Читать книгу Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 7: Off With His Head, Singing in the Shrouds, False Scent - Ngaio Marsh, Stella Duffy - Страница 33

‘I am not in the least embarrassed,’ Ralph said angrily. ‘You may need a solicitor, Camilla, and, if you do, you will undoubtedly consult me. My firm has acted for your family – ah – for many years.’

‘There you are!’ Alleyn said cheerfully. ‘The point is, did your firm act for Miss Campion’s family in the person of her grandfather, the day before yesterday?’

‘That,’ Ralph said grandly, ‘is neither here nor there.’

‘Look,’ Camilla said, ‘darling. I’ve told Mr Alleyn that grandfather intimated to me that he was thinking of leaving me some of his cash and that I said I wouldn’t have it at any price.’

Ralph glared doubtfully at her. It seemed to Alleyn that Ralph was in that degree of love which demands of its victim some kind of emphatic action. ‘He’s suffering,’ Alleyn thought, ‘from ingrowing knight-errantry. And I fancy he’s also very much worried about something.’ He told Ralph that he wouldn’t at this stage press for information about the Guiser’s visit but that, if the investigation seemed to call for it, he could insist.

Ralph said that, apart from professional discretion and propriety, there was no reason at all why the object of the Guiser’s visit should not be revealed and he proceeded to reveal it. The Guiser had called on Ralph, personally, and told him he wished to make a will. He had been rather strange in his manner, Ralph thought, and beat about the bush for some time.

‘I gathered,’ Ralph said to Camilla, ‘that he felt he wanted to atone – although he certainly didn’t put it like that – for his harshness to your mama. It was clear enough you had completely won his heart and I must say,’ Ralph went on in a rapid burst of devotion, ‘I wasn’t surprised at that.’

‘Thank you, Ralph,’ said Camilla.

‘He also told me,’ Ralph continued, addressing himself with obvious difficulty to Alleyn, ‘that he believed Miss Campion might refuse a bequest and it turned out that he wanted to know if there was some legal method of tying her up so that she would be obliged to accept it. Of course I told him there wasn’t.’ Here Ralph looked at Camilla and instantly abandoned Alleyn. ‘I said – I knew, dar – I knew you would want me to – that it might be better for him to think it over and that, in any case, his sons had a greater claim, surely, and that you would never want to cut them out.’

‘Darling, I’m terribly glad you said that.’

‘Are you? I’m so glad.’

They gazed at each other with half smiles. Alleyn said: ‘To interrupt for a moment your mutual rejoicing –‘ and they both jumped slightly.

‘Yes,’ Ralph said rapidly. ‘So then he told me to draft a will on those lines, all the same, and he’d have a look at it and then make up his mind. He also wanted some stipulation made about keeping Copse Forge on as a smithy and not converting it into a garage which the boys, egged on by Simon Begg, rather fancy. He asked me if I’d frame a letter that he could sign, putting it to Miss Campion –’

‘Darling, I have told Mr Alleyn we’re in love, only not engaged on account I’ve got scruples.’

‘Camilla, darling! Putting it to her that she ought to accept for his ease of spirit, as it were, and for the sake of the late Mrs Elizabeth Campion’s memory.’

‘My mum,’ Camilla said in explanation.

‘And then he went. He proposed, by the way, to leave Copse Forge to his sons and everything else to Camilla.’

‘Would there be much else?’ Alleyn asked, remembering what Dan Andersen had told him. Camilla answered him almost in her uncle’s words. ‘All the Andersens are great ones for putting away. They used to call Grandfather an old jackdaw.’

‘Did you, in fact, frame a draft on those lines?’ Alleyn asked Ralph.

‘No. It was only two days ago. I was a bit worried about the whole thing.’

‘Sweetest Ralph, why didn’t you ask me?’

‘Darling (a) because you’d refused to see me at all and (b) because it would have been grossly unprofessional.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Camilla.

‘But you already knew, of course,’ Alleyn pointed out, ‘that your grandfather was considering this step?’

‘I told you. We had a row about it.’

‘And you didn’t know he’d gone to Biddlefast on Tuesday?’

‘No,’ she said, ‘I didn’t go down to the forge on Tuesday. I didn’t know.’

