SWNOVELS A Christmas Party: Chapter 15
This was so startling that even Maud momentarily forgot the loss of her book. Paula demanded: ‘Then who gets Uncle Nat’s money?’
‘I don’t know,’ answered Stephen. ‘His next of kin, presumably.’
‘But I’m his next of kin!’ exclaimed Joseph, much agitated. ‘It’s absurd! I don’t want it! I shouldn’t know what to do with it! Really, Stephen, you’re taking a most exaggerated view of things! I feel quite sure that when the matter is explained –’
‘No, Stephen’s right,’ Mathilda said. ‘I know what a fuss there was when my Aunt Charlotte died, leaving a will on half a sheet of notepaper. The Law’s extremely sticky about wills. Besides, how can you explain such a piece of lunacy as not admitting the two witnesses into the room?’
‘But, Tilda, it was hard enough to bring Nat to the point of making a will at all!’
‘Well you’d better keep quiet about that,’ said Mathilda unkindly. ‘We know you persuaded him with the best intentions, but it might not sound so good to anyone who hasn’t the pleasure of knowing the Herriard family.’
Joseph looked quite stunned, and was for once bereft of the power of speech. Maud’s flat voice made itself heard. ‘Well, I am sure Nathaniel never meant Joseph to inherit all his money,’ she said. ‘It is not at all what he wished, for he did not consider that Joseph had any sense of money.’
‘Do you mean to tell me,’ said Paula ominously, ‘that I shan’t get my legacy after all?’
‘Not a penny of it,’ replied Stephen. ‘You may, of course, be able to bully Joe into disgorging it.’
That roused Joseph into exclaiming: ‘How can you, Stephen? As though I should have to be bullied into it! If you are right about this unlucky business – but I feel sure you’re not! – you can’t think that I should let the matter rest at that! I know well what poor Nat’s wishes were!’
‘If you are about to offer restitution, don’t!’ said Stephen grimly. ‘I’m not taking any.’
Paula suddenly surprised everyone by breaking into a peal of jangling laughter. ‘How damned funny!’ she said. ‘Nat’s been murdered, we’ve been torn and rent by fear and suspicion, all for nothing!’
Mathilda regarded her with disfavour. ‘It may be your idea of humour. It isn’t mine. I don’t for a moment suppose that you want my advice, but before you all rush to extremes, might it not be as well to discover just how the law does stand towards intestacy?’
‘He didn’t die intestate!’ Joseph said. ‘Just because there’s a small irregularity –’
‘That’s rather a good idea of yours, Mathilda,’ said Stephen, as though Joseph had not spoken. ‘I’ll get on to Blyth, and ask him.’
He left the room. Paula was still laughing, with more than a suggestion of hysteria in her voice. Joseph tried to put his arm round her, but was fiercely shaken off. ‘Leave me alone!’ she said. ‘I might have guessed you’d muddle everything! Fool! Fool!’
‘If you don’t shut up, I’ll empty this flower-vase over your head!’ threatened Mathilda.
‘Can’t you see the exquisite irony of it?’ Paula said. ‘He did it all for the best! Oh, my God, what a second act it would make! I must tell Willoughby! He at least will have the perception to appreciate it!’
Roydon, however, was not immediately to be found, nor, if Paula had found him, would her idea for a second act have been met with any enthusiasm. His thoughts were far from playwriting. He was confronting Inspector Hemingway, rather white about the gills, and with his Adam’s apple working convulsively.
‘I think,’ said Hemingway, laying a bloodstained handkerchief on the table between them, ‘that this is yours.’
‘No, it’s not!’ replied Roydon, in a frightened voice. ‘I never saw it before in my life!’
Hemingway stared disconcertingly at him for a moment, and then straightened the handkerchief, and pointed with the butt of his pencil to the embroidered letter in the corner.
‘I don’t know anything about it!’ Roydon said obstinately.
‘Laundry-marks, too,’ observed Hemingway. ‘Easily identified.’
There was an awful silence. Nothing in Roydon’s experience had fitted him to cope with such a situation as this. He was badly frightened, and showed it.
‘You put it into the incinerator by the potting-sheds, didn’t you?’ said Hemingway.
‘No!’
‘Come, come, sir, you’re not doing yourself any good by telling lies to me! I know you put it there.’
Roydon seemed to crumple up. ‘I know what you think, but you’re wrong! I didn’t murder Mr Herriard! I didn’t, I tell you!’
‘How did your handkerchief come to be in this state?’
‘I had a bad nose-bleed!’ Roydon blurted out.
The Sergeant, who was a silent witness, turned his slow gaze upon Hemingway, to see how he would receive this explanation.
‘Do you burn your handkerchiefs every time you have a nose-bleed?’ asked Hemingway.
