Murder at Midnight (8 page)

“He’s an ambulance man, Rex. He’s not a toxicology expert.”

Rex conceded with a grudging nod. “Had Humphrey not been here, we wouldn’t know it was curare, if that’s what it is.”

“I hope it is, for Vanessa’s sake. He said it wasn’t fatal if it didn’t get in your bloodstream. Lucky he knows his anthropology.”

“It’d be luckier if none of this had happened at all,” Rex remarked.

At that moment, Alistair knocked and entered the kitchen. “Any progress with your deductions, Sherlock?”

“Not really. We were saying earlier that, as one of the nonsuspects, you should keep an eye on the others.”

“In case anyone tries to get rid of the device that launched the dart,” Helen explained.

“Or the other dart,” Rex added.

“What should I be looking for? A long pipe would be easily spotted.”

Rex shrugged, at a loss. “I imagine it could be any length.”

“If we found it, we might be able to judge the distance from which the dart was shot,” Alistair suggested. “Or else an expert could. That might help a great deal.”

“Aye, it would, if we could remember who was standing where. Many of the guests’ memories will be blurred by booze.”

“Mine being no exception. Could I get some of that coffee?” Rex’s colleague asked. “I’m beginning to feel a bit sluggish. I wish now I hadn’t drunk so much whisky.”

“You and me both. Aspirin?”

“Whatever’s going,” Alistair said gratefully, accepting a mug of coffee from Helen, who always seemed to remember how much cream and sugar everyone took. He palmed the aspirin Rex offered. “Thanks. Hopefully, this will prevent a hangover headache. Look, you don’t suspect John, do you?” he asked standing awkwardly by the kitchen table.

“No particular reason to at this point,” Rex hedged.

“Right. Because he could never do anything like this. For goodness sake, he’s in the business of saving lives, not taking them.”

This was not a convincing argument in Rex’s book, since he had prosecuted several cases in his career where doctors, nurses, and hospital orderlies had finished off a patient for a variety of reasons. In many instances, it wasn’t even personal. They had believed they were pursuing a sacred mission, or else had a God complex, or suffered from Munchausen by Proxy. A sad case, which Rex had tried with ambivalence, involved a medical practitioner who had performed euthanasia on a cancer-ridden patient in the last throes of agony. Rex rubbed his tired eyes to dispel the memory of the dignified and unrepentant doctor.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Helen asked, rubbing his shoulder blades.

“Aye, I was just having morbid thoughts. Look, Alistair, in the interest of diligence and impartiality, we need to suspect everyone equally for the time being.”

“Even Julie?” Alistair demanded, clearly upset that John was not being removed from the suspects list.

“Even Julie,” Rex said before Helen could comment. “Fair’s fair. However, it’s highly unlikely Julie is involved. She doesn’t have any connection to these people, except Drew Harper. This is only her second visit to Scotland in recent years. Plus, her attention has been focused all night on Drew that I can see. On that point, I don’t see how he could have made a move without her noticing.”

“Unless they were in on the murders together … Look, would she even say anything if she saw Drew up to no good?” Alistair asked tellingly. It was clear he had noticed her infatuation with the house agent. “Aside from overreacting when he went over to chat with Zoe?”

“Alistair,” Helen exclaimed in a chiding voice. “Please. If Julie saw Drew blow a dart into one or other of the Frasers, or both, I do believe she would have said something! She may be besotted but she’s not a fool. I’ve known her for six years and we’re very close,” she finished off firmly.

“I take your point, Helen. I’m just saying that suggesting John is capable of murder is as ludicrous as accusing your friend Julie.”

“Nobody’s suggesting anything of the sort,” Rex placated his friend. “And you haven’t known John as long as Helen has known Julie.”

Alistair stood cradling his mug of coffee, staring into it. “Aye, but I know him in every sense. When you’re that close to someone, you learn what they’re capable of. And of murder, he isn’t.”

Well, they did say love was blind, Rex reflected. Was it worth reminding his legal colleague of family witnesses who had sworn on the bible that the defendant couldn’t have committed whatever gruesome crime he or she was accused of, only for a guilty verdict to be returned? Probably not. “Be that as it may, let’s assume, for the sake of thoroughness, that John and Julie are as potentially guilty as anyone else.”

“Fine,” Alistair said curtly.

Helen kept her mouth firmly shut.

“Now, one of us needs to be in there keeping watch. In fact, you both go and find out from Julie and John, respectively, if anyone left the room in our absence.”

“What are you going to do, Rex?” Helen asked on her way out of the kitchen with a tray laden with cups, sugar and cream, having refused his help. Alistair followed with the coffee pot.

“Make a call.”

