The Shortest Way to Hades (16 page)

“We were obliged,” said Ragwort, “to tell a quite extraordinary number of lies.”

“My dear Ragwort,” said Selena, “whatever can you mean? We said that Julia had been invited to Rupert’s flat for a drink by his friend Rowena: that was true. We said that we had come to collect her and take her back to Lincoln’s Inn: that was true. We said that we were in some haste and must leave at once: that was entirely true. How can you possibly suggest that we told any lies?”

She elected not to cross the river by the bridge at Chiswick but to remain on the south side of it until we reached Hammersmith—a distance which she covered with such rapidity as to move me to remark diffidently on the possible existence of a speed limit.

“In normal circumstances,” said Selena, “I would be quite willing to oblige you by dawdling along at any speed you found comfortable—say five miles an hour or so. You will perhaps recall, however, that I am hoping to catch a plane to Athens this evening, with a view to sailing round the Ionian Islands. The crew—namely Sebastian—has been instructed to report promptly for duty at 17:00 local time—or, as you landsmen would say, five o’clock this afternoon. To arrive late might seriously impair the authority of the skipper—namely mine—for the duration of the voyage.”

I perceived in her manner the blithe insouciance of a woman who had cast aside the responsibilities of practice at the Chancery Bar: it was as if she already breathed the salt Ionian air and her hand rested not on the steering-wheel of her car but on the tiller of some graceful sailing craft, cutting swiftly through the blue water. Knowing that in such a mood there could be no reasoning with her, I adopted the policy previously mentioned of keeping my eyes closed.

“I’m very sorry,” said Julia. “I’m afraid it’s my fault. I’ll explain to Sebastian, if we’re late, that it’s due to my embroiling you in a criminal investigation.”

I had not told them, I now realized, that our investigation was concluded, and that no crime had been committed. I thought it prudent to delay this disclosure until Selena had completed her negotiation of the streams of traffic moving rapidly round Hammersmith roundabout.

“We have been told,” I said, “that Rupert’s insult to Constantine Demetriou—that is to say, the Greek gigolo remark which resulted in Dolly being called down from the roof terrace—was uttered at the moment when the boats first came into view from the balcony. Between then and the moment at which Deirdre is known to have fallen we have supposed that a resolute person would have had time to ascend unobserved to the roof terrace and make a murderous attack on Deirdre.”

“The timing,” said Selena, “seemed fine but not impossible.”

“Quite so, if we had been right in assuming that the boats would have come into view when they passed Chiswick Steps. But the fact is that it is quite impossible from Rupert’s balcony to see anything like so far as that. The front of the building is at a slight angle to the river bank: the view upstream is admirable, but downstream, as Ragwort rightly remarked, it is very poor—one can see no farther than three or four hundred yards below Barnes Bridge. That is about a quarter of the distance to Chiswick Steps—the Boat Race crews would take, I suppose, no more than a minute to cover it. Which leaves, you see, no time at all for any attack on Deirdre. No one could have gone up to the roof before she fell without meeting Dolly on the way down from it. Indeed—”

“You were,” said Ragwort, “about to say?”

“I was about to say,” I said, “that very little time can have passed between the moment at which Dolly left the roof terrace and Deirdre either fell or jumped from it. Almost no time at all.”

“You surely aren’t suggesting,” said Ragwort, “that Dolly herself—? Oh nonsense, Hilary, she’s a simply delightful woman.”

“She is indeed,” I said, “a most charming and attractive woman. The study of history, however, demonstrates that charming and attractive women are not incapable of murder. You do see, don’t you, that if murder was committed she is the only person who had time to do it? On Boat Race Day, remember, and at so crucial a point in the contest, there would have been a considerable commotion on the towpath: it would have taken a minute or so for those watching from the balcony to become aware of anything amiss. If she had thrown her niece over the parapet and immediately descended to the drawing-room, I dare say they would all have believed that she was already downstairs when Deirdre fell.”

“Hilary,” said Selena, “you aren’t serious about this, are you?”

“No,” I said. “No, as it happens, I am not. I agree that she couldn’t have done it—she isn’t tall enough.”

