Penhallow

by Джорджетт Хейер

  The Major’s face began to lengthen. “This doesn’t sound promising, Inspector.”

  “No, sir, it isn’t promising, and that’s a fact. Talk about murder made easy! Why, even the butler played into the murderer’s hands, by having made it a rule never to leave more than a couple of drinks in the whisky decanter in his master’s room! And as for fingerprints, we can rule them out, because the only ones on the decanter that aren’t hopelessly confused are Penhallow’s own; and the only one on the veronal phial belongs to the housesmaid who admits she moved all the bottles when she dusted the shelf this morning.”

  “It boils down to this, that you’ve got nothing to go on then, unless something unexpected transpires?”

  “That’s about the size of it, sir. Still, we’ve not caught Jimmy the Bastard yet, and you never know how people will give themselves away once they get a bit scared. I think I’ve rattled one or two of them already, and I don’t despair, not by any means. After all, they don’t know how little I’ve got to go on.”

  The Major shook his head. “It looks nasty to me, very nasty, Logan.”

  “You’re right, sir: it is nasty, or I’m much mistaken. I got the feeling I’m only on the fringe of the truth of all that’s been happening in that house lately. Every now and then it came over me that I was standing on the edge of a regular volcano. And I’m not what you’d call fanciful, either. Plymstock felt it too. He passed the remark to me as we came away that it wouldn’t surprise him if something was to break at any moment.”

  “Well, we’ll hope it may,” said the Major.

  “Yes,” agreed Logan slowly. “We’ll hope it may, sir.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Inspector Logan, although he might suspect that his investigations had alarmed some members of the household, had as yet little conception of the extent of the turmoil into which Penhallow’s death, coupled with his own activities, had plunged Trevellin. Faith, watching with growing terror the unforeseen results of her crime, felt as though she had loosed a relentless tide which would soon engulf them all. When the Inspector’s suspicions seemed to draw first this innocent person into his net, and then that, her horror caused the danger in which she herself stood to occupy a secondary place in her mind. It had never occurred to her that any suspicion at all would attach itself to Penhallow’s death; far less that the death of the one person from whom every ill had seemed to her to emanate, should, instead of solving all difficulties, have been as a match set to a train of gunpowder.

  Bart’s open avowal of his intention to marry Loveday had precipitated a storm whose repercussions were felt even in the kitchen, where Reuben, thunderstruck at a development quite unsuspected by him, solemnly cast off his niece; and Martha, shocked out of her abandonment to grief, declared that in her day no girl who had caught the Master’s fancy would so far have forgotten her station as to dream of marriage. “Look at me, you malkin!” Martha said. “I did things decent! I knawed my place! I never prated to un of marriage, nor there wasn’t no one troubled by the bit of pleasure I had with un!”

  Sybilla, having loudly congratulated herself on being no blood relation of such a shameless hussy, penetrated into the front of the house, and confronted Raymond there, laying it upon him that he owed it to the family, to poor deluded Bart, and to the blessed memory of his father to put a swift end to so unnatural alliance. When he told her impatiently that he had no control over Bart’s actions, she sought out Bart himself; reminded him of the innumerable occasions when she had spanked him across her knee, expressed her fervent desire to perform this office for him again, and would have favoured him with a most unflattering reading of Loveday’s character had he not first shouted her down, and then, when her shriller tones mastered his, slammed out of her presence.

  Bart was at bay, only his sister supporting him in his resolve to marry Loveday. He, whose quick rages so soon blew over, had an uglier look in his eyes than Faith had ever seen there. His quarrel with Conrad was so bitter that all attempts at peace-making between them failed at the outset. The alliance which had weathered eves storm seemed to be broken past repair. When Bart had entered the room in time to hear Conrad casting the blame of Penhallow’s death on to Loveday, he had flung himself on to his twin with murder in his heart. It had taken all Logan’s and the Sergeant’s combined strength to hold him, when they had dragged him off Conrad’s throat; and such terrible words had been spoken then as would not easily be forgotten.

