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II
“I don’t suppose you want to see me,” said Bryan Eastley apologetically,
coming into the room and hesitating by the door. “I don’t exactly belong to
the family—”
“Let me see, you are Mr. Bryan Eastley, the husband of Miss Edith Crack-
enthorpe, who died five years ago?”
“That’s right.”
“Well, it’s very kind of you, Mr. Eastley, especially if you know some-
thing that you think could assist us in some way?”
“But I don’t. Wish I did. Whole thing seems so ruddy peculiar, doesn’t it?
Coming along and meeting some fellow in that draughty old barn, in the
middle of winter. Wouldn’t be my cup of tea!”
“It is certainly very perplexing,” Inspector Craddock agreed.
“Is it true that she was a foreigner? Word seems to have got round to
that effect.”
“Does that fact suggest anything to you?” The inspector looked at him
sharply, but Bryan seemed amiably vacuous.
“No, it doesn’t, as a matter of fact.”
“Maybe she was French,” said Inspector Bacon, with dark suspicion.
Bryan was roused to slight animation. A look of interest came into his
blue eyes, and he tugged at his big fair moustache.
“Really? Gay Paree?” He shook his head. “On the whole it seems to make
it even more unlikely, doesn’t it? Messing about in the barn, I mean. You
haven’t had any other sarcophagus murders, have you? One of these fel-
lows with an urge—or a complex? Thinks he’s Caligula or someone like
that?”
Inspector Craddock did not even trouble to reject this speculation. In-
stead he asked in a casual manner:
“Nobody in the family got any French connections, or—or—relation-
ships that you know of?”
Bryan said that the Crackenthorpes weren’t a very gay lot.
“Harold’s respectably married,” he said. “Fish-faced woman, some im-
poverished peer’s daughter. Don’t think Alfred cares about women much
—spends his life going in for shady deals which usually go wrong in the
end. I dare say Cedric’s got a few Spanish señoritas jumping through
hoops for him in Ibiza. Women rather fall for Cedric. Doesn’t always
shave and looks as though he never washes. Don’t see why that should be
attractive to women, but apparently it is—I say, I’m not being very helpful,
am I?”
He grinned at them.
“Better get young Alexander on the job. He and James Stoddart- West
are out hunting for clues in a big way. Bet you they turn up something.”
Inspector Craddock said he hoped they would. Then he thanked Bryan
Eastley and said he would like to speak to Miss Emma Crackenthorpe.
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