At the Gudgeon, they found Leyland writing up his diary at a table by the window, while Mr. Farris, in an uncomfortable rush-bottomed chair, was reading the local directory.
“Well,” said Bredon cheerfully, “it’s up to you now. Angela’s going upstairs to ask Nigel a few questions; when I know the answer to those, I shall be able to leave the whole business in your hands.”
“What exactly do you want me to do?” asked Leyland.
“Why, get on to the Continental police, and ask them to obtain all the information they can about the movements of a traveller who crossed the Channel about ten days ago, giving the name of Mr. Luke Wallace.”
Leyland gave one anguished glance in the direction of Mr. Farris, imagining that Bredon had not noticed him. Farris himself sprang to his feet with a look of utter bewilderment. “The Channel? The Continent? But I assure you I haven’t left England since Christmas! Really, Mr. Bredon—”
“It’s all right; nothing to do with you. Except that, apparently, somebody’s been borrowing your alias. That can hardly be described as impersonation, though of course it’s open to you to regard it as a breach of copyright. But I shouldn’t use that alias any more, if I were you, because the gentleman who borrowed it will, before long, be much in the mouths of the police.”
“That’s all very well,” objected Leyland, “but surely the fellow will have had the sense to take a fresh alias when he got across to the other side. Why stick to the old name, when he can always invent a new one?”
“He might do that, of course. But he’s been at such pains to identify himself, for a particular object, as Mr. Luke Wallace, that I have a strong suspicion he will stick to the name. You see, he thinks that the identification will put us off the scent.”
“And the real name?”
“Is, of course, Derek Burtell.”
XXIV
Backed Both Ways
Angela came in before anybody had time to add further comment. “France, Belgium,” she said. “A good way up the river, near Ditcham Martin, just after breakfast. Yes, each took three of the other—Derek’s suggestion.”
“That settles it,” said Bredon. “Leyland, I really think you might return Nigel his trousers. All the same, we won’t ask him downstairs just now, because I may be taking his name in vain a bit.”
“Derek Burtell!” said Leyland in a stupefied way. “How long have you been on his track?”
“Only since yesterday. I thought it all out this morning. But, of course, we ought to have recognized it was either he or somebody like him who was responsible for all this mystery-making.”
“Somebody like him? How, like him?”
“Somebody who took drugs. Don’t you see, this whole business has puzzled us from the first because there were signs of extraordinary cunning at work, and yet it didn’t figure out right. It didn’t give us a wrong impression, as it was obviously meant to; it simply gave us no impression at all. It was fantastic, like a dream. And that was because it was a dream, really—an opium dream, only carried out in real life.
“Derek, as we know, was a quite unimaginative person. But Derek was taking the stuff in large quantities; and whatever else is certain about the effects of drug-taking, it’s certain that it turns people into champion liars. Derek, in an ordinary way, was too stupid to lie, or at least to lie cleverly. But the drug let him out. They say every man has one good story in him; and Derek has produced one story, not by writing it but by acting it. I don’t think it would ever have formed itself properly in his imagination if it hadn’t come to him in those moments of exaltation when the drug-taker sees clearly and imagines without effort. Like Kubla Khan, you know. Only this time there was no gentleman from Porlock to interfere, and the dream was realized. The outline was a framework of splendid deception; the details were untidily managed, because Derek hadn’t got the drug in him when he arranged them.
“Derek Burtell hated his cousin. We know that, and we know why. But his hatred took something like a moral form; he at any rate believed that his cousin was as good as a murderer, because he was responsible for that woman’s death. He didn’t want to kill Nigel: he wanted Nigel to be executed by the laws of his country. Since Nigel couldn’t be punished for the murder he had done, he should be punished for a murder he hadn’t done. He should be punished for murdering Derek, and Derek would disappear in circumstances which would make everybody think he was murdered.”
“One moment, Miles,” said Angela. “Did Derek mean to give up his fifty thousand altogether? Because if Nigel had been hanged, the legacy would never have been available.”
“My impression is that he was backing himself both ways. If Nigel were hanged, well and good; he would sooner have his vengeance than any amount of legacies. But if Nigel escaped suspicion, the other plan would hold; Nigel would come in for the legacy, Derek would get into communication with him, and they would split the proceeds. Derek took his cousin fully into his confidence up to a point. Beyond that point he kept him in the dark. And I suppose he never dreamed that Nigel would have the face to tell that story he told us yesterday morning, or that he would be believed if he did. It would be supposed that Nigel was just inventing the tale of the bargain, to save his own skin. I believe you did think that, Leyland.”
“I’m still waiting to be told why I’m not to think so.”
“Because of Mr. Luke Wallace’s visit to Witney. We shall come to that. What I want you to take on trust for the moment is that everything Nigel has told us about his movements on that Sunday
