Trial and Error (17 page)

“Would you advise me to see Palmer's solicitors first or get in touch with Chitterwick?” asked Mr Todhunter humbly.

“Ring up Chitterwick and take him with you. That may make them take you more seriously. Of course you'll have to warn them that you can't prove a word of what you're saying, but that you're doing your best to collect proof; tell them you're ready to be called as a witness at the trial and ask them to cooperate with you in every possible way. They'll be ready enough to use you, even if they do think you're insane. Unless,” added Furze thoughtfully, “counsel advises against calling you at all. Your story sounds so fantastic, you see, that it might do more harm than good. But that all depends how confident they are without it.”

“Yes, I see; thank you very much,” said Mr Todhunter and took his leave.

5

He did not, however, go first of all to the solicitors. He took a taxi up to Maida Vale to keep an appointment he had made before leaving Richmond.

The appointment was with Mrs Farroway.

It was three months since Miss Norwood's death, and as might have been imagined, Mrs Farroway had not allowed them to be wasted. Giving him a week or two to let over the worst of his trouble, she had firmly rejoined her husband, settled up his affairs and carried him back to the north; only to return immediately on the news of her son-in-law's arrest. But this time Farroway was not with her. He was, in fact, in the middle of a nervous breakdown at home. It had come upon him almost at once after he had got back, and in the opinion of Mr Todhunter, when he heard about it over the telephone, it was about the best thing that could have happened to him. At any rate it kept him out of the way and would prevent him from being called as a witness at the trial and, as would be the inevitable consequence, from showing himself up as a bit of a cad and a consummate fool.

Mrs Farroway therefore received Mr Todhunter alone; though Felicity, it was understood, was still in bed in a neighbouring room. The companion with whom she had shared the flat had lately been got rid of, it seemed, and the second bedroom was now Mrs Farroway's whenever she chose to occupy it.

Her first words to Mr Todhunter were not about the tragedy, but of gratitude for what he had done for her daughter.

“God bless my soul!” exclaimed Mr Todhunter. “I'd completely forgotten. The play, yes! Er—is it still running, then?”

“Still running?” Mrs Farroway laughed. “Really, you're a most unusual impresario. It's a success. A tremendous success. And so is Felicity. She's made for life, thanks to you. You really didn't know?”

“I—it escaped my mind to look out for the notices,” apologised Mr Todhunter. “Besides, I was—um—in Borneo.”

“Well, then, all I can say is that we're all very grateful to you, and Felicity will be coming in before you go to thank you herself. And I suppose you realise that you're making a small fortune?”

“A small fortune?” cackled Mr Todhunter. “Indeed, no, I didn't. Am I truly? How exceedingly gratifying. Well, well. That man—what was his name?—Budd, has managed well, then?”

“Mr Budd has been marvellous. He took a lease of the Princess itself from the executors, and . . . oh, but Felicity will tell you all this herself. Now sit down, Mr Todhunter, and tell me what you wanted to see me about.”

Mr Todhunter disposed his uncouth length in a small chair and extended his legs. He put the tips of his fingers together and looked at Mrs Farroway over the top of them.

“You know, of course, that Vincent Palmer is innocent?” he began bluntly enough.

“Yes,” Mrs Farroway replied steadily. “I know that,”

“In fact you know,” Mr Todhunter said firmly, “that it was I who shot Miss Jean Norwood.”

As if to quash any polite protest on Mrs Farroway's part, Mr Todhunter hurriedly waved for silence.

“The matter is too serious to beat about the bush, Mrs Farroway. We must speak openly.
I
killed Miss Norwood, for reasons which still appear to me excellent. I have never regretted it, nor shall I once this wretched trial has been successfully disposed of. But I want you to understand exactly how it came about that so unlikely a person as myself should have committed murder. It was this way.”

Mr Todhunter then explained in full detail his version of the whole affair, from the moment he learned that he could live for only a few months longer until he heard casually from a fellow traveller in Tokyo that Vincent Palmer had been arrested. He blamed himself for the muddle over the revolvers, added an account of his visit to Scotland Yard, mentioned his anxiety lest the aneurism should burst prematurely and forestall his efforts to establish the truth and explained the steps he proposed to take in the immediate future.

“I want you,” he concluded earnestly, “to tell your family what I have just told you; your daughters certainly, your husband, too, unless you think it advisable not to do so. It is only right that they should know; and not merely right but necessary—imperative. You understand?” And Mr Todhunter looked his hostess in the eye.

