A Man Lay Dead (5 page)

“Yes. He must have seen it. Now I come to think of it he was in the hall when Rankin first produced it.”

“Did he comment on it in any way?”

“Vassily? No.” Handesley hesitated and turned to Nigel and Angela. “Wait a moment though. Didn’t he say something when Tokareff was holding forth about the knife and its association with a bratsvo?”

“I think he did,” said Nigel slowly. “He made some remark in Russian. Doctor Tokareff said, ‘This peasant agrees with me,’ and you, sir, told Vassily he could go.”

“That is how it was,” agreed Angela.

“I see. Rum coincidence that the knife, your butler and your guest should all be of the same nationality.”

“Not very odd,” said Angela. “Uncle Hubert has always kept up his interest in Russia — especially since the war. Charles was familiar with his collection of weapons and brought this horrible thing down specially for Uncle Hubert to see.”

“Yes. Is the dagger interesting from the point of view of the collector?”

Handesley winced and glanced at Angela. “It interested me enormously,” he said, “I offered to buy it.”

“Really? Did Mr. Rankin want to sell?”

There was a very uncomfortable pause. Nigel miserably cast about in his mind for something to say. Suddenly Angela broke the silence.

“You are very tired, Uncle Hubert,” she said gently, “let me tell Mr. Alleyn.” Without waiting for his reply she turned to the detective.

“Charles Rankin, in fun, wrote out a statement last night willing the knife to my uncle. Mr. Bathgate here and Mr. Arthur Wilde, another of our guests, signed the paper. It was all a joke.”

Alleyn, without any comment, made a note in his pocket-book. “Perhaps I may see this paper later on,” he said, “and now for the other servants.”

“All English,” said Angela, “except the cook, who is a Frenchman. There are three maids, two housemaids, and a little cockney — she’s a tweeny really — a sort of pantry man who, when we have large parties, does footman and helps Vassily, a kitchenmaid, and an odd-boy.”

“Thank you. Mr. Bathgate, you, I understand, are Mr. Rankin’s cousin. To your knowledge, had he any enemies? This, I know, sounds a childish inquiry, but I think I shall put it to you.”

“To
my
knowledge,” answered Nigel, “none. Obviously he had one.”

“Nobody who would benefit by his death?”

“Benefit?” Nigel’s voice grated suddenly. “My God, yes. I benefit. I believe he has left me the bulk of his property. You’d better arrest me, Inspector — I killed him for his money.”

“My good young man,” said Alleyn tartly, “please don’t muddle me with startling announcements of that sort. It is incredibly silly. Here are two witnesses to your theatricality. Pull yourself together and leave me to do my detecting. It’s tricky enough as it is, Lord knows.”

The unexpectedness of this rebuke had a very salutary effect on Nigel. For a second it lifted him out of his nightmare of shocked reactions.

“Sorry,” he said. “I don’t really want to leap into the handcuffs.”

“So I should hope. Now run off and find the assembled guests. I think the local blue-bottle buzzed something about the library. Send them along singly to the drawing-room; and, Miss North, will you find the servants?”

“Mrs. Wilde,” said Angela, “was in bed a little while ago. She is terribly upset.”

“I am sorry, but I should like everyone to be present.”

“Very well, I’ll tell her.” Angela went upstairs.

Having started off the examination with Arthur Wilde, Nigel waited with Sir Hubert in the garden. Apparently the detective spent a very short time over his interviews, for Nigel had smoked only two cigarettes when Mr. Bunce emerged with the tidings that the Chief Inspector was at Sir Hubert’s service. They went indoors and joined Alleyn. Handesley led the way down the hall, where Mr. Bunce still kept guard, into the big library that lay behind the drawing-room and the little gun-room. At the door he paused and looked intently at the Inspector.

“I see from your card,” he said courteously, “that your name is Roderick Alleyn. I was up at Oxford with a very brilliant man of that name. A relation perhaps?”

“Perhaps,” said the Inspector politely but uncommunicatively. He stepped back to allow Nigel to open the library door and they went in. Here all the others, with the exception of Marjorie Wilde, were already assembled. Tokareff’s voice could be heard booming as the door opened, and on their entrance they found him standing before the fire, bespectacled, earnest, and resoundingly verbose. Rosamund Grant, deadly white, was sitting in a far corner of the room, immaculate and withdrawn. Arthur Wilde, with an air of strained attention, appeared to be listening, dubiously, to the Russian’s dissertation. Doctor Young was fidgeting in the bow-window.

