Muriel Spark - The Complete Short Stories

Within three months the rumours had increased, and a reporter from a national newspaper was said to have visited the area. The police had to act. They disinterred Matthews’s body. The Home Office pathologist found that the fracture on his skull had been caused by a blow. It was now certain that Matthews had been murdered during the night of the second—third of October.

Poor Harold tried to explain to the police that he could not have killed his father, since old Matthews was not his father. That’s how the police came to know about his illegitimacy. But in any case, they didn’t waste time trying to get sense out of Harold, for the man had a perfect alibi.

During the night of the murder he had been watching the others playing cards in the kitchen, and then had gone to bed in a room which he shared with one of the farm hands.

It was at this point in the investigations that we from London were called in. First we were presented with a number of established facts. On the afternoon of the second of October Matthews had gone to a farm two miles from Mellow to help with a difficult calving. He left this place just after nine that night and was seen to cross some fields, slowly because of his age. This would bring him to the main road at about 10.20. The doctor was passing in his car and stopped, apparently to give Matthews a lift. Matthews entered the car, where he sat talking to the doctor. A courting couple who passed them at 10.30 said they seemed to be arguing rather violently. No one observed the car drive off.

You will wonder how the witnesses remembered these encounters three months after the event. Well, mainly because it was the night old Matthews was killed. People said, when they heard the news of Matthews’s death, ‘Why, I saw him that very night!’ and so on. It’s surprising the things people remember and what they forget, especially in this case, as you’ll see.

Everyone at the farmhouse was equally clear about what had happened that night, with the exception of Harold who wasn’t clear about much. They had been playing cards in the kitchen — some farm labourers who lived at the house, and Mrs Matthews — with Harold looking on. At midnight they heard a car drive up the farm lane and stop outside the outhouse. They assumed that old Matthews had got a lift home. They heard him, as they supposed, enter the outhouse, the door of which had a noisy hinge. A few seconds later the car drove off.

This was at midnight. They all swore they heard the church clock strike twelve when the car arrived. By our reckoning, it was not old Matthews whom they heard entering the outhouse, but the murderer dumping the body. A murderer with a car. Now Matthews had been seen arguing with the doctor at 10.30, only a few minutes’ drive from the farm. Yet these noises were not heard till twelve.

We questioned the doctor, of course. His name was Fell. He lived in another village — Otling, three miles from Mellow along the main road. His story was that he had sat chatting to Matthews — a patient of his —for over half an hour in the car. They had had a little argument about politics. He had then driven Matthews to his farm, arriving there at eleven o’clock. After that he had proceeded home where he arrived at ten past eleven.

There he found an urgent message to visit a sick patient, and set off immediately. He attended to his patient — a childbirth case — and was home again just as the church clock struck midnight.

Dr Fell’s manner was extremely helpful. He actually wrote out a statement for us, giving all his movements that night and citing his witnesses. We checked up on everything and could find no flaw in his alibi. There was no doubt he had visited his patient at twenty past eleven, for the child was registered as having been born at ten minutes to twelve. His housekeeper’s niece, who had just returned home from a dance, as well as his wife, gave evidence of his return home as the clock struck midnight. He couldn’t have been both at Mellow and at Otling as the church clock struck midnight.

And I was assured that the church clock always kept perfect time.

And you will say, were the farm people lying? Did they really hear those noises at the outhouse at midnight?

Do you know, it was a strange thing — we are all of us experienced in detecting lies — but we couldn’t break down one of those witnesses, either at Otling or at Mellow, in the slightest detail. We had no evidence against Dr Fell. It was quite a puzzle. Three months after the event, you know, there isn’t much physical evidence to go by — fingerprints and so on.

But we suspected Dr Fell. Our investigations had brought another important fact to light. Old Matthews had been receiving monthly payments from Dr Fell for thirty-odd years.

Of course, we thought of blackmail. We questioned Mrs Matthews about this. She denied knowledge of the money, but eventually told us that Dr Fell was Harold’s real father. It looked very much to us that the monthly payments were made to keep old Matthews quiet. A country doctor can’t afford to lose his reputation.

And we found that a few months before the murder these payments had increased. The increase coincided exactly with Dr Fell’s marriage to a much younger woman. If our theory was correct Matthews had seized the opportunity of the marriage to increase his demands, for in those days — perhaps even now — a doctor would not wish his bride to know of an illegitimate son in the neighbourhood. Here, then, was a clear motive for murder. But Dr Fell had his alibi. We could not prove it.

I questioned him again. His eyes fixed themselves on me. I was almost hypnotized. I must say I felt very uneasy in his presence. But of course in our profession we are trained to discount most of our personal feelings when dealing with a suspect. Still, the old rhyme went round my head as I drove away from his house:

I do not like thee, Dr Fell.

The reason why I cannot tell.

But this one thing I know full well:

I do not like thee, Dr Fell.

Shortly after this a member of the local police made a discovery which earned him promotion. He was looking through the statement which Dr Fell had written out for us when he noticed a peculiarity in the writing which coincided with that of the anonymous letter they had received accusing Harold of the crime. The letter had been written in a disguised hand, but still the experts confirmed the suspicions of that clever policeman. Now, at least, we had something concrete to tax Dr Fell with — and a concrete charge is always a help in a murder case.

He was, of course, upset at our discovery. Eventually he admitted writing it, said he had genuinely suspected Harold but could not bring himself to say so at the inquest. We suggested to him that the letter was written as a defence against blackmail on the part of Harold. The doctor denied it.

However, I went off to interview Harold, hoping to discover what he knew about Dr Fell. With simple people it is best to be direct. I said, ‘Harold, why did you try to get money out of Dr Fell?’

He said, ‘Eh?’

I said, ‘You think he killed the old man, don’t you?’

He said, ‘That’s right, sir, I do.’

But, like ourselves, poor Harold had no evidence to produce against the doctor. There were probabilities, but simply no answer to the fact that he had been seen at Otling at the very time the car had been heard at Mellow.

I can’t tell you how disappointed I was after that interview with Harold. There was no further point in our men hanging on at Mellow. We were to return to London next morning, our criminal in sight but not brought to justice.

I was so disappointed that I said, half to myself and half to Harold, ‘If only we could shake his alibi for that particular midnight!’ Harold didn’t seem to take this in. I went my way.