A Pocket Full of Rye Read online

  "You've been asking questions, sir, about what the master ate and drank and who gave it to him. They're in it together, sir, that's what I'd say. He got the stuff from somewhere, and she gave it to the master, that was the way of it, I've no doubt."

  "Have you ever seen any yew berries in the house, or thrown away anywhere?"

  The small eyes glinted curiously.

  "Yew? Nasty, poisonous stuff. Never you touch those berries, my mother said to me when I was a child. Was that what was used, sir?"

  "We don't know yet what was used."

  "I've never seen her fiddling about with yew." Ellen sounded disappointed. "No, I can't say I've seen anything of that kind."

  Neele questioned her about the grain found in Fortescue’s pocket, but here again he drew a blank.

  "No, sir. I know nothing about that."

  He went on to further questions, but with no gainful result. Finally, he asked if he could see Miss Ramsbottom.

  Ellen looked doubtful.

  "I could ask her, but it's not everyone she'll see. She's a very old lady, you know, and she's a bit odd."

  The Inspector pressed his demand, and rather unwillingly Ellen led him along a passage and up a short flight of stairs to what he thought had probably been designed as a nursery suite.

  He glanced out of a passage window as he followed her and saw Sergeant Hay standing by the yew tree talking to a man who was evidently a gardener.

  Ellen tapped on a door, and when she received an answer, opened it and said, "There's a police gentleman here who would like to speak to you, miss."

  The answer was apparently in the affirmative, for she drew back and motioned Neele to go in.

  The room he entered was almost fantastically overfurnished. The Inspector felt rather as though he had taken a step backward into not merely Edwardian but Victorian times. At a table drawn up to a gas fire an old lady was sitting laying out a patience. She wore a maroon-colored dress and her sparse gray hair was slicked down each side of her face.

  Without looking up or discontinuing her game, she said impatiently, "Well, come in, come in.- Sit down if you like."

  The invitation was not easy to accept as every chair appeared to be covered with tracts or publications of a religious nature.

  As he moved them slightly aside on the sofa, Miss Ramsbottom asked sharply, "Interested in mission work?"

  "Well, I'm afraid I'm not very, ma'am."

  "Wrong. You should be. That's where the Christian spirit is nowadays. Darkest Africa. Had a young clergyman here last week. Black as your hat. But a true Christian."

  Inspector Neele found it a little difficult to know what to say.

  The old lady further disconcerted him by snapping, "I haven't got a wireless."

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "Oh, I thought perhaps you came about a wireless license. Or one of these silly forms. Well, man, what is it?"

  "I'm sorry to have to tell you, Miss Ramsbottom, that your brother-in-law, Mr. Fortescue, was taken suddenly ill and died this morning."

  Miss Ramsbottom continued with her patience without any sign of perturbation, merely remarking in a conversational way, "Struck down at last in his arrogance and sinful pride. Well, it had to come."

  "I hope it's not a shock to you?"

  It obviously wasn't, but the Inspector wanted to hear what she would say.

  Miss Ramsbottom gave him a sharp glance over the top

  of her spectacles and said, "If you mean I am not distressed, that is quite right. Rex Fortescue was always a sinful man and I never liked him."

  "His death was very sudden-"

  "As befits the ungodly," said the old lady with satisfaction.

  "It seems possible that he may have been poisoned-"

  The Inspector paused to observe the effect he had made.

  He did not seem to have made any. Miss Ramsbottom merely murmured, "Red seven on black eight. Now I can move up the king."

  Struck apparently by the Inspector's silence, she stopped with a card poised in her hand and said sharply, "Well, what did you expect me to say? I didn't poison Wm if that's what you want to know."

  "Have you any idea who might have done so?"

  "That's a very improper question,' said the old lady sharply. "Living in this house are two of my dead sister's children. I decline to believe that anybody with Ramsbottom blood in them could be guilty of murder. Because it's murder you're meaning, isn't it?"

  "I didn't say so, madam."

  "Of course it's murder. Plenty of people have wanted to murder Rex in their time. A very unscrupulous man. And old sins have long shadows, as the saying goes."

  "Have you anyone in particular in mind?"

  Miss Ramsbottom swept up the cards and rose to her feet. She was a tall woman.

  "I think you'd better go now," she said.

  She spoke without anger, but with a kind of cold finality.

  "If you want my opinion," she went on, "it was probably one of the servants. The butler looks to me a bit of a rascal, and that parlormaid is definitely subnormal. Good evening."

  Inspector Neele found himself meekly walking out. Certainly a remarkable old lady. Nothing to be got out of her.

  He came down the stairs into the square hall to find himself suddenly face to face with a tall, dark girl. She was wearing a damp mackintosh and she stared into his face with a curious blankness.

  "I've just come back," she said. "And they told me-about Father-that he's dead."

