Murder of a Snob (12 page)

“The man who can probably tell you all about it is Arthur Fenchurch, the artist,” said Claudia. “He was asked to the dinner last night—he was going to start painting Watlington next week. He was at Casa Flavia when I was there—he painted me. Probably he mentioned it to Watlington. But the note must have been made before we were all in the study.”

“Before?”
challenged Crisp.

“How otherwise?” she countered. “Unless you suppose that Arthur Fenchurch turned up after we had left the study—without anybody knowing—and that he woke Watlington out of his afternoon snooze for a chat about smalltown Italian wine merchants.” She added: “It simply must have been made before.”

But it had not been made before. Benscombe, who had yet to complete his second year in the Force, felt his pulse quickening. Claudia's evidence was changing the whole perspective of the case.

His Chief was asking another question.

“Can you suggest why Watlington should want to make a note of these two wine merchants, local men? And add a definite date of more than a year ago?”

“I haven't the least idea. Unless it was part of the peerage campaign to lay in a stock of Italian wines.” Her gaiety passed as quickly as it had come. “I'm afraid all this won't help you to strike me off the list.”

Crisp nodded to Benscombe, who understood and slipped from the room.

“I'd like to run over the evidence you gave yesterday and see if you can add or subtract anything,” said Crisp. By this device he detained Claudia until Benscombe returned. As soon as Claudia had left the room Benscombe reported.

“I got Fenchurch on the phone, sir.” Benscombe was jubilant. “He said he last saw Watlington last Wednesday Watlington came to the studio. Fenchurch had not been in this house since last Thursday week. He was quite certain. Nailed his colours to the mast. Burnt his boats—”

“Crossed the Rubican and Cast the Die!” cut in Crisp. “Let's see how it fits in.”

“Breaks the spell of the stable clock, sir. Fenchurch was in the study between the others leaving it after lunch and—”

“How do you know that note was dictated by Fenchurch?” challenged Crisp. “You think you know it because an attractive girl told you so. She is attractive. Did you notice how she hit back at me for trying to put her in her place?”

“Yes, sir. But I don't call that particularly attractive. She's at her best when she—”

“She is,” agreed Crisp. “Querk told us he could fit no meaning to the Casa Flavia stuff. Claudia fits Fenchurch into it and your job o' work this morning dovetails. All this suggests that Fenchurch is in it. But it leaves us short of certainty.”

“He can't prove his movements on Saturday afternoon. What about my quizzing him, sir?”

“Leave him alone for the present. If he's in it, he can't afford to bolt. He'll rely on talking himself out of it. We'll work round him. Pick up that girl of his and find out what she did sell Watlington. Tomorrow, ask the Italian consulate whether those chaps really are wine merchants.”

A constable entered with a collection of house keys, labelled, and put them on the table.

“That registered parcel has not been found, sir.”

“This afternoon, Benscombe,” continued Crisp, when the orderly had gone, “you can find out whether Querk, Claudia and Ralph attach any importance to this Casa Flavia stuff.”

Benscombe was at a loss.

“Sorry, I don't see how to set about that, sir?”

“You can attend that conference they're going to have at four—but you don't need to report present.” Crisp pointed to the collection of house keys. “In that room, we heard Ralph brushing his hair. That means they will hear you if you try to take notes.”

“Good Lord, sir, it's a fine assignment! I ought to get something out of it!”

“You mean you think you will get everything out of it. You won't. If the murderer is one of the party, that murderer will be speaking in the presence of two innocent persons—which equals two policemen.”

The only physical difficulty in the assignment was to get in and out of the room unobserved and to manipulate the key without being heard by Ralph. Querk had gone out, but might return at any time. It was necessary to locate Claudia and each one of the servants.

By three fifteen, Benscombe was in the room, the door locked behind him. The window was a nuisance. The Victorian curtain pole, with its brackets of scrolled brass, was bare of curtains. The dressing table and washstand were set at an angle—which would not protect him from chance observation from the garden. There was nothing for it but to get down on the floor.

