THE RED HOUSE MYSTERY. A. A. Milne

      “We shall be in the way, yes, I quite understand,” she said; “but we can’t just shake the dust of the place off our shoes because something terrible has happened there. I must see Mark, and we can arrange later what to do. He must know how very deeply we feel for him. Perhaps we — ” she hesitated.

      “The Major and I might be useful anyway,” said Bill. “Isn’t that what you mean, Mrs. Calladine?”

      “Where is Mark?” said the Major suddenly, looking hard at Antony.

      Antony looked back unwaveringly — and said nothing.

      “I think,” said the Major gently, leaning over to Mrs. Calladine, “that it would be better if you took Betty back to London to-night.”

      “Very well,” she agreed quietly. “You will come with us, Ruth?”

      “I’ll see you safely there,” said Bill in a meek voice. He didn’t quite know what was happening, and, having expected to stay at the Red House for another week, he had nowhere to go to in London, but London seemed to be the place that everyone was going to, and when he could get Tony alone for a moment, Tony no doubt would explain.

      “Cayley wants you to stay, Bill. You have to go anyhow, to-morrow, Major Rumbold?”

      “Yes. I’ll come with you, Mrs. Calladine.”

      “Mr. Cayley would wish me to say again that you will please not hesitate to give your own orders, both as regard the car and as regard any telephoning or telegraphing that you want done.” He smiled again and added, “Please forgive me if I seem to have taken a good deal upon myself, but I just happened to be handy as a mouthpiece for Cayley.” He bowed to them and went into the house.

      “Well!” said Miss Norris dramatically.

      As Antony re-entered the hall, the Inspector from Middleston was just crossing into the library with Cayley. The latter stopped and nodded to Antony.

      “Wait a moment, Inspector. Here’s Mr. Gillingham. He’d better come with us.” And then to Antony, “This is Inspector Birch.”

      Birch looked inquiringly from one to the other.

      “Mr. Gillingham and I found the body together,” explained Cayley.

      “Oh! Well, come along, and let’s get the facts sorted out a bit. I like to know where I am, Mr. Gillingham.”

      “We all do.”

      “Oh!” He looked at Antony with interest. “D’you know where you are in this case?”

      “I know where I’m going to be.”

      “Where’s that?”

      “Put through it by Inspector Birch,” said Antony with a smile.

      The inspector laughed genially.

      “Well, I’ll spare you as much as I can. Come along.”

      They went into the library. The inspector seated himself at a writing-table, and Cayley sat in a chair by the side of it. Antony made himself comfortable in an armchair and prepared to be interested.

      “We’ll start with the dead man,” said the Inspector. “Robert Ablett, didn’t you say?” He took out his notebook.

      “Yes. Brother of Mark Ablett, who lives here.”

      “Ah!” He began to sharpen a pencil. “Staying in the house?”

      “Oh, no!”

      Antony listened attentively while Cayley explained all that he knew about Robert. This was news to him. “I see. Sent out of the country in disgrace. What had he done?”

      “I hardly know. I was only about twelve at the time. The sort of age when you’re told not to ask questions.”

      “Inconvenient questions?”

      “Exactly.”

      “So you don’t really know whether he had been merely wild or — or wicked?”

      “No. Old Mr. Ablett was a clergyman,” added Cayley. “Perhaps what might seem wicked to a clergyman might seem only wild to a man of the world.”

      “I daresay, Mr. Cayley,” smiled the Inspector. “Anyhow, it was more convenient to have him in Australia?”

      “Yes.”

      “Mark Ablett never talked about him?”

      “Hardly ever. He was very much ashamed of him, and — well, very glad he was in Australia.”

      “Did he write Mark sometimes?”

      “Occasionally. Perhaps three or four times in the last five years.”

      “Asking for money?”

      “Something of the sort. I don’t think Mark always answered them. As far as I know, he never sent any money.”

      “Now your own private opinion, Mr. Cayley. Do you think that Mark was unfair to his brother? Unduly hard on him?”

      “They’d never liked each other as boys. There was never any affection between them. I don’t know whose fault it was in the first place — if anybody’s.”

      “Still, Mark might have given him a hand?”

      “I understand,” said Cayley, “that Robert spent his whole life asking for hands.”

      The inspector nodded.

      “I know that sort. Well, now, we’ll go on to this morning. This letter that Mark got — did you see it?”

      “Not at the time. He showed it to me afterwards.”

      “Any address?”

      “No. A half-sheet of rather dirty paper.”

      “Where is it now?”

      “I don’t know. In Mark’s pocket, I expect.”

      “Ah!” He pulled at his beard. “Well, we’ll come to that. Can you remember what it said?”

      “As far as I remember, something like this: ‘Mark, your loving brother is coming to see you to-morrow, all the way from Australia. I give you warning so that you will be able to conceal your surprise, but not I hope, your pleasure. Expect him at three, or thereabouts.’”

      “Ah!” The inspector copied it down carefully. “Did you notice the postmark?”

      “London.”

      “And what was Mark’s attitude?”

      “Annoyance, disgust — ” Cayley hesitated.

      “Apprehension?”

      “N-no, not exactly. Or, rather, apprehension of an unpleasant interview, not of any unpleasant outcome for himself.”

      “You mean that he wasn’t afraid of violence, or blackmail, or anything of that sort?”

      “He didn’t appear to be.”

      “Right.... Now then, he arrived, you say, about three o’clock?”

      “Yes, about that.”

      “Who was in the house then?”

      “Mark and myself, and some of the servants. I don’t know which. Of course, you will ask them directly, no doubt.”

      “With your permission. No guests?”

      “They were out all day playing golf,” explained Cayley. “Oh, by the way,” he put in, “if I may interrupt a moment, will you want to see them at all? It isn’t very pleasant for them now, naturally, and I suggested — ” he turned to Antony, who nodded back to him. “I understand that they want to go back to London this evening. There’s no objection to that, I suppose?”

      “You