Death In Ecstasy

CHAPTER XXIII Mr. Ogden at Home

Mr. Ogden lived in an old-fashioned maisonette. His sitting room was on the street level and opened off a small hall from which a break-neck stair led up to his dining room and kitchen and then on to his bedroom and bathroom. He was served by a family who lived in the basement. He answered his own door and gave Alleyn and Fox a hearty, but slightly nervous, greeting.

“Hello! Hello! Look who’s here! Come right in.”

“You must be sick of the sight of us,” said Alleyn.

“Where d’you get that stuff?” demanded Mr. Ogden with somewhat forced geniality. “Say, when this darn business is through, maybe we’ll be able to get together like regular fellows.”

“But until then—?” suggested Alleyn with a smile.

Mr. Ogden grinned uncomfortably.

“Well, I won’t say nothing,” he admitted, “but I’ll try and act like I was a pure young thing. What’s new, Chief?”

“Nothing much. We’ve come to look at your house, Mr. Ogden.”

Mr. Ogden paled slightly.

“Sure,” he said. “What’s the big idea?”

“Don’t look so uncomfortable. We’re not expecting to find a body in the destructor.”

“Aw gee!” protested Mr. Ogden. “You make me nervous when you pull that grim British humour stuff.”

He showed them over the maisonette, which had the peculiarly characterless look of the ready-furnished dwelling. Mr. Ogden, however, appeared to like it.

“It’s never recovered from the shock it got when Queen Victoria okayed gas lighting,” he said. “It’s just kind of forgotten to disappear. Look at that grate. I reckon it would have a big appeal in the States as a museum specimen. Some swell apartment! When I first saw it I thought I’d side-slipped down time’s speedway. I asked the real estate agent if it was central heated and the old guy looked so grieved I just hadn’t the nerve to come at it again.”

“There are plenty of modern flats in London, sir,” said Inspector Fox rather huffily, as they went into the kitchen.

“Sure there are. Erected by Rip Van Winkle and Co. You don’t want to get sore, Inspector. I’m only kidding. I took this apartment because it’s old-world and British. I get a kick out of buying coal for this grate and feeling Florida in front and Alaska down the back.”

“It’s a very cosy little kitchenette, sir,” said Fox, still on the defensive. “All those nice modern Fyrexo dishes!”

“I’ve pepped it up some. There was no ice-chest and a line of genuine antiques for fixing the eats. And will you look at that hot-squat, coal-consuming range? I reckon that got George Whatsit Stevenson thinking about trains.”

Fox mumbled impotently.

They completed their tour of the maisonette and returned to the sitting room. Mr. Ogden drew armchairs up to the hearth and attacked the smoldering coals with a battered stump of a poker.

“How about a drink?” he asked.

“Thank you so much, not for me,” said Alleyn.

Mr. Ogden again looked nervous.

“I forgot,” he mumbled, “I kinda asked for that.”

“Good Heavens,” protested Alleyn, “you mustn’t jump to conclusions like this, Mr. Ogden. We’re on duty. We don’t drink when we’re on duty. That’s all there is to it.”

“Maybe,” said Mr. Ogden eyeing him doubtfully. “What can I do for you, Chief?”

“We’re still trying to untangle the business of the book. I think you can help us there, if you will. I take it that this is the room where you held your party?”

“Yup.”

“And there are your books,” continued Alleyn, pointing to where a dispirited collection of monthly journals and cheap editions propped each other up in an old bookcase.

“That’s the library. Looks world-weary, doesn’t it? I’m not crazy about literature.”

“I notice there are no red backs there, so the Curiosities must have showed up rather well.”

“That’s so. It looked like it was surprised at being there,” said Mr. Ogden with one of his imaginative flights.

“Well now, can you show me where it was on the night of your party?”

“Lemme see.”

He got up and walked over to the shelves.

“I reckon I can,” he said. “M. de Ravigne had parked his drink in that gap along by the stack of Posts and spilled it over. I remember that because it marked the shelf and he was very repentant about it. He called me over and apologised and I said: ‘What the hell’s it matter,’ and then I saw the old book. That’s how I come to show it to him.”

“You showed it to him. You’re positive of that? He did not find it for himself, and you didn’t see him with it before anything was said about it?”

Mr. Ogden thought that over. The significance of Alleyn’s question obviously struck him. He looked worried, but he answered with every appearance of complete frankness.