‘No, of course I don’t, but I knew what you’d think if you found it! I – I lost my head!’
‘When did you have this nose-bleed?’
‘Last night, after I’d gone up to bed. I put the handkerchief in my suitcase, and then I thought – I thought if you were to find it there it would look suspicious. I heard you were searching the house, and – and I thought I’d better get rid of it!’
‘Did you tell anyone about your nose-bleed?’
‘No. No, naturally I didn’t! It isn’t anything to make a fuss about. As a matter of fact, I often get them.’
‘But this morning, when you were afraid I might find the handkerchief, didn’t you think to mention to anyone what had happened?’
‘Yes, but I couldn’t say it then! I mean, it would have sounded odd. At least, I thought it would. Everyone would have wondered if it was true, or if I was only trying to account for the blood on my handkerchief. Oh, I know I behaved like a fool, but I swear I had nothing to do with the murder!’
‘Haven’t you ever heard of blood-tests?’ asked Hemingway.
‘Yes; but suppose my blood and Mr Herriard’s belong to the same group?’ objected Roydon. ‘I thought of that, and it seemed much safer to get rid of the damned thing. Because it could only lead you down a side-track, honestly!’
‘Well, if your story’s true, you’ve given me a great deal of trouble through behaving so foolishly,’ said Hemingway.
‘I’m sorry. Of course, I see now that it was silly of me, but the fact of the matter is that this whole affair is getting on my nerves.’ A sense of grievance overcame him. ‘I don’t think I’ve been treated at all well!’ he complained. ‘I was invited down here to a friendly party, and first Mr Herriard was damned rude to me, and then he got himself murdered, and now I know very well I’m under suspicion, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with me!’
‘Well, this handkerchief has a good deal to do with you,’ said Hemingway sternly. ‘You deliberately tried to conceal it, and that doesn’t look any too good, let me tell you!’
‘But I didn’t do it! I swear I didn’t do it! It isn’t Mr Herriard’s blood: it’s my own!’
‘That’ll be for others to find out,’ said Hemingway, and dismissed him.
The Sergeant drew a breath. ‘Do you believe him, sir?’
‘It’s about what I thought had happened when you first showed me the handkerchief,’ admitted Hemingway.
‘But that story he put up, about being afraid you’d find it!’
‘Might easily be true.’
The Sergeant looked disappointed. ‘You made a point when you asked him if he’d mentioned his nose-bleed to anyone.’
‘I didn’t really, but I wanted to see what he’d do if I rattled him. Nose-bleeding’s a silly sort of kid’s complaint: you don’t go round bucking about it.’
‘Then you do believe him!’
‘I’ve got what wouldn’t do you any harm, my lad: an open mind! This is a job for the scientists. Until they tell me that this blood belongs to old Herriard’s group, there’s nothing I can do about it. You’d better come along, and get some lunch now.’
The Sergeant, feeling rather dissatisfied, followed him out into the hall, where he was pounced on by Mottisfont, who said in a complaining tone that he had been waiting to speak to him for a long time.
‘Yes, sir, what is it?’ asked Hemingway, eyeing him dispassionately.
‘I don’t know how much longer you propose to take over your investigation,’ Mottisfont said sarcastically, ‘but I must point out to you that my time is not my own. I’m a very busy man. I came down here merely to spend Christmas, not to remain indefinitely. I have an important business engagement in town tomorrow, and with all due deference to you I propose to leave in the morning.’
‘I’ve no objection, sir,’ said Hemingway calmly. ‘You’re not being kept here.’
‘I understood that no one was allowed to leave the house!’
‘Did you, sir? Not from me, I’m sure. Of course, I shall want your address, but I shouldn’t dream of keeping you here.’
Mottisfont looked as though the wind had been taken out of his sails, and was beginning to grumble that he had been misled, when Paula came down the stairs, and interrupted him.
‘I suppose you have heard the latest news?’ she said. She was not laughing now; she looked hard and angry, and it was evident that she meant to vent her displeasure on as many people as possible.
‘What news?’ said Mottisfont.
‘Oh, so you haven’t! Well, you may be interested to hear that Stephen is not the heir, and that I do not get my legacy!’
Mottisfont stared at her. ‘Do you mean that a later will has been discovered?’
‘Oh no! Nothing like that! Merely that this one is invalid!’ said Paula savagely.
‘Indeed! I am very sorry to hear it, but I can hardly suppose that it concerns me,’ said Mottisfont.
She laughed shortly. ‘Not interested, in fact!’
The Inspector said: ‘Well, I’m interested, at all events, miss. In what way is the will invalid?’
