Female of the Species Read online

  “Where’s Drummond?” he called out.

  “He said he was going to stroll down to the river,” said Darrell.

  He cupped his mouth with his hands and let out a shout that startled the rooks for miles around. And very faintly from the distance came an answering cry.

  “What’s happened?” he said curtly.

  “I don’t know,” answered Bill uneasily. “Quite possibly it’s capable of some simple explanation. Apparently the Bentley has been found empty. However, we’d better wait till Drummond comes, and then the sergeant can tell his story.”

  I noticed Darrell glance significantly at Longworth; then he calmly resumed the study of a long putt. With a bang the ball went into the hole, and he straightened himself up.

  “My game, Algy. So Hugh was right: I was afraid of it. Here he comes.”

  We watched him breasting the hill that led down to the river, running with the long, easy stride of the born athlete. And it’s curious how little things strike one at times. I remember noticing as he came up that his breathing was as normal as my own, though he must have run the best part of a quarter of a mile.

  “What’s up?” he said curtly, his eyes fixed on the sergeant.

  “Are you Captain Drummond?” remarked the officer, producing a notebook.

  “I am.”

  “Of 5a, Upper Brook Street?”

  He was reading these details from the book in his hand.

  Drummond nodded.

  “Yes.”

  “You have a red Bentley car numbered ZZ 103?”

  “I have,” said Drummond.

  With maddening deliberation the worthy sergeant replaced his notebook in his breast pocket. And another curious little thing struck me: though Drummond must have been on edge with suspense, no sign of impatience showed in his face.

  “Have you been out in that car today, sir?”

  “I have not,” said Drummond. “But my wife has.”

  “Was she alone, sir?”

  “To the best of my belief she was,” answered Drummond. “She left here when I was down at the station in Mr Tracey’s car meeting this gentleman.”

  The sergeant nodded his head portentously.

  “Well, sir, I have to report to you that your car has been found empty standing by the side of the road not far from the village of Tidmarsh.”

  “How did you know I was here?” said Drummond quietly.

  “The constable who found the car, sir, saw your name and address printed on a plate on the instrument board. So he went to the nearest telephone and rang up your house in London. And your servant told him you was stopping down here. So he rang up at the station in Pangbourne.”

  “But why take all the trouble?” said Drummond even more quietly. “Surely there’s nothing extraordinary about an empty car beside the road?”

  “No, sir,” agreed the sergeant. “There ain’t. That’s true. But the constable further reported” – his voice was grave – “that he didn’t like the look of the car. He said it struck him that there had been some sort of struggle.”

  “I see,” said Drummond.

  Quite calmly he turned to Darrell.

  “Peter – your Sunbeam, and hump yourself. Algy – ring up Ted and Toby, and tell ’em they’re wanted. Put up at the hotel. Sergeant – you come with me. Tracey, ring up the railway-station and find out if two foreign-looking men have been seen there this afternoon. If so, did they take tickets, and for what destination? Let’s move.”

  And we moved. Gone in a flash was the large and apparently brainless ass; in his place was a man accustomed to lead, and accustomed to instant obedience. Heaven knows why I got into the Sunbeam: presumably because I was the only person who had received no definite instructions. And Drummond evinced no surprise when he found me sitting beside him in the back seat. The sergeant, a little dazed at such rapidity of action, was in front with Darrell, and except for him none of us even had a hat.

  “Tell us the way, sergeant,” said Drummond, as we swung through the gates. “And let her out, Peter.”

  And Peter let her out. The worthy policeman gasped feebly once or twice concerning speed limits, but no one took the faintest notice, so that after a time he resigned himself to the inevitable and concentrated on holding on his hat. And I, having no hat to hold on, concentrated on the man beside me.

  He seemed almost unaware of my existence. He sat there, motionless save for the swaying of the car, staring in front of him. His face was set and grave, and every now and then he shook his head as if he had arrived at an unpleasant conclusion in his train of thought.

  My own thoughts were frankly incoherent. Somehow or other I still couldn’t believe that the matter was serious – certainly not as serious as Drummond seemed to think. And yet my former scepticism was shaken, I confess. If what the sergeant said was right: if there were signs of a struggle in the car, it was undoubtedly sufficiently serious to make it very unpleasant. But I still refused to believe that the whole thing was not capable of some simple solution. A tramp, perhaps, seeing that an approaching car contained a woman alone had stopped it by the simple expedient of standing in the middle of the road. Then he had attacked Mrs Drummond with the idea of getting her money.

  Unpleasant, as I say – very unpleasant. But quite ordinary. A very different matter to all this absurd twaddle about gangs of criminals and dead men’s mistresses. Moreover, I reflected, with a certain amount of satisfaction, there was another thing that proved my theory. On Drummond’s own showing he attached considerable importance to the two foreign-looking men at the Cat and Custard Pot. Now it was utterly impossible that they could have had anything to do with it since they were sitting there in the garden at the very time that Mrs Drummond must have left Tracey’s house in the car. Which completely knocked Drummond’s conclusion on the head. The whole thing was simply a coincidence, and I said as much to the man beside me. He listened in silence.

