Read Online Case with No Conclusion by Leo Bruce - Free Book Online Page B

intended to commit suicide in his pocket. But this is where the hitch came; the hitch which fortunately always comes to make the detection of murderers possible.
Benson hadn’t brought his car.
What was Stewart to do? Either drive him away in his own, and involve himself in a hundred ways; blood on his cushions, the fact that he’d taken his car out at all, and the possibility of his being seen? No, he could not do that. Finally, he decided to leave him there in the chair. After all, nobody had seen him commit the murder, and he didn’t see how it could be proved against him.
    â€œBut it can. For me it would need no more than a process of elimination to be sure that it was Stewart. It was someone
in
the house. It wasn’t one of the servants, and Stewart had both the strength and the motive to do it. But as you have seen, my case doesn’t rest on that.”
    â€œIs that your case?” asked Beef.
    Again Stute smiled with long-suffering good-humour. “There’s a lot more to it,” he said. “I’ve discovered the motive for one thing—or perhaps even the motives. No one who has been in Sydenhamsince this murder happened could possibly be in doubt about one thing—the relationship between Stewart and Mrs. Benson. There was nobody in the place who had not heard stories about it, and it is possible that Benson’s murder was no more than the outcome of the eternal triangle.”
    â€œBut what about the five hundred pounds?”
    â€œI’ve been to see Stewart’s bank and it appears that he has drawn out altogether four sums of five hundred in single pound notes in the last two years. What could that be but blackmail? When Benson showed himself ready to sign a receipt for five hundred pounds, what, one must ask, was he receiving five hundred pounds for? Scarcely professional services. That, surely, is sufficient, though I daresay we shall find some more details between now and the date of the trial.”
    â€œBut, then,” persisted Beef, “if he’d handed that money over to Benson, and got a receipt for it, why wasn’t it in Benson’s pocket? Or was it?”
    â€œIt wasn’t,” said Stute, “but it was in Stewart’s bedroom. We found it with the faked confession of suicide when we arrested him.”
    â€œThere’s a couple more questions I’d like to ask,” Beef postulated.
    â€œCertainly,” said Stute.
    â€œDid you find any foot-prints round the drive or in the garden on the morning of the murder?”
    Stute laughed aloud. “Come now, Beef,” he said kindly. “You must try to keep up to date, you know. Foot-prints!”
    â€œAll right, all right,” said Beef. “Only I know what I’m thinking,” he added mysteriously.
    â€œThere’s one other little point,” Stute added. “You saw where the dagger was found? In its place on the table. Who would have put it there? Surely only one man. The man who kept it there, who played with it a dozen times a day and always returned it to the same spot. Circumstantial, I know, but very convincing.
    â€œYou see,” he said finally, turning to me, “I know the position, Mr Townsend. The police always arrest the wrong man, and then the wonderful private detective comes along and shows them how mistaken they are. I’m sorry, I should have liked to see you.make a good story of this, but this time it’s not going your way. I’m afraid there can be no doubt whatever about it. Stewart is guilty, and we shan’t have much difficulty in proving it. Next time you want to get the material for a mystery you’ll really have to follow the Yard’s investigations.”
    I sighed. What he had said was only too true.
    But Beef was not impressed. “There are one or two ’oles I should like to pick in that,” he said. “For instance, how did he come to be so silly as to have left the knife out