Chapter V.
Allport’s Alternatives
Without further remark, Allport turned and led the way back to the dining-room, the inspector following immediately behind him, The Tundish and I bringing up the rear. As we walked along the passage the doctor decreased his pace, so that after the other two had passed through the dining-room door, he and I were alone for a moment in the hall. He whispered to me hurriedly, “Jeffcock, you must do all you can to keep the peace between Kenneth and Ethel. You can see for yourself that I can do nothing. What with her hot temper and his subconscious determination to make his conduct match his mouth and chin, we shall have their young love-affair on the rocks before we know where we are.” He gave my arm a squeeze of thanks as I promised to do whatever I could, and we were at the door of the room with no more time for conversation.
It was patent that Ethel and Kenneth had quarreled. They were standing a little apart in one of the windows at the far side of the room. She was fondling the cat which still lay on the sill, basking in the blazing sun, and he stood looking at her, dour and sullen.
She turned and spoke to him as we came into the room, and I feel almost certain she said, “Very well then, Kenneth, there’s no more to be said. If your love for me depends on my deserting a friend in his trouble, it’s the sort of love I don’t want.”
Allport broke in on them before Kenneth had time to make any reply, saying that he wanted to make the position clear to us all before he took any further steps in the task he had before him.
“I have two alternative courses of action before me,” he explained, “and the one I adopt will rest entirely with you, though I can hardly think that you will show any hesitation in making your choice. Dr. Jeffries, I must tell you, agrees with Dr. Wallace that Miss Palfreeman met her death by poisoning. He is unable to state the nature of the poison used, which tends to confirm Dr. Wallace’s suspicion that an addition was made to the sleeping draft from the small flagon that I now have safely in my bag. That, of course, will be looked into more closely as soon as a proper post-mortem examination can be made.”
He paused for a moment to wipe the perspiration from his face. It was nearly midday and the room was suffocating. The sun shone straight on to the three long windows which stood wide open, but the dark green blinds drawn half-way down prevented the least movement of air. A bee, which had become trapped between one of the blinds and the window, buzzed away unhappily. I took advantage of the detective’s pause to ask him if there could be no possibility of suicide.
Ralph scowled at me for my pains and it was only then that I remembered that my suggestion would be casting a slur on poor Stella. It seemed to me, however, that that would be a comparatively happy solution, bearing in mind that the only alternative was cold-blooded murder. Murder too, not by some unknown outsider, but in all probability by one of us now in the room listening to the little detective making his suggestions. The Tundish, Ralph, Kenneth, or one of the two girls—it seemed equally absurd to associate any one of them with such a crime.
Allport soon settled the point, however. “Suicides don’t usually throw away the glass from which they have drunk,” he said, “and in addition to that, there are other points which preclude any such possibility.”
I had given no thought to the glass from which the poison had been taken. The references seemed to rouse The Tundish. He was sitting on the end of the table, apparently entirely at his ease, his legs swinging idly, as he lighted a cigarette. The match burned down and scorched his finger-ends, making him start, so absorbed was his attention in the detective’s remark. Ethel had seated herself on the window-sill, where she was pensively stroking the cat, her mind occupied, I felt sure, more with her quarrel with Kenneth than with the matter immediately in hand. She turned round quickly, however, directly the glass was mentioned, and burst out with, “But the glass——” Then she paused uncomfortably, reddened, and resumed her caressing of the cat.
“Yes? But the glass——?” Allport queried.
It was The Tundish who completed the broken sentence, however, calmly lighting another match as he did so. “Miss Hanson was going to say that the glass was on the little table at the side of Miss Palfreeman’s bed when she first went up to her room. It was still there when I went up a few minutes later to make my hurried examination. The glass was one of the usual graduated taper measures. I lifted it from the table, saw that there were a few drops of liquid at the bottom, which I smelled, and then I put it back on the table again. When I came down-stairs I meant to lock the door but forgot to do so, and as I have already explained, I asked Mr. Jeffcock to see that no one went into the room just before I went out to see my patient. That is all I can tell you about it.”
