The Ponson Case · Chapter 7 (2/3)

“I shouldn’t, sir, dream of troubling you so far,” Tanner assured him. “Besides, it is not necessary. A minute or two here when you are disengaged is all I want.”

“Be gad, sir, you’re modest. Comin’ all the way from London for a minute or two,” and calling out some directions to a groom, he led the way into a kind of small office at the end of the stable.

“Well, sir,” he said as he seated himself before a small roll top desk, and pointed to a chair, “and what can I do for you?”

“I am engaged, sir,” Tanner answered, “in making some confidential inquiries into the movements of a man, who, I understand, was recently here⁠—Mr. Cosgrove Ponson of London.”

“He was here”⁠—the Colonel hesitated a moment⁠—“this day week. And what the devil has he been doin’?”

“Nothing, sir, so far as we know. It is the case of another man altogether, but it is necessary for us to know if Mr. Ponson really was out of London on that day.”

“Well I’ve told you he was here. Is that evidence enough?”

“Quite, sir, as far as that goes. But I would like also to know some details to assure myself if his business here was genuine. What was his business, if I might ask?”

“You may ask and I’ll tell you too, be gad. He wanted to see Sir Jocelyn, that’s a three-year-old I’m goin’ to sell. Devilish good bit of horseflesh too. But he wouldn’t stretch to my figure. I wanted seven hundred, and he would only go five fifty. So it was no deal.”

“He came about this time in the morning, I suppose?”

“Yes, and a confoundedly silly time it was to come. He was to have been here at six for the morning exercise, but he missed his train, so he said, in London.”

“I understood so from him. Just one question more, sir. When was the arrangement about his visit made?”

“Some days before; I think it was on Monday evening I got his wire asking would Thursday suit me.”

“This is the man you mean, I presume?” and Tanner took out Cosgrove’s photograph.

The colonel nodded as he answered: “That’s he.”

“And there was nothing, sir, in the whole episode that seemed to you suspicious or otherwise than it appeared on the surface?”

“Not a thing.”

Tanner rose.

“Allow me then, sir, to express my thanks for your courtesy. That is all I want to know.”

Declining an invitation to go up to the house for a drink⁠—“too devilish risky to keep it here, be gad”⁠—he returned to Montrose and looked up the trains to London. There was one at 2:29 which, travelling by Edinburgh and Carlisle, reached St. Pancras at 6:30 the following morning. This, he decided, would suit him admirably, and when it came in he got on board.

As he sat a little later gazing out on to the smiling Fifeshire country, he went over once more, point by point, that portion of Cosgrove’s alibi which he had already checked. So far as he had gone it certainly seemed to him very complete. In the first place, not only was the journey north made with, so far as he could ascertain, a quite genuine purpose, but the selection of that particular night was reasonably accounted for. The arrangement for it had been made at least as early as the previous Monday, which, again, would be a reasonable time in advance. Tanner could see nothing in any way suspicious or suggestive of a plant about the whole business.

Then, coming to details, the missing of the train at King’s Cross might of course have been faked, but there was no evidence to support such a supposition. On the contrary, everything he had learnt seemed to prove it genuine. But even if it had been a plant, it was demonstrated beyond a shadow of doubt that Cosgrove had missed the 7:15 p.m. as he said, and that, further, he had travelled to Montrose by the 10:30. Even as the case stood Tanner felt bound to accept the alibi, but if he could confirm Cosgrove’s statement of his visit to his rooms at 7:45 or 8 o’clock, and to the Follies about 10:00, any last shred of doubt that might remain must be dispelled. This, he decided, would be his next task.

The following morning, therefore, he returned to Knightsbridge. Here, keeping his eye on Cosgrove’s door, he strolled about for nearly an hour before he was rewarded by seeing it open and Cosgrove emerge and disappear towards Piccadilly. He allowed some ten minutes more to elapse, then he walked to the door and rang. It was opened by the same dark, clean-shaven butler who had admitted him before. The man recognised his visitor, evidently with suspicion.

“Mr. Reginald Willoughby, the Albany?” he asked with sarcasm, and a thinly veiled insolence in his tone.

“That’s all right,” Tanner answered easily. “I know my name is not Willoughby. It’s Tanner”⁠—he handed over his real card⁠—“and if you’ll invite me in for a moment or two I’ll show you my credentials so that you’ll have no more doubt.”

The butler was evidently impressed, and proffering the suggested invitation, led the way to a small sitting room.

“Mr. Ponson he phoned the Albany,” he explained, “and they said there weren’t no one of that name there, so we was wondering about your little game.”

