Читать книгу Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 11: Photo-Finish, Light Thickens, Black Beech and Honeydew - Ngaio Marsh, Stella Duffy - Страница 31

When Alleyn and Dr Carmichael joined Troy in the studio rifts had appeared in the rampart of clouds and at intervals, shafts of sunlight played fitfully across Lake Waihoe and struck up patches of livid green on mountain flanks that had begun to reappear through the mist.

The landing stage was still under turbulent water. No one could have used it. There were now no signs of Les on the mainland.

‘You gave Mr Reece a bit of a shake-up,’ said Dr Carmichael. ‘Do you think he was right when he said the idea had never entered his head?’

‘What, that Marco was Strix? Who can tell? I imagine Marco has been conspicuously zealous in the anti-Strix cause. His reporting an intruder on the Island topped up with his production of the lens cap was highly convincing. Remember how you all plunged about in the undergrowth? I suppose you assisted in the search for nobody, didn’t you?’

‘Blast!’ said Dr Carmichael.

‘Incidentally the cap was a mistake, a fancy touch too many. It’s off a mass-produced camera, probably his own, as it were, official toy and not at all the sort of job that Strix must use to get his results. Perhaps he didn’t want to part with the Strix cap and hadn’t quite got the nerve to produce it or perhaps it hasn’t got a cap.’

‘Why,’ asked Troy, ‘did he embark on all that nonsense about an intruder?’

‘Well, darling, don’t you think because he intended to take a “Strix” photograph of the Sommita – his bonne bouche – and it seemed advisable to plant the idea that a visiting Strix was lurking in the underbrush. But the whole story of the intruder was fishy. The search party was a shocking-awful carry-on but by virtue of sheer numbers someone would have floundered into an intruder if he’d been there.’

‘And you are certain,’ said Dr Carmichael, ‘that he is not your man?’

‘He couldn’t be. He was waiting in the dining room and busy in the hall until the guests left and trotting to and from the launch with an umbrella while they were leaving.’

‘And incidentally in the porch, with me, watching the launch after they had gone. Yes. That’s right,’ agreed Dr Carmichael.

‘Is Mr Reece going to tackle him about Strix?’ Troy asked.

‘Not yet. He says he’s not fully persuaded. He prefers to leave it with me.’

‘And you?’

‘I’m trying to make up my mind. On the whole I think it may be best to settle Strix before the police get here.’

‘Now?’

‘Why not?’

Troy said: ‘Of course he knows you’re on to it. After your breakfast-tray remarks.’

‘He’s got a pretty good idea of it, at least,’ said Alleyn and put his thumb on the bell.

‘Perhaps he won’t come.’

‘I think he will. What’s the alternative? Fling himself into the billowy wave and do a Leander for the mainland?’

‘Shall I disappear?’ offered Dr Carmichael.

‘And I?’ said Troy.

‘Not unless you’d rather. After all, I’m not going to arrest him.’

‘Oh? Not?’ they said.

‘Why would I do that? For being Strix? I’ve no authority. Or do you think we might borrow him for being a public nuisance or perhaps for false pretences? On my information he’s never actually conned anybody. He’s just dressed himself up funny-like and taken unflattering photographs. There’s the forged letter in The Watchman, of course. That might come within the meaning of some act: I’d have to look it up. Oh yes, and makes himself out to be a gentleman’s gent, with forged references, I dare say.’

‘Little beast,’ said Troy. ‘Cruel little pig, tormenting her like that. And everybody thinking it a jolly joke. And the shaming thing is, it was rather funny.’

‘That’s the worst of ill-doing, isn’t it? It so often has its funny side. Come to think of it, I don’t believe I could have stuck my job out if it wasn’t so. The earliest playwrights knew all about that: their devils more often than not were clowns and their clowns were always cruel. Here we go.’

There had been a tap at the door. It opened and Marco came in.

He was an unattractive shade of yellow but otherwise looked much as usual. He said: ‘You rang, sir?’

