Scallaway's End

The Stairs

Thankfully for Sturling, Ethel Braithwaite stepped into the argument. Perhaps she felt indebted to him for defending her over Mrs Minkwater’s murder.

‘Rubbish!’ she snapped, turning on Symes. ‘After the gunshot I heard footsteps running down the hallway, but when I came out of the drawing room Sturling was in the doorway of the library, so it clearly wasn’t him. The murderer must have been one of you two.’

Syme’s eyes glittered. ‘Forgive me, Ms Brathwaite,’ he said greasily, ‘but haven’t we just proven you to have murdered both Mrs Minkwater and Sir Cumbridge?’ He turned to Sturling. ‘Well, who would have known it? So you two are together in this business. I might have known. How much money are you getting out of this whole thing, Sturling?’

Sturling eyed him somewhat coldly. ‘I am being given no money, and Ms Braithwaite and I have certainly not been plotting or carrying out any murders.’

Sueducate, who was looking worried, said, ‘Now, now, no need to get heated over the murder when we have no way of knowing. We’d better take the maid’s body to her room, then we can have a scout around the grounds and see if there’s any way out of this awful place. Surely the road will have dried up somewhat.’ As they went back into the library, Sturling’s eye was caught by something on one of the lower shelves. It was a large paperback novel, well worn and with a library stamp on the cover. It looked so out of place in the library of gold embossed covers that he put it in his pocket to look closer at later.

Outside was cold and drizzly, but a great improvement from the day before. Ethel Braithwaite had chosen to stay back at Scallaway’s End, as she disliked walking. Sturling couldn’t see how she could stand being alone in a house with three dead bodies in it. He felt slightly worried for Ethel, as, if she was not the murderer, she would now be the main target.

The three men set off outside under a drizzling sky. From his coat pocket Sturling withdrew the library book. It was a copy of Crime and Punishment, and the stamp on the cover read Scallaway Library: please return after three weeks. Sturling thumbed through the dog eared pages and noticed that near the back a page was marked. Opening to the page he saw that the bookmark was a piece of string with a few beads threaded on it. How strange. Sturling couldn’t picture any of his suspects taking a library book out of Scallaway Library. And yet one of them had, and had very nearly finished the book.

But Sturling had a lot more to dwell on than the library book. What was the pattern with all these murders? Mrs Minkwater was clear, one of the guests or the maid had either wanted revenge or money. Sir Cumbridge’s death was more of a mystery. Perhaps he had seen who the murderer was, and had had to be killed. But Sturling felt that it was something else. There was something which had been pressing on his mind linking to Sir’s murder which he couldn’t quite identify.

Then it came to him. The discovery of the absence of the knife had come just before Sir was about to tell him who it was he had seen outside that night. And what had stopped Sir Cumbridge telling Sturling who it was? Why, the maid’s scream. It was only now that it occurred to Sturling the strangeness of the maid’s positioning when she had screamed. Why had she only called for help when in the hallway outside the drawing room? Why not in the hunting room?

The hunting room…. And suddenly, Sturling remembered something Sir Cumbridge had said in their very first conversation, when they were discussing old Max Minkwater. ‘He has a fantastic collection of heads and furs and guns… pity the old lady keeps them all locked away.’ Locked away. Of course. The hunting room would have been locked in honour of Mr Minkwater’s memory. And Sturling remembered trying the door next to the library after his first meeting with Mrs Minkwater, only to find it locked. Looking back, he now remembered the words written on the door on a small placard. Hunting Room.

So what had the maid been doing lightly dusting a locked and out of bounds room? The fact was, she wasn’t. She had been listening outside the door, and when she overheard Sir Cumbridge about to tell himself who it was leaving the house, she had screamed to distract them.

Sturling had stopped walking, and the other two turned around. ‘Aren’t you coming, Sturling?’ called Sueducate. Sturling began to walk again, face impassive, mind a whirring machine. The flooding on the road had partly dried up, and they picked their way along the edge of the road where there was less mud.

So had the maid killed Sir Cumbridge? Sturling mused. It was certainly highly likely. But then came the mystery of who had killed the maid. The maid knew who had killed Mrs Minkwater. And someone else didn’t want Sturling knowing. Someone, most likely the maid, had also framed Ethel Braithwaite for the murder of Sir Cambridge.

And yet, Sturling mused, as they picked their way single file along the edge of the muddy road, there was still that something missing, that strange thing which did not add up. There was something which he had ruled out too early on, and he could not think what it was.

Symes, who was in the lead, stopped. ‘The road’s been clean washed out here,’ he said.

‘Perhaps one of us could keep going and try to reach the Scallaway township,’ suggested Sueducate. ‘At least then we can alert the police.’

The three men looked at where the brown, sodden road melted into a deep marsh. A great tree had fallen across the road not a hundred yards away, and water had pooled around it, creating a thick, muddy bog.

