The Cheltenham Square Murder E-Book

John Bude

• Herausgeber: Reading Essentials
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

The inhabitants of Regency Square inj Cheltenham are horrified when one of their number is killed, especially when the murder weapon is a bow and arrow. It is one thing to read about violent crimes in the newspapers, quite another when it happens in their own square and they could become suspects. Investigation unearth many secrets concealed by the respectable residents of Regency Square, but it is not until another death occurs that we can discover the truth behind the killings.

Leseprobe

The Cheltenham Square Murder

by John Bude

First published in 1937

This edition published by Reading Essentials

Victoria, BC Canada with branch offices in the Czech Republic and Germany

[email protected]

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except in the case of excerpts by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

The Cheltenham Square Murder

by

Contents

Chapter

Page

I

The Square Circle

5

II

Upset at Number Two

16

III

Death at Number Six

25

IV

Meredith Gets to Work

38

V

Burglary at Number Five

47

VI

Interviews

55

VII

The Empty House

69

VIII

Mystery on the Roof

81

IX

The Fitzgeralds Talk

97

X

April House

113

XI

Death Flies Again

130

XII

Suspect at Number One

141

XIII

Probables and Possibles

159

XIV

A Flutter at Number Seven

173

XV

The Raid at Charlton Kings

192

XVI

Pure Deduction

206

XVII

Jervis The Rake

217

XVIII

Startling Climax

228

XIX

Post Mortem

241

My thanks are due to Mr. Tom Barneby for his help in the archery details in this book

—J.B.

Chapter IThe Square Circle

Perhaps one of the most attractive features about that famous and lovely town, Cheltenham Spa, is its squares. Planned at a period more spacious than ours of to-day, they bear with them an atmosphere of leisure, culture, and almost rural tranquillity. They all bear a family likeness, and Regency Square, though perhaps smaller and more exclusive than others in the vicinity, typifies perfectly its Georgian origins. It consists of only ten houses erected in the form of a flattened U with a quiet, residential road ambling across its open side. These ten well-proportioned domiciles face on to the central, communal square of grass, which is shaded here and there by rare trees and graceful, flowering shrubs.

The architecture is varied, though pleasing, from the long, low façade of the White House, to the tall, flat-roofed simplicity of Number One on the opposite side of the square. None of these buildings, however, has more than three storeys, whilst most are ornamented with wrought-iron verandahs or carved stone balconies. As one faces into the square from the road one sees the left-hand arm of the U as a continuous frontage with a flat, crenellated roof and a series of four sets of stone steps leading down from four, solid-looking front-doors. To the right lies the White House in its own well-kept grounds and one other less distinguished, detached house which completes the right arm of the U.

At the base of the U are five undetached houses, the chief feature of which are the french windows on the second floor which give out on to stone balconies, supported by the pillars of porticos which hood their respective front-doors. An uninterrupted pavement runs round the three sides of the square, shaded with silver birch trees, which, combined with a number of discreet lamps, divide the pavement from the road. The general effect is of a quiet, residential backwater in which old people can grow becomingly older, undisturbed by the rush and clatter of a generation which has left them nothing but the memories of a past epoch.

Unfortunately, as in so many cases, the outward suggestions of the square are by no means compatible with the inward life lived by the people inhabiting it. Granted not one of those ten houses boasts a child. Granted that the average age of its residents is round about forty. Granted that traffic is scarce, barrel-organs unknown and wireless-sets so subdued that they are debarred from penetrating the walls of adjacent houses. But what of the yapping of Miss Boon’s dogs? Of the Rev. Matthews’ booming greetings which echo across the square? Of the eternal ringing of Dr. Pratt’s telephone-bell? Of the doubtful hymn-singing of the Misses Watt, and Captain Cotton’s high-powered motor-bike? And though, for the most part, the community live in amity, the very fact that they live in an enclosed intimacy not to be found in an ordinary road is sufficient to exaggerate such small annoyances and dissensions which from time to time arise.

