No Wind of Blame Read online

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Small. ‘You wouldn’t hardly expect him to give away anything she may have said to him, would you?’

  ‘No, nor I wouldn’t expect him to be so much on his guard that he leaves the house sooner than let me ask him a few questions,’ retorted Hemingway.

  ‘You think he knows something against Steel?’

  ‘I wouldn’t go as far as to say that, but I’ve a strong notion that he’s got his suspicions. Of course, he may know something highly incriminating about one of those two girls. On the face of it, though, I’d say it’s Steel he’s shielding.’

  ‘Or the Prince,’ interpolated Wake.

  ‘No,’ replied the Inspector positively. ‘Not since he’s had him staying in his house. It wouldn’t be human nature for him to want to protect that chap.’

  ‘Do you think he saw something?’ asked the Superintendent. ‘According to what he told Cook, he was called out to a case on Sunday afternoon, and must have driven past the Dower House. Did you happen to ask him?’

  ‘No,’ replied Hemingway. ‘I didn’t, because I knew what answer I’d get.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Well, I’m off to have a heart-to-heart with Mr Harold White. He ought to be back from his work by now.’

  ‘You’re going to question him about that tale you had from Mr Dering and Miss Fanshawe?’ said Wake. ‘Myself, I can’t see that it’s got anything to do with the murder.’

  ‘I’ve been told it’s probably the clue to the whole mystery,’ responded Hemingway.

  Wake blinked. ‘You have, sir? Who told you that?’

  ‘Miss Fanshawe did,’ said Hemingway.

  The Superintendent was so astonished by this answer that for some time after Hemingway had left the room he sat turning it over in his mind. Finally he said in somewhat severe accents: ‘What does Miss Fanshawe know about it? Seems a funny thing to me to act on what a kid like that says!’

  ‘That’s all right, sir: it’s only his way of talking,’ said Wake indulgently. ‘Sharp as a needle, he is, I give you my word.’

  The Inspector, meanwhile, made his way out of Fritton to the Dower House, where he found Harold White, who had just returned from the collieries.

  White received him in his study, an uninteresting apartment with an outlook on to a clump of tall evergreens. He seemed rather surprised to see the Inspector, but asked at once what he might have the pleasure of doing for him. ‘I suppose you’ve got a lot more tucked up your sleeve than we heard at the Inquest this morning,’ he remarked. ‘Queer business, isn’t it? I’d have said Carter was the last man in the world anyone would want to put out of the way, but don’t anyone tell me he was shot by accident! There was no accident about that.’ He picked up a box of cigarettes from his desk, and offered it to Hemingway. ‘Have you come about what my daughter seems to have told you after I’d gone this morning? She’s a bit worried about that. Poured it all out to me as soon as I got home. Well—’ He hesitated, and struck a match, and held it for the Inspector. ‘It isn’t for me to give you advice, but the fact of the matter is my daughter’s a bit of a talker. I wouldn’t set too much store by what she told you.’

  ‘How’s that?’ inquired Hemingway. ‘Didn’t she invite Mr Steel here on Sunday?’

  ‘Oh yes, I didn’t mean that! She’s always trying to get him to come over. Thinks he must be lonely, living by himself. You know what women are. What I meant was, that it didn’t strike me that Steel was listening to her with more than half an ear.’

  ‘I see,’ said Hemingway. ‘Was he listening when you warned him that you’d got Carter coming?’

  ‘Warned him I’d got Carter coming!’ repeated White derisively. ‘Trust my daughter to make a mountain out of a molehill! What I actually did was to say to her, not to him, that as I’d asked Carter over I didn’t think Steel would want to come.’

  ‘Like that, was it?’ said Hemingway. ‘Would he have been listening to that, by any chance?’

  ‘Lord, I don’t know! He might have been.’

  ‘Well, that’s very interesting,’ said Hemingway. ‘What’s more, it brings me to what I came to talk to you about.’

  ‘Shoot!’ invited White, waving him to an armchair, and himself sitting down by his desk.

  ‘The first thing I should like to know,’ said Hemingway, ‘is whether you’d got any particular reason for asking Mr Carter here on Sunday.’

  ‘Oh!’ said White, the smile leaving his face. ‘You needn’t tell me who put you up to asking me that question. And while I’m about it, I may as well tell you that there’s no love lost between me and Ermyntrude Carter, and never has been. Give her time, and she’ll go around saying I killed Carter, though what on earth I should want to do such a dam’-fool thing for it would puzzle even her to say!’

  ‘Now what makes you call it a “dam’-fool thing”, sir?’ inquired the Inspector.

  ‘Seems obvious to me. Wouldn’t you say it was a dam’-fool thing to murder a man for no shadow of reason?’

  ‘I’d be more likely to say it if there was a reason why it mightn’t suit your book for Mr Carter to be murdered,’ responded Hemingway.

  ‘Oh, come off it!’ said White. ‘I know just what you’re at, and a pack of rubbish it is!’

  The Inspector rose, and stubbed out his cigarette in an ashtray. ‘I wouldn’t like you to get me wrong,’ he said. ‘When I get on to a delicate matter, you’d be surprised how discreet I can be. You’re quite sure that you and Mr Jones and Mr Carter weren’t out to make a bit of money over this new building scheme they’ve got in Fritton?’

  White looked a little discomfited by this direct method of attack, and shifted the blotter on his desk. ‘There’s no reason why I should answer that sort of question.’

  ‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that, sir! You’re bound to assist me all you can, you know.’

  ‘You can’t expect me to admit anything like that. Besides—’

  ‘There, now, if you haven’t got me wrong after all! Properly speaking, I’m not interested in building schemes.’

  ‘Well, supposing I say I had got a little scheme on? Nothing illegal in that, is there?’

  ‘I don’t know, and what’s more I shan’t inquire,’ said Hemingway encouragingly.

  ‘All right, then, I had.’

  ‘Just as a matter of interest, was Mr Carter to put up the cash?’

  ‘Considering we – I – never had the chance to tell him about it, I can’t say. I thought he might be glad of the chance to make a bit of money.’

  ‘And you and Mr Jones were going to get a rake-off, I take it?’

  ‘I’m not going to answer for Jones. Naturally, there would have been some sort of a commission.’

  ‘My mistake!’ apologised the Inspector. ‘Seems to have been a fair pleasure to handle, Mr Carter.’

  White gave a short laugh. ‘Poor devil, he was anxious to make some money of his own, which he hadn’t got to account for to that wife of his!’

  ‘How did he account to her for the hundred pounds he lent you a couple of months ago?’ asked the Inspector.

  ‘I don’t suppose he did. She made him an allowance. No reason for her ever to have found out about it if he hadn’t been shot. I only wanted a loan to tide me over to the quarter. Don’t get any wrong idea into your head about that! I could sit down and write a cheque for the amount right now. I don’t say it’s convenient, but my bank will meet it all right.’ He glanced up rather shamefacedly, and added: ‘If you want the truth, it’s damned inconvenient that Carter’s dead! Of course, we weren’t going to make a fortune out of that little deal, but anything’s welcome in these hard times.’

  The Inspector nodded. ‘Anyone but Jones and Carter know of this scheme of yours?’

  ‘Well, of course not!’ said White impatiently. ‘A nice stink there’d have been