Murder Most Merry

him last week. Shattering! He’d been so useful, amusing the Brigadier. When he came, he looked like a lost soul with no luggage, but after no time at all he settled in perfectly.”

She paused and stabbed at a ball of colored cellophane with her stick before returning to her startled guest.

“Albert, I am terribly afraid that it was poor Mr. Taunton who took that dreadful jewelry of Maisie Phaeton’s. It appears to have been entirely her fault. He was merely wandering past her house, feeling in need of care and attention. The door was wide open and Mr. Taunton suddenly found himself inside, picking up a few odds and ends. When he discovered from all that fuss in the newspapers what he had got hold of—how well-known it was, I mean—he was quite horrified and had to hide. And where better place than here with us where he never had to go out?”

“Where indeed!” Mr. Campion dared not glance across the room at the Superintendent unwrapping his black and gold parcels. “Where is he now? Poor Mr. Taunton, I mean.”

“Of course I hadn’t the faintest idea what was worrying the man until he confessed,” the dragon went on stonily. Then I realized that something would have to be done at once to protect everybody. The wretch had hidden all that frightful stuff in our toolshed for three months, not daring to keep it in the house: and to make matters worse, the impossible person at the end of the garden, Mr. Sampson, had recognized him and would keep speaking. Apparently people in the—er—underworld all know each other just like those of us in— er—other closed circles do.”

Mr. Campion, whose hair was standing on end, had a moment of inspiration. “This absurd rigmarole about Taunton getting Sampson to buy him some Christmas gifts wholesale was your idea!” he said accusingly.

The dragon stared. “It seemed the best way of getting Maisie’s jewelry back to her without any one person being involved.” she said frankly. “I knew we should all recognize the things the moment we saw them and I was certain that after a lot of argument we should decide to pack them up and send them round to her. But, if there were any repercussions, we should all be in it—quite a formidable array, dear Boy—and the blame could be traced to Mr. Sampson if absolutely necessary. You see. the Brigadier is convinced that Sampson was there last night. Mr. Taunton very cleverly left him on the lawn and went behind the tool shed and came back with the box.”

“How completely immoral!” Mr. Campion couldn’t restrain himself.

The dragon had the grace to look embarrassed.

“I don’t think the Sampson angle would ever have arisen,” she said. “But if it had, Sampson was quite a terrible person. Almost a blackmailer. Utterly dishonest and inconsiderate. Think how he has spoiled everything and endangered us all by getting himself killed on the one afternoon when we said he was here, so that the police were brought in. Just the one thing I was trying to avoid. When the Inspector appeared this morning I was so upset I thought of you!”

In his not unnatural alarm Mr. Campion so far forgot himself as to touch her sleeve. “Where is Taunton now?”

The dragon threshed her train. “Really. Boy! What a fidget you are! If you must know, I gave him his Christmas present—every penny I had in cash for he was broke again, he told me—and sent him for a nice long walk after lunch. Having seen the Inspector here this morning he was glad to go.”

She paused and a granite gleam came into her hooded eyes. “If that Superintendent friend of yours has the stupidity to try to find him once Maisie has her monstrosities back, none of us will be able to identify him. I’m afraid. And there’s another thing. If the Brigadier should be forced to give evidence. I am sure he will stick to his guns about Mr. Sampson being down in the garden here at six o’clock last night. That would mean that the man Kroll would have to go unpunished for his revenge murder, wouldn’t it? Sampson was a terrible person—but no one should have killed him.”

Mr. Campion was silenced. He glanced fearfully across the room.

The Superintendent was seated at his table wearing the strained yet slap-happy expression of a man with concussion. On his left was a pile of black and gold wrappings, on his right a rajah’s ransom in somewhat specialized form.

From where he stood, Mr. Campion could see two examples amid the rest—a breastplate in gold, pearl, and enamel in the shape of a unicorn and an item which looked like a plover’s egg in tourmaline encased in a ducal coronet. There was also a soapstone monkey and a solid-silver paperknife.

Much later that evening Mr. Campion and the Superintendent drove quietly back to headquarters. Oates had a large cardboard box on his knee. He clasped it tenderly.

He had been silent for a long time when a thought occurred to him. “Why did they take him into the house in the first place?” he said. “An elderly crook looking lost! And no luggage!”

Mr. Campion’s pale eyes flickered behind his spectacles.

“Don’t forget the Duchess’ housekeeping money,” he murmured. “I should think he offered one of the widows who really run that place the first three months’ payment in cash, wouldn’t you? That must be an impressive phenomenon in that sort of business, I fancy.”

Oates caught his breath and fell silent once more. Presently he burst out

again.

“Those people! That woman!” he exploded. “When they were younger they led me a pretty dance—losing things or getting themselves swindled. But now they’re old they take the blessed biscuit! Do you see how she’s tied my hands, Campion?”

Mr. Campion tried not to grin.

“Snapdragons are just permissible at Christmas,” he said. “Handled with extreme caution they burn very few fingers, it seems to me.”

Mr. Campion tapped the cardboard box. “And some of them provide a few plums for retiring coppers, don’t they, Superintendent?”

WHO KILLED FATHER CHRISTMAS? – Patricia Moyes

 “Good morning, Mr. Borrowdale. Nippy out, isn’t it? You’re in early, I see.” Little Miss MacArthur spoke with her usual brisk brightness, which failed to conceal both envy and dislike. She was unpacking a consignment of stout Teddy bears in the stockroom behind the toy department at Barnum and Thrums, the London store. “Smart as ever, Mr. Borrowdale.” she added, jealously.

I laid down my curly-brimmed bowler hat and cane and took off my British warm overcoat. I don’t mind admitting that I do take pains to dress as well as I can, and for some reason it seems to infuriate the Miss MacArthurs of the world.

She prattled on. “Nice looking, these Teddies, don’t you think? Very reasonable, too. Made in Hong Kong, that’ll be why. I think I’ll take one for my sister’s youngest.”

The toy department at Barnum’s has little to recommend it to anyone over the age of twelve, and normally it is tranquil and little populated. However, at Christmastime it briefly becomes the bustling heart of the great shop, and also provides useful vacation jobs for chaps like me who wish to earn some money during the weeks before the university term begins in January. Gone, I fear, are the days when undergraduates were the gilded youth of England. We all have to work our passages these days, and sometimes it means selling toys.

One advantage of the job is that employees—even temporaries like me— are allowed to buy goods at a considerable discount, which helps with the Christmas gift problem. As a matter of fact, I had already decided to buy a Teddy bear for one of my nephews, and I mentioned as much.

“Well, you’d better take it right away,” remarked Miss MacArthur, “because I heard Mr. Harrington say he was taking two, and I think Disaster has her eye on one.” Disaster was the unfortunate but inevitable nickname of Miss Aster, who had been with the store for thirty-one years but still made mistakes with her stockbook. I felt sorry for the old girl. I had overheard a conversation between Mr. Harrington, the department manager, and Mr. Andrews, the deputy store manager, and so I knew—but Disaster didn’t—that she would be getting the sack as soon as the Christmas rush was over.