The Dying of the Light

by Michael Dibdin

  ‘But I don’t suspect her! I’ve never suspected her for a single moment!’

  Rosemary sighed.

  ‘I believe you,’ she said in a kindly tone. ‘But to those who know you less well, like Mavis Hargreaves, such naivety would have seemed almost impossible to credit from someone in your position. She would therefore have concluded that you were in fact playing a very deep game, pretending to suspect the Andersons in order to put the rest of us off our guard, and sought to cover her tracks by inventing the episode of Miss Davis and the cocoa, whose authorship she now attributes to me.’

  She gave him a wry smile.

  ‘And you must admit, Inspector, it worked a treat!’

  Jarvis looked longingly at the police car. His colleague lay spread-eagled on the bonnet, soaking up the sunshine, his foot wagging in time to some inaudible music.

  ‘How did you know Tomkins was from the island?’ he asked.

  ‘My mother was from the New Forest, but I was raised in Ryde,’ Rosemary explained. The children at school used to call me a foreigner, because I was born on the mainland. I can still hear their mocking voices. The accent is unmistakable.’

  ‘Ryde,’ mused Jarvis.

  He smiled. ‘Remember the Beatles? Okay, I used to think, so she’s got a ticket to Ryde. Why should that mean she doesn’t care?’

  ‘It’s not just the islanders,’ said Rosemary. ‘People in general can be very heartless.’

  Jarvis gazed into the distance, lost in thought.

  ‘As for the beetles,’ Rosemary went on, ‘I certainly do remember them. But I’m glad to say that we’re no longer troubled by them since the council fumigated the rooms.’

  ‘That was when I first started to take you seriously,’ Jarvis muttered almost inaudibly. ‘If she’s on to Tomkins, I thought, she can’t be as far gone as this Anderson is trying to make out.’

  He considered the grass at his feet for some time.

  ‘Just the same,’ he resumed, ‘I don’t think much of this Hargreaves angle. Apart from anything else, she doesn’t have a motive.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure, Inspector. Shortly before her death, Dorothy asked to see a solicitor with a view to changing her will. The Andersons believed that the alteration was in their favour, but I think that very unlikely. Hilary Bryant made the mistake of thinking that the prospect of the inheritance might soften the Andersons’ hearts, but they were if anything even more beastly to her afterwards. With that example before her, I can’t imagine that Dorothy would have allowed herself to be swayed, particularly since she knew it was likely she would have to go into hospital anyway. On the other hand, what more likely, under those circumstances, that she should have wished to settle her affairs, and that she should have decided that her close friend Mavis Hargreaves was a more suitable beneficiary than her apparently ungrateful and neglectful relatives?’

  A dreamy smile spread across Jarvis’s face.

  ‘Of course!’ he breathed. ‘Why didn’t I see it before? The solution’s been staring me in the face all along!’

  He looked keenly at Rosemary.

  ‘We were quite excited about that aspect of the case for a few days there, but we rather lost interest when it transpired that Mrs Davenport had in fact instructed the solicitor to make over her estate to Miss Rosemary Travis.’

  Rosemary sprang to her feet.

  ‘No!’ she broke out hoarsely. ‘It’s not true!’

  Jarvis gave a smile of triumph.

  ‘You’ve played a very clever game, Miss Travis, and you nearly got away with it. Yes, Mrs Hargreaves’s tale about the cocoa was indeed intended to deceive us, but she didn’t dream it up. Mavis Hargreaves isn’t a detective story addict any more than she was Dorothy Davenport’s close friend. You, on the other hand, are both!’

  He thrust an accusing finger at her.

  ‘Who had a better opportunity to poison the morphine syrup than the person who went to Mrs Davenport’s room to fetch it just a few hours before her death?

  The only fingerprints found on the bottle, apart from those of the deceased, were yours, Miss Travis! Your sleeping tablets were used to adulterate the cocoa, and you admit spending a considerable time alone with the victim after everyone else had left and the lights had been turned off. Your room is directly opposite that of Mr Purvey, whose door is always open. He assumed that the woman he saw taking his syringe was Miss Davis, because of the smell of alcohol, but it could equally well have been the person who had just entered Anderson’s office and removed a quantity of blue curagao!’

