“Oh, dear.” Budgie quickly undid some of the Colonel’s buttons.
“Well,” Violet said, with perhaps a touch of self-satisfaction, “it seems that Mousey may have had some surprises in store for at least a couple of us.”
“Three, sweetie,” Cerise smiled. “She told me about your attempts to get her to bail out that sinking ship of your cosmetics company. She said it was one turkey that would never even make it to Thanksgiving.”
“That ungrateful—” Violet cut herself off and looked sharply at Cerise. “She never did! None of that’s true, and you know it. I don’t know why, but you’re making it up. First, Mousey’d never say that. And second, nothing’s wrong with my company. We’re just fine. Although I will say, sweetie, judging from the amount of stuff that you load on your little puss, if you’d switch to my brand we could show a record profit.”
“Well, Violet,” Sebastian hastily put in, before the two women began to hiss and claw at each other. “No matter what, you know it couldn’t have been me. After all, I never even met the poor girl.”
“Since when have you ever needed a reason to do anything?” Violet snapped angrily, then looked at her brother and shook her head. She shrugged helplessly and smiled an apology at him.
Sebastian smiled back. “It’s all right, Sis. We’re all on edge.”
“Yes, we certainly are,” Mr. Drupe said. “And yet Miss Cornichon—for motives I do not even begin to comprehend—seems to be trying her best to make things worse.”
“All I’ve been trying to do is to get us to face the facts, so maybe we can figure out what happened. Meanwhile you, Mr. Drupe—for reasons that I fail to understand—seem to want us to do just the opposite.”
“Perhaps,” Drupe went on as though Violet hadn’t spoken, “Miss Cornichon wants this terrible affair to seem more dramatic and mysterious than it actually is, so her own participation in it will be rendered all the more newsworthy. But possibly I do her an injustice.” Drupe smiled in a way that made his mouth resemble that of a snapping turtle. “My own motives are simple. I have tried to employ my many years of training in the law to look at things coolly and objectively, and to provide a calm, rational, and logical perspective on events. Nothing more. And in Miss Cornichon’s melodramatic—but wholly unsubstantiated—leap to the conclusion that one of us must be the perpetrator, she has overlooked the simple, undramatic, unspectacular fact that none of us could have done it, because we were all together in the lounge.”
“Not quite,” Cerise pointed out. “Mrs. Hook and Mr. Ching weren’t with us.”
Mrs. Hook snorted and glared ferociously at Cerise. Mr. Ching sat with his arms folded, impassive, apparently unhearing, apparently unaware of the look of naked hostility which the Colonel was sending in his direction.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean.…” Cerise hunched her shoulders and looked embarrassed and apologetic.
“No, you’re quite right,” Sebastian said. “And Mr. Drupe, I’m afraid it still looks as though Violet is right, too. You see, we were together when the body was found. And before that, we were together at dinner. But between those two times, there was more than an hour when we were not together. That fits with Violet’s estimate of the time of death.”
Drupe sniffed his opinion of what that was worth.
“I should also mention,” Sebastian continued with a pleasant smile, “that during that hour or so, I believe that each of us was completely alone for at least part of the time.”
“I say! You mean—”
“I mean that I doubt very much that we can, any of us, conclusively prove what we were doing for the entire time between leaving the dining room and coming back here. I don’t know about motive and method, Mr. Drupe, but it does look as though each of us had ample opportunity.”
From the reactions around the room—immediate vehement denials; then a pause; then a reluctant realization; and finally astonished silence—it seemed that Sebastian’s analysis was correct.
Violet nodded an acknowledgment to him, and turned to the lawyer. “What do you say now, Mr. Drupe?”
Somewhere in the house, a clock lugubriously—and, it seemed, interminably—sounded twelve.
Mr. Drupe took out his large gold pocket watch and confirmed the time with a terse nod. “I say that nothing more can be accomplished here, with each of you feeding the others’ hysteria. I am going to bed. I suggest that you all do likewise. We will all probably need to be as fresh as possible tomorrow.”
Even Violet couldn’t disagree with that, and there seemed to be some slight reduction of tension as everyone gratefully welcomed a conclusion to the long and terrible evening. However, the rustling preparatory to their departure was brought to an abrupt halt by the eerie, unsettling laughter of Cassandra Argus.