There was, for instance, the controversy over the Tree. It was a minor war, which had been raging since the early winter, and now, in the middle of April, had come to a head. The Tree, a very old, almost immemorial elm, overhung the far, left-hand corner of the square, and in Mr. West’s opinion it was a Menace. The feelings of the other members of the square circle were divided. The masculine, short-skirted Miss Boon upheld that as it had stood for a hundred years there was no reason why it shouldn’t stand for another two hundred, an argument endorsed by Mr. Fitzgerald the bank-manager, and his pretty, though rather empty-headed young wife. The Rev. Matthews and his sister who could see the elm from their drawing-room were perfectly certain that its roots were sound, and that it would be a crime to cut it down. Dr. Pratt, on the other hand, sided with Mr. West because there was nothing he liked better than an argument with Miss Boon, whilst the caution and natural timidity of the Misses Nancy and Emmeline Watt placed them, as a matter of course, in the Menace camp. For the rest Captain Cotton didn’t care a damn, Mr. Edward Buller was more interested in the stock-market and his own ailments, Miss Barnet was away, and Sir Wilfred and Lady Eleanor Whitcomb, of the White House, retained their usual aloof and non-committal attitude to the brawls of the hoi-poloi.

“Look here, West,” said Dr. Pratt one early spring morning, “it’s no use letting this absurd argument drift on like this. You ought to act. See the Borough Surveyor—I think it’s in his demesne—get him on your side and have the tree cut down.”

“But what about Matthews? He’s dead against—”

“Oh, damn Matthews. He doesn’t want it cut down for aesthetic and sentimental reasons. But public safety is of far more importance than sentiment.”

“You know, Pratt,” said West apologetically, “I hate upsetting people. It seems a pity that this matter couldn’t be settled amicably.”

The doctor snorted.

“Well, if you won’t see the authorities, I’ll do it myself. It’s your place to—you started the shamozzle. Point is, unless that elm comes down somebody’s going to be killed in the long run. It’s our duty to act.”

“Oh, very well,” said West wearily. “I’ll mention the matter in the right direction and see what can be done about it. I’m sick of the whole business.”

“Good!” concluded Pratt emphatically. “You’re doing the sensible thing.”

“Am I?” wondered West. “It’s all very well for you. You’re making me shoulder the responsibility and if there’s a row I shall be the one to suffer.”

He didn’t want any more worries. He had quite enough to deal with as it was—financial worries, domestic worries, worries about the future. Ever since he had come such a cropper over those cement shares, selling when he ought to have held for a substantial rise, nothing had gone right with his finances. Buller had been handsomely apologetic over the misinformation which he had given him over those shares. Of course the man, although a stockbroker, could not always be expected to gauge the market to a T. The stock-market was a tricky business at the best of times and, of late, political unrest had undermined what little stability existed in the money world. But it had placed him in an awkward fix. If things didn’t suddenly take a turn for the better and his investments show an increased profit—well, good-bye to his retirement. He’d have to look around for a job and go into harness again.

Isobel wouldn’t like it. She was difficult enough now but if money got tight heaven alone knew what might happen. The old threat of a separation might be translated from a threat into an act. Things between them had become so strained since Christmas that it needed only a spark to send their domestic life sky-high. If only he could adopt a nice callous attitude toward his wife, the sort of attitude she seemed to hold for him, then the dread of this threatened split would no longer worry him. As it was he often lay awake at night trying to straighten things out. Trouble was that the others in the square knew all about it now. He had been quick to realize this fact from their politely veiled innuendos and unspoken sympathy. And it was all Isobel’s fault. She was brazen, thoughtless in the calm manner in which she accepted Captain Cotton’s odious advances. Hadn’t he seen them sharing a tea-table on the Promenade? And the fellow was an outsider, a wastrel, an adventurer. Nobody seemed to know where his money came from or how a mere car-salesman could run a house in the square with a manservant to look after him. It seemed incredible that an intelligent, educated woman like Isobel should have come under the spell of such a vulgar upstart. The retention of that prefix “Captain” should have been sufficient to warn her, for Pratt had told him in confidence that Cotton had never held a regular commission. Exactly what one would expect of the bounder.

