Landed Gently csg-4

by Alan Hunter

  Gently slackened his flying stride till the nobleman was abreast of him. ‘You didn’t hear it — and I shouldn’t have done, eh?’

  ‘I fail to understand you.’

  ‘That’s something else we have in common.’

  ‘Your imagination, Mr Gently-’

  ‘Is something that doesn’t topple busts!’

  Savagely he threw open doors along the corridors, revealing nothing but dark, empty and cobwebbed rooms. On the other hand, the door at the top of the stairway to the main floor swung mockingly ajar

  …

  Somerhayes, like a marble-eyed spectre, stood watching him in his fruitless activity.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The interrogation room in the north-east wing was empty; Sir Daynes and Inspector Dyson, Gently was told, had jointly carried off the offending Welshman to durance vile.

  ‘Did they get anything fresh from him?’ enquired Gently perfunctorily.

  ‘Oh yes, sir,’ replied his constable informant. ‘He admitted that he was in the wartime Special — knew all about the handling of truncheons, he did. The chief constable wants to give him one to see how he would go about it, only our inspector don’t much like it, so the CC scrubs round it.’

  ‘Just as well for Inspector Dyson.’ Gently permitted himself a grin. ‘And that was all — after two hours’ interrogation?’

  ‘Well, they trips him up a bit, sir — you know how it is. And there was something about him killing a sheepdog with a bottle when he was a nipper — dog jumps out at him, and he fetches it a clout with a pop-bottle.’

  Gently clicked his tongue. ‘I wouldn’t have said that was habit-forming. There was no charge made, was there, other than for assault and battery?’

  ‘No, sir. Not yet. But between you and me, sir, it’s working up to it.’

  Gently stood brooding in the empty room with its settling fire and suggestive disposition of chairs and table. With the light switched off, it looked doubly depressing. The corners were full of gloom which the north-facing window failed to dispel. What effect did it have on the character of its inhabitant, this mighty museum of perished vanity? How did one, tethered here, adjust oneself to the rushing current of the world outside? ‘A hymn of the eighteenth sounding sweet in the ears of all centuries succeeding’ — that was the quotation the author of the guidebook had dug up out of somewhere. But it was a hymn with forgotten music, a hymn of which only the antique words remained. And, in the meantime, a godless generation had camped at the gates of antiquity, unleashing its Jepsons and Brasses to sound chaos through the halls of pomp and circumstance. Would not the last lonely chorister be baffled by the universal shout? Would he not waver and lose the thread, and lose himself, and lose his balance…?

  Unconsciously Gently shook his head at the dying fire. But you couldn’t put history in the witness-box, either for the defence or the prosecution! A number of the cruder facts and a presumption of responsibility… that was the substance of justice in a court of law. But what were the facts of this case, and how far dare one to presume? What blindness and double-blindness awaited the trier-on of justice?

  ‘You are not returning to the Manor House for lunch, sir?’

  Thomas had stolen noiselessly in with a fresh chute of coal.

  ‘I’d forgotten about it, Thomas… Any prospect of a bite here?’

  ‘We keep an excellent table, sir, in the south-east wing. In the usual way his lordship patronizes it, but today he is being served privately with his cousin.’

  ‘Thanks for the tip, Thomas… His lordship and I have temporarily exhausted our small-talk.’

  Without much appetite, Gently made the diagonal journey through the forsaken building, and by trial and error discovered the south-east dining room. He was apparently late, since Percy Peacock and his wife, with Norah, the dark girl, were just leaving as he entered, and Brass was the solitary remaining occupant. The artist sat gloomily cracking nuts and drinking port. He made a weary gesture as Gently took a seat opposite him.

  ‘God, what a bloody Christmas! It’s giving me the willies. I wish I was in Kensington, and a thousand miles away!’

  Gently made a face and poured himself an aperitif from a bottle that stood on the table. A face looked through the service-door, and a moment later a plate of julienne soup was placed before him.

  ‘Last year I made an excuse to get out of this dump — there was only Anne and Norah here then. This year there was more of a crowd, so I was brain-sick enough to give it a whirl. Never again, Chief Inspector Gently, never again in this damned round of existence!’

  Brass cracked a nut so viciously that a fragment flew half across the room.

