Death Knocks Three Times (17 page)

“Life’s full of coincidences,” said Crook, comfortingly. “That’s what these highbrow novelists like John Sherren won’t admit. Look here, like me to come around? No, don’t thank me. Pleasure is mine.”

He bounced off in a state of delightful anticipation. He knew there was nothing in it for him at all, but he reminded himself that outsiders do sometimes romp home.

Before John returned to Brakemouth Dr. Munster had made his examination and passed sentence.

“I suppose,” said Miss Pettigrew, with very much the air of being in charge of the situation, “any additional excitement might be responsible for this collapse?”

Dr. Munster, who disliked Miss Pettigrew on sight and saw no reason why he should conceal the fact (she wasn’t a resident and was unlikely to come on his panel under any Social Security measure) said drily: “If you call an overdose of pheno-barbitone additional excitement—well, yes. But I can’t give a certificate, because that’s what she died of, and a coroner will have to establish how she came to take it.”

And off he went, leaving Hammond a prey to the deepest gloom. Miss Pettigrew even more thoughtful than usual, and all the lady residents twittering with a pleasure they hardly tried to conceal. She’d been poisoned, she’d committed suicide, it was a bad conscience, it was history repeating itself; don’t forget her sister, there’s something in heredity after all …

They hadn’t had such a good time since VE Day, when Mr. Hammond had stood everybody a drink in the bar, and served wine with dinner, all free of charge.

I
T WAS becoming quite monotonous. Each time he came back from visiting an aged relative, John Sherren was, as it were, greeted by a summons to attend that relative’s inquest. It had happened in the case of the old Colonel, in the earlier case of unfortunate Isabel Bond, and now, as he lugged his suitcase up Crispin Street, having brought it by bus for economy’s sake as far as the corner, he found his landlady on the doorstep waving a telegram.

Your Aunt Clara collapsed heart failure return immediately. Pettigrew.

“Heart failure,” he repeated, and in a louder tone he added: “I had a hunch something was wrong. She was so very strange last night, as if—as if some spring of action had suddenly run down.”

“She was quite an old lady, wasn’t she? And sometimes it’s a mercy when the call comes before they get helpless. I remember my dear mother …”

“Quite,” said John. “I’m afraid this means I shall have to go back at once.”

Mrs. Pringle laid affectionate hands on his suitcase. “You don’t stir outside of this house without you’ve something in your inside,” she assured him. “We don’t want you fainting by the road and yours is a delicate family, get giddy like your poor Aunt Isabel or took queer like the old lady you’ve just left. There was a telephone call, too, before the telegram, that was.”

“Who did that come from?”

“A Miss Letty Crewe, it sounded like. When Mr. Sherren arrives, says she, speaking ever so short, thought I was the housemaid, I dare say …”

“Quite,” said John who knew his Mrs. Pringle. “What did she say?”

“Same as the telegram. Come back at once, she said, and that’s all very well, I told her, but Mr. Sherren’s a gentleman with important work to do, and if the old lady’s passed on …”

“Quite,” said John for the third time. “Did she actually say that?”

“To tell you the truth she was a bit hard to hear, but I certainly thought she said something about a funeral, so I thought to myself if it’s a funeral someone must be dead, and it isn’t likely …”

“Have you a time-table, Mrs Pringle?” inquired John. His heart was pounding with excitement. “This doesn’t surprise me, doesn’t surprise me at all. I must, of course, return at once.”

“Now, come in, Mr. Sherren, and have a breather. Here’s the kettle boiling away, and here’s the milk and the sugar …”

John found the time-table and began to look up trains. All over, he was thinking, Aunt Clara dead. Of course he must go down, try and get a word with Twemlow. A pity the old chap was always so antagonistic, offensive even … He began to wonder about his own future.

“I’m sure you’re looking as white as a sheet,” said Mrs. Pringle. “Now, plenty of sugar, go on, help yourself, none of that nasty saccharine in this house. How were things in your hotel?” she added jealously.

“I had to have saccharine there,” acknowledged John.

“Didn’t bring any back here, I hope?”

“I threw the empty tube away last night as I came out of the drawing room, I shall have to get some more, though, if I’m going down again.”

