Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 3: Death in a White Tie, Overture to Death, Death at the Bar. Ngaio Marsh
he and Davidson shared an amusing secret.
‘Take this down, Fox,’ said Alleyn.
‘Very good, sir,’ said Fox.
‘As you have noticed,’ Davidson began, ‘I have a taste for the theatrical. Let me present this little scene to you as if we watched it take place behind the footlights. I have shaken hands with my host and hostess where the double flight of stairs meet in a gallery outside the ballroom. I come down the left-hand flight of stairs, thinking of my advancing years and longing for my bed. In the hall are scattered groups of people; coated, cloaked, ready for departure. Already the great house seems exhausted and a little raffish. One feels the presence of drooping flowers, one seems to smell the dregs of champagne. It is indeed time to be gone. Among the departing guests I notice an old lady whom I wish to avoid. She’s rich, one of my best patients, but her chief complaint is a condition of chronic, complicated and acute verbal diarrhoea. I have ministered to this complaint already this evening and as I have no wish to be offered a lift in her car I dart into the men’s cloakroom. I spend some minutes there, marking time. It is a little awkward as the only other men in the cloakroom are obviously engaged in an extremely private conversation.’
‘Who are they?’ asked Alleyn.
‘A certain Captain Withers who is newly come upon the town and that pleasant youth, Donald Potter. They both pause and stare at me. I make a great business of getting my coat and hat. I chat with the cloakroom attendant after I have tipped him. I speak to Donald Potter, but am so poorly received that in sheer decency I am forced to leave. Lucy Lorrimer – tiens, there I go!’
‘It’s all right,’ said Alleyn, ‘I know all about Lucy Lorrimer.’
‘What a woman! She is still screaming out there. I pull up my scarf and lurk in the doorway, waiting for her to go. Having nothing else to do I watch the other people in the hall. The grand seigneur of the stomach stands at the foot of the stairs.’
‘Who?’
‘The man who presides over all these affairs. What is his name?’
‘Dimitri?’
‘Yes, Dimitri. He stand there like an imitation host. A group of young people go out. Then an older woman, alone, comes down the stairs and slips through the doors into the misty street. It was very strange, all that mist.’
‘Was this older woman Mrs Halcut-Hackett?’
‘Yes. That is who it was,’ said Davidson a little too casually.
‘Is Mrs Halcut-Hackett a patient of yours, Sir Daniel?’
‘It so happens that she is.’
‘Why did she leave alone? What about her husband and – hasn’t she got a débutante attached to her?’
‘The protégée, who is unfortunately une jeune fille un peu farouche, fell a prey to toothache earlier in the evening and was removed by the General. I heard Lord Robert offer to escort Mrs Halcut-Hackett home.’
‘Why did he not do so?’
‘Perhaps because they missed each other.’
‘Come now, Sir Daniel, that’s not your real opinion.’
‘Of course it’s not, but I don’t gossip about my patients.’
‘I needn’t assure you that we shall be very discreet. Remember what you said about your attitude towards this case.’
‘I do remember. Very well. Only please, if you can avoid my name in subsequent interviews, I shall be more than grateful. I’ll go on with my recital. Mrs Halcut-Hackett, embedded in ermine, gives a swift look round the hall and slips out through the doors into the night. My attention is arrested by something in her manner, and while I stare after her somebody jostles me so violently that I actually stumble forward and only just save myself from falling. It is Captain Withers, who has come out of the cloakroom behind me. I turn to receive his apologies and find him with his mouth set and his unpleasant eyes – I mistrust people with white lashes – goggling at the stairhead. He does not even realize his own incivility, his attention is fixed on Lord Robert Gospell, who has begun to descend the stairs. This Captain Withers’s expression is so singular that I, too, forget our encounter. I hear him draw in his breath. There is a second’s pause and then he, too, thrusts his way through a party of chattering youngsters and goes out.’
‘Do you think Withers was following Mrs Halcut-Hackett?’
‘I have no reason to think so, but I do think so.’
‘Next?’
‘Next? Why, Mr Alleyn, I pull myself together and start for the door. Before I have taken three steps young Donald Potter comes out of the buffet with Bridget O’Brien. They meet Lord Robert at the foot of the stairs.’
‘Yes?’ said Alleyn, as Davidson paused.
‘Donald Potter,’ he said at last, ‘says what is no doubt a word of farewell to Bridget, and then he too goes out by the front entrance.’
‘Without speaking to his uncle?’
‘Yes.’
‘And Lord Robert?’
‘Lord Robert is asking in that very penetrating high-pitched voice of his if Dimitri has seen Mrs Halcut-Hackett. I see him now and hear him – the last thing I do see or hear before the double doors close behind me.’
‘That was a very vivid little scene,’ said Alleyn.
‘Well, it was not so long ago, after all,’ said Davidson.
‘When you got outside the house, did you see any of the others, or had they all gone?’
‘The party of young people came out as I did. There was the usual bustle for taxis with linkmen and porters. Those linkmen! They are indeed a link with past glories. When one sees the lights from their torches flicker on the pale, almost wanton faces of guests half-dazed with dancing, one expects Millamant herself to come down the steps and all the taxis to turn into sedan chairs. However, I must not indulge my passion for elaboration. The party of young people surged into the three taxis that had been summoned by the porter. He was about to call one for me when, to my horror, I saw a Rolls-Royce on the other side of the road. The window was down and there, like some Sybil, mopping and mowing, was Lucy Lorrimer. “Sir Daniel! Sir Daniel.” I shrank further into my scarf, but all in vain. An officious flunkey cries out: “The lady is calling you, sir.” Nothing for it but to cross the road. “Sir Daniel! Sir Daniel! I have waited for you. Something most important! I shall drive you home and on the way I can tell you –” An impossible woman. I know what it means. She is suffering from a curious internal pain that has just seized her and now is the moment for me to make an examination. I must come in. She is in agony. I think furiously and by the time I reach her window I am prepared. “Lady Lorrimer – forgive me – not a moment to spare – the Prime Minister – a sudden indisposition –!” and while she still gapes I turn and bolt like a rabbit into the mist!’
For the first time since the tragedy of last night Alleyn laughed. Davidson gave him a droll look and went on with his story.
‘I ran as I have not done since I was a boy in Grenoble, pursued by that voice offering, no doubt, to drive me like the wind to Downing Street. Mercifully the mist thickened. On I went, looking in vain for a taxi. I heard a car and shrank into the shadows. The Rolls-Royce passed. I crept out. At last a taxi! It was coming behind me. I could just see the two misted headlights. Then voices, but indistinguishable. The taxi stopped, came on towards me. Engaged! Mon Dieu, what a night! I walked on, telling myself that sooner or later I must find a cab. Not a bit of it! By this time, I suppose, the last guest had gone. It was God knows what time of the morning and the few cabs