She was too angry to care what she said, or to whom. ‘It’s invalid because it wasn’t signed in the presence of the witnesses. That fact has just been disclosed to us by our engaging butler.’
Mottisfont gave a slight titter. ‘How typical of Joseph!’ he remarked. ‘Quite a blow to you and Stephen, I fear!’
‘Quite!’ said Paula through her teeth.
‘You have all my sympathy,’ he said. ‘But it is never wise to anticipate, is it?’
‘Oh, get out!’ she said rudely.
He shrugged, and walked away. The Inspector said: ‘Well, well, this is quite a surprise, I must say, miss! Very unfortunate for all concerned. How did it come about that the will wasn’t witnessed? Mr Blyth never said anything.’
‘He didn’t know. My precious Uncle Joseph, who started life in a solicitor’s office, remembered just enough law to realise that witnesses would be wanted, and he got Sturry and Ford to sign as witnesses. But my Uncle Nat apparently wouldn’t have them in his bedroom, and they waited outside to do their stuff. Now it seems that my dear uncle forgot some clause or other, and on account of it the witnesses will be required to swear that they saw Uncle Nat sign his will. And of course, Sturry, as soon as he heard of it, seized the opportunity to queer my brother’s pitch, and said he couldn’t perjure himself. So that is beautifully that. It would be funny if it weren’t so damnable.’
The Inspector, who had listened to this with an expression of absorbed interest on his face, said sympathetically that it was a bit of a facer. ‘I am not what you’d call a whale on these matters myself, miss. What happens to the late Mr Herriard’s estate now?’
‘I don’t know, and I don’t care. I know nothing about law. My brother’s telephoning to Mr Blyth now. He thinks my Uncle Joseph will inherit everything, as next of kin. I expect he’s right. It’s the sort of ironic thing that would happen!’
‘Well, I think, if it’s all the same to you, miss, I’ll wait to hear the result of this telephone-call,’ decided Hemingway, laying his hat down on the table.
She shrugged. ‘Please yourself!’
He had not long to wait. Stephen appeared a moment or two later. In spite of her professed indifference, Paula pounced on him at once, and demanded to know what Blyth had said.
He lifted one eyebrow at the Inspector. ‘Taken Scotland Yard into your confidence?’
‘What the hell does it matter?’ she said impatiently.
‘That’s right,’ interjected Hemingway. ‘You don’t want to make a stranger out of me, sir.’
‘I should find it difficult, shouldn’t I?’ said Stephen. ‘You’re getting to be quite like one of the family. You remind me of a broker’s man.’
‘Ah, I wouldn’t know anything about them!’ Hemingway retorted, not in the least resentful of this insult. ‘I’ve never had one on my premises. They don’t like you to in my profession.’
Stephen grinned. ‘You win that round, Inspector, on points.’
Paula shook his arm. ‘Oh, do shut up! What did Blyth say?’
‘Refrain from mauling me about. Under the new circumstances I appear to be the only loser.’
‘Do you mean Uncle Joseph doesn’t pouch the lot?’ she asked incredulously.
‘Far from it. Under the Law of Intestacy, Uncle Nat’s property will be divided equally between his next of kin. That means that Joe will get half, and you and I will share the half that would have gone to Father, were he alive today.’
Her eyes were fixed on his. ‘Are you sure?’
‘No, I’m not sure of anything. That’s what Blyth says.’
She lifted her hands to her temples, pushing back the thick waves of her hair. ‘Good God, then we shall all be rich!’
‘Depends how you look at it. You and Joe will be comparatively rich, while I shall be comparatively poor. Death duties will be heavy. I doubt if it will work out at more than eighty thousand pounds for Joseph, and forty thousand pounds to you and to me.’
‘Will you be able to keep on this place?’ she asked.
‘Hardly. It will be sold, and the proceeds pooled, I suppose.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry about that!’ she said mechanically.
His lips twisted. ‘How sweet of you!’ he mocked. He glanced towards Hemingway. ‘Interested, Inspector?’
‘I’m always interested,’ Hemingway responded.
Maud chose that moment to come into the hall from the wide corridor leading past the billiard-room to the servants’ quarters. She was still carrying her mutilated book, and it was evidently still absorbing her attention, for she said without preamble: ‘They all say they know nothing about it. If you did it, Stephen, it would be more manly of you to own up to it.’
‘God’s teeth, how many more times do you want to be told that I never touched your book?’ Stephen demanded.
‘There is no need to swear,’ Maud said. ‘When I was a girl gentlemen did not use strong language in front of ladies. Of course, times have changed, but I do not think for the better. It’s my belief someone wantonly destroyed this book.’ Her pale gaze drifted to the Inspector’s face. ‘You don’t seem to be doing anything,’ she said, on a note of severity. ‘I think you ought to discover who put my book into the incinerator. It may not seem important to you, but as far as I can see you aren’t getting any further over my brother-in-law’s death, so you might turn your attention to this for a change.’
