CHAPTER XVII.This Way and ThatInez explained to the two detectives how she had obtained from Ryland the handkerchief with an unusual scent which had belonged to Daphne, the mysterious girl who alone could have confirmed, or at any rate supported, his alibi. She told of her tracing it to “Mignon’s” and of how the assistant there had fined down the likely owners to a single one whom she herself knew by sight. She told of how she had gone down the following morning to the girl’s room in the Fulham Road and how the girl had presently pointed out to her a young woman, simply but well dressed, who was walking along the other side of the road. Inez had followed her to South Kensington Station, and thence in the Underground to the Monument, from where the girl had walked to an office in Fenchurch Street. Inez had not dared to follow her into the building but, after a discreet interval, had scrutinized the names on the board and among them found, to her intense excitement, that of the Victory Finance Company. After a few minutes’ thought, she had applied to the hall porter as to whether he knew if a friend of hers, Miss Tatham (a creature of her imagination) was still employed with the Victory Finance Company, to which the porter had replied that so far as he knew the only young woman employed by the Company was Miss Saverel, who had only that minute arrived—but she could obtain further information from the Company itself—on the fourth floor—he offered her the lift. Inez had declined his offer, given him a shilling and departed. She had herself tried to find Ryland but, failing to do so, had come in to Scotland Yard.“What’s all this about a Victory Finance Company?” asked Barrod. “Why should you have got your eye on them, Miss Fratten?”Poole explained the connection and told the Chief Inspector briefly of his own examination of Sir Garth’s file connected with it and of the enquiries that Mangane was making for him. After some further discussion it was arranged that Poole should meet Miss Fratten at the Monument Station at half-past five that evening and that together they should trail Miss Saverel to her home, after which the detective would consider whether to question her. If Ryland Fratten could be found in the meantime, he was to be brought along, in order to identify his “Daphne.” As soon as Inez had gone, Barrod turned to his subordinate.“Who’s this Mangane?” he said. “Why’s he doing your work for you?”Poole flushed at the curtness of the enquiry.“He’s doing something for me that I couldn’t do nearly so well myself. I can trust him, I know; we were at . . . I knew him well before I joined the Force.”“That’s no reason for trusting anyone,” said Barrod. “Take a word of advice from me, young man, and don’t call in any gifted amateurs—you’ll get let down one of these days if you do.”Feeling considerably nettled at the two rebukes he had had from his superior that morning, Poole made his way out into Whitehall. Owing to Miss Fratten’s visit, he had missed his rendezvous with P. C. Lolling at the police station, but the sergeant in charge had told him over the telephone whereabouts the constable was likely to be found; Poole found him, in fact, talking to the Park-keeper who lodged in the Admiralty Arch. Having detached the constable from his gossip, Poole questioned him as to his knowledge of the tragedy on October 24th. Lolling had seen nothing of the incident. He had noticed a crowd at the spot where—he afterwards learnt—Sir Garth had fallen, but as he approached it, it had dispersed—not, presumably because of his awful presence but because the body had at that moment been put into a car and driven away. He had made a note of the incident in his note-book, the time being recorded as 6.40p. m.Foiled once more in his attempt to get first-hand evidence of the death, Poole was about to turn away, when Lolling volunteered that he knew of somebody who had seen the accident—the gentleman’s death, that was. Curiously enough he had been discussing that very subject with his friend, Mr. Blossom, the Park-keeper, when the Inspector had come up. Mr. Blossom, it appeared, had an acquaintance who had actually seen . . . At this point Poole interrupted to suggest that Mr. Blossom should be asked to tell his own tale.The Park-keeper had not, fortunately, gone far afield. He was secretly thrilled at meeting the detective who had charge of the Fratten case, but the dignity of his office did not allow him to reveal the fact. It was the case, he said, that an acquaintance of his, a Mr. Herbert Tapping, a tuning-fork tester—had actually witnessed the death of Sir Garth Fratten. He had had an argument with Mr. Tapping only yesterday, after reading the account of the Inquest. He, Mr. Blossom, had advanced the thesis that Sir Garth had been done in by his