As the Constable got to his feet, the Inspector changed his mind. "No. Just a moment. I'll first have a word with that butler chap," he decided.
"Elgin?"
"Yes, Elgin. Call him in. I've got an idea he knows something."
"Certainly, sir," the Constable replied. Going to the hall door, he opened it, calling, "Elgin, would you come in here, please."
As he opened the door, the Constable could see Elgin standing on the stairs and staring intently at the door, as though he had been there for some time, attempting to listen to what the police officers had been saying. The butler now began to walk tentatively up the staircase, but stopped when the Constable called him again, and came into the room rather nervously.
The Constable closed the hall door and resumed his place for note-taking, while the Inspector invited Elgin to sit, indicating a chair near the bridge table.
Elgin sat, and the Inspector began his interrogation. "Now, you started off for the pictures this evening," he reminded the butler, "but you came back. Why was that?"
"I've told you, sir," Elgin replied. "My wife wasn't feeling well."
The Inspector regarded him steadily. "It was you who let Mr. Costello into the house when he called here this evening, was it not?" he asked.
"Yes, sir."
The Inspector took a few paces away from Elgin, and then turned back suddenly. "Why didn't you tell us at once that it was Mr. Costello's car outside?" he asked.
"I didn't know whose car it was, sir. Mr. Costello didn't drive up to the front door. I didn't even know he'd come in a car."
"Wasn't that rather peculiar? Leaving his car around by the stables?" the Inspector suggested.
"Well, yes, sir, I suppose it was," the butler replied. "But I expect he had his reasons."
"Just what do you mean by that?" the Inspector asked quickly.
"Nothing, sir," Elgin answered. He sounded almost smug. "Nothing at all."
"Had you ever seen Mr. Costello before?" The Inspector's voice was sharp as he asked this.
"Never, sir," Elgin assured him.
The Inspector adopted a meaningful tone to enquire, "It wasn't because of Mr. Costello that you came back this evening?"
"I've told you, sir," said Elgin. "My wife – "
"I don't want to hear any more about your wife," the Inspector interrupted. Moving away from Elgin, he continued, "How long have you been with Mrs. Hailsham-Brown?"
"Six weeks, sir," was the reply.
The Inspector turned back to face Elgin. "And before that?"
"I'd – I'd been having a little rest," the butler replied uneasily.
"A rest?" the Inspector echoed, in a tone of suspicion. He paused and then added, "You do realize that, in a case like this, your references will have to be looked into very carefully."
Elgin began to get to his feet. "Will that be all..." he started to say, and then stopped and resumed his seat. "I – I wouldn't wish to deceive you, sir," he continued. "It wasn't anything really wrong. What I mean is... the original reference having got torn... I couldn't quite remember the wording..."
"So you wrote your own references," the Inspector interrupted. "That's what it comes to, doesn't it?"
"I didn't mean any harm," Elgin protested. "I've got my living to earn – "
The Inspector interrupted him again. "At the moment, I'm not interested in fake references," he told the butler. "I want to know what happened here tonight, and what you know about Mr. Costello."
"I'd never set eyes on him before," Elgin insisted. Looking around at the hall door, he continued, "But I've got a good idea of why he came here."
"Oh, and what is that?" the Inspector wanted to know.
"Blackmail," Elgin told him. "He had something on her."
"By 'her,'" said the Inspector, "I assume you mean Mrs. Hailsham-Brown."
"Yes," Elgin continued eagerly. "I came in to ask if there was anything more she wanted, and I heard them talking."
"What did you hear exactly?"
"I heard her say 'But that's blackmail. I won't submit to it.'" Elgin adopted a highly dramatic tone as he quoted Clarissa's words.
"Hm!" the Inspector responded a little doubtfully. "Anything more?"
"No," Elgin admitted. "They stopped when I came in, and when I went out they dropped their voices."
"I see," the Inspector commented. He looked intently at the butler, waiting for him to speak again.
Elgin got up from his chair. His voice was almost a whine as he pleaded, "You won't be hard on me, sir, will you? I've had a lot of trouble one way and another."