Tanner, following his usual custom, rapidly sized up his man, and decided how he should deal with him. With the veneer of his calling removed the Inspector imagined he might prove a braggart, a bully, and a coward. He therefore took a strong line.

“I suppose you know,” he began, without heeding the other’s remark, “that Mr. Cosgrove Ponson is under serious suspicion of the murder of his uncle, Sir William, at Luce Manor?”

It was evident this was the last thing the butler had expected to hear. He stared at the Inspector in amazement.

“Lord lumme!” he stammered, “is that a fact?”

“That’s a fact,” Tanner went on sharply, “and I want some information from you. And let me advise you to give it to me correctly, for if you don’t you may find yourself in the Old Bailey charged as an accessory after the fact.”

The man blenched, and Tanner felt that the estimate he had made of his character was correct.

“I don’t know nothing about it,” he growled sulkily.

“Oh yes, you do. Mr. Ponson told me he spent that Wednesday night here, or a part of it anyway. Is that true?”

Tanner had set his little trap to learn whether the butler had been primed with a story by Cosgrove. His victim did not answer for a time. Clearly a struggle was going on in his mind. Then at last he said, “Has Mr. Cosgrove been arrested?”

The question still further bore out the estimate Tanner had made of the man’s character. The Inspector could follow the thought which had prompted it. If the butler was to continue uninterruptedly in his master’s service, he would rather not have the latter know he had given him away, but if Cosgrove was already in custody he would keep on the safe side and tell the truth. Tanner did not assist him to a conclusion.

“Never you mind that. You concentrate on avoiding arrest yourself. Now, will you answer my question?”

After some further urging the statement came. Cosgrove had not spent the evening in his rooms. He had left about 6:45 to catch the 7:15 at King’s Cross, but he had returned unexpectedly in about an hour. He told the butler he had missed his train, and was travelling by a later one. He had gone out again, almost at once, and the butler had not seen him for two days.

Tanner asked several searching questions, and ended up completely satisfied that the man was telling the truth. There was no doubt whatever that Cosgrove’s story was true in this particular also.

There now remained to be checked only the matter of his visit to the Follies, and though Tanner was not certain of the necessity for this, his habit of thoroughness again asserted itself, and he drove to the theatre. There he learnt that there was no rehearsal that forenoon, and he went straight on to Chelsea. His ring at the actress’s flat was answered by a smartly dressed maid, to whom he handed his card, asking for an interview with her mistress.

The girl disappeared and in a few moments returned.

“Miss Belcher will see you now, sir.”

He was ushered into a small drawing-room, charmingly furnished in pale blue, with white enamelled woodwork. The chairs were deep and luxurious though elegant, the walls panelled with silk and bearing a few good monochrome drawings, while on the dark polished floor were thick and, as the Inspector knew, costly rugs. But though everything in the room was dainty, its outstanding feature was its roses. Roses were everywhere, massed in great silver bowls and rare old cut-glass vases.

“It’s a rose case,” thought the Inspector whimsically, as he recalled that in two other sitting rooms he had had to visit⁠—those of Miss Lois Drew and Cosgrove Ponson⁠—he had found the same decoration, though in neither case with the same prodigal liberality as here.

He waited for over half an hour and then the door opened and Miss Belcher appeared.

Seeing her full face in the light from the window, he realised her beauty as he had not done in the restaurant. Though she was slightly⁠—Tanner thought comfortable looking, though jealous people might have used the word stout⁠—her features were so delicately moulded, her little, pouting mouth so daintily suggestive of dimples, her light blue eyes so large and appealing, her complexion so creamy, and above all and crowning all, her hair, so luxuriant and of so glorious a shade of red gold, that he began to understand the position she held in the popular favour. She was dressed in a garment which Tanner imagined was a negligee, a flowing robe of light-blue silk trimmed with the finest lace, beneath which peeped out the tiny toe of a gilt slipper.

Tanner bowed low.

“I beg you to pardon this intrusion, madame,” he said, “but my business is both serious and urgent.”

Without speaking, the actress sank gracefully into a luxurious armchair, indicating with a careless wave of her arm a seat for the Inspector in front of her. He obeyed her gesture and continued:

“I have been ordered, madame, to make an investigation into the death of the late Sir William Ponson of Luce Manor, not far from Luton. I understand that you are acquainted with his nephew, Mr. Cosgrove Ponson?” His hostess nodded, still without speaking. Tanner thought her manner unnecessarily ungracious, and determined to give a hint of the iron which lurked beneath his velvet exterior.

