Dover watched him disappear into the gloom. Couldn’t the old fool go any faster than that? ‘Get a move on!’ he bawled at Mr Chettle’s slowly retreating back. ‘It’s an emergency! Matter of life and death!’
Mr Chettle half-turned and waved. ‘Right you are, lad!’ he gasped. ‘Leave it to me!’
Dover shrugged his shoulders and went back indoors. Mr Tompkins was still in the little sitting-room which contained the sofa and, Dover presumed, the gas fire. Dover poked his head round the door.
‘How’s it going?’ he asked in a tone which turned out more conversational than he had intended.
Mr Tompkins dropped the hand he had been holding. It belonged to a woman who lay, covered with a hand-knitted shawl, on the sofa.
‘I don’t think it looks too good, Mr Dover.’ Mr Tompkins gulped and shook his head. ‘I don’t think it looks too good at all.’
‘The doctor should be here in a minute,’ said Dover, feeling that under the circumstances he should take as optimistic a view as possible. The odds were strongly in favour of Mr Ghettle taking a trip through the pearly gates himself long before he got as far as the doctor’s house.
Mr Tompkins nodded his head absent-mindedly.
‘Anything I can do?’ asked Dover, looking idly round the sitting-room which, as yet, he had not entered. It was a tiny room and seemed to be packed with furniture, though Dover realized, on reflection, that it contained nothing more than a sofa, two upright chairs, a television set and a low table. Rather incongruously there was a french window set in the wall opposite the door. It led out into a little backyard stacked with empty packing-cases and mouldering cardboard boxes.
Dover shivered. There was a howling gale blowing through the room. ‘Might be a good idea to shut that french window,’ he suggested. ‘I reckon you’ve cleared all the gas out now.’
Meekly Mr Tompkins left the sofa and closed the french window. As an afterthought he drew the curtains. ‘Mr Fewkes is a great one for staring in,’ he explained.
‘What do you think happened?’ asked Dover, still lingering uneasily by the door.
‘I don’t know,’ said Mr Tompkins, who suddenly looked very tired. ‘She came in here to have a lie down after dinner. I suppose the light on the gas fire must have blown out somehow and she’d fallen asleep and just didn’t notice.’
‘Hm,’ said Dover. ‘Well, it’s a very small room, isn’t it? It wouldn’t take long to fill with gas.’
‘All this accommodation at the back of the shop is lousy,’ said Mr Tompkins with an unexpected burst of anger. ‘It’s poky and cramped. There isn’t room to swing a cat round. I wouldn’t have minded if we’d been forced to live here, but we weren’t.’
Dover sighed. ‘Did she usually lock the door when she had a nap?’ he asked.
Mr Tompkins looked at the Chief Inspector in surprise. ‘No, he said slowly, ‘of course she didn’t.’
‘The door was locked on the inside?’
‘Yes. I found the key on the hearth-rug when I broke in. That must mean she locked the door herself, from inside the room, mustn’t it?’
‘Was the french window shut?’
‘Oh yes, and locked. I had to break a pane of glass to get my hand through to open it.’ Mr Tompkins turned to look curiously at the french window.
‘How about the gas fire,’ asked Dover, ‘have you ever had any trouble with it blowing out before?’
‘No.’ Mr Tompkins, like an automaton, transferred his gaze to the gas fire. ‘It’s as old as the hills. You’ve got to use matches to light it, but it’s always been perfectly safe.’
Unwillingly Dover advanced into the room and bent down to have a closer look. ‘I supposed you turned the gas off?’
Mr Tompkins nodded. ‘It was the first thing I did, Mr Dover. Naturally. Of course, I knew you were turning it off at the meter but it was still coming through when I got in here.’
Dover tried the tap. It turned easily, neither too stiff nor too slack. He straightened up with a grunt and looked at the face of the woman lying motionless on the sofa. Dead as mutton, if he was any judge.
‘What do you think?’ asked Mr Tompkins anxiously. ‘Do you think it would be a good idea to carry her outside into the fresh air?’
There was a sound of voices in the shop, and a few moments later a feebly protesting Dr Hawnt was escorted, somewhat energetically, down the corridor by Sergeant MacGregor.
‘Trust you!’ growled Dover to his assistant as he backed out of the way. ‘You’re never bloody-well here when you’re wanted!’
Dr Hawnt was propelled into the sitting-room and pointed in the direction of his patient. He managed to fling one glance of mute reproach at Dover before collapsing in an involuntary heap by the sofa.
Dover and MacGregor retired to the kitchen while Mr Tompkins, thinking that the doctor would prefer to be left alone, hung miserably in the corridor by the sitting-room door.
‘I’m sorry I wasn’t here, sir,’ said MacGregor as Dover settled himself on a kitchen chair. ‘I didn’t know anything was wrong until old Mr Chettle asked me if I’d help Dr Hawnt down here. He’s a funny old codger, isn’t he? He kept shouting, “Tell ’em to fetch a doctor!” all the way down the
