A Night of Errors (11 page)

‘Became of young Grubb!’ Swindle was astonished. ‘He’s old Grubb the head-gardener, of course. And as good-for-nothink now as ’ow ’e was then.’

Hyland brightened. ‘We’ll look up this Grubb,’ he said.

‘Certainly we shall.’ Appleby turned again to Swindle. ‘Would you mind,’ he said, ‘giving me what you have already, no doubt, given the Inspector here – your own account of tonight’s discovery?’

And sullenly, but with a fair amount of intelligence, Swindle croaked out his story. There had been two guests to dinner: Mr Sebastian Dromio, who had come down to stay for a few days, and Mrs Gollifer. But as the one was a member of the family and the other an old family friend Swindle had not thought the occasion specially splendid, and when he had provided Mr Dromio with what he judged suitable in the way of port he had considered his day’s work over and retired to his own quarters, and had there given himself to the study of household accounts. For it appeared that with the passage of years he had taken upon himself something of the function of steward to Sir Oliver, and everything went through his hands.

At half past ten, or thereabouts, Robert had knocked on his door and informed him that Sir Oliver was home. Whereupon Swindle changed from slippers to shoes and emerged from his sanctum, apparently with the very proper intention of presenting his duty to his employer. He asked Robert, whose business it was at this hour to attend the front door, whether he had taken Sir Oliver’s bags to his room. And to this Robert replied that he had himself seen nothing of Sir Oliver, who must have come in another way. The news of his return Robert owed to his colleague Joseph. Joseph at this hour had the duty of receiving from a housemaid such shoes as had been collected from the bedrooms during dinner, and these he was accustomed to polish not in the servants’ quarters but in a sort of cubby-hole almost opposite the study door. There was nothing exceptional about this, Swindle reiterated upon a question from Appleby. Joseph did the same thing every night.

And while in his cubby-hole Joseph had heard Sir Oliver’s voice in the study. It was an unmistakable voice, so there could be no doubt about it. And Sir Oliver was in fairly continuous conversation with another man.

Rightly judging himself to be in possession of sensational information, Joseph had dropped his brushes and hurried to Robert. Whereupon Robert had hurried to Swindle – divagating only to give the news to the cook in the kitchen, the parlourmaid, housemaids and chauffeur in the servants’ hall, and two kitchenmaids who were helping William the gardener’s boy to eat a stolen veal-and-ham pie in a scullery. And Swindle, when he had informed himself of the manner of Sir Oliver’s arrival, had bidden Robert go about his business and leave any proper attendance upon their master to himself.

Appleby listened carefully to this recital. ‘And did you in fact,’ he asked, ‘go in and see Sir Oliver?’

‘Urrr!’ Swindle was contemptuous of the ineptitude of this question. ‘Sir Oliver made it a rule that he were never to be disturbed in there unless ’e rang the bell.’

‘But surely the circumstances were rather exceptional? He had been away for months–’

‘’E wouldn’t have heard nothink of that.’ Swindle shook his head decidedly. ‘I stayed where I was.’

‘I see. And you didn’t think to inform Lady Dromio that Sir Oliver had returned? Doesn’t that seem rather odd?’ Appleby paused. ‘Had you any reason to suppose that Sir Oliver desired that his presence should be unknown?’

For the fraction of a second Swindle hesitated. ‘How could I have?’ he asked surlily.

‘Very well. But now about his manner of coming back. If he didn’t come in by the front door how could he come in?’

‘Through that there French window, I suppose.’

‘Would it not be locked?’

‘It’s Joseph’s business to go round and fasten the windows at nine o’clock. But ’e may well have forgotten this one, good-for-nothink lout that ’e is.’

‘Well, we must ask him.’

‘Urrr.’

‘And when we do I think we shall get an answer you don’t like.’ Appleby turned to Hyland. ‘Does this man understand the risk he runs in withholding information on a matter like this?’

Hyland shook his head. ‘I hope he does,’ he said gloomily. ‘For it’s a very grave risk indeed. Better tell us the truth, my good man.’

It was conceivably this lofty manner of address, culled from the pages of fiction, that unnerved Swindle. He licked his leathery lips and let his eyes wander fearfully to the dead body on the floor. ‘I had a wire,’ he said.

‘Did you, now! And have you destroyed it? Well, let’s have a look at it.’

