Have His Carcase (16 page)

Harriet came in, and agreed that the water was cold and the wind icy.

Agreed on this point, they returned to the Flat-Iron, and felt their way carefuly

round it. Presently Wimsey, who had been doing some under-water

investigation on the Wilvercombe side of the rock, came out, spluttering, and

asked if Harriet had come down on that side or on the other to hunt for the

razor.

‘On the other,’ said Harriet. ‘It was like this, I was up on top of the rock

with the body, like this.’ She climbed out, walked up to the top of the rock, and

stood shivering in the wind. ‘I looked round on both sides of me like this.’

‘You didn’t look down in this direction, by any chance?’ inquired Wimsey’s

head, standing up sleek as a seal’s out of the water.

‘No, I don’t think so. Then, after I’d fussed about with the corpse a bit, I got

down this way. I sat on something just about here and took my shoes and

stockings off and tucked my things up. Then I came round in this direction and

groped about under the rock. There was about eighteen inches of water then.

There are about five feet now, I should think.’

‘Can you—?’ began Wimsey. A wave slopped suddenly over his head and

extinguished him. Harriet laughed.

‘Can you see me?’ he went on, blowing the water out of his nostrils.

‘I can’t. But I heard you. It was very amusing.’

‘Wel, restrain your sense of humour. You can’t see me.’

‘No. There’s a bulge in the rock. Where, exactly, are you, by the way?’

‘Standing in a nice little niche, like a saint over a cathedral door. It’s just

about the size of a coffin. Six feet high or thereabouts, with a pretty little roof

and room to squeeze in rather tightly sideways, if you’re not what the Leopard

caled “too vulgar big”. Come round and try it for yourself.’

‘What a sweet little spot,’ said Harriet, scrambling round and taking

Wimsey’s place in the niche. ‘Beautifuly screened from al sides, except from

the sea. Even at quite low tide one couldn’t be seen, unless, of course,

somebody happened to come round and stand just opposite the opening. I

certainly didn’t do that. How horrible! The man must have been in here al the

time.’

‘Yes, I think it’s more plausible than the boat idea.’

‘Bright!’ said Harriet.

‘I’m so glad you think so.’

‘I didn’t mean that – and it was my idea in the first place. I meant Bright, the

man who bought the razor. Didn’t the hairdresser person say he was a smal

man – smaler than you, anyway?’

‘So he did. One up to you. I wish we could get hold of Bright. I wonder –

Oh, I say! I’ve found something!’

‘Oh, what?’

‘It’s a ring – the sort of thing you tie boats up to, driven right into the rock.

It’s under water and I can’t see it properly, but it’s about five feet off the

ground and it feels smooth and new, not corroded. Does that help with our

boat-theory at al, I wonder?’

‘Wel,’ said Harriet, looking round at the lonely sea and shore, ‘there doesn’t

seem to be much reason why anyone should habitualy tie a boat up here.’

‘There doesn’t. In that case the murderer, if there was one—’

‘We’re taking him for granted, aren’t we?’

‘Yes. He may have put this here for his own private use. Either he tied a boat

up, or he—’

‘Or he didn’t.’

‘I was going to say, used it for something else, but I’m dashed if I know

what.’

‘Wel, that’s fearfuly helpful. I say, I’m getting cold. Let’s swim about a bit,

and then get dressed and discuss it.’

Whether it was the swim or the subsequent race over the sands to get warm

that stimulated Harriet’s brain is not certain, but when they were again sitting by

the lunch-basket, she found herself ful of ideas.

‘Look here! If you were a murderer, and you saw an interfering woman

pottering about among the evidence and then going off in search of help, what

would you do?’

‘Leg it in the opposite direction.’

‘I wonder. Would you? Wouldn’t you like to keep an eye on her? Or

possibly even do away with her? You know, it would have been fearfuly easy

for Bright – if we may cal him so for the moment – to slaughter me then and

there.’

