Shes one of those Near Successes, said Taverner. Shes starred once or twice in the West End[62], shes made quite a name for herself in repertory[63]she plays a lot for the little highbrow theatres and the Sunday clubs. The truth is, I think, shes been handicapped by not having to earn her living at it. Shes been able to pick and choose, and to go where she likes and occasionally to put up the money and finance a show where shes fancied a certain partusually the last part in the world to suit her. Result is, shes receded a bit into the amateur class rather than the professional. Shes good, mind you, especially in comedybut managers dont like her muchthey say shes too independent, and shes a troublemakerfoments rows[64] and enjoys a bit of mischief-making. I dont know how much of it is truebut shes not too popular amongst her fellow artists.
Sophia came out of the drawing-room and said: My mother is in here, Chief Inspector.
I followed Taverner into the big drawing-room. For a moment I hardly recognized the woman who sat on the brocaded settee.
The Titian hair was piled high on her head in an Edwardian coiffure, and she was dressed in a well-cut dark-grey coat and skirt with a delicately pleated pale mauve shirt fastened at the neck by a small cameo brooch. For the first time I was aware of the charm of her delightfully tip-tilted nose. I was faintly reminded of Athene Seyler[65]and it seemed quite impossible to believe that this was the tempestuous creature in the peach négligé.
Inspector Taverner? she said. Do come in and sit down. Will you smoke? This is a most terrible business. I simply feel at the moment that I just cant take it in[66].
Her voice was low and emotionless, the voice of a person determined at all costs to display self-control. She went on:
Please tell me if I can help you in any way.
Thank you, Mrs Leonides. Where were you at the time of the tragedy?
I suppose I must have been driving down from London. Id lunched that day at the Ivy with a friend. Then wed gone to a dress show. We had a drink with some other friends at the Berkeley. Then I started home. When I got here everything was in commotion. It seemed my father-in-law had had a sudden seizure. He wasdead. Her voice trembled just a little.
You were fond of your father-in-law?
I was devoted
Her voice rose. Sophia adjusted, very slightly, the angle of the Degas picture. Magdas voice dropped to its former subdued tone.
I was very fond of him, she said in a quiet voice. We all were. He wasvery good to us.
Did you get on well with Mrs Leonides?
We didnt see very much of Brenda.
Why was that?
Well, we hadnt much in common. Poor dear Brenda. Life must have been hard for her sometimes.
Again Sophia fiddled with the Degas.
Indeed? In what way?
Oh, I dont know. Magda shook her head, with a sad little smile.
Was Mrs Leonides happy with her husband?
Oh, I think so.
No quarrels?
Again the slight smiling shake of the head.
I really dont know, Inspector. Their part of the house is quite separate.
She and Mr Laurence Brown were very friendly, were they not?
Magda Leonides stiffened. Her eyes opened reproachfully at Taverner.
I dont think, she said with dignity, that you ought to ask me things like that. Brenda was quite friendly to everyone. She is really a very amiable sort of person.
Do you like Mr Laurence Brown?
Hes very quiet. Quite nice, but you hardly know hes there. I havent really seen very much of him.
Is his teaching satisfactory?
I suppose so. I really wouldnt know. Philip seems quite satisfied.
Taverner essayed some shock tactics.
Im sorry to ask you this, but in your opinion was there anything in the nature of a love affair[67] between Mr Brown and Mrs Brenda Leonides?
Magda got up. She was very much the grande dame.
I have never seen any evidence of anything of that kind, she said. I dont think really, Inspector, that that is a question you ought to ask me. She was my father-in-laws wife.
I almost applauded.
The Chief Inspector also rose.
More a question for the servants? he suggested.
Magda did not answer.
Thank you, Mrs Leonides, said the Inspector and went out.
You did that beautifully, darling, said Sophia to her mother warmly.
Magda twisted up a curl reflectively behind her right ear and looked at herself in the glass.
Ye-es, she said, I think it was the right way to play it.
Sophia looked at me.
Oughtnt you, she asked, to go with the Inspector?
Look here, Sophia, what am I supposed
I stopped. I could not very well ask outright in front of Sophias mother exactly what my role was supposed to be. Magda Leonides had so far evinced no interest in my presence at all, except as a useful recipient of an exit line on daughters. I might be a reporter, her daughters fiancé, or an obscure hanger-on of the police force, or even an undertakerto Magda Leonides they would one and all come under the general heading of audience.
Looking down at her feet, Mrs Leonides said with dissatisfaction:
These shoes are wrong. Frivolous.
