Ngaio Marsh - Death At The Bar

“I hope we won’t be a nuisance to you, Nick. A case of this sort’s always a bit tiresome, isn’t it? Local feeling and so on.”

Harper clapped a file down on his desk, threw his head back and looked at Alleyn from under his spectacles.

“Local feeling?” he said. “Local stupidity! I don’t care. They work it out for themselves and get a new version every day. Old Pomeroy’s not the worst, not by a long chalk. The man’s got something to complain about, or thinks he has. It’s these other experts, George Nark & Co., that make all the trouble. Nark’s written three letters to the Illington Courier . The first was about fingerprinting. He called it ‘the Bertillion system,’ of course, ignorant old ass, and wanted to know if we’d printed everyone who was there, when Watchman died. So I got him round here and printed him. So he wrote another letter to the paper about the liberty of the subject and said the South Devon Constabulary were a lot of Hitlers. Then Oates, the Coombe P.C., found him crawling about outside Pomeroy’s garage with a magnifying glass, and kicked him out. So he wrote another letter, saying the police were corrupt. Then the editor, who ought to know better, wrote a damn-fool leader and then three more letters about me appeared. They were signed ‘Vigilant,’ ‘Drowsy,’ and ‘Moribund.’ Then all the pressmen who’d gone away, came back again. I don’t care. What of it? But the C.C. began ringing me up three times a day and I got fed up and suggested he ask you, and he jumped at it. There’s the file.”

Alleyn and Fox hastened to make sympathetic noises.

“Before we see the file” Alleyn said, “we’d very much like to hear your own views. We’ve looked up the report on the inquest so we’ve got the main outline or ought to have it.”

“My views?” repeated Mr. Harper moodily. “I haven’t got any. I don’t think it was an accident.”

“Don’t you, now?”

“I don’t see how it could have been. I suppose old Pomeroy bleated about his injuries when he went screeching up to the Yard. I think he’s right. ’Far as I can see, the old man did take reasonable precautions. Well, perhaps not that, the stuff ought never to have been left on the premises. But I don’t see how, twenty-four hours after he’d stowed the bottle away in the cupboard, he could have infected that dart accidentally. We’ve printed the cupboard. It’s got his prints on it and nobody’s else’s.”

“Oh,” said Alleyn, “then it isn’t a case of somebody else having tampered with the bottle and been too scared to own up.”

“No.”

“How many sets of Pomeroy’s prints are on the cupboard door?”

“Several. Four good ones on the knob. And he turned the key in the top cupboard when he put the cyanide away. His print’s on the key all right and you can’t do the pencil trick, for I’ve tried. It’s a fair teaser.”

“Any prints on the bottle?”

“None. But he explained he wore gloves and wiped the bottle.”

“The cupboard door’s interesting.”

“Is it? Well, when he opened the parcel of darts he broke the seals. I got hold of the wrapping and string. The string had only been tied once and the seals have got the shop’s mark on them.”

“Damn good, Nick,” said Alleyn. Mr. Harper looked a little less jaundiced.

“Well, it goes to show,” he admitted, “the dart was O.K. when old Pomeroy unpacked it. Then young Will and Parish handled the darts, and then Legge tried them out. Next thing — one of ’em sticks into deceased’s finger and in five minutes he’s a corpse.”

“The inference being…?”

“God knows! They found cyanide on the dart, but how the hell it got there’s a masterpiece. I suppose old Pomeroy’s talked Legge to you.”

“Yes.”

“Yes. Well, Legge had his coat off and his sleeves rolled up. Cubitt and young Pomeroy swear he took the darts with his left hand and held them point outward in a bunch while he tried them. They say he didn’t wait any time at all. Just threw them into the board, said they were all right and then waded in with his trick. You see, they were all watching Legge.”

“Yes.”

“What about the other five, Super?” asked Fox. “He used six for the trick, didn’t he?”

“Meaning one of them might have contrived to smear cyanide on one dart, while they looked at the lot?”

