The Sirens Sang of Murder

by Sarah Caudwell

  ‘Is there any possibility that he might have committed suicide?’

  ‘Oh no, Professor Tamar, not with Edward. Poor Edward, he may not have been popular with everyone, but he was always popular with himself.’

  ‘It could still have been an accident, however. Were it not for the previous death, you would suspect nothing more sinister.’

  ‘I suppose not,’ said Clementine. ‘But I don’t actually see how it could have happened. Edward was quite heavily built, and the railings would have come up to his waist. If he’d simply stumbled, they’d have stopped him going over the edge. If he’d been leaning over them, I suppose he might have overbalanced, but why on earth should he lean over, specially in the pitch dark? I just don’t see how it could have happened, unless . . .’ She shivered and looked towards the window, as though seeing in the distance beyond not the sunlit thoroughfares of the City but the remote and desolate clifftop, which played, as I now recalled, so prominent and sinister a role in the folklore of Sark.

  ‘Unless?’

  ‘Unless there was something there he was so afraid of that he climbed over the railings to escape it.’

  I experienced again a sensation of coldness. I was seized at that moment, for no reason rationally explicable, by a curious conviction that the death of Edward Malvoisin had nothing at all to do with such modern and sophisticated things as settlements and companies but with something altogether darker and more ancient.

  7

  Confidential as the interview had been, it would have been the height of pedantry to withhold its substance from those who were already familiar with the greater part of the story and on Cantrip’s return would undoubtedly learn the rest. At lunch in the Corkscrew I accordingly did not hesitate to give my companions an account of it.

  I observed as I approached the conclusion of my narrative that Selena was regarding me with a rather curious expression, such as in the genre of literature aspired to by Cantrip and Julia might have been described as quizzical. I invited her to explain its significance.

  ‘I was only thinking,’ said Selena, ‘that Clementine’s theory would require the person responsible for the two deaths to satisfy a number of rather unusual conditions. First, he or she must be one of the descendants of Sir Walter Palgrave, or so closely connected with one of them as to have an interest in their financial advancement. Secondly, he or she must also know a great deal about the Daffodil Settlement – not only that it exists, but enough about how it’s run to foresee the problems that would be caused by the death of Oliver Grynne. That suggests someone, doesn’t it, who has worked in one of the offices of the trust company or its professional advisers?’

  ‘Moreover,’ said Ragwort, ‘it would have to be someone who could persuade Edward Malvoisin to go for a walk along the cliffs late on a dark and windy night. From what one has heard of his character, that surely suggests a young woman. A personable young woman, no doubt, but at the same time physically capable of pushing the unfortunate man over the cliff – a young woman, one might imagine, with a measure of training in some form of unarmed combat.’

  ‘So if Clementine’s theory were right,’ said Selena, ‘which I don’t for a moment say it is, then she herself would be the obvious suspect. One would have to assume that by asking for your assistance she was trying to make use of you in some devious kind of double bluff. We would not wish you, Hilary, to find yourself in a position of any embarrassment.’

  I pointed out that the capacity for rational thought was not confined, as Selena and Ragwort evidently believed, to the members of Lincoln’s Inn, and that the possibility they mentioned had not escaped me. A little further reflection, however, had satisfied me that it could be excluded.

  ‘I suppose you will agree,’ I said, ‘that Cantrip’s account of the events of Monday evening may be accepted as truthful?’

  ‘I fear that it must,’ said Ragwort sadly.

  ‘Very well then. Cantrip left the bar of the hotel at about a quarter past ten on Monday evening together with Clementine and the Contessa, and Edward Malvoisin was then alive and well. From then on, apart from the brief interval required to change into night attire, Clementine and Cantrip remained in each other’s company until the moment when the drunken handyman came galloping into the garden – that is to say, until after the accident which blocked the entrance to the Coupee. We have no way of knowing whether Edward Malvoisin’s death occurred before or after the accident, but in either case Clementine can have had no hand in it. If it was before, then it was while she was with Cantrip. If after, then at a place where it was physically impossible for her to have been at that time – unless you imagine, I suppose, that she could have scrambled down the cliffs and reached it by boat.’

