Chapter XXVI: Of an Old Salt, and His Dealings with a Young Lady

Wilson had sad news to break to his wife that evening. Holiday or no holiday, he was going back to England at once. He hoped that he would not be away more than a couple of days, but he could not be certain. He had a clue which he must follow up at once.

That admirable woman received his news with no more than a sigh. She had half expected some such development, and she had known all along that his choice of a place for his holiday was not all disinterested love for the coast or the people of France. "Get back as soon as you can, dear," she said; "the children will be dull without you."

Wilson kissed his wife, and promised to lose no time in coming back. Then he told her exactly what he had discovered, and what was the purpose of his journey to England. Finally, he asked her what she thought.

"I'm certain of one thing," she said, "and that is this. Mr. Pasquett didn't kill Hugh Radlett, or any one else. When you brought him home, dear, I had a good chance of telling what he was like. And I'm quite sure Mr. Pasquett never killed anybody."

"It's odd, but that's just how I feel myself. I can't fancy him a murderer----"

"Or the accomplice of a murderer," Mrs. Wilson put in.

"Or a murderer's accomplice," Wilson agreed. "And yet----Why did he lie about his _alibi_? Why did he deliberately fake an _alibi_, as he must have done?"

"Perhaps, dear, if he really was in England secretly at the time, he was afraid he would be suspected, and made up his _alibi_ for that reason."

"He was a fool if he did," said Wilson. "And yet--was he? If he was doing a bit of smuggling with that Culpepper girl, it might be awkward for him to say where he was."

"I never said he wasn't a smuggler, dear. I only said he wasn't a murderer. There's a great difference."

"Quite. And that might account for the _alibi_ fake, especially if he was in it with the Culpepper girl. But he didn't cross to England with Norah Culpepper. How did he get into England? That's what I want to know. There's no record of his entry at any of the steamship offices."

"If Miss Culpepper could cross the Channel unknown, so could he, I suppose."

"Yes, that's so. But why did he cross? What was he doing on that secret journey to England, if he wasn't mixed up with the murder? And how did the Culpepper girl come to bring him back in her boat?"

"Was he in the smuggling business with her?"

"Possibly; but, in that case, why didn't they cross from France together? No, I can't help feeling that Pasquett's journey had something to do with the murder. Old Culpepper had, you see. He was actually on the spot when the murder was committed. And Pasquett was his business associate, as well as mixed up with his daughter. No, it must all hang together, but I'm damned if I see how. You see, Culpepper's story seems to prove that Rosenbaum did it."

"In the light of what you've found out, dear, do you think Mr. Culpepper is to be regarded as a very reliable witness."

"No, of course not. His story is very likely all a fake, too. But, if it is, what have we to go on? I can only follow this smuggling trail blindly, in the hope that it will lead me somewhere."

* * * * *

Wilson caught the boat at St. Malo on the following day, and landed in the late afternoon at Southampton. Thence he took train for Bournemouth, where he put up at a hotel for the night. He rose early the next day, and began an energetic inquiry among the boatmen, with the object of seeing whether Norah Culpepper and her motor-boat were known at all in those parts. He drew blank, and set out to walk along the shore to Poole Harbour, which, he told himself, was the most likely place. As he walked, he kept a keen look-out for any place likely to furnish harbourage for a motor-boat that desired an inconspicuous refuge. There was nothing till he had passed Canford Cliffs, and come within a short distance of Poole itself. Then he struck inland, and made for the town along the eastern side of the harbour.

Poole Harbour is a big expanse, and Wilson realised that his quest was not easy. He wanted to find out whether a particular motor-boat, whose owner had probably been at pains to make it as inconspicuous as possible, had been seen anywhere in the harbour nearly nine months before. And he had only a suspicion that it had ever been there at all. Direct inquiries on this point were almost certain to be fruitless, but there was fortunately another way of approach. To the best of Wilson's belief, Norah Culpepper had been on one of her voyages to England only two nights before. Obviously the right line of inquiry was to begin by trying to trace her most recent visit, and then work back, if he could, to the events of the previous November. But, first of all, he would make a call on the revenue authorities and the coastguards, and see if they could help him in any way.

The authorities at the port were quite unhelpful. They had no suspicion that any smuggling was going on, and seemed to regard smuggling as an obsolete occupation. Nor had they any knowledge of Norah Culpepper or her boat. Wilson left them, and went towards the coastguard look-out, where he found an old sailor in charge. He explained that what he wanted was to get on the trail of a motor-boat, which he described, manned by a girl and a Frenchman, which he believed to be in the habit of making occasional visits to the harbour. The boat came, he said, all the way from France.

The coastguardsman denied all knowledge of such a boat. No one, he said, would be such a fool as to make voyages from St. Malo to Poole in a small motor-boat. It could be done, he admitted, but it would be dangerous work, even apart from the risk of being caught smuggling. "No," he said, "there ain't no boat comes here from France. Not but what," he added reflectively, "the boat sounds mighty like the young lady from Lymington. She 'as a French chap as helps 'er manage."

Wilson's heart leapt up. A few further inquiries left no doubt in his mind that "the young lady from Lymington" was really Norah Culpepper, or that she had covered her journeys to Poole by pretending to come from just along the coast.

"When did you last see that young lady?" he asked.

