Tragedy at Ravensthorpe (A Clinton Driffield Mystery)

by J. J. Connington

  Michael apparently had no need to pause before replying.

  “No,” he said definitely, “I saw nobody of that sort. I suppose you mean Maurice. He certainly wasn’t in the cordon when it went into the spinney or when it came out on the terrace. I’m absolutely sure of my ground there. But of course he may have been one of the late-comers. Almost as soon as we got to the terrace we had to sprint off down to the lake side, you see; and he might quite well have been a bit slow in the chase and have reached the top only after we’d come down here.”

  “That’s all I wanted to know,” said Sir Clinton, with a finality which prevented any angling for further information.

  Michael evidently had no desire to outstay his welcome, for in a few minutes he rose to his feet.

  “I think I’ll go over to Ravensthorpe now,” he said. “I suppose you’re not going to leave here for a while?”

  The words recalled to Sir Clinton the fact that he had not yet congratulated Michael on his engagement. He hastened to repair the oversight.

  “I was looking for you at the dance last night,” he explained, after Michael had thanked him, “but before I got hold of you, this burglary business cropped up, and I’ve had hardly a minute to spare since then. By the way, if you’re going over to the house, you might tell Joan that I shall probably have to pay them a visit shortly, but I’ll ring up and let them know when I’m coming.”

  Michael nodded and turned away, skirting the lake-let on his way to Ravensthorpe. Sir Clinton sauntered over to the waterside and watched the dragging operations which were still going on. When he made his way back to the hillock again, Inspector Armadale followed him.

  “There’s another point that occurred to me, sir,” he explained. “I think you told me that Polegate was wearing a Harlequin’s costume last night?”

  “That’s correct,” Sir Clinton confirmed. “And what then?”

  “One difficulty I’ve had,” the Inspector went on, was to explain how the fellow in white got away from them all so neatly. I think I see now how it was done.”

  Sir Clinton made no effort to conceal his interest.

  “Yes, Inspector?”

  Armadale obviously took this as complimentary.

  “This is how I figure it out, sir. Polegate had a white jacket and Pierrot trousers on over his Harlequin costume. At the end of the chase he bolted into the spinney and out on to the terrace above here. That gave him a breathing-space. It took Mr Clifton a minute or two to organize his cordon; and during that time the thief was hidden from them by the trees.”

  “That’s obviously true,” Sir Clinton admitted. “If he did change his costume, it must have been at that moment.”

  “I expect he had a weight of some sort ready on the terrace,” the Inspector continued. “When he’d stripped off his jacket and trousers, he wrapped them round the weight and pitched them over into the pool. That would make the splash they all heard.”

  “And after that?”

  The Inspector was evidently delighted with his idea.

  “That leaves us with Polegate in Harlequin dress on the terrace, with a minute or two to spare before the cordon was ready to move forward into the spinney.”

  “Admitted.”

  “Do you remember the camouflaged ships in the War, Sir Clinton?”

  “I sailed in one, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Well, you know what they were like: all sorts of cock-eyed streaks and colours mixed up in a regular tangle to destroy their real outlines. And what’s a Harlequin’s costume? Isn’t it the very same thing?”

  Sir Clinton confirmed this with an historical allusion.

  “You’re quite correct, Inspector. As a matter of fact, the Harlequin’s dress was originally designed to represent Invisibility. Nobody except Columbine was supposed to be able to see Harlequin, you know.”

  Inspector Armadale hurried to his conclusion.

  “What was to hinder Polegate, during that breathing-space, getting back into the spinney? It was a moonlight night. You know what the spinney would be like under a full moon: it would be all dappled with spots of moonlight coming through the trees. And against a setting of that sort the Harlequin costume would be next door to invisible. He’d only have to stand still in some chequered spot and no one would detect him. They were all hunting for a man dressed in white. None of them noticed him. None of them saw him, I guess.”

  Much to the Inspector’s surprise, Sir Clinton shook his head.

  “I’d be prepared to bet pretty heavily that someone saw him,” he affirmed.

