Murder Jigsaw by E. & M.A. Radford

Author:E. & M.A. Radford [Radford, E. & M.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dean Street Press
Published: 2019-03-04T06:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XIII

FRED EMMETT

Some five miles out of Exeter, on the London side of the city, there stands, amid farm lands, a large flour mill. On the opposite side of the road is a cattle cake mill. Next to the flour mill is an extensive piggery, with hundreds of Medium-Whites lolling in “garden” pens in front of their stys. From above the roof of each sty a revolving cowl whizzes round, drawing out the smelly air that comes from the presence of Mr. Pig’s sleeping quarters. Adjacent to the cattle mill are acres of poultry pens, divided and sub-divided into smaller enclosures; and each enclosure confining a separate breed of fowl.

Stretching across the front of each of the mills is a painted sign. It blazons to the onlooker that the mill is owned by Frederick Emmett and Sons, Ltd. The description is not quite accurate; the Emmett part had been deceased for some years at this time and the “Son” now reigned in his stead.

For nine months of the year Fred Emmett ground grain into flour. He turned the by-products into cattle food. He fed the middlings from the grindings to the pigs—and used the manure from the pigs for land, on which he grew grain to feed to his fowl. Nothing was ever wasted in Emmett’s mills; the result was that Fred Emmett could spend the remaining three months of the year fishing and shooting in Tremarden.

Sergeant Merry found all this out for himself when, on his tour of investigation of the Tremarden Arms suspects, he reached Emmett. Emmett’s workpeople, gathered in the roadside pub, announced enthusiastically that “Master Fred” was the best employer for whom any man or woman could hope to work. His business rivals, sadly outstripped, were eager to confess that a better man had beaten them. Everybody agreed that Fred was worth a mint of money, hadn’t a care in the world, and was friendly to all men. His bite, they agreed unanimously, was even less dangerous than his friendly bark.

In fact, try as he would, Merry could find nothing which would suggest any kind of motive through which Mr. Emmett would be likely to push the late, and unlamented, Colonel Donoughmore off this mortal coil.

Back in Tremarden, his search bore no better fruit. Nobody had ever heard Emmett say anything against the colonel. He had twitted him now and again, and said he’d knock his damned block off. But then, said the local sportsmen, Master Emmett was always going to knock somebody’s block off; but never did.

The only thing which Merry could find that was worrying Emmett was that he had lost his spectacles. He couldn’t see his fly on the water very well without them; a circumstance which had decreased his creel to an unfortunate level. He blamed the colonel for the upset, which had resulted in his mislaying the spectacles in a place he could not, for the life of him, remember, and said that he wished now, that he had thrown the

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.