Photo Finish

Chapter eight The Police

i

“From now on,” Alleyn said to Dr. Carmichael, “it would be nice to maintain a masterly inactivity. I shall complete my file and hand it over, with an anxious smirk, to Inspector Hazelmere in, please God, the course of a couple of hours or less.”

“Don’t you feel you’d like to polish it off yourself? Having gone so far?”

“Yes, Rory,” said Troy. “Don’t you?”

“If Fox and Bailey and Thompson could walk in, yes, I suppose I do. That would be, as Noel Coward put it, ‘an autre paire de souliers.’ But this hamstrung solo, poking about without authority, has been damned frustrating.”

“What do you suppose the chap that’s coming will do first?”

“Inspect the body and the immediate environment. He can’t look at my improvised dabs-and-photographs, because they are still in what Lattienzo calls the womb of the camera. He’ll take more of his own.”

“And then?”

“Possibly set up a search of some if not all of their rooms. I suggested he bring a warrant. And by that same token did your bed-making exercise prove fruitful? Before or after the envelope-and-ashes episode?”

“A blank,” said Dr. Carmichael. “Hanley has a collection of bedside books with Wilde and Gide at the top and backstreet Marseilles at the bottom, but all with the same leitmotiv.”

“And Ben Ruby,” said Troy, “has an enormous scrapbook of newspaper cuttings all beautifully arranged and dated and noted and with all the rave bits in the reviews underlined. For quotation in advance publicity, I suppose. It’s got the Strix photographs and captions and newspaper correspondence, indignant and supportive. Do you know there are only seven European Strix photographs, two American, and four Australian, including the retouched one in the Watchman? Somehow one had imagined, or I had, a hoard of them. Signor Lattienzo’s got a neat little pile of letters in Italian on his desk. Mr. Reece has an enormous colored photograph framed in silver of the diva in full operatic kit — I wouldn’t know which opera, except that it’s not Butterfly. And there are framed photographs of those rather self-conscious slightly smug walking youths in the Athens Museum. He’s also got a marvelous equestrian drawing in sanguine of a nude man on a stallion which I could swear is a da Vinci original. Can he be as rich as all that? I really do swear it’s not a reproduction.”

“I think he probably can,” said Alleyn.

“What a shut-up sort of man he is,” Troy mused. “I mean who would have expected it? Does he really appreciate it or has he just acquired it because it cost so much? Like the diva, one might say.”

“Perhaps not quite like that,” said Alleyn.

“Do you attach a lot of weight to Signor Lattienzo’s observations?” asked the doctor suddenly. “I don’t know what they were, of course.”

“They were confidential. They cast a strongly Italian flavor over the scene. Beyond that,” said Alleyn, “my lips are sealed.”

“Rory,” Troy asked, “are you going to see Maria again? Before the police arrive?”

“I’ve not quite decided. I think perhaps I might. Very briefly.”

“We mustn’t ask why, of course,” said Carmichael.

“Oh yes, you may. By all means. If I do see her, it will be to tell her that I shall inform the police of her request to— attend to her mistress and shall ask them to accede to it. When they’ve finished their examination of the room, of course.”

“You will?”

“That’s the general idea.”

“Well, then — Are you going to explain why?”

“Certainly,” said Alleyn. And did.

When he had finished Troy covered her face with her hands. It was an uncharacteristic gesture. She turned away to the windows. Dr. Carmichael looked from her to Alleyn and left the studio.

“I wouldn’t have had this happen,” Alleyn said, “for all the world.”

“Don’t give it another thought,” she mumbled into his sweater and helped herself to his handkerchief. “It’s nothing. It’s just the fact of that room along there. Off the landing. You know — behind the locked door. Like a Bluebeard’s chamber. I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s kind of got me down a bit.”

“I know.”

“And now — Maria. Going in there. Damn!” said Troy and stamped. “I’d got myself all arranged not to be a burden and now look at me.”

“Could it be that you’ve done a morsel too much self-arranging and I’ve done a morsel too much male chauvinism, although, I must say,” Alleyn confessed, “I’m never quite sure what the ladies mean by the phrase. Have a good blow,” he added as Troy was making gingerly use of his handkerchief. She obeyed noisily and said she was feeling better.

“What would Br’er Fox say to me?” she asked and answered herself. Alleyn joined in.

“ ‘We’ll have to get you in the Force, Mrs. Alleyn,’ ” they quoted in unison.

“And wouldn’t I make a pretty hash of it if you did,” said Troy.

“You’ve done jolly well with the half-burnt envelope. Classic stuff that and very useful. It forced Marco to come tolerably clean.”

“Well, come, that’s something.”

“It’s half an hour to lunch time. How about putting a bit of slap on your pink nose and coming for a brisk walk.”

“Lunch!” said Troy, “and Mr. Reece’s massive small talk. And food! More food!”

“Perhaps the cook will have cut it down to clear soup and a slice of ham. Anyway, come on.”

“All right,” said Troy.

So they went out of doors, where the sun shone, the dark wet trees glittered, the Lake was spangled, and the mountains were fresh, as if, it seemed, from creation’s hand. The morning was alive with bird song, sounds that might have been the voice of the bush itself, its hidden waters, its coolness, its primordial detachment.

They walked round the house to the empty hangar and thence, across the landing ground, to the path through the bush and arrived at the lakeside.

“Wet earth and greenery again,” said Troy. “The best smell there is.”

