A Question of Proof (11 page)

‘Follow that car,’ shouted the superintendent, ‘he can’t get away for long, but the sooner we catch him, the better.’

Hero bundled into the back seat, where Strangeways took her arm in the most friendly and reassuring way, remarking, ‘I seem to have plunged
in medias res
, as you might say.’ Michael jumped the car forward in second, skidded neatly between a bus and a sandwich man at the corner, and hurled them in a series of swoops and jerks through the traffic of the High Street. ‘O death,’ sang Strangeways, in a raucous baritone, ‘how bitter art thou to him that liveth in peace, to him that hath joy in his possessions and liveth free from trouble.’ The broad back of the Daimler slipped coyly round a corner, fifty yards ahead, its red rear lamp winking an offensive challenge. Michael changed down at forty, the car swayed and seemed to hang like a lift at the bottom of its descent, then he accelerated into the side street and was confronted by a level crossing, with the gates just beginning to close. Michael in control of a fast car was a person in whom one would scarcely recognise the decorous, slightly neurotic schoolmaster of Sudeley Hall. He put his car at the gates like a seasoned huntsman. Nigel murmured to Hero:

‘Does your vehicle jump?’ Then gently closed his eyes as they rocked over the metals with the gates scraping and jarring at their rear wings. The superintendent shot an apprehensive glance at Michael, but he was staring ahead, smiling serenely, apparently not contemplating further addition to his tale of victims.

They were out in the country now, drumming in third up a long incline. Trees pounced at them and withdrew, hedges moved endlessly past like conveyor belts, the tyres purred on a different road surface, and the Daimler kept its distance. They bucketed over the top and a steep hill fell away at their feet. Michael went down it like an airplane diving. The speedometer needle surged up from fifty to sixty, to seventy, to seventy-five. Armstrong, putting his head outside, found his eyelids fluttered up and down by the wind’s pressure. The Daimler looked bigger now, and they could see the figure inside bumping up and down hunched over the wheel. Strangeways held Hero closer, remarked that this was better than the movies and began singing an aria from ‘Israel in Egypt.’ Hero’s golden hair was floating above her head as though she were sitting over an electric fan, her eyes were sparkling and her mouth curved ecstatically. Even the superintendent forgot his fright in the general excitement, and to the astonishment of the company began to deliver hunting cries in a high tenor.

A red triangle flicked past; a blind crossroads ahead. The Daimler was over them. A baby Austin nosed out from behind a barn on the right; the owner gave a startled glance at the projectile leaping at him down the hill, flurried with his hands, and stopped almost in the middle of the crossroads. Michael’s left hand dropped on the brake and his right forced the wheel steadily over to the right. They swung behind the tail of the Austin, then Michael jerked the wheel to the left
and
braked hard. The tires screamed, a wall sprang at the right side of the car, seemed to halt in midspring as Michael put the wheel right over again, was snatched away. They were through.

‘Michael
darling
!’ said Hero.

‘God’s truth!’ said Nigel.

‘Well done, sir,’ said the superintendent, opening his eyes again, then pointed ahead. The Daimler was lurching from side to side of the road like a maddened bull. Urquhart must have fatally glanced back, expecting his pursuers to be smashed at the crossroads. A tyre burst. The Daimler went off at a tangent into the ditch. Her huge body pirouetted on its front wheels, was tossed up into the air like a toy, twirled over the hedge, and fell devastatingly into the field beyond, jerking clear a small black figure, a suitcase and several cushions, which came to earth scattered and severally, as though vomited out of a volcano. They all listened, expecting to hear the dreadful thump of the body, though even the Daimler’s crash had been scarcely audible through the roar of their own engine. When the body dropped out of sight behind the hedge, they winced and felt as if they were going to be hit hard in the wind. Michael pulled up and scrambled with the superintendent into the field. The Daimler looked like a scrap-heap. Urquhart, too, was in a sorry mess, but a bush had broken his fall and he was not dead. They got him quickly into the nearest village, where a doctor attended him till the ambulance came from Staverton.

Armstrong proposed to remain by Urquhart’s bedside in the hospital till he recovered consciousness; if he ever should. But he thanked Michael, a little awkwardly, for his help and promised to come up to the school that evening if he could, and tell them all about it.

‘Is he – James – the man, the one you’re looking for?’ said Hero, as Armstrong was preparing to depart.

‘Well, no, he’s not the murderer, ma’am. At least, I should be very surprised if – but if he ever gets over this, he’ll see the inside of a prison all right, I can promise you that.’