‘Yes,’ Alleyn agreed. ‘I rang. I’ve one or two questions to ask you. First, about the photograph you took yesterday afternoon through the window of the concert chamber. Did you put the print in the letter-bag?’

‘I don’t know what you mean, sir.’

‘Yes, you do. You are Strix. You got yourself into your present job with the intention of following up your activities with the camera. Stop me if I’m wrong. But on second thoughts you’re more likely to stop me if I’m right, aren’t you? Did you see the advertisement for a personal servant for Mr Reece in the paper? Did it occur to you that as a member of Mr Reece’s entourage you would be able to learn a lot more about Madame Sommita’s programmes for the day? On some occasion when she was accompanied by Mr Reece or when Mr Reece was not at home and you were not required, you would be able to pop out to a room you kept for the purpose, dress yourself up like a sore thumb, startle her and photograph her with her mouth open looking ridiculous. You would hand the result in to the press and notch up another win. It was an impudently bold decision and it worked. You gave satisfaction as a valet and came here with your employer.’

Marco had assumed an air of casual insolence.

‘Isn’t it marvellous?’ he asked of nobody in particular and shrugged elaborately.

‘You took yesterday’s photograph with the intention of sending it back to The Watchman and through them to the chain of newspapers with whom you’ve syndicated your productions. I know you did this. Your footprints are underneath the window. I fancy this was to be your final impertinence and that having knocked it off you would have given in your notice, claimed your money, retired to some inconspicuous retreat and written your autobiography.’

‘No comment,’ said Marco.

‘I didn’t really suppose there would be. Do you know where that photograph is now? Do you, Marco?’

‘I don’t know anything about any—ing photograph,’ said Marco, whose Italian accent had become less conspicuous and his English a good deal more idiomatic.

‘It is skewered by a dagger to your victim’s dead body.’

‘My victim! She was not my victim. Not –’ He stopped.

‘Not in the sense of your having murdered her, were you going to say?’

‘Not in any sense. I don’t,’ said Marco, ‘know what you’re talking about.’

‘And I don’t expect there’ll be much trouble about finding your fingerprints on the glossy surface.’

Marco’s hand went to his mouth.

‘Come,’ Alleyn said, ‘don’t you think you’re being unwise? What would you say if I told you your room will be searched?’

‘Nothing!’ said Marco loudly. ‘I would say nothing. You’re welcome to search my room.’

‘Do you carry the camera – is it a Strassman, by the way? – on you? How about searching you?’

‘You have no authority.’

‘That is unfortunately correct. See here, Marco. Just take a look at yourself. I shall tell the police what I believe to be the facts: that you are Strix, that you took the photograph now transfixed over Madame Sommita’s heart, that it probably carries your fingerprints. If it does not, it is no great matter. Faced by police investigation, the newspapers that bought your photographs will identify you.’

‘They’ve never seen me,’ Marco said quickly and then looked as if he could have killed himself.

‘It was all done by correspondence, was it?’

‘They’ve never seen me because I’m not – I’ve never had anything to do with them. You’re putting words in my mouth.’

‘Your Strix activities have come to an end. The woman you tormented is dead, you’ve made a packet and will make more if you write a book. With illustrations. The only thing that is likely to bother you is the question of how the photograph got from your camera to the body. The best thing you can do if you’re not the murderer of Isabella Sommita is help us find out who is. If you refuse, you remain a prime suspect.’

Marco looked from Troy to Dr Carmichael and back to Troy again. It was as if he asked for their advice. Troy turned away to the studio window.

Dr Carmichael said: ‘You’d much better come across, you know. You’ll do yourself no good by holding back.’

There was a long silence.

‘Well,’ said Marco at last and stopped.

‘Well?’ said Alleyn.

‘I’m not admitting anything.’

‘But suppose – ?’ Alleyn prompted.

