A Case of Spirits (13 page)

‘You didn’t remark upon it at the time, did you?’

‘I recall that at the time I was not certain. It meant, you see, that the chain of hands was broken, and the person on his right, Miss Crush, was collaborating in a deception, which I was not prepared to accept. She is very well regarded among spiritualists. However, I have since reluctantly decided that my inference must have been correct, though I cannot imagine what caused her to betray the Movement in this way.’

‘What happened next, sir?’

‘Miss Crush claimed to have been touched by the hand. And so did Miss Probert. She said that it was tugging at her dress. That’s very odd, isn’t it? You see, she was sitting on the opposite side of the table from Brand, between her fiancé and your inspector. Captain Nye objected strongly to what was going on and he was pelted with oranges for his trouble. I presume that Brand threw them. Shortly after that we put on the light.’

‘Did you immediately proceed to the experiment with the chair?’

‘I think we needed a few minutes to collect ourselves. I remember that I had to dissuade Probert from pouring Miss Crush a glass of gin. Nye, too, was still extremely exercised about what had happened. It was Brand who restored order eventually, by agreeing to let us sit for the second experiment in a subdued light. He was a very self-possessed young man, now that I think about him. He told Probert to show the apparatus to the rest of us. Of course, he had seen it for himself at the beginning of the evening, before everyone arrived.’

‘He’d also seen it the previous evening,’ Cribb reminded Strathmore.

‘So he had. Well, while the rest of us were looking at the chair, Brand busied himself, tidying up the oranges and flowers—a vase of chrysanthemums had been knocked over by an orange. We soon had the apparatus ready, and several of the party took turns to sit in the chair. At that stage it was working perfectly. Brand was searched and seated in the chair. We retired behind the curtain and the seance commenced. I was taking the galvanometer readings with Inspector Jowett. I remember that Miss Crush was the first to announce that she felt a supernatural presence in the room and shortly afterwards Miss Probert claimed that her hair was being stroked.’

‘You all remained seated, however?’ asked Cribb.

‘Every one of us. You may imagine the effect upon the company of what happened next. We all heard quite distinctly the sound of footsteps from behind the curtain while the galvanometer was steady at a reading of 188!’

‘What did you do, sir?’

‘First there were shouts from behind the curtain, punctuated, I may say, by some strong language which we doubted at first could have been spoken by Brand. Dr Probert asked me to look behind the curtain.’

‘And what did you see?’

‘Nothing. The study was in darkness, without even the light from the fire that we had next door. Brand asked me to fetch Probert, and, as the doctor went into the study, he kicked over the bowl of salt solution we had used to strengthen the contact with the medium’s hands. I went back to light a candle and we all went in to see what had happened. Captain Nye was sent downstairs to turn off the current.’

‘I believe that Mr Brand was in quite an agitated state.’

‘My word, yes. He was convinced that one of us had ventured behind the curtain, which would have been unforgivable. The Society does not conduct itself like that, as I told you. I think it was Miss Crush who finally regained Brand’s co-operation by persuading him that we may actually have had a spirit visitor with us. We later learned, of course, that it had been Professor Quayle stumbling by error into the wrong room.’

‘I think he was trying to evade me at the time, sir.’

Strathmore nodded. ‘I think each one of us must admit to a measure of blame for the things that happened that evening, Sergeant. Where was I? Ah yes, by the time Captain Nye came up from the cellar we were ready to resume the experiment, so the poor fellow was sent straight down again to switch the electricity on while we resumed our seats in the library.’

‘Do you happen to remember who was the last person to leave the study?’ asked Cribb,

‘It must have been Probert. I remember him drawing the curtain.’

‘And you returned to the galvanometer?’

‘I did. It was twenty minutes to eleven and we had a reading of 202. The next thing I recall is the door-handle turning and you arriving in the room. It gave us quite a shock, Sergeant, I can tell you.’

‘But not so big a shock as Mr Brand was getting, eh?’ said Cribb a little coarsely. ‘Well, sir, you’ve been very helpful. I think you’ve covered all the matters I was wanting to ask about.’

‘Possibly it helps that we are both investigators in our different ways, Sergeant,’ said Strathmore, standing up. ‘Without seeming to boast, I think I know what you peelers require from a witness. Might I inquire whether you have come to a conclusion yet about Brand’s death?’

