Superintendent Underbarrow continued to play it cool. ‘Now, suppose you just calm down and tell me all about it, eh?’
Dover took the advice and a deep breath. You had to remember that these plough-boys weren’t as bright in the head as the rest of us. He caught Superintendent Underbarrow by the lapels and gave him a good shake. ‘MacGregor! You’ve got to do something about MacGregor! It’s your duty!’
‘Well, now, and what would you like me to do, eh?’
‘ ’Strewth!’ groaned Dover. He gritted his teeth. ‘I want you to arrest him, you silver-buttoned dummy! Damn it all, you’ve just said he was trying to kill me.’
‘I did?’
‘All right, all right,’ said Dover in the hope that a bit of soft soaping might do the trick, ‘it was very clever of you. It never crossed my mind, I’ll admit that. I knew he was a treacherous little brute but . . . The young bastard, I’ll bet he’s been planning this for years.’
Superintendent Underbarrow took his time and thought it all over very carefully. Then he got it. ‘You old devil!’ he chuckled, digging Dover appreciatively in the ribs. ‘Tit for tat, eh? Paying me back in my own coin? Well, I suppose I asked for it. You’d certainly got me fooled there for a minute. Fancy trying to con me that your sergeant’s the murderer!’
‘Me? You bloody fool, you’re the one who said that.’
‘When?’
‘Just now, for God’s sake. You sat there as large as life and twice as ugly and said I ought to look nearer home.’
‘Yes, but I didn’t mean Sergeant MacGregor,' protested Superintendent Underbarrow, beginning to feel distinctly uncomfortable. ‘Good heavens, it never even occurred to me.’
‘Well, who did you mean?’
Superintendent Underbarrow got his handkerchief out and passed it slowly across his brow. 'The chap who murdered Walter Chantry, of course,' he explained. ‘It looks as plain as the nose on your face to me. A place as small as Sully Martin’s hardly likely to have two murderers running around loose at the same time, is it?’
Ten
MacGregor came trailing back up the stairs with Mrs Boyle’s handbag. He’d had quite a job getting hold of it as all the murdered woman’s belongings had already been inventoried by the efficient local police and placed under lock and key. Inspector Stokes, to whom the request had eventually been referred, had made a lot of difficulties. He’d only just finished putting the seals on the door of Mrs Boyle’s bedroom and had no intention of breaking them open again if he could possibly help it.
‘What on earth does he want it for?’ he asked, reluctandy fingering his penknife.
MacGregor retreated behind a mysterious smile and shook his head.
‘Aw, come off it!’ pleaded Inspector Stokes. ‘We’re all on the same side, aren’t we? You see,’ – he gazed at the strips of tape and the sealing wax which he had affixed with such loving care – ‘I’ll have to put something in the report about why I opened the door again. It’d help if I had a proper sort of reason.’
‘How about “ Detective Chief Inspector Dover wished to examine Mrs Boyle’s handbag”?’ suggested MacGregor unhelpfully.
‘There’s a good shilling’s worth of sealing wax on there,' Inspector Stokes grumbled. ‘To say nothing of the tape. Money down the drain and my chief constable in the middle of an economy drive. You see how I’m fixed, don’t you? You’ll be back safe and sound in London while I’m on the carpet trying to account to the old man for two and ninepence worth of assorted items of expendable stationery.’
‘Sorry,’ said MacGregor.
Inspector Stokes opened his penknife and inserted the blade tentatively under one of the seals. He paused. ‘Here, your boss isn’t on to something, is he?’
‘He’s waiting for that handbag sir.’
Inspector Stokes removed the blade from under the seal. ‘I don’t get this,’ he said. ‘I thought we were all agreed that Mrs Boyle was killed by mistake. Well, if she was, what’s so important about her handbag?’
‘I’m afraid I can’t say sir.’
‘Can’t or won’t?’ Inspector Stokes jabbed crossly at the seals and prised them off. ‘Well, I’ll have something to say about this in my report and I shan’t mince my words. Two can play at being uncooperative and you can tell your chief inspector that with my compliments.’
‘If I don’t get that handbag soon, sir,’ said MacGregor, ‘he’ll be down here and you can tell him yourself.’
Inspector Stokes turned the key in the lock. ‘I shall subject that handbag to a thorough examination,’ he announced with dignity, ‘before I surrender it.’
And he did. MacGregor, who was consumed by an equal curiosity, helped him. Neither of them were one whit the wiser when they’d finished.
‘It’d be a help,’ observed Inspector Stokes tartly as he shovelled the contents back in, ‘if we knew what we were looking for.’ He shook his head in bewilderment. ‘Why do you think she was carting five pairs of scissors round with her?’
‘Sentimental value, sir?’ suggested MacGregor, getting his hands on the bag at last and snapping it shut. ‘Well, thank you very much.’
‘Just a minute!’ said Inspector Stokes. ‘I want a signature first.’
As soon as he got back to Dover’s bedroom., MacGregor sensed that things were a bit fraught. The two senior police officers were sitting in grim silence and studiously avoiding looking at each other. MacGregor gave Dover the handbag.
‘Well,' said Superintendent Underbarrow with a painfully unnatural casualness, ‘I think I’d better be running along.’ He stood up and addressed a painting of Lake Windermere in autumn which was hanging on the wall. ‘You’ll let me know if there’s anything you want doing?’
Dover emptied the contents of Mrs Boyle’s handbag out on the bed and began poking through them. Now – what was it that Kettering woman had said?
MacGregor waited a fraction too long to see
