Martin Edwards – Trent’s Own Case (страница 12)

Verney looked into vacancy, as one assembling his ideas. ‘Why,’ he said, ‘to put it the simplest way, there must have been dozens of secretaries and chairmen of committees trying, at odd times, to sound me discreetly about what Randolph’s testamentary dispositions were. There’s the Humberstone General Infirmary; and the Humberstone Endowed Schools Foundation; and the Moss Lane Congregational Church of the same place; and the London Missionary Society; and the British and Foreign Bible Society; and the Yorkshire Congregational Union; and the Congregational Pastors Retiring Fund; and Leeds University; and the Scalbridge United Independent College; and the National Lifeboat Institution; and the Harrowby Seamen’s Institute; and the Dewsby Deaf and Dumb Institute; and—oh! I could name another dozen or more that have a direct interest in what happens to Randolph’s estate.’

‘Thanks! Thanks!’ Trent said smiling. ‘You needn’t go on, Verney, I see how it is. I’d no idea your field of work was such an extensive one. It’s no business of mine, of course, but I’m afraid this is going to be a serious thing for you personally.’

Again Verney shrugged. ‘It will send me hunting another job, after over two years of such a job as I shall never get again. But I’m not worrying about that just now. I want,’ he said savagely, ‘to see the man who killed Randolph taken and hanged—the cowardly brute who shot a defenceless old man in the back, and cut short a life that was given up to works of mercy and humanity. I suppose they’ll run the fellow down, Trent—you understand these things. It’s not likely he’ll escape, do you suppose?’

‘No, not likely,’ Trent said. ‘It does happen of course, now and then. But you have to give the police a reasonable allowance of time when a murder has been undiscovered for a good many hours, as I gather from what you tell me.’

Verney nodded. ‘Yes, naturally. I suppose it must depend on the traces left behind by the murderer—the weapon, footprints, fingerprints, the kind of thing one reads about.’

‘If he was careful,’ Trent pointed out, ‘he need not have left any traces at all. Criminals often don’t; but they may easily get found out all the same. Do you remember exactly what it was that was given out to the papers this morning?’

‘I’ve got one here.’ Verney produced a folded copy of the Sun from his coat pocket. ‘There you are—it’s little enough.’

Below an array of headlines, and a portrait of a clean-shaven, hard-looking old man, Trent read as follows:

At an early hour this morning the police were called to No. 5, Newbury Place, Mayfair, the London residence of Mr James Randolph, the millionaire whose long record of charitable activities and public beneficence has made his name honoured throughout the country.

He had been shot through the heart, the body lying on the floor of the bedroom, where he had, it is presumed, been dressing before attending the banquet of the Tabarders’ Company.

His absence from the banquet caused surprise, as he was a member of the Court of the Company, and was to have spoken to the toast of the guest of honour on this occasion, the Home Secretary. On inquiry at Tabarders’ Hall this morning, we learn that several attempts were made during the evening to call Mr Randolph’s house by telephone, but that the calls were unanswered.

Mr Randolph’s valet, the only servant sleeping on the premises, was, in fact, out for the evening; and it was by him that the body was discovered on his returning to the house, when he immediately telephoned the police.

No. 5 Newbury Place is one of a row of mews converted into five small residences, all tenanted by persons of social position. Such a house was well adapted to the simple way of life preferred by the late Mr Randolph, for he spent but little time in London, and lived as a rule at Brinton Lodge, his country house in the neighbourhood of Humberstone, Yorks.

‘So that’s all,’ Trent remarked. ‘Most of that was written up in the Sun office, after they’d made their own inquiries. There’s hardly anything at all about the crime itself, is there?’

‘Hardly anything,’ Verney agreed. ‘But I suppose it’s all that was given out. The other evening papers have just the same; not a syllable more. I’ve looked carefully.’

Trent considered the other’s haggard face for a moment in silence. ‘Well, the officer who saw you this morning,’ he suggested, ‘didn’t he tell you anything more? By the way, it’s the kind of case they would put Bligh onto, I should think, if his hands aren’t too full already. Was your visitor a tall, powerful-looking sort of bloke with a head like a billiard-ball?’

‘That was his name,’ Verney said with a faint smile, ‘and your description fits him nicely. No, he hadn’t a word more to tell me than there is in that paper. It was I who was expected to do the telling—whether I knew of anyone who could conceivably have had any ill-will against Randolph, or whether he had seemed at all upset or unusual in his manner lately, or whether I knew what he kept in the safe in the bedroom; and so on. And to all of that my answer was no, and no, and no. The inspector also wanted to know how I had been spending my own time that evening.’

