The Unfinished Clue (9 page)

Before she had time to open it, a cry from Lola stopped her. "Ah, Dios!" Lola exclaimed, and pointed dramatically to the window.

Geoffrey stood there, looking hot and dishevelled and nerve-ridden.

"Geoffrey! Where on earth have you been?" said Dinah involuntarily.

He passed a hand across his brow. "What's that got to do with you?" he said. "I don't know. Miles away." He became aware of their eyes staring at him, and said sharply: "What are you all looking at me for? It's nothing to do with you where I've been, is it?"

Dr Raymond stepped up to him, and took him by the arm. "Steady, young man. You're a bit over-done. Sit down. Something rather shocking has happened. Your father has been - well, murdered, I'm afraid."

Geoffrey looked blankly up at him. "What? Father's been murdered?" He blinked rather dazedly. "Are you going potty? I - you don't mean it, do you?" He read the answer in the doctor's face, and suddenly got up. "Good God!" he said. His mouth began to quiver; to their dismay he started to giggle, in helpless, lunatic gusts.

"Wells," Camilla gasped. "I must say!"

"Stop that!" Raymond said harshly. "Stop at once, Geoffrey: do you hear me? Now control yourself! Quite quiet!"

"Oh, I c-can't help it! Oh God, d-don't you's-see horn, f-funny it is?" wailed Geoffrey. "Your f, faces! Oh, d-don't make me laugh!"

Dinah vanished from the room, to reappear in a few moments with the brandy decanter and a glass. The doctor and Mrs. Twining were standing over Geoffrey, who had grown quieter, but who was still shaking with idiotic mirth.

Dr Raymond looked up. "Ah, thanks. Not too much - yes, that's enough. Now Geoffrey, drink this." He put the glass to Geoffrey's lips, and almost forced the spirit down his throat.

Geoffrey coughed and spluttered. The laughter died. He looked round the room, and moistened his lips.

"Sorry. I don't know what happened to me," he said in an exhausted voice. "Hul - hullo, Aunt Julia! What are you doing here? Who murdered Father?"

"We don't know, my dear," Mrs. Twining said quietly. "Dinah, if you'll take Mrs. Halliday and Miss de Silva into lunch, I think I'll stay here till Geoffrey feels more himself."

Dinah promptly held open the door for the other two to pass out. Under her compelling gaze they did so, but once in the hall Camilla gave a shudder, and declared her inability to pass the study-door. She was with difficulty induced to overcome this shrinking, and entered the dining-room in the end grasping Dinah's arm.

Both Guest and Halliday were seated at the table. Guest was stolidly eating cold beef and Halliday, opposite to him, was making a pretence of eating. They rose as the three women entered the room, and Guest pulled out a chair from the table. "That's right," he said. "Come and sit down, Mrs. Halliday."

Camilla disregarded him, but made a clutch at her husband. "Oh, Basil, isn't it awful? I feel absolutely frightful! What will the police do? Will they want to see me?"

Basil Halliday removed her hand from his coat sleeve. "There's nothing for you to feel frightful about, Camilla. It hasn't got anything to do with you. Sit down, and pull yourself together."

Camilla burst into tears. "You n-needn't talk to me in that unkind way!" she sobbed. "You don't seem to realise how upset I am. I mean, I was only with him a little while ago. What will the police ask me? I don't know anything about it!"

"Of course not. We neither of us know anything. All we have to do is to answer any questions perfectly truthfully," said Halliday, putting her into a chair. "That's right, isn't it, Guest?"

"I should think so," Guest replied. "Can't say I know much about the procedure."

Miss de Silva eyed Camilla austerely. "I do not find that there is reason for you to weep," she announced. "ll I do so that is what may be easily understood, since Sir Arthur was the father of Geoffrey. But I do not weep. because I have great courage, and, besides, I do not choose that my eyes should be red. There will bc reporters, and one must think of these things, for it is a very good thing to have one's picture in all the papers though not, I assure you, with red eyes."

This speech had the effect of stopping Camilla's rather gusty sobs. She said: "I can't think how you can be so callous! And please don't ask me to eat anything, because I simply couldn't swallow a mouthful!"

"Just a little chicken, madam," said Finch soothingly at her elbow, and put a plate down before her.