“I understand,” said Mrs Farroway quietly. “I—” Then, to Mr Todhunter's inexpressible embarrassment, she burst into tears, jumped to her feet, seized Mr Todhunter's hand and kissed it and rushed out of the room. For a normally unemotional woman it was a remarkable display. But then, it was a remarkable occasion.

Mr Todhunter, feeling that his interview with Felicity could well be postponed to another day, bit his nails for a moment in indecision and then grabbed his hat and shambled on tiptoe out of the room, out of the flat and out of the building altogether.

6

“Dear me!” clucked Mr Chitterwick on the telephone. “Oh dear . . . Well, well, well . . . Yes, of course . . . Anything I can do . . . Yes, naturally . . . Dear, dear, dear.”

“You'll come round at once then?” asked Mr Todhunter.

“At once, yes. Dear me, this is dreadful—dreadful.” “Yes, isn't it?” said Mr Todhunter drily and hung up the receiver.

CHAPTER XI

“Dear,
dear!” said Mr Chitterwick, “Dear, dear, dear! Dear,
dear!”

Mr Todhunter looked at him with exasperation. Mr
Chitterwick had been saying little else for the last half-hour. It did not sound
very helpful to Mr Todhunter.

“The bracelet,”
repeated the latter now with scarcely hidden irritation.

“The bracelet, yes.” Mr Chitterwick seemed to pull himself together.
His round, pink, cherubic face settled itself into firmer lines. His plump little
body visibly tautened for action. “The bracelet. Yes, undoubtedly we must
find the bracelet,” said Mr Chitterwick with great firmness.

The two were sitting in Mr Chitterwick's own special room at
Chiswick. Mr Chitterwick lived with an elderly aunt who had once ruled his life with
unremitting severity; but since he had achieved a certain notoriety of his own Mr
Chitterwick had been emboldened to throw off his shackles and had even succeeded in
acquiring a sitting room for his own particular use. Grumbling fiercely and
unceasingly, Mr Chitterwick's ancient aunt had been cajoled or intimidated
into allowing him, too, practically as much liberty as he wanted—which in any
case was not very much.

Mr Chitterwick had called upon Mr
Todhunter in Richmond and had heard the whole distressing story from its outset. He
recalled of course Mr Todhunter's unsuccessful attempts to extract from him
the name of a possible victim and, like Furze, found the affair not altogether
impossible to believe. He had readily undertaken to do what he could towards helping
Mr Todhunter in his remarkable dilemma.

The two had then paid a
solemn visit to Vincent Palmer's solicitors, where they were received by a
desiccated senior partner who seemed to take a great deal of convincing that Mr
Todhunter was really in earnest. Having at last grasped that his visitor's
supreme wish was to get into a dock—any dock—and there plead guilty to
the murder of Miss Norwood, Mr Felixstowe (for such was the desiccated
gentleman's name) had promised readily enough to do all he could to help Mr
Todhunter attain this desire but had been depressingly pessimistic about his
chances. Pointing out that in the absence of all evidence to the truth of a single
word no jury would be likely to acept Mr Todhunter's tale and counsel for the
prosecution would laugh it right out of court, he considered that in view of the
certain severity of the judge's comments Mr Todhunter might well find himself
faced with a prosecution for perjury. Mr Felixstowe had, however, promised to
consult a number of people most carefully upon the advisability of calling such a
possibly dangerous witness, had ventured a preliminary opinion of his own that it
might possibly be better, all things considered, for Mr Todhunter before bursting
his bombshell upon a sceptical world to await the verdict on Palmer which, without
being optimistic, Mr Felixstowe opined might very well prove a favourable one, and,
giving Mr Todhunter a hand like a piece of dried, cold fish, thanked him for coming.
It had in fact been painfully plain that Mr Felixstowe had not believed a single
word of Mr Todhunter's story and considered him at least a fool and possibly
insane. Mr Todhunter did not seem to have much luck with solicitors. He had been so
angry that his aneurism had been once more endangered.

His
temper now, after listening to Mr Chitterwick clucking all the way from
Lincoln's Inn to Chiswick, had scarcely improved.

“Er—lunch,” said Mr Chitterwick, not without relief, as a gong
boomed in the hall outside.

It was not usually the custom for
Mr Chitterwick's aunt to take her meals in the dining room. She preferred a
tray in the study where she passed most of her life, surrounded by her canaries and
her collection of mosses; but on this occasion, supported by her companion, she made
her appearance in the dining room just as Mr Chitterwick had been at some pains to
arrange her tray exactly as she liked it.

“Huh! Begun
already?” said Miss Chitterwick, sniffing the fragrant air. “Might
have waited for me, I should think.” She took no notice of Mr Todhunter at
all.

