Jack on the Gallows Tree (15 page)

“I am fairly sure that there will be an attempt on the life of Mrs Bickley.”

“But why, for heaven's sake? You say he's not a maniac?”

“I have told a number of people connected with the case that I don't think the murders were the work of a maniac. I have also let it be thought that the police don't.”

“What are you going to do now?”

“Get back to Buddington as quickly as possible,” said Carolus, accelerating on a piece of open road.

“And there?”

“See Inspector John Moore.”

But John Moore was not encouraging.

“I know you have ingenious ideas, Carolus, but this time you seem to be stretching it. You ask me to believe that because Mrs Bickley sold some old gold to Ebony someone is going to try to strangle her.”

“I said it was possible.”

“But you don't tell me why.”

“Can't you be satisfied with the fact that both the other women were killed after selling gold to this man?”

“Don't be absurd, Carolus.”

“You told me it was the only link connecting the two households.”

“Wasn't it?”

“No. In a small town like this you couldn't possibly have such mutually exclusive divisions. I can tell you several ways in which there was confusion. Dante Westmacott is a friend of a farmer called Raydell who is an acquaintance of Charles Carew. Raydell's housekeeper knew Mrs Westmacott before she was married and is a beneficiary in her will. Dante Westmacott was well acquainted with the Baxeters and had met Sophia Carew in their house. See what I mean?”

“Yes. But it only weakens your case about Ebony.”

“Perhaps. But I am quite serious, John, in asking you to take precautions for Mrs Bickley.”

“I should have to know a great deal more than you tell me.”

“Are you making progress, John?”

“I have to admit we're not. A small point I forgot to tell you is that the upholstery of Sophia Carew's car has been badly ripped. But there's nothing concrete to go on. The case remains mysterious because of the two murders. As I told you right at the beginning I believe I could solve either one, but two are baffling. They make one introduce the most fantastic theories. A young assistant of mine calculates that on the facts we have there are no less than six possible lines of solution, discounting such complications as suspects. He puts them down like this, though not in order of probability:

1. A maniac whose aberration is homicidal, who has an obsession with elderly women.
   
2. A murderer who had motives, unknown to us, for both murders.
   
3. Two separate murderers working independently, one of whom, by a freak of chance, saw the first murder and made the second look like it.
   
4. Two murderers working independently, and an outsider who made their murders appear to resemble one another, in other words who adorned both corpses with lilies.
   
5. Two murderers working in collaboration, who agreed to make their crimes look alike.
   
6. The two women murdered together at Rossetti Lodge at the same time, the apparent difference in time accounted for by the fact that Mrs Westmacott's body remained in a warm room while Miss Carew's was left in the open.' ”
   

“I could add several more to those,” said Carolus gravely.

“It's quite preposterous. Those are only basic possibilities. When it comes to suspects, about the only thing we know is that the murderer of Miss Carew probably didn't wear size eight shoes.”

“Have you checked on shoe sizes?”

“Yes, for almost every man even remotely connected with the case. Want to know them?”

“Please.”

“There are none size seven. Size eights are worn by Ebony, Charles Carew, Colonel Baxeter and Gabriel Westmacott. Size nines Raydell, Gilling, Wright, Bickley, Ben Johnson. Size ten Dante Westmacott and Thickett. Helpful, isn't it?”

“Yes.”

“As a matter of fact those shoes which were found, if they indicate anything at all, seem to me to suggest a woman as the murderer of Miss Carew. There's nothing physically impossible about that.”

“Not if it was a woman of Mrs Baxeter's size and strength.”

“Didn't need to be. Any woman of normal physique under, say, fifty could have done it. What else have we got? Two lilies stolen from a front garden in Station Road on the night of the murders and a lily found on each corpse. What's the good of that?”

“I should have thought a great deal—if you knew who stole the lilies.”