“Not you,” said Mrs. Pringle firmly. “You’ll take a nice supply of sugar with you. What you want, Mr. Sherren, is a woman to look after you.”

Wrong, he thought, all wrong. What he wanted was a service flat and a gentleman’s gentleman. He wanted it so much he didn’t observe the odd expression on Mrs. Pringle’s face. She was thinking: There, drat it! Another hint and he’s taken no more notice than a babe unborn. Aloud she said with sudden fierceness: “Who’s this Miss Crewe that rang up?”

“Oh, a buddy of Aunt Clara. A most alarming old woman. I must say if the Amazons looked like that I’m not surprised they defeated their enemies.” He finished his tea, ate one biscuit and hurried upstairs to change his coat for a seemly black one, and put some clean socks and handkerchiefs into a small case. When he came down there was a taxi at the door. He hurled himself into the taxi and was just in time to catch the Brakemouth train. It was a slow one, and he had plenty of time to think. Still, he had plenty to think about, so he didn’t find the journey too long.

At the hotel the tension had increased. After hearing what Dr. Munster had to say, Mr, Hammond very reluctantly communicated with the police. A death in a hotel is unpopular, but a death that is probably going to turn out a suicide is definitely unlucky. For an instant Mr. Hammond thought he’d have preferred murder. There’s less superstition about it, anyway. When the police came they had a word with the doctor, who made it clear he had no time to lose, and had anyway nothing to add to his original blunt statement. He had not seen Miss Bond for nearly a year and presumably she had got no worse during that time since she hadn’t sent for him or any other medical practitioner. The Inspector next asked for John and was a little annoyed to find he wasn’t on the premises. Miss Pettigrew, however, was very competent and made it clear that she regarded the police as employees of the public, from whom reasonable service was to be expected. She told them about

the letters (they found the envelope of the last, which was proof of something though not of what the message contained) and about last night’s bridge party, Mr. Marlowe’s visit, Mr. Sherren’s departure and his warning to her of a change in his aunt’s bearing which occasioned him anxiety.

“You noticed the change yourself, Miss Pettigrew?”

“I can’t say I did. Not particularly last night, I mean. For some time, ever since the letters started arriving, she has been more nervous, more apprehensive than of old. Then, too, I think her sister’s sudden death preyed on her mind, and of course she was by no means a young woman.”

Asked, flat out, if she thought Miss Bond the type to commit suicide. Miss Pettigrew replied forcibly that she should have considered it most unlikely. Questioned about Marlowe, she referred them unhesitatingly to John.

In John’s absence the police decided to examine Roger Marlowe and were considerably put about to find that he also was missing. Potter next came to the rescue with the information that he’d seen the feller go out a while ago. No, not carrying higgage, but looking as if he were in a bit of a hurry. Most hotels have their Commander Potter, who is a mine of the most trivial information concerning the movements and behavior of all the other guests.

Potter was inclined to be upstage with the police, who seemed to blame him for not knowing more of Marlowe’s movements. After all, he protested, there was still a little freedom left in this damned democracy, and surely a chap could go for a walk without filling ij up a form. The police withdrew and called for Major Atkins, but he couldn’t help them much either. He hadn’t known the deceased well, he said, but she’d seemed to him much the same as usual on the previous night. She’d played a devilish good game of bridge and swept the board.

By twelve o’clock Mr. Hammond was beginning to feel anxious. Marlowe had arranged to turn out of his room by midday andl when it came to packing Marlowe’s things, however, all thc| drawers were empty and the solitary shabby suitcase containec practically nothing. Hammond, a man of experience, realized at] once how things were and knew he’d have to cut his losses. Hel did, however, feel an odd twinge, remembering that it was the] dead woman who had, as he understood it, vouched for this scoundrel, and for the first time he began to wonder whether the inquest would be the comparatively simple affair he had at first anticipated. He trembled for the reputation of his beautiful hotel.

John arrived immediately after lunch, having had a very expensive and not very satisfactory meal en route. He hoped for a quiet word with Twemlow, who would presumably have been sent for, and by the time he arrived, the police had their claws thoroughly into John, so that he wriggled like an impaled mouse. When he heard the cause of death he stared at them all in incredulous dismay.

