Masters shut his eyes, counted ten, and opened them again. There was a brief silence, under the ghost-clock and in the room of sporting prints. Then Masters went on.
"The gardener," he said, "told him the hunt was coming. So he picked up a pair of field-glasses, and started up for the roof. Now the only way to the roof is through a covered door at the very back, or west side, of the roof.
"Sir George walked straight to the front of the roof, a position just about over the front door below. He raised the field-glasses, and focussed them. It seems there was a lurid kind of red sky behind him, but it was clear light Now get this, sir. The chimney-stacks were fifty feet behind him. He was alone on a concrete floor, without anybody or any object within fifty feet of him."
Masters paused. He riffled over several pages, flattening them down with his fist.
"Stop the bus again," muttered H.M. "What about the field-glasses? I seem to remember readin' a story where there was hokey-pokey with field-glasses, and they stuck somebody in the eye."
Masters was now cat-like and bland. "The fact is, sir, I thought you might bring that up. The glasses were just plain field-glasses, as you'll hear in a moment Accept that?"
"Uh-huh. Go on.?
"Our real evidence," Masters continued, "comes from six witnesses on this side of the road. Two of these witnesses," he pointed upwards, "were sitting astride the gable-tops of this pub. And these two witnesses are clinchers.
"The Ascombe Hunt is disbanded now. But in those days, it seems, everybody hereabouts was keen about it. It beats me to know why. You'd think it'd make country people read as hops to have a lot of horses and dogs tearing over private property and mucking it up. But they tell me it didn't These six men, they were down in the bar. They heard about the kafuffle coming just about when Sir George did. And up they went
"Our two chief witnesses are Arthur Puckston and Simon Frew. Mr. Puckston, who's still the landlord here, was astride one gable with an old brass telescope that belongs to the house. Simon Frew had a pair of big new binoculars he was very proud of.
This pub's on high ground, air. From the top you can see straight over and across Fleet House, covering the roof. During this time there was an unholy row in the wood. First one dog—"
"HOUND."
"— started to yell, then another, then a lot more, and before long: smack out they came from Black Hanger, tearing across in the open. Now listen to what Simon Frew said, when he was astride the middle gable with his binoculars. All this question-and-answer stuff has to be polished up and made smooth into a statement But here you are."
Again Masters smoothed put the turnover pages with his fist
"'The field—'" he began, and stopped. "This 'field,’ it'd seem, would mean the gents in the red coats."
"I got it son. Well?"
Masters read slowly.
The field had just started to come round the far side of Black Hanger, almost facing us. It is a good distance away there and on higher ground than us. I put my glasses on them. The first few men were smiling and waving their hands. They seemed to be waving straight in my face. I knew it could not be me. So I turned my glasses round.
"Towards Fleet House," Masters interpolated grimly. "About three hundred feet that's all."
Sir George was there. I could see all round him. He had his glasses to his eyes in one hand, and was waving with the other. Then it looked like somebody gave him a hard shove in the back. He stood there for a second. He shouted. He fell head-first I did not follow him with the glasses because I was too surprised. I just kept looking round to see who could have pushed him.
It was a shorn statement Yet Martin Drake, had he been there, would have seen the red sky with the silhouetted figure, and scented the autumn air, and sensed the rush and crash.
"I won't trouble you," Masters said drily, "with what you know. But just to hammer it home, sir! A bit of what Puckston said, the man with the telescope. His attention was caught by this yell Sir George gave."
And then spoke Mr. Puckston.
I looked round. I saw something pitch over the little ledge, but it was so quick I did not see what it was. I looked all over the roof, but did not see anybody or anything. I looked down. Sir George was lying there, and something was wrong with his head. Dr. Laurier ran out of the front door. Bert Hartshorn—
"Bert," Masters explained, "was the constable. He'd been at the pub, but naturally he (hurruml) couldn't climb on the roof."
— Bert Hartshorn was coming up to the terrace. Dr. Laurier said something, and Bert picked up Sir George's binoculars and walked into the house. Dr. Laurier said something else, and Lady Brayle came out with some kind of cloth. I said aloud, 'The bastard is dead.'
To Masters it was one more case, with nothing more of drama than a blueprint He closed the blue folder.
"There's more of Puckston," he explained. "And four others who were lower down in between the gables. But it needn't trouble us. Eh?"
H.M. groaned.
"Let's sew it up," suggested Masters. "The 'little ledge' Puckston talks about is a stone coping, just six inches high, which runs round the whole roof. You agree nobody could have hidden there? Or, if we accept the witnesses, attacked a big powerful man without some kind of struggle?"
"Uh-huh. I'm afraid I got to agree.’’
"You admit the fact that the roof was as bare as a biscuit-tin.”
"Well..”
"Sir George's injuries, for instance.’' Masters remained affable and bland, if anything more affable. "They were to the head, the arms, and one shoulder. That's not unusual, when somebody pitches from a comparatively low height There wasn't another fracture or another mark on him. Not even," Masters lingered on the word, "a bruise.’’
H.M. made fussed motions.'
"Don't leer. Masters. I hate leerin’. What's on your mind?"
"You were going to ask, weren't you, whether there was a bruise? Whether something might have been thrown or fired at him? Eh?"
H.M. only grunted.
"If it hit him hard enough to knock him over the edge," Masters pointed but "it must have left a mark or a bruise. But it didn't Finally, there's the evidence of the post-mortem."
Reaching with infinite effort into his hip pocket H.M. fished out a case of his vile cigars and lighted one with relish. He seemed to have little relish for anything else.
"There was a possibility, just a bare possibility," Masters goaded him, "that somebody might have given him a drug— poison, event — to make his head swim so he fell But there was no drug, no poison, nothing."
"As I understand it Masters, the post-mortem was performed by old Dr. Laurier. The family friend So! Was there anybody assistin’ him at the post-mortem? To sort of look on?"
Masters grinned.
"As a matter of fact, there was. A doctor from Newbury. I forget his name, but it's in the record. He confirmed the finding."
"O tempore," said H.M. "O mores. Oh, hell!"
Masters rubbed his hands together.
"Here's your victim," he explained, "on a concrete floor with no person or thing within fifty feet of him. He wasn't pushed. He had nothing thrown at him. He wasn't drugged in any way. What happened to him?"
"Son, I just don't know."
"You bet you don't But I can tell you. Sir George was a man over forty, who'd just climbed some long flights of stairs. He got excited waving to the hunt; he came over dizzy, as anybody might; and he fell. Do you still want to know the colour of the beach-chairs?'
"Sure I do," retorted H.M. instantly, taking the cigar out of his mouth. "What's the pink flash?" "Pink flash?"
"Certainly. See the second anonymous postcard on the table in front of you. Quote: Re Sir George Fleet: what was the pink flash on the roof? Go on, Masters: say it's a pink rat and I ought to be makin' faces at it"