After an amazed silence, Cyprian Gleed found his voice. ‘But that’s absolutely—’ He was about to say ‘fantastic’; but to say it would be to half admit that his idea of an Establishment was itself fantastic. ‘I really can’t discuss this. I came here to get an apology from you for the insolent way you treated Miss Sanders.’
‘Your journey has been in vain, then. Good morning.’
Trembling again, Cyprian scratched at his straggly beard. ‘Very well. I shall report your behaviour to the partners.’
Nigel, ignoring this, put a sheet of paper in the typewriter and began typing. He was pretty sure that Cyprian Gleed had not come here to take up the cudgels for Miss Sanders: Cyprian hardly seemed the chivalrous type. After biting his nails for a bit and glancing covertly at Nigel, the young man said:
‘Perhaps I’ve been rather outspoken.’
Nigel stopped typing, and looked at him silently.
‘I’ve no objection to talking about your problem, actually.’
I was right, thought Nigel: he came here to pump me. But on whose behalf? His mother’s? His own? Cyprian now answered Nigel’s questions with apparent frankness. Yes, he had come to Wenham & Geraldine’s the morning of 24th July. Somewhere around 10.30, he thought. After a few words with Miriam, he had gone upstairs. Why? To see his mother. Why? Well, actually he’d run short of money and wanted an advance on his allowance: he’d failed to catch her before she left her house for the office. How did he remember this, when it had happened months ago? He had examined the counterfoil of his mother’s cheque-book, which showed that it was on 24th July she had given him the advance.
‘You were lucky,’ remarked Nigel. ‘I can’t imagine many writers liking to be interrupted in the middle of their work with a request for money.’
‘Oh, that was part of my plan. When I came in, I started reading a page of her typescript and buttered her up about it,’ said Cyprian, with appalling candour. ‘She has abnormal vanity, even for a woman writer. And I don’t usually take any interest in her work—it’s entirely worthless, of course. So that did the trick.’
‘I see.’
‘When I’d got the cheque, I beat it—before she could change her mind. So, you see, I couldn’t have done anything to that proof, even if I’d wanted to. I was in here with her all the time. I expect she’d remember, if you asked her.’
‘But you could have nipped into the next-door room before visiting your mother?’
‘I could have. But it wouldn’t have been any good—not if I’d wanted to fiddle with the proof.’
‘Because Mr. Protheroe was there?’
‘No. Because my mother was there.’
Betraying none of the emotion this statement roused in him, Nigel got up and closed the sliding window.
‘How do you know?’
‘I saw her through that little window.’
‘Saw her talking to Protheroe?’
‘No. She was alone. She’d gone in to borrow an india-rubber. Actually, she was looking for it on his desk when I peeped through. I called to her, and she came straight back here. So she can give me an alibi.’ Nigel contemplated Cyprian so steadily that the young man added, with a roll of the eyes, ‘Honestly. You’ve only to ask her. Well, I suppose she mightn’t remember, but—’
‘I don’t doubt you.’ Nigel continued to study him. Cyprian was clearly capable de tout; but did he know just what he was saying? ‘I don’t doubt you. But I might doubt the india-rubber.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your mother could have been tampering with the proof,’ said Nigel flatly. Cyprian Gleed received the suggestion, with none of the moral indignation he had evinced over Miriam Sanders: indeed, there was something like a gleam in his eye—a vicious, calculating gleam he at once suppressed.
‘I suppose she could. It hadn’t occurred to me.’
‘Do you think she would?’
‘Well, psychologically I wouldn’t put it past her. Women of that type sometimes enjoy making mischief, you know. Or it can be the change of life.’
‘Who would she want to make mischief for?’ asked Nigel, getting up and going to a far corner of the room to put this execrable young man out of range of his boot.
‘Oh, just mischief in the abstract. Mischief for mischief’s sake.’ Cyprian was evidently about to enlarge on this when the door was flung open and the subject of the discussion swept in.
