Death of a Peer (11 page)

Alleyn saw Lord Charles look sharply at her.

“We don’t
know
, of course,” he said slowly.

“Would any of you say there was an unusual quality in his voice?” asked Alleyn. For a moment nobody answered and then Henry said impatiently: “He only sounded irritable.”

Frid said: “Aunt V. had kept him waiting.”

Alleyn looked at Roberta. “Lord Wutherwood was a comparative stranger to you, Miss Grey?”

“Yes.”

“Would you say that there was any particular ring of urgency or alarm in his voice?”

“I only thought that he sounded impatient.” said Roberta.

Alleyn waited for a moment and then with a freshening of his voice he said: “Well now, to sum up. Each time Lord Wutherwood shouted, the younger members of the party were in the dining room, Lady Charles was in her bedroom and Lord Charles was in here. Lady Wutherwood and Lady Katherine Lobe were with Lady Charles at the time of the first call. At the time of the second call they had gone severally to the bathroom and the other room at the far end of Flat 26.”

“Neat as a new pin,” said Frid, and lit a cigarette.

“It doesn’t take us very far, however,” said Alleyn. “It merely leaves us with the presumption that at these times Lord Wutherwood was still uninjured.” He turned sharply in his chair, recrossed his long legs and looked thoughtfully at the twins. The twins continued to stare at the fire while, under their clear skins, their faces rapidly turned a dull red. “Yes,” said Alleyn. “We arrive at a difficulty. The next step, as you will understand, is to find out the condition of Lord Wutherwood when Lady Wutherwood and one or the other of these two gentlemen entered the lift. As both of these gentlemen agree that only one of them went down in the lift and as each of them protests that he was that one, it would appear that neither of their statements can be particularly valuable. At the moment I don’t propose to argue this point. I propose, when she can see me, to ask for Lady Wutherwood’s impressions of what happened when she entered the lift, and to find out from her exactly when the two uninjured occupants of the lift first realized what had happened. In the meantime, if I may, I should like to see Lord Wutherwood’s chauffeur.” Alleyn glanced at his notes. “Can his name be Giggle?”

“Yes, yes,” said Lady Charles drearily. “The servants in both our families always have names like that. One of you boys go and find Giggle, will you?”

Alleyn watched the twin on the left-hand end of the sofa hitch himself up and walk away. “That’s the one that stammers,” thought Alleyn. “He’s got a mole behind his left ear.”

“Thank you, Stephen,” murmured his mother. The other twin stared uneasily at her, met Alleyn’s glance and looked quickly away.

Alleyn asked Lady Charles when Dr. Kantripp was expected to come back. She said that he had told her he had two visits to make and would call in to see Lady Wutherwood on his return. An image of Lady Wutherwood began to take hold of Alleyn’s imagination and, while he waited for Stephen Lamprey to fetch the chauffeur, he made a picture of her. She would be lying on Lady Charles’s bed in the second room on the left in Flat 26, the room next to that other where her husband waited for the police mortuary van. What was she like, this woman whose screams had risen with the returning lift, who had stumbled through the doors into Lady Charles’s arms, who was (he remembered Lord Charles’s profound uneasiness) not English? What lay at the back of her apparently severe prostration? Grief? Shock? Fear? Why did the Lampreys, incredibly garrulous on all other topics, close down on the subject of their aunt? It was not his habit to speculate on the characters of people whom he was about to interview, and he checked himself. Time enough for him to form an idea of Lady Wutherwood when he met her.

The far door opened. Stephen Lamprey came in, followed by a tall man in a dark grey chauffeur’s uniform.

“This is G-Giggle,” said Stephen.

Evidently Giggle was nervous. He stood to attention and kept closing and unclosing his mechanic’s hands. He sweated lightly and was inclined to show the whites of his eyes. He had a large palish face and bleached eyebrows that met in a thicket over his snub nose. He eyed Alleyn with an air half-mulish, half-apprehensive, but gave his answers crisply enough, thinking for a moment, and then speaking without hesitation. Alleyn began by asking him if he knew what had happened to Lord Wutherwood. With an uneasy look at Lord Charles, Giggle said Mr. Baskett had told him his lordship had met with a fatal accident.

“We are afraid,” said Alleyn, “that it was not an accident.”

“No, sir?”

