Martin studied the man carefully, weighing up all the possibilities in his mind.
“What makes you think that I will be prepared to sign any such document?” he asked at last.
The question didn’t seem to disconcert Burton in any way.
“I would think that the natural desire of a father to protect a daughter would be sufficient inducement. I can put a bullet in her knee right now if you wish, just to show you that I’m a man of my word?”
“I don’t think that that will be necessary,” Martin responded as he heard Beverley gasp with fear behind him, “I’m just curious to learn what is to stop you shooting all three of us once you have the signatures?”
“Not a lot I must admit.”
“I assume the will is going to bequeath the house and most everything else to you? I would think that you might have a job getting away with it.”
“True, although fortunately I’m not quite as stupid as you take me for. I am going to strike a bargain with you because, contrary to what you may imagine, I don’t particularly enjoy killing people unless it is necessary.”
“What sort of 'bargain' did you have in mind?”
“I will explain. To begin with, may I remind you of the very recent disposal of a useless individual called Paul Collins? Oh yes, I recognised who it was as soon as I saw him in the hallway. He came to my attention following investigations I undertook looking into possible suspects who may have been involved in the abortive attempt to break into this house that you mentioned to me. Discovering who he was naturally allowed led me into discovering Mrs Brent’s true identity of course.
This in turn naturally gave rise to concerns that made me feel it would be politic to advance my visit here by a few hours.”
“The death of Collins has nothing to do with me.”
“Ah, that is where you are wrong you see. Once you have signed the will I will pass you this gun, which by that time will be minus any ammunition of course, and you will pick it up and grasp it firmly in your right hand and squeeze the trigger. You will then place it close to where I can retrieve it. Later, the body of Collins will be placed somewhere in the grounds of this house, and the gun discarded reasonably close by. Sooner or later somebody will come to the house in an effort to find out why nothing has been seen or heard of the residents for a while. It will then be discovered that the three of you have fled, leaving behind a rather dead body. In good time a discarded weapon bearing your fingerprints will also be ‘discovered’. Evidence will subsequently reach the police from an anonymous source revealing the sordid fact that you were conducting an affair with the legal wife of Collins, and of course, when he came here to remonstrate, you naturally shot him. Not wishing to be put in the frame for murder, you have taken your daughter and mistress and fled the country.”
“Except that in all probability we will never even leave this cellar!” Martin said sarcastically.
“Oh ye of little faith!” Burton sighed. “Can you not grasp the fact that three extra bodies in here would be difficult to explain? It would inevitably start a massive police investigation, and certainly will not ease the problems your presence here already poses. On the other hand, a simple ‘crime’ like I am proposing, the disposal of a convicted pervert, will soon be forgotten. I have a colleague standing by with a car, and once you have signed, you will be given time to pack clothing and whatever possessions you desire. When you are ready, you will be driven to the airport. Tickets have already been arranged in your name; I even have forged passports for you to use. You already have sufficient financial resources to lose yourself somewhere in the world where nobody will ever find you. It will be a comparatively simple matter for you all to change identity and live out your natural span. After a year I will make representations through an intermediary to get you officially classified as dead. Once this has been done I shall see that this will is invoked. You will notice that the property is not willed to me, but to a charitable trust. A reputable employee of that trust will appear in due course, and certain embarrassing items will be removed from the premises, which will then be disposed of. The end result is that we all finish up with what we want. You will have saved the lives of your daughter and mistress, and I will have secured my own future safety.”
“And if I don’t agree to all this?”
“Simple; inconvenient as it will be, I shoot all three of you, your bodies will be taken away and dumped somewhere; probably inside one of the concrete supports of a new motorway extension that I have access to. Quite ironic really; in every sense of the word you will go from being a pillar of society to being part of a pillar of a motorway bridge. Anyway, I leave the choice to you.”
“To coin a phrase; it seems that I’m stuck somewhere between a rock and a very hard place,” Martin observed “May I at least look at what I’m supposed to sign?”
“By all means.”
