The Polo Ground Mystery (22 page)

“I'm calling at the manor on my way back. Shall I hand it over for you?” came the polite inquiry.

“If you'd be so good,” said Vereker, detaching the key from his bunch.

For a few seconds he stood hesitant, and then handed the key to Fanshaugh who, remarking that he must be back in Nuthill for tea, took his departure and was soon lost to sight.

“Not very complimentary to my intelligence,” muttered Vereker reflectively, and dismissing the subject from his mind glanced curiously round.

“There's something mysterious about this spot!” he exclaimed. “It's a spot that wishes to be visited, but I'm afraid there's no Celtic rock-a-by-baby spoof about its uncanny attraction. First an unknown with a close resemblance—a shaving-mirror resemblance—to Degerdon; then came Ralli, and now Fanshaugh!” He glanced round and noticed the trampled state of the bracken on all sides. Heather's minions had evidently done their work thoroughly on the off-chance of finding a weapon that had been flung away by the man who had shot Armadale. On thinking it over, Vereker was struck by the amount of labour expended on such an uncertain assumption. Still, experience had evidently proved to the police that in a case of murder the culprit's first idea was to get rid of the deadliest link connecting him with the crime. If Sutton's murderer had followed such a course, what more likely place than this covert with its dense undergrowth in which to bury the instrument for an indefinite length of time. Vereker's interview with Captain Fanshaugh had completely driven all desire for sketching out of his mind. Leaving the wood, he made his way up to Collyer's cottage with the intention of having a talk with the gamekeeper. Collyer was out, but Trixie Collyer came to the door, clad in a white overall and with palette and brushes in her hand. She asked Vereker into the little sitting-room of the cottage, which served as her studio and where she was busy at a flower study composed of pale yellow dahlias and Michaelmas daisies.

“You mustn't be too critical, Mr. Vereker,” she said, as he examined her work. “Mr. Ralli has been telling me about your fame as an artist, and it rather frightens me.”

Vereker suggested a slight alteration in tone values and was diplomatically encouraging. During this conversation, he took the opportunity of having a good look at Basil Ralli's fiancée and was struck by her extraordinary beauty. Her jet black hair, worn short and waved, reflected pale blue in the high lights from the general colouring of the room, and in contrast her skin shone almost luminously white. Scarlet lips, rather sensuous in their fullness, almost suggested artifice by their natural brilliance, and her eyes were the large liquid eyes so often seen in Turkish women. As Vereker talked, she stood gazing at her painting with a frown of dissatisfaction on her face.

“It's no good,” she exclaimed at last, as she flung down her brushes on her painting table. “I'm too upset to work.”

“All our nerves are a bit on edge at present,” commented Vereker, “over this terrible business at the manor.”

“I'm not worrying very much about that, Mr. Vereker,” she hastened to inform him. “Mr. Armadale was my father, and in a way I think he was genuinely fond of me, but I can't say I returned his affection. Until recently I didn't know he was my father, and, when I found out, the little affection I had for him vanished. Unknown to anyone, I went up to Hartlepool to see my mother. My curiosity was very natural, I think. I found her a very unhappy woman, a drudge degraded by her life with a drunken sailor who beat her regularly. Indirectly my father had brought her to this. She confided in me that she had been passionately in love with him and still loved him. Not once did she blame him for his seduction of her, for that's what, in plain words, his conduct amounted to. He had pensioned her off with three pounds a week, and left me to be brought up by his gamekeeper's wife. For myself, I didn't care two raps, and I'm grateful to him for my education, but his wretched treatment of my mother I couldn't forgive. So you see, Mr. Vereker, if I'm not greatly upset by my father's death, some of my callousness may be forgiven.”

“He was rather unhappy about your friendship with his nephew, I believe,” said Vereker, and was surprised at the effect produced by his words.

At once the girl's whole frame grew rigid, her fingers were clenched in anger, and her large eyes lit with dangerous fire.

“Beast!” she exclaimed vehemently. “Not only had he made a mess of my mother's life but he was determined to spoil mine. He told Basil when he discovered he was growing fond of me that I was his illegitimate brat by a little trollop who had been his first wife's maid. He spoke of my mother as if she were a common street woman!”

