Authors: Ngaio Marsh
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #det_classic, #Mystery & Detective, #Police Procedural, #Alleyn; Roderick (Fictitious character)
“Wait. What else? The Scorpion’s not here, George.”
“You don’t say,” Mr. Copper bitterly rejoined, looking round the open expanse of drive.
Noakes walked to the front of the Bloodbath and looked at the surface of the drive. He laid his hand pontifically on the bonnet and snatched it away with an oath.
“She’s boiling,” Mr. Copper observed.
“Ta for the information.”
“You would insist on the hurry. She can’t take it.”
“All right. All right. I said I ought to come on the bike. Stay where you are, George.”
Mr. Copper watched him with resentment. Doubled forward, he cast about the drive.
“The Scorpion,” he said, “drips her grease rather heavy, doesn’t she?”
“That’s right.”
“And she’s shod on three feet with Griprich and on the off hind with Startread. Correct?”
“Yes.”
“She’s came,” Sergeant Noakes said, “and went. Look for yourself.”
Mr. Copper said: “So what do we do? Roar after her with the siren screaming? If we had a siren.”
“We’ll follow it up for you through the usual channels. Don’t worry.”
“What’ll I say to the owner? Tell me that. I’m selling her on commission, mind! I’m responsible!”
“No need to panic. They might come back.”
“More likely to be halfway to London with changed number plates. Who started the panic, anyway? You, with your police records.
Come back
? Them!”
The front door opened and Mr. Cartell appeared, white-faced, in the entrance.
“Oh — Noakes,” he said. “I’ve a little further business to discuss indoors, but will join you in a moment. Will you stay where you are and deal with the car situation when they return?”
“Sir?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Cartell. “There’s no immediate need for alarm. They are coming back.”
With a sharp look at both of them he returned indoors.
“There you are,” Sergeant Noakes said. “What did I tell you? You leave this one to me.”
“What I can’t see,” Désirée said, turning her enormous lacklustre eyes upon her former husband, “is why you’ve got yourself into such a state. Poor Mr. Copper’s been told that you and P.P. and Connie won’t guarantee the sale. All he’s got to do is take the car away from them.”
“
If
they return it,” Mr. Cartell amended. “I hope, Harold darling, you’re not suggesting that they’ll make a break for Epping Forest and go native on Magnums’ smoked salmon! That really would be too tiresome. But I’m sure they won’t. They’re much too anxious to worm their way into my party.”
“You can’t,” Mr. Cartell said in a hurry, “possibly allow that, of course.”
“So everybody keeps telling me.”
“My dear Désirée—”
“Harold, I want to tackle you about Andrew.”
Mr. Cartell gave her one sharp glance and froze. “Indeed,” he said.
“He tells me you won’t let him have his money.”
“He will assume control of his inheritance at the appointed time, which is on the sixth of October next.”
“He did explain, didn’t he, why he needs it now? About the Grantham Gallery for sale and wanting to buy it?”
“He did. He also explained that he wishes to leave the Brigade in order to manage the Gallery.”
“And go on with his own painting.”
“Precisely. I cannot agree to anticipating his inheritance for these purposes.”
“He’s gone into it very carefully and he’s not a baby or a fool. He’s twenty-four and extremely levelheaded.”
“In this matter I cannot agree with you.”
“Bimbo’s been into it, too. He’s prepared to put up some of the cash and go in as a partner.”
“Indeed. I am surprised to learn he is in a position to do so.”
She actually changed colour at this. There was a short silence, and then she said: “Harold, I ask you very seriously to let Andrew have his inheritance.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You may remember,” she said, with no change of manner, “that when I do fight, it’s no holds barred.”
“In common with most—”
“Don’t say ‘with most of my delightful sex,’ Harold.”
“One can always omit the adjective,” said Mr. Cartell.
“Ah, well,” Désirée said pleasantly and stood up. “I can see there’s no future in sweet reasonableness. Are you enjoying life in P.P.’s stately cottage?”
Mr. Cartell also rose. “It’s a satisfactory arrangement,” he said stiffly, “for me. I trust, for him.”
“He won’t enjoy the Moppett-Leonard
crise
, will he? Poor P.P., such a darling as he is and such a Godalmighty snob. Does he know?”
“Know what?” Mr. Cartell asked unguardedly.
“About your niece and her burglar boyfriend?”
