“We can’t just go breaking in someone’s door on the off chance that something might not be right,” he said.

“Not even if a person may well be lying dead inside, murdered?”

He shifted uncomfortably. “I’m all alone here at the moment. Can’t leave the station unattended, can I? Besides, I can’t do nothing without my sergeant’s permission.”

“And where is he?”

“It’s his day off, miss. Can’t bother him on his day off.”

I had a growing desire to slap him but I fought to stay calm. “So if a major crime happened now, if someone ran down the street shooting people, you’d just watch because you’re all alone in the police station?”

I felt Darcy dig me in the side. The constable considered my question, not recognizing it as sarcasm. “Well, miss, if a man ran down our street shooting at people, I reckon I’d be bound to try and stop him, wouldn’t I? But if the gentleman you’re talking about is already dead, then an hour or so more won’t matter much to him, will it?”

In the face of such reason I had to back down.

“So you have no way of contacting Inspector Newcombe at all? You couldn’t find out where his meeting is being held?”

The constable considered this. “I suppose I could put through a telephone call to the main police station in Exeter and they might know how to find him, but he wouldn’t half be mad at me if I brought him back here for nothing.”

“I can promise you it’s not for nothing,” I said. “We now have proof that all those deaths were murders, you see.”

“You don’t say!” He stared at me, wide-eyed.

“And another man has died this morning and more people will go on dying unless the murderer is stopped.”

“Well, I never. Who’d have thought it around here?” he said. “I don’t recall there ever being a murder in these parts. Just like London, isn’t it?”

“So will you try to contact the inspector for us, please?” I asked.

“I’ll do my best, miss,” he said.

“We shouldn’t wait around any longer,” Darcy said. “They’ll worry where we’ve got to. And I’ve borrowed Monty’s motorcar without permission. The inspector will come out to us as soon as he gets your note.”

“I should add something about Mr. Klein,” I said and on the back of the envelope I wrote, Mr. Klein doesn’t answer his door. Suspect he may be dead inside his flat. Constable refused to break down door to find out.