‘But why should he? Of course he wouldn’t. He was trying to make the

murder look like suicide. In fact, you were a very valuable witness for him.

You’d seen the body and you could prove that there realy was a body, in case

of its subsequently getting lost. And you could prove that there actualy was a

weapon there and that therefore suicide was more likely than not. And you

could swear to the absence of footprints – another point in favour of suicide.

No, my dear girl, the murderer would cherish you as the apple of his eye.’

‘You’re right; he would. Always supposing he wanted the body found. Of

course there are lots of reasons why he should want it found. If he inherited

under a wil, for instance, and had to prove the death.’

‘I don’t fancy friend Alexis wil have left much in his wil. In fact, I’m pretty

sure he didn’t. And there might be other reasons for wanting to tel the world he

was dead.’

‘Then you think that when I’d gone, the murderer just trotted off home to

Lesston Hoe? He can’t have gone the other way, unless he deliberately kept

behind me. Do you think he did that? He may have folowed me up to see what

I was going to do about it.’

‘He might. You can’t say he didn’t. Especialy as you left the main road quite

soon after, to go up to the farm.’

‘Suppose he missed me there and went on ahead of me along the road to

Wilvercombe. Would it be possible to find out if he had passed over the level-

crossing at the Halt, for instance? Or – I say! Suppose he’d gone along the

main road and then turned back again, so as to pretend he’d come from

Wilvercombe?’

‘Then you’d have met him.’

‘Wel, suppose I did?’

‘But – oh! lord, yes – Mr What’s-his-name from London! By Jove!’

‘Perkins. Yes. I wonder. Could anybody be genuinely as foolish as Perkins

appeared? He was a rat of a man, too, quite smal, and he
was
sandy-haired.’

‘He was short-sighted, didn’t you say, and wore glasses. Merryweather

didn’t say anything about Bright’s wearing them.’

‘It may have been a disguise. They may have been quite plain glass – I didn’t

examine them, à la Dr Thorndyke, to see whether they reflected a candle-flame

upside-down or right way up. And, you know, I do think it’s awfuly funny the

way Mr Perkins simply evaporated when we got to the vilage shops. He was

keen enough to come with me before, and then, just as I’d got into touch with

civilisation, he went and vanished. It does look queer. If it was Bright, he might

just have hung round to get some idea of what I was going to say to the police,

and then removed himself before the inquiry. Good lord! Fancy me, meekly

trotting along for a mile and a half hand in hand with a murderer!’

‘Juicy,’ said Wimsey, ‘very juicy! We’l have to look more carefuly into Mr

Perkins. (Can that name be real? It seems almost too suitable.) You know

where he went?’

‘No.’

‘He hired a car in the vilage and got himself driven to Wilvercombe railway

station. He is thought to have taken a train to somewhere, but the place was ful

of hikers and trampers and trippers that day, and so far they haven’t traced him

further. They’l have to try again. This thing is getting to look almost too neat.

Let’s see how it goes. First of al, Alexis arrives by the 10.15 at the Halt and

proceeds on foot or otherwise, to the Flat-Iron. Why, by the way?’

‘To keep an appointment with Perkins, presumably. Alexis wasn’t the sort to

take a long country walk for the intoxicating pleasure of sitting on a rock.’

‘True, O Queen. Live for ever. He went to keep an appointment with

Perkins at two o’clock.’

‘Earlier, surely; or why arrive by the 10.15?’

‘That’s easy. The 10.15 is the only train that stops there during the morning.’

‘Then why not go by car?’

‘Yes, indeed. Why not? I imagine it was because he had no car of his own

and didn’t want anybody to know where he was going.’

‘Then why didn’t he hire a car and drive it himself?’

‘Couldn’t drive a car. Or his credit is bad in Wilvercombe. Or – no!’

‘What?’