Turning these unpleasant thoughts over in his mind as he made his way to the municipal offices, West almost collided with Miss Boon returning from her shopping, surrounded, as usual, by an ill-assorted pack of dogs.

“Ah, hullo, Arthur. Taking a constitutional?”

West guiltily prevaricated.

“Yes, just popping down to the bank.”

“Just been there myself,” said Miss Boon in her resounding bass. “Fitz looks off his oats, doesn’t he?”

“Fitzgerald? I haven’t really noticed. Is he ill?”

“Ill! He looks as if he’s seen a ghost. Or falsified his accounts. He ought to see Pratt.”

“Well he always seems happy enough—I mean in his home. If ever a couple were eminently suited to each other—”

Miss Boon shuddered.

“Horrible. The way they hang round each other’s necks. I grant you they’ve only been married for a short time and that she’s only just out of her teens, but Fitz is old enough to know better. Can’t fathom what he sees in that fancy little bit.”

“She’s very pretty,” contested West, edging along the pavement a little.

“Bah! Chocolate-box, Arthur. You’ve got low tastes.”

“And a lot to do,” added West meaningly. “I really must—”

Miss Boon side-stepped and planted herself and her dogs implacably in his path.

“Wait a bit. I want a word with you. About that Tree.”

West felt a cold shiver run up his spine. This was the one subject he wished to avoid.

“Well?”

“Matthews and I won’t have it cut down. You’re old-womanish in your attitude.”

“It’s unsafe. Patently so. Pratt agrees.”

“Pratt’s a fool. I like him but he’s a fool. If either of you dare—”

“Good-bye,” said West picking his way among the snuffling pack at his feet. “I’ve got a lot to do before lunch.”

Miss Boon swung round, whistled stridently to a Cocker on the far side of the street and made off in the direction of the square.

Poor Arthur, he was always a bit edgy these days. Making a regular nuisance of himself about that Tree. So childishly insistent that he was right. Of course Isobel’s behaviour was enough to drive any man to drink. Thank God she hadn’t any domestic worries. Dogs were the only sensible housemates. They didn’t argue or make trouble like human beings. She felt happy and full of vim striding along with her canine bodyguard.

But as she turned into Regency Square and made ready to mount the steps of Number One her eye was arrested by something unpleasant at the end of the square. Her expression altered. Her massive jaw advanced. Her eyes narrowed and she radiated something that was half-brother to hatred. The object of her disapproval was the retired stockbroker, Edward Buller, who had just come out on to his stone balcony and dropped into his chaise-longue. Being, as he himself firmly believed, an invalid, he often took up this post of vantage on sunny mornings in order to relieve the monotony of inaction by watching the activities of other people. Luckily for him Miss Boon’s expression was too distant for him to recognize as also was her muttered imprecation:

“That vile inhuman brute!”

And anybody overhearing that remark would have judged that Miss Boon meant exactly what she said.

Buller himself felt in an expansive mood since he was alone and not burdened with the necessity of acting up to his role of a dying man. The finance page of his morning paper had greeted him with the bald information that overnight he had successfully made a couple of thousand pounds. One of his finest coups since the opening of the new year. Although he had retired from active stockbroking five years previously, a genuinely wealthy man, he liked to feel that he was keeping his hand in and that this hand had not lost its notorious Midas-touch. It was a familiar saying in the city: “Buller always hits the bulls. Everything he touches turns to money.” Quite true it did. A nice little nest-egg of fifty thousand pounds tucked away in gilt-edged, these casual little snippets dropping into his hand, the house his own and no actual dependants. Of course there was that two hundred pound annuity which he had settled on his nephew Anthony, but that was a mere fleabite. Sensible boy. Had a way with him. Had the right attitude toward money. Believed that it was better to make money than to spend it. Well his nephew wouldn’t regret these sentiments because he had made him his sole heir. A bit of fun to watch the boy’s face when he told him last Christmas. Better to let the boy know now after what Pratt had reluctantly told him about his constitution. Go easy. Plenty of sunlight and fresh-air. Keep the windows open. A tendency, perhaps to T.B. Nothing serious but serious enough in his, Buller’s, opinion to talk about to his few sympathetic friends. Pity this rag-and-bobtail lot in the square didn’t seem to get on with him—not that he admired them but it would have been pleasant to swap ailments whenever he felt like a chat. The old dears next door were all right though a bit pious with their church-going and hymn-singing. A little of ’em went a long way.