‘Good God, Aunt, you surely don’t expect Scotland Yard to bother itself about a miserable book!’ exclaimed Paula. ‘We’re all sick and tired of hearing about it!’
‘And I,’ said Maud, quite sharply, ‘am sick and tired of hearing about Nat’s murder, and Nat’s will!’
‘In that case,’ said Stephen, ‘we can’t expect you to be interested in Blyth’s verdict.’
‘No, I am not interested,’ Maud replied. ‘I do not want a large fortune, and I do not want to be obliged to continue living in this house. I shall write to town for a copy of the Life of the Empress at once, and when I have finished reading it, I shall give it to the library in place of this one.’
Joseph, who was coming down the stairs, overheard this, and threw up his hands. ‘Oh, my dear, are we never to hear the last of that book? I thought we had decided to forget about it!’
‘You may have decided to forget about it, Joseph, but it was not your book. I was very much interested in it, and I want to know what the end was.’
‘Well, my dear, and so you shall,’ promised Joseph. ‘When all this stress is over, I’ll get you a copy, never fear!’
‘Thank you, Joseph, I will get one for myself, without waiting for anything to be over,’ said Maud, walking away.
The Inspector picked up his hat again. Joseph said: ‘Ah, Inspector! Just off? I mustn’t ask you if you’ve discovered anything, must I? I know you won’t keep us in suspense longer than you need.’
‘Certainly not, sir. I understand I have to congratulate you, by the way.’
Joseph winced. ‘Please don’t, Inspector! What has happened isn’t in the least what I wanted. But it may all come right yet.’
‘I hope it may, I’m sure, sir. I’m sorry about Mrs Herriard’s book, and I’m afraid she thinks I ought to bring someone to justice about it.’
Joseph smiled wearily. ‘I think we’ve all heard enough about that book,’ he said. ‘Unfortunately, my wife has a way, which the young people find tiresome, of recounting stray pieces of what she has read. The least said about it the better. She’ll soon forget about it.’
‘For the last time,’ said Stephen dangerously, ‘I – did – not – touch – the – book!’
‘Very well, old chap, we’ll leave it at that,’ said Joseph in a soothing voice.
The Inspector then left the house, accompanied by Sergeant Ware. During the drive back to the town, he was unusually silent, and the Sergeant, stealing a glance at him, saw that he was frowning. Over a lunch of cold turkey and ham at the Blue Dog, Hemingway continued to frown until the Sergeant ventured to ask him what he thought about the morning’s work.
‘I’m beginning to get some very queer ideas about this case,’ replied Hemingway, digging into a fine Stilton cheese. ‘Very queer. I wouldn’t wonder if I began seeing things soon.’
‘I was thinking myself of something you once said to me,’ said the Sergeant slowly.
‘If you thought more about what I say to you you’d very likely get to be an Inspector one of these days,’ replied Hemingway. ‘What did I say?’
‘You told me that when a case got so gummed up that it looked hopeless you liked it, because it meant that something was going to break.’
‘I won’t say it isn’t true, because very often it is, but it won’t do you any good to remember that kind of remark,’ said Hemingway severely.
‘Well, sir, is this case gummed up enough for you yet?’
‘Yes,’ said Hemingway, ‘it is.’
‘You’ve got something?’
‘I’ve got a strong feeling that things moved a bit too fast for someone this morning,’ said Hemingway. ‘It’s no use asking me how I get these hunches: it’s what they call a flair. That’s why they made me an Inspector.’
The Sergeant sighed, and waited patiently.
‘While I was prowling round the house today, more like a Boy Scout than a policeman, I treated myself to a nice quiet review of the case.’ Hemingway poised a piece of cheese on his knife, and raised it to his mouth. ‘And taking one thing with another, and adding them up together with a bit of flair, and a knowledge of psychology, I came to the conclusion that I was being led around by the nose. Now, that’s a thing I don’t take kindly to at all. What’s more, the Department wouldn’t like it.’ He put the cheese into his mouth, and munched it.
‘Who’s leading you around by the nose?’ asked the Sergeant, intent, but bewildered.
Hemingway washed the cheese down with some beer. ‘Kind old Uncle Joseph,’ he answered.
The Sergeant frowned. ‘Trying to put you off young Stephen’s scent? But –’
‘No,’ said Hemingway. ‘Trying to put me off his own scent.’
‘But, good lord, Chief, you don’t think he did it, do you?’ gasped the Sergeant.
