12 Mike Read online

  Note one: Interview the ground-man on this point.

  In the second place Adair might have upset the tin and trodden in its contents when he went to get his bicycle in order to fetch the doctor for the suffering MacPhee. This was the more probable of the two contingencies, for it would have been dark in the shed when Adair went into it.

  Note two Interview Adair as to whether he found, on returning to the house, that there was paint on his boots.

  Things were moving.

  He resolved to take Adair first. He could get the ground-man’s address from him.

  Passing by the trees under whose shade Mike and Psmith and Dunster had watched the match on the previous day, he came upon the Head of his house in a deck-chair reading a book. A summer Sunday afternoon is the time for reading in deck-chairs.

  “Oh, Adair,” he said. “No, don’t get up. I merely wished to ask you if you found any paint on your boots when you returned to the house last night?”

  “Paint, sir?” Adair was plainly puzzled. His book had been interesting, and had driven the Sammy incident out of his head.

  “I see somebody has spilt some paint on the floor of the bicycle shed. You did not do that, I suppose, when you went to fetch your bicycle?”

  “No, sir.”

  “It is spilt all over the floor. I wondered whether you had happened to tread in it. But you say you found no paint on your boots this morning?”

  “No, sir, my bicycle is always quite near the door of the shed. I didn’t go into the shed at all.”

  “I see. Quite so. Thank you, Adair. Oh, by the way, Adair, where does Markby live?”

  “I forget the name of his cottage, sir, but I could show you in a second. It’s one of those cottages just past the school gates, on the right as you turn out into the road. There are three in a row. His is the first you come to. There’s a barn just before you get to them.”

  “Thank you. I shall be able to find them. I should like to speak to Markby for a moment on a small matter.”

  A sharp walk took him to the cottages Adair had mentioned. He rapped at the door of the first, and the ground-man came out in his shirt-sleeves, blinking as if he had just woke up, as was indeed the case.

  “Oh, Markby!”

  “Sir?”

  “You remember that you were painting the scoring-box in the pavilion last night after the match?”

  “Yes, sir. It wanted a lick of paint bad. The young gentlemen will scramble about and get through the window. Makes it look shabby, sir. So I thought I’d better give it a coating so as to look ship-shape when the Marylebone come down.”

  “Just so. An excellent idea. Tell me, Markby, what did you do with the pot of paint when you had finished?”

  “Put it in the bicycle shed, sir.”

  “On the floor?”

  “On the floor, sir? No. On the shelf at the far end, with the can of whitening what I use for marking out the wickets, sir.”

  “Of course, yes. Quite so. Just as I thought.”

  “Do you want it, sir?”

  “No, thank you, Markby, no, thank you. The fact is, somebody who had no business to do so has moved the pot of paint from the shelf to the floor, with the result that it has been kicked over, and spilt. You had better get some more to-morrow. Thank you, Markby. That is all I wished to know.”

  Mr. Downing walked back to the school thoroughly excited. He was hot on the scent now. The only other possible theories had been tested and successfully exploded. The thing had become simple to a degree. All he had to do was to go to Mr. Outwood’s house—the idea of searching a fellow-master’s house did not appear to him at all a delicate task; somehow one grew unconsciously to feel that Mr. Outwood did not really exist as a man capable of resenting liberties—find the paint-splashed boot, ascertain its owner, and denounce him to the headmaster. Picture, Blue Fire and “God Save the King” by the full strength of the company. There could be no doubt that a paint-splashed boot must be in Mr. Outwood’s house somewhere. A boy cannot tread in a pool of paint without showing some signs of having done so. It was Sunday, too, so that the boot would not yet have been cleaned. Yoicks! Also Tally-ho! This really was beginning to be something like business.

  Regardless of the heat, the sleuth-hound hurried across to Outwood’s as fast as he could walk.

  CHAPTER XLIX

  A CHECK

  The only two members of the house not out in the grounds when he arrived were Mike and Psmith. They were standing on the gravel drive in front of the boys’ entrance. Mike had a deck-chair in one hand and a book in the other. Psmith—for even the greatest minds will sometimes unbend—was playing diabolo. That is to say, he was trying without success to raise the spool from the ground.