“Have you watered the ferns?” asked Miss Emmeline of her sister Nancy. “The warmer weather seems to be affecting them adversely, Nance.”

Miss Nancy looked up over her embroidery frame with an air of patient martyrdom.

“Do I ever forget. Really, Emmeline, you are a little trying at times. We have our separate duties and I’m sure I never attempt to evade the responsibilities I’ve accepted.”

“I’m very sorry, Nance. I’d no desire to upset you. I see Mr. Buller is taking the sun this morning.”

At this piece of news her sister laid down her embroidery and joined Emmeline at the window, where she was peeping obliquely along the façade of the house from behind a chink in the lace curtain at the projecting balcony of the adjacent building. For a moment the two sisters stared with commiseration and interest at the portly figure reclining in the chair, then Miss Nancy observed:

“I think he has got over his turn. It was terrible while it lasted, but I’m sure the spring is doing him a world of good. You were so brave that dreadful night, Emmeline.”

A tiny smirk of satisfaction rather belied Miss Emmeline’s modest denial.

“I only did what I could. But Doctor Pratt was wonderful. Wonderful. I could only sit by the bedside and pray that the crisis would pass.”

There was a pause as Miss Nancy cautiously withdrew from the window and resettled herself in her sewing-chair. At length she looked up and asked with immense gravity:

“I wonder, Emmeline, do you think we were right in telling Mr. Matthews the awful words you overheard? I can’t help feeling that it was a little unkind to Mr. Buller. Of course I know Mr. Matthews would never breathe a word to anybody but if Mr. West were to hear—”

“It was our duty,” broke in Miss Emmeline sternly, turning away from the window and picking up a feather-duster. “I know those words were only spoken in delirium. One likes to believe there was no truth in them, but I felt I wanted advice. I naturally turned to Mr. Matthews in my distress. You must understand, Nance, that from that day I have never born the slightest ill-will to Mr. Buller.

“But why should he think that he had swindled—yes, Emmeline, it’s the only word to use—that he had swindled Mr. West of all that money?”

“I think,” concluded Miss Emmeline, flicking her feather-duster over a china-laden what-not, “that it was a figment of his feverish imagination.”

Her sister, aware that the subject had now been closed, knew better than to try and reopen it. Instead she branched out into an entirely new conversational direction with the observation that Miss Barnet’s brother, Aldous, would probably be taking his sister’s house now that she had gone abroad again. They knew that their left-hand neighbour liked to “keep the place aired.” The Misses Watt, moreover, were intensely interested in Aldous because he represented, however obliquely, a world of which they knew nothing—the world of crime. For Aldous Barnet, who lived under the South Downs in the little village of Washington, was a writer of detective stories. In the course of his occasional visits he often dropped in and chatted to them about forgeries and thefts and murders. Of course these godless things would never come their way but it was interesting to hear about the wickedness of other people from a man who was practically an authority on the subject.

