The Daffodil Affair Read online

  Copyright & Information

  The Daffodil Affair

  First published in 1942

  © Michael Innes Literary Management Ltd.; House of Stratus 1942-2011

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of Michael Innes to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2011 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  ISBN: 0755120922 EAN: 9780755120925

  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

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  About the Author

  Michael Innes is the pseudonym of John Innes Mackintosh Stewart, who was born in Edinburgh in 1906. His father was Director of Education and as was fitting the young Stewart attended Edinburgh Academy before going up to Oriel, Oxford where he obtained a first class degree in English.

  After a short interlude travelling with AJP Taylor in Austria, he embarked on an edition of Florio’s translation of Montaigne’s Essays and also took up a post teaching English at Leeds University.

  By 1935 he was married, Professor of English at the University of Adelaide in Australia, and had completed his first detective novel, Death at the President’s Lodging. This was an immediate success and part of a long running series centred on his character Inspector Appleby. A second novel, Hamlet Revenge, soon followed and overall he managed over fifty under the Innes banner during his career.

  After returning to the UK in 1946 he took up a post with Queen’s University, Belfast before finally settling as Tutor in English at Christ Church, Oxford. His writing continued and he published a series of novels under his own name, along with short stories and some major academic contributions, including a major section on modern writers for the Oxford History of English Literature.

  Whilst not wanting to leave his beloved Oxford permanently, he managed to fit in to his busy schedule a visiting Professorship at the University of Washington and was also honoured by other Universities in the UK.

  His wife Margaret, whom he had met and married whilst at Leeds in 1932, had practised medicine in Australia and later in Oxford, died in 1979. They had five children, one of whom (Angus) is also a writer. Stewart himself died in November 1994 in a nursing home in Surrey.

  The Dry Salvages

  Describe the horoscope, haruspicate or scry,

  Observe disease in signatures, evoke

  Biography from the wrinkles of the palm

  And tragedy from fingers…especially

  When there is distress of nations and perplexity

  Whether on the shores of Asia or in the

  Edgware Rd.

  Part One

  Primrose Way

  1

  The room was void and unquickened; it was like a room in a shop window but larger and emptier; and the man who sat at the desk had never thought to impress himself upon what he entered every day. Comfort there was none, nor discomfort either; only, did the occupant deign to qualify the pure neutrality of his surroundings, it would surely be austerity that would emerge. The spring sunshine turned bleak and functional as it passed the plate glass of the tall, uncurtained windows.

  The windows were large; the big desk lay islanded in a creeping parallelogram of light; across this and before the eyes of the man sitting motionless passed slantwise and slowly a massive shaft of shadow. Perhaps twenty times it passed to and fro, as if outside some great joy-wheel were oscillating idly in a derelict amusement park. And then the man rose, clasped hands behind him and walked to a window – high up in New Scotland Yard. He looked out and wartime London lay beneath.

  With science the crane or scoop or derrick had been perched amid the skeletal remains of a large building; from this point of vantage it struck and shovelled ingeniously at a neighbouring structure whose ruin had stopped halfway down. It was possible to be sad, to be indignant; and many who walked those streets were making the biologically more useful discovery of anger. But a practical-minded man could confine himself to approving or critical appraisal of the speed with which the tidy-up was accomplished – and the man at the window looked superficially as if he might be like that. His movements were economical, impersonal, abstract. His glance, if considering, was unclouded by speculative care. But on his brow was a fixed contraction; this he had carried from desk to window, and now there was neither hardening nor relaxation as he looked out.

  Hudspith looked out and took it all in. He looked out and as a practical man placed it: there was this and that contingency to fear, to hope for, next time. And as a moralist Hudspith placed it: his lips framed a word. Wicked. Undoubtedly it was that. But was it evil? He thought not; he grudged to the mere fury and blindness of it that absolute word. During fifteen years Hudspith had controlled the file of police papers which dealt with the abduction and subsequent history of feeble-minded girls. Here lay his anger, and as he looked out over London he saw, in effect, only the shadow of this. Year by year the anger had burst deeper until it was now the innermost principle of the man. He confronted sin that was double and gratuitous. For, given social conditions which were common enough, it was tolerably easy to seduce, strand, swop, sell, hire out girls whose wits were reasonably about them. And so the meanness of going for the feeble ones was – well, exasperating. Evil was exasperating. Or rather, perhaps, it was exasperating that so few people were aware of it.

  Their minds stop short at wickedness – thought Hudspith, looking out over London. More of them are aware of God, of Immortality, of the Ideas of Reason, than are really aware of evil. And yet these things, as someone has said, are mere superstructure and superficies compared with the fact of evil… Hudspith did not go to church, but this knowledge of evil made him, in fact, a violently religious man. He pursued his particular police job, sordid and depressing as it was, with very much that dangerous metaphysical intensity which Captain Ahab put into the pursuit of the White Whale. Other things passed him by, not impinging – like his room.

