The Case of the Late Pig

'I say, Campion!' His voice sounded young over the wire. 'I've got an idea. I don't know if you remember it, but I said something to you yesterday. You didn't think much of it at the time — I saw that in your face — but I believe it's going to come in useful now. I'll be over right away.'

He was. In less than twenty minutes, he came panting up the drive in second gear, his face pink and his eyes burning with delighted enthusiasm. If it had been anybody but Lugg I could have forgiven him.

We held a consultation on the front lawn.

'It's that chap Whippet,' he said. 'I've been keeping an eye on him. I know how you feel — old school friends and that sort of thing — but you don't really know him at all, and things have been happening, haven't they? Someone must be behind them.'

'Yes, well,' I said, impatiently, 'go on.'

He was a little overwhelmed to find me so receptive, I think, but he hurried on eagerly enough.

'There's a house,' he said, 'an empty villa which stands all by itself at the end of a partly made-up road. It was the beginning of a building scheme which got stopped when the parish council found out what was happening. Whippet's been down there once or twice. I don't say anything definite, but didn't it occur to you that that fellow Hayhoe must have been killed somewhere other than out in the open field? It's a lonely little place. Just the place for a spot of bother. Let's go down.'

There was a great deal in what he said, and I did not want to waste time arguing. I moved over towards his car. He looked a little shamefaced.

I'm afraid we'd better take yours,' he said. 'Mine's not very young, you know, and she developed a spot of her usual trouble coming along just now. The oil gets in somewhere and rots up the ignition. That is, unless you can wait while I clean a plug or two?'

I was not in the mood to wait, and I got out the Lagonda. He settled beside me with a little sigh of sheer pleasure at its comfort.

'Straight down the hill,' he said, 'and first on the left.'

We turned out of the village and took the long lonely road which winds up through Tethering and on to Rushberry. Presently we turned again. There was a little beer-house, 'The Dog and Fowl', sitting coyly under a bank of elms about half a mile farther on, and as we neared it he touched my arm.

'You're rotting yourself up,' he said. 'You haven't been sleeping, and now this shock on top of it is getting you down. You'd better stop and have one.'

I cursed at the delay, but he insisted and we went in.

It was an unattractive little place, old and incredibly dirty. The bar was a mass of cheap advertising trophies, and the only other customer at the time we entered was a toothless old person with a Newgate fringe.

Kingston insisted on beer. There was nothing like old beer for steadying one, he said, and while the half-wit landlady shambled off to fill our tankards, Kingston interrogated the old man concerning Lugg. He did it very well, all things considered, using the idiom of the county.

The old gentleman could not help us, however. He was short of sight and hard of hearing, so he said, and never took much count of strangers, anyway.

It was after the two greasy tankards had been pushed towards us that Kingston showed me the cottage we were going to investigate. It was just visible from the tiny window of the bar. I could see its hideously new red roof peering out amid a mass of foliage about half a mile away.

'Yes, well, let's get on,' I said, for I had no great hopes of finding my unfortunate old friend there and time was getting short.

Kingston rose to the occasion.

'All right,' he said. 'We won't wait for another.'

He drained his tankard and so did I. As I turned away from the bar I stumbled and inadvertently caught the old man's pewter mug with my elbow. Its contents were splattered all over the floor and there was another few minutes' delay while we apologized and bought him another drink.

When I got to the car I stood for a moment looking down at the steering wheel.

'Look here, Kingston,' I said, 'd'you think it's really necessary to go to this place?'

'I do, old boy, I do.' He was insistent. 'It's odd, you know, a stranger hanging about an empty house.'

I got in and began to drive. A quarter of a mile up the road the car swerved violently and I pulled up.

'I say,' I said a little thickly, 'would you drive this thing?'

He looked at me and I saw surprised interest on his round, unexpectedly youthful face.

'What's the matter, old man?' he said. 'Feeling tired?'

'Yes,' I said. 'That stuff must have been frightfully strong. Drive on as quick as you can.'

He climbed out, and I moved heavily over into the place he had vacated. A minute later we were roaring down the road again. I was slumped forward, my head on my chest, my eyes half closed.

'Can't understand it,' I said, my words blurred. 'Got to get ol' Lugg. I'm tired — terribly tired.'