  ‘No,’ said Selena, ‘I don’t suggest that. I’ve done some sailing in the Channel Islands, and there’s nowhere on Little Sark to land a boat. And the currents are some of the most dangerous in the world – it would be suicidal to try to swim across.’ She sipped her wine, evidently still doubting the soundness of the conclusion. ‘I wonder if Clementine’s fiancé really is still in Hong Kong.’

  As it happened I was able to reassure her on this point. Clementine had telephoned her fiancé on the previous evening and had found him in his office. No means of transport, however jet-propelled, could have achieved his presence at that time in Hong Kong if he had been in Sark on Monday night. It was true, of course, that my source of information was Clementine herself, but she would hardly have deceived me on a matter so easily verified.

  During this discussion Julia had been lost in thought – or so at least I supposed, since I could see nothing in the composition of her prawn salad to cause her to sit gazing at it with such bemused perplexity. When she roused herself from her reverie it was to invite me to attend a seminar on international tax planning which she was to address on the following morning; she believed that the chairman, in view of my academic standing, would think it proper to waive the attendance fee.

  ‘My dear Julia,’ I said kindly, ‘I am sure that it will be a most interesting and instructive occasion. I fear, however, that there is little hope of my acquiring an instant expertise in so recondite an area.’

  ‘I was not proposing,’ said Julia, ‘that you should attempt to do so. I have been provided with a list of those expected to attend, and it includes Gideon Darkside. I thought you might welcome an opportunity to meet him.’

  ‘From all I have heard of him,’ I said, ‘that seems most improbable. You mean, I take it, that you think I ought to meet him. Have you any reason to think that he knows anything about the descendants of Sir Walter Palgrave?’

  ‘None at all,’ said Julia. ‘But your enquiry, as I understand it, is not merely genealogical – you are hoping to discover who, if anyone, is responsible for the alarmingly high mortality rate among the advisers to the Daffodil Settlement. It would be rather premature, don’t you think, to exempt from suspicion all those who do not happen to be descended from Sir Walter Palgrave? You haven’t forgotten, I suppose, that Oliver Grynne’s death occurred at a most convenient moment from the point of view of Gideon Darkside.’

  We were all at least agreed that Cantrip could be in no danger – his acquaintance with the Daffodil Settlement was plainly too recent and too slight to present a threat. We must nonetheless, I fancy, have begun to feel a faint stirring of uneasiness about him. In the hope of now finding him safely at his desk, we rose from lunch rather earlier than usual and walked back to 62 New Square with uncustomary briskness.

  On ascending the bare stone staircase to the first floor, we were encouraged to think these hopes well founded, for the door to the room occupied by Cantrip and Ragwort was standing slightly ajar.

  ‘Oh, he must be back,’ said Ragwort. ‘I left the door shut when I went to lunch.’ In his eagerness to greet his friend’s return, he entered the room with perhaps uncircumspect haste.

  It was the opinion of the philosopher Parmenides that change is impossible: the state of a
ffairs which exists at any given moment must be identical with that which existed at the immediately preceding moment, there being ex hypothesi no intervening moment in which any alteration could take place. What now occurred was a striking demonstration that this view is in practice mistaken. There existed at one moment a serene and elegant Ragwort, immaculate in pinstripes – above all, a perfectly dry Ragwort, his person free from any drop of extraneous moisture; at the next succeeding moment, with no intermediate process of development, there existed an entirely different Ragwort, with water cascading in abundance from every stitch and seam and an orange plastic bucket over his head.

  From the interior of the room came a triumphant cry of ‘Gotcher’, seeming at first to confirm that Cantrip had returned.