He tossed the envelope over, and Martin stooped down to pick it up. He was of course playing for time. Given the circumstances as Burton saw them there was little doubt that he would have to sign no matter what the will said. Martin was aware of the one thing that might possibly make all the difference between life and death; neither Collins nor Burton had made any reference to Georgie. Both girls had gone to the tree house, and as far as he was aware only one had been apprehended. Beverley had still not mentioned her, and for that he was glad.
Up to that point he had assumed that Beverley’s silence was simply because she was too scared to say anything, then he suddenly wondered if perhaps she really wasn’t as scared a she appeared to be, and was keeping quiet about Georgie’s existence deliberately. She may easily have worked out for herself that if Georgie had seen what had happened to her friend, and if she had kept her wits about her, it was not inconceivable that she would find some way to raise the alarm and bring help. He knew it was at best a nebulous hope, yet the only one he had, and he was determined to spin things out for as long as he could. He opened the envelope, pulled out the document inside and proceeded to read it carefully.
He was also watching Burton out of the corner of his eye. He saw him pull a second gun from his coat which he laid to hand beside him on the stairs after he had ostentatiously removed the safety catch. He debated whether to chance an attack whilst the gun was actually out of his hand and instantly dismissed the idea; the chances of failure were too high. The man undoubtedly had highly trained reflexes and would certainly snatch the gun up and fire even as he was charging forward and that wouldn’t save any of them.
As he read on, he saw Burton removing the ammunition from the gun that had been used to eliminate Collins, putting it back in his pocket. He seemed completely unconcerned about everything. With that task complete, he proceeded to wipe the empty gun very carefully with a clean handkerchief. Behind Martin, June and Beverley clung together, their faces filled with dread. The sheer trauma of events had left them largely speechless and Martin knew that he just had to keep playing for time for as long as he could keep it up; it was their only hope. The seconds ticked by, yet there was no sound of anyone else coming into the house and time was fast running out.
“OK,” Burton said at last. “You’ve had quite long enough, so what is it to be; life as an exile with those who are important to you, or do I need to waste more ammunition?”
“Do you really expect me to believe this fanciful story of a free ride to an airport, etc., etc.?” Martin asked, the will held loosely in his hand. “You must think I am more than averagely gullible.”
“What you choose to believe or disbelieve is of no interest to me,” was the calmly delivered answer. “I suppose you could say the choice revolves around accepting a nebulous chance, or opting for no chance at all. Do you have a pen on you?”
“No.”
Burton pulled a biro out of his pocket and threw it across to him.
“Decision time,” he said laconically.
Martin retrieved the pen, rested the will on the cover of the well, and slowly inscribed his signature on it.
“Right, now the witness.”
Martin put the pen in June’s hand.
“Your real name,” Burton called out warningly, “not your alias.”
Gritting her teeth, and trying not to allow her hand to shake, June signed and passed the pen and will back to Martin. He folded the document and inserted it back into the envelope. He turned back to face Burton once more. He was still sitting in the same place, but the second gun was now in his hand.
“Good, place the envelope there on the ground between us. Not too close.”
Martin did as he bid. As he straightened up, Burton lobbed the empty gun towards him.
“Pick it up in your right hand,” he said, “hold it as if you intended to fire it.”
Martin picked the gun up, raised it slowly until it was pointing at a spot directly between the killer’s eyes, and then he squeezed the trigger. There was a small click, but nothing else. Burton just sat there watching him; there was no emotion, he knew he held all the aces.
Martin lowered the gun, stepped forward slowly and placed it on top of the will.
“You see, it wasn’t so difficult was it?” Burton remarked in his oily voice. “So, if you will all now back off to the far wall?”
They did as he bid and he came down from the stairs with the gun dangling from his right hand, and his left holding the handkerchief. He stooped down, never taking his eyes away from them, and scooped up the items Martin had placed there. The gun was wrapped carefully in the handkerchief, and the will replaced into his pocket. When all was done he looked at them thoughtfully, the gun still in his hand and ready for instant use. Martin put one protective arm round June and the other round Beverley. If the man raised the gun he was determined to push the pair of them down behind the well as he lunged forward to tackle him. It would be a futile gesture, yet he was determined that he would go down fighting if it came to the crunch.
