The Case of the Headless Jesuit Read online

  “Yes …” said Cromwell, removing his bowler hat and carefully placing it on the rack. There was a livid weal across his forehead where it had been supported. The thought depressed him. He compared the frugality of railway meals, even at the Special Season, with the festal menu already recited in advance by his wife’s mother. It was a bit thick murdering people on New Year’s Eve. The thought added zest to the angry enthusiasm he already felt for bringing the criminal to justice.

  “I wonder …”

  The words died in Cromwell’s throat. Littlejohn was already asleep.

  “Must have had a thick night,” said the sergeant to himself with a lugubrious chuckle. It wasn’t as he thought, however. Unexpected revellers had descended upon the Littlejohns and the Inspector had spent what had been left of the night on the couch in the lounge. The springs weren’t too good.…

  The attendant wakened them both for lunch and by the time they’d finished soup, rabbit, and sour plums and custard, they were almost at their destination.

  The train leaving an undulating, industrial district, suddenly plunged into a tunnel and emerged into the heart of Mereshire. The change was almost miraculous. Ahead there was not a hill to be seen. The land was flat, intersected by dykes, with farms and pumping-stations dotted here and there, and in the far distance they could see the twin towers of Thorncastle cathedral riding high in the air. As the train sped along, the great church gradually seemed to gather around it larger buildings and then smaller ones, like a hen collecting a brood at her feet. Then, with an extra spurt, the express slid through the scattered outskirts of the city, past goods-yards and cattle-pens and into the station.

  “Here we are.…”

  There was no mistaking the man who had come to meet them. He was dressed in uniform and as clean as a new pin. He was anxiously watching the train for his new colleagues. They liked him at once. He was called Percival, Superintendent Percival, and he looked relieved when he found them. He was over six feet tall, well-built and cheerful. Rather a long, craggy face, with a Roman nose and a strong chin. Sparkling blue eyes, too. Neither shy nor self-assertive. All the promise of a good collaborator. They all wished each other a Happy New Year and then drove to the police station in the Superintendent’s car.

  “It’s growing dusk,” said Percival. “I guess you won’t want to start in Cobbold to-night. So, I’ll tell you what it’s all about and then take you to your hotel. I’ve booked you in at ‘The Mitre’, a good old place here, and I’m sure you’ll be comfortable.”

  The police had quarters in the Guildhall opposite the Cathedral. The close looked very green and peaceful in the mild evening and you could see an illuminated Christmas tree to the left of the church porch. As they talked the bells began to ring for evening service and flung a sweet chain of sound in every part of the police station.

  “Cobbold has worried us of late. We’ve another murder on our hands there.”

  “So they told me at the Yard. Has the second any connection with the first?”

  “We’ve an open mind on it, as yet, Inspector. The first was one of our own men. The village constable from Carstonwood, the next village to Cobbold, who was found drowned in one of the dykes between the two places. He’d been hit on the head first and drowned whilst unconscious.”

  “Nasty,” grunted Cromwell.

  He felt more eager than ever to get to work and find the killer. The death or injury of “one of us”, as he called them, was always added stimulus to him, and to every other policeman. It marked out a particularly ruthless type of criminal.…

  “Yes, very nasty. And we haven’t been able to get a line on it at all. There’d been nothing suspicious in the locality and Plucock left home on his usual daytime patrol. He was seen at noon. At dusk they found his body in the dyke. Not long dead. Not a sign of any strangers. No apparent motive.… A poor Christmas for his wife and family. He’d four youngsters, too.”

  “Beastly business. And what about last night.”

  “I thought I’d better get help at once. The two might be connected and murders on the Marsh are unusual. I’m a native of these parts and this and Plucock’s death are the first two I remember. It happened at the watchnight service at St. Mark’s Church, Cobbold.…”

  “Murder in church!” interjected Cromwell mysteriously.

