Superintendent Underbarrow shrugged his shoulders. Why try to prolong the agony? One might as well take a deep breath, hold one’s nose and go in at the deep end. The sooner they started, the sooner this extremely dubious business would be over. Even so, he couldn’t resist giving vent to one last feeble protest. ‘I still think we ought to find some other way.’
‘Oh, don’t be so bloody wet!’ snapped Dover and gave his colleague such a hearty farewell shove in the back that the Fatal Flight nearly claimed its second victim.
As the superintendent clattered miserably down the stairs Dover had yet another bright idea. Even he realized that the coming interview was going to be somewhat nerve-racking. What he really needed was a good stiff whisky but, in the circumstances, a few fags would be better than nothing. With surprising agility he nipped into MacGregor’s room and turned it over with a speed and skill that wouldn’t have disgraced a professional burglar. An extensive previous experience and a wide knowledge of human nature didn’t go unrewarded. In a matter of minutes he found a fifty tin of very expensive cigarettes which had been cunningly hidden under a spare pair of underpants. They were not the brand, Dover noted sourly, that young MacGregor kept for handing round to his friends. Still, there was no time now for crying over other people’s petty meannesses. Pausing only to help himself to a spare box of matches, Dover scuttled back like a thief in the night to his own room.
He’d barely finished coughing over his first mouthful of smoke when he heard the sound of voices and footsteps on the stairs.
This was it.
The door burst open.
‘Ah, there you are!’ Dover’s fat face broke into an unconvincing smile of welcome. ‘Come along in! I hope this isn’t putting you out at all but I reckoned it was about time you and me had another little chat.’ He peered over the newcomer’s shoulder. ‘Where’s your daughter?’
Wing Commander Pile’s jaw was set grim and hard. ‘I think I informed you before concerning the position with regard to my daughter. It has not changed. Furthermore, I myself do not intend to submit to any further questioning in these highly irregular circumstances. If you wish to interview me, you will do so at a police station and in the presence of my solicitor.’
‘Blimey!’ said Dover, putting on quite a good act of extreme surprise. ‘That’s a funny sort of attitude to take, isn’t it?’ He caught Superintendent Underbarrow’s eye and after some elaborate head jerking and eyebrow wiggling got the message over. Very quietly the superintendent closed the door.
‘Whether it is funny or not depends entirely upon your sense of humour,’ replied Wing Commander Pile, as unbending as ever. ‘Frankly, I am not very much concerned with what you think.’ He turned round to find the door shut and Superintendent Underbarrow leaning casually but solidly against it. His eyes narrowed as he turned back to address Dover. ‘May I ask what you imagine you are playing at?’
‘I’m not playing at anything,’ said Dover smoothly and twirled a chair round so that he could sit astride it with his arms resting on the back. ‘Me, I don’t think two murders is a game. You won’t either, you know. Twenty years in the nick sewing mailbags ain’t no picnic.’
Wing Commander Pile’s face softened into a granite smile. ‘You are not being so stupid as to accuse me of murder, are you?’
‘Yes,’ said Dover.
‘You must be mad!’
‘I’ll tell you exactly what happened,’ offered Dover obligingly, ‘then we’ll see how mad I am.’
Wing Commander Pile’s eyes flickered uncertainly round the room. ‘I refuse to say another word without my solicitor.’
‘Very wise,’ agreed Dover blandly. ‘In your position, I’d do the same. But nobody’s asking you to say anything. We just want you to listen, that’s all. Why don’t you sit down?’
‘I prefer to stand, thank you.’
‘Suit yourself.’ Dover ground out his cigarette stub with his boot and lit himself another. ‘We’ll take the murder of Walter Chantry first because that’s where it all started. Now, Chantry rescues you and your daughter from your house. No argument about that, is there? It’s my guess that you’d have liked to have done for him there and then but it was too risky. There were other people beginning to knock about and a dead body on your own doorstep might have led to a few too many awkward questions. Then there was your daughter. You wouldn’t have wanted her to be a witness to murder, would you? Apart from anything else, you couldn’t rely on her to keep her mouth shut. I know you do your utmost to keep her away from other people but you can’t keep guard twenty-four hours a day. Sometimes there’s a slip-up. Like this lunch-time with Lickes. So, for the moment, you had to let Chantry go.’
Wing Commander Pile changed his mind. He sat down, calmly crossing his legs and folding his arms. ‘What utter nonsense!’
‘Your first concern was to get rid of your daughter. Mrs Lickes obliged and brought the girl back to the hotel here. That left you free to go after Chantry. You couldn’t afford to wait. Chantry had to be killed either before he’d time to put two and two together or before he’d had the opportunity to tell anybody else that the answer was four. The earthquake had spelt disaster for you, but you’re sharp enough to turn disaster into advantages. In all that confusion and upheaval you reckoned you’d got a fair chance of murdering Chantry and getting away with it. And so’ – Dover preened himself – ‘you would – if they hadn’t sent me down. Bad luck for you, but that’s life, isn’t it? Right – well – you tell Lickes and the Hooper lad that you’re going back to your house to get some clothes and things before joining in with the rescue work. That gets them out from
