The Seven Dials mystery
Tredwell took her place.
"The vicar, my lord, is most anxious to see you, some unfortunate
controversy having arisen about the status of the Boys' Brigade."
Lord Caterham groaned.
"I rather fancied, my lord, that I had heard you mention at breakfast
that you were strolling down to the village this morning to converse
with the vicar on the subject."
"Did you tell him so?" asked Lord Caterham eagerly.
"I did, my lord. He departed, if I may say so, hot-foot. I hope I did
right, my lord?"
"Of course you did, Tredwell. You are always right. You couldn't go
wrong if you tried."
Tredwell smiled benignly and withdrew.
Bundle, meanwhile, was sounding the Klaxon impatiently before the lodge
gates, while a small child came hastening out with all speed from the
lodge, admonishment from her mother following her.
"Make haste, Katie. That be her ladyship in a mortal hurry as always."
It was indeed characteristic of Bundle to be in a hurry, especially
when driving a car. She had skill and nerve and was a good driver; had
it been otherwise her reckless pace would have ended in disaster more
than once.
It was a crisp October day, with a blue sky and a dazzling sun. The
sharp tang of the air brought the blood to Bundle's cheeks and filled
her with the zest of living.
She had that morning sent Gerald Wade's unfinished letter to Loraine
Wade at Deane Priory, enclosing a few explanatory lines. The curious
impression it had made upon her was somewhat dimmed in the daylight,
yet it still struck her as needing explanation. She intended to get
hold of Bill Eversleigh sometime and extract from him fuller details
of the house-party which had ended so tragically. In the meantime, it
was a lovely morning and she felt particularly well and the Hispano was
running like a dream.
Bundle pressed her foot down on the accelerator and the Hispano
responded at once. Mile after mile vanished, traffic stops were few and
far between and Bundle had a clear stretch of road in front of her.
And then, without any warning whatever, a man reeled out of the
hedge and on to the road right in front of the car. To stop in time
was out of the question. With all her might Bundle wrenched at the
steering wheel and swerved out to the right. The car was nearly in the
ditch--nearly, but not quite. It was a dangerous manoeuvre, but it
succeeded. Bundle was almost certain that she had missed the man.
She looked back and felt a sickening sensation in the middle of her
anatomy. The car had not passed over the man, but nevertheless it must
have struck him in passing. He was lying face downwards on the road,
and he lay ominously still.
Bundle jumped out and ran back. She had never yet run over anything
more important than a stray hen. The fact that the accident was hardly
her fault did not weigh with her at the minute. The man had seemed
drunk, but drunk or not, she had killed him. She was quite sure she
had killed him. Her heart beat sickeningly in great pounding thumps,
sounding right up in her ears.
She knelt down by the prone figure and turned him very gingerly over.
He neither groaned nor moaned. He was young, she saw, rather a
pleasant-faced young man, well dressed and wearing a small toothbrush
moustache.
There was no external mark of injury that she could see, but she was
quite positive that he was either dead or dying. His eyelids flickered
and the eyes half opened. Piteous eyes, brown and suffering, like a
dog's. He seemed to be struggling to speak. Bundle bent right over.
"Yes," she said. "Yes?"
There was something he wanted to say, she could see that. Wanted to say
badly. And she couldn't help him, couldn't do anything.
At last the words came, a mere sighing breath:
"_Seven Dials_ ... tell...."
"Yes," said Bundle again. It was a name he was trying to get
out--trying with all his failing strength. "Yes. Who am I to tell?"
"_Tell_ ... _Jimmy Thesiger_...." He got it out at last, and then
suddenly, his head fell back and his body went limp.
Bundle sat back on her heels, shivering from head to foot. She could
never have imagined that anything so awful could have happened to her.
He was dead--and she had killed him.
She tried to pull herself together. What must she do now? A
doctor--that was her first thought. It was possible--just
possible--that the man might only be unconscious, not dead. Her
instinct cried out against the possibility, but she forced herself to
act upon it. Somehow or other she must get him into the car and take
him to the nearest doctor's. It was a deserted stretch of country road
and there was no one to help her.
Bundle, for all her slimness, was strong. She had muscles of whipcord.
She brought the Hispano as close as possible, and then, exerting all
her strength, she dragged and pulled the inanimate figure into it. It
was a horrid business, and one that made her set her teeth, but at last
she managed it.
Then she jumped into the driver's seat and started off. A couple of
miles brought her into a small town and on inquiry she was quickly
directed to the doctor's house.
Dr. Cassell, a kindly, middle-aged man, was startled to come into
his surgery and find a girl there who was evidently on the verge of
collapse.
Bundle spoke abruptly.
"I--I think I've killed a man. I ran over him. I brought him along in
the car. He's outside now. I--I was driving too fast, I suppose. I've
always driven too fast."
The doctor cast a practised glance over her. He stepped over to a shelf
and poured something into a glass. He brought it over to her.
"Drink this down," he said, "and you'll feel better. You've had a
shock."
Bundle drank obediently and a tinge of colour came into her pallid
face. The doctor nodded approvingly.
"That's right. Now I want you to sit quietly here. I'll go out and
attend to things. After I've made sure there's nothing to be done for
the poor fellow, I'll come back and we'll talk about it."
