by Ngaio Marsh
Alleyn asked him when he had last seen Mr Cartell.
‘Ah – yesterday evening. I dined out. At Baynesholme. Before the party.’
‘The treasure hunt?’
‘You’ve heard about it? Yes. I saw them start and then I came home. He was in his room, then, walking about and talking to that – his dog. Great heavens!’ Mr Period suddenly exclaimed.
‘What is it?’
‘Desirée – his – Lady Bantling, you know! And Andrew! They must be told, I suppose. I wonder if Connie has thought of it – but no! No, she would hardly – My dear Alleyn, I beg your pardon, but it has only just struck me.’ He explained confusedly, the connection between Baynesholme and Mr Cartell, and looked distractedly at his watch. ‘They will be here at any moment. My secretary – a delightful gel – and Andrew who is to drive her. I suggested an eleven o’clock start as it was to be such a very late party.’
By dint of patient questioning, Alleyn got this sorted out. He noticed that Mr Period kept feeling in his pockets. Then, apparently recollecting himself, he would look about the room. He opened a cigarette-box and when he found it empty, ejaculated pettishly.
Alleyn said: ‘I wonder if you’ll let me give you a cigarette and smoke one myself: it’s all wrong of course, for a policeman on duty –’ He produced his case.
‘My dear Alleyn! Thank you. Do. Do. So will I. But I should have offered you one long ago, only with all this upset Alfred hasn’t filled the boxes and – it’s too tiresome – I’ve mislaid my case.’
‘Really? Not lost, I hope.’
‘I – I hope not,’ he said hurriedly. ‘It’s all very unfortunate but never mind,’ and again he showed great uneasiness.
‘It’s infuriating to lose a good case,’ Alleyn remarked. ‘I did myself, not long ago. It was a rather special and very old one and I regret it.’
‘So is this,’ Mr Period said abruptly. ‘A card case.’ He seemed to be in two minds whether to go on and then decided against it.
Alleyn said: ‘When you saw Mr Cartell last evening was he his usual self? Nothing had happened to upset him at all?’
This question, also, produced a flurried reaction. ‘Upset? Well – it depends upon what one means by “upset”. He was certainly rather put out but it was nothing that could remotely be related –’ Mr Period fetched up short and appeared to summon all his resources. When he spoke again it was with very much more reserve and control. ‘You would not,’ he said, ‘ask me a question of that sort, I think, unless you felt that this dreadful affair was not to be resolved by – by a simple explanation.’
‘Oh,’ Alleyn said lightly, ‘we needn’t put it as high as that, you know. If he was at all agitated or absent-minded, he might not be as careful as usual when he negotiated the bridge over the ditch. The dog –’
‘Ah!’ Mr Period exclaimed. ‘The dog! Now, why on earth didn’t one think of the dog before! It is – she – I assure you, Alleyn, a most powerful and undisciplined dog. At the moment, I am given to understand, particularly so. May she not have taken one of those great plunging leaps of hers, possibly across the drain and, dragged him into it? May she not have done that?’
‘She seems, at least, to have taken a great, plunging leap.’
‘There! You see?’
‘She would also,’ Alleyn said, ‘have had to dislodge a walloping big drain-pipe and precipitate it into the ditch.’
Mr Period put his hands over his eyes. ‘It’s so horrible!’ he said faintly. ‘It’s so unspeakably horrible.’ And then, withdrawing his hands, ‘But may she not have done precisely that very thing?’
‘It’s not very likely, I’m afraid.’
Mr Period stared at him. ‘You don’t think it was an accident,’ he said. ‘Don’t bother to say anything. I can see you don’t.’
‘I’ll be very glad if I find reason to change my opinion.’
‘But why? Why not an accident? That dog, now: she is dangerous. I’ve told him so, over and over again.’
‘There are certain appearances: things that don’t quite tally. We must clear them up before we can come to any conclusion. There must, of course, be an inquest. And that is why,’ Alleyn said cheerfully, ‘I shall have to ask you any number of questions all of which will sound ridiculous and most of which, I dare say, will turn out to be just that and no more.’
It was at this juncture that Fox joined them, his excessively bland demeanour indicating, to Alleyn at least, that he had achieved his object and secured Pixie’s leash. The interview continued. Fox, as usual, managed to settle himself behind the subject and to take notes quite openly and yet entirely unnoticed. He had a talent for this sort of thing.
