by Ngaio Marsh
Alleyn went into the dressing-room, leaving the door open. ‘Change of atmosphere,’ Fox heard him remark. ‘Very masculine. Very simple. Very good. Who gave him a hot bottle?’
‘Florence. The doctor says the old nurse went in later, to take a look at him. By all accounts she’s a bossy old cup of tea and likes her drop of port wine.’
‘This,’ Alleyn said, ‘is the house of a damn’ rich man. And woman, I suppose.’
‘He’s a big name in the City, isn’t he?’
‘He is indeed. C. G. Templeton. He brought off that coup with Eastland Transport two years ago. Reputation of being an implacable chap to run foul of.’
‘The servants seem to fancy him. The cook says he must have everything just so. One slip and you’re out. But well liked. He’s taken this very hard. Very shaky when I saw him but easy to handle. The colonel was tougher.’
‘Either of them strike you as being the form for a woman poisoner?’
‘Not a bit like it,’ Fox said cheerfully.
‘They tell me you never know?’
‘That’s right. So they say.’
They went out. Fox locked the door. ‘Not that it makes all that difference,’ he sighed. ‘The keys on this floor are inter-changeable. As usual. However,’ he added brightening, ‘I’ve taken the liberty of removing all the others.’
‘You’ll get the sack one of these days. Come on.’ They went downstairs.
‘The remaining guests,’ Fox said, ‘are in the second room on the right. They’re the lot who were with deceased up to the time she left the conservatory and the only ones who went outside the reception area before the speeches began. And, by the way, sir, up to the time the speeches started, there was a photographer and a moving camera unit blocking the foot of the stairs and for the whole period a kind of bar with a man mixing drinks right by the back stairs. I’ve talked to the man concerned and he says nobody but the nurse and Florence went up while he was on duty. This is deceased’s sitting-room. Or boudoir. The study is the first on the right.’
‘Where’s the quack?’
‘In the glasshouse with a hangover. Shall I stir him up?’
‘Thank you.’
They separated. Alleyn tapped on the boudoir door and went in.
Pinky sat in an armchair with a magazine, Timon Gantry was finishing a conversation on the telephone and Bertie, petulant and flushed, was reading a rare edition of ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore. When they saw Alleyn the two men got up and Pinky put down her magazine as if she was ashamed of it.
Alleyn introduced himself. ‘This is just to say I’m very sorry to keep you waiting about.’
Gantry said: ‘It’s damned awkward. I’ve had to tell people over the telephone.’
‘There’s no performance involved, is there?’
‘No. But there’s a new play going into rehearsal. Opening in three weeks. One has to cope.’
‘Of course,’ Alleyn said. ‘One does, indeed,’ and went out.
‘What a superb-looking man,’ Bertie said listlessly and returned to his play.
Warrender and Charles had the air of silence about them. It was not, Alleyn fancied, the kind of silence that falls naturally between two cousins united in a common sorrow: they seemed at odds with each other. He could have sworn his arrival was a relief rather than an annoyance. He noticed that the study, like the dressing-room, had been furnished and decorated by a perfectionist with restraint judgment and a very great deal of money. There was a kind of relationship between the reserve of these two men and the setting in which he found them. He thought that they had probably been sitting there for a long time without speech. A full decanter and two untouched glasses stood between them on a small and exquisite table.
Charles began to rise. Alleyn said: ‘Please, don’t move,’ and he sank heavily back again. Warrender stood up. His eyes were red and his face patched with uneven colour.
‘Bad business, this,’ he said. ‘What?’
‘Yes,’ Alleyn said. ‘Very bad.’ He looked at Charles. ‘I’m sorry, sir, that at the moment we’re not doing anything to make matters easier.’
With an obvious effort Charles said: ‘Sit down, won’t you? Alleyn, isn’t it? I know your name, of course.’
Warrender pushed a chair forward.
‘Will you have a drink?’ Charles asked.