  Clara shook her head sadly over it, and said that there seemed to be no end to the troubles besetting the house.

  “"They’ll make it up,” Faith said uneasily. “They always make it up, Clara!”

  “I never knew them quarrel like that before,” Clara replied. “You see, my dear, they aren’t easy to handle, the Penhallows, and there’s no one to hold them now Adam’s gone. I never knew anyone to drive a difficult team better than he did. Well, he’s dropped the reins, poor soul, and it’s a runaway team now, that’ll very likely overturn us all into the ditch.”

  “Raymond — Raymond will take his father’s place!”

  “Raymond doesn’t want to take his father’s place, my clear. Raymond’s a skirter, just as Char said. He wants to be rid of them, that’s all.”

  “Clara,” Faith said desperately, “wouldn’t it be better for them to be free? To make their own lives?”

  “It’s no good asking’ me, my dear. I’m a Penhallow, and it’s a bitter day to me that sees the family breakin’ up. I don’t say they haven’t had their quarrels, but they’ve always stuck together.”

  When the family met at lunch-time, an uneasy tension seemed to hang over them. Bart sat silent, his eyes lowered and his brow thunderous; Conrad’s sore spirit found relief in the utterance of bitter jibes at the expense of anyone who offered him the smallest opening. This had the effect of arousing Eugene’s animosity, and led to several passages of arms between them. Eugene, aggrieved by the disturbance to his peace, sensitive to any fancied aspersion cast at Vivian, and deeply chagrined by the news, clumsily conveyed to him by Clifford, that his portion amounted only to four thousand pounds, was in a querulous, spiteful mood ready to pick a quarrel with anyone. Vivian looked white and strained, and, choosing to read covert accusations into quite innocent remarks, had adopted a defiant attitude calculated to provoke hostilities. Clay afforded his brothers an opportunity of venting their feelings at his head by pointing out, with wearisome insistence, that it was absurd to suppose that he could have had anything to do with his father’s death. Charmian, ignoring the bickering and the sudden spurts of temper, held forth in an argumentative tone on the various aspects of Penhallow’s murder until Raymond, who until then had maintained his usual taciturnity, rounded on her, and bade her hold her tongue. As he enforced this command by bringing his fist down on the table with considerable force, all the glasses jumped, and Faith gave one of her nervous starts.

  “Naughty temper!” said Aubrey. “Is it getting on your nerves, Ray dear? Personally, I adore listening to Char laying down the law, and telling us how the deed was done, because she’s almost certainly wrong, and I do like people to make fools of themselves, don’t you?”

  “You’re probably in a position to know!” Raymond said.

  “I’m glad somebody has put that into words,” observed Eugene unpleasantly.

  “Oh, how too dreadfully unkind of you!” Aubrey said. “Oh, I do think you oughtn’t to have said that, Ray! After all, I am your little brother!”

  “One cannot help feeling that the Bastard’s disappearance was providential — with, or perhaps without three hundred pounds in cash,” said Eugene.

  Aubrey smiled sweetly upon him. “Oh, no, Eugene! No, really, I wouldn’t commit a murder for three hundred! So paltry!”

  “I maintain,” struck in Charmian, “that there was something extremely fishy about Uncle Phin’s visit, and it ought to be investigated.”

  Raymond turned towards her. “For God’s sake, can’t you shut up about tha
t? Your views are of no possible interest or value to anyone! Uncle Phin had nothing whatsoever to do with Father’s death!”

  “How do you know?” Conrad put in swiftly.

  “Oh, I was longing to ask that question!” said Aubrey. “I didn’t quite like to, but Con’s so wonderfully uninhibited!”

  “Far be it from me to make groundless accusations,” began Eugene.

  “Oh, shut up!” Charmian interrupted.

