“Don’t be unhappy,” she said. “What is it?”
“Good God!” he said. “Can you put it out of your mind so easily? It’s Miss Cost, with her skull cracked. It’s Miss Cost, face down in our wonderful spring. It’s your pin-up detective, inching his way into our lives. Do you suppose I enjoy the prospect of—” He stopped short. “I happen,” he said, “to be rather attached to my mother.”
Jenny said quickly: “Patrick — yes, of course you are. But—”
“You must know damned well what I mean.”
“All right. But surely it’s beside the point. Mr. Alleyn can’t think—”
“Can’t he?” His eyes slid away from her. “She was a poisonous woman,” he said.
A silence fell between them and suddenly Jenny shivered unexpectedly, as if some invisible hand had shaken her.
“What’s the matter?” he said irritably. “Are you cold?”
He looked at her miserably and doubtfully.
Jenny thought: I don’t know him. I’m lost…And at once was caught up in a wave of compassion.
“Don’t let’s go on snarling,” she said. “Let’s go home and sort ourselves out. It’s clouded over and I’m getting rather cold.”
He said: “I don’t blame you for wanting to get away from this mess. What a party to have let you in for! It’s better you should go to Dunlowman.”
“Now, that,” said Jenny, “is really unfair and you know it, darling.”
He glowered at her. “You don’t say that as a rule. Everyone says ‘darling,’ but you don’t.”
“That’s right. I’m saying it now for a change. Darling.”
He covered her hand with his. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I am really sorry. Darling Jenny.”
From his bedroom window Alleyn watched and thought: He’ll lose his oar.
It slipped through the rowlock. Patrick became active with the other oar. The dinghy bobbed and turned about. They both reached dangerously overboard. Through the open window Alleyn faintly caught the sound of their laughter.
“That’s done the trick,” he thought. The telephone rang and he answered it.
“Fox, here, sir,” said a familiar, placid voice. “Speaking from Portcarrow station.”
“You sound like the breath of spring.”
“I didn’t quite catch what you said.”
“It doesn’t matter. Have you brought my homicide kit?”
“Yes.”
“Then come, Birdie, come.”
Mr. Fox replaced the receiver and said to Superintendent Coombe and the Yard party: “We’re to go over. He’s worried.”
“He sounded as if he was acting the goat or something,” said Coombe.
“That’s right,” said Fox. “Worried. Come on, you chaps.”
Detective Sergeants Bailey and Thompson, carrying kits and suitcases, accompanied him to the launch. Coombe showed them the way, saw them off and returned to his office.
Alleyn saw them from his window, picked up his raincoat and went down the steps to meet them. They had attracted a considerable amount of attention.
“Quite a picturesque spot,” said Mr. Fox. “Popular, too, by the looks of it. What’s the story, Mr. Alleyn?”
“I’ll tell you on the way, Br’er Fox.”
Alleyn gave a likely-looking boy five shillings to take the suitcases up to the hotel. Numbers of small boys had collected and were shaping up to accompany them. “Move along,” said Mr. Fox majestically. “Shove along, now. Right away. Clear out of it.”
They backed off.
“You’m Yard men, bean’t you, mister?” said the largest of the boys.
“That’s right,” Alleyn said. “Push off or we’ll be after you.”
They broke into peals of derisive but gratified laughter and scattered. One of them started a sort of chant, but the others told him to shut up.
Alleyn took his own kit from Fox and suggested that they all walk round the arm of Fisherman’s Bay and up by Wally’s route to the enclosure. On the way he gave them a résumé of the case.
“Complicated,” Mr. Fox remarked when Alleyn had finished. “Quite a puzzle.”
“And that’s throwing roses at it.”
“Which do you favour, Mr. Alleyn? Mistaken identity or dead on the target?”