The Inspector regarded him for a moment longer, and then said dismissively, "Oh, that will do. Get out."
"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir," Elgin responded quickly as he made a hasty exit into the hall.
The Inspector watched him go and then turned to the Constable. "Blackmail, eh?" he murmured, exchanging glances with his colleague.
"And Mrs. Hailsham-Brown such a nice-seeming lady," the Constable observed with a somewhat prim look.
"Yes, well, one never can tell," the Inspector replied. He paused, and then ordered curtly, "I'll see Mr. Birch now." The Constable rose, went over to the library door, and opened it, calling, "Mr. Birch, please."
Hugo came through the library door, looking dogged and rather defiant. The Constable closed the door behind him and took a seat at the table, while the Inspector greeted Hugo pleasantly. "Come in, Mr. Birch," he invited. "Sit down here, please," he suggested, indicating a chair by the bridge table.
Hugo sat, and the Inspector continued, "This is a very unpleasant business, I'm afraid, sir. What have you to tell us about it?"
Slapping his spectacle case on the table, Hugo replied defiantly, "Absolutely nothing."
"Nothing?" queried the Inspector, sounding surprised.
"What do you expect me to say?" Hugo expostulated. "The blinking woman snaps open the blinking cupboard, and out falls a blinking corpse." He gave a snort of impatience. "Took my breath away," he declared. "I've not got over it yet." He glared at the Inspector. "It's no good asking me anything," he said firmly, "because I don't know anything about it."
The Inspector regarded Hugo steadily for a moment before asking, "That's your statement, is it? Just that you know nothing at all about it?"
"I'm telling you," Hugo repeated. "I didn't kill the fellow." Again he glared defiantly. "I didn't even know him."
"You didn't know him," the Inspector repeated. "Very well. I'm not suggesting that you did know him. I'm certainly not suggesting that you murdered him. But I can't believe that you 'know nothing,' as you put it. So let's collaborate to find out what you do know. To begin with, you'd heard of him, hadn't you?"
"Yes," snapped Hugo, "and I'd heard he was a nasty bit of goods."
"In what way?" the Inspector asked calmly.
"Oh, I don't know," Hugo blustered. "He was the sort of fellow that women liked and men had no use for. That sort of thing."
The Inspector paused before asking carefully, "You've no idea why he should come back to this house a second time this evening?"
"Not a clue," replied Hugo dismissively.
The Inspector took a few steps around the room, then turned abruptly to face Hugo. "Was there anything between him and the present Mrs. Hailsham-Brown, do you think?" he asked.
Hugo looked shocked. "Clarissa? Good Lord, no! Nice girl, Clarissa. Got a lot of sense. She wouldn't look twice at a fellow like that."
The Inspector paused again, and then said finally, "So you can't help us."
"Sorry. But there it is," replied Hugo with an attempt at nonchalance.
Making one last effort to extract at least a crumb of information from Hugo, the Inspector asked, "Had you really no idea that the body was in that recess?"
"Of course not," replied Hugo, now sounding offended.
"Thank you, sir," said the Inspector, turning away from him.
"What?" queried Hugo vaguely.
"That's all, thank you, sir," the Inspector repeated, going to the desk and picking up a huge red book that lay on it.
Hugo rose, picked up his spectacle case, and was about to go across to the library door when the Constable got up and barred his way. Hugo then turned towards the French windows, but the Constable said, "This way, Mr. Birch, please," and went to the hall door. Giving up, Hugo went out by the hall door, which the Constable closed after him.
The Inspector carried his huge red book over to the bridge table and sat consulting it, as the Constable commented satirically, "Mr. Birch was a mine of information, wasn't he? Mind you, it's not very nice for a J. P. to be mixed up in a murder."
The Inspector began to read aloud. "'Delahaye, Sir Rowland Edward Mark, KCB, MVO – '"
"What have you got there?" the Constable asked. He peered over the Inspector's shoulder. "Oh, Who's Who."
