Ngaio Marsh - Overture to Death

He went through the back of the stage, passing Dinah and Henry, who stood side by side in the wings.

“Good-evening, Mr. Jernigham,” said the superintendent. “Do you mind raising the curtain?”

“Certainly,” said Henry.

The curtain rose in a series of uneven jerks, revealing to the people still left in the hall a group of four persons: Jocelyn Jernigham, Selia Ross, Eleanor Prentice and the rector, who had returned from the back door with the key in his hand.

“I can’t believe it,” said the rector. “I simply cannot believe that it has happened.”

“Is it murder?” asked Mrs. Ross sharply. Her voice pitched a note too high, sounded shockingly loud.

“I–I can’t believe — ” repeated Mr. Copeland.

“But see here, Copeland,” interrupted the squire, “I don’t know what the devil everybody’s driving at. Shot through the head! What d’you mean? Somebody must have seen something. You can’t shoot people through the head in a crowded hall without being spotted.”

“The shot seems to have come from — from — ”

“From where, for heaven’s sake?”

“From inside the piano,” said the rector unhappily. “We mustn’t touch anything; but it seems to come from inside the piano. You can see through the torn silk.”

“Good God!” said Jocelyn. He looked irritably at Miss Prentice, who rocked to and fro like a middle-aged marionette and moaned repeatedly.

“‘Do be quiet, Eleanor,” said the squire. “Here! Templett!”

Dr. Templett had again gone behind the screen, but he came out and said, “What?” in an irascible voice.

“Has she been shot through the head?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“From inside the piano.”

“I never heard such a thing,” said Jocelyn. “I’m coming to look.”

“Yes. But, I say,” objected Dr. Templett, “I don’t think you ought to, you know. It’s a matter for the police.”

“Well, you’ve just been in there.”

“I’m police surgeon for the district”

“Well, by God,” said the squire, suddenly remembering it, “I’m Acting Chief Constable for the county.”

“Sorry,” said Dr. Templett. “I’d forgotten.”

But the squire was prevented from looking behind the screen by the return of Mr. Blandish.

“That’s all right,” said the superintendent peaceably. He turned to the squire. “I’ve just rung up the station and asked for two chaps to come along, sir.”

“Oh, yes. Yes. Very sensible,” said Jocelyn.

“Just a minute, Blandish,” said Dr. Templett. “Come down here, would you?”

They disappeared behind the screen. The others waited in silence. Miss Prentice buried her face in her hands. The squire walked to the edge of the stage, looked over the top of the piano, turned aside, and suddenly mopped his face with his handkerchief.

Blandish and Templett came out and joined the party on the stage.

“Lucky, in a way, your being here on the spot, sir,” Blandish said to Jocelyn. “Your first case of this sort since your appointment, I believe.”

“Yes.”

“Very nasty affair.”

“It is.”

“Yes, sir. Well now, with your approval, Mr. Jernigham, I’d just like to get a few notes down. I fancy Mr. Henry Jernigham and Miss Copeland are with us.”

He peered into the shadows beyond the stage.

“We’re here,” said Henry.

He and Dinah came on the stage.

“Ah, yes. Good-evening, Miss Copeland.”

“Good-evening,” said Dinah faintly.

“Now,” said Blandish, looking round the stage, “this is the whole company of performers, I take it. With the exception of the deceased, of course.”

“Yes,” said Jocelyn.

“I’ll just make a note of the names.”

They sat round the stage while Blandish wrote in his note-book. A group of ushers and two youths were huddled on a bench at the far end of the hall under the eyes of Sergeant Roper. Dinah fixed her gaze on this group, on Blandish, on the floor, anywhere but on the top of the piano jutting above the footlights and topped with pots of aspidistra. For down through the aspidistras, heavily shadowed by the screen, and not quite covered by the green and yellow bunting they had thrown over it, was Miss Campanula’s body, face down on the keys of the piano. Dinah found herself wondering who was responsible for the aspidistras. She had meant to have them removed. They must mask quite a lot of the stage from the front rows.

“ Don’t look at them ,” said her mind. She turned quickly to Henry. He took her hands and pulled her round with her back to the footlights.

“It’s all right, Dinah,” he whispered, “it’s all right darling.”

“I’m not panicked or anything,” said Dinah.

“Yes,” said Blandish, “that’s all the names. Now, sir — Well, what is it?”

A uniformed constable had come in from the front door and stood waiting in the hall.

“Excuse me,” said Blandish, and went down to him. There was a short rumbling conversation. Blandish turned and called to the squire.

“Can you spare a moment, sir?”

“Certainly,” said Jocelyn, and joined them.

“Can you beat this, sir?” said Blandish, in an infuriated whisper. “We’ve had nothing better than a few old drunks and speed merchants in this place for the last six months or more, and now, to-night, there’s got to be a breaking and entering job at Moorton Park with five thousand pounds’ worth of her ladyship’s jewellery gone and Lord knows what else besides. Their butler rang up the station five minutes ago, and this chap’s come along on his motor bike and he says the whole place is upside down. Sir George and her ladyship and the party haven’t got back yet. It looks like the work of the gang that cleaned up a couple of jobs in Somerset a fortnight back. It’ll be a big thing to tackle. Now what am I to do, sir?”

Jocelyn and Blandish stared at each other.

“Well,” said Jocelyn at last, “you can’t be in two places at once.”

“That’s right, sir,” said Blandish. “It goes against the grain when we’ve scarcely got started, but it looks as if it’ll have to be the Yard.”

i

Five hours after Miss Campanula struck the third chord of the Prelude, put her foot on the soft pedal, and died, a police car arrived at the parish hall of Winton St. Giles. It had come from Scotland Yard. It contained Chief Detective-Inspector Alleyn, Detective-Inspector Fox, Detective-Sergeant Bailey, and Detective-Sergeant Thompson.

Alleyn, looking up from his road map, saw a church spire against a frosty, moonlit hill, trees against stars, and nearer at hand the lighted windows of a stone building.

“This looks like the hidden treasure,” he said to Thompson who was driving. “What’s the time?”

“One o’clock, sir.”

As if in confirmation a clock, outside in the night, chimed for the hour and tolled one.

“Out we get,” said Alleyn.

The upland air was cold after the stuffiness of the car. It smelt of dead leaves and frost. They walked up a gravelled path to the front door of the building. Fox flashed a torch on a brass plate.

“Winton St. Giles Parish Hall. The Gift of Jocelyn Jernigham Esquire of Pen Cuckoo, 1805. To the Glory of God. In memory of his wife Prudence Jernigham who passed away on May 7th, 1801.”

“This is the place, sir,” said Fox.

“Sure enough,” said Alleyn, and rapped smartly on the door.

It was opened by Sergeant Roper, bleary-eyed after a five hours’ vigil.

“Yard,” said Alleyn.

“Thank Gawd,” said Sergeant Roper.

They walked in.

“The super asked me to say, sir,” said Sergeant Roper, “that he was very sorry not to be here when you arrived, but seeing as how there’s been a first-class breaking and entering up to Moorton Park — ”