MURDER MYSTERY Boxed Set – Dorothy Fielding Edition (12 Detective Cases in One Edition). Dorothy Fielding

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      CHAPTER 3

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      THE three men walked towards the river in silence for some minutes. A soft, sibilant murmur came from the water which had lost its lights now, and lay hidden in mist. It seemed to Pointer to be chanting "Accident—Suicide—Murder? Accident—Suicide—Murder?" under its breath.

      Any of the three might still be the word that would fit the puzzle which the Chief Inspector intended to solve. Haviland turned to the newspaper man.

      "Well, whether accident or suicide, we hand it over to you now, Mr. Wilmot. Unless the Chief Inspector thinks otherwise, of course. I suppose the case is closed, as far as the police are concerned? Olive seems to've got hold of the right tip. That letter that she saw Mrs. Tangye reading must have been the last straw. As a matter of fact, I said we should find that something of that kind had happened."

      Pointer lit his pipe.

      "The footsteps that stopped," he spoke the words as though they pleased his ear. "Sounds like one of your own articles, Wilmot."

      Wilmot turned a meditative eye on the Chief Inspector, "Nice head-line. But I make a point of never misleading my public."

      This time it was Pointer who looked his question.

      "Well, even if they ever existed, which I very much doubt. Tangye may have run down from town hoping to make his peace with his wife. Say that there was a row on Monday which made him skip dinner at home." Both Wilmot's listeners nodded. Each had already said that to himself. "He may have gone into the garden after her. It would cost me my reputation to raise hopes of a dramatic development, and then have it fizzle out into father's list slippers."

      "You think it will?"

      Wilmot did not reply for a second. Had they found anything which suggested foul play? Honestly, as far as he could see, they had not. But what about Pointer? His were the eyes that counted in this search.

      "What does the Counsel for the Prosecution say?" Wilmot asked instead of replying.

      "That when you talk of suicide—"

      "Or accident. I'm afraid I think that's only too possible," Wilmot said pensively.

      "Or accident. You forget the butter under Mrs. Tangye's wedding rings," Pointer spoke very seriously.

      "You overwhelm me with confusion, so I had!" Wilmot spoke in mock consternation. "Is this the sort of rock on which a police inquiry is built? I've no idea how that mysterious process begins. Do you inventory the butter on her finger solemnly under the heading of 'Clues of which the Police are in Possession'?"

      "No, no!" Haviland laughed in his turn. "The fact is, we haven't found even the ghost of such a thing as a clue which points to a crime, have we, sir?"

      "And where there's no clue there's no crime?" Wilmot queried.

      "Whose steps stopped in the garden?" Pointer asked. "Tangye would have come on in, if they had been his. At least, so it seems to me. Why was her left hand so buttery that it left such clear prints on her revolver and yet none on her fork?"

      Haviland turned to him quickly.

      "You spoke before of her prints on the Webley as being odd, sir? In what way, in fact?"

      "I can tell better when I have studied the enlargements," was the evasive reply.

      There was a short silence. This was different from theorising beforehand. The Chief Inspector was looking over the fields. Was the Hark, Hallo! coming? It all lay with the young man leaning with folded arms on the low parapet of the bridge and staring straight before him with level, quiet eyes.

      Haviland fidgetted with a cigar. "Of course," he said dubiously, "it's a question of finding out what's essential and what isn't..."

      Wilmot gave a short laugh. "Be able to do that, Haviland, and you'll be a god, not a policeman."

      "Still, as a matter of fact," Haviland went on doggedly, "that is what has to be done."

      "And pray what is the essential fact or facts here?" Wilmot asked indulgently.

      Pointer answered for the Superintendent, "The most essential thing in, this case is to find out exactly what happened on Sunday. When the break occurred."

      "Break?"

      "Between the old Mrs. Tangye and the new Mrs. Tangye. Between the woman who went on as always, and the woman who apparently changed her habits so much."

      "She seems to've quarrelled with Tangye on Monday as usual," Wilmot reminded him.

      "True," Pointer had to smile at the other's tone. "Yet she first began then to prepare for her coming departure."

      "Safe СКАЧАТЬ