The Inspector went on reading. "'Educated Eton... Trinity College...' Um! 'Attached Foreign Office-second Secretary... Madrid... Plenipotentiary.'"
"Ooh!" the Constable exclaimed at this last word.
The Inspector gave him an exasperated look and continued, "'Constantinople Foreign Office – special commission rendered; Clubs: Boodles, Whites.'"
"Do you want him next, sir?" the Constable asked.
The Inspector thought for a moment. "No," he decided. "He's the most interesting of the lot, so I'll leave him till the last. Let's have young Warrender in now."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE CONSTABLE went back to the library door and called, "Mr. Warrender, please."
Jeremy came in, attempting rather unsuccessfully to look completely at his ease. The Constable closed the library door and resumed his seat at the table, while the Inspector half-rose and pulled out a chair from the bridge table for Jeremy.
"Sit down," he ordered somewhat brusquely as he resumed his seat. Jeremy sat, and the Inspector asked formally, "Your name?"
"Jeremy Warrender."
"Address?"
"Three hundred and forty Broad Street, and thirty-four Grosvenor Square," Jeremy told him, trying to sound nonchalant. He glanced across at the Constable, who was writing all this down, and added, "Country address, Hepplestone, Wiltshire."
"That sounds as though you're a gentleman of independent means," the Inspector commented.
"I'm afraid not," Jeremy admitted with a smile. "I'm private secretary to Sir Kenneth Thomson, the Chairman of Saxon-Arabian Oil... Those are his addresses."
The Inspector nodded. "I see," he remarked. "How long have you been with him?"
"About a year. Before that, I was personal assistant to Mr. Scott Agius for four years."
"Ah, yes," said the Inspector. "He's that wealthy businessman in the City, isn't he?" He thought for a moment before going on to ask, "Did you know this man, Oliver Costello?"
"No, I'd never heard of him till tonight," Jeremy told him.
"And you didn't see him when he came to the house earlier this evening?" the Inspector continued.
"No," Jeremy replied. "I'd gone over to the golf club with the others. We were dining there, you see. It was the servants' night out, and Mr. Birch had asked us to dine with him at the club."
The Inspector nodded his head. After a pause, he asked, "Was Mrs. Hailsham-Brown invited, too?"
"No, she wasn't," said Jeremy.
The Inspector raised his eyebrows, and Jeremy hurried on. "That is," he explained, "she could have come if she'd liked."
"Do you mean," the Inspector asked him, "that she was asked, then? And she refused?"
"No, no," Jeremy replied hurriedly, sounding as though he was getting rattled. "What I mean is – well, Hailsham-Brown is usually quite tired by the time he gets down here, and Clarissa said they'd just have a scratch meal here, as usual."
The Inspector looked confused. "Let me get this clear," he said rather snappily. "Mrs. Hailsham-Brown expected her husband to dine here? She didn't expect him to go out again as soon as he came in?"
Jeremy was now quite definitely flustered. "I – er – well – er – really, I don't know," he stammered. "No – now that you mention it, I believe she did say he was going to be out this evening."
The Inspector rose and took a few paces away from Jeremy. "It seems odd, then," he observed, "that Mrs. Hailsham-Brown should not have come out to the club with the three of you, instead of remaining here to dine all by herself."
Jeremy turned on his chair to face the Inspector. "Well – er – well," he began, and then, gaining confidence, continued quickly, "I mean, it was the kid – Pippa, you know. Clarissa wouldn't have liked to go out and leave the kid all by herself in the house."
"Or perhaps," the Inspector suggested, emphasising his words to make them sound very significant, "perhaps she was making plans to receive a visitor of her own?"
Jeremy rose to his feet. "I say, that's a rotten thing to suggest," he exclaimed hotly. "And it isn't true. I'm sure she never planned anything of the kind."
"Yet Oliver Costello came here to meet someone," the Inspector pointed out. "The two servants had the night off. Miss Peake has her own cottage. There was really no one he could have come to the house to meet except Mrs. Hailsham-Brown."
