Under Suspicion

Taranaki Daily News, 30 March 1933, Page 15

Under Suspicion

Sy

Ralph Trevor

SYNOPSIS. Joyee Carole acts as housekeeperwmpanion to Wilbur Atherton, an eccentric old man who lives at Merlin Court. Joyce Is in love with Nicholas Raine, a young man from London. John Marston, head man on Lyttleton’s Farm, who Joyce has ■ known since childhood, has become Intrigued by Olga Brinning, an adventuress. The Rev. Cedric Dexter, acting for . the rector during the latter’s absence ' on three months’ sick leave, has somehow or other ingratiated himself with Atherton, the recluse, and is now almost a regular caller at Merlin Court. Joyce arrives home one day from a walk to find Wilbur Atherton has had a heart attack and died. The dead man’s will cannot be found, but it is common gossip that Joyce is a beneficiary to a considerable extent. An anonymous letter is received by Scotland Yard suggesting that Atherton’s death has not been a natural one. Inspector Curtis Burke is sent down to take charge of investigations.

CHAPTER. XlV.—(Continued.)

There was-someone in Wynthorpe who wished Wilbur Atherton dead. Who that someone was it Was his business to discover. "Whoever, it was had achieved the desired end, and it now remained for suspicion to be directed to some particular person. “Now, if I had been writing this as a novel,” mused the young man, “how’ should I have gone about it? First of all, there is the matter of motive to be settled. That fellow Burke hasn’t thought about motive at all- Now, why should anyone want Wilbur Atherton to die? Now, let me see. What about revenge? A man. like Atherton, successful in business, must have had a host of enemies; but business enemies are uusally confined to business, unless —yes, unless he happens to have hit them jolly hard financially. That’s going to be a tall order if I’ve got to hunt through all Atherton’s competitors and select a likely party. Anyhow, what was Atherton? How did,he make his money? Another point you’ve missed, Mr Burke. “Wilbur Atherton was a successful stockbroker. Suppose he floated a few bogus companies and a great many people lost their money. No, that’s just a bit too melodramatic. Still, it’s worth remembering- I may use that idea some other time. Now where are wo? There’s someone in Wynthorpe who wanted old man Atherton out of the way. That person must still be in Wynthorpe, because from what I can glean no one’s missing. “Ah, what about Miss Susan Snape? She was madly in love with Atherton in the old days. Nothing came of It. For all these years she’s been nursing a hatred against a man who let her down. He comes back. She finds he has almost forgotten her; that he ’half in love with someone else.. Good Lord I Where am I getting to? Who could that someone be? Joyce perhaps. Yes, very likely it was Joyce. The -way . she looked at her after the funeral. SuSan Snape would rather see Wilbur Atherton dead than mamed to anyone else. That’s better. Miss Snape managed to No, that won t do at all. - Susan Snape, on her own admission, was never invited io Merlin Court, “That doesn’t seem any good. Let me see, now. It isn’t everyone who r»m lay han clq on white arsenic. No chetnist will supply it without signing the poison book. What about the doctor? No, he wouldn’t be likely to want to poison a good patient, and heart patients are always good from a doctor’s point of view. We can rule him ■ out altogether. That leaves us with only Olga Brinning- I should say that if anyone’s done it she has. For one thing, she doesn’t altogether ‘belong’ down here. Too cosmopolitan. She may have done it, but how and, more Important, why? That’s where I’m right up against it again. The confounded thing doesn’t seem to have a solution at &1L Everyone in Wynthorpe might have done it, for that matter. “Now, how would anyone set about poisoning Atherton? Through his food, of course. That’s the only way. Who prepared the food? Mrs Oldroyd, the cook. But Mrs Oldroyd cooked for the whole staff as well, and Atherton did not have food specially cooked for him. You’re acquitted, Mrs Oldroyd. People don’t poison food that la io be consumed by, among others, themselves. That brings mo back again to Joyce, poor girt She’s been the victim of Fate; there’s no other way of putting it. But if Joyce didn’t put the arsenic into the food who in the name of the whole calendar of the saints did? Joyce didn’t, I’m dead sure of that. . . Oh, hang ill I can’t get anywhere at all with this I” Nicholas Raine struggled out of the chair and crossed oyer to the window. Beyond the garden rose the grey tower of Wynthorpe Church. A little to the left stood the rectory, and between two copper beech trees a view could be gleaned of the rectory garden, whose lawns were always kept so; wonderfully well. As the young man stared aimlessly tgross the green vista he saw the ■Reverend Mr Dexter step out from the, ■French window on to the lawn. We ! was in his shirt sleeves. A Panama, hat, somewhat yellow with age, was pulled down on his head, and in one, hand he carried a long-handled rake. Raine watched him carelessly. The day was too hot to inspire energy, and he rather envied the clergyman his Industry. Gardening, he told himself, was intended only for the cool of the day, but then when folk were gardenproud the weather did not matter. Mr Dexter crossed the lawn towards a clump of trees at the foot of the garden- Then he paused to light his curved briar pipe. Having got the - pipe drawing to his evident satisfaction he commenced to draw the rake lightly over the grass. Raine had often admired those lawns In the rectory garden, and now that be saw Mr Dexter raking them over he remembered a gardening hint he -had once read, about the advisability of performing the operation for the purpose of helping the grass to breathe. At the time he thought it curious—rather odd, in fact—but apparently it did some good, for that turf was in really excellent condition.. The young man turned away from the window. He would go into Carston and wire to Latimer Brookes. Yhen—-what was he to do then? Raine told himself frankly he didn’t tnow. >: An hour later he was in Carston post Office, and had despatched his wire, when, turning from the counter, lie noticed someone at one of the little desks he had just vacated. It was Olga Brinning, and she was obviously iwriting a letter. The sight of the ■woman writing a letter in Carston Post Office, and not at her cottage in Wyn- | -tborpe," aroused his suspicions. It xr’ght be worth his while to find out w.iOm she was writing to. ’ "ga Raia* hoverad about far.ji short 1

