Chapter III.The InquestThe inquest upon Mr. Tovey, although it was reported at length in all the evening papers, did not throw any further light upon the identity of his murderer. The knife was produced and handed round for examination. There was, however, nothing extraordinary about it, except perhaps its inordinate length and the fact that it had no handle.A cutler, called as an expert witness, identified it as the blade of a paper-cutter’s knife, carefully ground down so as to obliterate the maker’s name and also to produce an edge all the way up as well as at the point. Such blades were usually supplied with a wooden handle, into which they fitted loosely, being secured by means of a set-screw. This witness agreed that knives of this type were rarely seen in ordinary use, but that they were made in considerable quantities for use in certain trades. There would be no difficulty in purchasing one.Wal Snyder, with a mixture of glibness and injured innocence, gave his version of the affair. But the atmosphere of the coroner’s court, so painfully reminiscent of the police court, reduced him in a very short time to stuttering incoherence. Yes, he had caught sight of somebody just as the dead man fell. Hadn’t never seen him before, biggish fellow with a lot of black hair, and an ugly-looking cut across his cheeks, like as if he’d been slashed with a knife. Asked why he thought he was a sailor, Wal replied that he wore a woollen cap and a coat and trousers like the sailors wear. He knew because he had got pals down the West India Dock Road. Asked again if he had any reason to suppose that this was the man who stabbed the deceased, Wal became more confused than ever. Well, then, had he seen him strike the blow? Wal had not, but incautiously advanced the opinion that he looked just the sort of cove who’d do a thing like that.This brought the whole weight of the coroner’s displeasure upon his unlucky head. He was told to stand down and not talk nonsense. Then his appalled ear was assailed by an exact and monotonous catalogue of the misdemeanours committed by himself in particular and the Express Train gang in general; things which he fondly believed were known only to himself and a few chosen associates. They ranged from petty larceny to assault and battery, but the Inspector who recited them seemed to treat them with contempt. He smiled as he replied to the coroner’s questions.“No, sir, I don’t believe any of them have the intelligence or the pluck to plan a murder like this,” he said, “nor do I think that they would be likely to play any of their games outside the Express Train, under the very eyes of the police. In fact, sir, we have no evidence that any of them was in any way connected with the crime.”The constable who had been first on the scene proved an excellent witness, and earned the coroner’s commendation. He had been standing, at about half-past nine on the previous Sunday evening, on the pavement opposite the Express Train. There had been complaints of disorderliness in Praed Street at closing time. There had been a large number of people passing along the pavement, and the sudden surge of twenty or thirty men from the door of the public house caused a few moments confusion. He heard a lot of shouting, then saw a man fall on the pavement. A group immediately gathered round the fallen man and hid him from sight until he pushed them aside.Asked if he could form any estimate of the time which elapsed between his seeing the man fall and his reaching his side, the constable said, it could not have been more than fifteen seconds. He did not see anybody resembling the black haired sailor described by a previous witness, but had there been such a man he would have had ample time to disappear in the crowd in the interval. He could not distinguish faces across the street, it was too foggy. His ambulance training had convinced him that the deceased was dead when he reached him.A house-surgeon at St. Martha’s described the wound. It would not require the exercise of any great force to drive the knife in, but the location of the blow showed a certain knowledge of anatomy. The knife had passed right through the outer clothing of the deceased; it was only when the body was undressed that it was discovered. It seemed difficult to imagine how a man holding a blade without a handle could have driven it in so far. Death from such a wound would be practically instantaneous, but there would be no external hæmorrhage.The coroner, addressing the jury, made it quite plain that although there was no doubt how deceased met his death there was no evidence as to