Hemingway regarded him pityingly. ‘You can’t help not having flair, because it’s French, and you wouldn’t understand it,’ he said, ‘but you ought to be able to do ordinary arithmetic.’
‘I can,’ said the Sergeant, nettled. ‘Begging your pardon, sir, I can add two and two together and make it four as well as anyone. What I can’t do is to make it five. But I daresay that’s French too.’
‘No,’ said Hemingway, quite unruffled. ‘That’s Vision, my lad. You haven’t got it.’
‘No, but I know what it is,’ retorted the Sergeant insubordinately. ‘It’s seeing things, like you warned me you were beginning to.’
‘One of these days I shall get annoyed with you,’ said Hemingway. ‘You’ll be reduced to the ranks, very likely.’
‘But, Chief, he couldn’t have done it!’ the Sergeant pointed out.
‘If it comes to that, they couldn’t any of them have done it.’
‘I know; but he’s the one man who’s got an alibi from the moment Herriard went upstairs to the moment when he was found dead!’
‘When you put it to me like that, I can’t make out why I didn’t suspect him at the outset,’ said Hemingway imperturbably.
The Sergeant said almost despairingly: ‘He was talking to Miss Clare through the communicating door into the bathroom. You aren’t going to tell me you suspect her of being mixed up in it?’
‘No, I’m not. What I am going to tell you, though, is that when you get a bunch of suspects only one of whom has had the foresight to provide himself with an alibi, you want to keep a very sharp eye on that one. I admit I didn’t, but that was very likely because you distracted me.’
The Sergeant swallowed something in his throat. ‘Very likely,’ he agreed bitterly.
‘That’s right,’ said Hemingway. ‘You stop giving me lip, and think it over. Whichever way you turn in this case, you come up against Joseph. You must have noticed it. Take the party itself! Whose bright idea was that? You can ask any of the people up at the Manor, and they’ll all give you the same answer: Joseph! I never met the late Nathaniel when he was alive, but I’ve heard enough about him to be pretty sure he wasn’t the kind of man who liked Christmas parties. No, it was kind old Uncle Joseph who thought it would be nice to have a real old-fashioned Christmas, with a lot of goodwill floating around, and everyone making up old quarrels, and living happily ever after. Young Stephen wasn’t on good terms with Nathaniel, on account of his bit of fluff; Paula had been worrying the life out of him to put up the cash for Roydon’s play; Mottisfont had been getting his goat by selling arms to China, in a highly illegal fashion. So Joseph gets the bright idea of asking all three of them, plus two of the causes of the trouble, down to Lexham. You can say he was being well-meaning but tactless, if you like; on the other hand, you can widen your horizon a bit, and ask yourself if he wasn’t perhaps getting together all the people most likely to quarrel with Nathaniel, to act as cover for himself.’
‘Why, sir, he’s nothing but a soft old fool!’ protested the Sergeant ‘I’ve met his sort many times!’
‘That’s what he wanted you to think,’ said Hemingway. ‘What you’re forgetting is that he’s been an actor. Now, I know a bit about the stage. In fact, I know a lot about it. Joseph can tell me all he likes about playing Hamlet, and Othello, and Romeo: I don’t believe him, and, what’s more, I never did. He’s got Character-part written all over him. He was the poor old father who couldn’t pay the rent in The Wicked Baron, or What Happened to Girls in the ’Eighties; he was the butler in about half a hundred comedies; he was the First Grave-digger in Hamlet; he was –’
‘All right, I get it!’ the Sergeant said hurriedly.
‘And if I’m not much mistaken,’ pursued Hemingway, ‘his most successful rôle was that of the kind old uncle in a melodrama entitled Christmas at Lexham Manor, or Who Killed Nat Herriard? I’m bound to say it’s a most talented performance.’
‘I don’t see how you make that out, sir, really I don’t! If he’d got his brother to make a will leaving everything to him, there might be some grounds for suspecting him. But he didn’t: he got him to leave his money to Stephen Herriard.’
‘That’s where he was cleverer than what you seem to be, my lad. In spite of having started life in a solicitor’s office, he forgot the little formality of providing witnesses to see that will signed. You don’t need to know much about law to know you’ve got to have the signature to a will properly witnessed. You heard Miss Herriard telling me that he also forgot to put in some clause or other. What she meant was an Attestation Clause. That meant that the witnesses to the will would have to swear to Nathaniel’s having signed it in their presence before it was admitted to probate. So if Stephen didn’t get convicted of the murder, Joseph had still got a trump-card up his sleeve. In due course, by which I mean when the case had been nicely packed up one way or another, it would transpire that the will wasn’t in order after all.’
‘Yes, but it didn’t transpire in due course,’ objected the Sergeant. ‘It transpired today, and the case isn’t anything like packed up.’