  And now there was this girl – the girl with the outlandish name: Lucy Rideout. Once too often she had ridden out… Hudspith smiled bleakly – unseeing and unaware – into the bleak sunshine.

  A half-witted girl.

  ‘A horse!’

 
John Appleby, two storeys below, looked incredulously at the old gentleman who had recently been reinstalled as Assistant-Commissioner. ‘A horse?’ repeated Appleby. Never before had he been asked to go out and look for a horse.

  The old gentleman nodded, indecisively; he looked Appleby cautiously in the eye. Things had changed. There were quite a lot more sahibs in lower places, and a few more rankers in higher places, than in the old days. He attached little importance to such things. But every now and then it could come awkward – if one wasn’t minding one’s p’s and q’s. ‘Yes,’ he said; ‘a horse.’ His tone was doubtful, as if some qualification must follow. He paused, as if in search of something that could be enunciated with confidence. ‘Sit down,’ he said.

  Appleby sat down. ‘There’s Ambler,’ he suggested hopefully. ‘I believe Ambler has had a lot of experience with horses. When Crusader disappeared just before the Derby in thirty–’

  The Assistant-Commissioner shook his head. ‘No, no; it’s not that sort of horse. Not a valuable sort of horse – not at all valuable. And, in a way, it’s not really an official affair.’ He began to scratch his chin doubtfully; checked himself. ‘As a matter of fact, it’s my sister,’ he said ambiguously.

  ‘Ah.’ Appleby felt a growing dislike of this shadowy equine problem.

  ‘My sister lives in Harrogate. Tiresome sort of place.’ The Assistant-Commissioner was obscurely apologetic. ‘Know it, I suppose.’

  ‘I have an aunt living there, as a matter of fact.’

  ‘Indeed.’ The Assistant-Commissioner took a calculating glance at his own toes. ‘I wonder,’ he ventured, ‘if she knows–’

  ‘I believe she knows Lady Caroline quite well.’

  ‘What a coincidence!’ As he made this imbecile remark the Assistant-Commissioner scrutinized his toes more severely than before. He was not at all sure that this made the matter easier. He decided on a shift to humour. ‘You don’t happen to know,’ he asked, ‘if your aunt has a favourite cab?’

  ‘I don’t. But I think it very likely.’

  ‘Well, Caroline has – or had. She was attached to a particularly sober driver with a particularly quiet horse. At one time when Miss Maidment rang up the stables – I should explain that Maidment is her companion – I mean I should explain that Miss Maidment is her companion–’ The Assistant-Commissioner paused, perplexed. ‘What was I saying?’

  ‘You had got to the point, sir, at which Miss Maidment would ring up the stables.’

  ‘To be sure. Well, at one time she used to ask for an open landau, a respectable man and a quiet horse. But latterly she has simply asked for Bodfish and Daffodil.’ The Assistant-Commissioner paused. ‘Bodfish and Daffodil,’ he repeated. ‘The former was the driver and the latter the horse. That goes without saying, I suppose. One can imagine a Mr Daffodil, but nobody ever gave the name of Bodfish to a cab-horse.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  The Assistant-Commissioner appeared dashed. ‘Look here,’ he said, ‘I know it sounds tiresome. But just you listen. There’s a quirk in it later on.’

  Appleby, who quite liked this old gentleman, endeavoured to smile with cheerful interest. ‘I suppose, sir, it is Daffodil who has disappeared?’

  ‘Quite right. At first my sister was told the animal was dead. She was distressed, because the creature was a favourite, and not at all an old horse.’ The Assistant-Commissioner hesitated. ‘In fact, she felt rather like the poet.’

  Appleby smiled – genuinely this time. ‘Quite so, sir. Fair Daffodil, we weep to see you haste away so soon.’

  The Assistant-Commissioner nodded his head emphatically, much pleased with the success of his cultural reconnaissance. ‘Exactly. Exactly – my dear man. At first, then, they said the horse was dead – apparently feeling that the mention of anything shady would be bad for trade. Now, my sister is inquisitive – or what a politer age used to call a person of much observation. She sent for Bodfish, intending to learn the manner of the brute’s death. Bodfish came to see her – and I am sorry to say he was drunk. It had taken him that way. Caroline at once made Maidment – Miss Maidment, I should say – ring up the stables for a closed cab, a respectable driver and a quiet horse. She then drove Bodfish home, gave Mrs Bodfish a receipt for brewing cocoa in a particularly wholesome and attractive manner, and went on to make searching inquiries of Daffodil’s owner. When she learnt that the animal had been stolen she – well, she sent me a somewhat urgent telegram. Scotland Yard, apparently, came at once to her mind. Natural, having a brother there – I suppose.’