None of us spoke a word. The detective was deep in thought. He was half-seated on the arm of one of the two heavy armchairs that stood at either side of the fireplace. Margaret and Ralph were leaning against the mantelpiece, which is backed by a long, low looking-glass framed in oak. She was half-turned toward it and I could see her full face reflection as I stood against the door. Kenneth stood by the table. Ethel was still in the window-seat a little way behind him. The Tundish seemed the least disturbed of any of us and was obviously enjoying his cigarette. The bee, which was still buzzing behind the blind, escaped from its trap, and the sudden cessation of its hum somehow marked a period and plunged us into silence.
At last the detective spoke, “And the key was found——” He spoke with a slow emphasis, turning toward The Tundish, and tilting his chair. Then he stood up suddenly, his sentence incomplete, and his chair righted itself with a bang, that came like a blow to our straining nerves.
Margaret uttered a little startled cry, and he was immediately profuse with redundant apology. He seemed to have forgotten all about the key. At one moment he had us all tense with excitement as though we were waiting a verdict, and the next he could find nothing better to do than talk about his own clumsiness in partly overturning a chair. I could not understand him at all and I saw an amused smile play across the doctor’s face as he repeated, “And the key was found——”
“Oh, I don’t think that matters very much for the moment,” was the amazing reply. “That can all be gone into later. Please don’t divert me from the proposition I was about to put before you.
“Miss Palfreeman has been poisoned without the least shadow of doubt. Suicide—put that idea right out of your minds. It—is—murder. My first duty is to secure the murderer, and it must be obvious to you all that the facts, as we know them at present, point very definitely indeed to Dr. Wallace. I think that even he will agree with me that that is not an exaggerated statement.”
The Tundish nodded his head and murmured, “Quite so,” with an air I can only describe as one of pleasant acquiescence, and the little man proceeded with his harangue.
“On the other hand, a very long experience has taught me that these definite first impressions are often quite misleading. Either owing to a chain of unfortunate coincidences, or by the design of some one else, suspicion fastens on the innocent. That may seem a banal statement to make but it is a possibility that is often overlooked. In this case, already there are apparent several pieces of conflicting evidence, which it will take time and further investigation to appraise at their proper value. One clue—which I am not going to specify—distinctly indicates that the murder may have been committed by some one quite outside your house-party here. I propose to follow that up immediately myself, and it will mean that I may have to be away for a day or two. I don’t want to raise any false hopes, however, and I may as well tell you quite candidly that my opinion, formed on the balance of the facts, is that the murderer is listening to me now.”
He paused impressively. Ethel half stifled a sob.
“Now, here are my proposals to you,” he continued. “Either I must arrest Dr. Wallace at once on suspicion, and your statements as to the events of last night must be taken down in the usual way, or alternatively, you must all promise to obey my instructions to the letter, however absurd and unreasonable they may seem to you to be. Among other things I shall want your promise that you will none of you leave the house.”
Saying that he had one or two things to attend to which would take him about half an hour, and that it would give us a convenient opportunity for making our decision, he gave us a stiff little bow and left the room.
The Tundish was the first to break the awkward silence. “And if you don’t mind, I think I’ll follow our little friend’s example and leave you to it.” As he reached the door, he turned and smiled at us, all geniality and unconcern.
Five very uncomfortable people were left. There could be no doubt about which of the two alternatives we should choose. I think there was no doubt about that in any of our minds before a word was spoken. It was the tremendous difference between the reasons that led to our decisions that made our unanimity nothing but a mockery, and created an atmosphere that was thick with jealousy and distrust. As we stood about the room, it seemed to me that we were like the atoms of some unstable molecule, momentarily in unhappy association, but ready to dissociate and fly off on some course of our own, should the least provocation arise.
