The Incident at Fives Castle

by Clara Benson

  They scratched about for a while longer but without any luck.

  ‘Well, then,’ said Henry at last. ‘That seems to confirm our theory, at any rate. He was killed in the library.’

  ‘And now we return to the question: who did it?’ said Angela.

  ‘This St. John fellow,’ began Henry. ‘Do you know him personally?’

  ‘No. He’s a friend of Freddy’s. I met him for the first time today. I expect you’ve heard all about his political activities, though.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Henry. ‘That might be a coincidence, and to speak to him one wouldn’t exactly credit him with the greatest of intelligence, but firing a gun doesn’t take a great deal of brain-power. We’ve questioned him briefly, of course, and his story is an odd one but might well be true.’

  ‘It might, or it might not,’ said Angela. ‘I don’t know if you noticed, but he was lying about his alibi.’

  ‘Ah, you spotted that, did you? He might have made a mistake about the time, I dare say.’

  ‘If he did then he’s done it three times: once to me, once to you and then again to me. I asked him for the second time at dinner, and he was quite certain that he had left the castle before half past twelve—said he’d looked at his watch, in fact. But of course that’s simply not possible, since Bobby bumped into him when we were playing Sardines, and we didn’t begin that until well after one o’clock, as I recall.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Henry, ‘and he made a mistake about the fallen tree, too. If he had left when he said he did, he would inevitably have found himself walking along the path to the village with several of the villagers—and most of them managed to get home at that time. As far as we can tell, the landslide didn’t happen until closer to one o’clock. Where is he now, by the way? He and Freddy didn’t stay in the dining-room for long after the ladies left. I hope they’re not getting up to mischief.’

  ‘It depends on how you define mischief,’ said Angela, ‘but I think we’re safe. When I left the drawing-room, St. John was in deep and earnest conversation with Miss Foster about their respective literary efforts. It was touch and go as to who would manage to recite the worst poem to the other before things turned nasty.’

  ‘If these militant types would only stick to the bad poetry then my job would be a great deal easier,’ said Henry with a sigh. ‘I ought to have known we hadn’t rooted them all out. I fear the next few weeks are going to be difficult for the Government.’

  ‘What do you mean by “rooted them all out?”’ said Angela. ‘Rooted all who out?’

  There was no use in trying to hide things now, Henry was forced to admit.

  ‘The spies,’ he said.

  TWENTY-ONE

  ‘It all started a couple of years ago,’ began Henry. ‘You may remember all that industrial unrest we had—the strike and what-not, and the political activism that went on at the same time. There was a real worry within the Government during that period that we were about to suffer the same fate as Russia—or at least that Communism would shortly become a force to be reckoned with—and of course, those concerns were voiced on many occasions during meetings of the Cabinet. At a certain point, however, it was noticed that confidential decisions taken at Cabinet meetings appeared to be getting out, and that the information was making its way abroad. Stories about Britain’s intransigent attitude towards its Eastern neighbours began to appear in the foreign press, and certain statements were attributed to our politicians as a demonstration of our lack of faith. Of course, we denied absolutely that anyone had ever made such statements, and demanded in the strongest possible terms that the accusations be withdrawn immediately. In reality, however, there was much consternation within the Government, for almost everything that had been published was true.

  ‘Once our attention had been drawn to this, we started paying closer attention to what was going on abroad, and found that a surprising amount of information which ought to have been known only to a tiny number of very senior politicians in London was seemingly also known elsewhere: things about trade treaties and suchlike—dull stuff to most people, I dare say, but highly important in its own way. It was immediately obvious that somebody must be passing this information on, and we began investigating discreetly. We soon found the culprit: a young man called Stephen Golovin, who had recently begun working for the Cabinet Secretariat. He was the son of a doctor who had fled Russia with his family during the unrest of 1905 and had come to live in England. The Golovins settled down and lived here quietly and respectably for many years, but at some point—we don’t know exactly when—young Stephen must have fallen in with some bad company. We learned from his family that there was a period of a year or two in which he was estranged from them, and they were at a loss to understand why—nor did they have any idea what he was doing during this time. Eventually, however, he seemed to grow out of his youthful rebellion, came back into the fold and began looking for work.

