Crime at Guildford Read online

  ‘That’s all, sir, and thank you very much.’

  French got up, but a sudden idea struck him. ‘I suppose, sir, that wasn’t the day that Mr Sloley was a little—what shall I say?—jolly?’

  Norne frowned. ‘Jolly?’ he said coldly.

  ‘Well, inclined to sing a bit, for instance?’

  ‘If you must know, he did hum some tune while he was waiting for the papers,’ Norne said disagreeably. ‘But I don’t know what you mean by jolly. If you mean was Mr Sloley drunk? I may tell you he was not.’

  French was shocked that such an idea should have been imputed to him. If anything he had said had seemed to suggest it, he withdrew it unreservedly. He hoped Mr Norne would say nothing about this not very happy inquiry. ‘I mean that, if you please, sir. It’s important that nothing should be said about it to anyone. May I count on you?’

  Norne said he was not sufficiently interested in the subject to wish to speak of it again, and French, thinking this a good opportunity to withdraw, did so.

  He was wholly delighted with his interview. This really was extraordinarily important information; as important as any he had yet received. It now seemed certain that Sloley was in the thing with Lyde. And if so, Sheen must have been in it too. Lyde, making himself up to represent Minter, had bought the ciné camera. He and Sloley, or Sloley and Sheen, had experimented with the despatch case, so as to get the camera into the correct position. Then a method had to be devised of getting the safe open in Sloley’s presence, and one also which would account for his working with the despatch case at the time. This had been quite skilfully done with the story of the valuable papers and the visit to the match. And lest the faint sound of the filming mechanism might be heard, Sloley had simulated a little refreshment and had sung during the critical period. The photographs taken, the camera became a danger, and Lyde once more took over and got rid of it in a way which cut the loss as far as could be done.

  So much for Sloley and Lyde. What about Sheen?

  The list of shareholders recurred to French. He had already wondered if this had been got out with the sole object of getting Minter to the office on the fatal evening. Now this idea suddenly seemed much more likely.

  Then French remembered the glimpse he had had out of Sheen’s dining room window when he called to interview Mrs Sheen. Besides grass, shrubs, a mellow brick wall and a sleeping cat, he had seen a shed containing a bench and rack of tools. Suppose Sheen were a metal worker? Suppose, as well as getting Minter to the office, his part had been to cut the keys?

  So far French was well satisfied with his progress, but now he seemed to come to a full stop. Even if all this were true, it did not account for the murder of Minter. It did not explain exactly how the theft had been committed. Still less did it indicate where the missing stones were to be found. It did not give him the proof he required for court.

  This wasn’t good enough. He must do a lot better if he wasn’t going to make a hash of the entire case.

  He returned to his room thinking deeply. What must be his next step?

  Could he prove that the camera had been in Sloley’s case at the critical time?

  Unless he could find the case, he doubted it. If his theory were correct, the case must have had some arrangement whereby the light could have reached the lens. Either a hole had been cut in the side which was filled or covered in some way except when the pictures were actually being taken, or the raising of the lid must in some way have raised the camera also. At all events, some structural alteration to the case must have been made.

  But if so, Sloley would have been certain to destroy such tell-tale evidence as soon as the pictures were taken. He, French, could have a look about Sloley’s house, but he didn’t hope for any result therefrom.

  Deductions from Sheen’s list were, of course, even more nebulous. The man had made the list openly, and no human being could say what had been in his mind at the time.

  There remained the question of whether Sheen had or had not cut the keys. Was there any way in which this could be ascertained?

  French thought that if he could gain access to Sheen’s workshop he might find something suggestive. If Sheen had been as careful as everyone else seemed to have been in this confounded affair, there would be nothing. But he might conceivably have fallen below the general level and made a mistake. A very small slip might be enough to give him away. Suppose he had experimented on some blank keys before cutting the final models, and suppose one of these had slipped down out of sight and been forgotten, its discovery might be just what was required. French felt he must have a look.

