Solar Pons Versus the Devil's Claw Read online

  “Let us just hear it, if you please.”

  Pons sat back in his chair and closed his eyes, an expression of intense concentration on his lean, aquiline face. I listened intently as Mulvane pursed his lips and gave vent to a high, keening whistle. The tune was slow, melancholy, yet recognisably had something of the dance swirling somewhere within it. Despite our familiar, comfortable sitting-room with its cosy lamp-light and the warm fire I felt a stirring of the thrill that our visitor must have experienced as he heard it in the darkness of the night near a graveyard wall.

  Mulvane came to the end of the phrase and started on another. Despite his disclaimer he was doing well though I had, of course, no knowledge of how accurate his rendition had been. The last plaintive notes died away and to my surprise I saw the rapt, intent expression on Pons’ face change to a smile. He abruptly opened his eyes.

  “Splendid, Mr Mulvane! You have excelled yourself.”

  “Have I been of some help, Mr Pons?”

  Pons rubbed his fingers briskly together.

  “Of the greatest help, Mr Mulvane. This business begins to assume a recognisable pattern.”

  He smiled at me disarmingly.

  “It is an old Irish folk-tune, Parker, little remembered today. It is called, if I remember it accurately, The Devil’s Waltz.”

  Five: THE CEMETERY AT NIGHT

  THERE WAS A LONG SILENCE, broken only by my getting up to reach for the steel poker and to prod the fire into a brighter blaze. I put on more coal from the scuttle and went back to my armchair. The cosy sitting-room of 7B seemed to crouch beneath a more palpable cloud than hovered within it from Pons’ pipe and our visitor’s strong cheroot. There were furrows of concentration on the latter’s face as he turned again to my companion.

  “Remarkable that you should know the tune, Mr Pons. But what does it all mean?”

  Solar Pons reached out for the small metal instrument he used to clean the bowl of his pips and frowned.

  “That is a major question, Mr Mulvane, and one impossible to answer at this stage. We have several strands here and it will be possible only to unravel them on arrival in Buckinghamshire. I take it you have told me everything of relevance up to the incidents immediately preceding your uncle’s death?”

  “That is so, Mr Pons,” said the teacher quietly. “I think I have kept everything in sequence, just as I remember it.”

  “Yet there is something further, if I am not mistaken. On your card you said ‘For God’s sake help me in this terrible affair’. I presume from that that something even more horrifying happened round about the time of Mr Hardcastle’s death to warrant you committing such a phrase to paper.”

  “You are correct, Mr Pons. I do not recall having been so frightened in my life.”

  He looked apologetically at his questioner.

  “I am an academic, Mr Pons, it is true and one who is shy and retiring, but I can assert myself when required and in earlier years broke many a nose upon the rugby field.”

  He again looked apologetically at Pons.

  “By accident, I assure you.”

  “I believe you, Mr Mulvane,” said Pons gravely. “But we digress. I must ask you to recall the events of that fatal evening as precisely and in as much detail as you can remember.” “Certainly, Mr Pons. I am not likely to forget it.”

  Pons prodded briskly at the bowl of his pipe and tapped out the dottle on the fire-irons. He leaned back in his chair and stuffed more tobacco into the bowl, his alert eyes never leaving Mulvane’s face.

  “It was a bitterly cold day, like this evening, Mr Pons. Indeed, as you know, the weather has been bleak for the past few weeks. Our comer of Bucks was no exception and it was so inclement when I left the College in the late afternoon that I determined to forgo my planned visit to my local inn, The Three Cardinals. It was my intention to enjoy a good, hot dinner at the Manor, and then retire to the study with a book and a glass of Whisky in front of a roaring fire.”

  “Nothing better,” I asserted stoutly.

  Solar Pons shot me an amused glance and then again focused on the worried face of his client.

  “But something happened to break the pattern?”

