The Riddle of Sphinx Island

by R. T. Raichev

  The library was long and narrow and it had an air of melancholy charm about it. Bookshelves containing a great number of gilt and russet volumes reached up to the ceiling. It seemed to be used chiefly as a repository for things that their owners had not had the heart to throw away. Dilapidated chairs of different styles, a large sofa of the Louis Philippe period, partially disembowelled, with springs and stuffing coming out in places, little tables covered with knick-knacks, pipes, tarnished silver cigarette lighters, candlesticks, bowls full of dry flowers, one or two empty chocolate boxes and a shabby tiger hearthrug. There were some indifferent Edwardian family portraits on the walls. The window curtains were of faded green silk, their pelmets intricate with folds and tassels.

  On a side table there lay pre-war copies of The Field, Cineworld and The Tatler and an off volume of the Revue Hebdomadaire. There was also a batch of Batman comics, at the sight of which Hugh and Antonia exchanged glances.

  ‘My God, what a dump,’ Sybil said with a sigh. ‘Too embarrassing for words.’

  Payne picked up a book that had been left on the sofa and glanced at the title. Return to the Stars. Von Daniken.

  ‘One of papa’s. It goes back a terribly long time, beyond the flames of Troy and Carthage,’ Sybil said. ‘At least thirty years. Isn’t it odd that people who believe in aliens are never called “alienists”? Mama, on the other hand, was a Socialist. You’d never believe this, but her favourite book was On the Condition of the Working Classes in England. Porcelain socialism, papa used to tease her.’

  ‘The female version of champagne socialism, eh?’

  ‘That’s mama over there.’ Sybil pointed to the portrait on one of the walls. It showed a placid-looking woman swathed in several dead foxes and wearing lace mittens, her hair an immaculate white halo around her head. ‘Mama went on two expeditions to Tibet but she never changed the way she did her hair. It’s the same periwigged style so beloved by our own dear Queen, as I am sure you’ve noticed.’

  ‘A bit more cumulo-nimbus than HM’s Ionic capital, surely?’

  ‘Mama was the worst cheat at solitaire who ever lived.’

  ‘Whose are those Batmans,’ Payne asked casually.

  ‘Oh my brother’s.’ Sybil waved a dismissive hand. ‘Batman used to be John’s hero. No, sorry – it was one of Batman’s enemies John used to adore, forget which. The Joker?’

  ‘Not the Riddler?’

  ‘Isn’t that the same character?’

  ‘No, not really,’ said Payne. He started leafing through one of the comics. ‘I don’t think many people know that Patricia Highsmith used to write copy for Batman before becoming a proper writer.’

  ‘Did she? I wonder if Batman was an influence on Tom Ripley,’ Antonia said thoughtfully. ‘Duality is central to both characters. Batman leads a double life: dapper man about town by day, vigilante by night.’

  She walked up to the fireplace and stood peering at the portrait above the fireplace. ‘Is that a bullet hole?’

  ‘How clever of you to notice. Apparently John got carried away with his gun and he fired two shots,’ Sybil explained. ‘No one was hurt. Happened while I was in London. John seemed to have had a delusional episode or something. He’s apologised to everyone now.’

  Antonia pointed to the bookshelves on the right of the fireplace. ‘I don’t think those books are one hundred per cent authentic, are they?’

  ‘Trompe d’oeil – yes! If you push Sodom and Gomorrah slightly, the panel will open and you will see a secret staircase that leads upstairs, straight to John’s dressing room. No, don’t touch it! We’ve got the other matter to discuss first. The reason why you are here. Remember?’ Sybil looked round, as though making sure there was no one around who could overhear them and asked in a low voice, ‘Well, what do you think? Now you’ve met everybody. Any ideas?’

  ‘I can’t say we suspect anyone at this juncture, if that’s what you mean,’ Payne said.

  ‘None of your guests looks like a homicidal maniac,’ Antonia said. ‘Unless it’s your brother. He is the only one who seems vaguely implicated.’

  ‘Because of the shooting incident? Oh but that’s got nothing to do with it, nothing at all.’ Sybil shook her head vehemently. ‘It isn’t John. I’d have told you if it was John. Besides, I never said “homicidal maniac”. The killer – I mean the person who is planning to commit the murder – has a very rational reason for wanting to do it. He is not a nutcase.’

