Vintage Murder

by Ngaio Marsh

  “We’ll find out. Go on, please. After that?”

  She held her head between her hands.

  “After that? Wait. Bob was outside in the passage, whistling. I remember thinking: ‘It’s in the passage so it doesn’t matter.’”

  “But—what do you mean?”

  “It’s unlucky to whistle in the dressing-room. Bob stood there—he must have been just inside the doorway to the stage, because I heard him call out every now and then to the stage-hands. I remember thinking that he was evidently not going to bother about tidying himself for the party. He is a great ‘character’ and has been with us for years.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Alleyn quickly. “Go on. Let me have the whole story—give me a clear picture of everything. You are all in your rooms, taking off the make-up. Bob is just outside your door, in the entrance from the stage to the passage. You hear him chaffing the stage-hands. How long was he there? Can you tell me that?”

  She glanced at him in surprise.

  “I don’t know. Why—yes—yes—oh!” Suddenly her whole face was flooded with a kind of tragic thankfulness.

  “Listen—listen. Bob was still there when Hailey went out. I heard Hailey say something about why wasn’t he on stage with the party. Bob said: ‘I don’t like butting in, sir. Not my place,’ and I heard Hailey say: ‘Nonsense, you’re all invited. Come along with me, and we’ll make an entrance together.’ That was like Hailey—he’s always considerate with the staff, and nice to them. But Bob was shy and hung back. I heard him say he would wait for Minna. He stayed there. So, don’t you see, if Hailey had gone out before, and come back, Bob would have seen him, and when he did go he asked Bob to go with him. Don’t you see it means Hailey could not have thought of going up to the grid. Why didn’t I remember it before—oh, why didn’t I!”

  “I wish very much that you had. Never mind. How much longer did Bob stay there?”

  “I heard the others speak to him as they went past. I don’t know how many of them. That was before Hailey went out. But that doesn’t matter. It’s Hailey that matters—he would never have asked Bob to go with him if he meant to go up into the grid, and besides, I am sure it was too late then. If he had done it he would have gone out before, and Bob would have seen him.”

  “Was Bob there when you went out?”

  “I don’t think so. Hailey and George and—and Alfie came for me. We met in the passage.”

  “Tell me,” said Alleyn, “why did you stay so long in your room?”

  Something—the faintest shadow—of the old mischievous look, returned to Carolyn’s face. He was reminded of that night in the train when she had looked out of one eye at him.

  “I wanted to come on last,” she said. “It was my party.”

  “You deliberately delayed your entrance?”

  “Of course I did. I remember wishing Bob would go. I heard Minna come along and they stood there talking. I wanted everybody—but everybody—to be on stage.” She stared thoughtfully at Alleyn. “It seems so incredible now, me waiting there to make a big entrance, but you see I am Carolyn Dacres. I don’t suppose you understand.”

  “Yes, yes, I do,” cried Alleyn with sudden exasperation, “but can’t you see, you divine donkey, that I want to get your alibi established!”

  “Mine?” She caught her breath and then said softly: “Yes, I do see. For a moment I had forgotten to be frightened about—me.”

  “I hope that you will have no need to be frightened. I must see Bob, at once. Come on—get up. We’re going back.”

  He stood up and held out his hands.

  She gave him hers and rose lightly to her feet. They stood for a moment facing each other, hand-fasted as though they were lovers. Her fingers tightened round his. He thought:

  “Damn’! She is attractive.”

  She said: “I hope for only one thing, Mr. Alleyn—that you will soon believe us innocent and then I shall be able to be sorrowful.”

  “I understand that.”

  “It is so strange. I keep thinking ‘Pooh will tell me how to get out of this fix!’ I only realise with my mind—not yet with my heart. Perhaps that sounds rather trite and affected but I can’t find other words.”

  “Indeed, I understand.” She still held his hands.

  “Somehow at these sorts of times, after one has had a great shock, I mean, one speaks one’s thoughts openly. I do feel, in the most strange way, that we are friends.”

  “Yes,” said Alleyn.

  She gave him a candid and gentle smile and withdrew her hands.

  “Come along then. Let us return to—everything.”