‘Suppose, for the sake of argument, Strix took the shot you talk about. What would he do with it? He’d post if off to The Watchman at once, wouldn’t he? He’d put it in the mailbox to be taken away in the bag.’

‘Or,’ Alleyn suggested, ‘to avoid Mr Hanley noticing it when he cleared the box he might slip it directly into the mailbag while it was still unlocked and waiting in the study.’

‘He might do that.’

‘Is that what you’d say he did?’

‘I don’t say what he did. I don’t know what he did.’

‘Did you know the mailbag was forgotten last night and is still on the premises?’

Marco began to look very scary. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Is it?’

‘So if our speculation should turn out to be the truth: if you put the photograph, addressed to The Watchman, in the mailbag, the question is: who removed it? Who impaled it on the body? If, of course, you didn’t.’

‘It is idiotic to persist in this lie. Why do you do it? Where for me is the motive? Suppose I were Strix? So: I kill the goose that lays the golden egg? Does it make sense? So: after all, the man who takes the photograph does not post it. He is the murderer and he leaves it on the body.’

‘What is your surname?’

‘Smith.’

‘I see.’

‘It is Smith,’ Marco shouted. ‘Why do you look like that? Why should it not be Smith? Is there a law against Smith? My father was an American.’

‘And your mother?’

‘A Calabrian. Her name was Croce. I am Marco Croce Smith. Why?’

‘Have you any Rossis in your family?’

‘None. Again, why?’

‘There is an enmity between the Rossis and Madame Sommita’s family.’

‘I know nothing of it,’ said Marco and then burst out, ‘How could I have done it? When was it done? I don’t even know when it was done but all the time from when the opera is ended until Maria found her I am on duty. You saw me. Everybody saw me. I wait at table. I attend in the hall. I go to and from the launch. I have alibis.’

‘That may be true. But you may also have had a collaborator.’

‘You are mad.’

‘I am telling you how the police will think.’

‘It is a trap. You try to trap me.’

‘If you choose to put it like that. I want, if you didn’t do it, to satisfy myself that you didn’t. I want to get you out of the way. I believe you to be Strix and as Strix I think your activities were despicable but I do not accuse you of murder. I simply want you to tell me if you put the photograph in the postbag. In an envelope addressed to The Watchman.’

There followed a silence. The sun now shone in at the studio windows on the blank canvas and the empty model’s throne. Outside a tui sang: a deep lucid phrase, uncivilized as snow-water and ending in a consequential clatter as if it cleared its throat. You darling, thought Troy, standing by the window, and knew that she could not endure to stay much longer inside this clever house with its arid perfections and its killed woman in the room on the landing.

Marco said: ‘I surmise it was in the postbag. I do not know. I do not say I put it there.’

‘And the bag was in the study?’

‘That is where it is kept.’

‘When was the letter put in it? Immediately after the photograph was taken? Or perhaps only just before the postbox was emptied into it and it was locked.’

Marco shrugged.

‘And finally – crucially – when was the photograph removed, and by whom, and stabbed on to the body?’

‘Of that I know nothing. Nothing, I tell you,’ said Marco, and then with sudden venom, ‘But I can guess.’

‘Yes?’

‘It is simple. Who clears the postbox always? Always! Who? I have seen him. He puts his arms into the bag and rounds it with his hands to receive the box and then he opens the box and holds it inside the bag to empty itself. Who?’

‘Mr Hanley?’

‘Ah. The secretary. Il favorito,’ said Marco and achieved an angry smirk. He bowed in Troy’s direction. ‘Excuse me, madam,’ he said. ‘It is not a suitable topic.’

‘Did you actually see Mr Hanley do this, last evening?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Very well,’ said Alleyn. ‘You may go.’

He went out with a kind of mean flourish and did not quite bang the door.

‘He’s a horrible little man,’ said Troy, ‘but I don’t think he did it.’

‘Nor I,’ Dr Carmichael agreed.

‘His next move,’ said Alleyn, ‘will be to hand in his notice and wait for the waters to subside.’