  ‘Of course, the circumstances are exceptional…’

  ‘I wonder,’ retorted Brass. ‘Yes, I really and truly wonder! You say it’s exceptional, because we’ve got an unexplained corpse on our hands. Well, I think his lordship would make like he had an unexplained corpse on any blasted Christmas, and in that strong belief I’m going to Kensington next year.’

  He finished his port, and poured another. His fiery beard stuck out discontentedly from a stubborn chin. This was Brass having the blues, his aspect seemed to say, and woe-betide the mere mortal who came between the man and his grouch.

  ‘You’ve seen his lordship?’ hazarded Gently.

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen the damned fellow. Came moaning into the workshop, looking as though he’d seen the ghosts of his benighted ancestors. I tell you, the man’s up the pole. It’s inbreeding, or some bloody thing. Once I used to be charitable and think he was just a harmless eccentric, but the more I see of his lordship, the more I’m convinced that he’s crackers — and so was I, when he talked me into this infernal set-up!’

  Another nut distributed its shell impartially about the south-east dining room.

  ‘Do you know what he had the crust to ask me?’

  ‘No?’ Gently rested his spoon.

  ‘He asked me if I’d toppled that bust over last night — serious you know, just like a blasted judge! I mean, what do you make of a man who goes round asking things like that? If I wanted to have a spree I wouldn’t stop short at one bloody bust.’

  There was a fresh-air nature about Brass that, in spite of his ill-humour, was a welcome relief in that house of shadows. Here, at least, was a boisterous and aggressive sanity, a mind determined to stand square on its shameless egoism. If you bounced a question on Brass, it would come back clean without a wherefore…

  ‘Seriously, though… do you think his lordship is quite himself?’

  ‘Seriously, my son.’ Brass screwed his large features up over a refractory Brazil. ‘You know what I’ve said — and I’m not going back on it. But I’ve been thinking around, as I pottered over my dye-vats, and there’s one thing that struck me which I think ought to go on the record. Somerhayes never told you about his will, I suppose?’

  ‘His will?’ Gently sat up.

  ‘Yes — I can see he didn’t get round to it. And that convinces a suspicious mind like mine that there might be a reason for it. Wait a minute, old man, till they’ve brought in your pheasant.’

  The serving maid appeared with the dish Brass predicted, and Gently contained himself in some impatience while she performed her various ministrations. Brass watched her with unconcealed interest. She was quite a pretty serving maid…

  ‘As you were saying before we were interrupted?’

  Brass nodded and tossed off his second glass of port.

  ‘It’s not so much the will — I imagine that’s pretty straightforward. It’s what hangs to it that makes the thing suggestive. You’ve got a fair inkling by now, have you, of where the sixth baron and myself stand with each other?’

  ‘He appears to admire you very highly.’

  ‘Admires me — huh!’ Brass gave an expressive snatch of his head. ‘Gently, my son, that cock-eyed page of Debrett worships the bloody ground I walk on — like a damned heathen! He’s got a fix about artists. They do the one thi
ng no Feverell has ever been able to do — make something. And so here I am, the tin god of the last of the Feverells, the sacred calf cherished and worshipped in the high places of Merely — with Somerhayes, of course, my self-appointed priest. Do you ask me now how far round the fellow’s gone?’

  ‘He’s got a complex character…’

  ‘Complex is hardly the word, child. If you’d lived beside him for eighteen months… but hell an’-all, we won’t go into that! Just get the picture of Brass the God and Somerhayes the Priest, that’s all you really need to understand. Now Brass Divine all gods excelling has got one bad flaw in his make-up. He’s a little too easy about the come-and-go of cash. Priest Somerhayes isn’t so hot in that direction himself, but by the grace of inferior gods he’s got a cousin who is — and there, my maestro, the plot begins to thicken. Our High Priest can’t content himself with his cousin being a mere lay-sister. Her holy duty is too plain before her. She must take the veil, she must espouse the Church, and by way of endowing the sacred institution, she is to bring with her all the tin, shekels, tenements and messuages yet possessed by the house of Feverell — which is the substance and contents of the will I mentioned to you. Think that one over, sonny, and see where it gets you.’

  Gently gazed at his untouched pheasant as though it were something rare and miraculous in the field of ornithology.

  ‘You mean she’s the heiress to the estate, contingent on her marrying you?’

