The Affair of the Mutilated Mink (34 page)

'So it was really fired from my revolver - which was also the murder weapon?' the Earl said.

'Yes, my lord. He must have put another bullet in the same chamber after the murder. And it was very important you didn't discover the fact that it was the same gun that had been used twice. That was why he was quick to lock the gun in a box. If you'd sniffed it you would have realised it had just been fired - which would have really spoilt his scheme.'

'I'd have certainly thought it confirmed that he had committed the murder a minute or so before. But isn't that what you said he
wanted
everyone to think?'

'Yes, my lord, but he only wanted it
thought
- not confirmed. If you had sniffed that gun, then later on, when it was known that the lady had been killed over an hour before, you would have remembered that the gun Carter had been holding had just been fired when you found the body. That would show that his story of the alarm shot having been fired by somebody else in the corridor, with another gun, was a lie. It was for the same sort of reason - though in reverse, as it were - that he left the body right in front of the fire: it had to be kept warm. Given the poor road conditions, and the telephone being out of order, he could be pretty sure the doctor wouldn't arrive soon enough to pinpoint the time of death with great accuracy. He wouldn't test exhaustively, anyway, time of death having already been established by a dozen witnesses. But if my lord, or anybody else, had touched the body and found it was cold, you would have immediately realised the lady must have died some time before.'

'And we would have thought, after all, that Carter was not guilty,' Hugh said. 'But isn't that what he wanted?'

'No, sir. With respect, you thinking him innocent would not be good enough. Carter had the sense to realise that when we - the police - arrived, it would make no difference to us if you all assured us he was innocent. We'd have to satisfy ourselves of that. We'd have suspected everybody equally and checked into Carter's history and possible motives as closely as everyone else's. He had to arrange things so that we cleared him. But he wanted to be our number one suspect at first, so that we'd concentrate on him. He knew we wouldn't be able to find out much about his financial position, say, until today, when the banks and so on opened, and that by then the fur coat would have come to light, the second gun found, and his story would have apparently been authenticated. He believed that he would then be crossed off our list of suspects at once, that we'd concentrate on finding out who had framed him and that inquiries about him wouldn't continue.'

'And if it hadn't been for you, Mr Wilkins, that's just how things would have worked out,' Ann said.

Rex said, 'You referred to three phoney clues Carter had lined up that were supposed to clear him. You've only mentioned two: the mink and the second gun in the secret passage.'

'The third was more subtle. It was that phone call to the safe company. You see, Carter knew the combination because Lady Geraldine had told him. She urged him to keep quiet about his knowledge. But he couldn't have relied in advance on her doing that. Her knowledge that
he
knew might have made her suspicious. So by that phone call he gave the impression that somebody else had discovered the combination. Then he freely admitted his knowledge of it, in spite of Lady Geraldine's advice. It was a very smart move, making him appear thoroughly open and aboveboard. It was the one thing that, for a short time, did give me some small doubts about his guilt. Then Mr Allgood discovered the fragment of letter in Mr Haggermeir's fireplace, and that re-established my conviction.'

'Why?' the Earl asked simply.

'I couldn't believe it had actually been sent to Mr Haggermeir. Firstly, it seemed obvious to me that the person Mr Haggermeir had been talking to in the breakfast room was Miss Lorenzo herself - though it had never seemed to occur to Mr Allgood to ask who the other person in the room had been, no doubt because once he'd decided Mr Haggermeir was not the killer the matter wasn't relevant. But I've since checked with Mr Haggermeir and he confirms it. He'd had a row with the lady the previous night. He'd naturally been unable to offer her a part in
The King's Man
, and she'd taken this as an insult and been very annoyed. But he couldn't throw up the opportunity of signing her. He had to convince her that his reluctance to give her a part in the film was no personal slight. He decided the only way to do that was to take the big risk of telling her the full truth. Which he did on the Friday morning. They started their conversation in the breakfast room, and then when they were interrupted by a maid they moved upstairs to Mr Haggermeir's room. He offered to commission a film script especially for her, and promised to top any other offer she got from Hollywood provided she kept quiet about his real reason for being here.'

'So Carter told you the truth about that incident?' Hugh said.

'Yes, sir. He overheard it by chance, but later used it very cleverly.'

'What made you so sure that note wasn't written to Haggermeir?'