‘All right,’ Alleyn said and got up. ‘Now I want to have a word or two with your young man, if I’m allowed to call him that. There’s no real reason why you should leave us, except that I seem to get rather less than two-fifths of his attention while you are anywhere within hail.’ He walked to the door and opened it. ‘If you see Inspector Fox and Dr Otterly,’ he said, ‘would you be very kind and ask them to come back?’

Camilla rose and walked beautifully to the door.

‘Don’t you want to discover Ralph’s major preoccupation?’ she asked and fluttered her eyelashes.

‘It declares itself abundantly. Run along and render love’s awakening. Or don’t you have that one at your drama school?’

‘How did you know I went to drama school?’

‘I can’t imagine. Star quality, or something.’

‘What a heavenly remark!’ she said.

He looked at Camilla. There she was; loving, beloved, full of the positivism of youth, immensely vulnerable, immensely resilient. ‘Get along with you,’ he said. No more than a passing awareness of something beyond her field of observation seemed to visit Camilla. For a moment she looked puzzled. ‘Stick to your own preoccupation,’ Alleyn advised her, and gently propelled her out of the room.

Fox and Dr Otterly appeared at the far end of the passage. They stood aside for Camilla who, with great charm, said: ‘Please, I was to say you’re wanted.’

She passed them. Dr Otterly gave her an amiable buffet. ‘All right, Cordelia?’ he asked. She smiled brilliantly at him. ‘As well as can be expected, thank you,’ said Camilla.

When they had rejoined Alleyn, Dr Otterly said: ‘An infallible sign of old age is a growing inability to understand the toughness of the young. I mean toughness in the nicest sense,’ he added, catching sight of Ralph.

‘Camilla,’ Ralph said, ‘is quite fantastically sensitive.’

‘My dear chap, no doubt. She is a perfectly enchanting girl in every possible respect. What I’m talking about is a purely physiological matter. Her perfectly enchanting little inside mechanisms react youthfully to shock. My old machine is in a different case. That’s all, I assure you.’

Ralph thought to himself how unamusing old people were when they generalized about youth. ‘Do you still want me, sir?’ he asked Alleyn.

‘Please. I want your second-to-second account of the Dance of the Five Sons. Fox will take notes and Dr Otterly will tell us afterwards whether your account tallies with his own impressions.’

‘I see,’ Ralph said, and looked sharply at Dr Otterly.

Alleyn led him along the now familiar train of events and at no point did his account differ from the others. He was able to elaborate a little. When the Guiser ducked down after the mock beheading, Ralph was quite close to him. He saw the old man stoop, squat and then ease himself cautiously down into the depression. ‘There was nothing wrong with him,’ Ralph said. ‘He saw me and made a signal with his hand and I made an answering one, and then went off to take up the collection. He’d planned to lie in the hollow because he thought he would be out of sight there.’

‘Was anybody else as close to him as you were?’

‘Yes, “Crack” – Begg, you know. He was my opposite number just before the breaking of the knot. And after that he stood behind the dolmen for a bit and –‘ Ralph stopped.

‘Yes?’

‘It’s just that – no, really, it’s nothing.’

‘May I butt in?’ Dr Otterly said quickly from the fireside. ‘I think perhaps I know what Ralph is thinking. When we rehearsed, “Crack” and the Betty – Ralph – stood one on each side of the dolmen and then while Ralph took up the collection, “Crack” was meant to cavort round the edge of the crowd, repeating his girl-scaring act. He didn’t do that last night. Did he, Ralph?’

‘I don’t think so,’ Ralph said, and looked very disturbed. ‘I don’t, of course, know which way your mind’s working, but the best thing we can do is to say that, wearing the harness he does, it’d be quite impossible for Begg to do – well, to do what must have been done. Wouldn’t it, Dr Otterly?’

‘Impossible. He can’t so much as see his own hands. They’re under the canvas body of the horse. Moreover, I was watching him and he stood quite still.’

‘When did he move?’

‘When Ralph stole Ernie Andersen’s sword. Begg squeaked like a neighing filly and jogged out by the rear exit.’

‘Was it in order for him to go off then?’

‘Could be,’ Ralph said. ‘The whole of that part of the show’s an improvisation. Begg probably thought Ernie’s and my bit of fooling would do well enough for him to take time off. That harness is damned uncomfortable. Mine’s bad enough.’