Trent laughed. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘That’s the routine.’

‘So he was good enough to assure me,’ Verney said, with an answering gleam of grim amusement. ‘Fortunately I was able to satisfy him that my time had been fully occupied, in the presence of other people. It was the Institute Athletic Club’s weekly grind that evening, you see. I never miss running with the boys, and after changing, I stayed on with them in Kilburn, till half past ten, as I usually do. And now I must be off. It’s been a relief to talk the thing over.’

Trent rang the bell. ‘You might wait and see the latest edition,’ he said. ‘It’s usually delivered here before this time.’

Mrs McOmish appeared at the door, a copy of the Sun in her outstretched hand. ‘If it’s the paper you want—’ she said.

But her speech was cut short by an exclamation from Trent, who had already caught sight of the line of capitals strung along the top of the first page. He seized the paper from her and read aloud to Verney the brief paragraph which had been added, in heavy type, to the matter which he had already seen dealing with the Newbury Place murder.

‘It is understood,’ he read, ‘that an arrest has already been made in connection with this abominable crime.’

CHAPTER VII

ON A PLATE WITH PARSLEY ROUND IT

VERNEY had taken his leave, and Trent had noted that he was properly impressed—not to say astounded—by the fact, if fact it were, of the swift success of the official hunt for Randolph’s murderer. Trent had busied himself at once in procuring copies of all the latest editions and comparing their statements; then, after a meditative dinner, he had rung up a certain number in Bloomsbury, and proposed himself for a private and friendly call upon Chief Inspector Bligh, whom he was lucky enough to find at the other end of the wire.

The number of Trent’s friends among the metropolitan police, in its various grades, was small, but his relation with them was entirely one of mutual liking; and there was none with whom he was on easier terms than Mr Bligh, an officer of unusual parts, whose range of interests went considerably beyond his notable equipment of expert professional knowledge. In particular, he had made a hobby, and owned a considerable library, of the history of the Civil War in the United States.

It was nine o’clock when Trent found the inspector deeply engaged with book and pipe in his comfortable bachelor quarters.

‘Sorry to spoil your evening,’ Trent said as he placed his hat on a chair.

‘You won’t,’ Mr Bligh assured him. ‘If I’d thought you were likely to, I’d have told them downstairs to set the dog on you, instead of bringing up the drinks for you. Help yourself.’ And he waved a vast hand towards the tray with its convivial contents on the plush-covered table.

Trent took the armchair facing his host’s, and began the filling of a pipe. ‘Oh blessings on his kindly face and on his absent hair!’ he said. ‘I’ve interrupted your reading, anyhow. What is the book, I wonder? But need I ask? It is the Life, Campaigns, Letters, Opinions and Table-talk of General Joseph Eggleston Johnston, the Victor of Pumpkin Creek.’

‘There’s no such book,’ Mr Bligh retorted positively; ‘and,’ he added after a moment’s thought, ‘there wasn’t any such battle. What I was reading was Bernard Shaw—my favourite author.’

‘Another bond between us!’ Trent exclaimed. ‘And what draws you so especially to Shaw?’

The inspector patted affectionately the volume lying on his knee. ‘Shaw,’ he declared, ‘is the literature of escape. That isn’t,’ he added, in answer to Trent’s bewildered gaze, ‘my own expression.’

‘You relieve my feelings,’ Trent gasped, ‘more than I can say.’

‘No,’ the inspector said reminiscently. ‘That was the phrase used about Shaw by the man who first brought him to my notice. I had to interrogate a prisoner some years ago about a certain matter. A confirmed criminal, he was. They used to call him Pantomime Joe, on account of the cheek he used to give everybody from the dock. Why, if I’ve heard a judge say once that his court wasn’t a music hall, when Joe was on his trial, I’ve heard it half a dozen times. Joe was an educated man, and it was no surprise to me, when I visited him in his cell, to find him reading a book from the prison library. He showed it to me—Plays Pleasant, by G. B. Shaw. “What’s this?” I said. He grinned at me. “This is the literature of escape, Blighter,” he says, using a silly nickname he and his sort have always had for me. I thought that sounded a funny sort of reading to be put in the hands of a man who spent half his time in gaol, but he explained his meaning.’