Checkmate to Murder: A Second World War Mystery

by E. C. R. Lorac

  Robert Cavenish made an impatient movement. “I’ve no patience with that sort of jargon, Delaunier. There’s nothing amusing about murder, and being at close quarters to a case, as we happened to be in this one, doesn’t excuse being flippant about it.”

  Delaunier’s dark eyebrows shot up. “You can only take pleasure in fictitious corpses, mon cher,” he replied, his lively dark eyes glancing towards Cavenish’s bookcase, “or do you read Michael Innes for his literary style and Dorothy Sayers as an admirer of her encyclopædic information? Come, surely you are being inconsistent? In this particular case, a very objectionable, mean old man was shot: he was very old, and his life was of no value to anybody, so far as can be judged. I regard the whole thing as a problem—a design, I might say. The fact that we were at close quarters only renders the interest more intense, to my way of thinking.”

  Mackellon put in a word here: “I don’t think that Cavenish bothers about the decease of Mr. Albert Folliner, any more than you or I do. What he dislikes is a police interrogation which involves his own friends.”

  Delaunier’s regard was quizzical. “His own friends,” he repeated softly. “Well, Cavenish might have rendered Miss Manaton a better service by persuading her to fall in with her brother’s way of thinking. It could have done nobody any harm. The only truth which matters is truth concerning the murder, and there Miss Manaton had no evidence to offer. Of what use for that admirable detective to waste his intelligence pondering over Rosanne’s inspection of the black-out? We could all have told him that it had no bearing on the facts.”

  Cavenish flushed and his habitually tranquil face hardened as he answered: “I said before—and I say it again—to tamper with the truth is to put yourself in the wrong; it is a fool’s game, quite apart from the ethical aspect. Besides, you forget that Miss Manaton herself would not consider suppressing the truth, either for her own benefit, or the convenience of other people.”

  Delaunier shrugged his shoulders, a smile twitching his mobile lips. “As you will, mon cher, as you will. The convenience of other people, you suggest. The convenience would have been for Miss Manaton alone—though it might have eased the anxiety of her brother and her friends. For myself, cela m’est bien egal.”

  Mackellon interposed here. “You spoke about the detective—Chief Inspector Macdonald—being intelligent. I agree with you there. Any man less like a fool I never met, or less likely to be fooled. I don’t think he is likely to make any glaring mistakes, but if he had once discovered that we were tampering with the evidence, he would have been disposed to disbelieve everything we told him.”

  Delaunier nodded. “Yes, yes. I see your point. Incidentally, have you seen Manaton to-day?”

  “Obviously not,” said Mackellon. “Cavenish and I have had our jobs to do. The only time we are free is in the evenings. Have you seen him?”

  “I have, and he was in a very vile temper. He had said that he wanted to go on with the Richelieu portrait, but when I arrived, ready to pose for his convenience, Bruce says that he does not feel like work. Rosanne was out, else she might have made him see sense. As for his portrait—it can go to the devil. I can’t be bothered to go running round after him if he chooses to be temperamental. Well, if I don’t see you again before the inquest, I take it we shall be called to give evidence?”

  “It depends entirely how far the police have got with their case,” said Cavenish. “It’s quite probable that the first sitting will be no more than a necessary formality. They will take evidence of identification and of the discovery of death, and then adjourn. None of us has any first-hand evidence to give on the two primary points. They will call Verraby, Neil Folliner, and Mrs. Tubbs—the latter being the last to see the old man alive. Of course we may be summoned to attend in case the Coroner decides to take all the evidence available. I gather that the inquest will be held to-morrow morning, so if we are wanted, we shall get notice to-night. Good-night, Delaunier. Good of you to have looked in.”

  “Not at all, not at all. Good-night, both of you. Mackellon, remember you have promised me another game some time. Good-night!”

  II

  After Delaunier had gone, there was silence between the two men, and at length Mackellon said:

  “Well, I gather that your previous irritation with that chap has not abated.”

