Off with His Head

by Ngaio Marsh

  ‘And, originally, there was an actual sacrifice?’

  ‘Of some sort, I have no doubt.’

  ‘Human?’

  Dr Otterly said: ‘Possibly.’

  ‘This lock, or knot, of swords, now. Five swords, you’d expect it to be six.’

  ‘So it is everywhere else that I know of. Another element that makes the Five Sons unique.’

  ‘How do they form it?’

  ‘While they dance. They’ve got two methods. The combination of a cross interwoven with an A or a sort of monogram of an X and an H. Both of them take quite a bit of doing.’

  ‘And Ernie’s was as sharp as hell.’

  ‘Absolutely illicit, but it was.’

  ‘I wonder,’ Alleyn said, ‘if Ernie expected this particular Old Man to resurrect.’

  Dr Otterly laid down his knife and fork. ‘After what happened?’ He gave a half laugh. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised.’

  ‘What’s their attitude to the dance? All of them? Why do they go on with it, year after year?’

  Dr Otterly hesitated. ‘Come to that, Doctor,’ Fox said, ‘why do you?’

  ‘Me? I suppose I’m a bit of a crank about it. I’ve got theories. Anyway, I enjoy fiddling. My father, and his before him and his before that have been doctors at Yowford and the two Mardians and we’ve all fiddled. Before that, we were yeomen and before that tenant farmers. One in the family has always been a fiddler. I try not to be cranky. The Guiser was a bigger crank in his way than I. I can’t tell you why he was so keen. He just inherited the Five Sons habit. It runs in his blood like poaching does in Old Moley Moon’s up to Yowford Bridge or hunting in Dame Alice Mardian’s, or doctoring, if you like, in mine.’

  ‘Do you think any of the Andersens pay much attention to the ritualistic side of the thing? Do you think they believe, for instance, that anything tangible comes of the performance?’

  ‘Ah, now! You’re asking me just how superstitious they are, you know.’ Dr Otterly placed the heels of his well-kept hands against the edge of his plate and delicately pushed it away. ‘Hasn’t every one of us,’ he asked, ‘a little familiar shame-faced superstition?’

  ‘I dare say,’ Alleyn agreed. ‘Cosseted but reluctantly acknowledged. Like the bastard sons of Shakespearian papas.’

  ‘Exactly. I know, I’ve got a little Edmund. As a man of science, I scorn it, as a countryman I give it a kind of heart service. It’s a particularly ridiculous notion for a medical man to harbour.’

  ‘Are we to hear what it is?’

  ‘If you like. I always feel it’s unlucky to see blood. Not, may I hasten to say, to see it in the course of my professional work, but fortuitously. Someone scratches a finger in my presence, say, or my own nose bleeds. Before I can stop myself I think: “Hallo. Trouble coming.” No doubt it throws back to some childish experience. I don’t let it affect me in the slightest. I don’t believe it. I merely get an emotional reflex. It’s—‘ He stopped short. ‘How very odd,’ he said.

  ‘Are you reminded that the Guiser cut his hand on Ernie’s sword during your final practice?’

  ‘I was, yes.’

  ‘Your hunch wasn’t so far wrong that time,’ Alleyn observed. ‘But what are the Andersens’ superstitious reflexes? Concerning the Five Sons?’

  ‘I should say pretty well undefined. A feeling that it would be unlucky not to do the dance. A feeling, strong perhaps in the Guiser, that, in doing it, something is placated, some rhythm kept ticking over.’

  ‘And in Ernie?’

  Dr Otterly looked vexed. ‘Any number of crackpot notions, no doubt,’ he said shortly.

  ‘Like the headless goose on the dolmen?’

  ‘I am persuaded,’ Dr Otterly said, ‘that he killed the goose accidentally and in a temper and put in on the dolmen as an afterthought.’

  ‘Blood, as he so tediously insists, for the stone?’

  ‘If you like. Dame Alice was furious. She’s always been very kind to Ernie, but this time—‘

  ‘He’s killed the goose,’ Fox suggested blandly, ‘that lays the golden eggs?’

  ‘You’re in a bloody whimsical mood, aren’t you?’ Alleyn inquired idly, and then, after a long silence: ‘What a very disagreeable case this is, to be sure. We’d better get on with it, I suppose.’

  ‘Do you mind,’ Dr Otterly ventured, ‘my asking if you two are typical CID officers?’

