Death at Hallows End by Leo Bruce Read Free Book Online

confided.
    â€œWe understand they’re going to come into all the old gentleman’s money and it’s a big lot, but they haven’t got much in the meantime. Seems funny with them being farmers, doesn’t it? They’ve got a name for being close, though, so perhaps they don’t like paying for it out of their own money, as it were, and are waiting to get his. You never know with people, do you?”
    Carolus agreed that you didn’t, and at his friend’s request ran him quickly back to the crematorium for what he had described as the next lot. Then Carolus drove across country towards Hallows End which lay some forty miles from there.
    It was a raw ugly morning with rain threatening and a misty chill lying over the flat uninteresting countryside. The journey was tedious because he was cutting across the direction of the main roads by narrow by-roads, sometimes no more than lanes, and they kept his speed uncomfortably low.
    While still some four miles from the village, he had to follow a main road for a few hundred yards, and on it saw a bright new pub called the Falstaff Hotel. Its neo-Elizabethan architecture and expanse of diamond-paned windows did not attract him, but since it was likely to be the only place for lunch in the vicinity, he decided to follow the instruction on a large board: “Drive In.” Another board proclaimed: “Lunch now Being Served in the Tudor Dining Hall,” and yet another: “Accommodation for Motorists.” When, however, he reached the Sir Walter Raleigh Bar, he found that these inviting inscriptions, at least for today, had been unproductive for he was alone with the landlord, a youngish man with a large and turbulent growth of hair on his upper lip.
    â€œGood-o,” said the landlord, “you’re the first today. You must have a drink on me. What’ll you have?”
    Carolus accepted his usual Scotch and soda and prepared to face the other’s evident curiosity.
    â€œSee you’ve got a Bentley,” said the landlord. “Envy you. They’re fab. Absolutely fab.”
    â€œThey’re good,” said Carolus.
    â€œGood? They’ve marve. Wish I could afford one. Nothing better, car-wise.”
    Carolus deftly turned his line of thought.
    â€œDo you know the village of Hallows End?” he asked.
    â€œKnow it? Born there. Father the rector before the present man. You going there? Press, perhaps?”
    â€œNo,” said Carolus.
    â€œBut I’m interested in recent events round here.”
    â€œMean this joker who’s disappeared? Incred, isn’t it?”
    â€œNo. Nothing’s incredible. How do local people account for it?”
    â€œThey don’t. They can’t. Unless it’s a murder. They’ve no experience of that sort of thing. Murder-wise we’ve had nothing in the village this century.”
    â€œHas there been any attempt to connect it with Monk’s Farm and Grossiter’s death?”
    â€œShouldn’t think so. Why should there be?”
    Carolus believed in giving a little information sometimes — a sprat to catch a mackerel.
    â€œThe man who disappeared was on his way there,” he said. “He’d been called by Grossiter to make a new will for him.”
    â€œOh! Was that it? I see what you mean. Well, the Neasts are pretty unpop round here but I don’t think anyone connects them with this empty car. They’ve lived here a long time. Stranger-wise the folks are a bit suspish, but not of one of themselves. See what I mean?”
    Only just, thought Carolus, but nodded encouragingly and ordered two more drinks,
    â€œNot sold on mysteries myself but it’s oddish now you come to mention it. This Grossiter had only been at the farm a few days and no one would have known he was there if it hadn’t been for a character called Darkin who worked for him. He came here every night and told us. I thought him a bit obnox myself,