  "I'm afraid that's true."

  She pushed out a hand behind her as though blindly seeking for support. She touched an oak chest and slowly, stiffly, she sat down on it.

  'Oh no," she said. "No . .

  Slowly two tears rolled down her cheeks.

  "It's awful," she said. "I didn't think that I even liked him.... I thought I hated Wm.... But that can't be so, or I wouldn't mind. I do mind."

  She sat there, staring in front of her, and again tears forced themselves from her eyes and down her cheeks.

  Presently she spoke again, rather breathlessly.

  "The awful thing is that it makes everything come right. I mean, Gerald and I can get married now. I can do everything that I want to do. But I hate it happening tills way. I don't want Father to be dead.... Oh, I don't. Oh Daddy-Daddy . . ."

  For the first time since he had come to Yewtree Lodge, Inspector Neele was startled by what seemed to be genuine grief for the dead man.

  Chapter Nine

  "SOUNDS LIKE THE wife to me," said the Assistant Commissioner. He had been listening attentively to Inspector Neele's report.

  It had been an admirable précis of the case. Short, but with no relevant detail left out.

  "Yes," said the A C. "It looks like the wife. what do you think yourself, Neele, eh?"

  Inspector Neele said that it looked like the wife to him, too. He reflected cynically that it usually was the wife or the husband as the case might be.

  "She had the opportunity all right. And motive.?" The A C. paused. "There is motive?"

  "Oh, I think so, sir. This Mr. Dubois, you know."

  "Think he was in it, too?"

  "No, I shouldn't say that, sir." Inspector Neele weighed the idea. "A bit too fond of his own skin for that. He may have guessed what was in her mind, but I shouldn't imagine that he instigated it."

  "No, too careful."

  "Much too careful."

  "Well, we mustn't jump to conclusions, but it seems a good working hypothesis. What about the other two who had opportunity?"

  "That's the daughter and the daughter-in-law, sir. The daughter was mixed up with a young man whom her father didn't want her to marry. And he definitely wasn't marrying her unless she had the money. That gives her a motive. As to the daughter-in-law, I wouldn't like to say. Don't know enough about her yet. But any of the three of them could have poisoned him, and I don't see how anyone else could have done so. The parlormaid, the butler, the cook, they all handled the breakfast or brought it in, but I don
't see how any of them could have been sure of Fortescue himself getting the taxine and nobody else. That is, if it was taxine."

  The A C. said, "It was taxine all right. I've just got the preliminary report."

  "That settles that, then," said Inspector Neele. "We can go ahead."

  "Servants seem all right?"

  "The butler and the parlormaid both seem nervous. There's nothing uncommon about that. Often happens. The cook's fighting mad and the housemaid was grimly pleased. In fact, all quite natural and normal."

  "There's -nobody else whom you consider suspicious in any way?"

  "No, I don't think so, sir." Involuntarily, Inspector Neele's mind went back to Mary Dove and her enigmatic sniff. There had surely been a faint yet definite look of antagonism. Aloud, he said, "Now that we know it's taxine, there ought to be some evidence to be got as to how it was obtained or prepared."

  "Just so. Well, go ahead, Neele. By the way, Mr. Percival Fortescue is here now. I've had a word or two with him and he's waiting to see you. We've located the other son, too. He's in Paris at the Bristol, leaving today. You'll have him met at the airport, I suppose."

  "Yes, sir. That was my idea "Well, you'd better see Percival Fortescue now." The A C. chuckled. "Percy Prim, that's what he is."

  Mr. Percival Fortescue was a neat, fair man of thirty-odd with pale hair and eyelashes and a slightly pedantic way of speech.

  "This has been a terrible shock to me, Inspector Neele, as you can well imagine."

  "It must have been, Mr. Fortescue," said Inspector Neele.

  "I can only say that my father was perfectly well when I left home the day before yesterday. This food poisoning, or whatever it was, must have been very sudden?"

  "It was very sudden, yes. But it wasn't food poisoning, Mr. Fortescue."

  Percival stared and frowned.

  "No? So that's why-" he broke off.

  "Your father," said Inspector Neele, "was poisoned by the administration of taxine."

  "Taxine? I never heard of it."

  "Very few people have, I should imagine. It is a poison that takes effect very suddenly and drastically."

  The frown deepened.

  "Are you telling me, Inspector, that my father was deliberately poisoned by someone?"

  "It would seem so, yes, sir."

  "That's terrible! "

  "Yes indeed, Mr. Fortescue."

  Percival murmured, "I understand now their attitude in the hospital-their referring me here." He broke off. After a pause he went on, "The funeral?" He spoke interrogatively.

  "The inquest is fixed for tomorrow after the postmortem. The proceedings at the inquest will be purely formal and the inquest will be adjourned."

  "I understand. That is usually the case?"

  "Yes, sir. Nowadays."