  ‘I am,’ Alleyn said. ‘Fox is a sport.’

  Fox collected their plates, stacked all the crockery neatly on a tray and carried it out into the passage where he was heard to say: ‘A very pleasant meal, thank you, Miss. We’ve done nicely.’

  ‘Tell me,’ Alleyn asked. ‘Is the Guiser’s granddaughter about eighteen with dark reddish hair cut short and very long fingers? Dressed in black ski-ing trousers and a red sweater?’

  ‘I really can’t tell you about the fingers, but the other part’s right. Charming child. Going to be an actress.’

  ‘And is young Stayne about six feet? Dark. Long back. Donegal tweed jacket with a red fleck and brown corduroy bags?’

  ‘That’s right, I think. He’s got a scar on his cheekbone.’

  ‘I couldn’t see his face,’ Alleyn said. ‘Or hers.’

  ‘Oh?’ Dr Otterly murmured. ‘Really?’

  ‘What’s her name?’

  ‘Camilla Campion.’

  ‘Pretty,’ Alleyn said absently. ‘Nice name.’

  “Isn’t it?’

  ‘Her mum was the Guiser’s daughter, was she?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘There’s a chap,’ Alleyn ruminated, ‘called Camillo Campion, who’s an authority on Italian primitives. Baronet. Sir Camillo.’

  ‘Her father. Twenty years ago, his car broke an axle coming too fast down Dame Alice’s drive. He stopped at Copse Forge, saw Bess Andersen, who was a lovely creature, fell like a plummet and married her.’

  ‘Lor’!’ said Fox mildly, returning from the passage. ‘Sudden!’

  ‘She had to run away. The Guiser wouldn’t hear of it. He was an inverted snob and a bigoted Nonconformist, and, worst of all, Campion’s a Roman Catholic. ’

  ‘I thought I remembered some story of that kind,’ Alleyn said. ‘Had he been staying at Mardian Castle?’

  ‘Yes. Dame Alice was livid because she’d made up her mind he was to marry Dulcie. Indeed, I rather fancy there was an unofficial engagement. She never forgave him and the Guiser never forgave Bess. She died five years ago. Campion and Camilla brought her back here to be buried. The Guiser didn’t say a word to them. The boys, I imagine, didn’t dare. Camilla was thirteen and like enough to her mama at that age to give the old man a pretty sharp jolt.’

  ‘So he ignored her?’

  ‘That’s right. We didn’t see her again for five years, and then the other day she turned up, determined to make friends with her mother’s people. She managed to get round him. She’s a dear child, in my opinion.’

  ‘Let’s have her in,’ said Alleyn.

  II

  When they had finished their lunch, of which Camilla ate next to nothing and Mrs Bünz, who normally had an enormous appetite, not much more, they sat vis-à-vis by the parlour fire and found very little to say to each other. Camilla was acutely conscious of Simon Begg and, in particular, of Ralph Stayne, consuming their counter lunches in the Public Bar. Camilla had dismissed Ralph with difficulty when Mrs Bünz came in. Now she was in a rose-coloured flutter only slightly modified by the recurrent horror of her grandfather’s death. From time to time, gentle Camilla reproached herself with heartlessness and as often as she attempted this pious exercise the memory of Ralph’s kisses made nonsense of her scruples.

  In the midst of her preoccupations she noticed that Mrs Bünz was much quieter than usual and seemed, in some indefinable way, to have diminished in size. She noticed, too, that Mrs Bünz had a monstrous cold, characterized by heavy catarrhal noises of a most irritating nature. In addition to making these noises, Mrs Bünz sighed very often
and kept moving her shoulders uneasily as if her clothes prickled them.

  Trixie came round occasionally from the Public Bar into the Private. It was Trixie who had been entrusted by Alleyn with the message that the police would be obliged if Mrs Bünz and Miss Campion would keep the early afternoon free.

  ‘Which was exactly the words he used,’ Trixie said. ‘A proper gentleman if a policeman, and a fine deep voice, moreover, with a powerful kind of smack in it.’

  This was not altogether reassuring.

  Mrs Bünz said unexpectedly: ‘It is not pleasant to be told to await the police. I do not care for policemen. My dear husband and I were anti-Nazi. It is better to avoid such encounters.’

  Camilla, seeing a look of profound anxiety in Mrs Bünz’s eyes, said: ‘It’s all right, Mrs Bünz. They’re here to take care of us. That’s what we keep them for. Don’t worry.’

