More Work for the Undertaker (27 page)

‘I hardly think so,' said Miss Evadne, laughing, and conveying that he knew quite well what she had been doing, and indeed that it was some sort of little professional secret among sleuths. ‘I fear my apples have – what shall I say? . . .'

‘Buttered no parsnips,' Campion suggested foolishly, and was rewarded with the silence he deserved. His descending glance fell on the occasional table at her side. It was in its customary muddle and even the saucer of jam remained much as he had first seen it, save that it was a little more dusty. But this time, he noticed, there was only one bowl of everlasting flowers amid the miscellany. He was querying the little point when Miss Evadne's remark cut into his thoughts, startling him out of his wits.

‘So you didn't bring your nice friend Sir William Glossop after all?'

He was so astonished that he wondered if he really had heard the words, and he looked up to find her, wedged in among the crowd of people, amused and triumphant.

In the little pause Mr James, who was betraying a sensitiveness in social matters, came gallantly to the rescue.

‘Is that the Glossop of the P.A.E.O. Trust?' he inquired importantly. ‘A very brilliant man.'

‘Yes, he is, isn't he?' said Miss Evadne with contented assurance. ‘An interesting career. I was looking him up in the library this morning, and I see he's Cambridge. I had got it into my head that he was Bristol, I don't know why. The photograph they give is very youthful. Men are vainer than women in such matters. Isn't that interesting?'

‘Was he here?' Mr James was deeply impressed.

‘I hardly think,' Campion was beginning when Miss Evadne forestalled him.

‘Oh, yes,' she said. ‘Last night. He was waiting for this clever man, and so was I, and we fell into conversation. He omitted to
introduce himself but' – she turned to Campion with gentle triumph – ‘I read his name in his hat. It was lying on a chair facing me. I'm very long-sighted, you know. I found him knowledgeable, but not clever at mending kettles.' Her laugh was light and forgiving, and she turned to the actor beside her. ‘Adrian, are you thinking of reciting to us or not?'

As a change of subject it was masterly. The young man addressed seemed thoroughly startled, while little Mr James's watch shot out as though by reflex action.

‘I thought that was to be a treat for next week,' he said quickly. ‘I'd rather hoped so because I really must not stay today. Good heavens! I had no idea how late it was. You're too perfect a hostess, Miss Palinode. A most enjoyable evening. You're going to drop in to see me tomorrow, are you, or shall I call here?'

‘Oh, please come here. I'm a lazy woman,' she said, and waved her hand to him with peculiarly charming and feminine grace, as, after nodding and twinkling at the others, he hurried off through the throng.

‘A thoroughly good creature,' remarked the old lady as if she were throwing a careless rose after him. ‘You won't, of course, be put off by that, Adrian. He's hardly a
mind.
What do you think? Shall we or not? It's a little crowded for Ibsen, perhaps, but there's always Mercutio. Unless you feel we should be modern?'

Mr Campion, glancing round for escape, was surprised to find the doctor at his elbow.

‘I understand it was you who discovered my correspondent,' he was beginning in an earnest undertone, his eyes fixed firmly on Campion's spectacles. ‘I want to discuss that with you. You see, she was not a patient. That is, I didn't treat her. She wasn't ill – except mentally – as I may have told her.'

The murmur buzzed on, betraying the strained nerves of a much persecuted man. Campion was extricating himself gently, when Lugg appeared at their side. He said nothing, but a raising of the brows and two infinitesimal jerks of the heavy chins invited both men to follow him. They obeyed at once, escaping from the room with as little fuss as possible, and
came out at last on to the landing, to find Renee waiting for them. She was very white and as soon as they appeared she came over and slid an arm through each man's own, leading them towards the stairs.

‘Look,' she said, striving to sound matter-of-fact and achieving breathlessness. ‘It's Lawrence. He's had something in there. I don't know what it is or who gave it to him, or even if they've all had it, which would be frightful, but you'd better come at once. I – think he's dying, Albert.'

THE FIRST WILD
rumour, which had hinted that refreshment at a Borgia house-warming was very small beer when compared with the Palinode counterpart, had soon been superseded by something nearer the truth. Still, no one had been allowed to leave and tension was running very high.