  ‘Very natural, sir.’

  ‘Of course I replied that the local police were the people. So, if you please, she went to see the Chief Constable, taking her solicitor along with her. Seemingly nothing much had been done in the matter of Daffodil. And the Chief Constable, who had hard-worked officers to protect, was pretty stiff with Caroline. Not at first: I gather he tried heading her off by explaining some of the jobs he had on hand, and letting her in on a harmless wartime secret or two. But Caroline, who is even more specifically pertinacious than generally curious, held to her theme. It was aut asphodelos aut nullus with her. I believe her motive was quite selfish and practical: Daffodil was the only horse in Harrogate in which she really had confidence, and she was consequently determined that Daffodil should be traced. Too determined, I gather, for in the end the Chief Constable had pretty well to turn her out. So she went home, thought it over, dictated a stately letter of apology through Miss Maidment – and was thus in a position to present herself without absolute indecency on the poor chap’s doorstep once more on the following afternoon. He was a bit baffled.’

  ‘As one would imagine, sir.’

  ‘Quite so. And I think he tried a spot of irony – suggested Scotland Yard. Caroline explained that she was already in communication with me. I fear he rather crumpled up, and really did – er – pass the buck. In short – well, it is difficult, you know.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘My sister lives in the most modest way. As peers go we’re nobody in particular, as you know.’ The old gentleman smiled charmingly. ‘But then she is the widow–’

  ‘Quite so, sir.’

  ‘Which means that among her brothers-in-law–’

  ‘Clearly, sir. You would like me to go down?’

  The Assistant-Commissioner sighed unhappily. ‘It is difficult, isn’t it? And, you know, you look a bit tired.’ This was outrageous, but true. ‘And you can’t always be after those whopping big affairs. A man who manages in a twelve-month to fight a battle on a Scottish moor, and get wrecked on a desert island, and–’

  ‘Of course I’ll go if you wish it, sir.’

  ‘Just for a weekend it’s a nice quiet place enough.’ The Assistant-Commissioner, here touching perhaps maximum discomfort, thrust his toes despairingly out of sight beneath his desk and looked at Appleby in frank dismay. ‘You might even find the horse, I suppose.’ He shook his head perplexedly. ‘Caroline would be pleased – but then would it be tactful to the local men?’ He smiled wanly. ‘I leave the finding of Daffodil entirely to your discretion. The creature is said to be worth fifteen pounds. And that reminds me.’

  ‘Of the quirk, sir?’

  ‘Just that.’ The Assistant-Commissioner brightened. ‘It really is a bit remarkable. Like those tiny but disconcerting puzzles they used to take to Sherlock Holmes. In fact there’s really a mystery in the Daffodil affair – and mysteries don’t turn up here every day, do they? Oceans of crime in islets of anything like genuine mystification.’ He paused, obscurely troubled by something in this image. ‘The place is what is called a livery stables. Means just a business you hire from. But there’s the older meaning of a place you put your own horses to board. And somebody was doing that. Captain Somebody who has to do with tanks down there but likes to get on a horse from time to time. In a loose box next to Daffodil he had an animal that was worth hundreds of pounds. And this brute was stolen first.’

  Appleby looked up sharply. ‘
You don’t mean that–?’

  ‘Yes. This whopping valuable brute was stolen in the night. In the morning there was a great rumpus, and nobody much bothered about Daffodil or the stable any more. Anything of the sort would have been like locking–’

  ‘Quite so, sir.’

  ‘And then in the course of the day up drove one of those motor things for horses, returned Captain Somebody’s brute, and carried off Daffodil instead – this without anybody being more than vaguely aware of what was happening. Apparently a mistake had been made the first time. Daffodil was the wanted horse.’

  ‘And Daffodil is really worth almost nothing?’

  ‘Apparently not – except to my sister’s sense of security round and about the streets of Harrogate. Not very old, apparently – but broken-kneed or winded or something.’

  Appleby shook his head. ‘I doubt whether Lady Caroline ought to have confidence in a horse that has been down.’

  ‘My dear man, she no doubt likes its face. Anyway, Daffodil was not a valuable horse.’

  ‘There could be no question of pedigree, stud purposes – that sort of thing?’

  ‘Good Heavens, man! Bodfish – I mean Daffodil – wasn’t – um – that sort of horse.’

  ‘I suppose not.’ Appleby got up. ‘It does seem a little queer. I’ll catch the first train on Friday.’ He paused by the Assistant-Commissioner’s door. ‘There’s nothing else you can tell me about Daffodil?’

  ‘As a matter of fact there is. It’s an odd thing to say about a horse. But it appears – this despite Caroline’s good opinion of the creature – well, that it was rather a half-witted sort of horse. What would you say was implied by that? Don’t know much about the animals myself.’