  “No, do let him go on, Char!” begged Aubrey. “Whenever anyone says far be it from him to do something it means he’s going to do it, and I should simply love to hear who it is Eugene’s going to accuse!”

  “All I wish to point out,” said Eugene, “is that if we are to ask ourselves who stands to gain the most out of Father’s death there can be only one answer.”

  “But how beautifully put!” Aubrey said admiringly. “You couldn’t call it actually offensive, could you?”

  Raymond looked grimly at Eugene. “If you and your wife hadn’t sponged for years on Father, you’d have been a bigger gainer today than you are! You can put that in your pipe and smoke it!”

  This remark made Vivian flare up at once. She demanded to be told in what way Eugene could be considered to be any more to blame for the wasting of Penhallow’s fortune than any of his brothers; and added that for her part she had always hated Penhallow, and would rather have gone out charring than have subsisted on his generosity.

  “Let me advise you,” said Charmian, “not to be quite lavish with your abuse of Father, my good young woman! Your position is not so unassailable that you can afford to make it worse.”

  “I know very well you think I poisoned your father, any way I don’t care what you think, any of you!” declared Vivian, shaking with indignation. “If I’d thought of it, I would have!”

  “Now, that’ll do!” said Clara. “It was Jimmy killed Adam, whatever Char and Ray may say, and so we shall find, you mark my words!”

  By tea-time it had been established that Penhallon had died from swallowing an overdose of veronal; and Inspector Logan had learnt from Phineas Ottery that he had visited Trevellin to consult Penhallow on a small matter of business connected with house-property. “My nephew, Raymond Penhallow, will bear me out that my errand to Mr Penhallow was of the most trifling nature,” had said Phineas, with a wave of his hand. “He was present during a considerable part of the interview, so you may see for yourself, Inspector, that there was nothing particularly secret about it. Merely, I did not wish to admit the whole family into my confidence.”

  However plausible in itself, this explanation could not fail, coming as it did after Raymond’s assertion that he had not seen his uncle, to arouse the Inspector’s suspicions. He said nothing about this to Phineas, but returned to Trevellin, to request an explanation of Raymond.

  Raymond reddened angrily, and said something under his breath. Mentally he cursed Phineas for dragging him into an episode which neither of them could satisfactorily explain; and if he had not been afraid that panic might betray his uncle into making some admission that would lead the police to discover the truth, he would flatly have denied his statement. As it was, he took time to think out his answer, and said at last: “Very well, then, I did see him. I know nothing about his business with my father, however.”

  “Why did you inform me that you had not seen him, sir?”

  Raymond shrugged. “Did I say that? I don’t remember: I probably wasn’t attending to you very closely. To all intents and purposes, I didn’t see my uncle, since I know nothing of what his business may have been with my father, which is what you want to find out, isn’t it?”

  “I can’t be satisfied with that answer, Mr Penhallow.”

  “Then perhaps you’ll be satisfied with this instead!” Raymond retorted. “You’re chasing a red herring! My father’s dealings with my uncle were entirely trivial, and can have nothing whatsoever to do with this case!”

  As this brief interchange took place in the morning room, with the door communicating with the Yellow drawing-room, where Eugene was reclining upon a sofa, standing ajar, it was not surprising that by tea-time the news that Raymond, for reasons best known to himself, had been giving false information to the police should have spread round the family. Curiosity of the most morbid nature was immediately roused, and when a hired car presently brought both Phineas and Delia to Trevellin, it was generally felt that there was more Charmian’s theory than had at first been supposed. To Faith, it appeared so fantastic that the Otterys should be caught up in the meshes of the appalling net which she had woven that she could almost have believed herself to be struggling in the toils of a nightmare.

  Ostensibly, the Otterys had come to offer their condolences to the bereaved family, but although the scared look on Delia’s face, and the horror and dismay to be detected in Phineas’s manner, might ordinarily have been considered to be the natural results of hearing of an old friend’s murder, they were taken, under existing circumstances, to denote a personal concern in the affair, as intriguing as it was incomprehensible.