“The Maori people had a god-hero called Maui. He went fishing, and hauled up the South Island.”

“Quite recently, by the feel of it.”

“Geologically it was, in fact, thrust up from the ocean bed by volcanic action. I’ve no idea,” said Alleyn, “whether it was a slow process or a sudden commotion. It’s exciting to imagine it heaving up all of a sudden with the waters pouring down the flanks of its mountains, sweeping across its plains and foaming back into the sea. But I daresay it was a matter of eons rather than minutes.”

“And you say there are now lots and lots of painters, busy as bees, having a go at”—Troy waved an arm at the prospect— “all that.”

“That’s right. From pretty peeps to competent posters and from factual statements to solemn abstractions. You name it.”

“How brave of them all.”

“Only some of them think so.” Alleyn took her arm. “Some have got pretty near the bones. If things had been different,” he said, “would you have wanted to paint?”

“Not at once. Make charcoal scribbles, perhaps. And after a time make some more with paint. Bones,” said Troy vaguely. “The anatomy of the land. Something might come of it.”

“Shall we see what happens if we follow round the shore?”

“If you like. We’ll either fetch up in the front of the house or get ourselves bushed. After all we are on an island.”

“All right, smarty-pants. Come on.”

A rough track followed the margin of the lake, for the most part clear of the bush but occasionally cutting through it. In places storm water poured across the path. They came to a little footbridge over a deep-voiced creek. Here the bush was dense but farther on it thinned enough to allow glimpses, surprising close at hand, of the west wall of the house. They were walking parallel with the path that skirted the concert chamber. The ground here was soft under their feet.

They walked in single file. Alleyn stopped short and held up his hand. He turned and laid his finger on his lips.

Ahead of them, hidden by the bush, someone was speaking.

The voice was so low, so very quiet that it was almost toneless and quite without a personality. It was impossible to catch what was said or guess at who said it.

Alleyn signaled to Troy to stay where she was and himself moved soundlessly along the path. He was drawing closer to the voice. He remembered that at a point opposite the first window of the concert chamber there was a garden seat, and he fancied the speaker might be sitting on it. He moved on and in another moment or two realized that he should be able to make out the sense of what was said and then that it was said in Italian. At first the phrases slid past incomprehensibly and then he began to tune in.

“—I have acted in this way because of what is being— hinted — suggested by you. All of you. And because when these policemen come you may try—”

Alleyn lost the next phrase or two. There were gaps as if the speaker paused for a reply and none was forthcoming. The voice was raised “—this is why — I have anticipated — I warn you — can go further and if necessary I will. Now. How do you answer? You understand, do you not? I mean what I say? I will act as I have said? Very well. Your answer? Speak up. I cannot hear you.”

Nor could Alleyn. There had been some sort of reply— breathy — short — incomprehensible.

“I am waiting.”

Into the silence that followed a bell-bird, close at hand, dropped his clear remark ending with a derisive clatter. Then followed, scarcely perceptible, a disturbance, an intrusion, nowhere — somewhere— coming closer and louder: the commonplace beat of a helicopter.

Inside the house a man shouted. Windows were thrown open.

“Il elicottero!” exclaimed the voice. There was a stifled response from his companion and sounds of rapid retreat.

“Here are the cops, darling!” said Alleyn.

“Rapture! Rapture! I suppose,” said Troy. “Will you go and meet them?”

“It may be a case of joining in the rush, but yes, I think I’d better.”

“Rory — what’ll be the drill?”

“Unusual, to say the least. I suppose I introduce them to Reece unless he’s already introduced himself, and when that’s effected I’ll hand over my file and remain on tap for questioning.”

“Will you use the studio?”

“I’d prefer the study, but doubt if we’ll get it. Look, my love, after lunch will you take to the studio if it’s available? Or if you can’t stand that anymore, our room? I know you must have had them both, but perhaps you might suffer them again, for a bit. Carmichael will look in and so will I, of course, but I don’t know—”

“I’ll be as right as rain. I might even try a few tentative notes—”

“Might you? Truly? Marvelous,” he said. “I’ll see you round to the front of the house.”

Their path took a right turn through the bush and came out beyond the garden seat. On the gravel walk in front of the house stood Maria with her arms folded, a black shawl over her head, staring up at the helicopter, now close overhead and deafening.

“Good morning, Maria,” Alleyn shouted, cheerfully. “Here are the police.”

She glowered.

“I have been meaning to speak to you: when they have completed their examination, I think you’ll be permitted to perform your office. I shall recommend that you are.”

She stared balefully at him from under her heavy brows. Her lips formed a soundless acknowledgment: “Grazie tante.”

Hanley came running out of the house, pulling on a jacket over his sweater.

“Oh, hul-lo, Mr. Alleyn,” he cried. “Thank goodness. I’m the Official Welcome. The Boss Man told me to collect you and here you are. Ben’ troveto, if that’s what they say. You will come, won’t you? I thought he ought to be there in person but no, he’s receiving them in the library. You haven’t seen the library have you, Mrs. Alleyn? My dear, smothered in synthetic leather. Look! That contraption’s alighting! Do let us hurry.”

Troy went up the front steps to the house. Signor Lattienzo was there, having apparently stepped out of the entrance. Alleyn saw him greet her with his usual exuberance. She waved.

“Mr. Alleyn, please!” cried the distracted Hanley and led the way at a canter.

