‘I see.’ Mudge comtemplated resignedly this barren subject, and turned to other matters. ‘Now, I understand from Furbelow that you were only with Mr Shorthouse a few minutes.’
‘Yes.’ Stapleton’s answers were of the discouraging sort which throw all the burden on the interlocutor, but his manner was perfectly inoffensive.
‘Then – then’ – Mudge looked round him rather wildly, in an effort to remember what he had been going to say – ‘there was no one else in Mr Shorthouse’s dressing-room during the time you were there?’
‘No one.’
‘And you talked about –’
‘About my opera. He was vague and condescending – praising with faint damns, as it were. As a matter of fact, I’m certain he hadn’t even glanced at it. He didn’t return me the score, by the way – I suppose it’s still at his lodgings.’
‘After you left him you went home?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where are you staying, Mr Stapleton?’
‘In Clarendon Street. Quite near the theatre. Judith’s in the same house.’
‘Ah, yes. Miss Haynes, did you see or hear Mr Stapleton come in?’
‘No.’ Judith flushed, as though she had been accused of some impropriety. ‘I must have been in bed by that time.’
‘Did Shorthouse strike you as being in a suicidal frame of mind, Stapleton?’ Fen spoke a little absently; he was engaged in lighting a new cigarette from the end of the first.
‘I don’t think so.’ Stapleton grimaced expressively. ‘From what I knew of him, he wasn’t the man to commit suicide, either.’ He hesitated, and then went on: ‘The only odd thing I noticed about him was that he seemed scarcely able to keep awake. I suppose he must have drunk too much.’
Mudge raised his eyebrows, but forbore to comment, and in fact, Adam reflected, there was little to say; Stapleton might be telling the truth, or again, he might be telling a deliberate lie, in order to conceal the fact that he himself had doped the gin while he was in with Shorthouse. There seemed no way of deciding. One thing, however, was evident enough: that in order to hang an able-bodied man one must render him powerless first, and that this could be effected either by tying him up or by dosing him with Nembutal. But why – on the evidence – both? Certainly one or other of them seemed to be superfluous.
‘It must have been suicide, you know,’ Elizabeth put in. ‘Murder – well, I mean, it’s just impossible. Or is it?’ She frowned. ‘Really,’ she said, ‘it’s as though the laws of gravity were suspended . . .’
Apparently, however, Mudge had no comment to make on this. He returned to the attack.
‘And about your movements earlier in the evening?’ he said to Stapleton.
Stapleton raised his glass and drank before replying; it was not inconceivable that he wanted time to consider. ‘About nine o’clock,’ he said, ‘I left my digs in Clarendon Street, where I’d been reading since dinner-time, and went to the “Gloucester” for a drink; talked to one or two of the Playhouse people until closing-time; then went for a walk and eventually came back to the theatre at eleven to see Shorthouse.’
‘A walk,’ Mudge repeated resignedly. ‘Alone, I suppose?’
‘Alone. It wasn’t a bad evening. There was even a scrap of moon.’
‘Very well, sir. And was there anyone at your lodgings who could swear to the time you eventually got in?’
‘I doubt it. I’d arranged with my landlady that as I was likely to be late I should lock the door after me when I came in, so presumably she’d already gone to bed. But someone may have heard me. As a matter of fact, after I left Shorthouse I went for another walk.’
‘Another walk?’ Mudge stared, seemingly distressed at such lack of variety.
‘Another walk,’ Stapleton assured him solemnly. ‘Not a long one, on this occasion. I must have got home about twenty to midnight.’
Mudge inhaled deeply; he was on the point of speech when Fen forestalled him.
‘You didn’t talk to Shorthouse at all,’ Fen asked amiably, ‘about Miss Haynes?’
CHAPTER NINE
THE GIRL TURNED quickly to look at him, the electric light flashing momentarily on her fair hair.
‘Why should they have talked about me?’ she said, and was angry at the slight trembling of her voice.
Fen regarded her thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps it’s rather a delicate matter,’ he said. ‘But in the circumstances, people are bound to hear about it sooner or later . . . I understood that Shorthouse was – well, let us say, attracted to you.’
