Bodies from the Library

by Tony Medawar

  Geoffrey smiled indulgently. ‘What you want is eight hours solid sleep. Take it from me, there’ll be none of these fancies tomorrow.’

  ‘I hope not,’ said Veronica, with a slight shiver.

  III

  When Geoffrey Grant reached his own hotel it was, for the penniless ex-secretary of a millionaire, a strangely sumptuous bedroom into which he walked from the lift, just as it was a strangely sumptuous dressing-gown which he proceeded to exchange for his dinner-jacket.

  The time was not late, as lateness in Monte Carlo goes, but Geoffrey felt disinclined to go out again. Neither, however, did he feel like staying alone in his bedroom. An odd restlessness had come over him, not in any way connected with the incident of the wrong bag, for he had attached little importance to Veronica’s very small adventure. After standing for a moment in doubt in the middle of the floor, he went out of the room, crossed the passage and tapped at a door opposite.

  A loud voice told him to enter, in French of an almost incredibly execrable accent. Geoffrey went in.

  ‘Hullo, Archie, this is a bit of luck; I never expected to find you in.’ Geoffrey threw himself into a chair and crossed his long legs. ‘Well, how’s things? I rather wanted to see you before dinner, but you were out.’

  ‘I was,’ agreed the other, an exquisite young man in evening clothes, with a monocle dangling from a silk ribbon round his neck. ‘The Ransomes turned up here and I couldn’t get away.’ He inspected his friend critically. ‘What have you been doing with yourself, Geoffrey? You look uncommonly pleased with life.’

  ‘I am,’ Geoffrey agreed. ‘Give me a gasper—no, not a Turkish abomination; a real gasper—and I’ll tell you the whole ’orrible story.’

  ‘Been at it again?’ sighed the exquisite young man. ‘Really, you ought not to be let out without a keeper, Geoffrey. I don’t want to hear your story in the least.’ But he produced the required gasper nevertheless.

  ‘This,’ said Geoffrey, as he lit it, ‘is the real thing.’

  ‘It always is.’

  ‘Listen,’ Geoffrey said equably. ‘Listen while I get it all off my chest or I’ll burst your shirt-front in. Which will you have?’

  ‘Go ahead,’ said the exquisite young man, with resignation.

  Geoffrey went ahead. Swinging his legs precariously from a small table, Archie listened.

  When Geoffrey had finished, he shook his head. ‘Poor girl! Poor girl! Little does she know what fate has brought her. The world’s prize idiot, studded with diplomas a yard long; or ought to be.’ He dodged a cushion aimed at his head and drew at his cigar. ‘And what on earth made you tell her that rigmarole about being a newly-sacked profiteer’s valet or whatever it was?’

  ‘Because I had an idea that she wouldn’t go on knowing me unless she thought I was in the same boat as herself,’ Geoffrey pointed out patiently. ‘And I was right. She said as much this evening.’

  ‘I see. “Unhahnd me, Sir Jahsper. I may be but a poo-er maiden, but I have my pri-hide. Never let your riches darken my private bench in the Casino gardens again.” That sort of girl, is she? Humph!’

  ‘Yes. She is that sort of girl, Archie.’

  ‘Quite so, old man,’ Archie agreed hastily. ‘I’m sure she is, if you say so. You know that what you say goes with me. I was only thinking that—well, that this is Monte Carlo, after all, you know.’

  ‘I don’t care a hang what you were thinking,’ Geoffrey growled, ‘but don’t think it again.’

  ‘It’s unthought already,’ said Archie generously.

  There was a meditative silence, during which it was palpable that Archie was trying hard not to think it again.

  Geoffrey yawned and stretched. His restlessness seemed to have gone now. He had an appointment with Veronica the next morning. Time to think about getting his beauty-sleep.

  Suddenly Archie lifted his head and cocked an ear in the direction of the passage.

  ‘Hullo,’ he said. ‘Someone in your room?’

  ‘Not that I know of. Why?’

  ‘I heard a bump and I’d have sworn it came from your room or as near as dash it.’

  ‘Chambermaid, I suppose.’

  ‘It’s too late for chambermaids.’

  ‘Good heavens,’ Geoffrey grumbled, ‘have you begun getting nerves now? All right, little boy, Uncle Geoffrey will go and catch the naughty burglar.’

