A Connoisseur's Case Read online

  The Colonel was bidding his guest farewell outside his front door. Appleby slipped through the hall and into the drawing-room. Judith was rather impatiently turning over a copy of The Field.

  ‘Well,’ she said challengingly, ‘was Mr Binns really unfit for mixed company?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’ As he spoke, Appleby flicked off the lights, walked over to a window, and drew back a curtain.

  Outside, there was summer darkness. But to the left, from the main portico of Pryde Park, a glow of electric light fell across the drive.

  ‘Listen,’ Appleby said. ‘A nice noise – wouldn’t you say? Or hardly a noise at all.’

  ‘What on earth–’

  ‘And now look.’

  ‘Well, well.’ Judith, having looked, said no more. So there was no sound except the gentle purr of the silver-grey Rolls-Royce which had circled before them and was now departing into the night.

  6

  There was nothing out of the way in Appleby’s sitting up in the library at Pryde to smoke a final solitary pipe, and it was thus that Tarbox found him.

  ‘Is there anything further that you will require, sir?’

  ‘Thank you, Tarbox, nothing at all. The only thing that I could do with is a little light on this afternoon’s bad business.’

  ‘Yes, indeed, sir. It was a most distressing incident for her ladyship to become involved in. But I fear I cannot assist you to any solution. An enigmatical catastrophe, sir.’

  ‘Do you yourself remember anything of this old fellow, Seth Crabtree, back in Mrs Coulson’s time, or during the years he remained at Scroop after Mr Binns had taken over?’

  ‘Neither of these periods may be described as of yesterday, sir. But I think I may claim to be not without a modicum of reminiscence.’

  ‘Would you describe Crabtree as having been some sort of confidant of Mrs Coulson’s?’

  ‘Yes. I believe, that is to say, that there was some such impression abroad, sir. A confidant in humble station, of course. Crabtree could never have been categorized as an upper servant. He remained an outdoor man.’

  Appleby nodded.

  ‘Yes, he told me as much himself. Have you any idea of just what may have recommended him to the old lady?’

  ‘None whatever, sir, I am sorry to say. Of course he was a great one with the ladies.’

  ‘Old Crabtree was a great one with the ladles!’ Appleby stared. ‘You surprise me very much.’

  ‘You must not let it escape your recollection, sir, that Crabtree was scarcely old Crabtree at that time – neither during Mrs Coulson’s life nor when Mr Binns began his tenancy of Scroop. He was middle-aged, of course. But men of the world, sir, are cognizant – are they not? – of the powerful attraction which some males exercise over the fair sex at that period of life.’ Tarbox paused. ‘Favoured males,’ he added, a shade unexpectedly.

  ‘Yes, to be sure. But you don’t suggest that Mrs Coulson–?’

  ‘Certainly not, sir. Honi soit qui mal y pense, if the old adage may be allowed me. Mrs Coulson, although highly eccentric, was even more highly virtuous.’

  ‘She was eccentric?’ Appleby jumped at this. ‘Not merely as having a passion for knowing great people, and that sort of thing?’

  ‘No, sir. That, if I may venture the thought, is somewhat too widely diffused a foible to be felicitously subsumed within the concept of eccentricity. Mrs Coulson was otherwise odd.’

  ‘I see. But just how otherwise?’

  ‘I am afraid I cannot help you to further definition, sir. It was common averment, no more. And I was not myself much in the habit of frequenting the society at Scroop. An occasional cup of tea in the housekeeper’s room – yes. But any confabulation with the man Hollywood in the butler’s pantry – no.’

  ‘Ah, yes – Hollywood.’ Appleby had got to his feet and was leaning against the chimney piece. It seemed a more companionable way of continuing what Tarbox would have called this colloquy. ‘You don’t care for Hollywood?’

  ‘Well, sir, there is the name, to begin with. I confess to a certain sensitiveness in the matter of nomenclature. And “Hollywood”, to my mind, is a name in the highest degree absurd.’

  ‘I don’t quite chime in about the degree, Tarbox. But I give it to you that it’s a silly name. Have you no other reason for objecting to the butler over there?’

