Death in a White Tie (8 page)

Evelyn Carrados let the paper fall on the counterpane and stared at her husband.

“The papers are full of it,” she said woodenly.

“Good God, my dear Evelyn, of course they are! And this is only the ten o’clock racing edition brought in by a damn pup of a footman with my breakfast. Wait till we see the evening papers! Isn’t it enough, my God, that I should be rung up by some jack-in-office from Scotland Yard at five o’clock in the morning and cross-examined about my own guests without having the whole thing thrust under my nose in some insulting bloody broadsheet!”

He limped angrily about the room.

“It’s perfectly obvious that the man has been murdered. Do you realize that at any moment we’ll have some damned fellow from Scotland Yard cross-questioning us and that all the scavengers in Fleet Street will be hanging about our door for days together? Do you realize—”

“I think he was perhaps my greatest friend,” said Evelyn Carrados.

“If you look at their damned impertinent drivel on page five you will see the friendship well advertised. My God, it’s intolerable. Do you realize that the police rang up Marsdon House at quarter-past four — five minutes after we’d gone, thank God! — and asked when Robert Gospell left? Some fellow of Dimitri’s answered them and now a blasted snivelling journalist has got hold of it. Do you realize—”

“I only realize,” said Evelyn Carrados, “that Bunchy Gospell is dead.”

Bridget burst into the room, a paper in her hands.

“Donna! Oh, Donna — it’s our funny little Bunchy. Our funny little Bunchy’s dead! Donna!”

“Darling — I know.”

“But, Donna —
Bunchy
!”

“Bridget,” said her stepfather, “please don’t be hysterical. The point we have to consider is—”

Bridget’s arm went round her mother’s shoulders.

“But we
mind
,” she said. “Can’t you see — Donna minds
awfully
.”

Her mother said: “Of course we mind, darling, but Bart’s thinking about something else. You see, Bart thinks there will be dreadful trouble—”

“About what?”

Bridget’s eyes blazed in her white face as she turned on Carrados.

“Do you mean Donald?
Do you
? Do you dare to suggest that Donald would — would—”

“Bridgie!” cried her mother, “what are you saying!”

“Wait a moment, Evelyn,” said Carrados. “What is all this about young Potter?”

Bridget pressed the back of her hand against her mouth, looked distractedly from her mother to her stepfather, burst into tears and ran out of the room.

Mrs Halcut-Hackett’s beautifully manicured hands closed like claws on the newspaper. Her lips were stretched in a smile that emphasised the carefully suppressed lines from her nostrils to the corners of her mouth. She stared at nothing.

General Halcut-Hackett’s dressing-room door was flung open and the General, wearing a dressing-gown but few teeth, marched into the room. He carried a copy of a ten o’clock sporting edition.

“What!” he shouted indistinctly. “See here! By God!”

“I know,” said Mrs Halcut-Hackett. “Sad, isn’t it?”

“Sad! Bloody outrage! What!”

“Shocking,” said Mrs Halcut-Hackett.

“Shocking!” echoed the General. “Preposterous!” and the explosive consonants pronounced through the gap in his teeth blew his moustache out like a banner. His bloodshot eyes goggled at his wife. He pointed a stubby forefinger at her.

“He said he’d bring you home,” he spluttered.

“He didn’t do so.”

“When did you come home?”

“I didn’t notice. Late.”

“Alone?”

Her face was white but she looked steadily at him.

“Yes,” she said. “Don’t be a fool.”

Donald Potter read the four headlines over and over again. From the centre of the page his uncle’s face twinkled at him. Donald’s cigarette-butt burnt his lips. He spat it into his empty cup, and lit another. He was shivering as if he had a rigor. He read the four lines again. In the next room somebody yawned horribly.

Donald’s head jerked back.

“Wits!” he said. “Wits! Come here!”

“What’s wrong?”

“
Come here!
”

Captain Withers, clad in an orange silk dressing-gown, appeared in the doorway.

“What the hell’s the matter with you?” he enquired.

