Police at the Funeral (2 page)

Chief-Detective Inspector Stanislaus Oates began to laugh. Ten minutes before he had felt that spontaneous mirth was permanently beyond him.

‘Campion!' he said. ‘Who's after you now?'

The young man struggled down from his throne and held out his hand.

‘I'm waiting for a client,' he explained airily. ‘I've been here half an hour already. What are you looking for?'

‘Warmth and a little quiet,' said the other querulously. ‘This weather upsets my liver.'

He took off his raincoat, shook it peremptorily and spread it over Mr Campion's late resting-place. This performance he repeated with his hat and edged as near to the boiler as he could without burning himself. His companion regarded him with a faintly amused expression on his slightly vacuous face.

‘Quite the little cop, still, I see,' he said. ‘What's the idea? “Old Bobby revisits the scene of his first arrest”? “The sentimental journey of a Big Fifth”? I hate to seem inquisitive, Stanislaus, but I'm expecting a client, as I said before. In fact, when I heard your footsteps I thought you were the mysterious she and I don't mind telling you my heart sank.'

The Inspector turned from the furnace and looked at his friend attentively. ‘Why the fancy dress?' he inquired.

Mr Campion removed the monstrous tweed erection from his head and looked at it lovingly.

‘I called in at Belloc's on my way down here,' he observed, ‘and I caught sight of it. They tell me they make one a year for a rural dean, who wears it for a local ratting gala. I had to have it. Just the thing in which to interview a romantic client, don't you think?'

The Inspector grinned. The warmth was beginning to percolate into his bones and his
bonhomie
was fast returning.

‘What an extraordinary chap you are, Campion,' he said. ‘I'm never surprised when you turn up in the most amazing places. I shouldn't have said there were half a dozen men in London who knew of this little hide-out. Yet the first time I call here in twenty years I find you sitting here in fancy dress. How do you do it?'

Campion unbuttoned the flaps of the deerstalker meditatively. ‘The amiable Lugg put me up to it,' he said. ‘He's still with me, you know – bull pup and
femme-de-chambre
combined. I was looking for some suitable spot to interview a young lady who has been so grossly misinformed that she believes I'm a private detective.'

The Inspector knocked out his pipe against the boiler.

‘Funny how these ideas get about,' he said. ‘What do you call yourself these days?'

Campion looked at him reprovingly. ‘Deputy Adventurer,' he said. ‘I thought of that the other day. I think it sums me up perfectly.'

The Inspector shook his head gravely. ‘No more Chalices?' he said. ‘You put the wind up me last time. You'll get into trouble one of these days.'

The young man beamed. ‘Your idea of trouble must be very advanced,' he murmured.

The Inspector did not smile. ‘That's what I mean by trouble,' he remarked, pointing through the open doorway to the railed-in patch of grass. ‘There'll probably be no one to write “Here lies a Benefactor” at your feet, though. What is it this time? A scandal in High Life? Or are you out to crush the spy system?'

‘Neither,' said Mr Campion regretfully. ‘You find me here, Stanislaus, indulging in a silly childish desire to impress. Also, incidentally, to get my own back. I'm meeting a lady here – I've told you that about six times. You needn't go. I don't know her. In fact, I think you might add to the tone of the interview. I say, couldn't you go out and borrow a helmet from one of your boys on point duty? Then she'll know I'm telling the truth when I introduce you.'

Mr Oates became alarmed. ‘If you've got some silly woman coming here, don't you tell her who I am,' he said warningly. ‘What's the idea, anyhow?'

Mr Campion produced a sheet of thick grey notepaper from his inside pocket.

‘Here's a lawyer's letter,' he said. ‘I like to think it cost him personally six and eightpence. Go on – read it. I'll help you with the long words.'

The Inspector took the paper and read the letter to himself, forming each word separately with his lips and emitting an intermittent rumble as he half spoke the phrases.

The Inspector folded the letter carefully and returned it to Campion.

‘I don't think I should cotton to that chap myself,' he observed. ‘Nice enough, I have no doubt,' he went on hastily. ‘But if you're set up in a witness box with a chap like that chivvying you he makes you look a fool without getting the case on any further. He thinks he knows everything, and so he does pretty nearly – about books and dead languages – but has he the faintest idea of the mental process which resulted in the accused marrying the plaintiff in 1927 in Chiswick, when he had already married the first witness in 1903? Not on your life.'

