Slight Mourning Read online

“Indeed?”

  “And then all she said was to see Mr. Puckle about everything.”

  “Well, he is …”

  “I don’t want to be insensitive and all that,” went on Quentin, “but hang it all, it’s all going to be mine in under three weeks.”

  “Perhaps,” murmured Sloan, “that’s what Mrs. Fent is finding so hard to bear.”

  “Could be, but,” said Quentin importantly, “there are things to be done on an estate of this size and some of them need doing now.”

  “Like the development?”

  Quentin flushed. “I can’t afford to let the grass grow under my feet, Inspector. In fact,” he said neatly, “I can’t afford to let the grass grow full stop. That land has got to grow bricks if Strontfield is going to stay solvent. There was nothing wrong with the scheme that Renville drew up, you know. Even Bill said so.”

  “You’re going to go ahead with it then, sir, are you?”

  “Too soon to say,” said Fent shutting up like a clam. “Now what’s all this about Marjorie Marchmont being hard to find?”

  Annabel Pollock, when appealed to, proved more helpful. “I certainly didn’t see Mrs. Marchmont last night, Inspector, and I’m sure Helen didn’t because she stayed in her room all evening … no, I’m wrong. She didn’t.”

  This was obviously news to Quentin as well as to Sloan.

  “She came downstairs,” said Annabel, “just before bedtime—at least that’s when I bumped into her.”

  “Where?” asked Sloan.

  “Near the garden door. She was worried about its being locked for the night.”

  “And was it?”

  “She said so. I didn’t check. Then she went back to bed.”

  Sloan said, “When was this?”

  “Just before ten, I think. It was while Quentin was on the telephone.”

  “To my fiancée,” said Quentin proprietorially.

  “Of course,” went on Annabel, “Mrs. Marchmont might have come up to the house earlier and not got an answer.” She hesitated. “I did slip out for a few minutes about eight o’clock. Helen wouldn’t have heard the bell in her bedroom.”

  “And she wouldn’t have answered it if she had,” added Quentin petulantly.

  “Mr. Fent here would have heard it, though,” pointed out Sloan.

  Annabel shook her head. “Not if she’d come while he was out.”

  “You were out too then were you, sir?” said Sloan at his silkiest.

  Quentin looked distinctly sulky. “Only if you can call walking in my ow … in the Park being out.”

  “And did you see anyone while you were—er—out?”

  “What’s that to …”

  “The same person,” swept on Sloan smoothly, “might have seen Mrs. Marchmont.”

  “Saw Peter Miller, as a matter of fact,” he said huffily. “We—er—happened to meet down by the gates. He’s the farmer next door.”

  “Oh, he was in the Park too, was he?” Out of the corner of his eye Sloan could see Crosby making a note of that.

  “Just for a chat, Inspector.” Quentin Fent had hit his stride again now. “He seems a sensible sort of chap. He wanted to know my intentions naturally. He’s got land that’s ripe for development too. He reckons if I put up something down near the village he’ll get planning permission for the part of his land that’s next door to it. It’s no more good for farming than Strontfield is.”

  “And neither of you saw anyone else in the Park?”

  Quentin shook his head but Annabel Pollock said, “I did. Only in the distance, but I think I recognized him by his dog.”

  “Who?”

  “Richard Renville. He was taking Spot for a walk through the Park. It’s a Dalmation.”

  “It is permitted? This exercising of dogs in the Park?”

  “Can’t stop it,” said Quentin promptly.

  “There’s an old Right of Way,” said Annabel.

  “Been there since time immemorial and all that,” said Quentin. “We can’t close it.”

  Sloan noted the Royal pronoun and asked innocently, “What if the development comes?”

  “We can apply to divert it. Actually I think Renville’s plan lets it run between some houses.”

  “I see, sir.” One thing was certain. Quentin Fent hadn’t wasted any time since his cousin Bill had died. Sloan stood up. “Now if we might just have a word with Mrs. Fent …”

  “I’m sorry, Inspector.” Annabel shook her head regretfully. “She won’t hear of it.”

