Timetable of Death (27 page)

‘Why?’

‘You knocked me out with your truncheon.’

‘No, I didn’t.’

‘First of all, you threatened me, then – when I took no notice – you waited for your moment and attacked me in the churchyard.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Don’t lie, Hockaday. You know what you did. Dr Hadlow found some splinters from your truncheon in the wound. How do you explain that?’

‘I don’t
need
to explain it,’ said the other, trenchantly. ‘Wait here a moment.’

Hockaday went into the back room and could be heard rummaging around. When he returned, he was carrying a bunch of keys and a truncheon. He handed the latter to Conway.

‘Show me where the splinters could have come off,’ he challenged.

The reporter inspected the truncheon. It was exactly as Colbeck had described, hard, shiny and of the stipulated length. The wood had not splintered anywhere. It was certainly not the blunt object that had smashed into Conway’s skull. Doubts began to ripple in his mind. His assumption had been too hasty. With a murmured apology, he handed the truncheon back. Hockaday bent down behind the counter to retrieve something. When he stood up again, he was holding a stout length of timber with a jagged end.

‘This is what might have hit you, Mr Conway.’

‘Where did you get that?’

‘I took it off a man I arrested last night. He was rolling drunk and waving this around in the air.’ He put the weapon down. ‘Come with me.’

He took the reporter out of the shop and along the road to the local lock-up. Finding the right key, he inserted it in the lock then opened the heavy metal door. Half-asleep and smelling of beer, Bert Knowles peered at them through one eye.

‘This place stinks,’ he complained.

‘You brought the stink with you, Bert. Why did you hit Mr Conway?’

‘Who?’

‘He was attacked in the churchyard last night.’

‘Yes,’ said Knowles, grappling with a vague memory. ‘I filled in thar grave yest’day and I finds some bugger playin’ with the earth. Nobody was goin’ to ruin another grave o’ mine so I bashed ’im good and proper.’

‘This is the gentleman you bashed,’ said Hockaday, indicating Conway. ‘You’ll be had up for assault, Bert.’

‘T’were only a tap.’

‘Oh, no it wasn’t,’ said Conway, removing his hat to reveal the bandaging. ‘You cracked my head open, Mr Knowles.’

‘Serves yer right for messin’ wi’ my grave.’

Knowles broke wind with thunderous effect and burst out laughing. Closing the door, Hockaday locked it and turned to his companion.

‘I told you so, Mr Conway. It wasn’t me.’

He offered his hand. The two men would never like each other but that was not the point at issue. Conway had made an unfounded allegation. The extended palm was a sign that Hockaday was ready to forget the whole thing. Conway reached out and they exchanged a handshake. Inside the lock-up, Knowles began to kick the door mutinously and demand to be let out. The two men walked away.

In the privacy of their room, Colbeck studied the notes he’d made throughout the day spent in Derbyshire. Madeleine looked on fondly as he went over and over the evidence he and Leeming had gathered. In the end, he sat back in his chair and ran a hand through his hair. She crossed over to him.

‘It’s not often that you’re baffled, Robert.’

‘We’ve taken too many wrong turnings.’

‘You always say that’s unavoidable.’

‘It is, Madeleine. Detection is a case of trial and error. So far, I have to admit, there’s been rather too much error.’

‘You should have visited Derby Works earlier,’ she suggested, ‘then you’d have seen that roundabout. Better still, you should have remembered my painting of the Roundhouse in Camden. That might have alerted you.’

‘It might indeed. But I’m not despondent,’ he said, getting up. ‘In fact, I feel remarkably optimistic this morning. We’re almost within touching distance of solving this murder.’

‘Does that mean an arrest is in the offing?’

‘Who knows? There may be more than one.’

‘You think it was the work of accomplices?’

‘Anything is possible, Madeleine,’ he explained. ‘I’ve just been going through the things that bother me about this case.’

‘What are they?’

‘Well, that top hat keeps worrying me. Why would anyone wish to steal an unusually tall top hat?’ He gave a short laugh. ‘Was the thief a very short man who wishes to appear of more normal height?’

‘It may not have been stolen. It could just have been thrown away.’

‘Then someone would have found it.’

‘Not if it was deliberately hidden.’

