“And Mrs. Colvin?”
“A perfect saint, sir. Never put out by anything, sir, and always doing a good turn to somebody. But she was very churchy and was dead nuts on atheists and their kidney. Always said they ought to be burned at the stake, though I couldn’t see the young lady burning a cockroach. Now Mrs. Mesado, when she lost her temper she was dangerous. She’d pull her enemies to bits with red-hot pincers. I never seen a woman with such a fiery temper.”
“Mr. Colvin used to live with the Mesados too?”
“Yes, sir. He was a sort of companion to Mr. Mesado, doing this, that and t’other thing for him. But he’s a toff, sir, a regular toff. Liked a drop of drink, sometimes a drop too much, but he’s as good as gold. I don’t want a better master than Mr. Colvin, and I’m glad Mrs. Dobbs and me are going with them when they leave. They told us that definite in their letter to us from Portugal.”
“Have you been in Mr. Mesado’s service long, Dobbs?”
“Some three years now. Ever since they came to Firle House. I was with Sir Henry and Lady Waterton up in Fakenham, Norfolk, before that, and the Disses and Watertons were great friends always. I’ve known the Diss sisters ever since they was so high.” Dobbs accompanied his words with an explanatory gesture as to stature.
“There were three of them, I believe? What happened to the youngest, Amy?”
“There was a bit of a scandal about young Miss Amy,” said Dobbs, lowering his voice discreetly. “Got up to mischief with one of their grooms when she was in her teens, and the colonel kicked her out neck and crop. She went up to London, and some say she went all to pieces with men and drink. It’s not for me to say, because I don’t know. She was the prettiest of the three sisters, and they were all oil paintings fit to marry dooks and as like as triplets to look at.”
“Have you ever seen Miss Amy since then, Dobbs?” asked Vereker casually.
For some moments Dobbs hesitated and then replied: “Only once, sir, for a few minutes. Just before madam went on this cruise Miss Amy came down here for a week-end. Mrs. Mesado sent me and Mrs. Dobbs up to town that Friday she arrived and told us we could have the week-end off to see our friends in London. Paid all our expenses for the trip. She was real good like that at times. All the house servants except Gautier had been discharged because madam said she was giving up Firle House and wouldn’t live in it again. When we returned on Monday morning Miss Amy had gone. Madam said she left suddenly on Sunday night.
“Had there been a quarrel?”
“Gautier hinted at something of the sort, but she and I never got on well together. She was closer than an oyster when she liked. Fancied her luck with the men too.”
“Did Mrs. Mesado and Mrs. Colvin call their sister by the name Amy?” asked Vereker.
“No, sir. When they spoke of her, and that was seldom in my hearing, they called her Maureen. Her real name was Mrs. O’Connor, because she married the groom she fell in love with. He was a handsome Irishman, but as tricky as a monkey. They say he went off with another woman some years later. If it’s true he ought to have his skin peeled off him. Leading a young lady astray and then deserting her.
“Had they any children, Dobbs?”
“Only one, I believe. The cause of all the barney, and it was born dead. Merciful I call it.”
“Mrs. Mesado and the Colvins left for Tilbury on Monday morning, the 26th, to join the cruising liner ‘Mars’?”
“Yes, sir, just after we arrived. When they’d had breakfast they set off.”
“Do you know which room Miss Maureen occupied, Dobbs?”
“Yes, sir, the nicest of the guest rooms, and the one we’ve got ready for you. There’s a cupboard in it with some clothes and two pairs of shoes she left behind, but as we were told not to touch her things we have left them there. They won’t be in your way, sir, as there’s a gentleman’s wardrobe in the same room, which has been cleared for your use.”
“Thanks very much, Dobbs. Please don’t disturb anything on my account. I may be here for a few days only, so I have brought very little with me.”
“Very good, sir; and there’s one drawer in the chest of drawers with some of Miss Maureen’s odds and ends in it. Mrs. Mesado left that locked up and said it was not to be disturbed on any account.”
“That won’t trouble me, Dobbs. By the way, when did Mr. Mesado leave Firle House? Was it long before his wife went on this cruise?”
“About a fortnight before, sir.”
“Do you know where he has gone?”
“We don’t know for certain, but his valet, who went with him, told me on the quiet that he was going back to Buenos Aires. That’s his home.”
“Did he stay very much at Firle House?”
“No, sir; he only came down occasionally, and nearly always spent all his time at his flat near Hyde Park Corner. He didn’t like the country very much, and madam didn’t like the town, which wasn’t a very happy business. For a little while after he took this place he was as keen as mustard on it, planning and altering and furnishing, and then he took a sudden dislike to the place. The gentry round here gave him the cold shoulder, and he couldn’t stand that. The gentry are very conservative with furriners.”
“Wasn’t there some sort of tiff between him and Mrs. Mesado?”
