Troubles in the Brasses (22 page)

“To me, nothing whatever. As I understand it, Zlubert talked with MacVittie and Naxton for a short while, then took off again. I haven’t had a chance to get to them myself, I’ve been too busy answering the same asinine questions over and over till I’m ready to go back to Wales and spend the rest of my life herding Uncle Caradoc’s sheep. Sheep can be tiresome, too, but at least they don’t take photographs. Rick has not come back and I can’t blame him. Madoc, I am anxious, very anxious. What are we going to do about—?”

“The best we can, Tad. I’ve been working on it, but I need Rick. It’s a rotten shame Zlubert took off so fast, I wouldn’t dare ask any of these media blokes to take me down to the ranger station. You can imagine what that would lead to. Maybe Mr. Gabriel here can help us.”

Gabriel didn’t even look up from his reed. Sir Emlyn hiked himself out of the uncomfortable wooden chair, stiff from too much sitting, and walked over toward the window. Madoc went with him and did the talking.

“Gabriel?”

“Eh? Oh, yes. Sorry.” He was even younger than Madoc had thought; he must have been some kind of child prodigy. He laid his unfinished reed carefully on the windowsill and stood up. “Good morning. Or is it afternoon?”

“Who knows? I’d like to ask you a couple of questions, if you don’t mind. It’s about Cedric Rintoul.”

“Cedric? I don’t think I’ve seen him this morning. Has he been around?”

“No, but he was here last night. When I went upstairs, you and he were the last ones left in the lobby.”

“Were we? I thought Joe Ragovsky was still there. Joe fixed the fire, I remember that.”

“The fire had already been banked when I got back from the ranger station.”

“The ranger station? Was that where you went? In that crazy three-winged plane with the old chap in the funny helmet, right? You got back in one piece, eh. Good flight?”

“Gabriel, could we cut the small talk?”

“Whatever you like. I’m no good at it, anyway.”

The oboist was on the gangly side, with mouse-fine light brown hair that could have stood a trimming, and baby-blue eyes that blinked a lot. No doubt he had a doting wife, mother, or sweetheart who waited on him hand and foot back in Wagstaffe; he didn’t look like the sort who’d be much good at fending for himself. Right now he was casting a worried glance at his reed. “Was there something else you wanted to talk about? Because I’ve got this reed—”

“Gabriel, you’ve been making reeds the whole time you’ve been here.”

“I know, but I have this impossible dream that one day I’ll make an absolutely perfect reed. It’s rather like the quest for the Holy Grail. Not quite on the same scale, I don’t suppose.”

“Probably not, Gabriel, but no doubt a worthy aspiration. Getting back to Rintoul, could you tell me what time you left him?”

“I don’t think I left him, exactly. That is to say, if you leave somebody, it’s more as if one of you were going away somewhere. All I did was go upstairs to bed, which doesn’t quite count because he was going to be doing the same thing. Theoretically, anyway.”

“Rintoul was, however, still in the lobby when you went to bed?”

“I assume so, if he was here before.”

“But you don’t know? Weren’t you talking with him?”

“Not that I recall. Maybe Cedric was talking to me, and I just wasn’t hearing him.” David Gabriel was blushing now, a flaming crimson with flashes of scarlet. “You see—well, maybe Sir Emlyn isn’t going to like this much, but—well, what I was doing was—Sir Emlyn, do you know those Handel sonatas for two oboes and continuo?”

The elder Rhys nodded. “The six pieces Lord Polwarth discovered in Germany, which Handel is supposed to have composed as a child of ten? Yes, they are charming. Not the sort of thing I ever get to use myself, of course.”

“I realize that, and I know I ought to have been thinking about the pieces we’re going to be playing at Fraser River, but you see”—he really was the most spectacular blusher Madoc had ever run across—“I have this pupil.”

“A young woman pupil of seemly countenance and agreeable disposition, by any chance?” For some reason Sir Emlyn was smiling. “Is it possible you were meditating on the third movement of the Number Two in D-minor?”

“Well,” the young musician actually giggled, “as a matter of fact, yes.”

“I can think of nothing more appropriate. You might also give some thought to the Number Six in D-major. There, you may recall, the Affetuoso is followed by the Vivace, which you may find even more effective in terms of the learning experience than the Allegro.”