“Oh, yes! To bed! To bed!” She shrieked and giggled. “Remember the curse of the Mohawks. Misfortune to anyone who stays the night on Komondor. Now to bed! To bed!” She ran to the doorway, her scrawny arms flapping the billowy sleeves of her black robe. She stopped and turned back to the room, this time speaking almost inaudibly “She waits, you know. She waits. Pleasant dreams.”
“Charming.” Sebastian stared at the now-empty doorway. “I wonder if she sleeps hanging upside down?”
CHAPTER TEN
The next morning, if not sunny and bright, was at least much less grimly overcast. The fierce storm of the previous evening had eventually moved off, leaving the grey stone house darkly stained and streaked and most of the island a muddy quagmire.
Violet was late coming down to breakfast. After everyone retired, she had lain awake for several hours, going over events, trying to remember everything that had been said and done, seeing what possibilities she could come up with. It was close to dawn when she reached an interesting conclusion and finally fell asleep. By the time she came downstairs, only Sebastian was still in the dining room.
They smiled greetings at one another, and Violet went over to the long, dark oak sideboard upon which were arrayed numerous covered silver salvers containing scrambled eggs, a kedgeree, curries, smoked fish, bacon, sausage, ham, hash, porridge, potatoes, tomatoes, and congealed slices of last night’s joint. An impressive display marred only by the fact that everything looked more or less the same and none of it any good.
“Not exactly la nouvelle cuisine, is it?” Sebastian said as Violet cautiously raised, and quickly lowered, the cover of the kedgeree.
“I’ll say. Looks like these are leftovers from the morning the Light Brigade charged.”
“Maybe that’s why they charged. Anything was preferable to facing those scrambled eggs. You know, ‘Death Before Dysentery!’”
Violet came over and sat opposite Sebastian. She’d taken tea, some cold toast, and something that, by a process of elimination, she decided must be marmalade. “I can’t imagine where Mousey found this cook.”
“Probably preparing meals for political dissidents in one of Chiang Kai-shek’s prison camp, before Amnesty International got him fired.”
Violet took a sip of tea, made a face as she swallowed, and pushed the cup away. “You may be right. Ugh. Have you seen any of the others?”
“All of them. Except for that Argus creature. Fortunately. Probably out getting her broomstick serviced. That woman! Drives me right up the wall!”
“What are the rest doing?”
“I think the Colonel went out for a walk.”
“A walk? It must be knee deep in mud out there.”
“I know. He said something about the days he used to bivouac in rice paddies and went out. Derrick, I think, is in the library.”
“What for? He can’t read, can he?”
“I gather that old what’s-his-name—Augustus—put together quite a collection of documents concerning the early history of this region. I guess that’s what he’s interested in. Didn’t he say he’d been a history student?”
“And here I thought he never read anything longer than a designer label.”
&n
bsp; “Gee, Sis, I had the idea you were kind of interested in him.”
“You’re joking! That macho mannequin?”
“Be fair. Beneath that shallow exterior, there’s—”
“What?” Violet challenged, eyes flashing.
Sebastian shrugged. “I don’t know. As yet unplumbed depths of shallowness?”
Violet smiled and relaxed. “And the others?”
“Budgie said she was going to work on her comforter. And I don’t know about the rest.”
“What about Drupe?”
“Don’t know. He came in and went out, and didn’t say a word. He looked kind of grey. Not much appetite. Though, under the circumstances—” Sebastian waved at the sideboard “—that’s understandable. But he appeared to have had a bad night.”
“Really?” Violet looked up from the toast crumbs she’d been shoving around.
“Yes. But he’s about the only one who looked less than chipper. I must say, considering that the girl was a friend or relative or employer of everyone here, the shock of her death has worn off remarkably quickly. I mean, little Mousey-whatever’s removal hasn’t exactly left an unfillable gap in anyone’s life.”
“Not exactly, no. I’m afraid most people saw poor Mousey just as someone who could be manoeuvred or used for their own purposes or convenience, and of no interest or importance beyond that.”
“Including you?”
Violet looked up from the tablecloth, shrugged, then looked back down. “I may have been guilty of that, from time to time. But—dammit!—the girl seemed to demand it. Everything about her little washed-out presence said, ‘Use me; misuse me; abuse me.’ It’s as if she existed only to be taken advantage of.”