Dr. Pratt, too, whose house stood at right angles to Miss Barnet’s in the corner of the square, was also a willing audience to her brother’s anecdotes. He made it a custom to have Aldous in to dinner whenever he came to Cheltenham and, after their port, they settled down to an evening’s survey of crime and its many ramifications. Pratt had not perhaps the naive attitude of the Misses Watt toward theft and murder, but was more interested in the psychology of criminal types. His chief, perhaps his only, hobby was a detached study of the actions and reactions of his fellow-men, a study which, after years of silent practice he had reduced to a fine art. Pratt always felt that he could anticipate to a detail what a certain man would do in certain circumstances. Or for that matter, though with less confidence, a certain woman. This hobby invested him with an air of intellectual detachment which seemed to arouse more faith in his patients than a jovial bedside-manner.

The aloofness of Sir Wilfred and Lady Eleanor, whose large, expensive, dazzling White House abutted the doctor’s, was in an entirely different category. It was less intellectual and more snobbish, for Sir Wilfred’s immediate forebears had by no means thought it odd to take off their coats before sitting down to their unimaginative, midday dinners. It was quite impossible to disassociate Sir Wilfred and his wife from their titles. They allowed and took no liberties, but dwelt somewhat apart from the other denizens in Regency Square, a little condescending, a little patronizing and generally disliked. Although several people in the square had approached Sir Wilfred with the suggestion that he should become a member of the Wellington Archery Club he had always refused with the simple though irritating phrase that “bows and arrows were out-of-date.” To this sententious and absurd remark he owed quite half of his unpopularity, for Regency Square boasted a small, select band of keen archers, who were as fanatic in their own line as golfers. It was a well-known fact that many of the more vulgar residents in the vicinity referred to Regency Square as “Archery Nook.” For all that the municipal and even county teams often called upon Dr. Pratt, Miss Boon, West, Fitzgerald and the Rev. Matthews to “draw a bow” on their behalf.

Thus the inhabitants of Regency Square—diverse, yet as a community, typical; outwardly harmonious, yet privately at loggerheads; temperamentally and intellectually dissimilar, yet all of them chiselling away at the same hard block of granite which, for want of a better word, we call life.

Chapter IIUpset at Number Two

Hilary Fitzgerald glanced over the top of the ground-glass which filled in the lower sash of the bank windows. The Promenade was busy and crowded with afternoon shoppers, who ambled and chatted on the broad pavements beneath the thickening shadows of the chestnut trees. Expensive, glittering limousines were drawn up at the kerb watched over by zealous chauffeurs, who now and then opened doors and touched their hats to their fur-coated mistresses. Well-dressed middle-aged women pranced on high-heels, with a toy dog or a silent, moustached male in tow. Mahogany-faced gentlemen dawdled in the sunshine with small parcels dangling from their gloved fingers. Fitzgerald smiled a little wanly and accepted this mundane, animated scene with a nod of approval. Everything out there was going on just the same. Thank God for that! It was only in his head things were at sixes and sevens and his thoughts revolving round and round the same dark problems.

Suddenly his smile vanished and his slim, tall body stiffened. His eye had caught a glimpse of two people among that string of promenaders—two people whom he recognized instantly and with a hot surge of anger. The woman, pale, dark, distinguished with a set expression of disdain upon her almost Grecian profile, was Mrs. West. The floridly handsome man, with the bristly moustache, overwaisted suit and swaggering walk, was Captain Cotton.

“Disgusting!” he thought. “To stroll about together in this shameless fashion. It’s beyond me to say what she sees in that unmitigated swine!”

How he loathed those coarse, ruddy features, the insolent good-humour, the overweening self-confidence. The picture of that man was seldom absent from his inward vision. As he bent over his figures in the bank, as he sipped a whisky in his club, as he walked, talked, ate and dreamed—always that grinning, handsome face seemed to be leering at him. It was over a year now since Captain Cotton had come into the square and turned the bliss of his newly-married existence into a life of suspense and terrible anticipation. He could never shake the fellow off. Often when he walked home, tired, dispirited from the bank, there was a loud-voiced greeting at his elbow and the slap of that detested hand upon his shoulder. In the square they thought he was friendly with the “Captain.” But that was through no fault of his own. The fellow was a leech, a poisonous leech, that was slowly sucking the health out of his body and the balance from his mind. How long could he stand up to this fellow’s insidious attentions? How long would it be before he cracked up and threw in the sponge. And if it came to that?—he shuddered and drew away from the window. Whatever happened, for Joyce’s sake, he must hang on to the last shreds of his willpower and refuse to accept defeat.