  He stepped forward and gripped Rosemary’s arm.

  ‘I’m going to have to ask you to accompany me to headquarters, Miss Travis, and it’s my duty to inform you that anything you say will be taken down and may be used in evidence against you.’

  CHAPTER 12

  ‘Don’t be so ridiculous!’ said Rosemary, snatching her arm free.

  ‘What do you mean, ridiculous?’ Jarvis retorted. ‘You had the motive, the means and the opportunity. What more do you need?’

  Rosemary snorted incredulously.

  ‘Dorothy Davenport was my friend!’ she exclaimed. ‘I was closer to her than I’ve ever been to anyone in my life. I could no more have killed her than I could kill my own child.’

  ‘Don’t start dragging psychology into it!’ snapped Jarvis. ‘You told me all I needed to do was observe the rules, spot the clues and make the appropriate deductions. Well I’ve done that, Miss Travis, and they lead straight to you.’

  Rosemary smiled mischievously.

  ‘Ah, well as to that, you see, there’s one clue I haven’t told you about.’

  She took a folded piece of paper from her pocket and handed it to him. Jarvis opened out the page. MISS ROSEMARY TRAVIS was written in blue ballpoint on one side. He turned it over and read the lines of wavery writing on the other side.

  Rose my dear,

  This is not easy, particularly after everyone has been so kind. But it is the only way. They say laughter is what distinguishes us from the animals, but this does too, and just as clearly. They kill each other, but never themselves. Mr Darwin’s law is their cage, but we’re free to enjoy this last laugh at the universe’s expense.

  I can’t think of freedom without thinking of all those I am leaving behind, and especially you, Rose. What will become of you without me to fuss over and care for? I dread the idea of you ending up like the others, yet that’s what will happen if you stay here. You’re strong, Rose, but in the end they will grind you down.

  One possibility, if you are clever enough to take advantage of it, would be to make it look as though I were the victim in one of our whodunnits. The details I leave to you, dear Rose, who were always so much better at them than me, but I can at least provide the body. The investigation will reveal that death was due to an overdose of morphine syrup and some sleeping tablets which I took from your room. Just to be on the safe side, I also propose to drink the contents of those hideous miniatures which someone gave me for Christmas years and years ago and which I have always kept, for a reason which is only now dear to me.

  Don’t be afraid, Rose. I’m not.

  Dot.

  Jarvis folded the letter carefully.

  ‘For all I know, this could be another of your tricks.’

  ‘You can compare the handwriting with those letters of Dorothy’s which were never posted,’ Rosemary replied. ‘But you need have no fear, Inspector. Having achieved the aims laid down by Dorothy in her letter, I have broken my staff and drowned my book.’

  She slumped down on the garden seat again.

  ‘Is it true about the will?’

  ‘You mean to say she didn’t tell you?’ Jarvis demanded incredulously.

  Rosemary shook her head.

  ‘Of course not. Dorothy was much too considerate to have burdened the final days of our friendship with such an embarrassing revelation.’

  Jarvis held up the letter.

  ‘Assuming this is genuine,
’ he said heavily, ‘I can do you for conspiracy to pervert.’

  Rosemary gave a refined shrug.

  That’s up to you, Inspector. Personally speaking, I wouldn’t have thought that it would have made a very favourable impression. At all events, I take it that you are no longer proposing to “do” me for murder.’

  Jarvis stared blankly at her for a moment, then abruptly burst out laughing.

  ‘Don’t tell me you fell for it!’

  Rosemary flushed.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  Jarvis sat down on the seat and slapped Rosemary’s knee familiarly.

  ’You really believed I was going to arrest you, didn’t you?’

  ‘I must admit you sounded awfully convincing,’ she replied.

  Jarvis nodded.

  ‘So did you, Miss Travis, when you told me if I left without speaking to Mrs Hargreaves then you’d be the next to die. I didn’t believe you really were in danger, of course, but just a moment there I thought that you did. Well, now I’ve got my own back!’