  “There’s a kid in France,” said Mike disparagingly, as the bobbin rolled off the string for the fourth time, “who can do it three thousand seven hundred and something times.”

  Psmith smoothed a crease out of his waistcoat and tried again. He had just succeeded in getting the thing to spin when Mr. Downing arrived. The sound of his footsteps disturbed Psmith and brought the effort to nothing.

  “Enough of this spoolery,” said he, flinging the sticks through the open window of the senior day-room. “I was an ass ever to try it. The philosophical mind needs complete repose in its hours of leisure. Hullo!”

  He stared after the sleuth-hound, who had just entered the house.

  “What the dickens,” said Mike, “does he mean by barging in as if he’d bought the place?”

  “Comrade Downing looks pleased with himself. What brings him round in this direction, I wonder! Still, no matter. The few articles which he may sneak from our study are of inconsiderable value. He is welcome to them. Do you feel inclined to wait awhile till I have fetched a chair and book?”

  “I’ll be going on. I shall be under the trees at the far end of the ground.”

  “‘Tis well. I will be with you in about two ticks.”

  Mike walked on towards the field, and Psmith, strolling upstairs to fetch his novel, found Mr. Downing standing in the passage with the air of one who has lost his bearings.

  “A warm afternoon, sir,” murmured Psmith courteously, as he passed.

  “Er—Smith!”

  “Sir?”

  “I—er—wish to go round the dormitories.”

  It was Psmith’s guiding rule in life never to be surprised at anything, so he merely inclined his head gracefully, and said nothing.

  “I should be glad if you would fetch the keys and show me where the rooms are.”

  “With acute pleasure, sir,” said Psmith. “Or shall I fetch Mr. Outwood, sir?”

  “Do as I tell you, Smith,” snapped Mr. Downing.

  Psmith said no more, but went down to the matron’s room. The matron being out, he abstracted the bunch of keys from her table and rejoined the master.

  “Shall I lead the way, sir?” he asked.

  Mr. Downing nodded.

  “Here, sir,” said Psmith, opening a door, “we have Barnes’ dormitory. An airy room, constructed on the soundest hygienic principles. Each boy, I understand, has quite a considerable number of cubic feet of air all to himself. It is Mr. Outwood’s boast that no boy has ever asked for a cubic foot of air in vain. He argues justly–-“

  He broke off abruptly and began to watch the other’s manoeuvres in silence. Mr. Downing was peering rapidly beneath each bed in turn.

  “Are you looking for Barnes, sir?” inquired Psmith politely. “I think he’s out in the field.”

  Mr. Downing rose, having examined the last bed, crimson in the face with the exercise.

  “Show me the next dormitory, Smith,” he said, panting slightly.

  “This,” said Psmith, opening the next door and sinking his voice to an awed whisper, “is where I sleep!”

  Mr. Downing glanced swiftly beneath the three beds. “Excuse me, sir,” said Psmith, “but are we chasing anything?”

  “Be good enough, Smith,” said Mr. Downing with as
perity, “to keep your remarks to yourself.”

  “I was only wondering, sir. Shall I show you the next in order?”

  “Certainly.”

  They moved on up the passage.

  Drawing blank at the last dormitory, Mr. Downing paused, baffled. Psmith waited patiently by. An idea struck the master.

  “The studies, Smith,” he cried.

  “Aha!” said Psmith. “I beg your pardon, sir. The observation escaped me unawares. The frenzy of the chase is beginning to enter into my blood. Here we have–-“

  Mr. Downing stopped short.

  “Is this impertinence studied, Smith?”

  “Ferguson’s study, sir? No, sir. That’s further down the passage. This is Barnes’.”

  Mr. Downing looked at him closely. Psmith’s face was wooden in its gravity. The master snorted suspiciously, then moved on.

  “Whose is this?” he asked, rapping a door.

  “This, sir, is mine and Jackson’s.”

  “What! Have you a study? You are low down in the school for it.”

  “I think, sir, that Mr. Outwood gave it us rather as a testimonial to our general worth than to our proficiency in school-work.”