‘Even if one of us does manage to reach the town,’ said Sturling, ‘The police won’t be able to do much. They can’t drive out here, and I doubt they’ll want to walk.’

Then suddenly Sueducate pointed. ‘Look, in the distance,’ he said. Symes and Sturling followed his finger, and saw, in the distance, some men hacking up a fallen tree. ‘They’re clearing the road,’ said Sueducate. ‘Hopefully we can get away from this godforsaken place by tonight.’

They watched awhile longer, then turned back the way they had come, back to Scallaway’s End. As they reached the gateposts and turned into the driveway, Sturling noticed something he had never seen before. Tucked away to the right of the gateposts was a tiny little house, a one roomed little structure with a falling in roof. Sueducate noticed Sturling looking at it. ‘That’s the old gateman’s house,’ he said. ‘Been out of use for years. A nice enough little hideout though, I’ve stayed there a fair few times when I’ve got nowhere else to go and my aunt won’t let me in the house.’ He chuckled to himself.

While Symes and Sueducate went on ahead, Sturling hung back. Slowly he approached the old cottage. One window glared at him, rimmed with broken glass. It was a sorry looking little place. And yet…

The front door, Sturling soon discovered, was around the side of the little cottage. There was a little path leading to it, overgrown and covered with leaves. But Richard Sturling was not a detective for nothing. Someone had walked down that path very recently, someone light footed, who had kicked the leaves back into place after each step, creating the impression of reversed footprints. The old door was held in place with some great rusted hinges which looked to be years old. The doorstep below had been once painted white, and against the remnants of white peeling paint Sturling could see little coppery flecks of rust, which must have fallen from the hinges when the door had last been open. Judging from the wind and rain of last night, the door must have been opened very recently.

Suddenly, a shocked yell came from the house, followed by another. Turning from the gatesman cottage, Sturling raced up the driveway, up the stone steps and into the hall.

Ethel Braithwaite lay at the bottom of the stairs. She appeared to have fallen down the stairs, and her limbs and head were on odd angles with her body. Sturling pushed past the other two men who were staring, dumbstruck, and took Braithwaite’s pulse. But he already knew it was hopeless.

‘What the Hell happened?’ said Symes. None of them said what they were thinking. The silence hanging between the three of them was enough to tell all.

None of them had been out of sight from each other for more than a moment, except at the very end of the walk. Ethel Braithwaite was the only other person left alive. Or was she?

‘She could have just fallen from the top of the stairs,’ said Sueducate shakily. ‘Easy enough… the stairs are very steep.’ Sturling inspected Ethel Braithwaite’s knitted cardigan. It had several pieces of hair on it. And one of her fingernails was broken. Carefully he stepped over her and climbed the stairs. The carpet on the landing tracked, and he could see many scuffled imprints. At one place the wallpaper was scratched.

‘She had a fight with someone on the landing,’ he said, straightening up. ‘Whoever it was pushed her down the stairs.’ And as he said that he saw, in the tracking carpet, a smaller footprint just visible amidst all of the scuffles.

And suddenly, Richard Sturling knew who it was who had killed Mrs Minkwater. He knew who had pushed Ethel Braithwaite down the stairs. He knew who Sir Cumbridge had seen go outside that night. And he knew the thing which had been pressing on his mind since Mrs Minkwater’s murder, that missing something which he har ruled out too early.

‘Give me a moment,’ he said to the others, and hurried down the stairs and outside.

*

Richard Sturling had stood outside for nearly half an hour, perfectly still, when he was interrupted from his thoughts by Sueducate, who came walking slowly down the steps.

‘Why hello my dear Sueducate,’ said Sturling cheerily. Turning to see the man however, he saw that Sueducate was holding the small handgun which had killed two people already.

‘It’s you, isn’t it?’ said Sueducate through gritted teeth, pointing the gun towards Sturling’s head. ‘You’re the one who’s been killing us all along. You must have doubled back very fast to kill old Ethel Braithwaite.’

Sturling merely chucked. ‘My dear Sueducate,’ he said, ‘I did not kill anyone here, nor attempt any murders on the late Mrs Minkwater. I’m merely here to find out who did, and I believe - in fact I am positively certain - that I have found the murderer.’

‘Tell me,’ said Sueducate, the gun still pointed at Sturling. ‘Who is the murderer?’

But Sturling merely pointed down the driveway and towards the road where, listening carefully, the sound of engines and chopping could be heard. ‘The road clearers are nearly here,’ said Sturling. ‘We’ll soon be rescued. I could tell you who the murderer is now, however I will have to retell the whole story in the next hour to the rescue party and road clearers who will inevitably have some questions as to why we have a house full of corpses.’

Sueducate’s hand fell as he watched the first of the police cars turn into the driveway and come cruising up to Scallaway’s End.