Mr. Zero Read online

  “Well, that’s what I thought. I came round that corner and saw Dr. Hammond’s car, and when I got clear of the car I saw Dr. Hammond. He was standing on the edge of the quarry with his hands above his head and Brewster holding him up with a pistol. I tried to get there without being heard, but he suddenly loosed off his gun and the Doctor went over the edge. I thought he was done for. I don’t know why he wasn’t.”

  Dr. Hammond’s head came up again.

  “I jumped,” he said with a wry grin. “Brewster said, ‘I’m tired of you. Out you go!’ But I didn’t wait for the word go-I beat the pistol. And those infernal brambles practically skinned me alive.”

  “Better alive than dead, sir,” said Inspector Boyce. He looked at Algy with a dubious expression. “Well, sir, all this is a bit awkward for me. You see, what with one thing and another, the evidence had got pretty well piled up against you, and-well-it’s a bit awkward, but I’ve got a warrant for your arrest.”

  Dr. Hammond gave a groan.

  “Boyce, you continue to blither, and I warn you that I am in no state to be blithered at. That’s my professional opinion. Free, gratis, and for nothing. Here, give me a hand up-I don’t want a crick in the neck as well as a sock on the jaw.” He groaned again as he got to his feet. “Now, Boyce, get this into your head. The, I hope, late Mr. Brewster murdered Sir Francis Colesborough and Sturrock, and did his best to murder Mr. Somers and me. He boasted about Sir Francis and the butler-I heard him. Mr. Somers saw him shoot at me, and I saw him shoot at Mr. Somers. Now what’s your damn fool warrant worth? Hang it all, man, you can’t go arresting him now!”

  Inspector Boyce coughed slightly.

  “If you were feeling up to it, sir, what I would suggest would be for you and Mr. Somers to go along with me to see the Chief Constable-”

  “I don’t feel up to it,” said Dr. Hammond bitterly. “I feel very ill. I require a strong stimulant, a nice hot bath, and a complete change of clothing. But I’m a martyr to duty.”

  A hail came up from the quarry. The Inspector went and looked over the edge.

  “Found him?” he called out.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Dead?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, that’s going to save everyone a lot of trouble,” said Dr. Hammond.

  XL

  Darling, I think it went off too marvellously,” said Sylvia Colesborough. She shed her grey fur coat and leaned back in the sofa corner. “Algy darling, ring for tea, will you? I could drink cups, and cups, and cups. I didn’t think anyone could ask so many questions as that Coroner did. But he was rather sweet too. Didn’t you think it was rather sweet of him to say he quite understood how upset I must be feeling?”

  Gay giggled-she couldn’t help it. The giggle slid off into something like a sob. They had just come back from an inquest upon the two murdered men and the man who had murdered them, and Sylvia was talking as if she had been opening a bazaar. Sylvia would.

  Gay shivered, and was glad when Algy came and sat on the arm of the big chair and put a hand on her shoulder. It had been perfectly horrible, but at least Algy was cleared, and Sylvia was apparently going to get off scot free. She had given her evidence with a good deal of inconsequent charm. She had looked ethereally lovely in her black. Her voice had faltered in all the right places, and she had wept when she described the scene in the yew walk. The Coroner had asked her a great many questions, but neither he nor anyone else had so much as mentioned the Home Secretary’s lost memorandum. As far as this inquest went, it had never been stolen, and Lady Colesborough could not be supposed to have known of its existence.

  She had been blackmailed by Mr. Zero on account of a card debt which she did not want to confess to her husband. Sylvia had been very convincing about this. She told the Coroner just how difficult she found it to remember what were trumps. A tear fell when she admitted that Francis had forbidden her to play. And she had played. And she had lost. Five hundred pounds. And she had been so dreadfully afraid that Mr. Zero would tell Francis. So she had taken a packet of letters out of her husband’s safe. And so forth and so on. Not a word about the visit to Wellings and the Home Secretary’s despatch-case. The Coroner led her gently but firmly through the pathetic tale. Sylvia left the court with the admiration and sympathy of everyone present. Tomorrow the Press would feature her as the lovely Lady Colesborough. Really it wasn’t surprising that she should heave that gentle sigh and say how marvellously it had all gone off.

  “Monty’s been marvellous too,” said Algy, for Gay’s ear.

  Gay stuck her chin in the air.

  “I don’t see what he’s got to be marvellous about.”

  “Well, it hasn’t been all jam for him. He offered to resign, you know, but they wouldn’t let him. By the way, it puzzled me how Brewster could have known that Monty had got that memorandum and was taking it down to Wellings. You see, we were in the library, Carstairs, Brewster, and myself, and Monty was up in his room. Carstairs went out into the hall, took the envelope from the messenger, and gave it to me to take up to Monty. That’s what started them suspecting me. I had the handling of it. I knew what it was. I could have substituted the blank envelope which was found in the despatch-case at Wellings, or I could have rung up someone who was going to Wellings and told them to go ahead, the paper would be there. Now Brewster was doing statistics at the far end of the library. He never had a smell of the paper, and as far as my knowledge went he couldn’t have known that it had arrived, or that Monty had taken it with him.”

  Gay shivered. She didn’t want to talk about Mr. Brewster-who was Mr. Zero-who was dead. She said rather faintly,

  “How did he know?”

  “Carstairs told him. Beautifully simple-isn’t it? Carstairs approved of Brewster. He didn’t approve of me, chiefly because I’m Monty’s cousin and his Roman soul abhors the thought of family interest. Therefore he was quite sure that if anyone was playing the fool it must be me. Very hot on the trail was Carstairs, and he never said a word about having told Brewster that the memorandum had come and that Monty was taking it to Wellings until Brewster had blown his brains out and he couldn’t go on approving of him any more. Mind you, he really did think I’d taken the damned thing. He’s vindictive, but he’s honest. And now I step into Brewster’s shoes, and he’ll never cease regretting him.”

  Sylvia shut the vanity case with which she had been busy. She had taken off her hat and her hair shone like pale gold. There were faint shadows under her lovely eyes. Her delicate pallor was unstained by rouge, but she had touched her lips with coral. She said,

  “I suppose you really are engaged?”

  A little flame burned in Gay’s cheeks.

  “I’ve been telling you so about twenty times a day ever since it happened.”

  “I know, darling, but people do say these things-don’t they?”

  Algy looked across at her with a sparkle in his eye.

  “We have Monty’s blessing, I have written to all my relations, we have cabled the glad news to Gay’s parents, Aunt Agatha is in process of being de-iced, and there will be an announcement in the Times tomorrow. If there is anything else you can suggest-”

  Sylvia smiled a little vaguely. Algy sometimes made her feel as if he was laughing at her, and she found that rather confusing, because there was nothing to laugh at. She began to think about what she would wear at the wedding. Not black-but they mustn’t get married too soon. She said in a plaintive voice,

  “How long will it be before I can come to your wedding? I mean, I wouldn’t like to do anything that wasn’t right. I mean, poor Francis-well, you know what I mean.”

  Patricia Wentworth

  Born in Mussoorie, India, in 1878, Patricia Wentworth was the daughter of an English general. Educated in England, she returned to India, where she began to write and was first published. She married, but in 1906 was left a widow with four children, and returned again to England where she resumed her writing, this time to earn a living for herse
lf and her family. She married again in 1920 and lived in Surrey until her death in 1961.

  Miss Wentworth’s early works were mainly historical fiction, and her first mystery, published in 1923, was The Astonishing Adventure of Jane Smith. In 1928 she wrote The Case Is Closed and gave birth to her most enduring creation, Miss Maud Silver.

  ***

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