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Alleyn did not tell him that in giving her account of their meeting, Madame Lisse had made no mention of this incident.

Before he let Nicholas go, Alleyn asked him, as he had asked Hart, to give a description of the smoking-room. Nicholas appeared to find this request suspicious and distressing and at first made a poor fist of his recital. “I don’t know what’s in the ghastly place. It’s just an ordinary room. You’ve seen it. Why do you want to ask me for an inventory?” Alleyn persisted, however, and Nicholas gave him a list of objects, rattling it off in a series of jerks: “The wireless. Those filthy knives. There are seven of them and the thing that did it—” he wetted his lips—”hung in the middle. I remember looking at it while we were talking. There were some flowering plants in pots, I think. And there’s a glass-topped case with objets d’art in it. Medals and miniatures and things. And sporting prints and photographs. There’s a glass-fronted cupboard with china and old sporting trophies inside, and a small bookcase with Handley Cross and Stonehenge and those sort of books in it. Leather chairs and an occasional table with cigars and cigarettes. I can’t think of anything else. My God, when I think of that room I see only one thing and I’ll see it to the end of my days!”

“You’ve given me a very useful piece of information,” Alleyn said. “You told me that when you left your brother, the Maori mere was still in its place on the wall.”

Nicholas stared dully at him. “I hadn’t thought of it before,” he said. “I suppose it was.”

“Are you quite certain?”

Nicholas passed his hand over his eyes again. “Certain?” he repeated. “I thought I was, but now you ask me again I’m not so sure. It might have been when Bill and I were in the smoking-room in the morning. What were we talking about? Yes. Yes, we were talking about Mandrake in the pond. Yes, it was in the morning. Oh, hell, I’m sorry. I can’t say it was there in the evening. I don’t think I looked at the wall, then. I can’t remember.”

“There’s only one other thing,” Alleyn said. “I must tell you that Mr. Royal has given me the letter that was found in your mother’s room.”

“But,” said Nicholas, “that’s horrible! It was for me. There’s nothing in it — Can’t you — Must you pry into everything? There’s nothing in it that can help you.”

“If that’s how it is,” said Alleyn, “it will go no further than the inquest. But I’m sure you will see that I must read it.”

Nicholas’ lips had bleached to a mauve line. “You won’t understand it,” he said. “You’ll misread it. I shouldn’t have given it to them. I should have burnt it.”

“You’d have made a really bad mistake if you’d done that.” Alleyn took the letter from his pocket and laid it on the desk.

“For God’s sake,” Nicholas said, “remember that when she wrote it she was thinking of me and how much I’d miss her. She’s accusing herself of deserting me. For God’s sake remember that.”

“I’ll remember,” Alleyn said. He put the letter aside with his other papers and said that he need keep Nicholas no longer. Now that he was free, Nicholas seemed less anxious to go. He hung about the library looking miserably at Alleyn out of the corners of his eyes. Alleyn wrote up his notes and wondered what was coming. He became aware that Nicholas was watching him. For some little time he went on sedately with his notes but at last looked up to find, as he had expected, those rather prominent grey eyes staring at him.

“What is it, Mr. Compline?” said Alleyn quietly.

“Oh, nothing. It’s just — there doesn’t seem anywhere to go. It gets on your nerves, wandering about the house. This damned mongrel rain and everything. I–I was going to ask you where he was.”

“Dr. Hart?”

“Yes.”

“He’s locked up at the moment, at his own request.”

“So long as he is locked up. Mandrake and Hersey seem to have gone silly over him. Because he attended my mother! God, she was at his mercy! Hart! The man who ruined her beauty and had just murdered her son. Pretty, wasn’t it! How do I know what he was doing to her?”

“From what Lady Hersey tells me, his treatment was exactly what the doctor I spoke to prescribed. I’m sure you need not distress yourself by thinking that any other treatment would have made the smallest difference.”

“Why didn’t Mandrake get here sooner? They wanted the stuff from the chemist urgently, didn’t they? What the hell was he doing? Nearly four hours to go sixty miles! My mother was dying and the best they could do was to send a bloody little highbrow cripple with a false name.”

“A false name!” Alleyn ejaculated.

“Yes. Didn’t Jonathan tell you? He told me. He’s as common as dirt, is Mr. Aubrey Mandrake, and his name’s Footling. Jonathan put me up to pulling his leg about it, and he’s had his knife into me ever since.”

The door opened and Aubrey Mandrake looked in.

“Sorry,” he said, “I didn’t know you were still engaged.”

“We’ve finished, I think,” said Alleyn. “Thank you so much, Mr. Compline. Come in, Mr. Mandrake.”

“I only came in,” said Mandrake, “to say Lady Hersey is free now, if you want to see her. She asked me to tell you.”

“I shall be glad to see her in a minute or so. I just want to get my notes into some sort of order. I suppose you can’t do shorthand, can you?”

“Good Heavens, no,” said Mandrake languidly. “What an offensive suggestion.”

“I wish I could. Never mind. I’ve been going through your notes. They’re of the greatest help. You haven’t signed them and I’ll get you to do so, if you don’t mind.”

“I don’t mind, of course,” said Mandrake uneasily, “but you must remember they’re based on hearsay as well as on my own observations.”

“I think you’ve made that quite clear. Here they are.”

He gave Mandrake his pen and pressed the notes out flat for him. It was a decorative affair, the signature, with the tail of the “y” in “Aubrey” greatly prolonged and slashed forward to make the up-stroke of the “M” in “Mandrake.” Alleyn blotted it carefully and looked at it.

“This is your legal signature?” he said, as he folded the notes.

When Mandrake answered, his voice sounded astonishingly vicious. “You’ve been talking to the bereaved Nicholas, of course,” he said. “It seems that even in his sorrow he found a moment for one of his little pleasantries.”

“He’s in a condition that might very well develop into a nervous crisis. He’s lashing out blindly and rather stupidly. It’s understandable.”

“I suppose he told you of the incident at dinner? About my name?”

“No. What was the incident at dinner?”

Mandrake told him. “It’s too squalidly insignificant and stupid, of course,” he ended rapidly. “It was idiotic of me to let it get under my skin, but I happen to object rather strongly to that particular type of wholesome public-school humour. Possibly because I did not go to a public school.” Before Alleyn could answer he went on defiantly: “And now, of course, you are able to place me. I’m the kind of inverted snob that can’t quite manage to take the carefree line about my background. And I talk far too much about myself.”

“I should have thought,” said Alleyn, “you’d have worked all that off with your writing. But then I’m not a psychologist. As for your name, you’ve had the fun of changing it, and all I want to know is whether you did it by deed poll or whether I’ve got to ask for the other signature.”

“I haven’t, but I’m going to. ‘The next witness was Stanley Footling, better known as Aubrey Mandrake.’ It’ll look jolly in the papers, won’t it?”