by Clara Benson
‘Good God! He’s dead!’ exclaimed Dauncey.
Freddy gazed at the scene, taking in all the details.
‘So now we know where Lord Browncliffe’s Colt revolver went,’ he said. ‘He really ought to have kept that case locked.’
There was something like a choking sound behind him, and he turned to see Tom Chetwynd, who was white in the face and swaying a little.
‘Are you all right?’ said Freddy. ‘He was your friend, wasn’t he? I’m sorry.’
Tom said:
‘Well, if that doesn’t cap it all! Poor old Doug,’ and began to laugh hysterically in great gasps.
‘Better try and get a hold of yourself, old thing,’ said Freddy gently.
Tom took a deep breath and did as suggested.
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m all right now.’
Dauncey stepped forward.
‘Better not touch anything,’ said Freddy, and Dauncey brought himself up short.
‘I suppose not. What do we do now?’
At that moment, there was a hammering on the door.
‘We let events take their course,’ said Freddy, and went to unbolt the door.
Chapter Five
Three weeks later, Freddy returned to the offices of the Clarion after a morning spent outside to find Gertie waiting for him. She had made herself comfortable, and was at present sitting back in his chair with her feet up on his desk, much to the discomposure of Jolliffe, who was doing his best to keep his eyes away from her trim and well-proportioned legs.
‘Beastly drizzle today,’ she remarked. ‘I’m not sure which is worse—this, or that fearful heat.’
‘At least I can think now it’s cooler,’ said Freddy. ‘Anyway, to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit? Have you come to pay me my fifty pounds?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous—I never promised you fifty pounds. No, as a matter of fact, it’s something serious. You were at the inquest on Friday, weren’t you?’
‘I was. Rather a depressing show all round, what? I mean to say, one doesn’t like to think that life could ever become so dire that one felt the need to exit the stage.’
Gertie sat up and lowered her legs, somewhat to Jolliffe’s relief.
‘Yes, but that’s just it—he didn’t kill himself. They got it all wrong!’
‘What do you mean, they got it all wrong? Of course he killed himself. How could it possibly have been otherwise?’
‘I don’t know—I just know it wasn’t suicide.’
‘My dear girl, he bolted himself in and blew his brains out. That’s suicide by any definition.’ But Gertie was shaking her head vehemently, so he said, ‘What do you think happened, then?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Then why do you think it wasn’t suicide?’
‘Because he had no reason for it,’ said Gertie.
‘Of course he did. He had lots of reasons: Tatty threw him over, then you threw him over—that’s two, to start with. He’d disgraced himself with his father through his own incompetence. How many reasons do you need?’
‘Oh, there was nothing serious between Douglas and me. I spoke to him on the evening of the dance, remember? He was perfectly happy after I left him. He admitted it had been stupid of him to ask me, and I admitted I’d been stupid to say yes, then we both laughed and made it up, and everything was hunky-dory between us.’
‘Yes, I remember,’ said Freddy dryly.
‘What do you remember? I don’t have awfully clear memories of that night. Did I do something silly?’
‘No more than usual. But anyway, even if you parted on good terms, he was still pretty glum that whole evening, you have to admit. Why, he even came and sat at our table and explained at length how miserable he was, and how his father was angry with him because of his mistake about the wing slot patent.’
‘But didn’t you say that happened last year? I expect Westray have patented lots of inventions and won all sorts of prizes since then. Douglas and his father had been at loggerheads for years over one thing or another. It wasn’t the sort of thing that would drive him to suicide. Besides, that was how Doug was. He was a dreadful bore when he’d been drinking, but he would have been all right the next day, I know it. Tatty agrees with me—she spoke to him too, and you shall hear her story later. But there was something else. I didn’t remember it at the time, because I was rather—er—tired that night—’ (here Freddy raised his eyebrows) ‘—but it came to me a few days later something he said while we were talking. He said he was puzzling over something, and didn’t know what to do.’
‘Puzzling over what?’
‘That’s just it. I wish I could remember. He was feeling upset that evening, because he’d found something terrible out and he was in a quandary as to what to do about it.’
‘What had he found out?’
‘He didn’t say—at least, I don’t think he did. It was something he’d discovered which was bad enough in itself, but he’d been thinking about it and suddenly realized it was even worse than he thought, and would raise an awful stink if it came out. It was just a suspicion, and he had no proof, and he was wondering whether he ought to act or let it lie.’
Freddy was sceptical.
‘I don’t suppose it’s very important,’ he said. ‘And even if it is, that still doesn’t alter the fact that he was discovered in a room which was locked on the inside, and that his were the only finger-prints on the gun. I take it that is what you’re suggesting? If he didn’t shoot himself, then someone else must have done it. Or do you suspect an accident?’
‘Well, I didn’t, but do you think it might have been?’ said Gertie hopefully.
Freddy grimaced.
‘I don’t see how. The rest of his actions were pretty deliberate. After all, he went into Lord Browncliffe’s study, took a gun out of the cabinet, loaded it, then took it all the way upstairs to Lady Browncliffe’s dressing-room and locked himself in. Why did he do that, if he wasn’t intending to shoot himself? I don’t know about you, but I’m not in the habit of playing with revolvers just for the fun of it—especially not at other people’s evening-parties. No, whatever happened, it was deliberate all right. So if Westray didn’t do it himself, then who did, and how?’
