Джорджетт Хейер - Duplicate Death

"We didn't miss it, sir!" protested Thirsk, drawing a cigarette from the packet. "Only it's so indistinct no one could stand up in a Court of Law and swear to it!"

The Inspector raised his eyes from the photographs, both now held fan-shaped in his hand. "You are thinking that there is an impression of Mrs. Haddington's finger, superimposed on Miss Birtley's third and fourth fingers," he said. "I am of Thirsk's opinion: I would not care to swear to it. The whole is verra much blurred."

"Not so blurred but what you saw what I was after," Hemingway pointed out.

"Ma seadh! But it may be that Miss Birtley never had all five fingers on the instrument, and Mrs. Haddington's prints are what we would expect to find."

"Now tell me the story that girl told was all lies, and you'll be happy!" recommended Hemingway. "All right, Thirsk: I've done with 'em for the moment! Take 'em away!" He waited until the young finger-print expert had withdrawn, and then said: "Let's have it, Sandy! True, was it?"

"I am of the opinion that it was true," Grant said. "I would not set great store by anything a lassie in her position would say, because well I know they will lie to one for no reason at all, unless it might be that they do not like the police. But I think Mrs. Haddington looked into the cloakroom before any of the guests arrived, and I am verra sure that she scolded Elsie for taking the wrong towel from the linen cupboard. It is coloured towels that they use in that house, and Elsie took one of the peach ones that go in Miss Haddington's room, instead of one of the apricot ones that are, for the cloakroom." He smiled. "I would not myself know the difference! Be that as it may, Elsie did not see any wire upon the shelf when she changed the towel. So she says, but that might not be true. There is no reason why she should deny that she saw it, if indeed she did, but och! 7-ha eagal oirre! - She is afraid we might charge her with the murder, the silly creature! Yet I do not think that she saw it. Now the other lass - Gwenny Mapperley - is not afraid: she is a bold one, and she would be glad to do her mistress as much harm as she can. She leaves, she tells me, at the month. She talked - och, how she talked! - of all the trouble there has been in the house, and how much to believe I will leave you to judge. There are first the servants, who will not stay with Mrs. Haddington, except the butler and the chef, to whom she pays huge wages: there is then Miss Birtley, whom the servants do not like - but I think that is jealousy, for she is also in Mrs. Haddington's employment, and yet above them. When Mrs. Haddington is rude to her, she gives her some verra sharp back-answers. Indeed, from all I hear she has a hot temper! There was a fine quarrel between them this morning! There has also been trouble with Miss Cynthia - I caught a wee glimpse of her, Chief she is the bonniest lassie you ever did see! - but such tantrums, and such gallivanting about the town! She was not in her bed last night until past three o'clock, but dancing at some place or other with the young lord - Guisborough, is it? It is not decent! But for all Mrs. Haddington has set her heart on making a grand match for the lassie, they say she doesn't favour the lord, but it is Mr.. Harte she has in her eye. But the servants know as well as you or I that it is Miss Birtley and not Miss Haddington that brings that young man to the house. And I think you were maybe right when you thought that Mrs. Haddington had a hold over the Lady Nest, for Gwenny Mapperley has heard Mrs. Haddington speaking to her on the telephone, as though she had only to give her orders and her ladyship would obey them."

"You have been having a good gossip, haven't you?" said Hemingway. "Allowing for a bit of exaggeration, I shouldn't wonder if you'd been given a fair picture, though. Did your little pal, Gwenny, say anything about the late Seaton-Carew?"

"She did, but I think that was mostly spite against her mistress. He was paying great attention to Miss Cynthia, and I don't doubt the lass's mother would not like that; but whether she herself was his mistress or not they none of them know, whatever tales they may tell. She has not been that since she came to live in London."

"What do they make of her reaction to his death? She struck me as pretty cool, when I saw her."

"How can one tell with that kind? The servants will have you think she hasn't turned a hair; but the doctor went to see her today, and was with her quite a while, so maybe she is more upset than she will show." He added: "It was Dr Westruther. He will maybe have mentioned it to you?"

"No, he didn't, because I didn't ask him. It doesn't surprise me, though - except that I didn't somehow take him for the sort of chap who trots round to call on his patients, with a little bag in his hand. Still, I daresay he makes her pay through the nose for a visit from him: he's got a very expensive decor to keep up, I can tell you."

"Again the doctor has turned up, Chief."

"They do. If you're thinking that it was him twisted that wire round the late Seaton-Carew's neck, let me tell you that he'd have a lot more classy ways of doing a chap in than that! No, the more I consider the facts, the more I think we'll go round to Charles Street, Sandy, and have a real heart-to-heart with Mrs. Haddington."

"You still think it was she?" the Inspector said curiously.

"I won't go as far as to say that: I don't know, but I think everything points to her."

"Seall, Chief, with what we have learnt this day, is it still Mrs. Haddington with you?" protested the Inspector. "It was motive you wanted, and which of them has the motive but Poulton?"

"I know," Hemingway replied. He pointed the pencil he was holding at the telephone on his desk. "That's what's sticking in my gullet, Sandy! Has been, from the start. It doesn't matter what we discover about anyone else: I keep on coming back to it."

"Because you have seen prints that are verra like Mrs. Haddington's, on an instrument she would naturally handle?"

"Because I've got a strong notion those prints were made after Miss Birtley had laid down the receiver, and because I never did see how the receiver came to be hanging down, unless it had been deliberately put like that. Now, don't suggest that it got knocked off the table in a struggle, because though I may look gullible, I'm not really gullible at all. Seaton-Carew might have kicked the table over, but he didn't. He never touched the receiver -"

"Could he have grasped the wire?" Grant said doubtfully.

"No, and if he had, he'd have had the whole instrument off the table. But he wouldn't. You let me twist something round your neck, and see what your reaction is so far as you've time to react at all, which wouldn't be very far, according to what Dr Yoxall tells me! You won't grab at telephones: you'll grab at what's round your throat, my lad."

The Inspector was silent. Hemingway rose, and took his overcoat off the stand in one corner of the room. "We won't waste any time," he said. "We'll go along to Charles Street now."

"They will be dressing for dinner!" protested Grant.

"Yes, I don't suppose we shall be at all popular," agreed Hemingway. "I shan't lose any sleep over that. In fact, I'm hoping that's just what they are doing, because we shall be sure of catching them before they go - what's that word of yours? - gallivanting off round the town! Come on!"

The Inspector had not exaggerated the spirit of unrest brooding over the house in Charles Street. In defiance of her mother's wishes, Cynthia had spent the previous evening with Lord Guisborough, at a night-club; and, returning home in the small hours of the morning, had flung herself into bed without troubling even to remove the make-up from her face. Her mother, coming out of her own bedroom in a trailing velvet dressing-gown, met her on the landing, and exclaimed reproachfully. Cynthia, declaring with far from perfect diction that she refused to be spied upon, went into her room, and slammed the door.