  Mr. Downing raked the room with a keen eye. The absence of bars from the window attracted his attention.

  “Have you no bars to your windows here, such as there are in my house?”

  “There appears to be no bar, sir,” said Psmith, putting up his eyeglass.

  Mr Downing was leaning out of the window.

  “A lovely view, is it not, sir?” said Psmith. “The trees, the field, the distant hills–-“

  Mr. Downing suddenly started. His eye had been caught by the water-pipe at the side of the window. The boy whom Sergeant Collard had seen climbing the pipe must have been making for this study.

  He spun round and met Psmith’s blandly inquiring gaze. He looked at Psmith carefully for a moment. No. The boy he had chased last night had not been Psmith. That exquisite’s figure and general appearance were unmistakable, even in the dusk.

  “Whom did you say you shared this study with, Smith?”

  “Jackson, sir. The cricketer.”

  “Never mind about his cricket, Smith,” said Mr. Downing with irritation.

  “No, sir.”

  “He is the only other occupant of the room?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Nobody else comes into it?”

  “If they do, they go out extremely quickly, sir.”

  “Ah! Thank you, Smith.”

  “Not at all, sir.”

  Mr. Downing pondered. Jackson! The boy bore him a grudge. The boy was precisely the sort of boy to revenge himself by painting the dog Sammy. And, gadzooks! The boy whom he had pursued last night had been just about Jackson’s size and build!

  Mr. Downing was as firmly convinced at that moment that Mike’s had been the hand to wield the paint-brush as he had ever been of anything in his life.

  “Smith!” he said excitedly.

  “On the spot, sir,” said Psmith affably.

  “Where are Jackson’s boots?”

  There are moments when the giddy excitement of being right on the trail causes the amateur (or Watsonian) detective to be incautious. Such a moment came to Mr. Downing then. If he had been wise, he would have achieved his object, the getting a glimpse of Mike’s boots, by a devious and snaky route. As it was, he rushed straight on.

  “His boots, sir? He has them on. I noticed them as he went out just now.”

  “Where is the pair he wore yesterday?”

  “Where are the boots of yester-year?” murmured Psmith to himself. “I should say at a venture, sir, that they would be in the basket downstairs. Edmund, our genial knife-and-boot boy, collects them, I believe, at early dawn.”

  “Would they have been cleaned yet?”

  “If I know Edmund, sir—no.”

  “Smith,” said Mr. Downing, trembling with excitement, “go and bring that basket to me here.”

  Psmith’s brain was working rapidly as he went downstairs. What exactly was at the back of the sleuth’s mind, prompting these manoeuvres, he did not know. But that there was something, and that that something was directed in a hostile manner against Mike, probably in connection with last night’s wild happenings, he was certain. Psmith had noticed, on leaving his bed at the sound of the alarm bell, that he and Jellicoe were alone in the room. That might mean that Mike had gone out through the door when the bell sounded, or it might mean that he had been out all the time. It began to look as if the latter solution were the correct one.

  He staggered back with the basket, painfully conscious the while that it was creasing his waistcoat, and dumped is down on the study floor. Mr. Downing stooped eagerly over it. Psmith leaned against the wall, and straightened out the damaged garment.

  “We have here, sir,” he said, “a fair selection of our various bootings.”

  Mr. Downing looked up.

  “You dropped none of the boots on your way up, Smith?”

  “Not one, sir. It was a fine performance.”

  Mr. Downing uttered a grunt of satisfaction, and bent once more to his task. Boots flew about the room. Mr. Downing knelt on the floor beside the basket, and dug like a terrier at a rat-hole.

  At last he made a dive, and, with an exclamation of triumph, rose to his feet. In his hand he held a boot.

  “Put those back again, Smith,” he said.

  The ex-Etonian, wearing an expression such as a martyr might have worn on being told off for the stake, began to pick up the scattered footgear, whistling softly the tune of “I do all the dirty work,” as he did so.

  “That’s the lot, sir,” he said, rising.

  “Ah. Now come across with me to the headmaster’s house. Leave the basket here. You can carry it back when you return.”