  Rosemary looked him in the eye.

  ‘I meant exactly what I said, Inspector.’

  Jarvis waved Dorothy’s letter in her face.

  ‘You can’t have it both ways! You now admit you knew all along that Mrs Davenport hadn’t been murdered, so why on earth should you think you would be?’

  Rosemary shook her head.

  ‘You weren’t paying attention, Inspector. You heard what you wanted to hear, not the actual words that were spoken. That’s why people fail to guess the solution to detective stories, even though they’ve been given all the clues.’

  ‘You told me you would be the next to die,’ insisted Jarvis. “Those were your very words.’

  ‘And you assumed that by “die” I meant “be murdered”.’

  Jarvis narrowed his eyes.

  ‘You mean… You meant…’

  Rosemary nodded.

  ‘If it had come to that, yes. I couldn’t let Dorothy’s sacrifice go for nothing.’

  Jarvis looked at her.

  ‘I believe you would, too.’

  Rosemary smiled.

  ‘But fortunately for both of us,’ she said, ‘it didn’t come to that. Dot meant well, but she was always a bit vague when it came to working out the details of the plot. Left to my own devices, I’d have led you a merry old dance! As it was, of course, I had to improvise. There was no time to attempt anything really interesting.’

  Jarvis got out his notebook.

  ‘Right then, let’s have it from the beginning.’

  Rosemary groaned.

  ‘Must we, Inspector? I must confess that my heart always sinks at the prospect of the scene where All Is Explained.’

  There has to be one, though, doesn’t there?’

  Rosemary nodded resignedly.

  ‘Very well, I shall try and be as concise as possible.’

  Jarvis licked his pencil.

  ‘It was still early when I discovered Dorothy’s body,’ Rosemary began, ‘but I knew it would not be long before people were up and about, so I had to work quickly. First I went downstairs to the study and added some of that blue liqueur to the remnants of the morphine syrup.’

  ‘How did you know it was there?’ prompted Jarvis.

  ‘Miss Davis used to drink cocktails made with different-coloured liqueurs, including a blue one, arranged in layers. I don’t know how she managed to stop them all getting mixed up…’

  ‘Back of a spoon. One of Tomkins’s party tricks. They should get together, that pair. Talk about a marriage made in hell.’

  ‘I then washed out the miniature spirit bottles which Dorothy had drunk from and replaced them in their wooden case,’ Rosemary went on.

  ‘Why not just throw them away?’

  ‘Someone might have noticed if the set had been missing, but it was very unlikely that anyone would bother to check whether the bottles still had their original contents or not. After that I ground up some sleeping tablets and added the powder to the dregs of her cocoa. Finally, I crept into Mr Purvey’s room, removed one of his syringes and left part of the plastic wrapping on the floor near the head of Dorothy’s bed.’

  Jarvis whistled quietly.

  ‘With her still in it?’

  ‘I was acting as Dorothy’s executor, Inspector. She had given me my instructions. How could I not have carried them out to the best of my ability?’

  ‘Go on,’ said Jarvis above the sound of his scribbling pencil.

  ‘At length Dorothy’s absence was remarked and the alarm raised. My principal concern, of course, was to ensure that no one tampered with the items of evidence I had prepared. To that end I refused to leave Dorothy’s room until the police arrived. Miss Davis tried to remove me, but I made such a fuss that in the end she gave up and left me there. I took advantage of this to stage a brief conversational exchange for the benefit of Mr Channing next door. My voice is deep enough to do a passable imitation of Anderson, particularly when muffled by the wall. My purpose in all this was to provide clues for your officers to collect when they arrived. In the event, however, they made no attempt to speak to any of the residents, let alone Channing, and even failed to notice the medicine and the cocoa by Dorothy’s bed until I pointed them out.’

  She turned round, pointing to the other policeman, who was now prancing about on the gravel yelling, ‘Assume the position, motherfucker!’ at his shadow on the car.

  ‘Tell me, Inspector, why does your colleague try and conceal his myopia by wearing those ridiculous shaded glasses?’

  Jarvis shook his head.

