Читать книгу Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 5: Died in the Wool, Final Curtain, Swing Brother Swing - Ngaio Marsh, Stella Duffy - Страница 17

I

The cook being insensible and, according to Fabian, certain to remain so for many hours, Alleyn suffered him to be moved and concentrated on Albert Black.

There had been a certain spaciousness about the cook but Albert, he decided, was an abominable specimen. He disseminated meanness and low cunning. He was drunk enough to be truculent and sober enough to look after himself. The only method, Alleyn decided, was that of intimidation. He and Fabian withdrew with Albert into the annexe.

‘Have you ever been mixed up in a murder charge before?’ Alleyn began, with the nearest approach to police station truculence of which he was capable.

‘I’m not mixed up in one now,’ said Albert, showing the whites of his eyes. ‘Choose your words.’

‘You’re withholding information in a homicidal investigation, aren’t you? D’you know what that means?’

‘Here!’ said Albert. ‘You can’t swing that across me.’

‘You’ll be lucky if you don’t get a pair of bracelets swung across you. Haven’t you been in trouble before?’ Albert looked at him indignantly. ‘Come on, now,’ Alleyn persisted. ‘How about a charge of theft?’

‘Me?’ said Albert. ‘Me, with a clean sheet all the years I bin ’ere! Accusing me of stealing! ’Ow dare yer?’

‘What about Mr Rubrick’s whisky? Come on, Black, you’d better make a clean breast of it.’

Albert looked at the piano. His dirty fingers pulled at his underlip. He moved closer to Alleyn and peered into his face. ‘It’s methylated spirits they stink of,’ Alleyn thought.

‘Got a fag on yer?’ Albert said ingratiatingly and grasped him by the coat.

Alleyn freed himself, took out his case and offered it, open, to Albert.

‘You’re a pal,’ said Albert and took the case. He helped himself fumblingly to six cigarettes and put them in his pocket. He looked closely at the case. ‘Posh,’ he said. ‘Not gold, though, d’you reckon, Mr Losse?’

‘Well,’ Alleyn said. ‘How about this whisky?’

Albert jerked his head at the piano. ‘So he got chatty after all, did he?’ he said. ‘The little bastard. OK. That lets me out.’ He again grasped Alleyn by the coat with one hand and with the other pointed behind him at the piano. ‘What a pal,’ he said. ‘Comes the holy Jo over a drop of Johnny Walker and the next night he’s fixing the big job.’

‘What the hell are you talking about!’ Fabian said violently.

‘Can – you – tell – me,’ Albert said, swaying and clinging to Alleyn, ‘how a little bastard like that can be playing the ruddy piano and at the same time run into me round the corner of the wool-shed? There’s a mystery for you, if you like.’

Fabian took a step forward. ‘Be quiet, Losse,’ said Alleyn.

‘It’s a very funny thing,’ Albert continued, ‘how an individual can be in two places at oncst. And he knew he oughtn’t to be there, the ruddy little twister. Because all the time I sees him by the wool-shed he keeps on thumping that blasted pianna. Now then!’

‘Very strange,’ said Alleyn.

‘Isn’t it. I knew you’d say that.’

‘Why haven’t you talked about this before?’

Albert freed himself, spat, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Bargain’s a bargain, isn’t it? Fair dos. Wait till I get me hands on the little twister. Put me away, has he? Good oh! And what does he get? Anywhere else he’d swing for it.’

‘Did you hear Mrs Rubrick speaking in the wool-shed?’

‘How could she speak when he’d fixed her? That was earlier: “Ladies and gentlemen.” Gawd, what a go!’

‘Where was he?’

‘Alleyn, for God’s sake –’ Fabian began, and Alleyn turned on him. ‘If you can’t be quiet, Losse, you’ll have to clear out. Now, Black, where was Cliff?’

‘Aren’t I telling you? Coming out of the shed.’

Alleyn looked through the annexe window. He saw a rough track running downhill, past the yards, past a side road to the wool-shed, down to a narrow water race above the gate that Florence Rubrick came through when she left the lavender path and struck uphill to the wool-shed.

