A Man Lay Dead by Ngaio Marsh Read Free Book Online Page B

“wishes to speak to us all for a moment.”
    “Already,” began Tokareff, “we have been interviewed. Already the hunt is to begin. Excuse me please, but I must make myself clear to say—”
    “Will you please sit round this table,” said Alleyn, incisively cutting through the clamour of Tokareff’s rumbling bass. They all moved across to a long writing table near the windows and seated themselves at it, Alleyn taking the head.
    “I have only this to say,” he said quietly, “a man was done to death in this house at five minutes to eight last night. It is possible — but only just possible — that the crime was brought off by someone from the outside. Until the inquest is over I’m afraid no one may leave Frantock. You will all, if you please, confine yourselves to the house and grounds. Should any of you want to go further afield, just let me know, will you, and if the reason is urgent, I’ll provide a suitable escort. You will be at liberty to use the hall and drawing-room an hour after this little chat is ended. During that hour I must ask you to allow me to make my examination of those rooms.”
    There was a difficult silence. Then Rosemund Grant spoke.
    “For how long will these restrictions be enforced?” she asked. Her voice, level and expressionless, suddenly and shockingly reminded Nigel of Rankin’s.
    “The inquest will probably he held on Thursday,” said Alleyn. “Until after then, at all events, I shall ask you to stay where you are.”
    “Is this absolutely necessary?” asked Handesley. “I am, of course, only too anxious for every effort to be made, but I understand some of my guests — Mrs. Wilde for instance — are naturally longing to get away from the unhappy associations of my house.” A foreign overtone of deprecation in his voice filled Nigel suddenly with an enormous sense of pity.
    “Sir Hubert,” he said quickly, “the situation is more difficult for yeu than for any of us. If we must stay, we must, but I am sure we will, all of us, try to be as little nuisance and as much help as may be. Under such circumstances all personal considerations must go to blazes. I’m afraid that’s not very well put, but—”
    “I entirely agreed,” broke in Wilde. “It is inconvenient, but convenience hardly counts at such a time. My wife, I am sure, will understand this.”
    As in answer to this assertion the door was opened and Marjorie Wilde came in.
    The placing of the others, the tenseness of the moment and the lateness of her arrival gave it something of the character of a theatrical entrance. There was, however, little else that was stagey about Mrs. Wilde’s appearance. She came in very quietly, her make-up was much less vigorously stated than usual and her clothes, as Nigel found himself reflecting, contrived to look like mourning.
    “I’m very sorry to have kept you all waiting,” she murmured. “Please don’t move, anyone.”
    Her husband pulled a chair up for her and at last they were all seated at the table.
    “Now,” said Alleyn, “I understand, I think, the general principles and the history of this game which ended so strangely and so tragically. I do not, however, quite realize what would have happened if a sham instead of a real victim had been found—”
    “But excuse me,” began Tokareff, “is this, how you say, a relevancy?”
    “It is quite in order, otherwise I should not ask. What would you have done in the ordinary course of the game?” He turned to Wilde.
    “We should,” said Wilde, “have immediately assembled and held a mock trial, with a ‘judge’ and a ‘prosecuting attorney,’ each of us having the right to cross-examine. Our object would have been to find the ‘murderer’—the member of the party to whom Vassily had given the scarlet plaque.”
    “Thank you — yes, I see. And you have not done this?”
    “Good God, Inspector,” said Nigel violently, “what do you take us for?”
    “He takes one of us for a criminal,”