It was Ralph, for once, who took the initiative and broke the unpleasant little silence. “Well, of course we must agree to do what he tells us, though it seems to me that it is only prolonging the agony, and if I were in the doctor’s place, I should be glad to be gone and have done with it.”
I could see that Kenneth was ready for an outburst, and it came directly Ralph had completed his remark. “I can’t understand you. I can’t make you out at all. Murder might hardly be criminal from the way you seem to take it, and even a detestable murder like this—a girl poisoned in her bed—something to be borne in silence! I can hardly keep my hands off the brute, and the rest of you seem quite willing and even anxious to be friends.”
“Kenneth, how can you! Oh, how can you be so cruel! Suppose that you were in The Tundish’s place, how would you like it if we all of us turned against you and were ready to believe the worst? You seem almost as though you were anxious to believe that he did it.” Ethel had spoken quietly at first, but her sentence ended on a note of bitterness.
“That is a grossly unfair thing to say,” Kenneth answered hotly. “I might just as well say that you don’t care whether he did it or not, and I begin to think that I shouldn’t be far from the truth if I did say that. Everything proves that he doped the draft, and you can kiss him and fondle his hands! You don’t even reserve your judgment and say this man may be a vile murderer—you just flaunt your absurd hero-worship in front of us all. If he had a spark of decency in him he would give himself up.”
“Oh, yes, I know that is exactly what you would do. I can just see you doing it. I suppose you haven’t given a thought to what this will mean to daddy’s practise.”
“Why, what on earth do you mean? Surely he is not implicated in any way? It can’t make any difference to him.”
“Oh, can’t it!”
It was horrible to hear them quarreling, and I tried once or twice to interrupt them, but in their anger they ignored us entirely and might have been alone. At last I did manage to get in the remark that “Every one should be considered innocent until his guilt has been proved.”
It was a fatuous remark—worthy of Margaret herself—and Kenneth sneered that I seemed to have rather funny ideas on the subject of innocence. It was Margaret, however, who ultimately turned the discussion in a more pacific direction. She pointed out that Ethel knew the doctor about ten times as well as the rest of us, but even so she didn’t see how any one could be expected to ignore entirely all the evidence against him. “However,” she concluded, “Mr. Allport as good as said that he thought that he probably did it, but that there may be just an outside chance that he didn’t. Well, for my part, I am quite willing to wait until he has investigated that outside chance,” and she turned to Ralph, asking him what he thought about it.
Ralph paused perceptibly before replying, “There is nothing to be gained by beating about the bush. Allport would not have said what he did if he had much real hope from his outside clue. But, for your sake, Ethel, and because of your father’s practise, I am willing to agree to anything he asks us to do. Honestly, though, as far as the practise is concerned, I can’t see that it makes much difference. This sort of thing can’t be hushed up, you know!”
I protested that if the outside clue proved relevant, it did make all the difference in the world. Then, none besides ourselves need know how heavily Dr. Hanson’s locum-tenens had been involved, and, endeavoring to carry out The Tundish’s request, I concluded with, “For my part, whether this clue leads to anything or not, I shall take a lot of convincing before I can believe that either he or any of the rest of you are poisoners,” but even as I said the words, I was wondering, “If the doctor hasn’t done it, then which of the others has?”
“Right, then now we all know exactly where we are,” Kenneth grumbled. “Ethel and you have quite determined that he is a hero, I know that he’s a blackguard, and the other two know that he is one, but don’t quite like to say so. You had better let the little man know. I can only hope that it won’t be for long, and that you won’t insist on my pretending to be friends.”
“No one but a fool would think you capable of pretending anything,” I retorted, and went in search of Allport.
I had heard him busy with the telephone while we had been making our decision, and I found him talking with the inspector in the drawing-room. He was balancing himself on the curb round the fireplace, and I imagine he had been laying down the law to the local official, who looked annoyed and uncomfortable, and emitted a grunt of emphatic disapproval as I entered the room. Allport was grinning at him, his grotesque little face puckering up in his amusement, and as he came toward me he patted the big man on the back, saying, “Well, that, my big friend, is what I am going to do whether you like it or not.”