“No. It looks very much as though there has been foul play. You will understand that the police want to know the whereabouts of everyone in the flat from the time Lord Wutherwood was last seen, uninjured and apparently unthreatened, until the moment when the injury was discovered.”

He stopped and Giggle said doubtfully: “Yes, sir.”

“All right. Now, did you hear his lordship call out after he went out on the lift landing?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where were you?”

“In the passage, sir, in the flat, I’d been helping Master Michael with his train, sir.”

“Was Master Michael with you?”

“No, sir.”

“Do you know where he was?”

Giggle shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Well, sir, we was in the passage outside her ladyship’s room and Master Michael saw a parcel in her ladyship’s room and said something about giving it to his lordship. I mean his late lordship, sir.”

“Did Master Michael get this parcel?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And went away with it?”

“Yes, sir.”

Lord Charles cleared his throat and uttered a small deprecating sound. Alleyn turned to him.

“I’m so sorry, Alleyn. I quite forgot to tell you. Not that I imagine it can have the smallest bearing on anything. Michael had planned to give my brother a little present and actually came in here with it just before my brother went out.”

“I see, sir. There was no parcel in the lift.”

“No.” Lord Charles touched his moustache. “No. Actually he didn’t — he must have forgotten to take it.”

“Then it’s still here?”

“I suppose so. I—”

“There it is,” said Frid. She went to the far end of the room and returned with a square brown-paper parcel. “Do you want to see it, Mr. Alleyn? Routine and all that.”

“Yes, please.” Alleyn took the parcel in his long hands. “So he didn’t open it?”

“Well — well, no,” said Lord Charles. “Actually I was talking to my brother and told Michael to put the parcel down. I didn’t want to be interrupted.”

“I see, sir.” Alleyn turned the parcel over in his hand.

“Please, Mr. Alleyn!” said Lady Charles suddenly. “It’s rather precious and terribly breakable.”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize. May I ask what it is?”

“A piece of Chinese pottery. As old as the hills and perfectly hideous I think.”

“Good heavens!” Alleyn put the parcel delicately on the table. “Am I in a muddle,” he asked, “or was Lord Wutherwood a collector? I seem to remember a loan exhibition—”

“That’s right,” said Frid. “There’s a Ming or Ho or something gallery at Deepacres. All horses and smug goddesses, you know.”

“Well, Giggle,” said Alleyn, “Master Michael got this parcel and went away with it. What did you do?”

“I waited for a while, sir, and then I heard his lordship call for her ladyship so I came along to this flat and got my coat and cap, sir, from the staff sitting-room and I looked in at the door to say I was going. Then I went downstairs, sir. Master Michael came as far as the landing.”

“I see. In coming across to this flat you used the landing?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where was Lord Wutherwood?”

“His lordship was in the lift, sir.”

“Were the doors shut?”

“Yes, sir. I think they were.”

“Did he speak to you?”

“He told me to go down to the car, sir.”

“So you fetched your coat and hat, spoke to Master Michael, and returned to the landing?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you hear his lordship call a second time?”

“I can’t say I remember, sir. I don’t think so, sir.”

“Were the lift doors still shut when you returned?”

“I can’t say, sir. I hurried downstairs, sir, without looking at the lift.”

“Yes, I see. What did you do then?”

“I went straight to the car, sir.”

“Meet anybody?”

“Beg pardon, sir? Yes, I did pass the commissionaire, sir.”

“Speak to him?”

Giggle turned a deep crimson. “I just mentioned his lordship seemed to be in a bit of a hurry, sir.”

“How long were you in the car?”

“I couldn’t rightly say, sir. Not long before Miss Tinkerton came down. She’s her ladyship’s maid, sir. She came downstairs and sat with me.”

“And then?”

Giggle looked towards Roberta. “The young lady came and fetched us, sir.”

“You did, Miss Grey?”

“Yes.”

“We thought they might be wanted,” said Henry.

“Oh, yes. Thank you, Giggle, that’ll do for the moment. I may want to see you later.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Giggle went away. Alleyn looked round that circle of politely attentive faces. “That carries us to the time when Lord Wutherwood first called out and, rather patchily, a little way beyond it. There’s one small point we may as well clear up. I should like to know who wiped away the marks on the lift wall?”

“What marks?” asked Lord Charles while Roberta’s heart sank into a chasm. “I didn’t notice any marks.”

