There was a long silence, broken at last by Mandrake. “But nobody could have fixed it,” said Mandrake.
“Only after William was dead. He would have seen it when he was tuning, wouldn’t he? But this is the place, I see, to introduce Thomas, the dancing footman. Thomas set a limit to the time when the murderer departed. Incidentally he also proved, by a little excursion, that Hart couldn’t have shoved you in the pond. Thomas was Nicholas Compline’s undoing. If it hadn’t been for Thomas we would have had a job proving that Hart didn’t do exactly what Nicholas said he did: creep in by the door from the hall into the smoking-room and kill William. The mistaken identity stunt had to be supported by an approach from the ‘boudoir.’ But as things stood it was perfectly clear from the start that only Nicholas could have benefited by the wireless alibi. Mr. Royal, whose trip into the hall looked rather fishy, left the library after the wireless started, and Dr. Hart would have gained nothing whatsoever by the trick since he was alone for the entire time. Lady Hersey, who had no motive, is the stock figure of thriller-fiction — the all-too-obvious suspect. Moreover the trout-line device would have been of no use to her, either, since she went in after the noise started.”
“What exactly did he do, though?” asked Chloris.
“He killed his brother, rigged the wireless trick, came out and shut the door. Later, he opened the door, held a one-sided conversation with William, asked for the news, tweaked the string which he had pinned to the door-jamb and waited, with God knows what sensations, for someone to go into the smoking-room.”
“What happened to the line?”
“You will remember, Mandrake, that while you and Mr. Royal were together by the body, Nicholas came in. He had shut the door after him and was hidden from you by the screen. He had only to stoop and pull the line towards him. The drawing-pin had jerked away and he had not time to hunt for it. The line was in heavy shadow and the same colour as the carpet. It throws back well towards the screen when the trick is worked. He gathered it up and put it on the fire when he got the chance. You left him by the fire for a moment, perhaps.”
“He asked us to leave him to himself.”
“I’ll be bound he did. But a trout-line doesn’t burn without leaving a trace and we found its trace in the ashes.”
“I see,” said Mandrake.
“I can’t help thinking about his mother,” said Chloris. “I mean, it was Nicholas she adored.”
“And for that reason she killed herself. At the inquest you will hear the letter she wrote. Mandrake has already seen it. She hoped to save Nicholas by that letter. While seeming to make a confession, it tells him that she knew what he had done. No wonder he was upset when he read it. It was her last gesture of love — a very terrible gesture.”
“I think,” said Chloris shakily, “that he truly was fond of her.”
“Perhaps,” said Alleyn.
The library door opened and Hersey’s face, very pale and exhausted, looked in. “Is it an official party?” she asked. Alleyn asked her to come in. “I have already been over a good deal of this with Lady Hersey and with Mr. Royal,” he explained, and to Hersey: “I have not got as far as your visit with Nicholas Compline to his mother.”
“Oh, yes. You asked me last night to tell you exactly what he did and I couldn’t remember very clearly. That’s why I’ve come in. I’ve remembered what happened after he’d tried to tell her about William. I’m afraid it’s quite insignificant. He seemed frightfully upset, of course, and I suppose in a ghastly sort of way he was. He didn’t make her understand and turned away. I had to tell her. I knelt by her bed and put my arms around her. We were old friends, you know. I told her as best I could. I remember, now, hearing him walk away behind me and I remember that in the back of my head I was irritated with him because he seemed to be fidgeting about by the wardrobe. He must have been in a pretty awful state of mind. He was swinging the wardrobe door, I thought. I suppose he didn’t know what he was doing.”
“I think he knew,” said Alleyn. “The tweed hat was on the top shelf of the wardrobe. He was getting rid of a green-and-red Alexander trout-fly.”
“Wasn’t that rather a mad thing to do?” asked Hersey wearily, when Alleyn had explained about the trout-fly.
“Not quite as mad as it sounds. The hook was not an easy thing to get rid of. He couldn’t burn it or risk putting it in a wastepaper basket. He would have been wiser to keep the hook until he could safely dispose of it, or merely leave it on the mantelpiece, but no doubt he was possessed by the intense desire of all homicides to rid himself of the corpus delicti. In the shock of William’s death his mother would have been most unlikely to notice a second and very insignificant trout-fly in her hat-band.”
“And that’s all,” said Mandrake after a long silence.
“That, I think, is all. You would like to go now, wouldn’t you?”
“Shall we go?” Mandrake asked Chloris. She nodded listlessly but didn’t move. “I think I should go if I were you,” said Alleyn, looking very directly at Mandrake.
“Come along, darling,” Mandrake said, gently. They bade good-bye to Hersey and Alleyn and went out.
“ ‘Darling’?” murmured Hersey. “But it means nothing, nowadays, does it? Why do you want to get rid of them, Mr. Alleyn?”
“We’re expecting the police car and the ambulance. It won’t be very pleasant. You would like to get away too, I expect, wouldn’t you?”
“No, thank you,” said Hersey. “I think I’ll stay with my cousin Jo. He’s pretty well cut up about this, you know. After all, he gave the party. It’s not a pleasant thought.” She looked at the door into the smoking-room, the door with its rows of dummy books. “Mr. Alleyn,” she said, “he’s a despicable monster, but I was fond of his mother. Would she perhaps have liked me to see him now?”
“I don’t think I should if I were you. We can tell him you’ve offered to see him and we can let you know later on if he’d like it.”
“I must ask you — has he confessed?”
“He has made a written statement. It’s not a confession.”
“But…?”
“I can’t tell you more than that, I’m afraid,” said Alleyn, and before his imagination rose the memory of sheets of paper covered with phrases that had no form, ending abruptly or straggling off into incoherence, phrases that contradicted each other and that made wild accusations against Hart, against the mother who had accused herself. He heard Fox saying: “I’ve given him the warning over and over again, but he will do it. He’s hanging himself with every word of it.” He felt Hersey’s gaze upon him, and looking up saw that she was white to the lips. “Mr. Alleyn,” she said, “what will happen to Nicholas?” And when he did not answer Hersey covered her face with her hands.
Through the sound of pouring rain Alleyn heard a car coming up the drive and out on the sweep before the house.
Fox came in. “It’s our people, Mr. Alleyn.”
“All right,” said Alleyn, and he turned to Hersey. “I must go,” Hersey walked to the door. He opened it and he and Fox followed her into the hall.
Jonathan was standing there. Hersey went straight to him and he took her by the hands. “Well, dear,” said Jonathan, “it — it’s time, I think.”
Fox had gone to the front door and opened it. The sound of rain filled the hall. A large man in plain clothes came in, followed by two policemen. Alleyn met him and the large man shook hands. Jonathan came forward.
“Well, Blandish,” he said.