“I don't,” snapped Moore. “It could have been anyone in the town. Then there's another of these blasted dogs that barked in the night. That's all. Nothing to get your teeth into. While so far as times and alibis are concerned it seems possible for almost anyone in Buddington to have done both murders.”

“Personally I looked for motive,” said Carolus mildly.

“Oh, you did? And that's what brings you to think that we ought to protect Mrs Bickley?”

“Indirectly, yes.”

“You're crazy, Carolus. You're a dabbler looking for complicated, intricate motives and mental processes, whereas I'm pretty sure that the truth here is a simple one.”

“It is.”

“Do you suggest by that cryptic remark that you know who killed these women?”

“Oh no,” said Carolus, rather shocked. “Oh no, my dear John. If I knew that, I should tell you at once.”

“Then what do you know?”

“Not who but why. I understand, I think, why both those women were killed that night. That has always seemed to me the important thing in this case. As for who did it, he, she or they will reveal himself…”

“Or herself, or themselves,” put in Moore bitterly.

“Very soon now, I think,” continued Carolus, unperturbed. “My only anxiety is lest the revelation costs another life. I wish you would protect Mrs Bickley, John.”

“Do you know her?”

“Not yet. Nor her husband.”

“They're not exactly the sort of people one would normally feel much alarm about. Bickley's an ex-policeman.”

“No! Perhaps the revelation may come through someone else entirely. Heaven knows there are enough elderly women in the town.”

“And it must be an elderly woman?”

“If I am right in my notions, yes.”

“Then you
must
be thinking of a maniac, Carolus. I've thought that from the first. What we want here is a psychiatrist and I've a damned good mind to see if we can get one sent down, not to examine any particular suspect, because I haven't one, but to observe everybody in the case. Someone who appears reasonably normal, sane enough anyway to deceive those about him that he has no secret madness, must be going about …”

“Unless it really was a madman, John. An old-fashioned, out-and-out lunatic who has escaped from restraint.”

“Don't pull my leg, Carolus. This case isn't a joke.”

“No. And that reminds me, have you noticed anyone behaving as though he was sorry about the two old women? Anyone showing the slightest disposition to mourn them, for example?”

“I can't say I have.”

“Nor I. And I find that odd. Distinctly odd. Oh well, I shall have to do what I can myself for Mrs Bickley.” “I believe that's a leg-pull, too.”

“No, John, it's not,” said Carolus gravely. “I only wish it were.”

M
RS
B
ICKLEY
opened the door of Rossetti Lodge and invited Carolus to enter. She was small, neat and businesslike. As soon as she began to talk Carolus felt that here at last was someone who did not show indifference to the tragedy of recent events. She alone of all the friends and relatives of the two dead women seemed to be saddened by the loss of one of them.

“I was told to expect you, sir,” she said to Carolus. “You are going to find out who did this dreadful thing, aren't you? If there's anything I or my husband can do we shall be pleased.”

“Thank you, Mrs Bickley. I wonder who told you I would be coming to see you?”

“That was Mr Gabriel. He said you were sure to want to see where it happened.”

“Yes. I should like to do that. And there are a good many questions I want to ask you, Mrs Bickley.”

They were standing in the entrance hall of the house, furnished with William Morris mediaevalism. The wallpaper was of the original Morris printing of the Acanthus pattern of 1862 and the furniture, hangings, tiles and oddments of decoration had the unmistakable look of articles from the Pre-Raphaelite workshops. Mrs Bickley led the way to a small sitting-room leading off the hall, and here the pomegranate pattern glared from the walls and the shelves were full of books in Kelmscott editions. Two pieces of furniture contrasted with this, a long divan and in front of it a full-length mirror.

“This is where I found poor Mrs Westmacott,” said Mrs Bickley in a subdued but steady voice. “She was lying on that couch full length and would have looked peaceful if it wasn't for her expression. That was awful, sir, and it
worries me to think that the last I saw of her was like that with her eyes popping out. You see, she was a very even-tempered old lady and in all the years we had been with her I'd never known her in a passion about anything. Yet that's what she looked in death, as though she had died in a fit of temper.”