In the wet garden the Press had decided to swarm. They were kept out of the house and had reached a stage when they buzzed together, damp and irritable and full of unprofitable ideas.

Inside the house the excitement was even more intense. In Miss Evadne's room the party continued grimly. So far, there had been no more casualties. Names and addresses and an occasional short statement were still being taken by Inspector Porky Bowden, Luke's right-hand man from the station, and all refreshment and the vessels thereof had been removed by Dice and his poker-face assistants.

In the intervals Adrian Siddons recited.

Downstairs the drawing-room and its adjacent cloakroom had become an improvised hospital ward for Lawrence. Clarrie had taken the shades off the light bulbs at the doctor's request and the neglected apartment, which was not considered habitable by anyone in the household, had now taken on a bald sordidness of dusty boards, cruel lighting, and chipped enamel toilet-ware.

Doctor Smith was pulling down his shirt-sleeves when Renee came rustling in with a pile of fresh towels. She wore a cooking pinafore over her black finery and, now that the tragedy was averted, was inclined to be exuberant with relief.

She smiled at Lawrence, who lay on the worn Empire sofa looking dreadfully like some half-plucked black bird. His
skin was wet and livid and covered with goose-pimples, but he was out of misery and an aggrieved and astonished anger had begun to possess him.

The D.D.I. and Campion were comparing their sheets of notes. They were both tired, but Luke had got his second wind.

‘You see? It was quite different muck.' His murmur vibrated in Campion's ear and he ringed an item on both lists. ‘This chap was handed something quite different from everybody else – different colour, different stink. We shan't get the analyst's report until tomorrow. Can't. Have to get on as far as we can without.'

His pencil point ran on down the page and stopped at a query:

‘Says did not notice who gave him glass.'

‘What about that?'

‘It's feasible. He'd help if he could,' said Campion. ‘He takes a dim view of the entire proceedings.'

‘I thought that.' His effort to be quiet made him sound like a gigantic bumble-bee. ‘Everybody who knew the family at all well seems to have been helping. Miss Jessica, Lugg, Clytie even, for a time, the Doc here, Mr James, Mr Drudge the lawyer chap. Renee came in, the actors, everybody.'

Mr Campion turned to confront the doctor.

‘I don't want to commit myself, Luke,' he began, ‘and no one can be sure without the analysis, but I think he had something more than a purely herbal poison, don't you know.'

Luke was puzzled. ‘It was different stuff,' he said. ‘Different colour . . .'

‘Oh yes. I think the vegetable tisane was toxic, whatever it was. It probably saved his life by making him vomit. But I think he had something more.' He hesitated, his wretched eyes glancing from one man to the other. ‘Something more orthodox, if that's the word. He was both stiff and drowsy – peculiar. The reaction came so quickly, too. It might have been chloral in an enormous dose. I don't know. We shall find out, of course. I've taken specimens. Where's his glass, by the way; he had it with him?'

‘Oh, Dice took that. He's got all the exhibits.' Luke brushed the question aside. He had fastened on to the new idea like a terrier. ‘Hyoscine again, Doc?'

‘Oh no, I don't think so. It occurred to me at once and I was looking out for the symptoms, but I don't think so. If it was I shall be astounded.'

‘Someone is trying to make it look like Jessica.'

The pronouncement uttered in a voice which retching had destroyed until it was no more than a rasp of dry sticks startled everybody. They moved over towards the couch in a body and Lawrence lay looking up at them, a living gargoyle, his damp hair on end and his face glistening, but his eyes intelligent as ever.

‘Trying to throw suspicion on my sister.' The words were enunciated with extreme care, as if he suspected them all of being half-witted, or at best deaf. ‘The intention was to make her a scapegoat.'

‘What makes you think so?' Luke's interest was alive and eager and the sick man responded to it, forcing his broken voice and trying to raise himself on his pillows.

‘There was a scrap of leaf in my glass. I got it out after my first mouthful – I drank half of it at one draught; only thing to do with that sort of thing. All taste unpleasant.' He was so earnest that no one smiled. ‘Leaf was hemlock. Classic poison. That was how I knew. I came out at once.'

