coat, with its large pockets and the dog flopped at his feet. Both the dog and the coat were suggestive. ‘Rabbits?’ he said softly.

Sam hesitated, then slowly grinned. ‘Perhaps.’

‘You told me it sounded like someone was trying to get out,’ put in the landlady. ‘Gave me shivers, that did.’

Mr Stroud in his role as sceptic, laughed once more. ‘That’s a good ’un. How come you didn’t go and let ’em out then?’

‘Not ruddy likely,’ said Sam. He reached down and ruffled the dog’s head. ‘It isn’t natural. Even old Bessie here wouldn’t face
that.
Dogs know more than we think.’

Mr Stroud didn’t say anything but his face registered complete disbelief.

‘Why don’t you take a walk round one night with your Shep?’ asked Sam. ‘I’ll be surprised if she wants to go anywhere near the chantry. Maybe you’ll trust her even if you don’t believe me.’

Mr Stroud’s face fell. ‘Poor old Shep,’ he said. ‘Didn’t you hear, Sam? I lost her last week. She must’ve eaten some rat poison or some such, because she took ill and died. Had that dog for years, I did.’

The haunting or non-haunting of the chantry was forgotten in a wave of sympathy for the departed Shep.

‘Rat poison,’ said Bill thoughtfully as they walked away. ‘That could be nothing more than a coincidence or …’

‘Or it could be very useful for someone not to have a dog around to put the night-watchman on the alert,’ said Jack.

‘Exactly,’ agreed Bill. ‘Come on, Jack. I want to get back to London. After being handed a lead like that about the chantry, I want a search warrant and Sir Douglas Lynton’s blessing.
Something
was going on there on Saturday night and I’m going to find out what it was without any chance that pompous stuffed shirt Lythewell will step in to raise any objections.’

‘Right you are,’ agreed Jack.

They reached the Spyker, still safely parked by the bench under the shade of the oak tree.

‘Let’s see what we know,’ said Jack as he slipped the clutch and drove up the hill out of Whimbrell Heath. ‘First things first. Someone – someone from this village – committed a murder on Saturday night.’

Bill took a deep breath. ‘Murder it is. Even though we haven’t any irrefutable evidence of that.’

‘You’re planning to take the chantry apart on a hunch?’

‘All right,’ conceded Bill. ‘We’ve got more than a hunch. Murder it is,’ he repeated. ‘I doubt I’d get a warrant for anything less than suspected murder in the circumstances. I wish we had a line on the victim, though.’

‘Let’s see where we get, yes? Righty-ho. Someone – someone local – knew Signora Bianchi was going to be away and someone thought they would be undisturbed.’

‘How did the murderer get their victim into the cottage?’

Jack shrugged. ‘That’s something I can’t answer at the moment, but presumably, unless the victim was local and came on foot, they arrived by car or train.’

‘Where would the car be parked?’ asked Bill. ‘We know a car can’t get down Pollard Wynd.’

‘There’s the other road, Greymare Lane, that runs along the bottom of the village. Pollard Wynd leads off it. Miss Wingate didn’t see a car, but it could be parked out of sight somewhere along there. In fact,’ said Jack, ‘why don’t we go and have a look now?’

Greymare Lane was much as Betty Wingate had described. It was a long dirt-track with deep ditches on either side, with trees overhanging the lane. Jack drove slowly along the lane until the turning for Pollard Wynd and the brick bulk of Signora Bianchi’s cottage came into sight. After Pollard Wynd the road curved in a long bend.

Jack stopped the car and they both got out.

‘There have been cars along here,’ said Bill. ‘I can see tyre tracks.’ He looked back along the lane. ‘I can’t see the cottage from here.’

Jack looked up at the arching beeches. ‘It’d be very gloomy at night under these trees. A car could be left here quite easily, out of sight of both the cottage and Pollard Wynd. What d’you think? The victim could’ve arrived by car. If it was parked along here, Miss Wingate wouldn’t have seen it.’

‘That’s true,’ agreed Bill as they got back into the Spyker. Jack reversed the car in the entrance to Pollard Wynd and headed back down Greymare Lane.

‘The victim could have come to Whimbrell Heath by train and been picked up at the station,’ said Bill. ‘I suppose we can make enquiries. The porter or ticket collector might remember a stranger.’

Jack pulled a face. ‘They
might.
The trouble is that this is Surrey, not the wilds of the countryside. I imagine the railway station is fairly busy, especially with the new building going on.’

‘I wish we had a line on the victim,’ said Bill once more. ‘We know the victim’s a woman, but that’s about all we do know.’

Jack went to speak, then hesitated. ‘Leave that to one side for a moment, eh?’

‘Okay,’ said Bill after a pause. ‘I can see you’ve got an idea, but all in good time. Now, because the victim was a woman and because we know from Miss Wingate the woman was strangled, I’m going to presume the murderer was a man. Strangulation takes some strength.’

‘Not if a scarf or something similar is used,’ objected Jack, driving out of the shadows of Greymare Lane and back onto the main road. ‘However, for the time being, I agree. We can take as read it was a planned crime because of the chloroform and what-have-you, but what we’ve found out today makes it seem even more planned.’