Mr. Cartell turned scarlet and closed his eyes. “She is NOT,” he said in the trembling voice of extreme exasperation, “my niece.”
“How do you know? I’ve always thought Connie might have popped her away to simmer, and then adopted her back, as you might say.”
“That is a preposterous and possibly an actionable statement, Désirée. The girl — Mary Ralston — came from an extremely reputable adoption centre.”
“Connie might have put her there.”
“If you will forgive me, I’ll have a word with Noakes. I regret very much that I have troubled you.”
“P.P. is dining with us. He and I are going to have a cozy old chum’s gossip before my treasure hunt party arrives.”
Mr. Cartell said: “I am not susceptible to moral blackmail, Désirée. I shall not reconsider my decision about Andrew.”
“Look,” Désirée said. “I fancy you know me well enough to realize that I’m not a sentimental woman.”
“That,” said Mr. Cartell, “I fully concede. A woman who gives a large party on the day her brother’s death is announced—”
“My dear Hal, you know you looked upon Ormsbury as a social scourge and so did I. By and large, I’m not madly fond of other people. But I am fond of Andrew. He’s my son and I like him very much indeed. You watch out for yourself, Harold. I’m on the warpath.”
A motor horn sounded distantly. They both turned to the windows.
“And here,” Désirée said, “are your friends. I expect you want to go to meet them. Good-bye.”
When Mr. Cartell had left her, she moved into the French window and, unlike Moppett, very openly watched the scene outside.
The Scorpion came up the drive at a great pace, but checked abruptly. Then it moved on at a more decorous speed and pulled up. Leonard and Moppett got out simultaneously. Sergeant Noakes advanced and so did they, all smiles and readiness, but with the faintest suggestion of self-consciousness, Désirée considered, in their joints. It’s people’s elbows, she reflected, that give them away.
They approached the group of three. Moppett, with girlish insouciance, linked her arm through Mr. Cartell’s, causing him to become rigid with distaste.
First blood to Moppett, thought Désirée with relish.
Leonard listened to Sergeant Noakes with an expression that progressed from bonhomie through concern towards righteous astonishment. He bowed ironically and indicated the Scorpion. Catching sight of Désirée, he shook his head slowly from side to side as if inviting her to share his bewilderment. He then removed two large packages from the Scorpion.
Désirée opened the French window and strolled down the steps towards them. Mr. Cartell furiously disengaged himself from Moppett.
“I think,” he said, “that we should get back, Noakes. If Copper drives the other car, you, I suppose—”
Sergeant Noakes glanced at Moppett and muttered something.
“Don’t let
us
keep you,” Leonard said quickly and with excessive politeness. “Please.”
They touched their hats to Désirée and mounted their respective cars. They drove away, inexplicably at a disadvantage.
“Well,” Désirée asked cheerfully, “did you find my tiresome food?”
Moppett and Leonard, all smiles, began to chatter and give way to each other.
Finally Moppett said: “Dear Lady Bantling — yes. We’ve got it all, but, as you see, we ran into a muddle of sorts. Mr. Copper’s made a nonsense about the Scorpion, and we’ve missed buying it.”
“Inefficient,” Leonard said. “It appears somebody else had first refusal.”
“How very disappointing.”
“Isn’t it!” Moppett agreed. “Too sickening.” She gave a little scream and put her hand to her mouth. “Leonard!” she cried. “Fools that we are!”
“What, darling?”
“We ought to have gone back with them. Look at us!
Now
what do we do?”
Leonard allowed the slightest possible gap to occur before he said: “I’m afraid Mr. George Copper will have to make a return trip in my car. Too bad!”
“What
will
you think of us?” Moppett asked Désirée.
“Oh,” she said lightly, “the worst,” and they laughed with possibly a shade less conviction.
“At least,” Moppett said, “we can bring the food in, can’t we? And if we
might
ring up for
some
sort of transport…”
Bimbo came out of the house and fetched up short when he saw them. Désirée grinned at him.
“Why not stay?” she said very distinctly to Moppett. “After fetching all our food, the least we can do is to ask you to eat it. Do stay.”
Andrew put Nicola’s overcoat on the seat and sat opposite to her.
“The best thing about this train,” he said, “is that it’s nearly always empty. So you’re returning to the fold tomorrow, are you?”
Nicola said Mr. Period had asked her to do so, and that was why she had left her typewriter behind.