  ‘Ach!’ Mrs Bünz said, ‘you are a child. The police do not look after anybody. They make investigations and arrests. They are not sympathetic. Dar,’ she added, making one of her catarrhal noises.

  It was upon this sombre note that Inspector Fox came in to say that if Miss Campion had finished her luncheon Mr Alleyn would be very pleased to have a word with her.

  Camilla told herself it was ridiculous to feel nervous but she continued to do so. She followed the enormous bulk of Mr Fox down the narrow passage. Her throat became dry and her heart thumped. ‘Why?’ she thought. ‘What have I got to get flustered about? This is ridiculous.’

  Fox opened the door into the little sitting-room and said: ‘Miss Campion, Mr Alleyn.’ He beamed at Camilla and stepped aside for her. She walked in and was immeasurably relieved to find her friend Dr Otterly. Beyond him, at the far side of a table, was a tall dark man who stood up politely as she came in.

  ‘Ah!’ Dr Otterly said, ‘here’s Camilla.’

  Alleyn came round the table and Camilla found herself offering him her hand as if they had been introduced at a party.

  ‘I hope,’ he said, ‘you don’t mind giving us a few minutes.’

  ‘Yes,’ murmured Camilla, ‘I mean, no.’

  Alleyn pushed forward a chair.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘it won’t be as bad as all that, and Dr Otterly’s here to see fair play. The watchword is “routine”.

  Camilla sat down. Like a good drama student, she did it beautifully without looking at the chair. ‘If I could pretend this was a mood-and-movement exercise,’ she thought, ‘I’d go into it with a good deal more poise.’

  Alleyn said: ‘We’re checking the order of events before and during the Dance of the Five Sons. You were there, weren’t you, for the whole time? Would you be very patient and give us an account of it? From your point of view.’

  ‘Yes, of course. As well as I can. I don’t expect I’ll be terribly good.’

  ‘Let’s see, anyway,’ he suggested comfortably. ‘Now, here goes.’

  Her account tallied in every respect with what he had already been told. Camilla found it easier than she would have expected and hadn’t gone very far before she had decided with correct professional detachment that Alleyn had ‘star quality’.

  When she arrived at the point where Simon Begg as ‘Crack’, the hobby horse, did his improvisation, Camilla hesitated for the first time and turned rather pink.

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Alleyn said. ‘That was the tar-baby thing after the first general entrance, wasn’t it? What exactly is “Crack’s” act with the tar?’

  ‘It’s all rather ham, I’m afraid,’ Camilla said grandly. ‘Folkseyhokum.’ She turned a little pinker still and then said honestly: ‘I expect it isn’t really. I expect it’s quite interesting but I didn’t much relish it because he came thundering after me and, for some ridiculous reason, I got flustered.’

  ‘I’ve seen the head. Enough to fluster anybody in that light, I should imagine.’

  ‘It did me, anyway. And I wasn’t all that anxious to have my best ski-ing trousers ruined. So I ran. It came roaring after me. I couldn’t get away because of all the people. I felt kind of cornered and faced it. Its body swung up—it hangs from a frame, you know. I could see his legs: he was wearing lightish coloured trousers.’

  ‘Was he?’ Alleyn said with interest.

  ‘Yes. Washed-out cords. Almost white. He always wears them. It was silly,’ Camilla said, ‘to be rattled. Do you know I actually yelled. Wasn’t it shaming? In front of all those village oafs.’ She checked herself. ‘I don’t mean that. I’m half village myself and I dare say that’s why I yelled. Anyway I did.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Well,’ Camilla said, half laughing, ‘well then I kind of made a bee-line for the Betty and that was all right because it was Ralph Stayne, who’s not at all frightening.’

  ‘Good,’ Alleyn said, smiling at her. ‘And he coped with the situation, did he?’

  ‘He was just the job. Masterful type: or he would have been if he hadn’t looked so low comedy. Anyway, I took refuge in his bombasine bosom and “Crack” sort of sloped off.’

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘He went sort of cavorting and frisking out at the back and everybody laughed. Actually, Begg does get pretty well into the skin of that character,’ Camilla said with owlish professionalism.

