Eventually Peel, who had plenty of common sense when he wasn’t being given information about dairy cattle, had decided that the best thing he could do was to search the immediate environs of the bridge. He could interrogate natives later, but any delay in .searching might mean losing valuable evidence. The ground was fairly soft, and, for all Peel knew, somebody’s cows might be driven all over the place before he could stop them. The sergeant knew who had been at the bridge since the body had been found: Rigg, Venner, Wilson, and Hedges, all in labourer’s boots, Dr. Brown and Dr. Ferens in good country shoes. Rigg and Venner had lifted the body from the stream, Wilson and Hedges had turned up just after the body had been laid by the bank, and they had all come from the south side of the bridge. Dr. Ferens had come from the north, down the park. Peel and his attendant constable began to search the ground, the hedges, and the grass, seeking for any object or sign which might indicate the presence of any other person who had been at the spot. When they had been at this job for some quarter of an hour, Inspector Carson of Barnsford arrived, together with two of his own men and a photographer. Peel saluted his superior officer, and while the constables continued searching the ground, the two seniors stood on the bank and Peel gave a brief description of events as far as his information went.
“I reckon we must make a job of it this time,” he said. “I wasn’t happy in my mind over the last case, and I reckon this proves I was right.”
“What have you got in mind, Peel?”
“I believe there’s a murderer in this village. That girl Nancy Bilton was a bad lot and she got into trouble with some chap here. I daresay she made a nuisance of herself to him and he pushed her into the midstream. We never found out who he was, but I shouldn’t be at all surprised if this Sister Monica had some sort of idea about his identity.”
“Then why didn’t she tell you?” asked Carson. “She swore in the witness box she didn’t know the chap’s identity and she was a religious body. You’re not telling me you think she told lies?”
“No, I’m not, though I reckon she was queer—too religious, you know. Takes some women like that. I know she thought herself next door to the Almighty, for all her show of humble pie. My own idea is that she had her own suspicions and wouldn’t put ’em into words because she’d no means of proving it. And the chap knew she’d got an inkling of who he was and she was going round trying to ferret things out in that clever-belike way she’d got.”
The Inspector grunted. “More than a year ago, isn’t it? Not likely she’d have found out anything now.”
“I don’t know: this village is a queer place. Maybe somebody let something out to her, thinking it was all over and done with. Anyway, my guess is she met the chap down here and charged him with it sudden-like, and he heaved her into the millrace like he did the other. They do say she wandered round here of nights. Must have been some reason made her do it.”
Again the Inspector grunted. “Well, you’ve evidently had the last case on your mind, Peel. What’s your idea?”
Peel looked cautiously round the sunlit spot where they were standing, and lowered his voice even more. “Strikes me things went on pretty quietly in this village until two or three years ago. It’s the sort of village doesn’t change much from generation to generation. It was after that new estate manager came, three years ago, there seemed to be upsets.”
“I see,” said the Inspector. “Well, it’s worth looking into. And about these folk in the Mill House here.”
Peel interrupted with an exasperated snort. “There’s none so deaf as them that won’t hear. I reckon this spot is a sort of lovers’ lane. As you see, you can come round the mill from the village street and walk up the park by that steep path there. The village folk are allowed to use that path, but not to go through the Manor garden. They can get out again, into the village square, by a gate beside the walled kitchen garden. In other words, you can take a walk down the village street, turn into the park by the mill here, walk up the park, and get to where you started. The gates aren’t locked. I bet any money the Venners know who’s in the habit of walking through here: they know Sister Monica used to walk here after dark. Stands to reason they know who else does.”
The Inspector nodded. “We’ll see to that. And now what about fingerprinting the handrail of that bridge? It’s worn smooth enough. We might get something there. I reckon there’s been too much trampling around for footsteps to help, and it’s too much to hope that we’ll find anything left around. Not that you weren’t right to start here. And we’ll have those gates shut and see to it that no one comes through.”
“Very good,” said Peel. “Let ’em see we mean business from the word go this time, and not so much about the poor soul brooding and throwing herself in. Brooding my hat.”
CHAPTER V
“Her come over dizzy, poor soul. That be it. Terrible dizzy Sister’s been these weeks past. Only Sunday ’twere she fell flat as never was, and the little maids did all hear mun fall. And yesterday again, her did slip on stairs and knocked back of her head a real crack.”
It was “Nurse” Barrow giving evidence, treating Sergeant Peel to a wealth of detail over Sister Monica’s dizziness, until the sergeant