They arrived at the clearing as the helicopter landed and were raked with the unnatural gale from its propeller. Hanley let out an exasperated screech and clutched his blond hair. The engine stopped.

In the silence that followed, Alleyn felt as if he was involved in some Stoppard-like time slip and was back suddenly in the middle of a routine job. The three men who climbed out of the helicopter wore so unmistakably the marks of their calling, townish suits on large heavily muscled bodies, felt hats, sober shirts and ties. Sharp eyes and an indescribable air of taking over. Their equipment was handed down: cases and a camera. The fourth man who followed was slight, tweedy, and preoccupied. He carried a professional bag. Police surgeon, thought Alleyn.

The largest of the men advanced to Alleyn.

“Chief Superintendent Alleyn?” the large man said. “Hazelmere. Very glad indeed to see you, sir. Meet Dr. Winslow. Detective Sergeant Franks, Detective Sergeant Barker.”

Alleyn shook hands. The police all had enormous hands and excruciating grips and prolonged the ceremony with great warmth.

“I understand you’ve had a spot of bother,” said Inspector Hazelmere.

“If I may butt in,” Hanley said anxiously. “Inspector, Mr. Reece hopes—” and he delivered his invitation to the library.

“Very kind, I’m sure,” acknowledged Hazelmere. “You’ll be his secretary, sir? Mr. Hanley? Is that correct? Well now, if it’s all the same to Mr. Reece, I think it might be best if we took a look at the scene of the fatality. And if the Chief Superintendent would be kind enough to accompany us, he can put us in the picture, which will save a lot of time and trouble when we see Mr. Reece.”

“Oh,” said Hanley. “Oh, yes. I see. Well”—he threw a troubled glance at Alleyn—“if Mr. Alleyn will—”

“Yes, of course,” said Alleyn.

“Yes. Well, I’ll just convey your message to Mr. Reece. I’m sure he’ll understand,” said Hanley uneasily.

“I suggest,” said Alleyn, “that you might ask Dr. Carmichael to join us. I’m sure Dr. Winslow would be glad to see him.”

“Are you? Yes. Of course.”

“Thank you very much, Mr. Hanley,” said Hazelmere, blandly dismissive.

Hanley hesitated for a second or two, said, “Yes, well—” again, and set off for the house.

Alleyn said: “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you. You’ll understand what a tricky position I’ve been in. No official authority but expected to behave like everybody’s idea of an infallible sleuth.”

“Is that a fact, sir?” said Mr. Hazelmere. He then paid Alleyn some rather toneless compliments, fetching up with the remark that he knew nothing beyond the information conveyed by Les, the launch man, over a storm-battered telephone line, that a lady had been, as he put it, made away with and could they now view the remains and would Alleyn be kind enough to put them in the picture.

So Alleyn led them into the house and up to the first landing. He was careful, with suitable encomiums, to introduce Bert, who was laconic and removed his two armchairs from their barrier-like position before the door. Dr. Carmichael arrived and was presented, Alleyn unlocked the door, and they all went into the room.

Back to square one. Blades of cool air slicing in through the narrowly opened windows, the sense of damp curtains, dust, stale scent, and a pervasive warning of mortality, shockingly emphasized when Alleyn and Dr. Carmichael drew away the black satin sheet.

Hazelmere made an involuntary exclamation, which he converted into a clearance of the throat. Nobody spoke or moved and then Detective Sergeant Franks whispered, “Christ!” It sounded more like a prayer than an oath.

“What was the name?” Hazelmere asked.

“Of course,” Alleyn said, “you don’t know, do you?”

“The line was bad. I missed a lot of what the chap was saying.”

“He didn’t know either. We communicated by various forms of semaphore.”

“Is that a fact? Fancy!”

“She was a celebrated singer. In the world class. The tops, in fact.”

“Not,” exclaimed Dr. Winslow, “Isabella Sommita? It can’t be!”

“It is, you know,” said Dr. Carmichael.

“You better have a look, doc,” Hazelmere suggested.

“Yes. Of course.”

“If you’re thinking of moving her, we’ll just let Sergeant Barker and Sergeant Franks in first, doc,” said Hazelmere. “For photos and dabs.”

Alleyn explained that he had used his own professional camera and had improvised fingerprinting tactics. “I thought it might be as well to do this in case of postmortem changes. Dr. Carmichael and I disturbed nothing and didn’t touch her. I daresay the results won’t be too hot and I think you’d better not depend on them. While they’re doing their stuff,” he said to Hazelmere, “would you like to get the picture?”

“Too right I would,” said the Inspector and out came his notebook.

And so to the familiar accompaniment of clicks and flashes, Alleyn embarked on an orderly and exhaustive report, event after event as they fell out over the past three days, including the Strix-Marco element, the puzzle of the keys, and the outcome of the opera. He gave a list of the inmates and guests in the Lodge. He spoke with great clarity and care, without hesitation or repetition. Hazelmere paused, once, and looked up at him.

“Am I going too fast?” Alleyn asked.

“It’s not that, sir,” Hazelmere said. “It’s the way you give it out. Beautiful!”

Succinct though it was, the account had taken some time. Franks and Barker had finished. They and the two doctors who had covered the body and retired to the far end of the room to consult, now collected round Alleyn, listening.

When he had finished he said: “I’ve made a file covering all this stuff and a certain amount of backgrounds — past history and so on. You might like to see it. I’ll fetch it, shall I?”

When he had gone Dr. Winslow said: “Remarkable.”

