Ngaio Marsh - Overture to Death

“I’m very sorry about this, doctor.”

“That’s all right,” said Templett.

“I think Mr. Alleyn will agree with me that if it’s got no bearing on the case we’ll do our best to bury it.”

“Certainly,” said Alleyn.

“I don’t care much what happens,” said Templett.

“Oh, come now, doctor,” said Blandish uncomfortably, “you mustn’t say that.”

But Alleyn saw a gay little drawing-room with a delicate straw-coloured lady, whose good nature did not stretch beyond a very definite point, and he thought he understood Dr. Templett.

“I think,” he said, “you had better give us a complete time-table of your movements from two-thirty on Friday up to eight o’clock last night. We shall check it, but we’ll make the process an impersonal sort of business.”

“But for those ten minutes in the hall, I’m all right,” said Templett. “God, I was with her all the time, until I shut the window! Ask her how long it took! I wasn’t away two minutes over the business. Surely to God she’ll at least bear me out in that. She’s nothing to lose by it.”

“She shall be asked,” said Alleyn.

Templett began to give the names of all the houses he had visited on his rounds. Fox took them down.

Alleyn suddenly asked Blandish to find out how long the Pen Cuckoo telephone had been disconnected by the falling branch. Blandish rang up the exchange.

“From eight-twenty until the next morning.”

“Yes,” said Alleyn. “Yes.”

Dr. Templett’s voice droned on with its flat recital of time and place.

“Yes, I hunted all day Friday. I got home in time to change and go to the five o’clock rehearsal. The servants can check that. When I got home again I found this urgent message… I was out till after midnight. Mrs. Bains at Mill Farm. She was in labour twenty-four hours… yes…”

“May I interrupt?” asked Alleyn. “”Yesterday morning, at Pen Cuckoo, Mrs. Ross did not leave the car?”

“No.”

“Were you shown into the study?”

“Yes.”

“You were there alone?”

“Yes,” said Templett, showing the whites of his eyes. “Dr. Templett, did you touch the box with the automatic?”

“Before God, I didn’t.”

“One more question. Last night did you use all your powers of authority and persuasion to induce Miss Prentice to allow Miss Campanula to take her place?”

“Yes, but — she wouldn’t listen to me.”

“Will you describe again how you found her?”

“I told you last night. I came in late. I thought Dinah would be worried and after I’d changed, I went along to the women’s dressing-room to show her I was there. I heard some one snivelling and moaning, and through the open door I saw Miss Prentice in floods of tears, rocking backwards and forwards and holding her hand. I went in and looked at it. No doctor in his senses would have let her thump the piano. She couldn’t have done it. I told her so, but she kept on saying, ‘I will do it. I will do it.’ I got angry and spoke my mind. I couldn’t get any further with her. It was damned near time we started and I wasn’t even made-up.”

“So you fetched Miss Copeland and her father, knowing the rector would possibly succeed where you had failed.”

“Yes. But I tell you it was physically impossible for her to use her finger. I could have told her that — ”

He stopped short.

“Yes? You could have told her that, how long ago?” said Alleyn.

“Three days ago.”

iv

Smith returned.

“It’s Sergeant Roper, sir. He says it’s very particular indeed and he knows Mr. Alleyn would want to hear it.”

“Blast!” said Blandish. “All right, all right.”

Smith left the door open. Alleyn saw Nigel crouched over an anthracite stove and Roper, sweating and expectant, in the middle of the room.

“Right oh, Roper,” said Smith audibly. Roper hurriedly removed his helmet, cleared his throat, and marched heavily into the room.

“Well, Roper?” said Blandish.

“Sir,” said Roper, “I have a report.” He took his official note-book from a pocket in his tunic and opened it, bringing it into line with his nose. He began to read very rapidly in a high voice.

“This afternoon, November 28th, at 4 p.m. being on duty at the time outside the parish hall of Winton St. Giles I was approached and accosted by a young female. She was well-known to me being by name Gladys Wright (Miss) of Top Lane, Winton. The following conversation eventuated. Miss Wright enquired of me if I was waiting for my girl or my promotion. Myself (P.S. Roper): I am on duty, Miss Wright, and would take it kindly if you would pass along the lane. Miss Wright: Look what our cat’s brought in. P.S. Roper: And I don’t want no lip or saucy boldness. Miss Wright: I could tell you something and I’ve come along to do it, but seeing you’re on duty maybe I’ll keep it for your betters. P.S. Roper: If you know anything, Gladys, you’d better speak up for the law comes down with majesty on them that aids and abets and withholds. Miss Wright: What will you give me? The succeeding remarks are not evidence and bear no connection with the matter in hand. They are therefore omitted.”

“What the hell did she tell you?” asked Blandish. “Shut that damned book and come to the point.”

“Sir, the girl told me in her silly way that she came down to the hall at six-thirty on yesterday evening being one of them selected to usher. She let herself in and finding herself the first to arrive, living nearby and not wishing to return home, the night being heavy rain with squalls and her hair being artificially twisted up with curls which to my mind—”

“ What did she tell you ?”

“She told me that at six-thirty she sat down as bold as brass and played ‘Nearer my Gawd to Thee’ with the soft pedal on,” said Roper.

i

Sergeant Roper, sweating lightly, allowed an expression of extreme gratification to suffuse his enormous face. The effect of his statement on his superiors left nothing to be desired. Superintendent Blandish stared at his sergeant like a startled codfish, Detective-Inspector Fox pushed his glasses up his forehead and brought his hands down smartly on his knees. Dr. Templett uttered in a whisper a string of amazing blasphemies. Chief Inspector Alleyn pulled his own nose, made a peculiar grimace, and said:

“Roper, you shall be hung with garlands, led through the village, and offered up at the Harvest Festival.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Roper.

“Where,” asked Alleyn, “is Gladys Wrieht?”

Roper flexed his knees and pointed with his thumb over his shoulder.

“Stuck to her like glue, I have. I telephoned Fife from the hall to relieve me, keeping the silly maiden under observation the while. I brought her here, sir, on the bar of my bike, all ten stones of her, and seven mile if it’s an inch.”

“Magnificent. Bring her in, Roper.”

Roper went out.

“I didn’t get there till half-past seven,” whispered Dr. Templett, shaking his finger at Alleyn. “Not till half-past seven. You see! You see! The hall was full of people. Ask Dinah Copeland. She’ll tell you I never went on the stage. Ask Copeland. He was sitting on the stage. I saw him through the door when I called him down. Ask any of them. My God!”

Alleyn reached out a long arm and gripped his wrist.

“Steady, now,” he said. “Fox, there’s the emergency flask in that case.”

He got Templett to take the brandy before Roper returned.

“Miss Gladys Wright, sir,” said Roper, flinging back the door and expanding his chest.

He shepherded his quarry into the room with watchful pride, handed her over, and retired behind the door to wipe his face down excitedly with the palm of his hand.