  He collected the rug and basket and they walked together to the car, the voice of the creek growing fainter as they drew away from it. The sun was near the edge of the warm hill and soon their little gully would slip into the shade of afternoon. Carolyn paused and looked back.

  “It is a lovely place,” she said. “In spite of everything I shall think of it with pleasure. The painfulness of all this does not seem to have touched it at all.”

  “No,” said Alleyn, “it is very remote. We were interlopers but vaguely welcome, don’t you think?”

  “Yes. It is a friendly place, really.”

  “Are you very tired?”

  “I believe I am.”

  “No sleep last night?”

  “No.”

  They got into the car which smelt of hot leather and petrol, and bumped over the rough up to the road.

  On the way home they were both silent, Alleyn thinking to himself: “I really believe her. I believe her story. I believe she feels just what she said—a kind of friendliness for me, no more. Was she quite unaware that she attracted me so vividly for those few moments, or was she using her charm deliberately? Is she in love with Hambledon? Probably.”

  With an effort he screwed his thoughts round to the case. If this story about Bob was true, and if Bob turned out to be an intelligent fellow, they should be able to check movements of the actors with much more accuracy than Alleyn had thought possible. As soon as he got back, he would look again at his plan of the theatre. He was practically certain that the passage was the only source of exit from the dressing-rooms to the stage, therefore anyone of the company who went from the dressing-rooms to the ladder, would have to go past Bob as he stood in the narrow entry. If Bob could only tell him exactly how long he had stood there!

  They passed the musterer, riding a half-clipped, raky-looking horse at a lope along the rough grass at the roadside. The three panting sheep-dogs ran in the shade of the horse. The man again solemnly wagged his head at them and raised a hand as they passed. The folding hills marched about. A party of Maoris, grouped on a ramshackle veranda, grinned and waved. They overtook several cars and met several more. The settlements grew closer together, and at length they came over the brow of the last hill, and looked across the flat to Middleton.

  “Last lap,” said Alleyn, breaking a long silence.

  Carolyn did not answer. He turned to look at her. Her head was bent down and, as heavily as a mandarin’s, nodded with the motion of the car. She was sound asleep. At the next bend she swayed towards him. With an equivocal grimace he raised his left hand and tipped her head against his shoulder. She did not wake until the car drew up outside the hotel.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Exit Liversidge.

  Enter Bob Parsons (Whistling)

  AS SOON AS he had put Carolyn into the lift, Alleyn glanced into the writing-room. Should he try and get off a couple of letters for the English mail, or should he look up Wade and give him an account of the interview with Carolyn? He hovered uncertainly in the doorway, and then noticed George Mason, bent over one of the writing-tables, hard at work. Alleyn strolled across and seated himself at a neighboring desk.

  “Oh, hullo,” said Mason abstractedly. “Have a nice day?”

  Without waiting for an answer, he suddenly burst into a recital of his woes.

  “I don’t know what I’m doing, Alleyn. I’m a
ll anyhow. I don’t know what to tell our advance to do—whether to go on with the tour or cancel everything. And there’s all the English end to attend to. I’m going crazy just with not knowing. How long do you think they’ll keep us here, for God’s sake?”

  “Things are looking a bit clearer ahead now,” said Alleyn. “The local men seem to be very efficient.”

  “It’s awful to be worrying about the business side of it with old Alf—Well, there it is. The whole thing’s so damn’ beastly. Everybody wondering about everybody else. No use mincing matters. Someone did it. It’s this blasted uncertainty.”

  “I know,” said Alleyn. “I say, Mason, you know I’ve taken a hand in it, don’t you?”

  “Yes. Very glad to hear it.”

  “Well, look here, I’m going to ask you a question in confidence.” Mason looked alarmed. “You needn’t answer if you don’t want to, but it’d help matters a lot if you could tell me one thing.”

  “Can but ask.”

  “Right. Did Mr. Meyer know who took Miss Gaynes’s money?”

  Mason stared at him like a dyspeptic owl.

  “Matter of fact, he did,” he said at last.

  “You know who it was?”

  “Alfred told me,” said Mason uncomfortably. “It was a question of what we’d do. Damned awkward in the beginning of a tour like this.”