  "May I ask have you formed any ideas, any suspicions of who could- Really, l' Again he broke off.

  "It's rather early days for that, Mr. Fortescue," murmured Neele.

  "Yes, I suppose so."

  "At' the same it would be helpful to us, Mr. Fortescue, if you could give us some idea of your father's testamentary dispositions. Or perhaps you could put me in touch with his solicitor."

  "His solicitors are Billingsley, Horsethorpe & Walters of Bedford Square

  . As far as his will goes I think I can more or less tell you its main dispositions."

  "If you will be kind enough to do so, Mr. Fortescue. It's a routine that has to be gone through, I'm afraid."

  "My father made a new will on the occasion of his marriage two years ago," said Percival precisely. "My father left the sum of 100,000 to this wife absolutely and 2 50,000 to my sister, Elaine. I am his residuary legatee. I am already, of course, a partner in the firm."

  "There was no bequest to your brother, Lancelot Fortescue?"

  "No, there is an estrangement of long standing between my father and my brother."

  Neele threw a sharp glance at him-but Percival seemed quite sure of his statement.

  "So as the will stands," said Inspector Neele, "the three people who stand to gain are Mrs. Fortescue, Mss Elaine Fortescue and yourself?"

  "I don't think I shall be much of a gainer." Percival sighed. "There are death duties, you know, Inspector. And of late my father has been-well, all I can say is, highly injudicious in some of his financial dealings."

  "You and your father have not seen eye to eye lately about the conduct of the business?" Inspector Neele threw out the question in a genial manner.

  "I put my point of view to him, but al' Percival shrugged his shoulders.

  "Put it rather forcibly, didn't you?" Neele inquired. "In fact, not to put too fine a point on it, there was quite a row about it, wasn't there?"

  "I should hardly say that, Inspector." A red flush of annoyance mounted to Percival's forehead.

  "Perhaps the dispute you had was about some other matter then, Mr. Fortescue."

  'There was no dispute, Inspector."

  "Quite sure of that, Mr. Fortescue? Well, no matter.

  Did I understand that your father and brother are still estranged?"

  "That is so."

  "Then perhaps you can tell me what this means?"

  Neele handed him the telephone message Mary Dove had jotted down.

  Percival read it and uttered an exclamation of surprise and annoyance. He seemed both incredulous and angry.

  "I can't understand it, I really can't. I can hardly believe it."

  "It seems to be true, though, Mr. Fortescue. Your brother is arriving from Paris today."

  "But it's extraordinary, quite extraordinary. No, I really can't understand it."

  "Your father said nothing to you about it?"

  "He certainly did not. How outrageous of him. To go behind my back and send for Lance."

  "You've no idea, I suppose, why he did such a thing?" "Of course I haven't. It's all on a par with his behavior lately-crazy-unaccountable-it's got to be stopped!-"

  Percival came to an abrupt stop. The color ebbed away again from his pate face.

  "I'd forgotten," he said. "For the moment I'd forgotten that my father was dead."

  Inspector Neele shook his head sympathetically.

  Percival Fortescue prepared to take his departure. As he picked up his hat he said, "Call upon me if there is anything I can do. But I suppose-" he paused, 'you will be coming down to Yewtree Lodge?"

  "Yes, Mr. Fortescue. I've got a man in charge there now."

  Percival shuddered in a fastidious way.

  "It will all be most unpleasant. To think such a thing should happen to us-"

  He sighed and moved towards the door.

  "I shall be at the office most of the day. There is a lot to be seen to here. But I shall get down to Yewtree Lodge this evening."

  "Quite so, sir."

  Percival Fortescue went out.

  "Percy Prim," murmured Neele.

  Sergeant Hay, who was sitting unobtrusively by the wall, looked up and said "Sir?" interrogatively.

  Then, as Neele did not reply, he asked, "What do you make of it an, sir?"

  "I don't know," said Neele. He quoted softly, ""They're all very unpleasant people."' Sergeant Hay looked somewhat puzzled.

  "Alice in Wonderland," said Neele. "Don't you know your Alice, Hay?"

  "It's a classic, isn't it, sir?" said Hay. "Third Program stuff. I don't listen to the Third Program."

  Chapter Ten

  IT WAS ABOUT five minutes after leaving Le Bourget that Lance Fortescue opened his copy of the continental Daily Mail. A minute or two later he uttered a startled exclamation. Pat, in the seat beside him, turned her head inquiringly.

  "It's the old man," said Lance. "He's dead."

  "Dead! Your father?"

  "Yes, he seems to have been taken suddenly ill at the office, was taken to St. Jude's Hospital and died there soon after arrival."

  "Darling, I'm so sorry. What was it, a stroke?"

  "I suppose so. Sounds like it."

  "D
id he ever have a stroke before?"

  "No. Not that I know of."