‘I don’t know, but it must have happened somehow,’ said Gertie. ‘Listen, I came here because Tatty wants to talk to you too. She doesn’t believe Doug killed himself any more than I do, and she wants you to come and have a scout around at the house.’
‘Why me? Surely if she suspects something then she’d be better off calling the police.’
‘They won’t listen. The verdict of the inquest was quite clear—suicide. Even if I tried to talk to them they wouldn’t be interested. But you’ve done a bit of detective-work in the past, haven’t you?’
‘Oh, well, just a little,’ said Freddy modestly.
‘Then come with me to St. James’s Square and see Tatty. All you have to do is hear what she has to say, and see if you can spot anything the police might have missed.’
Freddy suspected that Gertie’s activity in this matter sprang mainly from guilt at the thought that she might have been partly responsible for Douglas Westray’s suicide, but did not voice this thought.
‘Wherefore this sudden friendship with Tatty?’ he said instead. ‘I thought she was your deadly rival.’
‘We are companions in misery,’ said Gertie piously. ‘We women ought to stick together in such circumstances. And besides, after what she got up to with you at the party I decided that perhaps she wasn’t such a bad old thing after all.’
‘Awfully convenient, your memory, isn’t it? You remember what Tatty and I got up to, but not what you got up to yourself.’
‘What are you talking about? I didn’t get up to anything.’
‘Q. E. D,’ said Freddy dryly.
‘But you will come, won’t you? Let’s go now—she ought to be in.’
‘I can’t go now, I have work to do,’ said Freddy.
; ‘Later, then.’
Freddy sighed. He did not think there was much use in it, but he knew Gertie would never leave him alone unless he agreed to it.
Oh, very well,’ he said grudgingly.
‘That’s more like it. I shall come and fetch you at six o’clock. Make sure you’re finished by then.’
She went out, and left Freddy to get on with his work.
Badenoch House looked very different in the early evening drizzle from when Freddy had last seen it, three weeks earlier at the summer ball. The black front door was no longer thrown wide open, and the grand columns that stood to either side of it seemed to be huddling around it as though to protect it from the rain. On applying to the butler, they were informed that Miss Nugent was at home and would see them. They were taken into a comfortable sitting-room on the first floor, whose windows overlooked the garden and the fire escape. Tatty was sitting in an armchair, reading a book. She rose to greet them as they were shown in.
‘I’ve brought Freddy,’ announced Gertie unnecessarily. ‘He doesn’t believe a word of it, but I said you’d convince him.’
Now that Freddy came to look more closely at Tatty, he saw that she looked worn and tired, and that her eyes were rimmed with pink.
‘Hallo, Freddy,’ she said.
‘I say, I’m awfully sorry about Douglas,’ he said.
She turned her head away.
‘So am I, but as you can imagine I can’t exactly wail about it in public. It wouldn’t look quite the thing, would it?’
‘I suppose not. But do you really think there’s any use in raking it all up? It won’t bring the poor chap back.’
‘No, it won’t, but I’d swear he wasn’t in the frame of mind to kill himself that evening. I’m sure of it.’
Freddy thought that Tatty, too, was feeling guilty, and wanted to convince herself that she had had nothing to do with Douglas’s death. But he had promised to listen to what she had to say, so he said:
‘Gertie says you don’t think he was unhappy.’
‘He was never happy, as such. He was the mournful sort as a rule, but don’t you see? He enjoyed it. That was the way he was. He got great satisfaction out of looking on the gloomy side of things. It cheered him up in an odd sort of way.’
‘Do you mean to say he was happy that you and he had broken off your engagement, and that you were going to marry Chetwynd?’ said Freddy.
‘No, of course not. He was upset enough about that, I won’t deny it. But when he interrupted Father’s speech that night, I thought I’d better do something to stop him ruining the party any more than he already had, so we went to be by ourselves and have a little chat.’
She stared at the floor. Freddy might almost have said that she looked slightly sheepish.
‘Well?’ he said. ‘Go on. What did he say that makes you so sure he wasn’t unhappy?’
She looked even more uncomfortable.
‘It’s not so much what he said, as what I said. I’m not proud of it, but I’m rather afraid I may have led him to believe that I might reconsider.’
‘Did you indeed? Did you mean it?’
‘Yes—no—I don’t know! I was terribly confused. Doug was worked up and a bit incoherent, and said that Tom wasn’t good enough for me, and I could see he was going to start talking and never stop, so I said the first thing I could think of to keep him quiet. I told him I’d been having second thoughts about Tom, but that now wasn’t the time to talk about it. I said I should think about it overnight, and that we’d talk about it in the next day or two with clear heads.’
‘And what did he say to that?’
‘He perked up, and seemed much happier. Of course, I knew he’d been drinking, and I knew that it was more than likely that once he’d sobered up he’d realise what an ass he’d made of himself and would come and beg pardon.’