how the blow was delivered. The jury, taking their clue from his remarks, found that the deceased had been murdered by some persons or persons unknown, and added a rider expressing their sympathy with his widow and daughter.Mr. Samuel Copperdock, who had escorted Mrs. Tovey and Ivy to the court, brought them back to his place in Praed Street for tea. In Mr. Copperdock’s mind there still lingered a strong suspicion that Wal Snyder and the Express Train gang were in some way mixed up in the affair. His disappointment that someone had not been brought to book made him unusually silent, and it was not until tea was over, and he and Mrs. Tovey were ensconced in arm-chairs in his comfortable parlour, that he resumed his accustomed cheerfulness.Mrs. Tovey, a voluminous figure in the deepest of black, had taken the tragedy with her accustomed philosophy. She was not the sort of woman to give way to despair; and all her life she had faced the ups and down of fortune with the same outward placidity. Her inner feelings were her own concern; even her husband had never attempted to probe their depth. Besides, Mrs. Tovey belonged to a class which cannot afford to let sentiment interfere with the practical considerations of the moment.“I shall keep on the business,” she was saying. “ ’Tisn’t as though I’d been left without a penny, in a manner of speaking. Jim had a tidy bit put away; he always used to say he was saving it up for our old age. Then there’ll be the insurance money. Ivy’s a good girl, she hasn’t cost us nothing for the last year or two, and it’s her I’m thinking of mostly. She’ll want a home yet for a bit, and she couldn’t have a better one.”Mr. Copperdock glanced over his shoulder towards the other end of the room, where Ivy and Ted were holding an earnest conversation in low tones. It was Thursday afternoon, early closing day, and the shop below was shut, a circumstance for which Ted appeared devoutly grateful.“I shouldn’t wonder if you lost Ivy before very long,” said Mr. Copperdock slyly. “But she’s a good girl, as you say. But you’ll never manage the business by yourself, Mrs. Tovey. Who’s going along to do the bit of buying of a morning?”“I’ll manage easy enough,” replied Mrs. Tovey confidently. “I shall take young Alf into the shop, and get another lad to drive the van. You’ll find I’ll manage to rub along very comfortable, Mr. Copperdock.”They entered upon an earnest discussion of the science of greengrocery, heedless of the equally earnest discussion which was going on behind their backs.“No, it’s no use, Ted, not yet,” Ivy was saying. “You none of you seem to understand quite. It’s different for Mum; she’s got the business to look after, and she doesn’t think of anything else. I can’t forget how good Dad always was to me, and we just couldn’t do anything he wouldn’t have liked.”“You mean he wouldn’t have liked you to—to walk out with me?” put in Ted, half resentfully.Ivy blushed in spite of herself. “It wasn’t that, exactly,” she replied. “Mind, he never said anything to me, but I’ve got it out of Mum since. He always wanted me to—to get on in the world, and be a credit to the education he’s given me. And I feel that even now he’s dead, I’ve got to try and do what he wanted.”“It isn’t that there’s anybody else?” he suggested with a note of anxiety in his voice.“There isn’t anybody else, Ted,” she replied, looking him straight in the face. “But I’m not going to promise anything until I’ve got over the shock of his being killed like that. Oh, Ted, who can have done it? He hadn’t an enemy in the world, not a real enemy, I mean.”Ted shook his head helplessly. “I can’t make it out,” he replied. “I can’t believe Wal Snyder had anything to do with it. After all, if—if he wanted to be friends with you, it wasn’t the way to go about it.”“Wal Snyder must have known perfectly well that I’d never have had anything to do with him,” exclaimed Ivy indignantly. The disclosure of that episode at the inquest had roused her to a pitch of anger she rarely displayed. “Besides, he’s too much of a worm to do a thing like that. I’d like to see him hanged, just the same.”Ted tactfully disregarded this piece of feminine logic. “It must have been some lunatic, or perhaps, whoever it was mistook your father for someone else,” he replied vaguely.“And sent him that telephone message first,” she struck in, with a touch of scorn. “No, poor Dad was murdered deliberately. Oh, Ted, if only I were a man, and could find out who did it!”Ted, looking at her clenched hands and tear-filled eyes, felt suddenly the urge of a great resolve. “Ivy, if I were to find out who it was, would you marry me?” he exclaimed impulsively.Her eyes dropped before his ardent gaze. “Perhaps,” she murmured.Their further conversation was interrupted by the stately rising of Mrs. Tovey from her chair.