“Well, yes, I suppose there was, but we never knew the cause of it. Probably Mrs. Mesado’s fault. Her temper would upset the angel Gabriel at times. Mr. Mesado was one of the easiest men to get on with and every one liked him. Some say he was a bit of a hairy lad with the ladies, but you can’t always blame a man for that. It’s born in some of them and they can’t help theirselves. And it ain’t always the man who’s to blame, sir,” said Dobbs, turning to Vereker and fixing him impressively with his round grey eyes.
“I suppose not,” remarked Vereker innocently.
“As for Mr. Mesado, whatever he did in that direction he did like a gentleman, and nobody ever knew or heard about it.”
Vereker was obliged to smile at Dobbs’s peculiar moral point of view, and the butler’s statement shed a confirmatory light on the information he had gathered from Miss Marchant. He was now convinced that there must have been some guilty liaison between Mesado and Miss Maureen O’Connor.
“Did a Mr. Miguel Dias ever come down here, Dobbs?” he asked after a pause.
“Only once, sir. He called to see Mr. Mesado. Said he was a business acquaintance. The master was out, so he stayed to tea with madam and Mr. and Mrs. Colvin and then went back to town. When Mr. Mesado heard of it he was very angry. When the master was angry he always went as white as a sheet and shut himself up in his room. He gave orders that if Mr. Dias ever called again he was not to be admitted, but he never came again to my knowledge. I didn’t like the look of the gent. Flashy, handsome man like a cardsharper. The week-end Mrs. Mesado and the Colvins left for their cruise there were only themselves, Miss Maureen and Gautier, the maid, in the house. That’s all, sir.”
“Miss Maureen arrived on Friday night and left on Sunday night?”
“Yes, sir. She must have had a nasty row with madam or she wouldn’t have left her case and clothes here.”
“It looks like it, Dobbs. At what time is lunch?”
“One o’clock, sir. You’ll just have time to have a look at our refrigerating plant and room before the gong goes.”
“Anything special about it?” asked Vereker without enthusiasm.
“Oh, yes, sir, one of the finest refrigerating rooms I’ve ever seen. We’re very proud of it and show it off to all our guests. It was a particular hobby of Mr. Mesado’s, because he was in the frozen meat trade and knew all about cold storage. It cost him a mint of money to install.”
“What principle docs it work on, Dobbs? Brine circulation or carbon dioxide?”
“Neither, sir. Mr. Mesado always said the ammonia compression method was the best and most economical. Direct expansion of liquid ammonia,” replied Dobbs with an air of technical superiority.
“Not da
ngerous, is it?”
“Well, no, sir, but we have special ammonia helmets ready in case of accident by bursting of portions of the plant. That, I’m led to believe, is not a likely affair.”
“I’m very much interested, Dobbs. If you’ll just show me where the freezing room is I’ll have a good look at it on my own after lunch. Is it working?”
“Not at present, sir. Mrs. Mesado had the machinery stopped before she left. We have no use for it at the moment. You see, sir, when Mr. Mesado came down here he used to entertain on a large scale and we had very big house parties. Then the cold room was essential for keeping fish, meat, game and foodstuffs, and it was always full. Still, it’s in working order and can be switched on if we want it.”
After being shown the location of the refrigerating room and the beautiful equipment of the kitchen, scullery, pantry, etc., Vereker went upstairs to the dining-room for lunch. During the meal he told Dobbs, who waited on him, that after having a look at the cold storage he would retire to his own room for the afternoon and get his painting materials ready for his first excursion on to the Downs. He impressed upon the butler that he did not wish to be disturbed until dinner, which he would like at seven o’clock. After lunch he rested for half an hour and then went downstairs to make a careful inspection of the refrigerating room. He was at first not intensely interested, but as he had never been in a modern cold storage room before he felt that he must not let slip an occasion for widening his general knowledge. It might come in useful some day.