  ‘So it’s a man,’ Payne said.

  ‘No, it’s not. I believe you are trying to catch me out.’

  ‘You said “he”.’

  ‘Did I?’ Sybil sighed. ‘I knew I’d slip up sooner or later. I might as well tell you the whole story. Wouldn’t be at all fair otherwise. But I must show you the object first. To my way of thinking it is the object that proves without any shadow of a doubt that –’ Sybil broke off and put her finger across her lips. Her eyes were fixed on the door. ‘I thought I heard a noise. No, it’s nothing.’

  After a moment’s pause she walked up to a small desk in the corner. She took out a key, inserted it in the lock but she didn’t turn it at once – she glanced over her shoulder –

  As though on cue, the door opened and Oswald Ramskritt came into the library.

  Sybil took out the key and turned round. She leant against the desk. She smiled. ‘Oh Oswald! It’s you!’

  ‘It’s me, yes. Did you expect somebody else?’

  ‘No, of course not. I am sorry. I’m a little jumpy, I don’t know why. Is anything the matter?’

  ‘I would like to talk to you for a moment, Sybil. If I may.’

  ‘Of course you may, Oswald, but I am a little busy at the moment. In about twenty minutes perhaps?’

  ‘I need to talk to you now. It really is rather urgent.’ Oswald Ramskritt looked towards Antonia, then towards Payne. ‘Sorry, folks. Do you mind? It’s very important. Oh and it’s private.’ He laughed.

  Payne said it was all right, they didn’t mind. They watched Oswald Ramskritt put his hand at Sybil’s back and pilot her out of the library.

  ‘He practically dragged her out,’ said Payne.

  ‘They were acting,’ Antonia said firmly. ‘The whole thing was staged.’

  ‘You think so? I am not sure.’

  As it turned out, they never got another chance to be alone with Sybil de Coverley again.

  16

  ENTER A MURDERER?

  It was five minutes to nine and dinner was over.

  Sybil de Coverley led the way to the drawing room where Maisie and Ella served the coffee. Sybil said that although she was awfully fond of the game, she wasn’t going to pester anybody into forming a four for bridge. She believed in having things ad hoc, in leaving people to their own devices. There were jigsaw puzzles and books and papers and magazines and Scrabble and crosswords and, of course, Cluedo. The box didn’t seem to be working for some reason, but then she’d never found television had much to offer in terms of entertainment these days, so terribly vulgar, strictly for the delectation of the half-witted. Thank God there were more than enough drinks – brandy and scotch and several kinds of liqueurs, some rather unusual ones.

  ‘Do help yourselves,’ she urged them.

  Picking up a small silver hand-bell she gave a prolonged tinkle. ‘Sorry. I keep forgetting we haven’t got maids or a butler. This place is getting harder to manage by the minute. The roof leaks, windows rattle, pipes burst, floors collapse, cisterns overflow, doors jam – now it’s the phone.’

  ‘I’ll see to all that. Once we’ve signed our agreement, things will move very fast, I promise you,’ Oswald said.

  ‘What’s the matter with the phone?’ Antonia asked. She wondered if they were getting closer to the murder.

  ‘I have no idea. It’s gone dead,’ Sybil said. ‘Something wrong with the line.’

  ‘We’ve all got mobile phones, haven’t we?’ Maisie looked round.

  ‘I haven’t got a mobile phone,’ Lady Grylls sa
id.

  Payne produced his mobile. ‘Still no network, so our mobiles won’t be much use.’

  ‘Are we completely cut off then?’ Doctor Klein said.

  ‘I believe the wind’s rising. Would you excuse me? I need to see to something.’ With a vague gesture, Sybil left the room.

  ‘Do let’s play some game, shall we?’ Lady Grylls said. ‘Cluedo can be fun.’

  ‘I hate Cluedo. I absolutely detest it,’ Mrs Garrison-Gore said in her alarmingly loud voice.

  ‘There’s a frightfully clever game called The Game,’ John de Coverley said. ‘It goes like this. Everybody writes the names of famous people on sticky labels, which are then put into a hat. Names like Marshall Pétain, Justin Bieber, Nurse Cavell, Pippa Middleton and so on. Each player then draws out a label without looking, sticks it on their forehead and tries to work out who they are by asking questions to which the others can answer only yes or no. It’s all frightfully clever. What do you think? Shall we play it?’