  He heaved himself out of his chair and stole noiselessly across the passage. Archie crept behind him. With a sudden jerk Geoffrey threw open his bedroom door. Inside the room, peering into a drawer in the dressing-table, was a man. He turned sharply round and Geoffrey recognised him at once as the (problematical) husband of the lady with the ospreys.

  ‘Wanting to borrow a spare sponge or something?’ he asked pleasantly. ‘I keep them on the wash-stand.’

  The intruder did not seem in the least disconcerted.

  ‘I owe you an apology, sir,’ he said, in perfect English, flavoured only with a very slight foreign accent of undistinguishable nationality. ‘I came to ask if you would be good enough to restore to me my wife’s bag, which you inadvertently took from the couch in the Casino, and getting no answer to my knock, took the liberty of looking round for it myself. Perhaps you will overlook my intrusion and hand me the bag.’

  ‘I must say,’ Geoffrey replied stiffly, ‘that I don’t much care about having my room invaded by a complete stranger, sir, even in search of his own property. As for the bag, you’ll find it at the Casino bureau, where I left it as soon as I discovered the mistake, for which I apologise.’

  The man’s eyes narrowed. ‘Is that all you have to say?’ he asked curtly.

  ‘Absolutely, Geoffrey agreed in surprise. What more after all can one do than apologise? Did the fellow want him to buy another bag? Geoffrey would be quite willing to do so if the first one was really lost. But it was at the Casino bureau. ‘Absolutely,’ he repeated.

  ‘Then you’ll be sorry!’

  Without a further word the man turned on his heel and swung out of the room and down the corridor, a square, burly figure, exuding unmistakable annoyance at every pore.

  IV

  ‘Well, can you beat that?’ demanded the astonished Geoffrey of his no less astonished companion. ‘What on earth did he mean?’

  ‘The man doesn’t seem to like having his wife’s handbag rescued,’ Archie remarked. ‘And I may be wrong, but I’ll swear he never knocked at your door.’

  The two stared at one another.

  ‘There’s something fishy going on somewhere,’ Geoffrey pronounced.

  ‘Well, what’s it all about, anyhow?’ Archie asked plaintively. ‘I don’t remember anything about handbags in that story of young love you were telling me just now. Have you been trying to steal some woman’s bag, my dear chap? There really wasn’t any need. You can always borrow from me while the funds hold out.’

  ‘Don’t be funny, Archie. I’m beginning to think this is serious.’ As shortly as possible Geoffrey explained how he had picked up a bag from the couch in the Casino, thinking that it was Veronica’s and slipped it into his pocket to produce later with triumph when she missed it and it had not been Veronica’s bag at all.

  ‘But why all this fuss?’ he concluded. ‘Women don’t keep anything in their evening bags but a lipstick and a mirror. Veronica seemed to think we were being followed back to our hotels and upon my word, it looks as if she were right. Why?’

  Archie carefully closed the door of Geoffrey’s bedroom and relit the stump of his cigar. ‘I’m so glad I came to Monte Carlo,’ he remarked. ‘Well, obviously, my dear old lad, if you’d only make some use of the little grey cells instead of standing there and bleating, you’d realise that there was something more than a lip-stick and a mirror in this particular bag. And from the anxiety shown by the parties of the other side to recover it, something dashed valuable too.

  ‘Yes, of course; I know that. But why should I be “sorry” that all I had to say was that I’d left the thi
ng at the Casino bureau?’

  Archie raised his eyebrows. ‘Put in words of one syllable, the chap did not think you had done so. And why? Because someone else stepped in during the interim and claimed it. And the husband of your Spanish friend thinks you’ve still got it. So let’s sit down and make ourselves comfortable while we wait for the fireworks.’ Archie dropped into an armchair, crossed one leg over the other and prepared to wait intelligently.

  ‘You think that chap really is going to follow up?’

  ‘From the look of him,’ Archie returned languidly, ‘I should say he’d follow anything up. A boy of the bulldog breed, was friend Fritz.’

  Geoffrey grinned. ‘I’m glad I came to Monte Carlo, too.’

  They waited.

  Nothing happened.

  ‘It doesn’t look as if he’s coming back tonight,’ suggested Geoffrey.

  ‘Give him a chance, give him a chance,’ Archie urged. ‘He hasn’t had time to collect his reinforcements yet.’

