Marsh smiled up at him. “No. Thank you very much.”
The servant said, “Very good, sir,” nodded, and marched from the room.
“They set a lovely table, Lord and Lady Purleigh.” Marsh nodded to my food. “Please. Eat. Enjoy your meal. Unquiet meals make ill digestion. ”
I lifted the lid from my plate. Fried eggs, bacon, sausage, fried tomatoes, buttered toast, a dead fish. I picked up the fork.
With his knife and fork, as precisely as a surgeon, Marsh cut a geometrically perfect square of egg white. He dipped the tip of his knife lightly into the bright yellow yolk, carefully spread yolk along the surface of the white, and then placed the result neatly in his mouth. He kept the fork in his left hand, the way English people do. He chewed with small even bites. Thoughtfully. Delicately. He swallowed and looked up at me, dabbing at his mouth with his napkin.
“Miss Turner had just arrived,” he said. “What happened at that point?”
I swallowed some sausage. “Someone fired a rifle.”
Marsh raised his eyebrows. “Fired a rifle. From where?” He cut off another perfect square of egg white.
Sergeant Meadows had set aside his notebook and he was eating as though he hadn’t eaten since the War. He was bent over his eggs and his heavy elbows were flapping like wings.
“From the forest,” I said. “About a hundred and fifty yards off. At the time, I thought he was aiming at Harry.” I cut off a piece of bacon, ate it.
Marsh carefully spread some yolk along the square. “You believed it was-what was the name? The magician?”
I swallowed. “Chin Soo.”
“You believed it was Chin Soo who fired the rifle.” He put the morsel of egg into his mouth.
“At the time, yeah.”
He chewed. Neatly. Regularly. He swallowed. He dabbed at his mouth. “You’re implying, of course, that you’ve since changed your mind.”
“Yeah.”
“Refresh my memory, would you? Which of the guests, exactly, were out gamboling on the lawn?”
Someone knocked at the door again.
“Rather like Victoria Station, isn’t it?” Marsh smiled. He called out, " Come in.”
The door burst open, banged against its stop, bounced back.
The Great Man caught it with his left hand as he stepped into the room, and he held it. “Phil,” he said. “We must leave.”
Chapter Thirty
I swallowed some egg. “Why’s that, Harry?”
His brow was furrowed. “Bess.” He let the door swing shut and he walked into the room. “I spoke with her on the telephone just now. She rang from Paris. She intends to leave tonight. She will be in London tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning, Phil. I must be there when she arrives.”
I looked at Inspector Marsh. He was smiling pleasantly up at the Great Man. “Forgive me,” he said. “Mr. Houdini?”
The Great Man turned to him, frowning impatiently.
Marsh said, “Who might Bess be, exactly?”
I kept eating. I had a feeling that breakfast would be over pretty soon.
“My dear wife,” said the Great Man. “She has been deathly ill in Paris. Her stomach. That awful food, all those sickening French sauces. She is better now, thank goodness, well enough to travel now. It has been a huge pleasure to meet you, Inspector, and I am sorry we shall have no opportunity to talk. But Mr. Beaumont and I must leave Maplewhite.”
I finished off my egg.
“Yes,” said Marsh. “So you said. You do understand, don’t you, Mr. Houdini, that this is a police investigation?”
Sergeant Meadows was pouring himself a cup of coffee. It looked like a good idea, so I did the same thing.
The Great Man was frowning. Impatiently. “Of course I understand. But I am merely a guest here. The investigation has nothing to do with me. Phil, will it take you long to pack?”
I sipped at my coffee. “Well, Harry,” I said.
“I imagine,” said Marsh, “that it shouldn’t be difficult for you to arrange for someone in London to meet your wife. I-”
“Impossible,” said the Great Man. “Bess expects me to be there.” He raised himself fully upright. “In all our married years together, I have never disappointed my wife, Inspector.”
Marsh smiled. “That does you great credit, Mr. Houdini,” he said. “But I regret to tell you that no one will be permitted to leave Maplewhite until such time as the preliminary investigation has been concluded.”
Impatience had become disbelief. “ Permitted?”
“Harry,” I said.
Marsh said, “Sergeant Meadows and I-”
“Inspector,” said the Great Man. “You fail to understand the situation. My wife is arriving. In London. In the morning. I will be there.”
“Mr. Houdini,” said Marsh.
The Great Man spoke slowly, to make sure that Marsh understood. “Inspector, do you know who I am?”
“Oh yes,” said Marsh, smiling brightly. “I could hardly fail to understand that, could I? Not a day goes by that I don’t admire those colorful advertisements of yours. They’re posted all over London, aren’t they? Ubiquitously, one might say.”
“Then perhaps it has occurred to you,” the Great Man pronounced, “that I am not without influence, even here in England.
I feel I must warn you-”
“ Harry.” I stood up. “Come on, Harry. Outside. Let’s talk.
We’ll be back in a minute, Inspector.”
He turned to me. “But Phil-”
“Come on.” I took him by the arm. He resisted, his muscle bunching under my hand. He held his head up, his gray eyes glaring at Marsh. Marsh was smiling up at him, pleasantly.
I tugged at the arm. “Harry, come on. We’ll get this straightened out.”
Reluctantly, his head high, he came along.
“The man is insane, Phil!”
“He’s a cop, Harry.”
“He is an imbecile!”
“I don’t think so.”
“But you heard me explain. He refuses to listen!”
“Harry, he’s just doing his job.”
“But permitted! How dare he? Bess will be in London tomorrow!” We were in the hallway outside the library. The Great Man was pacing up and down the parquet floor, waving his arms. I was leaning against the wall. My own arms were crossed.
“Why not call her back?” I said. “Ask her if she can take a later train. Tomorrow, maybe.”
He stopped pacing and turned to me and put his hands on his hips. “I refuse. Absolutely. I have given my word.” He stood upright again. “And Houdini never goes back on his word.”
“Harry, you’re just being stubborn. You’re angry at Marsh.”
“I have every reason to be angry.”
“Marsh needs to talk to everyone. He needs to figure out what’s going on.”
“ What?” He leaned toward me. “ What, Phil? What is this oh-so-important thing he needs to ‘figure out’?”
“Harry, I told you.” You had to be patient with him. “Someone tried to stab Miss Turner last night. Maybe it was the same person who fired that shot yesterday. And maybe he’ll try again-Miss Turner is in danger, Harry, until someone finds out what’s happening. And maybe all that-the rifle shot, the knife maybe it’s all connected to the Earl somehow. To the Earl’s death. I still don’t like the idea of suicide.”
He shook his head. “We have discussed this, Phil. It must have been suicide. No one could possibly have opened that door. I examined it with the utmost care.”
“And what was going on with the Earl? Why was he wandering around, playing ghost in the middle of the night?”
He shook his head. “The Earl was paralyzed, Phil.”
“He said he was paralyzed. He acted like he was paralyzed. But I told you, Harry, Miss Turner found those things in his room.”
“Someone placed them there, of course.”
“Why?”
“To discredit him.”
“She found them by accident. And what’s the point of discrediting the Earl?”
“I have no idea.”
“Yeah. Neither do I.”
He opened his mouth and then shut it. He took a deep breath. He looked out the casement window and he frowned. He cocked his head to the side. “I could simply leave,” he said suddenly. He was talking more to himself than to me. “Who would stop me?”