Dancing with Death

by Ruth Wade

  “Don’t beef, Foxy,” said Daly gently.

  Fox glanced quickly around at the grinning students and lowered his voice to say:

  “Sorry. I’m upset. I shouldn’t be here at all, really. I’m not fit to have a meal in public to-day.”

  He made as if to leave the table but Daly restrained him by saying that his departure after that outburst would cause unpleasant comment and that they would all leave soon. He prevailed upon him to drink a glass of wine and presently Fox seemed to regain control of himself again, though he looked as glum as a funeral. Hamilton appeared rather disappointed, as if he had been hoping for some entertainment from Fox, but Daly was quite obviously relieved.

  On a signal from Mike, Daly said that they would not take coffee this evening. They passed out of the restaurant in a body. As soon as they were outside the door Mike said firmly:

  “Good night, Professor Fox, Professor Hamilton. I hope I shall see you both in the morning.”

  Then he put his hand firmly under Daly’s elbow and marched him away towards the stairs. Hamilton uttered a mild squeak, but recovered himself when Fox said a mechanical:

  “Good night.”

  “Good night,” said Hamilton also, and he sounded amused.

  In Daly’s room they paused only for long enough to take their overcoats, for Daly said that Milligan’s house was ten minutes’ walk away. As they walked down the dark avenue, Daly said, with a sidelong glance at Mike:

  “Still after Milligan?”

  “And Miss Milligan,” said Mike without expression.

  “Sodia? How can you possibly — ?”

  “She doesn’t exactly behave like a normal young girl,” said Mike. “She could make nitro-benzene — I think someone said she has some knowledge of chemistry?”

  “No one said it,” said Daly sharply. “But she has. Hamilton mentioned bio-chemistry. Sodia is a medical student. But why should a student poison Bradley?”

  “This student may have had good reason,” said Mike. “She was accustomed to protecting her father — an unnatural responsibility for a young woman in any event. Quite obviously she has more than her share of mother-instinct or she would never stomach that Tennyson-Smith.”

  “What a strange line of evidence for a Peeler to follow,” said Daly.

  “Wasn’t it from yourself I learned it?” Mike retorted. “Psychology, and motives, and seeing into people’s minds. It’s a very good line with people like these, and I’m most thankful to you for teaching it to me. Miss Milligan behaved last night like a murderer. To-day, she cleared off home after your lecture and has not been seen since.”

  “How do murderers behave?” asked Daly hotly. “She behaved like a girl who has something on her mind, I’ll admit, but you have no reason whatever for concluding that it was murder — ”

  He waited with pathetic eagerness for Mike to give reasons for his statement, but Mike would say nothing. It was not until they reached Milligan’s house that he spoke again:

  “Don’t give away any information, if you please. This is to look like a routine enquiry.”

  “She’ll never believe that,” said Daly. “Sodia has more brains in her little finger — ”

  “Now, don’t finish that sentence,” said Mike. He was seized with a momentary compassion for Daly. “And don’t come in, if you don’t want to. I have Sergeant MacCarthy waiting inside.”

  “Then you’re really going to arrest her?” Daly’s voice was thin with shock.

  “No, not necessarily. We don’t know. Dammit, man, how can we know? I think you should go back to the College. I’ll call in there on my way home.”

  “No, thank you. I’ll come in with you. And I promise to behave.”

  Milligan’s house was old red brick, faced with granite. In the pillars at either side of the front door specks of mica glittered in the light of the street lamp on the pavement. A bulky shadow moved behind the blind. An elderly woman in a white coat opened the door to Mike’s knock. Daly had walked behind Mike across the little gravel sweep and up the shallow flight of steps, as if to accentuate his determination to play a subordinate role. But he was incapable of keeping this up for long. Now he stepped forward before Mike had time to speak and said:

  “Mr. Kenny and I would like to see Miss Milligan, Mary.”

  “She’s inside in the drawing-room,” said Mary, “and there’s a colossal big man within with her. I’ll tell her you’re here.”

  She glanced curiously at Mike but made no comment. They waited in the hall while she went into the drawing-room. Mike looked around him with interest. It was a fine old house, but the paintwork was chipped and the dark red flowered wallpaper looked as if it dated from the days of Queen Anne. The glass over the marble chimney-piece was so spotted with age that when Mike looked at himself in it, a grey ghost looked back at him.

  The drawing-room, when they were brought into it a moment later, was much better. There was a good fire, and clean old covers on the chairs and sofa, faded almost white. There were open shelves of books everywhere. The carpet was Persian, made to last for a century.

  While Mary closed the door behind them, Mike said:

  “I hope I haven’t delayed you too long, Miss Milligan. I couldn’t have come earlier.”

  “It’s all right,” said Sodia carelessly. “The sergeant has been entertaining me with funny stories.”

  The sergeant blushed crimson. Mike stared at him, fascinated. Daly said sharply:

  “Stop that, Sodia!”

  He went across and closed the curtains. They were black, with a marvellously haphazard Chinese design of flowering trees and birds, in white.