‘I think I’m closer to it now than I was, sir. Have you formed any opinion about it yourself, by any chance?’

‘Oh yes,’ said Strathmore. ‘I am quite certain how it happened, but I should not wish to prejudice your investigation. When you have made up your mind, you must let me know, and I shall tell you whether we have both arrived at the same conclusion.’

They’ve had their wish
—
called for the naked truth,

And in she tripped, sat down and bade them stare;

They had to blush a little and forgive!

PURSUING MISS PROBERT HAD a beneficial effect on Thackeray. Trailing a suspect was a duty he had performed more times than he cared to remember, but suspects with trim figures and elegant deportment were rare. Trailing was not quite the word to describe his sprightly step along Hill Street. He moved like a man twenty years his junior.

The difficulty was in convincing himself that she was a suspect at all. A young woman who devoted so much of her time to distributing food to the impoverished was not his notion of a murderess, however incriminating Cribb might regard the presence of a brush and comb in her basket. A dagger or a tin of weed-killer Thackeray was ready to be impressed by, but a brush and comb? He grinned to himself as he threaded his way through the shoppers of Richmond.

By crossing the street he gave himself a longer view of the pavement Alice Probert travelled along. An additional advantage of this parallel route was that she was unlikely to suspect his presence. People always supposed that if anyone chose to follow them they would automatically use the same side of the street.

He spotted her at once, waiting to cross at the junction with Red Lion Street. A young constable on traffic duty waved two four-wheelers past before halting a cart to allow her to cross. She nodded her thanks and stepped forward. She would be easy to keep in sight, with that bar of white on the trimming of her hat. She was not paying the smallest attention to Thackeray’s side of the street, but he went through the motions of making sure there were other pedestrians between himself and his quarry and occasionally altering his stride to take advantage of the cover of a passing vehicle.

Across Red Lion Street she stopped to exchange words with an older woman in a grey coat who had obviously been shopping, for an elderly manservant weighed down with parcels had stopped at the same time and stood patiently some yards behind her. It occurred to Thackeray that Alice must be well known in Richmond, at least among the well-to-do. Whatever felonies she intended with her brush and comb she was going to find it difficult to avoid being recognised. He stopped beside a tobacconist’s and waited, like the man with the parcels, for the end of the conversation.

Several minutes later, she took her leave of the woman in grey and moved on towards the point where Hill Street curved to the right and became George Street. To the left was Richmond Green, to the right the Parish Church, and ahead, beyond the Quadrant, the railway station. She chose none of these directions. Instead, she opened the door of a shop on the right and went inside. Thackeray stepped briskly ahead and drew level with the shop. It was a milliner’s. He thought of the brush and comb and smiled broadly. Cribb has not included a hat-shop in his calculations.

The window of the shop was arranged on the principle that the more goods one displayed, the greater was the chance of engaging the attention of a customer. From Thackeray’s side of the street the hats in their rows looked not too different from the arrangement of apples in the greengrocer’s next door.

He prepared to wait again. Five minutes passed by the clock over the jeweller’s midway along George Street. He was rather charmed by this little interlude in Alice Probert’s charitable excursion. Much as he admired young women with social consciences, he liked to be assured that they occasionally slipped into a milliner’s and tried on hats.

After another five minutes cold feet were beginning to occupy him more than saintly women. Nobody had gone into the shop since Alice, and only one customer, dressed in brown, had emerged. The stream of traffic and pedestrians coursed past him, emphasising how inactive he was. Then the disquieting thought came to him that there might be another entrance at the back of the shop, with access from Red Lion Street. He crossed the street in the direction of the greengrocer’s and turned and walked past the milliner’s, with the merest glance through the window. To his mortification there was nobody inside but a shop-assistant arranging a bonnet on a stand.

He turned about and pushed open the door. The assistant was a girl of thirteen or so. Her eyes opened wide at the arrival of an unaccompanied man in the shop. ‘May I help you, sir?’ she said, more as an expression of surprise than a promise of assistance.

‘I hope so. I was looking for my—er—niece. I thought she came in here to try on a hat a few minutes ago.’

‘You must be mistaken, sir. We haven’t had a customer in here for half an hour.’