  “Unfortunately, yes, Mr Pons. I enjoyed the dinner, it is true, but events conspired to cheat me of the treat I had looked forward to all day. My uncle had been acting in a peculiar manner for several days, but that was something I had been getting used to over the past months. I had gone up to my room to fetch a book and was on my way to the study when the butler told me that Mr Hardcastle wished to speak to me in his office.” “That was what time, Mr Mulvane?”

  “About a quarter to nine, Mr Pons. We had dined at seven, a little earlier than usual.”

  Pons frowned, turning over his pipe in his hands.

  “You mentioned Mr Hardcastle’s office?”

  “Yes, Mr Pons. It was an old, wainscoted room on the ground floor. It was literally an office, for Mr Hardcastle had converted it to that use and all the affairs if the estate were carried on from there.”

  I see.

  “Well, I went in to see my uncle, Mr Pons, and he was in a curious mood. I had been out in the evenings several times earlier that week and I had gained the impression that somehow he knew I had seen him about the grounds at night. Anyway, he made some excuses for my getting out some estate figures that evening and gave me a sheaf of papers to deal with, asking me to let them have them the following morning. He was restrained in manner, but seemed to be in an evil temper, so I did not argue with him. I sensed however, that the documents were the merest subterfuge.”

  “In what way, Mr Mulvane?”

  “Why, to keep me within the walls of the Manor that evening, Mr Pons. So being, as I said, still young and rather stubborn, I resolved to keep watch upon my uncle. I had no sooner got back to the study than I realised that the papers he had given me were of the most trivial nature. Now, you will see the lay-out when you get to the Manor, Mr Pons, but you must realise that to get from my uncle’s office to the front door of the house one must pass the study door. I made a few pencilled notations on a separate sheet of paper so that I should have the required details ready for my uncle the following morning and then went over and left the study door ajar.”

  “You thought your uncle intended to go out and did not wish you to know he had left the house?”

  “Exactly, Mr Pons. I could hear him moving about in his office from time to time until about ten, so I knew where he was. However, I sat in my wing chair, near the fire, half-turned away from the door. It had been quiet for some time when, a short while later, I became aware of a very unpleasant sensation.”

  “In what sense, Mr Mulvane?”

  “As though I were being watched, Mr Pons. I could not quite make it out, for the room was shadowy, but I fancied there was someone or something watching me from round the edge of the slightly-opened room door leading to the hall. It is difficult to convey here tonight, Mr Pons, but it was extremely unnerving.”

  “Indeed,” I put in.

  “However, there was a small oval mirror hanging to one side of the fireplace in front of me, and by slightly turning my head in the chair, as though I were intently studying my papers, I could make out the general area of the door. There was a white blob about halfway up the door-frame and I presently recognised the head of my uncle. He was intently studying me as I sat there in the quiet of the firelight and there was an expression of intense cunning and ferocity on his features that made me feel quite faint.”

  “Great heavens!” I exclaimed.

  “You may well say so, Dr Parker,” our visitor observed earnestly. “I closed my eyes for a second or two and when I reopened them my uncle had gone. A few seconds later I heard a door close somewhere in the house. I knew my uncle had not gone to the front door because he would have needed to unbolt it and that would have made a considerable noise.”

  Solar Pons had an extremely intent expression on his face now.

  “You were convinced your uncle wanted to go out of the house without you knowing, Mr Mulvane?”

  “Exactly, Mr Pons. There was a way he could do it without anyone being aware of it. The servants had retired to bed as they keep early hours, having to be up betimes in the morning, though the butler and sometimes the house-keeper stay up late. There were two other doors my uncle could easily have used; one at the rear of the house, opening on to the formal gardens; the other was a small door in the servants’ quarters which leads to the side.”

  Mulvane took a small sip at his glass and stared at my companion sombrely.

  “I was absolutely convinced he had given me those papers for a specific purpose and that he wanted to personally make sure I was in the study engaged on the task he had set me, before leaving the house for some obscure reason of his own. So I waited for a reasonable interval and then decided to follow.” “You thought Mr Hardcastle had some appointment near the family graveyard and that his rendezvous was so urgent as to make him ignore the threats to his life?”