He approached the room through a small airlock or ante-chamber, and was at once struck by the construction of the heavy insulated door. With his usual meticulousness he examined this door and found, to his surprise, that it could not be opened from inside. This seemed a dangerous oversight to his calculating appreciation of mishap, and his searching eye wandered over the inside of the massive door. He was standing in this act of examination when he noticed on the light painted surface several dark smudges and three clearly defined finger-prints. Immediately he was struck by the smallness of these finger-prints and concluded that they were those of a female hand, From his study of criminology the very fact that they were finger-prints gave his mind an inquisitive bias, and he promptly assumed that they had been left by one of the maids or the cook pushing open the door with soiled fingers. A moment of reflection shook this theory, for maids and cooks who handled food would hardly have soiled hands to such an extent as to leave well-defined finger-prints. Could they be blood? More than likely where meat and game and fish were being touched and carried. Pulling out a magnifying glass which he always carried with him, he examined them more closely. Doubtless they were blood, though even an expert, as he knew, could not dogmatise on that point without microscopic aid. The stains were dark brown as if made of congealed blood, but then he was aware that congealed blood could assume strange hues, from black to a vivid green, according to the material on which it had dried. As he was pondering on this he was all at once struck by the fact that the stains were on the surface of the door nearest the hinges. This discovery came with the thrill of an electric shock. A cook or maid pushing open the door when leaving the room would have left her finger impressions on the side farthest away from the hinges. This was startling, and now, thoroughly alive to possibilities, he made a most careful examination of the fingerprints and smudges. Those clots and smudges were intriguing; they were certainly never caused by anyone pushing the door open for purposes of ordinary egress. Leaving the door, he switched on the electric light and made a careful survey of the whole plant. He found nothing further of interest and was returning to the door when a spot of brilliant green light on the floor near the exit caught his eye. He stood for a moment looking at it and, shifting his position, discovered that it was immediately eclipsed but that only a few inches from that point another starry speck of burning red burst into view. At first he thought they must be tiny fragments of mica or other silicate forming shining particles of the stone or concrete floor. Drawing his electric torch from his pocket, he switched it on and ran it over the area from which those gems of light had shone. He found that they were caused by two small particles of what at first glance appeared to be glass. He picked up these fragments, examined them on the palm of his hand and to his amazement discovered that they were a small emerald and a ruby of similar dimensions.
“By Jove, what a find!” he exclaimed, and for the moment he was so overwhelmed by its importance that he stood as if stupefied, gazing at the diminutive stones glittering in his hand. Carefully wrapping them up in the tissue paper torn from the inside of a packet of Gold Flake cigarettes, he stowed them in his waistcoat pocket and made a further search on the floor. This search proving fruitless, he once more examined the door of the refrigerating room and, satisfied with his scrutiny, ascended to his bedroom and picked up the telephone from the table beside his bed. Giving Inspector Heather’s private number, he was at once put in communication with him.
“Ah, you, Mr. Vereker! Where are you?” came the familiar voice.
“Firle House, Jevington. You know Jevington?”
“You bet I do. It’s famous; I was born in the neighbourhood.”
“Can you come along tomorrow?”
“You’re excited. Anything important?”
“Hot scent. You know all about photography?”
“Not half! Want me to come down with the apparatus?”
“Yes, and bring your usual equipment. Can’t say whether the prints are sanguine or merely dirt. We may also want a precipitin test later,” explained Vereker, speaking as cryptically as he could in case he might be overheard.
“I’ll be down by car first thing in the morning. What’s the name of that pub at Jevington, Mr. Vereker?”
“Never mind pubs, Heather. Beer’s the only thing you can think about.”
“It’s the only thing worth thinking about when you’re thirsty, and I feel the symptoms coming on. Good-bye. First thing in the morning.”
Putting down the telephone instrument, Vereker sank into an easy chair, and for over half an hour he remained there, his eyes closed as if in sleep; but a curious nervous compression of the masseter muscles of his cheek declared that he was not only wide awake, but very much excited. The Pleasure Cruise Mystery which had proved so baffling was beginning to move rapidly towards a solution. The various puzzling incidents, apparently so refractory at first, now seemed to be gliding into position, and after a little further investigation he felt he would be in possession of the truth and have unravelled one of the most amazing criminal cases in his career as an amateur detective.
Rising at length from his chair, he glanced round his bedroom and at once remembered Dobbs’s information about Maureen’s clothes being in one of the cupboards. Crossing over to the cupboard he tried the door, but found it locked. Next he turned his attention to a walnut chest of drawers standing on the opposite side of the room. All the drawers had been emptied and newly relined with paper for the reception of his clothes with the exception of the small right-hand top drawer, which was locked. The contents of that cupboard and drawer might prove informative, and he began to ponder on some method of opening them. He tried all the keys on his own bunch, but none of them fitted either lock. He could procure skeleton keys from Heather, but that would take time, and time was important. He could pretend that he had left the key of his case behind and get a further selection from Dobbs, but that might rouse the butler’s suspicions without attaining a successful result. He was busy thinking of some way out of this difficulty when he noticed on the mantelpiece a beautiful Satsuma vase. At once he forgot all about keys and cupboards and went over to the ornament to admire it more closely. Picking it up to examine the bottom, he turned it over and two keys rattled against the porcelain mouth of the vase and fell on the floor.
