From now onwards it was hit or miss for Bunter. He had been seen once and it was now more than ever his business to keep out of sight. He waited for a few agonising moments before following, and was just in time to see Bright vanishing down the subway to the Underground.
At this moment, Bunter would have given much for his trusty bowler. He did his best, by again exchanging the cap for the hat as he ran across the yard, and struggling into the subfusc overcoat. It is not necessary to pursue the involved underground journey that occupied the next hour. At the end of it, hare and hound emerged in good order at Piccadilly, having boxed the compass pretty successfully in the interval The next move was to the Corner House, where Bright took the lift.
Now, at the Corner House there are three large floors, and each large floor has two doorways. Yet to get into the same lift as Bright was to challenge disaster. Bunter, like a baffled cat that sees its mouse vanish down a hole, stood and watched the ascending lift. Then he moved to the centre counter and stood, apparently inspecting the array of cakes and sweetmeats, but in reality keeping a sharp look-out on all the lift-doors and the two marble staircases. After ten minutes he felt that he might assume Bright’s purpose to be genuinely that of getting refreshment. He made for the nearest staircase and went up it like a lamp-lighter. The lift passed him on a downward journey before he reached the first floor, and he was assailed by a horrible conviction that it was bearing Bright away with it. No matter, the die was cast now. He pushed open the swing door on the first floor and began his slow stroll among the crowded tables.
The sight of bewildered customers looking for a seat is no unusual one in the Corner House. Nobody paid any attention to Bunter until he had made the circuit of the big room and satisfied himself that Bright was not among those present. He went out by the farther door, where he was challenged by the inquiry whether he had been served. He replied that he was looking for a friend and ran on up to the second floor.
This room was the exact twin of the first, except that, instead of a male orchestra in evening dress playing My Canary has Circles under His Eyes, it possessed a female orchestra in blue playing excerpts from The Gondoliers. Bunter pushed his way slowly through the throng until – his staid heart giving a sudden leap beneath the deplorable blue serge waistcoat – he caught sight of a familiar sandy head and crooked pair of shoulders. Bright was there, seated at a table containing three elderly women, and peacefully eating a grilled chop.
Bunter gazed desperately about him. At first it seemed hopeless to find a seat anywhere near, but at length he espied a girl making-up her face and dabbling at her hair preparatory to leaving. He made a dart for the table and secured the reversion of her chair. He was some time catching the eye of the waitress and ordering a cup of coffee; fortunately Bright seemed to be in no particular hurry with his chop. Bunter asked for the bill as soon as the coffee was brought, and sat patiently, his useful newspaper well spread out before him.
After what seemed an interminable delay, Bright finished his lunch, looked at his watch, called for his bill and rose. Bunter was four behind him in the queue at the pay-desk, and squeezed through the door in time to see the sandy head disappearing down the stairs. At this happy moment, the lift arrived. Bunter bundled into it, and was shot out on the ground floor well ahead of the quarry. He watched Bright out, took up the trail and, after a few minutes of hectic traffic-dodging, found himself in a cinema in the Haymarket, purchasing a ticket for the stalls.
Bright took a seat in the third row of the three-and-sixpennies. Bunter, hastily whispering to the attendant that he didn’t care to be too far forward, managed to slip in a couple of rows behind him. Now he could breathe again. From where he sat, he could see the top of Bright’s head, outlined against the comparative brightness at the foot of the screen. Ignoring the drama of Love and Passion which shimmered and squeaked its mechanical way from the first misunderstanding to the last lingering kiss, Bunter fixed his eyes on that head with such concentration that the tears stole down his cheeks.
The film shuddered to its close. The lights went up. Bright stood suddenly upright and pushed his way out into the gangway. Bunter prepared to follow, but Bright, instead of making for the nearest exit, merely walked across and passed behind a discreet curtain over which was blazoned in blue fire the legend ‘Gentlemen.’
Bunter sank down again and waited. Other gentlemen passed in and out, but no Bright returned. Fear smote Bunter. Was there a way out through the cloak-room? The lights dimmed and blacked out, and a Comic started. Bunter rose up, tripping over the feet of three sniggering girls and an irritable old man, and sneaked gently down the gangway.