“… so to take a loife from my standpoint-of-view is not such a crime as to be always living a false loife,” shouted Tokareff. “Zhis is the real crime more deadly—” he stopped suddenly as Handesley and Alleyn, followed by Nigel and Angela, came towards him.

“Inspector Alleyn,” said Handesley briefly, “wishes to speak to us all for a moment.”

“Already,” began Tokareff, “we have been interviewed. Already the hunt is to begin. Excuse me please, but I must make myself clear to say—”

“Will you please sit round this table,” said Alleyn, incisively cutting through the clamour of Tokareff’s rumbling bass. They all moved across to a long writing table near the windows and seated themselves at it, Alleyn taking the head.

“I have only this to say,” he said quietly, “a man was done to death in this house at five minutes to eight last night. It is possible — but only just possible — that the crime was brought off by someone from the outside. Until the inquest is over I’m afraid no one may leave Frantock. You will all, if you please, confine yourselves to the house and grounds. Should any of you want to go further afield, just let me know, will you, and if the reason is urgent, I’ll provide a suitable escort. You will be at liberty to use the hall and drawing-room an hour after this little chat is ended. During that hour I must ask you to allow me to make my examination of those rooms.”

There was a difficult silence. Then Rosemund Grant spoke.

“For how long will these restrictions be enforced?” she asked. Her voice, level and expressionless, suddenly and shockingly reminded Nigel of Rankin’s.

“The inquest will probably he held on Thursday,” said Alleyn. “Until after then, at all events, I shall ask you to stay where you are.”

“Is this absolutely necessary?” asked Handesley. “I am, of course, only too anxious for every effort to be made, but I understand some of my guests — Mrs. Wilde for instance — are naturally longing to get away from the unhappy associations of my house.” A foreign overtone of deprecation in his voice filled Nigel suddenly with an enormous sense of pity.

“Sir Hubert,” he said quickly, “the situation is more difficult for yeu than for any of us. If we must stay, we must, but I am sure we will, all of us, try to be as little nuisance and as much help as may be. Under such circumstances all personal considerations must go to blazes. I’m afraid that’s not very well put, but—”

“I entirely agreed,” broke in Wilde. “It is inconvenient, but convenience hardly counts at such a time. My wife, I am sure, will understand this.”

As in answer to this assertion the door was opened and Marjorie Wilde came in.

The placing of the others, the tenseness of the moment and the lateness of her arrival gave it something of the character of a theatrical entrance. There was, however, little else that was stagey about Mrs. Wilde’s appearance. She came in very quietly, her make-up was much less vigorously stated than usual and her clothes, as Nigel found himself reflecting, contrived to look like mourning.

“I’m very sorry to have kept you all waiting,” she murmured. “Please don’t move, anyone.”

Her husband pulled a chair up for her and at last they were all seated at the table.

“Now,” said Alleyn, “I understand, I think, the general principles and the history of this game which ended so strangely and so tragically. I do not, however, quite realize what would have happened if a sham instead of a real victim had been found—”

“But excuse me,” began Tokareff, “is this, how you say, a relevancy?”

“It is quite in order, otherwise I should not ask. What would you have done in the ordinary course of the game?” He turned to Wilde.

“We should,” said Wilde, “have immediately assembled and held a mock trial, with a ‘judge’ and a ‘prosecuting attorney,’ each of us having the right to cross-examine. Our object would have been to find the ‘murderer’—the member of the party to whom Vassily had given the scarlet plaque.”

“Thank you — yes, I see. And you have not done this?”

“Good God, Inspector,” said Nigel violently, “what do you take us for?”

“He takes one of us for a criminal,” said Rosamund slowly.

“I think the Murder Game should be played out,” Alleyn continued. “I propose that we hold the trial precisely as it was planned. I shall play the part of prosecuting attorney. I’m not very good at official language, but I’ll do my poor best. For the moment there will be no judge. That will be the only difference between this and the original version — except that I hope there will be no difficulty in at once discovering the recipient of the scarlet plaque.”

“There will be no difficulty,” said Wilde, “Vassily gave the scarlet plaque to me.”