  But to gain access to the place wouldn’t be easy. He could not simply break in. He could only be there by the permission of someone in the Sheen household. But this would put Sheen on his guard, the thing of all others which he, French, wished to avoid. To get a search warrant would have the same defect.

  For some time he sat worrying over the problem, and then he thought he saw his way. The scheme required a wet Saturday afternoon, and here the fates seemed extraordinarily propitious, for this was Saturday and it was beginning to rain. French decided that no time was like the present.

  The plan depended on there being a lane behind the wall at the bottom of Sheen’s garden, preferably with a door leading from the garden. If this door were old and cracked, so much the better; but if not, a suitably sized gimlet would doubtless meet the case.

  By lunch time French had arrived on the site, taking with him not only Sergeant Carter, but also an energetic young constable named Lowe. A reconnaisance in force disclosed the fact that the lane existed just as French had expected, moreover, that Sheen’s door was well stricken in years and had cracks of gratifying dimensions. All of which was very satisfactory.

  Sheen’s house was near the end of the cross-road from which the lane started. French posted Constable Lowe down the lane with instructions to watch Sheen’s ground through the cracks, and signal to him if Sheen went into his workshop. Meantime he and Carter took up their positions at the end of the lane. From where they stood Sheen’s house could be reached in a couple of minutes.

  The rain grew steadily heavier. Unpleasant as it made their task, French was overjoyed by it. It was much more likely that Sheen would go to his workshop for relaxation on a wet afternoon than on a fine one.

  French wanted to remain dry for his call on Sheen, lest drops of moisture deposited on the floor of the workshop might suggest activities which otherwise would remain decently hidden. He had therefore provided himself and Carter with two extra large umbrellas, and under these the two men crouched just far enough into the lane to avoid being seen from the adjoining houses.

  Time passed extraordinarily slowly as they stood listening to the patter of the drops on the umbrellas and keeping a watchful eye on Lowe. Carter was not a brilliant conversationalist at the best of times, and now his sources of inspiration seemed to have failed him entirely. However, French didn’t mind. He had plenty to think about.

  When about an hour had dragged drearily by, Lowe made a sudden signal. This was equivalent to the ‘Stand by!’ which the captain of a steamer rings down to his engineer, when variations in the movements of the engines are imminent. The two men stiffened and got ready to furl their umbrellas, while keeping a still more eager eye on their scout.

  Ten seconds more and there came another wave. This signified that Sheen had entered his workshop. French and Carter leaving their umbrellas standing against the wall, hurried out of the lane and round to Sheen’s front door. French rang. As before, Mrs Sheen answered.

  ‘I called for just a word with Mr Sheen, madam,’ French explained, ‘and as we were coming to the door I saw him go into his workshop. If you’ll allow us to follow him there direct, we needn’t trouble you further.’

  ‘Yes,’ Mrs Sheen answered, ‘he’s just gone out. Can you find your way?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, madam.’ French took off his hat and moved quickly round the house, so as to give the lady no time to
revoke her permission.

  The workshop was a small wooden building about twelve feet by five. There was just room for a narrow bench along the front, with a still narrower passage behind. Sheen had already taken off his coat and was screwing up a small casting in the vice. He stopped as the officers appeared, greeted them without enthusiasm, and asked them to come in out of the rain.

  ‘Mrs Sheen said we’d find you here, sir,’ French explained. ‘I’m sorry to trouble you, but if you would be so kind as to answer a question or two I won’t keep you long.’

  ‘It’s all right, chief-inspector,’ Sheen answered. ‘I’m not busy. Would you like to come into the house?’

  ‘Not at all, sir,’ French answered with truth. ‘All I want can be done here. As I say, I won’t keep you any time.’ He glanced round. ‘A nice little shop you have here, if I may say so. I do a little bit at the same kind of work, but I haven’t a place like this.’

  Sheen was not expansive. He was polite, but only just. French felt he must get to business.

  ‘It’s a small point that has arisen about your meeting in the office on the Saturday evening before the theft,’ he went on. ‘I’m afraid, sir, that you didn’t tell me all that you might have about that.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I dare say Mr Lyde has spoken to you about it, has he not?’

