by Ngaio Marsh
At the sight of the Yard man in his room Nigel immediately felt as guilty as he would have done if his hands had been metaphorically drenched in his cousin’s blood.
“I’m sorry,” he stammered, “I didn’t realize you were here—I’ll push off.”
“Don’t go,” said Alleyn amiably. “I’m not going to put the handcuffs on you. I want to ask you a question. Did you by any chance hear anything outside in the passage while you were dressing last night?”
“What sort of thing?” asked Nigel, overwhelmed with relief.
“Well, what does one hear in passages? Any sound of a footfall for instance?”
“No, nothing. You see, I was talking to Wilde all the time and his bath was running, too—I wouldn’t have been able to hear anything.”
“I understand Mrs. Wilde was in her room all this time. Do you remember hearing her voice?”
Nigel considered this carefully.
“Yes,” he said at last, “yes, I am positive I heard Mr. Wilde call out to her and I heard her answer him.”
“At what precise moment? Before or after the lights went out?”
Nigel sat on the bed with his head in his hands.
“I can’t be certain,” he said at last. “I’ll swear on oath I heard her voice and I think it was before and after the lights went out. Is it important?”
“Everything is important, but taken in conjunction with the icy Florence’s statement, your own is useful as a corroboration. Now, look here, show me Tokareff’s room, will you?”
“I think I know where it is,” said Nigel. He led the way down the passage into the back corridor and turned to the left. “Judging from my recollection of his vocal efforts, I should say this was it.”
Alleyn opened the door. The room was singularly tidy. The bed had been slept in, but was little disturbed. Dr. Tokareff would have appeared to have passed a particularly tranquil night. On the bedside table lay a Webster’s Dictionary and a well-thumbed copy of The Kreutzer Sonata in English.
“Thank you so much, Mr. Bathgate,” said Alleyn, “I can carry on here.”
Nigel withdrew, thankful to leave the atmosphere of official investigation and yet, paradoxically, conscious of a sense of thwarted curiosity.
Inspector Alleyn opened the wardrobe and drawers and noted down the contents, then turned his attention to the suitcase that had been neatly bestowed under one of the cupboards. In this he found a small leather writing case with a lock that responded at once to the attentions of a skeleton key. The case contained a number of documents typewritten in Russian, a few photographs, mostly of the doctor himself, and a small suede pouch in which he found a little seal set in a steel mount. Alleyn took it to the writing table, inked it and pressed it down on a piece of paper. It gave a tolerably clear impression of a long-bladed dagger. The Inspector whistled softly between his teeth and referring to the documents found a similar impression on many of the pages. He copied one or two sentences into his note-book, carefully cleaned the seal and replaced everything in the writing case, snapping the lock home and restoring the suitcase to its former position. Then he wrote a note in his little book, “Communicate with Sumiloff in re above” and with a final glance round, returned to the passage.
Next he went into Angela’s bedroom and then into Rosamund Grant’s. Finally he visited Sir Hubert Handesley’s bedroom, dressing-room, and bathroom. All these he subjected to a similar meticulous search, making a list of the clothes, going through the pockets, sorting, examining and restoring every movable and garment. He found little to interest him and had paused to light a cigarette in Handesley’s dressing-room, when a light rap on the door and a respectful murmur outside announced the presence of Detective-Constable Bailey.
Alleyn went out into the passage.
“Excuse me, sir,” said Bailey, “but I think I’ve got hold of something.”
“Where?”
“In the lady’s bedroom, sir. I’ve left it just as it is.”
“I’ll come,” said Alleyn.
They returned to Marjorie Wilde’s bedroom, passing Mary, all eyes, on the landing.
“Now then, Mary,” said Alleyn severely, “what are you doing up here? I thought I asked you all to stay in your own department for an hour.”
“Yes, sir. I’m that sorry, sir, but the master’s asked for ’is Norfick jacket wot’s got ’is pipe in it, sir, and Mr. Roberts ’e sent me up for it.”
“Tell Roberts I thought he understood my instructions. I will bring down the jacket myself for Sir Hubert.”