  “It has not,” said Cavenish. “Maybe I’m being unreasonable. One has a tendency to judge people against a background. A man may be acceptable enough in a given set of circumstances, and quite unacceptable in others. Delaunier as a chess player, or as an actor, may be an interesting fellow. When he starts airing his views about the affair of last night, I admit that I don’t like him. It’s no use making an analogy of a detective story: the two experiences have nothing in common to my way of thinking. How do you feel about it?”

  “I’m interested, but in a more impersonal way than yourself,” said Mackellon. “What I should like to get at is the opinion and reactions of that C.I.D. fellow. Why did he came into the studio? What did he think of it all? Did he believe any of us, or did he think we were all telling a carefully concocted yarn? He gave me the impression of being unusually aware: not only listening to what was said, but studying the speaker with a cool objective judgment. You know we must have looked a damned funny lot to him. Had that occurred to you?”

  Cavenish moved uncomfortably in his chair. “Yes. It occurred to me all right, but I thought the Chief Inspector was an unusually intelligent fellow: he seemed to grasp the situation immediately, without either surprise or incredulity.”

  “Never batted an eyelid. True to his nationality. He’s a Highlander, or derived from them. Incidentally,” Mackellon paused here and knocked his pipe out, and started refilling it as he asked:

  “Just how much do you know about the Manatons?”

  Again there was a silence, and at length Cavenish answered:

  “Just about as much as you do—barring a few words Rosanne has let drop, which I shan’t repeat.”

  Mackellon looked at the fire as he smoked, and then he said: “You remember Delaunier asked us to his rooms one evening for a double game of chess. I played Delaunier, you played Manaton. One or two things have occurred to me since. We stayed and jawed round the fire after our games were finished. I thought Manaton was an intelligent fellow in many ways, but he had curious gaps in his information about current events.”

  “Yes,” said Cavenish dryly. “He had. I didn’t notice him much at the time. He’s a good chess player. That’s all I cared about—not so good as Delaunier, of course. That chap’s nearly in the front rank. Did it ever occur to you—as it occurred to me—that Delaunier and Manaton together might be going to propose playing for stakes? They didn’t, though. Then we went along to the studio one evening, and after I’d got to know Rosanne I gave up criticising her brother.”

  Cavenish spoke simply, and Mackellon nodded. “Quite. I wish you luck. I still do. I like Rosanne Manaton. I think she’s fundamentally straight, and she must have had the hell of a life with that brother of hers: she’s honestly devoted to him and she slaves for him, to keep him straight.”

  “Then you think he’s crooked?”

  “Not of necessity. He’s unstable, and he gets drunk very easily. Not drunk in a noisy tipsy way, but in a way which makes him reckless and absolutely irresponsible. Hasn’t he ever borrowed money from you? I thought so. That money would have gone to the nearest pub. He puts down neat whisky as long as his money lasts. I lent him money once, and Rosanne asked me not to do it again.” Mackellon got up and stretched his long limbs. “When Macdonald was talking to us in the studio, I had a feeling that he had grasped something of all that without being told a word of it.”

  “That’s an exaggeration, of course,” said Cavenish. “The Chief Inspector is a trained observer, and as such he would gather a lot that the average man would miss. As a matter of fact, I thought that Bruce Manaton
showed up unusually well when he was talking to Macdonald. He was reasonable and explicit, and courteous—a quality not always noticeable in him.”

  Mackellon laughed. “Meaning that he is habitually infernally rude. Well, if you don’t feel like a game, I’ll get off home. I’ve got some figures I want to check.”

  “Right.” Cavenish got up and stood fiddling with some spills on the mantelpiece. As Mackellon turned to the door, the older man said:

  “You haven’t said what you came to say, have you?”

  Mackellon stood still by the door. “No. I suppose I haven’t, actually—but perhaps it’s as well to leave some things unsaid. I admit that I wish we had never got to know Delaunier or the Manatons, but I don’t suppose you feel like that about it.”

  “No,” said Cavenish quietly. “I don’t.”