‘Did he really want you back?’
Tatty grimaced.
‘I don’t know. He said he did, but I thought it was just the drink talking. We used to row all the time, you know, and I thought he must have been as secretly relieved as I was when I broke it off. At any rate, when I sent him away that evening with a promise to think about it I swear he was happy—or happier, at least. He apologized for interrupting Father’s speech, and we agreed that we’d talk about it in a day or two, when there was more time.’
‘Did you see him after that?’ asked Freddy.
She shook her head.
‘No. He went off, and I didn’t see him again for the rest of the evening. I thought he must have gone home, and I was glad of it, because then Tom came and we had a row about him, and I was glad Doug wasn’t there to hear it. I had no idea he’d stayed at the party. It was an awful shock when we found out what had happened. I still can’t understand how it did happen. I mean, he seemed all right when he went away—or as all right as he ever was. I’d promised to think about taking him back, so why did he go away and shoot himself? It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Could something else have happened in the meantime?’
‘Such as what?’
‘Well, there was this matter of the patent last year.’
‘That was all in the past,’ she said. ‘Sir Stanley was very angry with Doug at the time, it’s true, but I don’t see why the whole thing should have driven him to kill himself now.’
‘Perhaps it was one thing after another,’ suggested Freddy. ‘He lost Westray the prize, then he lost you, then Gertie. Perhaps in the end it was all too much for him.’
‘Rot,’ said Gertie. ‘Don’t you remember what I told you? He’d found something out about someone that would cause an awful scandal if it were known. What if the person in question decided to put him out of the way to stop him from revealing the secret?’
‘Rather far-fetched, don’t you think?’
‘No more than the idea that he killed himself.’
They were both glaring at him with a look he recognized well. When two women decided to organize against one man, the result was a foregone conclusion. He sighed.
‘Very well, then, assuming for a moment this is all true, and that someone somehow passed through a bolted door by a process of osmosis and killed him, what do you expect me to do about it?’
‘Why, help me find out who it was, of course,’ said Gertie.
‘Help you? Oh, you’re going to play detective, are you?’
‘Yes, but I can’t do it alone. I can question people and that sort of thing, but I’ll need you if there’s to be any shinning up drainpipes or crawling about in the mud, or for any rough stuff.’
‘I’m quite sure you can shin up a drainpipe just as well as I can—which is to say, not at all. And as for rough stuff, I’d much prefer to give it a wide berth if it’s all the same to you.’
‘Excellent, then that’s settled,’ said Gertie, who heard only what she wanted to hear, as a rule. ‘So, then, where do we start?’ She looked at Freddy expectantly.
‘I thought you were in charge of this business?’
‘Well, yes, I am, but more in the manner of a director of operations. I shall just give you a hint or two if I see you’re going wrong.’
‘How kind of you. Very well, then, in a case of this sort I should suggest we start with an examination of the scene of the crime—or, should I say, since we don’t know for certain it was a crime, the scene of the incident.’
‘Mother hasn’t been too keen on using her dressing-room since it happened,’ said Tatty. ‘So we can go in whenever you like.’
‘Now seems as good a time as any,’ said Freddy.
Chapter Six
Lady Browncliffe’s dressing-room looked much as it had on the night of Douglas Westray’s death, although she had removed many of her personal effects from the place. When they entered Gertie went straight across to the window and looked out, while Tatty hovered near the door, a worried frown on her face. Freddy stood in the middle of the room and gazed about him. The place was dim, and there was a faint smell of dust in t
he air. The heavy blue curtains were open, giving a view out onto the iron balcony and the garden below. Several patterned rugs were laid across the plain carpet underneath. Little tables stood here and there, scattered with ornaments and figurines and photographs in silver frames. On a chest of drawers stood two tall and stately vases, while hung about the walls were portraits and still life paintings done in oils. Lady Browncliffe seemed to be a collector of china, too, for a number of valuable-looking plates were displayed above the picture rails and on the walls to each side of the door. The folding desk was open, and on it were a leather blotter and a pen and ink stand. On one side of the dressing-table stood a sewing-box. The chair in which Douglas Westray had died stood to the right of the window. It was a carved mahogany affair, comfortably upholstered in a floral fabric. Freddy went to examine it. On the top left part of the back cushion there was a rusty streak of something.
‘Is that blood?’ said Gertie with distaste.
‘Looks like it. His head was resting here when we found him. I take it they didn’t clean it off?’
‘I don’t think anybody’s been in here since the police finished,’ said Tatty.
‘Helpful,’ said Freddy, looking at the thin film of dust that lay across a nearby table. ‘That means if there is any evidence then it ought to be still here.’
He turned his attention to the door. There was nothing special about it. It had a keyhole from which the key was missing, and a bolt about six inches above the door knob.
‘Who put this bolt on?’ he said.
‘It’s always been there as far as I know,’ said Tatty.
He shut the door experimentally, and shot the bolt, which fastened easily.
‘Is there a key?’ he said.
‘Not that I know of. Not one that we’ve ever used, anyhow. Most of the doors here don’t lock—or if they do I’ve no idea where the keys are.’