Rex dialed the number of Chief Inspector Dalgerry at Fort Wil
liam Police Station and, eventually getting him on the line, after
waiting for him to call back, explained the situation at Gleneagle Lodge and expressed his concern that the police had not yet arrived.

The chief inspector assured him that assistance was on its way. “The dispatcher, who knows my son, called me at home, Mr. Graves. He thought I would like to know since it was your place, again.”

Dalgerry had headed up the Moor Murders Case and, although Rex had solved the crime, he had let the chief inspector take most of the credit. Rex wasn’t so much interested in fame as in the satisfaction of finding out
whodunit
. The two of them engaged in a cautious professional acquaintance, the officer according Rex grudging respect, and Rex, in turn, cognizant of the chief inspector’s rank and experience.

“Aye, I’m beginning to regret buying this place. It was supposed to afford me some peace and quiet.”

Dalgerry chuckled over the phone. “Och, you love all the drama.
And from what I hear, this one’s a real gem. I’m in my car now
heading up the A82, approximately half an hour away, depending on road conditions, which are verra bad.” The chief inspector spoke in a growl, with a heavy Highland accent.

Rex thanked him and rang off while some charge was still left on his cell phone. He sat quietly at the kitchen table to reflect on what could most expediently be achieved in the short time before the police arrived. Little progress had been made other than the discovery of the dart, which in and of itself was certainly important, except that it could have been shot by almost anyone in the room, and just conceivably by someone not invited to the party.

9
a hero
’
s tale

Without the other piece
of the weapon, it was impossible to tell how far the dart had traveled in Ken’s case. The roughly symmetrical wound suggested a direct shot. What level of expertise had been required to deal a fatal blow to Ken, and who possessed such expertise?

Unlikely it was Vanessa. The idea was almost laughable. Nobody truly believed it was her dart, even though it had been found in her clutch. She had offered a plausible reason for having it and had been believable; unless she was a consummate actress, and her daughter took after her in that department. Rex ran agitated fingers through his beard and flung himself back in his chair. Think, think, he exhorted himself, staring up at the ceiling. A pipe, or whatever device had launched the dart, must exist, else why would the killer have used a dart? And it was imperative they locate any remaining darts. Rex wished they had adequate light to make a thorough search and speed up progress. Presumably the police would come prepared. However, he wanted to find more evidence before anyone had a chance to hide anything.

He pushed himself out of the kitchen chair and went to re-join his guests, surprised to find them listening intently to Ace Weaver in his wheelchair. It appeared the old man was regaling them with a tale of escape from Flanders when his Spitfire was shot down in 1943 by a German Focke-Wulf 190 fighter. He now formed an integral part of the group, his wheelchair turned about, and he seemed remarkably revived. His voice, though it quavered in places, was strong, his eyes bright and alert. His wife nodded and expressed surprise at appropriate moments even though she must have heard his war stories numerous times before. Zoe regarded her father fondly and twiddled a long tendril of coppery hair.

Rex sat down beside Helen on the sofa and waited, all but writhing with impatience, until the ex-airman finished narrating his story of an adolescent boy in a brown cap and loose trousers bringing him food and hiding him in an applecart out in the meadow while the Germans searched the farmhouse and outbuildings, one of them going so far as to prod him under the fruit with a pitchfork, almost discovering him. In the nick of time, the quick-witted Emile, for that was the boy’s name, created a diversion by drawing the soldiers’ attention to the pilot’s leather flight jacket floating in a marsh, compelling them to wade in and search while Ace made his escape on a bicycle disguised as a peasant, complete with beret and a string of onions hanging from the handlebars.

“I had a Gauloise dangling from my lips and a pair of spectacles with the lenses punched out,” he recounted. “Emile even rubbed some flour in my eyebrows to make me look older. I was only twenty-one at the time—younger, I think, than anyone in this room. The Channel was heavily guarded by German patrols, and the Belgian Resistance took me to Paris where I hid for a week in a safe-house. A Basque guide led me and two American airmen through the Pyrenees into neutral Spain, and then to Gibraltar, a British colony.”

Ace continued to address his audience. “It was a long way back home, but I was one of the lucky ones. Many didn’t survive the crash landings or were shot while escaping, or else were sent to POW camps. If Vanessa and I had had a son, we would’ve called him Emile,” he added wistfully. “Zoe finally came along, when we had all but given up hope.”

He smiled at his daughter, and Rex caught a glimpse of the young
er man. Ace must have been almost seventy when Zoe was born.

“Zoe’s first name is Emilia,” his wife told the group. “But she thinks it’s too old-fashioned and uses her middle name.”

Zoe rolled her eyes. “It’s awful. Emilia Weaver. Not exactly a brilliant stage name.”

