Behold a Fair Woman

by Francis Duncan

  But had he been as frank as he had claimed?

  That was a very different matter. Tremaine was certain, in fact, that he hadn’t been. Just what had he been planning? He had said something once about things not being as straightforward or working out as he had expected. He had talked about having to stop and think when you found that you couldn’t have what you wanted without doing damage in another direction.

  He hadn’t taken the trouble to come to the island with Nicola Paston merely for the purpose of baiting Latinam. He was too intelligent to be satisfied with that kind of arid revenge; he had been after something more.

  Behold a fair woman . . .

  Once again the phrase came back to his mind and with it a memory of Nicola Paston walking over the cliffs. Why had Bendall used that expression? Where did it belong?

  Colinet was undoubtedly being confronted with a wide choice of suspects now.

  Mrs. Burres and Major Ayres; hating Latinam for what he had done to their security, and Mrs. Burres at least in a hurry to get away from the island and the police investigations.

  Ivan Holt and Ruth Latinam; in love with each other and yet on uneasy terms, with Ruth Latinam making furtive journeys, perhaps to aid an escaped convict, and Ivan Holt labouring under some fear he would not disclose.

  Geoffrey Bendall and Nicola Paston; robbed of their inheritance and joining forces to pursue the man who had been responsible, Bendall pretending frankness because he knew it was inescapable but still retaining a secret.

  Valerie and Alan Creed; trying to build a new life away from the surroundings they had known and finding the past seeking them out, with Alan Creed grim and bitter under the threat of blackmail, maybe knowing that Latinam had brought the man whom he had betrayed out of the prison shadows to haunt him.

  And Marfield himself; unseen and unpredictable, lurking somewhere in the background, unable to get away unaided, and maybe awaiting his chance to seize his revenge.

  Yes, the choice was wide enough.

  It was very cool in the church. It was a place of refuge, and it was a refuge now that he needed, for the time he dreaded was very near. The time when a human being was to be faced with judgment.

  This was the fixed, immutable end, and it filled him always with despair since it was at odds with all that was sentimental in him. Sometimes it was in the open spaces that he found solace, with the sea and the sky or the still countryside around him; sometimes, as now, it was in the mellow sanctuary of a church.

  The lesson was from the twelfth chapter of Genesis. It was the story of Abraham’s going down into Egypt because of a famine in the land of Canaan. He sat listening to the deep, resonant voice reading the words.

  ‘And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon:

  Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say, This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive.

  Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake . . .’

  One phrase detached itself from the rest to emblazon itself upon his mind.

  Behold . . . a fair woman . . .

  Truth blazed around him. Not Nicola Paston. Not Nicola, after all, but Ruth! That was what Bendall had meant. That was why he had looked at Latinam!

  Not Nicola, whose fair hair had gleamed in the sunlight, but the dark, haunted Ruth, who was also fair to look upon.

  The pieces were tumbling into place now. Summerfold, the woman-hater, leaving his fortune to the man of dubious character who had schemed and wormed his way into his confidence; Mark Belmore saying that when Hedley Latinam and his sister had arrived on the island there had been unsavoury rumours concerning them; Bendall taking such pains for such little apparent satisfaction and talking about doing damage where it had not been his intention.

  Yes, it all fitted. It fitted too neatly to be anything other than the truth.

  At first Ruth Latinam had been no more than a name to Bendall; now she was a person. A person whom he could not willingly harm, despite the villainy of the man to whom she had been married.

  Unobtrusively Tremaine rose to his feet. He was glad he had chosen a seat near the back of the church. There were one or two curious glances at his strained face but he managed to reach the doorway and the open air without attracting too much attention.

  He could not have stayed. For one thought was now clamouring at the gate of his awareness to the exclusion of all others.

  Ivan Holt might have had little motive for killing Hedley Latinam in order to marry his sister. But how deadly a motive for murder he had possessed if she had instead been Latinam’s wife!

  23

  THUNDER IN THE AIR

  MARK BELMORE WATCHED his guest stub out nearly a third of the cigarette he had been smoking at the conclusion of their evening meal.