“Good,” said Burton after a couple of moments. “Everything is going along nicely. You will now all lie on the floor please, face down. I apologise for this but as I’m sure you understand, I need to return to the hallway without any rash interference on your part in order to summon my assistant to remove the remains of Mrs Collins’ late husband.”
The gun came up slowly and deliberately as he was talking, and it was aimed squarely at Beverley and not Martin, yet it was Martin he was looking directly towards.
“No heroics, please,” he said quietly. “There is still time for me to change my mind.”
Martin had no doubt that Burton now intended to execute them. The only question he needed to decide on was whether it was worth playing for a few more seconds’ grace, or to stake everything on a sudden frantic leap at their tormentor. But Burton was watching him, and in his eyes he could read the understanding of what was passing in his intended victim’s mind.
“You have five seconds,” said Burton deliberately, “and then your daughter dies.”
The eyes of a cold-blooded killer stared straight into Martin’s. He would be alert to anything that signalled any last desperate attempt to reverse the situation. Beverley would be shot, and equally certainly all three of them would die.
“One,” he said calmly, still holding the gun on the girl, “Two. Three. Four-”
There was the sharp crack of a shot, but it wasn’t Burton’s gun that fired.
Chapter Twenty-Eight. Sunday Morning.
Simultaneously with the sound of the shot the gun went spinning from Burton’s hand, and with an audible gasp he staggered down the steps and fell forward onto his knees on the cellar floor. Even as he landed, he recovered sufficient to lunge forward with his left hand towards the fallen weapon, but Martin was quicker. His reflexes already on a hair trigger, he was leaping forward even as the man fell, and he kicked the weapon spinning away from him to the far side of the cellar before the searching fingers could reach it. Ignoring the groaning man writhing near his feet he looked up the stairs to see who had come in the nick of time to save them.
Contrary to anything he might have expected it wasn’t a uniformed police marksman at the top of the steps. Emerging from the shadow was a short round, cherubic man; a man with familiar features, yet subtly different.
“Edwards!” Martin exclaimed in complete astonishment. “I cannot imagine how you come to be here, but I’m sure glad you are!”
“Yes Mr Isherwood,” said the figure, slowly descending the stairs, his features becoming clearer as he approached, a small automatic held in his right hand. “You might say my appearance is, shall we say, providential? Now, if you would be so kind as to rejoin your daughter and housekeeper, and stay there?”
Gone was the verbose, excitable and totally ineffectual personality of the butterfly man; in its place the quiet measured tones of a person who knew exactly what he was about.
“I don’t understand,” said Martin, his relief at the sudden rescue evaporating swiftly as he realised that the situation might not after all be as welcome as he had thought.
“Then I shall explain, now please move back, there’s a good fellow.”
There was no mistaking the aura of authority in the quiet voice. Martin stepped back, once again putting reassuring arms around the two most important people in his life. They looked with shocked eyes at the figure of Burton slumped against the wall to the side of the stairs, and then at the short round figure of the spurious butterfly collector, trying to take in what was happening.
“I have returned yet again to your house because of some unfinished business,” Edwards continued, looking down at the man who now crouched on the floor nursing an injured arm from which blood seeped out and onto the floor, “Which, I may add, does not concern butterflies.”
Martin looked at Burton, and then back at Edwards.
“You mean?” he ventured as a new suspicion formed in his mind.
“Yes, I think you understand. Now, in the circumstances, I feel it will be better if the three of you sat down with your backs to that far wall.”
There was that quality in his voice that suggested that he was even more ruthless than the killer he had just shot. Martin had no idea of how the man came to be there, yet he knew instinctively that any attempt to bluster would only invite more bloodshed. He backed off, and with Beverley on one side and June on the other he sat down against the far wall as directed. They both clutched him, and he could feel the quivering of fear, and there was nothing he could do to comfort them.
