Sgt Beef - Case Without A Corpse Part 26

It'd be about fifteen miles. It's the best shopping centre round here. Sawyer's brother was a painter and decorator with a little business of 'is own. 'E'd of got on nicely if it 'adn't been for that wife of 'is.

Stute's eyes were closed, but Beef wasn't to be hurried.

On that Wednesday 'e came in to the Dragon. . . .

Time? said Stute.

I was coming to that. Round about seven o'clock. Not long after young Rogers 'ad gone out. And he calls 'is brother aside. 'Fred,' 'e says, 'I've run away.' 'Run away?' says Sawyer. 'Yes,' 'e says, 'from 'er.' 'Good Lord!' says Sawyer, not 'ardly blaming 'im, you understand, but took aback all the same. 'What you going ter do?' 'e asks. 'Well,' says 'is brother, she's got the business. She'll keep the two men on and do just as well as if I was there.' Sawyer said 'e could quite believe that. But what is brother wanted was for 'im to lend 'im some money. See, she wrote all the cheques an' that. 'E couldn't draw nothink without 'er. See?

And did he? sighed Stute.

Yes. Ten quid 'e lent 'im. And 'is brother promised to write to 'im. 'E'd left a note for 'is wife, saying 'e couldn't stick the sight of 'er no more.

That wasn't very polite, remarked Stute.

Well, if you'd of seen 'er, sir! Anyway, off 'e goes.

What time?

Sawyer couldn't say for certain, but it must of been about an hour after 'e come in.

I see. Well, what do you expect me to do about it?

Beef seemed taken aback. You arst me to find out from Sawyer. ...

Stute stood up. All right, Sergeant. I'm sure you did your best. But I really don't see why you should expect me to be interested in Mr. Sawyer's lost brother. I don't suppose he even knew young Rogers?

A certain amount, 'e did, anyway.

Still, even knowing him scarcely seems a reason to be murdered, does, it?

Beef looked sulky. Well, there you are. I done what you said. And I told you the result.

Thank you, Beef, said Stute, icily. And the meeting was adjourned.

CHAPTER XX.

DAYS Pa.s.sED again without further revelations. At this point I really began to wonder whether it ever would be discovered whom Rogers had murdered. If Beef's story of Sawyer's brother was to be taken seriously there were now four possibilities. The whole thing was nightmarish, and I was reminded of the time when, a frightened preparatory schoolboy, I used to wake up and find myself trying to work out on my pillow the mathematical problems set in cla.s.s.

The worst of the case was that nothing seemed absolutely certain. There were probabilities, possibilities, theories, but nothing that one could get hold of.

And then one morning came an event which eliminated one of the possibilities, and at the same time gave new hope of a solution. It was a windy clear day in March, and there were snow-drops in the Braxham gardens, and the first indications of Spring, I remember. And Beef, instead of looking dull and liverish, seemed jovial that morning, and gave a twirl to his moustache instead of sucking it peevishly.

They've found 'im, he said excitedly. This ere Fairfax.

You mean, his body? It was Fairfax?

No! Beef's negative was drawn through a series of vowels. Alive an' kicking. Very much alive, I should think. 'E's in Paris.

Stute, less emotionally, confirmed the news.

He went to our consulate in Paris, he said. It appears that he wanted to move on to Switzerland. We have his address in Paris, and the French police are watching him in the meanwhile. His wife is with him.

What will you do next?

Run across, said Stute. I'm taking Beef with me.

Taking me? gasped Beef. Wotever for?

You know the man. I never trust a photo for identification. I want someone with me who knows him by sight.

Gor! 'N've I gotter goter France?

You'd better be ready in half an hour. We must catch the mid-day boat.

Beef didn't seem able to take it in. I don't know wot my wife'll say. Me going to Paris. I 'aven't been over since the War.

Well, you're going now. Hurry up and change.

Beef blundered out of the room as though he were dazed.

Only way, explained Stute sharply, as though he were trying to convince himself as well as me. Must have someone who knows the fellow.

I was, let me confess, wondering whether I should join them. I had been in Braxham just three weeks now, and had seen this case from the beginning. There were no claims on my time, and it really seemed that having stayed through all these preliminary routine enquiries I ought to follow the thing through to its climax. Besides, there was an element of the grotesque about this proposed expedition which appealed to me: Beef in Paris! The idea was enticing. And Fairfax, after all, was the person whose information would be most likely to be both surprising and useful.

Would you mind if I came? I asked Stute.

Funny chap you are. You weren't anxious to come to Long Highbury because you didn't think it would produce anything. Yet for this, which is far more likely to be a wild goose chase, you're keen. Come if you like, by all means. Only don't be disappointed if it turns out not to be our Fairfax at all. Or if he won't speak. Or if his information, after all, is valueless. I shouldn't be surprised, you know.

I won't be disappointed, I promised.

But how can you spare the time to follow us round? Don't you ever do anything?

I write detective novels, I admitted.

Stute made a curious and I thought rather hostile sound with his lips.

But soon we were tearing across country to catch the mid-day boat. There was a pale blue sky and sunlight which, at least after the winter months, seemed quite warm. And at last we were going somewhere, doing something. I felt really happy.

Beef seemed to feel the same. This ain't 'arf a lark, he said, is it? I mean, 'ere we are off to fans. It don't seem possible.

Stute made no reply, apparently concentrating on the road.

You think, then, Sergeant, that the information we shall get from Fairfax'll clear things up, do you?

I never said nothink about that, returned Beef guardedly, that's for Inspector Stute to say. But I mean, it's an outing, i'n't it?

It certainly was. With Beef in the most police-like clothes I have ever seen, with even a pair of large boots to conform to precedent, and Stute as ever, quietly dressed and inconspicuously refined, we made a queer trio.