Who Pays the Piper?_An Ernest Lamb Mystery by Patricia Wentworth

Author:Patricia Wentworth [Wentworth, Patricia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dean Street Press
Published: 2016-05-09T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Four

Bill Carrick and Susan Lenox drove in the pale sunlight. It had been fine all the morning. It was fine still, but there was an east wind blowing and no warmth anywhere. They went by crooked lanes between bare hedgerows, and then up through a cutting, where tree roots propped the banks, to an open heathy common. Right in the middle of it Bill drove off the road on to a flat sandy place and stopped the car. A solitary motor-bicycle went by and disappeared behind a clump of rowans and gorse bushes a couple of hundred yards away. Susan watched it out of sight. She frowned a little and said,

“He’s been behind us all the way.”

Bill said, “Yes.”

She looked at him with startled eyes.

“I can’t hear his engine.”

Bill said, “No—he’s stopped.” Then he laughed. “I wonder what he would have done if there hadn’t been a clump of trees.”

“Do you mean he’s following us? Bill!”

He sat round against the side of the car and faced her.

“Of course he is. I expect he’s been told to be discreet. He won’t do anything more than follow us unless he thinks I’m going to do a bunk. It must be very reassuring for him to see us sitting here in a nice open place like this—very calming. And as he’s well out of earshot, we can afford to be calm about it too.”

“You mean he’s a policeman?”

“Undoubtedly. Look here, Susan, we’ve got to face this. I’m under suspicion. Old Lamb isn’t going to risk my cutting loose. Of course I’d be a fool to do it, but if I’d really shot Dale I expect I should be so rattled by now that I might be ready for any fool trick. Ever since he saw us this morning I’ve been wondering why he hasn’t had me arrested, but now I think it’s because he’s got me on a string and if I bolt I’ll be giving myself away.”

Her hands clenched upon one another, straining.

“Bill—don’t!”

He leaned forward and put his hand down hard over hers.

“I’ve got to. Look here, my dear, we’ve got to talk this out and know where we are, and we’ve got this chance to do it—we may not get another. That’s why I brought you here. I picked a place where we shan’t be interrupted. We don’t want Cathy, or Aunt Milly, or the police, or Mrs. Mickleham getting themselves mixed up with this conversation—it’s between you and me. And the thing we start off with is this—are you quite sure in your own mind that I didn’t shoot Dale?”

Their looks shocked together and held. A heavenly certainty sank deep into Susan’s mind. She said,

“Quite sure.”

He nodded.

“That’s all right then, because I didn’t. But if you’d had any sort of doubt about it, everything was going to be a lot harder for both of us. The next thing is this—how much can you stand? Because it’s going to be fairly tough.”

Susan said, “I don’t know—I don’t think I can stand much more.

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