‘No,’ said Hemingway. ‘It isn’t. I told you I had a hunch things had been happening just a bit too quickly for someone. Kind Uncle Joseph hadn’t reckoned with the Lord High Everything Else. For some reason, which I haven’t yet had time to discover, something brought the matter up, and Sturry blew the gaff. I don’t fancy Joseph wanted that at all. He wouldn’t like Sturry cutting in ahead of his cue.’
The Sergeant scratched his head. ‘It sounds plausible, the way you tell it, sir, but I’d say it was too cunning for a chap like Joseph Herriard.’
‘That’s because you think he’s just a ham actor with a heart of gold. What you ought to bear in mind is the possibility that he’s a darned good actor, without any heart at all. You go back over all we’ve heard about this Christmas party! You picked up plenty of stuff from the servants yourself.’
‘I don’t know that I set much store by what they said,’ said the Sergeant dubiously.
‘I don’t set a bit of store by any of the information they thought they were giving. But they told you a lot they didn’t set any store by themselves, and that was valuable. What about Joseph hanging up paper-streamers, and bits of holly all over the house, until Nathaniel was fit to murder him?’
‘Well, what about it?’ asked the Sergeant, staring.
‘It all fits in,’ Hemingway said. ‘Kind old Uncle Joseph going to a lot of trouble to make things bright and cheerful for a set of people whom even he must have known wouldn’t like it any more than Nathaniel did. Kind old Uncle Joseph, in fact, working his brother up into a rare state of bad temper. He got on Nathaniel’s nerves. He meant to. He did everything he knew Nathaniel didn’t like, from decorating the house to clapping him on the back when he had lumbago.’
‘Yes, but he’s the sort of chap who always does put his foot into it,’ interposed the Sergeant.
‘That’s what you were meant to think,’ said Hemingway. ‘You wait a bit, because I’m going to show you that kind Uncle Joseph’s tactlessness is the predominant feature in this case. Piecing together all the information we’ve picked up, what do we get?’
‘Joseph trying to keep the peace,’ answered the Sergeant promptly.
‘Not on your life we don’t! Joseph throwing oil on the flames, more like. A man who wants to keep the peace doesn’t invite a set of highly incompatible people down to stay with a bad-tempered old curmudgeon who’s already got his knife into most of them.’
‘But everyone says he was always trying to smooth rows over!’
‘Thanks, I’ve heard him doing that for myself, and anything more calculated to make an angry person look round for a hatchet I’ve yet to see!’ retorted Hemingway. ‘Why, he even got on my nerves! But I haven’t finished, not anything like. Having got the whole party into a state when anything might have happened, he does a bit more pseudo-balm-spreading by hinting to Stephen’s blonde that Stephen’s due to inherit his uncle’s fortune, and it’s up to her to keep him quiet. Looked at your way, that’s more of his peacemaking; looked at my way, it’s a nail in Stephen’s coffin. No man could be as big a fool as to think that what you said to that girl wouldn’t come out at the wrong moment. He was making sure that we should discover that Stephen had reason to think he was the heir.’
‘Look here, sir, that’s going too far!’ the Sergeant exclaimed. ‘The one thing that does stand out a mile is that he fair dotes on his nephew! Why, look at the way he would stick to it the murder had been done from outside! And the way he kept on saying that his brother must have taken Stephen’s cigarette-case up to his room himself!’
‘I am looking at it,’ said Hemingway grimly. ‘Two of the silliest theories I’ve ever had to listen to. They wouldn’t have convinced a child in arms.’
‘But you can’t get away from the fact that he’s fond of Stephen!’
‘I’m not meant to get away from it,’ replied Hemingway. ‘I’ve had it thrust under my nose at every turn. The only thing I haven’t yet been privileged to see is any reason for all this overflowing affection. I’ve seen a good bit of kind Uncle Joseph and his nephew since I came down here, and I haven’t yet heard Stephen do other than treat him like dirt. That young man loathes the very sight of Joseph, and he takes no trouble to hide it. I’ve met some rude customers in my time, but anything to touch Stephen’s rudeness to Joseph I’ve never seen. But it doesn’t matter what he says: Joseph doesn’t take a bit of umbrage; he just goes on loving his dear nephew.’
