The Body in the Billiard Room

by H. R. F. Keating

  His Excellency pulled a long face.

  ‘Not very satisfying,' he said. ‘I mean, if there’s going to be no logical reason for a murder, you can’t hope to fathom out who’s done it by purely logical steps.’

  Ghote wanted to say that murder was seldom logical. But he did not think the observation would be well received.

  ‘However,’ he ventured, ‘such things are sometimes happening.’

  And if that was what had happened here in Ooty, he thought, if the business was caused only by one of the unpredictable twists of life, then it certainly was not an affair that merited summoning him all the way from Bombay.

  But this, again, was a thought he felt it wiser not to share.

  ‘A murder for no good reason, or out of mere malice,’ His Excellency went on in a ruminative way. ‘Habibullah might fit as a spur-of-the-moment murderer. It is possible, I suppose. Just about possible.’

  Then visibly he shook the notion off.

  ‘But, no. No, we can’t think of it. It would spoil—That is, it is really most unlikely. Most unlikely, wouldn’t you say?’

  He looked at Ghote almost piteously.

  And Ghote, though he resisted the pleading look, had in justice to agree that murder from such a cause was in fact unlikely indeed.

  ‘So that is leaving from those on your list just Mrs Trayling,’ he said. ‘And you yourself were already stating that even dear old maiden ladies must fall under suspicion. I am supposing same would apply to ladies who are widows only?’

  ‘Oh, yes, yes. No favouritism. Lucy Trayling was in the Club that night, and must stay on the list. And, do you know, I’ve just thought of something. A couple of months ago she tried to get Pichu sacked.’

  ‘Given a sack? But why was that?’

  ‘Well, it seems that ever since old Roly Trayling fell into the Lake she’s had some idea that Pichu, who saw it happen, might have saved the old boy. I don’t know why she waited this long to do anything about it. Something to do with making up her mind to go Home perhaps. But try to get Pichu sacked she did. Only of course, old Ringer Bell wouldn’t hear of it. Knew when the Club had got a good servant.’

  ‘So you are thinking,’ Ghote said, ‘that Mrs Lucy Trayling was instead plunging some sharp instrument into the said Pichu?’

  ‘Hit it in one, old boy. Question is again, though, what sharp instrument? That’s what we—That’s what you, Ghote, have got to concentrate on. The hidden sharp instrument. Something staring you in the face all along, just like that chopper thing in Mrs McGinty’s Dead. Was recalling that only this morning. Poirot saw the chopper looking just like some oriental ornament, but when the time was ripe he fell into that sort of trance little Godbole was talking about and he connected it up straight away with the missing murder weapon. Marvellous.’

  Ghote swallowed. Once again more was being expected of him than he felt he could produce.

  But an answer came.

  ‘When the time was ripe,’ he quoted. ‘And I am thinking the ripe time has not yet come.’

  ‘Hah. Then what happens between then and now, eh? What does India’s Poirot do next?’

  For a longer moment Ghote was as stuck for a reply. But an answer came.

  He rose smartly to his feet.

  ‘I do not know what would be doing such a person,’ he said. ‘But the investigating police officer would do just only one thing.’

  ‘And what’s that?’ His Excellency asked, looking startled.

  ‘He would be conducting rigorous search of the quarter occupied by the suspected blackmailer with a view to finding evidences. I am correct, no, in thinking such procedure has not been carried out by Inspector Meenakshisundaram?’

  ‘Well, no, old chap. Damned fellow was so stuck on his dacoity theory he just wasn’t interested in anything else.’ However, for all Ghote’s determination for once in this rarefied atmosphere to engage in a simple piece of investigation, he did not find it easy even to locate the quarter the dead billiards marker had occupied.

  His Excellency, of course, had no idea where it was. He did not even know exactly where, among the Club’s outbuildings, the servants’ quarters were. And when, emerging from Major Jago’s Room, they found Major Bell, red-faced and puffing, followed by his dog Dasher, thickly woolly and panting, he was able only to direct them vaguely in the right direction. He had, he said, no idea which of the quarters was Pichu’s.