Madoc had only a glimmer as to what his father was talking about, but Gabriel had by now faded to a nice, rosy pink and was grinning from ear to ear. “Thank you very much, Sir Emlyn.”

“Any time, my boy. And now if you could possibly turn your mind back to last night, I’m sure my son would be grateful for any recollection you might be able to dredge up about Rintoul. Perhaps it would help if you were to sit down again and get back to work on your reed? Re-create the scene, as it were.”

With the reed back in his hands and his dilemma about the Handel sonatas resolved, David Gabriel was finally at ease. “Let’s see. I was sitting here and Cedric was over there. You know, he did say something, I remember how. He said, ‘It’s getting damned cold in here.’ I think he must have been talking to me, because nobody else said anything. They must all have gone to bed, as you say. Then it occurred to me that my hands were so numb I could hardly manage my fingers, so I put my reed and my wire cutters inside the cover of my instrument case and picked it up and went to bed.”

“You didn’t say good night to Rintoul?”

“I may have nodded or something, I’m not sure. I don’t like Cedric much.”

“But he was in fact still sitting here when you left the lobby?”

“Unless he got up after my back was turned. I’m quite sure he didn’t come upstairs right behind me. I’m always pretty wary of letting Cedric get too close. He’s too apt to do some stupid thing like pinning a sign on your back or sticking a burr in your hip pocket so you’ll sit on it. I did hear somebody on the stairs after I got into my room, come to think of it, but I don’t think it was Cedric. Unless he was trying awfully hard to be quiet, which isn’t like him.”

“It didn’t occur to you to look out and see who was there?” Madoc asked.

“No, why should it?”

“Simply that you might have helped us to answer the question of who killed him.”

At last Madoc had found a way to get David Gabriel’s complete and undivided attention. “Oh, sweet dying Jesus!” the oboist all but shouted. “What the bloody hell’s going on here, will you answer me that?”

“I hope I can, soon.”

“And what happens if you can’t?”

“Then I’m afraid we may find ourselves stuck here till I can. Mr. Gabriel, did you attend that garden party at Monsieur Houdon’s?”

“Yes, I did.”

“And did you happen to notice some rather spectacular tall plants he has in his yard?”

“With leaves like great, big fans? Yes, I—well, I’m not much good at standing around making conversation with people. I found them handy to hide behind some of the time, if you really want to know.”

“That’s exactly what I want to know. Did you by any chance happen to notice anyone picking beans off the plants?”

“As a matter of fact, I did. I wasn’t thinking much about the beans at the time, I have to say. I was mostly hoping he wouldn’t come over and start talking to me.”

“He who?”

“Cedric Rintoul, naturally. But then Frieda Loye came along and told him he’d better leave those beans alone because Houdon had been warning everybody that they were deadly poison. So Cedric said, “Then what have you been stuffing them up your nose for?’ He reached over and pretended to be pulling them out. Cedric was good at magic tricks, I have to say. It honestly looked as if he was getting them out of her nose.”

“And how did Frieda Loye take that?”

“Not too well, I’m afraid. She went right up in smoke.”

“What did she say?”

“She said—” Gabriel swallowed and blushed. “She said, ‘Honest to God, Cedric, one of these days I’m going to kill you!’ ”

“D
ID SHE, INDEED?” ASKED
Madoc. “And what did Rintoul say to that?”

“It was rather strange. He said, ‘Cool it, Frieda. You’re not going to get hold of it that easily.’ ”

“What do you suppose he meant by ‘get hold of it’?”

“Well, Cedric had such a filthy mind that I thought maybe he was telling Frieda he wouldn’t—you know—have it off with her. Though I can’t imagine why she’d have wanted him to. Cedric was kind of a mess. Anyway, that was just a guess. He probably didn’t mean anything at all.”

“And what did he do with the beans he’d picked?”

“Tossed them back among the bushes.”

“All of them?”

“How could I tell? He might have palmed a few, I told you he was good at sleight-of-hand. Inspector, you’re not thinking Cedric used those beans to poison Wilhelm Ochs?”

“It’s fairly apparent that somebody did.”

“But Cedric and Wilhelm were pals. They always hung around together.”

“He could have given them to somebody else.”

“Why would he do that?”

“I have no idea. We simply have to bear in mind all the possibilities.”

“I suppose so. Oh look, there’s a car pulling up out front!”