  Mulvane pursed his lips.

  “I did, Mr Pons. In the event I was proved right.”

  “Pray be very precise as to detail now, Mr Mulvane.”

  “Very well, Mr Pons. I did not attempt to follow my uncle immediately, for I was certain I knew in what general direction he was going.”

  “Excuse me, Mr Mulvane,” Pons interrupted, “there is a curious gap in your narrative so far.”

  The teacher looked puzzled.

  “What might that be, Mr Pons?”

  “You have not yet said why you did not attempt to follow up your suspicions regarding this mysterious whistler in the night. You did nor visit the cemetery, for example, or question the servants?”

  Mulvane shook his head emphatically.

  “There was a very good reason for the latter, Mr Pons. I had no wish that my uncle should know of my suspicions regarding his nocturnal wanderings. Not that I had any precise suspicions. If I had questioned the servants the matter would have inevitably have come to his ears.”

  “Fairly answered, Mr Mulvane. But you have not yet answered my other two.”

  “As to that, Mr Pons, my reasons are rather intangible, I am afraid. As I have already indicated, I am a shy and retiring man. I was considerably shaken and somewhat frightened the night I heard that whistling. Nothing would have induced me to go within the graveyard alone at night. It is a grim and forbidding place, as you will see in due course. If I had gone there during the day it is so relatively close to the house that someone on the outside staff or even the indoor servants would have seen me and sooner or later the fact would have been reported to my uncle. I resolved to keep watch and try to solve the problems in my own way.”

  “Again, fairly said, Mr Mulvane. Why then, should you set out at such a late hour of night, alone and in the direction of that cemetery, a place you normally shunned?”

  Mulvane flushed and his voice was a little higher than normal as he replied.

  “If you will forgive me saying so, Mr Pons, the matter was slightly different. I was convinced my uncle was going there; he was an old man, who had indicated to me he was in fear of his life. If he could go there safely, so could I. Furthermore, I was convinced he was meeting a second person and I hoped to overhear something of their conversation, which would help explain these odd circumstances. I trust that satisfies you, Mr Pons?”

  Pons smiled, taking his pipe-stem out of the comer of his mouth.

  “For the moment, Mr Mulvane,” he said politely. “I beg leave to return to the matter at a later time, should circumstances so dictate.”

  Mulvane breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Now that is cleared up, Mr Pons, I will continue. It was a bitterly cold night, as I have said, and I was pleased to see there was quite a heavy mist coming up, which was admirable for my purposes. I let myself out of the front door, with no attempt at concealment. It was them about half-past ten and my uncle’s butler, Tolpuddle, came out into the hall, considerably surprised. I explained that I had an urgent letter to post in the village and he seemed satisfied with my explanation. The last post goes at eleven o’clock which made the circumstances seem plausible. I told him not to wait up, as I had my key, and he retired.”

  “What sort of man is this butler, Mr Mulvane?”

  “Extremely reliable and full of common sense, Mr Pons.”

  “Did he realise Mr Hardcastle had gone out so late and on such a night?”

  Mulvane shook his head.

  “It was my impression he did not, Mr Pons. And, of course, I had no direct proof that my uncle had left the Manor, though I was convinced in my heart that he had done so.”

  “Based on his flimsy excuse of giving you non-existent work to do on those documents and his furtive observation of you from the doorway.”

  “Precisely, Mr Pons. I waited in the porch until I was certain that Tolpuddle had left the hallway. The fog was thickening up nicely and I went off down the drive, out of the circle of lamplight cast by the porch lights, just in case any of the servants were watching from the windows.”

  Mulvane paused and took another sip of his drink as though his long narrative had made his throat dry.

  “When I was certain that I had not been seen, I circled round, keeping on the grass verge and again passed in front of the house, this time in the shadow of the shrubbery and set off down the side drive which leads to the stables and outhouses and, eventually, to the old family graveyard area.”