  He’d never been one for head-on clashes, not even as a young constable. Now he was an inspector he always looked for a way round. It was quicker. “Well, thank you both for seeing me. Now we must get on with finding Mrs. Marchmont.”

  He expanded on this theme to Crosby on their way down the drive. “We need some help on this. It’d take all day to go over this place and grounds alone and we need to see Mr. Peter Miller Fent …”

  Crosby gazed out of the car window. “And we don’t know that she actually got here, do we, sir?”

  “Only that Mrs. Renville said she said she was coming,” said Sloan briefly. “That’s all we really know. That and the fact that we’ve got to find her. Quickly.”

  In the event a small Norfolk terrier called Rags beat them all to it.

  It was toward the end of the afternoon and Sloan was back at the Police Station planning a large-scale search.

  Saturday afternoon in the nature of things was not the best day for this. True, volunteer labour was available—excepting those who were hitting a ball on a cricket pitch—but the professionals were busy keeping the traffic moving in the Berebury shopping area, policing the county cricket ground in Calleford and letting those who wanted to get to the County Show. This last was in the grounds of Ornum House and a great annual event. Peter Miller, the farmer, was here. At least that was what Sloan had been told at Fallow Farm. So those men who were on duty there were told to keep an eye open for him. Not that that was easy. Saturday was the third and last day and was devoted to the general public who had come en masse.

  The serious matter of the judging had been accomplished on the Thursday and most of the wrangling over the judges’ decisions got over on the Friday. By Saturday roiling passions had died down a little—until the next show—even in the section on pigs.

  Landrace Squire Larking the Third, Champion Boar of his class, surveyed the world with pink-rimmed eyes, confident in his glory, never to know how nearly he had come second to Landrace Martin II of Rooden in the next pen. Someone—surely not the owner of Landrace Martin II of Rooden—had scribbled on Landrace Squire Larking the Third’s First Prize Certificate:

  Dogs look up to humans

  Cats look down on them

  Pigs is equal.

  Rags, the Norfolk terrier, was having a job to look up to his human.

  He barked.

  Cynthia Paterson called him.

  He didn’t come.

  She called again.

  He barked.

  Not rabbits, she decided, walking in the direction of the bark. It had come from somewhere near the direction of the Folly. She came out of the trees which surrounded it and saw first of all the fallen statue. Better informed than Annabel Pollock and Peter Miller, and well schooled in a Classical mythology much older than the Christian, she knew it to be Eros himself.

  Pausing briefly to consider a Latin tag for the downfall of the God of Love—in a garden, too—she plunged in the direction of the barking.

  Rags, she decided, was right inside the Folly.

  She called again. When he didn’t come she went up to the Folly and looked inside.

  And then wished she hadn’t.

  FIFTEEN

  “Brandy,” said Annabel Pollock, taking one look at Cynthia Paterson’s shocked face. She looked ten years older.

  “The police,” said Quentin, looking younger and more frightened. “I’ll get them straightaway. And the doctor. Here, boy, come over here …”

 
The terrier had obediently followed his mistress over to Strontfield Park. After all, there had been absolutely no response from the large figure on the floor of the Folly. It had remained quite still in spite of all his barking. Rags had soon lost interest and trotted quite happily after Cynthia Paterson as she had stumbled across the Park to the house.

  “It’s Marjorie,” said Cynthia between dry bloodless lips. “I’m sure it’s Marjorie. It’s her hair.”

  “Of course,” said Annabel soothingly. “You’d know it anywhere.”

  “It’s not that,” Cynthia shuddered. “It’s what they’ve done with her hair. Like Porphyria.”

  “Come and sit down,” said Annabel. “Quentin’s gone to ring the police.”

  “Just like Porphyria,” repeated Miss Paterson more firmly.

  “Quite so,” murmured Annabel meaninglessly.

  “Poor Marjorie’s beautiful hair all round her neck.”

  “Drink some of this,” commanded Annabel.

  Obediently the older woman sipped the brandy. “Browning,” she remarked in a detached way a moment or so later.

  “Browning?”

  “Robert, of course,” said Cynthia. “Not Elizabeth.”