“I did,” said Roberta, in a much louder voice than she intended. “I wiped them off.”

“Why did you do this, Miss Grey?”

“I don’t quite know.” Why had she wiped away the marks? “I think it was because they looked so beastly. And I thought if other people used the lift — the lift was still working.”

“I see.” He was smiling at her. “Just tidying up?”

“Yes.”

“You shouldn’t, you know,” said Alleyn, dismissing it. “Well,” he said, “I don’t think any purpose can be served by keeping you all together. I’m so sorry, Lady Charles, but I’m afraid I ought to see your small son.” Alleyn looked deprecatingly at Nanny. “I know it’s all against nursery law,” he said.

“The boy’s worn out already, sir,” said Nanny.

“Oh, Nanny, he
isn’t
,” said Patch.

“That will do, Patricia.”

“Well, anyway—”

“It’ll be a very nasty shock for him, m’lady,” said Nanny. “Waking him up in the middle of the night and telling him his uncle’s been done away with.”

“I’ll explain, Nanny,” said Lady Charles.

“You needn’t bother, Mummy,” said Patch. “When I came out Mike was looking in the playbox for that magnifying glass you gave him. We guessed it was a murder and he thought he’d like to do some private detection.”

“
Honestly
!” said Frid, and burst out laughing.

“Look here, Nanny,” said Alleyn. “Suppose you take me along to the nursery and stand by. If you think I’m exciting him you can order me out.”

Nanny pulled down the corners of her mouth. “It’s for his mother to say, sir,” she said.

“I think I’ll just explain and bring him here to see you, Mr. Alleyn.”

Alleyn stood up. The movement had the effect of calling them all to attention. Lady Charles rose and the men with her. She faced Alleyn. There was a brief silence.

Alleyn said: “I think, if you don’t mind, I’ll go with Nanny. Of course if they think it would be advisable, his parents may be present while I speak to him.” Some shade of inflection in his voice seemed to catch the attention of the parents. Lady Charles said: “Yes, I think I’d rather…” hesitated, and glanced at her husband.

“I’m sure Mr. Alleyn will be very considerate with Mike,” he said and, behind the somewhat stylized courtesy which he was beginning to recognize as a characteristic of Lord Charles’s, Alleyn thought he heard a note of warning. Perhaps Lady Charles heard it too for she said quickly: “Yes, of course. I expect Mike will be
too
thrilled. Nanny, will you wake him and explain?”

Alleyn went to the door and opened it. “I don’t expect we shall be very long,” he said.

Henry laughed unpleasantly: Frid said: “When you’ve met Mike, Mr. Alleyn, you’ll realize that no one on earth could prime him with any story.”

“Don’t be an ass, Frid,” said Colin.

“What you may not realize,” said Henry suddenly, “is that Mike is a most accomplished little liar. He’ll think he’s telling the truth but if an agreeably dramatic invention occurs to him he’ll use it.”

“How old is Michael?” Alleyn asked Lady Charles.

“Eleven.”

“Eleven? A splendid age. Do you know that in the police-courts we regard small boys between the ages of ten and fifteen as ideal witnesses? They almost top the list.”

“Really?” said Henry. “And what type of witness do the experts put at the bottom of the list?”

“Oh,” said Alleyn with his politely depracting air, “young people, you know. Young people of both sexes between the ages of sixteen and twenty-six.”

“Why?” asked the twins and Henry and Frid simultaneously.

“The text-books say that they are generally rather unobservant,” Alleyn murmured. “Too much absorbed in themselves and their own reactions. May we go, Nanny?”

Without a word Nanny led the way into the hall. Alleyn followed her and shut the door but not before he heard Frid say: “And that, my dears, takes us off with a screech of laughter and a couple of loud thumps.”

Mike was fast asleep and therefore looked his best. The treachery of sleep is seen in the circumstances of its adding years to the middle-aged and taking them away from children. Mike’s cheeks were filmy with roses, his lips were parted freshly and his lashes made endearing smudges under his delicate eyelids. His mouse-coloured hair was tousled and still moist from his bath. Near to his face one hand, touchingly defenseless, lay relaxed across the handle of a Woolworth magnifying glass. He looked about seven years old and alarmingly innocent. Nanny, scowling hideously, smoothed the bed-clothes and laid a gnarled finger against Mike’s cheek. Mike made a babyish sound and curled down closer in his bed..

