The White Cottage Mystery Read online

  Margery Allingham

  The White Cottage Mystery

  Contents

  1 The Girl with the Blister on Her Heel

  2 W.T.

  3 The Tablecloth

  4 The Invalid Chair

  5 The Only Alternative

  6 The Explanation of M. le Gris

  7 No. 28 Rue d’Aramis

  8 The Torturer

  9 Two Extravagant Ladies

  10 The Next Move

  11 The Record

  12 The Happy Thought of Mr Gale

  13 Mrs Christensen’s Secret

  14 The Blackmailer

  15 Where Were You?

  16 Daylight

  17 The End of the Story

  1 The Girl with the Blister on Her Heel

  It was a little after four o’clock in the evening when Jerry Challoner swung his sports car smartly round the bend in the Kentish road and slid quietly through the village street.

  At the moment he was well contented with life. He was making good time and there was no need to hurry, since London was but thirty miles ahead. The autumn evening was sunny, and he felt as he glanced in front of him that there could be no other place in the world more peaceful.

  Even the red bus which passed at the crossroads seemed to be a gentler, more domesticated creature than its wilder brethren of the London streets.

  A girl alighted from the bus. As he approached, the conductor handed her out a large basket, ringing his bell immediately afterwards, so that by the time Jerry arrived she was standing there alone struggling with it.

  The next moment found the car drawn up beside her and Jerry leaning over the side.

  ‘I say,’ he said. ‘Can’t I give you a lift?’

  The girl turned round upon him.

  ‘God bless you! It’s about half a mile down this road, and I’ve such a blister on my heel!’

  ‘That’s fine,’ he said, as a moment or two later she settled herself beside him. ‘Where’s the house?’

  ‘Down here on the right – it’s called White Cottage. I’ll point it out to you; it’s just the other side of that big grey building.’

  ‘That’s a queer place. What is it? An institution?’

  ‘Oh no; that’s a private house.’

  Jerry looked at the great barrack of a place they were approaching with a certain amount of surprise.

  ‘A private house?’ he said. ‘Good lord! Who lives there? – it looks like a hospital.’

  ‘Doesn’t it!’ said the girl, and laughed; but she did not answer his question, and he had a fleeting impression that it had embarrassed her. They had passed the hideous building by this time, and the girl touched his arm.

  ‘Look!’ she said. ‘Here we are.’ She pointed towards a white house set far back from the road, surrounded by shrubbery.

  Jerry drew up before the gate and helped the girl out.

  ‘I’ll bring the basket along for you, shall I?’

  ‘Well – no, thanks awfully, if you don’t mind,’ she said, and she seemed curiously disconcerted.

  ‘Oh, all right!’ he said cheerfully. ‘I’ll leave it here, shall I? You can send someone down for it afterwards; don’t carry it yourself with that heel.’

  He turned to go back to the car as he spoke, conscious that she did not want him to stay a moment longer than was absolutely necessary.

  ‘Good-bye.’

  ‘Good-bye,’ she repeated, ‘and thanks.’

  A storm was blowing up fast, and already a few heavy drops had begun to fall. A little way down the road therefore he pulled up again to put the hood up, and as he did so took the opportunity to have a cigarette. He found that he had no matches, however, and was about to push on again when a policeman turned the corner and came down the path towards him.

  Jerry borrowed the necessary match and the two fell into conversation.

  ‘Storm coming up,’ said Jerry.

  ‘There is, indeed,’ said the policeman, who was red-headed. ‘We get some wonderful weather down in these parts on account of the hills.’

  The sound of footsteps on the road ahead disturbed him, and with the instinctive curiosity of the countryside he glanced up as a man strode past them. He was considerably over the general height, pale with a lank unshaven chin. He was bare-headed and his dry black hair was swept back from his face by the driving wind.

  He walked fast and vanished round the corner without once glancing to the right or left.