  “Ever been ratting?” he asked when I’d finished.

  Once more did I stare at this extraordinary individual in amazement. What on earth had that got to do with it?

  “Well – have you?” he repeated when I didn’t answer.

  “In the days of my youth I believe I did,” I answered. “Though the exact bearing of a boyish pastime on the point at issue is a little obscure.”

  “Then it oughtn’t to be,” he remarked curtly. “It’s only obscure because your grey matter is torpid. When a party of you go ratting, you put a bloke at every hole you know of before you start to bolt your rats.”

  He relapsed again into silence, and so did I. The confounded fellow seemed to have an answer for everything. And then just ahead of us we saw the deserted car.

  A constable was standing beside it, and a group of four or five children were looking on curiously. It stood some three or four feet from the left-hand side of the road, so that there was only just room for another car to pass. And the road itself at this point ran through a small wood – barely more than a copse.

  “You’ve moved nothing, constable?” said the sergeant.

  “Just as I found it, sergeant.”

  We crowded round the car and looked inside. It was an ordinary open touring model, and it was obvious at once that there were signs which indicated a struggle. The rug, for instance, instead of being folded, was half over the front seat and half in the back of the car. A lady’s handkerchief, crumpled up, was lying just behind the steering-wheel, and one of the covers which was fastened to the upholstery by means of press studs, was partially wrenched off. It was the cover for one of the side doors, and underneath it was a pocket for maps and papers.

  “This is your car, sir?” asked the sergeant formally.

  “It is,” said Drummond, and once more we fell silent.

  There was something sinister about that deserted car. One felt an insane longing that the rug could speak: that a thrush singing in the drowsy heat on a tree close by could tell us what had happened. Its head, of course, was pointed away fr
om Pangbourne, and suddenly Drummond gave an exclamation. He was looking at the road some fifteen yards in front of the bonnet.

  At first I noticed nothing, though my sight is as good as most men’s. And it wasn’t until I got close to the place that I could see what had attracted his attention. Covered with dust was a pool of black lubricating oil – and covered so well that only the sharpest eye would have detected it.

  “That accounts for one thing, anyway,” said Drummond quietly.

  “What is that, sir?” remarked the sergeant, with considerable respect in his voice. I was evidently not the only one who had been impressed with the keenness of Drummond’s sight.

  “I know my wife’s driving better than anybody else,” he answered, “and, under normal circumstances, if she pulled up, she would instinctively get into the side of the road. So the first question I asked myself was why she had stopped with the car where it is. She was either following another car which pulled up in front of her, or she came round the corner and found it stationary in the middle of the road, not leaving her room to pass. And the owners of the car that did not leave her room to pass wanted to conceal the fact that they had been here, if possible. So, finding they had leaked oil, they tried to cover it up. God! if only the Bentley could talk.”

  It was over in a moment – that sudden, natural spasm of feeling, and he was the same cool, imperturbable man again. And I felt my admiration for him growing. Criminal gangs or no criminal gangs, it’s a damnable thing to stand on the spot where an hour or two earlier your wife has been the victim of some dastardly outrage, and feel utterly impotent to do anything.

  “Do you think it’s possible to track that car?” said Darrell.

  We walked along the road for a considerable distance, but it was soon obvious that the idea was impossible. Far too much traffic had been along previously, and since there had been no rain the chance of following some distinctive tyre marking had gone.

  “Hopeless,” said Drummond heavily. “Absolutely hopeless. Hullo! one of those kids has found something.”

  They were running towards us in a body led by a little boy who was waving some object in his hand.

  “Found this, governor, in the grass beside the road,” he piped out.

  “My God!” said Drummond, staring at it with dilated eyes.

  For “this” was a large spanner, and one end was stained a dull red. Moreover, the red was still damp, and when he touched it, it came off on his finger.

  Blood. And the question which rose in all of our minds, and the question which none of us dared to answer was – Whose? As I say, none of us dared to answer it out loud: I think we all of us had answered it to ourselves.

  “You don’t recognise the spanner, I suppose, sir?” said the sergeant. “Is it one from your car or not?”

  “I do recognise it,” answered Drummond. “It’s the regular set spanner I keep in the pocket with the maps and papers and not in the tool-box, because it fits the nut of the petrol tank.”

  “The pocket that was wrenched open,” I put in, and he nodded.

  “Show us just where you found it, nipper,” said the sergeant, and we all trooped back to the Bentley.

  “Here, sir,” said the urchin. “Behind that there stone.”

  He was pointing to a place just about level with the bonnet, and it required no keenness of vision such as had been necessary to spot the dust-covered pool of oil to see the next clue. From the stone where the spanner had been found to a point in the grass opposite where the other car must have stood, there stretched a continuous trail of ominous red spots. Some were big, and some were small, but the line was unbroken. Blood once again – and once again the same unspoken question.

  “Well, sir,” said the sergeant gravely, “it’s obvious that there has been foul play. I think the best thing I can do is to get back to the station and phone Scotland Yard. We want a look-out kept all over the country for a motorcar containing a wounded lady.”

  Drummond gave a short laugh.

