The Skeleton in the Clock

Both of his visitors, one of whom could not bear this, made an instinctive movement to get up.

'No!' said Puckston, and stretched out his hand. 'Don't go, if I've not offended you. Sit down. I was hoping you'd come.'

They sat down.

'Don't think about it Arthur!' said Mrs. Puckston. But there was a heavier glaze in her eyes as she sewed.

'I won't,' said her husband, He concentrated hard for a moment, before slowly moving his head sideways. 'Norma, haven't you got a cup of tea for the gentlemen?'

The sewing slid from his wife's lap. 'Arthur, I never thought of that. I've never been so bad-mannered in all my born days.'

'But please don't…'

'Easy, son,' muttered H.M., and gripped Martin's wrist as the latter started to speak. H.M. looked at Puckston, who had ceased to care whether they saw the tears on his face. 'You said, Mr. Puckston, you hoped I'd come here. Was it about anything in particular?'

The other started to speak, but fell to brushing the cloth instead.

'Mr. Puckston,' said H.M., 'this person who — hurt your little girl.'

As Mrs. Puckston moved the kettle from the stove-lid, the white-brick kitchen was as still as death. Mrs. Puckston, an iron hook in her hand to remove the stove-lid and see to the fire, did not seem to breathe.

Puckston swallowed. 'Yes, sir?'

'Do you want me to nab that person, and see that there's punishment?'

The lid rattled back. From the stove leaped up a yellow lick of flame, curling high; momentarily it painted the kitchen with yellow brightness; and, had he been facing it, you might have fancied a reflection in Puckston's eyes.

Then the lean man's shoulders sagged.

'What’s the good?' he asked dully. 'Like old Sir George. Years ago. You can't beat 'em.'

'I know this country,' said H.M. 'Ifs asinine, sure. It's full of fatheads. But there's been justice here for nearly a thousand years.'

'Old Sir George…'

'Could he take your land from you, when he tried to?'

'No, by God 'e couldn't!'

Rattle went the stove-lid, back into place.

'Arthur,' said-his wife, herself near to breaking down, 'I don't think I’ll make tea. I think there's some bottles of the '24 port that the gentlemen would like better. I think I know how to find them.'

Then she was out of the room. Her husband, struggling to pull his wits together, pressed his hands flat on the table. His mildness, his weary look, showed he could scarcely do it.

'Can — you help me?' Puckston asked.

'If you help me.'

'How? I'll try. Yes; I'll do it'

'Son, I warn you: the first bit is goin’ to hurt It’ll keep you thinking about your daughter.' 'Go ahead.'

From his inside breast pocket H.M. took out three postcards. One, postmarked July 5th, read, Re Sir George Fleet: examine the skeleton in the clock. The second, July 6th: Re Sir George Fleet: what was the pink flash on the roof? The third, July 7th: Re Sir George Fleet: evidence of murder is still there. Clearing a space on the supper-table, pushing away cutlery and a bottle of Worcestershire sauce, he put down the exhibits.

'Son,' he said quietly, 'you sent these postcards.'

The other's mouth quivered like a hurt child's.

To be more exact,' added H.M., 'you dictated the substance and Enid put it down in correct grammar and spelling, with schoolgirl flourishes.' ''Ow did you know that?' asked Puckston. 'Never mind. It's not important. What I…' ''Ow did you know that?' repeated Puckston, with the insistence of the drunken or the damned. The tears had started. again.

'Oh, son! From your antiques here I thought you might subscribe to Willaby's catalogue. I asked Lady Br — I asked somebody in this district if you did, and she said yes. She also said she got her last catalogue on July 5th, which is the postmark on that first anonymous card.

'Y'see, that was the catalogue that listed the skeleton in the clock. Somebody got it on July 5th, and fired off an anonymous postcard to stir up the police about the Fleet case. There weren't likely to be two such curiosities.as that clock floatin' about' 'I'm not saying I didn't do it' Puckston had the palms of his hands pressed over his face. He rocked back and forth.

'But why did it have to be me who sent the postcards?' H.M. expelled a slow, deep breath of relief. They could hear the throb of the fire inside the stove, and Mrs. Puckston moving somewhere in the cellar.

'Well… now. That's what we're coming to. And it’ll be easier. Because it's about Sir George Fleet's death.'

H.M. snapped his fingers down at one side, without looking away from Puckston. Martin rightly interpreted this as an order to pick up the blue Scotland Yard folder, which H.M. had dropped.

Puckston was not composed now, but he was more composed. Any mention of Fleet could rouse him. His light-blue eyes, bloodshot and reddish at the lids, tried to focus on H.M. out of a long, wretched face.

'Do you remember,' continued H.M., turning over the typewritten pages of the folder, 'what happened the day Fleet died?'

'Do I remember when I first walked out with Norma?' 'You didn't like Fleet Hey?'

'I wonder,' said Puckston, shutting his eyes, 'if that man ever thought how much I looked down on him. 'Im, with 'is money made out of the fourteen-eighteen war! Me, whose forbears 'ave owned this inn a matter of two hundred year! But you can't make the nobs see that They don't notice!'

'Let's come to the day, shall we?'

'Glad to.'

'You, accordin' to your testimony, were sitting on the top of the north gable with a telescope. You were watching the hunt, You heard the shout Fleet gave. Now lemme read you a part of your statement verbatim.'

H.M. found the passage and ran his finger down it

I looked round. I saw something pitch over the little ledge, but it was so quick I did not see what it was. I looked—

H.M. paused abruptly. There was a space of silence, while Martin found the sweat stand out on his forehead.

'Y’see,' H.M. said very gently, 'that second sentence just can't possibly be true.'

'Why not?'

'I'll tell you. If there's one thing of general agreement, it's that Fleet gave a shout and immediately fell. If you doubt that, see the testimony of Simon Frew, who had the binoculars on the middle gable and is admittedly an honest witness.

'But what about you? You were on the north gable, watching the hunt: either the hounds streakin' to the north, or the field galloping round Black Hanger to the east You heard a yell: that's all. You couldn't have known where it came from, except somewhere behind you. You couldn't have known what it meant By the time you could swing that telescope round, Fleet must have been dead on the flagstones.

'Yet you claim, see, that out of all the space of sky and land comin' round into view through your telescope, you managed to pick out the exact spot where Fleet was standing just as he fell. Son, it won't do. It's plain ridiculous.'

Again there was a silence.

In Puckston's expression there was no fear, no wrath, no shrinking; only a curious twitch of the mouth which Martin could not identify.

'What did I do, then?' Puckston asked.

'Tm goin' to suggest' pursued H.M., turning back a page and tapping it, 'that the same thing which happened to Simon Frew also happened to you.'