  “Professor Badger was here just now,” said Sodia, who had not moved from her chair beside the fire. “He told me that you had been to interview my father in his lab.”

  “That is so,” said Mike quietly, concealing with an effort his annoyance. “Professor Badger will also have told you the reason.”

  “He says that the President was poisoned with nitro-benzene, and that you are convinced that my father did it.” Suddenly her voice was sharp. “If you have already arrested him, please tell me at once. Above all things, I hate having bad news broken gently.”

  Her hands became claws and she seemed to brace herself to receive a shock. Mike crossed deliberately to the other side of the fire. MacCarthy’s loud breathing in the silence reminded him of cows in a country lane at night. Then Daly sat down on the edge of the sofa, rather suddenly. Mike said:

  “No, we have not arrested your father. Why should we?”

  “Badger said — and now Professor Daly came with you — it looked as if — ”

  “Badger is an old gossip,” said Mike.

  “He said you know about my father’s habit of — taking away things,” she said. “Badger said that made you suspect my father of murder. Badger said that you think my father killed Bradley because of that silly trick that Bradley played on him last week.”

  “Just wait until I see Badger,” said Daly between gritted teeth. “Just wait.”

  “Badger said I was not to worry about the future,” said Sodia. “I could go and stay with himself and Mrs. Badger while my father was on trial.”

  “A fate worse than death,” murmured Daly. “What did you say?”

  “I thanked him,” said Sodia, “like a perfect lady.”

  Though she was reassured by Mike’s attitude, it was clear that she had been very much frightened. The reaction left her on the verge of hysteria, which showed momentarily in the flash of her green eyes. Mike said casually:

  “You make no great secret of the fact that Professor Milligan is a kleptomaniac.”

  “No. It’s much better not to. I don’t broadcast it, of course. He wouldn’t like that.”

  “Then you did not take the President’s threats seriously?”

  “No. Neither did my father.”

  “But it worried him, just the same?”

  “No. I said no. He and the President understood eac
h other. My father took no notice whatever.”

  “I see.” Mike achieved a disappointed sigh. “In that case, neither of you would have had any reason for wishing Bradley dead.”

  “Neither of us! You’re not thinking of me? I was quite friendly with the President. Why, I had dinner with him on the night before he died. You were there yourself, don’t you remember?”

  “I remember.” Mike watched her while she protested and observed that she was watching him just as closely. He said carefully: “We think it possible that he was poisoned at that dinner?”

  She started to say:

  “Nonsense!”

  Then suddenly she closed her mouth tight and covered it with her hand, as if to ensure that no further words would emerge from it. Mike spoke slowly and carefully.

  “The people at that dinner were not especially friendly to Bradley, as you have just realized. You seem to find it very shocking that I should consider you as a possible poisoner. I’ll tell you why I do, and then you can demolish all my reasons. MacCarthy, old man, please don’t snort,” he finished mildly.

  “I’m going out into the hall,” said MacCarthy shortly.

  “No offence?”

  “No, sir,” said MacCarthy, without expression.

  There was a pause while he went out of the room. Then Mike cocked an eye at Sodia and said:

  “That’s better, I think?” She nodded impatiently, and Mike went on: “When your father becomes excited his — little failing — becomes more pronounced. Professor Daly told me that a short while ago, in defence of your father. I, myself, saw him put ashtrays in his pockets in the President’s study this morning. He was excited then about Bradley’s death. Everyone was. I’m not using that in evidence against him. But I suggest that after Bradley had threatened to retire him Professor Milligan was furiously angry. I suggest that in his excitement he took something valuable, something that perhaps could not be returned. I can imagine how it would seem that the only solution was to poison Bradley before he could find out about it. You assured me a moment ago that your father took Bradley’s threats in good part. From my own observation I must disagree with you there. When I spoke to your father a little while ago about that interview with Bradley, the very recollection of it made him speechless with rage.”

  She started up, but Daly said:

  “I think he’s all right. He was singing when we left him.”

  She sank back into the armchair again. Mike went on quickly:

  “I have no doubt but that I could find out whether there is any truth in my theory, if I made enquiries in other places. But I never begin that way. I always find that it gives less pain to everyone if I go directly to the people concerned. It often saves time, too.” He made a little gesture with his hands. “Of course this method doesn’t always work.”

  “I think it will work this time,” she said quietly, after a pause.

  “I haven’t really been very secretive about it. I would have liked not to have it all come out, but it’s not worth while telling any more lies about it.”

  Neither Mike nor Daly moved. Daly noticed that for all her blasé air, she was still young enough to have hoped that she had shocked them. Presently she went on:

  “My father took a gold chalice out of Delaney’s museum. It was immediately after he had been with Bradley. He had gone up to the museum to find Delaney. I suppose he wanted someone to talk to. Delaney wasn’t there. The chalice was in the little room — it’s more like a cupboard, really — off the museum. Delaney had brought it in there to clean it, or make a drawing of it or something. My father would never have opened a glass case and taken it out, but when he looked in the little room to see if Delaney was there, he saw the chalice on the table. He just put it in his pocket. The top of it stuck right out. Only the foot fitted into his pocket. It happened that no one saw him on the way home. If Delaney had met him he would have just taken the chalice back.”