‘Was it then that you asked him to say nothing about the previous night when he caught you stealing the whisky?’ Alleyn held his breath. It was a long shot and almost in the dark.

‘Not then,’ said Albert.

‘Did you speak to him?’

‘Not then.’

‘Had you already spoken about the whisky?’

‘I’m not saying anything about that. I’m telling you what he done.’

‘And I’m telling you what you did. That was the bargain, wasn’t it? He found you making away with the bottles. He ordered you off and was caught trying to put them back. He didn’t give you away. Later, when the murder came out and the police investigation started, you struck your bargain. If Cliff said nothing about the whisky, you’d say nothing about seeing him come out of the shed?’

Albert was considerably sobered. He looked furtively from Alleyn to Fabian. ‘I got to protect myself,’ he said. ‘Asking a bloke to put himself away.’

‘Very good. You’d rather I tell him you’ve blown the gaff and get the whole story from him. The police will be interested to know you’ve withheld important information.’

‘All right, all right,’ said Albert shrilly. ‘Have it your own way, you blasted cow,’ and burst into tears.

II

Fabian and Alleyn groped their way down the hill in silence. They turned off to the wool-shed, where Alleyn paused and looked at the sacking-covered door. Fabian watched him miserably.

‘It must have been in about this light,’ Alleyn said. ‘Just after dark.’

‘You can’t do it!’ Fabian said. ‘You can’t believe a drunken sneak-thief’s story. I know young Cliff. He’s a good chap. You’ve talked to him. You can’t believe it.’

‘A year ago,’ Alleyn said, ‘he was an over-emotionalized, slightly hysterical and extremely unhappy adolescent.’

‘I don’t give a damn! Oh, God!’ Fabian muttered, ‘why the hell did I start this?’

‘I did warn you,’ Alleyn said with something like compassion in his voice.

‘It’s impossible, I swear – I formally swear to you that the piano never stopped for more than a few seconds. You know what it’s like on a still night. The cessation of a noise like that hits your ears. Albie was probably half-tight. Good Lord, he said himself that the piano went on all the time. Of course it wasn’t Cliff that he saw. I’m amazed that you pay the smallest attention to his meanderings.’ Fabian paused. ‘If he saw any one,’ he added, and his voice changed, ‘I admit that it was probably the murderer. It wasn’t Cliff. You yourself pointed out that it was almost dark.’

‘Then why did Cliff refuse to talk about the whisky?’

‘Schoolboy honour. He’d struck up a friendship with the wretched creature.’

‘Yes,’ said Alleyn. ‘That’s tenable.’

‘Then why don’t you accept it?’

‘My dear chap, I’ll accept it if it fits. See here. I want you to do two things for me. The first is easy. When you go indoors, help me to get a toll call through in privacy. Will you?’

‘Of course.’

‘The second is troublesome. You know the pens inside the shearing-shed? With the slatted floor where the unshorn sheep are huddled together?’

‘Well?’

‘You’ve finished crutching today, haven’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m afraid I want to take that slatted floor up.’

Fabian stared at him. ‘Why on earth?’

‘There may be something underneath.’

‘There are the sheep droppings of thirty years underneath.’

‘So I feared. Those of the last year are all that concern me. I’ll want a sieve and a spade and if you can lay your hands on a pair of rejected overalls, I’d be grateful.’

Fabian looked at Alleyn’s hands. ‘And gloves if it could be managed,’ Alleyn said. ‘I’m very sorry about taking up the floor. The police department will pay the damage, of course. It may only be one section – the one nearest the press. I think you might warn the others when we go in.’

‘May I ask what you hope to find?’

‘A light that failed,’ said Alleyn.

‘Am I supposed to understand that?’

‘I don’t see why you shouldn’t.’ They had reached the gate into the lavender walk. Alleyn turned and looked back at the track. He could see the open door into the annexe where they had left Albie Black weeping off the combined effects of confession, betrayal and the hangover from wood alcohol.

‘Was it methylated spirit they’d been drinking?’ he asked. ‘He and the cook?’

‘I wouldn’t put it past them. Or Hokanui.’

‘What’s that?’

‘The local equivalent of potheen.’

‘Why do you keep him?’

