by Ngaio Marsh
‘Why, Inspector, they didn’t tell me it was you. Now, do you know I never realized, that day I called about my poor friend’s troubles, that I was speaking to Lady Alleyn’s famous son.’
Inwardly writhing under this blatant recognition of his snob-value Alleyn shook hands and instantly introduced Fox to whom Mrs Halcut-Hackett was insufferably cordial. They all sat down. Alleyn deliberately waited for a moment or two before he spoke. He looked at Mrs Halcut-Hackett. He saw that under its thick patina of cream and rouge her face was sagging from the bones of her skull. He saw that her eyes and her hands were frightened.
He said: ‘I think we may as well begin with that same visit to the Yard. The business we talked about on that occasion seems to be linked with the death of Lord Robert Gospell.’
She sat there, bolt upright in her expensive stays and he knew she was terrified.
‘But,’ she said, ‘that’s absurd. No, honestly, Mr Alleyn, I just can’t believe there could be any possible connection. Why, my friend—’
‘Mrs Halcut-Hackett,’ said Alleyn, ‘I am afraid we must abandon your friend.’
She shot a horrified glance at Fox, and Alleyn answered it.
‘Mr Fox is fully acquainted with the whole story,’ he said. ‘He agrees with me that your friend had better dissolve. We realize that beyond all doubt you yourself were the victim of these blackmailing letters. There is no need for you to feel particularly distressed over this. It is much better to tackle this sort of thing without the aid of an imaginary Mrs X. She makes for unnecessary confusion. We now have the facts—’
‘But—how do you—?’
Alleyn decided to take a risk. It was a grave risk.
‘I have already spoken to Captain Withers,’ he said.
‘My God, has Maurice confessed?’
Fox’s notebook dropped to the floor.
Alleyn, still watching the gaping mouth with its wet red margin, said: ‘Captain Withers has confessed nothing.’ And he thought: ‘Does she realize the damage she’s done?’
‘But I don’t mean that,’ Mrs Halcut-Hackett gabbled. ‘I don’t mean that. It’s not that. You must be crazy. He couldn’t have done it.’ She clenched her hands and drummed with her fists on the arms of the chair. ‘What did he tell you?’
‘Very little I’m afraid. Still we learned at least that it was not impossible—’
‘You must be crazy to think he did it. I tell you he couldn’t do it.’
‘He couldn’t do what, Mrs Halcut-Hackett?’ asked Alleyn.
‘The thing—Lord Robert…’ She gaped horridly and then with a quick and vulgar gesture, covered her mouth with her ringed hand. Horrified intelligence looked out of her eyes.
‘What did you think Captain Withers had confessed?’
‘Nothing to do with this. Nothing that matters to anyone but me. I didn’t mean a thing by it. You’ve trapped me. It’s not fair.’
‘For your own sake,’ said Alleyn, ‘you would be wise to try to answer me. You say you did not mean to ask if Captain Withers had confessed to murder. Very well, I accept that for the moment. What might he have confessed? That he was the author of the letter your blackmailer had threatened to use. Is that it?’
‘I won’t answer. I won’t say anything more. You’re trying to trap me.’
‘What conclusion am I likely to draw from your refusal to answer? Believe me, you take a very grave risk if you refuse.’
‘Have you told my husband about the letter?’
‘No. Nor shall I do so if it can be avoided. Come now.’ Alleyn deliberately drew all his power of concentration to a fine point. He saw his dominance drill like a sort of mental gimlet through her flabby resistance. ‘Come now. Captain Withers is the author of this letter. Isn’t he?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Did you think he had confessed as much?’
‘Why, yes, but—’
‘And you suppose Lord Robert Gospell to have been the blackmailer? Ever since that afternoon when he sat behind you at the concert?’
‘Then it was Robert Gospell!’ Her head jerked back. She looked venomously triumphant.
‘No,’ said Alleyn. ‘That was a mistake. Lord Robert was not a blackmailer.’
‘He was. I know he was. Do you think I didn’t see him last night, watching us. Why did he ask me about Maurice? Why did Maurice warn me against him?’
