Ngaio Marsh - Overture to Death

A car drew up outside the hall. A door slammed.

“That’ll be the doctor, sir,” said Roper.

“Ah, yes. Let him in, will you?”

Dr. Templett came in. He had removed his make-up and his beard and had changed the striped trousers and morning coat proper to a French Ambassador, for a tweed suit and sweater.

“Hullo,” he said. “Sorry if I kept you waiting. Car wouldn’t start.”

“Dr. Templett?”

“Yes, and you’re from Scotland Yard, aren’t you? Didn’t lose much time. This is a nasty business.”

“Beastly,” said Alleyn. “I think we might move her now.”

They brought a long table from the back of the hall and on it they laid Miss Campanula. She had been shot between the eyes.

“Smell of eucalyptus,” said Alleyn.

“She had a cold.”

Dr. Templett examined the wounds while the others looked on. At last he straightened up, took a bottle of ether from his pocket, and used a little to clean his hands.

“There’s a sheet in one of the dressing-rooms, Roper,” he said. Roper went off to get it.

“What’ve you got there?” Templett asked Alleyn.

Alleyn had found Miss Prentice’s Venetian Suite behind the piano. He turned it over in his hands. Like the Prelude, it was a very jaded affair. The red back of the cover had a discoloured circular patch in the centre. Alleyn touched it. It was damp. Roper returned with the sheet.

“Can’t make her look very presentable, I’m afraid,” said Dr. Templett. “Rigor’s fairly well advanced in the jaw and neck. Rather quick after five hours. She fell at an odd angle. I didn’t do more than look at her. The exit wound showed clearly enough what had happened. Of course, I assured myself she was dead.”

“Did you realise at once that it was a wound of exit?”

“What? Yes. Well, after a second or two I did. Thought at first she’d been shot through the back of the head and then I noticed characteristics of an exit wound, direction of the matted hair and so on. I bent down and tried to see the face. I could just see the blood. Then I noticed the hole in the music. The frilling round the edge of the hole showed clearly enough which way the bullet had come.”

“Very sound observation,” said Alleyn. “You knew, then, what had happened?”

“I was damn’ puzzled and still am. When we’d rigged up the screen I had another look and spotted the nozzle of the revolver or whatever it is, behind the silk trimmings. I told Blandish, the local superintendent, and he had a look too. How the devil was it done?”

“A mechanical device that she worked herself.”

“Not suicide?”

“No, murder. You’ll see when we open the piano.”

“Extraordinary business.”

“Very,” agreed Alleyn. “Bailey, you might get along with your department now. When Thompson’s finished, you can go over the whole thing for prints and then dismantle it. In the meantime, I’d better produce my note-book and get a few hard facts.”

They carried the table into a corner and put the screen round it. Roper came down with a sheet and covered the body.

“Let’s sit down somewhere,” suggested Dr. Templett. “I want a pipe. It’s given me a shock, this business.”

They sat in the front row of stalls. Alleyn raised an eyebrow at Fox who came and joined them. Roper stood in the offing. Dr. Templett filled his pipe, Alleyn and Fox opened their note-books.

“To begin with,” said Alleyn, “who was this lady?”

“Idris Campanula,” said Templett. “Spinster of this parish.”

“Address?”

“The Red House, Chipping. You passed it on your way up.”

“Have the right people been told about this?”

“Yes. The rector did that. Only the three maids. I don’t know about the next-of-kin. Somebody said it was a second cousin in Kenya. We’ll have to find that out. Look here, shall I tell you the story in my own words?”

“I wish you would.”

“I thought I’d find myself in the double rôle of police surgeon and eye-witness, so I tried to sort it out while I waited for your telephone call. Here goes. Idris Campanula was about fifty years of age. She came to the Red House as a child of twelve to live with her uncle, General Campanula, who adopted her on the death of her parents. He was an old bachelor and the girl was brought up by his acidulated sister, whom my father used to call one of the nastiest women he’d ever met. When Idris was about thirty, the general died, and his sister only survived him a couple of years. The house and money, a lot of money by the way, were left to Idris, who by that time was shaping pretty much like her aunt. Nil nisi and all that, but it’s a fact. She never had a chance. Starved and repressed and hung about with a mass of shibboleths and Victorian conversation. Well, here she’s stayed for the last twenty years, living on rich food, good works and local scandal. Upon my word, it’s incredible that she’s gone. Look here, I’m being too diffuse, aren’t I?”

“Not a bit. You’re giving us a picture in the round which is what we like.”

“Well, there she was until to-night. I don’t know if you’ve heard from Roper about the play.”

“We haven’t had time,” said Alleyn, “but I hope to get volumes from him before dawn.”

Roper looked gratified and drew nearer.

“The play was got up by a group of local people.”

“Of whom you were one,” said Alleyn.

“Hullo!” Dr. Templett took his pipe out of his mouth and stared at Alleyn. “Now, did any one tell you that, or is this the real stuff?”

“I’m afraid it’s not even up to Form i at Hendon. There’s a trace of grease paint in your hair. I wish I could add that I have written a short monograph on grease paint.”

Dr. Templett grinned.

“I’ll lay you ten to-one,” he said, “that you can’t deduce what sort of part I had.”

Alleyn glanced sideways at him.

“We are not allowed to show off,” he said, “but with Inspector Fox’s austere eye on me, I venture to have a pot shot. A character part, possibly a Frenchman, wearing a rimless eyeglass. Any good?”

“Did we bet in shillings?”

“It was no bet,” said Alleyn apologetically.

“Well, let’s have the explanation,” said Templett. “I enjoy feeling a fool.”

“I’m afraid I’ll feel rather a fool making it,” said Alleyn. “It’s very small beer indeed. In the words of all detective heroes, you only need to consider. You removed your make-up in a hurry. Spirit gum, on which I have not written a monograph, leaves its mark unless removed with care and alcohol. Your chin and upper lips show signs of having been plucked and there’s a very remote trace of black crêpe hairiness. Only on the tip of your chin and not on your cheeks. Ha! A black imperial. The foreign ambassadorial touch. A sticky reddish dint by the left eye suggests a rimless glass, fixed with more spirit gum. The remains of a heated line across the brow suggests a top hat. And, when you mentioned your part, you moved your shoulders very slightly. You were thinking subconsciously of your performance. Broken English. “ ’Ow you say?” with a shrug. That sort of thing. For heaven’s sake say I’m right.”

“By gum!” said Sergeant Roper, devoutly.

“Amen,” said Dr. Templett. “In the words of Mr. Holmes — ”

“—of whom nobody shall make mock in my presence. Pray continue your most interesting narrative,” said Alleyn.

i

“— And so you see,” concluded Templett, “there is absolutely nothing about any of us that is at all out of the ordinary. You might find the same group of people in almost any of the more isolated bits of English countryside. The parson, the squire, the parson’s daughter, the squire’s son, the two church hens and the local medico.”