“But you’re
not
returning to Little Codling tomorrow,” Andrew said, with the air of taking a plunge, “you’re returning tonight. At least I hope so. Don’t say another word. I’ve got an invitation for you.”
He produced it and gave it to her with an anxious smile.
It was from his mother and it said:
Do come to my dotty party tonight. Andrew will bring you and we’ll put you up. He’ll explain all about it, but do come
.
Nicola stared at him in amazement.
“My mum,” he said, “has taken a fancy to you. So, as is no doubt abundantly obvious, have I. Now don’t go into a
brouhaha
and say you can’t. Just say: ‘Thank you, Andrew. How sweet of your mum, I’d love to.’ ”
“But
how
can I?”
“How?” Andrew said grandly. “Anyhow. Why not?”
“I tell you what,” Nicola said. “You’ve nagged at your mum to ask me.”
“I swear I haven’t. She nagged at me and I said I would if you would.”
“There you are, you see.”
“No, I don’t. And anyway, do stop carping and come. It’s definitely not one of my mama’s more rococo parties. I wouldn’t dream of taking you to one of them, of course.”
Nicola, who remembered hearing rumours of some of Lady Bantling’s parties, felt relieved.
“What I thought,” Andrew continued, “I’ll drop you wherever you live and you can nip into your Number One ceremonials and then I’ll pick up my dinner jacket. I have a car of sorts and we’ll dine somewhere and then we’ll drive down to Bayneshelme.”
“What about the cocktail party you’re all dressed up for?”
“Forget it, completely. Do come, Nicola. Will you?”
“Thank you, Andrew. How sweet of your mum to ask me. I’d love to.”
“Thank you, Nicola.”
For the rest of the journey Andrew talked to Nicola about himself. He said he wanted to paint more than anything else in life and that he’d been having lessons and was “meant to be not too bad,” but bad or not he had to go on with it. He said that if he could take the Grantham Gallery over, there was a studio at the back where he could paint and manage the Gallery at the same time. Then he described his unproductive and bad-tempered meeting that morning with his guardian and stepfather, Mr. Cartell.
“It was a snorter,” Andrew said thoughtfully. “He treated the whole thing as if it were a sort of adolescent whim. I’d brought down all the figures of the turnover and he wouldn’t look at them, damn him. I gave him the names of jolly good people who would supply an expert opinion, and he wouldn’t listen. All he would say was that my father wouldn’t have wanted me to resign my commission. What the hell,” Andrew shouted and then pulled himself up. “It’s not so much the practical side that infuriates me — I could, after all, I imagine, borrow the money and insure my life or whatever one does. It’s his bloody pontificating philistinism. What I believe I most resented,” he said, “was having to talk about my painting. I said things that are private to me and he came back at me with the sort of remarks that made them sound phony. Can you understand that?”
“I think I can. And I suppose in the end you began to wonder if, after all, you were any good.”
“You do understand, don’t you? Does everybody off-load their difficulties on you, or…No,” Andrew said, “I’d better not say that — yet. Thank you, anyway, for listening.”
“Do you admire Agatha Troy’s painting?”
He stared at her. “Well, of course. Why?”
“I know her. She’s married to Roderick Alleyn in the C.I.D. I go there quite often. As a matter of fact, I’m paying them a visit tomorrow evening.”
“What’s she like? I know what she looks like. Lovely bone. Kind of gallant. Is she alarming?”
“Not at all. She’s rather shy. She’s jolly good about being interested in younger people’s work,” Nicola added. She hesitated and then said: “You may not care for the idea at all, but if you liked I could show her one of your things.”
He turned very red and Nicola wondered if she had offended him.
He said at last, “Do you know, I don’t think I’d dare.”
“So Mr. Cartell really has downed you, I see.”
“No, he hasn’t, you low-cunning girl.”
“If you’d rather not I shan’t take umbrage. On the other hand I’ll be delighted if you say: ‘Thank you, Nicola. How sweet of you to ask me. I’d love to.’ ”
Andrew grinned and for an appreciable interval was silent.
“You win,” he said at last. “I’ll say that same small thing.”
The rest of the journey passed quickly for both of them, and in London they followed the plan proposed by Andrew.
At half past eight they were in his car on their way back into Kent. The night was warm for early April, the lights sailed past and there was a young moon in the sky. Nicola knew that she was beginning to fall in love.