  ‘As it happened, the Golovins were neighbours of Beresford Ogilvy, the then Home Secretary. He had always had a liking for the boy, and in the interests of helping his old friends offered Stephen Golovin a junior position in the Cabinet Secretariat which he accepted. The young man was a hard worker and had never raised in anyone the slightest doubt of his loyalty, until the very day he was intercepted in the act of smuggling a copy of the minutes to the latest Cabinet meeting out of the office and arrested.

  ‘I, personally, believed it was a mistake to have him arrested immediately, since I thought it would be wiser to keep him under observation for a while and find out whom he was passing the information to, and who, if any, were his accomplices. However, some of the more—shall we say—easily startled members of the Cabinet insisted on having the police called as soon as they found out what was going on. Golovin was arrested, tried and sentenced to twenty years in prison.’

  ‘I remember the case well,’ said Angela. ‘It was in the newspapers for weeks. And of course, the Home Secretary was forced to resign his ministry and his seat in Parliament, given the part he had unwittingly played in the affair.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Henry. ‘It was most unfortunate. As a matter of fact, although it wasn’t put about then, there was some talk of the whole Government having to resign which, as I’m sure you realize, would have been highly injurious to national security given the political mood at the time. Fortunately, it survived the crisis and a new Home Secretary was appointed. Meanwhile, Claude Burford, who was Ogilvy’s former secretary, was chosen to contest Ogilvy’s old seat and just scraped in by the skin of his teeth. He’s not as clever as Ogilvy was, but no doubt he’ll do well given his connections.’

  ‘No doubt,’ agreed Angela dryly.

  ‘At any rate,’ went on Henry, ‘the whole thing gave the Intelligence department an awful headache for months. It seemed to have died down in the past year or so, but I always rather wondered whether Golovin was working alone. He swore he was a lone agent, but I was never entirely convinced.’

  ‘Did he confess to the crime, then?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Was quite unashamed of it, in fact. He said his loyalties had never lain with Britain, and that his father had been a traitor for ever having left Russia in the first place. He refused to give us the names of the people to whom he had been passing on secrets, however, and we never found them out. Nor did we ever discover whether he was indeed telling the truth when he said he had been acting alone. Now and again we received a hint from our agents overseas that there was an entire ring of spies working here in Britain, but we were never able to confirm it.’

  ‘But now it looks as though your agents may have been right,’ said Angela.

  ‘Yes, it does,’ said Henry soberly.

  ‘Who knew that Professor Klausen was coming here, and why?’

  ‘As far as I am aware, only ourselves on the English side,’ said Henry. ‘On the American side, I don’t know. Buchanan first spoke to the Secretary of State, who sent the Ambassador to take part in the preliminary talks. I assume the need
for secrecy was emphasized, but undoubtedly a few people know over there. This meeting at Fives was arranged only last week, however, so there would have been no time for a spy to travel here from the United States.’

  ‘Plenty of time to send a telegram to an activist in England, however,’ said Angela. ‘St. John Bagshawe, for example.’

  ‘True enough,’ he replied.

  ‘Has the professor been removed from the chest yet?’ said Angela.

  ‘I’m almost ashamed to say he hasn’t,’ said Henry. ‘I know it’s not exactly a decent thing to do to a dead man, but we’ve had to leave him where he is until the rigor mortis wears off. We shall bring him out tomorrow, and then send someone out to fetch a doctor and the police. It seems to have stopped snowing, so with any luck the men will be able to move the fallen tree and clear a path through to the village. After that, the cat will be pretty much out of the bag, no doubt. I suppose I oughtn’t to take it too much to heart: after all, from what you say, everybody in the castle knows all about it already, so a few million more people around the country won’t make the situation any worse than it is.’

