Part 24 (1/2)
”That's ingenious,” Roberts admitted. ”That certainly is ingenious; but I can't get around to it fitting the hobo I knew.”
”Would you know that man again if you saw him?”
”Sure I'd know him, unless he was wearing a wig, or something. Say, you've got me thinking, Superintendent. But there's a couple of snags I can see.”
”Yes, Mr. Roberts?”
”Well, the first is that, a.s.suming the Leighton I knew is the Leighton you're after, I doubt whether he'd ever have got himself sobered up enough to tackle a job like this. Maybe we're not talking of the same man. Let it go. The second snag is the number of murders. It's too steep, Superintendent. The man who'd set out to commit no less than three murders so that his wife could inherit a fortune sure must be a mastermind! You can take it from me, all that amount of nerve don't fit my Leighton, and from what Mrs. Kane's been telling us about the guy her great-niece married, it don't fit him either. Why, the man who could plan deviltry on a scale as grand as that must have brains enough to make a fortune for himself!”
”It doesn't always follow that a clever man chooses an honest way to make a fortune, Mr.
Roberts. I admit the improbability of his planning three murders, and I believe that if he is at the bottom of this case he didn't plan three. It is far more likely that, in common with Mr. Kane, he took it for granted that his wife stood next in succession to Mr. Clement Kane.”
Roberts regarded him with a faint smile. ”You've got it fixed in your mind Mr. Silas Kane and Mr. Clement were murdered by the same man, haven't you, Superintendent? Does it ever strike you there's a queer difference in the methods employed?”
”In my profession, Mr. Roberts, we guard against getting fixed ideas. I have as yet no proof that Mr. Silas Kane was murdered.”
”Guess he was murdered, all right; but whether you'll ever know by whom is another matter. I've a hunch that the man who pushed him off that cliff edge is dead himself now.” He glanced at Jim. ”A while back, Kane, you said something that was maybe sounder than you knew. You said: 'Murder begets murder.' I believe in this case it did.”
”You take a great interest in this case, Mr. Roberts?” said Hannasyde.
”Yes, Superintendent. It's a dandy little problem.”
”Have you had much experience of crime?”
Roberts regarded him with his head slightly on one side. ”Now, why do you ask me that?”
”You seem to look upon it almost from a professional standpoint.”
”You're trying to flatter me, Superintendent. I've been-interested in crime for a good many years; but I don't aspire to your standards. But in my experience a murderer has only one trick in his repertoire. In this case you have one man killed so neatly you'll never prove it was murder; and another killed so blatantly there's no possibility it could have been anything but murder. Unless I'm mistaken, the two methods indicate two very different types of minds. One's subtle; one ain't.”
”Aren't you rather leaving out of account the attempt upon Mr. Kane's life? Doesn't it fall into the same category as Mr. Silas Kane's murder?”
”Why, no, I think not, Superintendent. The accident to the Seamew and the accident to the car were tricks that could easily go wrong, and did go wrong. They look to me like a plain guy trying to be clever. Mr. Silas Kane's murderer thought of a plan where there was no room for mistake. You have to hand it to him.”
”If you don't mind, sir, I think we've had about enough of this conversation,” interposed Jim. ”It isn't very pleasant for my great-aunt.”
Roberts turned at once with a swift apology on his lips, but Emily said fiercely: ”I've supposed all along that my son was murdered. Not that the police would ever prove it. The Mansells! They didn't do it! Who stood to gain by his death?” She gave a short laugh and folded her hands clo ser in her lap. Patricia, coming out onto the terrace through the drawing-room window, thought that for a moment she looked almost terrible, a little stout old lady with a rigid back, and eyes like blue ice.
There was a constrained silence. ”It can't be proved, Aunt, and-after all, Clement's dead,” said Jim uncomfortably.
Her tight mouth relaxed slightly. ”Yes. He's dead,” she answered.
Hannasyde, watching her, said bluntly: ”Do you seriously believe that he killed your son, Mrs.
Kane?”
Her stare abolished him; she replied in her curtest, most expressionless voice: ”What I believe is my own concern. It won't help you. You'll never prove anything.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
Patricia, who had been standing quite still just outside the drawing-room window, came forward, relieving a sudden tension. ”I think this is the letter you want, Mrs. Kane.”
Emily glanced at it. ” I don't want it. Give it to the superintendent.”
Hannasyde took it with a word of thanks and carefully inspected the postmark on the envelope.
He withdrew a folded letter and gave it back to Miss Allison.
”If I may keep the envelope, Mrs. Kane, that's all I want.”
”Keep anything you like,” said Emily. ”I don't mind.”
”Thank you.” Hannasyde put the letter in his pocketbook and got up. ”That's all, then, for the present.”
Jim accompanied him through the house to the front door.
”Thanks for my bodyguard, Superintendent. Between him and my stepbrother I ought to be pretty safe.”
”I hope so,” Hannasyde answered.
”They're a bit of a nuisance,” said Jim cheerfully; ”but at least your nice Sergeant Trotter's presence does augur a certain measure of belief in my story.”
”I'm sorry if I led you to think that I didn't believe your story.”
”Very handsomely said, Superintendent. Do you, by any chance?”
”Believe you? Why not, Mr. Kane?”
Jim laughed. ”It only dawned on me, after I'd got back here, that you probably suspected me of staging the whole show just to put you off the scent. I can prove my innocence by requesting you to inquire of the personnel at my office whether my hands were dirty or not when I walked in the back entrance.”
”I'm afraid that's no proof at all,” replied Hannasyde with his slow smile. ”You might have worn a pair of rubber gloves, mightn't you?”
”d.a.m.n! I never thought of that,” said Jim. ”I must remain a suspect. It's comforting to think that I'm in the best of company.”
Hannasyde returned a light answer and took his leave, catching the next omnibus back to Portlaw.
He was met at the police station by Inspector Carlton, who hailed his arrival with satisfaction, announcing, not without pride, that he had news to report.
”That alibi of Mr. Paul Mansell's,” he said. ”Well, we've shook it, Superintendent. Your outside chance came off. I've got a young fellow here who's prepared to swear he saw Mr. Mansell's Lagonda drawn up by the tradesmen's gate at Cliff House at 3.30 P.M. on the day Mr. Clement was shot.”
”That's interesting,” said Hannasyde, hanging up his hat. ”Reliable witness?”
”I'd say so. Garage hand. He's waiting in my office.”
”Right, I'll see him at once.”