easily, and— Well, never mind all that.” He was trying hard to speak lightly. “By the bye, Tom, what did I do—leave my driving license lying on the outhouse floor?”
“You assumed I said R-O-D-E—as in fact I did—when you ought to have assumed I was saying R-O-W-E-D.”
“The chief constable considered. “Yes. Yes, I see. If I’d really left Town at lunch-time, I shouldn’t have known anything about Gregson’s precious horse. Well, well. Tom, I’m not at all sure what the drill is in a situation like this, but I should imagine you’d better get into direct touch with the Home Office.”
“There’s no case against anyone else, sir.” The superintendent’s voice was carefully expressionless.
“Thanks very much, but no. Now Vera’s dead, nobody—”
He grimaced suddenly. “However, I’m much too much of a coward to want to hang about waiting for the due processes of law. So, Tom, if you don’t mind…”
A mile and a half beyond the house, the superintendent stopped his car in order to light a cigarette. But he never looked back. And even in Gregson’s farmhouse, where they were starting their makeshift evening meal, no one heard the shot, no one marked, across the dark stream, the new anonymous shadow under the willow tree.
After Evensong
They were standing at opposite ends of the living-room, studiously ignoring one another. A little too studiously, the inspector reflected, as, with a sergeant in tow for witness, he stepped inside and closed the door behind him: that elaborate disinterest was as revealing as any demonstrativeness could have been.
“Well now, Mrs. Soane, Mr. Masters,” he said cheerfully, “It’s about time we had a little talk. That’s providing Mrs. Soane feels up to it, of course.”
Enid Soane shrugged. She was a faded, worried-looking blonde woman in the middle thirties, a former employee of Soane’s whom he had married in his retirement. “I dont mind,” she said lifelessly. “I shan’t get a wink of sleep tonight anyhow.”
“A tragic business.” The inspector produced his notebook, perched himself on the arm of a chair. “Not at all the sort of crime you look for in a quiet little village like this. Let’s see, now… Mr. Masters, you’d known Mr. Soane for how long?”
Oliver Masters, who had been leaning against the mantelpiece, straightened up abruptly: a thin, dark, middle-aged man, with a hooked nose and a jutting jaw. “Six years,” he said. “Ever since he retired from business and became nature correspondent on the Echo . I’m on the Echo too, you know. That was how we met.”
“And did he often invite you here to stay?”
“Fairly often. He rather idealized journalists and journalism, and I don’t think he ever quite realized what a dull, unimportant cog in the machine I am. However…”
“On this occasion, then, you came down just for the weekend. And earlier this evening the three of you went together to Evensong at the village church.”
“Correct.”
“After which you and Mrs. Soane left Mr. Soane in the churchyard and took a walk.”
“Yes. Soane had been showing us some of the queer inscriptions on the older tombstones. We suggested a walk, as it was such a fine evening, but he said he wasn’t up to it—he suffered a good deal from sciatica, you know. He would sit in the churchyard for a bit, he said, and then go home. So we left him there. “
“About what time would that have been?”
“Oh… I suppose a quarter or twenty past eight.”
“M’m. And where did your walk take you?”
“We cut across the fields toward Hod Hill. Over Lumsden Bridge, past the old mill, and then—”
“Yes. Did you happen to meet anyone you knew?”
Masters frowned. “I don’t think… Wait, though. We did pass the time of day with an old chap on the bridge. A nice old boy in a shooting-jacket—don’t know who he was, but he seemed a respectable sort of citizen.”
“Ah, the colonel, that’d be.” The
“You assumed I said R-O-D-E—as in fact I did—when you ought to have assumed I was saying R-O-W-E-D.”
“The chief constable considered. “Yes. Yes, I see. If I’d really left Town at lunch-time, I shouldn’t have known anything about Gregson’s precious horse. Well, well. Tom, I’m not at all sure what the drill is in a situation like this, but I should imagine you’d better get into direct touch with the Home Office.”
“There’s no case against anyone else, sir.” The superintendent’s voice was carefully expressionless.
“Thanks very much, but no. Now Vera’s dead, nobody—”
He grimaced suddenly. “However, I’m much too much of a coward to want to hang about waiting for the due processes of law. So, Tom, if you don’t mind…”
A mile and a half beyond the house, the superintendent stopped his car in order to light a cigarette. But he never looked back. And even in Gregson’s farmhouse, where they were starting their makeshift evening meal, no one heard the shot, no one marked, across the dark stream, the new anonymous shadow under the willow tree.
After Evensong
They were standing at opposite ends of the living-room, studiously ignoring one another. A little too studiously, the inspector reflected, as, with a sergeant in tow for witness, he stepped inside and closed the door behind him: that elaborate disinterest was as revealing as any demonstrativeness could have been.
“Well now, Mrs. Soane, Mr. Masters,” he said cheerfully, “It’s about time we had a little talk. That’s providing Mrs. Soane feels up to it, of course.”
Enid Soane shrugged. She was a faded, worried-looking blonde woman in the middle thirties, a former employee of Soane’s whom he had married in his retirement. “I dont mind,” she said lifelessly. “I shan’t get a wink of sleep tonight anyhow.”
“A tragic business.” The inspector produced his notebook, perched himself on the arm of a chair. “Not at all the sort of crime you look for in a quiet little village like this. Let’s see, now… Mr. Masters, you’d known Mr. Soane for how long?”
Oliver Masters, who had been leaning against the mantelpiece, straightened up abruptly: a thin, dark, middle-aged man, with a hooked nose and a jutting jaw. “Six years,” he said. “Ever since he retired from business and became nature correspondent on the Echo . I’m on the Echo too, you know. That was how we met.”
“And did he often invite you here to stay?”
“Fairly often. He rather idealized journalists and journalism, and I don’t think he ever quite realized what a dull, unimportant cog in the machine I am. However…”
“On this occasion, then, you came down just for the weekend. And earlier this evening the three of you went together to Evensong at the village church.”
“Correct.”
“After which you and Mrs. Soane left Mr. Soane in the churchyard and took a walk.”
“Yes. Soane had been showing us some of the queer inscriptions on the older tombstones. We suggested a walk, as it was such a fine evening, but he said he wasn’t up to it—he suffered a good deal from sciatica, you know. He would sit in the churchyard for a bit, he said, and then go home. So we left him there. “
“About what time would that have been?”
“Oh… I suppose a quarter or twenty past eight.”
“M’m. And where did your walk take you?”
“We cut across the fields toward Hod Hill. Over Lumsden Bridge, past the old mill, and then—”
“Yes. Did you happen to meet anyone you knew?”
Masters frowned. “I don’t think… Wait, though. We did pass the time of day with an old chap on the bridge. A nice old boy in a shooting-jacket—don’t know who he was, but he seemed a respectable sort of citizen.”
“Ah, the colonel, that’d be.” The
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