  ‘Things are beginning to stir, aren’t they, Mordecai?’ he remarked quietly.

  ‘Yes, Mark, they are,’ Tremaine returned heavily. ‘It’s always a bad business when it gets this far.’

  ‘Colinet thinks he’s nearly home?’ queried Ralph Exenley.

  He had been invited over for the evening and occupied the fourth place at the table.

  ‘Surely that’s a good thing rather than a bad one?’ he went on. ‘Nobody likes to think a murderer’s running around loose!’

  ‘That’s true enough, Ralph. It’s just that I’m not sufficiently hardened to it. I haven’t been a professional who’s had to learn to take such things for granted. When I know that a human being is coming to the end of the road—even a human being who’s broken the law in a terrible way—I can’t avoid feeling depressed.’

  Exenley nodded sympathetically.

  ‘I know what you mean. It tends to break down your belief in the ultimate goodness of things, but evil does exist and it’s as well to face it in the end.’

  ‘Are you going up to the hotel again?’ Janet asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Tremaine told her. ‘The Chief Officer asked me to come back. He’s been there practically all day himself.’

  ‘Then he does expect something to develop,’ Mark said decisively. ‘I say, Mordecai, you’re looking as though you oughtn’t to go too far on your own. You’ve been taking it too hard. Besides, after what’s been happening lately I don’t think it’s altogether safe outside. Why not let Ralph go along with you for company?’

  ‘A good suggestion,’ Janet said enthusiastically. ‘Ever since you were attacked the other night I’ve been scared every time you’ve gone out. And I’m sure Ralph won’t mind.’

  ‘No, of course not,’ Exenley put in. ‘I’d rather like the chance to look in on things—especially if the Chief Officer’s expecting something to happen.’

  They walked up the road together. The strength had gone out of the sun but there was still an hour of daylight left.

  ‘You’re sure this isn’t putting you out, Ralph?’ Tremaine said. ‘I know you don’t get around too much as a rule and there’ll be quite a crowd at the hotel.’

  Exenley grinned.

  ‘Even a recluse like me doesn’t turn down this kind of opportunity. You don’t think I’ll be in the way?’

  ‘Of course you won’t,’ Tremaine returned confidently.

  He was not as certain as he tried to sound, however. He wondered how Colinet would take it. Policemen didn’t care to have the scene of their operations cluttered up with spectators.

  The big man came through the main doorway to meet them as they reached the hotel; obviously he had seen their approach. His glance rested fleetingly but curiously upon Exenley.

  ‘You know Mr Exenley, of course,’ Tremaine said hastily, in an endeavour to forestall any objections. ‘You don’t mind his being here?’

  The Chief Officer’s hesitation was not pronounced enough to be uncomfortable.

  ‘Not if he has your backing. Anyway, it was his water tan
k. I dare say he feels a personal interest!’

  Tremaine felt relieved. Colinet wasn’t going to be difficult. Perhaps it was a sign that he considered the situation to be well under control.

  The big man evidently did not wish to go back into the building. They strolled with him across the turf at the side of the hotel.

  ‘I don’t think it will be long now,’ he remarked.

  ‘Miss Latinam?’ Tremaine queried.

  ‘She’s showing signs of breaking. Some of the others aren’t in much better shape.’

  ‘She hasn’t been out?’

  ‘Not without one of my men very obviously in attendance. She hasn’t been able to do—what she may have wanted to do.’

  Colinet looked in Exenley’s direction. He raised his eyebrows a fraction.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Tremaine said. ‘Ralph knows all about it. He couldn’t help seeing what happened to me the other evening.’

  He indicated the now faint bruise on his head. Colinet nodded, satisfied.

  ‘It’s that chap Marfield, isn’t it?’ Exenley said diffidently. ‘The one who escaped from Parkhurst?’

  ‘Well, it might be,’ Colinet returned. ‘We haven’t set eyes on him yet, so officially we can’t say. But there are often things we know but don’t talk about officially because we haven’t the necessary proof.’

