Scandalous Behavior

38

Stone was in the library, reading some correspondence sent to him by Joan, when Geoffrey appeared. “Excuse me, Mr. Barrington, but Deputy Inspector Holmes is here and wishes to see you.”

“All right, Geoffrey, send him in.” He rose to greet the policeman, whose demeanor was, as always, neutral. Stone waved him to a seat. “How can I help you, Inspector?”

“Mr. Barrington, during your time at Windward Hall have you become aware of Sir Charles’s, ah, family situation?”

“In what respect?”

“In respect to the parentage of his children.”

“Ah.” Stone thought about it for a moment and decided to tell what he knew; this man was not going to let go. “I have become aware of that,” he said.

Holmes produced a notebook. “May I ask how you learned of it?”

“I suppose you could say, from the horse’s mouth.”

“Could you be explicit about which horse?”

“It was the Sunday night when Sir Charles gave a large party, at which he announced his imminent marriage to the former Elizabeth Bowen. I was sitting on that sofa” — he pointed to the one facing the fire — “and Sir Charles entered the room with another man, who turned out to be his son.”

“Leslie?”

“If you say so. I was sort of scrunched down on the sofa, having a brandy, so they couldn’t see me, and they spoke freely.”

“And what did they have to say?”

“Let’s see: the son complained about his father’s selling the house to me, instead of keeping it in the family, which I took to mean leaving it to him, or perhaps his sister, or both.”

“And how did Sir Charles respond to that?”

“He said that the son’s mother had left both her children very well fixed, and he saw no need to enrich them further. Do you know if that is correct?”

“If I may be indiscreet, I believe it is widely thought in the county that most, if not all, of the family money derived from the parentage of the wife, and that their relationship was based at least as much on economics as on familial affection.”

“I see. Well, the conversation — or at least, Sir Charles — continued as he explained his son’s parentage to him.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Holmes said, displaying unusual relish, for him. “How did he explain it?”

“It went back to an accident many years ago when they were sailing with a group of friends on Sir Charles’s yacht. The boy — Leslie, you say?”

“Yes.”

“The boy had an accident in which he was cut and bleeding very badly. They got him to a local hospital, but he needed a blood transfusion. Apparently neither of the parents had the same blood type as Leslie.”

Holmes consulted his notes. “That would be Type A Positive, for both of them,” he said.

“Yes, but the boy had a rarer type.”

“That would be Type B Negative,” Holmes read from his notes. “The rarest, I believe.”

“If you say so. The friends were tested and, fortunately, one of the men present had the correct type. A transfusion was given, and the boy recovered.”

“You see the contradiction here?” Holmes asked.

“Yes, it would appear that, since neither of the parents had the rare type, the son would have been fathered by another man.”

“Quite so. A man with Type B Negative. Did Sir Charles mention the name of the blood donor?”

“No, he did not. I had the impression that he wished to deny his son knowledge of his parentage, perhaps out of spite. He may have had some other reason, of course — I wouldn’t know about that.”

“These circumstances are terribly interesting,” Holmes said mildly.

“I suppose they are, in a gossipy sort of way, but how does that concern the police?”

“As a possible motive for murder.”

“Now,” Stone said, “you’ve lost me.”

“Well, as investigator to former investigator, if I may, let us suppose that the owner of the Type B Negative on that day was Sir Richard Curtis.”

“All right. You’re saying that Sir Charles could have murdered him out of outrage that he had fathered a child with Lady Bourne?”

“Yes, I am.”

“But the accident and the knowledge of the blood types occurred decades ago, apparently. That would be a very long time to hold a grudge, to keep outrage on the boil, would it not? Especially since Sir Charles and Sir Richard have been presumed by everybody who knows them, that I have met, to have been the best of friends during those decades.”

“I’ll grant you that.”

“And, in any case, you have a confessor to the murder in the person of the brigadier.”

“Wilfred Burns, yes. But what would his motive be?”

“I never met the man, only saw him from a distance a couple of times, so I wouldn’t know.”

“I’ve been looking into the backgrounds of the principals in this case,” the inspector said, “and in going over their military records I have discovered that Sir Richard was not the only man in the neighborhood who had Type B Negative blood.”

“Oh?”

“The brigadier was Type B Negative, as well.”

“Interesting, but how would that give the brigadier a motive for murder?”

“Guilt, perhaps.”

“Guilt? Guilt over what?”

Stone heard a chiming noise, and the inspector withdrew a watch on a chain from his waistcoat and stared at it, apparently appalled at what he saw. “Good heavens,” he said, rising, “I’m afraid I am late for a very important appointment. Please excuse me.”

He left the room abruptly, closing the door behind him, leaving Stone baffled.