In Spite of Thunder (28 page)

“In London, last winter, Mrs. Ferrier bought a book called
Poisons and Poisoners
. Aubertin and I found this book in the study on Friday afternoon; it helped me in persuading Aubertin. Hathaway found it later. As you said, Sir Gerald, it provided a blueprint for murder.

“Eve Ferrier saw, with genuine horror, how she
could
have killed Matthews at Berchtesgaden. She had done nothing of the kind; men of Matthews’s age are susceptible to high altitudes as well as high passions. But she could have done this, since the German police-surgeon had mentioned poison at the time. It made her frantic to prove she hadn’t. Especially since Philip, inspired by the same book, had been circulating rumours—and meant to use the device—against
her
.”

Hathaway, glowering, called for attention with a rap on the table like an insistent ghost.

“You tell us,” he inquired, “she herself could have been caught and killed by a device she was aware of?”

“Of course. See Dr. Boutet’s medical evidence.”

“In what way?”

“The victim, we learn, is overcome by a poison that destroys the judgment like alcoholic intoxication. The damage is done before the victim understands. Surely, Sir Gerald, considering the thumping lie
you
told on Friday evening, you can accept this?”

Audrey, who stood in some awe of Hathaway, regarded him with astonishment.

“Sir Gerald wasn’t telling the truth either?”

“With dire results as regards my sanity,” retorted Dr. Fell, “nobody was telling the truth. Including your obedient servant. On Friday night, wishing to question you, Aubertin and I called at Innes’s block of flats in the Quai Turrettini; Sir Gerald and Philip Ferrier were with us. (Remember that; it becomes important later.)”

“But what …?”

“By this time Sir Gerald, from the conversation of Aubertin and myself, was utterly convinced the person who used the poison was Mrs. Ferrier herself. He did not know how the lady had been caught in her own trap. He only knew the poison had been added to roses from the garden. So he tried to strengthen his case by swearing Mrs. Ferrier had gone into the garden before breakfast.

“She hadn’t. Other witnesses, including myself, could testify she hadn’t. He was trying to make his case too good; and it nearly landed him in trouble. Later, with a whoop and shout, he pried certain admissions from Paula Catford, and pitched on Miss Catford as the guilty person. If he agrees with Emerson that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, he could not have shown it better.”

“I believed—” Hathaway began with some passion.

“You believed it was for the best? Oh, ah. So did everybody else. Actually, nobody went into the garden on Friday morning. The bowl of roses had been in the study from the previous day. Philip Ferrier, the last person who came downstairs to breakfast, added poison before he joined us at the breakfast table.”

Here Dr. Fell, trying without success to light his pipe again, made fussed gestures.

“Tut! Aroint ye, now! Once more I anticipate events. Let us return to Friday morning just following the discovery of the murder, when I questioned Desmond Ferrier in the drawing-room at the Villa Rosalind. This was in the presence of Paula Catford and Brian Innes, before the arrival of the police.

“Never have I had such little success. All I discovered was the answer to a question no longer of any importance: that is, where had the murderer got the sulphuric acid?

“Paradoxically, as Dr. Boutet wrote, to buy nitrobenzene is fairly simple. Under its various names as essence of mirbane or benzeldahyde or artificial oil of bitter almonds, it has many commercial uses. But we may not, without provoking some curiosity, stride into a chemist’s and demand sixpennyworth of oil of vitriol. Indeed, I had been wandering about the villa looking for some bottle or container which might have held the stuff: until, in the drawing-room, I recalled Innes’s remark. …”

“My remark?” interposed Brian. “About what?”

“About the motor-cars,” answered Dr. Fell.

“You mean Philip got it—?”

“He got it out of the battery of a carefully preserved old-time motor-car from the nineteen-twenties: a car, by the way, which only Philip used. The sulphuric acid in modern batteries is better protected. However, when I owned one such car in the dimmer days of my slimness, I can recall tipping over the battery by accident and seeing sulphuric acid run out of it like beer out of a bottle.

“But what good was this information? None!

“In the drawing-room, then, I tried to make Desmond Ferrier speak out and tell what he knew. I let him see how much
I
knew. Because of some remarks made by Paula Catford, he saw his own awkward position (and Audrey Page’s) with most uncomfortable clearness.