  For the first time, Tarbox hesitated. A butler – Appleby felt – is a butler, after all. And it is not lightly that one denounces one of one’s peers.

  ‘One must be allowed one’s intuitive responses, sir.’ Suddenly Tarbox hesitated no longer. ‘No villainy would surprise me in the man Hollywood. A veritable Tarquin, that man might be.’

  ‘Good heavens!’ Appleby was properly startled by this. ‘But Crabtree would have no need to be a Tarquin?’

  ‘Very true, sir. Crabtree had a way with him, as I ventured to intimate. Even with the ladies, it may be. And certainly with the – um – wenches.’

  ‘I see.’ This eighteenth-century species of discrimination again properly impressed Appleby.

  ‘It was observed by an eminent historian, sir, that absolute power corrupts absolutely. And it is not so very long ago that the butler in a great establishment – or at least a large establishment, since we must not exaggerate the consequence of Scroop House – was in something like that position in regard to a number of young persons.’

  ‘What you have to tell me interests me very much.’ As he said this, Appleby found himself wondering whether the respectable and polysyllabic Tarbox was the victim of some sexual obsession. The unknown Hollywood might well be a Tarquin, but the conception of the late Seth Crabtree as a Don Juan was a difficult one. Yet it might be perfectly valid. Appleby retained a vivid impression of how he had himself found Crabtree a puzzling character. Judith hadn’t agreed; she had accepted him as a sensitive and simple old person, much attached to ancient ways and days. Perhaps she was right. And Crabtree could never offer any further explanation of himself now.

  But Crabtree wasn’t the only dubious character Appleby had heard of in connection with Scroop House. The present Mrs Coulson, Bertram Coulson’s wife, was flighty. Her predecessor as mistress of the place, Mrs Binns, who had cleared out, was roundly described by Colonel Raven as an immoral woman. And Bertram Coulson himself sounded distinctly odd.

  ‘It might be useful,’ Appleby said, ‘to know a little more of the actual circumstances under which Crabtree left England. When I talked to him – and my wife and I, you know, had quite a lot of conversation with him almost immediately before his death – he gave me the impression that it was simply a matter of his not liking the way things were going at Scroop. The Binns regime offended him. He hung on for a time, and then he quit. But for how long a time? I haven’t got a grip on any kind of time scheme yet. Can you help me there? Although it’s a shame to keep you up any longer.’

  ‘Not at all, sir. I appreciate that, in giving you any intelligence that I can, I am in a manner of speaking assisting the operation of the law. Moreover, sir, I have a particular occasion tonight for not retiring at an early hour. As to the matter of the chronological disposition of events, I believe I can be of some assistance to you. Old Mrs Coulson died in 1940, and Mr Binns – Mr Bertram Coulson’s tenant, as you know – moved in almost at once. The celerity of the operation was remarked upon.’

  ‘And Mr Binns already had a family?’

  ‘Only a son, Master Peter Binns, at that time. He would have been about five years old. The daughter, Miss Daphne, was born at the end of the following year. 1941, that is to say.’

  ‘And the scandalous departure of Mrs Binns?’

  ‘That cannot have been until 1950. As the Colonel, I believe, apprised you, it was an event immediately followed by the ending of Mr Binns’ tenancy and Mr Bertram Coulson’s coming into residence.’

  ‘So that takes us to a date about ten years back – and old Mrs Coulson’s death occurred ten years before that again.’

  ‘Precise
ly so, sir. And memory can be faulty at such an interval. But I believe that such information as I have given you is tolerably accurate.’

  ‘I’m most grateful.’ Appleby reflected for a moment. ‘We’ve been talking mostly about Scroop House and its occupants – usefully, no doubt, since Crabtree was employed there. But there must have been another aspect to his life, after all. The village and the village people, and so forth. What were Crabtree’s relations with them? Did he have a family in the village? Did his leaving it to go overseas raise any talk at the time? There’s a good deal of that sort of thing to be found out.’

  ‘Clearly so, sir. But I fear I can be of no help to you. We have our own village here – and I confess that I find one enough for me. But both Upper and Nether Scroop will have their gossip, one may safely suppose.’

  ‘I think Upper Scroop is close to the house?’

