No Wind of Blame

‘I haven’t any idea,’ responded Hugh. ‘You see, I don’t know when he died, or, in fact, anything about it, other than what I’ve been told.’

‘Then may I ask, sir, how you come to be here?’

‘I came to discover just what had happened.’

‘You knew something had happened?’

‘Yes, certainly I did. I had gone to call at Palings, and I ran into Miss Fanshawe on the lawn outside the drawing-room windows. She had apparently come from here, and was on her way to break the news to her mother.’

‘That’s right,’ said White. ‘She turned up just after I’d got back here from ringing up the doctor, and the police station. We were too late to be able to head her off.’

‘Miss Fanshawe being the deceased’s stepdaughter?’ said the Inspector. ‘From what direction did the young lady come?’

‘Down that path,’ replied White, pointing to the thicket across the stream. ‘She had her dog with her.’

‘Indeed, sir!’ said the Inspector, in an expressionless voice. ‘Well, I think that’s all we can do here, but if you gentlemen, and you, miss, will take me up to the house, my men can get on with what they’ve got to do before we have the body removed. There are one or two more questions I’d like to ask you, Mr White, and you too, Mr Jones.’

‘I’m ready to answer anything,’ offered Jones. ‘But I would like to have my coat back, if it isn’t wanted any longer.’

The Inspector said indulgently: ‘No, sir, I’m sure we don’t want your coat. You should have spoken about it before. Give the gentleman his coat, Sergeant.’

‘Look here, do you want me?’ asked Hugh.

Before the Inspector could answer, White said: ‘Yes, we do want you. You can tell the Inspector just what happened at that shooting-party yesterday.’

Hugh sighed. ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree. My evidence is nothing but hearsay, and valueless.’

‘Well, there’s no reason why you should object to telling what you know, is there?’ demanded White. ‘Seems to me it might have a pretty important bearing on poor Wally’s murder – a darned sight more than that kid Vicky’s happening to be around!’ he added scathingly.

The Inspector looked penetratingly at Hugh, and said: ‘Yes, sir, I should be obliged if you would accompany us to the house.’

Seven

The Inspector, having been shown White’s study window, and having verified the fact that from it no view of the bridge could be obtained, turned his attention to Hugh, and requested him to explain White’s reference to the shooting-party of the day before. Hugh replied in a voice calculated to depress excitement that he supposed White to be referring to Wally Carter’s carelessness in moving from his stand. ‘Instead of remaining where he was posted,’ he said, ‘he apparently wandered some way along the hedgerow, with the result that he very nearly got himself shot. If you want to know any more about it, you should ask Mr Steel, or Prince Varasashvili, who were both in a position – which I was not – to see what happened.’

‘Prince who, sir?’ demanded the Inspector.

Hugh repeated the name, explaining the Prince’s identity. It was evident that the Inspector thought the entrance into the case of a foreigner so exotically named at once invested it with immense possibilities. He said, that he would have to see the gentleman himself. He next inquired of Hugh how long he had been at Palings before encountering Vicky, and as it appeared from Hugh’s answer that, at the time of the murder, he had not arrived there, he asked him some searching questions about his journey from the Manor.

Hugh had driven himself to Palings in his own car, and admitted cheerfully that he had come through the village, and past the Dower House. But when urged to try to remember whether he had seen anyone in the neighbourhood of the Dower House, he shook his head. ‘No, I don’t think I saw anyone.’

‘But you’re not sure, sir?’

‘No, not entirely. Let us say that I didn’t notice anyone. But as I was driving, and not staring about me, that isn’t very surprising.’

The Inspector accepted this, and announced that he had, at the moment, no further questions to put to him.

‘Then I’ll go back to Palings,’ said Hugh.

The Inspector put his notebook into his pocket. ‘I shall be calling there myself, sir,’ he said. ‘I’ll run you there.’

It was plain that he did not want Hugh to reach Palings before himself, so Hugh made no demur, but meekly accompanied him to the police-car waiting in the drive. After conferring briefly with the Sergeant who had accompanied him, the Inspector got into the car beside Hugh, and they drove off.

The scene that awaited them at Palings was in the best traditions of the place. Ermyntrude, in a pink satin wrapper lavishly edged with ostrich feather trimming, was prostrate upon the couch in the hall, with a bottle of smelling-salts clasped in one plump hand, and a pink georgette handkerchief in the other. A glass and decanter on a low table beside her bore evidence that she had had to be revived with brandy. Vicky was not present, but Mary, looking rather white, was standing at the head of the couch, saturating a handkerchief with eau-de-Cologne. She glanced up quickly as Hugh walked in through the open front-door, and greeted him with a forced smile. ‘Thank goodness you’re back! Vicky told us – is it true?’

‘Yes, I’m afraid it is,’ Hugh replied. ‘Inspector Cook’s here. Can he come in?’

‘Police!’ moaned Ermyntrude. ‘Oh, if my poor first husband were alive to see this day!’