Judith was rather pale. ‘I suppose,’ she stammered, ‘one might – No, I –’
She stopped, embarrassed and confused. And Mudge closed the uneasy gap with unexpected smoothness and finesse.
‘Naturally,’ he cooed, with such a wealth of oily tact that Sir Richard stopped fidgeting with his pipe and stared – ‘naturally it’s a thing we should be bound to look into in the course of an investigation like this. And since secondhand accounts are always distasteful’ – he waved a hand in rather histrionic deprecation – ‘it’s better that we should hear what there is to hear from you.’
Stapleton said: ‘Darling, I don’t think you’re obliged –’ but before he could finish the girl interrupted him.
‘The Inspector’s quite right,’ she said in a low voice. ‘It’s bound to come out. And anyway, there’s nothing to conceal . . .’
‘You see, Boris and I are lovers’ – she tried to speak as if this were the most natural thing in the world, and failed – ‘and Mr Shorthouse had been making – well, I believe one calls them “advances”. That’s all. Naturally I didn’t encourage him.’
‘“Advances”?’ Mudge queried with glassy incomprehension.
Judith flushed, and answered more loudly than was necessary. ‘I don’t mean he wanted to marry me. Quite the reverse. He wanted me to be his mistress.’
Mudge made clicking sounds of an objurgatory kind, and shook his head. He seemed appropriately impressed. ‘But you, Mr Stapleton,’ he persisted. ‘You of course resented this?’
‘Not at all,’ the girl broke in before Stapleton could reply. ‘Our reactions aren’t quite so primitive, Inspector. We merely laughed at the whole business.’
But Stapleton was firm. ‘It isn’t as simple as that, darling.’
He turned to the Inspector. ‘I did resent it – yes. But since Shorthouse was – well, what he was, I didn’t feel so very distressed. One doesn’t bother much about burglars so long as they’ve no chance of getting into one’s own house.’
Mudge gravely indicated his appreciation of this rather anti-social sentiment.
‘And now, Miss,’ he said to Judith, ‘I wonder if you’d mind telling me about your movements last night?’
‘I was in all evening, alone, and I went to bed at half past ten.’
‘That seems straightforward enough. And you say you didn’t at all resent Mr Shorthouse’s – ah – suggestions?’
Judith shrugged. ‘That sort of thing happens, you know.’
‘Just so.’ Mudge exuded worldly sympathy. ‘Well, I think I needn’t trouble you any further for the present. Unless there’s anything Professor Fen would like to ask?’
Professor Fen, however, was at least partially comatose. He roused himself with difficulty.
‘No, nothing,’ he said after a certain amount of reflection. ‘Schön Dank, mein Jung’, he sang as an afterthought.
‘And we must go,’ Stapleton finished his beer and threw the end of his cigarette into the fire. ‘Or we shall never get any lunch.’
Judith stood up, wrapping her coat round her, and Stapleton took her arm, giving it a friendly little squeeze.
‘Oh, Mr Langley,’ – she spoke hesitantly, as they turned towards the door – ‘did Miss Davis say anything to you about Boris’s opera?’
‘She did indeed.’ Adam smiled at her. ‘I should very much like to look at it.’
‘You’ll be disappointed, I’m afraid,’ said Stapleton with youthful ser
iousness. ‘But it’s most kind of you, none the less.’
‘When can I have it?’
‘I suppose it’s still among Shorthouse’s possessions.’ Stapleton looked dubiously at Mudge. ‘Perhaps the Inspector —’
‘I’ll hand it over,’ Mudge assured him, ‘after I’ve been through his stuff. Unless, of course’ – he became momentarily jocose – ‘I find it has some special bearing on the crime.’
‘But don’t expect me to get it put on, even if I like it,’ Adam said. ‘You know as well as I do how little chance there is of that . . . By the way, it is a vocal score, I hope. Liszt is supposed to have played the whole of Tristan at sight from the full orchestral score, but I’m not up to that standard.’
‘I fancy it’s a legend.’ Stapleton was interested. ‘I don’t believe even Liszt could have done it . . . No, it is a vocal score. Oh, and I must return that removing-cream you lent me.’
‘Keep it,’ said Adam. Judith and Stapleton made their farewells and departed into the outer cold.
‘Removing-cream?’ Elizabeth inquired. ‘Not that expensive jar I bought for you during Don Pasquale?’