As he did so the curtain leading to ‘Gentlemen’ was drawn aside and a man came out. Bunter stared at him as he passed in the soft, thick twilight, but the sharp peak of the silhouette told him that this was a bearded man. He passed Bunter with a muttered apology and went on up the gangway. Bunter proceeded on his way down but, by some instinct, turned at the curtained door and looked back.
He saw the back of the bearded man, outlined against the sudden blue daylight, passing through an exit, and remembered how Wimsey had once said to him: ‘Any fool can disguise his face, but it takes a genius to disguise a back.’ He had not followed that back through London for five days without knowing every line of it. In a moment he was hurrying up the gangway and out through the exit. Beard or no beard, this was his man.
Two more taxis and then a clear run out to Kensington. This time, Bright appeared to be really going somewhere. His taxi drew up at a neat house in a good quarter; he got out and let himself in with a latch-key. Bunter went on to the next corner and there interrogated his driver.
‘Did you see the number of the house they stopped at?’
‘Yes, sir. Number 17.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Divorce, sir?’ asked the man, with a grin.
‘Murder,’ said Bunter.
‘Crikey!’ This appeared to be the natural reaction to murder. ‘Well,’ said the taximan, ‘ ’ope ’e swings for it.’ and drove off.
Bunter glanced about him. He dared not pass Number 17. Bright might still be on the watch, and both the cap and the felt hat were now, he felt, war-worn veterans of whom nothing more could be asked in the way of disguise. He saw a chemist’s shop and went in.
‘Can you tell me,’ he asked, ‘who lives at No. 17?’
‘Why, yes,’ said the chemist, ‘gentleman of the name of Morecambe.’
‘Morecambe?’ A great piece of jig-saw seemed to fall into place in Bunter’s mind with an almost audible click. ‘Littlish gentleman with one shoulder a bit higher than the other?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Reddish hair.’
‘Yes, sir; reddish hair and beard.’
‘Oh, he wears a beard?’
‘Oh, yes sir. Gentleman in the City, he is. Lived here as long as I can remember. Very pleasant gentleman. Did you want to know—?’
‘Yes,’ said Bunter. ‘The fact is, I heard there might be a vacancy for a gentleman’s personal attendant at No. 17, and I thought I’d like to know what the family was like before applying for it.’
‘Oh, I see. Yes, You’d find it a nice family. Quiet. No children. Mrs Morecambe is a nice lady. Good-looking in her time, I should say. Used to be on the stage, I’m told, but that must have been a good long time ago. Two maids kept and everything quite as you might wish to find it.’
Bunter expressed his gratitude and left the shop to send a telegram to Lord Peter.
The chase was ended.
XXXI
THE EVIDENCE OF THE HABERDASHER’S ASSISTANT
‘Ha! well! what next?
You are the cupbearer of richest joy—
But it was a report, a lie.’
The Second Brother
Monday, 6 July
‘I look at it this way,’ said Superintendent Glaisher. ‘If this here Bright is Morecambe, and Mrs Morecambe is in cahoots with Weldon, then, likewise
, Weldon and Bright – so to call him – are in cahoots together.’
‘Undoubtedly,’ said Wimsey, ‘but if you think that this identification is going to make life one grand, sweet song for you, you are mistaken. All it has done so far is to bust up every conclusion we have so far come to.’
‘Yes, my lord; undoubtedly the thing still has a hitch in it. Still, every little helps, and this time we’ve got more than a little to go on with. Suppose we work out where we stand. First of all, if Bright is Morecambe, he isn’t a hair-dresser; therefore he had no legitimate call to buy that razor; therefore his tale about the razor is all eyewash, like we always thought it was; therefore, humanly speaking there’s not much doubt that Paul Alexis didn’t commit suicide, but was murdered.’
‘Exactly,’ said Wimsey, ‘and since we have devoted a great deal of time and thought to the case on the assumption that it was a murder, it’s a convenience to know that the assumption is probably correct.’