Joyce came down the steps to meet him as he drew level with Number Four. He kissed her in a perfunctory manner, slipped a hand through her arm and went into the house. She looked at him with her large, round eyes and asked anxiously:

“He hasn’t—?”

He shook his head.

“Otherwise occupied, thank heaven!”

“Isobel?”

“Yes. Together on the Promenade. Quite openly now. There’s going to be an almighty explosion soon.”

“Well, if he’s blown up that won’t worry us. I wonder Arthur has stood it so long.”

“We have,” he answered wryly. “Though God knows,” he added with sudden repressed fury, “I’d like to...to—”

She laid a hand to his sleeve.

“Hilary!”

“Oh, all right. Don’t you worry, I’ll keep control of myself. But I warn you, Joyce, if this sort of thing, this nightmare situation goes on much longer, I shall go off my head.”

Captain Cotton stood just round the corner from Regency Square and squeezed Isobel’s gloved hand.

“And look here, old girl, don’t you worry about him,” he was saying in his thick, caressing voice. “I’ve got your little Arthur taped to a T. He may yap and snarl a bit but he daren’t bite. Nuisance that you have to take the brunt of his bad temper, but just you keep your nose up and he’ll soon grow tired of yapping. After all there’s nothing wrong in our little bit of fun, is there?”

“You know there isn’t,” replied Isobel, adoringly. “He can’t expect me to sit at home all day twiddling my thumbs. And that’s what it amounts to. I’ve loved to-day, Mark. You seem to make everything worth while. If only all these nosey-parkers—”

“Forget ’em. They’re not worth a row of beans. Same time, same place to-morrow, my sweet?”

“Of course, Mark.”

He glanced furtively up and down the road and kissed her. She smiled reprovingly at him, squeezed his hand again, murmured, “Au revoir,” and turned the corner primly into Regency Square.

Three days later a group of workmen trundled a hand-cart into the square, laden with axes and hatchets and ropes. After a certain amount of preparation they began in an unhurried way to cut down the elm tree.

The Rev. Matthews, arrested by the sound of chopping, looked up sharply from his breakfast egg.

“Preposterous, Annie. He’s stolen a march on us. I think it is singularly unsportsmanlike that we shouldn’t have been consulted before the authorities decided to have the Tree down.”

His sister, a faded, anaemic creature in nondescript clothes, agreed in a toneless voice. She always agreed with Cyril. She had been agreeing with him for over forty years.

“Personally I think West should be asked to resign from the Archery Club as a protest,” went on her brother pompously. “That may be uncharitable of me but I feel very strongly over this matter. You realize that anybody looking out of the windows of Number Five or Six will be able to see directly into our front-rooms. A disturbing thought, Annie.”

Again his sister agreed, though this time with less enthusiasm. After all so very little happened in the square that it would be quite exciting to follow the comings and goings of that queer Captain Cotton and to see Mr. Buller sitting out on his balcony.

The Rev. Matthews continued to scoop at his egg in silence. He was wondering if he hadn’t been too soft-hearted in keeping to himself the remarks which Miss Emmeline had gleaned from Buller’s delirium. He had not wanted to cause trouble between West and Buller. But now—? Well, West had not been particularly considerate over this business of the Tree. It might be a good idea to give some concrete manifestation of his disapproval and, after a strong protest, tell West what Buller had said. It would show the fellow that it was a mistake to look upon parsons as meek, long-suffering, without the courage to retaliate when they had been snubbed. Yes—Buller’s confession would give West something to think about. In the long run he might even apologize for his unchristian high-handedness. When he had mentioned the matter, in the strictest confidence of course, to Miss Boon, she had asserted that a thing of that sort should be brought out into the open. Out of fairness to Arthur, she said. He hadn’t seen it like that at the time, only the upset it would cause, but it was encouraging to feel that he could disturb this fellow’s complacency with Miss Boon’s approval. It was like eating your cake and having it at the same time.