“Isn’t it?” said Dr. Carmichael with a slightly proprietory air.

“You’ll never hear better,” Inspector Hazelmere pronounced. He addressed himself to the doctors. “What’s the story, then, gentlemen?”

Dr. Winslow said he agreed with the tentative opinion formed by Alleyn and Dr. Carmichael: that on a superficial examination the appearances suggested that the deceased had been anesthetized and then asphyxiated and that the stiletto had been driven through the heart after death.

“How long after?” Hazelmere asked.

“Hard to say. After death the blood follows the law of gravity and sinks. The very scant effusion here suggested that this process was well advanced. The postmortem would be informative.”

Alleyn returned with the file and suggested that Inspector Hazelmere, the two doctors, and he go to the studio leaving Sergeants Barker and Franks to extend their activities to the room and bathroom. They had taken prints from the rigid hands of the Sommita and were to look for any that disagreed with them. Particularly, Alleyn suggested, on the bottom left-hand drawer of the dressing table, the gold handbag therein, and the key in the bag. The key and the bag were to be replaced. He explained why.

“The room had evidently been thoroughly swept and dusted that morning, so anything you find will have been left later in the day. You can expect to find Maria’s and possibly Mr. Reece’s, but we know of nobody else who may have entered the room. The housekeeper, Mrs. Bacon, may have done so. You’ll find her very cooperative.”

“So it may mean getting dabs from the lot of them,” said Hazelmere.

“It may, at that.”

“By the way, sir. That was a very bad line we spoke on. Temporary repairs after the storm. Excuse me, but did you ask me to bring a brace and bit?”

“I did, yes.”

“Yes. I thought it sounded like that.”

“Did you bring a brace and bit, Inspector?”

“Yes. I chanced it.”

“Large-sized bit?”

“Several bits. Different sizes.”

“Splendid.”

“Might I ask—?”

“Of course. Come along to the studio and I’ll explain. But first — take a look at the fancy woodwork on the wardrobe doors.”

ii

The conference in the studio lasted for an hour and at its conclusion Dr. Winslow discussed plans for the removal of the body. The Lake was almost back to normal and Les had come over in the launch with the mail. “She’ll be sweet as a millpond by nightfall,” he reported. The police helicopter was making a second trip, bringing two uniform constables, and would take Dr. Winslow back to Rivermouth. He would arrange for a mortuary van to be sent out and the body would be taken across by launch to meet it. The autopsy would be performed as soon as the official pathologist was available: probably that night.

“And now,” said Hazelmere, “I reckon we lay on this— er — experiment, don’t we?”

“Only if you’re quite sure you’ll risk it. Always remembering that if it flops you may be in for some very nasty moments.”

“I appreciate that. Look, Mr. Alleyn, if you’d been me, would you have risked it?”

“Yes,” said Alleyn, “I would. I’d have told myself I was a bloody fool but I’d have risked it.”

“That’s good enough for me,” said Hazelmere. “Let’s go.”

“Don’t you think that perhaps Mr. Reece has been languishing rather a long time in the library?”

“You’re dead right. Dear me, yes. I better go down.”

But there was no need for Hazelmere to go down. The studio door opened and Mr. Reece walked in.

Alleyn thought he was probably very angry indeed.

Not that his behavior was in any way exceptionable. He did not scold and he did not shout. He stood stock-still in his own premises and waited for somebody else to perform. His mouth was tightly closed and the corners severely compressed.

With his head, metaphysically, lowered to meet an icy breeze, Alleyn explained that they had thought it best first to make an official survey and for Inspector Hazelmere, whom he introduced and who was given a stony acknowledgment, to be informed of all the circumstances before troubling Mr. Reece. Mr. Reece slightly inclined his head. Alleyn then hurriedly introduced Dr. Winslow, who was awarded a perceptibly less glacial reception.

“As you are now at liberty,” Mr. Reece pronounced, “perhaps you will be good enough to come down to the library, where we will not be disturbed. I shall be glad to learn what steps you propose to take.”

Hazelmere, to Alleyn’s satisfaction, produced his own line of imperturbability and said blandly that the library would no doubt be very convenient. Mr. Reece, then pointedly addressing himself to Alleyn, said that luncheon had been postponed until two o’clock and would be in the nature of a cold buffet to which the guests would help themselves when so inclined. It was now one-twenty.

“In the meantime,” Mr. Reece magnificently continued, “I will take it as a favor if you will extend my already deep obligation to you by joining us in the library.”

Alleyn thought there would be nothing Hazelmere would enjoy less than having him, Alleyn, on the sideline, a silent observer of his investigatory techniques.

He said that he had promised to look in on Troy. He added (truthfully) that she suffered from occasional attacks of migraine and (less truthfully) that one had threatened this morning. Mr. Reece expressed wooden regrets and hoped to see him as soon as it was convenient. Alleyn felt as if they were both repeating memorized bits of dialogue from some dreary play.

Mr. Reece said: “Shall we?” to Hazelmere and led the way out of the studio. Hazelmere turned in the doorway, and Alleyn rapidly indicated that he was returning to the bedroom. The Inspector stuck up his vast thumb and followed Mr. Reece to the stairs.

Alleyn shut the door and Dr. Carmichael, who had continued his now familiar role of self-obliteration, rose up and asked if Hazelmere really meant to carry out the Plan.

“Yes, he does, and I hope to God he’ll do himself no harm by it.”

“Not for the want of warning.”

