Читать книгу Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 4: A Surfeit of Lampreys, Death and the Dancing Footman, Colour Scheme - Ngaio Marsh, Stella Duffy - Страница 42

‘Open the window again, Br’er Fox, if you please,’ said Alleyn. ‘Let’s get some air into the room. That was a singularly distasteful scene.’

‘I suppose you know what you were both talking about?’ said Dr Curtis, ‘but I’m damned if I did.’

‘What’s your opinion of her, Curtis? No sign of epilepsy, was there?’

‘None that I could see. Plain hysteria. That doesn’t say there’s nothing wrong mentally, of course.’

‘No. What about it? Think she’s ga-ga?’

‘Ah,’ said Dr Curtis, ‘you’re wondering if she’s the answer to the detective’s prayer for a nice homicidal lunatic.’

‘Well,’ said Alleyn, ‘what about it? Is she?’

Dr Curtis pulled down his upper lip. ‘Well, my dear chap, you know how tricky it is. She seemed to speak very wildly, of course, although I must say you appeared to take an intelligent hand in the conversation.’

‘What was she getting at, Mr Alleyn?’ asked Fox. ‘All that stuff about having a powerful protector and it seemed to be one of the twins. You don’t seriously suggest anybody impersonated one of those young fellows?’

‘I don’t, Fox, but she does.’

‘Then she must be dotty. What was the big idea, anyway?’

‘It’s so damned preposterous that I hardly dare to think I’m on the right track. However, I’ll tell you what I imagine was the burden of her song.’

Dr Kantripp returned. ‘The nurse and the maid are getting her to bed,’ he said. ‘The maid will come along as soon as she can.’

‘Right. Sit down, Dr Kantripp, and tell us what you know of this lady’s history.’

‘Very little,’ said Dr Kantripp instantly. ‘I never saw her until tonight. As far as I can gather from Lady Charles and the others, there’s a history of eccentricity. You’d better ask them about that.’

‘Yes, of course,’ agreed Alleyn with his air of polite apology, ‘but I thought that first of all I would just ask you. I suppose they didn’t happen to mention whether the lady was interested in black magic?’

‘Now, how the devil,’ asked Dr Kantripp, ‘did you get hold of that?’

‘I was just going to explain. You heard her saying something about Marguerite Loundman of Gebweiler and Anna Ruffa of Douzy?’

‘I’ve got them down in these notes,’ said Fox, ‘though I didn’t know how to spell them.’

‘Well, unless my extremely unreliable memory is letting me down, those two were a brace of medieval witches.’

‘Oh, Lor’,’ said Fox disgustedly.

‘Go on,’ said Curtis.

‘Taking them in conjunction with her suggestions that she had a powerful protector, that her husband had been punished, that she had warned him of his peril, that she recognized her lift conductor by a mark on his neck, that this was a sign from her Little Master, together with all the rest of her mumbo-jumbo, I came to the preposterous conclusion that Lady Wutherwood thinks her husband was destroyed by a demon.’

‘Oh, no, really!’ cried Dr Curtis. ‘It’s a little too much.’

‘Have you ever come across a book called Compendium Maleficorum?’

‘I have not. Why?’

‘I don’t mind betting Lady Wutherwood’s got a copy.’

‘You think she’s been mucking about with some sort of occultism and gone so far that she actually has hallucinations or illusions.’

‘Is it so very unusual among women of her age, restless by temperament, to become hag-ridden by the bogus-occult?’

‘You come across some funny things,’ said Fox, ‘in these fortune-telling cases. I suppose you might say this is only going a step further.’

‘That’s it, Br’er Fox. If it’s genuine.’

‘You surely don’t believe –’ began Dr Kantripp.

‘Of course not. I mean, if Lady Wutherwood’s apparent condition is genuine, she’s just another gullible woman with a taste for the occult. But is her condition genuine?’ Alleyn looked at Dr Kantripp. ‘What do you say?’

‘I should like to see more of her and hear more of her history before venturing on an opinion,’ said Dr Kantripp uneasily.

‘And also,’ murmured Alleyn, ‘you would like, I fancy, to consult with the family.’

‘My dear Alleyn!’

‘I’m not trying to be offensive. Please don’t think that. But as well as being the Lampreys’ family doctor you are, aren’t you, personally rather attached to them?’

‘I think everybody who gets involved with the Lampreys ends by falling for them,’ said Dr Kantripp. ‘They’ve got something. Charm, I suppose. You’ll fall for it yourself if you see much of them.’

‘Shall I?’ asked Alleyn vaguely. ‘That conjures up a lamentable picture, doesn’t it? The investigating officer who fell to doting on his suspects. Now, look here. You are two eminent medical gents. I should be extremely grateful for your opinion on the lady who has just made such a very dramatic exit. Without prejudice and all that – which way would you bet? Was the lady shamming or was she not? Come now, it won’t be used against you. Give me a snap judgement, do.’

‘Well,’ said Dr Curtis, ‘on sight I – it’s completely unorthodox to say so, of course – but on sight and signs I incline to think she was not shamming. There was no change in her eye. The characteristic look persisted. And when you turned away there were no sharp glances to see how you were taking it. If she was shamming it was a well-sustained effort.’

