Sir Roderick, and that fashionable consultant, Dr Theodore Westruther, had consented to be the scorers and general managers of the party, dual roles which bade fair to reduce both gentlemen to a state of nervous prostration. The difficulties attendant upon persuading a chattering crowd of guests to postpone the exchange of confidences, and to take their places at the various tables were enormous; and when twelve persons had at last been singled out from the crowd and driven downstairs to the library, and those who were to remain in the drawing-room shepherded to their tables, it was still some time before play could begin. Earnest players, itching to inspect the hands stuck into the slots of the duplicate-boards, in vain suggested that Bridge and not conversation was the order of the evening. A babel of voices made play impossible, for besides the inveterate recounters of anecdotes, there was a strong faction of persons bent on making known the systems which governed their play; a still stronger one of those who were willing to play any convention, but who required to be reminded of the rules governing all but their particular choice; several nervous people who had never played duplicate Bridge before and had to have the procedure explained to them; one or two ladies of terrifying aspect, who warned their partners in menacing accents that they expected to be taken out of a No Trump call; and a small clique of fanatics who filled in the time before play started by describing in a very boring way the interesting hands they had held recently, and the skill with which they had made their contracts.
However, the united and patient efforts of the two scorers, Mrs Haddington and Miss Birtley, at last prevailed, and a sudden silence fell.
Timothy, who had been paired with Cynthia, resigned himself to an unsuccessful evening, for a very few minutes sufficed to convince him that her Bridge was of a dashing variety that took little account of part scores. She had a certain aptitude for the game, and since her social education had included a course of lessons from an expert, she was familiar with most of the conventions. But the gambling instinct was alarmingly strong in her; and an inability to concentrate her mind for any sustained period led her largely to ignore her partner’s discards, and frequently to forget that an important card still lurked in one of her opponents’ hands.
Timothy, who was dummy during the first hand, had leisure, while Cynthia struggled to make her contract, to look round the room, and study the assembled company. For the most part, his fellow-guests seemed to be an innocuous set of persons, hovering on the fringes of Society; but there were one or two people, like Lady Nest Poulton and Sir Roderick Vickerstown, and the Kenelm Guisboroughs, who had been born into a world the rest aspired to adorn. There were also some unplaceable specimens, such as Seaton-Carew, who fell into no easily definable class.
The Kenelm Guisboroughs were seated at the next table to Timothy’s, playing, in this first hand, against Lord Guisborough, and Mrs Criddon, a stout matron wearing a profusion of diamonds and an air of stern concentration. Possibly Mrs Haddington had felt that the sooner the cousins met, and were parted, the better it would be: certainly an atmosphere of dangerous restraint hung over their table. No greater contrast could have been imagined than that which existed between the cousins. Lord Guisborough, wearing a soft shirt, a tie askew, and with a lock of unruly hair drooping over one eyebrow, slouched in his chair, and, having told his partner she could play any convention she liked, declared on some undisclosed system of his own, and played his cards with a careless acumen and an air of boredom which made nearly every man in the room wish to kick him. Kenelm, on the other hand, who, in spite of springing from a younger branch of the family, was some years his cousin’s senior, looked like a Guardsman, which he was not, and might have served as a model of good, if rather pompous, form. He had a round and florid face, with a tooth-brush moustache, and slightly protuberant eyes, and whenever his noble relative succeeded in enraging him, which was often, his colour rose, his moustache bristled, and he looked very much as though he would burst. His wife, Irene, was a bloodless blonde, who habitually spoke in a complaining voice, and maintained a running fire of criticism of her husband’s bidding and subsequent play. Lord Guisborough she largely ignored.