The companion arranged her in a chair, a process which
entailed much fussing with rugs and voluminous skirts.

“Er—this is Mr Todhunter, Aunt,” said Mr Chitterwick when the
arrangement had been completed.

“What's he
want?” demanded Miss Chitterwick in return, without so much as a glance at Mr
Todhunter.

“He's come to lunch. . . Aren't
you staying, Miss Bell?” added Mr Chitterwick as the faded little lady who
had accompanied Miss Chitterwick was slipping unobtrusively out of the room.

“Don't want her here,” pronounced Miss
Chitterwick. “Spoil the conversation, she would. The gurl can take a tray
into your room for her. Can't trust her in mine. She'd have the place
on fire before you knew where you were. Cut a bit off for her, Ambrose. Not too
much. She don't want much food at her age.”

With
a sickly smile Miss Bell completed her exit. Mr Chitterwick began to carve.

“Committed a murder, have you?” suddenly said Miss
Chitterwick, looking at Mr Todhunter for the first time.

“Er—yes,” agreed Mr Todhunter, feeling like a small boy on the
mat.

“Now, how did you know that, Aunt?” clucked
Mr Chitterwick.

“Listened at the door,” crowed
Miss Chitterwick with relish. “Knew there was something up when you brought
him
here. Whom did you murder, Mr Snodbunting?”

“Really, Aunt!” deprecated Mr Chitterwick.

“I wasn't talking to you, Ambrose. I asked Mr
Snodbunting a question, but it seems he's too high and mighty to answer
it.”

“I—er—I murdered a lady called
Jean Norwood, an actress,” hastily said Mr Todhunter.

“If she's an actress, she ain't a lady,” Miss
Chitterwick corrected him.

“My aunt
hasn't—er—quite got used to modern ways,” Mr Chitterwick
twittered.

“Don't talk stuff and nonsense,
Ambrose,” riposted Miss Chitterwick, incensed. “I say
‘gurl,' don't I? Not ‘gairl' as my mother used to
say. That's modern, ain't it? . . . Was she a lady, Mr
Snodbunting?”

“No,” said Mr
Todhunter.

“There you are, Ambrose! Next time
p'raps you won't try to be so sharp. Here, what's this? Duck?
You know I can't eat duck.”

“I'm
sorry, Aunt. I—”

Miss Chitterwick thrust her
plate in two yellow claws under Mr Todhunter's nose, shaking with rage.
“Look what he's given me! Two little bits not fit to feed a pigeon.
Just so as he could have more for himself. That's Ambrose all over.
Mean!”

“I'm sorry, Aunt. I thought . .
.” Hurriedly Mr Chitterwick laid another slice of breast on the outraged old
lady's plate.

Mollified, she began to eat.

Mr Todhunter thought it best to avoid Mr Chitterwick's
eye.

For a few minutes lunch progressed in silence. Then:

“Why'd yer shoot her?” demanded Miss
Chitterwick, through duck.

Mr Todhunter offered a halting
explanation.

“They goin' to hang yer?”
enquired Miss Chitterwick with zest.

“I'm afraid
not,” mumbled Mr Todhunter.

“Wha'cha mean,
you're afraid not? Should've thought it more likely you'd have
been afraid they would. Hey, Ambrose? What's he mean?”

The two men looked helplessly at each other.

“You pulling my leg?” demanded Miss Chitterwick.

“No, no.” Seeing nothing else for it, Mr Todhunter embarked on his
story once more.

Miss Chitterwick heard him to the diffident
end. Then she turned to her nephew.

“Ought to be in an
asylum,
I
should say.”

“Yes, Aunt,”
agreed Mr Chitterwick meekly.

“That's where they
put people like him when I was a gurl.”

“Yes,
Aunt.”

Mr Todhunter found himself stung into a certain
defiance.

“I suppose you don't believe a word of
what I've been saying?”

Miss Chitterwick looked
at him with her shrewd old eyes. “Oh, Lawks,
I
believe yer.
You're too big a fool to be a good liar.”

“Yes, that's just what I think,” chimed in Mr Chitterwick with
relief. “I mean,” he corrected himself hastily, “I believe Mr
Todhunter too.”

“But there's not many who
will. And no wonder either,” pronounced Miss Chitterwick.

“That—er—is precisely the trouble,”
lamented Mr Todhunter.

“You want to get yerself
hanged?” asked Miss Chitterwick.

“I want to take
the proper responsibility for what I've done and rescue an innocent man,
madam,” returned Mr Todhunter with dignity.

“More
fool you, then,” asserted Miss Chitterwick.