‘Did Captain Withers suggest that Lord Robert was a blackmailer?’ In spite of himself a kind of cold disgust deadened Alleyn’s voice. She must have heard it because she cried out:
‘Why do you speak of him like that? Of Captain Withers, I mean. You’ve no right to insult him.’
‘My God, this is a stupid woman,’ thought Alleyn. Aloud he said: ‘Have I insulted him? If so I have gone very far beyond my duty. Mrs Halcut-Hackett, when did you first miss this letter?’
‘About six months ago. After my charade party in the little season.’
‘Where did you keep it?’
‘In a trinket-box on my dressing-table.’
‘A locked box?’
‘Yes. But the key was sometimes left with others in the drawer of the dressing-table.’
‘Did you suspect your maid?’
‘No. I can’t suspect her. She has been with me for fifteen years. She’s my old dresser. I know she wouldn’t do it.’
‘Have you any idea who could have taken it?’
‘I can’t think, except that for my charade party I turned my room into a buffet, and the men moved everything round.’
‘What men?’
‘The caterer’s men. Dimitri. But Dimitri superintended them the whole time. I don’t believe they had an opportunity.’
‘I see,’ said Alleyn.
He saw she now watched him with a different kind of awareness. Alleyn had interviewed a great number of Mrs Halcut-Hacketts in his day. He knew very well that with such women he carried a weapon that he was loath to use, but which nevertheless fought for him. This was the weapon of his sex. He saw with violent distaste that some taint of pleasure threaded her fear of him. And the inexorable logic of thought presented him to himself, side by side with her lover.
He said: ‘Suppose we get the position clear. In your own interest I may tell you that we have already gathered a great deal of information. Lord Robert was helping us on the blackmail case, and he has left us his notes. From them and from our subsequent enquiries we have pieced this much together. In your own case Captain Withers was the subject of the blackmailing letters. Following our advice you carried out the blackmailer’s instruction and left your bag in the corner of the sofa at the Constance Street Hall. It was taken. Because Lord Robert deliberately sat next to you and because Captain Withers had, as you put it, warned you against him, you came to the conclusion that Lord Robert took the bag and was therefore your blackmailer. Why did you not report to the police the circumstances of the affair at the concert? You had agreed to do so. Were you advised to let the case drop as far as the Yard was concerned?’
‘Yes.’
‘By Captain Withers? I see. That brings us to last night. You say you noticed that Lord Robert watched you both during the ball. I must ask you again if Captain Withers agrees with your theory that Lord Robert was a blackmailer.’
‘He—he simply warned me against Lord Robert.’
‘In view of these letters and the sums of money the blackmailer demanded, did you think it advisable to keep up your friendship with Captain Withers?’
‘We—there was nothing anybody could—I mean—’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Alleyn sternly.
She wetted her lips. Again he saw that look of subservience and thought that of all traits in an ageing woman this was the unloveliest and most pitiable.
She said: ‘Our friendship is partly a business relationship.’
‘A business relationship?’ Alleyn repeated the words blankly.
‘Yes. You see Maurice—Captain Withers—has very kindly offered to advis
e me and—I mean right now Captain Withers has in mind a little business venture in which I am interested, and I naturally require to talk things over so—you see—?’
‘Yes,’ said Alleyn gently, ‘I do see. This venture of Captain Withers is of course the club at Leatherhead, isn’t it?’
‘Why, yes, but—’
‘Now then,’ said Alleyn quickly, ‘about last night. Lord Robert offered to see you home, didn’t he? You refused or avoided giving an answer. Did you go home alone?’
She might as well have asked him how much he knew, so clearly did he read the question in her eyes. He thanked his stars that he had made such a fuss over Withers’s telephone. Evidently Withers had not rung her up to warn her what to say. Frightened his call would be tapped, thought Alleyn with satisfaction, and decided to risk a further assumption. He said:
‘You saw Captain Withers again after the ball, didn’t you?’
‘What makes you think that?’
‘I have every reason to believe it. Captain Withers’s car was parked in a side street off Belgrave Square. How long did you sit there waiting for him?’