  “Not exactly. They were just going to see in the New Year when in walked a man who’d been stabbed, and collapsed and died in the aisle. Somebody must have knifed him outside and he’d made for the first lighted place he could see. Where it was done, we can’t tell. Our men have been there all day, but not a clue so far. He couldn’t have walked any distance with a wound like that. How he kept his feet so far is a mystery to us.”

  “Was he a native?”

  “Had been. Although at the time he was living in London. He was a fellow called Granville Salter. The Salters used to be Lords of the Manor at Cobbold. Family there for generations. Then they fell on bad times. The death of Mr. Gregory Salter, Granville’s father, finished it. Death duties took what moneylenders hadn’t had already and the Hall was sold. Mr. Granville got some sort of work in London and took a flat there.”

  “What was he doing back in Cobbold then? Had he connections, or something?”

  “He hadn’t been very well, I gather. An attack of ’flu; and he came back to Cobbold for a rest and a good old-fashioned Christmas. He was staying with an old nurse of the family, Mrs. Alveston, who married the one-time bailiff, now dead. She owned her own house and Mr. Granville was always welcome there.”

  “I guess you haven’t had much time to get down to things yet, but we’ll have to find out if there were any other attractions there as well as Mrs. Alveston.”

  “Phyllis …”

  “Eh?”

  “Phyllis Alveston. Mrs. Alveston’s daughter. A very pretty girl with half the lads in the district after her. Granville was very fond of her. They’ve known each other since they were kids. But for some reason things didn’t get any forrader. I don’t know why. We’ll have to see into it.”

  Littlejohn didn’t feel like work. He sat sprawled before the fire in the large old-fashioned grate with his legs stretched out. He bore the traces of Christmas. A new pipe and some special tobacco, a present from his wife, and a pair of brown socks she had knitted for him, which went admirably with his grey tweeds and mellow brown shoes. Cromwell eyed him approvingly, noticing in particular the pipe and deciding to buy one exactly like it.

  “How was the wound inflicted?” asked Littlejohn suddenly.

  “Just under the heart, by this.…”

  Percival opened a drawer and passed over the weapon. Littlejohn took out a pair of black-rimmed glasses, put them on and examined the object carefully. It was murderous. A cruel, bright steel blade about six inches in length, fitted in a heavy black haft. On the blade an inscription: “Wilh. Gruber.”

  Littlejohn passed it over to Cromwell, who examined it efficiently and carefully.

  “A German prisoner’s knife.…”

  “Maybe,” said Littlejohn. “Maybe not. There are quite a lot of them about. Storm troopers and black-shirts carried them as part of their make-up in Germany in Hitler’s time. A lot of our boys got them as souvenirs and brought them home. It might be anyone’s.”

  Percival took the knife back.

  “That’s right,” he added. “As far as we know, there are no German prisoners about here. We’ll have to check up more carefully, but I think that’s a foregone conclusion. There were no fingerprints on it, either. The murderer must have worn gloves.”

  “Or wiped it afterwards.…”

  “I don’t think so. You see, we found it in the church porch. Our theory is, that Salter was stabbed and the knife left in the wound. When he reached the church, he drew out the knife himself, dropped it, and covered the wound with his overcoat. He was pressing the coat over the wound as he entered the building.”

  “And died almost at once.”

  “Yes. A fear
ful wound. You must see the doctor later. Well, I think that’s all. I’m almost ashamed to say it. It seems so little after all our work to-day, but there it is. It’s as big a mystery as poor Plucock’s death.”

  They sat in silence for a while, the bells still ringing and footsteps of churchgoers passing on the pavements outside.

  “A good start for the New Year in Cobbold. Who’s in charge there?”

  “Just the village constable, a fellow called Pennyquick. The man practically died in his arms. It’s upset him. He’s not far from retiring and, so far, has been used only to drunks and poachers. But he knows all that goes on in the village and he’s furious that this affair has been sprung on him without warning. You’ll find him useful for local colour and information. A good, sound, village officer.”

  “Right. And now about ‘The Mitre’, I suppose. A good meal wouldn’t come amiss. You join us?”

