Death at the Bar

by Ngaio Marsh

‘Do you think so, Mr Alleyn? In that case I’ll hold off. I fancy I hear a car, sir. Coming through the tunnel, isn’t it?’

  Alleyn listened.

  ‘I think so. We’ll get the CC to fix up a warrant. Well, Br’er Fox, it’s been a short, sharp go this time, hasn’t it?’

  ‘And you were looking forward to a spell in the country, sir.’

  ‘I was.’

  ‘We’ll be here yet awhile, with one thing and another.’

  ‘I suppose so. Here they are.’

  A car drew up in the yard. The side door opened noisily, and Colonel Brammington’s voice sounded in the passage. He came in with Harper and Oates at his heels. The colonel was dressed in a dinner suit. He wore a stiff shirt with no central stud. It curved generously away from his person and through the gaping front could be seen a vast expanse of pink chest. Evidently he had at some earlier hour wetted his hair and dragged a comb through it. His shoelaces were untied and his socks unsupported. Over his dinner jacket he wore a green tyrolese bicycling cape.

  ‘I can’t apologize enough, sir,’ Alleyn began, but the chief constable waved him aside.

  ‘Not at all, Alleyn. A bore, but it couldn’t be helped. I am distended with rich food and wines. Strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age. I freely confess I outdid the meat, outdid the frolic wine. It was, I flatter myself, a good dinner, but I shall not taunt you with a recital of its virtues.’

  ‘I am sure it was a dinner in a thousand,’ said Alleyn. ‘I hope you didn’t mind coming here, sir. Fox was still—’

  ‘By heaven!’ interrupted Colonel Brammington, ‘this pestilent poisoner o’er tops it, does he not? The attempt, I imagine, was upon you both. Harper has told me the whole story. When will you make an arrest, Alleyn? May we send this fellow up the ladder to bed, and that no later than the Quarter Sessions! Let him wag upon a wooden nag. A pox on him! I trust you are recovered, Fox? Sherry, wasn’t it? Amontillado, I understand. Double sacrilege, by the Lord!’

  Colonel Brammington hurled himself into a chair and asked for a cigarette. When this had been given him, he produced from his trousers’ pocket a crumpled mass of typescript which Alleyn recognized as the carbon copy of his report.

  ‘I have been over the report, Alleyn,’ said Colonel Brammington, ‘and while you expended your energies so happily in resuscitating the poisoned Fox (and by the way, our murderer carries the blacker stigma of a fox-poisoner!) I read this admirable digest. I congratulate you. A masterly presentation of facts, free from the nauseating redundancies of most bureaucratic documents. I implored you to allow me to be your Watson. You consented. I come, full of my theory, ready to admit my blunders. Is there by any chance some flask of fermented liquor in this house to which cyanide has not been added? May we not open some virgin bottle?’

  Alleyn went into the bar, found three sealed bottles of Treble Extra, chalked them up to himself and took them with glasses into the parlour.

  ‘We should have a taster,’ said Colonel Brammington. ‘Some Borgian attendant at our call. What a pity the wretched Nark is not here.’

  ‘There are times,’ said Alleyn, ‘when I could wish that Mr Nark had been the corpse in the case. I don’t think we need blench at the Treble Extra and I washed the glasses.’

  He broke a paper seal, drew the cork, and poured out the beer.

  ‘Really,’ said Colonel Brammington, ‘I do feel a little timid about it, I must say. Some fiendish device—’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Alleyn and took a pull at his beer. ‘It’s remarkably good.’

  ‘You show no signs of stiffening limb or glassy eye. It is, as you say, good beer. Well, now, Alleyn, I understand from Harper that you have all arrived at a decision. I, working independently, have also made up my mind. It would delight me to find we were in agreement and amuse me to learn that I was wrong. Will you indulge me so far as to allow me to unfold the case as I see it?’

  ‘We should be delighted, sir,’ said Alleyn, thinking a little of his bed.

  ‘Excellent,’ said Colonel Brammington. He flattened out the crumpled report and Alleyn saw that he had made copious notes in pencil all over the typescript. ‘I shall relate my deductions in the order in which they came to me. I shall follow the example of all Watsons and offer blunder after blunder, inviting your compassionate scorn and remembering the observation that logic is only the art of going wrong with confidence. Are you all ready?’

