Johnny Swanson - Eleanor Updale [88]
Bennett shouted at her again. ‘But you didn’t do anything to save him, did you? You were more interested in saving yourself. What’s it going to sound like in court when I tell them you were on your knees mopping the floor before your husband was even dead?’
‘My mother’s apron!’ said Johnny as the constable closed his notebook, defeated by the rush of revelations. ‘You used my mother’s apron, didn’t you? That’s why the police suspected her in the first place.’
Mrs Langford snapped into defiance. ‘What about you, Bennett? You can’t pin it all on me. You made me write that letter, remember? And you showed it to the police, to make out that I was in France. How are you going to explain that? Or why you drove me back down here and forced Howell to give me shelter? I’m not a fool. I know you didn’t do that for my sake. You wanted me here to make sure Howell kept producing the vaccine. And you hid me from the police because I might have told them you were involved – not just in selling illegal medicine, but in the murder too. Well, you can’t get out of it now. I’m going to tell them everything. You’re up to your neck in all this, and if I swing for it, so will you.’
‘My crimes are going to look pretty pathetic alongside yours,’ sniffed Bennett. ‘You’ve killed your husband, you tried to kill Howell, and you wanted to kill the boy …’
Johnny joined in: ‘And you would have killed my mother! She still might be hanged because of your lies. Oh, Mrs Langford! Mum and I thought you were our friend. We’ve never done anything to harm you. I even wanted to rescue you when I thought you were imprisoned here by Dr Howell. But you’re the jailer. You knew they’d arrested my mother. You knew she was innocent and you did nothing to help her.’
The sergeant unfastened the handcuffs from his belt and nodded to his constable to do the same.
‘I’m not sure I’m following all this, Officer,’ said Professor Campbell, flapping his fan. ‘It seems I have been sorely deceived by Dr Howell and Mrs Morgan – or should I call her Mrs Langford? I thought they were among the most diligent members of my staff! No doubt there are some arrests to be made here.’
Howell sat down on the edge of the desk, put his hands, with their well-bitten fingernails, over his face, and cried. ‘I’m sorry,’ he sobbed. ‘I don’t know how I got caught up in all this.’ Johnny wondered how he could ever have believed that Howell was the murderer, and that Mrs Langford had been scared of him.
The sergeant at last got a chance to speak. ‘I think I had better call Stambleton and see what they want me to do with the prisoners.’
Johnny picked up the dangling receiver. He heard a high-pitched ‘Hello?’ The operator was still on the line. She had been listening in to everything. Her garbled version of events would be all round the district by morning.
Chapter 43
ANOTHER PLACE, ANOTHER FIGHT
Far away from the mayhem at Craig-y-Nos, Hutch was sitting in an armchair reading (or rather dozing with a book on his lap and his glasses sliding down his nose) when he heard the doorbell. It was ringing hard and repeatedly. It must be the policeman, back with his warrant. Hutch had been in the chair for so long that his bad leg was stiff, and it took him a while to get down the stairs and into the shop. He turned on the light, hoping it would signal that he was on his way, but the bell kept going, nagging him to answer the door.
Hutch opened up. It wasn’t the policeman. It was the reporter, as impatient as ever. ‘I thought you were out,’ he said.
‘I was asleep,’ Hutch said crossly. ‘I’d nodded off. I’m allowed to do that in my own home, aren’t I?’
‘What about the boy? Couldn’t he answer the door?’
Hutch said nothing.
The reporter continued: ‘The boy. Johnny Swanson. He is here, isn’t he? Very brave of you to take him in. And just as well, as it’s turned out. I’ve had a look at his house. Every window smashed now. And rude words on the door.’
Hutch was still not