‘And he hasn’t come home? Surely he wouldn’t spend the night at his dentist’s?’
‘That would be most unusual, I suppose.’ There was a note of what might have been sudden desperate fatigue in Miss Ashmore’s voice. ‘It’s a London dentist. My father would spend the night in town. So his running away is not proven, so far. I imagine the same thing holds true of Giles.’
‘We at least know just when Giles took himself out of the picture. As you must have heard, my son Bobby saw him off on the midnight train. Perhaps your father and brother will come back together.’
‘Perhaps.’
‘Miss Ashmore, you have done right to tell me what you have. But the situation must be extremely painful to you. Had you better go home – where your mother is possibly in anxiety by this time? Bobby will take you back. Or I can find a police car.’
‘Thank you very much. But, please, not yet. For a little time, Sir John, I think I want to be alone. I’ll walk round the park. That will bring me back to the house in about half an hour.’ Virginia Ashmore smiled wanly. ‘Perhaps the mystery will have solved itself by then.’
‘It won’t have solved
itself
, Miss Ashmore.’ Appleby looked at the girl steadily, and spoke gravely. ‘But it may be solved – even in so short a time as thirty minutes.’
‘You mean you know–?’ The girl’s very lovely eyes had rounded perceptibly as she spoke.
‘What I chiefly know is that the temporal dimensions of this affair are confusing. Some things, like your father’s campaign against your uncle’s nervous balance, seem to have been building up for years. Then much happens in a few days – and, after that, even more in a few hours. But just how many hours? It’s the next thing I want to find out.’
‘The girl has gone off by herself,’ Appleby said to Bobby. ‘I think we’ll keep clear of her for a time. She has the devil of a lot on her plate, poor child.’
‘Perhaps her Frenchman will sustain her.’ Bobby said this with unconvincing casualness. ‘De Voisin, you know.’
‘I do know. But there is something she didn’t tell you. Pride, I suppose. De Voisin has walked out on her.’
‘The low hound!’
‘Well, yes. But the fact is he couldn’t take the knowledge – or a substantially enlarged knowledge – of some freakish and black-guardly tricks his future father-in-law had been up to. All these people are a really awful crowd.’
‘The girl isn’t.’
‘I think she might stick by them at a pinch, Bobby. But at least this Jules de Voisin is out. As long as he was going to marry Virginia Ashmore, he had an interest in the distribution of the Ashmore property. It would be a feasible motive for murder of the totally calculating and cold-blooded sort. But the moment he broke with these people, the motive vanished.’
‘He did come over here last night. It’s the final thing we know about him. He said he brought his kinsman a small farewell present.’
‘We must presume his present was just the nasty truth about his kinsman’s precious brother Rupert. No vengeance and nemesis from those
Résistance
days long ago. Just brother Rupert being utterly diabolical.’
‘Would that upset Martyn, do you think, or be a kind of relief to him?’
‘Upset him, I think. Do you know? That morning, when I was up on the roof with him and with de Voisin, there was a moment in which I thought his belief in his own interpretation of these episodes – call it the Croix de Lorraine interpretation – faltered. And his confidence faltered with it. Looking back, I can almost see him as clinging to a fantasy – but feeling, in the depth of his mind, that it was his own kindred who were after him.’
‘How utterly ghastly! But if some revelation of de Voisin’s upset him last night, he was composed enough when Giles took me in to be introduced to him. I had a sense of his feeling he was in command of something.’
‘Well, the main point is that de Voisin had ceased to have the slightest occasion to return later and kill him. It’s one elimination, and that’s something.’
‘What about this chap you and the Chief Constable were interviewing when I drove up with Virginia – the younger surviving brother, isn’t he, Ambrose?’
‘The violent Ambrose. I don’t think Ambrose was in on Rupert’s plot. Rupert’s plot belongs to the region – come to think of it – of slow poisonings. Not Ambrose Ashmore’s style. And I think Ambrose has told a good deal of truth about himself. He came storming over to the Chase last night, hard upon reading of Martyn’s engagement. He says he
found
his brother alive, had a flaming row,
left
his brother alive – and relieved his baffled feelings, so to speak, against your friend Finn’s jaw. There is a certain logical reason why his story
ought
to be true. But I find myself not believing it – not believing the whole of it – all the same.’
‘You believe he may really have killed his brother in a passion?’
