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"I will. You mean unless it was Henshaw it must have been one of them?"
"I would not be so definite as that. If the shot was from outside it opens wide possibilities."
"Enemies from anywhere?"
"Yes--if they knew about the TV show and where Ewen would be sitting."
"It is an inside job all right," Bellairs said, looking again at the chart. "You asked the doctor as to the direction of the shots. What was in your mind? Could anyone in the room have done it?"
"Not easily."
"But it was dark and everyone's attention was on the picture. There was room for anyone in the side seats to creep along the wall to the curtain and get near enough to fire the shots."
Roger did not immediately reply. He also studied his chart. "This would apparently give us Miss Gwennie Wren at seat 9," the inspector went on, "and on the other side Rhoda Rees in seat 13 and Sandra Henshaw in seat 18. Also possibly Mrs. Doodell in 5 and Mrs. Dayton in 7 as the seats between them and the wall were empty."
"All women."

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"Women nowadays can be handy with a gun," Bellairs said, pleased with his idea.
"I considered all that," Roger answered, "but I do not think it possible. Much too risky. The person who fired the shots could not be certain the victim would not fall over or cry out. The lights might have come on and the killer would have been revealed, pistol in hand. No. I am convinced the shots were from outside. By direction I was thinking rather of elevation."
"Then that leaves us with Henshaw and the two M.P.s you mentioned. Also of course the man Henshaw saw and Mr. Unknown who happened upon the scene and found everything ready for him."
The last remark was a little sarcastic. Roger for a moment studied Inspector Bellairs. He was a young man, confident of his powers and anxious no doubt to show his ability.
"If you take my advice," Roger said, "you will get hold of your Chief as quickly as you can, telling him how things stand and suggesting he asks Scotland Yard to come along at once. Please do not think I doubt your capacity but consider the sensation this is going to cause. Here, in Lord Bethesda's home, his son, a Member of Parliament, is shot. There are six or seven other Members in the house, too, and a lot more were due to morrow, though I hope I have stopped them."
"We do not call in the Yard until we find we cannot deal with a job ourselves," the inspector said, a little haughtily.

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"This is no ordinary job--if murders are ever ordinary. Another thirty or so Members are being told what has happened. They will hurry to the House on Monday to ask questions. One of the first will be what are the Yard doing about it? I pity all you local people if it has to be said the Yard was not informed."
"There is that," Bellairs admitted, reluctant to lose the chance of a lifetime.
"See Ruttle and Gibbons by all means, but they can wait. Use my name if you like. The Assistant Commissioner knows me and not long ago he asked me to help Superintendent Yeo in the Greenham Golf Club mystery. You can say I think it urgent."
Roger was emphatic, and he had the satisfaction of seeing his advice acted on. Bellairs went to the telephone and returned a few minutes later to say the Chief Constable for the district had been contacted. He was taking the necessary steps and meanwhile the local questioning was to continue. Bellairs was a little more deferential in his manner. The Chief Constable knew of Roger Bennion and if the big man at the Yard knew him, too, it made a difference.
Bill Ruttle, big and breezy, came into the room when summoned.
"This is a nasty business," he said. "I have just been told about it. I suppose there can be no mistake? Who did it?"

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"I am hoping you can help us," the inspector replied. "You did not see the television play?"
"I did not. Waste of time."
"Where were you? What were you doing? How did you spend your evening?"
"I was in my bedroom reading. I had brought a detective story with me and was rather anxious to see how it ended."
"You can let me see the book?"
"Certainly," Gibbons smiled. "I will give it you, if you like. It is by a good author but rather below standard. Too many characters and none very interesting. There is dope-traffic. A serious thing of course, but already used too often. That at least is my opinion; you may think otherwise."
"I am not concerned with story books but in the death of Ewen Jones," the inspector said sharply. Gibbons was too loquacious. "Did you leave the house during the evening?"
"My dear inspector, I thought I had answered that. I was in my room reading."
"You did not go out at all? Your shoes are wet."
Gibbons pushed forward his patent leather shoes of which the patent had long expired.

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"They are rather," he smiled a little ruefully. "I am afraid I am somewhat careless about such things. At home a woman looks after them for me. Last night I did go a little way and I think I trod in a flower-bed. Tonight I just went into the porch. I wanted to find a four for bridge but everyone seemed keen on the TV play except two or three who made for the billiards room. So I went to my room to finish my book. I came down when I had done so and met everyone pouring out of the TV room. They told me what had happened. Poor old Ewen. I wish I could help you, inspector. I can only urge you to leave no stone unturned to catch the villain guilty of so foul a crime."
"We never do," Bellairs replied. "Nor do we leave any avenue unexplored." The smug clichés always annoyed him. "Have you a gun, Mr. Gibbons?"
"Gracious, no! I only fired one once in my life. That was in a country fair, at a bottle. Only three or four yards away and I missed it."
"Never in the Army?"
"No. My eyes. And I was already in the House. My duty lay there. I did my best for our boys."
At that Bellairs let him go.
"A real gas-bag, Major Bennion. What do you think of him? What about his dirty shoes?"
"The mud was dry. That might let him out. Had he been up to mischief tonight. I think he would have cleaned or changed them. There was one, morsel of sense in all he said."
"Glad to hear it. What was it?"
"You may have to consider Ewen's private life as well as the political opinions he expressed. That is where the Yard comes in."

