The Sussex Downs Murder Read Online Free PDF Page B

got—”
    â€œPlease, Mr. Rother, I explained before, this is a private police investigation. All I’m asking for is information, and it’s for your own peace of mind if you let me have it.”
    â€œVery well.” Rother lifted his narrow shoulders. “I’ll restrain my natural curiosity. Well, the process is simple enough. Here are the kilns—three of them—twenty feet deep or there-abouts. The fires are lit in the first place at the bottom of the shaft, and after that, except for purposes of repair, the kilns are never let out.”
    â€œHow do you keep them alight?”
    Rother pointed to two heaps—one black, one white—on each side of the kiln’s circular mouth.
    â€œChalk and powdered coal—cullum, we call it locally. When the kilns are banked up, usually twice a day, we shovel on one layer of chalk to one layer of cullum. By the time the red-hot chalk reaches the base of the shaft it has been transformed by combustion into lime. Down below there are brick arches terminating at the bottom of each kiln. The men use these arches to dig out the lime, the chalk level automatically falls at the top, and the kiln is restoked with more layers of chalk and cullum. To put it as simply as possible, when a kiln is functioning properly, it consists of three layers. At the bottom pure lime, in the middle red-hot chalk in the process of being changed into lime, at the top pure chalk alternating with layers of unburnt cullum. You follow me, Mr. Meredith?”
    â€œPerfectly, sir. You’ve told me exactly what I was after. When are the kilns usually banked up?”
    â€œEarly morning and late afternoon.”
    â€œWould the level have fallen at all during the night?”
    â€œTo a certain extent—yes—due to the crumbling process of combustion.”
    â€œA couple of feet?”
    â€œYes, quite that.”
    â€œThanks. And now I wonder if you could let me have a glimpse of your order-book?”

Chapter Three
    More Bones
    Whatever William Rother may have thought about Meredith’s strange request for a glimpse of the order-book he allowed no hint of it to show on his haggard features. He just muttered, “Very well,” in the toneless voice of a man who makes no resistance to a whim, however queer he thinks it, and led the way back to the farmhouse. This time they entered it from the back, first through a small courtyard sporting a fir tree and a square of unkempt grass, then across some uneven flags into an airy stone-floored kitchen, the centre-piece of which was an enormous, well-scoured deal table. At the far end of the kitchen, under a low window, was a second, smaller table covered with a red cloth and loaded with ledgers, files, letters, reference-books, inkpots, pens and paper. On the broad window-sill stood a portable typewriter.
    Rother smiled wanly.
    â€œThe office,” he explained with a side-jerk of his head. “Such as it is. We don’t boast a study up here at Chalklands. Now what exactly are you after?”
    â€œI want a list, if possible, of all your customers supplied with lime during the last ten days—that is to say since the night of your brother’s disappearance.”
    â€œWith the amounts delivered?”
    â€œYes.”
    Rother picked up an ordinary black exercise-book and handed it to Meredith.
    â€œYou’ll find everything you want there, Mr. Meredith. It seems an extraordinary request to me, but you know your own business best. I’d do anything to help solve the mystery of John’s disappearance, and if he’s dead—which I’m beginning to suspect—to hang the man who murdered him. But what you imagine you’ll get out of that order-book beats me!”
    â€œMay I take a copy?”
    Rother nodded.
    â€œAnd in the meantime I want to walk out to the chalk-pit. If there’s anything further you want you’ll find me there. It’s directly behind