“Looks as if I possessed Aladdin’s lamp for the time being,” he exclaimed and rescued the keys. Gratified with this piece of good fortune—for he was certain they were the keys of the loc
ked receptacles—he picked them up and tried them. His surmise proved correct. The first key he tried was that of the cupboard, and with a sensation of breathless excitement he felt it turn and next moment the door stood open. From a decorated coat-hanger hung a tweed costume and jumper, and on the floor lay two pairs of shoes, one pair for evening wear and the other for ordinary morning use. Beside the shoes was a carelessly tied brown paper parcel. Walking over to his bedroom door, he locked it and returned to the cupboard. He then picked up the brown paper parcel and laid it on a small table at his bedside. A few moments sufficed to untie the loose knots of the string and lay out the contents. To his astonishment they consisted of undergarments and a pale green georgette evening gown. This gown, ostensibly new, had been rolled into a bundle in such a manner that it was clearly an act performed in the utmost haste and without any thought as to the ruin of the garment. He unrolled it carefully and found it stained in several places with ominously dark stains.
“Blood without any doubt!” he soliloquised and, rolling up the garments, once more parcelled and tied them up in their original covering. After replacing this bundle he withdrew the two pairs of shoes. He examined them and an involuntary exclamation of satisfaction escaped him on finding that they were size four. Maureen evidently took a size smaller than her sister Beryl. Replacing the shoes he locked the cupboard and dropped the key into the Satsuma vase. The small right-hand drawer of the chest next engaged his attention. It contained hair-brushes, cosmetics and an oval jewel-case bound in morocco. He picked up the jewel-case, pressed the catch and flung up the lid. On the black velvet interior of the receptacle lay a necklace of cinnamon and white diamonds exactly similar to the one he had seen in Dias’s possession at Estoril.
“Well, I’m damned!” he exclaimed and, taking the ornament from its box, stepped over to the window to examine it carefully. At first he thought it was a fine paste imitation, but on further scrutiny concluded that it must consist of genuine stones so brilliant was their sheen and so beautiful the setting. At that moment he remembered Ricardo’s jibe about enlarging his education as to precious stones, and bitterly regretted his insufficient knowledge. He must either take them to Dupont the jeweller, of Bond Street, whose name was on the white satin lining of the lid, or get Heather’s opinion. Of course Heather would know good paste imitations from genuine stones at a glance. He must wait for the inspector and see. Rummaging through the remaining contents of the drawer, he found nothing further of importance except a letter from Mrs. Mesado to her sister Maureen, inviting her to Firle House for the weekend. An examination of this letter surrendered an unexpected clue. The envelope had been sealed, and in sealing it Mrs. Mesado had pressed a wet thumb into the cooling wax. This was to Vereker a discovery of vital significance, and slipping the letter into his pocket he locked the drawer. Highly satisfied with his afternoon’s work he fixed up his easel and began to prepare a canvas for a sketch, but his thoughts were not in paint and canvas. He was busy with his hands on his task, but his mind was trying to find some explanation of the existence of two similar necklaces of white and cinnamon diamonds. In the midst of this occupation he suddenly rose from his chair, unlocked his bedroom door and stepped out on to the thickly carpeted corridor. Hearing no sounds of movement anywhere, he advanced noiselessly along to the door of the adjoining room, which opened on to the suite used by Guillermo Mesado when he stayed at Firle House. He found this room tidy as if ready for immediate occupation. A glance round declared that there was little to be discovered there which might help him in his investigation, and he was about to leave when his eye fell on a small silver-mounted photograph on the dressing table. Standing in the shadow cast by a large mirror on the table it had escaped his first hasty observation. He strode noiselessly across to the dressing table and picked up the photograph. Producing from his pocket the photograph of Miss Maureen O’Connor which Heather had managed to procure from Miss Marchant, he compared the two portraits very carefully. The sisters had the same cast of countenance, the same finely chiselled features and the same eyes, but one could not easily be mistaken for the other. In fact, Maureen resembled her sister, Constance Colvin, much more closely than she did Beryl Mesado. As he replaced the silver-mounted photograph of the last on the dressing table he reminded himself that he had never clearly seen that lady’s face in the flesh and alive. It had been a cardinal factor in the difficulties he had encountered in his investigation, but now that he was no longer in any doubt as to her facial appearance a very formidable obstacle to the validity of his theory of the crime was swept away, and he left the room with a feeling of redoubled satisfaction. Tomorrow he would see Heather and unfold the story of his amazing discoveries. He looked forward to that hour with unrestrained eagerness, for he knew Heather would be appreciative, and a master’s appreciation was a satisfactory reward to an enthusiast like Anthony Vereker. He spent the remainder of the afternoon in the library, and just before dinner was informed by Dobbs that he was wanted on the telephone. The caller was Albert, his batman, who had rung up from Fenton Street. He had received an urgent message from a Miss Marchant for his master, who was to be told that a Mr. Mig had called at Sussex Gardens the previous night and had been sent about his business. Mr. Mig had been inclined to aggression, but a phone call to the police station had made him depart with unceremonious haste.
The Pleasure Cruise Mystery Page 18