“No. But it was I who concocted it.”

“What’s the first step?”

“We’ve got to fix Maria asking for, or being given unasked, permission to lay out the body. Hazelmere had better set it up that she’ll be told when she may do it.”

“Suppose she’s gone off the idea?”

“That’s a sickening prospect, isn’t it? But we’re hoping the opportunity it offers will do the trick. I’m going along now to get those two chaps onto it.”

Dr. Carmichael said, “Alleyn, if you can spare a moment, would you be very kind and go over the business about the keys? I know it, but I’d like to be reminded.”

“All right. There are at least four keys to the bedroom. Maria had one, which I took possession of, the Sommita another, and young Bartholomew the third. Mrs. Bacon had the fourth. When Reece and the Sommita went upstairs after the concert they found Maria waiting. If the door had been locked she had let herself in with her own key. The Sommita threw a violent temperament, gave them what for, kicked them out, and locked the door after them. They have both said individually that they distinctly heard the key turn in the lock. Maria returned later with a hot drink, let herself in with her own key, and found her mistress murdered. There was no sight anywhere on any surface or on the floor or on the body, of the Sommita’s key. I found it subsequently in her evening bag neatly disposed and wrapped at the bottom of a drawer. Reece is sure she didn’t have the bag when they took her upstairs. The people who fussed round her in her dressing room say she hadn’t got it with her and indeed in that rig it would have been an incongruous object for her to carry — even offstage. Equally it’s impossible to imagine her at the height of one of her towering rages, getting the key from wherever it was, putting it in the lock in the fraction of time between Reece or Maria, closing the door behind them and them both hearing the turn of the lock. And then meticulously getting out her evening bag, putting her key in it, and placing it in the drawer. It even was enclosed in one of those soft cloth bags women use to prevent gold mesh from catching in the fabric of things like stockings. That’s the story of the keys.”

“Yes. That’s right. That’s what I thought,” said Dr. Carmichael uneasily.

“What’s the matter?”

“It’s just — rather an unpleasant thought.”

“About the third key?”

“Yes!”

“Rupert Bartholomew had it. Maria came to his room, very late in the night, and said I’d sent her for it.”

“Did she, by God!”

“He gave it to her. Bert, asleep in the chairs across the doorway, woke up to find Maria trying to stretch across him and put the key in the lock.”

“She must have been dotty. What did she think she’d do? Open the door and swarm over his sleeping body?”

“Open the door, yes. It opens inwards. And chuck the key into the room. She was hell-bent on our finding it there. Close the door, which would remain unlocked: she couldn’t do anything about that. And when, as is probable, Bert wakes, throw a hysterical scene with all the pious drama about praying for the soul of the Sommita and laying her out.”

“Actually what did happen?”

“Bert woke up to find her generous personal equipment dangling over him. She panicked, dropped the key on him, and bolted. He collected it and gave it to me. So she is still keyless.”

“Could you ever prove all these theories?”

“If the plan works.”

“Maria, eh?” said Dr. Carmichael. “Well, of course, she does look — I mean to say—”

“We’ve got to remember,” Alleyn said, “that from the time Maria and Reece left the room and went downstairs and he joined his guests for dinner, Maria was in the staff sitting room perparing the hot drink. Mrs. Bacon and Marco and others of the staff can be called to prove it.”

Carmichael stared at him. “An alibi?” he said. “For Maria? That’s awkward.”

“In this game,” Alleyn said, “one learns to be wary of assumption.”

“I suppose I’m making one now. Very reluctantly.”

“The boy?”

“Yes.”

“Well, of course, he’s the prime suspect. One can turn on all the clichés: ‘lust turned to hatred,’ ‘humiliation,’ ‘breaking point’—the lot. He was supposedly in his room at the crucial time but could have slipped out, and he had his key to her room. He had motive and opportunity and he was in an extremely unstable condition.”

“Do the rest of them think—?”

“Some of them do. Hanley does, or behaves and drops hints as if he does. Maria, and Marco I fancy, have been telling everyone he’s the prime suspect. As I daresay the rest of the domestic staff believe, being aware, no doubt, of the changed relationship between the boy and the diva. And of course most of them witnessed the curtain speech and the fainting fit.”

“What about Lattienzo?”

‘Troy and I overheard the jocund maestro in the shrubbery or near it, and in far from merry pin, threatening an unseen person with an evidently damaging exposure if he or she continued to spread malicious gossip. He spoke in Italian and the chopper was approaching so I missed whole chunks of his discourse.”

“Who was he talking to?”

“Somebody perfectly inaudible.”

“Maria?”

“I think so. When we emerged she was handy. On the front steps watching the chopper. Lattienzo was not far off.”

“I thought Lattienzo was not in his usual ebullient form when he came up here just now.”

“You were right,” said Alleyn and gave an account of the interview.

“The Italian element with a vengeance,” said the doctor thoughtfully.

“I must go along and fix things up in that room and then hie me to the library and Mr. Reece’s displeasure. Look in on Troy, like a good chap, would you, and tell her this studio’s free? Do you mind? She’s in our bedroom.”

“I’m delighted,” said the gallant doctor.

And so Alleyn returned to the Sommita’s death chamber and found Sergeants Franks and Barker in dubious consultation. A brace and a selection of bits was laid out on a sheet of newspaper on the floor.

“The boss said you’d put us wise, sir,” said Franks.

