Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 3: Death in a White Tie, Overture to Death, Death at the Bar. Ngaio Marsh
said Alleyn, ‘but it’s got traces of plate-powder in the tooling and it’s not the right kind, I fancy.’
‘I wouldn’t have believed it possible that I could have been so profoundly relieved,’ said Davidson. He waited for a moment and then with a nervous glance at Fox, he added: ‘I suppose I’ve no alibi?’
‘Well, no,’ said Alleyn, ‘I suppose you haven’t, but I shouldn’t let it worry you. The taximan may remember passing you.’
‘It was filthily misty,’ said Davidson peevishly. ‘He may not have noticed.’
‘Come,’ said Alleyn, ‘you mustn’t get investigation nerves. There’s always Lucy Lorrimer.’
‘There is indeed always Lucy Lorrimer. She has rung up three times this morning.’
‘There you are. I’ll have to see her myself. Don’t worry; you’ve given us some very useful information, hasn’t he, Fox?’
‘Yes, sir. It’s kind of solidified what we had already.’
‘Anything you’d like to ask Sir Daniel, Fox?’
‘No, Mr Alleyn, thank you. I think you’ve covered the ground very thoroughly. Unless –’
‘Yes?’ asked Davidson. ‘Come on, Mr Fox.’
‘Well, Sir Daniel, I was wondering if you could give us an opinion on how long it would take a man in Lord Robert Gospell’s condition to die under these circumstances.’
‘Yes,’ said Davidson, and again that professional note sounded in his voice. ‘Yes. It’s not easy to give you the sort of answer you want. A healthy man would go in about four minutes if the murderer completely stopped all access of air to the lungs. A man with a condition of the heart which I believe to have obtained in this instance would be most unlikely to live for four minutes. Life might become extinct within less than two. He might die almost immediately.’
‘Yes. Thank you’ sir.’
Alleyn said: ‘Suppose the murderer had some slight knowledge of medicine and was aware of Lord Robert’s condition, would he be likely to realize how little time he needed?’
‘That is rather a difficult question to answer. His slight knowledge might not embrace asphyxia. I should say that any first-year student would probably realize that a diseased heart would give out very rapidly under these conditions. A nurse would know. Indeed, I should have thought most laymen would think it probable. The actual time to within two or three minutes might not be appreciated.’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
Alleyn got up.
‘I think that really is everything. We’ll get out a statement for you to sign, if you will. Believe me, we do realize that it has been very difficult for you to speak of your patients under these extremely disagreeable circumstances. We’ll word the beastly document as discreetly as may be.’
‘I’m sure you will. Mr Alleyn, I think I remember Lord Robert telling me he had a great friend at Scotland Yard. Are you this friend? I see you are. Please don’t think my question impertinent. I am sure that you have suffered, with all his friends, a great loss. You should not draw too much upon your nervous energy, you know, in investigating this case. It is quite useless for me to tell you this, but I am a physician and I do know something about nerves. You are subjecting yourself to a very severe discipline at the moment. Don’t overdo it.’
‘Just what I’d like to tell him, sir,’ said Fox unexpectedly.
Davidson turned on him a face cordial with appreciation. ‘I see we understand each other, Mr Fox.’
‘It’s very kind of you both,’ said Alleyn with a grin, ‘but I’m not altogether a hothouse flower. Good-bye, Sir Daniel. Thank you so much.’
They shook hands and Fox and Alleyn went out.
‘Where do we go now?’ asked Fox.
‘I think we’d better take a look at Marsdon House. Bailey ought to have finished by now. I’ll ring up from there and see if I can get an appointment with the Carrados family en masse. It’s going to be difficult, that. There seems to be no doubt that Lady Carrados is one of the blackmailing victims. Carrados himself is a difficult type, a frightful old snob he is, and as vain as a peacock. Police investigation will undoubtedly stimulate all his worst qualities. He’s the sort of man who’d go to any lengths to avoid the wrong kind of publicity. We’ll have go to warily if we don’t want him to make fools of us and a confounded nuisance of himself.’
On the way to Marsdon House they went over Davidson’s evidence.
‘It’s a rum thing, when you come to think of it,’ ruminated Fox. ‘There was Sir Daniel looking at that taxi and wishing it wasn’t booked and there inside it were Lord Robert and the man who had made up his mind to kill him. He must have started in to do it almost at once. He hadn’t got much time, after all.’
‘No,’ said Alleyn, ‘the time factor is important.’
‘How exactly d’you reckon he set about it, sir?’
‘I imagine them sitting side by side. The murderer takes out his cigarette-case, if indeed it was a cigarette-case. Perhaps he says something to make Lord Robert lean forward and look through the window. He draws back his hand and hits Lord Robert sharply on the temple with the edge and point of the case – the wound seems to indicate that. Lord Robert slumps back. The murderer presses his muffled hand over the nose and mouth, not too hard but carefully. As the mouth opens he pushes the material he is using between the teeth and further and further back towards the throat. With his other hand he keeps the nostrils closed. And so he sits until they are nearly at Cheyne Walk. When he removes his hands the pulse is still, there is no attempt at respiration. The head falls sideways and he knows it is all over.’ Alleyn clenched his hands. ‘He might have been saved even then, Fox. Artificial respiration might have saved him. But there was the rest of the drive to Queens Gate and then on to the Yard. Hopeless!’
‘The interview with Sir Herbert Carrados ought to clear up this business of Dimitri,’ Fox said. ‘If Sir Herbert was any length of time in the buffet with Dimitri.’
‘We’ll have to go delicately with Carrados. I wonder if the obscure lady will be there. The lady that nobody noticed but who, since she did not dance very much, may have fulfilled the traditional office of the onlooker. Then there’s the Halcut-Hackett game. We’ll have to get on with that as soon as possible. It links up with Withers.’
‘What sort of a lady is Mrs Halcut-Hackett? She came and saw you at the Yard, didn’t she, about the blackmail business?’
‘Yes, Fox, she did. She played the old, old game of pretending to be the friend of the victim. Still she had the pluck to come. That visit of hers marked the beginning of the whole miserable affair. You may be sure that I do not forget this. I asked Bunchy to help us find the blackmailer. If I hadn’t done that he’d be alive now, I suppose, unless … unless, my God! Donald killed his uncle for what he’d get out of it. If blackmail’s at the bottom of the murder, I’m directly responsible.’
‘Well, sir, if you’ll excuse me, I don’t think that’s a remark to get you or anyone else much further. Lord Robert wouldn’t have thanked you for it and that’s a fact. We don’t feel obliged to warn everybody who helps in a blackmail case that it’s liable to turn to murder. And why?’ continued Fox with the nearest approach to animation that Alleyn had ever seen in him. ‘Because up to now it never has.’
‘All right, Brer Fox,’ said Alleyn. ‘I’ll pipe down.’
And for the rest of the way to Marsdon House they were both silent.
Marsdon