With this they had to rest contented for seven hours or so. After dinner that night, when the headmaster and his wife, Michael and Nigel were discussing the affair in the drawing room, the superintendent was announced. He walked gravely up to Percival Vale, ‘I’m afraid this will be a terrible shock to you, sir. Mr. Urquhart is dead. Before he died he made a confession. One which, I may say, confirmed my own theory about him. He had been playing fast and loose with your nephew’s fortune. He had appropriated a considerable part of it from time to time for his own uses, then speculated, unsuccessfully, in an attempt to make good the estate. I think he knew that I suspected this, for when I went to interview him this morning he sent in a message that he would see me in five minutes, and he spent those five minutes in collecting whatever remained and was accessible of Master Wemyss’ property. I had posted a plainclothes man
at
the door, but he got past him. For the rest we have to thank Mrs. Vale for her car and Mr. Evans for his fine driving.’

The headmaster sank into a chair, his face was buried in his trembling hands, and Armstrong could only guess what emotions were being concealed. He went on:

‘And, of course, that means that the murderer is still at large. Mr. Urquhart would be the last person to kill the boy, since his death would inevitably lead to his own immediate exposure. I take it that you had no suspicion of what was going on, Mr. Vale?’

The headmaster raised the face of one who saw the last props of a shaken world give way, ‘It can be scarcely necessary for me to say that I had no idea of it,’ he answered hopelessly.

‘I have a reason for asking the question, sir,’ said Armstrong, and proceeded to relate the incident of the anonymous note which had brought the solicitor to Edgworth Wood. ‘You see,’ he explained, ‘I couldn’t imagine what would induce Mr. Urquhart to keep such an unprofessional appointment, unless he himself had something on his conscience and the note referred to it. Now that we know he
had
something on his conscience, we can infer that the writer of the note must have known of it or guessed it –’

‘It might have been a shot in the dark,’ interrupted Strangeways.

‘That is barely possible, of course. Do you know of anyone who would be likely to have discovered Mr.
Urquhart’s
frauds, sir? Anyone, that is, who also had personal connection with your nephew?’

‘No.’

‘That is a pity, sir, because there doesn’t seem much doubt that a person who fulfils those two qualifications wrote the note, and the person who wrote the note was the murderer.’

VII

About it and About

THE NEXT DAY
Strangeways spent in getting the feel of the place, as he put it. He had a great advantage over the superintendent here; not only was he understood to be ‘on our side,’ for so the common room looked upon it, but he had an uncanny knack for fitting into the different kinds of circles and societies into which his profession brought him. He did this, not as most ‘mixers’ do, by altering himself to suit the environment, or by any apparent exercise of social tact. It was his obvious and genuine interest in the person he was talking to – a far more sincere form of flattery than imitation – that was his passport to so many differing types of individual. This interest was actually far less flattering to the individual than it seemed on the surface, for it proceeded from scientific and not sentimental curiosity, but its ultimately impersonal nature was concealed by Strangeways’ personal vitality and good manners, and very few of those who were subjects of it realised that they were dealing with a kind of human microscope.

Let us follow him as he steers an erratic, seemingly
aimless
course through a school day. He has had breakfast with the staff. Work has begun. He moves slowly down the corridor between classrooms, as Michael did three days before. First on the left, the headmaster taking Latin. The real, genuine old pedagogue’s voice, matured in the wood, snapping and buzzing away like electric sparks in a tense, strained silence. That man, thinks Nigel, has not passion enough for one kind of murder, and surely his mind is too complacent and academic for the other. The school is the symbol and vindication of his own ego. His reaction to the crime, Hero and Michael agree, is a feeling that his life work had been badly damaged; a kind of blow, not simply at his reputation, but at himself. That feeling is real, not assumed; I can see that for myself. It is unthinkable that such a man, in order to get hold of a property which he does not need, would commit a murder bound to damage the school and therefore to violate his own ego.

He moved on. Gadsby. A common enough type. Good-looking once, the life and soul of the party, a great success in a small, mentally confined circle. And then he grows older, loses his looks and youthful zest, the circle is broken up and he is left defenceless. There remains drink; ‘love affairs’; some kind of drug to make him forget his losses. He is almost burnt out, a bonhomous automaton. Almost burnt out, but perhaps not quite. The sort of person who might be found mixed up in one of these squalid
‘crimes
passionnels.’ The sort to commit murder from fright, not for revenge. Wonder how he supports this monastic life. He doesn’t talk to the boys like a homosexual, repressed or otherwise. I must have a look at the servants, that was a handsome wench waiting at breakfast.

