“Together?”
“I don’t remember. They were not there when I got down.”
“I see. Will you go on, Miss Seacliff?”
“Well, we all put up our easels and set our palettes and so on. Sonia came in last and Katti said we’d begin. Sonia went into the junk-room and undressed. She came out in her white kimono and hung about trying to get the men to talk to her. Katti told her to go on to the throne. She got down into the chalkmarks. She always fitted her right thigh into its trace first, with the drape behind her. I don’t know if you understand?”
“Yes, I think I do.”
And indeed Alleyn suddenly had a very vivid impression of what must have taken place. He saw the model, wrapped in the thin white garment, her warm and vital beauty shining through it. He saw her speak to the men, look at them perhaps with a pathetic attempt to draw their attention to herself.
Then the white wrapper would slide to the floor and the nude figure sink gingerly into a half-recumbent posture on the throne.
“She grumbled as usual about the pose and said she was sick of it. I remember now that she asked us if we knew where Garcia had gone on his hiking trip. I suppose he wouldn’t tell her. Then she lay down on her side. The drape was still stretched taut behind her. There is generally a sort of key position among the different canvases. When we set the pose we always look at that particular canvas to get it right. My painting was in this position so it was always left to me to push her down into the right position. She could have done it all herself but she always made such a scene. I’d got into the way of taking her shoulders and pressing them over. She wouldn’t do it otherwise. So I leant over and gripped them. They felt smooth and alive. She began to make a fuss. She said ‘Don’t,’ and I said ‘Don’t be such a fool.’ Katti said: ‘Oh, for Heaven’s sake, Sonia!’ Something like that. Sonia said: ‘Your hands are cold, you’re hurting me.’ Then she let herself go and I pushed down.” Valmai Seacliff raised her hands and pressed them against her face.
“She didn’t struggle but I felt her body leap under my hands and then shudder. I can’t tell you exactly what it was like. Everything happened at the same moment. I saw her face. She opened her eyes very wide, and wrinkled her forehead as if she was astonished. I think she said ‘Don’t’ again, but I’m not sure. I thought — you know how one’s thoughts can travel — I thought how silly she looked, and at the same moment I suddenly wondered if she was going to have a baby and the pose really hurt her. I don’t know why I thought that. I knew s-something had happened. I didn’t know what it was. I just leant over her and looked into her face. I think I said: ‘Sonia’s ill.’ I think Katti or someone said ‘Rot.’ I still touched her — leant on her. She quivered as if I tickled her and then she was still. Phillida Lee said: ‘She’s fainted.’ Then the others came up. Katti put her arm behind Sonia to raise her. She said: ‘I can’t move her — she seems stuck.’ Then she pulled. There was a queer little n-noise and Sonia came up suddenly. Ormerin cried out loudly: ‘Mon Dieu, c’est le poignard.’ At least that’s what he told us he said. And the drape stuck to my fingers. It came out of the hole in her back — the blood, I mean. Her back was wet. We moved her a little, and Katti tried to stop the blood with a piece of rag. Troy came. She sent Basil out to ring up the doctor. She looked at Sonia and said she wasn’t dead. Troy put her arms round Sonia. I don’t know how long it was before Sonia gave a sort of cough. She opened her eyes very wide. Troy looked up and said: ‘She’s gone.’ Phillida Lee started to cry. Nobody said very much. Basil came back and Troy said n-nobody was to leave the studio. She covered Sonia with a drape. We began to talk about the knife. Lee and Hatchett said G-Garcia had done it. We all thought Garcia had done it. Then the doctor came and when he had seen Sonia he sent for the p-police.”
Her voice died away. She had begun her recital calmly enough, but it was strange to see how the memory of the morning grew more vivid and more disquieting as she revived it. The slight hesitation in her speech became more noticeable. When she had finished her hands were trembling.
“I d-didn’t know I was so upset,” she said. “A doctor once told me my nerves were as sensitive as the strings of a violin.”
“It was a horrible experience for all of you,” said Alleyn. “Tell me, Miss Seacliff, when did you yourself suspect that Garcia had laid this trap for the model?”
“I thought of Garcia at once. I remembered what Lee had told me about the conversation between Garcia and Sonia. I don’t see who else could have done it, and somehow— ”
“Yes?”
“Somehow it — it’s the sort of thing he might do. There’s something very cold-blooded about Garcia. He’s quite mad about me, but I simply can’t bear him to touch me. Lee says he’s got masses of S.A. and he evidently had for Sonia — but I can’t see it. I think he’s rather repulsive. Women do fall for him, I’m told.”
“And the motive?”
“I imagine he was sick of her. She literally hurled herself at him. Always watching him. Men hate women to do that— ”
She looked directly into Alleyn’s eyes. “Don’t they, Mr. Alleyn.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know.”
“And of course he was livid when she defaced my portrait. She must have hated me to do that. In a way it was rather interesting, a directly sexual jealousy manifesting itself on the symbol of the hated person.”
Alleyn repressed a movement of impatience and said: “No doubt.”
“My own idea is that she was going to have a baby and had threatened to sue him for maintenance. I suppose in a way I’m responsible.”
She looked grave enough as she made this statement, but Alleyn thought there was more than a hint of complacency in her voice.
“Surely not,” he said.
“Oh, yes. In a way. If he hadn’t been besotted on me, I dare say he might not have done it.”
“I thought,” said Alleyn, “that you were worrying about your actual hand in the business.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Alleyn’s voice was grave, “the circumstance of it being your hands, Miss Seacliff, that thrust her down upon the knife. Tell me, please, did you notice any resistance at first? I should have thought that there might even have been a slight sound as the point entered.”
“I — don’t think— ”
“We are considering the actual death throes of a murdered individual,” said Alleyn mildly. “I should like a clear picture.”
She opened her eyes wide, a look of extreme horror came into her face. She looked wildly round the room, darted a furious glance at Alleyn, and said in a strangled voice: “Let me out. I’ve got to go out.”
Fox rose in consternation, but she pushed him away and ran blindly to the door.
“Never mind, Fox,” said Alleyn.
The door banged.
“Here,” said Fox, “what’s she up to?”
“She’s bolted,” exclaimed Nigel. “Look out! She’s doing a bolt.”
“Only as far as the cloak-room,” said Alleyn. “The fatal woman is going to be very sick.”
CHAPTER XI
Ormerin’s Nerves and Sonia’s Correspondence
“Well, really, Alleyn,” said Nigel, “I consider you were hard on that girl. You deliberately upset her lovely stomach.”
“How do you know her stomach’s lovely?”
“By inference. What did you do it for?”
“I was sick of that Cleopatra nonsense. She and her catgut nerves!”
“Well, but she is terrifically attractive. A really magnificent creature.”