Arthur Wilde’s announcement had a dramatic effect quite out of proportion to its real value. Nigel experienced a violent emotional shock, followed immediately by the reflection that, after all, the identity of the recipient of the plaque had very little bearing on the case.

It was odd that they should none of them have thought of locating the “villain” in the game. That was all.

Complete silence followed Wilde’s statement. Rosamund broke it. “Oh well,” she said evenly, “what of that?”

“Thank you very much, Mr. Wilde,” said Alleyn. The Inspector’s manner had undoubtedly become most convincingly official. “You have come forward as the first witness. You were given the plaque at dinner?”

“Yes — Vassily slipped it into my hand as I helped myself to the savoury.”

“Had you formed any definite plan about carrying out your role in the game?”

“Not precisely. I was thinking it over as I lay in my bath. Mr. Bathgate was in the next room. I decided against him as the victim — too obvious — then I heard the gong and the lights went out. I was just going to call out that it couldn’t be the ‘murder’ but an accident of some sort, when I realized that I should, be giving my own show away before I had brought it off. So I pretended to think it was the ‘murder’ and began drying myself and dressing. I thought I should find an easy ‘victim’ in the darkness. I did too—!”

A violent exclamation from Handesley interrupted him.

“What is it, Sir Hubert?” asked Alleyn gently.

“It was you then, Arthur, who ran into me on the landing and said, ‘You’re the corpse’?”

“And it was you who answered ‘Shut up, you ass,’ ” returned Wilde. “Yes, you thought I was fooling. When I realized that, I got away quickly.”

“Just a moment,” interrupted the detective. “Let me get this quite clear. Really it’s frightfully muddling. When the alarm was given, Mr. Wilde, you were in your bath. Knowing yourself to be the intended ‘murderer’ in the game you imagined the darkness and the gong sounding were accidental?”

“I thought the gong was sounded for dinner and that the lights had possibly fused.”

“Yes, I see. So you lay low and determined to perform your part in the game under cover of the dark?”

“Yes,” said Wilde. His voice was patiently courteous.

“For a detective,” thought Nigel, “the Inspector seems to be making rather heavy way of this.”

Alleyn continued. “So you came out on to the landing, ran into Sir Hubert and instantly uttered the set phrase. You, Sir Hubert, thought he was fooling?”

“Yes, certainly. The signal had been given. As a matter of fact I thought — I rather thought it was Rankin. I don’t know why.”

“Mr. Wilde,” said Alleyn, “in the words of the popular coloured engraving, when did you last see Mr. Rankin?”

“I was talking to him alone in the hall before we went up to dress. We were the last to go up. Charles remarked that if either of us was ‘he’ in the game it would be no good trying to victimize the other as everyone knew we were left alone together.”

“Yes, exactly. Then Mr. Rankin was still in the hall when you went up to dress?”

“Yes.”

“Did anyone see you together?”

Wilde thought for a moment. “Yes,” he said, “I remember Mary, the little between-maid, came in and went out the entrance hall to lock the front door. She was still tidying or something as I went upstairs. I remember I asked her if she knew the right time — if the hall clock was right. She said, ‘Yes, ten minutes to eight’ and I said, ‘Good Lord, we’ll be late’ or something like that and ran upstairs, leaving her there.”

“Presumably, then, Mr. Rankin was alone in the hall from a little after 7.50 till five minutes to eight when he was killed. About four minutes. Thank you, Mr. Wilde.”

Alleyn made a brief entry in his note-book and then looked round the table.

“Are there any questions that someone else would like to put?” he asked. “I can assure you that I will honestly welcome them.”

There was a short silence broken unexpectedly by Mrs. Wilde. She leant across the table, looking with an odd air of formality at her husband.

“I would like to ask,” she said rapidly, “what you and Charles talked about during the time you were alone together.”

For the first time Arthur Wilde hesitated.

“I don’t think,” he said quietly, “that we said anything that could have any bearing on the point at issue.”

“Neverzeless,” said Tokareff suddenly, “the question is asked.”

“Well—” there was the faintest echo of whimsicality in his answer. “Well, we talked about you, Doctor Tokareff.”

“Indeed? What about me?”

“Rankin seemed to resent your comments on his ownership of the dagger. He — he felt that it implied some sort of criticism of himself. He was rather on the defensive about it.”

Doctor Young unexpectedly uttered his throaty comment—“Kahoom”—and Alleyn smiled.