  “You heard nothing all this time?”

  “Nothing, Mr Pons. But then the fog blanketed everything and it was some minutes earlier that my uncle had quitted the house.”

  “You were certain he had left by that time?”

  “I am convinced he had made sure I was engrossed in my papers and had then set off as fast as he could. For what purpose I did not know but I was determined to find out. I had to observe extreme caution when going through the area of the stables and outbuildings, as outside staff often worked late and I did not wish to risk bumping into anyone there at that time of night.” Solar Pons fingered the lobe of his right ear meditatively. “Surely the same objective would apply to your uncle had he passed that way, Mr Mulvane?”

  “No, Mr Pons. There is a small side-lane, thickly screened by foliage, which is more direct and also leads to the side-door giving onto the road. I was convinced my uncle would have gone that way to avoid the stables but I did not wish to follow the same route in case he had stopped for some reason.”

  “Your uncle could have used the side-door to gain the village, surely?”

  There was a light hesitation in out visitor’s manner.

  “He could have, Mr Pons, but I was convinced he had not. If I found no trace of him near the graveyard entrance I intended to use the side-gate and find out whether or not he had gone to the village. As I have said, it was bitterly cold, and I was extremely uncomfortable by the time I had left the area of the outhouses, which were completely deserted as far as I could make out.” “What sort of man was your uncle, Mr Mulvane? Physically, I mean.”

  “Tall and well-made, Mr Pons. Extremely active and well preserved for his age. He had often passed for a much younger man. He had a thick black beard, which made him appear younger. It was jet black, actually, though his heavy head of hair was sprinkled with grey.”

  “Yet he was well over sixty, I believe.”

  “Indeed, Mr Pons. He was reticent about his age, though he might well have passed for fifty. The newspapers have not reported it correctly, or perhaps I should say those few journals which had essayed a figure have got it wrongly.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Because of the dates my uncle had let slip about his experiences in the East. Even allowing for the fact that he had been a young man, he could not have been less than sixty-eight at the time of his death. He was quite a gallant so far as the ladies were concerned. My own friend, Miss Sybil Masterson, commented about it on a number of occasions.”

  Pons’ eyes twinkled.

  “Ah, so there is a lady in the case, Mr Mulvane?”

  The teacher flushed and shifted in his chair.

  “Hardly that, Mr Pons. We are great friends, it is true, but there is no question of an understanding or anything of that sort. She teaches languages at the school.”

  “I see. So Mr Hardcastle was a strong, vigorous man belying his years and would have made short work of the distance to the graveyard area and the bitterly cold conditions on Wednesday evening; that is to say, two nights ago.”

  “That is correct, Mr Pons. I used extreme caution in following my uncle, as may be imagined. He was, as I have said, an extremely strong man, with an almost uncontrollable temper and I had no wish to come upon him unawares in the fog. Furthermore, I did not wish him to know I was spying upon him; and finally, as this seems to be an evening for frankness, I had no wish to leave the comfortable living conditions at the Manor to seek out lodgings in the village or even avail myself of the somewhat austere single masters’ quarters at the College.”

  Pons nodded slowly, his eyes intent on our visitor’s face.

  “At last, however, Mr Pons, using extreme caution I approached the old graveyard area. It is divided from the estate proper by a gloomy belt of trees and the estate walls take a sort of jink about it, to screen it from the stabling and outhouses. The mist was still thickening and I had no sooner arrived than I realised something out of the usual was taking place.”

  “In what way?”

  “The main gates of the cemetery were ajar, Mr Pons. To the best of my knowledge they were always kept chained and padlocked. Mr Pons, I am not a brave man and there was no love lost between me and my uncle, but somehow I felt it my duty to go forward. I sensed deadly danger and I felt I had to brave whatever wrath he might feel. There was something inexpressibly sinister about that graveyard and so, after making sure there was no-one about, I crept cautiously forward and went in through the gates.”

  “Your laudable sentiments do you great credit, Mr Mulvane. Danger to whom?”