Mr Period’s conversation continued to be jumpy and disjointed, but gradually a fairly comprehensive picture of his ménage emerged. Alleyn heard of Cartell’s sister who was, of course, deeply shocked. ‘One of those red women who don’t normally seem to feel anything except the heat,’ Mr Period said oddly. ‘Never wear gloves and look, don’t you know, as if they never sit on anything but their hats or a shooting-stick. But I assure you she’s dreadfully cut up, poor Connie.’
Alleyn felt that Mr Period had invented this definition of Miss Cartell long ago and was so much in the habit of letting fly with it that it had escaped him involuntarily.
‘I mustn’t be naughty,’ he said unhappily. ‘Poor Connie!’ and looked exquisitely uncomfortable.
‘Apart from Miss Cartell and Lady Bantling, who I suppose is in one sense a connection or an ex-connection, are there any near relations?’
‘None that one would call near. It’s an old family,’ Mr Period said with a pale glance at his ruling passion, ‘but going – going. Indeed, I fancy he and Connie are the last. Sad.’
Alleyn said: ‘I’m afraid I shall have to ask you for an account of yesterday’s activities. I really am very sorry to pester you like this when you’ve had such a shock, but there it is. “Duty, duty must be done.”’
Mr Period brightened momentarily at this Gilbertian reference and even dismally hummed the tune, but the next second he was in the doldrums again. He worked backwards through the events of the previous day, starting with his own arrival in the lane, driven by Lady Bantling, at twenty past eleven. The plank bridge over the drain had supported him perfectly: the lamp was alight. As he approached the house he saw Mr Cartell at his bedroom window, which was wide open. Mr Cartell never, Mr Period explained, went to bed before one o’clock when he took Pixie out, but he often pottered about his room for hours before he retired. Alleyn thought he detected a note of petulance and also of extreme reticence.
‘I think,’ Mr Period said restlessly, ‘that Hal must have heard me coming home. He was at his window. He seemed – ah – he seemed to be perfectly well.’
‘Did you speak to him?’
‘I – ah – I – ah – I did just call out something after I came upstairs. He replied. I don’t remember – However!’
Mr Period himself, it transpired, had gone to bed, but not to sleep as the arrival and departure of treasure-hunters in the lane was disturbing. However, the last couple had gone before midnight and he had dozed off.
‘Did you wake again?’
‘That’s what’s so appalling to think of. I did. At one o’clock when he took Pixie out. She made the usual disturbance, barking and whining. I heard it. I’m afraid I cursed it. Then it stopped.’
‘And did you go to sleep again?’
‘Yes. Yes, I did. Yes.’
‘Were you disturbed again?’
Mr Period opened his mouth and remained agape for some seconds and then said, ‘No.’
‘Sure?’
‘Nobody disturbed me,’ Mr Period said and looked perfectly wretched.
Alleyn took him back through the day. It was with reluctance that he was brought to admit that Mr Cartell had entertained his sister and two acquaintances to luncheon. As an afterthought he remarked that Lady Bantling and her son, Andrew Bantling, had been there for drinks.<
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‘Who,’ Alleyn asked, ‘were the acquaintances?’ and was told, sketchily, about Mary Ralston, Miss Cartell’s ward, and her friend, Leonard Leiss. At the Yard, Alleyn was often heard to lament the inadequacy of his memory, an affectation which was tolerantly indulged by his colleagues. His memory was in fact like any other senior detective-officer’s, very highly trained, and in this instance it at once recalled the paragraph in the Police Gazette of some months ago in which the name and portrait-parlé of Leonard Leiss had appeared together with an account of his activities which were varied and dubious. He had started life in Bermondsey, shown some promise, achieved grammar-school status and come under the protection of a benevolent spinster whom he subsequently robbed and deserted. This episode was followed by an association with a flick-knife gang and an interval of luxury spent with a lady of greater wealth than discretion, and employment as a chauffeur with forged references. There had been two convictions. ‘Passes himself off,’ the Police Gazette had concluded ‘as a person of superior social status.’
‘Is Mr Leiss,’ Alleyn asked, ‘a young man of about twenty-seven? Dark, of pale complexion, rather too-smartly dressed and wearing a green ring on the signet finger?’