  ‘Quite ready, sir,’ said Alleyn.

  III

  ‘When first this case turned up,’ said Colonel Brammington, ‘it seemed to me to be a moderately simple affair. The circumstances were macabre, the apparent weapon unlikely, but I accepted the weapon and rejoiced in the circumstances. It was an enlivening murder.’

  He turned his prominent eyes on Harper who looked scandalized.

  ‘After all,’ said Colonel Brammington, ‘I did not know the victim and I frankly confess I adore a murder. Pray, Mr Harper, do not look at me in that fashion. I want the glib and oily art to speak and purpose not. I enjoy a murder and I enjoyed this one. It seemed to me that Legge had anointed the dart with malice aforethought and prussic acid, had prepared the ground with exhibitions of skill, and had deliberately thrown awry. He had overheard Watchman’s story of his idiosyncrasy for the cyanide. He had seen Pomeroy put the bottle in the cupboard. Cyanide had been found on the dart. What more did we need? True, the motive was lacking, but when I learnt that you suspected Legge of being a gaolbird, a sufficient motive appeared. Legge had established himself in this district in a position of trust, he handled monies, he acquired authority. Watchman, by his bantering manner, suggested that he recognized Legge. Legge feared he would be exposed. Legge therefore murdered Watchman. That was my opinion until this afternoon.’

  Colonel Brammington took a prodigious swig of beer and flung himself back in his tortured chair.

  ‘This afternoon,’ he said, ‘I was astonished at your refusal to arrest Legge, but when I took the files away and began to read them I changed my opinion. I read the statements made by the others and I saw how positive each was that Legge had no opportunity to anoint the dart. I was impressed by your own observation that his hands were clumsy, that he was incapable of what would have amounted to an essay in legerdemain. Yet cyanide was found on the dart. Who had put it there. It is a volatile poison, therefore it must have been put on the dart not long before Oates sealed it up. I wondered if, after all, the whole affair was an accident, if there was some trace of poison on Abel Pomeroy’s clothes or upon the bar where he unpacked the darts. It was a preposterous notion and it was smashed as squat as a flounder by the fact that the small vessel in the rat-hole had been filled up with water. I was forced to believe the cyanide had been taken from the rat-hole immediately, or soon after, old Pomeroy put it there. Any of the suspects might have done this. But only four of the suspects had handled the darts; Legge, the Pomeroys, and Parish. Only Legge controlled the flight of the darts. Watchman took them out of the board after the trial throw and gave them to Legge. Now here,’ said Colonel Brammington with an air of conscious modesty, ‘I fancy I hit on something new. Can you guess what it was?’

  ‘I can venture to do so,’ Alleyn rejoined. ‘Did you reflect that all the darts had been thrown into the board on the trial, and that if cyanide was on any one of them, it would have been effectively cleaned off?’

  ‘Good God!’ ejaculated the chief constable.

  He was silent for some time, but at last continued with somewhat forced airiness.

  ‘No. No, that was not my point, but by Jupiter it supports my case. I was going to say that since Watchman removed the darts and handed them to Legge, it would have been quite impossible for Legge to know which dart was tainted. This led me to an alternative. Either all the darts were poisoned or else, or else, my dear Alleyn, the dart that wounded Watchman was tainted after, and not before, the accident.’ He glanced at Alleyn.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Alleyn. ‘One or the other.’r />
  ‘You agree? You had thought of it?’

  ‘Will Pomeroy suggested the second alternative,’ said Alleyn.

