The Case Has Altered (14 page)

“A coincidence.” Was there something in Owen's expression, the trace of a smile, that said it couldn't possibly be coincidence?

Grace said, “And Dorcas. It was just three days ago,” she added sadly.

Max did not reply, but looked out of the long window at the rising mist. It was by now early evening and getting dark. Fog blanketed the driveway and the flower beds and cut off the roots of trees, making the wood look impenetrable. “Poor girl,” he said.

They were lost in a moment of silence and Melrose hoped they'd go on. He could certainly show a legitimate interest—a double murder was surely grounds for curiosity, no matter what your mission—but he felt it was too soon after his arrival to carry the brunt of the questioning himself.

But Max carried it on. “That place, Wyndham Fen—where Dorcas was found—that's what all of South Lincolnshire used to be like—real fen country.”

“Max. You make it sound as if you mourned the loss of the fens more than the loss of Dorcas.”

“I didn't know her well enough to mourn her, dear one.” He held out his cup for fresh coffee.

This unadorned admission was rather refreshing, thought Melrose.
Why indeed would he “mourn” an employee with whom he'd probably had very little contact. “That's what they said in the pub; one old regular claimed we shouldn't call it the fens: ‘It ain't fens no more.' ”

Max laughed. “I'm sure. Sometimes I think we're as fragile as the landscape.”

“This must be pretty horrible for you,” said Melrose. “Police in your home and all the questioning.”

“The whole thing is completely beyond me,” said Grace. “What on earth was Verna doing late at night on the Wash? People don't walk out on those saltings for exercise.” Grace looked thoughtful. “Two murders within two weeks.”

Max put down his cup. “ ‘Alleged' murders, you should say.”

“Well, the alleged shot from the alleged gun caused quite an outpouring of alleged blood.”

Melrose laughed, but without humor. He was too busy taking impressions. Grace Owen, for one, didn't appear to resent the ex-wife's presence at Fengate, alive
or
dead.

“Jennifer Kennington was the last person to see Verna alive.” Calmly, she sipped her coffee.

No. The last person to see her alive would have been the killer
, thought Melrose. “I find it hard to believe that Lady Kennington would be a suspect. She appeared to me to be so . . . gentle.” They were miles from antique
bonheurs-du-jour
Turkestan rugs. But the Owens didn't seem to notice, submerged as they were in the strange business of murder at Fengate.

Grace nodded. “Yes, you're right. Except I think it's true that one can't tell what another's capable of in such circumstances. On the other hand, what on earth would her motive be? They didn't even know each other.”

“You mean, as far as we
know
they didn't.”

Melrose felt a cold spike of fear. They were seriously entertaining the notion that Jenny might have done this.

“Max would be a better candidate for chief suspect,” Grace said, laughing. “Or I would, or even Jack. In fact
anyone
would make more sense than Jennifer Kennington.” She sighed.

He would have loved to ask what motives she had in mind, but the question would wait.

“Grace—” Max put down his coffee cup. “You don't know what you're talking about.” His tone was perfectly amiable. Then he turned to Melrose. “This detective from New Scotland Yard—he's a friend of Mr. Trueblood.” He paused and searched through his pockets, finally drew out a card. “Superintendent Richard Jury, no less. Pretty high up, a superintendent.” He looked at Melrose quizzically. “But you know him, don't you? Didn't he recommend you? Grace? Isn't that true?”

As Grace nodded, Melrose said, “I know him slightly, yes.” He was feeling more and more uncomfortable, for he couldn't make out Max Owen. He couldn't make out whether he was being baited or whether Owen's questions were simply innocent. Melrose decided that he should be the one to turn the conversation to Owen's collection. “Where are the pieces you wanted me to have a look at?”

Grace broke in, tapping her toe against the carpet. “The rug. Mr. Plant says it's the real thing.”

Quickly, Melrose said, “It's my
opinion
it's, as you say, the ‘real thing.' ” He turned a self-deprecating smile on Max Owen, who was clearly happy to believe that his guest's opinion was also the real thing.

“So Christie's and old Parker were wrong!”

