“I see. That seems clear enough.”
Pons bent to examine the lock and then straightened up, closing the door behind him. We found ourselves in an extremely elegant, luxuriously furnished studio, the watery sun spilling down through the massive skylight windows.
An alert, fresh-faced police constable in uniform came down the room toward us, evident pleasure on his features. Solar Pons smiled.
“Ah, Constable Mecker. It is good to see you again.”
“Thank you, sir. The pleasure is mutual, I am sure. This is a bad business. I am sorry, Dr. Parker. I understand the accused gentleman is a friend of yours.”
“That is correct, Mecker,” I said. ‘Though Mr. Pons here hopes to clear the matter up.”
There was regret in Mecker’s eyes as he shook his head, turning back to my companion.
“Begging your pardon, sir, even your great skill will find it a well-nigh impossible task to complicate such a simple matter.”
“Well, if somewhat deprecatingly put, Mecker,” said Solar Pons drily. “So your superior has been telling me. We shall just have to wait upon events. And now I must set to work.”
He went across the studio, which was in a shocking state with tumbled furniture and canvases scattered about.
“This door has not been touched?”
“Our people went over it for finger-prints, Mr. Pons, but it is substantially as we found it.”
Pons went down on his knees and carefully examined the shattered lock.
“Hullo!”
There was surprise in his voice.
“The key is in the lock!”
“Impossible, Mr. Pons!”
“Just look for yourself, Jamison.”
I crossed over to stand behind the Inspector as he stooped to the door, which was off its hinges and lying propped against the wall. Jamison’s jaw dropped blankly.
“You are right, Mr. Pons.”
A bronze key, similar to that in the studio entrance door, was protruding from the brass lock-plate.
“You are sure it could not have been overlooked?”
Little spots of red stood out on Jamison’s cheeks.
“Positive, Mr. Pons. We made a careful check. That is so, is it not, Constable Mecker?”
“Certainly, sir.”
The puzzlement of his superior was echoed in Mecker’s own eyes.
“Well, well. This is most interesting.”
Solar Pons straightened up and rubbed his thin hands together in satisfaction.
“This is a most important development. I commend it to you, Inspector.”
I saw the puzzlement in Jamison’s eyes but said nothing, merely watched Pons as he went about the room in the brisk, alert manner I had grown to know so well. At a sign from the Inspector Mecker went to stand by the far door, out of earshot.
“Where was Mrs. Tregorran found?”
“Over here, Mr. Pons. She had been manually strangled
and our doctor’s post mortem report confirms this. She was a
well-built and perfectly healthy woman, some thirty-eight years old.”
Pons nodded and walked over to a place beneath one of the great sky-lights at the far side of the studio. From the jumble of broken picture frames and a crack in the glass where one of the panes extended almost to the floor, it was evident that a savage struggle had taken place. Pons had his powerful pocket lens out now and went minutely over the carpet and surroundings in this corner of the studio.
He straightened up, dusting the knees of his trousers.
“I can learn nothing further here.”
He stood looking down with a faint frown of puzzlement on his features.
“They had no children?”
Jamison shook his head.
“No, Mr. Pons.”
He hesitated slightly, embarrassment on his face.
“From what the servants tell us they were a quarrelsome couple. Begging your pardon, Dr. Parker. The marriage had gone wrong but apparently Tregorran had sought a reconciliation. He was painting Mrs. Tregorran’s picture at the time of her death.”
“Indeed?”
The puzzlement on Solar Pons’ face had increased.
“Where is this portrait?”
“It is on the easel yonder, Mr. Pons.”
“Hmm. So apparently Mrs. Tregorran was in the studio here, having her portrait painted, the couple on reasonably good terms, if I read the situation aright?”
“That would appear to be the case, Mr. Pons,” said the Inspector, shifting heavy-footed from one leg to the other.
“We have various statements from the servants.…”
“We will get to them later, Jamison, if you please.…” said Pons brusquely.
He turned to me.
“That seems rather odd, Parker, does it not?”
I nodded.
“The painting of the portrait, Pons? It certainly seems so to me. I had heard that the Tregorrans did not get on well together, but did not feel it was my place to point it out to you.”
Solar Pons stared at me with a languid expression on his face.
“Perfectly correct, Parker. You were old friends and you left me to form my own impressions. Exactly as I should have done had the position been reversed.”
He walked softly over to the easel indicated by Jamison. It stood directly beneath the main skylight and just across from it, on a raised platform was the chair so fatally vacated by the sitter. Paint-brushes were scattered on the floor, near a paint-bespattered palette and there was a sharp, chemical smell in the air. On a small side-table was a half-empty bottle of lager, with the stopper and foil lying by its side; an empty beer glass; and on a blue plate, the partly consumed remains of a sandwich. Jamison had approached and answered Pons’ unspoken question.
“He was in the habit of eating snacks in the studio all the while he was working.”
“I see.”
Pons stood plunged in thought, his keen eyes darting from easel to the scattered mess on the floor and then across to the dais. We waited silently while he made a minute examination. While he was doing this I looked at the almost completed canvas. It depicted a beautiful, imperious-looking woman with long blonde hair who stared insolently at the viewer from very frank, blue eyes. Jamison intercepted my glance.
“Lovely woman, wasn’t she, doctor? But a firebrand from what I can gather.”
I waited until Pons had re-joined me and he stood staring at the canvas in silence.
“It seems fairly clear what happened,” he said at last. “Tregorran put down the glass here and resumed his painting. At some period he dropped the palette, brushed past the easel — there are some threads of blue cloth caught on a protruding nail here — and rushed across to the dais. Mrs. Tregorran thrust back her chair — the indentations in the carpet on the dais where the sitter’s chair normally stood, are plain enough to see — and fled toward the door leading to the house. Tregorran intercepted her and penned her in the corner, where he strangled her among the picture-frames. In my judgment the attack was ferocious and unpremeditated. Both circumstances are singular.”
“Why so, Pons?”
Solar Pons smiled a thin smile.
“For obvious reasons, Parker. One, you have already told me that Tregorran was the gentlest of men, who would not harm a fly. But this attack was savage and brutal. That it was unpremeditated is equally obvious. The man was consuming his lunch and painting in an apparently ordinary manner when he was so overcome by rage that he rushed over toward his sitter and attacked and murdered her.”
“It is extraordinary, Pons,” I said, “and I do not pretend to understand it. Perhaps they had an argument and Mrs. Tregorran said something so insulting that it set him off?” Solar Pons’ eyes were bright as he stared at the canvas. “Perhaps,” he said softly. “We shall see.”
He turned back to the Inspector.