“Come along, Ivy,” she said. “It’s time we were getting along home.”Ivy rose obediently, as Mr. Copperdock helped her mother into her cloak. “Ted’ll see you home, Mrs. Tovey,” he said. “I don’t like the thought of your being about the streets alone.”“That’s very kind of you, Mr. Copperdock,” replied Mrs. Tovey. “I really don’t know what I should have done if it hadn’t been for all your goodness. You’ll come back to our place to-morrow and have a bit of something after the funeral?”“I’d be very glad to, Mrs. Tovey,” said Mr. Copperdock. He walked with them as far as the door of the shop, and stood there a few seconds, until he lost sight of Mrs. Tovey’s ample form among the crowd. Then he walked slowly up the stairs, and flung himself into his own particular chair.“I wonder if she suspects anything?” he muttered, with a reflective frown. “I’ll have to go cautious-like, I can see that.”Mr. Copperdock sat for a long time, motionless, his usually cheerful face furrowed in deep thought. He hated being alone at any time, but somehow this evening it was doubly distasteful. Ted was a long time coming back; no doubt Mrs. Tovey, hospitable soul, had asked him to step in. It was no good stepping across to Elmer Ludgrove’s; Thursday afternoon was that gentleman’s busiest day of the week. The herbalist never closed on Thursday. His customers were for the most part people who were engaged in trade, and the weekly half-holiday was their only opportunity for consultations. Also it seemed a long time before it would be his usual hour for going to the Cambridge Arms. Mr. Copperdock consoled himself with the thought that, as one who had actually attended the inquest, he would not lack an attentive audience.In due course Ted came back, with a suppressed light of excitement in his eyes. He said very little until they had finished tea, and then,à proposof nothing in particular, he burst out with the subject which occupied his mind. “I say, Dad, I would like to find out who killed poor old Tovey!” he exclaimed.Mr. Copperdock glanced at him in astonishment. “Would you, my lad?” he replied sarcastically. “Think you’re a sucking Sherlock Holmes, perhaps? You take it from me, if the police can’t lay their hands on the chap, ’tain’t likely you will.”Ted sighed heavily. In his heart of hearts he was of the same opinion himself. But the magnificence of the reward had blinded him to the difficulties which lay in his path. In every thriller which he had ever read the hero had at least the fragment of a clue to work upon. But rack his brains as he would, Ted could not hit upon the faintest idea of how to set about looking for one.His father continued to look at him with a not unkindly smile. “I dessay you think that Ivy would give a lot to know, eh?” he said, his native shrewdness carrying him straight to the point. “Well, I wouldn’t be disheartened if I was you. Women’s queer folk, and they often takes the will for the deed, as the saying is. But you stick to the tobacco trade, my boy, and don’t go trying no detective tricks on your own, or you’ll find yourself in trouble.”It was not until the following evening that Mr. Copperdock had a chance of a word with Mr. Ludgrove. The excitement engendered by Mr. Tovey’s funeral had kept him busy all the morning, and on his return from that ceremony he had found the herbalist’s shop full of people. But as he was coming back from his evening visit to the Cambridge Arms, he overtook Mr. Ludgrove, who was strolling with a leisurely air along the pavement of Praed Street.They were glad to see one another. “I have been hoping for a chance of a chat with you ever since yesterday,” said Mr. Ludgrove. “Of course, I read the report of the inquest in the papers, but naturally I should be interested in a fuller description. As you see, I am on my way home from my usual evening stroll. Would you care to come in for a few minutes?”Mr. Copperdock laid his hand on his friend’s arm. “No, no, you come over to my place,” he replied hospitably. “Ted’s sure to have a decent fire going, and there’s a bottle of whiskey in the cupboard. And it’s rarely enough you find time to come and see me, and that’s a fact.”Mr. Ludgrove agreed, and for the second time the tobacconist went over the story of the inquest. His son listened attentively, not so much to his father’s words as to the comments of the herbalist. He had great faith in Mr. Ludgrove’s wisdom, and he felt that at any time he might suggest some clue which could be followed up.But Mr. Ludgrove disappointed him. “It is really the most remarkable affair,” he said as his friend came to the end of his recital. “I confess that I have puzzled over it more than once since last Monday morning. In fact, I have no doubt that I shall amuse myself by speculating upon it during the week-end.”