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11. While Others Slept

Inspector Bellairs departed to report more fully to his superintendent. He left two constables in charge, one inside and one outside the premises, with instructions that no one was to leave. He had had a word with the domestic staff and learned they were favoured with a wireless set of their own which was in full blast while they attended to the washing up and other domestic chores. Each answered for the rest.

It was some time before the guests separated and went to bed. They clustered in small groups and tried to find an explanation for the tragedy. Apparently with no success, though the general opinion was that the shooting must have been from outside and that some enemy from the village was probably responsible for it.

They plied Major Bennion with questions, but he said he could tell them nothing they did not already know. He would have liked to go to his room but waited to see if he could help Rhoda. She, poor girl, was hardest hit of all of them. She was fond of her cousin Ewen. She had sent her messages but felt it up to her to see everyone settled for the night before she herself retired. With Ewen gone and with her uncle and aunt upstairs everything devolved on her.

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"Sleep as well as you can, my dear," Roger told her finally. "Everything will be in good hands tomorrow."
He then went to his own room and all was quiet. He did not write to Ruth. He knew she would be worried at his being concerned in another murder mystery but he might be able to tell her more about it before anything appeared in any paper she was likely to see. He did not anticipate there would be any of the odd visits of the night before. He lit a pipe and sat down to think things over.
Of the three suspects, as Inspector Bellairs regarded them, Henshaw, Ruttle and Gibbons, the first seemed to him the most likely. None of them had a clear alibi, but Ossie Henshaw not have failed to notice the marked attentions Ewen had been paying to his wife Sandra.
He, like the others, had called Ewen his friend, but why, unless he distrusted him, had he followed him to his wife's room the night before? The toothbrush excuse was such a feeble one.
Ossie had not been anxious for a third game of billiards. He had gone out and if the window of the TV room was slightly open because it was such a warm night, he might have listened for a few moments to the play. He could well have parted the curtains to peep inside. He would then have looked straight at the face of the man he distrusted, faintly visible in the light of the screen. He would hardly have been carrying his weapon but, if he had brought it with him, it would be a matter of moments to fetch--and use--it.

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Then he must get rid of it. The river. That would explain the dash across the lawn and his getting caught in the storm. A more reasonable explanation than his story of a rush to the hut for shelter. Would he not have returned to the house directly the rain started? Who could say how long the storm would last?
It was a theory he, Roger, had not mentioned to Bellairs but it seemed more reasonable than to suspect the two M.P.s, who were accustomed to show their differences and had other ways of dealing with them.
Apart from Ossie it was rather a mixed bag of M.P.s that Ewen had gathered to hear what was to prove his last oration. All, no doubt, big men in their own constituencies, but only four of them stood out as definite personalities. Foremost was Bill Ruttle, a grim Socialist of the older order He had worked in the mines as a boy in the bad old days. The iron of privation had bitten into his soul and the capitalist would always remain an enemy from whom only evil could come.
Fred Gibbons, years younger, was of the doctrinaire type. He had been to a school of economics and had adopted politics as a profession. A fluent speaker, he knew how to make his audience laugh. That always was a help.
"Jeremiah" Dayton was of yet another type. A relic of a bygone age. In his youth he had possessed a fine voice and had once won a bardic prize at an Eisteddfod. He was earnest and sincere and his fellow Welshmen no doubt loved him, even if some of them thought him a bit crazy.

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As for Joe Edmonds, he was less colourful but stood out as Ewen's best friend.
At this point Roger was disturbed by a knock on his door. He opened it. Outside stood Gwennie Wren in her night attire and a dressing-gown.
"I saw your light was on," she whispered. "I must have a word with you."
She slipped past him into the room.
"Will it not wait until the morning?" he asked.
"No, no! It is urgent. Never mind the proprieties. Do you know who shot Ewen?"
She seemed unusually agitated. He could almost see her breasts rising and falling as she spoke. He decided he must hear what she had to say but it was best to take the matter coolly.
"I do not," he said. "Sit down."
She took the chair and he sat on the edge of the bed. She had evidently come in some haste. Her pyjamas were of a flimsy, semi-transparent material and she was holding her wrap together with one hand. Her hair was untidy and she was in no way glamourised. That perhaps was reassuring!
"Do you believe I did it?" she asked just audibly.

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"The inspector considered the possibility, as you were in an end seat," he replied. "I thought it unlikely."
"Thank God for that! I have just found this among my clothes!"
She put her hand in the dressing-gown pocket and pulled out a small but very ugly snub-nosed revolver.
"Don't point it at me," he said. "Your finger is on the trigger. Put it on the bed."
She did so.
"Yours?" he asked.
"No!"
"Ever had one?"
"Never. But if that was found in my drawer--"
"When did you find it?"
"A few moments ago. I did not know what to do. So I brought it to you."
"Which is your room?"
"The first in the passage, on the other side. Brother Anselm's."
"When did you last look at the place where you found it?"
"After dinner. I went to tidy up and get a handkerchief before going to the TV. It was not there then."
"You are sure of that?"
"Quite sure."