The Murder of Busy Lizzie

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Nothing doing today, Mrs Gavin. I got business.’

‘It’s about fish,’ said Laura. Dimbleton’s expression altered.

‘That might be different,’ he said. ‘What about fish?’

‘There are complaints at the hotel.’

‘Honest? I’ve heard nothing of it. Where did you get it from?’

‘Where do you suppose?’

‘The game’s up, then. I thought so when McKell and his lads came over here on that bird-watching lark. Well, thanks for the information, Mrs Gavin. And now, just for the record, come clean. What’s your part in all this?’

‘That’s a difficult question,’ said Laura coolly. ‘Anyway, if you’ve anything to dump, I should get rid of it pronto. No point in hanging on to stinking fish.’

‘Where do you come in on the share-out?’

‘Ain’t going to be no share-out. Same like the boy with the apple-core, if you happen to know that story,’ said Laura. The boatman looked at her and scratched his head.

chapter sixteen

Into the Maze

‘Fountain-heads and pathless groves,

Places which pale passion loves!

Moonlight walks, when all the fowls

Are warmly housed, save bats and owls!

A midnight bell, a parting groan!

These are the sounds we feed upon.’

John Fletcher

« ^ »

So something has been going on,’ said Laura, when she met Dame Beatrice again. ‘Gavin and his people suspected gun-running, so now it’s up to them. I gave Dimbleton as much of a tip-off as I thought was ethical, because I don’t believe he’s a villain, only a tool. I expect he’s been well paid for the hire of his boat and told not to ask too many questions. And do you know what else I think? I think Eliza Chayleigh was murdered because she did ask too many questions. There’s that so-called poem, you know, about only watching the shadows on the wall when the “gentlemen” go by. And I think Ransome Lovelaine may have been mixed up in something fishy, too, and I think some of them had the impression he’d grassed to his cousins, those two rather decent Lovelaine youngsters, and that they may have told their father and he may have told us. I know I haven’t much to go on in saying all this, but it would account for a lot of the things which have been happening, wouldn’t it, don’t you think?’

‘I do not think it accounts for the death of Eliza Chayleigh. Apart from solving that problem, though, I think our work here is finished and I shall be glad to return home.’

‘You don’t intend to work out our three months’ tenancy of this house?’

‘I see no particular point in doing so.’

‘The rent’s paid. Are you going to lose all those extra weeks, then? This isn’t a bad spot in which to get on with the memoirs, you know.’

‘I propose to stay only long enough to clear up the mystery I mentioned. I still want to know who occupied this house on the Wednesday before we arrived and who entertained somebody to a cup of tea here.’

‘Well, we’re sure that one of the two was Eliza Chayleigh, aren’t we?’

‘It could well be so, of course, but who was the other?’

‘One of the smugglers, I should say, was the other person with her, if they thought she was an informer. He met her here and murdered her and chucked the body into the sea. Well, you’ve heard my yarn, so now what about your own?’

‘The farmer was not in when I was admitted, but his wife received me and intimated that if I cared to wait she would send Ransome to find him. Ransome, she said, was at work on his smallholding and would probably know whereabouts on the farm his father could be found.’

‘Did she actually call the farmer Ransome’s father?’

‘Oh, yes, quite freely and openly.’

‘Then she doesn’t mind her husband’s little departure from the straight and narrow? After all, it happened after they were married, I thought, so you’d imagine she’d take a dim view.’

‘She betrayed no animosity towards either her husband or Eliza or Ransome. She is a suspiciously placid woman. Well, she left me to go and send Ransome on his errand and, in due course, when we had drunk a cup of strong tea and eaten soda-cake—’

‘Bit of a martyr in a good cause, weren’t you?’

‘It is true that I do not care for strong tea and soda-cake, but it would have been discourteous to refuse the proffered hospitality and I was anxious to be agreeable.’

‘What’s the farmer like?’

‘You saw him on the boat. He crossed with us when we arrived, if you remember.’

‘He couldn’t have been the chap who tackled Mr Lovelaine that night, I suppose?’

‘He both could have been and was.’

‘You mean he admitted it?’

‘In response to a direct question, yes, he did.’

‘But what made you think he was the one?’

‘Perhaps if I give you a complete account of the interview you will see how events shaped themselves.’

‘Oh, sorry! Yes, of course. First say what the play treats on; then read the names of the actors; and so grow to a point.’

‘Exactly. Well, he greeted me in breezy fashion and asked what he could do for me. I replied that I had some very personal questions to put to him, but that, of course, I should understand and sympathise if he refused to answer them. At that he studied me for a while as though he were summing me up and asked whether it was anything to do with Dimbleton’s boat. This intrigued me very much, as you may imagine, and I made a cautious reply to the effect that it might or might not have to do with boats, including Dimbleton’s.’

‘So they’re on to the gun-running, are they?’ he said. ‘I knew it could only be a question of time.’

‘So he’s given the game away,’ said Laura. ‘Was he in on it, then?’

‘He says not, but that he and Ransome knew all about it and that one small party of ornithologists were smugglers in disguise.’

‘We guessed as much, didn’t we? I wonder what the genuine bird-watchers made of them?’

‘I doubt whether they mixed with any of the others. I think Miss Crimp had apportioned them to the chalets and had given them tables to themselves in the dining-room. She knew all about them, I’m sure.’

‘I said, if you remember, that she was mixed up in the smuggling racket. That day I called on Dimbleton when he had that gipsy type with the earrings at his cottage, Crimp was there, too, and talking about fish.’

‘Which you thought meant money.’

‘And which I also think meant guns. Did Cranby have anything more to say about guns?’

‘Only that he thought the witches’ cave had been the original storehouse, but that the witches fell foul of Eliza Chayleigh because hotel guests complained of their dancing naked by moonlight. It seems that their meetings were held out in the open over by the pre-historic hut-circles, but that, following the complaints, the cave became the meeting place of the coven and another hiding-place for the weapons had to be found. However, Cranby thinks that the owners of Puffins had left a key with Miss Crimp when they vacated the house, and that they had an arrangement with her that, from time to time, she would have the house dusted and windows opened and that, when she was notified of an imminent holiday tenancy, she would see to it that the beds were aired.’

‘But I thought he was the holder of the key? If this house was a hidey-hole, how