‘That doesn’t follow. But I want to avoid that girl in the park. Let’s simply walk round the house.’ Appleby came to a halt. ‘By Jove, no! First of all, we’ll go in again – unobtrusively.’
‘You mean, avoiding the eye of Tommy Pride’s men?’
‘Why not? They might want to be helpful, and only succeed in being puzzled. I’ve had an idea.’
‘Oh, I say!’ Bobby produced Finn’s exclamation with cheerful irreverence. ‘It’s a bit of a thrill, you know. I’ve never had a close-up view of Sir John in action before.’
‘Don’t be a young idiot. What about this door? It’s open, all right. Crazy place, the Chase. What we want is the cellarage. This way.’
‘Whatever do you want that for?’
‘To make ghostly noises from, and startle Colonel Thomas Pride upstairs. Mind these steps; they’re tricky. I’ve been down here before.’ Appleby located and flicked on a light-switch.
‘Good Lord!’ Bobby said.
‘Exactly. This is the Newcastle to which your hopeful companion Giles Ashmore brought his coal in the form of a dozen of claret. The stuff isn’t upstairs, so my guess is that Uncle Martyn brought it straight down here and dumped it in a bin. I’d just like to check on it.’
‘Here’s claret,’ Bobby said, and started puffing dust from a bottle. ‘Holy smoke! Château Margaux ’47.’
‘I had Lafite ’49.’ Appleby chuckled. ‘And here’s what we’re looking for. The whole dozen, just standing on end.’
‘I can’t see that tells you anything.’ Bobby turned round. ‘Is the champagne there too?’
‘Champagne?’
‘It seems Giles went the whole hog, and had half a dozen bottles of champagne shoved in the bottom of the box. It made it uncommonly heavy.’
‘There isn’t much champagne down here.’ Appleby poked around for a couple of minutes. ‘Louis Roederer
Cristal Brut
. I think it improbable that our young friend bought that in Linger – or anywhere else. We’ll go upstairs again. In fact, back into the open air. I need a breath of it.’
Finn was mooning around an untidy yard at the back of the house. He halted as the two Applebys came up to him.
‘Ancient sort of place,’ he said. ‘Did you know there was an old well?’
‘A well?’ Bobby said. ‘When I took a jump from the terrace last night I had a sudden notion I had fallen into the darkness of a well. But of course I hadn’t. Where’s the real one?’
‘Over here.’ Finn led the way to a corner of the yard. ‘I’ve just taken off its wooden lid. There’s nothing to fasten it down. Dangerous, in a way. Tumble down that, and you wouldn’t come up again.’
They peered down the well. They dropped a stone, and there was a faint
plop
.
‘Some water still,’ Bobby said. ‘Good place to get rid of something. Say, half a dozen of champagne.’
‘What’s that?’ Finn was startled.
‘Your friend Giles’ claret’s in the house, but his champagne has vanished. Martyn Ashmore must have so disliked the sight of it that he brought it out and pitched it down this well. The last act of his life.’
‘What macabre rubbish!’ Finn was indignant. ‘Convenient for dumping
something
, all the same. Shall we insist that Colonel Pride sends down one of his coppers? I don’t mind giving a hand to lower the rope.’
‘Embers,’ Appleby said suddenly. ‘Ashes.’
The two young men stared at him.
‘The fire is the key, you know. A brisk log fire in Ashmore’s room. Bobby, you saw it from the hall? And you both saw it through the window?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘We’ve been timing Ashmore’s death on the assumption that the fire had gone out before it happened – simply because he was lying in the ashes, without so much as his hair being singed. A couple of hours at least after you had a last glimpse of him. Only, as I said before, there’s been something devilishly wrong with our way of looking at the thing. Oh cursed spite, in fact. Finn, you follow me?’
‘I can’t say I do, sir.’ Finn looked excessively blank.
‘It was Hamlet’s feeling that the time was out of joint.
Our
time has been out of joint. That’s all.’ Appleby paused. ‘For suppose somebody simply raked out the fire – shoved the whole flaming mass into a big bucket, and really did chuck it down this well? He’d only have to rake dead ash and a charred stump or two from the back of that big fireplace–’
‘The chap who took the swipe at me!’ Finn said. ‘And then the pot shot this morning. The swipe was one thing. But the pot shot was quite another. He wouldn’t feel I needed murdering if he’d merely encountered me after he’d had a row with his brother.’
