Nothing Like Blood (19 page)

“When he went back, what did he do?”

“Do? Nothing that I know of. I was busy finding my way across there again without breaking my neck. When I got there, he was just standing over her, crying.”

“You've told all this to the police?”

“Not quite like I've told it to you, Mr Deene. I don't like the police, you see. Never have.”

“Mr Deene'll think you've been in trouble with them,” warned his wife.

“No. I've never been in trouble with them. I'm like a lot of other people, I don't like them. But I told them the gist of what I told you.”

“Would you say Lawson had drunk a lot that night?”

“Hard to tell. He has been drinking lately. He's in money trouble, I think, apart from all this. When he came in at night, he was usually what you might call well away, but not drunk, really.”

“He went on his own at night, usually? To the pub, I mean.”

“Yes? Sonia Reid didn't like pub-crawling. I heard them have an argument about it once. But some evenings she'd get him to take her to the pictures or something. They were very thick, you know.”

“Yes. I gather they were going to get married.”

“I never heard that. The other two, yes; they talked
about it. Mallister and Esmée Welton, I mean. But we never knew Steve Lawson and Sonia were engaged though …”

“Now, Redmond!” said Mrs Jerrison.

“Well, it was obvious, wasn't it? I mean, they were living together.”

“One other thing I'd like to ask you both. It's rather important, but I don't like asking because it may possibly seem to you to involve either Mrs Derosse or her niece. It is this. Did you see anything of Sonia between dinner-time and … the time her body was found that evening?”

The Jerrisons looked at one another.

“It doesn't involve Mrs Derosse or her niece,” said Jerrison. “But I did see Sonia that night in rather a strange way. I was making my last rounds—about half-past eleven—when I noticed one of the guests' doors being opened very, very slowly. I dodged back round the corner of the passage and waited. Then I saw Sonia Reid peep out and, not seeing anyone, come right out and shut the door. I'm sure she never saw me at all.”

“Whose room was it?” asked Carolus, expecting Jerrison to say Mrs Gort's.

“It was the door of the Natterleys' sitting-room,” said Jerrison.

“Have you told anyone that?”

“No, sir,” said Jerrison quickly.

“Have
you,
Mrs Jerrison?”

“No. I didn't take much notice of it at the time and, anyway, I told you I won't talk about the whole thing.”

“Not even to the police?”

“No,” said Jerrison.

“Then for God's sake don't repeat it to anyone! I mean that, Jerrison.”

“You seem to take it very seriously, Mr Deene.”

“I do. It is a matter of life and death. When the police have to be told, I'll tell them. Meanwhile, if you don't want another murder, say absolutely nothing about it.”

They both looked somewhat awed.

“I shan't say anything,” said Mrs Jerrison.

“You can count on me,” added her husband.

Carolus had another glass of beer with them and went up to see Helena Gort. He wanted to know just how long after Steve Lawson ran out of the room that night Jerrison followed him. As usual Helena was accurate.

“Two to three minutes,” she said, and Carolus had to be content with that.

I
T
was past ten but Carolus decided that, in view of what he had just learned, he should not wait till the morning to see the Natterleys. He knocked on the door of their sitting-room and, after a moment, the Major opened it a few inches. “We were about to go to bed,” he said, his face showing anxiety and intense curiosity. “Is it urgent?”

“It is, rather. You were good enough to tell me that, when I had reached a point at which your information would help, I should come to you. I reached that point suddenly, just now.”

“Come in,” said Major Natterley.

They both regarded Carolus inquisitively and he thought that their expressed willingness to confide really
meant their anxiety to find out anything he could tell them. He was determined, therefore, to take the offensive at once. “You told me you had a certain amount of information which would be of the greatest importance to me. Could you tell me what it was?”

“We were speaking in general terms,” said the Major. “As I explained to you, we have done our best not to become involved in the events which have disturbed this household. We do not care to associate ourselves …”

“But what was the important information, Major Natterley? It has become an urgent matter.”

“Oh, little things we have noticed,” said the Major airily.

“Such as?”

“We cannot call to mind at a moment's notice the very matters we intended to confide in you. After all, it is somewhat late and we are in the habit of retiring early. Perhaps tomorrow …”

“Tomorrow may be too late.”

“Too late for what?” put in Dora Natterley with a sweetness Carolus disliked.

“Too late to prevent another incident, probably involving both of you.”

“Involving us? You can't be serious. How can we possibly be involved in matters which we have been so careful to avoid?”

“I think you know the answer to that one, Major Natterley.”

“You mean the matter of the Dormatoze tablets which Mrs Mallister was taking? That is simply told. Through a series of circumstances which, you may be sure, were quite fortuitous, since we never wish to pry into other people's affairs, we became aware that Sonia Reid had a supply of the tablets used by the late Mrs Mallister. We thought the circumstance most curious since they are
rarely prescribed by doctors. Most unwisely, as we now think, we departed from our principles sufficiently to ask her about this, and she at first denied having any, then became rather rude.”

“I do not mean the matter of the Dormatoze tablets,” said Carolus. “I was fully aware of that.”

“From Mrs Gort, no doubt? “He turned to his wife. “You see, my dear, how unwise it is to confide in anyone in this house? We shall not do so again.”

“I think you will, Major Natterley. I think you will give me here and now certain information which you have so far concealed.”

The Major rose to his feet. “Are you threatening us, sir?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Carolus. Then, more calmly: “At least you are certainly being threatened, if not by me. You—or one of you—are in a situation of real danger.”

“This is preposterous! How can
we
be in any danger?”

“You yourself have said that you believe a murderer often finds himself under the necessity of striking again.”

