Scandal at High Chimneys (25 page)

“I—”

“It
was
a possibility?” demanded Clive, his own bitterness welling up. “You found it easier to protect Celia by blaming me?”

“That puts it too strongly.”

“Strongly or not, that’s what you meant?”

“In effect, perhaps it is. If you examine my every word and action in the light of what I say now, you will understand.”

“Oh, I understand. That’s not difficult. Still! You never really believed Celia was either guilty, or in any way out of her mind?”

“Never.”

“In that case, Doctor, why did you lock the door?”

The exotic beat of the music took on a tempest of strength and passion. Dr. Bland’s manner seemed to be affected by it.

“Door? What door?”

“The front door at High Chimneys. Kate and I, as we’ve been reminded so often, ran away from there last night. When we tried to leave by the front door, it was locked. According to Whicher—”

“Ah. Yes. Whicher!”

“According to Whicher,” pursued Clive, staring at the counter behind which Cherry made an elaborate pretence of not seeing him, “you borrowed Burbage’s key. You said there was one person you had better keep locked in the house. When you walked down the drive with Superintendent Muswell and Police-Constable Peters, you locked the front door behind you. Was it Celia you meant to keep in the house?”

“Alas! It was.”

“If you never really thought Celia might be unbalanced and dangerous, why should you lock her in?”

“My dear young man, it was only to prevent her from wandering out of the house and perhaps doing herself a mischief when she had been given an opiate. The night before, you may recall, she wandered downstairs as soon as Kate left her alone and unattended? If I had fancied the poor girl dangerous to anyone at High Chimneys, do you imagine I should have locked her
in?
”

Clive opened his mouth, and shut it again.

“Well, do you?” asked Dr. Bland.

The watch was still in Clive’s hand. It was three minutes past nine o’clock, and still no person had approached that counter at the far end.

“Listen to me, Doctor!” said Clive, still without turning his head. “Late this afternoon Celia escaped from your house in Devonshire Place….”

“You will favour me, sir,” interrupted Dr. Bland, “by not using the word ‘escape.’ The girl is not under restraint.”

“Her own word,” retorted Clive, “was ‘evade.’ She said she had evaded you. She came to my rooms, with Penelope Burbage, and you followed her trail. No, don’t interrupt again! Whether Celia visited me in the hope of finding Kate, or only to tell me the story she did tell, the fact remains that she told me. She accused Kate and Lord Albert Tressider of conspiring to commit these murders. Kate’s, she said, was the mind and strength of will which inspired the killings; and Tress, her so-called lover, was the man who carried them out. You heard that, Doctor?”

“I heard it. Agreed!”

“Can you deny you still believed Celia might be unbalanced?”

“No, heaven help me! I can’t deny it.”

“You admitted to me, in Celia’s presence, that this theory was all nonsense from beginning to end?”

“I did.”

“Then in what way has the situation changed? What are you doing here at the Alhambra? Why should you now believe Celia’s sanity can’t possibly be doubted?”

Dr. Bland’s voice took on richness and power.

“Because I have seen your friend Whicher,” he replied. “I have learned that Celia’s theory of the murders, in all its essentials, was perfectly correct. We were wrong, Mr. Strickland, and that ‘unbalanced’ girl was right.”

Clive thrust his watch into his pocket and spun round.

“That’s a lie,” he said.

“Oh, no. I pardon your offensive language, Mr. Strickland, in consideration of the overwrought feelings which give rise to such words—”

“It’s a lie, I tell you!”

“Look at me, young man. Look into my eyes! Then be satisfied as to whether I am in any way hoaxing or deluding you.”

The dance on the stage, observed here only as the shadows of ballet-girls writhing against the background of a palace-hall, had grown faster and more abandoned. Cymbals smote hard. The presence of the audience could be sensed by its breathing; not from any sound or movement it made.

Cymbals smote again as Dr. Bland spoke.

“My professional experience,” he declared, “should have given me wiser counsel. Neither poor Damon nor his daughter Celia was ever afflicted by the slightest mental instability. We slow-coaches, I suppose, are inclined to distrust keen minds when they are accompanied by nervous temperaments. They show us intelligence, and we call it lunacy.”