‘There is much force in that,’ Appleby said. ‘I can’t believe that Ambrose Ashmore hasn’t been feeling in an uncommonly hazardous situation. Still, it isn’t necessary to suppose he killed his brother. He may merely have found him dead. Not only dead, but apparently bludgeoned. Wiping away fingerprints, socking an intrusive young man, taking a gun to the same young man – doubly intrusive – next day: these things would flow reasonably enough from the sense of being in so tight a spot. There was his reputation as a thoroughly violent character, for one thing.’
‘But,’ Bobby said slowly, ‘if Ambrose did no more than walk into the Chase in a temper and find his brother dead, who does that leave us with?’
‘The remaining inhabitants of the British Isles, more or less.’ Appleby had turned away from the well, and was making once more for the front of the house. ‘Plus Monsieur Jules de Voisin. And plus, if you like, vengeful members of the
Maquis
. That option’s still open.’
‘For practical purposes, surely, we’re left with anybody who had a motive for killing the old man – and who hasn’t an alibi.’ Bobby paused until they had rounded an angle of the house. ‘What about the brother who is due to inherit this place – Rupert?’
‘Perhaps his dentist will provide
him
with an alibi,’ Appleby said. ‘I’ve known it happen.’
‘His son Giles?’
‘Oh, I say!’ Finn had halted in his tracks. ‘We’ve been
running
Giles, sir. Bobby and I, that is. Giles couldn’t take an effective bash at anybody.’
‘He could have got back into the house, Finn.’ Appleby too had halted, and he was looking at Finn with gravity. ‘When you all three scattered because of Ibell–’
‘Ibell, sir? But he was an unrehearsed effect. Giles couldn’t have reckoned on him.’
‘I rather question that. Ibell had his regular round.’
‘At least I don’t believe that Giles could have had time to manage that mucky fire-dousing business. I think Giles is out. But what about the girl?’
‘The girl,’ Bobby repeated quickly. ‘What girl?’
‘The girl wandering round the park now.’ Finn pointed into distance. ‘The girl – Giles’ sister – who seems to have insisted on revisiting the scene of the crime. Bobby, you brought her over, didn’t you?’
‘Certainly I did. And what the hell are you talking about?’ Bobby Appleby was looking at his friend Finn as if he had suddenly become his blackest enemy. ‘What sort of motive does
she
have?’
‘All Ashmores, male or female, had some sort of motive for eliminating nasty old Martyn.’ Finn spoke without confidence. ‘But keep your shirt on. Only an idle thought. Count me out, old man, on the detective stakes.’
‘What about yourself, for that matter?’ Bobby had squared up to Finn positively dangerously. ‘Left slinking around the Chase, weren’t you, last night? And wildly wounded in your bleeding vanity because old Martyn Ashmore had stolen the girl who’d already been stolen from you by that silly sod Giles?’
‘My dear lads,’ Appleby murmured, ‘please do remember that something quite serious is going on. Bobby, will you pipe down? And, Finn, the same to you.’
‘Sorry,’ Finn said. ‘I’ll go and cool off.’ He made towards Bobby an entirely amiable gesture which consisted in clenching a fist and brandishing it in air. ‘Be seeing you, sir.’ And he marched off.
‘Really, Bobby!’ Appleby glanced ruefully at his son. ‘I respect you immensely as a young man bowled over by a beautiful girl. Good luck to you.’
‘You said they’re an awful crowd – the Ashmores. You wouldn’t want to see me mixed up with them?’
‘The Ravens were, at the least, extremely eccentric. I plunged straight in.’ Appleby paused – then, seeing Bobby flush, he hurried on. ‘Let’s stick to the point. I really want your help in another character. Come round to the front of the house.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘I said something rash to Miss Ashmore about half an hour. There isn’t a great deal of it left.’
‘In your character as a novelist,’ Appleby said seriously. They were standing on the terrace, and in front of them was the window of the room in which Martyn Ashmore had died. ‘The same sort of novelist, more or less, as Alain Robbe-Grillet.’
‘Go on,’ Bobby said. He had a quick instinct for moments at which he wasn’t being made fun of.
‘Do you know, I was reading aloud to your mother from that chap the other evening? And I can remember at least a fragment of it.
Since its width is the same for the central portion as for the sides, the line of shadow cast by the column extends precisely to the corner of the house.’
‘Do you mean’ – Bobby was staring at the window – ‘that there is some specific significance in that quotation?’