“Damn’ shame to wake him,” Alleyn said under his breath.

“Needs must, I suppose,” said Nanny, unexpectedly gracious.. “Michael.”

“Yes, Nanny?” said Mike and opened his eyes.

“Here’s a gentleman to see you.”

“Gosh! Not a doctor!”

“No,” said Nanny grimly, “a detective.”

Mike lay perfectly still and stared at Alleyn. Alleyn sat on the edge of the bed.

“I’m so sorry to rouse you up,” he said civilly, “but you know what these cases are. One must follow the trail while it’s fresh.”

Mike swallowed and then, with admirable nonchalance, said: “I know.”

“I wonder if you’d mind going over one or two points with me.”

“O.K.,” breathed Mike. He uttered a luxurious sigh. “Then it
is
murder,” he said.

“Well, it looks a bit like it!”

“Golly!” said Mike. “What a whizzer!” He appeared to think deeply for a moment and then said: “I say, sir, have you got a clue?”

“At the moment,” said Alleyn, “I am completely baffled.”

“Jiminy cricket!”

“I know.”

“Well, it wouldn’t be any of us, of course.”

“Of course not,” said Nanny. “It was some good-for-nothing out in the street. One of these Nazzys. The police will soon have them locked up.”

“An outside job,” said Mike deeply.

“That’s what we’re working on at the moment,” agreed Alleyn. “But there are one or two points.” He looked at Mike’s parted lips and brilliant eyes and thought: “I must keep this unreal and how the devil I’m to do it’s a problem. No element of danger but plenty of fictitious excitement.” He said, “As a matter of fact it’s quite possible that the bird has flown to a hide-out miles and miles away from here. We just want to check one or two points and I think you can help us. You were in the flat this afternoon, weren’t you?”

“Yes. I was having a bit of a go with my Hornby train. Giggle helped me. He’s absolutely wizard with trains. Being a motor expert helps, of course.”

“Yes, of course. Where do you do it? Not much room in here, is there?”

Mike shrugged his shoulders. “Hopeless,” he said. “We used the passage. And then, just when he’d got the coupling mended and everything, Giggle had to go.”

“So I suppose you simply carried on without him?”

“As a matter of fac’, I didn’t. Ackshully, Robin was going to play with me. You see I had to give Uncle G. the parcel.” Mike looked out of the corners of his eyes at Nanny. “I say,” he said, “it’s pretty funny to think of, isn’t it? I mean, where is dead?”

“Heaven,” said Nanny firmly. “Your Uncle Gabriel’s as happy as the day’s long. Well content, he is, you may depend upon it.”

“Well, Henry said this afternoon that Uncle G. could go to hell for all he cared.”

“Nonsense. You didn’t hear Henry properly.”

“Where was the parcel?” asked Alleyn.

“In Mummy’s room. Just by the screen inside the door. I couldn’t find it when Robin said Mummy wanted me to give it to Uncle G.”

“When was that?” asked Alleyn, taking out his cigarette case.

“Oh, before. After they’d done their charade. The others were horribly waxy because Uncle G. didn’t look at the charade. Stephen said he was an old—”

“That’ll do, Michael.”

“Well, Nanny, he did. I heard him when I was looking for the parcel.”

“Did you give the parcel up as a bad job?” asked Alleyn.

Mike shrugged again. It was a gesture that turned him momentarily into a miniature of his mother. “Sort of,” he admitted. “I went back to Giggle and the Hornby and then I saw the parcel. We were by the door.”

“Was anyone in the bedroom?”

“Mummy and Aunt V. and Aunt Kit had come in. They were gassing away behind the screen.”

“So what did you do?”

“Oh, I just scooped it up and took it to Uncle G. in the drawing-room. Uncle G. looked as waxy as hell.”

“Michael!”

“Well, sorry, Nanny, but he did. He didn’t say anything. Not thank you or anything like that. He just goggled at me and Daddy told me to put it down and bunk. So I bunked. Patch said they had the manners of hogs and I think they had too. Not Daddy, of course.”

“Don’t speak like that, Michael,” said Nanny “It’s silly and rude. Mr. Alleyn doesn’t want to hear—”

“I
say
.” Mike sat up abruptly. “
You’re not Handsome Alleyn, are you
?”

