XVIII + 

The Barmaid Is Brought to Book + 

The bewilderment registered by Mr. Pulteney’s face at this extraordinary announcement rapidly gave way to a look of intense gratification. “At last,” he said, “I have lived! To be mistaken for a criminal, perhaps a murderer⁠—it is my nunc dimittis. All these years I have lived the blameless life of one who is continually called upon to edify his juniors; I have risen early in order to convict my pupils of the sin of being late; I have eaten sparingly in order to pretend that the food provided by our establishment is satisfying when it is not; I have pretended to sentiments of patriotism, of rugged sportsmanship, of moral approval or indignation, which I did not feel. There is little to choose, believe me, between the fakir and the schoolmaster; either must spend days of wearisome mortification, because that is the way in which he gets his living. And now, for one crowded hour of glorious old age, I have been mistaken for a guilty intriguer. The blood flows richer in my veins; I am overcome with gratitude. If only I could have kept it up!” + 

“Mr. Eames,” said Angela, “there’s one thing you said which you’ve got to take back. You said Mr. Pulteney was too much a man of reflection to be a man of action as well. And now you’ve heard how he broke into a garage, stole a piece of sandwich, and took the cap off a petrol-tank without being in the least certain that the car wouldn’t explode. Is this the pale scholar you pictured to us?” + 

“I apologize,” said Eames. “I apologize to Mr. Pulteney unreservedly. I will form no more judgments of character. You may tell me that Mrs. Davis is a murderess, if you will, and I will discuss the proposition on its merits.” + 

“Talking of which,” said Angela, “the cream of the situation is that we still don’t know who it was that was rubbering behind that beastly millhouse.” + 

“Oh, as to that,” said Eames diffidently, “I’ve felt fairly certain about that all along. I suppose it’s the result of living with priests that one becomes thus worldly wise. But didn’t you know, Mr. Bredon, that maids always steal their masters’ cigarettes? It is, I believe, a more or less recognized form of perquisite. Every liberty taken by the rich is aped by their domestics. And, although she is not in household service, I have no doubt that the barmaid here claims a like privilege.” + 

“Do you mean⁠—” began Bredon: + 

“You noticed, surely, that her fingers are a little stained with brown? I noticed it when she brought in my fried eggs. Ladies generally have expensive tastes in cigarettes, and I have no doubt that this maid would go for the Callipoli if she got a chance.” + 

“Miles, dear,” said Angela softly, “who was it said that it must be a servant who was listening at our bedroom door?” + 

“The uneducated do not take Mr. Pulteney’s view about curiosity. I daresay this young lady often listens at keyholes. With a corpse in the house, and detectives about, she listens with all the more avidity. And if the detectives insist on exchanging confidences close to that precise point in the shrubbery at which she is in the habit of smoking purloined cigarettes, they put themselves in her hands. But a stronger motive supervenes; what she overhears out of pure curiosity turns out to be of vital importance to herself. She learns that the young man she is walking out with is suspected of murder.” + 

“Good Lord, and of course it was she who reacted on our suggestions, not Brinkman! I don’t know if I mentioned it to you, Angela, but when Leyland and I were talking together at the millhouse, he said the only thing that would make him hesitate to arrest Simmonds would be evidence showing that Simmonds knew he wasn’t Mottram’s heir. And it was exactly that evidence which ‘Raight-ho’ proceeded to produce.” + 

“Oh,” cried Angela, “how perfectly odious! You mean that when I thought I was pumping Emmeline so cleverly, and getting out of her exactly what I wanted, she was really doing it all on purpose, and telling me exactly what she wanted?” + 

“I’m afraid so, my dear. A lot of reputations seem to be going west today. And, of course, I should say it’s odds that her whole story was absolutely trumped up, invented to suit the occasion. And we’re back exactly where we were, not knowing whether Simmonds knew he was cut out of the will or not.” + 

“On the other hand,” said Angela, “we do know, now, what put the wind up young Simmonds so badly. When you and Leyland passed him and Emmeline in the lane last night, she was telling him that he was suspected of murder, and had better be dashed careful what he said and who he said it to. Naturally it gave him a bit of a fright when he thought you were going to pump him about his uncle.” + 

“And meanwhile, what has Brinkman been up to? We’ve really no evidence against him until all this about the car cropped up. Dash it all, and just when I was going to get a game of patience!” + 

“I don’t want to put my oar in unduly,” said the old gentleman in an apologetic tone, “but might it not be a good thing to acquaint Mr. Leyland with the somewhat unusual state of affairs down at the garage? If Brinkman really intends to do what is popularly known as a ‘bunk,’ he may be off at any moment. Had I been more expert, I could no doubt have immobilized some important part of the mechanism. As it was, I was helpless.” + 

