Alleyn walked to the head of the table and surveyed its occupants. “If this were a normal investigation,” he said, “I would see each of you separately while the others were kept under observation. In these circumstances I can’t do that; I am taking each of your statements now in the presence of you all. That being done I shall send for Mr. Merryman.”
“Why the hell should he be the kingpin?” Dale demanded and then took the plunge. “Unless, by God, he did it!”
“Mr. Merryman,” Alleyn rejoined, “sat in the deck-chair now occupied by Mrs. Dillington-Blick. He was still there when the men left this room. He commanded a view of the deck, each side of it. He could see both approaches to the verandah. He is, therefore, the key witness. His temperament is not complaisant. If he were here he’d try to run the whole show. I therefore prefer to let you account for yourselves now and bring him in a little later.”
“That’s all very well,” Mr. Cuddy said. “But suppose he did it. Suppose he’s the Flower Murderer. How about that?”
“In that case, being ignorant of what you have all told me, he may offer a statement that one of you can disprove.”
“So it’ll be our word,” Dale said, “against his?”
“With this reservation. That he was in a position to see you all, and none of you, it seems, was able to see him or each other. He can speak about you all, I hope. Each of you can only speak for himself.”
Mr. McAngus said, “I don’t know why you all want him; he makes me feel uncomfortable and silly.”
“Ah, for God’s sake!” Dale ejaculated. “Can’t we get on with it!”
Alleyn, still standing, put his hands on the back of his chair and said, “By all means. This is the position as far as we’ve gone. I suggest that you consider it.”
They were at once silent and uneasily attentive.
“Three of you,” Alleyn said, “have given me statements about your movements during the crucial time — the time, a matter of perhaps eight minutes, between the moment when Mrs. Dillington-Blick left this room and the moment when Mr. Cuddy came back with an account of his discovery of the body. During those eight minutes the steward Dennis was strangled, I believe in mistake for Mrs. Dillington-Blick. None of the three statements corroborates either of the other two. We have a picture of three individuals all moving about, out there in the semi-dark, without catching sight of each other. For myself, I was the first to go. I met Mrs. Dillington-Blick by the verandah to which she went — I’m sorry to put it like this but there’s no time for polite evasions — as a decoy. No doubt she assured herself that Dennis was there and she was about to take cover when I appeared. To get rid of me she asked me to help her down the port side companion-ladder to the lower deck. I did so and then saw her to her cabin and returned here. Mr. Cuddy, in the meantime, had changed, gone below and then to the pool by way of the starboard side on the lower deck. Miss Abbott, who left after he did, walked round this deck and stood for some minutes on the starboard side. She remembers that she saw somebody in the pool.
“Mr. McAngus says he left by these double doors, stood for a time by the passengers’ quarters on the port side and then went to his cabin and to bed. Nobody appeared to have noticed him.
“Mr. Dale, I imagine, will now admit that his first statement, to the effect that he went straight to his cabin, was untrue. On the contrary, he was on deck. He hid behind a locker on the starboard side near the verandah corner hoping to overhear some cruelly ludicrous scene of mistaken identity. He afterwards went into the verandah, presumably discovered the body, returned to his cabin and drank himself into the state from which he has at least partially recovered
“I resent the tone—” Dale began.
“You’ll have to lump the tone, I’m afraid. I now want to know what, if anything, you heard from your hiding place and exactly what you did and saw when you went into the verandah. Do you propose to tell me?”
“Captain Bannerman—”
“No good coming at me,” said the captain. “You’re in a tight spot, Mr. Dale, and truth had better be your master.”
Dale smacked the palm of his hand down on the table. “All right! Turn on me. The whole gang of you and much good may it do you. You badger and threaten and get a man tied up in knots until he doesn’t know what he’s saying. I’m as anxious as anyone for this bloody murderer to be caught. If I could tell you anything that’d bring him to book I would. All right. I did what you say, I sat behind the locker. I heard Miss Abbott go past. Tramp, tramp. She walks like a man. I couldn’t see her, but I knew it was Miss Abbott because she was humming a churchy tune. I’ve heard her before. And then, it was quiet. And then, after a bit, somebody else went by. Going towards the verandah. Tip-toe. Furtive. I heard him turn the corner and I heard somebody — Dennis, I suppose — it was rather high-pitched — make a little sound. And then—” He wiped his hand across his mouth. “Then there were other sounds. The chair legs scraped. Somebody cried out. Only once and it was cut short. Then there was another sort of bumping and scraping. Then nothing. I don’t know for how long. Then the tip-toe footsteps passed again. A bit faster but not running and somebody singing, as Cuddy said. ‘Pack Up Your Troubles.’ In a head-voice. Falsetto. Only a phrase of it and then nothing.”
“In tune?” Alleyn asked.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Was the voice in tune?”
Dale said, “Well, really! Oh, yes. Yes. Perfectly in tune,” and gave a half laugh.
“Thank you. Go on. What did you do next?”
“I was going to come out but I heard another voice.”
He screwed round in his chair and jerked his head at Cuddy. “You,” he said. “It was your voice. Unmistakably. You said, ‘All alone?’ ” He aped a mellifluous, arch enquiry. “I heard you go in. Wet feet on the deck. And then, after a pause, you made a sort of retching noise and you ran out, and I suppose you bolted down the deck.”
“I’ve explained everything,” Mr. Cuddy said. “I’ve told them. I’ve concealed nothing.”
“Very well,” Alleyn said. “Keep quiet. And then, Mr. Dale?”
“I waited. Then I thought I’d just go round and ask what had happened. I must have had some sort of idea there was something wrong; I realize that now. It was — it was so deadly quiet.”
“Yes?”
“So I did. I went in. I said something, I don’t remember what, and there was no answer. So I–I got out my cigarette lighter and flashed it on — Oh, God, God!”
“Well?”
“I couldn’t see much at first. It seemed funny he didn’t say anything. I put the flame nearer and then I saw. It was hell. Like that doll. Broken. And the flowers. The deck was wet and slippery. I thought, ‘I’ve done this; it’s my fault. I arranged it and she’ll say I did. Let somebody else discover it!’ Something like that. I’d had one or two drinks over the night and I suppose that’s why I panicked. I ran out and round the deck, past the locker. I heard Cuddy’s voice and I saw him by the doors here. I ducked down behind the hatch and heard him tell you. Then I heard you walk past on the other side and I knew that you’d gone to look. I thought, ‘It’s too late for me to tell them. I’m here. I’ll be involved.’ So I made for the forward end of the deck.”
“Father Jourdain,” Alleyn said, “I think you must at that time have been by the entrance to this room looking after Mr. Cuddy, who had fainted. Did you see Mr. Dale?”
“No. But, as you say, I was stooping over Mr. Cuddy. I think my back was turned to the hatch.”