‘Thieves don’t discard or conceal assets. That hat was expensive. The least he would have done was to get good money from a pawnbroker. No,’ he decided, ‘the man still
has it, either as a souvenir or for some other reason.’

‘What else bothers you, Robert?’

He smiled sadly. ‘It’s the fact that I’m embroiled in a murder case when I’d rather be showing my dear wife the delights of Derbyshire. You’d love Melbourne Hall, and the countryside around it is breathtaking.’

‘All you have to is to arrange for the prime minister to invite us there.’

‘Oh, I don’t think that’s a possibility,’ he said with a laugh. ‘If I arrest his head gardener, Lord Palmerston is going to be exceedingly annoyed with me.’

‘
Are
you going to arrest him?’

‘I think that I probably shall. Gerard Burns was in the vicinity of Spondon on the night when the murder took place. He’s admitted that he visited a friend but refuses to divulge a name. His alibi is therefore unreliable.’

‘He does sound like the culprit, Robert.’

‘Superintendent Tallis met him and felt convinced he was our prime suspect. Mr Quayle, you must remember, was killed by a corrosive poison that contained elements from a weedkiller favoured by Burns.’

‘It was ministered by injection, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘but the victim had been given a sedative beforehand. Where could Burns have got the sedative and how could he get hold of a syringe? They’re not the kinds of things you’d find in a garden shed, are they?’

‘So where
could
they be found?’

Grouped around the bed, they were in a solemn mood. It was very close to the end. Harriet Quayle was fading away before their eyes. On the eve of her husband’s funeral,
she was about to join him. Stanley’s face was a mask of grief, Agnes’s eyes were moist and Lucas, wrestling with his own emotions, put an arm around his younger sister to steady her. Lydia stood apart from them, sad, lonely, out of place, yet glad that she was there at the moment of death.

The doctor opened the bedside drawer and took out a small black case, lifting the lid to reveal a syringe.

‘Nature is providing its own sedative now,’ he said, softly. ‘I could inject her again if you wish, but – quite frankly – it would be too late. I’m afraid that we must all prepare ourselves for the inevitable.’

He answered the summons at once. When Colbeck was told that someone had come to the hotel in search of him, he thanked the messenger then descended the stairs to the foyer. Waiting beside the reception desk, to his amazement, was Gerard Burns.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asked.

‘I thought I’d save you the trouble of coming to Melbourne again.’

‘That’s very considerate of you, Mr Burns. Are you also going to save me the trouble of proving your guilt by making a confession?’

‘It is a confession of sorts, Inspector.’

‘Let me hear it in private, then.’

The lounge was fairly empty and they sat in armchairs that were well away from the few other occupants. Burns needed time to gather his thoughts. Colbeck could see that his visitor had ridden to Derby. He wore riding boots and had the dishevelled look of someone who’d been in the
saddle on a windy day for a length of time. Tucked into the side of one boot was a riding crop.

Colbeck spread his arms. ‘What have you come to tell me?’

‘I was less than honest with you, I’m afraid.’

‘We all know that, especially Superintendent Tallis. You were lucky that he didn’t haul you off to the police station. He’s convinced that you’re our man.’

‘Then he’s wrong, sir. I’m not.’

‘I thought you came to confess.’

‘The confession is not about me, Inspector,’ said Burns, uneasily. ‘It’s about someone else.’

‘Is it the person you spent time with on the night of the murder?’

‘Yes, it is.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

‘He’s a good friend, sir, and I didn’t want to let him down. When we met here in Derby that night, he made me swear that I’d never tell a soul about it. To be honest, I couldn’t see why but I gave him my word nevertheless. And I’ve kept it.’

‘Why have you changed your mind?’

‘You and the superintendent have been breathing down my neck.’

‘Oh, so it’s a case of survival, is it?’ said Colbeck. ‘In order to save your own skin, you’re ready to incriminate a friend.’

‘No,’ replied Burns with passion, ‘that’s not why I’m here. He has nothing to do with the murder. The reason he didn’t want me to breathe a word of our meeting is that he was frightened it might cost him his job.’

‘Why should it do that?’

‘If it got back to his employer, my friend could have been dismissed.’