‘I was going to say: because he didn’t intend to come back. But that won’t

work, because of the return-ticket. Unless he took the ticket absentmindedly,

he
did
mean to come back. Or perhaps he just wasn’t certain about it. He

might take a return-ticket on the off-chance – it would only be a matter of a few

pence one way or the other. But he couldn’t very wel just take a hired car and

leave it there.’

‘N-no. Wel, he could, if he wasn’t particular about other people’s property.

But I can think of another reason for it. He’d have to leave the car on top of the

cliff where it could be seen. Perhaps he didn’t want people to know that

anybody was down on the Flat-Iron at al.’

‘That won’t do. Two people having a chat on the Flat-Iron would be

conspicuous objects from the cliff, car or no car.’

‘Yes, but unless you went down close to them, you wouldn’t know who they

were; whereas you can always check up on a car by the number-plates.’

‘That’s a fact – but it seems to me rather a thin explanation, al the same.

Stil, let it stand. For some reason Alexis thought he would attract less attention

if he went by train. In that case, I suppose he walked along the road – he

wouldn’t want to invite inquiry by taking a lift from anybody.’

‘Certainly not. Only why in the world he should have picked on such an

exposed place for the appointment—’

‘You think they ought to have had their chat behind a rock, or under some

trees, or in a disused shed or a chalk quarry or something like that?’

‘Wouldn’t it seem more natural?’

‘No. Not if you didn’t want to be overheard. If you ever need to talk

secrets, be sure you avoid the blasted oak, the privet hedge and the old

summer-house in the Italian garden – al the places where people can stealthily

creep up under cover with their ears flapping. You choose the middle of a nice

open field, or the centre of a lake – or a rock like the Flat-Iron, where you can

have half-an-hour’s notice of anyone’s arrival. And that reminds me, in one of

your books—’

‘Bother my books! I quite see what you mean. Wel, then, some time or the

other, Bright arrives to keep his appointment. How? And when?’

‘By walking through the edge of the water, from any point you like to

suggest. As for the time, I can only suggest that it was while you, my child, were

snoozing over
Tristram Shandy
; and I fancy he must have come from the

Wilvercombe side, otherwise he would have seen you. He’d hardly have taken

the risk of committing a murder if he knew positively that somebody was lying

within a few yards of him.’

‘I think it was pretty careless of him not to take a look round the rocks in

any case.’

‘True; but apparently he didn’t do it. He commits the murder, anyhow, and

the time of that is fixed at two o’clock. So he must have reached the Flat-Iron

between 1.30 and 2 – or possibly between one o’clock and two o’clock –

because, if you were lunching and reading in your cosy corner, you probably

wouldn’t have seen or heard him come. It couldn’t be earlier than 1 p.m.,

because you looked along the shore then and were positive that there wasn’t a

living soul visible from the cliffs.’

‘Quite right.’

‘Good. He commits the murder. Poor old Alexis lets out a yel when he sees

the razor, and you wake up. Did you shout then, or anything?’

‘No.’

‘Or burst into song?’

‘No.’

‘Or run about with little ripples of girlish laughter?’

‘No. At least, I ran about a few minutes later, but I wasn’t making a loud

noise.’

‘I wonder why the murderer didn’t start off home again at once. If he had,

you’d have seen him. Let me see. Ah, I was forgetting the papers! He had to

get the papers!’

‘What papers?’

‘Wel, I won’t swear it was papers. It may have been the Rajah’s diamond

or something. He wanted something off the body, of course. And just as he was

stooping over his victim, he heard you skipping about among the shingle. Sound

carries a long way by the water. The baffled vilain pauses, and then, as the

sounds come nearer, he hurries down to the seaward side of the Flat-Iron and

hides there.’

‘With al his clothes on?’

‘I’d forgotten that. He’d be a bit damp-looking when he came out, wouldn’t

he? No. Without his clothes on. He left his clothes at wherever it was he started

to walk along the shore. He probably put on a bathing-dress, so that if anybody

saw him he would just be a harmless sun-bather paddling about in the surf.’

‘Did he put the razor in the pocket of his regulation suit?’