‘I told you not to come here again,’ she said harshly. ‘It’s useless. You’re not getting a penny.’ Miss Miles became aware of Nigel’s presence. Her personality seemed to go out, then light up again in a quite different pattern, like an electric advertisement, all in an instant. ‘Oh, good morning, Mr. Strangeways. So sorry to interrupt you. I didn’t know you knew each other.’
‘We didn’t,’ said Cyprian. ‘Strangeways was interviewing me—’
‘I’m so glad. Cyprian’s the brains of the family. I know he’d do splendidly if someone gave him the sort of work that suits him—wouldn’t you, dear boy?’
‘Not that sort of interview,’ replied the dear boy sourly. ‘Strangeways is a detective.’
Laying her handbag on the table, Millicent Miles sat down. Her son was still sprawled in the armchair, contemplating her with the look of one who perceives that a difficult sum is coming out right after all.
‘A detective?’ she said. ‘But how fascinating! I’d never have suspected it. And you’ve been grilling poor Cyprian?’
Young Gleed grinned. ‘We’ve been discussing mischief in the abstract—and the concrete, too, Mother.’ The last word shot out in a venomously satirical tone. ‘Do you need me any more, Strangeways?’
‘No. Good morning.’
Cyprian Gleed picked up his black sombrero. He gave his mother a veiled look from the doorway, blew her a kiss, and departed.
‘I do wish he’d settle down to something. He’s got plenty of talent, but I’m afraid he’s become rather a drifter. I blame myself.’
‘Oh, surely not?’
‘That’s very sweet of you.’ She sighed, gave him an appealing, ingenuous look. ‘But he was the child of a broken marriage. It might have been different if I hadn’t divorced his father. Though I had cause enough, God knows. But why should I burden you with my little troubles?’
Nigel imagined the dialogue of Millicent Miles’s bestsellers must run on very much these lines. Their author proceeded:
‘You’re investigating this business about Thor’s book, I suppose?’
‘Yes. Your son told me—’
‘You’re a very naughty man. You made me believe you were a new reader, and I’d hoped you’d persuade the firm to reprint those novels of mine.’
‘Afraid I can’t help there. But you’ve a strong supporter in Mr. Ryle.’
‘Oh, Basil,’ she said off-handedly. ‘Yes, I suppose so. He’s certainly a very persevering young man. But it’s all so difficult.’ She sighed again. ‘I’ve often wondered if it’s a good thing to have personal relationships with one’s publishers. Perhaps it should be kept on a strictly business footing.’
Nigel received this outrageous speech without comment. Could she be shocked out of her complacence, self-deception, whatever it was?
‘Is your son an inveterate liar?’
‘Really, Mr. Strangeways!’
‘Can I rely on his evidence?’
‘What evidence? I don’t understand.’
‘He told me that he’d seen you in Mr. Protheroe’s room the morning the proof copy was altered—as good as caught you in the act.’
Nigel explained in detail. A sequence of emotions passed over Miss Miles’s face, but he could not tell how far they were genuine: she might just have been trying them on and discarding them, like new hats. Her final selection was the wounded mother’s.
‘Oh, Cyprian! How could you?’ she said brokenly. ‘What an age we live in, when children bring evidence against their parents. And false evidence, too!’
‘You weren’t in P
rotheroe’s room at all?’
‘How can I possibly remember? It was months ago. And I’ve often popped in there.’
‘Your son came to ask you for an advance on his allowance. Does that recall it?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ she replied, with mournful, hushed, sweet dignity. ‘You see, it’s happened so often. Cyprian gets into debt. I can’t think what he spends his money on. Oh dear, did he try to borrow from you?’
‘No … You mustn’t mind my asking this—but did you ever see the libellous passages in Time to Fight?’
Her brow furrowed with concentration. ‘Let me think. Of course I knew about them. Mr. Protheroe told me the sort of thing Thor said. And I dare say I have seen the proof lying about on his desk. But—’
‘And you talked to your son about it?’
‘I expect so.’ Her green eyes opened wide. ‘Oh, you can’t possibly think that Cyprian would do a thing like that?’