“Going away?” asked Mr. Copperdock incuriously.Mr. Ludgrove nodded. “I hope to catch the 12.35 from Liverpool Street to-morrow,” he replied.“Weed hunting, as usual?” said Mr. Copperdock facetiously.“If you like to call it so,” answered Mr. Ludgrove. “As you know, I employ most of my week-ends looking for our rarer English plants. It has become the custom to sneer at the simple remedies of our ancestors, but I assure you that there are plants growing in the hedgerow, if one can only find them, which will cure almost any human complaint, and it is my favourite practice to seek for them.”Mr. Copperdock shook his head. “Can’t say as I should find much fun in it,” he said. “Too lonely a business altogether. I likes to have someone to talk to when I’m on a holiday. And where might you be going this time?”“A little place I know in Suffolk, not very far from Ipswich. Now why don’t you come with me, Mr. Copperdock? I shall stay at the inn, a most pleasant little place, and we could go out searching for plants together.”But Mr. Copperdock was not to be tempted. “It’s very good of you, I’m sure,” he replied. “But, as a matter of fact, the country isn’t very alive, leastways not at this time of the year. Perhaps I’ll come with you some time in the summer, if you’re going to stay at a decent little pub. Some of them country pubs ain’t half bad if you’re thirsty.”After a little further conversation Mr. Ludgrove took his departure, and Mr. Copperdock, after a final drink, retired to bed. But it is to be feared that his thoughts gave him very little rest. He almost regretted that he had not accepted Ludgrove’s invitation. For it was being slowly borne in upon him that his agitation would drive him to confide in the wisdom of the herbalist. Ludgrove could be trusted not to give him away, and would certainly give him good advice.
The inquest upon Mr. Tovey, although it was reported at length in all the evening papers, did not throw any further light upon the identity of his murderer. The knife was produced and handed round for examination. There was, however, nothing extraordinary about it, except perhaps its inordinate length and the fact that it had no handle.
A cutler, called as an expert witness, identified it as the blade of a paper-cutter’s knife, carefully ground down so as to obliterate the maker’s name and also to produce an edge all the way up as well as at the point. Such blades were usually supplied with a wooden handle, into which they fitted loosely, being secured by means of a set-screw. This witness agreed that knives of this type were rarely seen in ordinary use, but that they were made in considerable quantities for use in certain trades. There would be no difficulty in purchasing one.
Wal Snyder, with a mixture of glibness and injured innocence, gave his version of the affair. But the atmosphere of the coroner’s court, so painfully reminiscent of the police court, reduced him in a very short time to stuttering incoherence. Yes, he had caught sight of somebody just as the dead man fell. Hadn’t never seen him before, biggish fellow with a lot of black hair, and an ugly-looking cut across his cheeks, like as if he’d been slashed with a knife. Asked why he thought he was a sailor, Wal replied that he wore a woollen cap and a coat and trousers like the sailors wear. He knew because he had got pals down the West India Dock Road. Asked again if he had any reason to suppose that this was the man who stabbed the deceased, Wal became more confused than ever. Well, then, had he seen him strike the blow? Wal had not, but incautiously advanced the opinion that he looked just the sort of cove who’d do a thing like that.
This brought the whole weight of the coroner’s displeasure upon his unlucky head. He was told to stand down and not talk nonsense. Then his appalled ear was assailed by an exact and monotonous catalogue of the misdemeanours committed by himself in particular and the Express Train gang in general; things which he fondly believed were known only to himself and a few chosen associates. They ranged from petty larceny to assault and battery, but the Inspector who recited them seemed to treat them with contempt. He smiled as he replied to the coroner’s questions.