“Right,” said Alleyn. He stood with his back to one of the exuberantly carved and painted wardrobe doors, felt behind him and bent his knees until his head was on a level with the stylized sunflower which framed it like a formalized halo. He made a funnel of his hand and looked through it at the covered body on the bed. Then he moved to the twin door and went through the same procedure.

“Yes,” he said, “it’ll work. It’ll work all right.”

He opened the doors.

The walk-in wardrobe was occupied but not crowded with dresses. He divided them and slid them on their hangers to opposite ends of the interior. He examined the inside of the doors, came out, and locked them.

He inspected the bits.

“This one will do,” he said and gave it, with the brace, to Sergeant Franks. “Plumb in the middle,” he said, putting his finger on the black center of the sunflower. “And slide that newspaper under to catch the litter. Very careful, now. No splintering, whatever you do. Which of you’s the joiner?”

“Aw heck!” said Franks to Barker, “what about you having a go, Merv.”

“I’m not fussy, thanks,” said Barker, backing off.

They looked uncomfortably at Alleyn.

“Well,” he said, “I asked for it and it looks as if I’ve bought it. If I make a fool of myself I can’t blame anyone else, can I? Give it here, Franks. Oh, God, it’s one of those push-me-pull-you brutes that shoot out at you when you least expect it.” He thumbed a catch and the business end duly shot out. “What did I tell you? You guide it, Franks, and hold it steady. Dead center. Anyone’d think we were defusing a bomb. Come on.”

“She’s new, sir. Sharp as a needle and greased.”

“Good.”

He raised the brace and advanced it. Franks guided the point of the bit. “Dead center, sir,” he said.

“Here goes, then,” said Alleyn.

He made a cautious preliminary pressure. “How’s that?”

“Biting, sir.”

“Straight as we go, then.” Alleyn pumped the brace.

A little cascade of wood dust trickled through the elaborate carving and fell on the newspaper.

“Nearly there,” he grunted presently, and a few seconds later the resistance was gone and he disengaged the tool.

At the black center of the sunflower was a black hole as wide as the iris of an eye and very inconspicuous. Alleyn blew away the remnants of wood dust that were trapped in curlicues, twisted a finger in the hole, and stood back. “Not too bad,” he said.

He opened the door. The hole was clean-cut.

“Now for the twin,” he said and gave the companion door the same treatment.

Then he went into the wardrobe and shut the doors. The interior smelt insufferably of La Sommita’s scent. He looked through one of the holes. He saw the body. Neatly framed. Underneath the black satin cover its arm, still raised in cadaveric spasm, seemed to point at him. He came out, shut and locked the wardrobe doors, and put the key in his pocket.

“It’ll do,” he said. “Will you two clean up? Very thoroughly? Before you do that, I think you should know why you’ve been called on to set this up and what we hope to achieve by it. Don’t you?”

They intimated by sundry noises that they did think so and he then told them of the next steps that would be taken, the procedure to be followed, and the hoped-for outcome. “And now I think perhaps one of you might relieve poor old Bert on the landing, and I’d suggest the other reports for duty to Mr. Hazelmere, who will probably be in the library. It opens off the entrance hall. Third on the right from the front. I’m going down there now. Here’s the key to this room. O.K.?”

“She’ll be right, sir,” said Franks and Barker together.

So Alleyn went down to the library.

It came as no surprise to find the atmosphere in that utterly neutral apartment tepid, verging on glacial. Inspector Hazelmere had his notebook at the ready. Mr. Reece sat at one of the neatly laden tables with the glaze of boredom veiling his pale regard. When Alleyn apologized for keeping him waiting, he raised his hand and let it fall as if words now failed him.

The Inspector, Alleyn thought, was not at the moment happy in his work though he put up a reasonable show of professional savoir-faire and said easily that he thought he had finished “bothering” Mr. Reece and believed he was now fully in the picture. Mr. Reece said woodenly that he was glad to hear it. An awkward silence followed, which he broke by addressing himself pointedly to Alleyn.

“Would you,” he said, “be good enough to show me where you found that book? I’ve been wondering about it.”

Alleyn led the way to the remote corner of the library and the obscure end of a top shelf. “It was here,” he said, pointing to the gap. “I could only just reach it.”

“I would require the steps,” said Mr. Reece. He put on his massive spectacles and peered. “It’s very badly lit,” he said. “The architect should have noticed that.”

Alleyn switched on the light.

“Thank you. I would like to see the book when you have finished with it. I suppose it has something to do with this family feud or vendetta or whatever, that she was so concerned about?”

“I would think so, yes.”

“It is strange that she never showed it to me. Perhaps that is because it is written in Italian. I would have expected her to show it to me,” he said heavily. “I would have expected her to feel it would give validity to her theory. I wonder how she came by it. It is very shabby. Perhaps it was secondhand.”

“Did you notice the name on the flyleaf? ‘M. V. Rossi’?”

“Rossi? Rossi!” he repeated, and stared at Alleyn. “But that was the name she did mention. On the rare occasions when she used a name. I recollect that she once said she wished my name did not resemble it. I thought this very farfetched but she seemed to be quite serious about it. She generally referred simply to the ‘nemico’ — meaning the enemy.”

“Perhaps, after all, it was not her book.”

“It was certainly not mine,” he said flatly.

“At some time — originally, I suppose — it has been the property of the ‘enemy.’ One wouldn’t have expected her to have acquired it.”

“You certainly would not,” Mr. Reece said emphatically. “Up there, was it? What sort of company was it keeping?”