  The Inspector looked at his Chief for a moment, obviously taken aback.

  “You think someone saw him?”

  Then a flood of light from a fresh angle in his mind seemed to illuminate the question.

  “You mean he had a confederate in the cordon? Someone who let him through and kept it dark? I never thought of that! You had me beaten there, Sir Clinton. And of course, now I see it, that’s the simplest solution of the whole affair. If we can get a list of the people in the cordon, we’ll be able to pick out the confederate before long.”

  Sir Clinton damped his enthusiasm slightly.

  “It won’t be so easy to get that list, Inspector. Remember the confusion of the whole business: the hurry, the effect of moonlight, the masks, the costumes, and all the rest of it. You may be able to put a list together; but you’ll have some difficulty yourself in believing that you’ve tracked down every possible person who was in the line. And if you miss one . . .”

  “He may be the man, you mean? Well, there’s no harm in trying. I’ll turn a sergeant on to gather all the news he can get.”

  “It’ll be a good test of his capacity, then, even if nothing else comes out of it,” Sir Clinton certified, carelessly.

  Chapter Eight

  THE MURDER IN THE MUSEUM

  SIR CLINTON cut short the shrill ringing of his desk telephone by picking up the receiver.

  “The Chief Constable speaking,” he informed his inquirer.

  Michael Clifton’s voice sounded over the wire.

  “Can you come up to Ravensthorpe at once, Sir Clinton, or send Inspector Armadale? There’s a bad business here. Mr Foss has been murdered. I’ve taken care that no one has got off the premises; and I’ve seen to it that his body has been left as it was found.”

  Sir Clinton glanced at his wrist-watch.

  “I’ll drive across as soon as possible. See that things are left undisturbed, please. And collect all the people who can give any evidence, so that we needn’t waste time hunting for them. Good-bye.”

  He shifted the switch of his telephone and spoke again.

  “Is Inspector Armadale here just now?” he asked the constable who answered his call. “Tell him I wish to see him in my room immediately.”

  While waiting for Armadale, Sir Clinton had a few moments in which to consider the information he had just received.

  “This looks like Part II of the Ravensthorpe affair,” he reflected. “Foss’s only connection with Ravensthorpe was the business of these Medusa Medallions. First one has the theft of the replicas; now comes the murder of this American agent. It’s highly improbable that two things like that could be completely independent.”

  His cogitation was interrupted by the entry of Armadale, and in a few words Sir Clinton gave him the fresh information which had come to hand.

  “We’ll go up there at once in my car, Inspector. Get the necessary things together, please. Don’t forget the big camera. We may need it. And the constable who does photography for us had better come along also.”

  Inspector Armadale wasted no time. In a very few minutes they were on the road. As he drove, Sir Clinton was silent; and Armadale’s attempt to extract further information from him was a complete failure.

  “You know as much as I do, Inspector,” the Chief Constable pointed out. “Let’s keep clear of any preconceived ideas until we see how the land lies up yonder.”

  When they reached Ravens
thorpe, they found Michael Clifton waiting for them at the door.

  “There are only two people who seem to know anything definite about things,” he replied to the Chief Constable’s first inquiry. “Joan’s one of them, but she really knows nothing to speak of. The other witness is Foss’s man—Marden’s his name. Will you have a look at the body first of all, and then see Joan and this fellow?”

  Sir Clinton nodded his acquiescence and the party followed Michael to the museum. Mold, the keeper, was again on guard at the door of the room, and Sir Clinton made a gesture of recognition as he passed in, followed by Armadale.

  A cursory glance showed Foss’s body lying in one of the bays formed by the show-cases round the wall. The Inspector went forward, knelt down, and held a pocket-mirror to the dead man’s lips.

  “Quite dead, sir,” he reported after a short time.

  “The police surgeon will be here shortly,” Sir Clinton intimated. “If he’s dead, we can postpone the examination of the body for a short time. Everything’s to be left as it is until we come back. Turn the constable on to photograph the body’s position in case we need it, though I don’t think we shall. Now where’s Miss Chacewater? We’d better get her version of the affair first. Then we can question the valet.”