“Yes, sir,” murmured Mary plaintively, and scuttled downstairs again.
“Well, Bailey, what is it?” asked the Inspector, shutting Mrs. Wilde’s door behind him.
“It’s this drawer-contraption here,” said Bailey, with his slightly disparaging air of social independence.
The six drawers of a Georgian tallboy were laid out neatly on the floor.
“You’ve no eye for antiques, Bailey,” said Inspector Alleyn. “That’s a very nice piece indeed.” He walked over to the empty carcass and stroked the top surface appreciatively.
“It’s a bit the worse for wear, however,” said Bailey. “The casing at the bottom’s hollow and there’s a hole in the inside lining. See, sir? Well, it seems to me someone’s been scuffling about in that bottom drawer and pushed a small soft object over the end of it. It’s fallen into the bottom. You can just touch it.”
Alleyn went down on his knees and thrust his fingers into the gap in the bottom of the tallboy.
“Give me that buttonhook on the table,” he said quickly.
Bailey handed it to him. In a few minutes the Inspector gave a grunt of satisfaction and fished up a soft smallish object. He dropped it on the floor and stared at it with extraordinary concentration. It was a woman’s yellow dogskin glove.
The Inspector took an envelope out of his pocket and from it he produced a discoloured and blistered press button to which a few minute particles of leather were still adhering. He laid it beside the fastening on their find and pointed his long finger at the floor.
The two buttons were identical.
“Not such a bad beginning, Bailey,” said Inspector Alleyn.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Rankin Leaves Frantock
AFTER A BRIEF COGITATION Alleyn went over to the writing-table and, laying the glove down, drew a chair up and sat in it, staring at his find as if it were some kind of puzzle for the correct solution of which a large prize was offered. He pursed his lips crookedly and twisted one long leg about the other. Finally, he took a rolled steel rule and a tape measure from his pocket and began to make elaborate measurements.
Bailey reassembled the tallboy, using methodical accuracy in the folding of each garment that it contained.
“Bring me one of the lady’s gloves, will you?” grunted Alleyn suddenly.
Bailey selected a delicate trifle of fawn-coloured suede and laid it on the writing-table.
“Looks several sizes smaller to me,” he said, and turned back to his job.
“It is smaller, but then it’s a different type,” rejoined the Inspector. “Your find is a sporting specimen. Mannish, tweeds-and-shooting-stick kind of thing. Indeed, a man with a moderate-sized hand could wear it.”
He smelt both the gloves, and looked for the makers’ names.
“Same shop,” he said, and fell to making further measurements and noting them down in his book.
“That’s that,” he said finally, and held out the suede glove to Bailey, who delicately replaced it.
“What about the other?” asked Bailey.
Alleyn deliberated.
“I think,” he said at last, “I think I’ll send it out to earn its keep. Have you finished in here?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then carry on with the prints in the other rooms, will you? I’ll join you in Mr. Rankin’s room before lunch-time. Wait for me there.” He put the glove in his pocket and went downstairs.
The hall
was deserted except for Mr. Bunce, who still kept watch and ward at the front door. Alleyn passed him and went into the entrance lobby. Mr. Bunce revolved and stared trance-like through the glass partition. What was the god up to now?
One or two outdoor coats hung in the lobby, together with a collection of sticks and a pair of goloshes. Alleyn examined all these depressing objects closely, feeling in the pockets, writing in his inevitable book. The breath of Mr. Bunce made a little mist upon the glass.
Finally, the Inspector drew from his own pocket a yellow dogskin glove. He threw it on the bench, picked it up, cast it among the sticks, again retrieved it, and finally dropped it on the floor. Catching the eye of the constable, and perhaps relishing his agonized curiosity, Alleyn laid his finger on his lips and raised his left eyebrow. A spasm of intense gratification passed across Mr. Bunce’s face, succeeded by an expression of low cunning. “This was Ercles’ vein,” Mr. Bunce might have been thinking. Alleyn took out his pipe and filled it. Then he opened the glass door. Bunce fell back a pace.
“Where are the ladies and gentlemen?” asked Alleyn.
“Sir, in the garding,” said Bunce.
