Freeman Wills Crofts - The Groote Park Murder

Vandam did not obtain all this information at his first call. He spent the afternoon going from shop to shop, and picked it up gradually. But nowhere did he hear of a rival to Smith.

Six o’clock was chiming from the city churches as Vandam left the last shop. His next business would be to go down to East Hawkins Street, where Miss Louden lived, and interview the lady herself. He thought that the evening would be as good a time as any for the purpose, and he went home with the intention of paying the call after he had dined.

But when, some two hours later, he asked for a drink in the bar of Louden’s Hotel, he met with a disappointment. The proprietor served him in person, and he soon learned that Miss Louden was unwell. Discreet inquiries produced the information that she was down with an attack of influenza, but was over the worst of it.

There was nothing for it, therefore, but to switch on to one of his other lines of investigation, and next day he determined he would begin the tracing of the movements of Swayne on the night of the murder.

The case against Swayne seemed to him quite strong, and he thought that if he could connect Swayne with Miss Jane Louden, and show that the fight with Smith had been about her, it would be overwhelming. But, even apart from that, it was by no means negligible.

Swayne and Smith had never got on. Smith was continually being offensive to Swayne, and Swayne was apparently swallowing it, until his temper had got the better of him and he had gone for his enemy, fighting seemingly with the object of killing him. That was only a month ago, and the passions then roused would still be strong. The whole thing looked, not only to Vandam, but to Hurst, as if Smith had some hold over the sales manager which made the latter stand treatment he would not otherwise have put up with; just, in fact, the kind of hold which would lead a man to commit murder.

A fact which tended in the same direction was the date of the tragedy. It had occurred on the very night on which Swayne had left Middeldorp for England. If Swayne intended to commit the crime, it was the night he would chose. From the psychological point of view, to complete his revenge would naturally be the thing he would wish to do last before leaving. There might also be another and more practical reason. He might hope that his departure would serve him as an alibi. If the police could be made to believe that the murder had been committed after he had gone, it would meet his case.

All these points were matters for investigation, and Vandam felt he must get at them without delay.

NEXT morning Inspector Vandam began his investigation into the movements of Swayne on the night of the murder, by a visit to his landlady, whose address he had obtained from Mr Hurst on the occasion of his visit to the Mees Street store.

Sydenham Avenue was in a much better district than Rotterdam Road, where Smith had lodged, and No. 18 proved to be a boarding-house of superior type to the average. The landlady, tall and stately as a stage duchess, received him in an office at the back of the lounge, and answered his questions with cold, though polite, efficiency.

Mr Swayne had lived in her establishment, she told him, for three years, during which time she had found him all that a gentleman should be. About a month previously he had informed her that he was going for a holiday to England, explaining that while he was anxious to retain his room, which was particularly comfortable, he did not want to pay for it while away, and asking her if she could let it for the three months. Anxious to oblige him, she had consented to do so if possible, and had succeeded in hearing of an engineer who wished for a few weeks’ accommodation while studying conditions in some of the neighbouring mines. This man agreed to take Swayne’s room for the three months, provided he could get it by a certain day. As the date was only four days before Swayne’s departure, the latter had given it up, and, there being no other vacant room in the boarding-house, he had gone for the period in question to the Bellevue Hotel. About his actual departure from Middeldorp, or his movements on the last day of his stay, the landlady could therefore tell nothing.

Nor did she know anything of Smith nor of the relations between him and Swayne. She had contented herself with her business of running the house, and was not cognisant of the private affairs of her guests.

Before leaving, Vandam asked the landlady if she could show him a photograph of Swayne. It happened that she was able to do so, and while commenting on it, Vandam took a mental note of the photographer’s address.

On leaving Sydenham Avenue he went to the studio. There he was able to buy a copy of the portrait, which by another lucky chance was adorning one of the show frames in the window. At the same time he purchased three or four similar sized photographs of men as like Swayne as he could find.

His next business was at the Bellevue Hotel, and returning to the centre of the town, he reached the great building and asked for the manager.

‘Mr Royle is in Capetown,’ he was told, ‘but Mr Buchan, his assistant, is here, if he would do.’

Mr Buchan proved to be an efficient-looking young man with red hair and a Scotch accent. He listened courteously as Vandam explained his business.

‘I don’t want it to go further, Mr Buchan, but as a matter of fact our Chief has got a bee in his bonnet about Mr Smith’s death. He believes it was suicide. Personally I don’t, but orders are orders, and I’ve got to try and settle the point. Now Smith is believed to have seen a Mr Swayne earlier that same day. You knew Mr Swayne? He is in the Hope Bros. firm, and left a few days ago for a holiday in England.’

‘I knew him, yes,’ Buchan answered. ‘He stayed here for two or three days before leaving South Africa, though I had met him before that. We do a good deal of business with Hope Bros., and I’ve come across most of their staff. Mr Crawley, the manager, I know intimately.’

‘Quite. Well, as I say, it is believed that Smith and this Mr Swayne met some time during the day Mr Swayne left. We want to settle this point, because if they did meet Mr Swayne should be able to give us some valuable information as to Mr Smith’s state of mind and so on. But we don’t want to make a fuss and wireless the boat if there’s nothing in it. So I’m to find out first if they did meet. Can you help me in that, do you think.’

Buchan shook his head.

‘Why, no, I’m afraid not. I didn’t see Swayne that evening at all.’

‘Some of your people might know. If you’d be so kind as to put me in touch, say, with your reception clerk, I could make a few inquiries.’

‘With pleasure. Will you come this way?’

A young man was working in the reception office. Mr Buchan called him over.

‘Ah, Bragg,’ he explained. ‘This gentleman, Mr Vandam, is making some private inquiries about Mr Swayne, who stayed here recently. You remember him, no doubt?’ Mr Buchan turned to Vandam. ‘Mr Bragg will do all he can for you, and if you want me I shall be in my office.’

‘Mr Swayne left by the south express that same Wednesday night,’ the young man said promptly when Vandam had explained his errand. ‘It leaves the station here at 3.45 a.m. It’s the through train from the north.’

‘Did you see him before he left?’

‘Not immediately before. I saw him in the afternoon about five. He went out of the hotel about five, and he made some remark to me as he passed the office window. I didn’t see him after that, but he must have come in some time later, for he sent a waiter down from his room at about half-past ten for his bill. I sent the bill up and the money came back.’