And So To Murder (23 page)

‘What’s the next question, son?’

‘The next question,’ returned Gagern, after looking rather vacantly at the floor, ‘is: who put the acid in the water-bottle on that set, and why?’

‘Ah!’ said H.M., with glee. ‘Now we’re comin’ to it. Answer: the same person who poured the acid down the speaking-tube, fired the revolver-shot, and prepared the poisoned cigarette. He put that acid in the water-bottle to underline the fact, to set it yellin’ before high heaven, that apparently there was a maniac loose and determined on sabotage. So he took ruddy good care to knock the water-bottle over.’

Hitherto Howard Fisk had not said anything. Nor did he say anything now. He sat stolid as a grandmother at a family reunion, his big hands folded in his lap; but the incredulous smile which went over his face answered for him.

Mr Hackett was not so stolid.

‘Are you going to take that lying down, Howard?’ he demanded.

‘Next question, son,’ said H.M.

‘The next question,’ replied Gagern, ‘is one that most of us would rather have answered than anything else. What is the reason for the intense personal animosity which the – er – author of all this has shown towards Miss Stanton?’

H.M. drew a deep breath. ‘And the answer, son, is short and sweet. There never was the slightest animosity towards her.’

‘The man’s mad,’ said Mr Hackett, rather wildly. ‘He’s clean off his chump. I didn’t think so before, but I know it now – You’ll be telling us next that Miss Stanton was never attacked at all.’

H.M. nodded.

‘You’re quite right, son,’ he agreed with profound seriousness. ‘She never was.’

‘Somebody,’ said the producer through his teeth, ‘tries to burn out her eyes with vitriol, fires a bullet straight at her, and slips a cigarette loaded with belladonna into a box on her desk. And yet you say she wasn’t attacked?’

‘Well,’ said H.M., examining the side of his pipe, and taking a reflective puff at it, ‘it depends on your definition of “attack”, and also the direction of the attack. First of all the would-be murderer was misled; and later he misled you all to a fare-ye-well. However, that’s gettin’ ahead of myself. Next question?’

‘But all the next questions,’ said Gagern, ‘take care of that. Who twice attacked Miss Stanton, and why? Are all these things connected, and if so, how?’

‘Ah!’ said H.M.

He took a last puff at his pipe. He put it down carefully in the ash-tray, and got to his feet. He lumbered over to the couch. The expression of his eye was not pleasant.

‘They’re all connected, son, in a way,’ he replied.

‘In what way? And why?’

H.M. came closer. His own expression was almost maniacally pleased. Before anybody could move he had shot out his hand, laid hold of the necktie of Joe Collins, alias Kurt von Gagern, wrapped the necktie round his hand, and yanked the slight form half-way to its feet.

He said:

‘Because, Joe, you’re the little joker who’s responsible for all this. You’re the feller who poured the acid, fired the revolver-shot, and have now just failed to kill with a poisoned cigarette the woman you married in Hollywood two years ago.’

Then his voice roared out:

‘And lemme tell you somethin’ else, Joe. If you share the general belief that the old man is gettin’ senile and dodderin’ and ready for the House of Lords: if you think I didn’t know the whole ruddy scheme was directed against Tilly Parsons to start with: then you better soak your head in cold water before you come round to me again with a song-and-dance about wantin’ to join up in the service again. We may not be able to prove attempted murder on you, but you’ll do time for bigamy just as soon as Tilly Parsons sets eyes on your handsome mug – and that’s what you wanted to avoid all along, ain’t it?’

Gagern did not reply. He could not, for the necktie was half strangling him. But his face was green, and a kind of bubbling squeal came from between his lips. When H.M. released him, he dropped with a boneless thud to the floor; and the tears in his eyes were more real than those caused by a ducking in the lake.

1

‘M
E
?’ said Tilly Parsons. ‘You couldn’t kill me with a battle-axe. I’m raring to go. Got a Chester, somebody?’

Thus spoke Tilly two days later, on a fine mellow afternoon when these affairs ended – as they had begun – in the office of Mr Thomas Hackett of Albion Films.

Mr Hackett, a noble host, had provided cocktails to celebrate both the completion of
Spies at Sea
and the end of Joe Collins’s meteoric career as a would-be murderer. It is true that Tilly still looked a trifle white round the gills, but she wore a dress whose colours could have been discerned by a blind man at a distance of thirty yards, and she was polishing off Old Fashioneds at a rate which made Mr Hackett’s own eyes stand out of his head.