  He looked so crestfallen that Angela could hardly help laughing.

  ‘What should you have done if you had been the one to find the body?’ she asked curiously.

  ‘I?’ said Henry. ‘If I had found the body, then we should certainly not be having this conversation now, Mrs. Marchmont—and I should not be worrying about the story’s getting into the papers.’

  ‘I can well believe it,’ said Angela. ‘I am only sorry you have been forced to accept my help.’

  ‘Oh, it could be worse,’ said Henry. ‘At least I know I can rely on your good sense.’

  ‘And my honesty, of course,’ said Angela.

  ‘Of course,’ he said.

  Angela smiled to herself, then said, ‘Is there anything else I can do to help you this evening? If there isn’t, then I’d rather like to go to bed now, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Oh, please do,’ said Henry. ‘I should like to go myself, but I suppose there will be more talking late into the night tonight. Politicians have the most extraordinary ability to talk for hours, without ever saying much to the purpose.’

  ‘I think it’s part of the job,’ said Angela in some amusement. She bade him goodnight and went upstairs. She was feeling very tired after the adventures of the night before and did not suppose she would be missed in the drawing-room. Once she reached her room she undressed and slipped into bed. She was about to switch off the lamp when she saw the book that Clemmie had lent her earlier, lying on the table by the bed where she had put it. She took it up and began to read. After a few minutes, however, her attention started to wander and she could not prevent her mind from reviewing the events of the day and attempting to make sense of them. Why had St. John lied about what time he had left Fives Castle? There seemed to be only one logical answer to that question, and that was that he wanted to establish an alibi for the murder. But how had he known that an alibi was needed? As far as Angela could recall, when they had first questioned him in Freddy’s bedroom none of them had mentioned the murder at that point. In that case, why not admit straight out that he had been wandering around the castle until after one o’clock? There was no reason to lie about it, since the truth would not have made him look any more foolish than he already did—unless, of course, his presence at Fives had a more sinister purpose. Could St. John have murdered Professor Klausen? He did not seem the type, but all the evidence was pointing that way: his political affiliations, his membership of a militant group, his previous violent activities—all of those would look bad for him if placed before a court. Perhaps they ought to give him a chance to account for himself before it got that far; it seemed only fair, after all.

  ‘Oh,’ said Angela, sitting up suddenly as she remembered something. She had meant to tell Henry about her strange conversation with Eleanor Buchanan earlier that evening, but it had slipped her mind. What had Eleanor meant when she said that she had done what Angela had asked of her and would not or could not do any more? Angela was at a loss to understand it. She thought back to their conversation. Eleanor had seemed to become agitated when they were talking about her locket—or, rather, its contents. Angela could picture the way Mrs. Buchanan wound her fingers in and out of the gold chain, pausing only occasionally to stroke the pendant absently. Perhaps she had been a little too inquisitive about Eleanor’s brother: after all, family disagreements were a very personal matter and it was hardly good manners to insist on being told the whole story.

  Angela yawned and glanced back down at The World Set Free. She was finding it slightly depressing and decided she would rather go to sleep. In the interests of remaining in Marthe’s good books, however, she slipped out of bed first to pick up her evening things, which she had left on the floor. She draped them as neatly as possible across a chair, moving her handbag to do so. The bag seemed unusually heavy, and she glanced inside it in puzzlement, then froze, staring at what she had found.

  ‘How very odd,’ she said at last. She reached inside and brought out a gun—a small revolver not unlike her own. Angela did not even need to open the cylinder to know how many bullets it would contain, but she did anyway. As she had expected, one chamber was empty. Angela gazed at the gun and thought very hard. This was evidently the weapon that had killed Professor Klausen. Why had the killer suddenly decided to plant it on Angela? To incriminate her, presumably.

  ‘I take it this is your idea of a joke, Mr. Murderer, whoever you are,’ said Angela to herself. ‘Well, I don’t think it’s funny. You had better watch out.’