  ‘Have to ask Iyer that,’ he grunted, subsiding onto one of the blue and white sofas. ‘Iyer deals with all that sort of thing. Makes a hell of a fuss about it, but does keep an eye on what’s going on.’

  He issued an enormous wheeze then, and they left in search of the Efficient Baxter.

  Who made difficulties.

  ‘Yes, yes, I have the keys to the billiards marker’s allotted quarter. But I do not think I should permit access. It has yet to be subject of police inspection.’

  ‘Hah,’ His Excellency said. ‘Just what Mr Ghote here thought. And all the more reason why we should get a look at it.’

  ‘Yes, but, Your Excellency,’ Mr Iyer answered, soaping his hands at top speed, ‘I am not sure that you yourself examining the quarter would not be ultra vires.’

  Ghote could stand the bureaucratic rigmarole no longer. ‘Get me that key,’ he snapped. ‘At once. Or there will be a question of obstructing a public servant in the exercise of his duty.’

  Whether it was because of his own bureaucratic jargon, or because of the sharpness of his tone, the reprimand had its effect. Mr Iyer scuttled away, to return almost immediately holding a large iron key. He then led them through the Club kitchens - Ghote caught a glimpse of that night’s roly-poly pudding being placed in a huge metal contraption of ancient vintage labelled No 6 Pudding Boiler - and out to the servants’ quarters. There Mr Iyer stiffly pointed to Pichu’s door. ♦

  ‘Thank you, that would be all,’ Ghote said firmly.

  He waited until the Efficient, and inquisitive, Baxter had disappeared. Then he inserted the heavy key into the lock, turned it and pulled the door open.

  Pichu’s private territory was by no means extensive. It measured a little more than two metres each way. Its floor was bare stone, and its only furniture was some shelves on the far wall.

  These, however, were not lacking in contents. Dominating everything there was the transistor radio Mr Iyer had spoken of with such envy, an expensive and formidable object well capable of receiving Test match commentaries from England or Australia. Ranged beside and below it there were tins and old boxes of every shape and size.

  With a sigh Ghote went over to them, took down the first one in the top row, a carton that had contained Liril soap tablets, opened it and began examining the contents. Finding nothing of interest, he replaced the carton - Liril Soap with the fresh tang of limes - and took down the tin next in line. With the same result.

  After he had been working with equal system for about a quarter of an hour His Excellency, who had been standing in the doorway watching, gave a little cough.

  ‘Don’t know how Dr Watson stood it,’ he said. ‘Somehow in the stories this sort of thing flips by in a flash.’

  Ghote, cross-legged on the floor with the sixth box, Quink Ink, 2 doz. bots., open in front of him, was going through the packets and packets of cigarettes it contained, enough to have provided Pichu with secret enjoyment for a long time to come. Nor were they the cheaper brands, let alone the leaf-rolled bidis a servant might be expected to smoke. Here instead were Charms, Panama Filters, Regent Kings.

  He looked up.

  ‘Please,’ he said, doing his best to conceal his immediate feeling of relief, ‘if you are having anything else you should be doing, kindly go. I will inform of any findings I may make. Be assured.’

  ‘Well, I do have one or two things I should be seeing to.’

  And Dr Watson, mercifully, wandered away.

  Just at the moment that, from between two packets of Four Square Kings, there fell a greasy, much-stained vi
siting card. Ghote picked it up and gave it a quick glance. Then he looked at it more carefully, interest aroused. Shri B. K. Biswas, it read, Proprietor Bengal Vegetarian Hotel, Ootacamund. Best Accommodations All Bathroom Attached.

  Thoughtfully he put it into his wallet.

  But when at length he had completed his search he had discovered nothing more that was in any way significant.

  Wearily he got to his feet and stretched.

  The only thing for it now was to go back to His Excellency and tell him that the move had hardly advanced matters. There was the card belonging to the proprietor of the Bengal Vegetarian Hotel which seemed to show he had more of a connection with the Club than might have been expected. But it was difficult to see what line of progress that indicated.

  So how would he look now in the eyes of the influential person who had specially summoned him to Ooty?