A devilish hubbub broke into his thoughts. He moved over to the door on his right whence it proceeded, murmuring, ‘
Mon Dieu, quel hulerberlu! Quel
, I might even say,
tohu-bohu
!’ Feet were clattering on desks, books falling, or, more likely, being thrown, hoots, groans and scuffles. A jerky, ineffectual voice said, ‘Stop this noise, won’t you! You two, sit down at once. What’s all this disturbance about?’

‘Please, sir, Pompo’s lizard has escaped. Wooh! Look out, sir, it’s going up your trouser leg.’

‘Lizard? What on earth are you talking about?’

‘Don’t you know what a lizard is, sir? A reptilian quadruped, common in tropical regions, with a long tail, and knobs on.’ ‘Ponsonby, none of your insolence or I’ll report you to Mr. Vale. Now then, Bastin, what’s all this about your filthy lizard?’ ‘Sir, he’s not filthy, sir, his name is Gloucestershire, because he’s got a long tail, you see, sir.’

‘Chew yourself, Pomps. We beat your mouldy old Middlesex anyway.’

The anguished voice of Sims blurted out again. It was just like a sheep strayed on the mountains, Nigel thought. ‘The next boy who talks without permission will be kept in this afternoon. Now then, what do you
mean
by bringing a lizard into form?’ Dead silence. ‘Will you answer me at once.’

‘Please, sir, you didn’t give me permission to speak.’ Sims laughed, an uncertain, would-be ingratiating laugh, ‘The point is well taken. You may speak.’

‘Well, sir, he was so lonely by himself in my desk – oh corks! Look out, you chaps, he’s trying to get under the door!’ There was a trebly increased rumpus, several bodies crashed against the door, then an angry wail arose, ‘Curse you, Stevens II, you’ve pulled its tail off! I’ll give you such a conk on the nut.’ ‘I’m frightfully sorry, Pompo. It just cime awiy in me ’and: ‘oh, you would, would you?’ Crash, bang, thump, screech. Strangeways moved off at a brisk walk, as he heard the headmaster’s door opening, and stopped again at a discreeter distance. Mr. Vale entered the inferno. Medusa herself could not have had a more petrifying effect, ‘The whole of this form will stay in this afternoon and write out lines for me. You three, Stevens II., Bastin and Ponsonby, will also come to my study at twelve-forty-five for a thrashing. A word with you, please, Mr. Sims.’ Strangeways moved hurriedly into the common room while the outraged headmaster swept past, towing Sims, as pale as dead Hector, at his chariot wheels. Strangeways unashamedly put his head to the study door and heard a dressing-down which made his ears tingle. Poor little devil, he thought, no one has ever given him a chance. Just like Vale to take up this line with him. Sarcasm, biting contempt, talking to him like he talks to one of
the
boys. Of course, Vale is really angry, indiscipline lets down the school; ergo, is an insult to himself. My hat, though, if anyone spoke to me like that 1’d break his head. But Sims is too crushed for that; the slave mentality. Chock-full of inferiority feeling no doubt. The way the boys seem to treat him would do it alone. Is there a point at which such slaves rebel? I wonder does a worm turn, in actual fact. Must find out whether Wemyss was numbered amongst his oppressors.

Sims returned, flushed and shaken, to his classroom, and Strangeways resumed his promenade. He smiled involuntarily as he stood outside Griffin’s door. He was teaching history, Nigel realised at last, full of flagrant inexactitudes and gross caricatures of eminent personages. Nigel left him as Henry the Eighth, decapitating wives right and left with a ruler. There was enormous competition amongst his form for the place of honour on the block. No, if murder is there, thought Nigel, I’ll eat all my hats and join the nudists. He moved further down the passage. Tiverton’s room. There was order here, but maintained at the cost of incessant nervous effort. The boys answered questions in respectful enough tones, but one felt that they would break out if the master let up his nervous pressure for a moment. There was no real sympathy between him and his pupils; they were not even united by the bond of fear, like the headmaster and his. I doubt if Tiverton is in the right job; he has enthusiasm, but no channel to communicate it here.
Might
have made a good scientist if he’d had more brains, or an expert connoisseur, perhaps, if he’d had the money. Murder? I doubt it. Too spinsterish and comfort-loving. I imagine he’s got a soft centre, too. But not absolutely off the cards.