“No, sir, I don’t believe any of them have the intelligence or the pluck to plan a murder like this,” he said, “nor do I think that they would be likely to play any of their games outside the Express Train, under the very eyes of the police. In fact, sir, we have no evidence that any of them was in any way connected with the crime.”
The constable who had been first on the scene proved an excellent witness, and earned the coroner’s commendation. He had been standing, at about half-past nine on the previous Sunday evening, on the pavement opposite the Express Train. There had been complaints of disorderliness in Praed Street at closing time. There had been a large number of people passing along the pavement, and the sudden surge of twenty or thirty men from the door of the public house caused a few moments confusion. He heard a lot of shouting, then saw a man fall on the pavement. A group immediately gathered round the fallen man and hid him from sight until he pushed them aside.
Asked if he could form any estimate of the time which elapsed between his seeing the man fall and his reaching his side, the constable said, it could not have been more than fifteen seconds. He did not see anybody resembling the black haired sailor described by a previous witness, but had there been such a man he would have had ample time to disappear in the crowd in the interval. He could not distinguish faces across the street, it was too foggy. His ambulance training had convinced him that the deceased was dead when he reached him.
A house-surgeon at St. Martha’s described the wound. It would not require the exercise of any great force to drive the knife in, but the location of the blow showed a certain knowledge of anatomy. The knife had passed right through the outer clothing of the deceased; it was only when the body was undressed that it was discovered. It seemed difficult to imagine how a man holding a blade without a handle could have driven it in so far. Death from such a wound would be practically instantaneous, but there would be no external hæmorrhage.
The coroner, addressing the jury, made it quite plain that although there was no doubt how deceased met his death there was no evidence as to how the blow was delivered. The jury, taking their clue from his remarks, found that the deceased had been murdered by some persons or persons unknown, and added a rider expressing their sympathy with his widow and daughter.
Mr. Samuel Copperdock, who had escorted Mrs. Tovey and Ivy to the court, brought them back to his place in Praed Street for tea. In Mr. Copperdock’s mind there still lingered a strong suspicion that Wal Snyder and the Express Train gang were in some way mixed up in the affair. His disappointment that someone had not been brought to book made him unusually silent, and it was not until tea was over, and he and Mrs. Tovey were ensconced in arm-chairs in his comfortable parlour, that he resumed his accustomed cheerfulness.
Mrs. Tovey, a voluminous figure in the deepest of black, had taken the tragedy with her accustomed philosophy. She was not the sort of woman to give way to despair; and all her life she had faced the ups and down of fortune with the same outward placidity. Her inner feelings were her own concern; even her husband had never attempted to probe their depth. Besides, Mrs. Tovey belonged to a class which cannot afford to let sentiment interfere with the practical considerations of the moment.
“I shall keep on the business,” she was saying. “ ’Tisn’t as though I’d been left without a penny, in a manner of speaking. Jim had a tidy bit put away; he always used to say he was saving it up for our old age. Then there’ll be the insurance money. Ivy’s a good girl, she hasn’t cost us nothing for the last year or two, and it’s her I’m thinking of mostly. She’ll want a home yet for a bit, and she couldn’t have a better one.”
Mr. Copperdock glanced over his shoulder towards the other end of the room, where Ivy and Ted were holding an earnest conversation in low tones. It was Thursday afternoon, early closing day, and the shop below was shut, a circumstance for which Ted appeared devoutly grateful.
“I shouldn’t wonder if you lost Ivy before very long,” said Mr. Copperdock slyly. “But she’s a good girl, as you say. But you’ll never manage the business by yourself, Mrs. Tovey. Who’s going along to do the bit of buying of a morning?”
“I’ll manage easy enough,” replied Mrs. Tovey confidently. “I shall take young Alf into the shop, and get another lad to drive the van. You’ll find I’ll manage to rub along very comfortable, Mr. Copperdock.”
They entered upon an earnest discussion of the science of greengrocery, heedless of the equally earnest discussion which was going on behind their backs.
“No, it’s no use, Ted, not yet,” Ivy was saying. “You none of you seem to understand quite. It’s different for Mum; she’s got the business to look after, and she doesn’t think of anything else. I can’t forget how good Dad always was to me, and we just couldn’t do anything he wouldn’t have liked.”