  “Shall I put back that boot, sir?”

  “Certainly not. I shall take this with me, of course.”

  “Shall I carry it, sir?”

  Mr. Downing reflected.

  “Yes, Smith,” he said. “I think it would be best.”

  It occurred to him that the spectacle of a housemaster wandering abroad on the public highway, carrying a dirty boot, might be a trifle undignified. You never knew whom you might meet on Sunday afternoon.

  Psmith took the boot, and doing so, understood what before had puzzled him.

  Across the toe of the boot was a broad splash of red paint.

  He knew nothing, of course, of the upset tin in the bicycle shed; but when a housemaster’s dog has been painted red in the night, and when, on the following day, the housemaster goes about in search of a paint-splashed boot, one puts two and two together. Psmith looked at the name inside the boot. It was “Brown, boot-maker, Bridgnorth.” Bridgnorth was only a few miles from his own home and Mike’s. Undoubtedly it was Mike’s boot.

  “Can you tell me whose boot that is?” asked Mr. Downing.

  Psmith looked at it again.

  “No, sir. I can’t say the little chap’s familiar to me.”

  “Come with me, then.”

  Mr. Downing left the room. After a moment Psmith followed him.

  The headmaster was in his garden. Thither Mr. Downing made his way, the boot-bearing Psmith in close attendance.

  The Head listened to the amateur detective’s statement with interest.

  “Indeed?” he said, when Mr. Downing had finished.

  “Indeed? Dear me! It certainly seems—It is a curiously well-connected thread of evidence. You are certain that there was red paint on this boot you discovered in Mr. Outwood’s house?”

  “I have it with me. I brought it on purpose to show to you. Smith!”

  “Sir?”

  “You have the boot?”

  “Ah,” said the headmaster, putting on a pair of pince-nez, “now let me look at—This, you say, is the—? Just so. Just so. Just…. But, er, Mr. Downing, it may be that I have not examined this boot with sufficient care, but—Can you point o
ut to me exactly where this paint is that you speak of?”

  Mr. Downing stood staring at the boot with a wild, fixed stare. Of any suspicion of paint, red or otherwise, it was absolutely and entirely innocent.

  CHAPTER L

  THE DESTROYER OF EVIDENCE

  The boot became the centre of attraction, the cynosure of all eyes. Mr. Downing fixed it with the piercing stare of one who feels that his brain is tottering. The headmaster looked at it with a mildly puzzled expression. Psmith, putting up his eyeglass, gazed at it with a sort of affectionate interest, as if he were waiting for it to do a trick of some kind.

  Mr. Downing was the first to break the silence.

  “There was paint on this boot,” he said vehemently. “I tell you there was a splash of red paint across the toe. Smith will bear me out in this. Smith, you saw the paint on this boot?”

  “Paint, sir!”

  “What! Do you mean to tell me that you did not see it?”

  “No, sir. There was no paint on this boot.”

  “This is foolery. I saw it with my own eyes. It was a broad splash right across the toe.”

  The headmaster interposed.

  “You must have made a mistake, Mr. Downing. There is certainly no trace of paint on this boot. These momentary optical delusions are, I fancy, not uncommon. Any doctor will tell you–-“

  “I had an aunt, sir,” said Psmith chattily, “who was remarkably subject–-“

  “It is absurd. I cannot have been mistaken,” said Mr. Downing. “I am positively certain the toe of this boot was red when I found it.”

  “It is undoubtedly black now, Mr. Downing.”

  “A sort of chameleon boot,” murmured Psmith.

  The goaded housemaster turned on him.

  “What did you say, Smith?”

  “Did I speak, sir?” said Psmith, with the start of one coming suddenly out of a trance.

  Mr. Downing looked searchingly at him.

  “You had better be careful, Smith.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I strongly suspect you of having something to do with this.”

  “Really, Mr. Downing,” said the headmaster, “that is surely improbable. Smith could scarcely have cleaned the boot on his way to my house. On one occasion I inadvertently spilt some paint on a shoe of my own. I can assure you that it does not brush off. It needs a very systematic cleaning before all traces are removed.”