“And yet he refused to speak out.”

Dr. Fell heaved a gusty sigh.

“I could scarcely have expected him to denounce his own son, you inquire? Well, but there was even more in it than this. Temperament had begun to dance again. He has found (I hope and I also believe), he has found his own great love in Paula Catford. Too much frankness on his part might have thrown suspicion on Miss Catford—as, later, Sir Gerald did throw suspicion on her. Nor could he resist playing the noble role of the hero wrongly accused.

“Paula Catford knew he had not been in the Cave of the Witches the night before, as he swore he had. She knew he had been with her in her hotel-room between shortly past seven and shortly past ten. She begged him to stop acting.

“And still he refused.

“By thunder, that did it! There was no choice but to throw in my lot with the police.

“I could still protect Audrey Page, who had been innocently embroiled. But I could no longer protect Desmond Ferrier. Even I, notorious for circumventing and flum-diddling the law when my personal feelings are involved—as Ferrier well knew, when he hurried to consult me at the beginning—could not be expected to shield Philip. Certainly I could not risk another tragedy.”

“That’s not the first time you’ve mentioned another tragedy,” Brian said. “What other tragedy? And to whom?”

“Either to you,” replied Dr. Fell, “or to Audrey Page. In actual fact, you escaped it only by one whistle and the grace of God.”

Heavily apologetic, the man who could tolerate all things and never preached sermons, Gideon Fell nevertheless shook his head when he blinked at Audrey.

“Come!” he urged. “The possibility of another move on the murderer’s part had existed since Thursday night. After promising Innes you would never go near the Villa Rosalind, young lady, you allowed yourself to be taken there in the hope Innes would follow you. To anyone who saw you on that Thursday night it was plain you cared not one scrap either for Philip Ferrier or for Philip’s father. It was Innes you cared for, I think?”

“Well, I don’t deny it,” declared Audrey, meeting his eyes. “He—he wants me to marry him.”

“My dear young lady, there is no need to apologize. But I saw this at the Villa Rosalind on Thursday night. Paula Catford saw it, and commented on it next day. The question was: had Philip seen it? If so, there might be all kinds of trouble.”

“
Had
Philip seen it?”

“Harrumph. Well. Whether he saw it or not, he had very good reason to know it on Friday night. Oh, Bacchus, he had!”

“How? And, if you’ll please tell me, how much did Paula Catford know or guess?”

Dr. Fell looked down over his several chins and sighed again.

“In answering both those questions at once, we can wind up the whole case.”

For a few seconds he concentrated, gathering together the filaments of his scatterbrain.

“From what Innes told me yesterday, Sunday,” he continued, “Paula Catford’s behaviour may be indicated without difficulty. She was upstairs at the villa on Friday morning, listening outside Sir Gerald Hathaway’s bedroom, when Innes and I were discussing the best way of shielding
you
. She could not really believe you and Desmond Ferrier were engaged in a hectic love-affair; she knew too well she was the favoured one. On the other hand, such knowledge has never entirely convinced any woman when doubts worm in.

“Following this, during the celebrated interview in the drawing-room, Ferrier built up such a case against himself and you—both as lovers and murderers—that her wonder increased. Finally, that night, you ’phoned Desmond Ferrier at the Villa Rosalind; and Miss Catford picked up an extension-receiver to listen. Immediately afterwards Ferrier left the house.

“She knew you two were meeting, but she had no idea where it would be. So she begged permission to accompany Aubertin and myself (together with Philip Ferrier) when we drove to Geneva for the purpose of questioning first Hathaway and then you. Since she could guess where you were hiding out, as she informed Innes, she nipped ahead of us to Innes’s flat and discovered there would be a meeting at the Cave of the Witches.

“Mark one thing! In her heart, or so I firmly believe, Paula Catford could still not credit either an intrigue or a murder planned between you and Desmond Ferrier. No: as I have learned since then, she overheard Aubertin and your obedient servant putting their heads together at the villa. Either from something Ferrier had let slip, or from what she could deduce by her own nimble wits, Miss Catford had begun to suspect Philip.

“She couldn’t reveal that, of course; she was too loyal to Desmond Ferrier. It was simply that she wondered about you and Ferrier; she had to have her doubts settled. And this could be done, she felt, if Ferrier openly admitted his love for her by saying frankly he had been with her on Thursday evening. That, and that alone, must have been her purpose in going with Innes to the Cave of the Witches.”