“You mean he wouldn’t have liked you to—to walk out with me?” put in Ted, half resentfully.
Ivy blushed in spite of herself. “It wasn’t that, exactly,” she replied. “Mind, he never said anything to me, but I’ve got it out of Mum since. He always wanted me to—to get on in the world, and be a credit to the education he’s given me. And I feel that even now he’s dead, I’ve got to try and do what he wanted.”
“It isn’t that there’s anybody else?” he suggested with a note of anxiety in his voice.
“There isn’t anybody else, Ted,” she replied, looking him straight in the face. “But I’m not going to promise anything until I’ve got over the shock of his being killed like that. Oh, Ted, who can have done it? He hadn’t an enemy in the world, not a real enemy, I mean.”
Ted shook his head helplessly. “I can’t make it out,” he replied. “I can’t believe Wal Snyder had anything to do with it. After all, if—if he wanted to be friends with you, it wasn’t the way to go about it.”
“Wal Snyder must have known perfectly well that I’d never have had anything to do with him,” exclaimed Ivy indignantly. The disclosure of that episode at the inquest had roused her to a pitch of anger she rarely displayed. “Besides, he’s too much of a worm to do a thing like that. I’d like to see him hanged, just the same.”
Ted tactfully disregarded this piece of feminine logic. “It must have been some lunatic, or perhaps, whoever it was mistook your father for someone else,” he replied vaguely.
“And sent him that telephone message first,” she struck in, with a touch of scorn. “No, poor Dad was murdered deliberately. Oh, Ted, if only I were a man, and could find out who did it!”
Ted, looking at her clenched hands and tear-filled eyes, felt suddenly the urge of a great resolve. “Ivy, if I were to find out who it was, would you marry me?” he exclaimed impulsively.
Her eyes dropped before his ardent gaze. “Perhaps,” she murmured.
Their further conversation was interrupted by the stately rising of Mrs. Tovey from her chair.
“Come along, Ivy,” she said. “It’s time we were getting along home.”
Ivy rose obediently, as Mr. Copperdock helped her mother into her cloak. “Ted’ll see you home, Mrs. Tovey,” he said. “I don’t like the thought of your being about the streets alone.”
“That’s very kind of you, Mr. Copperdock,” replied Mrs. Tovey. “I really don’t know what I should have done if it hadn’t been for all your goodness. You’ll come back to our place to-morrow and have a bit of something after the funeral?”
“I’d be very glad to, Mrs. Tovey,” said Mr. Copperdock. He walked with them as far as the door of the shop, and stood there a few seconds, until he lost sight of Mrs. Tovey’s ample form among the crowd. Then he walked slowly up the stairs, and flung himself into his own particular chair.
“I wonder if she suspects anything?” he muttered, with a reflective frown. “I’ll have to go cautious-like, I can see that.”
Mr. Copperdock sat for a long time, motionless, his usually cheerful face furrowed in deep thought. He hated being alone at any time, but somehow this evening it was doubly distasteful. Ted was a long time coming back; no doubt Mrs. Tovey, hospitable soul, had asked him to step in. It was no good stepping across to Elmer Ludgrove’s; Thursday afternoon was that gentleman’s busiest day of the week. The herbalist never closed on Thursday. His customers were for the most part people who were engaged in trade, and the weekly half-holiday was their only opportunity for consultations. Also it seemed a long time before it would be his usual hour for going to the Cambridge Arms. Mr. Copperdock consoled himself with the thought that, as one who had actually attended the inquest, he would not lack an attentive audience.
In due course Ted came back, with a suppressed light of excitement in his eyes. He said very little until they had finished tea, and then,à proposof nothing in particular, he burst out with the subject which occupied his mind. “I say, Dad, I would like to find out who killed poor old Tovey!” he exclaimed.
Mr. Copperdock glanced at him in astonishment. “Would you, my lad?” he replied sarcastically. “Think you’re a sucking Sherlock Holmes, perhaps? You take it from me, if the police can’t lay their hands on the chap, ’tain’t likely you will.”