“It doesn’t make any sort of sense,” said Alleyn. “How was Cubitt or young Pomeroy to know Legge was going to pink Watchman?”

“That’s right,” agreed Harper, relapsing. “So it must be Legge but it couldn’t be Legge; so it must be accident but it couldn’t be accident. Funny, isn’t it?”

“Screamingly.”

“The iodine bottle’s all right and so’s the brandy bottle.”

“The brandy glass was broken?”

“Smashed to powder, except the bottom, and that was in about thirty pieces. They couldn’t find any cyanide.”

“Whereabouts on the dart was the trace of cyanide?”

“On the tip and halfway up the steel point. We’ve printed the dart, of course. It’s got Legge’s prints all over it. They’ve covered Abel’s or anybody else’s who touched it, except Oates, and he kept his head and only handled it by the flight. The analyst’s report is here. And all the exhibits.”

“Yes. Have you fished up a motive?”

“The money goes to Parish and Cubitt. Two thirds to Parish and one third to Cubitt. That’s excepting one or two small legacies. Parish is the next-of-kin. It’s a big estate. The lawyer was so close as an oyster, but I’ve found out it ought to wash up at something like fifty thousand. We don’t know much beyond what everybody knows. Reckon most folks have seen Sebastian Parish on the screen, and Mr. Cubitt seems to be a well-known artist. The C.C. expects the Yard to tackle that end of the stick.”

“Thoughtful of him! Anyone else?”

“They’ve found a bit already. They’ve found Parish’s affairs are in a muddle and he’s been to the Jews. Cubitt had money in that Chain Stores Unlimited thing, that bust the other day. There’s motive there, all right.”

“Anyone else? Pomeroy’s fancy? The mysterious Legge?”

“Him? Motive? You’ve heard Pomeroy, Mr. Alleyn. Says deceased behaved peculiar to Legge. Chaffed him, like. Well, what is there in that? It seems there was a bit of a collision between them, the day Mr. Watchman drove into the Coombe. Day before the fatality that was. Legge’s a bad driver, anyway. Likely enough, Mr. Watchman felt kind of irritated, and let Legge know all about it when they met again. Likely, Legge’s views irritated Mr. Watchman.”

“His views?”

“He’s an out-and-out communist is Legge. Secretary and Treasurer of the Coombe Left Movement and in with young Will and Miss Moore. Mr. Watchman seems to have made a bit of a laughing-stock of the man, but you don’t do murder because you’ve been made to look silly.”

“Not very often, I should think. Do you know anything about Legge? He’s a newcomer, isn’t he?”

Harper unhooked his spectacles and laid them on his desk.

“Yes,” he said, “he’s foreign to these parts. We’ve followed up the usual routine, Mr. Alleyn, but we haven’t found much. He says he came here for his health. He’s opened a small banking account at Illington, three hundred and fifty pounds. He came to the Feathers ten months ago. He gets a big lot of letters, and writes a lot to all parts of the West Country, and sends away a number of small packages. Seems he’s agent for some stamp collecting affair. I got the name, ‘Phillips Philatelic Society,’ and got one of our chaps to look up the headquarters in London. Sure enough, this chap Legge’s the forwarding agent for the west of England. Well, he chummed up with young Will, and about three months ago they gave him this job with the Coombe Left business. I don’t mind saying I don’t like the looks of the man. He’s a funny chap. Unhealthy, I’d say. Something the matter with his ears. We’ve searched all their rooms and I found a chemist’s bottle and a bit of a squirt in his. Had it tested, you bet, but it’s only some muck he squirts into his beastly lug. So I returned it. Cubitt’s room was full of painting gear. We found oil, and turpentine and varnish. Went through the lot. Of course we didn’t expect to find anything. Parish,” said Harper in disgust, “uses scent. Well, not to say scent, but some sort of toilet water. No, I don’t mind saying I don’t like the looks of Legge, but there again, Miss Moore says Mr. Watchman told her he’d never set eyes on the man before.”