  “When did you find out about it?” Mike asked.

  “Not until next morning. It was lying on his dressing-table.”

  “Lying?”

  “Yes. The foot was broken off it.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I didn’t recognize it at first. I wrapped it up in tissue paper and put it away. I asked my father about it during the morning. He told me where it had come from. He always tells me at once. I couldn’t put it back broken, so I sent it to be mended.”

  “Where did you send it?”

  “I got a friend of mine to take it to a jeweller.” She named a large Grafton Street shop. Mike asked patiently:

  “What is your friend’s name?”

  “Tennyson-Smith. James. Not Jim.”

  “I’ll remember not to call him Jim,” said Mike. “But Bradley found out about it before you were able to get it back?”

  “Yes. The shop sent him a bill for eight pounds. Rather steep, I thought. But the President didn’t seem to mind that. He sent for me yesterday afternoon and was very nice about it all and insisted on giving me two five-pound notes to pay for the repairs. It was James’s fault, of course, for telling the jewellers that the chalice belonged to the College. It was then that the President asked us both to come to dinner last night. I didn’t want to, but he seemed very anxious that we should. After his kindness about the money — and everything — I thought it would be rude to refuse.

  I had a terrible time persuading James to come. He thought I should go alone. James,” Sodia explained carefully, “is not very bright.”

  Daly felt his heart leap at this comment. Mike was still asking questions.

  “Did your father say how the chalice had got broken?”

  “He said it just broke while he was taking it out of his pocket. It was very old — it belonged to Saint Malachy or someone.”

  “Where did the President get the money that he gave you to pay for the chalice?”

  “Out of his wallet, of course. Where else?”

  “Where, indeed?” Mike stood up. “I’m glad you told me all about it, Miss Milligan. Is your father a great friend of Professor Delaney?”

  “He’s very fond of Delaney. They have a great deal in common. They often dine together and Delaney comes down to the lab, sometimes for tea out of a beaker.”

  “Did Professor Delaney miss the chalice?”

  “He had just missed it when I went to tell him about it that morning. He was very worried at first, because he was afraid that the President would say he had been careless in leaving it about. You know he was afraid of the President, too. All the older people were.”

  “But you made it all right with Delaney?” Mike persisted.

  “Yes, of course. I only had to tell him what had happened to the chalice. He knew he would get it back.”

  “And he didn’t mind about its having been broken?”

  “No. He said it had been mended at that same place before.”

  She made no move as they went towards the door until Daly said softly:

  “Good night, Sodia.”

  Then she got up for the first time since they had entered the room and came out into the hall with them.

  The sergeant had disappeared, but rumbles of laughter came up the stairs from the direction of the kitchen, showing that he was working his wiles on the Milligan’s Mary.

  Daly opened the front door to find Hamilton standing on the steps outside. He had a large square parcel under his arm and a large grin on his round face. He moved briskly into the hall, laid down his parcel and hung up his coat as if he owned the house. Then he held the front door firmly while he ushered Mike and Daly outside. Sodia stood in the background, looking a little dazed. When the door had shut behind them, Daly said with a little sigh:

  “Hamilton will look after her. Why didn’t I think of chocolates?”

  “Too obvious,” said Mike. “I’m thinking of whiskey. The time has come for you to lead me to ‘The Cow’.”

  Chapter 12

  Long afterwards, Mike remembered how silent
Daly was as they walked to ‘The Cow.’ He had been glad of the silence, because it gave him time to think about the Milligans, and Hamilton, and Bradley’s strange generosity in paying for the repairs to the chalice. He wondered what could have been the reason for this. In a man to whom money was of the first importance, it could have been the impulse to pay in cash for good news. The good news might have been that now at last he had an excuse for getting rid of old Delaney. No one could blame him for retiring Delaney if it were known that he had become careless about the property of the College museum. Mike remembered, too, how Delaney had turned away when Bradley had come into the coffee-room on that first evening, as if Bradley had brought him to a sense of his own oddity, and he had hated Bradley for it. Professor Daly had told Mike about Delaney’s remark that he had one important task to finish before he would be ready to retire. What if Bradley had become an obstacle to this, and Delaney had poisoned him to ensure that he would be left in peace? Immediately after this thought came another, that the cause of Milligan’s uneasiness could be that he had manufactured nitro-benzene for his friend, Delaney. This was a remarkably trim-fitting theory. Milligan need not have known that the poison was for Bradley, since Delaney could have said that he wanted it for rats. But here Mike remembered with a slight shock that Professor Daly had told him how Delaney had described Bradley as a rat.

  At that moment Daly said bitterly:

  “Must you suspect my two oldest friends?”

  “Who?”

  “Delaney and Milligan, of course. That is what you are visibly churning over in your mind, isn’t it? You think that Delaney and Milligan, having both been threatened with the same fate as Bradley, got together to poison him. You think that Milligan manufactured nitro-benzene and Delaney administered it. You have a vision of the two of them trotting off to gaol together, haven’t you? Well, I can tell you at once that it is impossible.”