Chapter 33 #2
“No, that’s it.” Daisy felt flattened. “It doesn’t sound like very much, but I thought I ought to tell you.”
“I—we appreciate it. We’ll certainly follow up.
In fact, if it’s all right with you, Mr. Fletcher, Sergeant Piper can go right now and have a chat with Miss Hedger.
Just to confirm what you’ve told us, Mrs. Fletcher—not that I doubt it!
—and to see if she has anything to add that she didn’t think to mention to you. ”
Walking back to the Saracen’s Head with Ernie holding her umbrella above her head, Daisy felt better.
Surely Ernie’s time was too valuable for Underwood to waste it on a wild goose chase, which meant he didn’t think her theory was utter bosh.
And Alec had smiled at her as she left. She hoped that meant his silence was only because he was deferring to the inspector.
“Well done, Mrs. Fletcher,” said Ernie. “The chief would have cottoned on to Mrs. Hedger sooner or later, but you may have saved us days of following false leads. I’m awfully sorry for Miss Hedger, though. Does she realise where your questions were leading?”
“Not at the time. She may have put two and two together by now. The best thing you can do for Sally is make sure she understands you won’t drop her if her aunt turns out to be guilty.”
Blushing, Ernie said hotly, “I wouldn’t do that! But maybe she’ll hate me if we have to arrest her auntie.”
“I doubt it. My impression is that she’s not all that fond of Mrs. Hedger. She sticks by her because she’s the only family she has in this district, and she helps her because it’s her nature to be helpful.”
“She’s wonderful, isn’t she?”
“I like her very much,” Daisy assured him.
* * *
The church clock was striking six when Alec and Underwood, followed by Ernie and Pennicuik, turned off Wycombe End into the murky, muddy alley. The rain had stopped and the temperature had dropped, threatening a frost. The mud would be glazed with ice by morning.
The inspector took the search warrant from his pocket. “This is all very well, but if she won’t open the door, we can’t serve it.”
“Let’s worry about that if it happens.” Alec had a contingency plan involving windows and Ernie’s slight stature, but the less Underwood knew about it the better.
A dim light was visible through the curtain at the downstairs window of Mrs. Hedger’s one-up, one-down cottage.
Underwood stationed Ernie and Pennicuik on the opposite side of the alley, eight or ten feet away, less because the suspect might try to flee than because her tiny space had no room for them.
Underwood knocked.
An angry voice was heard from within. Then the door was opened, by Sally Hedger. She was in tears.
“Mr. Underwood,” she choked out, standing aside to let them pass. “She thinks now you arrested Mr. Vaughn it’s all right to wear her things. She says it’s not stealing because she was dead. I can’t make her understand—”
“Sally,” said Alec, “go out to Sergeant Piper. He’s just across the way. I’ll call you if your aunt asks for you.”
She fled as Alec turned to see the inspector gaping at the old woman in the rocking chair.
Mrs. Hedger’s short, stout body was enveloped in a glossy fur coat.
On a slimmer woman, it would have been a loose, comfortable travelling coat.
On her, it barely met across the bosom and completely enveloped her feet.
“Wotcha staring at? I di’n’ steal it.” She bristled with self-righteousness. “She was dead, she ha’n’ got no more use for it. ’Sides, she weren’t no better’n a doxy.”
“May Hedger, I must advise you…”
As Underwood proceeded with the Judges’ Rules warning, Alec went up the stairs, ducking under a low beam.
He didn’t have to exercise the searching skills Tom Tring had taught him years ago.
The beam of his torch picked out the expensive overnight suitcase in one corner of the tiny room.
On top of it was a stylish leather handbag.
Careful to protect fingerprints with a handkerchief, he moved the bag to the bed, an iron bedstead with a thin mattress covered with a faded, patched counterpane. The clasp clicked open easily. Alec turned the torch beam on the contents.
A silver cigarette case with the monogram JJG—Judith Jane Gray. Had she wanted gold and given in to her elderly husband’s notorious frugality? A bunch of keys—Alec hooked it out with his little finger. The pasteboard tag, “Cherry Trees,” removed any remaining doubt. He took them downstairs.
Mrs. Hedger was glaring at the inspector in malevolent silence.
Underwood looked at the bunch of keys and went straight to the salient fact. “You knew Mrs. Gray was dead.”
“I could tell right off. I’ve laid out many a corpse in my time.”
“You locked the cellar and didn’t report her death to the police.”
“Who’d invite that busybody Abel Harris to come sticking his nose in! It were an accident, any road.”