  “Have some more brandy,” said the nurse practically.

  “Don’t you know ‘Porphyria’s Lover’?” asked Miss Paterson. “One of his best poems.”

  The girl shook her head.

  “He strangled her,” said Cynthia Paterson shakily, “with her own hair.”

  As it happened, the village doctor got there fractionally ahead of the police. He’d bumped his car that bit farther over the long grass of the Park than Crosby cared to.

  “Dead,” said Washby thickly as Sloan reached him. “No doubt about it. Some time ago, too, I should say, though I’m no expert.” He turned and raised his voice. “I shouldn’t come any nearer, Quentin, if I were you. She’s not a pretty sight.”

  Quentin Fent nodded gratefully and stayed by the car. He seemed diminished by this turn of events.

  “Strangled,” said the doctor, “with her own hair. Do you want me to …”

  “No, thank you,” said Sloan. “If you would just—er—confirm death we’ll do the rest.”

  “I can do that all right,” said Washby unemotionally. “And identify the body, too, if that’s any help. Mrs. Marjorie Marchmont.”

  “That’s what I was told,” agreed Sloan. “Miss Paterson recognized her too.”

  Washby dusted his hands and started walking back to his car. Quentin Fent was still standing by it, one hand holding on to the door handle as if the car was a raft on a stormy sea.

  “Her husband,” said the doctor. “Do you want me to tell him …”

  “No, thank you,” said Sloan again. Most male murderers might be widowers: that didn’t mean that the husbands of most murdered women were always murderers, but it did mean that they had to be checked out First. Fast. “We’ll do that.”

  Washby essayed a wry smile. “Sorry. Of course. Well, in that case I’ll go back to the house and take a look at Miss Paterson. Her old heart’s not quite so good as she thinks it is.” He waved a hand in the direction of the Folly. “Finding Mrs. Machmont won’t have done her a lot of good.”

  “She wants to see you, too, Inspector,” put in Quentin. “She said so. Do you want me here now?”

  “Not at the moment, sir, thank you,” said Sloan. “We’ll be along to talk to you all later.”

  “Well, well, well,” drawled Dr. Dabbe as he in his turn stood before the Folly some ten minutes later.

  “That’s three holes in the ground,” murmured Detective Constable Crosby to no one in particular.

  The pathologist didn’t hear him. He was looking at the statue that was lying on the ground in front of the little building. “Love gone wrong?” he observed quizzically.

  “Cows,” replied Sloan mundanely. “Or so I’m told. They got into the Park last night from the farm next door.” That was something else that would have to be checked as soon as may be. Those cows in the Park last night made an excellent reason for Peter Miller to be in the Park too, last night. If any traces of the young farmer were found round the Folly there was a ready-made reason for them.

  Dr. Dabbe seemed unwilling to pass the sculptured figure lying in the grass. “The devil was a fallen angel, Sloan.”

  “So I understand, Doctor.” Sloan himself was in no hurry to go inside the Folly again. Since Dr. Washby left he’d been no nearer, so far, than the entrance and seen to it that no one else had either. Crosby was not going over the floor for footprints. “It’s too dry for anything but dust,” added Sloan, “though you never know.” You never did know either. Not in a case like this. Literally anything might come up.

  The pathologist gestured toward the huddled figure lying on the Folly floor. “Do we know—er—who?”

  “I’m afraid we do,” said Sloan heavily. “Mrs. Marjorie Marchmont. One of the twelve at the dinner party.”

  “Ah.”

  “And,” plodded on Sloan, “in view of what’s happened I think we can assume she would probably have been a material witness for the prosecution … if there is a prosecution, that is.” He felt suddenly old and tired. “We shouldn’t have let this happen.”

  Pathologists being in the nature of things uninterested in the might-have-been, Dr. Dabbe only craned his neck forward and peered at the body. “Not love gone wrong?”

  Sloan shook his head at the euphemism. They had other ones down at the Police Station but they all came to the same thing in the end. “I should be very surprised.”

  Like a ripple in a pond Crosby was working his way away from the centre of the floor toward the edges. He was somehow contriving to do this without once actively looking at the centrepiece to all the drama. Sloan had observed the same behaviour in his own cat when confronted by a bird too big for it to tackle.

