(2)
'The police don't accept Romilly's identification of the body?' said Judith. 'But why not?'
'The brothers were much alike, from what I remember of them,' said Romilly, 'and, of course, the face was in a dreadful mess. It would be easy enough to make a mistake, and, apparently, that is what I did. So Hubert is in Italy, is he? Oh, well, that settles it. Shall I still have to appear at the inquest?'
'I'm afraid so, sir,' said Kirkby. The jury will want to hear about your discovery of the body.'
'The jury? But this is a coroner's court! It isn't a court of justice!'
'In cases of violent death, sir, the coroner sits with a jury composed of seven to eleven persons. Their verdict need not be unanimous, but can be accepted provided that the minority does not number more than two persons. That is the law as it stands at present.'
'I don't care about this idea of a jury. It seems to me to smack of the criminal courts.'
'Well, those will have to come into it in due course, sir, won't they? This was not an accidental death.'
'Is that quite certain, though, Detective-Inspector? Those cliffs are very dangerous.'
'You will hear the medical evidence at the inquest, sir.'
'Well, Romilly,' said Dame Beatrice, when Kirkby had gone, 'it is as well that the mistake in identification was discovered in time, before the funeral took place. It is a grisly matter disinterring a corpse. What made you think it was Hubert?'
'I had not seen Caesar's boys except in the photographs he sent out to Kenya. I confused one with the other, that's all. Are they bringing Hubert over here to identify the body, do you know?'
'I doubt it,' said Dame Beatrice obliquely. 'There must be numbers of people who knew Willoughby.'
She was aware of Romilly's sigh of relief. She caught up with Kirkby. He was strolling towards the gates of Galliard Hall, outside which he had left the car which had brought him from Dorchester.
'Well?' he said. 'Any signs of guilt?'
'Nothing but signs of relief that he will not come face to face with Hubert at the inquest.'
'Oh, well, families being what they are, that's understandable, perhaps. It need not be a sign of guilt. Well, my next job is to find a reliable witness. The inquest is to be on Thursday, and it may have to be adjourned. It just depends upon what I can ferret out in the next couple of days, although I haven't much hope at present of anything new turning up in such a short time. You'll come along, I hope?'
'Most certainly. Where will it be held?'
'In the great hall of Galliard Hall itself. Mr Romilly has no objection to that, and it will be the most convenient place, as it is the only room in the neighbourhood, apart from a church hall, large enough for the purpose. I'll hope to see you at ten o'clock on Thursday morning, then.'
(3)
Kirkby's car was out of sight, and Dame Beatrice was about to enter her own, when a third car descended the long slope, a car which she recognised as that of her son Ferdinand. He was with his wife, and, with a wave of the hand to Dame Beatrice, he drove through the lodge gates and up to the house, presumably to carry out his assignment.
'Drive to the top of the hill, George,' said Dame Beatrice to her chauffeur, 'and find a place where we can park the car off the road. We will wait for Sir Ferdinand. I hope that he may have something interesting to tell me.'
George did as he was ordered, and they waited for the better part of an hour before Ferdinand's car came round the bend of the narrow road and pulled up on the grass verge just in front of them. Ferdinand got out. Dame Beatrice lowered the back-seat window.
'Give you lunch at Sandbanks, mother, and drop you at the Stone House afterwards,' he said, when he came up.
Dame Beatrice accepted this invitation, climbed into his car and left him to tell George to take her own car home.
'Well?' she said, when they were headed for Studland and the car ferry. 'What of Romilly?'
'Only that he isn't. There is not the very faintest resemblance. This fellow is too tall, too old and doesn't need glasses. I put my own on to look at the Raeburn, and he took a pair from its case, but put them back again and returned the case to his pocket. I received the impression that he was accustomed to produce them merely in order to demonstrate that he possessed a pair, which seems to indicate that he knows (or knew) the real Romilly.
'He doesn't know much about pictures, either. He didn't know which was the Raeburn, for one thing. To test him, I went first to another picture-you had described the position of the Raeburn and had said that it was a portrait, and it was exactly as you had told me-and began to eulogise it, and then I produced a handwritten letter of introduction cooked up, as a matter of fact, by my clerk, and asked him whether he was prepared to sell. He read it without using his glasses, and then explained that the pictures were heirlooms, so then I went over and scrutinised the Raeburn and asked him whether it was one of his ancestors. He agreed that it was. I ventured to say that it was from Reynold's best period, to which he agreed. Oh, there's no doubt about it, mother. He's an imposter all right. I wonder what's happened to the real Romilly Lestrange?'
(4)
The coroner was a solicitor and he sat with a jury of seven, two of whom were women. Kirkby had found three unbiased and reliable witnesses who, shown the body separately and being given no chance to communicate with one another until all had expressed an opinion as to the identity of the dead man, had severally asserted that it was Willoughby Lestrange. Only one of them was needed to testify in court, so Kirkby had selected the hotel manager. His evidence was clear and unchallenged. The deceased, he stated, had been a guest in his hotel in Carlisle for some years and had left it soon after the demise of Mr Felix Napoleon Lestrange, who had employed Mr Willoughby as secretary and to whom he was distantly related. They were known at the hotel as Mr Lestrange and Mr Willoughby respectively, to avoid confusion.
The manager was succeeded by Romilly, who gave evidence of the finding of the body. Judith was also called, as she had been with him at the time, and she substantiated his account. After this came the medical evidence. Doctor Gerald Randall was called.
'You are Doctor Gerald Randall?'
'That is my name.'
'When did you see the body of the man whom you now know was Mr Willoughby Lestrange?'
'I saw it, and examined it, on the afternoon of March 4th at about six-thirty.'
'What, in your opinion, was the cause of death?'
'I found that the deceased had been stabbed through the heart.'
'Were there any other marks of violence on the body?'
'Yes, but I formed the opinion that these had been inflicted after death had taken place. The head and limbs had been battered from having been in contact, I assumed, with the rocks among which, I understand, the body was found.'
'Did you form any opinion as to the length of time the man had been dead?'
'It is an opinion only, but I should say he had been dead for at least a week. I am not prepared to be more specific than that.'
'He could not have been dead for a lesser time than that?-say, three to four days?'
'To the best of my knowledge and belief, he had been dead for not less than a week, but not as long as a fortnight. The neck and face were discoloured and swollen, and the body, I was told, had been found floating. These symptoms occur when a body has been found in water in cold weather, between five and eight days after death. I am inclined to suggest the longer period, as decomposition of the trunk, with little distension, was already apparent.'
'You conducted an autopsy?'
'I did, with the assistance of my colleague, Mr Percy Mansel, the surgeon, who agrees with my findings.'