Clive seized the lapel of the doctor’s greatcoat.

“It’s a lie, I say! You are not going to tell me that Kate—”

“I am going to tell you,” said Dr. Bland, “precisely what Inspector Whicher told me not long ago. No more, sir, and no less. Will you hear it?”

“No!”

“Ah. Then you don’t dare to hear it? You are so besotted with a pretty face and an immodest nature that you would close your ears to truth? And you welcome the excuse to attack a man far older than yourself? Release my coat, sir!”

“I welcome the excuse to attack someone, yes. I will release your coat when I’m ready. Meanwhile—”

“Mr. Strickland—!”

“Meanwhile,” said Clive, “tell me what you have to tell me.”

“Release my coat, sir! Will you make a public spectacle of yourself?”

“Yes. Say what you have to say, Dr. Bland, or I’ll wring your God-damned neck too.”

“This is intolerable!”

“So
I
feel. Now speak!”

“Inspector Whicher,” retorted Dr. Bland, managing to keep some air of dignity even when he was held nearly up on tiptoe, “appeared to enjoy the prospect of an arrest no more than you do. But he, at least, can face truth.”

“
Will
you speak?”

“Very well. I met him here when I was searching for you, and Whicher was also searching for you. It seemed you were late. He asked me if I had seen you. I said I had seen you towards six o’clock in your rooms. I told him Celia had visited you, with Penelope Burbage; that Celia had left your rooms, and that I had followed with Penelope.

“Mr. Whicher asked me whether any incident had occurred to upset or delay you. I replied that Kate Damon appeared to have absented herself; otherwise, I said by way of jocularity, I could not think you had been upset or delayed by a mistaken theory of Miss Celia Damon.

“To my astonishment he wished to know what this theory was. Though I had no intention of telling him, he grew so strange of manner and even so threatening (there were three police-officers with him) that … well! In short, I was obliged to speak of it. His exact words afterwards were, ‘Why, sir, there was never any doubt that Mr. Damon was killed by a man and a woman working together.’—Now will you let me go?”

Dr. Bland jerked back, but Clive held him.

“No! What else did Whicher say?”

“I was astounded enough, as you may imagine….”

“Doctor, we’ll take your feelings for granted. What did Whicher
say?
”

“He said—”

“Yes?”

“‘Miss Celia Damon’s an uncommon clever young lady. She was dead right, you know, except about two things. It wasn’t the woman who planned this scheme of murder; the woman was only a kind of assistant. She idolized the man, and was entirely under his influence, and couldn’t help herself….’”

The ballet-music throbbed and soared towards its end. Clive’s grip, fastening more tightly, suddenly wrenched the doctor forward towards the third pillar.

“‘Idolized the man … entirely under his influence …’”

“Mr. Strickland,” said Dr. Bland, in a cool and panting voice of fury, “I will say no more.”

“By God, you will!”

“I will say no more,” continued Dr. Bland, looking him in the eyes, “because it will not be necessary. I should like to think you have not entirely taken leave of your senses. If you care to look behind you at this moment, you can need no further proof of my truthfulness. You might even be constrained to apologize.”

“What else did Whicher say?”

“Look!” said Dr. Bland.

There was something so utterly compelling about the doctor’s voice that Clive glanced round.

It was only for an instant, but it was enough.

A woman had come into the promenade from the direction of the stairs. Though the gas-globes shone dimly enough above their glass prisms, there were so many of them that Clive could distinguish her features without difficulty even at a distance.

She, on the other hand, did not see him. Frightened, repelled, seeming almost in a trance, the woman moved like a sleepwalker towards the northern end of the promenade. White-faced in the malodorous air, stepping as though gingerly over dirty mosaic tiles, she wore a boat-shaped hat and a short
sortie-de-bal
jacket over a low-cut evening-gown of scarlet and yellow.

And the woman was Kate Damon.

Kate, on her way towards the counter over which Cherry presided, passed the line of red and white pillars within half a dozen feet of where Clive stood.

“Well, young man?” said Dr. Bland.

Clive could no longer see Kate; the pillars obscured the view again. But his hand dropped from Dr. Bland’s lapel.