companion, the Jewish gentleman, at the place where he fell, but Tapping had countered this by replying that he had actually seen Sir Garth fall and that Mr. Hessel could not have struck him—he was holding his arm at the time that Sir Garth staggered and fell. Moreover, Mr. Tapping had gone so far as to state that nobody else was near enough to strike a blow at that time; he himself was about the nearest and he was fifteen yards away. Mr. Tapping’s theory was that the blow had been struck by the “Admiralty messenger” on the Duke of York’s Steps, or, alternatively, that someone had thrown a stone at Sir Garth.Poole asked for and obtained the address of Mr. Herbert Tapping and, thanking Blossom for his help, made his way towards the Underground Station at St. James’s Park. As he walked, he turned over in his mind the baffling problem which this new evidence—if Mr. Tapping confirmed his friend’s story—only helped to deepen. Reliable witnesses stated categorically that Sir Garth had not been struck on the Steps; now a new witness, possibly reliable, said that he had not been struck at the spot where he fell. Where, then, in the name of goodness, had he been struck?Mr. Tapping had suggested a stone; the idea was a wild one; who could throw a stone so accurately as to strike the small vital spot in Sir Garth’s back—and from where had it been thrown? No one had been seen doing such a thing. Coningsby Smythe, of course—the House of Commons clerk—had been close behind but he had—according to his own story, at least—been separated from Fratten by a passing car. . . . Poole stopped dead. A passing car! That must have been within a few feet of Fratten! He had actually fallen a little distance beyond the carriage way, but he might have staggered a step or two before falling. Was it conceivable that he had been struck by someone in that car?Poole’s brain raced as he searched aspect after aspect of this theory. Another thought struck him: Miss Peake had said that she had seen Sir Garth’s assailant on the Steps “leap into a waiting vehicle and drive away.” Poole remembered the words clearly, though he had not taken them down; the old-fashioned “vehicle” had caught his memory. Miss Peake, of course, was mad—quite useless as a witness—but, if he remembered rightly, that sentence had not been spoken in the hysterical outburst, that had shown him how hopeless she was, but in one of her more lucid moments. He had thought nothing of it at the time; her hysteria had discounted everything she had said—and, of course, she was clearly wrong in saying that the man had struck Fratten on the Steps—the evidence of Hessel, Lossett, and Wagglebow, all independent of one another, was too strong to allow of any doubt on that head.Poole decided to take the first opportunity of testing the car theory; the test might even be made at the very spot if it were done late enough at night; in the meantime he would go back and question both P. C. Lolling and the Park-keeper, Blossom—if Miss Peake’s story were true and there had been a waiting “vehicle” somewhere near the Admiralty Arch, one of them might have seen it.There was no difficulty in finding Lolling; he had not, apparently, moved twenty yards from where Poole had first found him, and was talking to a mounted constable; the detective wondered whether conversation might not be rather a weakness of P. C. Lolling’s. Lolling himself appeared to be aware that appearances did not favour him, for he hastened to explain to the Inspector that he had just been questioning the mounted constable about the events of 24th October—apparently the latter’s beat took him occasionally down the Mall. It had not done so, however, on the evening in question; he knew nothing of the circumstances of Sir Garth’s death, nor, in reply to Poole’s enquiry had he seen anything of a suspicious-looking car “loitering” in the neighbourhood of the Admiralty Arch. Lolling, to his infinite regret, was equally unable to help Poole in his new quest, though he thought it more than likely that his friend the Park-keeper could. The united efforts of Poole, Lolling and the mounted constable, however, failed to reveal the present whereabouts of Mr. Blossom; after wasting half an hour in fruitless search, Poole gave it up, directing Lolling to send the Park-keeper to Scotland Yard as soon as he came off duty.It was now too late to go in search of Mr. Tapping if he was to keep his rendezvous with Miss Fratten, so Poole decided to look in at Scotland Yard and refer his new theory to Chief Inspector Barrod, prior to taking the Underground from Westminster to the Monument. Barrod, however, had just gone across to the Home Office with Sir Leward Marradine, on some diplomatic case that was worrying the government, so Poole had to cool his heels for half an hour before