“An accident, was it?”
“Tha’s right, seeing she pushed me first. ‘Go away,’ she said. ‘I haven’t got time now for writing letters.’ And she give me a shove so I shoved back. I weren’t to know she’d lose her balance and go tumbling down. It wasn’t like I murdered her. An accident it were.”
“That’s for a jury to decide,” said Underwood. “You’re under arrest, Mrs. Hedger, and must come with us to the station to be charged. Please take off that coat. It will be used in evidence.”
“It’s cold out,” said Alec, struck by an unexpected wave of compassion for the stubborn, ignorant, cross-grained old woman. “Let her keep it on.”
* * *
On Friday evening, Alec came home to Hampstead. Daisy hurried down to greet him in the hall.
“Darling, I’m so glad you’ve made it in time for dinner. When I got your wire, I invited Tom and Mrs. Tring. It seemed only fair that they should hear all about the case.”
He handed his hat and coat to the parlourmaid, who bore them away for a good brushing. “Thank you, Elsie. I take it, Daisy, you expect to get more information out of me if Tom’s helping?”
“Naturally. They’re up in the nursery with the twins. Tom’s on hands and knees with his godson on his back, being a rhinoceros as far as I could make out. Oliver has a penchant for exotic steeds since last time we went to the zoo. I do hope he won’t become a big game hunter.”
“And Mirrie?”
“She’s on Mrs. Tom’s lap, reading a picture book while Mrs. Tom and Nurse Gilpin chat. Mrs. Tom gets on with Nurse much better than I do. Go and have a wash and brush up, darling. I’ll tell Mrs. Dobson to dish up in fifteen minutes, unless you want a whisky first, or a beer with Tom.”
“Beer sounds good. Make it half an hour. I’ll say good night to the twins and bring the Trings down. With luck, I’ll get the story over with and eat my dinner in peace.”
When they were all settled in the sitting room with drinks to hand, Tom rumbled, “You had the inquest yesterday, Chief?”
“Yesterday afternoon. It was just as well the coroner couldn’t sit sooner, gave us time to get it pretty much all wrapped up for him.
His jury brought in homicide by May Hedger.
Manslaughter or murder is up to a criminal jury, of course.
Sally Hedger made an excellent witness, Daisy, clear and concise in spite of floods of tears throughout the proceedings. ”
“Poor Sally! I wish I’d been there to support her.”
Alec grinned. “Ernie managed that, in his usual unobtrusive style. Not quite holding her hand, but being stalwart at her side with a supply of clean handkerchiefs, while behaving in a properly policemanlike manner.”
“He’s a good lad,” Tom observed.
“I left him there for another day, to help Underwood with reports and tying up loose ends.”
“That’s nice,” said Mrs. Tring placidly. “She sounds like a nice young woman. Didn’t you say that she’s wanting to move to London, Mrs. Fletcher? Me and Tom have been thinking of renting out a room, now he’s retired, if we could find a nice, reliable lodger.”
“She’s very reliable,” Daisy assured her. “I’d be glad to know she has a safe place to stay with good people when she comes to the big bad city.”
“And young Ernie knows he’s always welcome to take potluck with us.” She exchanged a glance of complicity with Daisy.
Tom wanted to hear about Daisy and her friend being locked in the cellar where the body was found. She gave him a highly coloured account that made him chuckle, while his missus tut-tutted.
“It’s funny now,” said Daisy, “but it was quite frightening at the time.”
Mrs. Tring was confused. “Well I never! And the man who shut you up turned out not to be the murderer after all?”
“He had other matters on his conscience. Apart from the cellar business, his crime was financial fraud.”
“Tell us the whole story, Chief,” Tom requested. “First of all, I assume you were able to present the coroner with a definitive identification of the body?”
“Oh yes, it was Judith Gray all right. The coroner would probably have accepted Sally Hedger’s evidence, along with what we found in her aunt’s attic: the luggage and handbag, contents intact.
As it happened, Mrs. Gray’s friend Mrs. Knox was able to give us the name of their mutual dentist. You know how people recommend their medical practitioners to their friends.
He’s a Harley Street man, as we supposed.
When we explained our difficulty, he came right down to Beaconsfield, records in hand.
Ghoulish curiosity, as DI Underwood said. ”
“Ah,” said Tom, grinning behind his magnificent moustache.
“He found the reality a great deal more unpleasant than he anticipated. He managed to identify her faster than I’d have believed possible.”
“I don’t blame him,” said Daisy.