Ngaio Marsh - Dead Water

“Except in so far as she happens to be the body?”

“You know what I mean. All right: she fixed the earlier jobs. All right: she may have got at that kid and set him on to Miss Pride. In a way, you might say she organized her own murder.”

“Yes,” Alleyn said. “You might indeed. It may well be that she did.” He glanced at his colleague. “Look,” he said. “Pender will be coming back this way any time now, won’t he? I suggest you put him in the shop just to see Miss Cissy Thing doesn’t exceed her duty? He can keep observation in the background and leave you free to lend a hand in developments at Wally’s joint or whatever it’s called. I’ll be damned glad of your company.”

“All right,” Coombe said. “If you say so.”

“This,” Alleyn thought, “is going to be tricky.”

“Come on,” he said and put his hand on Coombe’s shoulder. “It’s a hell of a bind, but, as the gallant Major would say, it is the drill.”

“That’s right,” said Superintendent Coombe. “I know that. See you later, then.”

Alleyn left him at the shop.

Jenny was waiting down by the seafront. They turned left, walked around the arm of the bay, and arrived at the group of fishermen’s dwellings. Boats pulled up on the foreshore, a ramshackle jetty and the cottages themselves, tucked into the hillside, all fell, predictably, into a conventional arrangement.

“In a moment,” said Jenny, “you will be confronted by Wally’s cottage, but not as I remember it. It used to be squalid and dirty and it stank to high heaven. Mrs. Trehern is far gone in gin and Trehern, as you know, is unspeakable. But somehow or another the exhibit has been evolved: very largely through the efforts of Miss Cost egged on — well—”

“By whom? By Major Barrimore?”

“Not entirely,” Jenny said quickly. “By the Mayor, who is called Mr. Nankivell, and by his Councillors and anybody in Portcarrow who is meant to be civic-minded. And principally, I’m afraid, by Mrs. Fanny Winterbottom and her financial advisors. Or so Patrick says. So, of course, does your Miss Emily. It’s all kept up by the estate. There’s a guild or something that looks after the garden and supervises the interior. Miss Emily calls the whole thing ‘ complètement en toc .’ There you are,” said Jenny as they came face-to-face with their destination. “That’s Wally’s cottage, that is.”

It was, indeed, dauntingly pretty. Hollyhocks, daisies, foxgloves and antirrhinums flanked a cobbled path. Honeysuckle framed the door. Fishing nets of astonishing cleanliness festooned the fence. Beside the gate, in gothic lettering, hung a legend: wally’s cottage. admission 1-. westcountry cream-teas. ices.

“There’s an annex at the back,” explained Jenny. “The teas are run by a neighbour, Mrs. Trehern not being up to it. The Golden Record’s in the parlour with the other exhibits.”

“The Golden Record?”

“Of cures,” said Jenny shortly.

“Will Wally be on tap?”

“I should think so. And his papa, unless he’s ferrying. There are not nearly as many visitors as I’d expected. Oh!” exclaimed Jenny stopping short. “I suppose — will that be because of what’s happened? Yes, of course it will.”

“We’ll go in,” Alleyn said, producing the entrance money.

Trehern was at the receipt of custom.

He leered ingratiatingly at Jenny and gave Alleyn a glance in which truculence, subservience and fear were unattractively mingled. Wally stood behind his father. When Alleyn looked at him he grinned and held out his hands.

Jenny said: “Good morning, Mr. Trehern. I’ve brought Mr. Alleyn to have a look around. Hullo, Wally.”

Wally moved towards her: “You come and see me,” he said. “You come to school. One day soon.” He took her hand and nodded at her.

“Look at that, now!” Trehern ejaculated. “You was always the favourite, miss. Nobody to touch Miss Williams for our por little chap, is there, then, Wal?”

There were three visitors in the parlour. They moved from one exhibit to another, listened, and looked furtively at Jenny.

Alleyn asked Wally if he ever went fishing. He shook his head contemptuously and, with that repetitive, so obviously conditioned gesture, again exhibited his hands. A trained animal, Alleyn thought with distaste. He moved away and opened the Golden Record which was everything that might be expected of it: like a visitors’ book at a restaurant in which satisfied clients are invited to record their approval. He noted the dates when cures were said to have been effected and moved on.

The tourists left with an air of having had their money’s worth by a narrow margin.

Alleyn said: “Mr. Trehern, I am a police officer and have been asked to take charge of investigations into the death of Miss Elspeth Cost. I’d like to have a few words with Wally, if I may. Nothing to upset him. We just wondered if he could help us.”

Trehern opened and shut his hands as if he felt for some object to hold on by. “I don’t rightly know about that,” he said. “My little lad bean’t like other little lads, mister. He’m powerful easy put out. Lives in a world of his own, and not to be looked to if it’s straightout facts that’s required. No hand at facts, be you, Wal? Tell you the truth, I doubt he’s took in this terrible business of Miss Cost.”

“She’m dead,” Wally shouted. “She’m stoned dead.” And he gave one of his odd cries. Trehern looked very put out.

“Poor Miss Cost,” Jenny said gently.

“Poor Miss Cost,” Wally repeatedly cheerfully. Struck by some association of ideas he suddenly recited: “ Be not froightened sayed the loidy, Ended now is all your woe ,” and stopped as incontinently as he had begun.

Alleyn said, “Ah! That’s your piece you said yesterday, isn’t it?” He clapped Wally on the shoulder. “Hullo, young fellow, you’ve been out in the rain! You’re as wet as a shag. That’s the way to get rheumatism.”

Trehern glowered upon his son. “Where you been?” he asked.

“Nowheres.”

“You been mucking round they boats. Can’t keep him away from they boats,” he said ingratiatingly. “Real fisherman’s lad, our Wal. Bean’t you, Wal?”

“I dunno,” Wally said nervously.

“Come and show me these things,” Alleyn suggested. Wally at once began to escort him round the room. It was difficult to determine how far below normal he was. He had something to say about each regrettable exhibit and what he said was always, however uncouth, applicable. Even if it was parrot-talk, Alleyn thought, it at least proved that Wally could connect the appropriate remark with the appointed object.

Jenny stayed for a minute or two, talking to Trehern, who presently said something of which Alleyn only caught the tone of the voice. This was unmistakable. He turned quickly, saw that she was disconcerted and angry and called out: “How do you feel about tea and a bun? Wally: do you like ice cream?”

Wally at once took Jenny’s hand, and began to drag her to a door marked Teas at the end of the room.

There was nobody else in the tearoom. An elderly woman, whom Jenny addressed by name, took their order.

“Was he being offensive, that type in there?” Alleyn asked in French.

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It doesn’t matter in the least,” Jenny said. “What sort of tea do you like? Strong?”

“Weak and no milk.” Alleyn contemplated Wally, whose face was already daubed with ice cream. He ate with passionate, almost trembling, concentration.

“It was raining this morning, wasn’t it, Wally?”

He nodded slightly.

“Were you out in the rain?”

Wally laughed and blew ice cream across the table.