Beulah was not in the drawing-room during the first hand, but she came in as the cards were being restored to the boards, and the various couples changed their tables, and began mechanically to empty ashtrays, and remove glasses. Supper would presently be served in the dining-room, but Mrs Haddington was well aware of the beneficial results of keeping her guests supplied with stimulating liquid refreshment, and had instructed Beulah to lose no time in asking if she might not get some harassed player a drink. This was, in fact, no more than a daughter of the house might have been expected to do, but nevertheless it annoyed Timothy to watch his beloved waiting on everyone, and looking more and more weary as the evening progressed. He tried several times to catch her eye, but she refused to look at him; once he saw Seaton-Carew address some remark to her which brought a flash into her eyes, and caused her to move away from that table at once; and although this was better than seeing her submit to that dashing gentleman’s familiarities, it did nothing to add to Timothy’s enjoyment of the party. He began to think rather badly of a state of civilisation that made it impossible for him to pick a quarrel with Seaton-Carew upon frivolous grounds, and then inform him that his friends would wait upon him in the morning; and to derive what satisfaction he could from the realisation that no more inimical partner could have been selected for Mr Seaton-Carew than Miss Beatrice Guisborough, who visibly despised him, and audibly condemned his card-play. The knowledge that Seaton-Carew would have liked to have had Cynthia for his partner, and was extremely bored, was poor comfort, however: Mr Harte was glad to see him and Miss Guisborough vanish from the room, and sorry to be obliged, a quarter of an hour later, to follow them to one of the tables set out in the library.
Beulah was well aware that Mr Harte had tried to catch her eye, and equally well aware that he had observed her brief encounter with Seaton-Carew. She hoped that he would make no attempt to single her out during the supper-interval, and made up her mind to keep as much out of his way as was possible. She was conscious of being kept under observation by Mrs Haddington, whose double-edged remark earlier in the evening had not been lost on her.
She was on her way upstairs, bearing a whisky-and-soda for Colonel Cartmel, when the intermittent ringing of the telephone-bell informed her that Mr Seaton-Carew’s call had at last come through. In expectation of it, she had informed him that it would be best for him to take it in Mrs Haddington’s sitting-room, and she now set down the little silver tray she carried, and went into this apartment. She emerged a moment later to see her employer upon the landing outside the drawing-room.
‘If that is for me, I hope you told whoever it is that I can’t possibly come to the telephone now!’ said Mrs Haddington.
‘It isn’t. It’s a long-distance call for Mr Seaton-Carew,’ replied Beulah.
Mrs Haddington uttered an impatient exclamation. ‘I’d forgotten. Really, I do think – Well, it can’t be helped! He’s in the library: you’d better go down and tell him at once. He can take it in my boudoir.’
‘I’ve already told him so,’ said Beulah, departing on her errand.
‘And just keep your eye on things for a minute or two!’ added Mrs Haddington, carefully gathering up her long skirt, preparatory to ascending the flight that led to her bedroom. ‘I’m going to powder my face.’ She became aware of Sydney Butterwick at her elbow, and stared at him. ‘Dear me! Is anything wrong, Mr Butterwick?’
‘No – oh, no!’ he said, stammering a little. ‘I just thought I’d get myself a drink – we’ve finished at our table!’
‘Of course!’ she said, with a graciousness he found even more quelling than her asperity. ‘You know your way to the dining-room, don’t you?’
At the table he had deserted, in the front drawing-room, Lady Nest sighed: ‘I can’t imagine what induces him even to try to play Bridge. Darling Jennifer, too cruel to have saddled
you with him! My heart bleeds for you! Why do you suppose he took you out of your heart call?’
‘God knows!’ responded Miss Cheadle, a raw-boned lady with the indefinable look of a horsewoman. ‘Feel a bit sorry for the boy: got something on his mind.’
‘I don’t want to depress you, Jenny,’ remarked Mr Charles Ashbourne, ‘but, according to Roddy, you’ve been fobbed off with a stop-gap. Jack Doveridge stood Lilias up at the last moment.’
‘Oh, well!’ said Miss Cheadle largemindedly. ‘That’s all right: somebody had to have him!’