  “Don’t be too sure of that, sergeant,” he remarked. “It was only my wife who knew where that spanner was kept. I should be more inclined, if I were you, to keep a look-out for a motor containing a wounded man. Though I tell you candidly if this thing is what I think it is – or, rather, what I know it is – you’re wasting your time.”

  And not another word would he say.

  Chapter 3

  In which I get it in the neck

  It was hopeless, of course, as I think we all realised from the beginning. But it was impossible to sit still and do nothing. And for the rest of that afternoon, until long past the time for dinner, we scoured the country. Drummond drove the Bentley alone – he was in no mood for talking – and I went with Darrell.

  It was in the course of that wearisome and fruitless search that I began to understand things a little more clearly. My companion amplified Mary Tracey’s vague remarks, until I began to ask myself if I was dreaming. That this affair was the work of no ordinary person was obvious, but for a long time I believed that he must be exaggerating. Some of the things he told me sounded too incredible.

  They concerned a man called Carl Peterson, who, it appeared, had been the head of the gang our hostess had alluded to. This man was none other than Wilmot, of airship fame. I, naturally, remembered the name perfectly – just as I remembered the destruction of his airship, mercifully after all the passengers had disembarked. Wilmot himself was killed – burned to death, as were the rest of the crew.

  And here was Darrell, in the most calm and matter-of-fact way, stating something completely different.

  “I was one of the passengers that night,” he said. “I know. Wilmot – or rather, Peterson, as we prefer to call him – was not burned to death. He was killed by Drummond.”

  “Killed!” I gasped. “Good God! what for?”

  Darrell smiled grimly.

  “It was long overdue,” he answered. “But that was the first opportunity there had been of actually doing it.”

  “And this woman knows that he killed him?” I said.

  “No – and yes,” he said. “She was not there at the time, but four days later she met Drummond by the wreckage of the airship. And she told him the exact hour when Peterson had died. I don’t know how to account for it. Some form of telepathy, I suppose. She also told him that they would meet again. And this is the beginning of the meeting.”

  “So that verse was sent by her, was it?”

  He nodded.

  “But it seems rather an extraordinary thing to do,” I persisted. “Why go out of your way to warn a person?”

  “She is rather an extraordinary woman,” he answered. “She is also a most terribly dangerous one. Like all women who have a kink, they are more extreme than men. And I don’t mind telling you, Dixon, that I’m positively sick with anxiety over this show. An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth – you know the old tag? I’m afraid it’s going to be a life for a life.”

  “You mean they may kill Mrs Drummond?” I cried in horror.

  “Just that and nothing more,” he said gravely. “Drummond killed her lover: she will kill his wife. She would have no more scruples over so doing than you would have over treading on a wasp. The only thing is – does it suit her book? Is she going to try and get Drummond into her power by using his wife as a lever? And only time will tell us that.”

  “What sort of a woman is she?” I said curiously.

  “To look at she is tall, dark, and very soignée. She’s handsome rather than pretty, and I should think has some Southern blood in her.”

  He smiled slightly.

  “But don’t run away with the impression that she’d be likely to look like that if you met her. Far more probably would she be a wizened-up crone covered with spectacles, or a portly dame with creaking corsets. So much for her appearance. Her character is a thing to stand aghast at. She has the criminal instinct developed to its highest degree: she is absolutely without mercy: she is singularly able. How much,
of course, was her and how much Carl Peterson in the old days is a thing I don’t know. But even if it was him principally, to start with, she must have profited considerably by seeing him at work. And a final point which is just as important if not more so than those I’ve already given, she must be a very wealthy woman. Peterson’s life was not a wasted one as far as other people’s money was concerned.”

  “It sounds a tough proposition,” I murmured.

  “It is,” he agreed gravely. “A damned tough proposition. In fact, Dixon, there is only one ray of sunshine that I can see in the whole business. To do them both justice, in the past they have never been crude in their methods. In their own peculiar way they had a sense of art. If that sense of art is stronger now with her than her primitive desire for revenge, there’s hope.”

  “I don’t quite follow,” I said.

  “She will play the fish – the fish being us. To kill Mrs Drummond offhand would be crude.”

  “I fail to see much comfort,” I remarked, “in being played if the result is going to be the same. It’s only prolonging the agony.”

  “Quite so,” he said quietly, “but is the result going to be the same?”

  A peculiar smile flickered for a moment round his lips.

  “You probably think I’m talking rot,” he went on. “At least, that I’m exaggerating grossly.”

  “Well,” I admitted, “it’s all a little hard to follow.”

  “Naturally. You’ve never struck any of these people before. We have. We met them quite by accident at first, and since then we’ve almost become old friends. We know their ways: they know ours. Sometimes we’ve fought with the police on our side: sometimes we’ve fought a lone hand. And up to date on balance we have won hands down. That is why I cannot help feeling – at any rate hoping – that this woman would not regard the slate as being clean if she merely killed Mrs Drummond. It has been our wits against theirs up till now. She wants a much fuller revenge than such a crude action as that would afford her.”

  “I am glad you feel optimistic over the prospect,” I murmured. “Chacun à son gout.”