‘I thought so,’ said Alleyn. ‘There was no “see how mad I am” stuff. And there was, didn’t you think, that uncanny thread of logic that one finds in the mentally unsound? But of course she may be as eccentric as a rabbit on skates and not come within the meaning of the act. “It is quite impossible,” as Mr Taylor says, “to define the term insanity with any precision.”’

‘In this case,’ said Kantripp, ‘you needn’t try. It doesn’t arise.’

‘If,’ said Fox in his stolid way, ‘she’d killed her husband?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Alleyn, ‘if she had done that.’

Dr Kantripp put his hands in his trouser pockets, took them out again, and walked restlessly round the room.

‘If she had done that,’ Alleyn repeated, ‘the question of her sanity or degree of insanity would be of the very first importance.’

‘Yes, yes, that’s obvious. As a matter of fact I understand that she has paid visits to some sort of nursing home. You can find out where and what it is, no doubt. Frid seemed to suggest there had been a bit of mental trouble at some time but – see here, Alleyn, do you suspect her of murder? Have you any reason to suppose there’s a motive?’

‘No more reason, perhaps, than I have for suspecting motive with the Lampreys.’

‘But, damn it all,’ Dr Kantripp burst out, ‘you can’t possibly think any one of those delightful lunatics is capable – to my mind it’s absolutely grotesque to imagine for one moment – I mean, look at them.’

‘Look at the field if it comes to that,’ said Alleyn. ‘The Lampreys, Lady Katherine Lobe. Lady Wutherwood –’

‘And the servants.’

‘And the servants. The nurse, the butler, the cook, and the housemaids belonging to this flat; and the chauffeur and lady’s maid belonging to the Wutherwoods. Oh, and a bailiff’s man at present in possession here.’

‘Good Lord!’

‘Yes. I expect when Messrs Lane and Eagle learn in the morning’s paper that Lord Charles has come in for the peerage, they will slacken the pressure. But in the meantime there is Mr Grumball, the bum-bailiff, to be added to the list of possibles. A fanciful speculation might suggest that Mr Grumball fell for the Lamprey charm and, moved by remorse and distaste for his job, altruistically decided to murder Lord Wutherwood; or, if you like, that Mr Grumball dispatched Lord Wutherwood as an indirect but certain method of collecting the debt.’

‘I’d believe that,’ said Dr Kantripp rather defiantly, ‘before I’d believe one of the Lampreys did it.’

‘How would you describe the Lampreys?’ asked Alleyn abruptly.

‘You’ve met them.’

‘I know. But to someone who hadn’t met them. Suppose you had to find a string of appropriate adjectives for the Lampreys, what would they be? Charming, of course. What else?’

‘What the devil does it matter how I describe them?’

‘I should like to hear, however.’

‘Good Lord! Well, amusing, and ah – well ah –’

‘Upright?’ suggested Alleyn. ‘Business-like? Scrupulous? Reliable? Any of those jump to the mind?’

‘They’re kind,’ said Dr Kantripp turning rather red. ‘They’re extremely good-natured. They wouldn’t hurt a fly.’

‘Never do anybody any sort of injury?’

‘Never, wittingly, I’m sure.’

‘Scrupulous over money matters?’

‘Very generous. Look here, Alleyn, I know what you’re driving at but it’s no good. They may be in a hole. They may be a bit vague about accounts and expenses and what-not. I don’t say they’re not. Since we’re being so amazingly unprofessional, I don’t mind confessing I wish they did tidy up their bills a bit more regularly. The whole thing is that while they’ve got money they blue it and when they haven’t they can’t haul in their sails. But it’s only because they’re vague. It never occurs to them that other people don’t live in the same way. They don’t really think that money is of any importance. They would never in this world do anything desperate to get money. They couldn’t. It’s the way they are bred, I suppose.’

‘Oh, no,’ said Alleyn. ‘I don’t agree with that. Business-consciences aren’t entirely bounded by the little fences of class, are they. However, that is beside the point.’

‘Well, look here,’ said Dr Kantripp hastily, ‘I really must run along. Curtis has got my address if you should want me. I asked Lady Wutherwood about her own doctor and she said she hadn’t one. Hadn’t had a consultation for three years. I’ve got his man, if it’s relevant. Cairnstock, the brain man we called in, you know, has left a report. He couldn’t wait to see you, but Mr Fox was here.’

‘Yes, Fox got the report.’

‘Right. Well, goodbye, Alleyn.’ Dr Kantripp offered his hand. ‘I – ah – I hope you will find – ah –’

‘Somebody,’ suggested Alleyn with a faint twinkle, ‘that nobody is at all fond of?’

‘Oh well, dammit, it’s a nasty business, isn’t it?’ said Dr Kantripp who presented the agreeable paradox of a man in a tearing hurry, unable to take his departure when there was nothing to stop him. ‘She’ll do all right. Lady W., I mean. I’ve given her a sedative and so on.’ He went to the door and executed a little shuffle. ‘Ah – Curtis will tell you we noticed – ah – a slight condition of the – ah – the eyes.’

‘Pin-point pupils?’ asked Alleyn.

‘Oh, you saw that, did you? Well – ah – Goodbye. Goodbye, Fox. Goodbye.’

‘Very awkward for him,’ said Alleyn, after the door had shut.