  ‘Drinks, let’s have drinks. I could do with a stiff brandy. Nothing like a Mind Number followed by a Liver Paralyser when things start flagging!’ Mrs Garrison-Gore laughed.

  ‘There was a game we used to play when I was young. It was called Who Can Bring Home the Awfullest Thing.’ Lady Grylls looked at Mrs Garrison-Gore fixedly.

  ‘First-class coffee,’ Major Payne said.

  Oswald Ramskritt had taken Maisie’s hand in his. ‘My enemies have called me hyperactive and hyper-acquisitive. You don’t believe that, do you? Tell me you don’t. You know how much your opinion matters to me.’

  ‘I don’t.’ Maisie looked very nervous.

  ‘You are a sweet child, but I notice you always smile in the same way at everybody, why is that? I’d have preferred the occasional special smile. Is that such an unreasonable request?’

  Antonia was unpleasantly reminded of the murderous Duke in ‘My Last Duchess’.

  ‘It will soon be May,’ Ella said to Doctor Klein. ‘A time of lilacs and shooting stars. I believe there was a poem about it.’

  ‘Summer’s practically knocking on the door. For me, buying summer clothes is the ultimate nightmare. It always puts me in mind of Sisyphus.’ Mrs Garrsion-Gore raised her brandy glass to her lips.

  John de Coverley said that summer was etched in his psyche as the time for girls. ‘I think of it as the most magical time of the year. The acrid tang of heat emanating from the sidewalks, the breezes of late afternoon, the whiff of perfume of a passing beauty – eh, Major Payne?’

  ‘One certainly falls in love quicker in summer,’ Payne agreed.

  ‘I miss summers in Germany,’ Doctor Klein said. ‘I remember walking in the Black Forest and thinking, but I haven’t yet started to live! One of your English poets, I believe, describes summer as a “dress rehearsal of coming manhood”.’

  ‘Am I right in thinking magnolias go into bloom in May?’ Antonia asked Ella. ‘I love magnolias.’

  John was talking to Lady Grylls, ‘ … the realisation that sooner or later one would fall desperately, knuckle-bitingly in love and lie drugged with pleasure on the grass with the girl of one’s dreams … There is nothing that quite compares to the pure poignancy of first love – nothing at all!’

  ‘Particularly when accentuated by several prodigious dollops of gin. That’s what one of my beaux used to say. He was described as “lovably louche” by his aunt of all people. He was known for spiking girls’ lemonades at dances. Do men still do that sort of thing?’ Lady Grylls glanced round.

  ‘Girls used to be notoriously broad-minded, but not any longer, it seems. Now they are bound to file for erotic coercion.’ Mrs Garrison-Gore boomed with laughter.

  ‘Talking about illicit love, we saw a production of Romeo and Juliet last month, but we didn’t think it terribly convincing.’ Payne said. ‘Romeo took the news of Juliet’s supposed demise as though it were a disappointing cricket score.’

  ‘Juliet came across as a pert blue stocking, which isn’t exactly as Shakespeare intended,’ Antonia said with a smile.

  ‘I thought I heard thunder – very distant thunder,’ Maisie said with an anxious glance towards the window.

  ‘Do you know how they used to create the illusion of distant thunder in old-fashioned plays?’ John de Coverley looked round. ‘By rubbing two coconuts together.’

  ‘The sea sounds furious. There’s a storm coming, that’s what the forecast said,’ Mrs Garrison-Gore reminded them.

  ‘Last time we had a storm on the island, the roof leaked like Alpine streams in springtime,’ John de Coverley said. ‘Like Alpine streams. Then the waves came – fuming and foaming. Looked as though the Kraken had awoken. Maybe that’s why we can’t get servants for long. Not that I mind awfully. This place practically runs itself. Practically runs itself.’

  ‘An island is an acquired taste,’ Lady Grylls said.

  ‘I hope you will forgive my impertinence, but haven’t you ever yearned for a son, Mr de Coverley?’ Doctor Klein asked. ‘I read somewhere that scions of old dynastic families preserved an ancestral nostalgia for the dignity and ceremonial of kinship.’