  ‘Yes, sir. And Nether Scroop is no more than a hamlet, a little south of the canal where it enters the tunnel.’

  ‘Ah, yes – I’ve been there. Or at least I’ve been to the Jolly Leggers. By the way, do you happen to know the publican there? Manager, he would probably call himself.’

  ‘I know him only by name, sir. Channing-Kennedy, I think. Obviously a socially anomalous person. It is my experience that they are best avoided.’

  Appleby laughed.

  ‘I think my wife would agree with you. She didn’t take to Channing-Kennedy at all. And now I think we’d both better go to bed. But I’ll just finish this pipe.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. You will no doubt extinguish the light.’ And Tarbox glanced round the room, spotted an ashtray with a couple of matchsticks in it, picked this up with ceremonial gravity, bowed, and withdrew.

  Appleby lingered no more than five minutes. He had a suspicion that the Crabtree affair might yet cost him a sleepless night or two. As yet, however, he lacked sufficient information to render vigil profitable. Fortunately he was not obsessed by it. He would be asleep within the next ten minutes.

  But this programme failed to fulfil itself. Appleby, obedient to Tarbox’s injunction, turned off the lights in the library before stepping into the hall. Here there was only a single low light at the far end. Not quite seeing where he was going, he only just saved himself from colliding with somebody who had been hurrying past the door.

  ‘I beg your pardon.’ Appleby stepped back as he apologized. At the same moment, he remembered a light switch close to his hand, and decided that the situation would be clarified if he depressed it. And this proved to be the case. The person into whose arms he had almost tumbled was the man who had hurried past Judith and himself on the towpath.

  ‘I can’t think where Tarbox–’ The stranger broke off as he recognized Appleby. Then he instantly carried on with what he had been proposing to say. ‘–has taken himself off to. Still, I’ve seen myself off these premises often enough.’ He gave Appleby a smile that was formal rather than cordial. ‘No doubt, sir, you are a guest of Colonel Raven’s. And perhaps I ought to explain, if Tarbox doesn’t turn up to vindicate me – that I am not to be regarded as a suspicious character. My name is West, and I am the local doctor. Tarbox summoned me on an emergency call – and quite right he proves to have been.’

  ‘But nothing really serious, I hope?’ Appleby asked.

  West produced another bleak smile.

  ‘That must be said to depend on how seriously you take the pleasures of the table. For I’m afraid the Colonel’s cook must have her appendix out in rather a hurry. So excuse me, please. I was making my way to the telephone.’

  Appleby stepped back, and Dr West passed him with a nod. There seemed no harm in waiting until he had called an ambulance or accomplished whatever else he was about. Indeed, as Tarbox was still invisible, it seemed the civil course. And presently the doctor came back.

  ‘No danger for an hour or two,’ he said. ‘And she’ll be in the surgeon’s hands by then.’ He gave a quick glance round the hall, as if looking for his hat or coat.

  ‘I think,’ Appleby said, ‘that we’ve met – or rather encountered each other – earlier today?’

  There was a moment’s silence, during which Appleby was visited by the odd conviction that West was meditating denying this blankly. As it was, the man seemed to temporize.

  ‘Indeed?’ he said interrogatively.

  ‘And my wife was with me at the time. We speculated – you will forgive me – as to whether you might not be the local GP.’

  ‘Ah, yes – on the towpath.’ West said this indifferently. ‘I often take a walk that way.’

  ‘Do you, indeed?’ Appleby was equally indifferent. ‘It seemed to us that very few people do. We may be described as having met in an isolated situation.’

  ‘Indeed?’ West looked coolly at Appleby. ‘This part of the country is familiar to you?’

  ‘Far from it. Although my wife, who is Colonel Raven’s niece, has been here from time to time. My name, by the way, is Appleby.’

  ‘Ah, yes – Sir John Appleby.’ West made no great ado about this. ‘I was going to say that, to strangers, appearances may be deceptive. There may have been more people around this afternoon than you think.’

  ‘That may well be so.’

  ‘Sir John, may I ask’ – and again West produced the bleak smile – ‘whether you are proposing to take a professional interest in the affair that our conversation appears to be veering towards?’

  A cool card, this – Appleby thought. Aloud, he said: ‘I see you have heard about Crabtree?’

