Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 11: Photo-Finish, Light Thickens, Black Beech and Honeydew

‘If ever there was a clam its middle name was Reece but I think he does.’

‘Are you any further on?’ asked the doctor.

‘A bit. I wish I’d found out whether Marco knows who took his bloody snapshot out of the bag. If ever it was in the bloody bag, which is conjectural. It’s so boring of him not to admit he put it in. If he did.’

‘He almost admitted something, didn’t he?’ said Troy.

‘He’s trying to work it out whether it would do him more good or harm to come clean.’

‘I suppose,’ hazarded Dr Carmichael, ‘that whoever it was, Hanley or anyone else, who removed the photograph, it doesn’t follow he was the killer.’

‘Not as the night the day. No.’

Troy suddenly said: ‘Having offered to make beds, I suppose I’d better make them. Do you think Miss Dancy would be outraged if I asked her to bear a hand? I imagine the little Sylvia is otherwise engaged.’

‘Determined to maintain the house-party tone against all hazards, are you, darling?’ said her husband.

‘That’s right. The dinner-jacket-in-the-jungle spirit.’

Dr Carmichael gazed at Troy in admiration and surprise. ‘I must say, Mrs Alleyn, you set us all an example. How many beds do you plan to make?’

‘I haven’t counted.’

‘The round dozen or more,’ teased Alleyn, ‘and God help all those who sleep in them.’

‘He’s being beastly,’ Troy remarked. ‘I’m not all that good at bedmaking. I’ll just give Miss Dancy a call, I think.’

She consulted the list of room numbers by the telephone. Dr Carmichael joined Alleyn at the windows. ‘It really is clearing,’ he said. ‘The wind’s dropping. And I do believe the lake’s settling.’

‘Yes, it really is.’

‘What do you suppose will happen first: the telephone be reconnected, or the launch engine be got going, or the police appear on the far bank, or the chopper turn up?’

‘Lord knows.’

Troy said into the telephone, ‘Of course I understand. Don’t give it another thought. We’ll meet at lunchtime. Oh. Oh, I see. I’m so sorry. Yes, I think you’re very wise. No, no news. Awful, isn’t it?’

She hung up. ‘Miss Dancy has got a migraine,’ she said. ‘She sounds very Wagnerian. Well, I’d better make the best I can of the beds.’

‘You’re not going round on your own, Troy.’

‘Aren’t I? But why?’

‘It’s inadvisable.’

‘But, Rory, I promised Mrs Bacon.’

‘To hell with Mrs Bacon. I’ll tell her it’s not on. They can make their own bloody beds. I’ve made ours,’ said Alleyn. ‘I’d go round with you but I don’t think that’d do either.’

‘I’ll make beds with you, Mrs Alleyn,’ offered Dr Carmichael in a sprightly manner.

‘That’s big of you, Carmichael,’ said Alleyn. ‘I dare say all the rooms will be locked. Mrs Bacon will have spare keys.’

‘I’ll find out.’

Troy said: ‘You can pretend it’s a hospital. You’re the matron and I’m a ham-fisted probationer. I’ll just go along to our palatial suite for a moment. Rejoin you here.’

When she had gone Alleyn said: ‘She’s hating this. You can always tell if she goes all jokey. I’ll be glad to get her out of it.’

‘If I may say so, you’re a lucky man.’

‘You may indeed say so.’

‘Perhaps a brisk walk round the Island when we’ve done our chores.’

‘A splendid idea. In a way,’ Alleyn said, ‘this bedmaking nonsense might turn out to be handy. I’ve no authority to search, of course, but you two might just keep your eyes skinned.’

‘Anything in particular?’

‘Not a thing. But you never know. The skinned eye and a few minor liberties.’

‘I’ll see about the keys,’ said Dr Carmichael happily and bustled off.

II

Alleyn wondered if he was about to take the most dangerous decision of his investigative career. If he took this decision and failed, not only would he make an egregious ass of himself before the New Zealand police but he would effectively queer the pitch for their subsequent investigations and probably muck up any chance of an arrest. Or would he? In the event of failure, was there no chance of a new move, a strategy in reserve, a surprise attack? If there was, he was damned if he knew what it could be.

He went over the arguments again: The time factor. The riddle of the keys. The photograph. The conjectural motive. The appalling conclusion. He searched for possible alternatives to each of these and could find none.

He resurrected the dusty old bit of investigative folklore: If all explanations except one fail, then that one, however outrageous, will be the answer.

And, God knew, they were dealing with the outrageous.

So he made up his mind and having done that went downstairs and out into the watery sunshine for a breather.

All the guests had evidently been moved by the same impulse. They were abroad on the Island in pairs and singly. Whereas earlier in the morning Alleyn had likened those of them who had come out into the landscape to surrealistic details, now, while still wildly anachronistic, as was the house itself, in their primordial setting, they made him think of persons in a poem by Verlaine or perhaps by Edith Sitwell. Signor Lattienzo in his Tyrolean hat and his gleaming eyeglass, stylishly strolled beside Mr Ben Ruby who smoked a cigar and was rigged out for the country in a brand new Harris tweed suit. Rupert Bartholomew, wan in corduroy, his hair romantically disordered, his shoulders hunched, stood by the tumbled shore and stared over the lake. And was himself stared at, from a discreet distance, by the little Sylvia Parry with a scarlet handkerchief round her head. Even the stricken Miss Dancy had braved the elements. Wrapped up, scarfed and felt-hatted, she paced alone up and down a gravel path in front of the house as if it were the deck of a cruiser.

To her from indoors came Mr Reece in his custom-built outfit straight from pages headed ‘Rugged Elegance: For Him’ in the glossiest of periodicals. He wore a peaked cap which he raised ceremoniously to Miss Dancy, who immediately engaged him in conversation, clearly of an emotional kind. But he’s used to that, thought Alleyn, and noticed how Mr Reece balanced Miss Dancy’s elbow in his dogskin grasp as he squired her on her promenade.

He had thought they completed the number of persons in the landscape until he caught sight out of the corner of his eye, of some movement near one of the great trees near the lake. Ned Hanley was standing there. He wore a dark green coat and sweater and merged with his background. He seemed to survey the other figures in the picture.

One thing they all had in common and that was a tendency to halt and stare across the lake or shade their eyes, tip back their heads and look eastward into the fast-thinning clouds. He had been doing this himself.

Mr Ben Ruby spied him, waved his cigar energetically and made towards him. Alleyn advanced and at close quarters found Mr Ruby looking the worse for wear and self-conscious.

‘’Morning, old man,’ said Mr Ruby. ‘Glad to see you. Brightening up, isn’t it? Won’t be long now. We hope.’

‘We do indeed.’