“A born victim?”
“If there is such a thing, then that’s what Rosa Sill was.”
“Well, she certainly realized her ultimate destiny.”
“Didn’t she, though?” Violet nodded thoughtfully. “And just when it seemed the worm might be turning. Poor little kid.… But you said Drupe looked unwell?”
“Yes. Probably just dyspepsia—he seems the type for it. Or maybe he was worried about old Argus’s curse.”
“Maybe,” Violet said, still pushing breadcrumbs with her finger.
Sebastian noticed she was making a bull’s-eye design. After watching her for another couple of minutes, he asked what she planned to do.
“I think,” Violet said slowly, “that we should act as though we’re going to be on this island for a while yet. As indeed we might be.”
“What do you mean?”
Violet lifted her head and looked steadily at her brother. “What did you think of my idea last night?”
“That it’s one of us? I don’t know. It’s kind of creepy to sit around, and look at nine people, and think that one of them’s a killer. Hard to accept that. On the other hand, an invisible intruder seems even harder to accept. So I don’t know. I guess I agree. Sort of. Why?”
“What you said last night—that you’re the only one who didn’t know Mousey—was right, of course. And, as you pointed out, that means you’re in the clear. You’re the only one who I know didn’t do it, and that’s important.”
“Golly, Sis, are you asking me to help you investigate?” Sebastian started to act very excited. “Me? Assist the Society-Girl Detective?”
“Give it a rest, Sebastian, would you? I’m serious. Are you interested?”
Sebastian looked into a pair of eyes identical to his own and smiled. “That’s probably the most amusing proposition I’m likely to receive around here. Sure. Do you have any ideas?”
“One or two that I want to check out before I say anything. Meanwhile, why don’t you go around and chat people up. You know, get them to talk about themselves and their relations with Mousey. Get at any gossip they might have heard about the other people here. You’re pretty good at digging seamy bits of information out of people.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Why? It wasn’t meant as one.”
“Oh, ta. You know, you’re really a pleasure to work with, Violet.”
“The hell with that. If we pull it off, it’ll be pleasurable enough.”
“You think we can?”
“We might. If we have to stay here long enough. And with a little luck. Yes, I think I may be able to deliver the killer to the police.”
“We, Violet. We deliver the killer. Be fair. We’re in this together now.”
“Fair? Since when is anything in this world fair? Was it fair that you got everything because you’re four minutes older? Was it fair that poor Mousey was hacked to pieces before she got anything? What’s fair? You know as well as I do that when a chance presents itself, you’ve got to grab it. I’ve no doubt that you can look after your own interests without my being ‘fair’ as you call it. But just remember which of us is the goddamn Society-Girl Detective, brother dear.”
Violet stared into space for a few minutes, a slight smile on her lips, perhaps already envisaging a successful conclusion and what it would mean. At least, Sebastian thought that that was where she’d drifted.
“What are you seeing, Sis? Headlines? ‘Society-Girl Detective Does it Again’? ‘Cosmetics Queen Cracks Caper’? What are you planning—to put out a new perfume? Maybe call it ‘Sleuth’?”
Violet abruptly snapped back to the present. “What a great idea, Sebastian! ‘Sleuth Perfume…for those secret places…for the detectives of love.’ I love it!”
“Come on, Sis, gimme a break.”
“Yeah? I know who’ll be first in line for a free sample.” Violet stared levelly at her brother. “And, if we pull this off, I know which irrepressible one of us is going to dine out on it for an awfully long time.”
The serious look that passed between them was not unlike a handshake, but it contained more mutual understanding and concurrence than any physical gesture could ever convey.
“Did you sleep well?” Mrs. Argus asked with a laugh from next to the sideboard where she was heaping food onto a plate. “Did you hear Her? She was here. She was walking the halls. Waiting. Waiting. Who will be next? Who?”