‘No, thank you very much. I won’t trouble you longer than I can help. There’s a certain amount of unavoidable business to be got through. There will be an inquest and, I’m afraid, a post-mortem. In addition to that we’re obliged to check, as far as we’re able, the events leading to the accident. All this, I know, is very distressing and I’m sorry.’
Charles lifted a hand and let it fall.
Warrender said: ‘Better make myself scarce.’
‘No,’ Alleyn said. ‘I’d be glad if you waited a moment.’
Warrender was looking fixedly at Alleyn. He tapped himself above the heart and made a very slight gesture towards Charles. Alleyn nodded.
‘If I may,’ he said to Charles, ‘I’ll ask Colonel Warrender to give me an account of the period before your wife left the party and went up to her room. If, sir, you would like to amend or question or add to anything he says, please do so.’
They waited for several moments and then without looking up Charles said: ‘Very well. Though God knows what difference it can make.’
Warrender straightened his back, touched his Brigade of Guards tie, and made his report, with the care and, one would have said, the precision of experience.
He had, he said, been near to Mary Bellamy from the time she left her post by the door and moved through her guests towards the conservatory. She had spoken to one group after another. He gave several names. She had then joined a small party in the conservatory.
Alleyn was taking notes. At this point there was a pause. Warrender was staring straight in front of him. Charles had not moved.
‘Yes?’ Alleyn said.
‘She stayed in there until the birthday cake was brought in,’ Warrender said.
‘And the other people in her group stayed there too?’
‘No,’ Charles said. ‘I came out and – I spoke to two of our guests who – who were leaving early.’
‘Yes? Did you return?’
He said wearily: ‘I told Gracefield, our butler, to start the business with the cake. I stayed in the main rooms until they brought it in.’
Alleyn said: ‘Yes. And then – ?’
‘They came in with the cake,’ Warrender said. ‘And she came out and Marchant – her Management is Marchant & Company – Marchant gave the birthday speech.’
‘And did the other people in the conservatory come out?’
‘Yes.’
‘With Miss Bellamy?’
Warrender said: ‘Not with her.’
‘After her?’
‘No. Before. Some of them. I expect all of them, except Marchant.’
‘You, yourself, sir? What did you do?’
‘I came out before she did.’
‘Did you stay in the main rooms?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I went into the hall for a moment.’ Alleyn waited. ‘To say goodbye,’ Warrender said, ‘to the two people who were leaving early.’
‘Oh, yes. Who were they?’
‘Feller called Browne and his niece.’
‘And having done that you returned?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘To the conservatory?’
‘No. To the dining-room. That’s where the speech was made.’
‘Had it begun when you returned?’
Still looking straight before him, Warrender said: ‘Finished. She was replying.’
‘Really? You stayed in the hall for some time then?’
‘Longer,’ he said, ‘than I’d intended. Didn’t realize the ceremony had begun, isn’t it?’
‘Do you remember who the other people were? The ones who probably came out before Miss Bellamy from the conservatory?’
‘Miss Cavendish and Saracen. And Timon Gantry, the producer-man. Your second-in-command went over all this and asked them to stay.’
‘I’d just like, if you don’t mind, to sort it out for myself. Anyone else? The two guests who left early, for instance. Were they in the conservatory party?’
‘Yes.’
‘And left – ?’
‘First,’ Warrender said loudly.
‘So you caught them up in the hall. What were they doing in the hall, sir?’
‘Talking. Leaving. I don’t know exactly.’
‘You don’t remember to whom they were talking?’
‘I cannot,’ Charles said, ‘for the very life of me see why these two comparative strangers, who were gone long before anything happened, should be of the remotest interest to you.’
Alleyn said quickly: ‘I know it sounds quite unreasonable, but they do at the moment seem to have been the cause of other people’s behaviour.’
He saw that for some reason this observation had disturbed Warrender. He looked at Alleyn as if the latter had said something outrageous and penetrating.
‘You see,’ Alleyn explained, ‘in order to establish accident, one does have to make a formal inquiry into the movements of those persons who were nearest to Miss Bellamy up to the time of the accident.’
‘Oh! ‘ Warrender said firmly. ‘Yes. Possibly.’