“Pheno-barbitone tablets?” he exclaimed. “Are you—are you sure?”

“Dr. Munster and the police surgeon are in no doubt at all.”

“I thought you could only get those things on a doctor’s prescription.”

“Exactly.”

“You mean, my aunt had a prescription?”

“You didn’t know that, Mr. Sherren?”

“My aunt was not exactly a confiding person. But I can tell you one thing: that is, if you’re interested in a psychological observation.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“If you’ve got any ideas in your head that this might be suicide, you can forget them. My aunt was a very religious woman. Anyway, so far as I’m aware, she had no motive, except, of course, the letters.”

“Which letters would those be, sir?”

“I thought Miss Pettigrew would have told you.”

“There might be more than one set,” the Inspector pointed out.

“By Jove, you’re right. There were.”

“How do you know that?” The Inspector snapped into rigid attention.

“I heard Marlowe—you’ve seen Marlowe, of course? No? That’s damned odd—I came into the drawing room last night in time to hear him say something about his offer remaining open till midday today and something about letters. He was engaged in a way to my Aunt Isabel, you know, but it never came to anything. I suppose he was referring to letters she had written to him.”

“And that’s all you heard?”

“Yes.”

“Mr. Sherren, I understand your aunt asked you to stay with her last night when every one else had retired. Did she have anything special to tell you?”

“She only said this might be her last opportunity. I asked her what she meant by that and she said that at her age and in her state of health it was never safe to count on the future, or words to that effect. No, I don’t recall that she told me anything of importance.”

Questioned more closely, he described as well as he could remember the events of the late evening. “She was very sleepy and somehow seemed broken. I simply thought she’d stayed up too late, but …” He hesitated.

“But you told Miss Pettigrew you expected some development?”

“I asked her to keep in touch. I was Miss Bond’s only living relative.”

“Quite so, Mr. Sherren. But of course you didn’t really anticipate that anything of this kind would happen?”

“How should I?” demanded John quickly. “I’ve told you, she seemed to me very tired and not quite herself. I suppose she was feeling hazy and took an overdose of sleeping tablets—I suppose that’s what she had the stuff for—entirely by accident. Is there any way of checking up on how many she had?”

“We’ve found the little phial in which she kept them. It was in her bag, quite empty.”

“I suppose,” said John carefully, “she took them after she went into her room. She asked me for a glass of water.”

“You didn’t see her take them?”

“No.”

“According to Miss Pettigrew she was one of those people who can’t swallow the smallest pill dry. She had to have water to wash them down. The obvious thing would be to put the pellets into the water and drink it off.”

“Probably she did, then.” John was looking both puzzled and wary.

“In that case there should be traces of the pheno-barbitone in the glass, but there are none. On the other hand, Mr. Sherren, thanks to the upset this affair has caused on the premises, the domestic routine is rather confused, and in consequence we were able to

examine the tray of cups used by Miss Bond’s party for their tea last night. One of those cups contains a sediment that has been identified as pheno-barbitone.”

John saw what the Inspector was driving at. He was a novelist to whom almost all things were possible, but even he drew the line at suggesting that a lady intending to commit suicide would take her fatal dose around a tea-table with three people looking on. And yet, wasn’t that just the sort of trick Aunt Clara might play? And how monstrous that on this night of all nights the cups should not have been washed? He said lamely: “It must have been an accident.”

“A very queer sort of accident,” suggested the Inspector. His next question gave John a worse shock than ever. “Mr. Sherren, have you any pheno-barbitone in your possession?”

“I?” John’s voice squeaked like a slate pencil. “Of course not. Why should I? I never require sleeping pills.”

“Then do you know what it looks like? You’ve seen it, I dare say.”

“No. No. Not so far as I recall.”

“It’s a very small pill; it might by the careless or the uninitiated be confounded with saccharine.”

“Saccharinel” John drew a deep breath. They’d got there now. Then he babbled eagerly: “Of course it was an accident. It’s easy to see now how it happened. She must have put it in her tea thinking it was saccharine …”

But the Inspector countered that with a stern: “I understand Miss Bond always had sugar supplied by the management. She didn’t take it for herself.”