  ‘Oh, you mean about his calling at the office that evening? No, I didn’t mention it. Why should I? It had nothing to do with the crime, and you didn’t ask me the question.’

  ‘I asked you, sir, for a full account of what happened.’

  ‘About the crime, yes. Not about irrelevant matters. I didn’t tell you that I had wound my watch before going to bed that night. Why not? For the same reason that I didn’t mention Lyde’s call: it had nothing to do with the case.’

  ‘That’s not quite correct, sir. If I had known Mr Lyde was there I would have asked him if he had seen anyone else in the building. He might have, you know.’

  ‘He didn’t.’

  ‘Well, there was another person there, all the same. And that brings me to the object of my call. I want to know, sir, whether the light on the landing outside Miss Barber’s door was on or off when you and Mr Sloley got out of the lift. Can you remember?’

  ‘Yes; it was on.’

  ‘Did that suggest anything to your mind when you saw that it was on?’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Did you wonder who had turned it on?’

  French anxiously tried to estimate the time. Constable Lowe had been told that after the expiration of four minutes he was to ring Sheen up and keep him at the telephone as long as he could. This interrogation was going very well so far, but as there was nothing that French really wanted to know, he could not keep it up indefinitely. Sheen, moreover, was getting annoyed.

  ‘I didn’t wonder,’ the man returned. ‘I supposed Lyde had arrived before us. It was the natural thing to suppose, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Quite. But when Mr Lyde reached the landing, the light was also on. Who did he think had turned it on?’

  Sheen shook his head impatiently. ‘I don’t know what he thought. If you want to know, I’m afraid you’ll have to ask him. Where’s all this getting to, anyway, chief-inspector?’

  ‘Confound Lowe,’ French thought. ‘Can’t he ring the blessed telephone?’ But what he said aloud was: ‘I wanted to know if he said anything to you or Mr Sloley on the subject?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It wasn’t discussed at all?’

  ‘Haven’t I said no?’

  ‘Then just tell me this, Mr Sheen. Did you and Mr Sloley not know that it had been on when Mr Lyde entered?’

  With an instantly suppressed sigh of relief French heard Mrs Sheen’s voice from the house. ‘Harry! Harry!’ it called, and when Sheen had opened the door and shouted back, it went on: ‘Telephone!’

  ‘The telephone,’ Sheen said to French. ‘Excuse me a moment. I’ll not be long.’

  ‘Thank you, sir; no hurry,’ French answered politely, and then as the man vanished he went on to Carter. ‘Now, Carter, we’ve about three minutes. Wire into it. You take the bench and I’ll do the floor.’

  They had closed the door after Sheen as if to prevent the rain beating in. Carter now set himself to run over the tools and débris on the bench, while French, dropping on his knees, began to shine his powerful wide-angled electric torch over the floor.

  It was laid rather roughly with old railway sleepers. They were about ten inches wide and were fairly level on the tops, but between them there were spaces of from a quarter to three-quarters of an inch. A glance showed that the floor, for a workshop, was clean; it had certainly been swept recently, and there was nothing to be seen on it which was in the slightest degree suspicious. French therefore concentrated on the cracks between the sleepers, shining the torch into them, and rapidly running along each from one end of the shed to the other.

  Both men worked at their highest capacity, for they knew their time was severely limited. Lowe was a smart man, but even he was not likely to keep Sheen talking about non-existent business for more than two or three minutes. Up and down the floor French ran his torch, but though the cracks were full of all kinds of débris, he couldn’t see anything helpful.

  Then suddenly he drew in his breath. ‘Got it, I believe, Carter,’ he whispered eagerly, and plunged his hand into his pocket for a forceps which would reach down into the crack.

  But as he did so Carter whispered. ‘Here he is, sir! Look out!’

  ‘Keep him out for heaven’s sake,’ French gasped. ‘A moment’ll do it.’