  ‘By jove, you may be right,’ Geoffrey exclaimed, remembering Veronica’s ‘adventure’ in the Casino gardens. ‘The fellow who spoke to Veronica wasn’t the same as our man. There are two of them in it besides the woman.’

  ‘And probably plenty more behind the scenes,’ Archie said, comfortably. ‘Yes, it looks quite like a scrap. I wonder what’s behind it all. What’ll you bet on a supply of dope?’

  ‘Or a stolen diamond necklace?’

  ‘Or a packet of Woodbines?’

  Geoffrey stretched himself slowly. Though spare he was well-muscled. He flexed a tentative forearm. ‘Well, I wish they’d come along, while we’re ready for them.’

  ‘Like me to sleep in here with you tonight?’ Archie grinned. ‘Or across your threshold, like a Great Dane?’

  ‘I suppose one doormat’s as good as another. By the way, are you going to scrap in a white waistcoat and tails?’

  Archie looked down at his perfectly fitting coat not without pleasure. ‘Why not?’ His eyes wandered to the gaudy garment which covered his companion. ‘Are you going to scrap in a dressing-gown?’

  Geoffrey yawned. ‘To tell you the truth, I don’t believe there’s going to be a scrap at all. Our friends will take the sensible course and complain to the police in the morning. That is, if those grey cells of yours were right and they genuinely think I’ve been trying to steal that bag.’

  ‘Oh, that’s what they think all right,’ Archie said carelessly.

  There was a moment’s silence. Then Geoffrey uttered an exclamation and slapped his thigh.

  ‘Caught it?’ Archie asked sympathetically.

  ‘Archie, a great light has broken on me. You and your rotten grey cells are off the track altogether. That isn’t what they think at all. You see, they’ve been to the Casino, and they have got the bag. That’s what the trouble is.’

  ‘My dear old boy, why?’

  Geoffrey beamed. ‘Because it was the wrong bag.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I had both bags in my hands, you see. I don’t know which is which, but obviously I must have given Veronica theirs and taken hers back to the Casino. So naturally they think I’ve double-crossed them. That is the expression, isn’t it?’

  But Archie was not smiling. ‘Ah! Then do you know what friend Fritz has been doing while we’ve been waiting here? Scurrying along to your young woman’s hotel as fast as his legs will carry him.’

  ‘By Jove, Archie, that’s the first sensible thing you’ve said tonight. I’d better ring up the Magnificent at once, and warn her.’

  Geoffrey went to the telephone by his bedside, demanded and got the Magnificent and asked to be put on to Miss Steyning’s room. There was a pause of at least two minutes. Then Geoffrey muttered something into the mouthpiece, hung up the receiver and turned to Archie with undisguised alarm in his voice.

  ‘The chap says he can’t get any reply. I’m going round there at once.’ He was moving towards the door as he spoke.

  ‘And so am I,’ said Archie, with some indignation.

  V

  The night-clerk at the Magnificent was a man whom very little in this world could surprise; yet even he forgot himself so far as to raise his eyebrows when there burst suddenly through the imposing main entrance a tall young man clad in a vivid purple dressing-gown. The fact that under it he wore the stiff shirt and black tie of ordinary evening dress detracted nothing from the glory of the dressing-gown. The night-clerk could not but feel that the companion who followed close on the heels of the dressing-gown in the more conventional white waistcoat and tails, however exquisite, was something of an anti-climax.

  Geoffrey wasted no time on the night-clerk’s musings. He had covered the quarter-of-a-mile from the Hermitage, his own hotel, in something under two minutes; in any case he never allowed petty considerations of etiquette to stand in his way when he was in a hurry. As he strode up to the counter, behind which the night-clerk’s eyebrows still formed a cold note of interrogation, he gave an impression of such purpose that the night-clerk, who had had every intention of translating the query of his eyebrows into frigid speech, hastily reconsidered this decision.

  ‘I was speaking to you on the telephone just now,’ Geoffrey said shortly, in excellent French. ‘You told me there was no answer from Miss Steyning’s room. Try to get her again, please.’

  Once more as he looked at the dressing-gown across his counter, words rose tumultuously to the night-clerk’s lips; once more his eyes rose to Geoffrey’s face and he thought better of it. Confining himself to a pointed shrug of his thin shoulders, he turned to the telephone at his elbow.