  Without being acutely sensitive to atmosphere, Michael Clifton could not help noticing a fresh characteristic which had come into the Chief Constable’s manner. This was not the Sir Clinton with whom he was acquainted: the old friend of the Chacewater family, with his faintly whimsical outlook on things. Instead, Michael was now confronted by the head of the police in the district, engaged in a piece of official work and carrying it through in a methodical fashion, as though nothing mattered but the end in view.

  Followed by the two officials, Michael led the way to the room where Joan was waiting. The Chief Constable wasted no time in unnecessary talk. In fact, he plunged straight into business in a manner which suggested more than a touch of callousness. Only later on did Michael realize that in this, perhaps, Sir Clinton displayed more tact than was apparent at the moment. By his manner, he suggested that a murder was merely an event like any other—rather uncommon, perhaps, but not a thing which called for any particular excitement; and this almost indifferent attitude tended to relax Joan’s overstrained nerves.

  “You didn’t see the crime actually committed, of course?”

  Joan shook her head.

  “Shall I begin at the beginning?” she asked.

  Sir Clinton, by a gesture, invited her to sit down. He took a chair himself and pulled out a notebook. Inspector Armadale copied him in this. Michael remained standing near Joan’s chair, as though to lend her his moral support.

  After thinking for a moment or two, Joan began her story.

  “Some time after lunch, I was sitting on the terrace with Mr Foss. I forget what we were talking about—nothing of any importance. Soon after that, Maurice came out of the house and sat down. I was surprised to see him, for he’d arranged to play golf this afternoon. But he’d sprained his right wrist badly after lunch, it seems, and had ’phoned to put off his match. He sat nursing his wrist, and we began to speak of one thing and another. Then, I remember, Mr Foss somehow turned the talk on to some of the things we have. It was mostly about Japanese things that they spoke; and Mr Foss seemed chiefly interested in some of the weapons my father had collected. I remember they talked about a Sukesada sword we have and about the Muramasa short sword. Mr Foss said that he would like to see them some time. He thought that Mr Kessock would be interested to hear about them.”

  She broke off and seemed to be trying to remember the transitions of the conversation. Sir Clinton waited patiently; but at last she evidently found herself unable to recall any details of the next stage in the talk.

  “I can’t remember how it came up. It was just general talk about things in our collection and things Mr Foss had seen elsewhere, but finally they got on to the Medusa Medallions somehow. Mr Foss was telling Maurice how tantalizing it was to buy these things and pass them on to collectors when he’d like to keep them for himself if only he could afford it. Then it came out that he always took a rubbing of all the coins and medals he came across. I remember he made some little joke about his ‘poor man’s collection’ or something like that. I forget exactly how it came about, but either he asked Maurice to let him have another look at the Leonardo medallions or Maurice volunteered to let him take rubbings there and then. I can’t recall the exact way in which the suggestion was made. I wasn’t paying much attention at the time.”

  She looked up to see if Sir Clinton showed any sign of annoyance at incomplete information; but his face betrayed neither dissatisfaction nor approval. Inspector Armadale, though following the evidence keenly and making frequent notes, seemed to think that very little of her information was to the point.

  “Then,” Joan went on, “I remember Mr Foss getting up from his chair and saying: ‘If you’ll wait a moment, I’ll get the things.’ And he went away and left Maurice and me together. I said: ‘What’s he gone for?’ And Maurice said: ‘Some paper to take rubbings of the medallions and some stuff he uses for that, dubbin or something.’ In a few minutes, Mr Foss came back again with some sheets of paper and some black stuff in his hand. I was interested in seeing how he did his rubbing or whatever you call it, so I went with them to the museum.”

  “And then?” Sir Clinton prompted. As they were evidently coming near the moment of the murder in Joan’s narrative, it was clear that he wished to leave her no time to think of the crime itself.

