The Sittaford Mystery - Agatha Christie [79]
‘You like guessing, don’t you, Miss Trefusis?’ he said amiably.
‘When people don’t tell you things you have to guess!’ retaliated Emily.
‘If a man, as you say, is leading a blameless life,’ Inspector Narracott said, ‘and if it would be an annoyance and an inconvenience for him to have his past life raked up, well, the police are capable of keeping their own counsel. We have no wish to give a man away.’
‘I see,’ said Emily, ‘but all the same—you went to see him, didn’t you? That looks as though you thought, to begin with at any rate, that he might have had a hand in it. I wish—I wish I knew who Mr Duke really was? And what particular branch of criminology he indulged in in the past?’
She looked appealingly at Inspector Narracott but the latter preserved a wooden face, and realizing that on this point she could not hope to move him, Emily sighed and took her departure.
When she had gone the Inspector sat staring at the blotting pad, a trace of a smile still lingering on his lips. Then he rang the bell and one of his underlings entered.
‘Well?’ demanded Inspector Narracott.
‘Quite right, sir. But it wasn’t the Duchy at Princetown, it was the hotel at Two Bridges.’
‘Ah!’ The Inspector took the papers the other handed to him.
‘Well,’ he said. ‘That settles it all right. Have you followed up the other young chap’s movements on Friday?’
‘He certainly arrived at Exhampton by the last train, but I haven’t found out yet what time he left London. Inquiries are being made.’
Narracott nodded.
‘Here is the entry from Somerset House, sir.’
Narracott unfolded it. It was the record of a marriage in 1894 between William Martin Dering and Martha Elizabeth Rycroft.
‘Ah!’ said the Inspector, ‘anything else?’
‘Yes, sir. Mr Brian Pearson sailed from Australia on a Blue Funnel Boat, the Phidias. She touched at Cape Town but no passengers of the name of Willett were aboard. No mother and daughter at all from South Africa. There was a Mrs and Miss Evans and a Mrs and Miss Johnson from Melbourne—the latter answer the description of the Willetts.’
‘H’m,’ said the Inspector—‘Johnson. Probably neither Johnson nor Willett is the right name. I think I’ve got them taped out all right. Anything more?’
There was nothing else it seemed.
‘Well,’ said Narracott, ‘I think we have got enough to go on with.’
Chapter 28
Boots
‘But, my dear young lady,’ said Mr Kirkwood, ‘what can you possibly expect to find at Hazelmoor? All Captain Trevelyan’s effects have been removed. The police have made a thorough search of the house. I quite understand your position and your anxiety that Mr Pearson shall be—er—cleared if possible. But what can you do?’
‘I don’t expect to find anything,’ Emily replied, ‘or to notice anything that the police have overlooked. I can’t explain to you, Mr Kirkwood. I want—I want to get the atmosphere of the place. Please let me have the key. There’s no harm in it.’
‘Certainly there’s no harm in it,’ said Mr Kirkwood with dignity.
‘Then please be kind,’ said Emily.
So Mr Kirkwood was kind and handed over the key with an indulgent smile. He did his best to come with her, which catastrophe was only averted by great tact and firmness on Emily’s part.
That morning Emily had received a letter. It was couched in the following terms:
‘Dear Miss Trefusis,’—wrote Mrs Belling. ‘You said as how you would like to hear if anything at all should happen that was in any way out of the common even if not important, and, as this is peculiar, though not in any way important, I thought it my duty Miss to let you know at once, hoping this will catch you by the last post tonight or the first post tomorrow. My niece she came round and said it wasn’t of any importance but peculiar which I agreed with her. The police said, and it was generally agreed that nothing was taken from Captain Trevelyan’s house and nothing was in a manner of speaking nothing that is of any value, but something there is missing though not noticed at the time being unimportant. But it