  We soon perceived, however, that the only occupant was one who should, to judge by appearances, have reached the years of restraint – a well-preserved septuagenarian, one would have guessed, probably of military antecedents, with neatly trimmed white hair and moustache and the clear suntanned complexion which ought to be the reward of healthy living and an easy conscience. This reassuring first impression was contradicted only by a certain black demonic brightness, which we could not fail to recognize, in the eyes beneath the snow-white eyebrows. It appeared that Cantrip’s Uncle Hereward had arrived in London.

  It was perhaps fortunate, though it seemed at the time regrettable, that Ragwort was for some minutes unable to remove the bucket from his head. This was due, as we afterwards discovered, to its having once contained some kind of glutinous substance, the adhesive properties of which were revived by contact with water. Though it is inconceivable that any words of a blasphemous or indecorous nature would in any circumstances pass Ragwort’s chaste and beautiful lips, yet it is possible that in the first few moments of outrage he expressed himself with greater frankness than would have been seemly towards a man so much his senior. In the circumstances I have mentioned, however, his words were inaudible.

  His feelings cannot have been soothed, I suppose, by the fact that Colonel Cantrip, plainly still under the impression that it was his nephew who stood dripping and indignant in the doorway – one young Chancery junior with a plastic bucket over his head is not easily distinguished from another – continued to dance gleefully round him with whoops and cries of triumph.

  When at last apprised of his error, the old soldier apologized with every proper sign of penitence. He had been subjected, it seemed, to overwhelming temptation. Sitting waiting quietly for his nephew, he had happened to observe that the ledge over the door was of a kind peculiarly suitable for balancing a bucket of water; upon visiting the cloakroom a few minutes later, he had chanced to find there just such a bucket as he had had in mind.

  ‘And you naturally felt,’ said Ragwort, ‘that the door and the bucket were in some manner predestined for each other?’

  ‘That’s it,’ said the Colonel, impressed by Ragwort’s ready grasp of the position. ‘Thought I’d give young Michael a bit of a surprise, you see – liven him up a bit. Never thought of it being anyone else who came in. I say, lucky it was only you, isn’t it, not one of the top brass?’

  ‘That is indeed,’ said Ragwort, ‘one of the happiest aspects of the whole episode. If you will be good enough to excuse me, sir, I shall now go and see if I can find any clothes which drip rather less water on the carpet. Though, of course, another pleasing aspect of the matter is that I can drip almost any amount of water on the carpet without making it significantly wetter.’

  Detecting perhaps that Ragwort’s manner towards him was courteous rather than cordial, Colonel Cantrip observed his departure with what seemed to be relief. ‘Bit peeved with me, do you think? Well, he’s got a point, I suppose. Never thought of it being anyone but young Michael coming through that door – knew this was his room, you see, didn’t realize he shared it with anyone. Where’s the young blighter got to?’

  It was beginning to be an interesting question.

  In obedience to my promise to Clementine, I spent the afternoon at St Catherine’s House, searching the registers of marriage for entries relating to the daughters of Sir Walter Palgrave.

  I approached my task in optimistic mood, thinking that the rarity of the name would make it a relatively easy one. Halfway through the afternoon, however, my spirits were somewhat dashed by the discovery that one of the ladies in question had inconsiderately allied herself in marriage to a man by the name of Smith. The prospect of attempting to identify the offspring of their union among the births registered in the subsequent three decades made me almost regret the quixotic impulse which had moved me to accept Clementine’s proposal. Moreover, I could not but reflect that if my whole investigation were to be conducted in St Catherine’s House, barely five minutes walk away from Middle Temple Lane, the payment of my expenses would do little to enhance the attractiveness of the arrangement.

  I began to wonder whether my approach to the task entrusted to me had not been unduly literal. While Clementine’s ostensible object in retaining my services was to trace the existing members of the Palgrave family, her real purpose, as I well knew, was to discover the truth concerning the deaths of Oliver Grynne and Edward Malvoisin. Could I, if I neglected the latter, properly claim credit, and indeed payment, for having pursued the former? It would be contemptible.

