Mystery Mile (13 page)

They left the crowded kitchen and went back into the library, where Biddy lay dozing in a chair. She started up when they came in. ‘Any luck?' she said eagerly.

Their faces told her their news.

‘Where are the others?' Giles glanced round the room.

‘In the garden. As soon as it got light Isopel wanted to go out searching again. Albert wouldn't let her go alone. Mr Barber went to bed. I put him in the honeysuckle room. Isopel and I thought it was the best thing to do.'

Giles crossed over to the window and looked out: it was just light. There was still a greyness over everything, and the air was fresh and sweet. He caught sight of Isopel and Campion coming up through the trees towards the house. Campion was
bending forward, looking at the girl, and Giles fancied he heard her laugh. There was nothing unusual in it; most people laughed with or at Mr Campion, and yet he felt surprised, almost resentful. The situation had no funny side that he could see.

They came in two or three minutes later. Isopel was grave as before, but Giles's resentment against Campion grew. He had certainly succeeded in reassuring her where he himself had failed.

‘See here,' said Marlowe, ‘this thing's getting more and more peculiar every way you look at it. I must admit our crowd of sleuths aren't over-gifted, but it is their own back gardens they've been searching, isn't it? There's no boat been seen about, and none of those belonging to Mystery Mile are missing. Nor were any of them out yesterday.'

‘You know,' said Biddy, suddenly sitting up, ‘what we're all doing is to ignore that note Addlepate brought in. There're three suppositions: either Mr Lobbett has really been kidnapped and managed to scribble a few lines to warn us, or else he went quite mad and wrote it because he imagined the whole thing, or else someone else wrote it to put us off.'

‘She's right, you know,' said Marlowe. ‘We've been jibbing at that note. But dad wrote it, sure enough. And on a page of his own notebook, too. I'd like to believe,' he went on slowly, ‘that dad had written that sanely, even though it meant that he had fallen into their hands. But I can't believe it, because there's no sign of them. You don't tell me a stranger wouldn't be noticed on a place like this. A cartload of men strong enough to get dad away would be the most conspicuous thing in the scenery for miles. He must have crawled out of that maze alone, fixed the note on the dog's collar – heaven knows when – and then disappeared as if he'd dropped into a quicksand.'

As he spoke the others started, and Mr Campion and the twins exchanged glances. The explanation which had occurred to all of them at some time during the search had not been mentioned by any of them. As in many other places on the east coast, there were several spots of ‘soft' in the black mud which
lay round Mystery Mile, and in these quick patches it was quite possible for a man to be sucked under and completely buried within a few minutes.

No one cared to suggest this possibility. Marlowe drew the sheet of paper from his pocket. ‘“The blue suitcase,”' he said – ‘that's quite safe, isn't it, Isopel?'

The girl nodded. ‘Yes. Biddy and I brought it down here. We thought it would be safer.' She smiled wryly. ‘I don't envy anyone trying to steal it. It weighs about a hundredweight. It's over in that corner.' She pointed to the far end of the room, where the heavy leather suitcase with a blue canvas cover stood beside a bookcase.

‘That's it,' said Marlowe. ‘That's the one he was so anxious about all through the voyage. I think we'd better open it.'

Isopel looked dubious. ‘I don't think he'd like it, Marlowe.'

‘I just can't help that.' The boy spoke emphatically. ‘I've got to find out what this whole thing is about.'

He strode across the room and took the case by the handle. The weight of it surprised him, and instead of lifting it he dragged it into the centre of the room. The others watched him, fascinated, as he dragged off the blue canvas cover and disclosed a leather-bound steel case with a lock that ran all one side of the box.

The boy looked at it doubtfully. ‘Now we're sunk,' he said. ‘There's no key, of course. Father had that with him.'

Giles and Biddy glanced at Mr Campion, who was standing modestly in the background.

‘It'll take a locksmith to do this,' said Marlowe, ‘or a crook,' he said bitterly.

Once again the brother and sister looked at their friend inquiringly. He came forward, looking slightly uncomfortable.

‘This sort of thing looks awfully bad,' he said. ‘I never show off in the ordinary way.'