‘He doesn’t break out very often. We can’t pick our men in war-time.’

‘I’d love to lock him up,’ Alleyn said. ‘He stinks. He’s a toad.’

‘Then why do you listen to him?’

‘Do you suppose policemen only take statements from people they fall in love with? Come in. I want to get that call through before the bureau shuts.’

They found the members of the household assembled in the pleasant colonial-Victorian drawing-room, overlooking the lawn on the wool-shed side of the house.

‘We rather felt we couldn’t face the study again,’ Ursula said. ‘After last night, you know. We felt it could do with an airing. And I’m going to bed at eight. If Mr Alleyn lets me, of course. Does every one realize we got exactly five and a half hours of sleep last night?’

‘I should certainly refer that Flossie’s portrait did not preside over another session,’ Fabian agreed. ‘If there was to be another session, of course. Having never looked at it for three years I’ve suddenly become exquisitely self-conscious in its presence. I suppose, Ursy darling, you wouldn’t care to have it in your room?’

‘If that’s meant to be a joke, Fabian,’ said Ursula, ‘I’m not joining in it.’

‘You’re very touchy. Mr Alleyn is going to dash off a monograph on one of the less delicious aspects of the merino sheep, Douglas. We are to take up the floor of the wool-shed pens.’

Alleyn, standing in the doorway, watched the group round the fire. Mrs Aceworthy wore her almost habitual expression of half-affronted gentility. Terence Lynne, flashing the needles in her scarlet knitting, stared at him, and drew her thin brows together. Ursula Harme, arrested in the duelling mood she kept for Fabian, paused, her lips parted. Douglas dropped his newspaper and began his usual indignant expostulation: ‘What in Heaven’s name are you talking about, Fab? Good Lord –’

‘Yes, Douglas, my dear,’ said Fabian, ‘we know how agitating you find your present condition of perpetual astonishment, but there it is. Up with the slats and down goes poor Mr Alleyn.’

Douglas retired angrily behind his newspaper. ‘The whole thing’s a farce,’ he muttered obscurely. ‘I always said so.’ He crackled his paper. ‘Who’s going to do it?’

‘If you’ll trust me,’ said Alleyn, ‘I will.’

‘I don’t envy you your job, sir.’

‘The policeman’s lot,’ Alleyn said lightly.

‘I’ll tell the men to do it,’ Douglas grunted ungraciously from behind his paper. He peeped round the corner of it at Alleyn. The solitary, rather prominent eye he displayed was reminiscent of Florence Rubrick’s in her portrait. ‘I’ll give you a hand, if you like,’ he added.

‘That’s the spirit that forged the empire,’ said Fabian. ‘Good old Duggie.’

‘If you’ll excuse me,’ Alleyn said and moved into the hall. Fabian joined him there.

‘The telephone’s switched through to the study,’ he said. ‘I promise not to eavesdrop.’ He paused reflectively. ‘Eavesdrop!’ he muttered. ‘What a curious word! To drop from eaves. Reminds one of the swallows and, by a not too extravagant flight of fancy, of your job for the morrow. Give one long ring and the exchange at the Pass may feel moved to answer you.’

When Alleyn lifted the receiver it was to cut in on a cross-plateau conversation. A voice angrily admonished him: ‘Working!’ He hung up and waited. He could hear Fabian whistling in the hall. The telephone gave a brief tinkle and he tried again, this time with success. The operator at the Pass came through. Alleyn asked for a police station two hundred miles away, where he hoped Sub-Inspector Jackson might possibly be on duty. ‘I’ll call you,’ said the operator coldly. ‘This is a police call,’ said Alleyn, ‘I’ll hold the line.’ ‘Aren’t you Mount Moon?’ said the operator sharply. ‘Yes, and it’s still a police call, if you’ll believe me.’ ‘Not in trouble up there, are you, Mr Losse?’ ‘I’m as happy as a lark,’ said Alleyn, ‘but in a bit of a hurry.’ ‘Hold the line,’ giggled the operator. A vast buzzing set up in his ear, threaded with ghost voices. ‘That’ll be good-oh, then, Bob.’ ‘Eh?’ ‘I said, that’ll be jake.’ The operator’s voice cut in omnipotently. ‘There you are, Mr Losse. They’re waiting.’

