Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 10: Last Ditch, Black As He’s Painted, Grave Mistake. Ngaio Marsh

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СКАЧАТЬ wouldn’t of sprung it across me in those days, sir.’

      ‘I’m sure they wouldn’t. One more thing. After the shot and before you were attacked and doubled up, you saw the Ambassador, did you, on his feet? Silhouetted against the screen?’

      ‘Sir.’

      ‘Did you recognize him?’

      Chubb was silent.

      ‘Well – did you?’

      ‘I – can’t say I did. Not exactly.’

      ‘How do you mean – not exactly?’

      ‘It all happened so quick, didn’t it? I – I reckon I thought he was the other one. The President.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Well. Because. Well, because, you know, he was near where the President sat, like. He must of moved away from his own chair, sir, mustn’t he? And standing up like he was in command, as you might say. And the President had roared out something in their lingo, hadn’t he?’

      ‘So, you’d say, would you, Chubb, that the Ambassador was killed in mistake for the President?’

      ‘I couldn’t say that, sir, could I? Not for certain. But I’d say he might of been. He might easy of been.’

      ‘You didn’t see anybody attack the spearsman?’

      ‘Him! He couldn’t of been attacked, could he? I was the one that got clobbered, sir, wasn’t I? Not him: he did the big job, didn’t he?’

      ‘He maintains that he was given a chop and his spear was snatched out of his grasp by the man who attacked him. He says that he didn’t see who this man was. You may remember that when the lights came up and the Ambassador’s body was seen, the spearsman was crouched on the ground up near the back of the pavilion.’

      Through this speech of Alleyn’s such animation as Chubb had displayed, deserted him. He reverted to his former manner, staring straight in front of him with such a wooden air that the ebb of colour from his face and its dark, uneven return, seemed to bear no relation to any emotional experience.

      When he spoke it was to revert to his favourite observation.

      ‘I wouldn’t know about any of that,’ he said, ‘I never took any notice of that.’

      ‘Didn’t you? But you were quite close to the spearsman. You were standing by him. I happen to remember seeing you there.’

      ‘I was a bit shook up. After what the other one done to me.’

      ‘So it would seem. When the lights came on, was the waiter who attacked you, as you maintain, still there?’

      ‘Him? He’d scarpered.’

      ‘Have you seen him since then?’

      Chubb said he hadn’t but added that he couldn’t tell one of the black bastards from another. The conventional mannerisms of the servant together with his careful grammar had almost disappeared. He sounded venomous. Alleyn then asked him why he hadn’t reported the attack on himself immediately to the police and Chubb became injured and exasperated. What chance had there been for that, he complained, with them all being shoved about into queues and drafted into groups and told to behave quiet and act cooperative and stay put and questions and statements would come later.

      He began to sweat and put his hands behind his back. He said he didn’t feel too good. Alleyn told him that the sergeant would make a typescript of his statement and he would be asked to read and sign it if he found it correct.

      ‘In the meantime,’ he said, ‘we’ll let you go home to Mr Whipplestone.’

      Chubb reverting to his earlier style said anxiously: ‘Beg pardon, sir, but I didn’t know you knew –’

      ‘I know Mr Whipplestone very well. He told me about you.’

      ‘Yes, sir. Will that be all, then, sir?’

      ‘I think so, for the present. Good night to you, Chubb.’

      ‘Thank you, sir. Good night, sir.’

      He left the room with his hands clenched.

      ‘Commando, eh?’ said the sergeant to his notes.

      II

      Mr Fox was doing his competent best with the group of five persons who sat wearily about the apartment that had been used as a sort of bar-cum-smoking-room for male guests at the party. It smelt of stale smoke, the dregs of alcohol, heavy upholstery and, persistently, of the all-pervading sandarac. It wore an air of exhausted raffishness.

      The party of five being interviewed by Mr Fox and noted down by a sergeant consisted of a black plenipotentiary and his wife, the last of the governors of British Ng’ombwana and his wife, and Sir George Alleyn, Bart. They were the only members of the original party of twelve guests who had remembered anything that might conceivably have a bearing upon events in the pavilion and they remained after a painstaking winnowing had disposed of their companions.

      The ex-governor, who was called Sir John Smythe, remembered that immediately after the shot was fired, everybody moved to the front of the pavilion. He was contradicted by Lady Smythe who said that for her part she had remained riveted in her chair. The plenipotentiary’s wife, whose understanding of English appeared to be rudimentary, conveyed through her husband that she, also, had remained seated. Mr Fox reminded himself that Mrs Alleyn, instructed by her husband, had not risen. The plenipotentiary recalled that the chairs had been set out in an inverted V shape with the President and his Ambassador at the apex and the guests forming the two wide-angled wings.

      ‘Is that the case, sir?’ said Fox comfortably, ‘I see. So that when you gentlemen stood up you’d all automatically be forward of the President? Nearer to the opening of the pavilion than he was? Would that be correct?’

      ‘Quite right, Mr Fox. Quite right,’ said Sir George, who had adopted a sort of uneasy reciprocal attitude towards Fox and had, at the outset, assured him jovially that he’d heard a great deal about him to which Fox replied: ‘Is that the case, sir? If I might just have your name?’

      It was Sir George who remembered the actual order in which the guests had sat and although Fox had already obtained this information from Alleyn, he gravely noted it down. On the President’s left had been the Ambassador, Sir John and Lady Smythe, the plenipotentiary’s wife, the plenipotentiary, a guest who had now gone home and Sir George himself, ‘In starvation corner, what?’ said Sir George lightly to the Smythes, who made little deprecatory noises.

      ‘Yes, I see, thank you, sir,’ said Fox. ‘And on the President’s right hand, sir?’

      ‘Oh!’ said Sir George waving his hand. ‘My brother. My brother and his wife. Yes. ’Strordinary coincidence.’ Apparently feeling the need for some sort of endorsement he turned to his fellow guests. ‘My brother, the bobby,’ he explained. ‘Ridiculous, what?’

      ‘A very distinguished bobby,’ Sir John Smythe murmured, to which Sir George returned: ‘Oh, quite! Quite! Not for me to say but – he’ll do.’ He СКАЧАТЬ