  Jerry looked after him, struck by the same vague expression of apprehension in the man’s face that he fancied he had noticed in the girl’s. From round the bend behind them came the click of a latch, and he was reminded of the gate leading down to the White Cottage where he had left the girl. The stranger must have entered it.

  He turned to the constable.

  ‘I think I’ll push on,’ he said.

  The policeman opened his mouth to reply, but he was interrupted by the sudden report of a shot-gun somewhere to the right of where they stood. He paused and frowned.

  ‘It’s getting dark for shooting,’ he said. ‘Specially so near the road. These fellers round here don’t realize that this road ain’t the lonely lane it used to be. I’ve had several complaints lately of folk being scared to come along here in the evening, afraid they should be took for a rabbit or summat. If you’ll excuse me, sir, I’ll go and see if I can set eyes on that chap.’

  Jerry climbed back into the car, and was just about to press the starter when a cry behind made him turn and peer through the window.

  A girl was flying down the road towards him, her face white and terrified. She was screaming hysterically at the top of her voice:

  ‘Police! Police! Police! Murder!’

  The red-headed policeman ran towards her, and Jerry climbed out of his car once more and hurried after him.

  As he came up the girl pointed behind her.

  ‘It’s the White Cottage,’ she said breathlessly. ‘’E’s in there all covered a blood.’ On the last word she reeled forward, and Jerry was just in time to catch her as she collapsed.

  He was the first to speak.

  ‘Do you know her?’

  The policeman nodded.

  ‘She’s the parlourmaid at the White Cottage,’ he said. ‘We’d best go along there. Can you manage her feet, sir, if I take her shoulders?’

  The storm was coming nearer at every moment, and the heavy clouds overhead shed an unnatural darkness over the scene. The laurel bushes round the White Cottage were rustling together in the fidgety wind that precedes a downpou r.

  Jerry and the constable carried the fainting girl through the wicket-gate and stumbled down the path with her.

  As they came up to the front door it was thrown open and a grey-faced, horror-stricken girl came running out into the porch.

  Jerry hardly recognized her as the same one he had set down at the gate less than ten minutes before. All the light and youth seemed to have been drawn from her face and her blue eyes were wide.

  ‘Oh, I’m glad you’ve come!’ she said breathlessly. ‘Something horrible has happened. Come in at once.’

  Jerry and the policeman set the maid down in a chair in the porch and followed the girl into the house.

  They found themselves in a square hall, neat and white-painted, with four doors leading off from it. Three of these were open, showing glimpses of bright rooms within. The fourth was closed, and a group of silent horror-stricken people stood staring at it.

  Jerry followed the direction of their eyes and saw a slow dark stain oozing out from beneath the door. It showed up very clearly on the pale-grey lino although it was almost twilight in the hall.

  The red-headed policeman strode forward and, step
ping carefully to avoid the mark, laid a hand on the door-knob.

  ‘Don’t go in!’

  The words were uttered in an hysterical scream, and a woman in the group started forward impulsively. Jerry, glancing at her for the first time, saw how much she resembled his acquaintance of early in the afternoon. She was older, perhaps, and a little more frail, but the likeness was unmistakable.

  The policeman removed his hand from the knob and regarded her doubtfully.

  ‘What’s up in there?’ he demanded suspiciously.

  ‘Don’t go in – it’s too horrible.’

  The woman began to sob on the last words, and there was a general movement in the group about her as with a sudden squeaking of wheels a man in a hand-propelled invalid-chair shot forward, and Jerry and the policeman found themselves looking down into the pale, harassed face of a man aged about five-and-thirty. His head and shoulders were those of a giant; but the rest of him was attenuated and terribly crippled. He spoke hurriedly in a quiet voice that was in direct contrast to the woman’s hysteria.

  ‘You know me, constable,’ he said. ‘Thank God you’ve come. A most appalling thing has happened. Mr Crowther of the “Dene” has been shot. He is lying in there just inside the door. My wife came in through the french windows and found him … be careful how you go in.’

  The policeman grasped the door-handle once more.