  ‘Not contingent, old fellow — at least, not as far as I know. She gets it anyway. It’s the bribe to make me sit up and take notice.’

  ‘And Mrs Page — what are her views?’

  ‘Hell! It’s not as crude as that. Janice hasn’t been told — it’s up to Leslie to make the running.’

  Gently nodded to the pheasant. ‘And of course, you haven’t made any…’

  ‘Don’t be so blasted cunning!’ retorted Brass, grinning at him. ‘Do you think I’m made of stone, to sit behaving with a trollop like that in the offing? I made a pass at her for her own sake, long before I got the wink from Somerhayes. But as I told Sir Daynes, she’s man-proof, and it’ll be a year or two yet before there’s anything doing there.’

  ‘Aren’t you forgetting Earle?’

  ‘No, I’m not forgetting Earle. That kid was certainly storming the ramparts, but you can take it from me he wasn’t getting anywhere, and never would have done.’

  Gently at last made a motion with his knife and fork, but he seemed to be eating without much consciousness of the act. Brass sat watching him with an air of devilment. He cracked a nut to give the Central Office man time to take in the significance of what he had heard.

  ‘You were sure about Earle… but his lordship wasn’t. Is that what occurred to you when you were thinking it over?’

  Brass shrugged massively. ‘Without putting too fine a point on it, as someone said.’

  ‘In fact he might have taken Earle seriously?’

  ‘He might. I don’t say he did. But it seemed an idea worth toying with.’

  ‘Mr Brass.’ Gently looked the artist in the eye. ‘Either you think his lordship capable of letting his obsession get the better of him or you don’t… Which is it going to be?’

  Brass laughed gleefully and levered his great body away from the table.

  ‘This is where I leave you!’ he said, tossing the nut-crackers on the table. ‘Enjoy your pheasant, try some apple foam — and don’t be afraid of that bottle of port. God Brass is going to the workshop. You’ll find him there if you want to talk weaving.’

  And he strode out of the dining room, still laughing loudly to himself. But there wasn’t any smile on Gently’s wooden countenance.

  Sir Daynes returned, looking, if not cheery, as though he felt he had coped ably with the iniquity of things. Gently met him in the hall, flanked by Dyson and a constable, and the good baronet expressed his apology for having failed to take Gently back to lunch.

  ‘Said you’d gone up on the roof — wouldn’t be having a game, would they?’

  Gently grinned faintly. ‘No — I was up there all right.’

  ‘Damned odd place to be, but I suppose you know your own business best. Anyway, we popped Johnson in the cooler, and he’ll be remanded tomorrow. Just going to run over the servants to see if we can pick up anything fresh.’

  ‘Naturally, you won’t have charged him…?’

  ‘Not yet, man. Probably will do this evening.’

  ‘Before you do, there’s a couple of small matters worth considering.’

  ‘Eh?’ barked Sir Daynes, apprehension suddenly gripping him.

  Gently hunched himself owlishly in the depths of his ulster. ‘Firstly, Mrs Page has made a statement which supports Johnson’s account of his movements… Secondly, his lordship has made one that practically exonerates Johnson.’

  Sir Daynes’s blue eyes opened wider and wider, and by way of support, Dyson’s jumped open too.

  ‘You said… what?’ gaped the baronet in desperate incredulity.

  Gently repeated his thunderbolt without any enthusiasm.

  ‘But good God, man — we’ve got Johnson — got a case — this is preposterous! What do these people think they’re doing, making irresponsible statements?’

  Gently shrugged from his depths. ‘There’s still a loophole… but it’s a small one. On the whole, I think we’d better discuss the matter before we go any further.’

  With a lengthened face Sir Daynes led the party back to the milder atmosphere of the interrogation room, and the face was still longer when he had heard what Gently had to tell him.

  ‘Good heavens!’ he kept interjecting. ‘Good heavens! It’s unbelievable! Can’t call you a liar — good heavens, what a business!’

  At the end of the relation he stood rigidly with his face towards the fire. His hands, clasped behind his back, were the only barometer of his bewildered anguish. A long minute passed before he turned. Then he shot a fierce, bitter look at Dyson.

  ‘Well!’ he rapped. ‘Go on — you’re in charge of this blasted case.’

