Agatha Christie - Why Didn't They Ask Evans Read online

  'Why?' You were the only person who saw that photograph.

  As soon as Bassington-ffrench was left alone with the body he changed the photograph which only you had seen.' But Bobby continued to shake his head.

  'No, that won't do. Let's grant for the moment that that photograph was so important that I had to be "got out of the way", as you put it. Sounds absurd but I suppose it's just possible. Well, then, whatever was going to be done would have to be done at once. The fact that I went to London and never saw the Marchbolt Weekly Times or the other papers with the photograph in it was just pure chance - a thing nobody could count on. The probability was that I should say at once, "That isn't the photograph I saw." Why wait till after the inquest when everything was nicely settled?' 'There's something in that,' admitted Frankie.

  'And there's another point. I can't be absolutely sure, of course, but I could almost swear that when I put the photograph back in the dead man's pocket Bassingtonffrench wasn't there. He didn't arrive till about five or ten minutes later.' 'He might have been watching you all the time,' argued Frankie.

  'I don't see very well how he could,' said Bobby slowly.

  'There's really only one place where you can see down to exactly the spot we were. Farther round, the cliff bulges and then recedes underneath, so that you can't see over. There's just the one place and when Bassington-ffrench did arrive there I heard him at once. Footsteps echo down below. He may have been near at hand, but he wasn't looking over till then - I'll swear.' 'Then you think that he didn't know about your seeing the photograph?' 'I don't see how he could have known.' 'And he can't have been afraid you'd seen him doing it - the murder, I mean - because, as you say, that's absurd. You'd never have held your tongue about it. It looks as though it must have been something else altogether.' 'Only I don't see what it could have been.' 'Something they didn't know about till after the inquest. I don't know why I say "they".' 'Why not? After all, the Caymans must have been in it, too.

  It's probably a gang. I like gangs.' 'That's a low taste,' said Frankie absently. 'A single-handed murder is much higher class. Bobby!' 'Yes?' 'What was it Pritchard said - just before he died? You know, you told me about it that day on the links. That funny question?' "'Why didn't they ask Evans?'" 'Yes. Suppose that was it?' 'But that's ridiculous.' 'It sounds so, but it might be important, really. Bobby, I'm sure it's that. Oh, no, I'm being an idiot - you never told the Caymans about it?' 'I did, as a matter of fact,' said Bobby slowly.

  'You didr 'Yes. I wrote to them that evening. Saying, of course, that it was probably quite unimportant.' 'And what happened?' 'Cayman wrote back, politely agreeing, of course, that there was nothing in it, but thanking me for taking the trouble. I felt rather snubbed.' 'And two days later you got this letter from a strange firm bribing you to go to South America?' 'Yes.' 'Well,' said Frankie, 'I don't know what more you want.

  They try that first; you turn it down, and the next thing is that they follow you round and seize a good moment to empty a lot of morphia into your bottle of beer.' 'Then the Caymans are in it?' 'Of course the Caymans are in it!' 'Yes,' said Bobby thoughtfully. 'If your reconstruction is correct, they must be in it. According to our present theory, it goes like this. Dead man X is deliberately pushed over cliff presumably by OF (pardon these initials). It is important that X should not be correctly identified, so portrait of Mrs C is put in his pocket and portrait of fair unknown removed. (Who was she, I wonder?)' 'Keep to the point,' said Frankie sternly.

  'Mrs C waits for photographs to appear and turns up as grief-stricken sister and identifies X as her brother from foreign parts.' 'You don't believe he could really have been her brother?' 'Not for a moment! You know, it puzzled me all along. The Caymans were a different class altogether. The dead man was - well, it sounds a most awful thing to say and just like some deadly old retired Anglo-Indian, but the dead man was a pukka sahib.' 'And the Caymans most emphatically weren't?' 'Most emphatically.' 'And then, just when everything has gone off well from the Caymans' point of view - body successfully identified, verdict of accidental death, everything in the garden lovely -you come along and mess things up,' mused Frankie.