But it was some few days before the opportunity occurred for him to speak and by that time new and startling events had taken place at Number Two. The final, devastating quarrel between Arthur and his wife was impressed gently upon the square. Nobody knew anything for certain, they could only use their eyes and ears, put two and two together and make four. Miss Boon dropped the first hint with the information that when “taking her ménage for an airing” the previous evening, she had heard the sounds of a violent altercation proceeding from the open window of Arthur’s bedroom. Unfortunately the curtains were drawn to so that she was unable to say exactly what had been happening. This was on 30th April, just a week after the elm had been felled and carted away. About noon on 1st May Miss Annie Matthews, weeding the diamond-shaped bed in her minute front garden, saw a taxi draw up at Number Two. After a short time Mrs. West, followed by the taximan carrying a cabin-trunk, got into the taxi and was driven off. There was no sign of Mr. West. On 2nd May Dr. Pratt called on West with the offer of a “lift” to the butts if he were intending to shoot that evening. He had found his friend slumping in an armchair with a glass of whisky at his elbow, disinclined to talk and refusing to turn out. Pratt had left him with the uneasy feeling that something had gone vitally wrong in the West household. He had seen no sign of Mrs. West. On the 3rd the cat was completely let out of the bag by Mrs. Haggard, the housekeeper at Number Two who, meeting the Fitzgerald’s maid in the High Street, informed her with a sort of breathless, well-I-never flow of words that Mrs. West had left her husband. No—she didn’t rightly know where she had gone, but probably to her mother in Stroud. Of course, it was all this Captain Cotton. She’d seen this coming for months past she had, and her only surprise was that it hadn’t come sooner. Lordy yes—poor Mr. West had took it bad. He was proper fond of her, and dirty dogs like that Captain Snake-in-the-grass ought to be hung, drawn and quartered.

By nightfall of that memorable day the whole of Regency Square knew of the crisis. It penetrated even the aristocratic walls of the White House, and was discreetly discussed at dinner before the servants and later more forcibly in the bedroom. All eyes were turned upon Number Five. Had Captain Cotton also disappeared? But much to the general, though unacknowledged, disappointment his high-powered motor-bike roared its customary, after-breakfast challenge through the confines of the square. Buller, who sometimes took a glass of sherry in the same pub, declared that the fellow seemed more jaunty and self-satisfied than ever. Everybody felt sorry for Arthur West, even those who had been opposed to him in the Tree controversy. Even Matthews felt dubious about handing on the information which he had received from Emmeline Watt, when he paid him a duty-call on the evening of the 5th.

He found the place in great disorder. Packing-cases were strewn about, the rooms were stripped of ornaments and pictures, the floors were littered with newspapers.

“I’m going away,” said West shortly in answer to the Vicar’s look of inquiry. “You know why, of course?”

The Rev. Matthews hummed and hawed.

“Ah, yes, to be sure. I had heard something. Nothing definite of course. A little domestic upset I take it?”

West glared at him.

“A little upset! My wife’s left me, Matthews. For good. I’m leaving the square. For one thing I can’t bear to live with the associations in this house and for another—you may as well know the truth—I’m so hard up that I’ve got to sell out.”

The Vicar was genuinely surprised. He knew that West was not a wealthy man, but he had never suspected that he was not in comfortable circumstances.

“My dear fellow, I’m very sorry to hear this. If only I could do something. But, unfortunately, Annie and I live, as you probably know, on a mere pittance—”

“Kind of you,” said West shortly, “but it’s too late now. This crash might have been avoided if I hadn’t come such a cropper over those cement shares of mine. Things were not easy before, but when we began to get short of money—”

“Quite.” Should he tell West now about Buller’s delirium? This was the opportunity. Only fair to Arthur, said Miss Boon. “Why did you sell out so hastily?”