“And a study of history demonstrates, I suppose,” said Ragwort, “that women of short stature
are
incapable of murder?”

“The commonplace experience of lifting a suitcase into a luggage-rack demonstrates the muscular effort required to raise a heavy object above one’s head. If Dolly had ever trained as a weight-lifter, it is conceivable that she might be able to lift a young woman of similar height and weight to herself over a barrier some two inches taller; otherwise not—I am satisfied that the possibility may be excluded.”

We continued eastwards in silence. It was not until we reached Trafalgar Square, where buses, pigeons and wandering tourists, all equally indifferent to impatient toots of the horn, reduced our speed to that of an unhurried pedestrian, that Selena spoke again.

“I’m glad,” she said, “that there’s no question of murder. It means we can stop being anxious about Camilla.”

Unaware that we had begun to be anxious about Camilla, I invited her to explain her meaning.

“Well, you’ve always said, Hilary, that you didn’t think it was murder because the wrong girl was dead.”

“Yes,” I said. “I have always taken the view that if a murder were to take place in the Remington-Fiske family it would be the heiress who was murdered.”

“And it’s quite true, of course,” continued Selena, as she edged her way forward into the Strand, “that if anyone else in the family had wanted to inherit the estate, they would have had to dispose of Camilla. But Deirdre was the next in line of inheritance, so she was the only one for whom that would have been enough. Anyone else would have had to get rid of both of them. And there’s no particular reason, is there, why they should do so in order of seniority?”

The crew after all arrived before the captain. We found my young colleague Sebastian Verity sitting in Selena’s room in 62 New Square, peacefully reading a copy of Homer’s
Odyssey
—a graceful young man, gray-eyed and silken-haired, of agreeably poetic appearance. His name will perhaps be known to my readers—though the work has not reached so extensive an audience, even among the discerning, as its artistic and scholarly merits would deserve—for his verse translation of the
Idylls
of Theocritus, published some fifteen months prior to the events here related.

He rose and came forward to greet us with an eagerness astonishing in a young man who expected to spend the next two weeks being tossed about on the Mediterranean in a small, damp, dangerous sailing-craft. I reflected, however, that at the prospect of spending a fortnight in Selena’s company in a cell in Wormwood Scrubs the eyes of my young colleague would have shone with an equally rapturous delight; such is the effect of passion on a tender and devoted heart. Despite the adverse consequences which such familiarity might have on shipboard discipline, Selena allowed herself to be embraced.

“The first question is,” he said, “whether I should begin immediately to address you as ‘sir’ or may continue to call you Selena until we are on board.”

“I shall be quite content,” said Selena, “to be addressed as ‘skipper,’ provided that it is done in a suitably respectful manner.”

“Those of you,” said Sebastian, “who have seen Selena only on dry land will probably think of her as a reasonable, good-natured, easy-going sort of woman, and may find it difficult to credit the transformation which takes place as soon as she sets foot on a sailing-boat. I think it’s because of the books she reads. She spends the winter months, you know, reading books about sailing and seamanship—they all seem to recommend that the conduct of the ship’s captain should be modelled as closely as possible on that of Captain Bligh of the
Bounty.”

“Sebastian,” said Julia kindly, but with a certain sternness, “we think that you exaggerate.”

“By no means,” said Sebastian, “quite the contrary. I wouldn’t venture to tell you, Julia, of the dangers and appalling living conditions which are the fate of anyone who puts to sea with Selena. If you were to imagine me clinging precariously to the rigging in the sort of howling gale which she describes as a nice, lively little breeze, or think of me scrubbing decks and pumping bilges from dawn to dusk under the merciless sun, pleading in vain for a small sip of retsina to cool my thirst—no, Julia, it’s more than your gentle heart could bear. You would want to report the whole thing to the Court of Human Rights or someone.”

“There is,” said Selena, “not a word of truth in this.”

“Sebastian,” said Ragwort, “we believe every word you say. We ask ourselves only by what compulsion, knowing all this, you were persuaded to enlist for the voyage.”