  “Yes. Will you tell me who it was?”

  Mason eyed him unhappily but shrewdly.

  “What’ll it lead to? Look here, Alleyn, you’re not trying to link up the theft and the murder, are you?”

  “Personally, I long to disassociate them.”

  “By Jove!” said Mason slowly. “I—wonder.”

  “When did Mr. Meyer guess who took the money?”

  “Oh, Lor’—he saw it happen.”

  “Did he, indeed! Come now, put it to you, as our learned friends say. I’ll put one name to you, and one name only. If I’m wrong, let it drop. I promise not to go on.”

  “All right!” agreed Mason, looking rather relieved.

  “Liversidge?”

  There was a long silence.

  “Oh, Lor’,” repeated Mason, “I thought you were going to say Broadhead. After young Palmer’s display, you know.”

  “How did Mr. Meyer come to see it?”

  “It was on board—the last night. Alfred was going along the passage to his state-room and passed Val’s door. He’d just seen her in the smoke-room. He heard someone moving about in her cabin and thought it was a funny time for the stewardess to be in there. Then he noticed that her light wasn’t up—there’s a thick glass fanlight, you know. Alfred saw a sort of flicker as if someone had an electric torch going. He was standing there, uncertain what to do, when the door opened a crack. Opposite the door there was a men’s lav., with curtains in front of the entrance place. Alfred popped behind them and watched. He thought perhaps one of the stewards was doing the odd spot of pinching. Well, presently the door of Val Gaynes’s room opened wider, and out came Mr. Frankie Liversidge, very pussyfoot and cautious. Alf said it was just like a scene from one of the old French farces, and, of course, he thought the explanation was the same.”

  Mason pulled a face, and then rubbed his nose thoughtfully.

  “Do go on,” said Alleyn.

  “Well, here’s the bit that’ll sound rather peculiar, I dare say. You’d never have thought it after thirty years in the business, but Alfred was a bit straight-laced. Fact! He wouldn’t stand for any funny business in any of his companies. I know it sounds queer,” said Mason apologetically, “but that’s how he was. Well, what did he do but come out through the curtains and fetch up, face-to-face, with Liversidge. He just stood there and stared at Liversidge reproachfully, and was cogitating what he’d say to him about the way nice young girls were to be held in respect or something, when Frankie said: ‘I’ve been making an apple-pie bed for Val.’ Frankie’s face was as white as a sheet and he had his hands in his pockets. Alfie didn’t say a word, and Frankie gave a kind of laugh and made an exit. What do you think old Alfred did next?”

  “Had a look at the bed to see if it was in apple-pie order?”

  “Got it in one,” said Mason, opening his eyes very wide. “And it wasn’t. I mean it was. All tidy and undisturbed. Nothing wrong with it. Well, Alfred toddled off to his own room and did a bit of hard thinking. He decided that Liversidge had been waiting there for Val and had changed his mind, for some reason. Alfred thought he’d watch the situation for a bit, and speak a few heavy-father lines to Val, if they seemed to be called for. That was that. Then came the discovery of the theft and Alf put two and two together and made a burglary.”

  “When did he tell you about it?”

  “The first evening we were here. He told me he’d tackled Liversidge and there was no doubt he’d done it. God knows why. He’d won a lot at poker. He’s just a bad ’un. Well, Alfred said he’d pay it back to Val and stop it out of Liversidge’s treasury. And of course Liversidge would go as soon as we could get a decent actor from Australia to play the parts. For the sake of the good name of Incorporated Playhouses he wouldn’t make it public. I agreed and that was that. Now look, Alleyn. I’ve told you as much as I know myself but, if you can, keep it to yourself. The Firm—”

  “I understand that. If it doesn’t belong to the case we won’t press it,” said Alleyn at once. He added a word or two to something he had written while Mason was talking.

  “There’s just one more thing,” he said. “Did Mr. Meyer get the impression that Liversidge knew he hadn’t got away with the apple-pie bed story? At the time, I mean?”

  “I see what you mean. Alfred said Liversidge turned very white as soon as he saw him and seemed very uncomfortable. Alfred just stared at him, sort of more in sorrow than in anger. I don’t think he made any pretence of believing the story. He said Frankie’s face gave him away.”