“I deeply regret to have to inform you that there is reason to believe Sir William was murdered, and that grave suspicion rests on Mr. Cosgrove.”

This time the mask of indifference was pierced.

“But how perfectly outrageous,” the lady cried, a flicker of anger passing over her expressive face, “and stupid and cruel as well. How dare you come here and tell me such a thing?”

“Because I think you may help me to clear him. Please consider the facts. The medical evidence shows Sir William was murdered some time after 8:30 on the evening of Wednesday week. We know that Mr. Cosgrove Ponson was financially in low water⁠—in fact, was in debt for a very large sum, and under threat of exposure and ruin unless he paid up. We know also he benefited to a considerable extent under Sir William’s will. Further, in the boathouse from which Sir William’s body was set adrift, a cigarette end was found⁠—one of a peculiar brand, but little smoked in England, but which Mr. Ponson continually uses, and lastly, and this is what brings me to you today, Mr. Ponson has been unable to account satisfactorily for his time on the evening in question. He says he was with you from 8:30 till 9:00, and what I want to ask you is, Can we get proof of that? I think you will appreciate that proof of that means proof of his innocence.”

Tanner had been unobtrusively watching his companion while he spoke, and her demeanour interested him keenly. While he was recounting the medical evidence and Cosgrove’s financial position she had listened perfunctorily, as if bored by such trifles being brought to her notice. But when he mentioned the cigarette she started and a look first of fear and then of anger showed momentarily in her eyes. It seemed to Tanner she might have so acted if she knew Cosgrove was guilty⁠—as if she was aware of and prepared for all he had to say except this about the cigarette, and that her anger was against Cosgrove for having smoked under such circumstances. She did not speak for some moments, and Tanner felt instinctively she had seen his little trap, and was considering a way out. At last she appeared to come to a conclusion, and replied in a quiet voice:

“What Mr. Ponson has told you is quite true, or at least almost. He was at my room at the Follies for about half an hour that evening, but not quite at the hour you have mentioned. He came about half-past nine, and left at ten. I know the time because it is the only period in that play during which I am off the stage.”

She had avoided his trap anyway, and her answer confirmed Cosgrove’s story. But Tanner recognised he was dealing with a very clever woman, and he was by no means so convinced of the truth of her statement as he was of that of the butler. He went on:

“Obviously, madame, if we have to go before a jury the more corroborative evidence we can get the better. Now, are there any other persons who might have seen Mr. Ponson at the theatre, and who could be called to add their testimonies?”

“I don’t know if anyone else actually saw Mr. Ponson,” she answered, “but I should think it likely. Probably the doorkeeper did, or one of the other men. Have you made inquiries?”

“No, madame. Not yet.”

“Well, you had better do so,” and she got up to indicate that the interview was at an end.

Tanner found himself in the street with a baffled feeling of having handled the interview badly. But it was at least obvious that the lady’s advice was good, and somewhat ruefully he drove back to the Follies.

Here he made exhaustive inquiries, but without any very satisfactory result. The stage doorkeeper knew Cosgrove, and said he was a frequent visitor to Miss Belcher. He remembered he had come two or three evenings in the week in question at about 9:30, and stayed with the actress for about half an hour. But he could not be sure whether or not Wednesday was one of these evenings. Three or four other attendants had also seen him, but in no case had there been anything to attract their attention to him, and none of them could say on what nights he had been there. But Tanner had to admit to himself that he could hardly expect such information from persons who were not interested in Cosgrove’s visit.

But on another point he got positive information. His inquiries established the fact that on the Wednesday night of the murder Miss Belcher had been on the stage at 9:15. She therefore could not have been masquerading as Mrs. Franklyn’s servant at the Old Ferry.

On the whole the Inspector felt that, in spite of his momentary suspicion of Miss Belcher’s manner, he must fully accept the alibi. The evidence of Cosgrove’s missing the 7:15 p.m. train, and travelling by the 10:30 was overwhelming. The butler’s corroboration of his master’s return to Knightsbridge was convincing. Though Tanner was not so sure of Miss Belcher’s statement, it at least agreed with Cosgrove’s. Further, the lady had not fallen into Tanner’s little trap about the hour of the call and had disagreed with what he told her Cosgrove had said.

Then another point struck him. Cosgrove was at Knightsbridge between 7:45 and 8:00, and at King’s Cross at 10:30. Was this evidence alone not sufficient? Would it have been possible for him to have visited Luce Manor in the interval? Suppose he had used a fast motor and gone by road?