  Tremaine adjusted his recalcitrant pince-nez. They had reached the corner of the hotel now and were looking out over the cliffs towards the water.

  ‘If it is Marfield,’ he said slowly, ‘he’s been depending on Ruth Latinam for food and perhaps for aid of another kind. If he doesn’t get it—or if he doesn’t see anything of her—it’s bound to bring him out of hiding. Even if he isn’t in immediate danger of starving he’ll be compelled to try and find out what’s happening. He daren’t risk letting too much time go by in ignorance.’

  ‘That’s the way I see it,’ Colinet agreed. ‘And when he does show up he’ll find we’ve arranged a reception party for him.’

  ‘You seem to have the whole thing well organized,’ Exenley said admiringly. ‘Force Marfield into the open and your murderer’s in the bag.’

  ‘If Marfield is the murderer,’ Tremaine said, and the Chief Officer gave him a sharp glance.

  ‘You don’t sound too happy about it.’

  ‘I’m not,’ Tremaine admitted. ‘I know it looks like the obvious answer, but it seems such a stupid thing for Marfield to have killed Latinam, the man he was depending on.’

  ‘Crooks are stupid,’ Colinet observed dryly. ‘Most of them, anyway.’

  Tremaine was still staring across the cliff, his thoughts plainly unresolved.

  ‘Did you discover anything about the will?’

  ‘You were right there,’ Colinet said. ‘There was a clause in it in which Summerfold wrote down what he thought about women and said that he wanted nobody who’d been foolish enough to get married to benefit from his estate. He certainly had a bee in his bonnet over it; his wife going off as she did seems to have sent him properly off his balance in that respect. He laid down that Latinam was to come into the money provided that he wasn’t married—as he understood was the case—and provided that he didn’t get married within two years of his becoming entitled to the legacy. If Latinam broke the conditions the money was to go to Summerfold’s nephew, the son of his late sister, Mary Summerfold. Bendall wasn’t actually mentioned by name. If he was married everything was to go to charity.’

  ‘So that’s what brought Bendall here.’ Tremaine gave up his unseeing stare over the cliff and turned to Colinet. ‘He may not have known definitely that Latinam was married to the woman he was passing off as his sister but he suspected something of the kind. It wasn’t just the desire to revenge himself on Latinam that was in his mind; there really was a chance of getting hold of his uncle’s fortune.’

  ‘But couldn’t a will like that be challenged as unreasonable?’ Exenley asked, frowning.

  ‘I dare say it could,’ the Chief Officer agreed. ‘I’m not competent to express a legal opinion on it, but the conditions sound drastic enough to have given Latinam grounds for disputing them, even if Bendall did manage to prove that he’d been married all along. In view of the other circumstances, though, Latinam couldn’t have felt very sure of himself. Bendall must have given him a bad time.’

  ‘Where does Mrs. Paston come into it?’ Exenley said. ‘She didn’t stand to benefit in any case. It looks as though Bendall was prepared to go shares with her although he didn’t need to do so. Surely that’s a point in his favour?’

  ‘Another point in his favour,’ Tremaine observed, ‘is that when he came to know Ruth Latinam he tried not to hurt her. He knows that she and Ivan Holt are in love and he’s been keeping quiet about the marriage to avoid throwing suspicion on Holt.’

  ‘He’s been keeping quiet about several things,’ Colinet remarked significantly.

  ‘What about Mrs. Burres?’ Tremaine said, changing the subject a shade too obviously. ‘Any reaction there?’

  ‘You don’t get much reaction from a piece of granite,’ Colinet said. ‘She sits there knitting like the figure of doom. But let’s go inside. The light’s fading and you’re making things sound too complicated. I hate complications!’

  They went into the hotel and walked through into the lounge. All the others were there, sitting about the room in the increasing shadows, apart from each other, not speaking, and yet linked by an atmosphere of tension that was frighteningly palpable.

  There was a stir of movement as Colinet’s massive form loomed in the doorway. Suspicion, fear, hostility—they were all there in the glances that met them as they entered.