Adam reassured her. ‘I gave him the one which Edwin tried to pinch. I haven’t been using it myself.’
‘They’re a nice couple,’ said Fen thoughtfully. ‘And very much in love, it would seem. But the girl’s suffering from nerves, and Stapleton looks as if he ought to see a doctor . . . I wonder if she disliked Shorthouse’s deplorable proposals as little as she pretended.’
‘You mean,’ Mudge queried, ‘that she might have had a motive for killing him?’
‘There’s a kind of physical revulsion’ – Fen was speaking almost to himself – ‘which could possibly drive a girl like that to murder. I believe any suggestion of promiscuous sensuality would repel her violently. Anyway, one can’t rule it out altogether. And one can’t rule out the possibility that Stapleton resented Shorthouse’s behaviour to the point of homicide. It really seems to depend on just how far Shorthouse went.’ He paused. ‘That gives us four motives: Peacock (his career, via the production), Charles Shorthouse (money), Stapleton (vengeance), and Judith Haynes (offended virtue). And what are the problems? First, why Shorthouse was tied, as well as doped with Nembutal? Second, who phoned Shand, and why? Third, what was Shorthouse doing in the theatre at that hour?’
‘You forget the real problem,’ said Adam. ‘That is, how anyone could manage to kill Shorthouse at all.’
‘I have the beginnings of an idea about that,’ Fen replied, ‘though I must admit I don’t see – well, never mind. I must visit Charles Shorthouse. Adam, do you know him?’
‘A little.’
‘Good. Come with me. We’ll have lunch, and then drive to Amersham.’
CHAPTER TEN
SO SIR RICHARD returned to his house on Boar’s Hill, and Mudge went esoterically about his business. Fen, Adam, and Elizabeth lunched in Fen’s room at St Christopher’s. It was a large room in the second quadrangle, reached by a short flight of carpeted stairs which led up from an alley-way giving access to the gardens. It was, as the saying goes, ‘lined with books’; Chinese miniatures were on the walls; and various dilapidated plaques and busts of the greater masters of English Literature decorated the mantelpiece. They ate off a noble Sheraton table, and were served by Fen’s scout.
They talked about opera, and in particular about Wagner; speculations about the death of Shorthouse had inevitably reached a stasis for want of further information. Over coffee, they considered plans for the afternoon.
‘I certainly shan’t come to Amersham,’ said Elizabeth. ‘It’s far too cold. How soon will you be going?’
‘Almost at once, I should think.’ Fen looked at his watch. ‘Two o’clock. It’ll take us at least an hour to get there, even in Lily Christine.’
‘I suppose you’re a safe driver,’ Adam remarked gloomily. He was rather nervous of cars. ‘What will you do with yourself, darling?’
‘Go to a film, I should think,’ Elizabeth answered. ‘Or fall asleep beside the fire. You’ll be back when?’
‘Between tea and dinner, with any luck,’ said Fen. ‘We’ll see you then.’
It was not until they were properly under way that Adam recognized the force of that ‘with any luck’. They would require a great deal of luck, he thought, sitting petrified in the front seat, if they were to get back at all. To realize that anyone is not a very good driver takes a little time; the mind is not eager, in the face of a long journey to accept this particular verity; and it was not until Fen emerged into the High Street, with the velocity of a benighted traveller pursued by spectres, that Adam became really alarmed.
‘Be careful!’ he shouted. ‘Be careful, or something will get us!’
‘It’s perfectly all right,’ said Fen, hauling on the wheel in a split-second manoeuvre between two buses which made Adam go cold all over. ‘I never take any risks.’ He rushed between a cart and a lorry with about half an inch to spare on either side. ‘It simply doesn’t seem to me to be worth it.’
Adam said nothing – there was, indeed, nothing to say – but sat as rigid as if he had been confronted by the Gorgon’s head. The car rushed on towards Headington. It was a small, red, battered and extremely noisy sports car; a chilled-looking female nude in chromium projected from its radiator cap; across its bonnet were scrawled in large white letters the words LILY CHRISTINE III.
‘I bought her,’ said Fen, removing both hands from the wheel in order to search for a cigarette, ‘from an undergraduate who was sent down. But of course she was laid up during the war, and I don’t think it’s improved her.’ He shook his head, sombrely. ‘Things keep falling out of the engine,’ he explained.