Indeed, it gave signs of becoming, if somebody were not careful, a party. It was indecorous of Monica Stanton and Bill Cartwright to adjourn to the next office every ten minutes for the purpose of what Tilly called necking, though excusable. Mr Howard Fisk was there, with his arm round a young actress whom he was grooming in several senses. Miss Frances Fleur – whose distress at the whole affair had lasted exactly twenty-four hours – drank (to the regret of everybody) orange juice.

But in the midst of them, perhaps prouder than he had ever been since the day he got James Answell acquitted on a murder charge at the Old Bailey, sat Sir Henry Merrivale. You would never, of course, have guessed this. He kept up a steady and malignant glare which made Mr Fisk’s young actress jump out of her skin whenever he turned towards her. Yet he was happy: for he was going to have a screen-test as Richard the Third; and he had been provided with real armour and a helmet to play it in.

‘Come on,’ said Tilly. ‘You know why you’re here, Ancient Mariner. And you don’t fool me with your glittering eye, either. Let’s hear about it. Tell us how you tumbled to him when none of the rest of us did. Since it’s all my fault, in a way, I want to hear about it.’

‘Are you sure you want to hear about it?’ asked Howard Fisk quietly.

For a moment Tilly’s face pinched up. Whether it was sentimentality, or alcohol, or real emotion, perhaps Tilly herself could not have said. But, after a spasm had gone over her face, she got out a handkerchief, wiped her eyes, and defiantly finished her cocktail.

‘You bet I want to hear about it,’ she retorted. ‘After all, if Frances can take it,
I
can. The little son of a so-and-so stung her worse than he stung me.’ She regarded Miss Fleur with real and frank curiosity. ‘How
did
he get round you, dearie?’

Miss Fleur, sipping orange-juice, returned the curiosity with interest.

‘That makes us rivals, doesn’t it?’ Miss Fleur asked, with slight surprise. ‘Fancy that.’ She laughed.

Tilly stiffened.

‘And what,’ she inquired, ‘is so funny about that?’

‘Nothing, dear.’

‘You mean I’m a hag?’ asked Tilly, with candour. ‘Sure I am. I never thought the fellow married me for my boz-yew. But there’s life in the old dame yet, dearie, and don’t you forget it. After all, I’m not the betrayed woman in this business. You are.’

Miss Fleur put down her glass. ‘Are you insinuating that I am a betrayed woman?’

‘Oh, well, what’s a little betrayal among friends?’ said Tilly, broad-minded to the last. ‘Judas, if that’s the worst that ever happens to me, I’ll think I’ve got off lucky. As far as I’m concerned, the atrocities can start any time they want to. Which reminds me’ – she turned to Monica and Bill – ‘that the way you two are carrying on is a public scandal. What would your Aunt Flossie say, if she could see you now? Foo! Shame on you! (Set ’em up again, Tommy, and don’t spare the rye.)’

‘Good old Aunt Flossie!’ said Bill, taking Monica carefully into his lap and kissing her.

‘Terrible,’ said Tilly, absent-mindedly clucking her tongue. ‘Shocking. What was I saying? The old Ancient Mariner. Come on, honey. Tell us about it. What do you say?’

For some time H.M., sunk in a tense and brooding meditation, had chewed on a cigar and said no word. His faint muttering voice reached them from afar.

‘“
Now is the winter of our discontent
”,’ whispered H.M., with a sudden semaphore gesture which upset Howard Fisk’s glass, “
made glorious summer by this sun of York. Now
–”’

‘Sure, honey. It’s swell: you’ll lay ’em in the aisles. But what about paying some attention to us for a change?’

The ensuing scene was chaotic.
Imprimis
, H.M. did not like being addressed as the Ancient Mariner; and, secondly, he said he had artistic temperament and must not be interrupted while rehearsing his lines. He howled about ingratitude to such an extent that it took some minutes to soothe him down. When he did continue, it was a sort of weary patience.

‘Now looky here,’ he said. ‘The easiest way to straighten out this tangle is to let you straighten it out for yourselves, by rememberin’ what happened. Then you’ll see it with very little pushing from me.’

He smoked for a time in silence. Then he peered over his spectacles, first at Monica and then at Thomas Hackett.

‘I want you,’ he continued, ‘to sort of cast your minds back to the afternoon of August 23rd, and to this office – where it all started. You,’ he pointed to Monica, ‘and you,’ his finger moved to Hackett, ‘are sittin’ here talking before young Cartwright comes in. Got that?’