Now it was Brian who sat up, shushing Audrey’s questions and drawing Dr. Fell’s attention.

“Just a minute! You and Aubertin had put your heads together as soon as that? You had decided …?”

“We had decided on the murderer; we had decided on the method. All I did, in the way of making myself suspect, was to provide Miss Page with an alibi for the crucial time before breakfast when the flowers were poisoned. Aubertin overlooked that.”

“And afterwards?”

“Well! Desmond Ferrier’s admission that his son always preferred to have dinner at the Globe Restaurant or the Hotel du Rhône was confirmed by a ’phone-call to the dining-room at the latter place. Eve Ferrier
had
asked for Philip there: though Philip, on Thursday night, actually took Miss Page to the Richemond. The discovery of Philip’s diary was a clincher.

“Consequently, when Aubertin and I drove to Geneva with Paula Catford, we encouraged Philip to accompany us. Aubertin wanted to have him followed from that time.”

“Followed?”

“Of course. If we could prevent it, there must be no more murder-attempts.”

Again memory opened its vistas to Brian.

“You had Philip followed from the time you and Aubertin entered the block of flats where I live? Isn’t that so? When the policeman reported, ‘Mr. Director, the signal has been given,’ did that mean the shadow was ready to take over from there?”

“It did. Philip, already in none too pleasant a mood either towards you or towards the young lady who was frankly staying at your flat, went with us when we took the lift to the flat. Neither you nor Miss Page was there, admittedly. But the front door was wide open, as you know. Our party separated afterwards; and Philip, who had walked smack into some revelations that upset him still worse …”

“Revelations? What revelations?”

“Have you forgotten the sheet torn from the note-pad? The paper you lost?”

Brian said nothing.

“The address of the night-club,” Dr. Fell explained patiently, “brought out from pencil-tracings in Audrey Page’s handwriting, was inscribed on that paper. You couldn’t find it next day; Philip had picked it up in your flat. Also in her handwriting, scrawled blatantly in lipstick across a mirror in your bedroom, was a message beginning, ‘I love you too—’”

Dr. Fell paused, blinking over his eyeglasses.

“And that,” Brian asked, “was what sent him to the Cave of the Witches?”

“Oh, ah. After he had first taken a taxi back to the villa, to procure a convenient automatic pistol and a convenient mask he could slip on in the dark. This over-reserved young man had gone berserk; his fine plan was in ruins; a brilliant and brutal murder had been committed for nothing; and somebody must pay for it. He had quite literally a shot at making you both pay. Unfortunately, the police-tail spotted nothing wrong at the Cave of the Witches; as you yourself said, nobody spotted anything wrong. And, when Aubertin and I heard of this murder-attempt next day, Aubertin was already prepared to close in. He dared not wait.

“Thus we come to the last scene of the last act.

“I was ordered to (harrumph) discuss the evidence in the study, while Aubertin kept Philip outside in a position to listen. But, by thunder, I insisted the boy’s father shouldn’t be there to watch his son’s arrest! With cross-purposes still working—”

“Desmond Ferrier returned to the villa?”

“He did. Amid many oaths he was detained in another room, where he could neither see nor hear. Oaths continued to shower from Aubertin when another unexpected guest turned up. Philip’s arrest could not have been exactly welcome to Miss Page either. Unfortunately, when she went to the airport for the not-very-sinister purpose of picking up her luggage, one of Aubertin’s men thought she was trying to escape. He detained her and in triumph sent
her
to the villa, where she must be kept out of the way until the curtain was down.

There was a long silence.

“As a last word, my dear sir,” and Dr. Fell blinked at Hathaway, “as a last word, I will give you a piece of advice against the time you are next tempted to try your hand at solving a problem in murder.”

“Indeed?”

“Desmond Ferrier, by getting me to the villa before anything had happened, hoped my presence would stop any games his son might have in mind. He shouted to the world I was there, as he told Innes. It had no effect at all. Philip, though not officially an actor, had more stage-blood in his veins than his step-mother and fully as much as his father. Take warning, Sir Gerald: as Philip said himself, it is not easy to cope with stage-people.”