Ted sighed heavily. In his heart of hearts he was of the same opinion himself. But the magnificence of the reward had blinded him to the difficulties which lay in his path. In every thriller which he had ever read the hero had at least the fragment of a clue to work upon. But rack his brains as he would, Ted could not hit upon the faintest idea of how to set about looking for one.
His father continued to look at him with a not unkindly smile. “I dessay you think that Ivy would give a lot to know, eh?” he said, his native shrewdness carrying him straight to the point. “Well, I wouldn’t be disheartened if I was you. Women’s queer folk, and they often takes the will for the deed, as the saying is. But you stick to the tobacco trade, my boy, and don’t go trying no detective tricks on your own, or you’ll find yourself in trouble.”
It was not until the following evening that Mr. Copperdock had a chance of a word with Mr. Ludgrove. The excitement engendered by Mr. Tovey’s funeral had kept him busy all the morning, and on his return from that ceremony he had found the herbalist’s shop full of people. But as he was coming back from his evening visit to the Cambridge Arms, he overtook Mr. Ludgrove, who was strolling with a leisurely air along the pavement of Praed Street.
They were glad to see one another. “I have been hoping for a chance of a chat with you ever since yesterday,” said Mr. Ludgrove. “Of course, I read the report of the inquest in the papers, but naturally I should be interested in a fuller description. As you see, I am on my way home from my usual evening stroll. Would you care to come in for a few minutes?”
Mr. Copperdock laid his hand on his friend’s arm. “No, no, you come over to my place,” he replied hospitably. “Ted’s sure to have a decent fire going, and there’s a bottle of whiskey in the cupboard. And it’s rarely enough you find time to come and see me, and that’s a fact.”
Mr. Ludgrove agreed, and for the second time the tobacconist went over the story of the inquest. His son listened attentively, not so much to his father’s words as to the comments of the herbalist. He had great faith in Mr. Ludgrove’s wisdom, and he felt that at any time he might suggest some clue which could be followed up.
But Mr. Ludgrove disappointed him. “It is really the most remarkable affair,” he said as his friend came to the end of his recital. “I confess that I have puzzled over it more than once since last Monday morning. In fact, I have no doubt that I shall amuse myself by speculating upon it during the week-end.”
“Going away?” asked Mr. Copperdock incuriously.
Mr. Ludgrove nodded. “I hope to catch the 12.35 from Liverpool Street to-morrow,” he replied.
“Weed hunting, as usual?” said Mr. Copperdock facetiously.
“If you like to call it so,” answered Mr. Ludgrove. “As you know, I employ most of my week-ends looking for our rarer English plants. It has become the custom to sneer at the simple remedies of our ancestors, but I assure you that there are plants growing in the hedgerow, if one can only find them, which will cure almost any human complaint, and it is my favourite practice to seek for them.”
Mr. Copperdock shook his head. “Can’t say as I should find much fun in it,” he said. “Too lonely a business altogether. I likes to have someone to talk to when I’m on a holiday. And where might you be going this time?”
“A little place I know in Suffolk, not very far from Ipswich. Now why don’t you come with me, Mr. Copperdock? I shall stay at the inn, a most pleasant little place, and we could go out searching for plants together.”
But Mr. Copperdock was not to be tempted. “It’s very good of you, I’m sure,” he replied. “But, as a matter of fact, the country isn’t very alive, leastways not at this time of the year. Perhaps I’ll come with you some time in the summer, if you’re going to stay at a decent little pub. Some of them country pubs ain’t half bad if you’re thirsty.”
After a little further conversation Mr. Ludgrove took his departure, and Mr. Copperdock, after a final drink, retired to bed. But it is to be feared that his thoughts gave him very little rest. He almost regretted that he had not accepted Ludgrove’s invitation. For it was being slowly borne in upon him that his agitation would drive him to confide in the wisdom of the herbalist. Ludgrove could be trusted not to give him away, and would certainly give him good advice.