Free Murder of a Snob by Roy Vickers

Anything! There can be no fear now of betraying professional confidence. His vast fortune has become meaningless. The family he had hoped to found is already destroyed. It is saddest of all when a successful life ends in undeserved squalor. Don’t you think!”
    â€œI do!” said Crisp. “Will you tell me how you knew Cornboise was guilty before we knew it?”
    â€œMy fear—my intuitive knowledge—was based on a premonition.”
    Querk sat down with an air of one conferring an honour on the company.
    â€œIn the library after lunch, my poor friend made a questionable remark—I prefer not to repeat it—which seemed to cast doubt on Miss Lofting’s status as—ah—a lady of reasonable education and unblemished social repurtation. His own phrase, used in his Will, to describe an essential prerequisite in his nephew’s wife. I happened to be watching Ralph’s eyes. What I saw there positively frightened me, Colonel.”
    Benscombe writhed and received a scowl from his Chief. “Is that all, Mr. Querk?”
    â€œ Everything !” said Querk with profound satisfaction. “I am keeping nothing back. Nothing whatever. It would be very difficult, Colonel, to exaggerate the unease I subsequently suffered. When I retired to my room at about a quarter to three, I was unable to rest, though the heat almost invariably makes me drowsy after lunch. I sat wide awake by the window which, I may remark, permits an oblique view of the window of the library.”
    â€œAh!” Crisp permitted himself a sigh of relief. “And you saw something?”
    â€œI did indeed. Something, however, which merely served to increase my anxiety. I saw poor Ralph approach the window and enter the library. Within, say, a couple of minutes, he emerged. As he did so, the stable clock struck a quarter past five. In such circumstances, a striking clock gives an almost uncanny emphasis. Don’t you think?”
    â€œWe can safely agree on that,” said Crisp. “What did you do? ”
    â€œI did everything possible,” answered Querk, “to persuade myself that my fears were groundless. When Ralph came out, however, his outline was, to say the least, alarming. He seemed to totter blindly away. He actually fell prone on the lawn, then picked himself up, and hurried to the garage. I take no shame in confessing to you, Colonel, that my own state of mind was not far removed from panic.”
    â€œBut you still did nothing!” snapped Crisp.
    â€œOn the contrary, I took immediate action. Action which I fondly believed, had ended the whole unhappy incident. To be precise, I closed the book I had been trying to read, and went down to the library.”
    â€œWhat!” The exclamation had burst from young Benscombe—a terrible breach of etiquette.
    Querk looked at him in some surprise, was about to comment, when Crisp cut in.
    â€œWhat did you see in the library, Mr. Querk?”
    â€œNothing noteworthy,” answered, Querk. He glanced again at Benscombe, as if expecting another interruption. “My first impression was that Lord Watlington must have dozed off again. I shut the door with deliberate clumsiness, so that the noise should wake him. Then I became aware that he was not asleep.”
    â€œWhat did he look like?” rapped out Crisp.
    â€œI confess that I did not notice his appearance, though, had it been in any way remarkable, I should doubtless have done so. I was about to speak to him when he—er—made a noise at me.”
    â€œAre you sure?” Crisp was puzzled. “What sort of noise?”
    â€œA deplorable noise,” answered Querk. “Made by pursing the lips and blowing through them. In the same breath—if that is possibles—he said: ‘What do you want, you old horse thief?’—a playful idiom much used in Africa among intimate friends.”
    The Chief Constable and his aide exchanged glances