  '" Why didn 't they ask Evans? "' Bobby repeated the phrase thoughtfully. 'You know, I can't see what on earth there can be in that to put the wind up anybody.' 'Ah! that's because you don't know. It's like making crossword puzzles. You write down a clue and you think it's too idiotically simple and that everyone will guess it straight off, and you're frightfully surprised when they simply can't get it in the least. " Why didn't they ask Evans? " must have been a most frightfully significant phrase to them, and they couldn't realize that it meant nothing at all to you.' 'More fools they.' 'Oh, quite so. But it's just possible they thought that if Pritchard said that, he might have said something more which would also recur to you in due time. Anyway, they weren't going to take chances. You were safer out of the way.' 'They took a lot of risk. Why didn't they engineer another "accident"?' 'No, no. That would have been stupid. Two accidents within a week of each other? It might have suggested a connection between the two, and then people would have begun inquiring into the first one. No, I think there's a kind of bald simplicity about their method which is really rather clever.' 'And yet you said just now that morphia wasn't easy to get hold of.' 'No more it isn't. You have to sign poison books and things.

  Oh! of course, that's a clue. Whoever did it had easy access to supplies of morphia.' 'A doctor, a hospital nurse, or a chemist,' suggested Bobby.

  'Well, I was thinking more of illicitly imported drugs.' 'You can't mix up too many different sorts of crime,' said Bobby.

  'You see, the strong point would be the absence of motive.

  Your death doesn't benefit anyone. So what will the police think?' 'A lunatic,' said Bobby. 'And that's what they do think.' 'You see? It's awfully simple, really.' Bobby began to laugh suddenly.

  'What's amusing you?' 'Just the thought of how sick-making it must be for them!

  All that morphia - enough to kill five or six people - and here I am still alive and kicking.' 'One of Life's little ironies that one can't foresee,' agreed Frankie.

  'The question is - what do we do next?' said Bobby practically.

  'Oh! lots of things,' said Frankie promptly.

  'Such as... ?' 'Well - finding out about the photograph - that there was only one, not two. And about Bassington-ffrench's house hunting.' 'That will probably be quite all right and above board.' 'Why do you say that?' 'Look here, Frankie, think a minute. Bassingtonffrench must be above suspicion. He must be all clear and above board.

  Not only must there be nothing to connect him in any way with the dead man, but he must have a proper reason for being down here. He may have invented house hunting on the spur of the moment, but I bet he carried out something of the kind. There must be no suggestion of a "mysterious stranger seen in the neighbourhood of the accident". I fancy that Bassingtonffrench is his own name and that he's the sort of person who would be quite above suspicion.' 'Yes,' said Frankie thoughtfully. 'That's a very good deduction. There will be nothing whatever to connect Bassington-ffrench with Alex Pritchard. Now, if we knew who the dead man really was ' 'Ah, then it might be different.' 'So it was very important that the body should not be recognized - hence all the Cayman camouflage. And yet it was taking a big risk.' 'You forget that Mrs Cayman identified him as soon as was humanly possible. After that, even if there had been pictures of him in the papers (you know how blurry these things are) people would only say: "Curious, this man Pritchard, who fell over a cliff, is really extraordinarily like Mr X."' 'There must be more to it than that,' said Frankie shrewdly.

  'X must have been a man who wouldn't easily be missed. I mean, he couldn't have been the sort of family man whose wife or relations would go to the police at once and report him missing.' 'Good for you, Frankie. No, he must have been just going abroad or perhaps just come back (he was marvellously tanned - like a big-game hunter - he looked that sort of person) and he can't have had an
y very near relations who knew all about his movements.' 'We're deducing beautifully,' said Frankie. 'I hope we're not deducing all wrong.' 'Very likely,' said Bobby. 'But I think what we've said so far is fairly sound sense - granted, that is, the wild improbability of the whole thing.' Frankie waved away the wild improbability with an airy gesture.

  'The thing is - what to do next,' she said. 'It seems to me we've got three angles of attack.' 'Go on, Sherlock.' 'The first is you. They've made one attempt on your life.