Sub-Inspector Jackson was not there but PC Wetherbridge, who had been detailed to the case in town, answered the telephone and was helpful. ‘The radio programmes for the second week in January, ’42, Mr Alleyn? I think we can do that for you.’

‘For the evening of Thursday the 29th,’ Alleyn said, ‘between eight and nine o’clock. Only stations with good reception in this district.’

‘It may take us a wee while, Mr Alleyn.’

‘Of course. Would you tell the exchange at the Pass to keep itself open and call me back?’

‘That’ll be OK, sir.’

‘And Wetherbridge. I want you to get hold of Mr Jackson. Tell him it’s a very long chance, but I may want to bring someone in to the station. I’d very much like a word with him. I think it would be advisable for him to come up here. He asked me to let him know if there were developments. There are. If you can find him, he might come in on the line when you call me back.’

‘He’s at home, sir. I’ll ring him. I don’t think I’ll have much trouble over the other call.’

The voice faded, and Alleyn caught only the end of the sentence …‘a cobber of mine … all the back numbers … quick as I can make it.’

‘Three minutes, Mr Losse,’ said the operator. ‘Will I extend the call?’

‘Yes – No! All right, Wetherbridge. Splendid. I’ll wait.’

‘Working?’ demanded a new voice.

‘Like a black,’ said Alleyn crossly, and hung up.

He found Fabian sitting on the bottom step of the stairs, a cigarette in his mouth. He hummed a dreary little air to himself.

‘Get through?’ he asked.

‘They’re going to call me back.’

‘If you’re very very lucky. It’ll be some considerable time, at the best, if I know Toll. I’m going up to the workroom. Would you care to join me? You can hear the telephone from there.’

‘Right.’ Alleyn felt in his breast pocket. ‘Damn!’ he said.

‘What’s up?’

‘My cigarette case.’

‘Did you leave it in the drawing-room?’

‘I don’t think so.’ He returned to the drawing-room. Its four occupants who seemed to be about to go to bed, broke off what appeared to be a lively discussion and watched him. The case was not there. Douglas hunted about politely, and Mrs Aceworthy clucked. While they were at this employment there was a tap on the door and Cliff came in with a rolled periodical in his hand.

‘Yes?’ said Douglas.

‘Dad asked me to bring this in,’ said Cliff. ‘It came up with our mail by mistake. He says he’s sorry.’

‘Thank you, Cliff,’ they murmured. He shuffled his feet and said awkwardly, ‘Goodnight, then.’

‘Goodnight, Cliff,’ they said, and he went out.

‘Oh Lord!’ Alleyn said. ‘I’ve remembered. I left it in the annexe. I’ll run up there and fetch it.’

He saw Terence Lynne’s hands check at their work.

‘Shall I dodge up and get it?’ Douglas offered.

‘Not a bit of it, thanks, Grace. I’ll do my own tedious job. I’m sorry to have disturbed you. I’ll get a coat and run up there.’

He returned to the hall. Cliff was in the passage leading to the kitchen. Fabian had gone. Alleyn ran upstairs. A flashlight bobbed in the long passage and came to rest on the workroom door. Fabian’s hand reached out to the lock. ‘Hi!’ Alleyn called down the passage, ‘you had it.’ The light shone in his eyes.

‘What?’

‘My cigarette case. You took it away from the unspeakable Albert.’

‘Oh, help! I put it on the piano. It’ll be all right.’

‘I think I’ll get it. It’s rather special. Troy – my wife – gave it to me.’

‘I’ll get it,’ Fabian said.

‘No, you’re going to work. It won’t take me a moment.’

He got his overcoat from his room. When he came out he found Fabian hovering uncertainly on the landing. ‘Look here,’ he said, ‘you’d better let me – I mean –’

The telephone in the study gave two long rings. ‘There’s your call,’ Fabian said. ‘Away with you. Lend me your coat, will you, it’s perishing cold.’

Alleyn threw his coat to him and ran downstairs. As he shut the study door he heard the rest of the party come out of the drawing-room. A moment later the front door banged.