For some seconds the girl's beauty was convulsed by the ugliness of an overwhelming anger, and then, conscious that she had let her feelings carry her away, she suddenly ceased talking and recovered her self-control with amazing swiftness.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Vereker,” she said calmly, “but my paddy gets the better of me when I sense an injustice. I must try and forget all about it now.”

“The only thing to do,” remarked Vereker sympathetically.

“There's still a fly in the ointment,” continued Miss Collyer. “Now that everything looks more hopeful for me than ever it has done, I'm being pestered by another suitor whom I don't care two straws for. His name is Frank Peach, and his mother is my mother's sister. I've done my best to be friendly and decent towards him, but we're worlds apart, and there's something strange about him which gives me the creeps. I'm really horribly afraid of him. When I found that his feelings towards me were growing warmer than I cared for, I tried my hardest to choke him off. It only made matters worse. He simply wouldn't be choked off. He grew jealous and sulked. As long as I remember, he has been subject to morose fits, during which he moons about alone and speaks to no one. There's a trace of insanity in his family on his father's side. However, since I told him that I was in love with Mr. Ralli, he has begun to threaten us both. This morning he met us on our walk before breakfast and created a terrible scene. It was all I could do to prevent the two men from coming to blows. So you see why I'm upset, Mr. Vereker.”

“I can quite understand your feelings,” remarked Vereker.

At that moment Collyer came into the cottage. He was looking worried, and on Vereker's tactful reference to the fact, he smiled.

“You see, Mr. Vereker, I don't know from Adam what Mr. Ralli's going to do about the shootin' this year,” he said. “He don't seem to be terrible keen on shootin' at all; partridges is very poor, and all this trampin' about coverts ain't doing a heap of good. I wish they'd find that dratted pistol and go back to London first train. My pheasants ain't had no peace of mind for the last week.”

“I'm afraid I'm one of the offenders, Collyer.”

“That you ain't, sir. You don't do no harm sitting quiet like and painting portraits of trees and such. Birds don't mind that. It's all this rampaging about and 'ollerin' to one another. There's too many people allowed about, and if I had my way I'd stop Captain Fanshaugh and Mr. Degerdon makin' a right-of-way through Duck Wood on to the Godstone road. I've just seen the fust-named gent paradin' about the estate as if the place was his. Mr. Armadale was easy-going, but Mr. Ralli's going to be sloppy.”

“I met Captain Fanshaugh on my way here through Wild Duck Wood. He said he was returning from Caterham and cutting across country to Nuthill.”

“Then the gentleman ain't particular about the truth,” said Collyer. “He hadn't been to no Caterham. I saw him coming up from Godstone way through my glasses, and that's just opposite direction.”

“You don't seem to like Captain Fanshaugh, Collyer,” said Vereker, with a laugh.

“Well, sir, he's meddlesome, that's what he is. He got on the soft side of Mr. Armadale, and not content with running the stables he wanted to run my job as well. I told him straight, sir, that he'd better mind his own business, which was shootin' when the season came round, and leave the keeperin' to me. We had words over the partridges. He asked me one day, ‘Do you know the chipped-egg system, Collyer?' and I says, ‘Yes, sir, and I could teach you how to suck 'em.' He was mad with me for a bit, but I heard him tellin' the guv'nor about it later as a joke. The guv'nor gave him too much rope, and as I reckoned left him a tidy bit in his will.”

“Oh, I didn't know that, Collyer,” said Vereker, with surprise.

“It's true. I heard Mr. Armadale givin' the instructions to Mr. Pettifer, his solicitor, when that gentleman came down for a day's pheasant shootin' last winter.”

“Do you know how much he left him?”

“That I couldn't say, sir. They was walking in front of me on the way to Hanging Covert, and as we was going downwind I couldn't catch all as was said, but I heard the word thousand. ‘May it do him good,' says I to myself; ‘I dessay he needs it, for he's always tryin' to make a bit for hisself at horse-coping.'”

“Have Mr. Degerdon and Captain Fanshaugh always made Wild Duck Wood a short-cut on to the Godstone road?” asked Vereker.