He was away some time. Bundle watched the clock on the mantelpiece.
Five minutes, ten minutes, a quarter of an hour, twenty minutes--would
he never come?
Then the door opened and Dr. Cassell reappeared. He looked
different--Bundle noticed that at once--grimmer and at the same time
more alert. There was something else in his manner that she did not
quite understand, a suggestion of repressed excitement.
"Now then, young lady," he said, "let's have this out. You ran over
this man, you say. Tell me just how the accident happened?"
Bundle explained to the best of her ability. The doctor followed her
narrative with keen attention.
"Just so; the car didn't pass over his body?"
"No. In fact, I thought I'd missed him altogether."
"He was reeling, you say?"
"Yes, I thought he was drunk."
"And he came from the hedge?"
"There was a gate just there, I think. He must have come through the
gate."
The doctor nodded, then he leaned back in his chair and removed his
pince-nez.
"I've no doubt at all," he said, "that you're a very reckless driver,
and that you'll probably run over some poor fellow and do for him one
of these days--but you haven't done it this time."
"But--"
"The car never touched him. _This man was shot._"
CHAPTER VI
SEVEN DIALS AGAIN
Bundle stared at him. And very slowly the world, which for the last
three quarters of an hour had been upside down, shifted till it stood
once more the right way up. It was quite two minutes before Bundle
spoke, but when she did it was no longer the panic-stricken girl but
the real Bundle, cool, efficient, and logical.
"How could he be shot?" she said.
"I don't know how he could," said the doctor dryly. "But he was. He's
got a rifle bullet in him all right. He bled internally, that's why you
didn't notice anything."
Bundle nodded.
"The question is," the doctor continued, "Who shot him? You saw nobody
about?"
Bundle shook her head.
"It's odd," said the doctor. "If it was an accident, you'd expect
the fellow who did it would come running to the rescue--unless just
possibly he didn't know what he'd done."
"There was no one about," said Bundle. "On the road, that is."
"It seems to me," said the doctor, "that the poor lad must have been
running--the bullet got him just as he passed through the gate and he
came reeling on to the road in consequence. You didn't hear a shot?"
Bundle shook her head.
"But I probably shouldn't anyway," she said, "with the noise of the
car."
"Just so. He didn't say anything before he died?"
"He muttered a few words."
"Nothing to throw light on the tragedy?"
"No. He wanted something--I don't know what--told to a friend of his.
Oh! yes, and he mentioned Seven Dials."
"H'm," said Doctor Cassell. "Not a likely neighborhood for one of his
class. Perhaps his assailant came from there. Well, we needn't worry
about that now. You can leave it in my hands. I'll notify the police.
You must, of course, leave your name and address, as the police are
sure to want to question you. In fact, perhaps you'd better come round
to the police station with me now. They might say I ought to have
detained you."
They went together in Bundle's car. The police inspector was a
slow-speaking man. He was somewhat overawed by Bundle's name and
address when she gave it to him, and he took down her statement with
great care.
"Lads!" he said. "That's what it is. Lads practising! Cruel stupid,
them young varmints are. Always loosing off at birds with no
consideration for anyone as may be the other side of a hedge."
The doctor thought it a most unlikely solution, but he realized that
the case would soon be in abler hands and it did not seem worth while
to make objections.
"Name of deceased?" asked the sergeant, moistening his pencil.
"He had a cardcase on him. He appears to have been a Mr. Ronald
Devereux, with an address in the Albany."
Bundle frowned. The name Ronald Devereux awoke some chord of
remembrance. She was sure she had heard it before.
It was not until she was half-way back to Chimneys in the car that it
came to her. Of course! Ronny Devereux. Bill's friend in the Foreign
Office. He and Bill and--yes--Gerald Wade.
As this last realisation came to her, Bundle nearly went into the
hedge. First Gerald Wade--then Ronny Devereux. Gerry Wade's death might
have been natural--the result of carelessness--but Ronny Devereux's
surely bore a more sinister interpretation.
And then Bundle remembered something else. Seven Dials! When the
dying man had said it, it had seemed vaguely familiar. Now she knew
why. Gerald Wade had mentioned Seven Dials in that last letter of his
written to his sister on the night before his death. And that again
connected up with something else that escaped her.
Thinking all these things over, Bundle had slowed down to such a sober
pace that nobody would have recognised her. She drove the car round to
the garage and went in search of her father.
Lord Caterham was happily reading a catalogue of a forthcoming sale of
rare editions and was immeasurably astonished to see Bundle.
"Even you," he said, "can't have been to London and back in this time."
"I haven't been to London," said Bundle. "I ran over a man."
"What?"
"Only I didn't really. He was shot."
"How could he have been?"
"I don't know how he could have been, but he was."
"But why did you shoot him?"
"I didn't shoot him."
"You shouldn't shoot people," said Lord Caterham in a tone of mild
remonstrance. "You shouldn't really. I daresay some of them richly
deserve it--but all the same it will lead to trouble."
"I tell you I didn't shoot him."
"Well, who did?"
"Nobody knows," said Bundle.
"Nonsense," said Lord Caterham. "A man can't be shot and run over