Hangmans Holiday Read Online Free PDF

brightest red you ever see—like them carrots there. It wasn’t so pretty as ’is ma’s, though much the same colour. He didn’t favour ’er in the face, neither, nor yet ’is dad. She said ’e took after some of ’er side of the family.”
    “Did you ever see any of the rest of the family?”
    “Only ’er sister, Mrs. Susan Brown. A big, stern, ’ard-faced woman she was—not like ’er sister. Lived at Evesham she did, as well I remembers, for I was gettin’ my grass from there at the time. I never sees a bunch o’ grass now but what I think of Mrs. Susan Brown. Stiff, she was, with a small ’ead, very like a stick o’ grass.”
    Wimsey thanked Mrs. Harbottle in a suitable manner and took the next train to Evesham. He was beginning to wonder where the chase might lead him, but discovered, much to his relief, that Mrs. Susan Brown was well known in the town, being a pillar of the Methodist Chapel and a person well respected.
    She was upright still, with smooth, dark hair parted in the middle and drawn tightly back—a woman broad in the base and narrow in the shoulder—not, indeed, unlike the stick of asparagus to which Mrs. Harbottle had compared her. She received Wimsey with stern civility, but disclaimed all knowledge of her nephew’s movements. The hint that he was in a position of some embarrassment, and even danger, did not appear to surprise her.
    “There was bad blood in him,” she said. “My sister Hetty was softer by half than she ought to have been.”
    “Ah!” said Wimsey. “Well, we can’t all be people of strong character, though it must be a source of great satisfaction to those that are. I don’t want to be a trouble to you, madam, and I know I’m given to twaddling rather, being a trifle on the soft side myself—so I’ll get to the point. I see by the register at Somerset House that your nephew, Robert Duckworthy, was born in Southwark, the son of Alfred and Hester Duckworthy. Wonderful system they have there. But of course—being only human—it breaks down now and again—doesn’t it?”
    She folded her wrinkled hands over one another on the edge of the table, and he saw a kind of shadow flicker over her sharp dark eyes.
    “If I’m not bothering you too much—in what name was the other registered?”
    The hands trembled a little, but she said steadily:
    “I do not understand you.”
    “I’m frightfully sorry. Never was good at explaining myself. There were twin boys born, weren’t there? Under what name did they register the other? I’m so sorry to be a nuisance, but it’s really rather important.”
    “What makes you suppose that there were twins?”
    “Oh, I don’t suppose it. I wouldn’t have bothered you for a supposition. I know there was a twin brother. What became—at least, I do know more or less what became of him—”
    “It died,” she said hurriedly.
    “I hate to seem contradictory,” said Wimsey. “Most unattractive behaviour. But it didn’t die, you know. In fact, it’s alive now. It’s only the name I want to know, you know.”
    “And why should I tell you anything, young man?”
    “Because,” said Wimsey, “if you will pardon the mention of anything so disagreeable to a refined taste, there’s been a murder committed and your nephew Robert is suspected. As a matter of fact, I happen to know that the murder was done by the brother. That’s why I want to get hold of him, don’t you see. It would be such a relief to my mind—I am naturally nice-minded—if you would help me to find him. Because, if not, I shall have to go to the police, and then you might be subpœna’d as a witness, and I shouldn’t like—I really shouldn’t like—to see you in the witness-box at a murder trial. So much unpleasant publicity, don’t you know. Whereas, if we can lay hands on the brother quickly, you and Robert need never come into it at all.”
    Mrs. Brown sat in grim thought for a few minutes.
    “Very well,” she said, “I will tell