Mr Campion nodded. ‘I think you're right,' he said. ‘Although Marcus is a very good solicitor. But cases in Cambridge are usually very
refeened,
I believe. I wish that girl would turn up if she's coming. I gave Lugg explicit instructions to send her here the moment she arrived at Bottle Street. I thought this would provide a peep at the underworld which would be at once clean, safe and edifying. The kind of girl Marcus can have persuaded to marry him must be mentally stunted. Besides, her trouble seems to be absurd. She's lost a very unpleasant uncle – why worry to look for him? My idea is to sit up on this convenient structure, array myself in my little ratting cap, and make a few straightforward comments on Uncle Andrew. The young woman, deeply impressed, will return to Marcus, repeating faithfully all that she has seen and heard – that sort always does. Marcus will deduce that I am rapidly proceeding
bin-wards, and he will scratch my name out of his address book and leave me in peace. How's business?'

The Inspector shrugged. ‘Mustn't grumble,' he said. ‘Promotion has always meant trouble, though, as far back as I can remember.'

‘Look out,' said Campion suddenly. ‘She comes!'

The two men stood listening. Wavering footsteps echoed in the alleyway. They advanced almost to the yard and then retreated a little way.

‘A lame man wearing number nine boots, smoking a cheroot and probably a chandler's mate by profession,' Campion murmured, putting on his tweed cap. ‘Sounds like “good sensible” shoes anyhow,' he went on more seriously. ‘I hope Marcus hasn't picked a thundering English rose.'

Mr Oates glanced though the slit between the half-open door and the post. ‘Oh,' he said casually, ‘it's that bloke.'

Mr Campion raised an inquiring eyebrow.

The Inspector explained. ‘I was followed from the Yard today,' he said. ‘I forgot all about the man in the rainstorm, to tell you the truth. I suppose he's been hanging about outside the entrance here ever since I came in. Probably somebody with a grievance, or some lunatic with an invention to offer me for detecting the criminally-minded on sight. You'd be surprised what a lot of that sort of thing I get, Campion. I suppose I'd better see him.'

The rain had stopped for the time being, although the sky was still cold and overcast. Stanislaus Oates stepped out into the court, walked to the mouth of the passage, glanced down at it and then stepped back again into the shelter of the yard. Campion stood in the doorway of the boiler-room to watch the comedy, lank and immaculate, the ridiculous tweed cap perched on the top of his head.

The footsteps sounded again, and a moment later the square man with the hint of lost respectability about him emerged.

At close quarters he presented a more complex appearance than he had shown at a distance. His reddish face was puffy, and coarse skin and deep lines almost obscured the natural regularity of his features. The suit, which he wore with an air, was grease-spotted and disreputable, a condition not improved
by the fact that at the moment it was practically soaked. Despite his furtive glance round there was an air of truculence about him, and he fixed the Inspector firmly with his slightly bloodshot eyes.

‘Mr Oates,' he said, ‘I should like to speak to you. I have a piece of information which may save you and your friends a lot of trouble.'

The Inspector did not reply, but stood waiting for further developments. The man had revealed a remarkably deep voice and an unexpectedly educated accent. Interested, Mr Campion advanced incautiously out of his hiding-place, and the intruder, catching sight of his somewhat unconventional appearance, broke off abruptly, his jaw dropping.

‘I didn't know you had a companion,' he said sullenly.

‘Or a witness?' suggested the Inspector dryly.

Mr Campion removed his hat and stepped out into the yard.

‘I'll go if you like, Inspector,' he said, and paused abruptly.

All three men stood silent. Down the alleyway echoed the sound of high-heeled shoes clicking sharply on the stones. Mr Campion's visitor had arrived.

She came into the yard the next moment, the very antithesis of his expectations. A tall, slender young woman, smartly dressed in the best country-town tradition. She was also young, much younger than Campion had supposed. She looked, as the Inspector remarked afterwards, like some nice person's kid sister. She was not beautiful. Her mouth was a little too large, her brown eyes too deeply set, but she was definitely attractive in her own rather unusual way. Mr Campion was glad that he had removed his ‘ratting cap'. Subconsciously his opinion of his friend Marcus improved. He stepped forward to meet her, holding out his hand.

‘Miss Blount?' he said. ‘My name's Campion. I say, I'm awfully sorry I bothered you to come all this way.'

He got no further. The girl, whose glance had travelled past him to the other two men, now caught sight of the squat stranger who had something of such interest to tell the Inspector. An expression of terrified recognition crept into her face, and the young man was alarmed to see a wave of pallor rise slowly up her neck and spread. The next moment she had
taken an uncertain step backward, and he caught her arm to steady her. The Inspector sprang towards them.

‘Look out,' he said. ‘Bend her head down. She'll be all right in a minute.'

He was fishing for his flask when the girl straightened herself.

‘I'm sorry,' she said. ‘I'm all right. Where is he?'

The two men turned, but of their square acquaintance there was no sign. Rapidly retreating footsteps down the passage told of his escape. Oates started after him, but when he reached the end of the alley and looked up and down the street the evening rush was well under way. The pavements were crowded, and of the mysterious stranger, the sight of whom had so startled Mr Featherstone's fiancée, there was no trace.