“I don’t want to influence you — not that I flatter myself I can — at the outset. The popular theory with Coombe is the first. To support it this wretched boy says he saw Miss Pride arrive, leave and return. She, herself, saw him. Down on the road we’re coming to in a minute. So did Dr. Mayne. Now the second figure, of course, must have been Miss Cost, not Miss Pride. But between the departure of Miss Pride and the arrival of Miss Cost, Barrimore went to the gates and chucked away the notice. Who replaced it? The murderer? Presumably. And when did Wally let himself into the enclosure? If he did? It must have been before Miss Cost appeared, or she would have seen him. So we’ve got to suppose that for some reason Wally did go in and did hide behind the boulder, after Miss Pride had left — avoiding Barrimore, who didn’t see him. I don’t like it. It may be remotely possible, but I don’t like it. And I’m certain he wouldn’t replace the notice. He hasn’t got the gumption. Anyway the timetable barely allows of all this.”
“He’d hardly mistake the deceased for Miss Pride, silly-and-all as he may be, if he got anything like a fair look at her.”
“Exactly, Br’er Fox. As for the galloping Major: he swims round in an alcoholic trance. Never completely drunk. Hardly ever sober. And reputed, incredibly enough, to have had a brief fling with Miss Cost at about the same time as Wally’s warts vanished. He is thought to have proved fickle and to have aroused her classic fury. She also set her bonnet, unsuccessfully it seems, at the Doctor, the Rector and the Mayor. Barrimore’s got a most beautiful and alluring wife, who is said to be bullied by him. She showed signs of acute distress after she heard the news. She’s the original Green Lady. It’s all in the notes: you can have a nice cozy read any time you fancy.”
“Thanks.”
“That’s Wally’s cottage. We are about to climb Wally’s Way — and that is Wally’s mama, another alcoholic, by the by, leering over the back fence. His father is ferryman at high tide and general showman in between. The whole boiling of them — the Barrimores, the Parson, the Doctor, the Major, the Treherns, Miss Cost herself, with pretty well everybody else in the community — stood to lose by Miss Pride’s operations. Apart from arousing the cornered fury of a hunted male, it’s difficult to discover a motive for Miss Cost’s murder… Good evening, Mrs. Trehern!” Alleyn shouted and lifted his hat.
“Yoo-hoo!” Mrs. Trehern wildly returned, clinging to her back fence. “Lock ’er up. Bloody murderess.”
“Who’s she mean?” asked Fox.
“Miss Pride.”
“Bless my soul! Quelle galère!” Fox added, cautiously.
“You must meet Miss Pride, Br’er Fox. She’s a top authority on French as she should be spoke.”
“Ah!” said Fox. “To be properly taught from the word go! That’s the thing. What does she think of the gramophone method?”
“Not much.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” said Fox with a heavy sigh.
Mrs. Trehern gave a screech, not unlike one of her son’s, and tacked into the cottage. Alleyn went over to the fence and looked into the back garden. The clothesline had been removed.
They climbed up Wally’s Way to the enclosure. One of Coombe’s men was standing a little way along the hotel path.
Alleyn said to Bailey: “The whole area was trampled over when the rain came down. From below, up to the boulder, it’s thick broken bracken and you won’t get results, I’m afraid. On the shelf above the pool where the deceased was crouched, leaning forward, you’ll find her prints superimposed over others. Above that, behind the boulder, is the area where our man, woman or child is thought to have hidden. There’s a clear indication of the place where the rock was prized up, and signs that some effort was made to scrape out the footprints. All this, on top of the mess left by the crowd. And to add to your joy, Superintendent Coombe and Dr. Mayne were up there this morning. Their prints ought to be fairly easy to cut out. The Super was wearing his regulation issue and the Doctor’s are ripple-soled. Thompson, give us a complete coverage, will you? And we’ll need casts, Bailey. Better take them as soon as possible.” He looked up at the sky. Heavy clouds were rolling in from the northwest and a fresh wind had sprung up. The sea was no longer calm. “Anyone notice the forecast?”