  “I see,” said Alleyn slowly. “See here, Mr. Mason, I’ll have to hand this on to Wade, but I’ll ask him not to make it public if he can avoid it. It may have no bearing on the case.”

  “Damn’ fair of you. Though now we’ve got murder in the Firm, my God, I suppose we can’t be too fussy about an odd theft or so.” And Mason buried his face in his hands.

  “I’m dead beat,” he said. “I feel as if I’d got a red-hot cannonball in my chest and half a ton of sawdust in my stomach.”

  “Can’t you do anything about it?”

  “I’ve seen half the men in Harley Street. I wonder if Te Pokiha would know anything? Some of these natives—Are you going?”

  “I must get on. I promised I’d look in at the police station. Thank you so much, Mr. Mason.”

  Alleyn walked up the hill to the police station, where he found Wade and Superintendent Nixon. He gave them a full account of his interview with Carolyn and with Mason. Wade was inclined to be skeptical about Carolyn, until he heard the story of Liversidge.

  “It looks the most promising thing we’ve got hold of up to date,” he said. “If he thought Meyer suspected him he’d have the motive before they got on the train. I reckon it’s almost good enough for a warrant, Super.”

  “What do you think, Mr. Alleyn?” asked Nixon.

  “I think I’d hold off a bit,” said Alleyn. “If you both agree I’ll look up Liversidge and see if I can get the delicious creature to bare his nasty little soul for me. Perhaps, Mr. Nixon, you would prefer to tackle this bit yourself?”

  “No, no,” said Nixon quickly, “we’ll be only too pleased if you’ll carry on with us, won’t we, Wade?”

  “Too right, sir. I want to look up old Singleton again. The stage-doorkeeper, Mr. Alleyn. He’s always boozy, but he’s a bit less boozy at this time of day.”

  “Why not ring up Liversidge and get him to come round now,” suggested Nixon, “and we’ll make a party of it?”

  “Wouldn’t that be fun!” said Alleyn grimly. “All right. Let’s.”

  Nixon telephoned the hotel and spoke to Liversidge, who s
aid he would “toddle over” immediately. Alleyn and Nixon occupied the interval with a peaceful discussion on departmental shop. Liversidge arrived, looking too like a not-so-young actor to be credible.

  “This is Mr. Liversidge, Superintendent Nixon,” said Alleyn.

  “Good afternoon,” said Liversidge grandly.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Liversidge,” said Nixon. “Will you take a seat? As you know, Mr. Alleyn is very kindly working with us on this case. He has one or two questions he would like to ask you.”

  “The indefatigable Mr. Alleyn!” said Liversidge, seating himself gracefully. “And what can I do for Mr. Alleyn? Still worrying about what A said to B when the lights went out, Mr. Alleyn?”

  “Ah well,” answered Alleyn. “It’s my job, you know. As you make your apple-pie bed, so you must lie on it. Or about it, as the case may be.”

  “I’m afraid that is too deep for me,” rejoined Mr. Liversidge, turning an unlovely parchment colour.

  “Haven’t you ever made an apple-pie bed, Mr. Liversidge?”

  “Really!” said Liversidge. “I didn’t come here to discuss practical jokes.”

  “You don’t enjoy practical jokes?”

  “No.”

  “Did you take Miss Gaynes’s money as a practical joke?”

  “I simply don’t know what you are talking about.”

  “From information received, we learn that you took this money. Wait a moment, Mr. Liversidge. I really should not bother to deny it if I were you. Denials of that sort are inclined to look rather the worse for wear in the face of the sort of evidence we have here. However—” He took out his notebook and pen. “Did you take this money or did you not?”

  “I refuse to answer.”

  “Right. On the whole the most sensible thing to do. Perhaps I should tell you that after your interview with Mr. Meyer on the day you arrived in Middleton, Mr. Meyer had another interview with Mr. Mason. It was a matter that concerned the Firm, you see.”

  “What has Mason—” Liversidge stopped short.

  “What has he told us? Simply the gist of what Mr. Meyer told him.”