Her mother sighed.

“That’s quite a story, Ace,” Drew said with admiration, leaning back on the loveseat.

“Yes,” Helen agreed. “All it needs is a secret romance with a pretty Belgian girl.”

Rex gave her a discreet nudge, as he wanted to move on, but it was too late. A look of sweet reminiscence lit Ace’s watery blue eyes.

“There was such a one,” he began with a devilish smile. “Her name was Lisette.” And then he gave an apologetic smile to his wife. “Vanessa was but a baby then.”

“I wasn’t even born!” she objected with a laugh, apparently forgetting, as had the others, the small matter of murder recently perpetrated in the house.

“Bravo to the brave airmen of the RAF,” Alistair said.

Ace Weaver bowed his head in modest acknowledgment, but perhaps also in memory of lost comrades, Rex thought. “
Lest auld acquaintance be forgot”
would hold special meaning for him, no doubt.

“Thank you for sharing your war memories with us,” Rex said. “But to return to less heroic feats, I can report that I have spoken to Chief Inspector Dalgerry, and he will be with us shortly.”

Sighs of relief and a few claps of applause followed Rex’s announcement.

“What’s taken the police so long?” Alistair asked, glancing at the mantelpiece clock.

“I understand the chief inspector decided to head up the investigation himself and has been busy putting a team in place.”

“I remember Chief Inspector Dalgerry,” Flora said. “He probably thinks the case is in safe hands until he gets here.” She smiled with encouragement at Rex.

“Thank you, Flora. I can’t say how sorry I am to subject you to a second investigation here at Gleneagle Lodge. You probably won’t ever want to visit again.”

“I feel quite safe with you,” she said with heart-warming confidence. “I only hope you can solve this case as quickly as the last one.”

“Well, I don’t have much time. Still, it might help keep us awake if we used the rest of the wait time productively by continuing our search. What say you all?”

His suggestion met with a lukewarm reception. A sense of apathy appeared to be setting in, and no doubt most of the company would have been happy to let the police take care of the search, which would have to be done all over again, in any case.

“What will the chief inspector say if he hears we’ve been meddling with the investigation?” Professor Cleverly asked with a wry grin, rousing himself on the loveseat.

“Oh, he won’t mind,” Flora said. “Less work for him. He really didn’t do much at all last time except charge about like a bull in a china shop.”

Rex suppressed a chuckle. This was indeed a fair description of Dalgerry’s activity at Gleneagle Lodge that fateful summer. However, he didn’t want to appear disrespectful. “Chief Inspector Dalgerry didn’t get to his position because of his daintiness,” he pointed out. “More from dogged perseverance and bullheadedness.” He smiled in spite of himself. Dalgerry was indeed a bulldog.

“Now,” he said, setting the coffee cups to one side of the table. “I expect we were all prepared to be up until the wee hours in any case, even if it wasn’t for this unfortunate business.”

“What a way to start a new year!” Drew lamented.

“Well, we can’t turn back the clock,” Julie said tartly, seemingly less enamored of Drew. “Might as well get on with it and try to find out who did away with poor Ken and Catriona.”

“I wish they could speak to us,” John remarked, glancing over at the sheet-enshrouded bodies.

“It’s possible they didn’t even know what hit them,” Vanessa said. “I hope not, anyway. Is whatever you said a fast-acting poison?” she asked Professor Cleverly.

“Curare paralyzes and asphyxiates the victim,” he said, smoothing his head. “It won’t have been very quick.”

“Oh dear.” Vanessa Weaver’s features sagged in distress.

This time it was her daughter who consoled her, and not the other way round. “The killer is not among us.” Zoe turned to Rex. “While you were away we discussed who was the most likely suspect and drew a blank. We decided the most logical culprit is long gone.”

Rex decided it could do no good to alarm the innocent or alert the guilty to his suspicions. “I hope you are right, Zoe. Perhaps finding some more clues will point in that direction. Whose bag have we not checked yet?” One such article remained on the table, untouched since the earlier search, the guests assured him when he inquired. Helen and Julie who were staying at the lodge had not brought their handbags downstairs.

“This black one is mine,” said Señora Delacruz, sitting straight and poised on a loveseat beside the professor. She had not appeared to flag all night, whereas the others looked jaded and disheveled for the most part, except Cleverly who had no hair to speak of to begin with.

“This will entail further invasion of privacy, I’m afraid,” Rex apologized once more.

“Perhaps we should give the men a turn and see what comes up in the rest of their pockets?” Margarita Delacruz put a fresh cigarette in her black lacquer holder and held it to her lips, clasping the professor’s hand as he lit the end with a lighter engraved with her initials.

