Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 10: Last Ditch, Black As He’s Painted, Grave Mistake. Ngaio Marsh
told My Excellency that my nkuki mtu mwenye – my mlinzi – my man with the spear, spoke the truth.’
‘I see.’
‘You are non-committal. You want to know how I know?’
‘If it suits you to tell me.’
‘I am,’ announced The Boomer, ‘the son of a paramount chief. My father and his and his, back into the dawn, were paramount chiefs. If this man, under oath to protect me, had been guilty of murdering an innocent and loyal servant he could not have uncovered the body before me and declared his innocence. Which is what he did. It would not be possible.’
‘I see.’
‘And you would reply that such evidence is not admissible in a British court-of-law.’
‘It would be admissible, I dare say. It could be eloquently pleaded by able counsel. It wouldn’t be accepted, ipso facto, as proof of innocence. But you know that as well as I do.’
‘Tell me this. It is important for me. Do you believe what I have said?’
‘I think I do,’ Alleyn said slowly. ‘You know your people. You tell me it is so. Yes. I’m not sure, but I am inclined to believe you are right.’
‘Ah!’ said The Boomer. ‘So now we are upon our old footing. That is good.’
‘But I must make it clear to you. Whatever I may or may not think has no bearing on the way I’ll conduct this investigation: either inside the Embassy, if you’ll have us here, or outside it. If there turns out to be cogent evidence, in our book, against this man, we’ll follow it up.’
‘In any case, the event having taken place in this Embassy, on his own soil, he could not be tried in England,’ said The Boomer.
‘No. Whatever we find, in that sense, is academic. He would be repatriated.’
‘And this person who fires off German weapons in ladies’ lavatories. You say he also is black.’
‘Mrs Cockburn-Montfort says so.’
‘A stupid woman.’
‘Tolerably so, I’d have thought.’
‘It would be better if her husband beat her occasionally and left her at home,’ said The Boomer with one of his gusts of laughter.
‘I should like to know, if it isn’t too distressing for you to speak of him, something of the Ambassador himself. Did you like him very much? Was he close to you? Those sorts of questions?’
The Boomer dragged his great hand across his mouth, made a long rumbling sound in his chest and sat down.
‘I find it difficult,’ he said at last, ‘to answer your question. What sort of man was he? A fuddy-duddy, as we used to say. He has come up, in the English sense, through the ranks. The peasant class. At one time he was a nuisance. He saw himself staging some kind of coup. It was all rather ridiculous. He had certain administrative abilities but no real authority. That sort of person.’
Disregarding this example of Ng’ombwanan snob-thinking, Alleyn remarked that the Ambassador must have been possessed of considerable ability to have got where he did. The Boomer waved a concessionary hand and said that the trend of development had favoured his advancement.
‘Had he enemies?’
‘My dear Rory, in an emergent nation like my own every man of authority has or has had enemies. I know of no specific persons.’
‘He was in a considerable taking-on about security during your visit,’ Alleyn ventured, to which The Boomer vaguely replied: ‘Oh. Did you think so?’
‘He telephoned Gibson and me on an average twice a day.’
‘Boring for you,’ said The Boomer in his best public school manner.
‘He was particularly agitated about the concert in the garden and the blackout. So were we for that matter.’
‘He was a fuss-pot,’ said The Boomer.
‘Well, damn it all, he had some cause, as it turns out.’
The Boomer pursed his generous mouth into a double mulberry and raised his brows, ‘If you put it like that.’
‘After all, he is dead.’
‘True,’ The Boomer admitted.
Nobody can look quite so eloquently bored as a Negro. The eyes are almost closed, showing a lower rim of white, the mouth droops, the head tilts. The whole man suddenly seems to wilt. The Boomer now exhibited all these signals of ennui and Alleyn, remembering them of old, said: ‘Never mind. I mustn’t keep you any longer. Could we, do you think, just settle these two points: First, will you receive the Deputy Commissioner when he comes?’
‘Of course,’ drawled The Boomer without opening his eyes.
‘Second. Do you now wish the CID to carry on inside the Embassy or would you prefer us to clear out? The decision is your Excellency’s, of course, but we would be grateful for a definite ruling.’
The Boomer opened his slightly bloodshot eyes. He looked full at Alleyn. ‘Stay,’ he said.
There was a tap at the door and Gibson, large, pale and apologetic, came in.
‘I’m sure I beg your pardon, sir,’ he said to the President. ‘Colonel Sinclaire, the Deputy Commissioner, has arrived and hopes to see you.’
The Boomer, without looking at Gibson, said: ‘Ask my equerry to bring him in.’
Alleyn walked to the door. He had caught a signal of urgency from his colleague.
‘Don’t you go, Rory,’ said The Boomer.
‘I’m afraid I must,’ said Alleyn.
Outside, in the passage, he found Mr Whipplestone fingering his tie and looking deeply perturbed. Alleyn said: ‘What’s up?’
‘It may not be anything,’ Gibson answered, ‘It’s just that we’ve been talking to the Costard man who was detailed to serve in the tent.’
‘Stocky, well-set up, fair-haired?’
‘That’s him. Name of Chubb,’ said Gibson.
‘Alas,’ said Mr Whipplestone.
Chubb stood more-or-less to attention, looking straight before him with his arms to his sides. He cut quite a pleasing figure in Costard et Cie’s discreet livery: midnight blue shell-jacket and trousers with gold endorsements. His faded blond hair was short and well-brushed, his fresh West Country complexion and blue eyes deceptively gave him the air of an outdoor man. He still wore his white gloves.
Alleyn had agreed with Mr Whipplestone that it would be best if the latter were not present at the interview. ‘Though,’ Alleyn said, ‘there’s no reason at all to suppose that Chubb, any more than my silly old brother George, had anything to do with the event.’
‘I know, I know,’ Mr Whipplestone had returned. ‘Of course. It’s just that, however illogically and stupidly, I would prefer Chubb not to have been on duty in that wretched pavilion. Just as I would prefer him not to have odd-time jobs with Sheridan and those beastly Montforts. And it would be rather odd for me to be there, wouldn’t it? Very foolish of me no doubt. Let it go at that.’
So Alleyn and an anonymous sergeant had Chubb to themselves in the Controller’s office.
Alleyn said: ‘I want to be quite sure I’ve got