“What did you say to all this?” he asked.

Arthur Wilde rumpled up his hair. “I told him not to be an ass,” he said. “Charles was always rather touchy — it was characteristic. I tried to explain how a knife associated, as Doctor Tokareff believed, with the innermost ritual of a bratsvo, would naturally have more significance to a Russian than to an Englishman. He soon got over his huff and said he quite saw my point. Then we chaffed each other about the Murder Game and I left him.”

“Any more questions?” asked Alleyn. There were none apparently.

“I realize,” said Wilde, “that I was probably the last person — except Mary and the man who killed him — to see Charles alive. I hope very much that if anyone does think of any questions they would like to put, they will not hesitate in asking them.”

“I should like to say,” said Nigel, “that I can corroborate most of what you have said. I left you with Charles and heard you come up a few minutes later. You remember we shouted out to each other while your bath was running and afterwards when the lights went out. I can state positively that you were in the bathroom before, during, and after the time when the crime was committed.”

“Yes,” agreed Marjorie Wilde, “and you called through to me, too, Arthur.”

“Your rooms were all close together?” asked Alleyn.

Nigel sketched out a rough plan of the four rooms and slid it across the table to him.

“I see,” said the Inspector, and looked carefully at it. “I am sure you all appreciate,” he said a moment later, “the importance of establishing Mr. Wilde’s account of his movements. They have already been corroborated by Mrs. Wilde and Mr. Bathgate. Can anyone else bring forward any point that bears on the relative positions of these three after Mr. Wilde came upstairs?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Wilde eagerly, “I can. When I was in my room dressing, Florence, Angela’s maid, came in to ask if she could help me. She stayed a few moments, not long, but she must have heard Arthur calling out and everything — the door into the bathroom wasn’t shut properly.”

“She will be able to verify this herself, of course,” said the Inspector. “We have now a fairly complete picture of the movements of three of the house party from shortly after seven-thirty until the time of the murder. Mrs. Wilde went upstairs first, Mr. Bathgate second and Mr. Wilde last. They were all calling out to each other while they were dressing and their voices were probably heard by a housemaid. Mr. Bathgate, I understand that you were the first downstairs after the alarm was given and that you turned up the lights?”

Nigel’s thoughts had been wandering along a strange byway opened up by Mrs. Wilde’s eager corroboration of her husband’s story. He pulled himself together and looked at the Inspector. It struck him that the official manner came easily enough to Alleyn when he chose to assume it

“Yes,” he said. “Yes — I turned on the lights.”

“You found your way downstairs after the two minutes had elapsed?”

“Yes, the others were behind me on the stairs.”

“You got to the main switch and turned it on immediately?”

“Not immediately. The others were calling out from the stairs. I hesitated for a second.”

“Why?” asked Rosamund Grant.

“I really can’t say. It was all rather strange and I felt — I don’t know — somehow reluctant. Then Sir Hubert called out and I pulled down the switch.”

“You were talking to Mr. Wilde right up to the time you left your room?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Yes,” said Arthur Wilde, with a friendly glance towards him, “you were.”

“Did you speak to anyone when you were on the landing?”

“I don’t remember. Everyone was talking in the dark there. I struck a match.”

“Yes,” said Angela quickly, “he struck a match. I was further along the passage and saw his face suddenly lit up from beneath. He must have been just outside his room then.”

“Mr. Bathgate,” said the detective, “your match was still alight, wasn’t it, as you went downstairs?”

“Yes. It went out about half-way down.”

“Did anyone pass you on the stairs?”

“No, nobody passed me.”

“Are you certain of that?”

“Quite positive,” said Nigel.

“Any more questions?” asked Alleyn. Nobody spoke.

Inspector Alleyn turned to Tokareff.

“Doctor Tokareff,” he said, “I shall take you next, if you please.”

“Thank you,” said the Russian pugnaciously.

“You went upstairs with the first detachment — Miss North, Miss Grant, Mrs. Wilde, and Sir Hubert Handesley?”

Tokareff was glaring combatively through his spectacles at the detective.

“Certainly I did,” he said.

“Did you go straight to your room?”

“Yes, immediately. This I can prove for I am in good mood while I am in my room last night, so I sing the
Death of Boris
fortissimo. I am in distant wing of house but still my voice is robust. Many should have heard.”

“I heard,” said Handesley, and he actually smiled.