Half an hour? It had not been that long. ‘I’m sure she came in,’ Thackeray insisted. ‘There ain’t a back door to the shop, is there?’

‘No, sir. Perhaps if you could tell me how madam was dressed . . .’

‘Dark green coat,’ said Thackeray. He was good at descriptions. ‘Hat the same colour, trimmed with white.

And she was carrying a basket of oranges.’

‘Oh!’ said the girl, as if the clouds had rolled away. ‘Wait a moment.’ She crossed to a chest of drawers and took out a large purple hat. ‘Was madam’s hat in this style, but green in colour?’

‘That’s the one!’ said Thackeray.

‘She got it here last week,’ said the girl. ‘It matched her coat beautifully. But she came in fifteen minutes ago to visit Miss Barkway, the manageress. She comes almost every day. She is not a customer, sir. She is a personal friend of Miss Barkway. You
are
related to her, sir?’

‘I’m her Uncle Edward,’ said Thackeray at once. ‘Where is she now? Through there?’ He pointed to a door he had noticed behind a full-length mirror.

‘That leads upstairs to Miss Barkway’s rooms,’ said the girl in a whisper. ‘The lady always goes straight upstairs and comes down after five minutes in different clothes. I really don’t know why. Perhaps you do. She left the shop a few minutes before you came in. Didn’t you notice her? But of course you wouldn’t if you expected to see her in the green hat. She was wearing brown. And she always covers her face with a veil.’

‘Oh glory!’ said Thackeray, remembering the figure he had seen come out of the shop. ‘Did you by any chance notice which way she went?’

‘I can’t say I was watching her today, but I’ve sometimes seen her cross the street and go through Golden Court towards Richmond Green. It’s a little paved passage—’

‘I’m obliged to you, miss,’ he said, already opening the door. He put his hand in his pocket and found sixpence. ‘I can trust you not to say anything about this to Miss Barkway, can’t I?’

Golden Court was lined with small, interesting shops where people lingered and reflected, indifferent to the activity of George Street. Thackeray’s arrival on the scene, running, was met with looks of the sort traction-engines receive when they pass through small villages. Concerned only with the possibility that Alice had given him the slip, he clattered heavy-footed through the passage. Richmond Green opened to him at the end, some ten acres of turf bordered by a narrow road, with elegant houses beyond. A hundred yards ahead was the figure of a woman in brown carrying a basket. As he watched, she turned left and entered one of the buildings fronting the Green.

For an instant before he started after her, Thackeray sensed that someone else was coming after him through Golden Court. It was no more than a fleeting impression and at this moment it mattered to him less than the necessity of fixing in his mind which house Alice Probert had entered. He did not look behind him. Instead he crossed the Green to the three-storeyed terrace Alice had entered. It was an example of the period when terraces were built as gentlemen’s residences rather than workmen’s cottages. Indeed, as he approached the tall gate of the end house she had gone into, and looked through the wrought-iron work at the Roman pilasters and frieze that framed the front door, and at the five bays on each of the upper floors, he felt bound to ask himself what the poor of Richmond were doing behind such an exterior. And why Alice Probert chose to clothe herself in brown and wear a veil before she visited there.

He reckoned a minute had passed since she had gone inside, but there was no movement behind the ground floor windows. He waited another two minutes, as if admiring the lines of the building, as people must often have done, and then moved on. It seemed likely that Alice was being received in a room at the rear of the house, and he wanted to confirm the fact. There was no tradesmen’s entrance at the side, so he continued a few yards along the pavement until he came to a red-brick arch, which a board informed him had been the gateway to the long-demolished Richmond Palace. He went through into Old Palace Yard, turning left at a building named The Trumpeter’s House. A short way ahead he recognised the rear of the terrace, surrounded by a tall brick wall. He located an unlocked gate and entered the garden. There was a small shed to his left, close to the house, a woodstore, he decided, and a suitable place to shelter inside briefly. It did house wood, but in the form of picture-frames, several stacked against the wall and another half-constructed, supported on a carpenter’s bench. An oil-painting lay nearby, presumably after being measured for its frame. It was a still life of two vegetable marrows.

