Artists in Crime

‘Naow!’ said Sonia with vindictive mimicry.

‘It’s shifted a whole lot,’ asserted Hatchett aggressively. ‘I bet you anything you like—’

‘Wait a moment,’ said Troy.

‘It’s moved a little,’ said Katti Bostock.

Troy sighed.

‘Rest!’ she said. ‘No! Wait a minute.’

She took a stick of chalk from her overall pocket and ran it round the model wherever she touched the throne. The position of both legs, one flank, one hip, and one shoulder were thus traced on the boards. The blue drape was beneath the rest of the figure.

‘Now you can get up.’

Sonia sat up with an ostentatious show of discomfort, reached out her hand for the kimono and shrugged herself into it. Troy pulled the drape out taut from the cushion to the floor.

‘It’ll have to go down each time with the figure,’ she told the class.

‘As it does in the little romance,’ drawled Malmsley.

‘Yes, it’s quite feasible,’ agreed Valmai Seacliff. ‘We could try it. There’s that Chinese knife in the lumber-room. May we get it, Miss Troy?’

‘If you like,’ said Troy.

‘It doesn’t really matter,’ said Malmsley languidly getting to his feet.

‘Where is it, Miss Seacliff?’ asked Hatchett eagerly.

‘On the top shelf in the lumber-room.’

Hatchett went into an enormous cupboard by the window, and after a minute or two returned with a long, thin-bladed knife. He went up to Malmsley’s table and looked over his shoulder at the typescript. Malmsley moved away ostentatiously.

‘Aw yeah, I get it,’ said Hatchett. ‘What a corker! Swell way of murdering somebody, wouldn’t it be?’ He licked his thumb and turned the page.

‘I’ve taken a certain amount of trouble to keep those papers clean,’ remarked Malmsley to no one in particular.

‘Don’t be so damned precious, Malmsley,’ snapped Troy. ‘Here, give me the knife, Hatchett, and don’t touch other people’s tools in the studio. It’s not done.’

‘Good oh, Miss Troy.’

Pilgrim, Ormerin, Hatchett and Valmai Seacliff began a discussion about the possibility of using the knife in the manner suggested by Malmsley’s illustration. Phillida Lee joined in.

‘Where would the knife enter the body?’ asked Seacliff.

‘Just here,’ said Pilgrim, putting his hand on her back and keeping it there. ‘Behind your heart. Valmai.’

She turned her head and looked at him through half-closed eyes. Hatchett stared at her. Malmsley smiled curiously. Pilgrim had turned rather white.

‘Can you feel it beating?’ asked Seacliff softly.

‘If I move my hand—here.’

‘Oh, come off it,’ said the model violently. She walked over to Garcia. ‘I don’t believe you could kill anybody like that. Do you, Garcia?’

Garcia grunted unintelligibly. He, too, was staring at Valmai Seacliff.

‘How would he know where to put the dagger?’ demanded Katti Bostock suddenly. She drew a streak of background colour across her canvas.

‘Can’t we try it out?’ asked Hatchett.

‘If you like,’ said Troy. ‘Mark the throne before you move it.’

Basil Pilgrim chalked the position of the throne on the floor, and then he and Ormerin tipped it up. The rest of the class looked on with gathering interest. By following the chalked-out line on the throne they could see the spot where the heart would come, and after a little experiment found the plot of this spot on the underneath surface of the throne.

‘Now, you see,’ said Ormerin, ‘the jealous wife would drive the knife through from underneath.’

‘Incidentally taking the edge off,’ said Basil Pilgrim.

‘You could force it through the crack between the boards,’ said Garcia suddenly, from the window.

‘How? It’d fall out when she was shoved down.’

‘No, it wouldn’t. Look here.’

‘Don’t break the knife and don’t damage the throne,’ said Troy.

‘I get you,’ said Hatchett eagerly. ‘The dagger’s wider at the base. The boards would press on it. You’d have to hammer it through. Look, I’ll bet you it could be done. There you are, I’ll betcher.’

‘Not interested, I’m afraid,’ said Malmsley.

‘Let’s try,’ said Pilgrim. ‘May we, Troy?’

‘Oh, do let’s,’ cried Phillida Lee. She caught up her enthusiasm with an apologetic glance at Malmsley. ‘I adore bloodshed,’ she added with a painstaking nonchalance.

‘The underneath of the throne’s absolutely filthy,’ complained Malmsley.

‘Pity if you spoiled your nice green pinny,’ jeered Sonia.

Valmai Seacliff laughed.

‘I don’t propose to do so,’ said Malmsley. ‘Garcia can if he likes.’

‘Go on,’ said Hatchett. ‘Give it a pop. I betcher five bob it’ll work. Fair dinkum.’

‘What does that mean?’ asked Seacliff. ‘You must teach me the language, Hatchett.’

‘Too right I will,’ said Hatchett with enthusiasm. ‘I’ll make a dinkum Aussie out of you.’