The drawing-room at Dalehouse is an exact duplicate of the dining-room, as far as its dimensions are concerned, and with its long Georgian windows, it must, I imagine, have been a difficult room to furnish. Mrs. Hanson had done her best with it, but the deep armchair: and comfortable settee always looked to me out of place and a little apologetic, like a party of chorus girls, who, going to a night club, have landed in a bishop’s palace by mistake. A grand piano stood at right angles to the inside wall. It was little used, and on the top were several family photographs in frames.
I had told Allport that we were ready for him when I interrupted his conversation with the inspector, and he came toward me smiling. I could not help thinking that he was pleased with the inspector’s opposition. When he reached the piano, something caught his eye, however, and I saw his amused expression die away and one of astonishment take its place. Then, to my surprise, he picked up one of the photographs, and after scrutinizing it closely, took it out of its frame and examined the back. Inspector Brown stood watching him from the hearth-rug, and I gazed at him from the doorway. We exchanged an amused glance, his, I fancied, tinged with despair; but, quite unconcerned, Allport put the photograph back in its frame, replaced it carefully on the piano, and bowed to us each in turn with a whimsical smile.
“That is another little puzzle for you,” he said.
I told him of our decision.
“Good, and was it unanimous?”
“We have all decided to do whatever you tell us to,” was all I replied.
As soon as we had rejoined the others he sent one of his men to find The Tundish, and then he made us promise individually that we would do exactly what he asked without any reservation, and that we would tell him everything we knew that had any bearing on the matter. We took our places round the table, he at one end, and The Tundish at the other.
I felt that the doctor’s ordeal had begun, and I wondered what he would say about the key, and whether he would make any statement about his quarrel with Stella the night before her death. But we were to be interrupted again. The man who had been stationed in the hall came in and whispered a few words in Allport’s ear. Allport nodded.
“Yes, show her in at once,” he said, and turning to the doctor, “Miss Summerson has just returned.”
The plain clothes man must have told her something of what had happened, because, though she looked anxious and worried, she expressed no surprise when she came in and found us sitting round the table. She had already put on her white coverall, and as she stood just inside the door, with her hands clasped in front of her and her fingers working convulsively, I thought she made rather a lonely, piteous little picture.
Somehow or other, Miss Summerson both surprised and intrigued me. Neither the lie she had told in the dispensary on the morning of my arrival, nor her general pallid, hesitating appearance seemed to be in keeping with the character The Tundish had painted and the neat precise print I had been compelled to admire on the doctor’s bottles. She ought, by all the rules, to have been dark, decisive, efficient and fifty, and there she stood against the door—about twenty-three, I thought—nervously clasping and unclasping her hands, her colorless hair scraped back into a kind of bun, her pale blue eyes with their fair lashes turning first to the doctor and then to Allport, and her white face and coverall all helping to complete a picture that could represent incompetence and fright. I argued to myself, that if normally she was efficient, then now she was afraid, and that if on the other hand she was not frightened now, then she could never be careful or precise, but to that conclusion the writing on the labels gave the lie, so I guessed that she was badly scared.
We were soon to learn one reason for her embarrassment, however, for before Allport had time to ask her any question she said in a voice that trembled with emotion, “Doctor, I’ve lost the key to the poison cupboard. What can I do? What shall I do?”
“Please tell us all about it, and if you can, when and where you lost it,” Allport questioned, in his iciest tones.
“I didn’t miss it until I got to——” she stammered, and then to our general discomfiture she reddened to the roots of her pale hair, put her hands to her face and burst into tears. Ethel got up and went to her, while the rest of us waited unhappily for the flood of tears to abate.
The detective looked angrily over his shoulder at the clock.