Reluctantly Swindle produced a small yellow envelope and handed it to Hyland. The telegram had been dispatched in the West End of London that afternoon and read: LEAVE STUDY ACCESSIBLE FROM TERRACE TONIGHT CONFIDENTIAL OLLY.

‘And who,’ asked Hyland, ‘is Olly?’

‘Sir Oliver, of course. It be what ’e be called as a kid. Master Olly, her ladyship made us call him. Though, mark you, ’e was a baronet all the time.’

‘Odd.’ Appleby was staring thoughtfully at the telegram. ‘And he signed this in that way in order to occasion less remark in the local post office, I suppose. Well, what did you do about it?’

‘I came in here just before ten and found that Joseph had fastened the window as he should. So I left it on the latch and came away again.’

‘It will be best to be frank with us, Mr Swindle.’ Appleby folded up the telegram. ‘Did any explanation of this instruction of Sir Oliver’s come into your head?’

‘I thought there must be a woman in it, of course.’ Whether guilefully or not, Swindle contrived to look surprised that any other explanation could be entertained.

‘You mean that Sir Oliver after being away all this time, wished to have a ready means of introducing a woman into his own house in a clandestine manner?’

‘Urrr.’

‘Surely sixteen or seventeen would be the age for such an awkward stratagem? What attractions could it have for an experienced man of the world?’

Swindle’s face fell into an evil leer. ‘There be no reckoning the queer turns will give an edge to that sort of thing. Why, ’e might have had a fancy for that there rug.’

Hyland glanced down at the gaping polar bear – and at the shrouded body sprawled on it. His expression indicated severe disapprobation of this unwholesome erotic lore. ‘But I understood,’ he said, ‘that the footman Joseph heard Sir Oliver in conversation not with a woman but a man?’

‘I’m not saying what happened. I’m saying what I thought ’ud be happening. Like enough Sir Oliver had some private business ’e wanted quiet for. Like enough it was urgent and ’e thought to join the family later.’

‘Very well. You had left the window here unfastened. When the news was brought to you that Sir Oliver had returned you were, of course, not surprised. And you told Robert to go about his business. This was at half past ten. What happened later?’

‘Nothink till an hour later, or just short of that, when I was thinking of going to bed. The family was still up, it seemed, and so young Robert ’e was on duty still. Well, ’e heard a great crash from this room ’ere, and ’e hurried to it and tried the handle and found it locked. And at the same time ’e noticed the smell. Like somebody had charred a steak bad, ’e said. Well, I sent him round to the window, expecting it might be open still – which it were, so in ’e came and unlocked the door. There was Sir Oliver in the same clothes ’e sailed in, a-lying in the fireplace with his feet on the rug and his head in the coal-scuttle as you might say and his arms a-roasting as you seen them. I got him out – Robert being good for nout but whimpering – and there were no life in him, that were plain. So I went out and told her ladyship and Mr Dromio.’

‘You say that Robert heard a crash. How would you account for that?’

‘It would be the tantalus, of course.’ And Swindle pointed to a remote corner of the room. ‘And not just knocked over, either. Hurled bodily, as you might say.’

Appleby had already taken stock of the appearance to which the butler referred. Lying where he pointed was the splintered debris of a rosewood tantalus designed to hold three decanters; it lay amid a litter of thick shattered crystal.

‘It would certainly make enough noise.’ Appleby turned to Hyland. ‘And it was hurled across the room about an hour after voices were first heard here.’

‘And when there was already a smell of burning flesh from the body.’ Hyland frowned. ‘There’s something uncommonly odd in that.’

‘Then within a couple of minutes the butler and footman were in the room. Whoever threw that tantalus must virtually have passed Robert on the terrace. But why should this unknown person, presumably alone with the dead man, pick up a heavy object and hurl it with what must have been tremendous force across the room?’

‘Perhaps,’ suggested Hyland, ‘there was a third person as well.’

‘More like ’e were seeing things.’ Swindle croaked out this reading of the matter unexpectedly. ‘And who wouldn’t be seeing things after doing the like of that?’ He poked out a clawlike hand towards the rug. ‘That were it. The fire it would be flicking and flaring and casting shadows. And the killer ’e would think there were someone moving there in the far corner of the room. And ’e would panic and up with the tantalus and ’url it. Same as ’im in the Bible did with the ink-pot at the Devil.’