“Look here.”

Captain Withers, whistling between his teeth, strolled up and looked over Donald’s shoulder. His whistling stopped. He reached out his hand, took the newspaper, and began to read. Donald watched him.

“Dead!” said Donald. “Uncle Bunch! Dead!”

Withers glanced at him and returned to the paper. Presently he began again to whistle through his teeth.

Lady Mildred Potter beat her plump hands on the proofs of the
Evening Chronicle
obituary notice and turned upon Alleyn a face streaming with tears.

“But who could have
wanted
to hurt Bunchy, Roderick? Everyone adored him. He hadn’t an enemy in the world. Look what the
Chronicle
says — and I must say I think it charming of them to let me see the things they propose to say about him — but look what it says. ‘Beloved by all his friends!’ And so he was. So he was. By all his friends.”

“He must have had one enemy, Mildred,” said Alleyn.

“I can’t believe it. I’ll never believe it. It must be an escaped lunatic.” She pressed her handkerchief to her eyes and sobbed violently. “I shall never be able to face all this dreadful publicity. The police! I don’t mean you, Roderick, naturally. But everything — the papers, everyone poking and prying. Bunchy would have detested it. I can’t face it. I can’t.”

“Where’s Donald?”

“He rang up. He’s coming.”

“From where?”

“From this friend’s flat, wherever it is.”

“He’s away from home?”

“Didn’t Bunchy tell you? Ever since that awful afternoon when he was so cross with Donald. Bunchy didn’t understand.”

“Why was Bunchy cross with him?”

“He had run into debt rather. And now, poor boy, he is no doubt feeling too dreadfully remorseful.”

Alleyn did not answer immediately. He walked over to the window and looked out.

“It will be easier for you,” he said at last, “when Donald gets here. I suppose the rest of the family will come too?”

“Yes. All our old cousins and aunts. They have already rung up. Broomfield — Bunchy’s eldest nephew, you know — I mean my eldest brother’s son is away on the Continent. He’s the head of the family, of course. I suppose I shall have to make all the arrangements and — and I’m so dreadfully shaken.”

“I’ll do as much as I can. There are some things that I must do. I’m afraid, Mildred, I shall have to ask you to let me look at Bunchy’s things. His papers and so on.”

“I’m sure,” said Lady Mildred, “he would have preferred you to anyone else, Roderick.”

“You make it very easy for me. Shall I get it done now?”

Lady Mildred looked helplessly about her.

“Yes. Yes, please., You’ll want his keys, won’t you?”

“I’ve got the keys, Mildred,” said Alleyn gently.

“But — where —?” She gave a little cry. “Oh, poor darling. He always took them with him everywhere.” She broke down completely. Alleyn waited for a moment and then he said:

“I shan’t attempt the impertinence of condoling phrases. There is small comfort in scavenging in this mess for crumbs of consolation. But I tell you this, Mildred, if it takes me the rest of my life, and if it costs me my job, by God! if I have to do the killing myself, I’ll get this murderer and see him suffer for it.” He paused and made a grimace. “Good Lord, what a speech! Bunchy
would
have laughed at it. It’s a curious thing that when one speaks from the heart it is invariably in the worst of taste.”

He looked at her grey hair arranged neatly and unfashionably and enclosed in a net. She peered at him over the top of her drenched handkerchief and he saw that she had not listened to him.

“I’ll get on with it,” said Alleyn, and made his way alone to Lord Robert’s study.

Sir Daniel Davidson arrived at his consulting-rooms at half-past ten. At his front door he caught sight of the news placard and, for the first time in his life, bought a sporting edition. He now folded the paper carefully and laid it on top of his desk. He lit a cigarette, and glanced at his servant.

“I shan’t see any patients,” he said. “If anybody rings up — I’m out. Thank you.”

“Thank you, sir,” said the servant and removed himself.