  Jerry followed him into the room.

  The dead man was lying on his back in a pool of blood just inside, his face uplifted and the upper part of his shirt and coat torn aside.

  From his waist to his neck he had been almost blown to pieces.

  Jerry turned away, his gorge rising. As he did so he saw a single-barrel shot-gun lying on the square dining-table in the centre of the room; the barrel was pointing towards the door, and he noticed that a great part of the velour tablecloth had been blown away by the shot.

  The policeman hesitated no longer, but drew out his notebook; his hand trembled as he held the pencil.

  Jerry turned to him and produced his card.

  ‘Constable,’ he said. ‘I’m Jerry Challoner, the son of Detective Chief Inspector W. T. Challoner of the Yard.’

  2 W.T.

  Many people seeing W. T. Challoner for the first time made the mistake of thinking that his nickname, the ‘Greyhound’, was a joke. He was a fresh-faced, inoffensive-looking man with white hair, bright eyes and an engagingly fatherly manner. No one had ever inquired and the unobservant might have placed his age at sixty had they not noticed the peculiar alertness of his step and the faint indication of enormous back muscles beneath his grey jacket.

  The detective stood in the morning-room at the back of the house that had been placed at his disposal and faced his colleagues in the case – the red-headed constable and the heavy-faced inspector from New Campington. Jerry, silent and attentive, stood behind his father.

  ‘Well,’ W.T. said genially, ‘I think we may as well begin our preliminary inquiry now, don’t you?’

  ‘By all means.’

  The inspector seemed to welcome the authority of the older man.

  The detective turned to the police constable.

  ‘Let me see,’ he said. ‘You have the names of everyone in the house at the time of the crime, and as many particulars as you could collect about them?’

  The red-headed policeman nodded and produced his notebook.

  The detective sat down at the table and spread the book out before him.

  ‘Now,’ he said with the air of one talking aloud to himself, ‘whom have we? Roger William Christensen, the owner of the house. Is that the chap in the invalid-chair I saw as I came in? Eva Grace Christensen, his wife – she found the murdered man, I understand … Norah Phyliss Bayliss, her sister.’

  Jerry pricked up his ears – so her name was Norah.

  The detective went on reading.

  ‘Joan Alice Christensen, the Christensens’ baby; Estah Phillips, nurse to the child; Kathreen Goody, 17, parlourmaid; Doris James, 40, cook … Ah! Is that everyone, constable?’

  ‘I think so, sir.’

  ‘Good. Now how about the murdered man – who was he?’

  The policeman stepped forward and turned over the page of the notebook.

  ‘It’s all there, sir,’ he said.

  The detective beamed.

  ‘Splendid! I see – Eric Crowther, of the “Dene”. Where’s that?’

  ‘The big grey building next door.’

  ‘Did he live there alone – no wife, no servants?’

  ‘No wife, but servants. His valet is in the next room,’ said the inspector, his thick voice sounding unexpectedly in the silence that followed the question. ‘I had him brought over as soon as I came.’

  ‘Very wise, Inspector,’ said W.T.; ‘I think we’ll have him in at once, constable.’

  The policeman disappeared, to return a moment or so later with an untidy man. His small eyes were pale and there was a crop of unattractive dampish yellow-grey hair about his face and chin.

  He came creeping in, the policeman’s hand on his shoulder as if he were already arrested, and paused before the table without looking up.

  The detective sat looking at him in silence for some seconds, his bright eyes grown keen and piercing. Suddenly an exclamation escaped him: ‘Clarry Gale!’ he said.

  The man winced and his eyes flickered as he glanced at the detective before him.

  The next moment a timorous smile spread over his face.

  ‘W.T.!’ he murmured. ‘What a miracle! ‘Ow are you, guv’nor?’

  The detective did not smile.

  ‘What are you calling yourself now?’ he inquired.

  ‘William Lacy, sir.’