‘But – Mary – my wife – was there. Still there ! Radiant. There, seen by everybody – I can’t imagine …’ Charles sank back in his chair. ‘Never mind,’ he murmured. ‘Go on.’
Warrender said: ‘Browne and his niece had, I think, been talking to Saracen and Miss Cavendish. When I came into the hall … They were – saying goodbye to Gantry.’
‘I see. And nobody else was concerned in this leave-taking? In the hall?’
There was a long silence. Warrender looked as if somebody had tapped him smartly on the back of the head. His eyes started and he turned to Charles who leant forward grasping the arms of his chair.
‘My God!’ Warrender said. ‘Where is he? What’s become of him? Where’s Richard?‘
IV
Alleyn had been trained over a long period of time to distinguish between simulated and involuntary reactions in human behaviour. He was perhaps better equipped than many of his colleagues in this respect, being fortified by an instinct that he was particularly careful to mistrust. It seldom let him down. He thought now that, whereas Charles Templeton was quite simply astounded by his own forgetfulness, Warrender’s reaction was much less easily defined. Alleyn had a notion that Warrender’s reticence was of the formidable kind which conceals nothing but the essential.
It was Warrender, now, who produced an explanation.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Just remembered something. Extraordinary we should have forgotten. We’re talking about Richard Dakers.’
‘The playwright?’
‘That’s the man. He’s – you may not know this – he was …’ Warrender boggled inexplicably and looked at his boots. ‘He’s – he was my cousin’s – he was the Templetons’ ward.’
For the first time since Alleyn had entered the room, Charles Templeton looked briefly at Warrender.
‘Does he know about this catastrophe?’ Alleyn asked.
‘No,’ Warrender said, ‘he can’t know. Be a shock.’
Alleyn began to ask about Richard Dakers and found that they were both unwilling to talk about him. When had he last been seen? Charles remembered he had been in the conservatory. Warrender, pressed, admitted that Richard was in the hall when Browne and his niece went away. Odd, Alleyn thought, that, as the climax of the party approached, no less than five of Miss Bellamy’s most intimate friends should turn their backs on her to say goodbye to two people whom her husband had described as comparative strangers. He hinted as much.
Warrender glanced at Charles and then said: ‘Point of fact they’re friends of Richard Dakers. His guests in a way. Naturally he wanted to see them off.’
‘And having done so, he returned for the speeches and the cake-cutting ceremony?’
‘I – ah … Not exactly,’ Warrender said.
‘No?’
‘No. Ah, speaking out of school, isn’t it? But I rather fancy there’s an attraction. He – ah – he went out – they live in the next house.’
‘Not,’ Alleyn ejaculated, ‘Octavius Browne of the Pegasus?’
‘Point of fact, yes,’ Warrender said, looking astonished.
‘And Mr Dakers went out with them?’
‘After them.’
‘But you think he meant to join them?’
‘Yes,’ he said woodenly.
‘And is perhaps with them still?’
Warrender was silent.
‘Wouldn’t he mind missing the ceremony?’ Alleyn asked.
Warrender embarked on an incomprehensible spate of broken phrases.
‘If he’s there,’ Charles said to Alleyn, ‘he ought to be told.’
‘I’ll go,’ Warrender said, and moved to the door.
Alleyn said: ‘One minute, if you please.’
‘What?’
‘Shall we just see if he is there? It’ll save trouble, won’t it? May I use the telephone?’
He was at the telephone before they could reply and looking up the number.
‘I know Octavius quite well,’ he said pleasantly. ‘Splendid chap, isn’t he?’
Warrender looked at him resentfully. ‘If the boy’s there,’ he said, ‘I’d prefer to tell him about this myself.’
‘Of course,’ Alleyn agreed heartily. ‘Ah, here we are.’ He dialled a number. They heard a voice at the other end.
‘Hallo,’ Alleyn said. ‘Is Mr Richard Dakers there by any chance?’
‘No,’ the voice said. ‘I’m sorry. He left some time ago.’
‘Really? How long would you say?’
The voice replied indistinguishably.