  “Well … no, sir, if you don’t mind. I’ve a family, you see, and they’ll be expecting me. My son’s home on leave from the forces. He’s eighteen and just doing his service. And my girl’s down from Cambridge. So, there’s to be a sort of family gathering if I can make it. I don’t feel much like merrymaking with all this on our hands.…”

  “I guess you don’t, but there’s nothing we can do till morning. Have a good time.”

  Their bags had been sent on to the hotel and Littlejohn and Cromwell joined them at “The Mitre”.

  The place was decorated for the season and the dinner was in keeping. The inn was crowded with drinkers and diners. Here and there a family party on a special table.

  “Home from home,” said Cromwell, carefully opening a mince tart and pouring in rum from a small jug.

  “The next best …”

  It was difficult not to surrender to the general feeling of warmth and merriment and make a night of it. Cromwell, usually a bit lugubrious, thawed out considerably and wondered to himself how far expenses sheet would stand it.

  “I feel like a glass of port just to top off that lot,” he chuckled hopefully.

  But he didn’t get it, for the argument was cut short by an intrusion. It was a clerical one, too. A parson, quietly dining at a single table by the fireplace rose and approached them.

  “Please pardon me, gentlemen,” he said. “My name is Smythe. I’m curate at Cobbold. I saw you earlier to-day with Superintendent Percival and I wonder if you are engaged on the Cobbold murder case.… Are you?”

  Cromwell eyed the parson up and down. A pasty, slim, dark young man in the middle twenties, with pale eyes and thinning, streaky hair. He was shy and nervous and had to screw up his courage whenever faced by a problem.

  “Yes, sir,” said Littlejohn. “We’re from Scotland Yard.”

  The curate assumed a look of awe and he clasped his hands before him in that clerical fashion which, according to its accompanying facial contortion, can signify reverence, surprise, fervent glee, or simple resignation.

  “Are you? Well, sir … I take it you are the one in charge …”

  He addressed himself to Littlejohn, carefully stretching his neck and seeking an answer in the Inspector’s expression. Cromwell looked at Smythe with contempt and surprise.

  “Of course he is.…”

  A gramophone began to blare in the next room, which embraced a dance-floor a little larger than an average door-mat. Couples rose and, crushing themselves in the small polished rectangle, began to shuffle and sway. There was hardly room to move a foot, but the promiscuity seemed to please them and each pair, lost in the rhythm of the music and movement, solemnly performed the ritual, oblivious of all else. Then, the music changed and the heaving mass broke bounds. They pranced and tramped from the polished to the rougher timber of the floor and then, over the carpet and among the tables, greatly to the consternation of those trying to eat.

  “It’s New Year,” explained one young executant, his upper lip decorated with a huge moustache and his partner almost tucked under his arm.…

  “I wanted to mention a matter to you, or to the police here …” Smythe was saying. “It may be trifling and unimportant and I don’t wish to waste your time.…”

  He looked like excusing himself for the rest of the evening.

  “What is it, sir?”

  “Well … I’d been to a New Year’s Eve party before the watchnight service.… A little family gathering, you know, games and so forth, the season, you know … and had to hurry to get to church in time. I’m afraid I was almost the last there.…”

  “Yes.…”

  Two newcomers arrived. They looked to have fortified themselves at the bar already and were in merry mood. A man and a girl. He wore an enormous frieze greatcoat, so large that he resembled a walking overcoat. He divested himself of it and flung it, with an effort, over the back of a vacant chair. He looked small and insignificant without it. His companion was a tall, well-built fair girl, with a huge mass of golden hair, sleek and brushed, and falling to her shoulders in what must have been a modern fashion. Fifty years ago, they’d have said she’d let it down ready for bed. She wore a large tweed coat, too square at the shoulders, too close at the waist. Both saw Smythe, hooted at him, pointed to the dance-floor and in pantomime urged him to participate.

  “A-b-b-b,” said the distracted and blushing curate to Littlejohn.