‘Do you mean you can do it?' Isopel's look of wide-eyed astonishment brought a faint colour to Mr Campion's cheek.

‘Perhaps if you would all turn your backs –' he murmured, taking out a small piece of wire and what appeared to be a penknife from his pocket.

‘You're not going to do it with that? It's only got two blades,' said Biddy, staring at the knife, her curiosity overcoming her anxiety.

‘Inaccurate,' said Mr Campion. ‘Two blades
and
a thing for taking nails out of horses' hooves. Whenever I see a horse hoof I take out this natty little instrument and –' As he was talking he was bending over the delicate lock, his thin fingers working with unbelievable rapidity. ‘I prod,' he went on, ‘and prod – and –
hup!
– out she comes!
Voilà!
'

A sharp click accompanied the last word as the spring lock shot back. Marlowe slipped down upon his knees before the case to raise the lid.

As he lifted the heavy steel covering he disclosed a layer of newspaper. The others pressed round eagerly, hoping for at least some glimmer in the mystery which surrounded them.

Marlowe drew off the paper carefully. Filling the entire case, and neatly stacked in half-dozens, were some forty or fifty, gaudily bound children's books. It looked like the supply for an infants' school-prize day.

Marlowe stretched out his hand and drew out a book gingerly as if he suspected it to contain some hidden explosive. He turned the leaves over: it was entitled
Robinson Crusoe Told to the Children
, and appeared to be perfectly genuine. They took out one book after another, turning over the pages of each. They were all in the same binding, some new, some patently second-hand, and appeared to be the complete output of a library called ‘The Kiddies' Own'.

They were little green books profusely decorated with designs in gold, and pasted on the front of each was a coloured illustration of the story within. They consisted mostly of famous tales, simplified and bowdlerized for young people's consumption.

Campion and the others turned each copy over, hunting vainly for any mark in the margin or message scribbled on the flyleaves.

They hardly spoke, but went on steadily scouring every volume, until they sat back and looked at each other in bewilderment. The most exhaustive and methodical search had
revealed only that no copy differed to any great extent from its fellows.

Marlowe looked at Campion helplessly. ‘What do you make of it?' he said.

Mr Campion glanced round at all of them. They were looking at him appealingly, asking for an explanation. He threw out his hands. ‘My dear old birds,' he said, ‘I think I'm losing my speed. This finds you where it leaves me at present – high and dry. It all looks like good clean reading to me.'

MR CAMPION WAS
hidden in the high-backed Queen Anne chair in the faded drawing-room at the Dower House, and Biddy did not notice him at first when she came bustling in.

It was not until she caught sight of his long thin legs sprawled out across the hearthrug that she realized that he was there. She pounced on him immediately.

‘Albert, if you don't get rid of Mr Barber for the Lobbetts this day I shall have a nervous breakdown. I can't bear it.'

He sat back in his chair and grinned at her.

‘You won't,' he said. ‘You've got more real nervous stamina than all the rest of us put together.'

Biddy did not smile. She remained staring down at him, a peculiar intensity in her eyes.

‘You're a beast, Albert,' she said. ‘I used to be awfully fond of you. I'd never seen you at work before. Now I think you're callous and – oh, and horrible!'

She was speaking hurriedly, her voice very near tears.

‘There's Isopel and Marlowe nearly ill with grief and anxiety about their father for the last two days,' she hurried on, ‘and all you do is to organize silly little searches over the island and advise them not to call the police. You're making so little fuss about it that that idiot Barber doesn't even believe that Mr Lobbett has disappeared.'

Mr Campion did not speak. He sat huddled in the corner of his chair, blinking at her behind his spectacles.

‘Well, what are you going to do?' Biddy looked down at him angrily.

He rose to his feet, and walking up to her suddenly put his arm around her neck and kissed her vigorously. She gasped at him, astonishment predominating over every other emotion.

‘What – what are you doing?' she expostulated, breaking away from him.

‘Rough stuff,' said Mr Campion, and walked out of the room with unusual dignity. In the doorway he paused and looked back at her. ‘You'll be sorry when you see me in my magenta beard,' he said.

