“Oh no doubt!” Bryce’s voice was muffled. Apparently he was pulling clothes over his head. “Competent enough to nab me if I’m not cunning. I was stopped for speeding on the A13 about six weeks ago and the officer concerned-a beefy brute with one of those metamorphic glares-was most uncivil. I wrote to the Chief Constable about it. It was a fatal thing to do, of course. I see that now. They’ve got it in for me all right. My name’s on a little list somewhere, you may be sure.”
He had padded into the room by now and Dalgliesh saw with surprise that he did indeed look concerned. Murmuring reassurance he accepted sherry-Bryce’s drinks were always excellent-and settled himself in the latest acquisition, a charming Victorian high-backed chair.
“Well, Adam. Give, as they say. What has Reckless discovered? Such an inappropriate name!”
“I’m not altogether in his confidence. But another instalment of manuscript has arrived. It’s rather better written this time. A description of a handless body in a boat and typed apparently by Seton himself.”
Dalgliesh saw no reason why Bryce should be denied this bit of information. Sylvia Kedge was hardly likely to keep it to herself.
“Posted when?”
“Before lunch yesterday. From Ipswich.”
Bryce wailed his dismay. “Oh no! Not Ipswich! One was in Ipswich on Thursday. One often is. Shopping, you know. One hasn’t an alibi.”
“You’re probably not the only one,” Dalgliesh pointed out consolingly. “Miss Calthrop was out in her car. So was Latham. So was I, come to that. Even that woman from Priory House was out in the buggy. I saw her as I drove over the headland.”
“That would be Alice Kerrison, Sinclair’s housekeeper. I don’t suppose she went any farther than Southwold. Probably fetching the groceries.”
“On Thursday afternoon. Isn’t it early closing?”
“Oh, Adam dear, what does it matter? I expect she was just out for a drive. She’d hardly drive the buggy as far as Ipswich just to post an incriminating document. She hated Seton, though. She was housekeeper at Seton House before his wife died. Sinclair took her on after Dorothy killed herself and she’s been there ever since. It was a most extraordinary thing! Alice stayed with Seton until after the inquest, then, without a word to him, she packed her bags and walked up to Priory House to ask Sinclair if he had a job for her. Apparently Sinclair had reached the point when the urge for self-sufficiency didn’t extend to the washing-up and he took her on. As far as I know neither has regretted it.”
“Tell me about Dorothy Seton,” invited Dalgliesh.
“Oh, she was lovely, Adam! I’ve got a photograph of her somewhere which I must show you. She was madly neurotic, of course, but really beautiful. Manic depressive is the correct jargon, I believe. Exhaustingly gay one minute and so down the next that one felt positively contaminated with gloom. It was very bad for me, of course. I have enough trouble living with my own neurosis without coping with other people’s. She led Seton a terrible life, I believe. One could almost pity him if it weren’t for poor Arabella.”
“How did she die?” enquired Dalgliesh.
“It was the most appalling thing! Seton strung her up from that meat hook in the beam of my kitchen. I shall never forget the sight of that darling furry body hanging there elongated like a dead rabbit. She was still warm when we cut her down. Look, I’ll show you.”
Dalgliesh had been half-dragged into the kitchen before he grasped that Bryce was talking about his cat. He successfully fought down the first impulse to nervous laughter and followed Bryce. The man was shaking with anger, grasping Dalgliesh’s forearm in a surprisingly powerful grip and gesticulating at the hook in impotent fury as if it shared Seton’s guilt. There seemed no immediate chance of getting any information about Dorothy Seton’s death now that Arabella’s end was so vividly recalled. Dalgliesh sympathised with Bryce. His own love of cats was as great if less vocal. If Seton had indeed wantonly destroyed a beautiful animal out of malice and revenge it was difficult to regret him. More to the point, such a man must have made his share of enemies.
Dalgliesh enquired who had found Arabella. “Sylvia Kedge. She had come up to take some dictation for me and I was delayed arriving from London. I got here about five minutes later. She had phoned Celia to come and cut Arabella down. She couldn’t reach the body herself. Naturally both of them were terribly upset. Sylvia was physically sick. We had to push the wheelchair to the sink and she threw up all over my washing-up. I won’t dwell on my own sufferings. But I thought you knew all the details. I asked Miss Dalgliesh to write. I hoped you might have come down to prove Seton did it. The local police were quite hopeless. Now, if it had been a human being, think of the fuss and nonsense! Just like Seton. It’s so ridiculous. I’m not one of those sentimentalists who think that human beings are more important than any other form of life. There are too many of us anyway and most of us neither know how to be happy ourselves nor make anyone else happy. And we’re ugly. Ugly! You knew Arabella, Adam. Wasn’t she the most beautiful creature? Didn’t you feel it was a privilege to watch her? She was life enhancing.”
Dalgliesh, wincing at Bryce’s choice of words, said the appropriate complimentary things about Arabella who had indeed been a beautiful cat with every appearance of knowing it. His aunt had told him of the incident in one of her fortnightly letters but not surprisingly had made no mention of Bryce’s request that he should come down and take over the investigation. Dalgliesh forebore to point out that no actual evidence had been produced against Seton. There had been a great deal of anger, ill-feeling and suspicion but remarkably little rational thought applied to the problem. But he had no stomach for solving it now. He induced Bryce to return to the sitting room and asked again how Dorothy Seton had died.
“Dorothy? She had gone to Le Touquet for an autumn holiday with Alice Kerrison. Things were pretty bad between her and Seton by then. She had become terribly dependent on Alice and I suppose Seton thought it would be a good idea if there were someone to keep an eye on her. When they had been away a week Seton realised that he couldn’t face living with her again and wrote to say he wanted a separation. No one knows what exactly was in the letter but Alice Kerrison was with Dorothy when she opened it and said at the inquest that it upset Mrs. Seton terribly and that she said they must go home at once. Seton had written from the Cadaver Club and the house was empty when they got back. Alice said that Dorothy seemed all right, perfectly calm and really much more cheerful than usual. She began preparing supper for the two of them and Dorothy wrote at her desk for a short time. Then she said she would go for a walk along the beach to see the moon on the sea. She walked to the bottom of Tanner’s Lane, stripped herself naked, put her clothes in a neat pile with a stone on top and walked out to sea. They recovered the body a week later. It was suicide all right. She left a little note under the stone to say that she realised now that she was no use to herself or to anyone else and had decided to kill herself. It was a very direct note, perfectly clear, perfectly lucid. I remember at the time thinking that most suicides talk about ending it all. Dorothy just wrote that she had decided to kill herself.”
“What happened to the letter that Seton wrote her?”
“It was never found. It wasn’t with Dorothy’s belongings and Alice didn’t see her destroy it. But Seton was quite open about it. He was sorry but he had acted for the best. It had become impossible to go on. I didn’t realise exactly what living with Dorothy had done to him until I saw his play two years later. It was about marriage to a neurotic but in the play it’s the husband who kills himself. Well, naturally. Seton wanted to cast himself in the major role. Not literally, of course. Still, he might just as well have played the part. He couldn’t have been much worse than poor Barry. Not that one can blame the actors. Such a very bad play, Adam! And yet written with a kind of terrible honesty and pain.”