‘So it is. Well, now, if Weldon and Morecambe are both in this together, it’s likely that the motive for the murder is what we thought – getting hold of Mrs W.’s money – or isn’t it?’
‘It’s likely,’ agreed Wimsey.
‘Then what’s all this Bolshevik business got to do with it?’ demanded Inspector Umpelty.
‘Lots,’ said Wimsey. ‘Look here; I’m going to offer you two more identifications. First of all, I suggest that Morecambe was the bearded friend who came to stay with Weldon at Fourways Farm at the end of February. And secondly, I suggest that Morecambe was the bearded gentleman who approached Mr Sullivan of Wardour Street and asked him for the photograph of a Russian-looking girl. It is interesting that Mr Horrock’s cultivated theatrical mind should have associated him immediately with Richard III.’
Inspector Umpelty looked puzzled, but the Superintendent smacked his hand on the table.
‘The hunchback!’ he cried.
‘Yes – but they seldom play Richard as a real hunch-back nowadays. A slight suggestion of crookedness is what they usually give you – just that scarcely perceptible twistiness of shoulder that Morecambe has about him.’
‘Of course, that’s plain enough, now we know about the beard,’ said Glaisher. ‘But why the photograph?’
‘Let’s try and put the story together in the right order, as far as we’ve got it,’ suggested Wimsey. ‘First of all, here is Weldon, over head and ears in debt, and raising money against his expectations from his mother. Very well. Now, early this year, Mrs Weldon comes to Wilvercombe, and begins to take a great deal of interest in Paul Alexis. In February, she definitely announces that she means to marry Alexis, and possibly she is foolish enough to admit that, if she does marry him, she will leave him all her money. Almost immediately after this announcement, Morecambe comes to stay at Weldon’s farm. And within a week or two, the strange coded letters with the foreign stamps begin to arrive for Alexis.’
‘That’s clear enough.’
‘Now, Alexis has always hinted to people that there is a mystery about his birth. He fancies that he is of noble Russian descent. I suggest that the first letter —’
‘One minute, my lord. Who do you suppose wrote those letters?’
‘I think Morecambe wrote them, and got them posted by some friend in Warsaw. As I see it, Morecambe is the brains of the conspiracy. He writes his first letter, no doubt in plain English, hinting at Imperialist activities in Russia and grandiose prospects for Paul Alexis, if he can prove his descent – but, of course, there must be complete secrecy about the whole thing.’
‘Why the secrecy?’
‘To preserve the romantic atmosphere. Alexis, poor egg, swallows this, hook, line and sinker. He promptly writes back telling the so-called Boris everything he knows or imagines about himself. The code is henceforth used, of course, to keep Alexis in the proper frame of mind and give him a nice toy to play with. Then, from the little bits of family tradition that Alexis supplies, “Boris” (that is, Morecambe) builds up a suitable genealogical fantasy to fit in with these data, and outlines a marvellous plot to place Alexis on the Imperial throne of Russia. Meanwhile, Alexis reads books about Russian history, and obligingly assists his murderer to bait and arm the trap. Eventually, Boris tells him that the conspiracy is nearly ready to take effect; and that is when we find Alexis indulging in mysterious hints and prophecies of his forthcoming apotheosis.’
‘Just a minute,’ said Glaisher. ‘I should have thought that the simplest way for Morecambe would have been to get Alexis to break off with Mrs Weldon on the grounds that he had to go to Russia and be a Tsar. Surely that would have attained the object of the plot without bumping off the poor little blighter.’
‘Well, would it?’ said Wimsey. ‘In the first place, I rather imagine that Mrs Weldon’s romantic reaction to a notion of that kind would have been to hand over large sums of money to Alexis for the Imperial war-chest, which would hardly have suited Messrs Weldon and Morecambe. Secondly, if Alexis did break off the engagement and they trusted to that – what would happen next? They couldn’t go on for the remainder of all their lives writing code-letters about imaginary conspiracies. Some time or other, Alexis would wake up to the fact that the plot was never going to materialise. He would tell Mrs Weldon and in all probability the status quo would be restored. And the lady would be keener than ever on the marriage if she thought her fiancé really was the unacknowledged Tsar of all the Russias. No; the safest way was to tell Alexis to keep the whole thing absolutely secret, and then, when the time came, they could wipe him out finally and completely.’