Alleyn’s face turned a brilliant red. “You’ve been reading the lower type of newspapers, young Lamprey.”

“I say, you are! Gosh! I read all about the Gospell murder in the
True Detective
! A person in my form at school knew a person whose father is a friend of — Gosh, of yours. He bucked about it for weeks. He won’t buck much longer, ha-ha. I say, sir, I’m sorry I mentioned that name. You know — H.A.”

“That’s all right.”

“I suppose you think it’s a pretty feeble sort of nickname to have. At school,” said Mike lowering his voice, “some people call me Potty. Potty Lamprey.”

“One lives down these things.”

“I know. Ackshully, I suppose you wouldn’t remember a person called N. Bathgate. He’s a reporter.”

“Nigel Bathgate? I know him very well indeed.”

Mike achieved an admirable expression of detachment. “So,” he said off-handedly, “as a matter of fac’ do we. He told me he called you Hand — you know — as a sort of joke. In the paper. To make you waxy.”

“He did.”

Mike giggled and gave Alleyn a sidelong glance.

“I suppose there’s not much hope nowadays,” he said, “for anybody to get into detection. I suppose you have to be rather super at everything.”

“Are you thinking of it?”

“As a matter of fac’ I am, rather. But I suppose I’m too much of a fool to be any use.”

“It’s largely a matter of training. What sort of memory have you got?”

“He’s the most forgetful boy
I
ever had the training of,” said Nanny. Mike gave Alleyn a man-to-mannish look.

“Let’s see how you shape,” Alleyn suggested. “Have a stab at telling me as closely as you can remember just exactly what happened, let’s say from the time you picked up the parcel and onwards. Go along inch by inch and tell me exactly what you saw and heard and smelt for the next fifteen minutes. That’s the sort of stuff you have to do at this game.” He opened his notebook. “We’ll say you’re an expert witness and I’m taking your statement. Off you go. You picked up the parcel? With which hand?”

“With my left hand because I had a Hornby signal in my right.”

“Good. Go on.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.”

“Well, I stepped over the rails. Giggle was fitting two curved bits together. I said I wouldn’t be a jiffy and he said ‘All Right, Master Mike.’ And I walked down the passage past the curtain of Robin’s room. Robin’s room is generally a sort of hall in 26 but Mummy had the curtains put there to make a room and a passage. Is this the right way, sir?”

“Yes.”

“The curtains were shut. They’re a kind of blue woolly stuff. The door at the end of the passage was shut. I opened it and went onto the landing.”

“Did you shut the door?”

“I don’t think so,” said Mike simply. “I hardly ever do. No, I didn’t, because I heard Giggle winding up the engine of the Hornby and I looked back at him.”

“Good. Then?”

“Well, I crossed the landing.”

“Was the lift up?”

“Yes, it was. You can see the light through the glass in the tops of the doors. There wasn’t anybody on the landing or outside the lift. Not standing up, anyway. So I went into the hall of No. 25 and I don’t suppose I shut the door. I’m afraid I’ll be a bit feeble if you say I’ve got to describe the hall because there were all the things the others had had for their charade. They’d just sort of bished them into the cupboard and they were bulging out and there were coats lying on the table and…” Mike stopped and screwed up his eyes.

“What is it?”

“Well, sir, I’m just sort of trying to
see
.”

“That’s right,” said Alleyn quietly. “You know your brain is really rather like a camera. It takes a photograph of everything you see, only very often you never develop the photograph. Try to develop the photograph your brain took of the hall.”

Nanny said: “The boy’s getting flushed.”

“I’m
not
,” said Mike, without opening his eyes. “
Honestly
, Nanny. Well, in my photograph the light is sort of coming through the window in front of me. Into my eyes. So everything has got its shadow coining my way. There’s a thing of flowers on the round table and a bowler. I think it was Uncle G.’s bowler. And I saw Henry’s gloves. And a scarf and some race glasses and one of those hats people wear in hot places. Wait a bit, sir. There’s something else. It’s sort of on the edge of the picture. Not quite developed, like you said.”

“Yes?”

“I’ll get it in a jiffy, all right. It’s a shining kind of thing. Not ’zackly big but long and bright.”

Nanny uttered a brusque exclamation and made an anxious gesture with her hands as though she fended something away from herself and from Mike.