“What time’s lunch?”
“One-fifteen.”
The Inspector glanced at the clock. Five to one. A busy morning. He returned to the porch, sat on the bench, and for ten minutes smoked his pipe and did not so much as glance at the constable. The porch became thick with tobacco smoke. At five past one Alleyn opened the outer door, knocked his pipe out on the edge of the stone step, and remained staring out on to the drive.
Presently the sound of voices drifted in from the garden. Alleyn darted back into the porch, and Bunce, once more electrified, saw him take down two or three coats and fling them on the floor. He was bending over them when Handesley, Mr. and Mrs. Wilde, Angela, and Tokareff came up the front steps. They all stopped short at sight of the detective, and a complete silence fell among them.
“So sorry!” said Alleyn, straightening himself. “I’m afraid I’m very much in the way. Just been doing a little routine work, Sir Hubert. I suppose it would be possible for someone to hide behind these garments.”
There was more than a suggestion of enthusiasm in Handesley’s response. “Yes—yes indeed, I should think very possible,” he agreed quickly. “Do you think that is what may have happened? That someone came in from outside before the door was locked and waited until—until the opportunity arose.”
“That is a possibility that I myself have considered,” began the Russian. “It is quite so clear as—”
“The door was still locked, wasn’t it?” interrupted Alleyn, “after the crime was committed?”
“Yes,” answered Handesley, “yes, it was. Still, the murderer might have escaped in the dark by one of the other doors, surely?”
“It is worth considering,” agreed Alleyn. He hung up the coats, and in doing so dropped a yellow dogskin glove on the floor. He stooped and picked it up.
“An odd glove,” he said. “I am afraid I have dropped it out of some pocket. So sorry. Any claimants?”
“It’s yours, Marjorie,” said Angela suddenly.
“Why—so it is.” Mrs. Wilde looked at it without touching it. “I—it’s mine. I thought I had lost it.”
“I don’t see the other,” said Alleyn. “This is the left hand.Don’t say I’ve gone and lost the right.”
“It was the left I lost. I must have dropped it here.”
“Are you sure you did not leave them both down here, Mrs. Wilde?” asked Alleyn. “You see, if you did and the right has gone, it might be worth tracing.”
“You mean,” said Handesley, “that the right-hand glove might have been taken by—by the murderer when he hid here?”
“That sounds an interesting theory,” said Arthur Wilde. “Darling, when did you miss this glove?”
“Oh, I don’t know—how can I tell?” answered Marjorie Wilde breathlessly. “Yesterday—yesterday we went for a walk—he and I. I had the right-hand glove then. He had given them to me—you remember, Arthur?—last Christmas. He teased me about losing it.” She turned blindly towards Wilde, who put his arm about her for all the world as though she were a child.
“Did you wear the single glove yesterday?” persisted Alleyn.
“Yes—yes, I wore it.”
“And when you came in, what did you do with it, Mrs. Wilde?”
“I can’t remember. It’s not in my room.”
“Did you leave it here, do you think?” asked Angela gently. “Marjorie, do try to think. I can see what Mr. Alleyn means. It may be frightfully important.”
“I tell you I can’t remember. I should think I did. Yes—I did. I’m sure I did. Arthur, shouldn’t you think I did?”
“Darling heart!” said Wilde. “I didn’t see you; but I know you generally throw your gloves down as soon as you get in. I should take very long odds on it. The fact that the lost one was here,” he went on, turning to Alleyn, “looks rather as if it was a favourite spot.”
“I think so, too,” said Alleyn. “Thank you so much, Mrs. Wilde. I’m very sorry to bother you.”
He opened the inner door, and Mrs. Wilde and Angela went through followed by the men. Handesley paused.
“What about luncheon, Mr: Alleyn?” he said. “I should be delighted if—”
“Thank you,” said Alleyn, “but I think I will finish up here and in the bedrooms. The mortuary car will arrive at one-thirty. I should suggest, Sir Hubert, that you keep your guests as long as possible in the dining-room.”
“Yes, yes,” said Handesley, turning away quickly. “I know what you mean. Yes, I will.”