  III

  After Mackellon had gone, Cavenish took up his book again and tried to read, but found that he could not settle down to it. Having read the same page three times without taking in a word of the meaning, he put the book down and decided to go for a walk and try to get rid of the unaccustomed restlessness which possessed him.

  He put on his overcoat and went quietly out of the house. It was a black moonless night, and he stood at the front door until his eyes grew a little accustomed to the dark. As he stood, Cavenish felt a sudden sense of unease. He had only the vaguest notions about police procedure, and he wondered if he and Mackellon and Delaunier were all being “shadowed.” Were the police watching their movements, noting that the three of them had foregathered this evening for a consultation? Some motive of caution in Cavenish’s careful, sensible mind told him that he would be better advised to go indoors again, rather than roam the streets in the black-out. The thought irritated him and he stepped out, determined to walk off the malaise which possessed him.

  When he reached the main road he turned northwards, towards Hampstead. The air was clear to-night, and a sharp north wind met him: he could see the traffic lights at the road junctions ahead—Circus Road and Marlborough Place—the green lights shining beneath their hoods with startling vividness. There was very little traffic on the wide road, and still fewer pedestrians. Now that his eyes were accustomed to the gloom, Cavenish set out at a good pace, finding that the exercise lulled his sense of discomfort. When he reached Swiss Cottage, he hesitated at the junction of the roads, and then took the right-hand fork, leading to Fitzjohn’s Avenue and the Heath. As he began to mount the long hill, he admitted to himself that he knew where he was going. Common sense might bid him keep away, but something stronger than common sense was urging him in the direction of Hollyberry Hill.

  Cavenish, as Rosanne Manaton knew, was a poet at heart. Beneath the façade of organising ability and conscientious industry was a mind which played with the music of words, and as he walked his mind repeated the rhythm and melody of one of the most melodious of poets. Asked for his opinion of Swinburne, Cavenish would have said: “It’s all sound, just skilful sound, without any significant thought behind it,” but as he strode up the hill his mind took pleasure in the rhythm of “Atalanta.”

  “Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her,

  Fold our hands round her knees and sing;

  Oh that man’s heart were as fire and could spring to her,

  Fire, and the strength of the streams that spring.”

  His mind was too occupied with the verse to be analytical, and no errant sense of the ludicrous prompted him to laugh at the thought of a middle-aged, conscientious Home Office official striding up Fitzjohn’s Avenue in the black-out to the lilting music of Swinburne.

  Towards the top of the hill he turned off to the right and made his way through several small roads until he reached Hollyberry Hill and turned in at the gate of number 25 towards the studio. Even at the door he hesitated, and then, angry with his own hesitation, knocked at the studio door. It was opened by Bruce Manaton; heedless of the black-out regulations, he threw the unscreened door wide, so that Cavenish was confused by the sudden glare of light.

  “Damn you, what do you want? Where’s Rosanne?” demanded the painter. “Where is she, I ask you?”

  IV

  Cavenish pushed inside and closed the studio door. Facing him, at the far end, was the great white canvas with the drawing of the Cardinal. The canvas was streaked now with daubs of violent red, vermilion, cadmium scarlet, alizarin crimson and cobalt violet shadows. To Cavenish it looked quite mad—experiment or lunacy, he knew not which.

  “Where is she?” demanded Manaton again. He had donned his blue painter’s coat, and his palette was still in his left hand, bedaubed with thick shining splodges of red.

  “I don’t know where she is, Manaton. How should I know? I haven’t seen Rosanne since I left here last night. You’d better tell me what you mean.”

  “She went out, just after tea, to do the shopping, she said. That man was here—Macdonald. He’s searched the place, ransacked everything. Rosanne went out just before he started: she knew he was going to search—and she’s not come back. God! I shall go mad if I don’t know where she is.”

  “Didn’t she say where she was going, or when she’d be in?”

  “No, I tell you. She just went.”

  “If you’re really worried about her, why not tell the police? They’ll know if there’s been an accident.”

  Manaton flung his palette down and laughed, a furious sound with no mirth in it.