starting for the City.The evening rush had already begun when Poole reached the Monument. The shoals of small fry would not be released till six o’clock, but at 5.20p. m.when the detective emerged from the “east-bound” platform, a steady stream of superior clerks, secretaries and managers, was pouring into the “west-bound” as quickly as was consonant with their dignity.To Poole’s surprise, Inez Fratten was already waiting for him. Dressed in a dark mackintosh—there had been intermittent drizzle all day—and a small black hat, the detective did not at first recognize her as she stood, meekly waiting, in a corner just out of the rush of passengers. Her smile of welcome sent a thrill of pleasure through him and seemed to brighten up the drab surroundings of the east-end station.“You’re very punctual, Miss Fratten,” said Poole. “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting.”“You’re before time,” replied Inez. “I came early because I suddenly got a qualm that she might get off at five. She hasn’t been this way, anyhow.”Together they made their way upstream towards Fenchurch Street. A squad of newsboys hurrying out with the last editions alone seemed to be going in the same direction as themselves—everyone else was making for home and supper. Poole thought gloomily of the amount of work he had in front of him before his own supper was likely to be eaten; a further sigh escaped him as he thought of the loneliness of the “home” that awaited him at the end of the day; he did not often think of that aspect of his work—its endlessness, its loneliness; perhaps the presence of the girl at his side had started a train of thought that had better be promptly quenched.A glance at Inez showed him that she had no such thoughts; her eyes were alive with interest as she scanned each approaching female face; so far as she was concerned, the hunt was up and the thrill of it had thrust into the background the sadness of her loss and the anxiety of her “brother’s” position.Arrived at Ald House, the two hunters took up a position outside, and to one side of, the entrance. To avoid an appearance of watching they had arranged to stand as if in conversation, Poole with his back to the entrance and Inez Fratten, half-hidden by him, facing it; in this way she would be able to see everyone who came out and her own presence would be unlikely to attract the attention of their quarry. For a time they actually did converse, Poole doing most of the talking—about plays, books, politics, football—any subject that came into his head—while Inez answered in monosyllables and kept her gaze steadily fixed upon the entrance. After half an hour of it, however, even Poole’s eloquence—inspired as it was by the happy necessity of gazing into those enchanting eyes—began to dry up. Fortunately the six o’clock rush made their presence less conspicuous than it had been, and for another quarter of an hour Poole did little more than look at Inez while she kept her unwavering eyes focussed on the doorway through which “Daphne” must come.By 6.15 the stream had begun to thin; only an occasional junior clerk or typist hurried eagerly from office or counting-house towards bus or train, buttoning up coat collars or huddling under umbrellas as the gusts of rain swept down upon them. It was none too pleasant standing in the open street; besides, now that it was emptying, their continued conversation had an air that lacked conviction.They discussed their course of action. They might move into the entrance and watch from some dark corner, or—now that there was no crowd to obscure the line of vision—they might take up a position further from the spot they had to watch. On the other hand their quarry’s continued failure to appear suggested that she might after all have left earlier in the day and they be wasting their time by further waiting. They had reached the point of discussing the possibilities of enquiry when footsteps coming out of the entrance hall of Ald House caught their ear. Instantly they resumed their former attitudes; Poole with his eyes fixed upon Inez’ so that he could read hope or disappointment in their expression. He had not long to wait; he heard the two quicker steps of someone taking the two stone steps from Ald House on to the pavement and on the instant a look of astonishment flashed into the girl’s eyes. He heard her quick gasp of surprise and then the steps passed behind him and he turned his head to look; a man, of medium height and slightly built, was walking away from them, his coat collar turned up and his soft hat pulled low over his eyes. He had not gone ten steps when he checked, as if hesitating whether to go on or turn back. As he turned his head back towards the house he had left the light from a passing lorry fell upon his face; it was Ryland Fratten.