“Were you singing the
Death of Boris
all the time — until the gong sounded and the lights went out?”

“Yes, certainly.”

“A gala performance! You visited a bathroom?”

“
Nyit
! No! I do not bath at this hour. It is not advisable. Better at night before bed to open the pores. Then a gentle sweat—”

“Yes, quite. You dressed then?”

“I dress. While I dress I sing. When I come to great cry of agony, I interpret in the manner of Fedor Chaliapin—” he suddenly gave tongue to a galvanizing bellow. Mrs. Wilde suppressed a little shriek. “At this moment,” ended Doctor Tokareff, “gong goes and lights go out. It is the game. I cease to sing and count sixty twice in Russian. Then I come out.”

“Thank you very much. I understand that you were the first to realize what had happened to Mr. Rankin?”

“Yes, I was first. I have seen the knoife from the stairs.”

“What happened then?”

“Miss Angela was saying in joking, ‘no one is to touch the body.’ I was agreeing not jokingly because I have seen the man is dead.”

“But I understand you did not examine the body—”

“Excuse me, please,” began the Russian with a great deal of emphasis. Alleyn glanced quickly round the table. A swift wave of consternation and panic seemed to have galvanized the faces of all the guests. Mrs. Wilde was white to the lips and Rosamund Grant was staring fixedly at her. Wilde leant swiftly towards his wife. She spoke suddenly, her voice breathlessly unlike the fashionable squeak that they were all accustomed to.

“Wait a minute, I had better explain.”

“Never mind now, old girl,” said Wilde. Even then the conjugal endearment struck Nigel as being singularly inept.

“It’s all right,” said Marjorie Wilde, “I know what Doctor Tokareff is going to say. I lost my head. I pushed them all aside and knelt down by him. I pulled him over and looked at his face and I tried to call him back; when I saw he wasn’t there any more I tried to call him back, tried to force him to come back. I dragged his shoulders away from the blood and I felt the knife gritting on the floor underneath him, gritting about inside him. He was very heavy, I only moved him a little way. They all said I wasn’t to touch him — I wish I hadn’t, but I did. I touched him.” She stopped as abruptly and breathlessly as she had begun.

“It was much better for you to tell me this at once, Mrs. Wilde,” said Alleyn, very matter of fact. “One quite appreciates the emotional stress and shock of this terrible discovery. I should like,” he continued generally, “to fix the actual grouping of this scene in my mind. Mrs. Wilde was kneeling beside the body. She had moved it over on to its back. Doctor Tokareff, you were standing beside her?”

“Certainly. I stood there saying, ‘do not touch.’ Still she continued to shake at him. I have seen immediately that she is hysterical and I tried to raise her upwards, but she resisted me. In hysteria sometimes zere is sush a strength. Then Miss Grant said quite quietly, ‘It’s no use to call Charles now, he is gone for good,’ and at once Mrs. Wilde stopped. Then I have raised her away and Sir Hubert Handesley said, ‘For God’s sake please make sure he is dead.’ I have known immediately that he is dead, but nevertheless I examine, and Miss North said, ‘Telephone Doctor Young,’ so she does.”

“Is everyone agreed that this is substantially correct?” asked Alleyn — formally.

There was a general murmur of assent.

“Since I prove that from seven-thirty to seven fifty-five I sing very loud in my room,” announced the Russian, “is not this an Ali Baba? I should like now to go to London where I have appointment for a meeting.”

“I am afraid that is impossible,” said Alleyn smoothly.

“But—” began the Russian.

“I will explain afterwards, Doctor Tokareff. At the moment we will see out the consummation of the Murder Game. Sir Hubert, what were your movements from the time you went upstairs until the alarm?”

Handesley looked at his own interlocked fingers lying before him on the table. He did not raise his eyes. His voice was even and unbroken.

“I went to my dressing-room at the far end of the corridor. I undressed and spoke to Vassily who was putting out my things. Then he went out and I had my bath. I had finished bathing and had dressed — all except my dinner jacket, when there was a knock at my door. Angela came in. She wanted to know if I had any aspirin. Miss Grant had a headache and would like to take some. I found the aspirin and gave it to Angela. She went out and almost immediately afterwards the alarm sounded. I joined the party on the landing and it was then that Arthur — Mr. Wilde — tapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘You are the corpse.’ I think that is all.”