“No, sir. Raoul de Ravigne did no snooping around those books. I showed it to him. And get this, Chief. If I hadn’t showed it to him he’d never have seen it. He had turned away from the books and was telling Garnette how thoughtless he’d acted putting his glass down on the shelf.”

“But he would have seen it before, when he put his glass down.”

“Yeah? Well, that’s so. But even if that is so you can bet your suspenders Ravigne is on the level. See here, Chief, I get you with this book stuff and God knows I feel weak under my vest whenever I remember the Curiosities belonged to me. But if you’re thinking of Raoul de Ravigne for the quick hiccough, forget it. He worshipped Cara. He surely worshipped her.”

“I know, I know,” said Alleyn abstractedly.

Fox, who had examined the shelf, suddenly remarked:

“There’s the mark of the stuff there still. Spirit. It’s lifted the varnish.”

“So it has,” said Alleyn. “After you had shown him the book what happened to it?”

“Why, I don’t just remember. Wait a while. Yeah, I got it. He looked at it sort of polite but not interested, and handed it to Garnette.”

“And then?”

“I can’t remember. I guess we walked away or something.”

“Previous to the glass incident what had you all been doing?”

“Search me. Talking.”

“Had you been talking to Mrs. Candour, Miss Quayne and Mr. Garnette?”

“That’s so. Checking up, are you? Well, I reckon that’s right. We were here by the fire, I guess.”

“And you don’t remember seeing the book after that evening?”

“No. But I don’t remember not seeing it till the day that sissy stopped in for Garnette’s books. I’m dead sure it wasn’t here then. Dead sure.”

“That’s a most important point. It seems to show—”

Alleyn paused and then said: “Look here, Mr. Ogden, as far as I can see there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be perfectly frank with you. Tell me, is it your opinion the book disappeared on the night of your party?”

“Honest, Chief, I’m not sure. I don’t know. I can’t go any further except that I’d stake a couple of grand Ravigne doesn’t come into the picture.”

“Who looks after you here and does the housemaiding?”

“The girl Prescott. The daughter of the janitor.”

“Could we speak to her, do you think?”

“Sure! She’ll be down in the dungeon they call their apartment. I’ll fetch her.”

He went out into the little hall and they could hear him shouting:

“Hey! Elsie! Cm’ on up here, will you?”

A subterranean squeak answered him. He came back grinning.

“She’ll be right up. Her old man does the valeting and butling, her ma cooks, and Elsie hands out the cap and apron dope. The bell doesn’t work since they forgot to fix it way back eighteen-twenty-five.”

Elsie turned out to be a pleasant-faced young woman. She was neatly dressed, and looked intelligent.

“Listen, Elsie. These gentlemen want to ask you something.”

“It’s about a book of Mr. Ogden’s that was stolen,” said Alleyn. “It’s a valuable book and he wants us to trace it for him.”

Elsie looked alarmed.

“Don’t worry,” said Alleyn, “we rather think it was taken by a man who tried to sell him a wireless. Do you remember the night Mr. Ogden had a large party here? About three weeks ago?”

“Yes, sir. We helped.”

“Splendid. Did you do the tidying next day?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I suppose you dusted the bookshelves, didn’t you?”

“Oh, yes, sir. They were in a terrible mess. A gentleman had upset a glass. Just there it was, sir.”

She pointed to the shelf.

“Were any of the books damaged?”

“The one next the place was, sir. It was stained-like.”

“What book was that?”

“I never noticed the name, sir. It had brown paper on it. You couldn’t see.”

“Was there a red book there?”

“You mean the queer-looking old one. That hasn’t been there for a — well, for some time.”

“That’s the one we’re trying to trace, Elsie. You think it was not there that morning?”

“No, sir. I’m sure it wasn’t. You see that’s where it always stood, and I noticed it wasn’t there because I thought it was a pity because it wouldn’t have mattered if that old book had been marked because I didn’t know it was a valuable book, sir. I just laid the other one down by the fire to dry off and put it back again. I didn’t take the cover off because I didn’t like it. It was put on very neat with nice shiny paper.”

Alleyn glanced at Mr. Ogden, who turned bright pink.

“But it wasn’t the old book, sir. The old book was bigger and it hadn’t got a cover. Now I come to think of it, I remember I says to Mr. Ogden, I says: ‘Where’s the big red book?’ Didn’t I, sir? When you was looking through them to see the damage.”

“By heck, I believe she did,” shouted Mr. Ogden.

“Splendid, Elsie. So one way and another you’re absolutely certain there was no big red book?”