‘I don’t admit I sat there.’
‘Then if Captain Withers tells me he took a partner to the Matador last night after the ball I am to conclude that it was not you?’
‘Captain Withers would want to protect me. He’s very, very thoughtful.’
‘Can you not understand,’ said Alleyn, ‘that it is greatly to your advantage and his, if you can prove that you both got into his car and drove to the Matador last night?’
‘Why? I don’t want it said that—’
‘Mrs Halcut-Hackett,’ said Alleyn: ‘Do you want an alibi for yourself and Captain Withers or don’t you?’
She opened her mouth once or twice like a gaping fish, looked wildly at Fox and burst into tears.
Fox got up, walked to the far end of the room, and stared with heavy tact at the second print in the Nightcap series. Alleyn waited while scarlet claws scuffled in an elaborate handbag. Out came a long piece of monogrammed tulle. She jerked at it violently.
Something clattered to the floor. Alleyn darted forward and picked it up.
It was a gold cigarette-case with a medallion set in the lid and surrounded by brilliants.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rose Birnbaum
MRS HALCUT-HACKETT dabbed at the pouches under her eyes as if her handkerchief was made of blotting-paper.
‘You frighten me,’ she said. ‘You frighten me so. I’m just terrified.’
Alleyn turned the cigarette-case over in his long hands.
‘But there is no need to be terrified, none at all. Don’t you see that if you can give me proof that you and Captain Withers motored straight from Marsdon House to the Matador, it clears you at once from any hint of complicity in Lord Robert’s death?’
He waited. She began to rock backwards and forwards, beating her hands together and moving her head from side to side like a well-preserved automaton.
‘I can’t. I just can’t. I won’t say anything more. I just won’t say another thing. It’s no good. I won’t say another thing.’
‘Very well,’ said Alleyn, not too unkindly. ‘Don’t try. I’ll get at it another way. This is a very magnificent case. The medallion is an old one. Italian Renaissance, I should think. It’s most exquisitely worked. It might almost be Benvenuto himself who formed those minute scrolls. Do you know its history?’
‘No. Maurice picked it up somewhere and had it put on the case. I’m crazy about old things,’ said Mrs Halcut-Hackett with a dry sob. ‘Crazy about them.’
Alleyn opened the lid. An inscription read ‘E. from M.W.’ He shut the case but did not return it to her.
‘Don’t lose it, Mrs Halcut-Hackett. The medal is a collector’s piece. Aren’t you afraid to carry it about with you?’
She seemed to take heart of grace at his interest. She dabbed again at her eyes and said: ‘I’m just terribly careless with my things. Perhaps I ought not to use it. Only last night I left it lying about.’
‘Did you? Where?’
She looked terrified again the moment he asked her a question.
‘Some place at the ball,’ she said.
‘Was it in the green sitting-room on the top landing?’
‘I—yes—I think maybe it was.’
‘At what time?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘During the supper hour didn’t you sit in that room with Captain Withers?’
‘Yes. Why not? Why shouldn’t I?’ She twisted the handkerchief round her hands and said: ‘How do you know that? My husband—I’m not—he’s not having me watched?’
‘I don’t for a moment suppose so. I simply happened to know that you sat in this room some time just before one o’clock. You tell me you left your cigarette-case there. Now when you came out of that room what did you do?’
‘I went into the cloakroom to tidy. I missed the case when I opened my bag in the cloakroom.’
‘Right. Now as you went from the green sitting-room to the cloakroom two doors away, did you happen to notice Lord Robert on the landing? Please don’t think I am trying to entrap you. I simply want to know if you saw him.’
‘He was coming upstairs,’ she said. Her voice and manner were more controlled now.
‘Good. Did you hear the dialling sound on the telephone extension while you were in the cloakroom?’
‘Yes. Now you remind me I did hear it.’
‘When you came out of the cloakroom did you go back for your case?’
‘No. No, I didn’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘Why? Because I forgot.’
‘You forgot it again!’
