Bodies from the Library 3. Группа авторов

Mrs Prentisse now.’

      A minute later Dorothy Prentisse was on the line.

      ‘That you, darling? How sweet of you to ring! Yes, I’ll be back early in the morning. I’m glad you found everything as it should be. But you shouldn’t have asked Peter to dinner. Well, I’d been looking forward to us having our evening together alone … A special reason? Well, we might find some special excuse and put him off. He won’t mind … Till tomorrow then, darling. ’Bye.’

      Bright and early on Monday Holt himself arrived at the Porter Street apartment. He was like a man who had been given a job to do, and knew that he had done it well. From an unsealed envelope he produced several closely typed sheets.

      Prentisse gave them a glance, tried to look impressed, and asked how much. Holt’s account was for just over eighteen pounds and Prentisse wrote him a cheque.

      It was a lot of money, Prentisse thought ruefully, for the view of an office and a few minutes with Holt. It rather looked, in fact, as if Peter would have the laugh. Which reminded him. Peter would be at Oudenarde Mansions and he’d better be rung up at once. And then Prentisse couldn’t help wondering just how that sleuth of Holt’s had got to work and he took the typed sheets from the envelope and began casually to read.

       The party was picked up almost on arrival and followed to Liverpool Street Station where he took the train for Wenton Junction. He was met by a small black sedan driven by a lady and the car was followed to Justin Friars, six miles away, where it entered the grounds of a smallish country house known as Friars House. Phillipson followed me and he and I shared the supervision from then on.

      Prentisse stopped reading. He had wondered why Peter had not gone to Cambridge and he smiled to himself as he knew why. After all, Friars House was Peter’s, and Justin Friars was only some twenty miles from Cambridge. He knew it well enough. He had been there once or twice when he and Dorothy had been staying at Carnford Hall. It wasn’t more than a ten-minute run in a car. As for the woman, she was probably Peter’s married sister. Or wasn’t she still in India? Maybe she and her husband were home on leave. Curiosity made him read on.

       There seemed to be no servants whatever in the house but observation was difficult. The couple did not appear until about eight-thirty that evening when they walked round the lawns and the borders and back through the long walk to the house. The woman was tallish, fair and about thirty by all appearances. Once or twice the couple were seen to embrace during their tour of the garden.

      Prentisse was horrified. The woman was definitely not Peter’s sister and who she might be he had no idea. What he did know was that in beginning a joke he had committed an enormity. He had intruded unwarrantably into another man’s private life and the fact that it had been done under a lamentable misapprehension would not make it appear the less reprehensible. His face was flushed as he realised what he must at once do.

      He rang Oudenarde Mansions and it was Daniels who answered.

      ‘Sorry, sir, but the master’s just gone away.’

      ‘Away? What do you mean?’

      ‘What I said, sir. He got back at about eleven o’clock and almost at once he ordered me to pack his bags for the South of France. He didn’t know how long he’d be away.’

      ‘Good Heavens! Any idea why he went off like that?’

      ‘No idea at all, sir,’ Daniels replied.

      ‘Very extraordinary!’ Prentisse said. ‘There should have been a letter for him from me asking him to dinner tonight. Did he read it? It was on pale blue paper.’

      ‘Yes, sir, I remember it. He read it as soon as he came in.’

      ‘Very extraordinary!’ Prentisse said again. ‘Let me know as soon as you hear anything from him.’

      ‘I will, sir,’ Daniels promised.

      Prentisse hung up. He was angry and he was worried. What on earth could have possessed Claire to have made him go off like that? If it was that letter, then he surely should have had sense enough to know that his secrets were implicitly safe.

      He picked it up and once more began reading.

       A light went on in a bedroom at about ten o’clock and we brought a ladder from the garden and placed it near the open window when the lights went out. We had to act with enormous care but hearing was perfect. There were the following scraps of conversation.

      (1) ‘Are you sure Phipps can be trusted?’

       ‘Yes,’ the woman said, ‘I’ll square it with him on Sunday morning again. I’ll have to be there in any case when he’—name not identified—‘rings. He’ll be sure to ring about noon.’

      (2) ‘Darling, we’ll have to be most careful from now on. You really mustn’t go making faces at me behind his back.’ He is apparently the unidentified name of 1.

       ‘It’s all rather funny in a way,’ Claire said. ‘He’s not a bad old stick, really. I don’t think we’ll be running any risk.’

      Something had already stood still with Lutley Prentisse. He read the rest of those sheets and as if his eyes no longer saw any words. When he laid the last sheet down he stood for a moment, hand gripping the table and his face a queer grey.

      At first his movements seemed rational. He took the tube to Hampstead and made his way to his house and spoke rationally enough to the staff. Mrs Prentisse had gone out for a moment, he was told, but should be back practically at once. He went out himself and at a music shop bought a gut ’cello string. When he came back, Mrs Prentisse was there.

      Five minutes later Lunt brought in tea. He found Mrs Prentisse lying dead on the carpet and Prentisse sitting writing at that Queen Anne bureau. Lunt, white-faced and aghast, could get no answer from him. So he ran out to the road and got a message to the police. When they came it was still as if Prentisse did not hear. He let them take him by the arm and lead him away. The sergeant had a look at that paper on which he had been writing.

      ‘Heavenly days, have a look at this, Inspector! What do you suppose it means?’

      The inspector had a look. It didn’t mean anything to him either. It was just a phrase, written over and over again.

      ‘To the Editor of The Times, Dear Sir.’