  “We went into the museum. Since that night of the masked ball, Maurice has removed most of the smaller articles of value from the cases and put them into the safe; so in order to get the medallions he had to open the safe. It’s a combination lock, you know; and as I knew Maurice wouldn’t like us to be at his elbow while he was setting the combination, I took Mr Foss under my wing and led him over to where the Sukesada sword is hung on the wall. We looked at it for a few moments. I remember taking it out of its sheath to show the blade to Mr Foss. Then I heard Maurice slamming the door of the safe; and when we went into the bay where it is, Maurice was there with the Leonardo medallions in his hand.”

  “One moment,” Sir Clinton interrupted. “You said it was a combination lock on the safe. Do you happen to know the combination?”

  Joan shook her head.

  “Maurice is the only one who knows that. He never told it to any of us.”

  Sir Clinton invited her to continue.

  “Maurice handed Mr Foss one of the medallions and Mr Foss took it over to the big central case—the one with the flat top. Then he began to take a rubbing of the medallion with his paper and black stuff. He didn’t seem quite satisfied with his first attempt, so he had a second try at it. As we were watching him, he seemed to prick up his ears, and then he said: ‘There’s someone calling for you, Miss Chacewater.’ I couldn’t hear anything myself; but he explained that the voice was pretty far off. He had extra good hearing, I remember he said. He seemed very positive about it, so I went off to see what it was all about.”

  “Was that the last time you saw him?”

  “Yes,” said Joan, but she had obviously more to tell.

  “And then?”

  “As I was going away from the museum door, I met Mr Foss’s man, Marden. He had a small brown-paper parcel in his hand. He stopped me and asked me if I knew where Mr Foss was. Something about the parcel, I gathered, though I didn’t stop to listen to him. I told him Mr Foss was in the museum; and I went on to see if I could find who was calling. I searched about and came across Mr Clifton; but I didn’t hear anyone calling my name. Mr Foss must have been mistaken.”

  “And then?”

  Michael Clifton evidently thought it unnecessary that Joan should bear the whole burden of giving evidence. At this point he broke in.

  “Miss Chacewater and I were together in the winter-garden when I heard a shout of ‘Murder!’ I didn’t recognize the vo
ice at the time. I left Miss Chacewater where she was and made my way as quick as I could towards the voice. It came from the museum, so I hurried there. I found Foss on the floor with a dagger of some sort in his chest. He was gone, so far as I could see, before I came on the scene at all. The man Marden was in the room, tying up his hand. It was bleeding badly and he said he’d cut it on the glass of a case. I kept him under my eye till I could get a couple of keepers; and then I rang you up at the station.”

  “What had become of Mr Chacewater?” Sir Clinton asked, without showing that he attached more than a casual interest to the question.

  “That’s the puzzle,” Michael admitted. “I didn’t see him anywhere in the museum at the moment and I’ve been hunting for him everywhere since then: but he’s not turned up. He may have gone out into the grounds, of course, and left Foss alone in the museum; and possibly he had got out of earshot before the cry of ‘Murder!’ was raised by the valet. I don’t know.”

  Sir Clinton saw that the Inspector wished to ask a question, but he silenced him by a glance.

  “One more point, and we’re done, I think,” he said, turning to Joan. “Can you give me a rough idea of the time when the cry of ‘Murder!’ was raised? I mean, how long was it after you had left the museum yourself?”

  Joan thought for a few seconds.

  “It took me three or four minutes before I came across Mr Clifton, and we were together—how long would you say, Michael?—before we heard the shout?”

  “Not more than five minutes,” Michael suggested.

  “That’s about it,” Joan confirmed. “That would make it about eight or nine minutes, roughly, between the time I left the museum and the time we heard the shout.”

  “About that,” Michael agreed.

  Sir Clinton rose and closed his notebook.

  “That’s all you have to tell us? Everything that bears on the matter, so far as you know?”

  Joan paused for a moment or two before replying.

  “That’s all that I can remember,” she said at last, after an evident effort to recall any fresh details. “I can’t think of anything else that would be of use.”