  ‘Don’t ask,’ he sighed.

  ‘I only mention the matter because it’s so very dispiriting to have to bring the finer points of one’s work to people’s attention,’ Rosemary went on. ‘Even once I’d got him to notice the morphine bottle and the mug of cocoa, your colleague didn’t seem capable of grasping their significance until I explained it to him. As for the wrapping from the syringe, I dropped a brooch right beside it and got him to pick it up for me to save my bad back and he still didn’t see it. In the end I retrieved it myself and replaced it before you arrived. I knew that once the morphine and the cocoa had been analysed someone was bound to come to question me about the allegations I’d made. I just hoped it would be someone of a rather higher calibre-as happily proved to be the case.’

  She smiled graciously at Jarvis.

  ‘As soon as we met, Inspector, I sensed that you were someone who would respond to a challenge. I therefore proceeded by indirection, continually insisting that the murderer must be one of the residents and refusing to consider the Andersons as possible suspects, despite the evidence against them which I kept bringing to your notice. I also deliberately avoided any mention of the syringe, even though the prescribed dose of morphine clearly wouldn’t have been enough to kill Dorothy. I thought you would enjoy thinking that you’d outwitted me there.’

  Jarvis had stopped making notes. He opened his mouth to say something, then shook his head.

  ‘Once you had gone upstairs to see Channing,’ Rosemary continued, ‘I had to find some way of distracting the Andersons’ attentions while you spoke to the others. I took a chance and approached Mrs Hargreaves, who had been unexpectedly kind to me the day before. She gamely agreed to create a diversion by breaking out and hiding in the grounds. Miss Davis assaulted her violently when she found her, and warned her of even more brutal reprisals if she said anything to you, but despite her origins I’m glad to say that Mavis proved to be an absolute brick. She produced the story I had taught her about the cocoa, and luckily you believed her.’

  Jarvis folded up his notebook and put it away in his pocket together with Dorothy’s letter.

  ’I did what?’ he inquired urbanely.

  Rosemary eyed him.

  ‘Well, you did, didn’t you?’

  Jarvis laughed.

  ‘My dear Miss Travis, you surely don’t think that a police officer of twenty years’ experience can be
deceived by such moonshine? This isn’t one of your detective stories where some old lady runs rings round Inspector Clod. This is real life.’

  Rosemary assumed a politely quizzical expression.

  ‘But you arrested them, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, on charges of cruelty and neglect arising from what I’d learned about conditions here at the Lodge,’ Jarvis returned.

  ‘You didn’t need to wait for Mavis’s testimony to do that!’

  ‘No, but once Anderson had overheard her trying to frame him and his sister, I had to act. What would have happened if I’d left her there? That pair would have beaten her within an inch of her life, wouldn’t they?’

  Rosemary nodded.

  ‘But if you knew all along that the whole thing was a hoax, why did you get so fearfully cross when Mavis refused to confirm her earlier testimony just now? For that matter, why come at all?’

  Jarvis smiled at her.

  ‘I came to see you,’ he said.

  ‘Me?’

  He nodded.

  ‘I just dropped by to see how you were getting on.’

  Rosemary looked flustered.

  ‘But you seemed so angry!’ she protested. ‘All that business about feeling like a clockwork toy.’

  Jarvis laughed.

  ‘You’re not the only one who can play a part, Miss Travis!’

  Rosemary fixed him with a cool stare.

  ‘Well, anyway, it comes to the same thing in the end.’

  She bit her lip.

  ‘Do you think it is the end, Inspector?’

  Jarvis rubbed his forehead.

  ‘Well, I don’t know. You’ve left me quite a little pile of loose ends to sort out, one way and another. But certainly you won’t be seeing Anderson or his sister again, if that’s what you mean.’

  Rosemary shook her head minimally.

  ‘I was thinking of Dorothy.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  Rosemary shook her head impatiently.

  ‘Never mind. I was talking to myself, really.’

  Jarvis blushed furiously.

  ‘You mean do I believe in an afterlife?’ he mumbled.

  Rosemary said nothing.

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ he went on. ‘I mean, I don’t not believe in it.’