“Wait a bit,” Mike repeated impatiently. “Don’t tell me. Long and thin and bright.”

He opened his eyes and stared triumphantly at Alleyn. “I’ve got it,” he said. “It was on the edge of the table. One of those long pointed things they keep in the sideboard drawer. A skewer. That’s what it was, sir. A skewer.”
ii

Mike paused and regarded Alleyn with some complacency. Nobody stirred. The nursery clock ticked loudly on the mantelpiece. A little gust of wind shook the window-panes. Down below in Pleassaunce Court a sequence of cars changed gears and accelerated. A paper-seller yelled something indistinguishable and somebody shouted “Taxi!” Nanny’s roughened hands, working together stealthily against her apron, made a faint susurration.

“They used it in their charade,” said Mike. “I heard Frid yelling out for it.”

“The charade?” Alleyn echoed. “Well, never mind. Go on.”

“About the skewer? Well, there’s one thing…”

Mike stopped. His face lost its look of eagerness and, as small boys’ faces can, became extremely blank.

“What’s up?” asked Alleyn.

“I was only wondering. Is the skewer a clue?”

“Anything might be a clue,” said Alleyn carefully.

“I know. Only—”

“Yes?”

Mike asked in a small voice: “What
happened
to Uncle G.?”

Alleyn took his time over this. “He was hurt,” he said. “Somebody went for him. It’s all over now. Nothing of the sort can possibly happen again.”

Mike said: “What was wrong with his eye?”

“It was hurt. People’s eyes bleed rather easily, you know^ Are you a boxer?”

“A bit. I was only wondering—”

“Yes?”

“About the skewer. You see I sort of remembered. After I tried to give the parcel to Uncle G. I went to the dining-room and after I went to the dining-room I went back with Giggle to the landing because Giggle was going away and we went through the hall and I said good-bye to Giggle because he’s rather a friend of mine, and I saw him go downstairs and I leant on the table and — well I was only just mentioning it because I happened to remember — well, anyway, the skewer wasn’t on the table then.”

“Michael,” said Nanny loudly, “don’t make things up.”

“It
wasn’t
. I put my hands where it would have been.”

There was another silence. Mike sat up and clasped his arms around his knees. “Shall I go back?” he asked. “Back to where I took the parcel to Uncle G.?”

“Yes,” said Alleyn, “go back.”

“Well, that’s everything I can remember about the first time in the hall. I went through the hall into the drawing-room. Daddy and him were by the fire. So I gave him the parcel. Well, I mean I didn’t give it to him because of what Daddy told me. I mean it was a bit awkward.”

“What was awkward?”

“Uncle G. being in such a stink about something. Gosh, he was in a stink.”

“You mean he was upset?”

“Absolutely livid. Gosh, you should have seen his face! Jiminy cricket!”

“Don’t exaggerate,” said Nanny. “You’re letting your fancy run away with you.”

“I am
not
,” cried Mike indignantly. “He wants me to tell him ezackly all I can remember and I am telling him. You are silly, Nanny.”

“That will do, Michael.”

“Well, anyway—”

“Never mind,” Alleyn interrupted. “Have you any idea why your uncle was angry?”

Nanny said: “I don’t think Michael ought to answer these questions without his parents say that he may.”

“O
Nanny
!” cried Mike in accents of extreme provocation. “You are!”

“Then we shall ask them to come in,” said Alleyn. “Bailey.” A figure stepped out of the shadows on the other side of the scrap-covered screen by Mike’s bed. “Will you give my compliments to his lordship and ask him if he would mind coming to the nursery?”

“Very good, sir.”

“Is he another detective?” asked Mike when Bailey had gone.

“He’s a finger-print expert.”

Mike suddenly gave a galvanic leap, ending in a luxurious writhe among the blankets. “I suppose he’s brought his insufferlater,” he said.

“All his kit,” agreed Alleyn gravely. “What happened when you left the drawing-room?”

“Well, I went to the dining-room and talked to Robin. The others had gone out. And then Giggle came along and said he had to go because Uncle G. was yelling in the lift. So I went to the landing with Giggle and he went downstairs. When he’d gone Uncle G. yelled out for Aunt V. So I bunked into 26. Gosh, he did sound livid. Absolutely waxy. I bet I know why.”