‘Well, after all, he is his nephew, and when you’ve known a chap since he was a kid –’
‘Now you have gone off the rails!’ said Hemingway. ‘When Stephen was a kid, Joseph was drifting about the world creating a sensation with his masterly portrayal of Mine Host of the Garter Inn, and Snug the Joiner, and very likely a First Citizen as well, not to mention a Soothsayer, and William, a Country Fellow. He wasn’t within a couple of thousand miles of this country. If he knew that he’d got a nephew, that’s about all he did know of Stephen until he planted himself on Nathaniel a couple of years ago. And if you’re going to tell me that an affinity sprang up between them, you can spare your breath! Stephen never had a bit of time for kind Uncle Joseph, as you’ve heard over and over again from the servants. Went out of his way to be rude to him. In return for which, I’m being asked to believe that Joseph fair doted on him. Well, as far as I’m concerned, he overdid his doting. It isn’t in human nature to dote on a young chap who does nothing but hand you out offensive remarks on a plate. In fact, that’s where all kind Uncle Joseph’s highly organised plans began to come a bit unstuck. Stephen wouldn’t co-operate. However, Joseph banked on a lot of half-baked people like you thinking that he was a saint, and letting it go at that. The trouble is, I’m not half-baked, and I don’t believe in saints who carry on like Joseph, playing up to the gallery all the time, till you feel you ought to give him a round of applause.’
‘When you put it like that –’ began the Sergeant slowly.
‘You keep quiet, and listen to me. It’s my belief Joseph meant to fasten this murder on to Stephen from the start, but just in case anything should go wrong, he first saw to it that his brother’s will shouldn’t hold water, when it came to be admitted to probate, and next that we should be provided with a few other likely suspects, to fall back on if the case against Stephen fell through. Thus we have Miss Herriard, and that limp playwright of hers, all ready to hand, not to mention Gun-running Mottisfont. And if I’m not much mistaken it was Joseph who egged Roydon on to read his play aloud on Christmas Eve, well knowing that it would drive Nathaniel to a frenzy.’
‘You’ve got nothing to go on to make you say that, sir,’ protested the Sergeant.
‘I’ve got this to go on: that he didn’t stop Roydon! I’ll bet he could have done so, if he’d wanted to. He let him read it, and the balloon went up with a bang. Nathaniel, having had one row with Mottisfont, had another with Miss Herriard, and threw in a few mean cracks at Stephen, just for good measure. In fact, kind Uncle Joseph had got his stage nicely set, and all he had to do then was to stick a knife into Nathaniel, and sit back while we made fools of ourselves.’
‘And you don’t know how he managed to stick that knife into Nathaniel!’ interjected the Sergeant.
‘No, I don’t; but for the moment I’m leaving that out of the discussion. It’s safe to say that he did it damned cleverly, because it’s got me baffled up to the present. But he chose a time when everyone else would be changing for dinner, and thus unable to produce alibis; and, further, he gave himself an alibi by carrying on a conversation with the one person who was obviously out of the running as a suspect.’
‘Might be something in that door,’ mused the Sergeant, thinking it over.
‘What door?’
‘The one between his dressing-room and the bathroom he shared with Miss Clare. I mean, she didn’t actually see him, did she?’
‘If you’re thinking that she was listening to a gramophone, it’s a possibility, but not a very likely one. What’s more, I haven’t so far found a gramophone on the premises.’
‘Well, if he really was in his dressing-room all the time, how did he do it?’
‘Never mind how he did it. We’ll come to that presently. Just now I want you to consider his behaviour ever since the murder. He first arranges that Stephen shall be one of the three to discover Nathaniel’s body. That gave him the opportunity to tell me, when the proper time came, that Stephen didn’t turn a hair at finding his uncle dead.’
‘He told you that?’
‘Not half as crudely as that. He said his dear nephew was not one to show his feelings, which left me with the impression that Master Stephen had been pretty callous. But there! I pick up impressions a lot quicker than Joseph knows, and I’d already picked up the impression that Stephen had been rather fond of his Uncle Nathaniel, and was a good deal more upset by his death than he meant to give away. But of course there was more to getting Stephen into Nathaniel’s room than that. Stephen inspected the windows and the bathroom door, just as any man would, while Joseph pretended to be mourning over his brother’s body. That made it possible for Stephen to have had the chance to tamper with the fastenings. All Joseph had to do was to tell me that he was sure the windows were shut. When I asked him, as I was bound to, whether he’d actually seen them, he said no, but his dear nephew had, which came to the same thing. He knew it didn’t come to the same thing, anything like, but it sounded well: just what a soft old fool would say. Oh, you have to hand it to him!’
‘It makes him out to be pretty black,’ said the Sergeant, awed.
‘Well, you don’t suppose a man who sticks a knife into his brother’s back is a gilded saint, do you?’
‘But, sir, I still can’t see it altogether your way! I’d swear the one thing Joseph dreaded was that we should bring the murder home to Stephen! I mean, he went out of his way to explain that Stephen’s rough manner didn’t mean anything, and he was always sticking up for him!’
‘Of course he was! That was his rôle, and very well he played it. But did he convince you that Stephen hadn’t had anything to do with it?’