On the other side of the matchboarding, Ralph turned in his bed. To Benscombe the springs registered as if the bed were immediately behind him. From sundry small noises made by the other, he observed that audibility varied, part only of the matchboarding acting as a sounding board. While he was still groping for the best spot, he heard the door of Ralph's room open, then Claudia's voice:

“Would you like a wash and brush up before tea?”

“No, thanks! Are the police still nosing about?”

“Not up here. They've locked every unoccupied room above the ground floor.”

There came the vague noises of a room being tidied before Claudia spoke again.

“I came up to tell you that Querk wants to have tea with us. I said he could. We mustn't snub him—he has been so helpful.”

She was winding the clock on the mantelpiece. Benscombe heard her tilt it to start the pendulum.

“Ralph, dear, did you hear my little piece about Querk?”

“Yes! Who was that doctor man you forced on me?” Ralph's tone was that of a fractious child.

“Sir William Turvey. It's unkind to say I forced him on you.”

“I've heard of him somewhere. Is he a mental specialist, Claudia?”

“Not in the ordinary sense.” Her tone was placatory. “He's a physician specialising in psychiatry.”

“And he's collected a knighthood for it. That means that if he says I have an hallucination, people will believe him. That might turn out all right. If the police were to believe I was merely lying they'd reason that I might know you had killed him.”

Benscombe had not been in the Force long enough for the human being to be sunk in the policeman. He waited with painful anxiety for Claudia's reaction.

Instead, there came the squeak of castors and the thumping of a cushion. That confounded tidying process! Then Ralph's voice again:

“They haven't got anything definite against you, have they, Claudia?”

“Ralph, dear,
don't
! You're torturing yourself for nothing. I had another chat with the Chief Constable this morning. He did
not
treat me as if he thought I might be guilty of murder. I am in no danger whatever.”

“That doesn't mean a thing!”

“I know you think I'm merely trying to stop you from worrying. Talk it over with Querk and let him tell you what he thinks. I'll see if he has come back.”

The sound of the door being opened and shut. The groan of Ralph's bed springs. Benscombe glared at the matchboarding as if it had betrayed him.

“That's absolutely consistent with her innocence,” ran his thoughts. “And nearly as consistent with her guilt. And his! Oh, damn!”

Behind his exasperation was the conviction that Crisp would have little difficulty in interpreting the words of one or the other.

He set himself to memorise the words, discovered uncertainties at crucial points, mainly grammatical. The mood and tense of verbs were of paramount importance. The only positive thing Claudia had said was that she was not in danger.

In danger of being caught? Or only in danger of being unjustly suspected?

There had been no strain in her voice when she used the word ‘murder.' Surely real murderers always dodged that word! He had not been a policeman long enough to know.

Absorbed, he failed to hear the stable clock strike four—did not know the tea party had started until he heard Querk's voice.

“And how is the patient? Ready to sit up and take nourishment, I hope. Miss Lofting, let me take that tray from you. It must be very heavy!”

Fussing with the tray was followed by Claudia asking Querk the irritating questions about sugar and milk. Then Ralph's nerve-racking voice crashing through the pretence.

“Querk! Why did you risk your own neck by lying to the police? If they find out the truth they'll charge you with being my accessory.”

A spoon was laid precisely in a saucer—two clear cut clinks. Benscombe felt that in the next few minutes his own career in the Force would be made or marred.

“With those words, my dear Ralph, you have forced an issue I had hoped to avoid. I shall speak to you frankly, and, I fear harshly. But I shall be harsh, only, my dear boy, in order to be kind.”

“It would be kind if you would co-operate and tell me what the devil you're aiming at.”

“‘Co-operate'! You have given me the very word I wanted. Let us co-operate in this awkward little problem of your—ah—alleged mental state. Hallucination or no hallucination. That, in the words of Hamlet, is the question.”