‘Yes – I see that.’
‘Now we come to Leila Garland. I don’t think there is any doubt that Alexis deliberately pushed her off on to our conceited young friend, da Soto – though naturally neither da Soto nor she would admit that possibility for a moment. I fancy Antoine has got the right idea about that; he is probably an observer of considerable experience in these matters. Leila would be a very dangerous person if she were allowed to know anything about the pretended plot. She would be bound to talk, and they didn’t want talk. We’ve got to remember that the object of all this business was to stage a suicide. Young emperors on the point of leading successful revolutions do not commit suicide. To tell Leila about the plot was to tell the world: therefore, Leila must be got rid of, because, if she remained closely in contact with Alexis, it would be almost impossible to keep her in ignorance.’
‘Sounds as though young Alexis was a bit of a black-guard,’ said Inspector Umpelty. ‘First, he chucks his girl. Secondly, he leads poor old Mrs Weldon up the garden, by pretending to go in with an engagement he doesn’t mean to carry out.’
‘No,’ said Wimsey. ‘You don’t allow for the Imperial outlook. A prince in exile may form irregular attachments, but, when the call comes to him to take up his imperial station, all personal ties must be sacrificed to his public duty. A mere kept woman, like Leila, can be simply dismissed or handed over to somebody else. A person to whom he is bound by more honourable ties will also have to be sacrificed, but with more ceremony. We do not know, and we never shall know, exactly what Alexis meant to do about Mrs Weldon. We have her word for it that he tried to prepare her for some grand and surprising development in the near future, though, naturally, she put the wrong interpretation on the thing. I imagine that what Alexis intended to do was to write her a letter, after his departure for Warsaw, telling her what had happened to him and offering her his hospitality at his Imperial court. The whole affair would have been surrounded with a halo of romance and splendour and self-sacrifice, and no doubt Mrs Weldon would have enjoyed it down to the ground. There’s one thing: although, before all this Russian business started, Alexis had Mrs Weldon completely under his thumb, he apparently always refused to take any large sums of money from her – and that, I think, is greatly to his credit, and shows that he had the instincts of a gentleman, if not necessarily of a prince.’
‘That’s true,’ said Glaisher. ‘I suppose, if the plo
t had never been started, he would have married her.’
‘Oh, yes, I should think so. He’d have married her and done his duty by her according to his own lights, which were probably – well, continental. He would have been a charming husband to her and kept a mistress in a discreet and decent manner.’
Inspector Umpelty seemed disposed to quarrel with the term ‘decent,’ but Wimsey hurried on with his argument.
‘I fancy, too, that Alexis may have shown a little reluctance to take this course with Leila and Mrs Weldon. He may have been really fond of Leila; or he may have felt uncomfortable about letting Mrs Weldon down. So that was why they invented Feodora.’
‘And who was Feodora.’
‘Feodora was no doubt supposed to be the lady of lofty lineage destined to be the bride of the new Tsar Pavlo Alexeivitch. What was easier than to go to a theatrical agent, find the photograph of a not-too-well-known lady of Russian extraction, and send it to Alexis as the portrait of the Princess Feodora, the lovely lady who was waiting and working for him in exile until the time should come for her to take her place beside him on the Imperial throne? Those blessed romances that Alexis was so fond of are full of that kind of thing. There would be letters, perhaps, from Feodora, full of tender anticipation. She would be already in love with the Grand-Duke Pavlo from all she had heard of him. The glamour of the whole idea would bewitch him. And besides, it would be his duty to his people to marry Feodora. How could he hesitate? A glance at that very beautiful face, crowned with its regal head-dress of pearls—’
‘Oh!’ said Glaisher. ‘Yes, of course. That would be one reason why they hit on that particular photograph.’