‘Yes,’ said Monica.

‘Yes,’ said the producer.

‘All right. And the telephone rings: remember? All right. Who is on the phone?’

‘Kurt Gagern,’ replied Mr Hackett. His face darkened. ‘Or Joe Collins. Or whatever his blasted name is.’

H.M. peered at Monica. ‘Is that correct? Do
you
remember it?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Monica. ‘I remember, because Mr Hackett addressed him as Kurt. What about it?’

‘He told you,’ continued H.M., turning to Hackett again, ‘about the acid being upset on the set. You said you didn’t want to come over to the sound-stage for a minute or two. Now, why? Think! What else did you say?’

The producer’s eyes narrowed. He stared at the telephone. Then, as though struck on the back of the head with enlightenment, he snapped his fingers.

‘I said: “
The new writer has just arrived
,” ’ he answered.

2

‘Exactly,’ said H.M. ‘ “The new writer has just arrived.” Now I want you to stop for a second and think of the lurid and appallin’ significance of those words. I want you to think what they meant to the feller who was listening to them.

‘What in blazes would they naturally mean? Ever since the middle of the month it had been decided that Tilly Parsons, the great scenario-writer, should come over from Hollywood to work on
Spies at Sea
. Nobody knew exactly when she was to get here: you didn’t know it yourself. But she was expected. The thoughts of all you people, including Gagern (let’s call him that) were exclusively and burningly concentrated on
Spies at Sea
. When Gagern heard over the phone that the new writer had arrived, what was he goin’ to think? What would anybody have thought?’

H.M. paused.

He looked at Tilly.

‘Now Gagern was already preparing for your arrival. He’d arranged that little comedy with the acid in the water-bottle so that there would seem to be a maniac and a saboteur on the premises, and later – when you did arrive – it’d cause no stunned astonishment when acid was poured into your face to …’

Tilly was looking white. Monica herself did not feel well.

‘… to blind you,’ concluded H.M. ‘He was expert enough at changing his voice so that he could still escape detection provided you didn’t
see
him.

‘Y’see, there was no other way out. He couldn’t run away. He was very merciful. He didn’t want to kill you. He just wanted to blind you.

‘As I say, he’d already prepared the way for this by his little trick with the water-bottle. He’d timed this to take place several days to a week before your actual arrival. So it must have given him a whale of a shock to ring up here, reporting the acid being upset on the set, and to discover that Tilly Parsons – apparently – was already here. He had to work like lightning now, or he’d be caught. He was scared; but he wasn’t at all surprised that Tilly Parsons had turned up so unexpectedly. Why should he be? Anybody who knew you would know that turnin’ up unexpectedly would be exactly the sort of thing you would do.

‘Now, what happened next? You’ – here H.M. pointed to Thomas Hackett – ‘pushed over to the sound-stage, leaving Monica Stanton with Bill Cartwright. Yes?’

‘Yes,’ conceded Mr Hackett.

‘You told Cartwright to bring her over to the sound-stage, didn’t you? H’mf, yes. Now, when you went on ahead to the floor, did you enlighten Gagern about his mistake? Did you say: “Son, you’ve got it all wrong: the gal who’s coming over here with Cartwright is not Tilly Parsons, but Monica Stanton from East Roystead?” No, you didn’t; and I’ll prove it to you.’

This time H.M. fastened his murderous glare on Howard Fisk, with such intensity that the director removed his arm from around the little blonde.

‘Do you remember,’ pursued H.M., ‘the first words you said when you were introduced to Monica Stanton?
I
do, because they were all written down for me by W. Cartwright; but do you recall ’em?’

Mr Fisk whistled.

He also seemed to be suffering the pangs of enlightenment.

‘Good Lord, of course,’ he muttered, and gave Monica a ghostly smile. ‘I thought she was Tilly Parsons, too. I said: “
Ah, the expert from Hollywood. Hackett mentioned it. I hope you won’t find our English ways too slow for you
.”’ He reflected. ‘And you’re quite right. Hackett merely said to Gagern and me that the new writer was here, and was coming over to see us in charge of Bill Cartwright. We were too much upset about other matters to discuss it.’

H.M.’s cigar had gone out, but he did not relight it.

‘And now, my fatheads,’ he continued, ‘I want to point out the one fact which (if you’d had your wits about you) would have let the cat out of the bag with a reverberatin’ yowl.