"A month ago or more," was the disappointing reply. "But one of the others may have seen her since. I'll ask." He bawled to the two men standing on the look-out, "Has either of ye seen that girl from Lymington here lately? Her with the fast motor-boat?"

Wilson saw the two men exchange a few words. Then one came towards them. "I saw her two nights ago," he said. "Why, what's up?"

"Then she's the woman I'm looking for," said Wilson. "I've explained to your mate I'm an officer from Scotland Yard." The man whistled. "Now, I want you to tell me, if you can, whether any of you saw her here on the night of November 17th last, or on that or the following day."

The two men looked at each other. "Too long ago," said the old man, and the other nodded. "I shouldn't remember if I had." "Nor should I," said the other. "She comes here about once a month, I should say." The older man agreed.

"Well," said Wilson, "if you can find out about November 17th, there'll be something for you." Both men shook their heads. "But, even if you can't," Wilson went on, "perhaps you know where she puts the boat when she's here."

"Is it down at Peter's, Billy?" asked the younger man.

"Ay, Peter's," said the elder. "Maybe you don't know old Peter."

Wilson affirmed his ignorance.

"Peter's an old chap, used to be a fisherman, has a crazy old boathouse up by Hamworthy," said the younger man. "He's too old to go out himself, and he lets out boats off the beach."

"He might know 'bout November," said the other.

Wilson thanked the coastguardsmen, and set off in search of Peter, whom he had been told he would find in a little cabin on the beach, near his boats. He had no difficulty in locating it. "This is Peter's," was scrawled in red on a plank fixed on the top of the cabin. "Boats for hire," it said beneath, and there was a doggerel inscription scrawled on the wall.

"If in a pretty boat you'd sail,
Upon the ocean's breast,
Remember this and do not fail,
OLD PETER HAS THE BEST."

"AND CHEAPEST" was written below, apparently as an afterthought, a concession of the poet to the spirit of competitive industry. Wilson approached the cabin. Its proprietor came out as he drew near.

"Old Peter" did not look like a real sailor. He was more like a landsman decked out as an advertisement of Lifebuoy Soap. On his head was an enormous sou'wester, on his feet an enormous pair of sea-boots. The space between was filled in with oilskins of an appearance too nautical to be true, and by a great, shaggy, bearded face, in which were set a pair of little, cold, calculating eyes with the most unnautical appearance. In short, "Old Peter" was got up as the authentic representation of the "Old Salt."

Wilson greeted this apparition. "Business brisk?" he asked. "Old Peter" replied by moistening a finger and holding it up to catch the wind. "A fine day for a sail, your honour," he said. He spoke with a strong Irish brogue.

Wilson replied that he was looking for a young lady of his acquaintance, who, he believed, kept her boat with him at Hamworthy. He described Norah Culpepper. Did "Old Peter" know if she was in the town?

"Sure, and it's but two days ago she was here," was the answer. Wilson pretended disappointment. "This is the second time I've missed her," he said. "The other time was in the winter, the middle of last November."

"Your honour means the time she came here alone, an' the gentleman met her and took her back with him."

"Yes. I was to have gone with them," Wilson improvised. "I'm an old friend of hers."

"A fine young lady," said Old Peter. "An' she can handle a motor-car as well as she can a boat."

"I didn't know she ever brought her car here."

"Why, sir, that very time you were speakin' of, she drove down the gentleman in a motor-car to my bit of a place out at Hamworthy. In a proper hurry, too, she was. She told me I was to get the car driven in to Poole and sent back to the garage, and she and the gentleman went off in the boat. She left me the money to pay the garage--and something for meself, sir. A most open-handed young lady, by your honour's leave."

"When was it you say that happened?"

"Faith, and what does it matter, and it so long ago?"

Wilson took a note from his pocket, and held it in his hand as he answered, "Oh, I wondered if you remembered. That's all."

Old Peter's eyes fastened on the note. "And why wouldn't I remember?" he said. "Sure, it was the day one of me boats was stolen."

"What day was it?"

Old Peter consulted a dog's-eared memorandum book. "It was on the eighteenth day of November."

"What time of day?"

"In the afternoon, your honour. I was just after havin' me afternoon nap when they drove up."

"Do you know where they had come from?"

"I do not, but the gentleman at the garage said it was the day before she had had the car, and she'd been after drivin' it a matter of two hundred and fifty miles."

Wilson quickly thought out the distance from Poole to London. It coincided nearly enough with the distance mentioned for the double journey. He confirmed the information that Norah Culpepper came to Poole in her boat about once a month, always, save on this one occasion, accompanied by Etienne. They arrived usually in the morning, and left in the late afternoon. As Wilson took his leave, the old man said, fingering the note which Wilson had given him, "It's thirsty weather, sir, an' I wouldn't like to be breakin' into this for the matter of a drink." Wilson laughed, added a _pourboire_ to the note, and made for the town.

At the garage where Norah Culpepper had hired her car he met with a disappointment. The place had changed hands only two months before, and the old proprietor had died. The man who had been his assistant had left the town, and his whereabouts were unknown. No confirmation could therefore be got of what Old Peter had told him. Wilson called at the police station, and set the local police to work to discover some one who had been at the garage at the time when the car was hired. But he did not propose to wait in Poole till this was done. He caught the next train for London. "Now for Mr. Culpepper," he said to himself.