Ngaio Marsh - Hand in Glove

“And that,” Leonard observed, smirking at Bimbo, “takes the silly grin off your face, Jack, doesn’t it?”

“Whereas,” Alleyn continued, “you, Mr. Leiss, and Miss Ralston were directly threatened, both by Mr. Cartell and, I think, Mr. Period, with criminal proceedings which would almost certainly land you in jail.”

“No!” Connie ejaculated.

“A threat,” Alleyn said, “that may be said to provide your motive as well, I’m afraid, Miss Cartell. As for Alfred Belt and Mrs. Mitchell, who are not present, they were both greatly concerned to end Mr. Cartell’s tenancy, which they found intolerable. Murder has been done for less.”

It was not pleasant, he thought, to see the veiled eagerness with which they welcomed this departure. Leonard actually said: “Well, of course. Now you’re talking,” and Moppett flicked the tip of her tongue over her lips.

“But I repeat,” Alleyn went on, “that it is circumstance, opportunity and behaviour that must concern us. Opportunity, after a fashion, you all had. Miss Ralston and Mr. Leiss were on the premises late that night; they had stolen the cigarette case and the case was found by the body. The trap was laid by somebody wearing leather-and-string gloves, and Mr. Leiss has lost such a pair of gloves.”

Leonard and Moppett began to talk together, but Alleyn held up his hand and they stopped dead.

“Their behaviour, however, doesn’t make sense. If they were planning to murder Mr. Cartell they would hardly have publicized their actions by singing and whistling under Mr. Period’s window.”

Moppett gave a strangulated sob, presumably of relief.

“Lady Bantling had opportunity, and she knew the lay of the land. She could have set the trap; but it’s obvious that she didn’t do so, as she was seen, by Mr. Bantling and Miss Maitland-Mayne, returning across the planks to her car. She, too, had publicized her visit by serenading Mr. Cartell from the garden. Her behaviour does not commend itself as that of an obsession maternal murderess.”

“ Too kind of you to say so,” Désirée murmured.

“Moreover, I fancy she is very well aware that her son could anticipate his inheritance by borrowing upon his expectations and insuring his life as security for the loan. This reduces her motive to one of mere exasperation, and the same may be said of Mr. Bantling himself.”

“And of me,” said Bimbo quickly.

Alleyn said: “In your case, there might well be something we haven’t yet winkled out. Which is what I mean about the secondary importance of motive. However, I was coming to you. You had ample opportunity. You retired to a bathroom, where you tell me you spent a long time bandaging your hand. You could equally well have spent it driving back to the ditch and arranging the trap. No, please don’t interrupt. I know you were bitten. That proves nothing. You may also say that you took Mr. Leiss’s overcoat to him. Were his gloves in the pocket?”

“How the hell do I know! I didn’t pick his ghastly pockets,” said Bimbo, turning very white.

“A statement that at the moment can’t be checked. All the same, there’s this to be said for you: if you are both telling the truth about your movements this evening, you are unlikely to have chucked the paperweight at Mr. Period’s head. Although,” Alleyn said very coolly, “the amorous dog chase might well have led you into Mr. Period’s garden.”

“It might have,” Désirée remarked, “but, in point of fact, it didn’t. Bimbo was never out of my sight.”

“If that is so,” Àlleyn said, “it leads us to an inescapable conclusion.”

He waited, and across the stillness of the room there floated small inconsequent sounds: the whisper of Fox’s pencil and his rather heavy breathing, the faint rasp of Moppett’s fingernails on the arms of her chair, and from somewhere within the house a scarcely perceptible mechanical throb.

“There remains,” Alleyn said, “just one person to whom opportunity, behaviour and motive all point, inescapably. This one person presents certain characteristics: a knowledge of Mr. Cartell’s movements, the assurance that at one o’clock the Baynesholme guests would have long ago left the scene, and access to Mr. Leiss’s gloves. So much for opportunity. Behaviour. There are certain reactions. Everybody knows about Mr. Period’s propensity for writing letters of condolence: he’s famous for them. Now, suppose one of you gets a Period letter, couched in rather ambiguous terms but commiserating with you on the loss of somebody whom you saw fighting-fit the previous evening. What would you think? Either that he was dotty or that he had sent you the wrong letter. You might get an initial shock, but a few moments’ thought would reassure you. You would not, having gone to find out what it was all about and encountered a bewildered Mr. Period, turn deadly white and almost faint. But if you had murdered the supposed subject of the letter, how would you react? Suppose you had awakened in the morning with the remembrance of your deed festering in your mind and then been presented with this letter. Suppose, finally, that when you were being interviewed by the police, a second letter arrived, couched in exactly the same phrases. Wouldn’t that seem like a nightmare? Wouldn’t it seem as if Mr. Period knew what you’d done, and was torturing you with his knowledge? What would you do then?”

Connie Cartell had risen to her feet. She made an extraordinary gesture with her weather-chapped bandaged hand.

“You can’t prove it,” she said. “You haven’t got the gloves.”

At that moment a loud and confused rumpus broke out in the garden. There was a cry of frustration and a yelp of pain. The Pekingese leapt from Connie’s embrace.

A body crashed against the French windows. They burst open to admit Pixie, immensely overwrought and carrying some object in her mouth. She was closely followed by Alfred Belt.

Alleyn shouted: “Shut those windows.” Alfred did so and stood in front of them, panting noisily.

With an expertise borne of their early training, Alleyn and Fox seized, respectively, Pixie and Li. Alleyn thrust his thumbs into the corners of Pixie’s slavering mouth.

Her plaything dropped to the floor. Alfred, gasping for breath, stammered: “In the garden, sir. Here. Ran her to earth. Digging.”

Moppett cried out: “Lennie! Lennie! Look! They’re your gloves!”

Alleyn said to Bimbo: “Catch hold of this dog.”

“I’ll be damned if I do.”

“I do her,” said Trudi.

She dragged Pixie from the room.

Alleyn stooped to retrieve the gloves. He unrolled them. The leather in the palms had been torn, and fragments of string hung loose from the knitted backs. The thumb of the left-hand glove was discoloured with blood. He began to turn it inside out. As he did so, Connie Cartell screamed.

It was a shocking sound, scarcely less animal than the canine outcry that had preceded it. Her mouth remained open and for a moment she looked like a mask for a Fury. Then she plunged forward and, when Fox seized her, screamed again.

The lining of the thumb showed a fragment of blackened and bloodstained cotton wool, and smelt quite distinctly of the black ointment used for girth-gall.

Mr. Pyke Period reclined on his library sofa, nibbling calf’s-foot jelly and giving audience to Alleyn, Nicola and Andrew. He had just prevailed upon Dr. Elkington to allow him downstairs. Wan though he was, he might nevertheless have been suspected of enjoying himself.

“It’s so utterly dreadful,” he said. “One cannot believe it. Connie! One knows, of course, that she has the reputation of a thruster in the hunting field, but I’ve always thought of her as just another of those fatiguing women who shout and laugh. Rather stupid, in fact.”