“And if so be they found the money, the pair of them, Sam thought it’d be a good idea to leave the other chap in the house for keeps. Then if ever there was an inquiry, the explanation was there, ’twas the dead chap broke in.”
“It’s a possibility,” agreed Macdonald, “rogues are often hopeful. But there’s another explanation. Perhaps Sam was followed by one of his thieving friends, a chap who knew that Sam came back to High Garth and thought he didn’t come there without a reason. We just don’t know, Mr. Staple, but we’ve got to lay hands on Sam Borwick. Now there’s another point I want to discuss with you. You knew that old Borwick never had a banking account: he kept his cash in the house. But you’re not the only person who would have known that. If a farmer always asks for cash and always pays in cash, a lot of other farmers must have known what that meant—no banking account.”
“Aye, you’re right, but ’twasn’t so uncommon at one time. When I was a lad, a lot of farmers did the same. ’Twas only the big farmers kept their money in a bank and paid by cheque.”
“So I’ve heard. Now Mr. Brough would have known that old Borwick had no banking account. Brough pays the rent for the land at High Garth in cash, every quarter day, he told me so.”
“Aye, he’d pay in cash, and that’s what the two old folks live on, they’ve nought else coming in.”
“And Mr. Brough would have known that old Borwick made a good sum at his sale, and since he knew Borwick’s habits, Brough may well have argued, as you have done, that the cash was hidden in the house. He never suggested that to me when he asked me to go round the house with him. He only said he wanted to look at the furniture, because some of it was valuable and Mrs. Borwick was worried about it.”
“Aye, he might have been wiser if he’d told you the whole story,” went on Staple. “Now I once heard you say, ‘I’m guessing my way along,’ and I’ve been doing a bit o’ guessing myself over this story. Brough, he goes along to Borwick’s little place to pay his rent every quarter day, same’s he told you, and I’ve no doubt he has a crack with Mrs. Borwick and she’ll tell him her troubles, likely enough. Old Nat, he’s in a sorry way and he won’t last much longer. When Nat’s gone, what is there left for his missis? The land goes to Sam, and Sam won’t bother about his old mother. As I see it, Mrs. Borwick may have said to Brough, ‘There’s that money Nat got for the sale of his stock and that money’s up there, at the house,’ and Brough said, ‘That should be looked into.’ You never know, he may have gone farther and said, ‘When Nat’s gone, you and I could do worse than make a partnership and farm together.’ ” Staple chuckled and then went on. “That’s an old story, a widow woman with money, and a farmer who could do with more capital, as they all can these days. Now I’m not just havering, Mr. Macdonald. I’m thinking things out my own way. Seems to me, Mrs. Borwick may have said, ‘Better find that money before Sam does,’ and that looks to me as though one of them, she or Brough, had heard tell that Sam had been seen in the district, looking around as it were.”
“Yes, that’s sound reasoning,” agreed Macdonald. “Now Brough suggested to me that perhaps Sam had got himself taken on by the pipe-line contractors. That would have given him somewhere to live in the district, near enough to High Garth to get over there any night he chose, to look around.”
“Could be, though Sam was never a worker,” said Staple. “Still, they’d have taken him on, likely enow, he’s a hefty-looking chap.”
“Now I don’t think he’s still up there with the gangers,” said Macdonald, “but there’s just a chance he’s hiding out there, especially if he’s short of money. Now when things are fixed up, so that I’m working with the county men officially, I’m going up to see the manager of the pipe-line gangs and I shall ask to have all the gangers paraded, so that I can have a look at them. Would you be willing to come up there with me? You know Sam Borwick by sight, and there’s not many folk could be sure of recognising him. I asked Jock Shearling, but he never really knew Sam.”
“Aye, I’ll go with you, if you ask me,” replied Staple.
3
While Macdonald was talking to Staple, Inspector Bord went to see old Mr. and Mrs. Borwick. They lived in a dreary little stone house close by the railway line which runs through Lunesdale to Yorkshire. The house had been built by a farmer a hundred years ago, before the railway took most of his land: it was “two up and two down,” a kitchen and a small parlour downstairs and two bedrooms above. The Borwicks used the kitchen as their living room and old Nat slept in the parlour, because he could no longer get upstairs. He sat crouched over the fireplace when Bord entered, a tremulous deaf old man who did not answer when spoken to.
“Don’t you bother talking to him,” said Mrs. Borwick. “He don’t take things in, not since his stroke.”
She was a shrivelled old woman, with white wispy hair and dark eyes, but still alert-looking and intelligent.
“I’m sorry to tell you that there’s trouble up at