'Because if Mr Haggermeir had told Miss Lorenzo the facts, she wouldn't have written to him in those terms. She wouldn't have repeated in the letter things he'd already told her about his grandmother being deserted, and so on. She certainly wouldn't have bothered to mention the old lady's age when she died! She would have simply said something like, "the story you told me this morning convinces me it is my duty to expose," etc. Apart from that, though, I didn't believe Miss Lorenzo would have cared that much what Mr Haggermeir was up to. It was nothing to do with her. She certainly wouldn't have got so indignant as that fragment of letter sounded. Thirdly, if I was wrong and she was so concerned about what he was doing, why not tell your lordship or her ladyship the facts? As I said, after the Superintendent decided Mr Haggermeir wasn't guilty of the murder, he didn't give much thought to these points. But I asked myself this: if the letter did not refer to Mr Haggermeir, whom did it refer to? I decided that the most feasible explanation was that Miss Lorenzo was writing about herself. And, in view of her attempted phone call later, it was a fair bet the letter had been meant for her agent. Now, when Lady Geraldine interrupted her, she thrust it into her writing case. But either because she felt guilty about the way she was deceiving Lady Geraldine, or because she was still suspicious of her, her manner was furtive. Lady Geraldine innocently and casually mentioned this to Carter. And incidentally, that was another point against him in my mind. The killer had known about that letter and where Miss Lorenzo had put it. It was overwhelmingly probable that Carter was the only person Lady Geraldine had mentioned the incident to; they had driven together to the village a few minutes after it had happened, and it was just the sort of thing one might naturally refer to. On the other hand, it was extremely unlikely Lady Geraldine would have gone round talking about it at the party later. Obviously, though, I didn't want to ask her straight out.

Anyway, immediately she mentioned it Carter smelt danger. So later, after he'd killed Miss Lorenzo, he took the letter away with him. He read it and saw how, with judicious editing, it could be used to frame Mr Haggermeir. He carefully cut it to shape, charred the edges, and planted it in Mr Haggermeir's room. Then he told Mr Allgood and me about the conversation he'd heard. It was a fair bet we'd then search Mr Haggermeir's room.'

'But how do
you
reconstruct that letter?' Hugh asked.

Wilkins took out his notebook. 'I copied down the wording of that fragment in here. Now, let me see. Something like this:

'This is to state that the real reason for my present visit to Alderley is not, as I have said, to discuss making a movie, but to attempt to expose a wicked criminal who once cruelly deceived a whole family and caused the death at the age of eighteen of a young and innocent girl. He told her they would be married, but he left her, her reputation ruined, having robbed her of a valuable collection of jewellery.'

Wilkins closed his notebook. 'That would be the rough gist of it, anyway.'

Rex said, 'That's remarkable. But how did it lead you so quickly to the business of Laura's relatives? You said just now that in normal circumstances it would have taken a long time to trace Carter's connection with them. You did it in no time.'

'Well, given that the first part of that fragment referred to herself, the last part had to relate to people in her life. I've explained how I deduced that it had been intended for her agent. So yesterday, on my day off, I went up to London to visit him. Nice man, very helpful. Name of Cattin. He's only nominally her agent in this country, as she's never worked much over here. But they'd known each other many years, and she always looked upon him - as a sort of adviser and father confessor. So naturally he was eager to help in any way he could.

'I told him a good part of the story, though not my suspicions of Carter, of course. I wanted to know if at any time of Miss Lorenzo's past life there'd been an incident concerning a family who'd been cruelly deceived, the death of a young girl, and the theft of some valuables. He told me yes, that she had talked about it years ago. But she'd never told him the name of the family and he was a bit hazy in his recollection of the details. However, he agreed to try and find out more. He spent much of yesterday afternoon on the telephone to Italy, speaking to various friends and relatives of Laura's. Eventually he pieced together the story, together with a description of the young man direct from Laura's aunt. It fitted Carter.

'Then Mr Cattin came with me to the Savoy hotel, where Miss Lorenzo had left her luggage, and we went through it together. We found a copy of the edition of
The Londoner
magazine containing the article on Miss Lorenzo and, on another page, the photo of Lady Geraldine and Carter. Mr Cattin explained how he'd sent it to Miss Lorenzo. But, of course, this wasn't anything remotely resembling proof. I asked Mr Cattin to do one more thing for me: try and find out from the aunt if by any chance she had a photo of the criminal. Well, it turned out she had a rather blurred snapshot, I was told. I then arranged with the Italian police to collect the negative from her and put it on the first flight to London. After that it was just a question of waiting.'