‘You, yourself, went out through the back exit a little later, didn’t you?’

‘That’s right,’ Ralph agreed very readily. ‘Ernie chased me, you know, and I hid. In full view of the audience. He went charging off by the back exit, hunting me. I thought to myself, Ernie being Ernie, that the joke had probably gone far enough, so I went out, too, to find him.’

‘What did you find, out there? Behind the wall?’

‘What you’d expect. “Crack” squatting there like a great clucky hen. Ernie looking absolutely furious. I gave him back his sword and he said –’ Ralph scratched his head.

‘What did he say?’

‘I think he said something about it being too late to be any use. He was pretty bloody-minded. I suppose it was rather a mistake to bait him but it went down well with the audience.’

‘Did Begg say anything?’

‘Yes. From inside “Crack”. He said Ernie was a bit rattled and it’d be a good idea if I left him alone. I could see that for myself, so I went off round the outside wall and came through the archway by the house. Dan finished his solo. The Sons began their last dance. Ernie came back with his sword and “Crack” followed him.’

‘Where to?’

‘Just up at the back somewhere, I fancy. Behind the dancers.’

‘And you, yourself? Did you go anywhere near the dolmen on your return?’

Ralph looked again at Dr Otterly and seemed to be undecided. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said. ‘I don’t really remember.’

‘Do you remember, Dr Otterly?’

‘I think,’ Otterly said quietly, ‘that Ralph did make a round trip during the dance. I suppose that would bring him fairly close to the stone.’

‘Behind it?’

‘Yes, behind it.’

Ralph said: ‘I remember now. Damn’ silly of me. Yes, I did a trip round.’

‘Did you notice the Guiser lying in the hollow?’

Ralph lit himself a cigarette and looked at the tip. He said: ‘I don’t remember.’

‘That’s a pity.’

‘Actually, at the time, I was thinking of something quite different.’

‘Yes?’

‘Yes. I’d caught sight of Camilla,’ said Ralph simply.

‘Where was she?’

‘At the side and towards the back. The left side, as you faced the dancing arena. OP, she calls it.’

‘By herself?’

‘Yes, then.’

‘But not earlier? Before she ran away from “Crack”?’

‘No.’ Ralph’s face slowly flooded to a deep crimson. ‘At least, I don’t think so.’

‘Of course she wasn’t,’ Dr Otterly said in some surprise. ‘She came up with the party from this pub. I remember thinking what a picture the two girls made, standing there together in the torchlight.’

‘The two girls?’

‘Camilla was there with Trixie and her father.’

‘Was she?’ Alleyn asked Ralph.

‘I – ah – I – yes, I believe she was.’

‘Mr Stayne,’ Alleyn said, ‘you will think my next question impertinent and you may refuse to answer it. Miss Campion has been very frank about your friendship. She has told me that you are fond of each other but that, because of her mother’s marriage and her own background, in its relation to yours, she feels an engagement would be a mistake.’

‘Which is most utter and besotted bilge,’ Ralph said hotly. ‘Good God, what age does she think she’s living in! Who the hell cares if her mum was a blacksmith’s daughter?’

‘Perhaps she does.’

‘I never heard such a farrago of unbridled snobbism.’

‘All right. I dare say not. You said, just now, I think, that Miss Campion had refused to see you. Does that mean you haven’t spoken to each other since you’ve been in South Mardian?’

‘I really fail to understand –‘

‘I’m sure you don’t. See here, now. Here’s an old man with his head off, lying on the ground behind a sacrificial stone. Go back a bit in time. Here are eight men, including the old man, who performed a sort of playdance as old as sin. Eight men,’ Alleyn repeated and vexedly rubbed his nose. ‘Why do I keep wanting to say “nine”. Never mind. On the face of it, the old man never leaves the arena or dance floor or stage or whatever the hell you like to call it. On the face of it, nobody offered him any violence. He dances in full view. He has his head cut off in pantomime and in what for want of a better word, we must call fun. But it isn’t really cut off. You exchanged signals with him after the fun so we know it isn’t. He hides in a low depression. Eight minutes later, when he’s meant to resurrect and doesn’t, he is found to be genuinely decapitated. That’s the story everybody gives us. Now, as a reasonably intelligent chap and a solicitor into the bargain, don’t you think that we want to know every damn’ thing we can find out about these eight men and anybody connected with them?’