“Yes, sir, certain sure. There was just a row of five in brown paper covers and then the ones that are there now. I remember it all so distinct because that was the day before we went for our holidays, and I says I’d like to get things nice for a start off because Mr. Ogden was going to do for himself and get his meals out, and he’d been that kind, and it seemed such a pity like, anything should be missing, so I was quite anxious to make everything nice, so I did and so that’s how I remember.”

“Thank you very much indeed, Elsie.”

She went away in high feather.

“Just as well she didn’t look at the book, Mr. Ogden,” said Alleyn dryly. “Which was it? Petronius?”

“Ah, hell!” said Mr. Ogden.

“Well, Fox, we must go our ways.” Alleyn wandered over to the shelves. “M. de Ravigne certainly left his mark,” he said. “The stuff ran some way along. What was it?”

“A highball.”

“Ah, well,” said Alleyn, “we’ll have to find out what Mr. Garnette did with the Curiosities.”

“By God,” began Mr. Ogden violently, “if Garnette—”

He stopped short. “I ain’t saying a thing,” he added darkly.

“Come along, Fox,” said Alleyn. “We’ve kept Mr. Ogden too long already. I must present Elsie with the wherewithal for a new bonnet. She skipped away before I could do it. I’ll find her on the way down.”

They said good-bye. Elsie was hovering in the little hall. Alleyn winked at Fox who went on ahead. Alleyn joined him in the car five minutes later.

“Very talkative girl that,” said Fox dryly.

“She is. In addition to being swamped with thanks I’ve heard all about her sister’s miscarriage, the mystery of the drawing room poker (it seems Elsie suspects someone of chewing at the tip), her young man who is a terror for crime stories, how Mr. Ogden broke a Fyrexo pot and why Elsie likes policemen. She remembers the day Claude came for the books. She put them in his attaché-case for him. Ogden was out, as he said. Elsie says there were six, which is rum, as she spoke of five before that. What’s the time?”

“Five-thirty.”

“I made an appointment with young Pringle for six. I expect he’ll be in. Look here, Fox, I’ll drop you at Knocklatchers Row. If Garnette is in, ask him what he did with the book that night at Ogden’s. Go easy with him. It would be lovely to hear the truth for once from those perfect lips. He’ll swear he left it behind him, of course, but try and get some means of checking up on it. Then, if you’ve time, look up the unspeakable Claude. Ask him how many books he collected from Ogden for Garnette. He’ll probably say he’s forgotten, but ask him. Oh, and ask Garnette if he examined them when they came in. Will you do all that, Fox?”

“Right-oh, sir. What’s your view now? Things are a bit more shipshape, aren’t they?”

“They are, Fox, they are. It’s closing in. I’ve little doubt in my own mind now. Have you?”

“No. It looks as if you’re right.”

“We haven’t got enough for an arrest, of course. Still, the cable from Australia may bring forth fruits, and I’ll have to get in touch with Madame de Barsac. You were quite right. She’s in a nursing home. The telegram was from her housekeeper. I hope to heaven Cara Quayne’s letter has survived. I’ll ring up the Sûreté tonight. Old Sapineau is by way of being a pal of mine. Perhaps he can do something tactful for me. Here we are at Knocklatchers Row. In you go, Fox. It’s better I should see Pringle alone. I’ve got to convince him we know he came to this church on Sunday afternoon without giving away the source of information. I’ll have to bluff, and I can do that better without your eye on me. It may come to taking an extreme measure. Watkins and Bailey are meeting me there. I’ll be back at the Yard some time this evening. What a life, ye screeching kittens, what a life!”

Alleyn drove on to Lower Sloane Street, where he was joined by Detective-Sergeants Bailey and Watkins.

“Stay down opposite the door,” said Alleyn, “and try not to look like sleuths, there’s good fellows. If you see me come to the window, wander quietly upstairs. Hope it won’t be necessary.”

He went upstairs to the flat, where he found Maurice Pringle.

Maurice looked a pretty good specimen of a wreck. His face was the colour of wet cement, there were pockets of green plasticine under his eyes, and he had the general appearance of having spent the day on an unmade bed. Alleyn dealt roundly with him.

“Good evening, Mr. Pringle. You’re looking ill.”

“I’m feeling bloody if it’s of any interest,” said Maurice. “Sit down, won’t you?”

“Thank you.” Alleyn sat down and proceeded to look calmly and fixedly at Maurice.

“Well, what’s the matter?” demanded Maurice. “I suppose you haven’t come here to memorise my face, have you?”