Her voice lacked conviction, and Nigel thought it was intended to do so. He felt a profound disgust: talking with emotional twisters, like Millicent Miles and her son, one became tainted oneself. He was never nearer to throwing up the case.
‘I’m trying to eliminate the people who couldn’t have done it,’ he said. ‘Physically, or psychologically. Have you known Mr. Geraldine long?’
She gave her rattling, good-comrade laugh. ‘Now him you can’t suspect! I met him many years ago. Under rather strange circumstances. And then not again till recently. Why?’
‘I’m groping in the dark—to find links. Is there any link between Mr. Geraldine and General Thoresby, for instance, apart from the publishing one?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
Millicent Miles was visibly losing interest. She had an inward look now, as though debating some course of action. Her face hardened.
‘I must say that second libellous passage is marvellous stuff,’ said Nigel. He began quoting from it. ‘“But the Governor, occupied with the more congenial business of cocktail parties … took no action whatsoever except to obstruct the military … As a result of his criminal negligence, there was considerable loss of life and widespread destruction of property. The massacre at the Ulombo”—’
‘“Holocaust,”’ interrupted Miss Miles in a distrait voice.
‘“Massacre,” surely?’
‘No, “holocaust.” I’ve a first-rate verbal memory.’ She was giving her full attention now. ‘I particularly remember Stephen reading that bit out to me. It stuck in my mind—the word “holocaust”—I’ve never been sure how to spell it. But my spelling’s awful, anyway.’
A few minutes later Nigel left her. He could not know that one of the questions he had asked this morning would lead directly to a murder.
Chapter 6
Delete
‘WHAT ACTION WOULD you take if I told you that it was Stephen Protheroe who tampered with the proof?’
‘I shouldn’t believe it,’ said Liz Wenham. ‘Apart from anything else, his whole life is bound up with this firm. It’s quite inconceivable.’
‘But supposing I gave you absolute proof?’ Nigel persisted.
‘Well, we’d have to get rid of him,’ Arthur Geraldine said, after a pause. ‘Oh yes, Liz, we would. But surely you haven’t—?’
‘And he’d find it difficult to get another job?’
‘Another job like this—yes.’
‘But, of course, leaving us would be by far the worst blow to him,’ said Liz. ‘I don’t mean just financially.’
‘And we’ve agreed that he had infinitely more opportunity to do it than anyone else here?’
‘Yes, but—’ The two partners began speaking together, shocked by the enormity of Nigel’s suggestion.
‘No, wait a minute,’ he interrupted. ‘Stephen had no apparent motive whatsoever, you’re saying. I agree. But perhaps somebody had a very strong motive for discrediting Stephen, ruining him. We’ve been thinking in terms of a culprit who wanted to damage either the firm or General Thoresby. But all we know so far is that Miss Miles was publicly humiliated by the General fifteen years ago, and that the firm turned down a project of her son’s in July. As motives, these seem ludicrously inadequate.’
‘I agree.’
‘On the other hand, Stephen Protheroe was the main obstacle here to Miss Miles’s having her novels reprinted. She was seen, alone, in his room during the crucial period. She knew about the libellous passages—as I told you, her using the word ‘holocaust’ that time is damned difficult to explain away except as a Freudian slip. She’d not been about the place long enough, in July, to know that you would never sack Protheroe on mere suspicion, however strong.’
‘But it’s all so melodramatic and trivial,’ said Liz Wenham. ‘I don’t particularly care for Millicent Miles, but I can’t see her doing it just to get her novels reprinted.’
‘If that was her only motive, I’d agree. But I’m convinced she has some much deeper grudge against Stephen.’
‘How can she? They’ve only known each other for a few—’
‘That’s what they say. I don’t believe it. They hate each other’s guts. They talk to each other with a—the sort of familiarity bred by contempt, or hatred—as though they’d grown old in it.’
Arthur Geraldine’s shark-like mouth stretched in a grimace.
‘You may be right. But why should they pretend they’d never met each other before?’
‘Why indeed? My head’s buzzing with whys. Why, for instance, do Wenham & Geraldine allow Miss Miles to take up residence here indefinitely? She finished moving house months ago, after all.’