“I’ve only found handkerchiefs, keys, wallets, phones, and breath mints so far,” Alistair recapped.

“Handkerchiefs,” Rex repeated, hit by a memory flash. “Whose was it that Catriona used? I recall someone offering her their hanky.”

“It was mine,” John said producing a bunched up wad of white cotton from his pocket.

“When did she return it?”

“After Helen dressed her cut and she had no further need of it.”

“The police might want to see that.”

“It’s a present from ma mum!” It could have been “mam” he said, referring to his mother. Either way, he sounded like a wee lad on the verge of tears.

“Poor little Jonny,” Alistair teased his partner, who blushed and promptly surrendered the item to Rex. The white material revealed several large blood spots soaked through it.

Flora and Margarita looked away.

“I didn’t find anything resembling a dart or anything that could propel one,” Alistair concluded his inventory. “I haven’t looked in the coat pockets yet, men’s or ladies’. Shall I fetch them?”

Rex acquiesced with a nod. He had no objection to Margarita’s suggestion. The order of the search did not matter. Alistair brought in the outdoors apparel from the hall, which he had not got to earlier. He and Cleverly had kept their jackets on, as had Rex, who pulled out his pocket linings to show he had nothing in them. He drew his pipe out of his corduroys and patted down his other pocket to make sure it was empty. Nobody seemed to expect any surprises from him, but out of common courtesy and consideration for his guests he felt he could not hold himself exempt from the search.

Alistair put on one of the latex gloves and began fishing in pockets. “This is John’s,” he said indicating the medic’s dark blue anorak. He extracted what looked like a small television remote from one of the outer pockets.

“What is that?” Margarita inquired.

“A breathalyser.” John explained he had purchased it at Boot’s pharmacy chain. “Alistair won’t get into the car of an evening when it’s my turn to drive unless I test my alcohol level.”

“A wise precaution.” Margarita inclined her head in approval.

“How did you get stuck with being the designated driver for New Year’s Eve?” Julie asked.

“I bribed him,” Alistair said.

“We tossed a coin,” John corrected.

His mittens were stuffed into another pocket, but that was all there was. Alistair continued to sift through the other coat pockets. None produced a dart or anything else of a menacing nature, except for a penknife found in Jason’s fleece jacket, along with, less noteworthy, his car keys and two old rugby tickets, some candy wrappers, and a used tissue.

“Good time as any to get rid of this rubbish,” Alistair said with evident distaste, being of a fastidious nature.

“Better not dispose of anything yet,” Rex said, putting the breathalyzer and penknife aside on the table.

One of Cleverly’s coat pockets yielded a spectacle case and a
brown leather bookmark with gold lettering, which the professor was delighted to be reunited with, remarking that he had looked for it everywhere. Drew’s Burberry overcoat offered even less of interest: lip salve, a comb, and a small bottle of cologne. A disappointing find when all was said and done, Rex thought. And nothing in the women’s coats either.

“The contents of men’s pockets do reflect the personality of the owner, don’t they?” Flora commented.

“Like props,” Zoe agreed.

“Everybody seems in character so far. Jason’s were predictably messy!” Flora playfully backhanded him on the arm.

“Thank goodness, no guns or lethal spray,” Jason exclaimed, wiping
his brow in jest.

Zoe giggled. “Or voodoo dolls with pins stuck in their eyes.”

“Really, Zoe. No need to be ghoulish on an occasion like this.” Vanessa handed over to Rex a canvas hold-all located by her husband’s wheelchair. “Ace didn’t bring a coat.”

Mr. Weaver had come wrapped in his traveling blanket. His bag was packed with an extra sweater, a bottle of prescription medicine, a container of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, a pair of reading glasses in a soft case, and a change of underclothes. Rex went through the articles carefully without taking any out of the bag. Vanessa rewarded his delicacy with a nod and smile of gratitude. He and Alistair decided to refrain from searching the invalid’s person.

“I need to go to the loo,” Flora complained.

So, it transpired, did a couple of other guests. Rex assured them he would allocate sufficient lighting to the cloakroom just as soon as they were through with the search. A few others, who hadn’t already done so, wanted to make phone calls letting people at home know they might be held up at the lodge. They were all growing weary. Rex asked for everyone’s patience while he quickly proceeded with the last bag.

The tasselled accessory belonged to Margarita. It was covered in bluish black sequins and opened with an old-fashioned twin clasp. He removed a delicately embroidered handkerchief, a small pill box containing what the señora said were aspirin, and which resembled the aspirin in the kitchen, a tortoiseshell comb, scarlet lipstick in a gold-plated capsule, and a slim leather billfold holding British and Venezuelan notes and several credit cards.