‘No, I can’t say that he did.’
‘The point is,’ said Hemingway, ‘that the excuses he made for Stephen were so weak that they made us more suspicious than ever about him, which was all according to plan. The most damaging things I found out about Stephen I found out either from his uncle, by way of artless conversation, or through his uncle, like when it came out he’d hinted to Miss Dean that Stephen was the heir. He’d even taken care to hint the same to Mottisfont, knowing Mottisfont would spill it the instant he got the wind up on his own account.’
‘There was never anything you could actually take hold of, though.’
‘No; I told you we were up against a very clever customer.’
‘Yes, but – Look here, sir, what about the will? If he was as clever as you make out, he must have known how the money would be divided up once the will was found to be no good! And he doesn’t get the lot: he only gets half.’
‘You’re developing some very large ideas, aren’t you?’ said Hemingway. ‘If you think eighty thousand pounds is a fortune to be sneezed at, I’ll bet Joseph doesn’t! Why, he’s been sponging on his brother for the last two years, which means he’s broke, or as near to it as makes no odds! Eighty thousand pounds would be as good a reason for murder to him as one hundred and sixty thousand pounds.’
‘Well, I don’t know. I’d have expected him to have got his brother to have made the will out in his favour, somehow.’
‘Don’t you ever take to crime, my lad, because it’s easy to see you wouldn’t make a do of it! If he’d come in for the whole fortune, instead of only half, it would have looked suspicious. I don’t suppose he even thought of trying for the lot. He’s far too downy a bird.’
The Sergeant appeared to consider the matter, fixing his superior with a grave, unblinking stare. After a prolonged and ruminative silence, he said: ‘I don’t deny it sounds convincing, the way you put it, sir. And you do have a knack of spotting your man.’
‘Flair,’ corrected Hemingway coldly.
‘All right, flair. And I don’t deny that I never fancied Miss Herriard, nor Mottisfont, nor that young Roydon. But what I do say, Chief, is that there isn’t a bit of real evidence against Joseph, because you don’t know how he did it, or when he found the time to do it.’
‘That,’ said Hemingway, ‘is what we are now going to discover.’
‘Well, I hope you’re right, sir; but we’ve been at it the best part of two days now, and we’re no nearer discovery, not as far as I know. Every line we had, or thought we had, broke down. The door-key hadn’t been tampered with; the ladder couldn’t have been got at; and there isn’t a secret way into the room. I’m blessed if I know how we’re ever going to make any headway.’
‘That’s right,’ said Hemingway cheerfully. ‘And all the time I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if the clue to the whole mystery has been under our noses from the outset. Probably something so simple that a child could have spotted it. Life’s like that.’
‘If it’s as simple an all that it’s a wonder you haven’t spotted it,’ said the Sergeant sceptically.
‘It’s very likely too simple for me,’ Hemingway explained. ‘I was hoping you’d hit on it.’
The Sergeant ignored this. ‘If only we had some finger-prints to help us!’ he said. ‘But everything was gone over so carefully, it doesn’t seem to be any use trying that line again. I did think we might have got something from the dagger, but the hilt was as clean as a whistle. And it was plain the other dagger hadn’t been touched, nor the sheath of the one he used. Well, we saw how easily it slipped in and out of the sheath, didn’t we? I could have drawn the blade out without touching the sheath, if I’d wanted to, when I took the whole thing down. In fact, now I come to think of it, I never used my left hand at all, and I’ll bet he didn’t either.’
‘Just a moment!’ said Hemingway, frowning. ‘I believe you’ve got something!’
‘Got what, sir?’
‘Your left hand. Do you remember just what you did do with it when you were up on that chair?’
‘I didn’t do anything with it, barring –’ The Sergeant stopped, and his jaw fell. ‘Good lord!’
‘When you stretched up your right hand, to take the knife down, you steadied yourself with your left hand against the wall. And that, my lad, is ten to one what kind Uncle Joseph did too, without thinking about it any more than you did! Come on, we’ve got to get hold of the finger-print boys!’
The Sergeant rose, but he had been thinking deeply, and he said: ‘Hold on a minute, sir! That’s raised a point in my mind. I had to stretch up a good bit to reach that knife. Joseph couldn’t have got near it, not on a chair.’
‘Then he didn’t use a chair,’ replied Hemingway impatiently. ‘I never met anyone like you for trying to throw a spanner in the works!’
‘What did he use, then?’
Behind Inspector Hemingway’s bright gaze his brain moved swiftly. Once more his excellent memory stood him in good stead. ‘Christmas decorations: step-ladder!’ he said. ‘Same one Nathaniel fell over on his way up to dinner. Come on!’