‘Poisoning the watchman’s dog?’ asked Bill with a lift of his eyebrows.

‘Exactly.’

‘And that brings us to where the body was taken. The chantry.’ Rather to Bill’s surprise, Jack didn’t reply. ‘Do you think the body’s hidden in there?’ demanded Bill bluntly.

Jack made an impatient gesture. ‘I don’t know what else
to
think. Anyone in Lythewell and Askern can get hold of the key, but I’m blowed if I know where they hid the body once they got it in there. I had a fairly good look round.’

‘Behind something? Underneath something? Inside something?’ suggested Bill. ‘That knocking Sam Catton heard at one in the morning means there was something going on in there. Whatever it is, we’ll find it if it’s there to be found. I just wish I could get some sort of angle on who the victim was.’

‘Yes …’ said Jack, again with the hesitation in his voice. ‘Bill, I’m going to make an assumption. I’m going to assume the murderer is connected with Lythewell and Askern.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Bill in mild surprise. ‘I can’t say that’s too far-fetched, especially now we know about the chantry.’

‘A murder,’ said Jack, ‘is one way to solve a problem. A person is inconvenient and therefore they are removed. Right?’

‘All right,’ agreed Bill. ‘I don’t know where you’re going and it all sounds a bit cold-blooded, but yes, you’re right.’

‘Now we thought, quite reasonably, that Signora Bianchi was the problem. And, indeed, she certainly was and is a problem, but not
the
problem.’ He grinned. ‘She proved that, very conclusively.’

‘Don’t remind me,’ muttered Bill. ‘I’ll never forget her waltzing in like that. Never.’

‘However,’ said Jack, disregarding his friend’s grumbles, ‘I think we may have witnessed the birth of another problem for someone connected with Lythewell and Askern.’

Bill looked at him blankly.

‘The exhibition?’ prompted Jack. ‘There was a woman there who behaved very oddly indeed, if you recall.’

‘The flag-seller, you mean?’

Jack nodded. ‘The flag-seller. What’s more, because it was at the exhibition, all the Lythewell and Askern lot were present.’

Bill laughed. ‘And because of that, you think our victim might be Mrs Whatever-she-was-called? The flag-seller?’

‘Mrs Joan McAllister. Yes, I think she might be. I ran into her after the exhibition, if you remember, and I thought she definitely had something up her sleeve.’

Bill shrugged. ‘Just as you like. At least we’ve got her name. She was taken to the Charing Cross hospital, wasn’t she? I presume she gave her address to the hospital, so we can check up on her. But Jack, she struck me as more or less off her rocker. Didn’t she tell you she fainted away because of the contrast between the idle rich – us, in other words – and the waifs and strays she was collecting for? It sounds downright cuckoo to me.’

‘That is, or would be, as loopy as a corkscrew,’ agreed Jack. ‘But I didn’t believe her. She certainly had a shock that day – that was real enough – but I didn’t believe her account of what had shocked her. It’d be interesting to see if we can find her, don’t you think?’

‘If you want to go looking for nutty flag-sellers, be my guest,’ said Bill tolerantly. ‘I want a warrant for the chantry.’

‘Mrs McAllister?’ said Miss Sharpe. ‘I don’t know, I’m sure.’ She was about as unlike her name as it was possible to be – a sagging, faded woman who looked, Jack thought, as if she could do with some fresh air and some good food.

She certainly wouldn’t find any fresh air in 46, Purbeck Terrace. The house was redolent with the odour of stale cooked cabbage, which seemed to kick the idea of good food into touch, too.

It was the following morning. A telephone call from Scotland Yard to the Charing Cross hospital had established Mrs Joan McAllister’s address as 46, Purbeck Terrace, Paddington, and Jack, with Bill Rackham’s rather amused blessing, had taken himself off to investigate.

46, Purbeck Terrace was a boarding house. At one time it had evidently been a prosperous Victorian residence, but age, grime and changes in fashion had taken their toll. The down-at-heel nature of the house took him by surprise. Not that he’d thought Mrs McAllister was particularly affluent, but she was a flag-seller, after all, and collecting for charity was, in his experience, an occupation limited to the middle-classes.

The landlady, Mrs Kiddle, after bearing up under her disappointment that Jack did not require a room, informed him that Mrs McAllister had left them. Was it a fortnight ago? No, wait, she told a lie. It was more like three weeks since. No, she didn’t know Mrs McAllister’s present address, but if he’d like to speak to Miss Sharpe – if Mrs McAllister had been friendly with anyone, it was Miss Sharpe – she might know where she’d got to.

Mrs Kiddle showed him into a room she referred to as the Residents’ Lounge. It didn’t invite lounging. It had a worn carpet on which the pattern was still just about discernable, and the sofa and armchairs had seen better days. Lots of better days. Three stuffed birds under a glass dome and a dusty aspidistra in a streakily polished brass pot on a stand added to the general funereal joy.