Ngaio Marsh - Artists in Crime

“All the students’ rooms are up there,” said Troy, and pointed to the upper landing on the right. “The bathrooms, and mine, are on the other side. Through here”—she pointed to a door on the half-landing—“are the servants’ quarters, the back stairs and a little stair up to the attic-room where — where Sonia slept.”

Alleyn saw that there were lights under two of the doors on the students’ landing.

“Fox and Bailey are up there,” he said. “If you don’t mind— ”

“You’d better do my room,” said Troy. “Here it is.”

They went into the second room on the left-hand landing. It was a large room, very spacious and well-proportioned. The walls, the carpet, and the narrow bed, were white. He saw only one picture and very few ornaments, but on the mantlepiece sparkled a little glass Christmas tree with fabulous glass flowers growing on it. Troy struck a match and lit the fire.

“I’ll leave you to your job,” she said.

Alleyn did not answer.

“Is there anything else?” asked Troy.

“Only that I should like to say that if it was possible for me to make an exception— ”

“Why should you make any exceptions?” interrupted Troy. “There is no conceivable reason for such a suggestion.”

“If you will simply think of me as a ship’s steward or — or some other sexless official— ”

“How else should I think of you, Mr. Alleyn? I can assure you there is no need for these scruples — if they are scruples.”

“They were attempts at an apology. I shall make a third and ask you to forgive me for my impertinence. I shan’t keep you long.”

Troy turned at the door.

“I didn’t mean to be beastly,” she said.

“Nor were you. I see now that I made an insufferable assumption.”

“—But you can hardly expect me to be genial when you are about to hunt through my under-garments for incriminating letters. The very fact that you suspect— ”

Alleyn strode to the door and looked down at her.

“You little fool,” he said, “haven’t you the common-or-garden gumption to see that I no more suspect you than the girl in the moon?”

Troy stared at him as if he had taken leave of his senses. She opened her mouth to speak, said nothing, turned on her heel and left the room.

“Blast!” said Alleyn. “Oh, blast and hell and bloody stink!”

He stood and looked at the door which Troy had only just not slammed. Then he turned to his job. There was a bow-fronted chest of drawers full of the sorts of garments that Alleyn often before had had to turn over. His thin fastidious hands touched them delicately, laid them in neat heaps on the bed and returned them carefully to their appointed places. There was a little drawer, rather untidy, where Troy kept her oddments. One or two letters. One that began “Troy darling” and was signed “Your foolishly devoted, John.”

“John,” thought Alleyn, “John Bellasca?” He glanced through the letters quickly, was about to return them to the drawer, but on second thoughts laid them in a row on the top of the chest. “An odious trade,” he muttered to himself. “A filthy degrading job.” Then there were the dresses in the wardrobe, the slim jackets, Troy’s smart evening dresses, and her shabby old slacks. All the pockets. Such odd things she kept in her pockets — bits of charcoal, india-rubbers, a handkerchief that had been disgracefully used as a paint-rag, and a sketch-book crammed into a pocket that was too small for it. There was a Harris tweed coat — blue. Suddenly he was back on the wharf at Quebec. The lights of Troy’s ship were reflected in the black mirror of the river. Silver-tongued bells rang out from all the grey churches. The tug, with its five globes of yellow light, moved outwards into the night tide of the St. Lawrence, and there on the deck was Troy, her hand raised in farewell, wearing blue Harris tweed. “Good-bye. Thank you for my nice party. Good-bye.” He slipped his hand into a pocket of the blue coat and pulled out Katti Bostock’s letter. He would have to read this.

… You are a gump to collect these blood-suckers… he’s a nasty little animal… that little devil Sonia Gluck… behaving abominably… funny this ‘It’ stuff… you’re different. They’d fall for you if you’d let them, only you’re so unprovocative… (Alleyn shook his head at Katti Bostock.) Your allusions to a detective are quite incomprehensible, but if he interrupted you in your work you had every right to bite his head off. What had you been up to anyway? Well, so long until the 3rd. Katti.

The envelope was addressed to Troy at the Chateau Frontenac.

“Evidently,” thought Alleyn, “I had begun to make a nuisance of myself on board. Interrupting her work. Oh Lord!”

In a minute or two he had finished. It would have been absolutely all right if he had never asked about her room. No need for that little scene. He hung up the last garment, glanced round the room and looked for the fourth or fifth time at the photograph of a man that stood on the top of the bow-fronted chest. A good-looking man who had signed himself “John.” Alleyn, yielding to an unworthy impulse, made a hideous grimace at this photograph, turned to leave the room and saw Troy, amazed, in the doorway. He felt his face burning like a sky sign.

“Have you finished, Mr. Alleyn?”

“Quite finished, thank you.”

He knew she had seen him. There was a singular expression in her eyes.

“I have just made a face at the photograph on your tallboy,” said Alleyn.

“So I observed.”

“I have gone through your clothes, fished in your pockets and read all your letters. You may go to bed. The house will be watched, of course. Good night, Miss Troy.”

“Good morning, Mr. Alleyn.”

Alleyn went to Katti Bostock’s room where he found nothing of note. It was a great deal untidier than Troy’s room, and took longer. He found several pairs of paint-stained slacks huddled together on the floor of the wardrobe, an evening dress in close proximity to a painting-smock, and a row of stubborn-looking shoes with no trees in them. There were odds and ends in all the pockets. He plodded through a mass of receipts, colour-men’s catalogues, drawings and books. The only personal letter he found was the one Troy had written and posted at Vancouver. This had to be read. Troy’s catalogue of the students was interesting. Then he came to the passages about himself. “… turned out to be intelligent, so I felt the fool… Looks like a grandee… on the defensive about this sleuth… Took it like a gent and made me feel like a bounder.” As he read, Alleyn’s left eyebrow climbed up his forehead. He folded the letter very carefully, smoothed it out and returned it to its place among a box of half-used oil-colours. He began to whistle under his breath, polished off Katti Bostock’s effects, and went in search of Fox and Bailey. They had finished the men’s bedrooms.

Fox had found Malmsley’s opium-smoking impedimenta and had impounded it. The amount of opium was small. There were signs that the jar had at one time been full.

“Which does not altogether agree with Mr. Malmsley’s little story,” grunted Alleyn. “Has Bailey tried the thing for prints?”

“Yes. Two sets, Garcia’s and Malmsley’s on the pipe, the lamp and the jar.”

“The jar. That’s interesting. Well, let’s get on with it.”

He sent Bailey into Phillida Lee’s room, while he and Fox tackled Valmai Seacliff’s. Miss Seacliff’s walls were chiefly adorned with pictures of herself. Malmsley and Ormerin had each painted her, and Pilgrim had drawn her once and painted her twice.

“The successful nymphomaniac,” thought Alleyn, remembering Katti’s letter.

A very clever pencil drawing of Pilgrim, signed “Seacliff,” stood on the bedside table. The room was extremely tidy and much more obviously feminine than Troy’s or Katti’s. Seacliff had at least three times as many clothes, and quantities of hats and berets. Alleyn noticed that her slacks were made in Savile Row, and her dresses in Paris. He was amused to find that even the Seacliff painting-bags and smock smelt of Worth. Her week-end case had not been completely unpacked. In it he found three evening dresses, a nightdress and bath-gown, shoes, three pairs of coloured gloves, two day dresses, two berets, and an evening bag containing among other things a half-full bottle of aspirin.