Mr Jonas Bradlaw was, when off duty, as amiable a representative of his craft as you could wish to meet. Undertakers, by and large, are brisk, sanguine, workman-like fellows, and not at all the miserable ghouls mistakenly imagined by those unable to dissociate what they believe to be a dreadful conclusion from the agents charged with its expeditious arrangement. Mr Bradlaw gave such slanderers the lie. He was not gloomy, for he conceived his task to be a useful and rewarding one. He was not cadaverous; half a lifetime of knocking oak and elm into elongated hexagons had given him a solid physique that even now, in the comparative idleness of proprietorial supervision, lent nearly as much dignity to a funeral as had any pair of his late father’s black horses. Nor was he a hand-rubbing necrophile; he regretted death in a general way as much as anyone and was sorry when old friends came under his roof in attitudes of stiff formality and desirous no longer of taking a part in the conversation.
Conversation—of a lightish kind—he valued, for he was a divorced man (on account of overmuch and carelessly directed amiability, it was said), and led a home life practically devoid of the spoken word. This was because his young housekeepers came and went at such frequent intervals that not one had had time to tire of her employer’s television set sufficiently to find anything to say before bed-time. He had once toyed with the idea of getting rid of the set, but had baulked at putting his personal attractions, unaugmented, to the test. Could it be, he had sometimes secretly wondered, that his housekeepers regarded him as a price, not a prize?
On the morning following that on which an unexpected commission for Mr Bradlaw had been found in the field opposite The Aspens, the undertaker moved busily around his yard and workshop, hiding an inner unease with a more than usually jocose encouragement of his three joiners. “A good board, that, Ben.” “How’s the missus, Charlie?...Aye, take the beading over that knot, lad.” “God, this’n’ll twist right off the bloody rollers if there’s a ha’porth of damp on Thursday!”
He bustled from bench to trestle in his waistcoat and pin-stripes. A wing collar, ready for rapid attachment, hung on a nail above the glue-pot. At the far end of the shop, safe from sawdust and pitch-splashing, was suspended his morning coat. Bradlaw, like a fireman, could be presentable for duty within seconds of a call. Rather pointless, really, he sometimes reflected, was this constant readiness to dash off somewhere. His were the most patient customers in the world. Yet it paid to give the impression of efficiency, concern, dispatch.
He had returned a short time previously from the hospital where, in consideration of Mrs Poole’s solitude and nervousness and at the suggestion of Inspector Purbright, the remains of Mr Gwill had been given refrigerated accommodation until the funeral. The coffin was almost ready. It was a nice job. Bradlaw hoped it might be taken into the hospital during visiting hours. One on-the-spot demonstration was worth a whole printing of calendars.
Yet even this prospect did not much lighten Bradlaw’s thoughts. The police, he had been told on his return from the hospital, had called in his absence and would come back later. And that, he reflected, could mean only one thing. He looked at his watch. The inquest would be nearly over. He listened as he dodged around among the elm shavings for Betty—no, it was Eileen now—to ring the bell summoning him to the office.
Eventually the bell did sound. Bradlaw hastily harnessed himself in the wing collar, hooked around it the ready-knotted black tie, and wriggled into his coat as he crossed the yard and entered the house.
Closing the door behind him, he eyed the two waiting men.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” said Bradlaw gravely, tucking his chin well down and doing his best to convey the impression that he, death’s ferryman, had touched shore for five minutes only, but would consider accepting a message for the other side provided it was brief, and addressed to the highest authority.
“Hello, there!” responded Purbright. Love winked cheerfully and perched himself on a chair arm. Bradlaw, who knew and was known by both men perfectly well, realized that the presumably solemn nature of their inquiries was not going to prevent them from treating him with familiarity. Which was a pity, for his nervousness would have been better concealed if professional gloom could have been assumed on both sides.
“Well, here’s a fine how-d’ye-do,” began Purbright, offering cigarettes. “What do you know about it, Nab?”
Hearing his nickname, Bradlaw abandoned hope of being able to remain stuffy and safe. But he wasn’t going to be backslapped into parting with anything compromising. He rolled his head, glanced at the shut door and hoarsely confided: “They tell me he went and got himself knocked off: is that right?”
Purbright unexpectedly jabbed Bradlaw’s paunch. “Dead right.” he whispered. “Point is...who? Eh?”
“Poor old Gwill.” Bradlaw relaxed. Purbright seemed inclined to be bar-parlourish about the affair, a good sign. “You’d never have thought he was the sort to end up like that. Here, it wasn’t women, was it?” He pronounced “women” like a medical term.
“Dunno,” Purbright said. “Might it have been?”
Bradlaw pretended to consider. Then he shook his head. “I never heard of anything. Mind you, there’s often a woman in these things. They’re queer creatures. Damn me, they are, you know.”
“There’s the woman next door, of course. Had he anything to do with her, would you say?”
Bradlaw looked momentarily shaken. “Why, have you seen her?”
Watching him, Purbright replied: “I happened to run into her yesterday. She said she’d been away.”
“Ah!” Bradlaw paused, and added: “No, she’s got her head screwed on. Widows are safe enough as a rule. She’d been away, you said?”
“That’s right. Why?”
“You mean, she can’t have done it?”
“We haven’t decided yet who could and who couldn’t. We’re at the damn-fool question stage. Let’s see”— Purbright eyed Bradlaw with faint amusement—“what we can find in that line for you, shall we? What, for instance, were you doing on the night before last? And don’t say laying in business in Heston Lane.”
“Laying out, sir.”
“You shut up, Sid; I’m waiting for Nab to incriminate himself.”
Bradlaw chuckled and smoothed the few remaining parallel lines of hair across his pinkly shining head. “Night before last...” He massaged the putty of his mouth and frowned. “Night before last...” He removed his hand and his mouth returned to its own devices, the first of which was to ejaculate: “Buffs!”
“Pardon?” said Purbright.