‘Oh, dear!’ Mr Period said helplessly. ‘I suppose Raikes has told you. Yes. Alas, he is!’
After that it was not hard to induce a general lament upon the regrettability of Leonard. Although Sergeant Raikes had in fact not yet reported the affair of the Scorpion sports-car, Mr Period either took it for granted that he had done so or recognized the inevitability of coming round to it before long. He said enough for Alleyn to get a fair idea of what had happened. Leonard, Mr Period concluded, was a really rather dreadful young person whom it would be the greatest mistake to encourage.
‘When I tell you, my dear fellow, that he leaned back in his chair at luncheon and positively whistled? Sang even! I promise! And the girl joined in! A terrible fellow! Poor Connie should have sent him packing at the first glance.’
‘Mr Cartell thought so too, I dare say?’
‘Oh, yes!’ said Mr Period, waving it away. ‘Yes, indeed. Oh, rather!’
‘To your knowledge had he any enemies? That sounds melodramatic, but had he? Or, to put it another way, do you know of anyone to whom he might have done any damage if he had lived?’
There was a long pause. From the lane came the sound of a car in low gear. Alleyn could see through the window that a canvas screen had been erected. His colleagues, evidently, had arrived.
‘I’m just trying to think,’ said Mr Period. He turned sheet-white. ‘Not in the sense you mean. No. Unless – but, no.’
‘Unless?’
‘You see, Alleyn, one does follow you. One does realize the implication.’
‘Naturally,’ Alleyn said. ‘It’s perfectly obvious, I’m sure. If a trap was laid for Mr Cartell last night, I should like to know if there’s anyone who might have had some motive in laying it.’
‘A booby-trap, for instance?’ He stared at Alleyn, his rather prominent front teeth closed over his underlip. ‘Of course I don’t know what you’ve found. I – I – had to go out there and – and identify him, but frankly, it distressed me very much and I didn’t notice – But, had, for instance, the planks over the ditch – had they been interfered with?’
‘Yes,’ said Alleyn.
‘Oh, my God! I see. Well, then; might it not all have been meant for a joke? A very silly, dangerous one, but still no more than a booby-trap? Um? Some of those young people in the treasure hunt. Yes!’ Mr Period ejaculated. ‘Now, isn’t that a possibility? Someone had moved the planks and poor Harold fell, you know, and perhaps he knocked himself out and then, while he was lying unconscious, may not a couple – they hunted in couples – have come along and – inadvertently dislodged the drain-pipe?’
‘You try dislodging one of those pipes,’ Alleyn said dryly. ‘It could scarcely be done inadvertently, I think.’
‘Then – then: even done deliberately out of sheer exuberance and not knowing he was there. A prank! One of those silly pranks. They were a high-spirited lot.’
‘I wonder if you can give me their names?’
As most of them had come from the county, Mr Period was able to do this. He got up to twenty-four, said he thought that was all, and then boggled.
‘Was there somebody else?’
‘In point of fact – yes. By a piece of what I can only describe, I’m afraid, as sheer effrontery, the wretched Leiss and that tiresome gel, Mary Ralston, got themselves asked. Desirée is quite hopelessly good-natured. Now he,’ Mr Period said quickly, ‘in my opinion would certainly be capable of going too far – capable de tout. But I shouldn’t say that. No. All the same, Alleyn, an accident resulting from some piece of comparatively innocent horse-play would not be as appalling as – as –’
‘As murder?’
Mr Period flung up his hands. ‘Alas!’ he said. ‘Yes. Of course, I’ve no real knowledge of how you go to work, but you’ve examined the ground no doubt. One reads of such astonishing deductions. Perhaps I shouldn’t ask.’
‘Why not?’ Alleyn said amiably. ‘The answer’s regrettably simple. At the moment there are no deductions, only circumstances. And in point of fact there’s nothing, as far as we’ve gone, to contradict your theory of a sort of double-barrelled piece of hooliganism. Somebody gets the enchanting idea of rearranging the planks. Somebody else gets the even more amusing idea of dislodging a main sewer pipe. The victim of the earlier jeu d’esprit, by an unfortunate coincidence, becomes the victim of the second.’