  Phineas, holding Faith’s hand between both of his told her that even at the risk of finding themselves in the way neither he nor his sister could forbear motoring over to see how she did, and to inquire further into the very shocking nature of Penhallow’s death. Delia, more than usually incoherent, opened and shut the clasp of her handbag a great many times, scattered her sympathy amongst the family, and timidly asked after Raymond. This gave Phineas an opportunity to interrupt Ingram’s account of his father’s death, and say with that unctuous intonation which never failed to annoy his nephews: “Ah, the dear good fellow! This must be at once a sad and a solemn day for him! So much rests upon his shoulders! All the responsibilities of a not inconsiderable estate, the cares of a large family! I must seek him out, and place my services, such as they are, at his disposal.”

  “I simply must know!” Aubrey said, in an anguished voice. “I shan’t be able to bear it if I don’t, and we all know what repressions do to one! What are they, Uncle Phineas?”

  “Ah, my boy!” said Phineas, reflecting that Aubrey had always been an objectionable young detrimental. “There are many questions upon which an older head can come to the help of a young one.”

  “Uncle’s mixed his dates,” remarked Conrad. “Ray’s going on for forty. Incidentally, he’s been managing the estate for the past ten years.”

  “Try again, Uncle,” recommended Eugene, with drawling insolence. “We wouldn’t know why you want to see Ray, of course.”

  Chairman fixed her uncle with a penetrating gaze. “Come now!” she said briskly. “I don’t believe in beating about the bush! Just what brought you up here yesterday to see Father, Uncle? That’s a question which is interesting us a good deal.”

  Delia made an inarticulate sound, and looked imploringly towards her brother. He pressed his fingertips together, perhaps to control their slight unsteadiness, and replied smilingly: “I am afraid my errand to your dear father was sadly unexciting. Tut, tut! You silly child, have you been picturing a mystery? The influence of the modern crime novel!”

  “I never read them.”

  He passed his tongue between his lips. “Well, well! And so you want to know why I came to see my old friend! My dear, if it interests you so much, of course you may know: I came to seek his advice in the matter of a little land deal which I have in contemplation. Now you will all say how dull!”

  “I wasn’t going to,” said Aubrey. “I mean, dull isn’t the word that actually leaped to my tongue. But perhaps I’d better not say what that was.”

  “Mendacious,” suggested Eugene. “No, adroit.”

  Phineas decided to remain deaf to this. Still smiling, he said: “And did you foolish young people really think that I might have had something to do with your father’s death? I ought to be cross with you, but I know so well what tricks overwrought nerves can play with one that I can forgive you.”

  “That’s all very well,” said Ingra
in bluntly, “but if your visit to Father was so damned innocent, why did Raymond deny that he’d seen you here?”

  Phineas’s eyes snapped, and a muscle quivered in his cheek. “The foolish fellow! Now, why should he do that. I wonder? Can he have thought that I didn’t want my little project to leak out? No doubt that would be it!”

  “You know, I do feel that we’ve all under-rated Uncle Phin!” said Aubrey, looking round appealingly.

  Happily for Phineas, Raymond chose this moment to walk into the room. He checked at sight of the visitors. and his brow began to lower. “What the devil… ?” he demanded, in anything but a welcoming tone.

  Delia got up, dropping her handbag, and moved towards him, her eyes suffused suddenly with tears, and her lower lip quivering. “Ray, dear! I — we had to come to tell you how sorry — see if there is anything — I mean, if we could be of the least help in this sad time...”

  “Very kind of you, but there’s nothing you can do, thanks. You’d have done better to have stayed away.”

  She whitened, and her hand fell from his sleeve. Aubrey said brightly: “Isn’t it strange, Eugene dear, how often quite unintelligent persons, like Ray, manage to put into clear, concise language what others, like you and me, who are much cleverer, don’t you agree, feel to be the inexpressible?”