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III
Craddock.
“Yes, yes, I knew all the Crackenthorpes. I remember old Josiah Cracken-
thorpe. He was a hard nut—shrewd man, though. Made a lot of money,”
Inspector Craddock. “So you’ve been listening to that young fool, Quim-
heads. Got it into his head that somebody was trying to poison Luther
them.”
“Dr. Quimper,” said Craddock, “seemed to think there was.”
“Doesn’t do for a doctor to go thinking. After all, I should hope I could
recognize arsenical poisoning when I saw it.”
out. “There was”—he drew upon his memory—“the Greenbarrow case,
Mrs. Teney, Charles Leeds, three people in the Westbury family, all buried
nicely and tidily without the doctors who attended them having the least
suspicion. Those doctors were all good, reputable men.”
“All right, all right,” said Doctor Morris, “you’re saying that I could have
made a mistake. Well, I don’t think I did.” He paused a minute and then
said, “Who did Quimper think was doing it—if it was being done?”
“He didn’t know,” said Craddock. “He was worried. After all, you know,”
he added, “there’s a great deal of money there.”
“Yes, yes, I know, which they’ll get when Luther Crackenthorpe dies.
And they want it pretty badly. That is true enough, but it doesn’t follow
that they’d kill the old man to get it.”
“Not necessarily,” agreed Inspector Craddock.
“Anyway,” said Dr. Morris, “my principle is not to go about suspecting
things without due cause. Due cause,” he repeated. “I’ll admit that what
ently—but I still don’t see why you come to me. All I can tell you is that I
didn’t suspect it. Maybe I should have. Maybe I should have taken those
gastric attacks of Luther Crackenthorpe’s much more seriously. But you’ve
got a long way beyond that now.”
Craddock agreed. “What I really need,” he said, “is to know a little more
about the Crackenthorpe family. Is there any queer mental strain in them
—a kink of any kind?”
The eyes under the bushy eyebrows looked at him sharply. “Yes, I can
to melancholia. Came of an inbred family. She died soon after her second
son was born. I’d say, you know, that Luther inherited a certain—well, in-
stability, from her. He was commonplace enough as a young man, but he
was always at loggerheads with his father. His father was disappointed in
him and I think he resented that and brooded on it, and in the end got a
sons. His daughters he was fond of. Both Emma and Edie—the one who
died.”
“Why does he dislike the sons so much?” asked Craddock.
“You’ll have to go to one of these new-fashioned psychiatrists15 to find
that out. I’d just say that Luther has never felt very adequate as a man
himself, and that he bitterly resents his financial position. He has posses-
sion of an income but no power of appointment of capital. If he had the
power to disinherit his sons he probably wouldn’t dislike them as much.
Being powerless in that respect gives him a feeling of humiliation16.”
“That’s why he’s so pleased at the idea of outliving them all?” said In-
spector Craddock.
he’s managed to save a considerable sum out of his large income—mostly,
will to someone? That he can do.”
“Oh, yes, though God knows who he has left it to. Maybe to Emma, but I
should rather doubt it. She’ll get her share of the old man’s property.
Maybe to Alexander, the grandson.”
“He’s fond of him, is he?” said Craddock.
“Used to be. Of course he was his daughter’s child, not a son’s child. That
may have made a difference. And he had quite an affection for Bryan
Eastley, Edie’s husband. Of course I don’t know Bryan well, it’s some years
since I’ve seen any of the family. But it struck me that he was going to be
very much at a loose end after the war. He’s got those qualities that you
need in wartime; courage, dash, and a tendency to let the future take care
of itself. But I don’t think he’s got any stability. He’ll probably turn into a
drifter.”
“As far as you know there’s no peculiar kink in any of the younger gen-
eration?”
“Cedric’s an eccentric type, one of those natural rebels. I wouldn’t say he
not what I call a very pleasant character, coldhearted, eye to the main
chance. Alfred’s got a touch of the delinquent21 about him. He’s a wrong ’un,
always was. Saw him taking money out of a missionary22 box once that they
used to keep in the hall. That type of thing. Ah, well, the poor fellow’s
dead, I suppose I shouldn’t be talking against him.”
“What about…” Craddock hesitated. “Emma Crackenthorpe?”
“Nice girl, quiet, one doesn’t always know what she’s thinking. Has her
own plans and her own ideas, but she keeps them to herself. She’s more
character than you might think from her general appearance.”
“You knew Edmund, I suppose, the son who was killed in France?”
“Yes. He was the best of the bunch I’d say. Goodhearted, gay, a nice
boy.”
“Did you ever hear that he was going to marry, or had married, a French
girl just before he was killed?”
Dr. Morris frowned. “It seems as though I remember something about
it,” he said, “but it’s a long time ago.”
“Quite early on in the war, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. Ah, well, I dare say he’d have lived to regret it if he had married a
foreign wife.”
“There’s some reason to believe that he did do just that,” said Craddock.
In a few brief sentences he gave an account of recent happenings.
“I remember seeing something in the papers about a woman found in a
sarcophagus. So it was at Rutherford Hall.”
“And there’s reason to believe that the woman was Edmund Cracken-
thorpe’s widow.”
“Well, well, that seems extraordinary. More like a novel than real life.
But who’d want to kill the poor thing—I mean, how does it tie up with ar-
senical poisoning in the Crackenthorpe family?”
“In one of two ways,” said Craddock; “but they are both very farfetched.
Somebody perhaps is greedy and wants the whole of Josiah Cracken-
thorpe’s fortune.”
“Damn fool if he does,” said Dr. Morris. “He’ll only have to pay the most
stupendous taxes on the income from it.”
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