Mr Todhunter
suddenly cackled.

“Yes, but anyhow, taking that for
granted, what would you advise me to do in order to get myself hanged, Miss
Chitterwick?”

“Oh, don't ask me. Better
ask Ambrose. He's the high and mighty one about nowadays,” replied
Miss Chitterwick pettishly.

“But I am asking
you.”

“Oh, you are, are you?” Miss
Chitterwick paused. “Well the noospapers call Ambrose a detective nowadays,
it seems. I suppose they don't know what a guffin he is. So why don't
you ask Ambrose to detect your murder for you? Lawks, any guffin—even
Ambrose—ought to be able to do that when he knows who the murderer
is—hey?”

“Detect it,” echoed Mr
Todhunter, much struck. “From the beginning. Exactly as in an unsolved case.
Why, Miss Chitterwick, that's a very good idea.”

Miss Chitterwick tossed her ancient head and bridled, but from the way in which the
mauve ribbons trembled on her cap her nephew knew that she was pleased; though of
course she would rather have died than admit it.

“Yes,” continued Mr Todhunter. “Of course. That's
exactly what we must do, Chitterwick. That is, if you will be good enough to spare
the time. We must detect the murder together. We must—er—visit the
scene of the crime, no doubt—”

“And try to
find a witness who saw you there that night,” chimed in Mr Chitterwick with
enthusiasm, delighted because his aunt was pleased.

“And
search for my footprints—”

“And
fingerprints—”

“And prove that the case
against Palmer is mistaken—”

“And enquire
who was on the river that night—”

“And
question my servants—”

“And find someone
who heard the shot—”

“And prove my
purchase of the revolver—”

“And draw out a
correct timetable—”

“And trace my progress
step by step—”

“And find the places where
you broke through the hedges—”

“And—good gracious me, of course you're perfectly right, Miss
Chitterwick. We must go about this matter in a methodical way and prove a convincing
case against me. After all, you should be able to do that, Chitterwick, seeing that
you know the murderer.”

“That usual stumbling
block is certainly absent,” beamed Mr Chitterwick.

Mr
Todhunter finished the last morsel of duck on his plate.

“Well,” he remarked with a touch of his old sardonic humour,
“well, I hope you really are a good detective, Chitterwick, for it seems that
I am an unusually skilful murderer. I've baffled the police quite
successfully. I only hope I shall not baffle you too.”

“Surely,” said Mr Chitterwick, “you won't be able to
baffle us both togetht “

Mr Todhunter cackled again. In spite of the gravity
of the situation, the irony tickled him that he should be faced with so much
difficulty in detecting the murder he had planned so long and so carefully.

2

The difficulty was a real one, for the
case against Vincent Palmer was as strong as it was simple. Mr Todhunter and Mr
Chitterwick had learned something of its details from the solicitors for the
defence, and the main lines had of course appeared during the arguments before the
magistrates.

It appeared that the young man had lied when he
told Mr Todhunter, and the police, too, that he had been at home with his wife in
Bromley on the evening of the crime. He had not only been in Richmond, he had been
in the grounds of Miss Norwood's house—or so, at any rate, no less
than three witnesses were ready to swear. These witnesses had heard the sounds of a
quarrel, too, coming from the barn, voices shrill with anger.

Miss Norwood had then come running up to the house in a state of obvious agitation
and, seeing her personal maid, had told her to tell the parlourmaid that no one else
was to be admitted that evening. She returned to the garden and, a few minutes
later, a shot was heard—by the maid, who at that time had her head out of a
window and was listening hopefully for more quarrelling. (Mr Todhunter, remembering
Marie, could well believe this.) She did not recognise the noise as a shot but
thought it a motorboat misfiring on the river.

The glass which
Mr Todhunter so unfortunately had omitted to wipe was the deciding factor in the
case against Palmer. It bore fingerprints which were undoubtedly his. Witnesses may
be mistaken, but here was definite proof that Palmer had not been in Bromley that
evening but in Richmond; so definite that Palmer had been compelled to admit that he
had been there. Why, then, had he lied, if it were not that he had shot Jean
Norwood? That the revolver taken from him bore traces of having been recently fired
was only needed to clinch the case.

In face of this evidence,
Mr Chitterwick felt it necessary to point out that Mr Todhunter's coldblooded
prudence in removing the fatal bullet had been a terrible mistake. The error about
the revolvers would be easily cleared up, for the police would be able to establish
with certainty which one had been purchased by Mr Todhunter through the records of
the gunsmith at whose establishment it had been bought. But only the bullet could
have identified which revolver had killed Miss Norwood.