“It’s a beastly night,” agreed Alleyn, “and we’re at the worst part of it.”

“Yes, sir. That’s right, sir.”

“Dull job, night duty, isn’t it?”

“Chronic, sir. Nothing much to do as a general rule except walk and think.”

“I know.”

Gratified by this encouragement, the constable said: “Yes, sir. I always reckon that if there’s any chap or female on this beat, hanging off and on, wondering whether they’ll make a hole in the river or not, it’s between two and four of the morning they’ll go overboard if they’re ever going. The river patrols say the same thing.”

“Yes,” said Alleyn. “So do doctors and nurses. It’s the hour of low vitality.” He did not move away and the constable, still further encouraged, continued the conversation.

“Have you ever read a play called ‘Macbeth,’ sir?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Alleyn, turning his head to look at the man.

“I wonder if it’d be the same thing, sir. The one I have in mind is by this Shakespeare.”

“I think it’ll be the same.”

“Well, sir, I saw that piece once at the old Vic. On duty there, sir, I was. It’s a funny kind of show. Not the type of entertainment that appeals to me as a general rule. Morbid. But it kind of caught my fancy and afterwards I got hold of a copy of the words and read them. There’s one or two bits I seem to be reminded of when I am on night duty. I don’t know why, I’m sure, because the play is a countrified affair. Blasted heaths and woods and so on.”

“And witches,” said Alleyn.

“That’s so, sir. Very peculiar. Fanciful. All the same there’s one or two bits that stick in my mind. Something about ‘night thickens’ and it goes on about birds flying into trees, and ‘good things of day begin to droop and drowse’—and — er—”

“‘While night’s black agents to their prey do rouse.’ ”

“Ah. It’s the same, then. Gives you a sort of sensation, doesn’t it, sir?”

“Yes.”

“And there’s another remark that took my fancy. This chap Macbeth asks his wife, ‘What is the night?’ meaning what’s the time and she says ‘Almost at odds with morning, which is which.’ It’s the kind of way it’s put. They were a very nasty couple. Bad type. Superstitious, like most crooks. She was the worst of the two, in my opinion. Tried to fix the job so’s it’d look as if the servants had done it. Do you recollect that, sir?”

“Yes,” said Alleyn slowly, “yes.”

“Mind,” said the constable, warming a little, “I reckon if he hadn’t lost his nerve they’d have got away with it. No fingerprinting in those days, you see. And you know how it’d be, sir. You don’t expect people of their class to commit murder.”

“No.”

“No, you don’t. And with the weapons lying there beside these grooms or whatever they were, and so on, well the first thing anybody would have said was: ‘Here’s your birds.’ Not that there seemed to be anything like what you’d call an inquiry.”

“Not precisely,” said Alleyn.

“No, sir. No,” continued the constable, turning his back to the wind, “if Macbeth hadn’t got jumpy and mucked things up I reckon they’d have got away with it. They seemed to be well-liked people in the district. Some kind of royalty. Aristocratic, like. Well, nobody suspects people of that class. That’s my point.”

Alleyn pulled his hat on more firmly and turned up the collar of his coat.

“Well,” he said, “I’ll go off duty.”

“Yes, sir. I beg pardon, sir. Don’t know what came over me speaking so freely, sir.”

“That’s all right,“ said Alleyn. ”You’ve put a number of ideas in my head. Good night to you.”

Chapter XVII

Mr. Fox Finds an Effigy

The north wind that had come up during the night brought clouds. Before dawn these broke into teeming rain. At nine o’clock Roberta and Henry breakfasted in a room heavy with Victorian appointments. The windows were blind with rain and the room so dark that Henry turned on the lights.

“I don’t suppose that’s ever been done before except in a pea-soup fog,” he said cheerfully. “How did you sleep, Robin?”

“Not so badly,” said Roberta, “but for the wind in the chimney. It would drone out your name.”

“My name?” said Henry quickly. “I’ve never heard the north wind make a noise like ‘Henry.’ ”

“Your new name.”

“Oh,” said Henry, “that. Yes, it is rather flatulent, isn’t it?”

“Have you heard how Lady Wutherwood is this morning?”

“I met Tinkerton on the landing. She says Aunt V. slept like a log. ‘Very peaceful,’ Tinkerton said, as if Aunt V. was a corpse.”

“Don’t.”

“I suppose it’s real,” said Henry, returning with eggs and bacon from the side table. “I suppose somebody did kill Uncle G. last night. This morning it scarcely seems credible. What shall we do all day, Robin? Do you imagine if we go out our footsteps will be dogged by a plain-clothes detective? It might be fun to see if we could shake him off. I’ve always thought how easy it must be to lose a follower. Shall we try, or is it too wet?”

“There’s a policeman down in the hall.”

“How inexpressibly deadly for him,” said Henry. “I think the hall is possibly the worst part of this house. When we were small the direst threat Nanny had for us was that we should be sent to live in Brummell Street. Even now I slink past that stuffed bear, half expecting him to reach out and paw me to his bosom.”

“It’s such a large house,” said Roberta, “even the bear looks smallish. Has it been your family’s house for long?”

“It dates from a Lamprey who did some very fishy bit of hanky-panky for Good Queen Anne or one of her ministers. A pretty hot bit of work, one would think, to be rewarded with such a monstrous tip. She made him a Marquis into the bargain. The house must have been rather a fine affair in those days. It took my grandfather to ruin it. Uncle G. and Aunt V. merely added a few layers of gloom to the general chaos.”

“I suppose it’s your father’s house now.”

Henry paused in the act of raising his cup. “Golly,” he said, “I wonder if it is. One could make rather a lovely house of it, you know.” And to Henry’s face came a speculative expression which Roberta, with a sinking heart, recognized as the look of a Lamprey about to spend a lot of money.

“There’ll be terrific death duties,” she cried in panic.

“Oh, yes,” said Henry, grandly dismissing them.

They finished their breakfast in silence. An extremely old manservant, who Roberta thought must be Mrs. Moffatt’s husband, came in to say Henry was wanted on the telephone.

“I’ll answer it in the library,” said Henry, and to Roberta: “It’ll be the family. Come on.”

In a dimly forbidding library Roberta listened to Henry on the telephone: “Good morning, good morning,” said Henry brightly. “Anybody arrested yet or are you all at liberty? … Oh, good…Yes, thank you, Mama… No, but Tinkerton says she’s all right…” He ambled on in a discursive manner and Roberta’s attention strayed but was presently caught again by Henry ejaculating: “Baskett! Why on earth?… Good lord, how preposterous.” He said rapidly to Roberta: “That vast person Fox has been closeted with Baskett and Nanny for an hour and they’re wondering if he thinks Baskett… All right, Mama… No, I thought of showing Robin the house and then we might pay you a visit… Tonight?… Oh. Oh I see… Yes, if you think we ought to…Yes, I know it’s monstrous but it might be made rather pleasant don’t you think?” Henry lowered his voice. “I say, Mum,” he said guardedly, “will it be Aunt V.’s or ours?… Oh. Oh, well good-bye darling.”

He hung up the receiver. “I’m afraid we’ll have to stay tonight, Robin,” he said. “They’re bringing him here, you see.”

“I see.”

“And Mama rather thinks we get this house. Let’s have a look at it” ii

At eleven o’clock Alleyn got the surgeon’s report on the post-mortem. It was accompanied by a note from Dr. Curtis. The skewer, he said, had been introduced into the left orbit and had penetrated the fissure at the back of the eye and had entered the blood vessels at the base of the brain.