Incredibly to Benscombe, Claudia interrupted with an offer of sandwiches. When the confusion had died down, Ralph demanded querulously:

“Go ahead, Querk. What's the best tale to tell 'em?”

“You cannot believe that I am suggesting the—er—telling of a tale! I myself enjoy, in no small measure, the confidence of the Chief Constable. I would not dream of lending myself to any abuse of that confidence in the form of an untrue or misleading statement. We must tell the truth, Ralph, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. And what is the truth that we must tell? What is the only truth about yourself that your fellow man can perceive, and so believe?”

“That I am either a liar or a lunatic. And dammit, I'm beginning to believe they're about right!”

“Then you are beginning to believe—as I do—that there is only one way of telling your truth. A liar will not admit that his statement may be untrue. A lunatic is not conscious of his lunacy. But you—you know in your heart of hearts that your account of your—er—murderous exploit will not survive the test of cross-examination. Quite apart from my own direct evidence, you must already be harbouring some doubt as to whether things
could
have happened as you believed last night they
had
happened.

“Very well! All I am now advising is that you manfully admit your own doubt. Admit that the circumstances of your uncle's death were a supreme shock to you. Admit that, for emotional reasons on which we need not dwell, your emotional logic convinced you that it was you yourself who had murdered him. Admit that this emotional conviction remains firmly planted in your consciousness—that nothing that any of us can say will dislodge it. But admit, too, that your
intellect
accepts the assurance of the Chief Constable that, in fact, you did
not
murder your uncle.”

In the pause that followed, Benscombe could sense the crushing effect of Querk's preposterous oratory. Through a mist of unctuousness, the fellow was talking horse sense.

Then Claudia's voice:

“It does seem to me that Mr. Querk has solved the problem. You can stick to everything you've said, if you want to, provided you don't fly out at the police when they show they think you're mistaken.”

Benscombe felt that for once the Chief had failed him—had he not said that a murderer would be speaking in the presence of two innocent persons? Querk and Claudia were pulling together. The two innocent persons? And Ralph the guilty one?

But, in that case, the two innocent persons were trying to persuade the guilty person that he was an innocent person—which seemed wrong, somehow. Moreover, if Ralph was indeed the murderer, Querk's evidence that Watlington was alive after five fifteen must be false. This would tend to make Querk the murderer or accessory—which was absurd. Therefore Querk and Ralph must be the two innocent persons. Therefore—

“If you wangle Turvey into putting over the hallucination for you,” Ralph was saying, “the police will be left free to concentrate on you and Claudia. You, no doubt, can look after yourself. What about Claudia?”

“And
what
about Claudia—if Miss Lofting will pardon me! Let us face that problem with the same frankness. Within these four walls, Ralph, will you admit that you secretly suspect Miss Lofting of having killed your uncle?”

Benscombe unconsciously held his breath. But he had to let it out before Ralph answered:

“What I do suspect is that if I am dropped out of the case, the police will muck about with microscopes and cigarette ash and the rest of it until they've put her in the dock.”

“But why,” demanded Claudia, “should they want to put me in the dock? There's no reason why I should kill the poor old boy. When we were playing with that die stamp together, he was charming. He dropped all that nonsense about objecting to our marriage.”

“You're talking like a kid, Claudia. How can you prove all that? If they ever get hold of the Casa Flavia story, they'll make a bee line for you.”

“Oh, nonsense! They've got hold of it already. Your uncle had noted it on his blotting pad. Colonel Crisp was talking about it this morning. I told him I had stayed there and that Arthur Fenchurch was there too and had painted me.”

“You told him that!” shrieked Ralph. “Oh Claudia, then they
have
got something definite against you! At this moment Crisp and that grinning Yesman of his are probably shaking the whole story out of Fenchurch. Casa Flavia, my god! A motive the size of a haystack!”

So Casa Flavia was the key to the murder! Benscombe contemplated the fact that he had now completed his assignment.

Claudia and Ralph were both speaking at once, and Querk was trying to cut in.