‘You mean – just empirically. Hoping something will emerge?’

‘Exactly. You know very well that where nothing apropos does emerge, nothing will be made public.’

‘Oh, no, no, no,’ Ralph ejaculated irritably. ‘I suppose I’m being tiresome. What was this blasted question? Have I spoken to Camilla since we both came to South Mardian? All right, I have. After church on Sunday. She’d asked me not to, but I did because the sight of her in church was too much for me.’

‘That was your only reason?’

‘She was upset. She’d come across Ernie howling over a dead dog in the copse.’

‘Bless my soul!’ Alleyn ejaculated. ‘What next in South Mardian? Was the dog called Keeper?’

Ralph grinned. ‘I suppose it is all a bit Brontë. The Guiser had shot it because he said it wasn’t healthy, which was no more than God’s truth. But Ernie cut up uncommonly rough and it upset Camilla.’

‘Where did you meet her?’

‘Near the forge. Coming out of the copse.’

‘Did you see the Guiser on this occasion?’

After a very long pause, Ralph said: ‘Yes. He came up.’

‘Did he realize that you wanted to marry his granddaughter?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what was his reaction?’

Ralph said: ‘Unfavourable.’

‘Did he hold the same views that she does?’

‘More or less.’

‘You discussed it there and then?’

‘He sent Camilla away first.’

‘Will you tell me exactly all that was said?’

‘No. It was nothing to do with his death. Our conversation was entirely private.’

Fox contemplated the point of his pencil and Dr Otterly cleared his throat.

‘Tell me,’ Alleyn said abruptly, ‘this thing you wear as the Betty – it’s a kind of stone age crinoline to look at, isn’t it?’

Ralph said nothing.

‘Am I dreaming it, or did someone tell me that it’s sometimes used as a sort of extinguisher? Popped over a girl so that she can be carried off unseen? Origin,’ he suggested facetiously, ‘of the phrase “undercover girl”? Or “undercover man”, of course.’

Ralph said quickly and easily: ‘They used to get up to some such capers, I believe, but I can’t see how they managed to carry anybody away. My arms are outside the skirt thing, you know.’

‘I thought I noticed openings at the sides.’

‘Well – yes. But with the struggle that would go on –’

‘Perhaps,’ Alleyn said, ‘the victim didn’t struggle.’

The door opened and Trixie staggered in with two great buckets of coal.

‘Axcuse me, sir,’ she said. ‘You-all must be starved with cold. Boy’s never handy when wanted.’

Ralph had made a movement towards her as if to take her load, but had checked awkwardly.

Alleyn said: ‘That’s much too heavy for you. Give them to me.’

‘Let be, sir,’ she said, ‘no need.’

She was too quick for him. She set one bucket on the hearth and, with a sturdy economy of movement, shot half the contents of the other on the fire. The knot of reddish hair shone on the nape of her neck. Alleyn was reminded of a Brueghel peasant. She straightened herself easily and turned. Her face, blunt and acquiescent, held, he thought, its own secrets and, in its mode, was attractive.

She glanced at Ralph and her mouth widened.

‘You don’t look too clever yourself, then, Mr Ralph,’ she said. ‘Last night’s ghastly business has overset us all, I reckon.’

‘I’m all right,’ Ralph muttered.

‘Will there be anything, sir?’ Trixie asked Alleyn pleasantly.

‘Nothing at the moment, thank you. Later on in the day some time, when you’re not too busy, I might ask for two words with you.’

‘Just ax,’ she said. ‘I’m willing if wanted.’

She smiled quite broadly at Ralph Stayne. ‘Bean’t I, Mr Ralph?’ she asked placidly and went away, swinging her empty bucket.

‘Oh, God!’ Ralph burst out, and, before any of them could speak, he was gone, slamming the door behind him.

‘Shall I?’ Fox said and got to his feet.

‘Let him be.’

They heard an outer door slam.

‘Well!’ Dr Otterly exclaimed with mild concern, ‘I must say I’d never thought of that!’

‘And nor, you may depend upon it,’ Alleyn said, ‘has Camilla.’