“Buller.”

“I see. Er . . . you don’t think that your loss might have been his . . . er . . . gain?”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, Mr. Buller knows all about the stock-market. He has inside information. Couldn’t he, perhaps, have manipulated, I think that’s the word, manipulated the market so that your shares depreciated.”

“Well?”

“Then when they had dropped to a very low figure, advised you to sell out and bought them in himself, knowing quite well that they were in for a sensational rise. They’ve almost trebled their price I believe.”

“What makes you think all this?” asked West suspiciously.

“It was something which came to my knowledge some little time back. I don’t know if I ought to—”

“Well?” demanded West inexorably.

With carefully chosen words the Rev. Matthews told, in the strictest confidence of course, everything that he had heard from Miss Watt.

The following afternoon a pantechnicon transferred part of Arthur West’s furniture to a couple of unpretentious, unfurnished rooms in George Street, the remainder being dumped in an auction-room ready to be sold. West himself closed and fastened the windows, bolted and locked the doors of Number Two, which in the parlance of the square was soon referred to, with commendable tact, as the Empty House. From that moment his life moved outside the circle of his old acquaintances. He even resigned from the Archery Club.

A week or so later, 1st June to be exact, Aldous Barnet’s sleek, blue Alvis drew up outside his sister’s house under the watchful gaze of the Misses Watt. His arrival had caused them quite a flutter of excitement. It seemed to widen for them the small world within which they dwelt, and they planned to send him an invitation to tea as soon as convention allowed. It would be pleasant to hear again about the dreadful doings of that elegant Dr. Crippen or that strange Mr. Charlie Peace who lived two lives in one.

But the Misses Watt would have been even more excited and fluttering if they had looked over Barnet’s shoulder that evening as he sat at his sister’s desk writing a letter.

Dear Meredith [he wrote],

Apropos of that conversation we had at the County Court a few weeks back—my offer still holds good. It would give me a lot of pleasure if you could spend part of your annual holiday with me here. I know you are keen on that book I’m planning out about the work of the County Police, but I really can’t get going without your help and advice. So if you’re still of the same mind as you were when we last met, what about the 10th? I think you said your holiday started from that date. Mind you, this is a proper collaboration and your name will have to go on the title page. (Officialdom permitting!) If you don’t know Cheltenham you’ll find it interesting.

Yours sincerely,

Aldous Barnet.

On the envelope he wrote:

Superintendent Meredith,

Sussex County Constabulary,

Lewes, Sussex.

Chapter IIIDeath at Number Six

It was on Monday, 13th June, three days after Superintendent Meredith’s arrival in Cheltenham, that Captain Cotton decided to call on Edward Buller. Buller was one of the few people in the square with whom he seemed to have something in common. Perhaps it was that they were both inherent gamblers, that they both enjoyed a little flutter. He had an idea, therefore, that Buller wouldn’t refuse to extend to him a little professional help and advise him about the investment of some idle capital. After a solitary dinner, served by his manservant Albert, Cotton lit a cigar and sauntering out in the square looked up at the window of Buller’s study, which was on the second floor. In accordance with his usual practice Buller had left the window wide open and was, at that moment, standing at it smoking his after-dinner pipe.

“Can I have a word with you?” called up Cotton. “Won’t take up much of your valuable time.”

“Certainly. You can find your own way. The door’s not locked.”

“Thanks.”

A few minutes later the two men were standing over a tray of drinks in the roomy, well-lighted room where Buller spent most of his time and transacted his few bits of very profitable business.

“Say when,” said Buller, the siphon poised over the rim of the glass.

“Whoa!” cried Cotton. “That’s just how the doctor ordered it. You probably wondered, old man, what I’ve come to see you about.”