To the sleek room, in tone dull-red and white and dark gold, these dim lamps lent at once an intimacy and a kind of religious hush. In a far corner stood a grand piano, with Sir George Fleet's framed photograph on its dull-gleaming top.
The questions which rushed from Martin—"Who was murdered? Where in the prison? When?" — were shushed by a particularly meaning look from H.M. Martin sank down into a deep sofa, feeling the pain-throbs above his eyes. All of them beard the nonchalant maid, Phyllis, saunter through the hall to open the front door.
"It's the cops again, m’lady," rose the bored voice of Phyllis from outside.
The cops, on this occasion, were represented only by Chief Inspector Masters. Masters, holding a brown cardboard file in his left hand as well as the brief-case in his right, coughed with discomfort at the door of the drawing-room. His bowler hat was held under his arm.
Aunt Cicely responded automatically. Though clearly still frightened and shocked, it was apparent she had resigned herself to the belief that somebody, somehow, would take care of this matter. In white, with flowing sleeves, vivid against a Burgundy carpet, she turned to the newcomer.
"Mr. Masters! It was so kind of you to come’
"Well, all—" said Masters, completely off balance by this reception of a police officer, "I'm not here, on official business, as you might say. I just wanted to pick up Sir Henry."
"Do please make yourselves at home!" urged Aunt Cicely, with such sincerity that even Masters believed it "I shall have to run along to bed now, but do make yourselves comfortable. Have you got the Ovaltine, Phyllis? That's a good girl! And I must have someone to talk to before I. Phyllis! Where is Lady Brayle?"
"Gone home, mlady. Long ago."
Aunt Cicely fretted. "Then I wonder… Mr. Masters! Is Ricky over at the Dragon?"
"Not there now, Lady Fleet It's been closed for half an hour."
"Then I suppose," Aunt Cicely said, "he must be with Susan Harwood." And she gave a bright, inquiring smile at Martin Drake.
(Careful, now! But you don't know anything about Susan except that Ricky wants to marry her and Ruth says he's deeply enamoured, so you're safe in admitting ignorance. Besides, the maddening questions…)
"Susan is a dear girl," said Aunt Cicely. "But of course — I" She laughed deprecatingly. "I mean; her father being a farmer. Not serious; and what matter? No woman can resist Ricky. I’ve always told him so. And I must confess," her attractive laughter rang again, "I've always been rather proud of it. It seems to reflect credit on me, somehow. What was I thinking of? Oh, yes! Retiring. Of course. Will you say good-night for me to everyone?"
Radiating charm with her smile, giving a whisk of the loose sleeve, Aunt Cicely left them.
It was just as well, Martin thought, that a harmless if somewhat feather-headed siren had gone. The tension which invaded that room, when H.M. and Masters faced each other, set his nerves tingling again.
"Got the stuff?" demanded H.M.
"All of it," Masters growled. "I'm fair sick of interviews, and that's a fact" He dropped hat, brief-case, and cardboard file into a chair.
Murder.
Thanking Grandmother's Providence first of all, Martin's thoughts raced on, the person killed couldn't have been Jenny. Jenny had been here today, hovering over him, her behaviour being 'unladylike and disgusting.' Lady Brayle and Aunt Cicely were both very much alive. So was Dr. Laurier, whom he had met here in this house early in the morning.
(In front of him, like mumbled voices heard in a crowded room, he was conscious of H.M. and the Chief Inspector talking away. Masters was pointing at Martin, and asking questions about the fall off the roof. H.M. was growling that the victim seemed to have no evidence; and up went Master's blood-pressure again. But little of this penetrated to Martin.)
The person killed, he was thinking, couldn't have been Stannard either. Stannard was as right as rain. Now he knew it couldn't have been Ricky, because Ricky's mother had just asked whether her son was at the pub. That left only…
"Look here!" Martin exclaimed, and jumped up. "Was it Ruth Callice?"
Both the others — Masters with his face red instead of ruddy, H.M. taking out a cigar — swung round.
"Burn it all, son, don't start shoutin' like that," complained the latter, making fussed gestures. "Was she what?"
Martin felt a hollow of dread, with a pulse to it inside his chest
"Was she the victim? Did somebody kill Ruth?"
Yes, his voice had been loud. In the north wall of the room towards the west door opened. It opened to show a glimpse of a billiard-room, corresponding with the library on the other side of the house.