Roberts, the pantryman, came into the hall and announced lunch. Alleyn waited until they had all gone, pocketed the glove, and went upstairs to Rankin’s room, where he found Bailey waiting for him.
“Any luck, sir?” asked the finger-print expert.
“Not a great deal. The glove is Mrs. Wilde’s. She had lost it. Probably shoved it over the end of the drawer when she first came here. She wore the mate yesterday, and the general idea is that she left it in the lobby downstairs. That may have been suggested by my supposedly finding the other one there. However, it seems quite likely. If she did, anyone may have picked it up. I’ve started a hare that our man may have come in from outside. You’ve seen how the ground lies there. Quite impossible, but it’s useful to let them think it’s our theory.”
“It would have been very easy for the butler to pick that glove up in the lobby or the hall and keep it by him,” said Bailey.
“Ah, your favourite. Yes, it would, and it would have been equally easy for any of the others to do so. Get out all the clothes, will you, Bailey. Blast! I had hopes of that glove.”
“The left-hand print on the stair knob is Mr. Wilde’s,” said Bailey.
“Is it?” answered Alleyn without enthusiasm. “Aren’t you a one?”
“It seems to me, sir,” said Bailey, as he opened the wardrobe doors, “that whoever stabbed Mr. Rankin took an enormous risk. Suppose he had turned and seen him.”
“If it was a member of the house-party, he had only to pretend he was the murderer in the game.”
“How was he to know Rankin wasn’t the ‘murderer’?’
“It was an eight-to-one chance,” said Alleyn. “Mr. Wilde was the only one who would have been certain of that, and he was in his bath. Wait a moment, though—there was one other.”
“Yes, sir—Vassily.”
“One to you, Bailey. But Vassily wasn’t playing.”
“Well, sir, I think he was.”
“I’m not at all sure I don’t agree with you, you know. What have we here?”
Bailey had laid Rankin’s suits out on the bed and was sprinkling the water jug and glass with white powder. The two worked in silence for some time until Alleyn had come to the last of Rankin’s garments—a dinner jacket. This he carried over to the window and examined rather more closely.
“As a rule,” he observed,
“there is much less to be gleaned from the clothes of a man with a valet than from those of the poorer classes. ‘Highly recommended by successful homicide’ would be a telling reference for any manservant. Here, however, we have an exception. Presumably, Mr. Rankin’s valet sent him down here with a tidy dinner jacket. By Saturday night he had managed to get a good deal of liquid powder down the face of it.”
“Keen on the ladies, I dare say,” said Detective-Sergeant Bailey placidly.
“Poor devil.There are certain aspects of our job that are not very delicious.”
Alleyn produced an envelope and a pocket knife. By dint of scraping the coat very delicately he managed to collect a pinch of fine light powder.
“I may have to send the jacket in for analysis,” he said, “but I think this will do. Go through all the papers now, Bailey, and the drawers. Then I think we have finished in here.”
He left his companion and returned to Mrs. Wilde’s, to Angela’s, and to Rosamund Grant’s rooms. On each of their dressing-tables he found collections of bottles and boxes. Mrs. Wilde seemed to travel with half a beauty parlour in tow. The Inspector, who had collected a case from downstairs, opened it and produced a number of small bottles into each of which he poured samples of liquid powder and of scent. These he carried back to Rankin’s room and, picking up the dinner jacket, nosed it reflectively.
“I rather fancy,” he said to Bailey, “I rather fancy it’s a mixture of ‘Milk of Gardenias’ and ‘Chanel 5.’ Mrs. Wilde and a hint of Miss Grant, in fact. But an analysis will correct me.”
“Someone,” said Bailey, “has dusted the outer rim of the stairs and not the inner. There’s a glove mark on the knob. Did you notice, sir?”
“How you do dwell on those stairs,” said Alleyn.
And with that he finally left the bedroom and went downstairs. In the hall he found Nigel.
“You have finished your lunch early, Mr. Bathgate,” said Alleyn.
“I came out,” said Nigel. “Sir Hubert told me what was happening, and I thought if you didn’t mind that I would like to—to see Charles off.”