  They'll probably try again. This time we might get what they call "a line" on them. Using you as a decoy, I mean.' 'No thank you, Frankie,' said Bobby with feeling. 'I've been very lucky this time, but I mightn't be so lucky again if they changed the attack to a blunt instrument. I was thinking of taking a great deal of care of myself in the future. The decoy idea can be washed out.' 'I was afraid you'd say that,' said Frankie with a sigh. 'Young men are sadly degenerate nowadays. Father says so. They don't enjoy being uncomfortable and doing dangerous and unpleasant things any longer. It's a pity.' 'A great pity,' said Bobby, but he spoke with firmness.

  'What's the second plan of campaign?' 'Working from the "Why didn't they ask Evans?" clue,' said Frankie. 'Presumably the dead man came down here to see Evans, whoever he was. Now, if we could find Evans ' 'How many Evanses,' Bobby interrupted, 'do you think there are in Marchbolt?' 'Seven hundred, I should think,' admitted Frankie.

  'At least! We might do something that way, but I'm rather doubtful.' 'We could list all the Evanses and visit the likely ones.' 'And ask them - what?' 'That's the difficulty,' said Frankie.

  'We need to know a little more,' said Bobby. 'Then that idea of yours might come in useful. What's No. 3?' 'This man Bassington-ffrench. There we have got something tangible to go upon. It's an uncommon name. I'll ask Father. He knows all these county family names and their various branches.' 'Yes;' said Bobby. 'We might do something that way.' 'At any rate, we are going to do something?' 'Of course we are. Do you think I'm going to be given eight grains of morphia and do nothing about it?' 'That's the spirit,' said Frankie.

  'And besides that,' said Bobby, 'there's the indignity of the stomach pump to be washed out.' 'That's enough,' said Frankie. 'You'll be getting morbid and indecent again if I don't stop you.' 'You have no true womanly sympathy,' said Bobby.

  CHAPTER 9 Concerning Mr Bassingtonffrench

  Frankie lost no time in setting to work. She attacked her father that same evening.

  'Father,' she said, 'do you know any Bassingtonffrenches?' Lord Marchington, who was reading a political article, did not quite take in the question.

  'It's not the French so much as the Americans,' he said severely. 'All this tomfoolery and conferences - wasting the nation's time and money -' Frankie abstracted her mind until Lord Marchington, running like a railway train along an accustomed line, came, as it were, to a halt at a station.

  'The Bassington-ffrenches,' repeated Frankie.

  'What about 'em?' said Lord Marchington.

  Frankie didn't know what about them. She made a statement, knowing well enough that her father enjoyed contradiction.

  'They're a Yorkshire family, aren't they?' 'Nonsense - Hampshire. There's the Shropshire branch, of course, and then there's the Irish lot. Which are your friends?' 'I'm not sure,' said Frankie, accepting the implication of friendship with several unknown people.

  'Not sure? What do you mean? You must be sure.' 'People drift about so nowadays,' said Frankie.

  'Drift - drift - that's about all they do. In my days we asked people. Then one knew where one was - fellow said he was the Hampshire branch - very well, your grandmother married my second cousin. It made a link.' 'It must have been too sweet,' said Frankie, 'But there really isn't time for genealogical and geographical research nowadays.' 'No - you've no time nowadays for anything but drinking these poisonous cocktails.' Lord Marchington gave a sudden yelp of pain as he moved his gouty leg, which some free imbibing of the family port had not improved.

  'Are they well off?' asked Frankie.

  'The Bassington-ffrenches? Couldn't say. The Shropshire lot have been hard hit, I believe - death duties, and one thing or another. One of the Hampshire ones married an heiress. An American woman.' 'One of them was down here the other day,' said Frankie.

  'Looking for a house, I believe.' 'Funny idea. What should anyone want with a house down here?' That, thought Frankie, was the question.

  On the following day she walked into the office of Messrs.

  Wheeler & Owen, House and Estate Agents.

  Mr Owen himself sprang up to receive her. Frankie gave him a gracious smile and dropped into a chair.

  'And what can we have the pleasure of doing for you. Lady Frances? You don't want to sell the Castle, I suppose. Ha! Ha!' Mr Owen laughed at his own wit.