Inez explained to the two detectives how she had obtained from Ryland the handkerchief with an unusual scent which had belonged to Daphne, the mysterious girl who alone could have confirmed, or at any rate supported, his alibi. She told of her tracing it to “Mignon’s” and of how the assistant there had fined down the likely owners to a single one whom she herself knew by sight. She told of how she had gone down the following morning to the girl’s room in the Fulham Road and how the girl had presently pointed out to her a young woman, simply but well dressed, who was walking along the other side of the road. Inez had followed her to South Kensington Station, and thence in the Underground to the Monument, from where the girl had walked to an office in Fenchurch Street. Inez had not dared to follow her into the building but, after a discreet interval, had scrutinized the names on the board and among them found, to her intense excitement, that of the Victory Finance Company. After a few minutes’ thought, she had applied to the hall porter as to whether he knew if a friend of hers, Miss Tatham (a creature of her imagination) was still employed with the Victory Finance Company, to which the porter had replied that so far as he knew the only young woman employed by the Company was Miss Saverel, who had only that minute arrived—but she could obtain further information from the Company itself—on the fourth floor—he offered her the lift. Inez had declined his offer, given him a shilling and departed. She had herself tried to find Ryland but, failing to do so, had come in to Scotland Yard.
“What’s all this about a Victory Finance Company?” asked Barrod. “Why should you have got your eye on them, Miss Fratten?”
Poole explained the connection and told the Chief Inspector briefly of his own examination of Sir Garth’s file connected with it and of the enquiries that Mangane was making for him. After some further discussion it was arranged that Poole should meet Miss Fratten at the Monument Station at half-past five that evening and that together they should trail Miss Saverel to her home, after which the detective would consider whether to question her. If Ryland Fratten could be found in the meantime, he was to be brought along, in order to identify his “Daphne.” As soon as Inez had gone, Barrod turned to his subordinate.
“Who’s this Mangane?” he said. “Why’s he doing your work for you?”
Poole flushed at the curtness of the enquiry.
“He’s doing something for me that I couldn’t do nearly so well myself. I can trust him, I know; we were at . . . I knew him well before I joined the Force.”
“That’s no reason for trusting anyone,” said Barrod. “Take a word of advice from me, young man, and don’t call in any gifted amateurs—you’ll get let down one of these days if you do.”
Feeling considerably nettled at the two rebukes he had had from his superior that morning, Poole made his way out into Whitehall. Owing to Miss Fratten’s visit, he had missed his rendezvous with P. C. Lolling at the police station, but the sergeant in charge had told him over the telephone whereabouts the constable was likely to be found; Poole found him, in fact, talking to the Park-keeper who lodged in the Admiralty Arch. Having detached the constable from his gossip, Poole questioned him as to his knowledge of the tragedy on October 24th. Lolling had seen nothing of the incident. He had noticed a crowd at the spot where—he afterwards learnt—Sir Garth had fallen, but as he approached it, it had dispersed—not, presumably because of his awful presence but because the body had at that moment been put into a car and driven away. He had made a note of the incident in his note-book, the time being recorded as 6.40p. m.
Foiled once more in his attempt to get first-hand evidence of the death, Poole was about to turn away, when Lolling volunteered that he knew of somebody who had seen the accident—the gentleman’s death, that was. Curiously enough he had been discussing that very subject with his friend, Mr. Blossom, the Park-keeper, when the Inspector had come up. Mr. Blossom, it appeared, had an acquaintance who had actually seen . . . At this point Poole interrupted to suggest that Mr. Blossom should be asked to tell his own tale.