  Tremaine looked around. At Mrs. Burres, shapeless, incalculable, the knitting in her lap. At the major, his appearance gaunt and haggard in this light, clearing his throat with nervous uncertainty.

  At Geoffrey Bendall, nothing cynical in his attitude now, his features sharply outlined, his head thrust forward. At Nicola Paston, more composed than any of the others, her fair hair set against the windows leading to the terrace behind her.

  At Ruth Latinam, pale, nervously twisting a handkerchief in her lap. She did not meet his eyes. Not by a single word had she referred to that incident on the cliff, but that she was well aware of what had happened was plain enough.

  And he looked at Ivan Holt, sullen and removed, an unspoken aggression in his face.

  Colinet was right. This was the brooding before the storm.

  There were other players in the drama who were not yet present. There was Marfield. There was Valerie Creed, and there was her husband, Alan Creed, who had revealed once already the desperation in his mind.

  Ivan Holt thrust himself suddenly from his chair.

  ‘Think I’ll go out,’ he said shortly, addressing no one and everyone.

  Ruth Latinam’s eyes widened. They were dark with terror.

  ‘No, Ivan. No, don’t go out—please!’

  Holt disregarded her.

  ‘Can’t stay here,’ he muttered. ‘Atmosphere’s stifling.’

  He pushed open the windows to the terrace and they watched him pass out of sight along the building. Ruth Latinam made a movement as though to follow him and then relaxed again. There was despair in her attitude. She was, Tremaine thought, waiting for something.

  The light was going quickly now. Colinet had said nothing since he had entered the room; he, too, seemed to be waiting.

  It was not necessary for him to wait for long.

  24

  THE PATTERN LOOKS NEAT AND TIDY

  FROM SOMEWHERE IN the building there came a sudden cry and the crash of glass. It was followed by the sound of a piece of furniture thudding to the ground.

  As though a tableau which had been becoming impossible to maintain had dissolved at the peremptory wave of a producer’s hand, the room filled with movement. Tremaine thought that his own reaction had been swift but he was behind Ruth Latinam as she rushed in panic through the door.<
br />
  The room Hedley Latinam had used as an office was in disorder. The desk had been overturned and the window had been broken. Ivan Holt lay crumpled in one corner.

  Ruth Latinam went to her knees at his side. She heard Tremaine behind her and twisted to face him, wildness in her eyes.

  ‘He isn’t dead?’ she cried, clutching at him. ‘Say he isn’t dead!’

  He looked down at the man on the floor.

  ‘No,’ he said reassuringly, ‘he’s a long way from dead. Just knocked out for a moment or two, that’s all.’

  Holt opened his eyes. He saw Ruth Latinam and instinctively he reached up to her. And then he saw the big form of Colinet and the guarded look settled in his face.

  ‘What was it?’ the Chief Officer said. ‘What happened?’

  Holt’s lips tightened.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I didn’t get a chance to see.’

  ‘It was Marfield,’ Ruth Latinam said desperately. ‘I know it was Marfield. Tell them, Ivan, tell them!’

  The expression on Holt’s face changed; they saw the bewilderment there as he stared up at her.

  ‘He swore he’d kill you if I said anything,’ she went on. ‘That’s why I couldn’t go to the police. I knew he meant it. I was afraid for you, darling—so very afraid!’

  Holt struggled up. His arm went around her.

  ‘I caught him in here,’ he said crisply to Colinet. ‘He knocked me down and made a bolt for it. He can’t have got far.’

  The Chief Officer was already turning towards the doorway, his bulk thrusting a way through the people blocking it and the passage beyond. Tremaine was aware of an upsurge of relief. It had been fear for her lover and no sinister motive which had lain behind Ruth Latinam’s behaviour. She had known Marfield to be a man who might shrink from no crime and she had not dared to ignore his threats.

  He did not think that she had suspected the escaped convict of having killed her husband; her first reaction had been that it had been Holt who had been responsible for she had known that he suspected Latinam of menacing her in some way.