The senior partner looked a little disconcerted. ‘It’s a tradition of the firm that we should always keep a room available for our authors.’
‘The fact is, she’s extremely difficult to dislodge,’ said Liz Wenham. ‘I’ve hinted often enough. You really must tell her quite definitely, Arthur. You were going to do so in September.’
‘For that matter,’ asked Nigel, ‘why should she want to stay on?’
‘Meanness. Saves her burning her own electricity.’
‘Ah, come now, Liz, she’s not as bad as that.’
‘Or to be on the spot when the proofs of Time to Fight came along, in the hope she could get at them somehow and do Protheroe down?’ suggested Nigel. ‘Why else remain next-door neighbour to a man she abominates?’
They were in Mr. Geraldine’s room, whither Nigel had been summoned, shortly after his conversation with Millicent Miles, to give a progress report. He had told them that handwriting identification was impossible in this case, and fingerprint tests would probably be useless. The proof had been handled legitimately by at least half a dozen members of the firm, apart from the author, the compositor and Nigel himself. If the culprit was somebody who had no legitimate reason for handling the copy, he would presumably have taken care not to leave prints on it. Nigel was quite prepared, should the partners ask it, to fingerprint everyone in the firm: but Geraldine and Liz Wenham had agreed that, with so little chance of getting results, it would not be worth the trouble involved and the bad feeling among the staff that would ensue. It was decided, therefore, that only those who had been authorised to handle the proof should be asked privately to give Nigel a complete set of fingerprints. If some other prints were then to be found on the proof, the partners would decide what steps should be taken to identify them.
‘I should enjoy being present, Arthur, when you asked Miss Miles for her dabs,’ said Liz, grinning amiably.
‘God forbid it should come to that!’
The senior partner was clearly beginning to repent of ever starting this investigation. Engaged with the preliminaries to the libel action, he was looking preoccupied today, though his old-fashioned courtesy did not fail. He kept coming back to General Thoresby’s highly unethical behaviour.
‘But look here, Strangeways. You say he as good as told you that he wanted to provoke a libel action. I never heard of such a thing! I shall instruct our lawyers to take
it up.’
‘There was no other witness when he said it. He could deny saying it, in court. It’d be my word against his.’
‘He seems to have the best motive of all for fiddling with the proof,’ said Liz.
‘Yes. But he couldn’t have done it himself. And can you imagine Protheroe, or Ryle, or the printer accepting a bribe from him to do it? Besides, he told me he was not guilty, and I believe him.’
There was a brief silence; then Liz said, ‘So we come back to Miss Miles, or her son, or Stephen … You’ve no other candidates?’ she added, when Nigel did not reply.
Nigel had one other, but he was not prepared to talk about him yet. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Let’s see if anything comes out of the fingerprint tests first.’
‘And if nothing comes?’
‘Then I’d advise you to drop the investigation. I could spend days or weeks, and a great deal of your money, digging into the past to find some link between Protheroe and Miss Miles. But would it be worth your while?’
‘I don’t like digging things up. You never know what you may find,’ said Liz in her forthright way. ‘You might discover that Arthur had kept a brothel and Millicent was one of its inmates.’
Geraldine’s large pink face went pinker. ‘Really, Liz, you have an atrocious mind. Now, how do we set about this fingerprinting business?’
They discussed the procedure for a little; then Nigel went home to fetch his apparatus. After lunch he took the prints of the partners, Protheroe, and two members of the staff through whose hands the proof had passed. None of these raised any objection; nor did Mr. Bates, General Thoresby, and the manager of the printing works, when Liz Wenham explained to them over the telephone that it was to be done simply for the purpose of elimination. These, too, Nigel visited in turn; and by six o’clock he had taken complete sets of fingerprints from all concerned. It was understood that he would not be returning to the office till after the weekend, since the tedious task of bringing up latent prints on the 250-odd pages of Time to Fight and comparing them with the specimens he had obtained, would take him the best part of two days.