‘I see. Thank you so much. Sorry to have bothered you.’
He hung up. ‘He was only with them for a very short time,’ he said. ‘He must have left, it seems, before this thing happened. They imagined he came straight back here.’
Warrender and Templeton were, he thought, at peculiar pains not to look at each other or at him. He said lightly: ‘Isn’t that a little odd? Wouldn’t you suppose he’d be sure to attend the birthday speeches?’
Perhaps each of them waited for the other to reply. After a moment Warrender barked out two words. ‘Lovers’ tiff?’ he suggested.
‘You think it might be that?’
‘I think it might be that?’
‘I think,’ Warrender said angrily, ‘that whatever it was it’s got nothing to do with this – this tragedy. Good lord. why should it?’
‘I really do assure you,’ Alleyn said, ‘that I wouldn’t worry you about these matters if I didn’t think it was necessary.’
‘Matter of opinion,’ Warrender said.
‘Yes. A matter of opinion and mine may turn out to be wrong.’
He could see that Warrender was on the edge of some outburst and was restrained, it appeared, only by the presence of Charles Templeton.
‘Perhaps,’ Alleyn said, ‘we might just make quite sure that Mr Dakers didn’t, in fact, come back. After all, it was a biggish party. Might he not have slipped in, unnoticed, and gone out again for some perfectly explainable reason? The servants might have noticed. If you would …’
Warrender jumped at this. ‘Certainly! I’ll come out with you.’ And after a moment: ‘D’you mind, Charles?’
With extraordinary vehemence Charles said: ‘Do what you like. If he comes back I don’t want to see him. I …’ He passed an unsteady hand across his eyes. ‘Sorry,’ he said, presumably to Alleyn. ‘This has been a bit too much for me.’
‘We’ll leave you to yourself,’ Alleyn said. ‘Would you like Dr Harkness to come in?’
‘No. No. No. If I might be left alone. That’s all.’
‘Of course.�
��
They went out. The hall was deserted except for the constable who waited anonymously in a corner. Alleyn said: ‘Will you excuse me for a moment?’ and went to the constable.
‘Anybody come in?’ he asked under his breath.
‘No, sir.’
‘Keep the Press out, but admit anyone else and don’t let them go again. Take the names and say there’s been an accident in the vicinity and we’re doing a routine check.’
‘Very good, sir.’
Alleyn returned to Warrender. ‘No one’s come in,’ he said. ‘Where can we talk?’
Warrender glanced at him. ‘Not here,’ he muttered, and led the way into the deserted drawing-room, now restored to order but filled with the flower-shop smell of Bertie Saracen’s decorations and the faint reek of cigarette smoke and alcohol. The connecting doors into the dining-room were open and beyond them, in the conservatory, Dr Harkness could be seen, heavily asleep in a canvas chair and under observation by Inspector Fox. When Fox saw them he came out and shut the glass door. ‘He’s down to it,’ he said, ‘but rouseable. I thought I’d leave him as he is till required.’
Warrender turned on Alleyn. ‘Look here!’ he demanded. ‘What is all this? Are you trying to make out there’s been any – any …’ he boggled, ‘any hanky-panky?’
‘We can’t take accident as a matter of course.’
‘Why not? Clear as a pikestaff.’
‘Our job,’ Alleyn said patiently, ‘is to collect all the available information and present it to the coroner. At the moment we are not drawing any conclusions. Come, sir,’ he said as Warrender still looked mulish, ‘I’m sure that, as a soldier, you’ll recognize the position. It’s a matter of procedure. After all, to be perfectly frank about it, a great many suicides as well as homicides have been rigged to look like accidents.’
‘Either suggestion’s outrageous.’
‘And will, we hope, soon turn out to be so.’
‘But, good God, is there anything at all to make you suppose – ?’ He stopped and jerked his hands ineloquently.
‘Suppose what?’
‘That it could be – either? Suicide – or murder?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Alleyn said. ‘Could be. Could be.’
‘What? What evidence – ?’
‘I’m afraid I’m not allowed to discuss details.’