  ‘There is no reply from Miss Steyning’s room, sir,’ he remarked a minute later.

  ‘What’s its number?’ Geoffrey demanded.

  This time the night-clerk did give way to his feelings. ‘Monsieur, this is highly irregular,’ he burst out, with a jaundiced glance at the offending dressing-gown. ‘It is quite impossible for me to give you the number of Mademoiselle Steyning’s room. I must ask you please to leave the hotel at once, or I shall be compelled—’

  A large hand shot out and grabbed the back of his neck.

  ‘What’s the number of Miss Steyning’s room?’ Geoffrey repeated pleasantly. ‘Quick—before I bump your nose on the counter.’

  ‘Number three hundred and twenty-seven, third floor,’ hurriedly squeaked the night-clerk, who had a wholesome respect both for his nose and the counter.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Geoffrey, and released him. ‘Come on, Archie.’ Without delay he made for the main staircase and, disdaining the lift, leapt up the shallow steps three at a time.

  ‘Lunatics!’ muttered the outraged little night-clerk, torn between a desire to leave his post which was strictly forbidden and a dislike of being kicked downstairs which he feared only too well might happen were he to follow. Finally he chose the better part of valour and, choking down his emotion as best he could, watched the purple dressing-gown disappear round the angle of the stairs.

  ‘But why all this frantic excitement, old man?’ panted Archie, toiling up the stairs in the dressing-gown’s wake. ‘You surely don’t think anything can have happened to the young woman, do you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Geoffrey replied, with a touch of grimness. ‘But that’s just what I’m going to find out.’

  Arrived at the third floor, they hurried down the main corridor, Geoffrey watching the numbers of the doors as he passed them.

  ‘Three twenty-three, three twenty-five, three twenty—hullo, the door’s open.’

  It was true. The door was standing slightly ajar and the light from inside was visible through the opening. Without hesitation Geoffrey threw it wider and looked inside. The room was empty.

  ‘Gone, has she?’ remarked Archie with interest, peering over his shoulder.

  ‘She’s been to bed too,’ Geoffrey frowned, glancing swiftly round the room. ‘Been to bed and got up again. Archie, I don’t like this. Let’s see if—’

  ‘Look
out,’ Archie whispered suddenly. ‘Someone coming.’

  They drew back from the open door. A girl was advancing along the corridor, in a shell-pink wrapper with a good deal of lace about it.

  Geoffrey exclaimed with relief, ‘Veronica! Thank goodness.’

  ‘Hullo!’ said Veronica cheerfully, as she caught sight of them. ‘What on earth are you doing, Geoffrey? I didn’t know you were going to change your hotel.’

  ‘What’s happened, Veronica?’ Geoffrey demanded. ‘I’ve been trying to get you on the telephone from the Hermitage, but the man couldn’t get an answer. So we came round. Oh, by the way, Lord Bramber, Miss Steyning.’

  ‘How do you do?’ Veronica said perfunctorily and turned back again at once to Geoffrey. ‘But Geoffrey, you surely didn’t come round like that, did you?’

  For the first time Geoffrey seemed to become aware of the purple dressing-gown. ‘Good lord!’ he exclaimed, not without surprise. ‘I suppose I did. Well, I must have done, mustn’t I?’

  ‘He’s mad, Miss Steyning,’ Archie pointed out sadly. ‘Always has been. Used to gibber at his nurse and probably mopped a bit in his spare time too, to say nothing of mowing—I was shouting at you to change it all the way down the stairs,’ he added to Geoffrey, in tones of sorrow and pity.

  ‘You want to improve that shout of yours,’ Geoffrey said kindly. ‘I never heard a word.’

  Veronica obliged the company with a slight blush. The reason for Geoffrey’s great haste was only too obvious.

  ‘Well, I’m very glad you have come,’ she said hastily, ‘both of you. Because I’ve had another adventure. Wait here a minute while I make my room respectable and then I’ll tell you. It’s really rather exciting.’

  VI

  ‘I like this lady of yours,’ Archie remarked with candour, when the door had closed behind Veronica and sounds as of drawers being opened and shut were coming from behind it.

  ‘You leave the poor girl alone, that’s all,’ Geoffrey growled. ‘She’s got troubles enough on her hands without you adding to them.’