‘Of course, if you put it like that –’
‘Coincidences do happen with unbelievable frequency. I sometimes think they’re the occupational hazards of police work. So far, for all we’ve seen, there’s no reason to suppose that Mr Cartell has not been the victim of one of them. Unless,’ Alleyn said, ‘you count this.’
He had a very quick, dexterous way of using his hands. With the least possible amount of fuss he had produced, laid upon Mr Period’s writing desk and lightly unfolded from his handkerchief, the gold case with a jewelled clasp. ‘I’m afraid,’ he said, ‘I shall have to keep it for the time being. But can you identify it?’
Mr Period gave a startled ejaculation and got to his feet.
At the same moment there was a tap on the door which at once opened to admit a girl and a tall young man.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Nicola said, ‘the front door was open and we thought – I’m awfully sorry.’ She stopped short, catching sight of the gold case lying on the handkerchief. ‘Oh,’ she exclaimed. ‘I am glad. Your lovely cigarette-case! You’ve found it!’
‘Ah – yes,’ Mr Period said with a little gasp. ‘Yes. It – it would appear so.’ He pulled himself together. ‘Nicola, my dear,’ he said, ‘may I introduce –’
‘But we’ve met!’ Nicola cried. ‘Often. Haven’t we? I was talking about you only yesterday. Bless my soul,’ she added gaily, ‘who, to coin a phrase, would have thought of meeting you?’
‘To coin another,’ Alleyn said mildly, ‘it’s quite a coincidence, isn’t it? Hallo, Nicola.’
III
‘Put it like this,’ Alleyn said. ‘I don’t say you’ll ever have to, but suppose you were asked to swear on oath that the window was shut during the Pixie episode, would you do it?’
Nicola said: ‘I’d have to, wouldn’t I? Because it was.’
‘Not a shadow of doubt?’
‘Not one. Alfred will say the same.’
‘I dare say.’
‘I wish I knew what you were up to,’ Nicola said, staring out into the garden.
‘I? I’m on my job.’
‘Yes, but are you peering into petty larceny or mucking into a – I’m sure I don’t know why I’m trying to be facetious – into a murder? Or do they tie in together? Or what?’
‘I don’t know. No more than you do.’
‘I suppose,’ Nicola said with some penetration, ‘you’re not very pleased to f
ind me here.’
‘Not as enchanted as I would be to find you elsewhere.’
‘It’s funny. Because, before this blew up I was thinking of Troy. I’m coming in tomorrow evening and I wondered if I could bring a young man with me.’
‘My dear child, she’ll be delighted. Do I detect –?’
‘No!’ Nicola said in a hurry. ‘You don’t detect anything. He paints.’
‘Ah. Mr Andrew Bantling?’
‘I suppose you spotted the paint under his fingernail.’
‘So I did. It reminded me of my wife.’
‘That sounds human, anyway.’
Alleyn said: ‘Look here, Nicola, we’ll have to keep all this on an aseptically impersonal basis, you know. I’ve got to look into a case that may well involve something that is generally called a serious charge. You, unfortunately may be a relevant witness. I wish it wasn’t like that, but it is. Okay?’
‘Do I have to call you Superintendent?’
‘You needn’t call me anything. Now, let’s press on, shall we? I’m bringing Mr Fox in to take notes.’
‘Lor!’ Nicola looked at him for a moment and then said: ‘Yes, okay. I won’t be tiresome. I do see.’
‘Of course you do.’
Fox came in and was introduced.
In great detail, Alleyn led her through the events of the past twenty-four hours and as he did so it seemed to Nicola that she grew physically colder. Her relationship with the Alleyns was something that she had taken for granted. Without realizing that she did so, she had depended upon them, as the young do with established friends, for a sort of anchorage. They were old enough to give her a feeling of security and young enough, she felt, to ‘understand’. She had been free to turn up at their London house when she felt like it and was one of the few people that Alleyn’s wife could endure in the studio when she was working. With Alleyn himself, Nicola had progressed by way of a schoolgirl crush, from which she soon managed to recover, into a solid affection. She called him ‘Le Cid’ shortened it into ‘Cid’ and by this time had forgotten the origin of the pun.
Now, here he was, CID in action, being friendly enough: considerate and impersonal, but, she had to face it, quietly panic-striking. She began to see him in headline terms. ‘Superintendent Alleyn interviews society secretary.’