'By Jove,' the Earl said, 'and it only arrived in the nick of time. Allgood was really floundering.'

Wilkins cleared his throat. 'Well, actually, my lord, it arrived quite early this morning. Unfortunately, when I saw it I realised what they'd meant by blurred. It was completely unrecognizable as Carter.'

They all stared. Rex said, 'But that photo you held out.'

'—was kindly supplied by the picture editor of
Athletics Weekly
. It was an unpublished photo taken just after Carter won the three thousand meters steeplechase at the British championships two years ago.'

The Earl slapped his knee and gave a roar of laughter. 'Wilkins, that's brilliant! You sly dog!'

'Thank you, my lord. I relied on the sudden shock breaking him down. These good-looking, charming, vain young criminals are almost always the quickest to show themselves up when things start to go wrong. And it worked. Unfortunately, what I didn't know, and what I don't think I could possibly have guessed, was that shortly before Mr Allgood had handed Carter a loaded revolver and not taken it back.'

Lord Burford said: 'Well, Wilkins, I must congratulate you and thank you for again gettin' us out of a very sticky situation. Rest assured, I shall write to the Chief Constable, praising your handling of the case in the highest terms.'

'Oh, no, my lord, please don't do that. The more commendations of that sort I get, the more cases of this sort I'll be assigned to. And I really don't like them. I'd much sooner be handling nice simple burglaries and car thefts.'

'Well, if you're quite sure . . .' The Earl broke off and called, 'Come in,' as there was a knock on the door.

It was Sergeant Leather. He came across the room. 'Excuse me, my lord.' He turned to Wilkins. 'Sorry to interrupt, sir, but you're wanted immediately.'

'What is it?'

'Murder, sir. At Meadowfield School.'

'Good gad,' Lord Burford exclaimed. 'I'm on the Board of Governors. Who's been murdered?'

'The matron, my lord. Found hanging in the gym, her hands tied behind her back.' He looked back at Wilkins. 'The odd thing is, sir, she was wearing a Red Indian headdress.'

Wilkins gave a groan and got to his feet. 'Oh dear, here we go again. I don't like school murders. So many people about, and all the teachers hate each other and lie like troopers all the time.'

Ann said, 'Oh, come now, Mr Wilkins. I'm sure you'll clear it up in no time.'

'I doubt it, Miss. I'm not sanguine, not sanguine at all.' He sighed. 'Well, goodbye, my lord - and everybody. Glad to have been of service. Lead the way, Jack.'

They started for the door. Suddenly Rex said, 'Hey, wait a moment, Wilkins. There's something you haven't explained.'

Wilkins stopped. 'Carry on, Jack. I'll join you in a jiffy.' As Leather went out he turned, asking, 'What's that, sir?'

'Who in the world clonked Carter on the head last night?'

Lord Burford said, 'My word, I'd completely forgotten about that.'

Wilkins said, 'Oh.' There was a pause.

'Don't you know?' Ann asked.

Wilkins hesitated. 'Yesterday, I understand, her ladyship put forward the suggestion that some passing tramp had gained access to the house. I think that's probably the explanation for the attack on Mr Carter.'

'A hobo?' Rex exclaimed. 'You've got to be kidding!'

'I suppose you'll be putting out a dragnet for him?' Ann said quietly.

'Oh, I don't think so, Miss. As a matter of fact, he did me a good turn.'

'What the deuce do you mean?' Lord Burford asked.

'Well, my lord, I was very anxious about Mr Allgood's decision to allow Carter to go away. Leather told me about it when I telephoned him after getting back from London yesterday evening. Let a criminal out of your sight and you might never see him again. If Carter had somehow spotted the fact that I was on to him - I didn't think he had, but I couldn't be sure - he might just disappear. But more important was Lady Geraldine's going with him. She's a smart young lady. It only needed him to make one tiny slip when they were discussing the case together and she might well jump to the truth. Then her life wouldn't be worth a brass farthing. So I started desperately trying to think up a way to prevent the trip. Do you know, I even went to the trouble of getting out my truncheon and driving up here last night? I don't quite remember what happened then. Think I must have fallen asleep in the car. Had rather a strange dream, might even have done a bit of sleepwalking. Anyway, when I woke up I just went home again. But when I heard this morning that Carter had been temporarily incapacitated I was mightily relieved, I can tell you. So you see why I say that this, er, tramp did me a good turn. Well, if that's everything, I must be going. Goodbye my lord, ladies and gentlemen.'