  Carter slipped out of the shed and French heard him say smoothly, ‘I think Mrs Sheen was calling you, sir: just this moment.’ Then came Sheen’s voice: ‘Couldn’t have been. She heard me at the telephone.’ Then Carter’s again: ‘Is that so, sir? Funny how one makes mistakes. I could have sworn I heard her calling you.’

  French by this time had picked up his treasure trove, dusted his knees, extinguished his torch, and banished the eager expression from his face. Then he opened the door slowly.

  ‘I told you you were wrong, Carter,’ he said rather unkindly. ‘You’re far too cocksure.’

  ‘Sorry, sir,’ Carter returned with becoming sulkiness of manner.

  ‘Idiots there are in this world,’ announced Sheen, whose temper had evidently not improved. ‘That was some fool saying he wanted to buy my house. My house, if you please! Said he had seen an advertisement of it and that the agents had told him it was for sale. Argued about it as if I didn’t know who owned my own house! Then after questioning him for about an hour I discovered it was in another street. He’d got hold of the wrong address. Well, are you satisfied now about the light on the landing?’

  ‘I think so,’ French returned. ‘You have told me the matter was not discussed. I’m much obliged to you, sir.’

  ‘But what was at the back of it all?’

  ‘Nothing, sir, except that the point was raised by my superiors. They said, “Those three men must have seen the light on and must have known some other person was in the building. They haven’t told you about it. Get on to them.” But the thing’s quite easy to understand. You and Mr Sloley would subconsciously assume that Mr Lyde had turned on the light, and he, being a stranger to the office, wouldn’t think about it. Yes, sir, I think that’s all and quite satisfactory.’

  French was now only anxious to get away, and as this seemed to be the idea in Sheen’s mind also, the withdrawal was achieved without further difficulty.

  ‘What did you get, sir?’ Carter asked as soon as they were out of sound of the house.

  ‘Show you in my room. Can’t take it out here. That was good, Carter. Lowe did that well and you weren’t too bad yourself. If I’m right about what’s in my pocket, we’ve got those fellows!’

  In his room French very carefully removed his find from his pocket and laid it on a sheet of glass, putting a second over it.

  It
was a tiny piece of cinematograph film, bearing about half of one picture.

  ‘They’ve been trimming their work, and this piece has dropped off the bench,’ said French, carefully raising the glasses to the light. ‘Ah,’ he went on, ‘that’s about what we wanted!’

  The picture was a microscopic view of part of Norne’s office with a hand holding the end of something like a key. The key and the safe had been cut off.

  18

  Enter Light

  French was agreeably surprised to find that Cooper, the photographer, was still in the building. Congratulating himself on his good luck, he went up to see him. Cooper greeted him as jovially as their respective ranks would allow.

  ‘I’ve got something to show you, sir,’ he burst out without waiting for French to speak. ‘Look here.’ He held out a key with extremely complicated wards.

  ‘What is it?’ French asked.

  ‘Key of the A.C.’s safe!’ Cooper returned with a grin. ‘You weren’t far wrong about that ciné camera idea. Let me show you.’

  He took from a drawer a roll of cinematograph film and a small ciné camera of the type he had recommended. ‘Here’s the machine and here’s what it does. Look, sir, through this glass.’ Rapidly he rigged the film in a frame, switched on a light below it, and motioned French to look through an eye-piece.

  ‘By Jove,’ French observed as he applied his eye to the lens, ‘you’ve actually been and bought a machine? I thought you said they were a prohibitive price?’

  ‘Something like seventy quid all this outfit cost,’ Cooper replied. ‘I didn’t think the A.C. would stand for it, but he did. Thought we should have one for other purposes as well. But you see the key, sir. Like a tiny black spot on the film, and magnifies up till you can see every ward as clear as you’d want.’

  ‘Very interesting,’ said French presently. ‘And the key was cut from the photo?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Jackson did it. He made a good job. Fitted first shot and opened the safe as easy as the A.C.’s own.’

  ‘When did you try it?’ French went on. He thought he might have been told what was in the wind.