Ruth Callice came out of the billard-room, and' John Stannard after her. They were noticed neither by H.M. nor by Masters. But Martin saw them, and slowly sat down again.
"Listen," said H.M., standing in front of Martin. "The victim hasn't got anything to do with you; and I'm trying to drive it through Masters's head that the victim hasn't got anything directly to do with the case either."
"Ho," said Masters, and snorted like a bull. "A murder slap-bang in our laps, and it hasn't got anything to do with the case."
"Regardin' motive," H.M. insisted over his shoulder, "no."
He turned back to Martin. "You put up at the pub, didn’t yon? Didn't you meet the Puckstons?"
"Puckstons? That's the—?"
"Yes. Father, mother, and daughter."
"I met Puckston, yes, and I think I saw his wife. I don't remember any daughter."
"Enid Puckston," said ELM. His expression was not pleasant "Only a kid.."
"Oh, ah," muttered the Chief Inspector. "Only a kid. Like the one twenty-two years ago."
"She was the pride and joy," said H.M., slowly and heavily, "of those people's hearts. Goin' to a fancy school, she was. Not harming anybody."
"Last night at Pentecost," Masters interrupted, "she was stabbed through the heart and (hurrum!) pretty badly mutilated. What's more, for a fair-to middling certainty, she was killed with that dagger your crowd found in the condemned cell."
For some time nobody spoke.
To Martin, Enid Puckston was only a name, not even a person to be visualized. Yet the ugliness and brutality struck through. At this ppint, too, he became aware that Masters was speaking not for information, but for effect; that the corner of Masters's eye had caught Ruth and Stannard over there by the billiard-room. Martin shook his head to clear it
"Stabbed and mutilated," he repeated. Then he looked up. "Was she—r?’
Masters now spoke almost blandly.
"No, sir. She wasn't violated, if that's what you mean. Or any attempt like it Might have been anybody's crime. Might have been—" here Martin could have sworn the Chief Inspector was about to say 'man or woman,' but checked himself—"might have been anybody who'd got what they call a strong sadistic nature. With their flummy talk nowadays," he added.
"Where was she found?"
"Ah! As to that, now!"
Straightening up, with an air of surprise and grave welcome, Masters turned round in the direction of Ruth and Stannard.
"Evening, miss! Evening, sir!" he intoned, as though he had just seen them. "Didn't notice you in the dark. I'd be glad to have a bit of a chat with both of you, if it's convenient"
"Yes, of course," answered Ruth, whose eyes were fixed on Martin. Abruptly, as though breaking loose, she ran across the room and took Martin's hands.
"So you're up and about!" Ruth added, scanning his face and forehead. She added, as though in reproach: "Martin, you look horrible."
He grinned at her. "No worse than a hangover. Honestly!"
Stannard approached more slowly. H.M. had spoken of him as having had a shock, and you could well believe it. Some of his strong vitality — not too much, but some — seemed to have ebbed from him. The black eyes had no glitter, he smiled, though with visible effort As he moved towards them he put one hand on the back of a dark-red wing chair as though his ankle hurt him.
What had he seen in that execution shed last night?
But, for that matter, Ruth herself looked far from well. She was as trim as ever, the small light-brown curls gleaming above the rounded face, her dress a close-clinging green. Yet she looked physically ill. And Martin began to understand the strain which had been growing on everybody all day.
The strain grew and grew. They seldom spoke of it And yet..
"Martin," Ruth began, and braced herself. "Some people are saying what happened to you was an accident It wasn't, was it?"
"No. It wasn't"
Very much, now, he was conscious of H.M. and Masters in the background.
"What did happen?" asked Ruth. Then, without waiting for a reply, as though afraid of a reply she went on:
"All I know is that I was waked up about a quarter to five by that alarm-bell going. Then I heard a crash—"
"Great Scott, Ruth, did I fall as hard as that?"
"It was the tea-tray!" said Ruth, and snatched her fingertips away from him in a reproachful way as though he had somehow insulted her.
"What tea-tray?"
"Jenny," Ruth explained, "was carrying a loaded tea-tray through the dining-room to those little back stairs. She heard you — she heard that thud on the awning, and the awning ripping wide open, and something hitting the flagstones. And would you believe it?"