  ‘Crabtree?’ West shook his head. ‘I don’t know the name. But I’ve heard that, hard by where we passed each other, some unfortunate man has been hit on the head. I’m not the police surgeon, as you may know, so I’ve heard no more than that. But it’s an unusual sort of thing in these parts. In no time, I think’ – and again there came the bleak smile – ‘we shall all be suspecting each other of all sorts of crimes.’

  ‘No doubt we shall.’

  ‘And, Sir John – oddly enough – the general opinion will be that any strangers in the neighbourhood will be the first who ought to give an account of themselves.’

  ‘Will it, indeed.’ Appleby judged this last remark of West’s impertinent. But he gave no sign of this. ‘Crabtree,’ he said, ‘was a villager here who went overseas about fifteen years ago, and had apparently only just come back. Perhaps your own acquaintance with the district is of more recent date?’

  ‘Decidedly. I came from quite another part of the country to take over the practice here only three years ago.’

  ‘Ah. Then I’m afraid, Dr West, that you may get missed out in the general epidemic of suspicions you have been predicting. Crabtree, you see, can have had only a few hours in which to get seriously across anybody for the first time here. So unless we are to imagine that he had been followed to this part of the world by somebody with whom he had developed bad relations fairly recently, we seem obliged to view his murder – for murder it certainly was – as a matter of the settling of some very old score indeed.’

  ‘I can see some force in that train of reasoning.’ West spoke as a man who doesn’t, in fact, think any too highly of the proposition being put to him. ‘But one can surely imagine a motive generating itself, so to speak, more or less on the spot. Robbery, for example.’

  ‘Yes, that is true. But there is no sign that this unfortunate fellow had much to be robbed of.’

  ‘He had returned, you say, from foreign parts. He might have had savings – and, if so, they were probably on his person. Even if his appearance was shabby, as you seem to suggest, that might hold. And he may have been observed fingering them over. Or he may have confided rashly in some stranger, or former acquaintance. Isn’t robbery the commonest motive in the category of crime you appear to be dealing with?’

  ‘Probably it is.’ Appleby was reflecting that this was, at least, a clear-headed man. At the same time he was remembering the curious impression that West had made upon him on the occasion of his br
ushing past on the towpath. ‘Crabtree had a few shillings in his pocket, no more. And nothing to give any line on his recent movements.’

  ‘A few shillings?’ Dr West had found his hat, and seemed about to show himself out into the night. The interest he was taking in the death of Crabtree, if intelligent, was very far from being absorbed. ‘Doesn’t that suggest robbery? He may have returned to England far from prosperous. But he would scarcely be destitute.’

  ‘That is true. But a criminal of any astuteness, having killed Crabtree upon some motive other than that of immediate financial gain, would be likely to take his wallet, pocketbook or whatever before throwing the book into the lock. It would set the police on a false trail.’

  ‘No doubt.’ West’s attitude was again approaching indifference as he moved towards the front door.

  ‘As a matter of fact, there is one suggestion of robbery in the affair. Crabtree was in possession of something when I myself encountered him at the Jolly Leggers that had disappeared when we found the body. But it was of no conceivable value.’

  ‘Is that so?’ West’s hand was on the door. ‘You’ll forgive me if I get off to bed. On my job, one has to go rather short of sleep from time to time.’

  ‘I’d hate to cause you a single sleepless hour, Dr West. Good night.’

  7

  On the following morning the Applebys went walking again. This time their objective was avowedly Scroop House. Colonel Raven had rung up Bertram Coulson and announced the proposed call. That the Crabtree affair was, so to speak, in its hinterland had been left as well-understood.

  ‘Do you think it may have been Uncle Julius?’ Judith asked, as they walked down the drive. She put the question with a great air of comfortable chat.

  ‘It’s no doubt a possibility that should be inquired into,’ Appleby said a trifle shortly. ‘And Tarbox. And the cook. She must be severely questioned as soon as they’ve had her appendix out. And, for that matter, the whole blessed neighbourhood. The vicar. The vet. The district nurse. The delightful fellow who was anxious to deliver a piano. And Channing-Kennedy, who refused to have one.’