Ngaio Marsh - Died in the Wool

He took it from her and turned to her glass. As he dabbled the wool on his jaw he watched her reflection. Her back was towards him. She stooped over the bed. When she moved aside, the bedclothes had been pulled up and the book was no longer on the table.

“Here’s the bottle,” she said, holding it out.

“Will you be an angel and take it yourself? I’m just fixing this blasted cut.”

“Mr. Alleyn,” she said loudly, and he turned to face her. “I’d rather you staunched your wounds in your own room,” said Miss Lynne.

“Please forgive me, I was trying to save my collar. Of course.”

He went to the door. “Terry!” Ursula called quietly down the passage.

“I’m off,” said Alleyn. He crossed the landing to his own room. “Terry!” Ursula called again. “Yes, coming,” said Miss Lynne, and carrying the candle and her hot-water bottle she moved swiftly down the passage, observed by Alleyn through the crack of his own door.

“Every blasted move in the game goes wrong,” he thought and darted back to her room.

The book, a stoutly bound squat affair, had been thrust well down between the sheets. It fell open in his hands and he read a single long sentence.

February 1st, 1942 . Since I am now assured of her affection towards me I must confess that the constant unrest of this house and (if I am to be honest in these pages, of Florence herself) under which I have for so long been complaisant, is now quite intolerable to me.

Alleyn hesitated for a moment. A card folder slipped from between the pages. He opened it and saw the photograph of a man with veiled eyes, painfully compressed lips, and deep grooves running from his nostrils to beyond the corners of his mouth. The initials “A.R.” were written at the bottom in the same fine strokes that characterized the script in the book.

“So that was Arthur Rubrick,” Alleyn thought and returned the photograph and the diary to their hiding place.

Before he left Miss Lynne’s room, Alleyn took an extremely rapid look at her shoes. All except one pair were perfectly neat and clean. Her gardening brogues, brushed, but unpolished, were dry. He closed the door behind him as the voices of the two girls sounded in the passage. He found them at the head of the stairs in conference with Mrs. Aceworthy, a formidable figure in mottled flannel, which she drew unhappily about her when she saw Alleyn. He persuaded her, with some difficulty, to return to her room.

“I am going to Fabian,” said Ursula. “How are we going to carry him upstairs?”

“I think he will be able to walk up,” Alleyn said. “Take him gently. I’ll get Grace to help put him to bed. Is he awake, do you know?”

“Not Douglas,” said Terence Lynne. “He sleeps like a log.”

Ursula said: “Has Fabian had another blackout, Mr. Alleyn?”

“I think so. Wait for me before you bring him.”

“Damn!” said Ursula. “Now, of course, he’ll think he can’t marry me. Come on, Terry.”

Terence went; not, Alleyn thought, over-willingly.

He knocked on Douglas Grace’s door and, receiving no answer, walked in and flashed his torch on a tousled head.

“Grace!”

“Wha-aa?” The clothes were flung back with a convulsive jerk and Douglas stared at him. “What d’you want to make me jump like that for?” he asked angrily and then blinked. “Sorry, sir. I was back at an advanced gun post. What’s up now?”

“Losse had had another blackout.”

Douglas gazed at Alleyn with his familiar air of affronted incredulity. “He will now,” Alleyn thought crossly, “repeat the last word I have uttered whenever I pause to draw breath.”

“Blackout,” said Douglas faithfully. “Oh, hell! How? When? Where?”

“Up near the annex. Half an hour ago. He went up there to collect my cigarette case.”

“I remember that,” cried Douglas triumphantly. “Is he still all out? Poor old Fab.”

“He’s conscious again, but he’s had a nasty crack on the head. Come and help me get him upstairs, will you?”

“Get him upstairs?” Douglas repeated, looking very startled. He reached for his dressing-gown. “I say,” he said. “This is pretty tough luck, isn’t it? I mean, what he said about Ursy and him?”

“Yes.”

“Half an hour ago,” said Douglas, thrusting his feet into his slippers. “That must have been just after we came up. I went out to the side lawn to have a look at the weather. He must have been up there then, good Lord.”

“Did you hear anything?”

Douglas gaped at him with his mouth open. “I heard the river,” he said. “That means there’s a southerly hanging round. Sure sign. You wouldn’t know.”

“No. Did you hear anything else?”

“Hear anything? What sort of thing?”

“Voices or footsteps.”

“Voices? Was he talking? Footsteps?”

“Let it pass,” said Alleyn. “Come on.”

They went down to the drawing-room.

Fabian was lying on the sofa with Ursula on a low stool beside him. Tommy Johns and Cliff stood awkwardly by the French windows looking at their boots. Markins, with precisely the correct shade of deferential concern, was setting out a tea tray with drinks. Terence Lynne stood composedly before the fire, which had been mended, and flickered its light richly in the folds of her crimson gown.

“Here, I say,” said Douglas. “This is no good, Fab. Damn bad luck.”

“Extremely tiresome,” Fabian murmured, looking at Ursula. He was still covered by grey blankets and Ursula had slid her hand beneath them. “Give the stretcher-bearers a drink, Douglas. They must need it.”

“You mustn’t,” said Ursula.

“See section four. Alcohol after cerebral injuries, abstain from.”

Markins moved away with decorum. “You must have a drink, Markins,” said Fabian weakly. Douglas looked scandalized.

“Thank you very much, sir,” said Markins primly.

“You’ll have whisky, won’t you, Tommy? Cliff?”

“I don’t mind,” said Tommy Johns. “The boy won’t take it, thank you.”

“He looks as if he wants it,” said Fabian, and indeed Cliff was very white.

“He doesn’t take whisky, thank you,” said his father, with uncomfortable emphasis.

“I think you ought to get to bed, Fab,” fussed Douglas. “Don’t you agree, Mr. Alleyn?”

“We’ll drink to your recovery when we’ve finished the job,” Alleyn said.

“I’m not going to be carried upstairs and don’t you think it.”

“Well then, you shall walk and Grace and I will see you up.”

“O.K.,” said Douglas amiably.

“One’s enough,” Fabian said peevishly. “I tell you, I’m all right. You give these poor swine a drink, Douglas. Mr. Alleyn started the rescue squad, didn’t he? He might like to finish the job.”

He sat up and grimaced. He was very white and his hands trembled.

“Please Fab, go slow,” said Ursula. “I’ll come and see you.”

“Come on,” Fabian said to Alleyn. He grinned at Ursula. “Thank you, darling,” he said. “I’d like you to come but not just yet, please.”

When they were outside in the hall, Fabian took Alleyn’s arm. “Sorry to appear churlish,” he said. “I wanted to talk to you. God, I do feel sick.”

Alleyn got him to bed. He was very docile. Remembering Markins’ story of the medicine cupboard in the bathroom, Alleyn raided it and found dressings. He clipped away the thick hair. The wound, a depression, swollen at the margin and broken only at the top, was seen to be clearly defined. He cleaned it and was about to put on a dressing when Fabian, who was lying face downwards on his pillow, said: “I didn’t get that by falling, did I? Some expert’s had a crack at me, hasn’t he?”