  “Police!” he stormed. “Are you being funny? For all I know the police have taken her. It’s just the sort of fool-thing they would do. I tell you I can’t tell the police. I don’t know where she is, or what she’s doing or why…” He stamped his feet furiously, and shouted, “As for you, damn and blast you, if it hadn’t been for you this needn’t have happened. You and your puritanical conscience, you poor codfish—you knew you were safe enough. If you’d told Rosanne to say she was in here, with us, this would never have happened. It’s your fault.”

  Cavenish stood aghast, not knowing what to reply.

  “You’re wrong,” he protested. “I know you’re wrong. You wanted to shield Rosanne with lies—”

  “Yes, damn you! I wanted to shield her, with lies or with anything else. Don’t I know what she’s done for me? Is there anything I wouldn’t do for her? You make me sick, you and your prating ways. Get out, I say! Get out!”

  “I tell you I won’t get out! I want to know where Rosanne is…”

  His words were interrupted by Manaton’s storm of laughter.

  “Where she is? She’s not here, I tell you that! Didn’t Macdonald go over the place inch by inch? Ask him! She’s not here. Go and ask Delaunier! Perhaps he knows.”

  Robert Cavenish felt helpless: helpless and sick at heart. To stay here was useless. He went outside and began to tramp up and down the dark roadway, thinking, arguing with himself, helpless and irresolute.

  Chapter Twelve

  I

  Reeves, having been given the job of finding the ex-tenant of the Manatons’ studio, decided to call on Miss Stanton of Sedgemoor Avenue as a start. Reeves wanted to find out what Mr. Randall Stort looked like, and he guessed that Miss Stanton was an observant person.

  He rang the bell at the very superior front door of Ithaca, belabouring his brains in the endeavour to remember where he had heard the name Ithaca before. “One of those yarns… argonauts or something…” was as far as he had progressed when the front door was opened to him by “the holy terror” in person. She was dressed in a severe tailor-made suit, her white hair brushed back hard against her head, and she now wore horn-rimmed glasses, which made her look still more awe-inspiring. Reeves spoke with becoming humility.

  “Good-afternoon, madam. Could you spare me a few minutes to answer some questions? I hope it is not inconvenient.”

  “Not at all. I am never too busy to do my duty,” boomed Miss Stanton.
“Come in. I was just about to have tea. The tea is already made, so I can offer you a cup during your interrogation.”

  “Very kind of you, ma’am,” said Reeves.

  He rubbed his shoes vigorously on the doormat before risking a step on the mirror-like surface of the hall floor; he hoped he would not slip on it. For some reason, Miss Stanton had succeeded in making a very competent young detective inspector feel like a small boy again.

  “Come in. Sit down.”

  Miss Stanton knew her own mind clearly. She led the way into an old-fashioned dining-room whose solid mahogany shone with polish. A lace-edged cloth covered one end of the long table and tea was laid upon it for one person. Miss Stanton fetched another cup and saucer and plate from the sideboard, sat down at the head of the table and seized the silver teapot, saying:

  “Well, young man, what do you want to know? Help yourself to toast.”

  “Thank you,” said Reeves, continuing immediately, in a subdued version of the voice in which he gave evidence in court. “I want to know what Mr. Randall Stort looked like—the previous tenant of the studio abutting on your garden.”

  Miss Stanton said “Ha!” in a deep, victorious tone of voice, as she passed Reeves a cup of very hot, very strong tea, to which she had added sugar. (The tea was exactly as Reeves liked it, and the toast was excellent.)

  “I’m delighted to know that someone is expending a little intelligence over this deplorable crime,” said Miss Stanton. “Mr. Randall Stort is a tall man, inclined to obesity, with an unhealthy, pale face, lank black hair which falls in a lock over his forehead like the arch-fiend’s own, and dark eyes. I should say that he is about fifty years of age. He has a birthmark on his neck below his right ear, and he is left-handed. I can tell you all these details because I called upon him in his studio to tell him what I thought of his behaviour in trespassing on my property. Believe me, I did not mince my words. I have the satisfaction of knowing that one woman, at least, has told him exactly what she thought of him.”