LITMIR.BIZ

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said Frid warningly.

      Patch made a rapid grimace at the constable’s chair and opened the door.

      ‘Here, wait a minute,’ cried Frid in alarm. But she was too late: Patch had gone.

      ‘Look here,’ said Frid to the constable, ‘can I go after her? I want to ask her something.’

      ‘I’m afraid you can’t Miss. I can ask the young lady to come back, if it’s any use,’ offered the constable, who had risen to his feet.

      ‘I don’t think it is,’ said Frid gloomily, ‘her French isn’t up to it.’ She wandered in a desultory manner round the room.

      Lord Charles came in from the hall and went to the fireplace. He leant his arms on the mantelpiece and his head on his arms.

      ‘Well, old man?’ said Charlot.

      ‘Well, Immy,’ he said without changing his position, ‘they’ve taken him away. You didn’t know him when he was a young man, did you?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘No. When we were boys we were good friends. It seems a queer thing for him to go away like this.’

      ‘Yes,’ said Charlot, ‘I expect it does.’ He went and sat beside her.

      ‘Well,’ said Henry, ‘what happens now?’

      ‘Examination of witnesses continues, I trust,’ said Frid. ‘Who do you say he’ll ask for next? I’m longing for my turn.’

      ‘Frid, my dear,’ said her father, ‘don’t.’

      ‘Don’t what, Daddy?’

      ‘Don’t be quite so whatever it is you are being. We’re all rather tired. Immy, ought I to ask if I may see Violet?’

      ‘I don’t think so, darling. Dr Kantripp says she seems to be much quieter and more sensible. No doubt she’ll –’

      The drawing-room door opened slowly. The young constable scrambled to his feet, followed, one after another, by the Lampreys. Framed in the doorway, supported on one hand by a uniformed nurse and on the other by her maid, stood the dowager Lady Wutherwood.

      Roberta had been given a good many frights that evening and perhaps her resistance to shock had been weakened. There is no doubt that the appearance of Lady Wutherwood in the drawing-room doorway struck terror to Roberta’s heart. It was as if some malicious stage-manager had planned this entrance along the best traditions of Victorian melodrama. By some chance of lighting, the colour of the green-painted door jamb was reflected in Lady Wutherwood’s face. Her chin was lowered and her cavernously set eyes were in shadow while her mouth, which was wet but which still retained a trace of rouge, caught the light and glittered. The coils of dyed hair had become loosened and hung forward. Perhaps she had thrust Tinkerton aside, for her dress was ill-fastened and much in disarray. She seemed to have no bones. Even her hands showed no clear highlights on fingers and wrists, but hung puffily among the folds of her dress. Propped up by the nurse and maid, her posture was so odd that it suggested to Roberta a horrid notion. She thought Lady Wutherwood looked for all the world as though she dangled by the neck like some ill-managed puppet. Her lips moved and so still was the room that Roberta heard that clicking sound as Lady Wutherwood arranged her mouth for speaking. But when she did speak it was in an unremarkable voice, a voice that held no overtones of tragedy or horror.

      ‘Charles,’ said Lady Wutherwood, ‘I’ve come to see the police.’

      ‘Yes, Violet. I’ll tell them.’

      ‘I’ve come to see them because there is something they must understand. They have taken away Gabriel’s body. It must come back to me, to my house. The funeral will be from my house and nowhere else. I want to tell them that. Gabriel must come back.’

      III

      Charlot hurried to her sister-in-law’s side and Roberta heard her speak in the voice she had used in the old days when one of the children was hurt or distressed. It was a tranquil voice but Lady Wutherwood seemed scarcely aware of it. The nurse professionally soothing said: ‘Now, come along. We’ll just sit and wait while they bring the doctor.’

      ‘Not in there,’ said Lady Wutherwood. ‘I won’t go into that room.’

      ‘Now, now, dear.’

      ‘Where is the detective? I must see the people in authority.’ Lady Wutherwood’s head turned with a rolling movement and from the shadowed caverns of her eyes she seemed to look at Charlot. ‘Go away,’ she said loudly.

      Lord Charles turned to the constable. ‘Will you tell Mr Alleyn?’

      He said: ‘Yes, my lord, certainly,’ and looked at Lady Wutherwood who, with her escort, completely blocked the doorway.

      ‘There’s a chair in the passage, nurse,’ said Charlot.

      Tinkerton said: ‘Come along now, m’lady,’ in a thin voice but with an air of authority. Her mistress leant towards her and with a clumsy lurch turned and went into the passage, still supported by the two women. Charlot shut the door and eyeing her family spread out her hands and shrugged her shoulders.

      ‘What,’ she began, ‘do you suppose –’

      But Frid interrupted her. Frid, standing in the centre of the room, urgent, and for once unconsciously dramatic, harangued her family in a sort of impassioned whisper.

      ‘Look here,’ she said, ‘he’s out of the way. What are we going to do? What has Patch said we did in the dining-room?’

      ‘Obviously,’ said Henry, ‘she told the truth.’

      ‘She may have lied like a book.’

      ‘Shall I whizz out and ask her?’ Stephen suggested.

      ‘My dear,’ said Charlot, ‘the place is solid with policemen. You’d be arrested.’

      ‘Well,’ said Frid impatiently, ‘what shall we say? Quick. Before he comes back.’

      ‘You will tell Alleyn the truth, Frid,’ said Lord Charles.

      ‘But, Daddy –’

      ‘You will tell him the truth.’ He looked at Lady Katherine. ‘After all,’ he added, ‘nothing matters much now, after what has been already told.’

      ‘But – all right, Daddy,’ said Frid. ‘The truth it is. I don’t know what everybody else thinks, but to me it’s pretty obvious who did it.’

      The others stared at her. Frid gestured towards the door.

      ‘Oh, no,’ said her father.

      ‘Daddy, but of course. She’s mad. She’s stark ravers. You know how they hated each other. And Mummy, you said that you left her alone when you came here to ask one of the boys to work the lift. She must have done it then. Who else?’

      ‘Charlie, do you think –?’

      Lord Charles stared at his wife. ‘Who else, Immy?’ he said. ‘Who else?’

      ‘I think Frid’s right,’ said Stephen.

      ‘Then,’ said Henry, ‘for God’s sake come off your racket, you and Colin, and tell us who went down in the lift with them.’

      Colin said: ‘I went down in the lift.’

      ‘Don’t be a bloody fool,’ said Stephen. ‘If Aunt V. did it, what do you want to muck in for? You’re mad.’

      ‘You’re both mad,’ said Henry. ‘If Aunt V. did it –’

      ‘If Violet killed Gabriel,’ said Charlot suddenly, ‘it is not our business to do anything but clear ourselves.’

      ‘Immy,

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