Jack on the Gallows Tree (12 page)

“Don't expect too much.”

“We'll see.”

T
HE
bar of the Dragon was now at its most crowded. It was a large room, but there was little empty floor space and the few tables and many chairs left almost no room in which customers could move about. There were not many
women in the bar and the few there seemed to keep as far from Miss Shapely as possible.

“It doesn't do,” she confided in Carolus. “It's all right if they come in with a gentleman, otherwise I don't encourage it. You never know.”

“Quite,” said Carolus understandingly.

Conversation was animated but never rowdy, and there were no groups of men who stood with bent heads while one of them talked in a low voice till all stood up to laugh—in other words no dirty stories. Miss Shapely dealt with demands for drinks or deputed them to Fred, and all was order and decorum.

“We've missed dinner,” said Rupert Priggley. “Do you think we could get a sandwich?”

Carolus asked Miss Shapely.

“I'll send to the kitchen,” she said, as though unable in her august situation to deal with the matter directly.

“Has Gilling come in yet?”

Was it possible that there was a faint suggestion of softening, of warmth almost, in Miss Shapely's manner? That could not possibly be a blush on her cheek, but did not her eyes sparkle a mite?

“Yes. That's Mr Gilling by the door. That very quiet respectable-looking gentleman with the raincoat.”

The description made Mr Gilling unmistakable and Carolus soon had him in conversation. He was respectable to the point of despondency.

“You look after the cars at the Granodeon, don't you?”

“Only to Oblige, I do. I've got my pension from the army and don't need to do it. But I like to do something and the doctor told me I oughtn't to be idle. It's my kidneys.”

“Yes?”

“Chronic. I get cold shivers, racking headaches, pains all down my back. Still, we have to carry on, don't we?
Can't give way. I look after the car-park, yes. But I was only saying to Miss Shapely the other day, I don't think I can keep on with it. Too much of a strain for anyone in my condition.”

“But you were there on the night of the murders?”

“I'm there every night. It's the Worst Thing for me, I daresay, but we must do something. I wouldn't mind so much if it weren't for my gall-stones. Play me up properly, they do. Put the liver out of order. You don't know what they are till you've had them.”

“Don't you get treatment?”

“Certainly I do. I don't know what we should do without the National Health.”

“Well, we couldn't afford to have kidney
and
liver trouble.”

“They're nothing to speak of really. We have to make the best of things, don't we?”

“Will you have a drink?”

“I'll have a little gin. I'd dearly like a nice light ale, but I daren't touch it. It's my flatulence. I get awful pains just here over the heart and palpitations you wouldn't believe. Then the giddiness. No, I daren't touch beer or tea. I'll just have a little gin to relieve it, because that's the best thing.”

“Do you remember that evening, Mr Gilling?”

“I'm not likely to forget it. I had a terrible day that Thursday. It was my ulcer. Vomiting all day, I was. I thought to myself, I can never go on duty tonight with this. But there you are, we have to, don't we? Yes, I remember that Thursday.”

“What time did you get to the car-park?”

“I nearly always get there round about four o'clock unless I'm suffering too much. Then at five I slip up to the café, where the manageress lets me have a cup of coffee. She's a friend of Miss Shapely's and a very nice respectable person. Then I stay in the car-park most of the time till
nine o'clock, after which I come over here. You see, I can't walk about much. Lumbago.”

“Lumbago?”

“Acute. All round the lower part of the back. I can hardly get up when I've once sat down, and as for walking anywhere—well, I couldn't do it. Yes, I was over at the car-park that day till nine.”

“You don't remember Miss Carew's car being brought in?”

“No. It wasn't. Not while I was there. I knew her car well. She'd nearly always got the dog with her and used to leave it in the car when she went into the pictures. She'd sometimes leave me a few biscuits or a bone or something to give him if he got restless. I knew her, too. She never forgot to ask after my chilblains, because she'd suffered with them, too, and told me the best thing for them—painting with iodine. I should have noticed if she'd come in.”

“Suppose someone else was driving her car?”

“I should have seen it. No, it must have come in after nine o'clock since they found it there in the morning. Between nine and half-past ten, about, when the entrance is locked.”

“But if someone brought it in then wouldn't he or she have been taking a risk of being seen afterwards? Leaving the car-park, I mean?”

“No. There's a way out round the back for anyone on foot. Leads into Station Road. He could have put the car in and gone out that way.”

“Or she could.”

“Miss Carew, you mean? Wasn't she dead by then?”

“We don't know the time of her death.”

Mr Gilling seemed taken aback by that.

“I thought you knew that,” he said. “You mean she might have gone out to where she was found in someone else's car?”

“Why not? Do you know a farmer called Raydell?”

“Yes. Just left here, hasn't he? He upset Miss Shapely the other day.”

“Do you know his car?”

“Yes, but I can't say whether it was in the park that night. It is sometimes, but I can't remember every car that comes in. I very often wait till they've parked them and give them their ticket as they go out. I can't run round with my sciatica. It cripples me in this weather. Have to Lay Up with it some days. You don't know what it is.”

“So you can't really say what other cars were in the park that night?”

“No. I can't. Not to be sure. I remember Miss Carew's wasn't because I heard about her next day, and remembered at once. Otherwise I shouldn't. I forget things, you see. With these fits of neuralgia I get, things go out of your mind.”

“You can't, for instance, recall whether Miss Tissot's chauffeur brought her car in?”

“We can very soon ask him because that's him over there. Just come in. Very respectable young man. Miss Shapely thinks a lot of him, I believe. Shall I call him across?”

“Yes,” said Carolus.

“I shall have to go over and get him,” explained Mr Gilling. “I can't make my voice heard with this laryngitis I get. Seems to come on worse in the evening.”