tinfe. In ten minutes Olga Brinning emerged. From his vantage point on the other side of the street Raine imagined she looked about her with an air of furtiveness. Then she walked to her little two-seater and switched on the engine. As soon as she was out of sight Raine re-entered the Post Office and made for the writing desk she had occupied. Luck wks with him. A fresh slip of blotting-paper had been placed there only that morning, and there were comparatively few marks upon its pink expanse. Taking a small mirror from its case, Raine scrutinised the paper. At first he could see nothing but a jumble of ink marks, but looking closer he found one which was slightly heavier than the other, and it was unmistakably in the hand of a woman.

It was where she had blotted her envelope, and he read with difficulty— Mr Jules Lamont, 84a Nelson Terrace, Bayswater, London, W. For a moment Raine stood staring at the inscription as though it fascinated hirn.

“It would be interesting to discover the identity of Mr Lamont,” mused Raine, as he made a note of the name and address in his pocket-book. Filled with excitement, he made his way to Carston Public Library and asked for a London Directory. A moment later he was turning over the pages with almost feverish insist“Ah!” he exclaimed, jabbing his finger on the list of residents that comprised Nelson Terrace, and where his finger rested he read: “84a, Lamont, Jules, Chemist." Raine closed the bulky volume with a thud. “Chemist,’’ he said to himself. “Chemist —arsenic—murder.” And as he handed the book back to the assistant he felt that he was hot on the trail at last.

CHAPTER XV.

Two Leading Line*.

It is curious how, in criminal Investigation, diverging points of view are apt to result in entirely different diagnosis. All such investigation Is based upon a mental conception of the crime itself plus whatever clues are available. If none is available then, as in the case of Wilbur Atherton’s death, a great deal must inevitably be left to the Imagination. In this particular case there were two points of view’, and those two points of view were leading two men to quite different conclusions. It was possible that in the end they would arrive at the same terminus by different routes and that it did not really matter which way they travelled. But that is not quite the point. Curtis Blake was investigating the alleged murder of Wilbur Atherton because he had chosen the profession of criminal Investigation to earn him a livelihood. In his case—apart from those human attributes -which none of us can suppress—sentiment did not play a very vital part. He was utterly unaffected by the human side of his job. All Curtis Burke knew and appreciated was that Wilbur Atherton had, according to the subsequent facts, been poisoned and that an abnormal number of grains of arsenic were found in the body some little time after death.

, Burke was not a specialist in forensic medicine and he had not unduly troubled himself about the medical side of the matter To his way of thinking that, ended when the Home Office pathologist gave his evidence at the coroner’s inquiry. A fact had been established. That fact was that Wilbur Atherton.had been poisoned by arsenic. . That was. sufficient. It was Burke’s job to discover who that person was who had so contrived to dismiss Mr Atherton from having any further, interest in. things terrestrial. He had to work on facts, not on theories. Several facts had already presented themselves. Convincing proof had led him to arrest Joyce Carnle on suspicion, and though he did not want to arrest her; though in his own mind he felt that she was not implicated (although he had had his waverings of late), it simply had to be done. Then there was Nicholas Raine.

Nicholas Raine had first approached tlje mystery with the mind and imagination of the mystery fiction writer that he was. It was pleasant to idle and dabble in reality for a change. One was given a rare opportunity of testing one’s own methods in relation to actual facts. It was an exceedingly good test. But things had changed. From merely a hobby en passant, as it were, it had developed into something, as serious as life itself. Nicholas Raine found himself desperately fighting for a girl he had suddenly grown to love deeply, devotedly. Technical theories of crime detection did not matter now. No time was to be lost. He could not afford to idle and speculate too long while the girl who was more dear to him than anything else in the world, was waiting in a prison cell to be tried for her life on a charge of wilfully murdering Wilbur Atherton. (To be Continued.)