“Christ!” Sebastian said, standing up and moving quickly to the door. “Speaking of scrambled eggs.…”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The opening phases of the investigation were not overly productive. Sebastian talked to Mrs. Hook, Derrick, and Aunt Budgie, but learned nothing of any interest. The housekeeper made all her usual complaints, and would probably still be going on if she had not flared up and stormed off after Sebastian made what he though quite an innocuous joke about her name. Derrick put Sebastian almost to sleep as he mellifluously droned on about such fascinating aspects of colonial life as map-making and cryptography. And Budgie, seeming listless and distracted, told Sebastian much more than he ever wanted to know about the Colonel’s many ailments—hypertension, arteriosclerosis, his tendency to throw off thromboses the way most people perspired—and the medication she had to administer to treat them. Surely, Sebastian thought, trying to swallow a yawn, a murder investigation should be more interesting than this; Violet must be keeping the good stuff for herself.
She was, but she didn’t get to it right away. First, she tried to engage Mrs. Argus in conversation, but the old woman was too involved in working her way through a huge plate of breakfast to say anything, even to make grim predictions of catastrophe. One person, at least, liked Mr. Ching’s cooking.
Then Violet went to see Cerise. She thought it would be better if the two of them could make up and start afresh; beyond that, she wanted to find out whatever Cerise could tell her about Mousey’s financial affairs, and also just what it was that had caused Cerise to react so strangely and violently at dinner. The first of these objectives was easily, and happily, accomplished; for the second, all Cerise knew was that Rosa had recently been going over records with a new firm of accountants, and had acted very oddly—Cerise couldn’t be more specific than that—when she got the report; and as
to the third, Cerise nimbly stepped aside from any probes into her background or private life.
Violet then decided to take advantage of the fact that everyone was engaged elsewhere to do a little snooping on the second floor…in one particular bedroom. Even though she doubted that the object she wanted to look through would be there, she felt it was still worth a try. She was right, it was not there, but, at the back of a dresser drawer, she found something better: something that confirmed her hypothesis; something that solved the murder. Damn! she thought, I’ve done it again!
She hurried downstairs, trying not to grin as if she’d just won a lottery. She located Sebastian and told him to quietly get everyone into the lounge…everyone, that is, but one.
Luckily for Sebastian, the Colonel was just returning to the house. Red-faced, he was walking awkwardly in a pair of hip waders that were thickly covered in mud for their entire length. Sebastian, curious about Violet, didn’t want even to speculate about what the Colonel might have been doing. He merely told him about the meeting, and went to summon the others.
Soon Violet had her assembly, but she kept them waiting as she first looked into each of the eight faces around her. Then she announced, “I know who killed Mousey.” The exclamations of surprise, curiosity, and scepticism were more or less what she had expected, and she waited until they died down before continuing. “Last night, I had pretty well figured out who it must be, but I couldn’t see what this person’s motive could be. Then, this morning, I learned the reason. And I found proof. As I said, I know who did it.”
“I assume you mean Mr. Drupe,” Sebastian said. “After all, he’s the only one who isn’t here.”
More sounds of surprise, during which Violet glared at her brother, while he smiled innocently back.
“Yes, I mean Mr. Eustace Drupe.”
“Nonsense!” Derrick said. “That dried up old crock couldn’t have—”
Violet held up a silencing hand. “Let me explain. Last night, when I was going over everything in my mind, there were some things I couldn’t understand, that didn’t make any sense. Most of them had to do with the way Drupe was acting. Even for a lawyer who became wealthy and famous by obstructing the justice that was due his rich and powerful clients, he seemed particularly loath to have any investigation take place. You remember how he tried to keep me from examining the body, which was the best chance to get an accurate fix on the time of death. Then he tried to discredit my findings. You’ll also remember that when we conducted our search, he didn’t want to go along. Perhaps he wanted the opportunity to create more confusion, to obscure things further. Then when I said the killer might be one of us, you heard how he mocked the idea, finally ending with that oh-so-reluctant revelation of Mousey’s mental imbalance. Well, whether or not she was disturbed was beside the point, as Sebastian correctly pointed out. Drupe was trying to deflect our attention, muddy the waters. And finally, there was his absurd argument that it couldn’t be any of us because we’d all been together at the time of death. Now, I could understand some of Drupe’s early obstructionism—after all, he and I are not fond of each other, to put it mildly—and some of his points may have a certain validity. But it was those last bits about Mousey’s paranoia and our all being together that gave me trouble. I don’t like Mr. Drupe at all, but I do know he’s far too smart to have believed that was relevant. He raised the issues solely to sow confusion.
An Old-Fashioned Mystery Page 8