“Partly,” said Alleyn coolly.

“What the devil do you mean? See here, Inspector Alleyn, if that’s your name, I’m about fed up with your methods. You’re one of the new gentlemen-police, aren’t you?”

“No,” said Alleyn.

“Well, what the hell are you?”

“Just police.”

“I’d be obliged,” said Maurice loftily, “if you’d get your business done as quickly as possible. I’m busy.”

“So am I, rather,” said Alleyn. “I should be delighted to get it over. May I be brief, Mr. Pringle?”

“As brief as you like.”

“Right. Who supplies you with heroin?”

“None of your cursed business. You’ve no right to ask questions of that sort. I’ll damn’ well report you.”

“Very good,” said Alleyn.

Maurice flung himself down in his chair, bit his nails and glowered.

“I wish to God I hadn’t told you,” he said.,

“Your behaviour and your looks sold me long before you did,” rejoined Alleyn.

Maurice suddenly flung his hands up to his face.

“If my manner is discourteous I must apologise,” Alleyn went on, “but this is a serious matter. You have deliberately lied to me. Please let me go on. You informed me that you spent Sunday afternoon with Miss Jenkins in Yeoman’s Row. That was a lie. You were seen in Knocklatchers Row on Sunday afternoon. You went into the House of the Sacred Flame. Am I right?”

“I won’t answer.”

“If you persist in this course I shall arrest you.”

“On what charge?”

“On the charge of receiving prohibited drugs.”

“You can’t prove it.”

“Will you risk that?”

“Yes.”

“Do you hold to your statement that you did not go to the House of the Sacred Flame on Sunday afternoon?”

“Yes.”

“Are you protecting yourself — or someone else?”

Silence.

“Mr. Pringle,” said Alleyn gently, “if you are placed under arrest what will you do about your heroin then?”

“Damn your eyes!” said Maurice.

“I am now going to search your flat. Here is my warrant. Unless, of course, you prefer to show me how much dope you have on the premises?”

Maurice stared at him in silence. Suddenly his face twisted like a miserable child’s.

“Why can’t you leave me alone? I only want to be left alone! I’m not interfering with anyone else. It doesn’t matter to anyone else what I do.”

“Not to Miss Jenkins?” asked Alleyn.

“Oh, God, they haven’t sent you here to preach, have they?”

“Look here,” said Alleyn, “you won’t believe me, but I don’t particularly want to search your flat or to arrest you. I came here hoping that you’d give me a certain amount of help. You went to Knocklatchers Row on Sunday afternoon. I think you went into Garnette’s rooms. There you must either have overheard a discussion between Miss Quayne and another individual, or had a discussion with her yourself. For some reason you kept all this a secret. From our point of view that looks remarkably fishy. We must know what happened in Garnette’s rooms between two-thirty and three on Sunday afternoon. If you persist in your refusal I shall arrest you on a minor charge, and I warn you that you’ll be in a very unpleasant position.”

“What do you want to know?”

“To whom did Miss Quayne say: ‘I shall tell Father Garnette what you have done?’ ”

“You know she said that?”

“Yes. Was it to you?”

“No.”

“Was it to M. de Ravigne?”

“I won’t tell you. It wasn’t to me.”

“Had you gone there to get heroin?”

“I won’t tell you.”

Alleyn walked over to the window and looked down into the street.

“Does Mr. Garnette supply you with heroin?” he asked.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” said Maurice suddenly. “Garnette didn’t kill Cara Quayne.”

“How do you know that, Mr. Pringle?”

“Never you mind. I do know.”

“I am afraid that sort of statement would not be welcomed by learned counsel on either side.”

“It’s all you’ll get from me.”

“—and if you happened to be in the dock, the information would be superfluous.”

“I didn’t kill her. You can’t arrest me for that. I tell you before God I didn’t kill her.”

“You may be an accessory before the fact. I’m not bluffing. Mr. Pringle. For the last time will you tell me who supplies you with heroin?”

“No.”

“Oh, come in, you two,” said Alleyn disgustedly.

Bailey and Watkins came in, their hats in their hands. Alleyn was rather particular on points of etiquette.

“Just look around, will you,” he said.

The look-round consisted of a very painstaking search of the flat. It lasted for an hour, but in the first ten minutes they found a little white packet that Alleyn commandeered. No written matter of any importance was discovered. A hypodermic syringe was their second find. Alleyn himself took six cigarettes and added them to the collection. Throughout the search Maurice remained seated by the electric radiator. He smoked continually,and maintained a sulky silence. Alleyn looked at him occasionally with something like pity in his eyes.

