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Ngaio Marsh

Murder and mayhem strike when a small group of people are confined to an island in the middle of a New Zealand lake in one of Ngaio Marsh’s last – and best – novels.The luxury mansion on New Zealand's Lake Waihoe is the ideal place for a world-famous soprano to rest after her triumphant tour. Among the other guests are Chief Superintendent Alleyn and his wife - but theirs is not a social visit. When tragedy strikes, and isolated by one of the lake's sudden storms, Alleyn faces one of his trickiest cases…

The Ngaio Marsh Collection

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Ngaio Marsh

For Fredaneve with love

Table of Contents

Title Page (#u86743d15-42bf-554f-8df3-a15c9a54ede8)

Dedication (#ufaff53a7-4ec8-5692-be5f-5c9cd2bc39e0)

Cast of Characters (#ue8325fbb-0306-5dd4-9e36-0a79f8091595)

CHAPTER 1 The Sommita (#ud9d5db8d-a9e1-5450-bf00-00f352a01c22)

CHAPTER 2 The Lodge (#u3dfacad9-7676-5ba1-b7a2-d29ba3ed7000)

CHAPTER 3 Rehearsal (#u1ab24142-c366-5cc3-9f40-b8c8946310d5)

CHAPTER 4 Performance (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER 5 Nocturne (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER 6 Storm Continued (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER 7 Strix (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER 8 The Police (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER 9 Departure (#litres_trial_promo)

By the Same Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Cast of Characters (#ulink_59cb4fa5-300e-551f-acfb-5475ba06d880)

CHAPTER 1 The Sommita (#ulink_1fd02e44-a7b3-5224-9bf9-2c01aff3a91f)

One of the many marvels of Isabella Sommita’s technique was her breathing: it was totally unobservable. Even in the most exacting passages, even in the most staggering flights of coloratura, there was never the slightest disturbance of the corsage.

‘You could drop an ice cube down her cleavage,’ boasted her manager, Ben Ruby, ‘and not a heave would you get for your trouble.’

He had made this observation when sitting in a box immediately above the diva at the Royal Festival Hall and had spoken no more than the truth. Offstage, when moved by one of her not infrequent rages, La Sommita’s bosom would heave with the best of them.

It did so now, in her private suite at the Château Australasia in Sydney. She was en negligé and it was sumptuously evident that she was displeased and that the cause of her displeasure lay on the table at her elbow: a newspaper folded to expose a half-page photograph with a banner headline, CROSS-PATCH? and underneath, LA SOMMITA IS NOT AMUSED!

It had been taken yesterday in Double Bay, Sydney. The photographer, wearing a floppy white hat, a white scarf over his mouth and dark spectacles had stepped out from an alleyway and gone snap. She had not been quick enough to turn her back but her jaw had dropped and her left eye had slewed; its habit when rage overtook her. The general effect was that of a gargoyle at the dentist’s: an elderly and infuriated gargoyle. The photograph was signed Strix.

She beat on the paper with her largish white fist and her rings cut into it. She panted lavishly.

‘Wants horsewhipping,’ Montague Reece mumbled. He was generally accepted as the Sommita’s established lover and he filled this role in the manner commonly held to be appropriate, being large, rich, muted, pale, dyspeptic and negative. He was said to wield a great deal of power in his own world.

‘Of course he needs horsewhipping,’ shouted his dear one. ‘But where’s the friend who will go out and do it?’ She laughed and executed a wide contemptuous gesture that included all present. The newspaper fluttered to the carpet.

‘Personally,’ Ben Ruby offered, ‘I wouldn’t know one end of a horsewhip from the other.’ She dealt him a glacial stare. ‘I didn’t mean to be funny,’ he said.

‘Nor were you.’

‘No.’

A young man of romantic appearance in a distant chair behind the diva clasped a portfolio of music to his midriff and said in a slightly Australian voice: ‘Can’t something be done? Can’t they be sued?’

‘What for?’ asked Mr Ruby.

‘Well – libel. Look at it, for God’s sake!’ the young man brought out. ‘Well, I mean to say, look!’

The other two men glanced at him, but the Sommita without turning her head said: ‘Thank you, darling,’ and extended her arm. The intention was unmistakable: an invitation, nay, a command. The young man’s beautiful face crimsoned, he rose and, maintaining a precarious hold on his portfolio, advanced crouchingly to imprint a kiss upon the fingers. He lost control of his portfolio. Its contents shot out of their confine and littered the carpet: sheet upon sheet of music in manuscript.

He fell on his knees and scrabbled about the floor. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he gabbled. ‘Oh hell, I’m so bloody sorry.’

The Sommita had launched a full-scale attack upon the Australian press. Rupert, she said, indicating the young man, was absolutely right. The press should be sued. The police should be called in. The photographer should be kicked out of the country. Was he to be suffered to wreck her life, her career, her sanity, to make her the laughing stock of both hemispheres? (She was in the habit of instancing geographical data.) Had she not, she demanded, consented to the Australian appearances solely as a means of escape from his infamy?

‘You are sure, I suppose,’ said Mr Reece in his pallid manner, ‘that it’s the same man? Strix?’

This produced a tirade. ‘Sure! Sure!’ Had not the detested Strix bounced out of cover in all the capitals of Europe as well as in New York and San Francisco? Had he not shot her at close quarters and in atrocious disarray? Sure! She drew a tempestuous breath. Well, she shouted, what were they going to do about it? Was she to be protected or was she to have a breakdown, lose her voice and spend the rest of her days in a straitjacket? She only asked to be informed.

The two men exchanged deadpan glances.

‘We can arrange for another bodyguard,’ Montague Reece offered without enthusiasm.

‘She didn’t much fancy the one in New York,’ Mr Ruby pointed out.

‘Assuredly I did not,’ she agreed, noisily distending her nostrils. ‘It is not amusing to be closely followed by an imbecile in unspeakable attire who did nothing, but nothing, to prevent the outrage on Fifth Avenue. He merely goggled. As, by the way, did you all.’

‘Sweetheart, what else could we do? The fellow was a passenger in an open car. It was off like a bullet as soon as he’d taken his picture.’

‘Thank you, Benny. I remember the circumstances.’

‘But why?’ asked the young man called Rupert, still on his knees assembling his music. ‘What’s got into him? I mean to say, it doesn’t make sense and it must cost a lot of money to follow you all over the globe. He must be bonkers.’