Dinah had seated herself beside Stephen Guest, and was mechanically eating a morsel of chicken. It seemed curiously tasteless, and rather difficult to swallow. She felt as though she were partaking of lunch in an unpleasant nightmare, where everything was topsyturvy, and familiar people said and did ridiculous things that surprised you even in your dream. She asked, "Have the police come?" and thought at once how odd that sounded, quite unreal, as unreal as the thought of Arthur, murdered in his own study. It was the sort of macabre thing that happened to other people, and was reported in the evening papers, making you wonder whatever they could be like who got themselves into such extraordinary cases. Things like this just didn't happen in one's own family. It was no good repeating to oneself that it had happened; one just couldn't realise it.

"Yes, they arrived about five minutes ago," Guest was saying. "Four of them. They're in the study now. They'll want to interview Fay first, I expect. Is she very upset?"

"Well, naturally it's a frightful shock," Dinah said. "I've left Dr Raymond and Mrs. Twining with her. She seems more stunned than anything. Geoffrey's there too," she added.

Camilla raised her head. "I never saw anything like the way Geoffrey took it!" she announced. "It takes a lot to shock me, but I must say that about finished me. He just laughed! However badly he'd quarrelled with poor Sir Arthur I should have though he could at least have pretended to be sorry."

"Hysteria?" inquired Guest, lifting his brows.

"I'm sure I don't know. All I can say is that he came in looking quite wild. I was absolutely terrified. I thought he'd gone mad or something."

"It is for Geoffrey a good thing that his papa is killed," said Lola thoughtfully. "Naturally I cannot marry him when he has no money, but that is quite different now, and he will have a great deal of money, and also he will be Sir Geoffrey, which I find is better than Mister; more distinguished."

"Sorry," said Dinah, "but Arthur wasn't a baronet. Geoffrey will have to go on being Mister."

Miss de Silva appeared to be much chagrined by this piece of information, and slightly indignant. "I should prefer that I should be Lady Billington-Smith, like your sister," she said firmly. "I do not understand why Geoffrey is not to be Sir Geoffrey. It seems to me quite incomprehensible, but perhaps it will be arranged. I will speak to Geoffrey."

Suddenly Dinah knew that she too was going to break into hopeless laughter. She bit her lip, and tried to choke down the impulse.

The watchful Finch came round the table and poured some wine into her glass. "A little burgundy, miss," he whispered.

Dinah gulped it down gratefully. Really, Finch was wonderful: like a sick-room attendant.

Camilla, on whom food and drink seemed to have had a reviving effect, had launched into an exclamatory and rambling discussion of the morning's events with no one in particular. Her husband tried to stop her. "It's no use asking who could have done it: we can't possibly know," he said angrily. "The less we talk about it the better!"

The footman came into the room from the hall, and murmured something in Finch's ear. He was a young man, and looked somewhat scared, as though all these dramatic proceedings were to him a fearful pleasure.

Finch nodded, and went round behind Guest's chair. "The Superintendent would like to see you now, sir," he said in, a low voice. "In the morning-room, sir."

Diriah',"nverhmriug,-was irresistibly reminded of a dentist's waiting-room. Your name was spoken in a sepulchral voice, and out you went, feeling a little sick at the pit of your stomach.

Stephen Guest was not long gone. He came back into the room after perhaps ten minutes, and nodded to Halliday. "They want you next," he said. "Just taking slatements. Apparently they can't do much till the Chief Constable turns up from Silsbury. I understand he's bringing the police surgeon along with him."

Halliday got up jerkily, and went out.

"What did they say? Will they want to see me? Do they know who did it?" asked Camilla.

Guest picked up his table-napkin and sat down again. He glanced rather contemptuously across at Camilla, and replied briefly: "Not yet. I expect they'll want to see everyone."

"Where's Fay?" asked Dinah. "Have they finished with her yet?"

"She's gone up to her room. They saw her first, I think. I spoke to Mrs. Twining. She said Fay wanted to be alone. Going to lie down, and would rather no one came up. I'm afraid there's no chance of any of us getting away today. Will that affect you, Miss de Silva?"

"At the moment, and because I choose, and not at all for any other reason, I rest," said Lola with dignity, "Certainly I do not go away, but I think it will be better if I change this frock that I am wearing, for it is green, as you see, and I am quite of the family, so that I must put on a black dress. And I remember that I brought with me a black dress that is extremely chic, moreover."

"As a matter of fact, I was wondering what one, ought to wear," said Camilla. "I mean, it doesn't seem quite right to be going about in colours, does it? Only I simply never wear black, and I can't say I want to buy anything, because it isn't as if it would be the least use to me afterwards, you see."