  Little birds, yes.

  Then it was tail down, body still, and pounce.

  But not with a big bird like a sea-gull. It might be only a foot or so away but the cat still wouldn’t see it. Nor would it go through the motions of the chase. And I’m as bad, he thought to himself irritably. Thinking about cats instead of about a murderer.

  The pathologist altered his stance the better to see. “I don’t think, Sloan, that I’ve ever seen it done this way before.”

  “Nor me,” said Sloan flatly. “And don’t want to again,” he added, battening down the hatches of feeling while still trying to notice the things a policeman should notice.

  “Interesting, though,” said the pathologist in the tone of a true enthusiast adding a rare species to his collection.

  Sloan didn’t find it interesting. The dead woman represented to him failure by any yardstick you cared to choose.

  “All done, sir,” sang out Crosby. He’d finished his crablike progression over the floor and now he had his back to the inside wall of the Folly. He still wasn’t looking at the body on the floor. Sloan didn’t blame him. It wasn’t a pretty sight. Strangulation never was.

  “Thank you,” said Sloan. At least Crosby wasn’t a converted ghoul. That was something to be thankful for. Inspector Hawkins over at Kinnisport had one of those on his hands. The fellow had fished so many bodies out of the harbour down there that he’d actually got to like it—become a bit of a specialist, so to speak. A defence mechanism, Sloan supposed, but his colleagues still didn’t like him for it.

  “Why,” grumbled Dr. Dabbe, “does this sort of thing always have to happen on a Saturday afternoon?”

  “I couldn’t say, sir, I’m sure,” responded Sloan. And he couldn’t, either.

  “I couldn’t pick on Burns anywhere.” Burns was Dr. Dabbe’s lugubrious assistant.

  Dyson, the police photographer, and his assistant, Williams, had been drummed up, though, and at a signal from Sloan advanced to take their pictures. Behind them an ambulance bumped its way across the Park. The pathologist continued to squint at the body.

  “Dea
d some time, Sloan, I should say.”

  “Last seen alive toward the end of yesterday afternoon, Doctor.” That was something else that would have to be gone into, and soon.

  “Could be last night.” Dabbe waved a hand at the sadly livid face. “And not poisoning this time.”

  “Not poisoning,” agreed Sloan soberly.

  “I wonder why not poisoning,” mused the pathologist.

  “I think I know why not poisoning,” said Sloan. He wasn’t sure what he really knew but he was fairly sure about this. “There wasn’t time for poisoning to work.”

  “Ah,” Dr. Dabbe lifted his eyebrows. “Time was of the essence, was it?”

  “She was going up to the house last night,” said Sloan, “to see Mrs. Fent. Or so I’m told.”

  “And someone didn’t want her to?”

  “I think that’s about the measure of it,” agreed Sloan. “Mind you, Mrs. Fent might not have seen her. She’s playing hard to get.”

  “But,” Dabbe pointed a finger at the body, “whoever embarked on this might not have known that.”

  “Might not have been able to count on it,” amended Sloan. “The deceased was of—er—a forceful personality. Not over-sensitive, either, from all accounts.”

  “Ah, I see. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.”

  A flash bulb suddenly cast a bright light into the shadows of the Folly. “Now one that way,” called Dyson to Williams. “Then I’ll take one from floor level.” He crouched down and focused his camera on Marjorie Marchmont’s head and neck. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone strangled with their own hair before.”

  “Neither have I,” said Sloan, gritting his teeth. If anyone else said that to him he’d …

  “I took a few of the outside of this place while we were waiting,” said Dyson amiably. “Want anything else doing while I’m here?” He gestured toward the fallen statue. “I could do you a nice one of Crosby with his foot on old Nick here. Call it ‘Down with All Traitors’ and I’d get ten-pence a go for it back at the station.”

  “Not today, thank you,” said Sloan. The pathologist, a clear field at last, had already advanced toward the body. He stood for a long moment, silent, considering: a specialist in death and all the thousand ills the flesh is heir to.