The Park-keeper had not, fortunately, gone far afield. He was secretly thrilled at meeting the detective who had charge of the Fratten case, but the dignity of his office did not allow him to reveal the fact. It was the case, he said, that an acquaintance of his, a Mr. Herbert Tapping, a tuning-fork tester—had actually witnessed the death of Sir Garth Fratten. He had had an argument with Mr. Tapping only yesterday, after reading the account of the Inquest. He, Mr. Blossom, had advanced the thesis that Sir Garth had been done in by his companion, the Jewish gentleman, at the place where he fell, but Tapping had countered this by replying that he had actually seen Sir Garth fall and that Mr. Hessel could not have struck him—he was holding his arm at the time that Sir Garth staggered and fell. Moreover, Mr. Tapping had gone so far as to state that nobody else was near enough to strike a blow at that time; he himself was about the nearest and he was fifteen yards away. Mr. Tapping’s theory was that the blow had been struck by the “Admiralty messenger” on the Duke of York’s Steps, or, alternatively, that someone had thrown a stone at Sir Garth.
Poole asked for and obtained the address of Mr. Herbert Tapping and, thanking Blossom for his help, made his way towards the Underground Station at St. James’s Park. As he walked, he turned over in his mind the baffling problem which this new evidence—if Mr. Tapping confirmed his friend’s story—only helped to deepen. Reliable witnesses stated categorically that Sir Garth had not been struck on the Steps; now a new witness, possibly reliable, said that he had not been struck at the spot where he fell. Where, then, in the name of goodness, had he been struck?
Mr. Tapping had suggested a stone; the idea was a wild one; who could throw a stone so accurately as to strike the small vital spot in Sir Garth’s back—and from where had it been thrown? No one had been seen doing such a thing. Coningsby Smythe, of course—the House of Commons clerk—had been close behind but he had—according to his own story, at least—been separated from Fratten by a passing car. . . . Poole stopped dead. A passing car! That must have been within a few feet of Fratten! He had actually fallen a little distance beyond the carriage way, but he might have staggered a step or two before falling. Was it conceivable that he had been struck by someone in that car?
Poole’s brain raced as he searched aspect after aspect of this theory. Another thought struck him: Miss Peake had said that she had seen Sir Garth’s assailant on the Steps “leap into a waiting vehicle and drive away.” Poole remembered the words clearly, though he had not taken them down; the old-fashioned “vehicle” had caught his memory. Miss Peake, of course, was mad—quite useless as a witness—but, if he remembered rightly, that sentence had not been spoken in the hysterical outburst, that had shown him how hopeless she was, but in one of her more lucid moments. He had thought nothing of it at the time; her hysteria had discounted everything she had said—and, of course, she was clearly wrong in saying that the man had struck Fratten on the Steps—the evidence of Hessel, Lossett, and Wagglebow, all independent of one another, was too strong to allow of any doubt on that head.
Poole decided to take the first opportunity of testing the car theory; the test might even be made at the very spot if it were done late enough at night; in the meantime he would go back and question both P. C. Lolling and the Park-keeper, Blossom—if Miss Peake’s story were true and there had been a waiting “vehicle” somewhere near the Admiralty Arch, one of them might have seen it.
There was no difficulty in finding Lolling; he had not, apparently, moved twenty yards from where Poole had first found him, and was talking to a mounted constable; the detective wondered whether conversation might not be rather a weakness of P. C. Lolling’s. Lolling himself appeared to be aware that appearances did not favour him, for he hastened to explain to the Inspector that he had just been questioning the mounted constable about the events of 24th October—apparently the latter’s beat took him occasionally down the Mall. It had not done so, however, on the evening in question; he knew nothing of the circumstances of Sir Garth’s death, nor, in reply to Poole’s enquiry had he seen anything of a suspicious-looking car “loitering” in the neighbourhood of the Admiralty Arch. Lolling, to his infinite regret, was equally unable to help Poole in his new quest, though he thought it more than likely that his friend the Park-keeper could. The united efforts of Poole, Lolling and the mounted constable, however, failed to reveal the present whereabouts of Mr. Blossom; after wasting half an hour in fruitless search, Poole gave it up, directing Lolling to send the Park-keeper to Scotland Yard as soon as he came off duty.
It was now too late to go in search of Mr. Tapping if he was to keep his rendezvous with Miss Fratten, so Poole decided to look in at Scotland Yard and refer his new theory to Chief Inspector Barrod, prior to taking the Underground from Westminster to the Monument. Barrod, however, had just gone across to the Home Office with Sir Leward Marradine, on some diplomatic case that was worrying the government, so Poole had to cool his heels for half an hour before starting for the City.
