Ngaio Marsh - Tied Up in Tinsel

Mr. Smith came in, however, and looked on with his customary air of sardonic amusement and sharp appraisal. Particularly, Alleyn thought, did Mr. Smith observe his adopted nephew. What did he make of Hilary and his antics? Was there a kind of ironic affection, an exasperation at Hilary’s mannerisms and — surely? — an underlying anxiety? Hilary made a particularly effusive foray upon Wrayburn and a group of disconcerted subordinates, who stopped chewing and stared at their socks. Mr. Smith caught Alleyn’s eye and winked.

The dining-room became redolent of exotic smells.

Presently Wrayburn made his way to Alleyn.

“Will it be all right, now,” he asked, “if I get these chaps moving? The stream’s coming down very fresh and we don’t want to be marooned, do we?”

“Of course you don’t. I hope my lot get through all right.”

“When do you expect them?”

“I should think by daylight. They’re driving through the night. They’ll look in at the station.”

“If they’re short on waders,” said Wrayburn, “we can fix them up. They may need them.” He cleared his throat and addressed his troops: “Well, now. Chaps.”

Hilary was effusive in farewells, and at one moment seemed to totter on the brink of a speech but caught sight of Mr. Smith and refrained.

Alleyn saw the men off. He thanked them for their work and told them he’d have been very happy to have carried on with their help and might even be obliged to call on them again though he was sure they hoped not. They made embarrassed but gratified noises, and he watched them climb into their shining gear and file off in the direction of the vans that had brought them.

Wrayburn lingered. “Well,” he said. “So long, then. Been quite a pleasure.”

“Of a sort?”

“Well—”

“I’ll keep in touch.”

“Hope things work out,” Wrayburn said. “I used to think at one time of getting out of the uniformed branch but — I dunno — it didn’t pan out that way. But I’ve enjoyed this opportunity. Know what I mean?”

“I think so.”

“Look. Before I go. Do you mind telling me what it was you fished out of that tree?”

“Of course I don’t mind, Jack. There just hasn’t been the opportunity.”

Alleyn reached into his breast pocket and produced, between finger and thumb, the golden strand. Wrayburn peered at it. “We saw it from the dressing room window,” Alleyn said.

“Metallic,” Wrayburn said. “But not tinsel. Now what would that be? A bit of some ornamental stuff blown off the Christmas tree into the fir?”

“It was on the wrong side of the fir for that. It looks more like a shred of dress material to me.”

“It may have been there for some time.”

“Yes, of course. What does it remind you of?”

“By gum!” Wrayburn said. “Yes — by gum. Here! Are you going to look?”

“Care to keep your troops waiting?”

“What do you think!”

“Come on, then.”

They unlocked the cloakroom door and went in. Again the smell of makeup, the wig on its improvised stand, the fur-topped boot, the marks on the carpet, the cardboard carton with the poker inside and, on its coat hanger against the wall, the golden lamé robe of the Druid.

Alleyn turned it on its coat hanger and once again displayed the wet and frayed back of the collar. He held his shred of material against it.

“Might be,” he said. “It’s so small one can’t say. It’s a laboratory job. But could be.”

He began to explore the robe, inch by inch. He hunted back and front and then turned it inside out.

“It’s damp, of course, and wet at the bottom edge. As one would expect, from galloping about in the open courtyard. The hem’s come unstitched here and ravelled out. Zips right down the back. Hullo! The collar’s come slightly adrift. Frayed. Might be. Could be.”

“Yes, but — look, it’d be ridiculous. It doesn’t add up. Not by any reckoning. The thing’s here . In the cloakroom. When he was knocked off, if he was knocked off, he wasn’t wearing it. He couldn’t have been. Unless,” said Wrayburn, “it was taken off his body and returned to this room, but that’s absurd. What a muck it’d be in!”

“Yes,” Alleyn agreed absently. “It would, wouldn’t it?”

He had stooped down and was peering under the makeup bench. He pulled out a cardboard box that had been used for rubbish and put it on the bench.

“Absorbent tissues,” he said, exploring the contents. “A chunk of rag. Wrapping paper and — hullo, what’s this.”

Very gingerly he lifted out two pads of cotton wool about the shape of a medium-sized mushroom.

“Wet,” he said and bent over them. “No smell. Pulled off that roll there by the powder box. But what for? What the devil for?”

“Clean off the makeup?” Wrayburn hazarded.

“They’re not discoloured. Only wettish. Odd!”

“I’d better not keep those chaps waiting,” Wrayburn said wistfully. “It’s been a pleasure, by and large. Made a change. Back to routine, now. Good luck, anyway.”

They shook hands and he left. Alleyn cut himself a sample of gold lamé from the hem of the robe.

He had a final look round and then locked the cloakroom. Reminded by this action of the study, he crossed the hall into the east-wing corridor, unlocked the door, and turned out the lights.

As he returned, the library door at the far end of the corridor opened and Mr. Smith came out. He checked for a moment on seeing Alleyn, and then made an arresting gesture with the palm of his hand as if he were on point duty.

Alleyn waited for him by the double doors into the hall. Mr. Smith took him by the elbow and piloted him through. The hall was lit by two dying fires and a single standard lamp below the gallery and near the foot of the right-hand stairway.

“You’re up late,” Alleyn said.

“What about yourself?” he rejoined. “Matter of fact, I thought I’d like a word with you if that’s in order. ’Illy’s gone up to bed. How about a nightcap?”

“Thanks very much, but no. Don’t let me stop you, though.”

“I won’t bother. I’ve had my lot and there’s still my barley water to come. Though after that little how-d’ye-do the other night the mere idea tends to turn me up in advance.”

“There’s been no more soap?”

“I should bloody well hope not,” said Mr. Smith.

He walked up to the nearest hearth and kicked its smouldering logs together. “Spare a moment?” he asked.

“Yes, of course.”

“If I was to ask you what’s your opinion of this turn-up,” he said. “I suppose I’d get what they call a dusty answer, would’n I?”

“In the sense that I haven’t yet formed an opinion, I suppose you would.”

“You telling me you don’t know what to think?”

“Pretty much. I’m collecting.”

“What’s that mean?”

“You’ve been a collector and a very successful one, haven’t you, Mr. Smith?”

“What of it?”

“There must have been times in your early days, when you had a mass of objects in stock on which you couldn’t put a knowledgeable value. Some of them might be rubbish and some might be important. In all the clutter of a job lot there might be one or two authentic pieces. But in those days I daresay you couldn’t for the life of you tell which was which.”

“All right. All right. You’ve made your point, chum.”

“Rather pompously, I’m afraid.”

“I wouldn’t say so. But I tell you what. I pretty soon learned in my trade to take a shine on the buyer and seller even when I only had an instinct for good stuff. And I always had that, I always had a flare. You ask ’Illy. Even then I could pick if I was having a stroke pulled on me.”