  ‘Damn! However! Legge, I had decided, was not capable of anointing one, much less six darts during the few seconds he held them in his hand before doing his trick. Legge would scarcely implicate himself by anointing the dart after he had seen Watchman die. Therefore someone had tried to implicate Legge. I was obliged to bow to your wisdom, my dear Alleyn. I dismissed Legge. I finished your report and I considered the other suspects. Who, of these seven persons, for they are seven if we include Miss Darragh and Miss Moore, could most easily have taken cyanide from the small vessel in the rat-hole? One of the Pomeroys, since their presence in or about the outhouses would not be remarked. Abel Pomeroy’s fingerprints and only his were found on the small vessel. Who of the seven had an opportunity to smear cyanide on the dart? Abel Pomeroy, since he unpacked the darts. Who, in the first instance, had cyanide brought into the premises? Abel Pomeroy. Putting motive on one side, I felt that Abel Pomeroy was my first choice. My second fancy—and don’t look so wryly upon me, Harper, a chief constable may have fancies as well as the next man—my second fancy fell upon Will Pomeroy. Your interview with the unspeakable Nark, my dear Alleyn, was not barren of interest. Amidst a plethora of imbecilities, Nark seemed to make one disclosure of interest. He said, or rather from your report I understood him to hint, that he had, on the occasion of Watchman’s first visit to Ottercombe, overheard an amorous encounter between Watchman and Miss Moore. He hinted, moreover, that as he crept farther along Apple Lane he came upon Will Pomeroy, lurking and listening in the hedge. Now, thought I, if this were true, here is the beginning of motive; for, in the interim, the courtship between young Pomeroy and Miss Moore ripened. Suppose, on Watchman’s return, that the rustic lover thought he saw a renewal of attentions. Suppose Parish or Cubitt hinted at the scene they interrupted by the furze bushes? But ignoring motive, what of opportunity? Will Pomeroy handled the darts after they were unpacked by his father. Could he have had a phial of cyanide-solution in his pocket? Nobody watched Will Pomeroy with the close attention that they all gave to Legge. Your observation on the trial throw shatters this theory. Do I see another bottle of this superb beer? Thank you.

  ‘On the whole I preferred Pomeroy senior. There seemed no reason to doubt young Pomeroy’s violent defence of Legge. He would not have thrown suspicion on Legge and then vehemently defended him. Old Pomeroy, on the other hand, detests Legge and has, from the first, accused him of the murder. But I was determined to look with an equal eye upon the field of suspects. I turned, with I hope becoming reluctance, to the ladies. On Miss Darragh I need not dwell. Harper has told me of your discovery of her link with Legge, and it is obvious that she merely took what may be described as a family interest in him. The family tree in this instance being unusually shady. Ha! But Miss Moore, if Nark is to be believed, cannot be so dismissed. There had been amorous passages between Miss Moore and Watchman. Miss Moore denied this in the course of your interview. Could love have turned into the proverbial hatred? What happened when those ambiguous heelmarks were printed in the turf behind the furze bush? A quarrel? Was she afraid her lover would betray her to her fiancé? And opportunity? Could she have introduced poison into the glass? Who better, since she poured out the brandy? But here, as with young Pomeroy, I had to pause. Whoever poisoned Watchman took peculiar pains to implicate Legge, but, ever since the investigation began, Miss Moore has been ardent to the point of rashness in her defence of Legge. She has braved everything for Legge, and there is a ring of urgency in her defence that bears the very tinct of sincerity. I dismissed Miss Moore. I turned, at last, to Sebastian Parish and Norman Cubitt. Here it was impossible to ignore motive. Motive in the form of handsome inheritances was an conspicuous as a pitchfork in Paradise. What of fact? Cubitt did not handle the darts but, on my second alternative, he could have tainted the poisoned dart after Watchman threw it down. But if the dart was a blind and didn’t kill Watchman, what did? The brandy? We are told that criminals repeat the manner of their crimes and this attempt upon you and Fox supports the theory. The murderer had killed Watchman by the method of putting cyanide in his brandy? The murderer hoped to kill you by putting cyanide in your sherry? To return. The fingerprint and rat-hole objection applies to Cubitt and Parish as it does to everyone but Pomeroy senior. Of course it is possible that the murderer drew the poison off with some instrument and without touching the vessel. This brings me to Parish.’

  Colonel Brammington darted a raffish glance at Alleyn and accepted a fresh cigarette.