Swindle, Appleby reflected, did Martin Luther too much honour. Nevertheless his suggestion hinted unlooked-for imaginative powers. It conjured up a real picture of something which might have happened in this sinister room.

Appleby looked down at the remains of the tantalus. ‘There’s not enough glass,’ he said.

‘What’s that?’ Hyland was startled.

‘It’s made to hold three decanters. There’s about enough glass there to reconstitute two.’

‘Perhaps one had been broken long ago.’

‘That it had not!’ Swindle was suddenly indignant. ‘Three there were, as ’twas fit and proper there should be.’

Hyland slapped his white-gloved hand on the table. ‘The weapon!’ he exclaimed. ‘The blow might have been given with just such a thing as a decanter. It mightn’t even break if it was the heavy square sort.’

‘It’s a possibility.’ Appleby considered this for a moment. ‘But why should he make off with it? Remember he didn’t simply hit Sir Oliver and bolt in a panic. He was here for long enough after his deed to permit of all the burning of the arms. And then, for whatever reason, to hurl the tantalus. Would he then pick up again the decanter he had committed the crime with, and carry it away with him? I don’t see that.’

‘I think I do.’ And Hyland, always suggestible, nodded with conviction. ‘Panic overcame him, not at first, but slowly. And then he threw the tantalus for the reason Swindle suggests. In the confusion of that moment he might well think of the third decanter as incriminating – fingerprints on it, for instance. Indeed, there’s a rational motive in that.’

‘So there is.’ Appleby nodded. And as he did so the litter of crystal on the floor gleamed like split diamonds. ‘Hyland,’ he said, ‘do you know I may have seen the fellow – decanter and all?’

Had Appleby wanted Inspector Hyland out of the way (and it is not inconceivable that he did) he could not have done it better than retail at this point his encounter with the slumbering man with the glittering object at his feet. Instantly Hyland’s picture of a dark domestic tragedy went by the board and he addressed himself with all his energies to organizing a hunt for this prowler in the environs of Sherris. Whereupon Appleby decided that, unearthly as was the hour, he would endeavour to introduce himself to the family. And Swindle, approached on this, thought it possible that Mr Sebastian Dromio might be still available.

And presently Appleby was shown into the library, a gloomy room full of ancient books arrayed behind latticed doors, and suggesting that some eccentric Dromio had been fond of reading perhaps a couple of hundred years ago. At the moment it contained a Dromio who seemed fond of drinking, for Sebastian sat before the cheerless fireplace plying himself from, a syphon and a half-empty bottle of whisky. He received Appleby matter-of-factly and without inquiry as to his status. ‘Nasty thing,’ he said. ‘Hard on the women. But then young Oliver never was the thoughtful sort. Have a spot.’

Because he was no longer a policeman Appleby had a spot. ‘Who’s the heir?’ he enquired.

‘To the title, you mean? Dashed if I know much about that sort of thing. If it dodges backwards I suppose it comes to me. But probably it just fades out. I must ask some fellow at the club.’ Sebastian looked sharply at Appleby and appeared to see that he found this ignorance surprising. ‘Never inquired,’ he said, ‘because I was just not interested. No money nowadays in a handle to your name. And it’s money I’d like to see – particularly after this mess, which is likely to give the last blow to the family business. Young Oliver couldn’t have got himself killed at a more awkward moment. Forgive my talking like this. No use, you know, putting too fine a point upon matters in an affair of this sort.’

‘None at all,’ agreed Appleby. ‘So you don’t stand to gain by what has happened, Mr Dromio?’

Upon this, at least, Sebastian did for a moment seem to feel that a finer point might have been put. But he shook his head confidently. ‘Quite the other way. I’ve been holding things together for years and filling my own modest nose-bag on the strength of it. But I’m dashed if I see myself doing it any longer. Have to retire to lodgings in Cheltenham – that sort of thing.’ Sebastian picked up the bottle. ‘And the simplest comforts are so deuced expensive these days. Take whisky.’ And Sebastian took whisky. ‘Or take–’

‘I think it would be better to take care.’ And Appleby pointed frankly to the bottle. ‘The police, you know. I was one of them myself–’

‘A policeman!’ Sebastian Dromio was startled. ‘I thought you might be the under – the doctor, that is to say.’

Appleby shook his head, not at all offended at having been taken for someone sent to measure the body. ‘I know their ways, and presently they’ll be back badgering you again. So it would be just as well to keep a clear head.’