‘I didn’t just forget but I went to the head of the stairs and Maurice was in the other sitting-out room at the stairhead, waiting for me. I went in there, and then I remembered my case and he got it for me.’
‘Had the telephone rung off?’ asked Alleyn.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Was anyone else on the landing?’
‘I guess not.’
‘Not, by any chance, a short rather inconspicuous lady sitting alone?’
‘No. There wasn’t anybody on the landing. Donald Potter was in the sitting-room.’
‘Was Captain Withers long fetching your case?’
‘I don’t think so,’ she said nervously. ‘I don’t remember. I talked to Donald. Then we all went downstairs.’
‘Captain Withers did not say whether there was anyone else in the telephone-room when he got the cigarette-case?’
‘No, he didn’t say anything about it.’
‘Will you be very kind and let me keep this case for twenty-four hours?’
‘Why? Why do you want it?’
Alleyn hesitated and at last he said: ‘I want to see if anybody else recognises it. Will you trust me with it?’
‘Very well,’ she said. ‘I can’t refuse, can I?’
‘I’ll take great care of it,’ said Alleyn. He dropped it in his pocket and turned to Fox who had remained at the far end of the room. Fox’s notebook was open in his hand.
‘I think that’s all, isn’t it?’ asked Alleyn. ‘Have I missed anything, Fox?’
‘I don’t fancy so, sir.’
‘Then we’ll bother you no longer, Mrs Halcut-Hackett,’ said Alleyn, standing before her. She rose from her chair. He saw that there was a sort of question in her eyes. ‘Is there anything you would like to add to what you have said?’ he asked.
‘No. No. But you said a little while ago that you would find out about what you asked me before. You said you’d trace it another way.’
‘Oh,’ said Alleyn cheerfully, ‘you mean whether you went from Marsdon House to the Matador in Captain Withers’s car, and if so, how long it took. Yes, we’ll ask the commissionaire and the man in the office at the Matador. They may be able to help.’
‘My God, you mustn’t do that!’
‘Why not?’
; ‘You can’t do that. For God’s sake say you won’t. For God’s sake…’
Her voice rose to a stifled, hysterical scream, ending in a sort of gasp. Fox sighed heavily and gave Alleyn a look of patient endurance. Mrs Halcut-Hackett drew breath. The door opened.
A plain girl, dressed to go out, walked into the room.
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘I didn’t know—’
Mrs Halcut-Hackett stared round her with the air of a trapped mastodon and finally blundered from the room as fast as her French heels would carry her.
The door slammed behind her.
The plain girl, who was most beautifully curled, painted and dressed, looked from Alleyn to Fox.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she repeated nervously. ‘I’m afraid I shouldn’t have come in. Ought I to go and see if there’s anything I can do?’
‘If I were you,’ said Alleyn, ‘I don’t think I should. Mrs Halcut-Hackett is very much distressed over last night’s tragedy and I expect she would rather be alone. Are you Miss Birnbaum?’
‘Yes, I am. You’re detectives, aren’t you?’
‘That’s us. My name is Alleyn and this is Mr Fox.’
‘Oh, how d’you do?’ said Miss Birnbaum hurriedly. She hesitated and then gave them her hand. She looked doubtfully into Alleyn’s face. He felt the chilly little fingers tighten their grip like those of a frightened child.
‘I expect you’ve found it rather upsetting too, haven’t you?’
‘Yes,’ she said dutifully. ‘It’s dreadful, isn’t it?’ She twisted her fingers together. ‘Lord Robert was very kind, wasn’t he? He was very kind to me.’
‘I hope your toothache’s better,’ said Alleyn.
She looked at her hands and then up into his face.
‘I didn’t have toothache,’ she said.
‘No?’
‘No. I just wanted to go home. I hate coming out,’ added Miss Birnbaum with extraordinary vigour. ‘I knew I would and I do.’
‘That’s bad luck. Why do you do it?’
‘Because,’ said Miss Birnbaum with devastating frankness, ‘my mother paid Mrs Hackett, I mean Mrs Halcut-Hackett, five hundred pounds to bring me out.’