Here Ruth turned to Stannard, who, though he must have heard the story half a dozen times, only nodded.
"Would you believe it?" Ruth said to Martin. "Jenny says the front door was partway open, with mist in the hall. Jenny simply threw the whole tea-tray to one side and rushed out. She found you lying on the terrace in the mist, with blood coming out of your forehead. Then Jenny began screaming. By mat time I was there, and Ricky came flying downstairs in his pyjamas. Poor Cicely was tired out and slept through it Fortunately Dr. Laurier was on the spot"
Stannard, smiling, had been examining the trim of his fingernails and polishing them on the sleeve of his dark-grey suit He grew grave now. He approached Martin, limping a little, and formally extended his hand.
"My dear fellow," he said in his husky hearty voice, "real congratulations on a lucky escape."
Everybody I meet, Martin thought seems to want to shake hands.
"It was you ringing that alarm-bell?"
Stannard's look was wry. "Yes. For my sins."
Well, then, here was one hand free from attempted murder and one face without hypocrisy. Martin already liked Stannard; he liked the man better now.
"But" Ruth prompted. "Up on the roof?" She made a tentative gesture.
Martin thought he had better get it over. He told them everything, from the time he and Jenny walked through the mist to the time somebody's hands lunged out He could see Master's black notebook, the shorthand travelling steadily. H.M. had sat down near the tall white marble mantelpiece, with its dull-gold clock and its dull-gold candelabra against dark-red walls.
When the recital was finished, neither Ruth nor Stannard commented. They did not even speak. Too much repression! Dangerous! The person who did speak, after studying Martin, was Chief Inspector Masters.
"Field-glasses, eh?" ruminated Masters. "A pair of old field-glasses, on an orange-topped table near the north-west side of the roof!"
"That's right"
"Would it interest you to know, sir, that other witnesses who went up there later didn't see any field-glasses?"
"I can't help that They were there earlier."
"I say, Masters." H.M. raised his head briefly. "Could they 'a' been the same glasses George Fleet used on the famous day?"
Masters simmered. "For the last time, Sir Henry—" "Will I stop babblin' about field-glasses, you mean? Oh, Masters, I know there were no hokey-pokey spikes to stick him in the eye! But I gather the field-glasses weren't busted; they fell just wide of the terrace and on the grass. And that's why the policeman picked 'em up and carried 'em inside." "Yes!"
H.M., an unlighted cigar in his fingers, craned round in his chair to blink at Martin.
"Now tell me, son," he said. "Supposing, Just supposing!) these were the same glasses! Were they a good pair? Good lenses? Easy focus? No blurrin' that would…" He paused. "Were they?"
"As I told you," Martin returned, "I didn't look through them very long. But they were in first-rate condition. I’ll swear to that"
"That's good news," breathed H.M. "Oh, my eye! That helps a lot."
Masters was unable to yank down his bowler hat on his bead, since he was not wearing it, but his gesture conveyed this.
"The field-glasses," he said, with strong self-control, "were in A-l order. They, had nothing wrong with them. And therefore (eh?) they're a great big smacking-sure help to us?"
"That's right, Masters."
"Er — just so." Masters addressed himself to his notebook and to Martin. "Anything more you can tell us, Mr. Drake?"
"I don't think so." This atmosphere had become dangerously explosive, and Martin tried to lighten it "I woke up with Lady Brayle sitting beside me. I annoyed her, and she annoyed me, so I decided to dress and come downstairs. In here I found H.M. telling Aunt — telling Lady Fleet about his previous existence as a Cavalier poet and duellist" He grinned. "By the way, sir, you ought to talk to Dr. Laurier."
"What's that, son? Hey?"
"Dr. Laurier. He's an authority on old-time fencing. He can tell you all about the 'Fifty-fifty and the 'Low-High' and the 'Vanity' and everything else. Incidentally, he says his father fought two duels in France."
Masters barked him back to attention. But Masters himself had a grievance, and was annoyed enough to air it
"A fat lot of good;" he growled, "this gentleman Laurier did us last night!"
Martin, knowing a question would shut him up, said nothing.
"All he kept talking about" Masters growled, "was his father, with the big grey beard, when the gentleman was old and a bit scatty, sitting in a rocking-chair in front of that infernal skeleton-clock, rocking back and forth and muttering something in French that Sir Henry says means, 'Would a man of honour have done it?’