The telephone repeated its double ring.

‘There you are, Mr Losse,’ said the operator. ‘We’ve kept open for you. They’re waiting.’

It was PC Wetherbridge. ‘Message from the Sub-Inspector, sir. He’s left by car and ought to make it in four hours.’

‘Gemini!’

‘I beg pardon, Mr Alleyn?’

‘Great work, Wetherbridge. Hope I haven’t cried Wolf.’

‘I don’t get you too clear, sir. We’ve done that little job for you. I’ve got it noted down here. There are three likely stations.’

‘Good for you,’ said Alleyn warmly.

‘Do you want to write the programmes out, Mr Alleyn?’

‘No, no. Just read them to me.’

Wetherbridge cleared his throat and began: ‘Starting at 7.30, sir, and continuing till nine.’ His voice droned on through a list of items. ‘… Syd Bando and The Rhythm Kids … I got a Big Pink Momma … Garden Notes and Queries … Racing Commentary … News Summary … Half an Hour with the Jitterbugs … Anything there, Mr Alleyn?’

‘Nothing like it so far, but carry on. We’re looking for something a bit highbrow, Wetherbridge.’

‘Old Melodies Made New?’

‘Not quite. Carry on.’

‘There’s only one other station that’s likely to come through clearly, up where you are.’

Alleyn thought: ‘I hope to God we’ve drawn a blank.’

‘Here we go, sir. 7.30, Twenty-first instalment of: “The Vampire”. 7.45, Reading from Old Favourites. 8.5, An Hour with the Masters.’

Alleyn’s hand tightened on the receiver. ‘Yes?’ he said, ‘any details?’

‘There’s a lot of stuff in small print. Wait a jiffy, sir, if you don’t mind. I’m putting on my glasses.’ Alleyn waited. ‘Here we are,’ said Wetherbridge, and two hundred miles away a paper crackled. ‘8.25,’ said Wetherbridge, ‘Polonaise by Chopping but there’s a lot more. Back,’ said Wetherbridge uncertainly, ‘or would it be Bark? The initials are J.S. It’s a pianna solo.’

‘Go on, please.’

‘The Art of Fewje,’ said Wetherbridge. ‘I’d better spell that, Mr Alleyn. F for Freddy, U for Uncle, G for George, U for Uncle, E for Edward. Any good?’

‘Yes.’

‘It seems to have knocked off at 8.57.’

‘Yes.’

‘Last on the list,’ said Wetherbridge. ‘Will that be the article we’re looking for, sir?’

‘I’m afraid so,’ said Alleyn.

III

After they’d rung off he sat on for a minute or two, whistling dolefully. His hand went automatically to the pocket where he kept his cigarette case. It was quite ten minutes since Fabian went out. Perhaps he was waiting in the hall.

But the hall was empty and very still. An oil lamp, turned low, burnt on the table. Alleyn saw that only two candles remained from the nightly muster of six. The drawing-room party had evidently gone to bed. Fabian must be upstairs. Using his torch, Alleyn went quietly up to the landing. Light showed under the doors of the girls’ rooms and, farther down the passage, under Douglas’s. There was none under Fabian’s door. Alleyn moved softly down the passage to the workroom. No light in there. He waited, listening, and then moved back towards the landing. A board creaked under his feet.

‘Hallo!’ called Douglas. ‘That you, Fab?’

‘It’s me,’ said Alleyn quietly.

Douglas’s door opened and he looked out. ‘Well, I wondered who it was,’ he said, eyeing Alleyn dubiously. ‘I mean it seemed funny.’

‘Another night prowler? Up to no good?’

‘Well, I must say you sounded a bit stealthy. Anything you want, sir?’

‘No,’ said Alleyn. ‘Just sleuthing. Go to bed.’

Douglas grinned and withdrew his head. ‘Enjoy yourself,’ Alleyn heard him say cheekily, and the door was shut.

Perhaps Fabian had left the cigarette case in his room and was already asleep. Odd, though, that he didn’t wait.

There was no cigarette case in his room. ‘Blast!’ Alleyn muttered. ‘He can’t find it! The miserable Albert’s pinched it. Blast!’