‘We didn’t bother about surnames. We knew them as Virginia and Sarah.’
‘Nor they, sir?’
‘They knew us as Tom and Bonamy. No names, no packdrill. It was just one of these holiday pick-ups, you know.’
‘And enjoyed by all, I have no doubt, sir. I envy you.’
‘Why? Think of Starsky and Hutch. Look at that Greek Romeo Kojak. The police have all the opportunities.’
‘I have nothing to learn from American police methods, sir. So far as my duties are concerned, stuffed shirt is my middle name.’
‘OK, so no muscling in on our preserves,’ said Tom, eyeing the handsome young sergeant with little favour.
‘No such luck, sir.’
The landlord of the public house in Stint Magna knew Harrow and greeted the sergeant with resignation.
‘Don’t tell me my ladies have been getting into mischief,’ he said.
‘You’ve read about the death of Professor Veryan at Holdy Castle, I suppose, Sam?’
‘Very unfortunate, that. Shows how careful people ought to be, climbing about on ruins.’
‘Yes. Did your ladies sleep here on that Sunday night?’
‘No, nor on the Friday and Saturday neither. Paid their bills – I charge by the week – on the Friday morning, told me they wouldn’t be back till the Monday and had a midday snack and a drink with two young fellers been coming here regular, and then went gallivantin’ off with them. Not much call to ask how they spent the weekend, I reckon. Lady students they may be, but larky as they come. Oh, well, you’re only young once.’
‘Where are they now?’
‘Sunbathin’ and studyin’ out on my back lawn. It ain’t overlooked and we gives ’em warning of opening time so’s they can get their shorts and shirts on over their bikinis and come respectable into the bar.’
‘Call them in now.’
‘It wants half an hour.’
‘I haven’t got half an hour to mess about. Besides, I want to talk to them before those young fellows get here.’
‘That won’t be yet awhile. What’s the big idea?’
‘Orders from up top. That’s all I know.’
‘OK. Get ’em in the back way, Dilly. Tell ’em it’s the police and they better look slippy.’
Virginia and Sarah proved to be long-legged, attractive hoydens, well up to the exacting standards which Tom, at any rate, set for the women of his fancy. They eyed the sergeant with approval.
‘The fuzz gets scrummier and scrummier,’ said Virginia, when she had introduced herself by this name.
‘And crumbier and crumbier,’ said Sarah. ‘Just look at this innocent boy!’
‘You’re welcome to do that as long as you want,’ said Harrow, ‘but, while you’re doing it, I have to ask you a few questions concerning the death at Holdy Castle.’
‘Not guilty, me lud,’ said Virginia.
‘You were in a caravan parked just below the ruins of Holdy Castle when the death occurred, and two young men whom you knew as Bonamy and Tom were with you.’
‘But the two boys weren’t. We spent Friday afternoon and Saturday and Sunday all day together, but when it came to bedtime they chickened out on us, even though we assured them we were on the pill.’
‘Look, ladies, this is a very serious matter. The inquest has been adjourned because there is some evidence – not much, but some – that Professor Veryan was murdered. I do ask you, for your own sakes, not to play games. Do you swear that you were alone in the caravan on the nights in question?’
‘Yes,’ said Virginia. ‘They done us wrong – in reverse.’
‘We was stood up,’ said Sarah, copying her friend’s flippant tone; then she caught Harrow’s eye and became serious. ‘It wasn’t very flattering,’ she said.
‘But you yourselves definitely were in the caravan on that Sunday night?’
‘We were hardly likely to have crawled back here to Uncle Sam and Aunt Dilly and ask for our beds back because our favours had been rejected,’ said Virginia. ‘The boys brought us back first thing on Monday morning, as promised, and our wounded feelings could not survive in the face of their contrition for having let us down.’
‘None of that matters very much, miss. I now come to a leading question and you, being educated ladies, will recognise it as such and will not be tempted into making any false statements concerning it.’
‘Oh, Lord! I know what’s coming. That drunken bellowing,’ said Sarah. ‘Very unpleasant.’
‘What time was this, and which night?’
‘The Sunday night, at about half-past eleven.’
‘Bellowing? Not a single shout?’
‘No. There was quite a bit of it. It sounded like a first-class row, and it was too close to be pleasant. I got up and locked the door of the caravan and closed the windows. It made the place horribly stuffy, but if there is one thing I bar it’s people who are fighting drunk.’
‘Are you sure of the time, miss?’
‘Yes, I’ve got a luminous watch.’
‘What made you look at it?’
‘I said to Virginia that surely the pubs had closed long before, and that made me look at my watch.’
‘Of course we were there,’ said Tom. ‘Do you impugn our virility?’
‘No, only your veracity, sir,’ said Mowbray. ‘Sergeant Harrow is convinced that the young ladies were telling him the truth. He sums them up as the last types who would have denied sleeping around, if sleep around they did. He asserts that they were humiliated and distressed by what they saw as your unchivalrous behaviour.’
‘The world has turned itself upside down,’ said Tom, ‘so what’s the use? We never dreamed you’d be swine enough to question the girls.’
‘Pigs is the word for us, not swine, sir,’ said Mowbray, with an avuncular smile.
‘So our alibi has gone up in smoke.’
‘According to Dame Beatrice, you are not the only liars in your party, sir. She is far from satisfied with the interviews she had, although, strangely enough, she was inclined to accept your own story. Just as a matter of interest, may I ask why you let the young ladies down?’
‘In winter-time a young man’s fancy
From his love will not be sundered,
But there’s no fun in bed with Nancy
When the temperature’s a hundred,’
said Tom and he added, ‘The July nights were much too hot for fornication. We preferred to sleep under the stars.’
‘In other words,’ said Bonamy, ‘we did spend Sunday night in my godmother’s paddock and on the other two nights we were equally far from the madding crowd.’
‘That may turn out very awkward from your point of view, gentlemen. My advice is to stick to your assignments, however inconvenient, insanitary or uncomfortable they may be.’
‘So there it is, ma’am,’ said Mowbray later to Dame Beatrice. ‘One helpful pointer has emerged, though. There seems no reason to doubt those girls. Harrow, who is my barometer where the young of the female sex are concerned, is convinced that they were vexed and chagrined when the young fellows dodged the column.’
‘Was their excuse for so doing a genuine one? Did it ring true?’
‘Oh, indeed, ma’am. I myself slept in the porch those nights. I thought we were going to end up with violent thunderstorms, it was so hot and humid down here.’
‘It is never too hot for me. Old bones are sensitive only to the cold. I wonder if the quarrel the girls mentioned was between Saltergate and Veryan. The time Sarah quoted was eleven-thirty and that fits.’
‘And doesn’t help, ma’am.’
‘Well, now, have you Miss Broadmayne’s home address?’
‘With all the others, yes, ma’am. We had it in mind that all work at the castle would cease, at any rate for a time, after Professor Veryan’s death, and that the parties would disperse to their homes.’