The evening rush had already begun when Poole reached the Monument. The shoals of small fry would not be released till six o’clock, but at 5.20p. m.when the detective emerged from the “east-bound” platform, a steady stream of superior clerks, secretaries and managers, was pouring into the “west-bound” as quickly as was consonant with their dignity.
To Poole’s surprise, Inez Fratten was already waiting for him. Dressed in a dark mackintosh—there had been intermittent drizzle all day—and a small black hat, the detective did not at first recognize her as she stood, meekly waiting, in a corner just out of the rush of passengers. Her smile of welcome sent a thrill of pleasure through him and seemed to brighten up the drab surroundings of the east-end station.
“You’re very punctual, Miss Fratten,” said Poole. “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting.”
“You’re before time,” replied Inez. “I came early because I suddenly got a qualm that she might get off at five. She hasn’t been this way, anyhow.”
Together they made their way upstream towards Fenchurch Street. A squad of newsboys hurrying out with the last editions alone seemed to be going in the same direction as themselves—everyone else was making for home and supper. Poole thought gloomily of the amount of work he had in front of him before his own supper was likely to be eaten; a further sigh escaped him as he thought of the loneliness of the “home” that awaited him at the end of the day; he did not often think of that aspect of his work—its endlessness, its loneliness; perhaps the presence of the girl at his side had started a train of thought that had better be promptly quenched.
A glance at Inez showed him that she had no such thoughts; her eyes were alive with interest as she scanned each approaching female face; so far as she was concerned, the hunt was up and the thrill of it had thrust into the background the sadness of her loss and the anxiety of her “brother’s” position.
Arrived at Ald House, the two hunters took up a position outside, and to one side of, the entrance. To avoid an appearance of watching they had arranged to stand as if in conversation, Poole with his back to the entrance and Inez Fratten, half-hidden by him, facing it; in this way she would be able to see everyone who came out and her own presence would be unlikely to attract the attention of their quarry. For a time they actually did converse, Poole doing most of the talking—about plays, books, politics, football—any subject that came into his head—while Inez answered in monosyllables and kept her gaze steadily fixed upon the entrance. After half an hour of it, however, even Poole’s eloquence—inspired as it was by the happy necessity of gazing into those enchanting eyes—began to dry up. Fortunately the six o’clock rush made their presence less conspicuous than it had been, and for another quarter of an hour Poole did little more than look at Inez while she kept her unwavering eyes focussed on the doorway through which “Daphne” must come.
By 6.15 the stream had begun to thin; only an occasional junior clerk or typist hurried eagerly from office or counting-house towards bus or train, buttoning up coat collars or huddling under umbrellas as the gusts of rain swept down upon them. It was none too pleasant standing in the open street; besides, now that it was emptying, their continued conversation had an air that lacked conviction.
They discussed their course of action. They might move into the entrance and watch from some dark corner, or—now that there was no crowd to obscure the line of vision—they might take up a position further from the spot they had to watch. On the other hand their quarry’s continued failure to appear suggested that she might after all have left earlier in the day and they be wasting their time by further waiting. They had reached the point of discussing the possibilities of enquiry when footsteps coming out of the entrance hall of Ald House caught their ear. Instantly they resumed their former attitudes; Poole with his eyes fixed upon Inez’ so that he could read hope or disappointment in their expression. He had not long to wait; he heard the two quicker steps of someone taking the two stone steps from Ald House on to the pavement and on the instant a look of astonishment flashed into the girl’s eyes. He heard her quick gasp of surprise and then the steps passed behind him and he turned his head to look; a man, of medium height and slightly built, was walking away from them, his coat collar turned up and his soft hat pulled low over his eyes. He had not gone ten steps when he checked, as if hesitating whether to go on or turn back. As he turned his head back towards the house he had left the light from a passing lorry fell upon his face; it was Ryland Fratten.