  'I wish we could,' said Frankie. 'No, as a matter of fact, I believe a friend of mine was down here the other day - a Mr Bassington-ffrench. He was looking for a house.' 'Ah! yes, indeed. I remember the name perfectly. Two small if 's.' 'That's right,' said Frankie.

  'He was making inquiries about various small properties with a view to purchase. He was obliged to return to town the next day, so could not view many of the houses, but I understand he is in no great hurry. Since he left, one or two suitable properties have come into the market and I have sent him on particulars, but have had no reply.' 'Did you write to London - or to the - er - country address?' inquired Frankie.

  'Let me see now.' He called to a junior clerk. 'Frank, Mr Bassington-ffrench's address.' 'Roger Bassington-ffrench, Esq., Merroway Court, Staverley, Hants,' said the junior clerk glibly.

  'Ah!' said Frankie. 'Then it wasn't my Mr Bassingtonffrench.

  This must be his cousin. I thought it was odd his being here and not looking me up.' 'Quite so - quite so,' said Mr Owen intelligently.

  'Let me see, it must have been the Wednesday he came to see you.' 'That's right. Just before six-thirty. We close at six-thirty. I remember particularly because it was the day when that sad accident happened. Man fell over the cliff. Mr Bassingtonffrench had actually stayed by the body till the police came. He looked quite upset when he came in here. Very sad tragedy, that, and high time something was done about that bit of path.

  The Town Council have been criticized very freely, I can tell you. Lady Frances. Most dangerous. Why we haven't had more accidents than we have I can't imagine.' 'Extraordinary,' said Frankie.

  She left the office in a thoughtful mood. As Bobby had prophesied, all Mr Bassington-ffrench's actions seemed clear and above aboard. He was one of the Hampshire Bassingtonffrenches, he had given his proper address, he had actually mentioned his part in the tragedy to the house agent. Was it possible that, after all, Mr Bassington-ffrench was the completely innocent person he seemed?

  Frankie had a qualm of doubt. Then she refused it.

  'No,' she said to herself. 'A man who wants to buy a little place would either get here earlier in the day, or else stay over the next day. You wouldn't go into a house agent's at six-thirty in the evening and go up to London the following day. Why make the journey at all? Why not write?' No, she decided, Bassington-fFrench was the guilty party.

  Her next call was the police station.

  Inspector Williams was an old acquaintance, having succeeded in tracking down a maid with a false reference who had absconded with some of Frankie's jewellery.

  'Good afternoon. Inspector.' 'Good afternoon, your Ladyship. Nothing wrong, I hope.' 'Not as yet, but I'm thinking of holding up a bank soon, because I'm getting so short of money.' The inspector gave a rumbling laugh in acknowledgement of this witticism.

  'As a matter of fact, I've come to ask questions out of sheer curiosity,' said Frankie.

  'Is that so. Lady Frances?' 'Now do tell me this. Inspector - the man who fell over the cliff - Pritchard, or whatever his name was -' 'Pritchard, that's right.' 'He had only one photograph on him, didn't he? Somebody told me he had three?

  'One's right,' said the inspect
or. 'Photograph of his sister it was. She came down and identified him.' 'How absurd to say there were three!' 'Oh! That's easy, your Ladyship. These newspaper reporters don't mind how much they exaggerate and as often as not they get the whole thing wrong.' 'I know,' said Frankie. 'I've heard the wildest stories.' She paused a moment then drew freely on her imagination. 'I've heard that his pockets were stuffed with papers proving him to be a Bolshevik agent, and there's another story that his pockets were full of dope, and another again about his having pockets full of counterfeit bank notes.' The inspector laughed heartily.

  'That's a good one.' 'I suppose really he had just the usual things in his pockets?' 'And very few at that. A handkerchief, not marked. Some loose change, a packet of cigarettes and a couple of treasury notes - loose, not in a case. No letters. We'd have had a job to identify him if it hadn't been for the photo. Providential, you might call it.' 'I wonder,' said Frankie.