Ngaio Marsh - When in Rome

“ Distasteful !”

“Well — macabre — dreadful, if you like. But your photograph may at least prove that the sarcophagus had not been interfered with at that juncture.”

“It had not. You yourself must have seen—”

“In that lighting it looked perfectly all right but a flashlamp might bring out some abnormality, you know.”

“What was it like,” Grant said, “when you examined it, as I gather you did, with Valdarno?”

“There was — a slight displacement,” Alleyn said. “If the Baroness’s photograph shows none it will establish that the murder was committed after we left the Mithraeum.”

“And after we had all left the building?” Grant asked.

“Not quite that, perhaps, but it might come to that. May we just define the rest of the party’s movements. Yours, for instance.”

“I had offered to stay in the Mithraeum in case anybody wanted information about the rest of the insula. Miss Jason remained with me for, I suppose, ten minutes or so and we then made our way up by the shortest route: the main exit from the Mithraeum, through the antechamber and then down the short passage to the stairway. We didn’t pass the well and sarcophagus, of course, and we met nobody.”

“Hear anybody? Voices?”

“No. I don’t think so.”

“Wait a bit,” Sophy said.

“Yes, Miss Jason?”

“I don’t suppose it matters but—” She appealed to Grant. “Do you remember? Just as we were leaving the Mithraeum there was a sound of voices. All mixed up and booming because of the echo.”

“Was there? I’ve forgotten.”

“Men’s or women’s voices?” Alleyn asked.

“They were so distorted it’s hard to say. A man’s I think and perhaps a woman’s: perhaps yours and Baroness Van der Veghel’s on your way up the stairs. Or Baron Van der Veghel’s. Or all three.”

“Might be,” Alleyn said. “Which way did you go back, Major Sweet?”

“Ah, ’um. I pottered round a bit. Had another look at the well and if you ask me whether the lid of the sarcophagus was out of position I can only say if it was I didn’t notice it. I — ah — I went up into the nave of the old church. Matter of fact, while I was there I heard you and — ah — the Van der Veghels in the cloisters. Taking photographs.”

“That is so,” said the Baroness. “I took the head of Mercury.”

“You were still at it when I went on up the stone stairs. Took my time. Didn’t see the woman. Or Mailer. My opinion, he wasn’t there, anywhere on the premises. Sure of it.”

“Why?” Alleyn asked.

“To be perfectly honest because if the fellow had been there I’d have found him. I thought it damned peculiar him not turning up like that, leaving us cold after taking a whacking great fee off us. So I thought: if the blighter’s hanging about somewhere I’m going to dig him out. And I didn’t.”

“I really can’t believe,” said Grant, “that you could have made anything remotely resembling a thorough search, Major Sweet. In that short time? In that light? And with all those side passages and excavations? No!”

“That is so,” said the Baron. “That is undoubtedly so.”

“I resent that, sir,” said the Major and blew out his cheeks. The Baron paid no attention to him. “Mr. Alleyn,” he said. “Surely it is not impossible that this Mailer was hiding down there, perhaps already with the body of the woman he had murdered, and that he waited until we had gone before putting it — where it was found. Mr. Alleyn — what do you say? Is it possible?”

“I think it’s possible, Baron, yes. But when, in that case, did he make his escape?”

“Perhaps he’s still there,” Kenneth suggested and gave his little whinnying laugh.

“I have thought of that,” the Baron said disregarding Kenneth. “I have thought that perhaps he waited until the good fathers made their search. That he hid himself somewhere near the top and, while they looked elsewhere, contrived to elude them and again hid himself in the basilica until we had driven away and then made his escape. I do not know. Perhaps it is an absurd suggestion but — he is gone, after all.”

“I think,” Lady Braceley said, “it’s a very clever suggestion.” And she actually summoned up the wreck of an arch glance for the Baron, who bowed and looked horrified.

“To sum up,” Alleyn said, “if that’s not a laughable phrase in the context. None of us saw Mailer or Violetta after Mailer left us, ostensibly to join Mr. Dorne at the statue of Apollo in the cloisters of the old church at the middle level of San Tommaso.”

Sophy had given a little ejaculation.

“Yes, Miss Jason? You’ve thought of something?”

“Only just. It may be — it probably is — nothing. But it was during the group-photograph episode.”

“Yes?”

“There was a noise somewhere outside the Mithraeum. Not far away, I’d have thought, but all mixed up and distorted by echoes. A woman’s voice, I think, and then it was — well, kind of cut off. And then — later — a kind of thud. At the time I supposed somebody — somewhere — had shut a very heavy door.”

“I remember!” the Baron ejaculated. “I remember perfectly! It was when I took my picture of the group.”

“Yes? You do?” Sophy said. “A kind of bang — thumping noise?”

“Exactly.”

“Like a door?”

“A very heavy door.”

“Yes,” Alleyn agreed, “it did sound rather like that, didn’t it?”

“But,” Sophy said, turning white, “there aren’t any heavy doors down there that I can remember.” She appealed to Grant. “Are there?”

“No. No doors,” he said.

“So I wonder if it was something else — something being dropped, for instance. Not from a great height. Just a little way. But something very heavy.”

“Like a stone lid?” Alleyn suggested.

Sophy nodded.

When Alleyn asked the travellers not to leave Rome for the present there was a great outcry from Lady Braceley and Major Sweet. The Major talked noisily about his rights as a British subject. Lady Braceley lamented and referred to persons in high places to whom she commanded immediate access. She was silenced at last by her nephew, who muttered and cajoled. She shed tears which she dexterously manipulated with the folded edge of her handkerchief.

The Major seemed to be sensibly influenced by the information that additional expenses would be met. He subsided into a sullen and wary acquiescence.

Grant, Sophy and the Van der Veghels were temperate in their reactions. What, as the Baroness rhetorically and vaguely asked, could one do against Fate? Her husband, at a more realistic level, said that while it was inconvenient it was at the same time obligatory upon them to remain in situ if circumstances seemed to require their presence.

Grant said impatiently that he had intended to stay in Rome anyway and Sophy said her holiday extended over the next four weeks. While she had made vague plans for Perugia and Florence she was perfectly ready to postpone them.

They broke up at half past one. The travellers with the exception of Grant and Sophy availed themselves of the large car provided by Valdarno. Alleyn had a brief talk with the Questore and with appropriate regrets declined an invitation for luncheon. He had, he said, to write a report.

When he finally emerged from the building he found Grant and Sophy waiting for him.

“I want to talk to you,” Grant said.

“By all means. Will you have lunch with me?” Alleyn made a bow to Sophy. “Both of you? Do.”

“Not me,” Sophy said. “I’m only a hanger-on.”

“You’re nothing of the sort,” Grant contradicted.