After lunch, Crewe, accompanied by Marsland, walked up to the police station at Staveley to call on Inspector Murchison. The police station was a building of grey stone, standing back in a large garden. It would have been taken for a comfortable middle-class residence but for the official notices of undiscovered crime which were displayed on a black board erected in the centre flower-bed. A young policeman was sitting writing in a front room overlooking the garden, which had been turned into a general office.
Crewe, without disclosing his name or using Sir George’s card, asked him if he could see the inspector in charge. The young policeman, requesting him to take a seat, said he would inquire if the inspector was disengaged, and disappeared into an inner office. He shortly returned to say that Inspector Murchison would see them, and ushered them into the inner office, where a police officer sat writing at a large desk.
Inspector Murchison of Staveley was in every way a contrast to Police-Sergeant Westaway of Ashlingsea. He was a large and portly man with a good-humoured smile, twinkling blue eyes, and a protecting official manner which ladies who had occasion to seek his advice found very soothing. He had been stationed at Staveley for nearly thirty years, but instead of souring under his circumscribed existence like Sergeant Westaway, he had expanded with the town, and become more genial and good-tempered as the years rolled on.
He was a popular and important figure in Staveley, taking a deep and all-embracing interest in the welfare of the town and its inhabitants. He was a leading spirit in every local movement for Staveley’s advancement; he was an authority in its lore, traditions, vital statistics, and local government; he had even written a booklet in which the history of Staveley was set forth and its attractions as a health and pleasure resort were described in superlative terms. He was regarded by the residents as a capable mentor and safe guide in all affairs of life, and was the chosen receptacle of many domestic confidences of a delicate and important nature. Husbands consulted him about their wives’ extravagance; wives besought him to warn husbands against the folly of prolonged visits to hotels on the front because there happened to be a new barmaid from London.
It was striking proof of Inspector Murchison’s rectitude that, although he was the repository of as many domestic histories as a family physician or lawyer, none of the confidences given him had ever become common gossip. For all his kindly and talkative ways, he was as secret and safe as the grave, despite the fact that he had a wife and five grown-up daughters not less curious than the rest of their sex. He was an efficient police officer, carefully safeguarding the public morals and private property entrusted to his charge, and Staveley shopkeepers, as they responded to his smiling salutations when he walked abroad, felt that they could sleep in peace in their beds, safe from murder, arson, or robbery, while his portly imposing official personality guarded the town.
Inspector Murchison swung round on his office chair as Crewe and Marsland were brought in by the young policeman.
“What can I do for you, gentlemen?” he asked courteously.
“This is Mr. Crewe,” said Marsland. “Mr. Crewe has been making inquiries about the murder at Cliff Farm.”
“Glad to see you both,” said Inspector Murchison, extending his hand. “If I can be of any assistance to Mr. Crewe he has only to say so. Of course I’ve heard all about the murder at Cliff Farm. It was you who discovered the body, Mr. Marsland. A terrible affair. Poor, inoffensive Frank Lumsden! I knew him well, and his grandfather too—a queer old stick. Buried his money where no one can find it. And that is what is at the back of this murder, Mr Crewe, I have no doubt.”
“It certainly looks like it,” said Crewe.