The three-quarters of an hour which elapsed before they arrived at High Wycombe, Adam occupied with repenting, in some detail, the moral imperfections of his past life. By the time they had left the main road, and were climbing the hill which leads to Amersham, he was sufficiently resigned to be capable of conversation again.
‘Tell me,’ said Fen, ‘is Charles Shorthouse married?’
‘No,’ Adam replied. ‘He lives in what is reputed to be sin’ – at this point Fen’s negotiation of a particularly acute bend aroused in him afresh the fear of eternal torment – ‘I mean, reputedly he lives in sin with a woman called Beatrix Thorn. She is not attractive,’ Adam added unchivalrously. ‘She is not attractive at all. But composers have a way of getting hold of the most appalling women. I can never quite see why it is. Look at the Princess Wittgenstein. Look at Mile Recio. Look at Cosima. Look at –’
‘All right,’ said Fen. ‘I accept the general proposition.’ He changed gear with a sound like a dragon in torment. ‘Then those two make up the ménage?’
‘There’s also an amanuensis. I forget his name. He does the piano scores of the operas. And then there are hangers-on of one sort and another.’ Adam frowned, in the effort of giving definition to this woolly asseveration. ‘Kept critics; admirers; parasites.’
‘What would you say was Shorthouse’s standing as a composer?’
‘Pretty high,’ Adam admitted reluctantly. ‘On a par with Walton and Vaughan Williams, anyway. Whether he deserves it is another matter; I’m inclined to think not. He’s a kind of Salieri to their Mozart – or a Meyerbeer to their Wagner.’
‘And he disliked Edwin?’
‘Very much. As far as I know, there wasn’t any special reason for it, though; a purely temperamental antipathy. They saw very little of one another, in any case.’
The road widened. A sand-pit flashed by on their right hand, dark ochre under the grey sky. They entered a beech-wood, dank and cavernous, the ground carpeted with rotting leaves. Through tangles of briar and dead bracken there were glimpses of deep dells. By a deserted, rickety cottage, its windows blank and its hedges untrimmed, they turned off to the left.
‘Nearly there,’ Fen murmured.
They came out of the wood, and a few hundred yards farther on arrive
d at a tall gate with an old lodge beside it.
‘This is it,’ said Adam. ‘It’s a sharp turn,’ he announced with considerably more urgency, ‘and the ground’s very wet . . .’
A grinding shock accompanied their entry into the drive. In Adam’s imagination the flames of the pit crackled with horrifying imminence. But Fen did not stop; the flames receded.
‘It’s only a wing,’ said Fen without much perturbation. ‘Goodness, what a clatter it’s making. I suppose it must have worked loose.’
Creating a din like a gang of riveters on Clydeside, they sped up the short gravel drive. In another moment the house came in view.
It was an unspectacular building, large, modern, two-storied, constructed of red brick. The drive curved to the right and ended in a sundial surrounded by spiky-looking lavender bushes. Fen stopped just short of this, and switched off the ignition. After a moment the car backfired, and then, as if unsatisfied with the first attempt, backfired again, much more loudly.
‘It’s funny she still does that,’ said Fen, interested. ‘I’ve never been able to make out the reason for it. Well, let’s have a look at the damage.’
But they were given no opportunity to do this. A small, savage-looking woman with a long nose and a harsh voice rushed suddenly out of the front door and up to them.
‘The noise,’ she hissed vehemently. ‘The noise. Have you no consideration for the Master?’ She paused, her beady eyes almost popping out of her head with annoyance. ‘Mr Langley: you at least should know. All cars must be left outside the gates. Who knows what damage your uproar may have done to the Master’s work?’
‘Uproar?’ Fen repeated, greatly offended. ‘Lily Christine is a very quiet-running car. I admit,’ he added handsomely, ‘that the wing was making rather a noise, but then you’d make a noise if you’d just been torn off by a gate-post.’
‘The precise cause of the disturbance,’ snapped the small woman, ‘is scarcely relevant. It’s the result that matters. The Master’s brain is a highly delicate instrument; the least shock may unhinge it – no, I don’t mean that, of course . . .’
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