“I never went at all,” she sobbed at length, turning toward The Tundish. “I told you an untruth about going to Millingham—I—I—w-wanted the time off and thought that you would be more likely to let me go if I gave some definite reason. I am so very sorry.” She dried her eyes, and having made her little confession seemed to regain some of her composure.
“But what has all that got to do with your losing the key?” Allport snapped. “Please do answer my question.”
She explained that she carried the keys in a special pocket that she wore underneath her skirt. They were apparently secured to a chain attached to some part of her underwear—five or six on one ring, and the key of the cupboard, being especially important, on a ring of its own, connected to the rest by a piece of leather lace. When she had opened the cupboard on Tuesday morning she had noticed that the leather was becoming frayed, and had made up her mind to have it renewed. The key was there when she locked up the cupboard at three o’clock the same afternoon, and she had put it back in her pocket as usual and had then gone home. She didn’t notice that the lace was broken, and the ring with the key gone, until she undressed on going to bed.
“What did you do then?”
“Nothing, what could I do? It was eleven o’clock.”
“But surely you ought to have come and told the doctor first thing in the morning—it was rather an important key to lose, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, but I thought that most likely it must have dropped out on to the dispensary floor. I don’t use the pocket for anything but for the keys.”
“Where were you this morning? In Merchester?”
“Yes, first thing.”
“And yet you didn’t come to make sure that the key was safe?”
“No,” and after some hesitation, “I couldn’t.”
“Now, why couldn’t you?”
“Well, for one thing I had told Dr. Wallace that I was going to Millingham for the night when I wasn’t, but it wasn’t altogether that.”
“What was it then?”
“I don’t want to tell you.”
“But, my dear young lady, you must tell me. This is not a game of clumps, it’s a serious matter. Come now, what is it that you don’t want to tell me?”
“I—got engaged this morning.”
“Oho! Yes, but surely you could have spared just half an hour to ask about the key?”
“But you see I didn’t know that I was going to get engaged. My fiancé came to stay with us yesterday afternoon. He was going away by car first thing this morning, and we had arranged beforehand that I was to go as far as Boston with him, and then come back by train. We started at half past six. I was upset about the key but I wasn’t going to give it all up. It—you see, it meant too much to me.”
“And quite right too,” came emphatically from The Tundish, and, “Yes, I should think so indeed,” from Ethel.
“Then it amounts to this,” continued Allport, who seemed quite callous to the girl’s obvious and natural embarrassment, “you had the key at three o’clock yesterday, and you missed it at eleven o’clock when you went to bed. I suppose you made a thorough search of all your pockets and your bedroom and so forth?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, will you please go into the dispensary and write down very carefully and in full detail exactly what you did and where you went, between three and eleven o’clock yesterday? That’s all I want for the present.”
Miss Summerson had barely reached the door, however, when he called her back again and asked her to show him the other keys. She fumbled about underneath her coverall and produced a small bunch of keys on a ring at the end of a chain.
“Tell me exactly how the other key was fastened to these.”
“It was on a little ring by itself fastened to this ring by a short piece of leather lace.”
“But what a most extraordinary arrangement! Why didn’t you keep it on that ring along with the rest? It would have been safer, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose so, but these are my own keys, and I wanted to keep the other separate.”
“Why?”
Miss Summerson made no reply, but stood miserably in front of him, fiddling with the bunch of keys.
“You are sure that all this about the leather lace is not imagination?”
“No,” almost inaudibly; then, “I mean to say yes, there was a lace just like I’ve said.”
“Have you ever seen this queer arrangement, Doctor?”
The Tundish, I thought, hesitated for the merest fraction of a second, then he said pleasantly, “No, I don’t think I have. I knew that Miss Summerson had the key secured to a chain, somewhat in the way she has described, but I never had any reason to handle her keys or ask her exactly how they were attached.”
Allport sat drumming with his fingers on the table for a time, then he shrugged his shoulders, and told her curtly that she could go, adding, “Please be careful to be exact in the report I’ve asked you to write out.”
Miss Summerson hurried from the room.