The Skeleton in the Clock

'You understand now what I meant, old boy?'

'Yes. I've understood that all along.'

'What are you going to do?'

'Get that address in London, somehow.'

'Phooey!' exploded Sir Henry Merrivale.

It was such a bellow that they all were touched by it except Stannard. Ever since that remark about Martin rushing across the road after Ruth, Stannard had been faintly smiling. Sir Henry Merrivale was standing behind the desk, surveying the quill pen with its blue feather. Ricky went over to him.

'Look, sir.' He spoke with directness. 'There's a lot more going on here than most of us can understand. Can you help?'

'Well, son, that's just what I was goin' to tell you.' H.M. raised his head and spoke with the same directness. 'Across the road,' he indicated, 'there's a snake named Masters. Chief Inspector Masters.'

'Yes. I heard my gov — my father's death was being investigated again. It's my mother I’m.. ’ H.M. shook his head.

'Masters wont bother your mother, son. He thinks it's all eyewash. I'm the one who believes there was hokey-pokey.'

'It's a funny thing.' Ricky had the same, desperately undecided look. 'Today I was giving Jenny and Martin here my personal reminiscences of what happened on the day of— well, the day it happened.'

H.M.’s interests quickened, 'So? You remember it?'

'Very plainly; but by fits and starts. Anyway, in telling them, I had just got to the point where Miss Upton and I came round, the side of the house and saw him lying there with the tapestry-piece over his head. Then, as I told them, we started back. And I looked up at a window, the upstairs window on the first floor just to the right of the front door.'

'You'd just got to there,' interposed Martin. 'What did you see?'

'The face,' answered Ricky, 'of somebody I'd never met The face of a total stranger. Looking down like God. Even this afternoon I might have imagined I'd invented it, if I couldn't half-swear I've met the same man in this room.'

Ricky swung round.

'Excuse me, Mr Stannard,' he added, 'but I think it was you.'

Stannard's black eyes twinkled above the pyramided fingertips. He smiled, and Ruth smiled as one who shared the secret

'Don't apologize, Mr. Fleet' the barrister urged him. 'What you say is quite true. You did see me.'

H.M. regarded him curiously. 'So!' he muttered., 'Then why is it there's nothin' about you in the record?'

'Because there is no reason why there should be.'

'How d'ye mean?'

'I came down here, for one day, on a matter of business.' 'Specifically?'

'Sir George wished to begin certain legal proceedings. He went to a solicitor in London, who hesitated and took counsel's opinion: meaning myself. I told the solicitor his client had no.case. Would that do for Sir George? Oh, no. I must come down here and explain why. Being the rawest of young juniors then,' Stannard spread out his hands whimsically, 'I bowed.'

'Uh-huh. What happened then?'

Stannard's eyes narrowed. His voice appeared to come from deep in his soft collar, where his chin was pressed. He glanced up at Ricky.

'If memory serves,' he remarked, 'that window yon speak of is, or was, the window of your father's study.'

'It's still a study, in a way,' said Ricky. Ricky's eyes were fixed on Stannard with hard, cold, uncompromising, hostility. 'The governor's trophies are still there, and one or two of mine. And the guns.'

'Go on,' H.M.'s very soft tone prodded Stannard, and the hitter's shoulders lifted.

'Sir George raved,' he went on, and now Ricky was pale with anger. 'I talked. Some one came in to tell him about the hunt He asked me if I were interested in hunting. I replied, I fear with truth, that nothing on earth interested me less. He took up a pair of field-glasses and excused himself to go up on the roof for a few minutes. Shortly afterwards I beard a shout and an unpleasant sound on flagstones. I went to the window.'

The old, friendly, engaging expression kindled Stannard's face.

'Don't think me callous or unfeeling, I beg. I was shocked, of course. What struck me,' his mouth twisted, 'was the utter pointlessness of this tragedy. I stood there for perhaps five minutes. The dead man's pipe was still spilled on the desk-blotter. There were his guns behind folding glass cases. Then round the house came the large woman and the boy: that I remember as a symbol. The large woman and the grubby boy looking on horrified, looking on stupefied, as though they had seen the end of the world. Whereas they had seen the end only of (forgive me) an overbearing man who would be little missed.'

Ricky started to speak, but H.M. shushed him fiercely.

'I gave my name and address to the local policeman,' Stannard added. 'But I was not needed. I took the train from Newbury: giving (I recall) a very callow statement to a newspaper reporter at the train. I have no connection with the Fleets, and never met any of them from that day to this.'

'And that's all'

'That's all,' smiled Stannard, and Ruth joined the smile. 'Stung!' said H.M.

From the desk he picked up the pen with the long blue feather, and seemed to meditate aiming and firing it at one of the brass andirons opposite.

'Whole great big beautiful bloomin' possibility,' he said, 'and yet—' H.M. threw down the pen. He adjusted his spectacles, peering at Ricky over them. 'I say, son. That roof. It's our last hope. Is there any possibility of seeing it?'

'Certainly. We use it more nowadays, for parties, than we ever did like to come along, Martin?'

'Not for a minute,'‘ replied a bedevilled man whose thoughts churned round and round Jenny. 'If you don't mind: in spite of what the old poisoner said—'

'Poisoner?'

'Lady Brayle. I was speaking figuratively. In spite of what she said, I’d like to use your telephone.'

'At your service, old boy. Beside the stairs in the hall'

That was how, a few minutes later, Sir Henry Merrivale and Richard Fleet climbed several flights of dark steep stairs, and emerged under a metal hood with a door opening on the northwest corner of the roof.

Clear evening light, with a softness of air which could be felt like a touch, lay over the concrete surface. The roof, a hundred feet square and perhaps forty-five feet from the ground, had its floor painted light brown. At equal intervals, from north to south across the middle, stood the low white oblongs of the chimney stacks.

Just-before-the-war porch-furniture, of dulled chromium tubing and orange canvas seats, stood scattered about the roof. There were tables with orange tops, like the colour of the awning down over the front door. Two beach-umbrellas lay on the floor, ready to be put up. All these H.M. surveyed with displeasure.

A faint breeze moved here. Some distance over across the road you could see the three higher gables of the Dragon's Rest; and, on slightly rising ground behind them, the vast expanse of Guideman's Field and the wood called Black Hanger. To the north, much farther away, you could distantly study the round grey bulk of Pentecost Prison: its tiny windows unwinking, its air repellent even from here.

H.M., fists on hips, turned round.

'Oi! Son!'

'Yes, sir?' Ricky, the muscles tight down his lean jaws, kicked moodily at the floor.

'Don't let Jack Stannard get your goat' H.M. hesitated. His face seemed to swell and grow cross-eyed with embarrassment 'Looky here. Did you like your old man very much?'

'It wasn't that' Ricky shrugged it away. 'The governor's very dim in my mind. He had his faults; he could wallop you like blazes. But—'

'But?'

'Well, he never minded how filthy dirty you got, or if you were in a fight. If you wanted something to do with