“Seafaring,” said Sebastian, “as of course you know, has from ancient times been a vital element in the Greek way of life, and has had a great influence on their thought and literature. I am anxious to achieve an insight into the sufferings and privations which would have been endured by the ordinary Greek seaman in the periods of which I profess the study. I dare say I’m overdoing it rather—one can hardly imagine that a freeborn Athenian of the fifth century, for example, however poor and economically exploited, would have submitted to quite such despotic treatment as I must look forward to. Still, I am doing my best.”

“When we go aboard,” said Selena, “I shall be revenged for this.”

“Your explanation,” said Ragwort, “reflects great credit on you. But it occurs to us, from our recollection of certain passages in classical literature, that rough words and harsh discipline were not the worst that an Athenian sailor—a young and personable Athenian sailor—might have had to face at the hands of his officers: advantage, we fear, would sometimes have been taken of his subordinate status to make him the instrument of sensual gratification. Have you considered, Sebastian, that you may be placing yourself in a similar danger?”

“Hilary will confirm,” said Sebastian, “that in the cause of Scholarship no sacrifice is too great.”

Having wished our friends a happy and prosperous voyage and waved them farewell from the great gateway between New Square and Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Julia and Ragwort and I turned by common consent in the direction of the Corkscrew. The weather, which had been charming, became suddenly gray and blustery, with a suggestion of rain: we quickened our step, and Julia put on the raincoat which she was carrying.

“My dear Julia,” said Ragwort, as we walked through Great Turnstile, “I do not wish to appear critical, but would you care to tell us how in the world you came to purchase that raincoat? It’s at least two sizes too small for you.”

“It
is
rather tight across the shoulders,” said Julia. “Indeed, quite uncomfortably so. I rather wish you hadn’t mentioned it, Ragwort—I’ve never noticed before.”

“It might be better,” said Ragwort, “if you didn’t have so much in the pockets.”

“I don’t have anything in the pockets,” said Julia. “I emptied them yesterday in the cause of nearness and order. Oh.” Seeking to demonstrate the emptiness of her pockets, she had produced from one a cellophane-wrapped box, containing, according to its label, a bottle of expensive scent, and from the other a thick brown envelope. “I don’t remember why I’ve got these.”

“If you have been buying scents made by Monsieur Patou,” said Ragwort, “you may count on your bank manager to remember the transaction. Have you any idea what’s in the envelope?” Julia shook her head.

Comfortably established at one of the round oak tables in the Corkscrew, and with a reassuring glass of Niersteiner in her hand, she nonetheless continued for some time to gaze at the envelope with bewildered apprehension, turning it this way and that, as if fearing that its contents might prove inimical to her welfare. At last, however, she was prevailed upon to open it. It contained photographs: some two dozen, all in color, of about the same dimensions as a postcard.

“Julia,” said Ragwort with some severity, “these are not the sort of photographs which one expects to find in the possession of a member of the English Bar—except, possibly, for the purposes of a prosecution for obscenity. How in the world do you come to have them?”

“I haven’t the least idea,” said Julia. “Oh look,” she added, with every sign of pleasure, “there’s one of Selena and me.” The picture showed them sitting side by side on a sofa: Selena, with a look of judicial detachment, seemed to be appraising the quality of her champagne; Julia was smiling with sleepy and bemused benevolence at two other persons—one male, the other female, both naked, in an attitude of greater intimacy than I would wish to describe in detail to my readers: though Selena and Julia were fully dressed, the photograph was taken at such an angle as somehow to suggest that all four figures were part of a single tableau. The background I recognized without difficulty, having seen it less than two hours earlier—it was the drawing-room of Rupert Galloway’s flat. It required but little scholarship to infer that the photographs had been taken at the gathering attended by Selena and Julia in the previous November; and it seemed not over-adventurous to surmise that the film from which they were made had been in the camera appropriated by the spurious policemen.

“Julia,” I said gently, “is that the coat which Selena found for you in the cupboard at Rupert’s flat?” She nodded. “And are you,” I continued, “quite, quite sure that it’s yours?”

She turned the coat this way and that, inside out and upside down, searching, I suppose, for some winestain or cigarette burn which would identify it as unquestionably hers. Eventually, at Ragwort’s suggestion, she looked inside the collar and found sewn there a small name-tape. On reading it, she became rather pale.