Dinah felt herself to be incapable of entering into this discussion, and turned instead to Guest, who was spreading butter on a cheese biscuit in a leisurely way that seemed rather incongruous. "Have they found out anything, Stephen?" she asked softly.

"I don't know," he replied. "They aren't giving much away."

Dinah sighed, wishing that he would be a little less laconic. In a moment or two Halliday came back into thc room. He said in an unnaturally calm voice: "They want you, Camilla. You've got to tell them just what you were doing this morning, you know. It's only to check up on your movements, so don't get fussed and say a whole lot of things that aren't in the least relevant."

"Oh, Basil, I wish you'd come with me!" said Camilla. "Won't they let you? I simply hate going alone. I know they'll ask me all sorts of questions I don't know anything about."

"Then say you don't know! For God's sake don't behave as though you were frightened!" he said roughly. "There's nothing at all for you to be frightened of, I keep on telling you!" He held the door for her to pass out, and shut it behind her with a snap. He came back to his chair, and reached out a hand for his tumbler. "This is a bit serious for me," he said. "I suppose you know I seem to have been the last person to have seen Sir Arthur alive?"

Dinah stared at him in surprise. Lola, who was carefully peeling a peach, paid no heed. Stephen Guest folded up his napkin. "No, I can't say I did know," he replied. "Well, I was," Halliday said. "As a matter of fact I had - not exactly a row with him, but — well, call it a disagreement. One doesn't quarrel with a man in his own house; that goes without saying. It's rather unfortunate, as things have turned out." He glanced across the room to where Finch was standing. "I understand you heard me talking to Sir Arthur, Finch. You seem to have given the police the impression that we had a violent row."

"That was not my intention, sir," replied the butler gently. "When I was asked if I had heard anyone with Sir Arthur at any time between twelve o'clock and one, I could not do less than tell them the truth."

"You needn't have told them we were quarrelling," said Halliday. "It was no such thing. However, it doesn't really matter, only that it puts me into rather an awkward position."

"I am extremely sorry, sir," said Finch.

Camilla came back looking flustered. "Thank goodtiess that's over!" she said. "They want you now, Miss de Silva. Basil, if we aren't allowed to go home we'd better see about our things being unpacked again. I must say, I can't see why we should have to stay here. It's getting absolutely on my nerves, having all these policemen hanging about. There's one in the hall now. I suppose they're afraid we shall try to escape!"

"I seem to be reserved for the last," remarked Dinah, when the Hallidays had gone. "I do wish they'd hurry. I want to go up to Fay."

"I fancy, miss, that you will not be required to make a statement," said Finch, coming to her elbow with the coffee-tray. "I understand that you were on the terrace the entire time."

"Yes, I suppose I was," reflected Dinah. "Does that mean I'm not a suspect?" Even as she said the words she wished that she had not. She got up. "I'll take my coffee upstairs with me. I think this is all getting rather beastly I hadn't thought of that before. Not even when Halliday told us about being the last to see Arthur. I didn't seem to mean anything in particular, somehow. 1 suppose every one of us is more or less under suspicion.

"I shouldn't worry, if I were you," said Guest, opening the door. "Don't let Fay worry either. See?"

The afternoon was surely the most interminable ever spent at the Grange. It seemed to Dinah as though it would never end. The feeling of unreality grew. Fay remained shut in her room, and would admit no one; the Hallidays had also chosen to stay upstairs. Dawson was sobbing noisily as she went about her work. Geoflrey seemed unable to sit still; and Stephen, who sat perfectly quietly in the billiard-room and read the paper, seemed just as unnatural by reason of his very calm. Lola, after a protracted interview with the dazed but suspicioius Superintendent, had announced that it was important that she should rest between lunch and tea, and had gone upstairs for that purpose. Mrs. Twining remained in the drawing-room with Geoffrey, and Dr Raymond had been permitted to depart as soon as his statement had been carefully transcribed.

The Chief Constable, Major Grierson, arrived just before half past three in a large car with the Divisional Surgeon, a sergeant in plain clothes, and a photographer. He was a worried-looking man of about fifty, with a quick, fussy way of talking, and what appeared to be a chronic catarrh. He kept on dabbing at his thin nose with a ball of a handkerchief, and his conversation was punctuated by sniffs. He was met by the local Superintendent, and by Dinah, who happened to be in the hall when he arrived. He said: "This is a terrible business. Shocking, shocking! Knew the General quite - er - well. You're his sister-in-law? Quite. Now Superintendent, if you are ready… !"