“The head was here?”

“On that cushion, yes, sir. She thought the world of those cushions. I don't understand a lot about it, but they were from someone's workshop and had been bought by Mr Westmacott's father; that's the old lady's father-in-law I mean, sir. Her head was there and her hands were folded round this lily stalk we've heard so much about. It's my belief she died on that sofa, because unless there was more than one of them she couldn't have been lifted there. She was very heavy, as you may know, and took more than anyone's strength to lift.”

“There was no sign of a struggle?”

“Nothing at all, sir. The police went over everything for fingerprints and looked here, there and everywhere, but it was just as if no one had been here that night. If the doctor hadn't been sure she was strangled you'd have sworn she died natural.”

“Did you know that Gabriel Westmacott came to see his mother that evening?”

“Oh yes, sir. He popped across to see us as he always does when he comes to the house. Mind you, he didn't stay long. Well, I like looking at the television same as anyone else, though there are times when my husband wants to throw something at it. That night it was so silly he said he wouldn't stand another minute and went round to the Dragon.”

“What time would that have been?”

“Oh, quite early on. Long before Mr Gabriel came over. I was alone then. It can't have been more than eight when Bickley went. He didn't come back till after closing. Must
have been half-past ten when he got in. But I was here the whole while, and if Mrs Westmacott had wanted anything she only had to ring. She had a private telephone line across to our place. But she never did.”

“You don't know how long Gabriel Westmacott was with her?”

“I don't.”

“Nor why he came?”

“Well, sir … I don't like to say anything …”

“He told me he had come because he needed some money and that Mrs Westmacott gave it to him.”

“I'm afraid I don't quite believe that, sir. We had had this before.”

“Really?”

“Mrs Westmacott had to hide her money, you see. It's not nice to talk about it, but I'm sure you won't make trouble. She liked to keep a large sum in the house and next morning I found it had gone. I haven't said anything to the police.”

“I see. Now Mrs Westmacott is believed not to have been killed till midnight or thereabouts.”

“We'd gone to bed by then, or rather I had. My husband sits up for a bit after he comes in at night with his evening paper. He's interested in horses. But he always puts the light out and doesn't wake me up. He would have heard if Mrs Westmacott had rung, up to half-past twelve, anyway.”

“Who had a latch key of the house?”

“Only Mrs Westmacott and Mr Gabriel. And Mr Dan has still got his. We had our key of the back door, because we always came in and out that way.”

“You are sure Dante Westmacott had one?”

“Mr Dan didn't very often come to the house, but when he did he always walked straight in.”

“So you think someone must have been admitted by Mrs Westmacott herself? Someone she knew?”

“That's what it looks like. She wasn't at all the nervous sort and would go to the front door herself if she was up. If it had been very late and she wasn't expecting anyone, I daresay she would have rung over to us. But not if she knew who it was.”

“She could move about quite easily?”

“In the house, she could. But she didn't like going out except in a bathchair. To tell you the truth, sir, I believe it would have done her good to have walked round as far as the church on Sundays, but there you are. As for going to the door, she would have thought nothing of it and always went up to bed on her own.”

“At what time did you see her last, Mrs Bickley?”

“I always went across at nine. She didn't eat much at night, just a light meal about seven which I would get for her and take the tray away. She wasn't a lady to want fussing over or to put others out. I would come across at nine, put her hot-water bottle in her bed if it was at all chilly, then go down to see if there was anything she wanted. Sometimes she would keep me chatting for a while, then she would remember I liked the television and tell me to go and turn it on, as though it was a little joke of hers. That night she was reading. She didn't say anything about expecting Mr Gabriel, but just said good night at once and I left her. Never thinking, of course.”

“Neither you nor your husband heard or saw anything unusual during the night?”

“No, sir. It was just like any other night, so far as we were concerned.”