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INSPECTOR PASCAL MYSTERIES 1000
#17 No Exit, © 2016-2023 by T.K. Naliaka

“Yes, Sergeant Braque?”

“Inspector Joplin, I am looking for Inspector Pascal.  You were conferring with him in the study.”

Joplin glanced up from his notes at the big, broad-shouldered uniformed policeman. “He’s still there.”

Braque sharply shook his head. “No, sir; he’s not!”

“I can’t help you then.”

Braque insisted. “Sir, I can’t find him!”

“He’s probably just walking about.”

“Sir!  We don’t work like that!  I was posted in the hallway.  You came out.  I waited.  Inspector Pascal didn’t come out.  I called, then I checked.  He’s not there.  Where is he?”

A bit more wary then Joplin offered, “Perhaps he went out another door.”

“No sir! If he intended to go out by another exit, he would have informed me, but there is no other door. Yet, he’s not there!”

Joplin leaned over the staircase railing to the foyer below. “Mr. Darcy!  Have you seen Inspector Pascal?”

The step-brother of the deceased owner of the mansion, paused at the foot of the staircase.  He turned slightly and pointed towards the lawns outside. “I just passed him on his way to the stable.”

Braque considered him stonily, then Inspector Joplin.  He colored, then pushed past Joplin, descended the stairs and slammed Darcy against the wall.

Darcy gasped as Braque handcuffed him. “What are you doing??”

Ignoring Darcy’s protests, Braque hauled him up the stairs and down the hallway.  He threw open the study door.  “You’re lying!  Where’s Inspector Pascal??”

Joplin, followed by two of his men crowded in. “Sergeant Braque! You have overstepped your authority!”

Braque turned on him and growled. “I was posted outside right there! Prove to me how Inspector Pascal left this room without me seeing him! He never came out!”

They all hesitated, then Officer Blake went out to the hallway as Officer Haskell quickly walked the perimeter of the entire room. A moment later, Blake came back in. “Sir, from that position, there’s complete visual control of the hallway.”

Haskell rejoined them and told them what they could plainly see for themselves. “There is no other exit.”

They turned to look at Darcy.  He said nothing.

Furious, Braque turned around and stared at the spacious, empty study – two opposing sides of windows that overlooked the rear garden and the front driveway, a half-height book shelf along the corridor wall, a pair of sofas with two upholstered club chairs in the center on a red Persian rug and a long wall of ornate, floor-to-ceiling built-in mahogany wood shelves displaying thousands of books.  Braque strode to the bookshelves and began tugging and testing the woodwork.  Haskell left Blake to guard Darcy and joined Braque.  Inspector Joplin frowned, then he stepped forward and pointed. “Try that section.”

Braque quickly shifted over.  A moment later he pulled out his torch and shone it into the joint between two shelf sections.  He stepped back and looked at the section, then he reached out and began clearing it of books, then he used his nightstick to punch through the backing of the shelf.  He peered through the hole, then reached his hand inside and felt around.  There was a ‘click,’ the shelf disengaged, shifted forward and swung out slightly on hinges.

Joplin exclaimed, “An elevator!”

Braque pressed the call button.  A few moments later, the car rose up from below.  The door slid open.  It was just big enough for three persons, but it was a tight squeeze with big, broad-shouldered Braque, so Joplin got inside with him and they descended to the ground floor.  The door opened on the opposite side, into the four-bay garage. They turned to look at how the elevator was concealed behind another façade of storage shelving, then to consider the four sedans parked inside the garage.  After checking them all, they both returned quickly to the one locked vehicle.  Joplin called Haskell. A minute later the elevator rose up then descended.

Haskell stepped out. “We searched him. Darcy had two sets of car keys.”

Joplin indicated the silver sedan. “See if either of them can open that car.”

All of a sudden, bright light and a cool swash of fresh air swept inside the stuffy trunk as the rear hatch was thrown open.  Bound hand and foot, with a wide piece of tape over his mouth, Pascal blearily opened his eyes to look up at three stern men looking down at him.

A half-hour later, Pascal, freed, with a new white bandage covering a cut and bruise on his temple, hiked stiffly up the grand staircase, protectively shadowed by a scowling Sergeant Braque.  A stone-faced Inspector Joplin with his men followed them.

Pascal explained as he climbed. “None of the guests recalled seeing the victim after dinner.  Darcy invited - we would say lured - his step-brother away from the dining room to the study to help set up a nice selection of digestives after dinner for their guests.”

They followed him into the room.  Pascal indicated the sitting area. “The trick was to fool the other guests that the victim had left.  Darcy struck him down here.” Pascal considered Braque’s handiwork, then indicated the opened shelf concealment door and elevator. “He carried him downstairs via the elevator and dumped the body into his vehicle in the garage. Darcy re-entered via the elevator to invite the other guests up to this study; all accomplished under three minutes.  Not a soul was aware that Darcy had left and returned via a secret exit.”

He gingerly touched the bandage on his forehead ruefully. “Neither was I…” Pascal crossed to the bookshelves to pick up a small black, slim object.  “… until I discovered this remote on the shelf… a very odd thing to keep in a room with absolutely no electronics.”  He pressed a button.