“Where is Leyland, by the way?” asked Bredon. + 

“He is just coming up the street now,” said Eames, looking out of the window. “I’ll call to him to come in here.” + 

“Hullo, what have you been up to?” asked Bredon, as Leyland entered. + 

“Why, to tell the truth, I have been shadowing Mr. Pulteney. I must apologize, Mr. Pulteney, but I felt bound to be careful. I’ve had you kept under close observation all this week; and it was only as I stood behind the door, watching your investigations into that car, that I became perfectly convinced of your innocence.” + 

“What! more suspicion! This is indeed a day! Why, if I had had the least conception that you were watching me, Mr. Leyland, I would have led you a rare dance! My movements, I promise you, should have been full of mystery. I should have gone out every night with a scowl and a dark lantern. I am overwhelmed.” + 

“Well, I must apologize at least for spying upon your detective work. You do very well for an amateur, Mr. Pulteney, but you are not suspicious enough.” + 

“Indeed! I overlooked something? How mortifying!” + 

“Yes, when you took the cushion off that front seat, you failed to observe that there was a neat tear in it, which had been quite recently sewn up. Otherwise I am sure that you would have done what I did just now⁠—cut it open.” + 

“And is it fair to ask what you found inside?” + 

“Well, we seem to have gone too far now to have any secrets between us. I feel sure that both you, Mr. Pulteney, and you, Mr. Eames, are anxious to see justice done, and are prepared to help at least by your silence.” + 

“To be sure,” said Pulteney. + 

“I am at your service,” said Eames. + 

“Well, this is actually what I found.” With a dramatic gesture he produced a small waterproof wallet, and turned out its contents. “You will find a thousand pounds there, all in Bank of England notes.” + 

“Well,” said Bredon, when the exclamations of surprise had died away, “are you still suspecting young Simmonds?” + 

“I’m not easy about him yet in my own mind. But of course I see Brinkman’s deeper in this business than I had suspected so far. A man who’s innocent doesn’t prepare to do a bolt with a thousand pounds and a motorcar that doesn’t belong to him.” + 

“Well,” said Bredon, “I suppose we ought to be keeping an eye on Mr. Brinkman.” + 

“My dear old thing,” said Leyland, “don’t you realize that I’ve had two of my men at the Swan all this week, and that Brinkman hasn’t been unaccounted for for one moment? The trouble is, he knows he’s being watched, so he won’t give himself away. At least I’m pretty sure of it. But the motor, of course, puts us in a very good position. We know how he means to escape, and we can afford to take the watch off him and put it on the motor instead. Then he’ll show his hand, because he’s mad keen to be off. At present he’s in his room, smoking a cigarette and reading an old novel. He won’t move, I think, until he makes certain that we’re all out of the way. Probably not till after supper, because a night ride will suit his purpose best. And he’s got a night for it too; there’s a big storm coming on, unless I’m mistaken.” + 

“And what about Simmonds?” asked Bredon. + 

“And the barmaid?” added Angela. + 

“Well, of course I could question both or either of them. But I’d sooner not, if I can help it; it’s cruel work, I was wondering if you, Mrs. Bredon, could go and have a talk to that maid after we’ve had our tea, and see what satisfaction you can get out of her?” + 

“I don’t mind at all. In fact, I rather want to have it out with dear Emmeline. I owe her one, you see. Meanwhile, let’s have tea by all means. I wonder if Brinky will come down to it?” + 

Brinkman did come down, and tea was not a very enlivening meal. Everybody in the room looked upon him as a man who was probably a murderer and certainly a thief. Consequently everybody tried to be nice to him, and everybody’s style was cramped by the effort. Even Mr. Pulteney’s verbosity seemed to have been dried up by the embarrassment of the situation. On the whole, Eames carried it off best. His dry, melancholy manner was quite unaltered; he talked about patience to Bredon, he talked Pullford gossip to Brinkman; he tried to draw out Pulteney on educational questions. But most of the party were glad when it was over, when Brinkman had shut himself up again, and Angela had betaken herself to the back premises to have it out with the barmaid. + 

The “best room” had been turned by common consent into a sort of committee room; during all this whirligig of sensations, the background of their mind was filled with those protuberant portraits of the late Mr. Davis which so defiantly occupied the walls. It was here that Angela found them assembled when she came up, some half an hour later, a little red about the eyes. + 

