CHAPTER EIGHT

MR MADOC WAS dismissed. He came striding to his seat and flung himself down upon it with a complete disregard for the fact that in so doing he had driven the chair forcibly against Mrs Thomas Pincott’s knees. Her muffled exclamation of offence and pain produced no visible effect. He scowled, thrust his hands into his pockets, and once more proceeded to cross his legs, only this time it was left over right, left ankle well hitched up over right knee.

At the grating sound of the chair Garth looked sideways, and found himself presented with an excellent view of the sole of Mr Madoc’s left shoe, a well worn surface to which a Phillips rubber sole had been affixed. This too bore signs of wear. Some of the rubber had broken away. Glistening against this broken surface, a sizeable splinter of glass took the light, and Garth Albany’s eye. He could have jumped, and was thankful that Aunt Sophy had removed her hand from his arm in order to apply a handkerchief to her eyes.

After an interval, cold reaction followed. Broken glass may be picked up anywhere. It is no good saying you don’t believe in coincidences, because they happen. On the other hand even complete scepticism would have to admit that a man might walk through the Church Cut and pick up a piece of glass on his shoe without its having any particular significance. Against that stood the undoubted fact that the Church Cut did not lie between Prior’s End and the village. It was difficult to conceive of any reason why Mr Madoc should have passed that way. If, for instance, he had business at one of the houses served by the Cut, the more natural approach would be by the road which bordered the Green.

He had got as far as this, when he became aware that Bush was giving his evidence, sitting very upright with a hand on either knee, his natural air of melancholy intensified to the point of gloom.

It was Janice’s name that had caught Garth’s attention.

‘Miss Janice, she came knocking at the door. I come down, and she said she was afraid of Mr Harsch being taken ill in the church, and would I bring my key and come along over. So I come. And there he was, poor gentleman, fallen down and dead, and the pistol lying a matter of six inches from his hand like as if it had dropped when he fell. And Miss Janice, she said “Oh, Mr Harsch!” and took him by the hand. And I took hold of the torch and held it up, and I said, “It’s no good, miss – he’s dead.” ’

‘You did not touch the pistol or move it in any way?’

‘There wasn’t anything touched, sir, except that Miss Janice she had hold of his hand and she put her other hand on his wrist to feel for the pulse.’

‘You are sure that the pistol wasn’t moved at all?’

‘Yes, sir.’

The coroner put up a hand and smoothed back his hair. Then he looked down at his notes.

‘You have a key to the church?’

‘Yes, sir. I’m sexton and verger.’

‘What other keys are there?’

‘The old rector, he had three. The one I’ve got is the one my father had before me.’

‘That would be one of the three?’

‘No, sir. There was four keys in all. The rector had three of them – the old rector that was. Miss Fell, she kept one of them after the Rector died – she used to go in and do the flowers. Miss Brown that lives with her and plays the organ for the services, that’s the key she uses. Mr Harsch’s key, that was the one that did used to belong to the organist, but when he was called up the rector had it back and loaned it out to Mr Harsch.’

‘I’d just like to be sure I’ve got that right. There are four keys. The rector has one, you have one, Miss Fell has one which is used by Miss Brown, and Mr Harsch had one. Is that correct?’

‘Yes, sir.’

There is no other key?’

‘No, sir.’

The coroner leaned forward and wrote. Then he looked up again.

‘Where do you keep your key, Mr Bush?’

‘Hanging on the dresser, sir.’

‘It was in its place when Miss Meade came for you?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘When had you last seen it before that?’

‘At a quarter after ten o’clock, when I locked up for the night.’

‘You saw it then?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘The church door was locked when you went there with Miss Meade?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Do you know whether Mr Harsch was in the habit of locking the door?’

‘Oh, no, sir – he wasn’t.’

‘You know this for a fact?’

‘Yes, sir. I’ve often been in when he was playing and stood there to listen.’

‘Have you ever known him to lock the door?’

Bush took time to think. Then he said, ‘Well, sir – once or twice – if he was there late. But you wouldn’t call it a habit.’

The police inspector was then called to testify that Mr Harsch’s key had been found in his left-hand jacket pocket. There was a very much smudged fingerprint on it. This print closely resembled the forefinger print on the pistol, which was similarly blurred, the print of the thumb and of the other three fingers being clearly those of the deceased.

‘You mean that there was only the one blurred print on the key, and one blurred but four clear prints on the pistol?’

The inspector said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and gave place to the spare ascetic figure of the rector.

‘I would just like to ask you about your key to the church, Mr Cavendish. It was in your possession on the evening of Mr Harsch’s death?’

‘Certainly.’

‘May I ask where you keep it?’

The rector delved into his trouser pocket and produced a bunch of keys depending from a chain. From these he separated an ordinary-looking door-key and held it out.

The coroner observed it.

‘This is the key?’

‘Yes. As you see, it is neither really old, or exactly up-to-date. The church is an old one. The original keys were found too cumbrous to be convenient, and my predecessor had a new lock fitted to this side door. The two main doors are bolted on the inside. The old keys are no longer used.’

‘So that access to the church must be means of one of the four keys of which the sexton spoke?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did you go down to the church at all yourself on Tuesday evening?’

‘No.’

‘But have you on other occasions visited the church whilst Mr Harsch was playing the organ?’

‘Oh, yes. He played very well. I have gone in to listen to him.’

‘Did you ever find the door locked?’

Like Bush, the rector paused.

‘I don’t think so. I cannot recall any such occasion.’

‘Thank you, Mr Cavendish, that will be all.’

As the rector returned to his seat, the coroner inclined his head in Miss Fell’s direction, and spoke her name.

Garth took her up to the platform. She pinched his arm very hard indeed, and looked a good deal as she might have looked if she had been ascending the scaffold. Much to her relief, she was first asked about the key. The coroner heard her answers, because he wrote them down, and Garth could hear them in the second row, so presumably the jury heard them too, but as far as the rest of the hall was concerned there was merely a fooffle.

What the coroner wrote down was that Miss Fell kept her key in the unlocked left-hand top drawer of the bureau in the drawing-room, and that Miss Brown, who had very kindly been acting as organist, took it whenever she had occasion.

‘Are you sure that your key was in the drawer on the night in question?’

Miss Fell was understood to say that it was always there unless Miss Brown had taken it.

‘When did you actually last see it?’

Miss Fell had no idea. She had had to give up doing the flowers in the church – she really never used the key now.

She had begun to feel more at home. She remembered meeting the coroner a good many years ago when he was a young solicitor. Ingleside… Yes, that was the name – Ingleside. Her colour came back, and her voice became much more audible.

‘Now, Miss Fell – you have made a statement to the effect that you heard a shot fired on this Tuesday evening. Your house is next to the church? It is in fact the Rectory?’