Obeying Sophias imperious wave of the head, I hurried after Taverner. I caught him up in the outer hall just going through the door to the stairway.
Just going up to see the elder brother, he explained.
I put my problem to him without more ado.
Look here, Taverner, who am I supposed to be?
He looked surprised.
Who are you supposed to be?
Yes, what am I doing here in this house? If anyone asks me, what do I say?
Oh I see. He considered for a moment. Then he smiled. Has anybody asked you?
Wellno.
Then why not leave it at that. Never explain. Thats a very good motto. Especially in a house upset like this house is. Everyone is far too full of their own private worries and fears to be in a questioning mood. Theyll take you for granted so long as you just seem sure of yourself. Its a great mistake ever to say anything when you neednt. Hm, now we go through this door and up the stairs. Nothing locked. Of course you realize, I expect, that these questions Im asking are all a lot of hooey! Doesnt matter a hoot who was in the house and who wasnt, or where they all were on that particular day
Then why
He went on: Because it at least gives me a chance to look at them all, and size them up, and hear what theyve got to say, and to hope that, quite by chance, somebody might give me a useful pointer. He was silent a moment and then murmured: I bet Mrs Magda Leonides could spill a mouthful if she chose.
Would it be reliable? I asked.
Oh no, said Taverner, it wouldnt be reliable. But it might start a possible line of inquiry. Everybody in the damned house had means and opportunity. What I want is a motive.
At the top of the stairs, a door barred off the right-hand corridor. There was a brass knocker on it and Inspector Taverner duly knocked.
It was opened with startling suddenness by a man who must have been standing just inside. He was a clumsy giant of a man, with powerful shoulders, dark rumpled hair, and an exceedingly ugly but at the same time rather pleasant face. His eyes looked at us and then quickly away in that furtive, embarrassed manner which shy but honest people often adopt.
Oh, I say, he said. Come in. Yes, do. I was goingbut it doesnt matter. Come into the sitting-room. Ill get Clemencyoh, youre there, darling. Its Chief Inspector Taverner. Heare there any cigarettes? Just wait a minute. If you dont mind. He collided with a screen, said I beg your pardon to it in a flustered manner, and went out of the room.
It was rather like the exit of a bumble-bee[68] and left a noticeable silence behind it.
Mrs Roger Leonides was standing up by the window. I was intrigued at once by her personality and by the atmosphere of the room in which we stood.
The walls were painted whitereally white, not an ivory or a pale cream which is what one usually means when one says white in house decoration. They had no pictures on them except one over the mantelpiece, a geometrical fantasia in triangles of dark grey and battleship blue. There was hardly any furnitureonly mere utilitarian necessities, three or four chairs, a glass-topped table, one small bookshelf. There were no ornaments. There was light and space and air. It was as different from the big brocaded and flowered drawing-room on the floor below as chalk from cheese. And Mrs Roger Leonides was as different from Mrs Philip Leonides as one woman could be from another. Whilst one felt that Magda Leonides could be, and often was, at least half a dozen different women, Clemency Leonides, I was sure, could never be anyone but herself. She was a woman of very sharp and definite personality.
She was about fifty, I suppose; her hair was grey, cut very short in what was almost an Eton crop[69] but which grew so beautifully on her small well-shaped head that it had none of the ugliness I have always associated with that particular cut. She had an intelligent, sensitive face, with light-grey eyes of a peculiar and searching intensity. She had on a simple dark-red woollen frock that fitted her slenderness perfectly.
She was, I felt at once, rather an alarming woman I think, because I judged that the standards by which she lived might not be those of an ordinary woman. I understood at once why Sophia had used the word ruthlessness in connection with her. The room was cold and I shivered a little.
Clemency Leonides said in a quiet, well-bred voice:
Do sit down, Chief Inspector. Is there any further news?
Death was due to eserine, Mrs Leonides.
She said thoughtfully:
So that makes it murder. It couldnt have been an accident of any kind, could it?
No, Mrs Leonides.
Please be very gentle with my husband, Chief Inspector. This will affect him very much. He worshipped his father and he feels things very acutely. He is an emotional person.
You were on good terms with your father-in-law, Mrs Leonides?
Yes, on quite good terms. She added quietly: I did not like him very much.
Why was that?
I disliked his objectives in lifeand his methods of attaining them.
And Mrs Brenda Leonides?
Brenda? I never saw very much of her.
Do you think it possible that there was anything between her and Mr Laurence Brown?
You meansome kind of a love affair? I shouldnt think so. But I really wouldnt know anything about it.