‘Why did that make you sure it wasn't Miss Jessica?' The doctor put the question before either man could intervene. He spoke very simply, as if Lawrence's mind was in the same shape as his body, and the patient closed his eyes in pure exasperation.

‘She wouldn't have been so crude,' he whispered, ‘even if she'd been so uncharitable. Even the Greeks found hemlock difficult stuff to administer satisfactorily. She'd have known that. Someone ignorant of that is trying to suggest that she poisoned Ruth. Ridiculous, and wicked.'

Doctor Smith jerked his chin up.

‘I think Mr Lawrence is right,' he said. ‘It's a thing that's been bothering me without my being able to pin it down.
Someone rather clever but not quite clever enough is doing this, Luke.' He paused abruptly. ‘I don't quite understand the attack on that young Dunning, though.'

‘But I thought you knew who it was? I thought the police had put out a net.'

They had forgotten Renee. Her invitation was as surprising as it was embarrassing.

‘D'you mean to tell me you don't know
yet
?' she demanded. ‘Aren't you really going to make an arrest? How long is this going on?'

The doctor coughed. ‘I understood there was a certain police activity,' he began. ‘The general idea seemed to be some sort of sudden swoop . . .?'

The question trailed away. Charlie Luke's attitude had become withdrawn.

‘We are anxious to interview a man called Joseph Congreve,' he said a little stiffly. ‘Our search for him may have started a hare or so. Will you come along now, Mr Campion? Miss Jessica's waiting for us in the other room. You've got a midder, you say, doctor? Well, come back as soon as you can, won't you? Look after Lawrence, Renee.'

They entered the dining-room and the first person he saw, standing on the hearthrug under the portrait of Professor Palinode, was Superintendent Yeo. He was taking no part in the proceedings. He stood squarely, his hands folded under the tail of his jacket, and he glanced at them both as they appeared but did not smile.

The significance of his arrival was not lost upon anybody. Here was an ultimatum from HQ. An arrest, in fact, would oblige.

Luke went over to him at once and Campion would have followed had not a gentle hand detained him. Miss Jessica greeted him as a deliverer. She had discarded the cardboard from her hat, but still wore the motoring veil knotted carelessly behind her head in the manner of the Victorian romantic painters. Her bag was missing, too, and her gown, which as usual was muslin over wool, had achieved some interesting drapery effects. Altogether she looked, curiously enough, rather decorative and a hundred per cent feminine.

‘Something has disagreed with Lawrence,' she said superbly. ‘Did you know?'

‘Yes,' he said gravely, ‘it might have been very serious.'

‘I know. They told me.' She indicated Dice and his colleagues with a wave of her hand. Her nice voice was as intelligent as ever, but it had lost its authority, and he saw with dismay that she was desperately afraid.

‘I did not make a mistake,' she went on with the dreadful earnestness of one not absolutely sure. ‘You'll have to help me convince them of that. I followed Boon's recipes very carefully, except where I had to make omissions. It was a party, you see, and one does like to give one's guests one's best.'

Her little face was very serious, her nice eyes deeply troubled.

‘I am fond of Lawrence,' she said, as if the admission was one of weakness. ‘He is more near to me in age than any of the others. I wouldn't hurt him. But then I wouldn't hurt anybody, if I knew.'

‘Look here,' said Mr Campion, ‘what did you actually do?' She was only too anxious to tell him.

‘I brewed two tisanes, nettle and a tansy. Evadne purchased the yerba maté and made it herself. That was a lightish brown. It's nearly tea, you know. The nettle drink I made was grey, and the tansy was yellow. But they tell me the stuff that Lawrence drank was a deep bottle-green.'

‘With leaves in it,' murmured Campion involuntarily.

‘Had it?' She picked him up at once. ‘Then it couldn't have been anything I made. I always strain everything very carefully through old linen – clean, of course.' She regarded him inquisitively. ‘Don't you remember what Boon says? “The residue constitutes a valuable vegetable addition to the diet.”'

‘Oh dear,' said Mr Campion, peering at her through his spectacles. ‘Yes, I suppose he does. Tell me, have you got these – er – residual vegetables downstairs?'