There was a barely audible click-click as the concealment door latch engaged and disengaged. “I tried it; the door opened and I was unexpectedly face-to-face with Darcy who was in the elevator where he’d been eavesdropping on Inspector Joplin and me.”
 © 2016-2023 T.K. Naliaka, All rights reserved

INSPECTOR PASCAL MYSTERIES 1000
#16, Washed Away by T.K. Naliaka ©2016-2023

“I don’t think you’re crazy, sir!” Sergeant Braque called down. “They just don’t understand the way you work!”

The voice below asked. “But, you do?”

“Of course, sir!”

“I appreciate that; since I need you to pull me out of this!  I want it very clear that I’m not here because I enjoy slogging through decrepit drainage systems... just for the record or my obituary, preserving the family honor, of course!”

“I won’t let that happen, sir!”

“Thank you Sergeant Braque!”

“You’re welcome sir!”

He sighed and looked around, then he sloshed through thigh-deep water carefully examining the subterranean junction by his flashlight.  Crouching, he peered inside the wide, dark outlet pipe.  The flashlight’s beam went a long way, then dissipated in a deeper gloom.  After a few minutes, he called up, “Sergeant Braque!” There was no reply.  He frowned, “Sergeant Braque?”

The voice was cool and venomous. “I’m so sorry Inspector Pascal!  Your Sergeant Braque was called away for a moment…too bad for you!”

The line Pascal had used to climb down into the big cistern suddenly dropped to slap on the surface of the water.  He splashed over before it sank, gathered it up quickly in big loops and hung it over his shoulder, then shined the flashlight beam up, but he didn’t see anyone. There was a loud clang, then a grinding screeching. Pascal pointed the flashlight to his right and watched the old rusted iron metal sluice gate start to move.

Pascal quickly stepped back to look up. “Wait!”

“You will be washed to the river! It’s a two-hundred meters-long conduit!  I do not believe that you will be able to make it… alive that is!”

Pascal shouted. “That’s how you killed Ferdinand!  You lured him here, gave him a shove and his body was found floating eight kilometers downriver!”

“Almost effortless, yes; one of the easiest things I’ve ever had to do, next to disposing of you, too - just flushing my problems away!”

The water level was rising, swirling around his waist.  Pascal jumped to catch at a handhold, but fell short.  He shouted. “What did Ferdinand do?”

The voice was contemptuous. “He never did anything!  So why should he inherit this estate and not the one who worked it?”

Pascal countered. “But it’s all going to Lady Paulina’s nephew, Martin!  He’s never even stepped foot in this country, much less this estate!  At least Ferdinand came here often!”

There was a low chuckle. “He’ll come; provided the authorities permit him a visa!  It will take a while so Martin will need the current staff to care for it for him! It’s in immaculate condition, therefore everyone will recommend this!  Martin will not be able to resist his new role playing lord of the manor, so it will be status quo for a little while.  As for Ferdinand, he came, he drank, he staggered away, every one of his visits here a fog!”

“Martin will sell!  Then where you will be?”

“Living well off the sales of the valuables that none of them knew about because they forgot there exists a catalog of them!  It was very helpful to me to select what to tuck away year after year, none the wiser!”  He mimicked. ‘Are you sure, my Lady… you instructed to replace the blue vase with the green, to match your curtains two years ago.  Ferdinand, don’t you remember you broke the clock during your party in May?” He snorted. “It was so easy!”

The water was up to Pascal’s chest.  He grabbed at an iron ring above him as he could feel the strengthening pull of the flow towards the outlet pipe.  He missed, then lunged up again and again, but was still short.  Quickly he felt along the wall, but the smoothed cement denied his fingers a good grip.

He heard a laugh.

“Having trouble? Just think how your bodyguard will be disciplined for negligence for leaving you - even for just five minutes - underground in a 200-year-old drainage system!”

Pascal jumped and hooked his fingers in the ring.  He quickly fed the end of the line through it and knotted it.  The rising water was lifting his feet off the bottom and his body floated as he held onto the line and worked to wrap a loop around his waist.  Just in time, the sluice gate opened wider and the water surged through, crashing and churning around him.

Pascal clung to the rope. There was shouting and lights flashing, but with the water gurgling and rushing by his ears, he couldn’t make out what was being yelled; suddenly there was a huge splash.  He turned to see Cédron’s head break the surface of the water close to him.

Frantically, Cédron grabbed at the loose end of the line, then he pulled himself towards Pascal.  Pascal elbowed him as Cédron tried to climb up on Pascal to force his head under water.  Pascal stiff-armed him away. “It’s over Cédron!  Everything you said was recorded!  It’s far past dealing only with me!  Ferdinand was weak and flawed, but he didn’t deserve being murdered!”

There was a grinding clang and rumble as the sluice gate began to close.  Cédron’s face twisted with fury as he tried to grab Pascal again.  Pascal kicked out.  Cédron lost his grip on the line, then he thrashed and caught it.

Pascal coolly held his gaze. “One murder, then the next seems as easy… and easier to justify!  No court in the world would have convicted you of Ferdinand’s murder!  There was no evidence!  But now you’ve given us the confession we didn’t have!!  You’ve sealed your own fate!  You’ll hang for that crime!”

Cédron stared at Pascal.  He looked up, saw police.  Finally, he slowly shook his head.  He let go of the rope, sank under the churning water and was gone.

Pascal waited.  The water at last drained; he was alone.  Chilled, he called up wearily. “Sergeant Braque, I want to get out of here.” by T.K. Naliaka ©2016 All rights reserved