  “I beg pardon.…”

  “I was—er—saying, as I made for the vestry door, I saw what must have been the murdered man. It couldn’t have been anyone else. It wasn’t pitch dark and I could make out his outline on the path which passes the main gate of the church. There was someone else with him … er …”

  “Who, sir?”

  “I don’t know. They were standing, apparently talking, face to face. All I can say is, it was a man about the same build as the dead man, in a soft hat and overcoat. I was in such a hurry I didn’t see more. Only later I remembered it … I wonder if the information … er … is of use to you.…”

  He looked earnestly at Littlejohn, and then across at the dance-floor where the new arrivals were performing, locked in a close embrace and cheek to cheek. The girl had removed the badly fitting coat and was now resplendent in a frock of emerald green. The couple signalled impatiently to Smythe, who smiled thinly back at them and then thinly at Littlejohn.

  “It’s most important, sir. You must have been the last man to see Mr. Salter alive and you probably saw his murderer, too.”

  “Oh.…”

  Mr. Smythe, blushing at the attentions of the good-looking girl, now turned chalky white at the revelation.

  “Had I spoken, or intervened, he might not.…”

  The poor curate looked as if he’d committed the murder himself.

  “Maybe. But you can’t blame yourself for that. If anybody’d passed, spoken, or intervened, there may have been no crime. You have nothing with which to reproach yourself, sir.…”

  “I’m so glad.… If you want me … I mean, if I can be of any further use, anyone in the village will tell you where to find me. I think I told you, I’m curate at Cobbold.…”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you for telling us this. It may prove very useful.…”

  “Will that be all, sir …?”

  “I think so, thank you.…”

  Mr. Smythe’s friends were still indicating by signs that they urgently needed his presence. Still pale, he rather hesitantly left to join them. The man who owned the overcoat eagerly surrendered his partner to the parson and, nonchalantly separating another girl from her companion, clutched her closely and passed into a state of agitated trance. The fair girl took Smythe into her arms without more ado in a delighted embrace and began to steer him around. The curate looked rather sheepishly over his shoulder at the detectives, who were now making for the bar for a nightcap or two.

  “Must be mother-love,” said Cromwell, without moving a muscle of his face.

  “He seems to need it,” chuckled Littlejohn. “If you care to take a turn on the dance-floor yourself, it’s all right to m
e.”

  “Me?” yelled Cromwell, and, looking down at his regulation boots, from which he was almost inseparable, he laughed, too.

  THREE

  THE MAN WHO BROUGHT THE NEW YEAR IN

  THE wind changed to north-east during the night and, dispelling the damp and murk, sharpened the outlines of the trees and buildings in the cathedral close, cleared the sky of rain clouds and replaced them by high flying bundles of fleecy white. Littlejohn felt better for a good sleep. Cromwell joined him morosely at breakfast. In the course of performing his morning exercises he had biffed his head on one of the beams of the bedroom. He had an angry, concussed expression as he caressed a lump almost the size of a pigeon’s egg at the line where his thinning hair receded from his forehead.

  “Give me modern places,” he grumbled. “Those damn’ beams are too low.…”

  Percival called for them early. He looked smart and efficient and was anxious to start. Cromwell gingerly covered his lump with his bowler.

  Outside the town the road became a causeway, about two feet above the surrounding fields. In bad weather they became flooded and formed a large lake with just the road to connect the towns and villages. The dark soil of the Marshland looked hard and cold. Some had been ploughed and stood up in sharp rows; and some still held the relics of the autumn crops, winter greens, stray cabbage stalks, sprouts and kale, straggling and frostbitten. Thin sunlight fell on the wintry fields. Everything stood out in keen distinctness; smallholdings and farms, bare trees and hedges, hens and geese picking and trooping about the yards and gardens of cottages and holdings. Clusters of houses and even the farms hugged the road, as though afraid to venture far across the reclaimed land. Now and then along the route the car passed stretches of water covered with thin skimmings of ice. A few men with guns prowled the fields and the sides of the meres, after the waterfowl. It was still holiday for some; others were working in the fields or driving carts of manure and turnips along the road.