"Ah, but not done a murder,’' Masters added. "Because, according to the record, he was in this very room talking to the butler when Sir George Fleet pitched off the roof." Masters started, and woke up. "Hurrum! Sorry! Off the subject! Now, Mr. Drake! What I wanted to ask—"
But he never asked it
Masters's gaze had strayed towards H.M.; and, after a pause, Masters's expression became that of one who sees a prayed-for portent in the sky.
H.M. had sat up straight His mouth fell open, and the unlighted cigar dropped out and rolled on the carpet. His look was fixed straight ahead behind the big spectacles; his hands were on the arm of the chair, his elbows hooked as though to push himself up. His voice, astounded, started from deep in the cellar and was at the same level when it emerged.
"Wait a minute!" H.M. begged. "Lemme think! Stop babblin' and lemme think!"
Nobody spoke. Martin, Ruth, and Stannard exchanged inquiring glances; Masters remained very quiet indeed; and H.M. fiercely pressed his hands over his head.
"But that couldn't be," H.M. addressed the empty air. "It couldn't be, unless… yes, burn me there was!"
His hands dropped again to the arms of the chair. With some effort he propelled himself to his feet
"I got to go and look at something," he explained, with an — air of haste and absent-minded apology. "I've been an awful ass; but I got to go and look at something now. You stay here. You play bridge or something." And he lumbered across to the hall door, where he turned right towards the interior of the house.
"By George," breathed Masters, "the old bounder's got it!"
Martin stared after H.M. "Got what?"
"Never you mind that, sir," Masters said cheerfully. "We'll get back to business. Now, Mr. Stannard!"
"I beg your pardon?" Stannard was obviously surprised.
"I said a while ago," Masters told him smoothly, "that I'd like a word with you. If you don't mind, I'd like to take a statement from you as to what happened in the execution shed last night." '
The other stood motionless, a vertical line between his black eyebrows.
"If memory serves, Inspector, I gave a statement to the police this morning."
"Yes, sir. But that was to Inspector Drake. County Constabulary."
"True. And what then?"
'The Chief Constable's Office—" Masters was suave—"have got in touch with our people in London. I’m in charge of the case, you see. Now, about that statement…"
Stannard pushed back his cuff and glanced at his wrist-watch.-
It's rather late, Inspector."
"I'm afraid I've got to insist, Mr. Stannard."
Dead silence.
The light of battle sprang across that room as clearly as the opposing lamps had shone behind the fencers at Pentecost Prison last night. And Martin knew why.
Too often had John Stannard wiped the floor with the police, including Chief Inspectors of the C.I.D., in a battle of question-and-answer at the Central Criminal Court Masters knew this; Stannard knew he knew it They looked at each other.
Last night, Martin reflected, Stannard could have wiped the floor with Masters in such an engagement But Stannard was shaky now; there was some horror inside him; his eyes were dull; his movements, perhaps mental as well as physical, seemed slow. Then he glanced towards Ruth Callice.
To Martin's astonishment, Ruth was looking at Stannard with an expression of… well, not nearly as strong as hero-worship; but something deeply moved and as near to love as made no difference. What had been happening during the past twenty-four hours? Ruth veiled her look instantly, slipping back into H.M.'s chair.
And Stannard smiled.
"I'm at your service, Inspector," he said. And vitality seemed to flow and expand through him.
He sat down at the other end of the sofa from Martin, crossed his knees, and took from his pocket a cigar in a cellophane wrapper.
"I’ll make the statement" he went on, "mainly because," he looked sideways, "I think my friend Drake deserves to hear it."
'The trouble was," Martin blurted, "I thought I might have left you there helpless or dying or — God knows what."
"No. You played the game strictly according to the rules. Unfortunately, however…"
Sharply Masters cut across the amenities.
"You might begin," he said, "from the time Mr. Drake locked you up behind the iron door at just past midnight — Well!’
To tell the truth," Stannard admitted, "I was not as easy in my mind as I led others to think. I have — some imagination too. But there it was; it had to be done, and more than done. So I opened the door of the execution shed." Again he looked at Martin. "You never saw it. Nor did any of the others. I'd better describe it. It was—"
"I don't want to hear any of that sir," snapped Masters.
"Oh?" Stannard slowly turned his head back. "You 'don't want to hear any of that?"'
