They had to shout these ridiculous observations against the noise of the gale. Alleyn moved round the group until he gently collided with something he recognized as one of the pillars supporting the entrance porch. He remembered that when Wrayburn’s men collected their gear from the porch, one of them had switched on the converted lanterns that adorned the pillars.
Alleyn kept his torchlight on the men. They turned to follow his progress, screwing up their eyes and sticking close together. His hand reached out to the end pillar and groped round it. He backed away and felt for the wall of the house.
“Why,” he called out, “didn’t you wait for the light for this job?”
They all began to shout at once and very confusedly. Scraps of unlikely information were offered: Hilary’s dislike of litter, Nigel’s extreme sensitivity about the fate of his masterpiece. It petered out.
Vince said: “Come on. Get moving,” and the pairs of gloved hands returned to the packing case.
Alleyn had found a switch. Suddenly the porch and the courtyard were there to be seen: all lit up as they had been for Hilary’s party.
The drama of darkness, flashing lights and half-seen ambiguous figures was gone. Three heavily clad men stood round a packing case and glowered at a fourth man.
Alleyn said: “Before you take it away, I want to see inside that thing.”
“There’s nothing in it,” Kittiwee shrilly announced, and at the same time Vincent said, “It’s nailed up. You can’t.”
Mervyn said: “It’s just an old packing case, sir. The pianna come in it. It’s got a lot of rubbish inside thrown out for disposal.”
“Fair enough,” Alleyn said. “I want to look at it, if you please.”
He walked up to them. The three men crowded together in front of the case. “God!” he thought. “How irremediably pitiable and squalid.”
He saw that each of them was using the others, hopelessly, as some sort of protection for himself. They had a need to touch each other, to lose their separate identities, to congeal.
He said, “This is no good, you know. You’ll only harm yourselves if you take this line. I must see inside the case.”
Like a frightened child making a show of defiance, Kittiwee said, “We won’t let you. We’re three to one. You better watch out.”
Mervyn said, “Look, sir, don’t. It won’t do you any good. Don’t.”
And Vincent, visibly trembling: “You’re asking for trouble. You better not. You didn’t ought to take us on.” His voice skipped a register. “I’m warning you,” he squeaked. “See? I’m warning you.”
“Vince!” Kittiwee said. “Shut up.”
Alleyn walked up to them and in unison they bent their knees and hunched their shoulders in a travesty of squaring up to him.
“The very worst thing you could do,” he said, “would be to attack me. Think!”
“Oh Gawd!” Kittiwee said. “Oh Gawd, Gawd, Gawd.”
“Stand aside, now. And if you knock me over the head and try the same game with another job, you’ll come to worse grief. You must know that. Come, now.”
Vincent made an indeterminate gesture with his shovel. Alleyn took three steps forward and ducked. The shovel whistled over his head and was transfixed in the side of the packing case.
Vincent stared at him with his mouth open and his fingers at his lips. “My oath, you’re quick!” he said.
“Lucky for you, I am,” Alleyn said. “You bloody fool, man! Why do you want to pile up trouble for yourself? Now stand away, the lot of you. Go on, stand back.”
“Vincey!” Kittiwee said in scandalized tones. “You might of cut his head off!”
“I’m that upset.”
“Come on,” Mervyn ordered them. “Do like ’e says. It’s no good.”
They stood clear.
The case was not nailed up. It was hinged at the foot and fastened with hook-and-eye catches at the top. They were very stiff and Alleyn could use only one hand. He wrenched the shovel from its anchorage and saying, “Don’t you try that again,” dropped it to the ground at his feet.
He forced open the first two catches and the side gaped a little, putting a strain on the remaining one. He struck at it with the heel of his hand. It resisted and then flew up.
The side of the case fell against him. He stepped back and it crashed on the paved courtyard.
Moult, having laid against it, rolled over and turned his sightless gaze on Alleyn.
Nine — Post Mortem
Moult, dead on the flagstones, seemed by his grotesque entry to inject a spasm of activity into his audience.
For a second or two after he rolled into view, the three servants were motionless. And then, without a word, they bolted. They ran out of the courtyard and were swallowed up by the night.
Alleyn had taken half-a-dozen steps after them when they returned as wildly as they had gone, running and waving their arms like characters in some kind of extravaganza. To make the resemblance more vivid, they were now bathed in light as if from an offstage spot. They turned to face it, made prohibitive gestures, shielded their eyes, and huddled together.
The field of light contracted and intensified as a police car moved into the courtyard and stopped. Vincent turned and ran straight into Alleyn’s arms. His companions dithered too long, made as if to bolt, and were taken by four large men who had quitted the car with remarkable expertise.
They were Detective-Sergeants Bailey and Thompson, fingerprint and photography experts, respectively; the driver, and Detective-Inspector Fox.
“Now then!” said Mr. Fox, the largest of the four men, “what’s all the hurry?”
Kittiwee burst into tears.
“All right, all right,” Alleyn said. “Pipe down, the lot of you. Where d’you think you’re going. Over the hill to the Vale? Good-morning, Fox.”
“ ’Morning, Mr. Alleyn. You’ve been busy.”
“As you see.”
“What do we do with this lot?”
“Well may you ask! They’ve been making a disgusting nuisance of themselves.”
“We never done a thing. We never touched him,” Kittiwee bawled. “It’s all a bloody misunderstanding.”
“Touched who?” Inspector Fox asked.
Alleyn, whose arm had been excruciatingly stirred up by Vincent, jerked his head towards the packing case. “Him,” he said.
“Well, well!” Fox observed. “A body, eh?”
“A body.”
“Would this be the missing individual?”
“It would.”
“Do we charge these chaps then?”
“We get them indoors, for Heaven’s sake,” said Alleyn crossly. “Bring them in. It’ll have to be through the window over there. I’ll go ahead and switch on the lights. They’d better be taken to their own quarters. And keep quiet, all of you. We don’t want to rouse the household. Cooke — what’s your name? — Kittiwee — for the love of decency — shut up.”
Fox said, “What about the remains?”
“One thing at a time. Before he’s moved, the Divisional Surgeon will have to take a look. Bailey — Thompson.”
“Sir?”
“You get cracking with this setup. As it lies. Dabs. Outside and inside the packing case. The sledge. All surfaces. And the body, of course. Complete job.” Alleyn walked to the body and stooped over it. It was rigid and all askew. It lay on its back, the head at a grotesque angle to the trunk. One arm was raised. The eyes and the mouth were open. Old, ugly scars on jaw and fattish cheek and across the upper lip, started out lividly.
“But the beard and moustache and wig would have covered those,” Alleyn thought. “There’s nothing in that.”
His hands were busy for a moment. He extracted an empty flat half-pint bottle from a jacket in the coat and sniffed at it. Whisky. From the waistcoat pocket he took a key. Finding nothing more, he then turned away from the body and contemplated Vincent and his associates.