At this moment, two redoubtable ladies at a table in the middle of the room created a diversion by arguing with steadily mounting choler on the correct play of the hand which one of them had just (according to the other) mismanaged. It was a cardinal rule that these devoted friends should be kept apart at any Bridge-party, for each had a voice like the screech of a macaw, and neither had the smallest control over her temper. It was of course impossible to keep them apart throughout a duplicatecontest, but it had been hoped that since one was North and the other West no cause for dissension would arise. Unfortunately, North saw fit to criticise West’s play, which, considering she and her partner had benefited by it to the tune of five hundred points above the line, was unhandsome of her. An altercation arose which showed every sign of developing into a brawl; and Mrs Haddington came back into the room to find play at all tables at a standstill. It said much for her tact that she was speedily able to soothe both ruffled ladies; and still more for her admirable command over herself that she did not betray her annoyance by so much as the flicker of an eyelid. Only Beulah, entering the room a moment later, knew that she was at all put out. Mrs Haddington, smiling with determination, said to her in an acid undertone: ‘I thought I told you to keep an eye on things for me!’
Play was resumed, but another hitch soon occurred, which was explained by Dr Westruther, who came up from the library to say that they were held up there by Seaton-Carew’s absence. ‘Called away to the telephone in the middle of a hand,’ he said. ‘They’re waiting to finish it.’
‘Still telephoning?’ said Mrs Haddington. ‘Nonsense! He can’t be. Or, if he is, he oughtn’t to be!’ she added, with a perfunctory laugh. ‘It’s really very naughty and inconsiderate of him, and I shall scold him severely! Roddy, do go and remind him that he’s holding everyone up! In my boudoir: you know where it is!’
‘I’ll soon have him out of it,’ said Sir Roderick, who disliked him, and had already confided to Dr Westruther that the fellow was a bounder.
He then stumped out of the room, colliding in the doorway with Sydney Butterwick. He glared, his sapient eye taking in the fact that this weakheaded young man had been fortifying himself a little too liberally. ‘Now then, now then, look where you’re goin’, young fellow!’ he growled, and went off down the stairs to the boudoir.
A minute later he came back into the drawing-room, breathing rather hard, and looking very much shaken. He seemed to find some difficulty in speaking, and it was seen that his hand was trembling. Everyone stared at him; and Lady Nest, perceiving his pallor, jumped up from her chair, exclaiming: ‘Roddy, are you feeling ill?’
He gulped, and made a gesture waving her aside. ‘Westruther!’ he said. ‘Job for you! Go down there! That fellow – Seaton-Carew!’
‘What is it?’ Mrs Haddington demanded sharply. ‘Roddy, what’s the matter? Where’s Dan?’
Sir Roderick tottered to a chair, and sat down. ‘He’s dead,’ he said bluntly. ‘Turned me up a bit. Nasty shock. No, no, Lilias, you stay where you are! Job for Westruther, not you. The fellow’s been strangled!’
Seven
The insistent clamour which had been intruding for some time into Chief Inspector Hemingway’s dreams at last woke him. He swore, raised himself on one elbow, and groped for the lamp beside his bed. A moment later a voice said in his ear: ‘Chief Inspector Hemingway?’
It was a brisk, official voice: the Chief Inspector recognised it as one that belonged to his superior, and life-long friend, Superintendent Hinckley, of the Criminal Investigation Department. He said, with great correctness: ‘Yes, sir.’
‘Sound sleeper, aren’t you? Easy conscience, I expect. There’s a job waiting for you.’
‘Now, look here, Bob!’ said the Chief Inspector, abandoning the official manner. ‘If you’re having a joke with me –’
At the other end of the wire, Superintendent Hinckley grinned unseen. ‘I’m not lying in my nice, warm bed! I’m on duty, and I’ll thank you to remember it, my lad!’
Chief Inspector Hemingway, around whose exposed shoulders an icy draught was blowing, replied to this sally in terms which caused his superior to inform him severely that he wanted to hear no more of his lip. ‘Wake up!’ he said. ‘This is a job after your own heart.’
‘At this time of night?’ said Hemingway indignantly. ‘Don’t tell me another Pole has gone and got himself knifed by one of his pals, because I’m not as young as I was, and if I’ve got to go off at this hour and listen to a lot of highly excitable foreigners, all jabbering different lies at me, I’m chucking the Force right now!’
‘It isn’t anything like that,’ replied the Superintendent. ‘Didn’t I tell you it was after your own heart? Some bloke’s been strangled in a house in Charles Street. Very classy joint: what you call good décor!’
In spite of himself, Hemingway was interested. ‘You don’t say! What’s it all about? Robbery with violence?’