Edwards seated himself on the steps, the gun in his hand, as he looked at Burton, who had also pulled himself into a sitting position, pain-wracked eyes glowering at the man who faced him.
“Who the hell are you?” the wounded man snarled between gritted teeth.
“Our mutual friends here know me as Hugh Edwards,” he answered calmly.
“If that’s your real name, then I’m a Dutchman!”
“I doubt you are a Hollander,” Edwards agreed. “Then your name isn’t Peter Buxted either, so what’s in a name?”
“All right; what do you want?”
“I don’t actually want anything.”
“Then why are you here, what the hell are you doing shooting at people who’ve never done you any harm?”
“I might ask you the same question,” Edwards answered calmly. “Since you ask, I will tell you. You might call me a specialist contractor. In return for an agreed commission I carry out certain specified tasks. I am extremely expensive, working only for the richest clients. My current assignment is to see that justice is carried out upon the person of a certain Mr Phillip Burton, late Sergeant in the local constabulary.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Are you really as obtuse as you pretend to be?” Edwards asked rhetorically. He didn’t wait for an answer. “Some twenty-five years ago,” he continued, “you organised a situation that netted for you a sum of money that was in the region of a million pounds in used notes. Using your position as a police officer you obtained information concerning the movement of this money belonging to a London businessman, to another businessman in Glasgow. You determined to make use of this information in order to divert these funds to your own use. A good deal of careful planning went into the operation, the details of which I will not bore you with. You involved Mrs Collin’s late father in the venture, promising him great riches, yet neglecting to inform him that the only reward he would actually receive for his services would be a bullet. From your point of view of course, this was necessary, because he was the only witness to the actual crime who might possibly seek to incriminate you later.”
“I still don’t know what you are talking about,” Burton blustered, yet Martin could see the fear growing in the man’s eyes, “I don’t know a thing about any robbery; certainly I don't know anything at all about any killing!”
“Oh, I think you do, but no matter. The car containing the money was cleverly diverted along the route you planned, and at a pre-arranged point it was pulled over in a legitimate way by a uniformed police officer. There were two men in the car, one of whom just happened to be the son of the aforesaid London businessman to whom I have already referred. Both men were executed, as was your plan. You then returned to this house with Carpenter, and here you brought the proceeds of your crime down into this cellar, ensuring the late Dr Marston’s full co-operation by means of blackmail. Once Carpenter’s usefulness to you was finished, he was executed also.”
“You’re just bluffing; if you think he’s dead, where’s his body, eh?” Burton snarled, but the fear was all too apparently growing in his eyes.
“The actual hiding-place of the late Mr Carpenter’s remains are of little consequence to me,” Edwards said in his rather bored voice. “However, the lengths to which you have gone to get your hands on this property suggest to me he lies here somewhere. I have already investigated the grounds and know he isn’t there, ergo, he is inside. It is my considered opinion that his body was never found for the very good and simple reason that his remains were dropped rather unceremoniously into this long disused well.”
“You have a very active imagination!”
“Mr Burton, it will be a simple matter for me to ask Mr Isherwood here to tie a rope round your body and lower you down the well shaft so that you can see for yourself what is down there. I rather imagine he would like to leave you there, come to think of it.”
Burton baulked at that. “Why are you telling me all this rubbish?” he blustered.
“Because it is part of my contract; my principal desires that you should know why you are being brought to justice.”
“You actually intend to kill me?”
“Naturally.”
“For what; you don’t have a single shred of evidence to support these wild allegations of yours!”
“You are forgetting, Mr Burton, that I am not a judge, I am a contractor; I don’t need ‘evidence’ as you call it. Suffice it to say that I have undertaken a certain task and I am carrying it out.”
“All right, so you are a professional killer!”
“If you like; personally, I still prefer ‘Contractor’ because anyone, even you, can kill. With me it is a highly skilled profession. I am a specialist and I only work for the very wealthiest people as I have already mentioned.”
“Then whatever you are being paid, I’ll double it!”
