Read Have His Carcase for Free Online

more houses and at length a little green, with a smithy
    at one corner and children playing cricket on the grass. In the centre of the
    green stood an ancient elm, with a seat round it and an ancient man basking in
    the sunshine; and on the opposite side was a shop, with ‘Geo. Hearn: Grocer’,

    displayed on a sign above it.
    ‘Thank goodness!’ said Harriet.
    She almost ran across the little green and into the vilage shop, which was
    festooned with boots and frying-pans, and appeared to sel everything from
    acid drops to corduroy trousers.
    A bald-headed man advanced helpfuly from behind a pyramid of canned
    goods.
    ‘Can I use your telephone, please?’
    ‘Certainly, miss; what number?’
    ‘I want the Wilvercombe police-station.’
    ‘The police-station?’ The grocer looked puzzled – almost shocked. ‘I’l have
    to look up the number for you,’ he said, hesitatingly. ‘Wil you step into the
    parlour, miss – and sir?’
    ‘Thank you,’ said Mr Perkins. ‘But realy – I mean – it’s the lady’s business
    realy. I mean to say – if there’s any sort of hotel hereabouts, I think I’d better
    – that is to say – er – good-evening.’
    He melted unobtrusively out of the shop. Harriet, who had already forgotten
    his existence, folowed the grocer into the back room and watched him with
    impatience as he put on his spectacles and struggled with the telephone
    directory.

    III
    THE EVIDENCE OF THE HOTEL
    ‘Little and grisly, or bony and big,
    White, and clattering, grassy and yellow;
    The partners are waiting, so strike up a jig,
    Dance and be merry, for Death’s a droll fellow.
    . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
    Where’s Death and his sweetheart? We want to begin.’
    Death’s Jest-Book
    Thursday, 18 June
    It was a quarter-past five when the grocer announced that Harriet’s cal was
    through. Alowing for stoppages and for going out of her way to the Brennerton
    Farm, she had covered rather more than four miles of the distance between the
    Grinders and Wilvercombe in very nearly three hours. True, she had actualy
    walked six miles or more, but she felt that a shocking amount of time had been
    wasted. Wel, she had done her best, but fate had been against her.
    ‘Hulo!’ she said, wearily.
    ‘Hulo!’ said an official voice.
    ‘Is that the Wilvercombe police?’
    ‘Speaking. Who are you?’
    ‘I’m speaking from Mr Hearn’s shop at Darley. I want to tel you that this
    afternoon at about two o’clock I found the dead body of a man lying on the
    beach near the Grinders.’
    ‘Oh!’ said the voice. ‘One moment, please. Yes. The dead body of a man at
    the Grinders. Yes?’
    ‘He’d got his throat cut,’ said Harriet.
    ‘Throat cut,’ said the official voice. ‘Yes?’
    ‘I also found a razor,’ said Harriet.
    ‘A razor?’ The voice seemed rather pleased, she thought, by this detail.
    ‘Who is it speaking?’ it went on.

    ‘My name is Vane, Miss Harriet Vane. I am on a walking-tour, and
    happened to find him. Can you send someone out to fetch me, or shal I—?’
    ‘Just a moment. Name of Vane – V-A-N-E – yes. Found at two o’clock,
    you say. You’re a bit late letting us know, aren’t you?’
    Harriet explained that she had had difficulty in getting through to them.
    ‘I see,’ said the voice. ‘Al right, miss, we’l be sending a car along. You just
    stay where you are til we come. You’l have to go along with us and show us
    the body.’
    ‘I’m afraid there won’t be any body by now,’ said Harriet. ‘You see, it was
    down quite close to the sea, on that big rock, you know, and the tide—’
    ‘We’l see to that, miss,’ replied the voice, confidently, as though the
    Nautical Almanack might be expected to conform to police regulations. ‘The
    car’l be along in about ten minutes or so.’
    The receiver clicked and was silent. Harriet replaced her end of the
    instrument and stood for a few minutes, hesitating. Then she took the receiver
    off