"No. Not by a jugful!"
"Thus," Stannard said evenly, "denying a witness his right to give testimony in his own way. The other name is coercion. May God help you if I ever quoted your words in court"
Sling went the mental whip across Masters's face. Masters, dogged and conscientious, was inwardly raving. But he remained impassive, with sheathed claws.
"Hurrum! My mistake. Go on!"
"It was a good-sized room," pursued Stannard, taking the cellophane wrapper off the cigar, "though with not a very high ceiling, as in the condemned cell. Its walls were brick painted white, pretty dirty, with two small barred windows near the top of the opposite side.
"I picked this up, detail by detail, with my light In the centre of the floor, which was stone, I saw the gallows-trap: two big oblong wooden panels, fitting closely together and set flush with the floor-level. They would drop together when you pulled a lever. An iron beam stretched across the ceiling just over this trap. In the left-hand corner — concealed from a condemned man as he entered by the opening door — was a rather large vertical lever which controlled the drop.
"My dear Drake, do you remember the feel of the condemned cell just over’ the way? Yes; I can see you do. Well, this was worse. I had expected that. As soon as I opened the door of that execution shed, the whole room seemed to jump at me. It did not like visitors."
Chief Inspector Masters interrupted harshly.
"Just a minute, sir!"
"Yes?"
Masters had to shake his own head to clear it of a spell. Like the mist on the countryside that morning, this dim-lighted drawing-room became invaded with the shapes and sounds of Pentecost Prison.
"I ask you!" persisted Masters "What kind of talk is that?’
"It is true talk, Inspector. Write it down."
"As you like, sir."
"A dirty white brick room, a trap, an iron beam, a lever no other furniture," continued Stannard. Instead of lighting the cigar, he put it down on the arm of the sofa. "But I had seen a rocking-chair across the passage in the condemned cell. I went over there, fetched in the chair, and, as a matter of honour, closed the door behind me.
"I put the rocking-chair in a comer, the far corner from the door, looking obliquely across the gallows-trap towards the lever. I hung my lamp over the back of the chair and tried to read The Cherry Orchard. This became impossible. The influences, previously poisonous, were now devilish.
"No, Inspector! Don't make faces. I saw no ghosts and I heard none. I am prepared to admit the influences may have been imaginary, though I don't believe it Everything centered round that gallows-trap.
"There, of course, the condemned person had dropped on his long or short rope — according to weight — into a brick-lined pit underneath. It was natural that these currents of hatred, of malice, of despair, should come from there or seem to come from there.
"Then I did the worst possible thing.
"I put down my book. I did what I called in my own mind —" a sardonic grin tightened back Stannard's lips—"the act of a boxer riding with the punch. I lit a cigar. I rocked in the chair, and deliberately exposed myself to whatever was here. I tried to imagine what an execution would look like. In short, I did exactly what I said Drake would, do.’
"I knew I was somewhat rattled; but not how rattled until
"You remember that I was sitting in the comer of the execution shed. I had been imagining the hanging of Hessler, who had tried to escape from the condemned cell. I had been wondering about this: when the doctor and other officials went down into the pit to make sure the hanged man was dead, how did they get down? Ladders? But I saw no ladders. All of a sudden I woke up from these thoughts.
"My cigar, which for some reason I had been holding near the tip, had burnt down and was searing my fingers. And I was not sitting in any comer. I was sitting in my rocking-chair on the gallows-trap itself."
Stannard paused.
He moved his right hand towards the cigar on the arm of the chair, and suddenly drew back again. Ruth Callice, a little way back from the light which touched Stannard's cheek, sat back with her eyes closed. There were bluish hollows under Ruth's eyes.
"The explanation, of course," said Stannard, "is so simple as to be almost comic. I mention it as a matter of: say unconscious muscular reaction. You're familiar, I imagine, with old fashioned rocking-chairs? And how they moved when you swung? I had simply rocked myself there.
"This sobered me. I threw that chair back and stamped out the cigar. My burnt fingers seemed to pain out of all proportion. It was now getting on towards two o'clock in the morning. And I decided to carry out an idea that.. well, it bad been in my mind from the first I would try out that idea, and get rid of its fears."
"Wear' demanded Masters. "What idea?"
Stannard grimaced.
"I wanted to see what would happen," he replied, "if I threw the lever and the trap fell."