‘Why should the employer want to dismiss him?’

‘It’s because of
me
, sir. He didn’t know that we’d stayed in touch but we did. As it was, of course, my friend was in the clear but we didn’t know that at the time.’

‘I’m not sure that I follow you, Mr Burns.’

‘He worked for Mr Quayle. A dead man can’t give you the sack.’

Colbeck’s mind was racing. He thought about two young men who excelled at cricket and had been drawn together. He remembered thinking how the pair of them would bond easily and spend free time together whenever they could.

‘You’re talking about the coachman, aren’t you?’

‘That’s right, sir – John Cleary.’

Harriet Quayle’s death was slow, gentle and uneventful. She just passed away before their eyes. They had been ready for it for so long that there was no outpouring of grief. Each of them contained his or her own sorrow and watched as the doctor examined their mother. He confirmed her death with a faint nod. Lydia shed the first tears. Unable to mourn a murdered father, she was moved by the loss of her mother.

Within minutes, the news reached the servants below stairs and they expressed themselves with less restraint. A beloved mistress had been taken from them. Their weeping and moaning soon bordered on hysteria. John Cleary stayed long enough to comfort some of the women. When the wailing eventually gave way to maudlin reminiscences, he
took his leave and went off to his room above the stables. The coachman had his own reasons for mourning the loss of a woman he liked and respected. Kneeling beside a wooden chest, he took out a key and used it to open the chest. Cleary then reached in and took out a tall, cylindrical hat. He then placed it gently on his head as if crowning himself.

It was rare that Victor Leeming was able to gather such comprehensive evidence in so short a period. When he caught the train, he was still congratulating himself on his success. The sense of triumph lasted all the way to Derby and made the journey seem ridiculously short. Alighting from his compartment, he expected to take a cab to the hotel so that he could pass on the fruits of his research. But he got no further than a dozen yards along the platform before Colbeck stepped out to greet him.

‘Welcome back, Victor!’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Was your visit a profitable one?’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Leeming. ‘I’ve so much to tell you, sir.’

‘Get back onto the train and I’ll be happy to listen to it.’

Leeming was taken aback. ‘Where are we going?’

‘We’re off to Nottingham to make an arrest.’

They found an empty compartment and jumped into it. Saving his own news, Colbeck asked for details of the evidence that Leeming had managed to gather.

‘It was as you suspected, sir,’ explained the sergeant. ‘I found a number of occasions when Mr Quayle and Mrs Peet visited Christie’s together. Each of them not only bought items at the same auctions, they had them delivered to the same hotel.’

‘Which one?’

‘It was Brown’s Hotel in Albemarle Street. The manager wouldn’t let me see the booking register at first but he changed his mind when I told him that we’d discuss the matter at Scotland Yard.’

‘What did you discover?’

‘The two names cropped up time and again, sir. Mr Quayle and Mrs Peet stayed there – in separate rooms – when no auctions were being held at Christie’s. It was obviously their meeting place.’

‘You’ve done very well, Victor.’

‘It was your idea to look more closely at Mrs Peet.’

‘But it was Mr Haygarth who supplied the information about her obsession with oriental porcelain. He’d seen her collection at the house and had heard her praise the auction house which she patronised. Haygarth also told me what a handsome woman she’d been.’

‘She was a handsome woman with a much older husband.’

‘Significantly, Mr Peet had no interest at all in her collection. He once told Haygarth that china was something that ought to be used and not put on display in glass-fronted cabinets. But he loved his wife,’ Colbeck went on, ‘so he indulged her. At some point, Mrs Peet met a man with the same love of porcelain as herself. That friendship developed to the point where they had clandestine trysts.’

‘Now we
know
what he was doing in Spondon that night.’

‘He wanted to see the plot where her body was to be laid. If he’d turned up at the funeral, his presence would have been noted. The visit had to be surreptitious.’

‘How did he actually get to the village, sir?’

‘Thanks to Gerard Burns, I finally worked that out.’

‘Has he given himself away?’

‘No, Victor – without realising it, he’s just handed his friend a death sentence.’

Leeming was bemused. ‘So who are we going to arrest?’

‘It’s Mr Quayle’s coachman – John Cleary.’