“No, sir, only since Mr. Armadale was shot. As I was saying, Mr. Ralli's soft with them.” Turning to his foster-daughter, he said, “If so be as you marry him, Trixie, girl, you'll just have to put a bit o' that temper of yours into him. He needs a bit of wiring up. I don't see why they should be helping the police to find that pistol,” he said, addressing Vereker once more. “The inspector has more than enough men of his own to trample down covert.”

“They're helping the police, are they?” asked Vereker to make sure that he had heard aright.

“That's the yarn they spun me, sir, when I came upon them unexpected yesterday morning just after sunrise in Duck Wood.”

“I was in Wild Duck Wood yesterday morning about that time. I didn't see you, Collyer, but I thought I saw Mr. Degerdon. He was wearing a brown Norfolk jacket and cap.”

“That was him, sir. I saw you all right making your pictures quiet as a lamb under them old oaks. Thinks I, it would be better if more gents would take to paintin' landshapes, as they calls them, instead of trapesin' about helpin' bobbies to do their job.”

“Like you, Collyer, I wish they'd find that automatic pistol. It would help to clear up the mystery. Do you know if Mr. Armadale ever had more than one automatic in his possession?”

“He used to have three, sir. He gave me one which is lying about the house somewhere at the present moment.”

“It's in the small right-hand drawer of the chest in your bedroom,” said Miss Collyer.

“Ah, that's where I put it when Mr. Armadale give it to me. It were no use to me. Whether the guv'nor kept the other two or only one, I couldn't say.”

“Would you lend me yours for a few days, Collyer? I'd like to make one or two experiments with one.”

“Certainly, sir,” said Collyer, and went upstairs to get the weapon.

On his leaving the room, Trixie Collyer asked Vereker . he would like a cup of tea. At the moment, Vereker was longing for tea, and as he looked up at her to thank her for her opportune thought he noticed a strange look of uneasiness on her face. The fact at once fired his interest, but excusing herself, she disappeared into the kitchen to make the tea. A few minutes later, Collyer returned to the sitting-room and Trixie brought in a laden tray.

“You be wrong this time, Trixie,” said Collyer, addressing her. “I can't lay hands on that Colt pistol. It's not in the drawer you said.”

“That's where it was when I saw it last,” replied the girl, with an air of preoccupation, and turning to Vereker, asked, “Milk and sugar, Mr. Vereker? It's most annoying; we haven't a drop of cream in the house!”

“It's somewhere about the house,” said Collyer, trying to recollect when he had last handled the weapon. “I'll have a good rummage round for it later, and let you have it to-morrow, sir.”

“Thanks very much, Collyer,” replied Vereker. “I hope you'll come across it. You're certain it hasn't left the cottage?”

“Oh, yes, sir, I'm sure of that. I cleaned and oiled it not long ago, and mebbe I put it away careful somewhere else. I don't like American pistols lying about handy. If you don't know 'em, they're nasty things for accidents. It's easy for anybody careless to leave a cartridge in the barrel without knowing it.”

After tea, Vereker thanked the Collyers for their hospitality and, leaving the cottage, started off across the estate for the Nuthill road. On his way he met Basil Ralli making his way up to the cottage.

“Now, Vereker, you mystery-monger, what's the meaning of this?” asked Ralli, laughing and producing a Yale type of key from his pocket. “Fanshaugh handed this back to me about an hour ago and said you had asked him to deliver it to me.”

“So I did. It's Sutton's key to the side door near the gun-room. What did he say? I'm particularly anxious to know.”

“He told me some cock-and-bull story about your finding it on an occasional table in your room at Vesey Manor.”

“I kept him in the dark about the manner and place of its discovery.”

“I know; but the joke is that this is not the key to Sutton's private postern.”

“You've tried it?” asked Vereker eagerly.

“Of course I did. These keys are all very similar to an unpractised eye, and before Fanshaugh left I thought I'd make certain, because the key didn't look like the one I gave you.”

“He underrated my intelligence. I half expected this result,” said Vereker gravely.

“You're sure you've made no mistake?” asked Ralli.

“Certain. I know my Yale key, which is as familiar to me as my own nose—rather more so. Are you perfectly certain you gave me the correct key?”