Sir Daniel sat thinking. He had trained himself to think methodically and he hated slipshod ideas as much as he despised a vague diagnosis. He was, he liked to tell his friends, above all things, a creature of method and routine. He prided himself upon his memory. His memory was busy now with events only seven hours old. He closed his eyes and saw himself in the entrance-hall of Marsdon House at four o’clock that morning. The last guests, wrapped in coats and furs, shouted cheerfully to each other and passed through the great doors in groups of twos and threes. Dimitri stood at the foot of the stairs. He himself was near the entrance to the men’s cloakroom. He was bent on avoiding Lucy Lorrimer, who had stayed to the bitter end, and would offer to drive him home if she saw him. There she was, just going through the double doors. He hung back. Drifts of fog were blown in from the street. He remembered that he had wrapped his scarf over his mouth when he noticed the fog. It was at that precise moment he had seen Mrs Halcut-Hackett, embedded in furs, slip through the entrance alone. He had thought there was something a little odd about this. The collar of her fur wrap turned up, no doubt against the fog, and the manner in which she slipped, if so majestic a woman could be said to slip, round the outside of the group! There was something furtive about it. And then he himself had been jostled by that fellow Withers, coming out of the cloakroom. Withers had scarcely apologized, but had looked quickly round the melting group in the hall and up the stairs.

It was at that moment that Lord Robert Gospell had come downstairs. Sir Daniel twisted the heavy signet ring on his little finger and still with closed eyes he peered back into his memory. Withers had seen Lord Robert. There was no doubt of that. Sir Daniel heard again that swift intake of breath and noticed the quick glance before the fellow unceremoniously shoved his way through the crowd and disappeared into the fog. Then Lord Robert’s nephew, young Donald Potter, came out of the buffet near the stairs. Bridget O’Brien was with him. They almost ran into Lord Robert, but when Donald saw his uncle he sheered off, said something to Bridget, and then went out by the front entrance. One more picture remained.

Bunchy Gospell speaking to Dimitri at the foot of the stairs. This was the last thing Sir Daniel saw before he, too, went out into the fog.

He supposed that those moments in the hall would be regarded by the police as highly significant. The papers said that the police wished to establish the identity of the second fare. Naturally, since he was obviously the murderer! The taxi-driver had described him as a well-dressed gentleman who, with Lord Robert, had entered the cab about two hundred yards up the street from Marsdon House. “Was it one of the guests?” asked the paper. That meant the police would get statements from everyone who left the house about the same time as Lord Robert. The last thing in the world that Sir Daniel wanted was to appear as a principal witness at the inquest. That sort of publicity did a fashionable physician no good. His name in block capitals, as likely as not, across the front sheets of the penny press and before you knew where you were some fool would say: “Davidson? Wasn’t he mixed up in that murder case?” He might even have to say he saw the Halcut-Hackett woman go out, with Withers in hot pursuit. Mrs Halcut-Hackett was one of his most lucrative patients. On the other hand, he would look extremely undignified if they found out that he was one of the last to leave and had not come forward to say so. It might even look suspicious. Sir Daniel swore picturesquely in French, reached for his telephone and dialled WHI1212.

Colombo Dimitri in his smart flat in the Cromwell Road drew the attention of his confidential servant to the headlines.

“What a tragedy,” he said. “It may be bad for us at the beginning of the season. Nobody feels very gay after a murder. He was so popular, too. It is most unfortunate.”

“Yes, monsieur,” said the confidential servant.

“I must have been almost the last person to speak with him,” continued Dimitri, “unless, of course, this dastardly assassin addressed him. Lord Robert came to me in the hall and asked me if I had seen Mrs Halcut-Hackett. I told him I had just seen her go away. He thanked me and left. I, of course, remained in the hall. Several of the guests spoke to me after that, I recollect. And then, an hour later, when I had left, but my men were still busy, the police rang up. He was a charming personality. I am very, very sorry.”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“It would be a pleasant gesture for us to send flowers. Remind me of it. In the meantime, if you please, no gossip. I must instruct the staff on this point. I absolutely insist upon it. The affair must not be discussed.”

“
C’est entendu, monsieur.
”