“If they told you otherwise.”

“Parker is a friend of Max,” said Grace, “who loves to take issue with whatever Max acquires. He's knowledgeable, yes, but I suspect he's quite jealous, really.”

Looking toward another room, Max Owen said, “Come on in here, Mr. Plant. There's another rug I'd like an opinion on.” He was moving toward the door, and said over his shoulder, “Darling, bring the booze, will you?”

How wonderful! thought Melrose, trailing after Owen as Grace went to the sideboard and picked up a cut-glass decanter.
If it's rugs I have to classify, by all means, bring the booze.

In the next room, Max and Melrose stood looking down at a rug of blues and reds and graceful swirls as Grace pulled glasses out of one of the many cabinets housing them. They would never be at a loss for a glass, the Owens.

“It's a Nain. You know, that very fine rug from Iran. But Parker says it isn't, says it's the wrong design. Supposed to be Ispahan.”

Melrose put on a thoughtful expression. He only wished Grace weren't there, with her lovely lack of guile. He found it extremely difficult to put on his act in the face of her artlessness. He cleared his throat. “That depends on what one means by Ispahan, I suppose.”

Max Owen looked puzzled. “Well, surely, people agree as to
what
that is!”

Melrose smiled, gave Owen a sad little headshake. “Mr. Owen, in this business there are very few things people agree upon.”

Max smiled. “Since you seem to know rugs, you might give me your opinion of the ones upstairs.”

Hell's bells
, thought Melrose. Well, it was bound to happen, wasn't it, that Max Owen would go trolling beyond the boundary of Jury's list?

“I'm going to see Annie about dinner, then.” She set cups on the tray, picked it up, walked out, calling over her shoulder, “Around eight? Will that give you time?”

Max said, “No, but eight's fine. I'm starved. Thirsty, too. Thanks.” Grace handed them both a glass of whiskey, said she hoped the brand was all right with Mr. Plant. Any brand was all right with Mr. Plant at this point, threatened with a mess of upstairs rugs.

Max moved over to an open court cupboard (at least that's what Melrose thought it was,
Don't call it for God's sakes a “buffet,”
Trueblood had warned him). He picked up a deep blue ashtray of what looked to Melrose like Murano glass and brought it over to set between them on an old trunk. But Max Owen was so drowned in his antique sea, he forgot to light up, if that was his intention. “That
table à la Bourgogne
you brought I told Suggins to put upstairs in a small study I use. The pieces I'm wondering about are in here.” Max handed Melrose a thick glass tumbler. “Such as that
secretaire.”

If there was one thing Melrose knew it was
secretaires à abattant.
Or at least he thought he did, until his eyes fell on Max Owen's. This one was completely different from the one that had been in Trueblood's shop several years before. You couldn't have stuffed a body into this one, that was certain. It was black lacquer with gilt ornamentation, the front at a forty-five-degree angle which fell down to reveal a writing surface. He nodded; he frowned in turn in response to Max Owen's comments, understanding
practically nothing of Max's antiquarian jargon, fashioned largely out of French.
Demi-lune; menuisier.
And it was amazing how the man could go on about marquetry and parquetry, soffits and jappaning. Why in the devil did he need any other opinion? Melrose stifled a yawn; he felt he could have communed with the
secretaire
on its own terms. By the time Max was finished, there wasn't an inch of gilding, a corner of ormolu, a tracery of acanthus leaves that Melrose wasn't intimately acquainted with.

Max lowered and raised the writing surface and asked, “What do you think?”

Melrose looked seriously thoughtful for several moments, chin resting in his hand, finger tapping his cheek, and said, “I think you're absolutely right.”

Max Owen looked quite smug. “Even about the hidden drawer, the secret drawer? The Sotheby's fellow said he'd never encountered anything like that in the genuine article.”

Had he missed the secret drawer? “You mean Tim Strangeways?” Melrose suddenly remembered that Strangeways was a name Trueblood had told him to invoke, if Max got onto some discussion about the people at Sotheby's. So Melrose's smile was even smugger than Max's. Strangeways had already been brought to heel.