“Well, I didn’t try any subterfuges this time; I let her have it straight from the shoulder. And then she cried, and I cried, and we both cried together a good bit.” + 

“The mysterious sex again,” said Mr. Pulteney. + 

“Oh, you wouldn’t understand, of course. Anyhow, she’s had a rotten time. That first evening, when she listened outside the door, it was only for a moment or two, out of sheer curiosity, and she didn’t hear anything that interested her. It was yesterday evening, when you two were talking, that she got interested. She overheard at first merely by accident, which just shows how careful you ought to be. She caught the name ‘Simmonds’; she heard, for the first time, about the Euthanasia policy, and what it might have meant to him and to her. She went on listening, naturally, and so she came in for all Mr. Leyland’s exposition of the case against Simmonds. You didn’t convince my husband, Mr. Leyland, but you had a much greater success on the other side of the wall. The poor girl, who’s been brought up on novelettes and penny-shockers all her life, drank in the whole story. She really believed that the man who had been making love to her, the man she was in love with, was a cold-blooded murderer. She acted I think, very well. He came round that evening to take her out for an evening walk, and on the way she taxed him with his supposed crime. If you come to think of it, that was sporting of her.” + 

“It was,” said Leyland. “People are found dead in ditches for less than that.” + 

“Well, anyhow, it worked all right. Simmonds listened to her charges, and then denied them all. He didn’t give her any evidence for his denial, but she believed him. There was no quarrel. Next day, that is to say this morning, Emmeline heard you two arranging for a talk at the millhouse. She didn’t suspect the trap; she walked straight into it. What she heard made her believe that there was only one way to save Simmonds⁠—to pretend that he knew about the Euthanasia, and knew the money wasn’t coming to him. The poor girl reflected that Simmonds had been hanging round the house on the night of Mottram’s death; he had been there waiting to see her when she left the bar at closing time. So, bravely again, I think, she came to me with her story about the anonymous friend and her young man with his lost legacy. Of course, by sheer accident, I made it much easier for her to pitch me this yarn, and I swallowed it whole. She thought that, with some blackening of her own conscience, she had saved an innocent man’s life.” + 

“And that’s all she knows, so far?” + 

“No, at the end of lunch she heard you, Miles, saying that you’d give me half an hour to talk things over. So when she saw us stealing down to the now familiar trysting-place by the mill⁠—she hadn’t gone to the funeral⁠—she followed us and listened again. And, to her horror, she realized from what you said that all her lying had failed to do its work. Leyland still believed, believed more than ever, that her young man was the criminal. Her anxiety put her off her guard, and a sudden sneeze gave her away. She didn’t dare go back to the house; she hid in the privet-hedge.” + 

“And the long and short of it is,” suggested Leyland, “that her story is no evidence at all. Simmonds may be as guilty or as innocent as you like; she knew nothing about it. Can she give any account of Simmonds’s movements on the night of the murder?” + 

“Well, she says she had to be in the bar up to closing time, and then she slipped round to the back door, where he was waiting for her, and stood there talking to him.” + 

“For how long?” + 

“She says it might have been a quarter of an hour, or it might have been three quarters of an hour; she really couldn’t say.” + 

“That sounds pretty thin.” + 

“How impossible you bachelors are! Miles, can’t you explain to him? Oh, well, I suppose it’s no use; you couldn’t possibly understand.” + 

“It’s certainly rather an unfortunate circumstance for Simmonds that, just at the moment the gas was turned on in Mottram’s room, he was indulging in a kind of ecstasy which may have lasted a quarter of an hour, or may have lasted three quarters.” + 

“Meanwhile,” said Bredon, “I hope you realize that your own case against Simmonds is considerably weakened? You were trying to make out, if you remember, that Simmonds murdered Mottram and burned the will, knowing that the will cut him out of his inheritance. But since we have learned to discredit the testimony of ‘Raight-ho,’ we have no evidence that Simmonds ever knew anything about the will, or had ever so much as heard of the Euthanasia policy.” + 

“That’s true. And it’s also true that these last discoveries have made me more inclined to suspect Brinkman. I shall have to keep my eye on Simmonds, but for the time being Brinkman is the quarry we must hunt. It’s Brinkman’s confession I look forward to for the prospect of those forty pounds.” + 

“Well, if you can catch Brinkman and make him confess, you’re welcome to them. Or even if Brinkman does himself in somehow, commits suicide rather than face the question, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt, and we’ll treat it as murder. Meanwhile, if you will excuse me, I think I’ve just time to lay out that patience before supper.” + 

“Oh, he’s hopeless,” said Angela. + 