  Dyson wilted a little and sucked his lip under his teeth. ‘Well, sir, it seems to me…’

  ‘Go on, blast you — what are you stopping for?’

  ‘It seems to me sir… on the present evidence… that there’s a strong case against his lordship.’

  Sir Daynes took a deep breath and bit his lips until he must have hurt himself. The age showed in his rough-hewn features more cruelly than Gently had ever seen it. And slowly, he bowed his head.

  ‘Yes,’ he muttered through his teeth. ‘Yes, Dyson — quite right, Dyson! There’s a case against him — a strong case — a case a blundering old fool like me ought to have seen all along! Been pointers enough, Christ knows. Been men around me who could see it as clean as a pikestaff. Only I’m an obstinate old fool. I didn’t want to see it, and I wouldn’t. I knew Somerhayes’s father… thought I knew Somerhayes. Time, high time, for an old dotard to retire!’

  ‘Johnson might have come back…’ murmured Gently apologetically, but the baronet shook his head peremptorily and put a hand on the Central Office man’s shoulder.

  ‘No good flogging that horse any more… I can see what I can see! We’re going to hang a Feverell, Gently, and no Johnson will save his skin. Mad, he was, mad, and perhaps he’ll get away with it. But into the dock he’s going, like the most beggarly killer before him. It doesn’t need a United States colonel to show me the way of duty.’

  Gently fumbled around in his pockets. Somewhere there should be a forgotten peppermint cream! An abashed Dyson, shaken by his chief’s distress, made officious arrangements of the gear on the table.

  ‘Get Mrs Page in, Dyson.’

  The baronet came out of his momentary stupor.

  ‘We’ll have to have her statement first — needn’t go into details. Don’t suppose the feller’ll run away until we’re ready for him.’

  A constable made a move towards the door, but Gently stopped him with a gestu
re. ‘If you don’t mind… I’d rather you didn’t call Mrs Page for the moment.’

  ‘What?’ demanded the baronet. ‘Why? Why not?’

  ‘It’s a difficult question… All this case is a bit involved. There are some psychological oddities about it that don’t quite square, not to mention some of the hard, irreducible facts…’

  Sir Daynes didn’t jump down his throat, as he would have done of yore. He was relearning his respect for the apparently vague and unofficial ways of Gently. Also, there might be some excuse for not immediately pursuing that thorny path of duty…

  ‘Well?’ he prompted, with moderated severity.

  ‘I’m not sure… I’m not happy about it. I’d like to talk to Mrs Page myself before you have her in here. And Somerhayes too… I can’t quite pin that fellow down. We’ve had two bouts already, and each time he’s slipped through my fingers. I’ve got the impression that it’s going to be the best out of three.’

  ‘You mean you think he’ll confess?’

  ‘I don’t know, and that’s the truth.’

  ‘Then what are you after?’

  ‘I’m not sure of that either.’

  ‘Damn you, Gently!’ exploded Sir Daynes, with a flash of his old fire. ‘Why do you want to hang it out, man — why not put us out of our misery?’

  Gently shrugged into his ulster and brought out his last, fluff-engrained peppermint cream.

  ‘It’s a personal matter,’ he said. ‘It has been all along.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Dorothy, Mrs Page’s snuffling personal maid, re-admitted Gently into the dainty little northwest drawing room. Her mistress was dressing, she told him, she would inform her that the inspector wanted to see her. Left alone, Gently prowled about the room in the habitual way of detectives the world over. He wasn’t looking for anything… but anything that might be looked for he wanted to see. In the present instance there was nothing, except indications of the character of the occupant. An exquisite, almost precious taste was exhibited by the furniture, the pictures and the ornaments. On the wall opposite the fireplace, quite by itself, hung a tapestry recognizable as one of Brass’s designs. It was worked in restrained tints of blue, green and yellow, and depicted a formalized group of two nymphs being chased by a faun, the golden-white flesh colours among the big, arbutus-shaped leaves giving the piece a dreamy, ideal character. The books in the case were a small collection of current reading-matter. They suggested a fondness for the more romantic productions of current literature. On a low stand or plinth in a corner stood a piece of modern sculpture, a primitive torso in beech; it had no arms and no legs above the knee, but the vigorous trunk seemed to have a strange, independent life of its own. Gently was still examining it critically when the door opened and Mrs Page swept fragrantly into the room.