“We may have said that, yes, and it seems more than likely that we were right, as events have shown. But it doesn't concern us.”

“It didn't, last time.”

The Major took a lofty attitude, not an easy matter for a small man. “So you are saying in effect that, unless we give you some so-called information which we are supposed to possess, our lives may be in danger?”

“Exactly.”

“I've never heard such nonsense in my life,” said Major Natterley, driven to the first person singular by his indignation. “I shall see the police in the morning.”

“That would be the wisest thing you could possibly do,” said Carolus. “But not in the morning. Tonight.
Now,
Major Natterley. I suggest you phone them at once, for I may say that, if I fail to persuade you to confide either in them or me, I shall go to them at once.”

“Are you suggesting that we have something to hide? Something to be ashamed of?”

“Only in so far as you have impeded the course of justice by failing to give all the relevant facts to those investigating.”

It was possible that the Major might have held out, but at this point Dora Natterley began quietly to cry.

“You have upset my wife,” said Major Natterley. “You come here late at night with a cock-and-bull story about our having dangerous information …”

Carolus knew that the man was weakening. Since he did not at once say ‘I must ask you to leave', there was more to come.

“May we ask,” the Major began again when he had patted his wife's shoulder and handed her a clean handkerchief, “what this supposed information concerns?”

Carolus had kept this, hoping that he would not have to fire it. But he gave it to them now, with both barrels as it were. “It concerns the visit made to you by Sonia Reid about an hour before her death.”

He stopped, and there was silence in the room but for Dora's renewed sobs. At last the Major spoke—quite boldly in the circumstances.

“Oh that?” he said. “Why couldn't you say so? It does not seem much to make a fuss about. She did look in for a minute. What about it?”

“Have we got to go through all this, Major Natterley? Why on earth can't you be sensible about it? You know perfectly well the importance of that visit.”

“Beyond the fact that we may have been the last people she spoke to, I can't see any importance.”

“Why did she come here?”

“To inquire after my wife, who had complained of a headache that evening.”

“But you were scarcely on speaking terms since the matter of the Dormatoze tablets?”

“That is an exaggeration. We did not dislike Sonia Reid. She was scarcely our sort, of course, but there was no hostility.”

“What brought her here?”

“It would be interesting to know how you became aware that she … looked in for a moment.”

“It is my business to know these things. I am also aware that she took every precaution against being seen. As you must have noticed.”

“There was nothing extraordinary in the thing,” said Major Natterley, regaining some of his composure. “We didn't think it worth mentioning to the police. She just looked in to ask how my wife was …”

“She was here for at least twenty minutes,” said Carolus. This was his first piece of bluff, but it worked.

“She may have been. Time passes when one is chatting. We do not time our guests' visits.”

“You don't intend to tell me why she came?”

“You know that. To inquire …”

“Major Natterley, I know why she came. And if you have any sense, you know I know why she came.”

“You tell us, then,” said the Major, still hoping that there was an element of bluff in Carolus which he could call.

“I will,” said Carolus. “She wanted you to look after something for her.”

There were renewed sobs from Dora and a look of real fury on the Major's face. “And why not, sir?” he said. “We are the kind of people to whom others can confide their valuables and their secrets. We are
not
the kind of
people to reveal them to the first inquisitive snooper who comes here asking questions.”

“So you accepted the sealed envelope?” said Carolus calmly.

“Certainly,” said the Major defiantly. “Why should we refuse such a simple request?”

“You mean … you still have it?”

“It is in a safe deposit at our bank.”

“You did not think it your duty after the girl's death to reveal these facts?”

“Mr Deene, we refuse to associate ourselves with police inquiries and things of that sort. If you feel that the envelope should now be opened, you may accompany us to the bank tomorrow and—since you are evidently aware of so much of this sordid matter—we will examine the contents together.”

“I would give a great deal to do that,” said Carolus, “but frankly I daren't. We should all be laying ourselves open to a serious charge. No, Major Natterley, there is only one course open to you. Go to the police station tomorrow morning as early as possible, ask for the C.I.D. man concerned in events at Cat's Cradle, and tell him about this. Make what excuse you like for not having done so before—that you did not realize the importance of it, or whatever you think best. He will go with you and take possession of the envelope.”

“You really think that is necessary?”

“It is vital. For your own sake and your wife's.”

“But what can be in this envelope of such moment?”

“I don't know, exactly, though I have an idea. I can tell you that it has already cost one and, in a sense, two lives.”

Major Natterley looked sobered. “It is most distasteful for us …” he began.

“Murder
is
distasteful,” said Carolus shortly.

Mrs Natterley was calmer now. In fact, the couple seemed to have found a kind of relief in having their secret drawn out of them.

“It is not that we are ungrateful for your warning,” said Major Natterley. “We did not perhaps realize the full gravity of the matter.”

“We
have
been a little uncomfortable about it,” said his wife.

Carolus could not bear this complacency. “Uncomfortable?” he said. “I should like you to realize that, if it had not been for the discretion of two people in this house, you might well … Do you keep a revolver, Major Natterley?”

“We do,” said the Major.

“Then keep it beside you tonight. And lock your doors. That may sound melodramatic, but it is a precaution I feel I must advise.”

“Well do as you say. We little thought when in a moment, which we see now to have been one of weakness, we agreed to keep this packet for the night …”

“So it was only for the night that Sonia asked you to keep it?”

“That's all. She said she would collect it first thing in the morning. Her room had already been searched, she said, and this was a private, family matter.”

“That's interesting. Did she seem in a hurry?”

“She glanced at her watch a couple of times, certainly. Not very polite, we felt.”

“She did not say whether or not she had asked anyone else to take charge of it?”