  ‘As it happens, I have been thinking about it. Yes, most certainly.’ John held up his monocle in a didactic fashion. ‘I believe in asserting the honourable lineage of the de Coverleys … Where the hell has Sybil vanished to?’

  ‘I think I will go to my room now,’ Doctor Klein said. ‘Don’t look so alarmed, Ella. Sometimes I am overpowered by a general sense of worthlessness, that’s all.’

  None of this is real, Antonia thought. How long had it taken them to learn their speeches? Had there been any clues for her and Hugh to pick up? And how closer were they to the murder?

  It was five minutes later.

  Doctor Klein stood in front of the chest of drawers in his room. He had discovered that the bottom drawer had been opened and that someone had rummaged inside it. The file hadn’t been replaced properly. And they must have seen what was under the file. Not very careful, were they? How very curious. Someone now knew his secret …

  No, not ‘someone’. Only Mrs Garrison-Gore from the room next door could have done it. She was the Nosey Parker type. He had noticed her shooting curious glances at him. She knew. Did she have any intention of telling anyone? Would she tell Oswald? Or would she perhaps use the idea in her next book?

  Oh well, it was bound to come out sooner or later.

  He sat on his bed. He felt an odd fuzziness in his head. Perhaps he needed to change his medication?

  He thought of Oswald. He found Oswald a fascinating study. Oswald enjoyed having what the English called the ‘whip-hand’ on women. Could a man be so unselfconsciously bad – so thoroughly evil? Was that possible? Doctor Klein had decided that he would continue observing Oswald and if he found that Oswald had but one redeeming feature, then Oswald might be given another chance – then he might be – well, spared.

  Sybil de Coverley had entered the library and was preparing for her murder. She went round flicking an old-fashioned feather duster across the rows of books. She didn’t want anyone to start sneezing at what was to be the culmination of the Murder Game. She turned off all the table lamps barring one. She walked up to the desk and pulled out the diaries that had belonged to one of her uncles, perhaps the most a-typical de Coverley – morocco-bound and written in multi-coloured inks – amethyst-purple, blood-red, chrome-yellow, jet-black, sapphire-green.

  The diaries contained arcane clues to her forthcoming death – no they didn’t, she suddenly remembered. Mrs Garrison-Gore had ruled against using the diaries.

  Sybil felt tired and a little confused. She went on leafing through the diaries. Not diaries exactly. They contained pensees, the odd observation on the predictability of life as well as beauty tips. ‘Bathe the eyelashes in moon-water … When photographed, place tapering hands on cheeks as if supporting a Greek vase.’

  How lovely the calligraphy had been seventy years ago, as stern and frivolous as her uncle’s pure pr
ofile and floating fair … In his prime her uncle had been known as the ‘last professional beauty’ …

  She put the diaries back in the desk. ‘Tonight is as good a night to be killed as any,’ she said aloud.

  Turning round she gave an awkward laugh. She’d been startled by her ghostly reflection in the mirror. She felt an odd reluctance to apply the horror make-up they had decided on. For some reason she found herself in the grip of sudden panic – panic, as it had been defined by the ancient Greeks – as a ‘conviction that some malignant supernatural power was coming’.

  Nonsense, all nonsense, she told herself. It’s this bloody island – it’s sapping my energy – the sooner I get rid of it, the better –

  She gasped and her hand flew up to her throat as she heard the door open.

  She gave a sigh of relief.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said with a smile. ‘Why the solemn look?’

  I incline towards overdoing things, Feversham thought. I tend to become the part. Like Perkin Warbeck, or was it Lambert Simnel, who had really believed himself to be one of the Princes of the Tower?

  He must be careful. By no means must he become the part. It wouldn’t do for him to edge into something like a play by Pirandello. Pretending to be someone else was rather fun and he believed he could do it really well, but convincing himself to be someone else was quite a different matter.

  That way madness lay.

  17

  TRUTH TRIUMPHANT

  Antonia and Hugh and Lady Grylls were now the only people in the drawing room.

  ‘What in heaven’s name is “slosh”?’ Antonia asked.

  ‘A game one plays with billiard balls,’ Payne explained.

  ‘This sofa is big enough to hold ten,’ Lady Grylls said. ‘What period is it, Hughie? It’s the sort of thing you’d know.’

  ‘No particular period. Manufactured round the First World War, I imagine.’