  Alleyn led her through the rest of the evening and was told nothing that he hadn’t already heard from Dr Otterly. It was oddly touching to see how Camilla’s natural sprightliness faltered as she approached the moment of violence in her narrative. It seemed to Alleyn she was still so young that her spirit danced away from any but the most immediate and direct shock. ‘She’s vulnerable only to greenstick fracture of the emotion,’ he thought. But, as they reached the point when her grandfather failed to reappear and terror came upon the five sons, Camilla turned pale and pressed her hands together between her knees.

  ‘I didn’t know in the slightest what had happened, of course. It was queer. One sort of felt there was something very much amiss and yet one didn’t exactly know, one felt it. Even when Dan called them and they all went and looked—I—it was so silly, but I think I sort of wondered if he’d just gone away.’

  ‘Ah!’ Alleyn said quickly. ‘So he could have gone away during the dance and you mightn’t have noticed?’

  Dr Otterly sighed ostentatiously.

  ‘Well—no,’ Camilla said. ‘No, I’m sure he couldn’t. It would have been quite impossible. I was standing right over on the far side and rather towards the back of the stage. About OP second entrance, if you know where that is.’

  Alleyn said he did. ‘So you actually could see behind the stone?’

  ‘Sort of,’ Camilla agreed and added in a worried voice:

  ‘I must stop saying “sort of”. Ralph says I do it all the time.Yes, I could see behind the stone.’

  ‘You could see him lying there?’

  She hesitated, frowning. ‘I saw him crouch down after the end of the dance. He sat there for a moment, and then lay down. When he lay down, he—I mean I really couldn’t see him. I expect that was the idea. He meant to hide. I think he must have been in a bit of a hollow. So I’d have noticed like anything if he’d got up.’

  ‘Or, for the sake of argument, if anybody had offered him any kind of violence?’

  ‘Good heavens, yes!’ she said, as if he’d suggested the ridiculous. ‘Of course.’

  ‘What happened immediately after he sank out of sight? At the end of the dance?’

  ‘They made a stage picture. The Sons had drawn their swords out of the lock. “Crack” stood behind the stone looking like a sort of idol. Ralph stood on the prompt side and the Sons separated. Two of them stood on one side, near me, and two on the other, and the fifth, the Whiffler—I knew afterwards it was Ernie—wandered away by himself. Ralph went round with the collecting thing and then Ralph snatched Ernie’s sword away and they had a chase. Ralph’s got rather a nice sense of comedy, actually. He quite stole the show. I remember “Crack” was behind the dolmen about then
so he ought to be able to tell you if there was anything—anything—wrong—’

  ‘Yes. What did he do while he was there?’

  ‘Nothing. He just stood. Anyway,’ Camilla said rapidly, ‘he couldn’t do anything much, could he, in that harness? Nothing—nothing that would—’

  ‘No,’ Alleyn said, ‘he couldn’t. What did he do, in fact?’

  ‘Well, he sort of played up to Ralph and Ernie. He gave a kind of falsetto neigh, and he went off at the back.’

  ‘Yes? And then?’

  ‘Then Ralph pretended to hide. He crouched down behind a heap of rubble and he’d still got Ernie’s sword. And Ernie went off-stage looking for him.’

  ‘You’re sure all this is in the right order?’

  ‘I think so. One looked at it in terms of theatre,’ said Camilla. ‘So, of course, one wouldn’t forget.’

  ‘No,’ Alleyn agreed with careful gravity, ‘one wouldn’t, would one. And then?’

  ‘Then Uncle Dan did his solo and I rather think that was when the bonfire flared up.’ She looked at Dr Otterly. ‘Do you?’

  ‘It was then. I was playing “Lord Mardian’s Fancy,” which is Dan’s tune.’

  ‘Yes. And Ralph came out of his hiding-place and went off at the back. He must have returned his sword to Ernie and walked round behind the wall because he came on at the O.P. entrance. I call it “O.P.”’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ‘And I think, at about the same time, Ernie and “Crack” must have come back together through the centre entrance at the back.’

  ‘And Ernie had got his sword?’

  ‘Yes, he had. I remember thinking: “So Ralph’s given him back his sword,” and anyway, I’d noticed that Ralph hadn’t got it any longer.’

  Camilla had a very direct way of looking at people. She looked now straight at Alleyn and frowned a little. Then, a curious thing happened to her face. It turned ashen white without changing its expression. ‘About the sword,’ she said. ‘About the sword—?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It wasn’t—it couldn’t have been—could it?’

  ‘There’s no saying,’ Alleyn said gently, ‘what the weapon was. We’re just clearing the ground, you know.’