  Then she went to bed and slept for nine whole hours with the gun under her pillow.

  TWENTY-TWO

  When Angela went into the breakfast-room the next morning she found only Aubrey Nash and Gabe Bradley there, laughing about something. When he saw her, Gabe glanced at the Ambassador, drained his cup and excused himself tactfully.

  Angela took a seat across the table from Aubrey, helped herself to coffee and began buttering a roll.

  ‘It’s snowing again, I see,’ she said by way of a greeting. ‘I suppose that means we’ll be cut off for another day at least.’

  ‘Maybe not,’ replied Aubrey. ‘Lord Strathmerrick has sent out some men to begin clearing away the tree and the landslide. I don’t know how bad it is, but I guess we’ll be able to get through to the village by this afternoon.’

  ‘And then the police can be fetched at last.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s what Jameson has in mind,’ he said. ‘I believe he’s planning to telephone Scotland Yard directly—that is, if the lines aren’t down in the village too.’

  ‘I see,’ said Angela. ‘Have you seen Mr. Jameson this morning? I want to speak to him.’ She had been tempted to remain quiet about the gun she had found in her bag, given that she was presently without her own, but after reflecting on the matter a while she had reluctantly decided to tell Henry about it, even though it was bound to make her look even more guilty in the eyes of some of the more suspicious of the men. After all, Henry had taken her into his confidence last night, so it would be discourteous of her at the very least to act in bad faith.

  ‘I think he and Lord Strathmerrick are busy with Professor Klausen,’ said Aubrey.

  ‘Have they moved him?’

  ‘Yes. I guess the rigor mortis wore off and they were able to get him out. I’m glad of it—it’s hardly fitting to store a dead body in an old chest like so much cast-off laundry.’

  ‘No,’ agreed Angela. ‘He deserves some decency after the way in which he died. I don’t suppose I’ll get an opportunity to talk to Mr. Jameson until later, then.’

  ‘I guess not.’

  ‘What shall you do today, if you can’t get away from Fives? I dare say you and Gabe have plenty of affairs of state with which to occupy yourself. Or are you doing some detective-work?’

  Aubrey grimaced.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Nobody has told me a
nything. The British Government fellows have taken charge and are doing it all their own way. Hardly to be wondered at, I guess—after all, it’s their show and their dead body.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Angela. ‘I imagine it must be rather embarrassing for them to have invited the official representative of another country to meet their pet celebrity, only to have him be murdered before the introduction can take place. It doesn’t exactly give a good impression of their efficiency, at any rate.’

  ‘True—although it was hardly their fault. I’m only surprised they haven’t placed Bagshawe under lock and key yet.’

  ‘I imagine they’d like to,’ said Angela, ‘but there’s no real evidence of his guilt—he wasn’t carrying a gun, for example—and they can’t just lock him up on suspicion. If they went around shutting away people they thought might have done it, then no doubt Freddy and I would have been locked in our bedrooms since yesterday, too.’

  ‘I only hope they find the evidence they need,’ said Aubrey. ‘Lord Strathmerrick was talking last night about searching everyone’s rooms today, although I don’t know how he’s going to explain that to everyone, seeing that we’re meant to be keeping quiet about the murder.’

  ‘He needn’t worry about that,’ said Angela. ‘Everybody in the house seems to know more about it than we do.’

  ‘Is that so?’ he said in mild surprise. ‘It just goes to show how hard it is to keep a secret in a place like this.’ He was silent for a moment, then said regretfully, ‘I’m sorry I never got to meet Klausen—I’d have liked to hear what he had to say. I’ve missed my chance now, though. I was only sent here because the meeting was arranged at the last minute and there wasn’t time for anyone to get over to Scotland from Washington. But there’s no urgency any more, and by the time everything has been resolved here, the matter will have passed out of my hands and will be the responsibility of the Department of State.’

  ‘I expect Selma will be pleased to get away,’ said Angela. ‘I think she was looking forward to the Riviera.’