Still puzzled, flustered and annoyed, she watched him from the porch as he crossed the green and entered the park gates. Mr Campion swaggered consciously until he was well out of sight of the Dower House, when his shoulders drooped; he walked more slowly, and he allowed himself a profoundly mournful expression, which persisted until he reached the Manor.

Marlowe was waiting for him.

‘I've got it all set, as we said last night,' he said. ‘There's one snag in it, however. Mr Barber wants to come up with us. He's taken some photographs of the Romney and he wants to get a second opinion on them. He insists on driving us up. What shall we do?'

Mr Campion seemed not in the least put out. ‘That's a good idea,' he said. ‘Perhaps we can lose him in Town. I don't know about Isopel, but Biddy seems to have taken a dislike to him.'

‘Isopel's shown signs of strain, too,' said Marlowe. ‘They've had to listen to him more than we have. Do you feel confident of this trip to the city?'

‘It all depends on what you mean by “confident”,' said Mr Campion. ‘I certainly feel that we shall have more chance of finding out where we are, through a few well-placed inquiries in Town, than we shall if we sit here and wait for something else to happen. If we leave Giles in charge he'll look after the girls quite as well as ever we could. He's hot dogs on the England, Home, and Beauty Act. I think if we get rid of Mr Barber for them that'll be about the best thing we can do.'

‘Giles knows all about it then?' said Marlowe.

Mr Campion nodded. ‘I put a bit of sugar on his nose and said “Trust”, and away I came.'

Marlowe grinned. ‘They're charming folks,' he said. ‘I've got the greatest admiration for Biddy.'

He paused abruptly, but Mr Campion made no comment.

He did not appear to have heard, and the conversation did not continue, for at that moment Mr Barber appeared, bustling out of the doorway to the waiting car. He was smiling and self-engrossed as ever, and the leather case was still under his arm.

‘My friends, I have kept you waiting.' He apologized profusely. ‘I hope you have persuaded Mr Campion to be of our party, Mr Lobbett. I am a chauffeur
par excellence,
I assure you. I drive, as you say, as well as the devil. I shall run you to London, take you where you will, and at six or seven o'clock I shall be ready to drive you back again.'

Marlowe's jaw dropped. ‘But I thought, Mr Barber,' he said, ‘that you had seen all you wanted to of the Romney?'

Mr Barber's bushy eyebrows rose. ‘But no,' he said, ‘I am just begun. Besides, you must remember, I am acting for your father. Until I see him I shall not consider that I have carried out my commission. You see' – he tapped his leather case mysteriously, – ‘I have something here that I know will interest him.'

Marlowe glanced at Mr Campion, who sighed but offered no comment, and the three climbed into the car. Biddy saw them flash past the Dower House, and her resentment against Mr Campion grew as her curiosity was piqued.

Mr Barber lived up to his word. His driving was really remarkable. They reached London before lunch in spite of their late start, and Mr Barber, who had his own ideas of what was the most important place in the city, drew up with a flourish outside Simpson's.

Lunch with Mr Barber proved to be a greater ordeal than a journey in his company. Freed from the restraint of being a guest, his behaviour became skittish. He playfully threw a piece of bread at a man several tables away whom he fancied he recognized, and was childishly amused when he discovered his mistake. He also pocketed a fork as a souvenir, an incident that horrified Mr Campion, at whom the Oriental winked delightedly. He continued in this sportive fashion throughout the meal, and as they came out into the Strand disclosed to the
bewildered Marlowe that the loose pockets of his ulster contained at least four crescent rolls which he had secreted.

‘Not a bad bag,' remarked Mr Campion appraisingly. ‘How's the time going, by the way?'

The Oriental put his hand into his waistcoat pocket and felt for the immense gold watch he usually carried. The change in his expression was ludicrous. His heavy jaw fell open, his eyes goggled.

‘My watch – my watch – it's gone,' he said. ‘I must have dropped it in there.' He turned and hurried back into the restaurant with extraordinary agility for so cumbersome a man.

Mr Campion watched him disappear, then he turned to Marlowe with a sigh of relief. ‘He'll be no end of a time looking for it,' he said. ‘I put it under the tablecloth. Come on.' And before the other had realized what had happened he had piloted him out into the roadway and hailed a taxi.