Max laughed. “Good.” Then he turned to another commodelike piece and started a little lecture on
bureaux-de-roi.

Melrose's attention span was turning into that of a four-year-old. He simply couldn't keep his mind on this stuff for five minutes running. He decided not to open up a stall in Camden Passage.
Pay Attention!
he ordered himself.

“. . .
de-roi
. This is an excellent specimen of the type.”

Melrose was studiously examining the legs, running his hand up and down one, then he rose and pulled out one of the drawers, again running his hand along the joining, closed it, and sighed. “I'm not so sure.” Well, he had to take issue at some point with the genuineness of one of these
objets d'art
so he might as well with this one, especially since it hadn't been on the list.

At this point, Max asked him to examine another, much smaller rug near the windows.
Hell, not another rug.
Melrose couldn't even remember
what kind of Persian carpet was in his own drawing room, the one Trueblood drooled over and said was priceless . . . a priceless—what? Now he was forced to inspect what Owen told him was an antique Fereghan. It was quite beautiful, a light blue background with a pattern of interlinked medallions.

“My friend Parker says the design isn't right for it to be a genuine Fereghan.”

Melrose smiled. “Oh, I'm sure the medallion is genuine enough. But is your friend Parker?”

Max's laugh was a bellow; it seemed clear to Melrose that Owen and this Parker were highly competitive. And Max Owen wasn't looking for an expert; he was looking for somebody to tell him he was right. Melrose was happy to oblige.

Max had turned to the whiskey decanter, splashed more whiskey into his glass, held up the decanter in silent query to Melrose. Melrose shook his head.

Max replaced the stopper, asked, “Did you know her well?”

The question took Melrose completely by surprise. He feigned ignorance. “Know who?”

“Jennifer Kennington.”

“No. As I said, I met her only the one time. In Stratford-upon-Avon. I think she lives there.”

Max nodded. He was standing now, swirling the whiskey in his glass, his eyes seemingly fixed on the fog beyond the windows. “She needed investment money for some pub or restaurant she wanted to open. I'm the investor.” He drank his whiskey, still looking out on darkness. “The few days in the country certainly turned out to be pretty unhappy for Jennifer, I'm afraid.” He picked up a wooden chalice, examined it, replaced it.

From his expression, Melrose thought they'd been pretty unhappy for Max Owen, too.

 • • • 

T
he Owens' friend Major Linus Parker joined them for dinner at the last minute. He preferred people call him, simply, “Parker.” Melrose could sympathize with this ridding oneself of rank and title. Parker was a large
man in his sixties whose house (which he had baptized “Toad Hall”) lay off the public footpath, halfway between Fengate and the pub.

It was Parker who said, “It was almost comical, the police coming round. ‘And where were you, sir, at the time of the murder?' ” He said this in a deep voice, exaggerating the Lincolnshire accent. “I didn't think police actually
said
things like that. Sounded more like a parody of police.”

“They apparently do,” said Max Owen. “And did you give a thorough accounting of your movements?”

Parker said, “I was right here until eleven.”

“After that, I mean.”

“You've got me dead to rights; I was walking home.”

Jack Price, who'd been silent for most of the meal, said, “And I went back to the studio.”

“And Grace went to bed, and I went into my study. Not an alibi amongst us, too bad.”

“I went to sleep immediately,” said Grace.

“Ho-
ho
. Try telling that to our chief inspector!”

“Have done,” said Grace. “Anyway, Max does have an alibi. You said sometime between eleven-thirty and midnight Suggins brought you a drink.”

Max nodded. “Right. So it seems my future lies in the hands of our gardener, who likes a nip himself now and again.”

“Which takes care of
his
testimony,” said Parker.

Max said, “Mr. Plant's a friend of Lady Kennington.”

“An acquaintance, rather,” said Melrose.

“So you said.” Max was looking at Melrose with a depth of glance that made him extremely uncomfortable and kept him turning the stem of his wineglass. “Jenny was with Verna, seems to have been the last person to see her alive. Or at least that's what I gather the Lincs police have deduced.” He gazed at Melrose as if to see how he'd take it.