  ‘To Parish,’ he repeated. ‘And here we must not ignore a point that I feel is extremely important. Parish purchased the cyanide solution. It was he who suggested, to the certifiable Noggins, that it should be gingered up, as he put it. It was he who carried it back to the inn. Old Pomeroy said that the wretched Noggins’ sealing-wax was unbroken when Parish gave him the bottle. It is possible to substitute one drop of sealing-wax by another? And if this had been done, why the interference with the rat-hole? But suppose the wrapping and seal were intact. Suppose that Parish made sure of obtaining a strong enough poison, delivered the bottle, sealed as he had received it, and later went to the rat-hole; why then he would be acting more wisely, he would be removing suspicion one step away from himself. His defence would be: “If I had intended to use this damnable poison surely I would have taken the opportunity to extract it from the bottle when it was actually in my hands.” I began to think I had got on the trail at last. I inspected the notes made by our man, Oates, when the memory of the night’s events were still fresh, or as fresh as the aftermath of Courvoisier would allow. It was Parish, equally with Watchman, who suggested they should have the brandy, Parish who applauded and encouraged the suggestion that Legge should try the experiment with the darts. I began to wonder if this was an opportunity Parish had awaited, if he had the cyanide concealed about him in readiness for use. Could he have reasoned that Legge, full of brandy, was likely to make a blunder in throwing the darts and that, if he did blunder, here was Parish’s opportunity to bring off his plan? This was purely conjectural, my dear Alleyn, but before long I came upon a thumping fact. Up to the moment when Miss Moore poured out the brandy that failed to restore Watchman, Parish, and only Parish, had an opportunity of putting anything in Watchman’s glass. Parish knew that if Legge wounded Watchman, Watchman would turn queasy. Parish encouraged the brandy-drinking and dart-throwing. Parish stood near the glass until it was used.’

  Colonel Brammington thumped the arm of his chair and pointed a hairy finger at Alleyn.

  ‘Above all,’ he shouted, ‘Parish has done nothing but murmur against Legge. Suspicions, Bacon remarked, that are artificially nourished by the tales and whisperings of others, have stings. This, Parish foresaw. This he hoped would prove true. My case against Parish is that he took cyanide from the rat-hole as soon as he could after Abel Pomeroy put it there. Or, I offer it as an alternative, that he took cyanide from the original bottle, replaced the small amount with water, and contrived to rewrap and seal the bottle; and, as a blind, upset the vessel in the rat-hole without disturbing Pomeroy’s prints, and filled it with water. This suggests a subtlety of reasoning which may or may not appeal to you. But to the burden of my tale. Parish had, that very evening, heard of Watchman’s idiosyncrasy for cyanide, he had been reminded of Watchman’s habit of turning faint at the sight of his own blood, he had heard Watchman baiting Legge and Legge’s offer to perform his trick with Watchman’s hand, he had heard Watchman half-promise to let him try. The following night, when the brandy was produced and drunk, he saw his chance. He encouraged the drinking and the projected experiment. When Legge wounded Watchman and Watchman turned faint, Parish stood near the glass. He had the cyanide about him. Brandy was suggested. Parish put his poison in the glass. The lights went out. Parish groped on the floor, bumped his head against Cubitt’s legs, found the dart and infected it. He then ground
whatever phial he had about him into powder together with the broken tumbler on the floor, and finding a more solid piece under his heel threw it into the fire. And from then onwards, gentlemen, I maintain that everything the fellow did or said is consistent with the theory that he murdered his cousin. I plump for Parish.’

  Colonel Brammington stared about him with an unconvincing air of modesty tinged with a hint of anxiety.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘there you are. An essay in Watsoniana. Am I to be set down? Shall I perceive my mentor wafting his eyes to the contrary and a falling lip of much contempt?’

  ‘No, indeed,’ said Alleyn. ‘I congratulate you, sir. A splendid marshalling of facts and a magnificent sequence of deductions.’

  If so large and red a man could be said to simper, Colonel Brammington simpered.

  ‘Really,’ he said. ‘I have committed no atrocious blunder? My deductions march with yours?’

  ‘Almost all the way. We shall venture to disagree on one or two points.’

  ‘I make no claim to infallibility,’ said the chief constable. ‘What are the points? Let us have them.’

  ‘Well,’ said Alleyn apologetically and with an uncomfortable glance at Harper and at Fox, ‘there’s only one point of any importance. I—in our view of the case you’ve—you’ve hit on the wrong man.’

  CHAPTER 20

  Conjecture into Fact

  For a second or two Alleyn wondered if there would be an explosion or, worse, a retreat into heavy silence. Fearing that the expression of gloating delight upon Harper’s face might turn the scales, Alleyn had placed himself between the chief constable and his superintendent. But Colonel Brammington behaved admirably. He goggled for a moment, he became rather more purple in the face, and he made a convulsive movement that caused his shirt-front to crackle sharply, but finally he spoke with composure.