‘Sling his hook?’

‘Yes.’

‘Will you let him?’

‘I can’t stop him. The police may try to or I suppose Reece could simply deny him transport.’

‘Do you think Reece believes Marco is Strix?’

‘If ever there was a clam its middle name was Reece but I think he does.’

‘Are you any further on?’ asked the doctor.

‘A bit. I wish I’d found out whether Marco knows who took his bloody snapshot out of the bag. If ever it was in the bloody bag, which is conjectural. It’s so boring of him not to admit he put it in. If he did.’

‘He almost admitted something, didn’t he?’ said Troy.

‘He’s trying to work it out whether it would do him more good or harm to come clean.’

‘I suppose,’ hazarded Dr Carmichael, ‘that whoever it was, Hanley or anyone else, who removed the photograph, it doesn’t follow he was the killer.’

‘Not as the night the day. No.’

Troy suddenly said: ‘Having offered to make beds, I suppose I’d better make them. Do you think Miss Dancy would be outraged if I asked her to bear a hand? I imagine the little Sylvia is otherwise engaged.’

‘Determined to maintain the house-party tone against all hazards, are you, darling?’ said her husband.

‘That’s right. The dinner-jacket-in-the-jungle spirit.’

Dr Carmichael gazed at Troy in admiration and surprise. ‘I must say, Mrs Alleyn, you set us all an example. How many beds do you plan to make?’

‘I haven’t counted.’

‘The round dozen or more,’ teased Alleyn, ‘and God help all those who sleep in them.’

‘He’s being beastly,’ Troy remarked. ‘I’m not all that good at bedmaking. I’ll just give Miss Dancy a call, I think.’

She consulted the list of room numbers by the telephone. Dr Carmichael joined Alleyn at the windows. ‘It really is clearing,’ he said. ‘The wind’s dropping. And I do believe the lake’s settling.’

‘Yes, it really is.’

‘What do you suppose will happen first: the telephone be reconnected, or the launch engine be got going, or the police appear on the far bank, or the chopper turn up?’

‘Lord knows.’

Troy said into the telephone, ‘Of course I understand. Don’t give it another thought. We’ll meet at lunchtime. Oh. Oh, I see. I’m so sorry. Yes, I think you’re very wise. No, no news. Awful, isn’t it?’

She hung up. ‘Miss Dancy has got a migraine,’ she said. ‘She sounds very Wagnerian. Well, I’d better make the best I can of the beds.’

‘You’re not going round on your own, Troy.’

‘Aren’t I? But why?’

‘It’s inadvisable.’

‘But, Rory, I promised Mrs Bacon.’

‘To hell with Mrs Bacon. I’ll tell her it’s not on. They can make their own bloody beds. I’ve made ours,’ said Alleyn. ‘I’d go round with you but I don’t think that’d do either.’

‘I’ll make beds with you, Mrs Alleyn,’ offered Dr Carmichael in a sprightly manner.

‘That’s big of you, Carmichael,’ said Alleyn. ‘I dare say all the rooms will be locked. Mrs Bacon will have spare keys.’

‘I’ll find out.’

Troy said: ‘You can pretend it’s a hospital. You’re the matron and I’m a ham-fisted probationer. I’ll just go along to our palatial suite for a moment. Rejoin you here.’

When she had gone Alleyn said: ‘She’s hating this. You can always tell if she goes all jokey. I’ll be glad to get her out of it.’

‘If I may say so, you’re a lucky man.’

‘You may indeed say so.’

‘Perhaps a brisk walk round the Island when we’ve done our chores.’

‘A splendid idea. In a way,’ Alleyn said, ‘this bedmaking nonsense might turn out to be handy. I’ve no authority to search, of course, but you two might just keep your eyes skinned.’

‘Anything in particular?’

‘Not a thing. But you never know. The skinned eye and a few minor liberties.’

‘I’ll see about the keys,’ said Dr Carmichael happily and bustled off.