  Perhaps some kudos could be gained from the factual confirmation he had gathered of Pichu’s more than ordinary wealth. Some credit, too, could be had from pointing out how that visiting card indicated that the Maharani was definitely likely to have been a blackmail victim. But neither discovery was the sort of expected revelation of that ‘something that had never occurred before’.

  He took one last look round the little box-like quarter.

  And an idea came to him.

  Quickly he went over to the big shiny radio, lifted it from its place and turned it round. Yes, its plastic back was secured by large flat screws which could be undone with a coin. And there were pale scratches round them that indicated that this had been done more than once.

  He dipped into his trouser pocket, found a big, wavy-edged ten-paisa piece, hoped it would do and set to work.

  The screws yielded easily. The radio’s back came away. And, stuffed inside, he saw a roll of shiny paper, evidently from some magazine.

  He dropped down to the floor again and carefully spread the roll out.

  It appeared to be a cutting from a film gossip magazine. A year or more old.

  Sarla Kumar, star of the upcoming Prem Putla, has a new hero in her private, private life. Hero from the old, old days, almost British Raj. Yes, none other than a maharajah, and one who in youth (how long ago was that, Highness Pratapgadh?) was a real champion at the old sport of pig-sticking. And we predict that, wife, wives or no wives, the beauteous Sarla will have the chance to retire before Prem Putla hits the screens. Which, if all we hear is true, would be one good move.

  Sarla Kumar. The name rang a bell. Yes, of course, Prem Putla, Love Doll, was the film that had been advertised on the front of that hoarding where he had had his twenty-rupee talk with the dog doctor.

  And there was something more. Something teasing at the edge of his mind.

  Got it.

  On the painted hoarding someone had plastered a bright yellow handbill. And it had said - although at the time it had made no particular impression — ToNite Sarla Kumar in Person Willingdon Talkies.

  So, Sarla Kumar, a star whose name had been very clearly linked to the Maharajah’s, was in Ooty. And Pichu had thought it worthwhile to cut out that piece from that old magazine and, more, to hide it carefully away. If ever anything stank of a blackmail attempt this was it. Then the boot could, after all, be altogether on the other foot when it came to illicit love affairs. If the Maharani would want to keep from her husband her meetings with Mr Amul Dutt at the Bengal Vegetarian Hotel, equally he would surely want to hide Sarla Kumar from her. If she knew, as perhaps Pichu had, that his affair with the star of Prem Putla had been renewed, it would give her a very strong hold over him.

  9

  Reluctantly Ghote decided that before going to the Willingdon Talkies and seeing if he could discover where Sarla Kumar was to be found, by way of checking out what he had learnt, he had to report his discovery to his looming, inescapable Watson. He had promised him he would let him know the outcome of his search of Pichu’s quarter, and he could hardly go back on that. Especially not to someone on whom his future career probably depended.

  He found His Excellency sitting at ease in a long wicker chair out on the portico.

  ‘Sir,’ he said, endeavouring to put some excitement into his voice, ‘I was most urgently looking for you.’

  ‘Hah. A clue among all that stuff Pichu had collected up?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was discovering eventually, most carefully concealed, a cutting from a filmi gossip magazine wherein it was stated that the Maharajah of Pratapgadh was at one time having illicit affair with a certain star by the name of Sarla Kumar, a lady who is just only now in Ooty itself.’

  ‘Ah ha. And the cutting was concealed no doubt in a whole batch from similar magazines?’

  ‘Excuse me?’ Ghote asked, again blankly puzzled.

  ‘The purloined letter, old boy. Expect you penetrated the ruse just as the Chevalier Dupin did.’

  Ghote decided that a straight question was the only way he was likely to make out what on earth His Excellency was talking about.

  ‘Please, what letter is this?’

  ‘The Edgar Allan Poe story, old fellow. You must remember it. Where your illustrious predecessor found the stolen letter which the best police detectives in Paris had not been able to locate because he guessed that it would have to be hidden in a letter-rack, the most obvious place.’

  ‘Well, yes, sir. But, I am assuring, if I had been asked to find a certain letter, the first place I would be looking as a simple CID wallah would be any letter-rack.’

  ‘Ah, ho, no. I venture to suggest that you’d do that precisely because you’re a Great Detective of today,’ His Excellency said with unruffled cheerfulness.

