Dorothy Sayers - The Nine Tailors

“Not he. There was a big bit of cheese beside him and near half a loaf of bread and two bottles of beer, one empty and one full. And he hadn’t died of cold, neither, as you might expect. I’ve seen men that had died of exposure, and they died peaceful — curled up like kittens, mostly, as if they’d gone out in their sleep. No. He’d died on his feet, and whatever it was, he’d seen it coming to him. He’d struggled like a tiger against the ropes, working at them till he could get upright, and they had cut through the stuff of his jacket and through his socks. And his face! My God, sir, I’ve never seen anything like it. His eyes staring open and a look in them as if he’d looked down into hell. It fair shook me.

“I looked him over — and then I saw Will’s old coat lying on the floor, thrown off, it might be, in his struggles — and that didn’t look like dying of cold, neither. I couldn’t tell what to make of it, for I didn’t recognise him, you see. I had a look in his breast pocket, and found some papers. There was some made out in the name of Taylor and some in a French name that I’ve forgotten. I couldn’t make head or tail of it. And then I had a look at his hands.”

“Ah!” said Wimsey, “now we’re coming to it.”

“Yes, my lord. You must remember that I knew Deacon. Not very well, but I knew him. And he carried a big scar on one hand, where he’d fallen down one day, carrying a tray with a glass jug on it. I’d seen that scar, and I’d never forget it. When I saw that, my lord, and knew who ’twas — well, there! I hadn’t much doubt about what’d happened. Forgive me. Will — I thought you’d done him in, and as God’s my witness, I couldn’t blame you. Not that I hold with murder, and it came to me then that things could never be the same betwixt you and me — but I didn’t blame you. Only I wished it had happened in a fair fight.”

“If it had happened, Jim, it would a-been in a fair fight. I might a-killed him, but I wouldn’t a-killed him when he was tied up. You might a-known that.”

“Well, so I might. But it seemed to me at the time as there was no way out of it. I had to think quick what to do. I found some old boards and beams in a corner, and I stood them up in front of him, so as if anybody came in they might not notice him — not unless they were looking for something — and then I came away and thought hard. I kept the keys. I knew I’d be wanting them, and Rector is so absentminded, he’d probably think he’d mislaid them.

“I thought all that day — and then I remembered that Lady Thorpe’s funeral was fixed for the Saturday. It seemed to me that I might put him in her grave and that he need never be found, barring accidents. I was due to leave on Saturday morning, and I thought I could fix things so as to have an alibi.

“I had a bad moment on Friday. Jack Godfrey told me they were going to ring a muffled peal for Lady Thorpe, and I was all of a shake, thinking he’d see him when he went up to put the leathers on the bells. By a big stroke of luck, he didn’t go till after dark, and I suppose he never looked into that dark corner, or he’d have seen the planks had been moved.”

“We know what you did on Saturday,” said Parker. “You needn’t bother with that.”

“No, sir. I had an awful ride with that bike. The acetylene lamp worked none too well, and it was raining like the tropics. Still, I got there — much later than I meant, and I went to work. I cut him down—”

“You needn’t tell us that, either. There was a witness on the top of the bell-chamber ladder all the time.”

“A witness?”

“Yes — and lucky for you, my lad, he was a highly respectable and gentlemanly burglar with the heart of a rabbit and a wholesome fear of bloodshed — otherwise you might be paying blackmail through the nose. But I will say for Nobby,” added Parker reflectively, “that he would consider blackmail beneath him. You got the body down into the churchyard?”

“And glad I was to get it there. Rolling it down the ladders — it gave me the heebie-jeebies. And those bells! I was expecting all the time to hear them speak. I never have liked the sound of bells. There’s something — you’d think they were alive, sometimes, and could talk. When I was a boy, I read a story in an old magazine about a bell that called out after a murderer. You’ll think I’m soft, talking that way, but it made an impression on me and I can’t forget it.”

“ The Rosamonde —I know the story,” said Wimsey, gently. “It called, ‘Help, Jehan! Help, Jehan!’ It gave me the grues, too.”

“That’s the one, my lord. Anyhow, I got the body down, as I said. I opened the grave and was just going to put him in—”

“You used the sexton’s spade, I suppose?”

“Yes, sir. The key of the crypt was on Rector’s bunch. As I was saying, I was going to put it in, when I remembered that the grave might be opened and the body recognised. So I gave it some good, hard blows with the spade across the face—”

He shuddered. “That was a bad bit, sir. And the hands. I’d recognised them, and so might other people. I got out my jack-knife, and I — well, there!”

“‘With the big sugar-nippers they nipped off his flippers,’” quoted Wimsey, flippantly.

“Yes, my lord. I made them into a parcel with his papers and slipped it all in my pocket. But I put the ropes and his hat down the old well. Then I filled up the grave and put the wreaths back as tidily as I could, and cleaned the tools. But I can tell you, I didn’t care about taking them back into the church. All those gold angels with their eyes open in the darkness — and old Abbot Thomas lying there on his tomb. When my foot crunched on a bit of coke behind the screen, my heart was in my mouth.”

“Harry Gotobed really ought to be more careful with the coke,” said Wimsey. “It’s not for want of telling.”

“That damned parcel of stuff was burning my pocket, too. I went up and had a look at the stoves, but they were all stoked up for the night, and the top nowhere near burnt through. I didn’t dare put anything in there. Then I had to go up and clean down the belfry. There’d been beer spilt on the floor. Fortunately, Harry Gotobed had left a bucket of water in the coke-house, so I didn’t have to draw any from the well, though I’ve often wondered if he noticed next day that the water was gone. I made everything as clean as I could, and stacked the planks up where I’d found them, and I took away the beer-bottles—”

“Two of them,” said Wimsey. “There were three.”

“Were there? I couldn’t see but the two. I locked up everything tight, and then I wondered what I’d better do with the keys. Finally, I thought I’d best leave them in the vestry, as though Rector had forgotten them — all but the key of the porch, and I left that in the lock. It was the best I could think of.”

“And the parcel?”

“Ah! that. I kept the papers and a lot of money that was with them, but the — those other things — I threw into the Thirty-Foot, twelve miles off from Fenchurch, and the bottles with them. The papers and notes I burnt when I–I got back to London. There was a good fire — for a wonder — in the waiting-room at King’s Cross and nobody much about. I didn’t think anybody would look for them there. I didn’t quite know what to do with Will’s coat, but in the end I posted it back to him with a note. I just said, ‘many thanks for loan. I’ve put away what you left in the belfry.’ I couldn’t be more open you see, for fear Mary might undo the parcel and read the letter.”

“I couldn’t write much to you, for same reason,” said Will. “I thought, you see, you had somehow got Deacon away. It never entered my head that he was dead. And Mary usually reads my letters through before they go, sometimes adding a bit of her own. So I just said: ‘Many thanks for all you’ve done for me’—which might a-been took to refer to you nursing me when I was ill. I see you hadn’t took the £200, but I supposed you’d managed some fashion, so I just put that back in the bank where it came from. It was a queer thing to me that your letters had grown so short all of a sudden, but I understand it now.”