“Any other reasons, Mr. Alleyn? Apart from nobody being bloody enough?” Thompson asked.
“If it had happened where he was lying and he’d been alive, there’d have been much more blood on the ground.”
Bailey suddenly said, “Hey!”
Mr. Fox frowned at him.
“What’s wrong, Bailey?” Alleyn asked.
“Look, sir, are you telling us it’s not homicide at all? That the old chap died of heart failure or something and Ernie had the fancy to do what he did? After? Or what?”
“I think that may be the defence that will be raised. I don’t think it’s the truth.”
“You think he was murdered?”
“Yes.”
“Pardon me,” Thompson said politely, “but any idea how?”
“An idea, but it’s only a guess. The post mortem will settle it.”
“Laid out cold somehow and then beheaded,” Bailey said, and added most uncharacteristically, “Fancy.”
“It couldn’t have been the whiffler,” Thompson sighed. “Not that it seems to matter.”
“It wasn’t the whiffler,” Alleyn said. “It was the slasher.”
“Oh! But he was dead?”
“Dead.”
“Oh.”
Chapter XI
Question of Temperament
Camilla sat behind her window. When Ralph Stayne came into the inn yard, he stood there with his hands in his pockets and looked up at her. The sky had cleared and the sun shone quite brightly, making a dazzle on the window-pane. She seemed to be reading.
He scooped up a handful of fast-melting snow and threw it at the glass. It splayed out in a wet star. Camilla peered down through it and then pushed open the window.
“ ‘Romeo, Romeo,’ ” she said, “ ‘wherefore art thou Romeo?’ ”
“I can’t remember any of it to quote,” Ralph rejoined. “Come for a walk, Camilla. I want to talk to you.”
“O.K. Wait a bit.”
He waited. Bailey and Thompson came out of the side door of the pub, gave him good morning and walked down the brick path in the direction of the barn. Trixie appeared and shook a duster. When she saw Ralph she smiled and dimpled at him. He pulled self-consciously at the peak of his cap. She jerked her head at him. “Come over, Mr. Ralph,” she said.
He walked across the yard to her, not very readily.
“Cheer up, then,” Trixie said. “Doan’t look at me as if I was going to bite you. There’s no bones broke, Mr. Ralph. I’ll never say a word to her, you may depend, if you ax me not. My advice, though, is to tell the maid yourself and then there’s nothing hid betwixt you.”
“She’s only eighteen,” Ralph muttered.
“That doan’t mean she’s silly, however. Thanks to Ernie and his dad, everybody hereabouts knows us had our bit of fun. The detective gentleman axed me about it and I told him yes.”
“Good God, Trixie!”
“Better the truth from me than a great blowed-up fairy-tale from elsewhere and likewise better for Camilla if she gets the truth from you. Here she comes.”
Trixie gave a definite flap with her duster and returned indoors. Ralph heard her greet Camilla, who now appeared with the freshness of morning in her cheeks and eyes and a scarlet cap on her head.
Alleyn, coming out to fetch the car, saw them walk off down the lane together.
“And I fancy,” he muttered, “he’s made up his mind to tell her about his one wild oat.”
“Camilla,” Ralph said, “I’ve got something to tell you. I’ve been going to tell you before and then — well, I suppose I’ve funked it. I don’t know what you feel about this sort of thing and — I — well — I—”
“You’re not going to say you’ve suddenly found it’s all been a mistake and you’re not in love with me after all?”
“Of course I’m not, Camilla. What a preposterous notion to get into your head! I love you more every minute of the day: I adore you, Camilla.”
“I’m delighted to hear it, darling. Go ahead with your story.”
“It may rock you a bit.”
“Nothing can rock me really badly unless — you’re not secretly married, I hope!” Camilla suddenly ejaculated.
“Indeed I’m not. The things you think of!”
“And, of course (forgive me for mentioning it) you didn’t murder my grandfather, did you?”
“Camilla!”
“Well, I know you didn’t.”
“If you’d just let me —”
“Darling Ralph, you can see by this time that I’ve given in about not meeting you. You can see I’ve come over to your opinion: my objections were immoderate.”
“Thank God, darling. But—”
“All the same, darling, darling Ralph, you must understand that although I go to sleep thinking of you and wake in a kind of pink paradise because of you, I am still determined to keep my head. People may say,” Camilla went on, waving a knitted paw, “that class is vieux jeu, but they’re only people who haven’t visited South Mardian. So what I propose—”
“Sweetheart, it is I who propose. I do so now, Camilla. Will you marry me?”
“Yes, thank you, I will indeed. Subject to the unequivocal consent of your papa and your great-aunt and, of course, my papa, who, I expect, would prefer an R.C., although I’m not one. Otherwise, I can guarantee he would be delighted. He fears I might contract an alliance with a drama student,” Camilla explained and turned upon Ralph a face eloquent with delight at her own absurdities. She was in that particular state of intoxication that attends the young woman who knows she is beloved and is therefore moved to show off for the unstinted applause of an audience of one.
“I adore you,” Ralph repeated unsteadily and punctually. “But, sweetest, darling Camilla, I’ve got, I repeat, something that I ought to tell you about.”
“Yes, of course you have. You began by saying so. Is it,” Camilla hazarded suddenly, “that you’ve had an affair?”
“As a matter of fact, in a sort of way, it is, but—”
Camilla began to look owlish. “I’m not much surprised by that,” she said. “After all, you are thirty and I’m eighteen. Even people of my vintage have affairs, you know, although, personally, I don’t care for the idea at all. But I’ve been given to understand it’s different for the gentlemen.”
“Camilla, stop doing an act and listen to me.”
Camilla looked at him and the impulse to show off for him suddenly left her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Well, go on.”
He went on. They walked up the road to Yowford and for Camilla, as she listened, some of the brightness of the morning fell from the sky and was gone. When he had finished she could find nothing to say to him.
“Well,” Ralph said presently, “I see it has made a difference.”
“No, not at all,” Camilla rejoined politely. “I mean, not really. It couldn’t, could it? It’s just that somehow it’s strange because — well, I suppose because it’s here and someone I know.”
“I’m sorry,” Ralph said.
“I’ve been sort of buddies with Trixie. It seems impossible. Does she mind? Poor Trixie.”
“No, she doesn’t. Really, she doesn’t. I’m not trying to explain anything away or to excuse myself, but they’ve got quite a different point of view in the villages. They think on entirely different lines about that sort of thing.”
“ They‘? Different from whom?”
“Well — from us,” Ralph said and saw his mistake. “It’s hard to understand,” he mumbled unhappily.