  Ghote, in a burst of inner fury, contemplated making off without further comment in the direction of the Willingdon Talkies and his possible lead to where Sarla Kumar might be found.

  ‘And what did you deduce from this cutting about our princely friend and this - what was her name? - Sheela Kumar?’ His Excellency went on.

  ‘No, sir, it is Sarla Kumar. She was a famous film star for some months about one year past, and she was even making personal appearance last night at Willingdon Talkies.’

  ‘Hah. And making personal appearance for Pratapgadh somewhere round about here, eh? That your thinking?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘By Jove, you know I believe this is the best yet. Fellow like Pratapgadh might well go to considerable lengths to keep a business like this from his Maharani, and if Pichu stood in his way . . . Yes. Yes, it’s strong, very strong.’

  He came to an abrupt halt.

  ‘Of course, though,’ he added, ‘a strong motive thrust under one’s nose often means the suspect is innocent after all. We all know that. But, still, this wasn’t exactly thrust under our noses, was it? No, I think you’re on to something, Ghote. And now’s just the time to put it to the test.’

  ‘Yes, Your Excellency, it is most necessary to check the veracity of any such lead. I was just on my way—’

  ‘Now, it so happens I was chatting to Pratapgadh not ten minutes ago, and he told me he was off to play golf and was looking everywhere for a partner. Couldn’t oblige him myself. Golfing days over, I fear. Anno domini, you know. But you could step into the breach, my dear fellow. First-rate opportunity for Poirot-style talk.’

  ‘But—But—Please, I am not at all able—’

  And at that moment there stepped out on to the portico the Maharajah of Pratapgadh himself, tall, boldly handsome, and just a little paunchy. His long golf-bag was slung carelessly over his shoulder.

  ‘Ah, Pratapgadh, my dear chap, just found someone for you to play with.’

  The Maharajah came strolling over.

  ‘It is Mr Ghote here?’ he asked. ‘The Bombay detective we’ve all been hearing so much about. I’m not sure about playing against you, old boy. You might worm all my filthy secrets out of me as we go round.’

  ‘If you are not wanting . . .’ Ghote snatched at the excuse with more than a little eagerness.
/>   But the Maharajah’s eyes took on instantly an aggressive glint.

  ‘No Pratapgadh ever refused a challenge.’

  ‘Well, but I am afraid I am not having any golf clubs,’ Ghote said.

  ‘Never mind. Share mine. Only a friendly round, after all. Although it’ll give me a slight advantage, eh? Unfamiliar clubs.’

  The Maharajah laughed.

  ‘Well, yes,’ Ghote conceded dismally. ‘You would have a most great advantage.’

  ‘Then come along, old boy. Let’s be on our way.’

  And, almost before he had time to take it in, Ghote found himself sitting up beside the Maharajah in his jeep, careering out of the town and through the rolling hills and wooded valleys of the countryside.

  ‘The course is out at Fingerpost,’ the Maharajah shouted, as he swerved past a flock of sheep meandering along the narrow twisting road. ‘Pretty well the best in India, you know.’

  ‘Oh, yes?’ Ghote shouted back.

  Then they were there.

  The Maharajah brought the jeep to a screeching halt outside the long, low, tin-roofed clubhouse building, jumped out, tossed his golf-bag to a little wizened man who had emerged from beside the building at the sound of the jeep’s engine, and led the way out on to the course.

  Ghote, following him, strove to remember anything he could about the game that he was on the point of playing. It was not much. He had seen golfers in action only once, on an occasion when he had been at the select Willingdon Club back in Bombay pursuing inquiries.

  He felt a leaden lump of depression settle somewhere in his chest. And it was not lightened when he reminded himself that the actual object of this sudden diversion was, not to play this mysterious game, but to extract from the breezily confident Maharajah any additional evidence he could.

  ‘Well, old boy,’ his opponent said cheerfully, ‘what handicap do you play to?’

  ‘My handicap is that I am not at all acquainted with the game of golf,’ Ghote replied, deciding that the truth was in any case bound to come out very soon.

  But the Maharajah took the disclaimer as the funniest of jokes.