He sat on the edge of the bench and considered what to do next. He had no authority to enter the house. He discounted the idea of speaking to the servants. It was safer to work alone, from outside. He would begin by making discreet observations through the windows.

He crept from the hut with a stealth that would not have disgraced a Red Indian and flitted from window to window at the rear of the house. Discouragingly, this bold manoeuvre yielded no return. The first windows he reached were so coated with condensation that the room behind could only be the kitchen, and the rest were shuttered. If he wanted to persist with the investigation he would need to raise himself by some means to the level of the first floor. He looked round for a ladder. None was available. But it is difficult to keep a Scotland Yard man down when he is determined to go up. Adjoining the back of the house was a concrete path and between the path and a small lawn was a wooden trellis supporting a Virginia creeper.

He stepped back and estimated the height of the first floor window nearest the trellis. It was some fourteen feet above the ground. He examined the trellis. It was formed in six-inch squares. He counted twenty squares from the ground to the top. As a structure it was sturdy enough to support a Virginia creeper, but would it take a climber of fifteen stone?

He walked round to the side facing the lawn and gripped two of the upright laths and set his right boot on the lowest cross-piece and gently transferred the weight of his body from the ground to the trellis. It held, so he slotted his left boot into the space above and began a slow ascent. He would not have been surprised at any stage to hear the rending of wood, but happily for the cause of law and order he reached the top without incident.

The most difficult part was still to come. The window-sill was between three and four feet higher than the last crosspiece of the trellis. He would be obliged to raise himself above the level of the structure without any other support, and since it was set back a yard or so from the house it would be inviting disaster to reach out for the sill.

He considered the possibility of sitting astride the trellis and attempting to stand up, but he foresaw a problem in securing an adequate foothold. It was slightly less hazardous, he decided, to remain facing the house, lodge both feet on the fourth cross-lag piece from the top and, by straightening his body and pressing his knees against the topmost lath, achieve an upright stance. This he tried, gripping the top of the trellis with his hands until he felt sufficiently secure to let go and raise himself for a glimpse through the window.

It was only a glimpse, but there was something to see this time. The moment when he became perpendicular coincided with a rare shaft of November sunlight, and he was given a highlighted view of the back of a man in shirt-sleeves, standing close to the window putting up an artist’s easel. It made him remember the frames in the shed below, and the still-life painting of marrows. In this fleeting first look, he had time for no more than an impression of the rest of the room. The sun caught the curved edge of a white globe at the other end. He concluded that it was the porcelain shade of a table lamp. He lowered himself and gripped the top of the trellis again.

After a suitable pause he rose for a second look. In those few seconds, the sun had gone in, so the surfaces it caught were less sharply defined, but because the light was more diffused and the shadows less pronounced, it was actually possible to see more of the interior. Thackeray therefore looked past the artist to see what his subject was, and his eyes returned to the white globe. He now saw that it was not what he had supposed. Unless his unusual position was producing symptoms of vertigo, there was not one white surface, spherical in shape, but two, adjacent to each other. They were not porcelain globes, nor were they part of a paraffin lamp. They were part of Miss Alice Probert, and she was standing quite still on a kind of pedestal, or podium. She was wearing no clothes at all.

For a moment after this discovery, Thackeray teetered at the top of the trellis, his equilibrium dreadfully imperilled. By shooting out his arms and using them like a tightrope walker, he succeeded in recovering sufficiently to carry out the drill every constable learns at the start of his career: that facts must always be checked. He looked through the window for the third time.

There was no disputing the fact that there was a man at an easel in the room or that a young woman was posing naked in front of him. It is difficult, of course, positively to identify somebody in a state of nature whom you have met clothed for the first time the same morning, but Thackeray was as certain as he could be that he was looking at Alice Probert. True, she was in half-profile, or rather her face was (he was trying to ignore the rest of her, which apart from general indications as to stature was more distracting than helpful to the process of identification), and her black hair had been unpinned and allowed to lie loosely over her shoulders, but her piercing blue eyes (mercifully focused on the wall), the slight pertness of her nose and cheekbones and the way she held her head were conclusive, in his opinion. Having done all that duty required, Thackeray relaxed his knees and resumed his handhold on the trellis. This was fortunate, because he was immediately subjected to a second shock, a voice from below him in the garden.