“Oh, my dear Mr Burton, have you no concept of professional ethics?” Edwards exclaimed, rolling his eyes heavenwards. “I couldn’t possibly do that; unlike you I have my reputation to think of. Besides, I already have more money than I strictly need.”
“Look, no one need ever know; you can shoot that lot over there, collect your fee and I’ll vanish!”
Edwards looked at him blankly for several seconds, and then sighed as if in resignation
“You know,” he explained patiently, “that’s your trouble, you have no principles. You are the sort of person who is always bad news, the sort of low-life who would stab his own grandmother in the back if it suited him. You live your life in the perpetual delusion of grandeur peculiar to the psychopath. You think you are successful, yet even those closest to you wouldn’t trust you to never sell them down the river if it appeared expedient.
If you possessed such an abstract concept, you would have many deaths on your conscience Mr Burton, and if I had not intervened, three more entirely innocent people would have been added to your tally.”
“You’ve got it all wrong,” Burton said, and the note of desperation was growing in his voice, “I had no intention of killing them; they were going to fly abroad!”
“Possibly, yet on the wings of angels I think. No, Mr Burton, I suspect that you planned on dumping their bodies in the well along with the late Mr Carpenter’s. You see, unlike you, I am an extremely thorough man; I know that you are here on your own; there is no colleague waiting, no additional vehicles, therefore you fully intended that these innocent people would be sacrificed to protect your own skin. When you staged your so-called 'master crime', you tangled with the wrong people; you simply couldn’t see that you were completely out of your league. I’m afraid your sins have finally caught up with you; the least you can do is face the end like a man. It has taken a long time; you have been reasonably skilful in hiding your tracks, yet not skilful enough. My Principal had suspicions about you from the start, and these were heightened when you so conveniently vanished from the scene shortly after the crime. His undercover investigators uncovered a possible link with Springwater House, and so a discrete watch was kept on the activities of its lawful occupants, and was maintained for a good many years. Some while later the actions of a certain Peter Buxted became of interest, and when Dr Marston’s wife died we suspected that if evidence linking you to ex-Sergeant Burton, and to those two deaths still lay concealed somewhere on the premises, the guilty person would inevitably appear out of the woodwork to eliminate it. My Principal needed to be certain that he had the right man you see. It was a simple matter to bug your phones and office, and piece-by-piece the true story was put together, and we discovered, just as our mutual friend Mr Isherwood did, that Buxted and Burton were one and the same man.”
Burton glowered at the little man, but he said nothing. Martin could see the fear growing in his eyes, and much as he loathed the man, the thought that he was about to witness a cold-blooded execution made him grow cold inside.
“Look, maybe the man
is
a killer,” he interrupted. “Why not just hand him over to the police?”
“I’m sorry, Mr Isherwood, you know that that is not possible,” Edwards responded. “I can understand your squeamishness. I shall of course arrange for you and the ladies to leave here before I complete my work.”
“Look, this is getting bloody silly!” Burton exploded, still nursing his injured arm. “You can’t just shoot a man down in cold blood; it isn’t human! Just name your price and I’ll meet it!”
“I’m afraid there is nothing you could offer that can cause me to renege on a contract,” Edwards said calmly. “Please try not to fret yourself too much; my task is nearly done. To complete the picture that I was asked to pass on to you; my principal believed you probably imagined your hold over Castleman to be satisfactory, unfortunately, like others I needn’t mention, he could easily be persuaded to provide information. After the murders he disposed of Carpenter’s car as per your instructions, and when Mr Isherwood came snooping about a quarter of a century later, it wasn’t only you that was informed of his interest in certain matters. You see, Mr Burton, I am acting on behalf of a very high-principled businessman, and he needed to be sure he had the right man. My services had been engaged when Dr Marston died in, shall we say, dubious circumstances. I was asked to prepare the ground in readiness, which I did by adopting the guise of a lepidopterist. Finally, when all the pieces were in place, he approached me with the ratification of the contract. Money is not important to the principal, but the un-avenged death of a son and employee is. As always, I chose my time and location carefully, and so here we are.”