  By now there might well be in existence as many as a hundred descendants of the late Sir Walter Palgrave. Even if I were eventually able, by my present methods, to identify them all, it would almost certainly be too late to investigate their whereabouts at the time of the two deaths. Nor could I disregard the possibility, already suggested by Julia, that if these deaths were not accidental, they had nonetheless been brought about for some other motive than that which Clementine supposed. A fund so substantial that a hundred thousand pounds or so could be abstracted from it almost unnoticed might offer enticing opportunities to those responsible for its administration – if any of these happened to have been taken, the threat of exposure might seem a more than adequate reason for murder.

  By the time I returned to the Corkscrew that evening I had resolved on an entirely different approach to the matter. I had been at fault, I now saw, in indulging the natural preference of the Scholar for quiet, solitary research among the dusty documents of a bygone era. My attention should be concentrated not on a shadowy and hypothetical class of suspects of whom I knew nothing, but on those persons whom I already knew to exist and to be connected with the Daffodil Settlement. I must not be deterred by the possibility that this might oblige me to travel to the Channel Islands, Monaco, or even, if necessary, the Cayman Islands.

  Selena and Ragwort, sitting alone together at one of the round oak tables, shook their heads when I asked if there were any news of Cantrip.

  ‘And now we know why not,’ said Ragwort, suppressing a sneeze. ‘He must have known perfectly well that his uncle was arriving sometime this week, and he’s hoping to stay away until the coast’s clear, leaving the rest of us to cope with the old ruffian. I suggest that when he comes back we sue him for enormous damages.’

  ‘Do you think,’ said Selena, ‘that we have any cause of action?’

  ‘Certainly – there is quite clearly a liability under the rule in Rylands v. Fletcher. Having in one’s possession a dangerous and mischievous thing, namely a lunatic uncle, and allowing him to escape and do damage.’ Ragwort failed to suppress a sneeze.

  I enquired why Julia was absent from our company.

  ‘She should be joining us shortly,’ said Selena, ‘but she’s gone home to change – she’s taking the Colonel to the theatre this evening. He seemed rather disappointed, you see, that he wouldn’t be spending the evening with Cantrip – he’d been thinking, he said, that they might do a show and then have a bite of supper at one of the night spots. But of course, he said, it wouldn’t be any fun on his own, so he’d just go back to his club and have an early night. He gave a rather convincing impression of being a lonely old soldier whose friends and c
ontemporaries have long since fallen on distant battlefields.’

  ‘Whereupon Julia,’ said Ragwort, ‘who is in some ways a very impressionable girl and can be reduced to tears by two stanzas of Siegfried Sassoon, proposed herself as his companion. At this the old scoundrel brightened up amazingly.’

  ‘Well,’ said Selena, ‘at least she’s taking him to something she actually wants to see – she’s managed to get tickets for All’s Well That Ends Well, with Roland Devereux in the lead. I’m not sure that it’s exactly what the Colonel means by “a show”, but then I’m not sure anything is that’s currently appearing on the London stage.’

  Roland Devereux, I remembered, was a young Shakespearean actor who had recently become known to a wider audience by appearing in a television series. Recalling the now celebrated perfection of his profile, I was not surprised to learn that Julia was among his admirers.

  ‘I fear,’ said Ragwort, ‘that there is rather more to it than that. There was once an acquaintance between them – of which it is perhaps not proper to speak further.’

  ‘Roland Devereux,’ said Selena, ‘unless I’m forgetting someone, was the last slender young man but three to be the object of Julia’s hopeless and undying passion. I don’t count you, of course, Ragwort, since the attachment is of a continuing nature. And I’m not counting Patrick Ardmore, who isn’t a slender young man and has no business behaving as if he were. She spent a great deal of time admiring Roland Devereux’s profile, with many allusions to Praxiteles and Michelangelo and so forth, and her admiration did not go wholly unrewarded. It was all quite a long time ago, but she still takes a sentimental interest in his progress.’

  It was at this point that Julia herself arrived. The rather exuberant décolletage which she had judged suitable for the evening’s entertainment, though it attracted favourable comment from two members of the Building Bar at the next table, was regarded by Ragwort with some disapproval.