Detective and mystery stories; England -- Fiction; Murder -- Investigation -- Fiction
“It doesn’t do to forget these things. You’ve probably forgotten that
it was Marryatt who started the whole subject, by saying it was the
kind of afternoon when one would want to murder somebody. You see, he
couldn’t get the subject out of his mind, and he thought the easiest
way to get it off his chest was to start talking about murder, quite
naturally, in an abstract sort of way.”
“You’re making him out a pretty cool customer.”
“He was, up to a point. Remember, he started out on a round, knowing
that the body of his victim lay under the railway arch. Only at the
third tee his nerve deserted him, and he pulled his drive.”
“Yes, but hang it all, anybody——”
“I’m only mentioning the fact; I don’t say there was necessarily
anything significant about it. Anyhow, I sliced mine, and so we came
to find Brotherhood’s body. And that was too much for him; you will
remember that at the moment he was quite unnerved. We had to send him
off to fetch Beazly—and he wasn’t half glad to go. After that,
remember, right up to the time of the inquest, he was in a state of
pitiful agitation. He explained that by telling us that he was nervous
about whether he’d be allowed to bury Brotherhood or not; but when you
come to think of it, does that account for the extraordinary
excitement and nervousness he showed about the whole thing? Anyhow,
the jury found suicide—and remember, he always wanted us to believe it
was suicide—and immediately his trouble vanished. He seemed to lose
interest in the business from then on.
“But over one thing he did give himself away. Do you remember, when
Carmichael produced that photo of Miss Rendall-Smith, Marryatt
professed not to know who it was? Now, I fancy there are aspects of
the case here which we haven’t been able to trace yet. But on the face
of it, it was curious that Marryatt, who has lived here for quite a
long time and knows all the clerical society round here, shouldn’t
know the daughter of the man who used to be Rector of Binver. For some
reason, he preferred not to be in the know. He said he’d take it over
to Binver and identify it. He took it over: it was early-closing day,
and Campbell’s studio must really have been shut. But Marryatt comes
back with some lame story about Campbell not being shut after all; and
he tells us, not only whom the photograph represents, but the whole
life-story of the lady into the bargain. I say, he made a mistake
there. We ought to have been suspicious.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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