He darted to the right; it was as well he did. Kate had gone in that direction too, her back to him. Cherry, casual and bright-eyed, seemed to be talking in an animated way to Kate. She was recommending some sweets, it appeared, in a heavy glass jar on the counter.

Removing the lid from the jar, Cherry made a gesture of invitation. Kate’s own movement implied assent if only the other would make haste. Cherry smiled and was all eagerness. While Kate opened her reticule as though looking for small change, Cherry took up a piece of paper which she curved into a fairly large cone-shape, twisting its lower end together for a sweet-container.

Lifting the jar, Cherry poured it nearly full of loose sweets. She replaced the lid. Clive, some distance back, would never have seen the letter Cherry slipped in beside the sweets if he had not been on the alert for it. Nor would he have seen the packet of bank-notes Kate pushed across the counter.

Smiling, Cherry extended the improvised bag of sweets in her left hand. With her right hand, arm behind an elbow lifted so that it seemed almost vertical, she carefully patted her back curls.

The bait had been taken. It was the signal.

Clive, already well to the right, was supposed to remove his hat and signal someone else. But he did not do so. He stood motionless.

It was rather dark on the right of the counter, though not dark enough to hide the shape of a man lounging there. As Kate received the bag from Cherry, making sure the letter was there, the shape on the right moved with tigerish swiftness.

Round the side of the counter, in a plum-blue greatcoat trimmed with strips of astrakhan, swept Lord Albert Tressider.

Tress, with a broad and cruel smile, his eyelids drooping, towered up over Kate. He extended his hand, inviting her to give him something. Kate jerked back, whirling round so that Clive could see her in profile.

Still he could not hear what Tress said, but the words were clearly spaced:

“I’ll have that, my girl.”

A scream froze in Kate’s throat. She shrank back, whirling the paper cone away from him so that sweets flew out of it.

“No!” she cried very distinctly. Whereupon Tress, seizing her right wrist in his left hand, slapped her full across the face with his right.

Then it happened.

“
You so and so,
” said Clive Strickland.

He did not merely say this; he shouted it. The words tore through the thick and murky air, ringing above the last loud bars of music. There was not a man or a woman in the promenade who failed to hear; several spun round.

Tress heard it too. Momentarily he loosened his grip on Kate’s wrist; he straightened up, turned to his left, and saw Clive coming at him.

Kate, still clutching the paper cone with the letter inside, may or may not have seen Clive. She had wrenched free, and was running towards the western side of the promenade. Tress, silk hat on the back of his head and greatcoat open, seemed in one triumphant instant to make up his mind.

Already Clive had dropped his own greatcoat. Sinuous, sneering, Tress slipped out of his. He flung it back over his shoulder and waited with his back to the counter.

“Well, well!” he jeered, in savage contempt. “The feller wants to fight, does he? He wants to
fight!
Let’s see what he gets, then! Let’s see—”

That was when Clive hit him.

The music of the dance ended in a shattering cymbal-crash as Clive hit him twice, with a left to the body and a right to the head.

Tress didn’t or couldn’t guard. The first blow landed in his stomach, cutting off breath and speech; the second, crossing with full body-weight behind it, caught him on the left side of the jaw and sent him spinning along the counter into a pyramid of oranges.

A yell of delight went up from spectators. Glass jars of sweets toppled and crashed amid falling oranges as Tress’s weight struck the floor.

“Hoo-roar!”

“Go it, Jem Mace!”

“Make a ring! Make a ring!”

Tress, corpse-pale with wrath, shaken and winded but not much hurt, scrambled up to his knees. Clive waited. For a moment Tress breathed noisily; afterwards he screamed and charged. Clive took two flailing blows in the face. Then he broke Tress’s nose with a straight left, doubled him up again with a right to the stomach, and sent him reeling into more oranges with a second left.

A stupefying roar shook the gas-flames in their globes.

“Hit him on the boko!

Dot him on the snitch!

Wot a lovely fighter—!

Was there ever sich?”

It was not Cherry who sang or chanted that. Cherry wasn’t there; mysteriously, she seemed to have disappeared. The tearing noise of a policeman’s rattle, which somebody had sprung across the room, pierced through the din.

Clive, panting and waiting, could not watch what was happening on the north side of the promenade. Shouts blattered round the counter.