“It’s the ranger wagon, Madoc,” Sir Emlyn exclaimed, quite unnecessarily since his son was already heading for the door, feeling some sixteen pounds lighter than he had a moment ago.

Rick was out of the wagon, opening the tailgate to get at a large kettle. Ed Naxton was running over to help him. So were a number of other people. Madoc got there first.

“Ellen sent you a present.” Disdaining any help, Rick was going to carry the kettle himself. “Your kitchen stove going?”

“It was the last time I looked,” Madoc replied. “What have you got there?”

“Spaghetti, best she could do at such short notice. We knew from what you told us last night that the rations were getting pretty slim up here. When the message came through from Wagstaffe, Ellen got on the radio and told me I’d better get back and let her fix something for you all to eat. That was when I was up here earlier with the plane. Maybe you noticed me turn back. It didn’t look as if I was going to get down any time soon, so rather than waste my gas circling the field, I went on home and waited till they quit buzzing over. You folks have had a busy morning.”

“You might say that,” Madoc agreed. “But what’s happening, Rick? Are there any plans to get us out of here?”

“Yes, we’re going to start ferrying you folks down in the wagon to the ranger station as soon as we get the word. A charter plane’s coming to collect you from there and fly you on to Vancouver. They didn’t want to risk landing on Lodestone Flat with the Grumman in the way. But it’s going to take a while yet before they get everything organized, and we figured there was no reason why you had to go hungry in the meantime. Ellen said to tell you she’s sorry she didn’t have a dessert to send, but she’ll have something baked by the time you get to the house. I put this kettle inside a box of straw to keep it hot on the way up, but you might want to set it on the stove a while. Better give it a stir now and then, Ellen says, so it won’t catch on the bottom.”

“Don’t worry, this spaghetti isn’t going to scorch. It won’t last long enough,” Joe Ragovsky assured the ranger. “Boy does this smell good! How about rustling up some plates, somebody? We’ll stick ’em in the oven to take the chill off.”

All was joy and bustle, everybody getting in everybody else’s way and nobody giving a rap. Lady Rhys came downstairs, marvelously revived by the odor of home cooking and the prospect of getting away. Sir Emlyn kissed her right in front of the entire assemblage. It was no mere peck on the cheek, either.

Only Lucy Shadd was oddly subdued. She made no move to run the show as usual. While the others milled around making themselves more or less useful as the case might be, Lucy stayed out in the lobby, sitting next to the stove, holding the scarf high around her throat.

Since the chairs were all in the lobby anyway, it seemed silly to try to cram them back into the kitchen. The sensible thing, it was agreed by mass osmosis, would be for each person to fill a plate for himself from the spaghetti kettle and Joe’s new batch of biscuits and carry his lunch into the lobby. Luckily, Ellen Rick was the kind of cook who breaks spaghetti into short pieces instead of leaving it in strings, probably because she was used to feeding small children and Ace Bulligan, so they wouldn’t have much trouble managing the food buffet-style.

Steve MacVittie remembered that there were still two bottles of red wine in the plane, not much for a party of this size but enough for everyone to have a few sips in celebration of their impending rescue. Ranger Rick had already eaten, he told them; he wouldn’t share the festive repast but acted as waiter and busboy instead. It was he who brought Lucy Shadd the spaghetti and wine she hadn’t been able to raise gumption enough to get for herself.

Madoc noticed how quiet she was, but didn’t say anything until he himself had managed to put away the double helping he felt he deserved and knew he needed. Then he asked her, “What’s the matter, Lucy? Is your neck still bothering you?”

Lady Rhys and Frieda Loye were both clearly surprised that Madoc should bring up the topic which those in the know had been avoiding. So was Lucy, but she answered readily enough. “Yes, it’s rather painful. I expect I did too much yesterday.”

“What did you do to your neck, Lucy?” Joe Ragovsky asked.

Madoc answered for her. “Somebody wrapped a violin string around it yesterday morning. That’s what all the screaming was about.”

“My God!” shouted Joe, “you mean he was trying to strangle her?”

Everybody started yelling at once, but Sir Emlyn made a small gesture with his finger to his lips, and the mouths all snapped shut together. There was much to be said, Madoc thought, for a policeman’s having a conductor as a father.

“That appears to have been the intention,” he went on quietly. “And this morning, I must tell you, we’ve had a further complication. When I came down to open up the fires, I found Cedric Rintoul on the kitchen floor, stabbed to death with an icepick.”