Alleyn took down four of the neighboring books. One, a biography called La Voce, was written in Italian and seemed from cover to cover to be an unmodified rave about the Sommita. It was photographically illustrated, beginning with a portrait of a fat-legged infant, much befrilled, beringleted and beribboned, glowering on the lap, according to the caption, of “La Zia Giulia,” and ending with La Sommita receiving a standing ovation at a royal performance of Faust.

“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Reece. “The biography. I always intended to read it. It went into three editions. What are the others?”

One in English, one in Italian — both novels with a strong romantic interest. They were gifts to the Sommita, lavishly inscribed by admirers.

“Is the autobiography there?” asked Mr. Reece. “That meant a helluva lot to me. Yes sir. A helluva lot.” This piece of information was dealt out by Mr. Reece in his customary manner: baldly as if he were citing a quotation from Wall Street. For the first time he sounded definitely American.

“I’m sure it did,” Alleyn said.

“I never got round to reading it right through,” Mr. Reece confessed and then seemed to brighten up a little. “After all,” he pointed out, “she didn’t write it herself. But it was the thought that counted.”

“Quite. This seems, doesn’t it, to be a corner reserved for her own books?”

“I believe I remember, now I come to think of it, her saying something about wanting someplace for her own books. She didn’t appreciate the way they looked in her bedroom. Out of place.”

“Do you think she would have put them up there herself?”

Mr. Reece took off his spectacles and looked at Alleyn as if he had taken leave of his senses. “Bella?” he said. “Up there? On the steps?”

“Well, no. Silly of me. I’m sorry.”

“She would probably have told Maria to do it.”

“Ah, apropos! I don’t know,” Alleyn said, “whether Mr. Hazelmere had told you?” He looked at the Inspector, who slightly shook his head. “Perhaps we should—?”

“That’s so, sir,” said Hazelmere. “We certainly should.” He addressed himself to Mr. Reece. “I understand, sir, that Miss Maria Bennini has expressed the wish to perform the last duties and Mr. Alleyn pointed out that until the premises had been thoroughly investigated, the stattus” (so Mr. Hazelmere pronounced it) “quow must be maintained. That is now the case. So, if it’s acceptable to yourself, we will inform Miss Bennini and in due course—”

“Yes, yes. Tell her,” Mr. Reece said. His voice was actually unsteady. He looked at Alleyn almost as if appealing to him. “And what then?” he asked.

Alleyn explained about the arrangements for the removal of the body. “It will probably be at dusk or even after dark when they arrive at the lakeside,” he said. “The launch will be waiting.”

“I wish to be informed.”

Alleyn and Hazelmere said together: “Certainly, sir.”

“I will—” he hunted for the phrase. “I will see her off. It is the least I can do. If I had not brought her to this house—” He turned aside, and looked at the books without seeing them. Alleyn put them back on their shelf. “I’m not conversant with police procedure in New Zealand,” Mr. Reece said. “I understand it follows the British rather than the American practice. It may be quite out of order, at this juncture, to ask whether you expect to make an arrest in the foreseeable future.”

Hazelmere again glanced at Alleyn, who remained silent. “Well, sir,” Hazelmere said, “it’s not our practice to open up wide, like, until we are very, very sure of ourselves. I think I’m in order if I say that we hope quite soon to be in a position to take positive action.”

“Is that your view, too, Chief Superintendent?”

“Yes,” Alleyn said. “That’s my view.”

“I am very glad to hear it. You wish to see Maria, do you not? Shall I send for her?”

“If it’s not putting you out, sir, we’d be much obliged,” said Inspector Hazelmere, who seemed to suffer from a compulsion to keep the interview at an impossibly high-toned level.

Mr. Reece used the telephone. “Find Maria,” he said, “and ask her to come to the library. Yes, at once. Very well, then, find her. Ask Mrs. Bacon to deal with it.”

He replaced the receiver. “Staff coordination has gone to pieces,” he said. “I asked for service and am told the person in question is sulking in her room.”

A long silence followed. Mr. Reece made no effort to break it. He went to the window and looked out at the Lake. Hazelmere inspected his notes, made two alterations, and under a pretense of consulting Alleyn about them, said in a slurred undertone: “Awkward if she won’t.”

“Hellishly,” Alleyn agreed.

Voices were raised in the hall, Hanley’s sounding agitated, Mrs. Bacon’s masterful. A door banged. Another voice shouted something that might have been an insult and followed it up with a raucous laugh. Marco, Alleyn thought. Hanley, all eyes and teeth, made an abrupt entrance.

“I’m terribly sorry, sir,” he said. “There’s been a little difficulty. Just coming.”

Mr. Reece glanced at him with contempt. He gave a nervous titter and withdrew only to reappear and stand, door in hand, to admit Maria in the grip of Mrs. Bacon.

“I’m extremely sorry, Mr. Reece,” said Mrs. Bacon in a high voice. “Maria has been difficult.”

She released her hold as if she expected her catch would bolt and when she did not, left the arena. Hanley followed her, shutting the door but not before an indignant contralto was heard in the hall: “No, this is too much. I can take no more of this,” said Miss Dancy.

“You handle this one, eh?” Hazelmere murmured to Alleyn.

But Mr. Reece was already in charge.

He said: “Come here.” Maria walked up to him at once and waited with her arms folded, looking at the floor.