‘No, nothing of that sort, as far as I can make out. In fact, no one knows rightly what it’s all about. It happened in the middle of a Bridge-party, that I can tell you!’
‘Ah!’ said the Chief Inspector. ‘Daresay the chap led his partner a heart after he’d signalled he wanted a club. Well, I’ve got no sympathy for him!’
‘Look here!’ interrupted the Superintendent, in whom this suggestion awoke galling memories. ‘If I have much more from you, Stanley, you’ll know it! Get up and dress! I’m putting you in charge!’
‘What’s C Division done?’ demanded Hemingway, swinging his legs out of bed, and groping with his bare feet for his slippers. ‘Don’t they do night-duty these days?’
‘You’ll find Inspector Pershore waiting for you at the house,’ said the Superintendent, with some relish.
‘Oh, I will, will I? Well, isn’t that a bit of luck for me? Of course it would have to be him, wouldn’t it? He’ll tell me all about it, I expect, and give me a few hints and tips as well, if I speak nicely to him! Hold on, while I shut this damned window, Bob!’ He laid down the receiver, pushed the sash up, shrugged himself into a dressing-gown, and sat down again on the edge of the bed. ‘All right: go ahead! Who’s the murdered chap?’
‘Man called Seaton-Carew.’
‘Anything known about him?’
‘Nothing known about any of them.’
The Chief Inspector groaned. ‘Any line on it at all?’
‘Might be, might not. Doesn’t sound like a cinch, from the first report. There were forty-nine people in the house at the time –’
‘What?’
‘Fifty-five, counting the servants,’ said the Superintendent.
‘And I suppose any one of them could have bumped this chap off! You know, Bob, I believe I’ve got an attack of ‘flu coming on, or maybe it’s scarlet fever!’
The Superintendent laughed. ‘That’s all right: it isn’t as bad as that! Pershore has established that most of them couldn’t have had anything to do with it. Not counting the servants, there seem to be seven people who might have had the opportunity.’
‘Is that all! It’s too easy, Bob!’
‘According to Pershore, it’s easier still. He says it’s a clear case against one person – young fellow, name of Butterwick.’
‘Well, if that’s what he says, I’ve only got six people to interrogate – not counting the servants,’ said the Chief Inspector unkindly. ‘In fact, he may as well send young Butterwick off home to bed at once. I’d be
tter get round there before he gets us all into trouble jugging a lot of innocent people. Let me have Sandy Grant, will you, Bob? Setting aside he knows my ways, once you get used to his silly habit of never giving you a straight yes or no, I’d sooner have him with me than any of the rest of them.’
‘I’ve already detailed him, and Sergeant Snettisham, to you.’
‘That’s fine, but you don’t have to go dragging Snettisham out of his bed at this hour: he’s a married man, and I shan’t need him tonight. Besides, I’ve got some consideration for other people, even if there are some that haven’t.’
‘All right, all right! I’ll send a car round to pick you up.’
‘You’re spoiling me!’ said Hemingway, and rang off.
It was shortly before two in the morning that the police car drew up behind two others, and an ominous ambulance, outside Mrs Haddington’s house in Charles Street. Chief Inspector Hemingway, followed by the wiry, redheaded Inspector Grant of the CID, got out, and were admitted into the house by a uniformed constable, who saluted, and said that Inspector Pershore was awaiting them in the dining-room. Inspector Pershore came out of this room to greet them. He was a large, hard-faced man, with a consequential manner that had never yet failed to annoy the Chief Inspector. He took himself and his duties very seriously; and if Hemingway disliked him it was only fair to say that this dislike was cordially reciprocated. The higher Hemingway rose in the Department, the more important the cases that were entrusted to him, the less could Inspector Pershore understand the rules governing such promotion. He could not be brought to believe that anyone as incorrigibly flippant as the Chief Inspector could be what he called an efficient officer. He had been heard to express his astonishment at what the Chief Inspector’s superiors put up with, and would certainly have been staggered to learn that no less a personage than the Assistant Commissioner had once said: ‘Put Hemingway on to it! He’ll threaten to resign – but he’ll bring home the bacon!’