But at that moment young Wright saw that Mr Gilling was attempting to catch his attention and came over.

“Evening, Mr Gilling,” he said. “How are your varicose veins?”

“Terrible, yesterday, they were. Swelled up to twice the size. I thought I should have to go into hospital with them. But we mustn't give in, must we? Make the best of things. This gentleman wanted to know if your car was in my park on the night of the murders?”

Wright looked startled, as well he might at this question.
He was a tall very solemn-looking young man with something furtive and restless in his brown eyes.

“Are you Mr Deene, sir?” he asked Carolus. “Yes? Miss Tissot told me you were investigating. I hope I can give you some helpful information. Yes, the car was in the cinema car-park because Miss Tissot had given me permission to drive it that evening. I was taking my young lady to the pictures.”

“Did you need the car for that?”

“My young lady lives about three miles out at a village called Tillshill, and I went to fetch her and afterwards drove her home.”

“She would remember that?”

“Oh, I don't know. I shouldn't like her asked. She comes of very respectable people. Her father is the postmaster.”

“That's all very well, Wright, but aren't you forgetting that two women have been murdered? If you need an alibi the ‘respectability' of your girl's parents will have to be outraged. This is a serious matter.”

“But why should I need an alibi, Mr Deene?”

“I don't know that you will. I said
if
you need an alibi. What time did you go to the pictures?”

“The half-past six house. Came out before nine.”

“Then what did you do?”

“Went and had a coffee in the cinema tea-room.”

“And after that?”

“I drove my young lady home.”

“Straight home?”

“We had a little run round.”

“In which direction?”

“Lilbourne way, if you want to know.”

“That's in the opposite direction from Tillshill, isn't it?”

“Almost. Yes. It was just a little run round.”

“I see. Did you come back through Buddington?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact we did.”

“What time would that have been?”

“I don't know. We'd just had a little run round.”

“About eleven?”

“Certainly not later.”

“Then you drove out to Tillshill?”

“Yes. Straight away.”

“No little run round this time?”

“No.”

“So you were back at the hotel with the car parked before midnight?”

“Well before.”

“Anyone see you?”

“I don't think so. There was no one at the hotel garage. All asleep. I met no one on my way to bed.”

“How do you like working for Miss Tissot?”

“Miss Tissot is a Lady, Mr Deene. I owe everything to her, including my education. She had me taught to drive.”

“Yet she was thinking of doing without a car, wasn't she?”

“Some of her investments were disappointing. She thought she might not be able to afford it. But of course now she has come into money from Miss Carew.”

“So you will keep your job?”

“Oh I don't think Miss Tissot would have let me go in any case.”

“Now please answer this carefully, Wright. On that Thursday on which the two old ladies were murdered did you see or hear or notice anything which you think might be important? Either in Buddington or on the Lilbourne road or anywhere else?”

Wright seemed to consider this.

“There was one small thing, but I don't like to mention it and I don't think it has anything to do with the murders.”

Mr Gilling, who had remained with them, seemed the most interested member of Wright's small audience.

“Let's hear it, anyway,” suggested Carolus.

“It was after the pictures. When I took my young lady for a little run round. We happened to stop for a moment …”

“Where was this?”

“Out on the Lilbourne road.”

“But where exactly? Or don't you know?”

“From what I've heard since, I imagine it was very near where Miss Carew's body was found. It was just before you come to a cottage standing alone on the right hand side of the road.”

“And what time would it have been?”

“I suppose it was getting on for eleven. We just happened to stop for a minute. We were sitting there talking when suddenly my young lady gave a kind of scream. There was a face at the window of the car.”

“Could you see it clearly?”

“I should recognize it again. I suppose my eyes were used to the darkness …”

“I should think they were by that time.”

“Anyway I saw a man with a big ginger moustache staring in.”

“Never seen him before?”

“No. In a few moments I got out of the car, but it was too late. He was cycling away. I shouted, but he wouldn't stop. I went to pick up a stone to throw at him, because naturally I was very angry. As I did so I saw something white by the side of the road which I thought was a piece of paper. I don't know what made me pick it up. It was the flower of a lily, just the single bell.”

“I see. You didn't try to follow this Peeping Tom in the car?”

“No. He was going away from Buddington and my young lady was very upset and wanted to get home.”

“Of course she was,” put in Mr Gilling sympathetically. “Any respectable young lady would have been. I shouldn't have liked it myself, suffering as I do from nerves. I go cold
all over and can't hardly breathe. It's as though my heart was going to stop beating. I don't wonder your young lady felt it.”

“That's all you have to tell me, Wright?”

“Yes, Mr Deene. I hope you won't say anything to Miss Tissot about this. She's very particular, as you know.”

“She knows you have a girl?”

“She knows about my young lady, yes. I don't tell her more than that, because she's above such things, if you understand what I mean. She's a real lady, Miss Tissot is, and won't have anything to do with them in the hotel.”

“I'm much obliged to you both for your information. Does either of you know Bickley by sight?”

“I know him,” said Gilling, “but he's not here tonight. She never comes in. TT, I believe. He doesn't so often come in since Mrs Westmacott bought them a television set. I can't look at that myself because of my eyes. I get them sore and inflamed if I'm not careful and have to bathe them with boracic. But Mr and Mrs Bickley seem to like it and stay at home looking at it. He won't come in now because it's nearly closing time. Yes, I will have a little more gin and water, sir. It's the only thing I Dare Touch.”

Wright had impatiently waited for a chance to address Carolus.

“What do you think about the murders, sir? Miss Tissot doesn't like to discuss them, but I believe her opinion is that they must have been the work of a maniac.”

“Of course they were,” said Mr Gilling. “What else could they have been? They were both respectable ladies.”