“You are making scenes, Maria,” said Mr. Reece, “and that is foolish of you: you must behave yourself. Your request is to be granted; see to it that you carry out your duty decently and with respect.”

Maria intimated rapidly and in Italian that she would be a model of decorum, or words to that effect, and that she was now satisfied and grateful and might the good God bless Signor Reece.

“Very well,” said Mr. Reece. “Listen to the Chief Superintendent and do as he tells you.”

He nodded to Alleyn and walked out of the room.

Alleyn told Maria that she was to provide herself with whatever she needed and wait in the staff sitting room. She would not be disturbed.

“You found her. You have seen what it is like,” he said. “You are sure you want to do this?”

Maria crossed herself and said vehemently that she was sure.

“Very well. Do as I have said.”

There was a tap on the door and Sergeant Franks came in.

Hazelmere said: “You’ll look after Miss Bennini, Franks, won’t you? Anything she may require.”

“Sir,” said Sergeant Franks.

Maria looked as if she thought she could do without Sergeant Franks and intimated that she wished to be alone with her mistress.

“If that’s what you want,” said Hazelmere.

“To pray. There should be a priest.”

“All that will be attended to,” Hazelmere assured her. “Later on.”

“When?”

“At the interment,” he said flatly.

She glared at him and marched out of the room.

“All right,” Hazelmere said to Franks. “Later on. Keep with it. You know what you’ve got to do.”

“Sir,” said Sergeant Franks and followed her.

“Up we go,” said Alleyn.

He and Hazelmere moved into the hall and finding it empty, ran upstairs to the Sommita’s bedroom.

iii

It was stuffy in the wardrobe now they had locked themselves in. The smell was compounded of metallic cloth, sequins, fur, powder, scent, and of the body when it was still alive and wore the clothes and left itself on them. It was as if the Sommita had locked herself in with her apparel.

“Cripes, it’s close in here,” said Inspector Hazelmere.

“Put your mouth to the hole,” Alleyn suggested.

“That’s an idea, too,” Hazelmere said and began noisily to suck air through his peephole. Alleyn followed his own advice. Thus they obliterated the two pencils of light that had given some shape to the darkness as their eyes became adjusted to it.

“Makes you think of those funny things jokers on the telly get up to,” Hazelmere said. “You know. Crime serials.” And after a pause. “They’re taking their time, aren’t they?”

Alleyn grunted. He applied his eye to his peephole. Again, suddenly confronting him, was the black satin shape on the bed: so very explicit, so eloquent of the body inside. The shrouded limb, still rigid as a yardarm, pointing under its funeral sheet — at him.

He thought: But shouldn’t the rigidity be going off now? And tried to remember the rules about cadaveric spasm as opposed to rigor mortis.

“I told Franks to give us the office,” said Hazelmere. “You know. Unlock the door and open it a crack and say something loud.”

“Good.”

“What say we open these doors, then? Just for a second or two? Sort of fan them to change the air? I suffer from hay fever,” Hazelmere confessed.

“All right. But we’d better be quick about it, hadn’t we? Ready?”

Their keys clicked.

“Right.”

They opened the doors wide and flung them to and fro, exchanging the wardrobe air for the colder and more ominously suspect air of the room. Something fell on Alleyn’s left foot.

“Bloody hell!” said Hazelmere. “I’ve dropped the bloody key.”

“Don’t move. They’re coming. Here! Let me.”

Alleyn collected it from the floor, pushed it in the keyhole, and shut and locked both doors. He could feel Hazelmere’s bulk heaving slightly against his own arm.

They looked through their spy holes. Alleyn’s was below the level of his eyes and he had to bend his knees. The bedroom door was beyond their range of sight but evidently it was open. There was the sound of something being set down, possibly on the carpet. Detective Sergeant Franks said: “There you are, then, lady. I’ll leave you to it. If you want anything knock on the door. Same thing when you’ve finished. Knock.”

And Maria: “Give me the key. I let myself out.”

“Sorry, lady. That’s not my orders. Don’t worry. I won’t run away. Just knock when you’re ready. See you.”

The bedroom door shut firmly. They could hear the key turn in the lock.

Alleyn could still see, framed by his spy hole, the body and beyond it a section of the dressing table.

As if by the action of a shutter in a camera they were blotted out. Maria was not two feet away and Alleyn looked into her eyes. He thought for a sickening moment that she had seen the hole in the sunflower but she was gone only to reappear by the dressing table — stooping — wrenching open a drawer — a bottom drawer.

Hazelmere gave him a nudge. Alleyn remembered that he commanded a slightly different and better view than his own of the bottom left-hand end of the dressing table.

But now Maria stood up and her hands were locked round a gold meshed bag. They opened it and inverted it and shook it out on the dressing table and her right hand fastened on the key that fell from it.

Hazelmere shifted but Alleyn, without moving his eye from the spy hole, reached out and touched him.

Maria now stood over the shrouded body and looked at it, one would have said, speculatively.

With an abrupt movement, more feline than human, she knelt and groped under the shroud — she scuffled deep under the body, which jolted horridly.

The black shroud slithered down the raised arm and by force of its own displaced weight slid to the floor.

And the arm dropped.

It fell across her neck. She screamed like a trapped ferret and with a grotesque and frantic movement, rolled away and scrambled to her feet.

“Now,” Alleyn said.

He and Hazelmere unlocked their doors and walked out into the room.

Hazelmere said: “Maria Bennini, I arrest you on a charge—”