When it was all over he sent the two Yard men out into the landing, walked over to where Maurice sat by the heater, and stood there looking down at him.

“I’m going to tell you what I think is at the back of your obstinacy,” he said. “I wish I could say I thought you were doing the stupid but noble protection game. I don’t believe you are. Very few people go in for that sort of heroism. I think self, self-indulgence if you like, is at the back of your stupid and very churlish behaviour. I’m going to make a guess, a reprehensible thing for any criminal investigator to do. I guess that on Sunday afternoon you went to Garnette’s flat to get the packet of heroin we found in your boot-box. I think that Garnette is a receiver and disperser of such drugs, and that you knew he had this packet in his bedroom. I think you went in at the back door, through into the bedroom. While you were there someone came into the sitting-room from the hall. You were not sure who this person was, so you kept quiet, not moving for fear they should hear you and look in at the connecting door. While you stood still, listening, this unknown person came quite close to the door. You heard a faint metallic click and you knew the key had been turned in the lock of the safe. Then there was an interruption. Someone else had come into the sitting room. It was Cara Quayne. There followed a dialogue between Cara Quayne and the other person. I shall emulate the thrilling example of learned Counsel and call this other person X. Cara Quayne began to make things very awkward for X. She wanted to know about her bonds. I think perhaps she wanted to add to them on the occasion of her initiation as Chosen Vessel. It was all very difficult because the bonds were not there. X tried a line of pacifying reasonable talk, but she wasn’t having any. She was very excited and most upset. X had a certain amount of difficulty in keeping her quiet. At last she said loudly: ‘I shall tell Father Garnette what you have done,’ and a second later you heard the rattle of curtain rings and the slam of the outer door. She had gone. Now your actions after this are not perfectly clear to me. What I think, however, is this: You behaved in rather a curious manner. You did not go in to the sitting room, strike an attitude in the doorway, and say: ‘X, all is discovered,’ or: ‘X, X, can I believe my ears?’ No. You tiptoed out of the bedroom and through the back door which you did not lock and which remained unlocked all through the evening. Then you scuttled back here and proceeded to make a beast of yourself with the contents of the little white packet. Now why did you do this? Either because X was a person who had a very strong hold of some sort over you, or else because X was someone to whom you were deeply attached. There is of course, a third — damn it, why can’t one say a third alternative? — a third explanation. You may have drugged yourself into such a pitiable condition that you hadn’t the nerve to tackle a white louse, much less X.”

“God!” said Maurice Pringle. “I’ll tackle you if there’s much more of this.”

“There’s very little more. You asked me to be brief. You had to take Miss Jenkins into your confidence over this because you wanted her to tell us you’d been in her flat all the afternoon. Now if you refuse to tell me who X is you’re going to force me to do something very nasty about Miss Jenkins. She’s a secondary accessory after the fact. With you, of course. You’re going to force me to arrest you on the dope game. If you persist in your silence after your arrest you will be the direct cause of fixing the suspicion of homicide on the man who you say is innocent. There will be no more heroin. I should imagine your condition is pathological. You should go into a home and be scientifically treated. How you’ll stand up to being under lock and key in a police station is best known to yourself. Well, there you are. Is it to be a wholesale sacrifice of yourself, Miss Jenkins and — possibly — an innocent person? Or are you going to clear away the sacrificial smoke at present obscuring the features of Mr. Or Madam X?”

Alleyn stopped abruptly, made a curious self-deprecatory grimace, and lit a cigarette. In the silence that followed, Maurice stared at him piteously. His fingers trembled on the arms of the chair. He seemed scarcely to think- Suddenly his face twisted and with the shamefaced abandon of a small boy he turned and buried his eyes in the cushions.

After a moment Alleyn stretched out a thin hand and touched him.

“It’s best,” he said. “I’m not altogether inhuman, and believe me, in every way, it’s best.”

He could not hear the answer.

“Do you agree?” asked Alleyn gently.

Without raising his head Maurice spoke again.

“—want to think — tomorrow — give me time.”

Alleyn thought for a moment.

“Very well,” he said at last, “I’ll give you till tomorrow. But don’t commit suicide. It would be so very unprincipled, and we should have to arrest Miss Jenkins for perjury or something, and hang Mr. Garnette. Perhaps I’d better leave someone here. You are a nuisance, aren’t you? Good evening.”