  ‘Good! Take all this down in shorthand, Jerry, will you? … All right, Gale, don’t get alarmed; you shall have your dues. Now answer me. How long have you been in Crowther’s employ?’

  ‘Ten years.’

  The words were spoken with such a world of feeling that every eye in the room was turned upon the speaker instantly.

  Even the ‘Greyhound’ seemed surprised.

  ‘Ten years?’ he said. ‘That’s ever since you came out of Wormwood Scrubs isn’t it? Did he know your record?’

  The man who called himself William Lacy nodded.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ve been going straight for ten years, then?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I must congratulate you, Gale.’ The detective was plainly puzzled, but he questioned the man no further about himself. When next he spoke it was to talk of the dead man.

  ‘How long has Crowther had the “Dene”?’

  ‘About six years.’

  ‘Has he known the Christensens all that time?’

  ‘And before.’

  The detective nodded understandingly.

  ‘You would call them old friends of his, then,’ he said. ‘He knew them well enough to walk into this house without knocking?’

  ‘He did that with most people ’e knew,’ declared Gale. ‘No one wouldn’t’ave the nerve to stop ‖im coming in anywhere, if they wanted him or if they didn’t.’

  The detective looked up sharply.

  ‘What kind of a man was he?’ he said. ‘Was he well liked in the neighbourhood?’

  With an expression of hatred made all the more horrible by the weakness of the face it clothed, Clarry Gale drew in a long whistling breath through his discoloured teeth.

  ‘He was a devil,’ he said, and he spoke fervently and as though he had made no exaggeration.

  A flicker of interest passed over the faces of the four listeners, and the detective continued:

  ‘Do you know why he came across here today?’

  ‘To find Mrs Christensen.’

  ‘Do you know why he wanted her?’

  ‘He’d been waiting for her since half past three and she didn’t come.’

  ‘Did Mrs Christensen often visit Crowther?’

  ‘No. He’d often taken her
into New Campington in his car, but she never came to the “Dene” alone, although I know he was always fidgeting her to. I took a note over to her this morning, though, and ’e told me ’e was expecting ’er this afternoon.’

  ‘Did he seem angry when he left the “Dene?” ’

  ‘’E was never angry – ’e was just laughin’, curse ’im.’

  ‘And that was the last you saw of him alive?’ continued the detective.

  Gale nodded.

  ‘It was,’ he said, and with something strangely like relief in his voice.

  W.T. paused for a moment, then he looked up.

  ‘Well, that will do. I’ll send for you again later. Oh, by the way – just one thing. How many other servants are there over at the “Dene” beside you?’

  ‘Only the cook,’ said the man, hesitating in the doorway. ‘Nice old party she is, by name of Fisher, Mrs Elsie Fisher.’

  ‘I see. There were only you three living at the “Dene”, then.’

  ‘Yes, sir, only us three and Mr Cellini.’

  The detective pricked up his ears.

  ‘Mr Cellini?’ he inquired. ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘The Italian chap what lived with the guv’nor.’

  ‘His companion?’

  ‘Something of that sort.’

  ‘I see. And this man is an Italian. Was he on equal footing with your master? I mean was he in the position of a friend?’

  ‘Oh no, they weren’t friends.’

  There was the ghost of a smile on the old lag’s face, and the detective glanced at him sharply.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’ he demanded.

  Clarry Gale sneered.

  ‘’E ’adn’t no friends,’ he said. ‘Mr Cellini felt the same towards ’im as most of us, I reckon.’

  ‘And how was that?’

  ‘’E ‘ated ’im!’

  There was an almost ferocious intensity in the man’s voice, and the detective sat back in his chair.

  ‘You yourself, of course, have a pretty strong alibi, I suppose, Gale?’ he said.

  ‘Me? I been with Mrs Fisher in the kitchen ever since lunch.’

  A faint smile appeared on the detective’s face.

  ‘So I imagined,’ he said. ‘If you hadn’t your animosity towards your late employer might have been misunderstood. However – where is Mr Cellini now?’