After a moment Alleyn stretched out a thin hand and touched him.
“It’s best,” he said. “I’m not altogether inhuman, and believe me, in every way, it’s best.”
He could not hear the answer.
“Do you agree?” asked Alleyn gently.
Without raising his head Maurice spoke again.
“—want to think — tomorrow — give me time.”
Alleyn thought for a moment.
“Very well,” he said at last, “I’ll give you till tomorrow. But don’t commit suicide. It would be so very unprincipled, and we should have to arrest Miss Jenkins for perjury or something, and hang Mr. Garnette. Perhaps I’d better leave someone here. You are a nuisance, aren’t you? Good evening.”
CHAPTER XXIV
Maurice Speaks
On a stormy evening of December last year, five days after the murder of Cara Quayne, Nigel Bathgate stood at the window of his flat in Chester Terrace and looked across the street into Knocklatchers Row. It was blowing a gale and the rain made diagonal streamers of tinsel against the wet black of the houses. The sign of the Sacred Flame swung crazily out and back. A faint light shone from the concealed entry and ran in a gleaming streak down the margin of a policeman’s cape. The policeman had just arrived, relieving a man who had been on duty there all the afternoon. As Nigel looked down through the rain Miss Wade’s umbrella appeared from the direction of Westbourne Street. He knew it was Miss Wade’s umbrella because of its colour, a dejected sap-green, and because Miss Wade’s goloshes and parts of herself were revealed as she struggled against the wind. The goloshes turned in at Knocklatchers Row just as a taxi came up from the opposite direction. It stopped at the House of the Sacred Flame. Mr. Ogden got out, paid his fare, threw away his cigar and, nodding to the policeman, disappeared down the entry. Then Maurice Pringle came down Chester Terrace, the collar of his mackintosh turned up and the brim of his hat pulled down over his eyes. Another taxi followed Mr. Ogden’s. It overtook and passed Maurice Pringle and a man who came from the same direction as Maurice. There was an interval, and then Lionel and Claude appeared under one umbrella. Then two more taxis and at last a closed car that whisked round the corner and drew up stylishly under the Sign of the Sacred Flame. Two men got out of this car. The first was large and solid, the second tall with a good figure, and a certain air of being well-dressed.
When Nigel saw this last figure he turned from the window, picked up his hat and umbrella, and went out into the rain.
In Chester Terrace the wind blew as violently as it had done on the night of the murder. The whole scene was a repetition so exact that Nigel had a curious sensation of suspended time, as though everything that had happened since Sunday evening was happening still. Even as he lowered his umbrella to meet the veering wind, Cara Quayne raised the cup to her lips, Garnette drank brandy and rectified spirit in the room behind the altar, his face veiled by the smoke of Maurice Pringle’s cigarette. De Ravigne stood with the book in his hand, and Ogden stared at him with his mouth open. Mrs. Candour, Miss Wade and the two acolytes nodded like mandarins in the background, and the doorkeeper repeated incessantly: “I’m afraid you’re too late. May I draw your attention to our regulations?”
“It would be fun to write it all up on those lines,” thought Nigel, “but not precisely what the Press-lord ordered.”
This reflection brought him to the entry and the end of his fancies.
The torch in the wire frame was unlit. A large constable stood in the doorkeeper’s place and beside him were Chief Detective-Inspector Alleyn and Detective-Inspector Fox.
“They’re all in, sir,” said the constable.
“Ah,” answered Alleyn. “We’ll give them a minute to get comfortably settled and then we shall gatecrash.”
“Good evening,” said Nigel.
“Hullo. Here’s Public Benefactor No. 1. Well, Bathgate, your information was correct and we’re all much obliged. How did you find out?”
“Through Janey Jenkins. I rang up to see if she was all right after our ghastly night out with Pringle, and she told me they were meeting at Garnette’s flat this afternoon. It’s Ogden’s idea. He thought they ought to get together like regular fellows and figure things out.”
“Americans are a gregarious race,” said Alleyn. “Did you get the eavesdropper fixed up, Fox?”
“We did, sir. The Reverend went for a constitutional this afternoon and we fixed it all up nice and quiet while he was away. It’s a small room and everything ought to come through very clear.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Nigel composedly.
“A cunning devise, Bathgate, a cunning device. We shall sit among pagan gods and listen, like a Sforza in a Renaissance palace, to tales of murder. It will probably be inexpressibly tedious, but we may pick up a bit here and there.”
“You mean, I suppose, that you have installed a dictaphone.”
“Not quite that. We have installed a microphone with wires leading to a small loud-speaker. What a pity Leonardo is not alive to-day. I believe he is the only man of his time who would not be disconcerted by modern contraptions.”
“He wouldn’t like the women,” said Nigel.
“He wouldn’t recognise them as such. I think we might go in, Fox, don’t you?”
They went quickly into the hall. Alleyn led the way to a recess on the right where Monsieur de Ravigne’s statuette stood above a small altar. The whole recess only held six rows of chairs and was like a miniature shrine. The entrance was framed with heavy curtains which Fox drew after them. They were thus completely hidden from the main body of the hall. Fox switched on his torch and pointed it at the far corner by the altar. Nigel saw a glint of metal. They moved forward. Fox stooped down. A tiny metallic sound broke the silence. It was like a minute telephone under a heap of cushions. At a sign from Alleyn they squatted on the ground. Nigel’s knees gave two stentorian cracks and Alleyn hissed at him. A Lilliputian Mr. Ogden remarked:
“O.K. by me. Well folks, there’s no cops listening in. The plain-clothes guy that’s been sticking around the back door came unglued this morning, and the dick at the front’s only there for show. I guess we’d better square up and make it a regular meeting. There’s no sense in sitting around and handing out hot air. The first thing to do is to appoint a chairman.”
“Oh, God!” said Pringle’s voice.
“But surely, Mr. Ogden,” said Father Garnette, “there is no neeessitah—”
“I agree with Mr. Ogden.” That was de Ravigne. “It is better to make this affair formal. Let us appoint a chairman. I propose Mr. Ogden should fill this office.”
“Aw say, I wasn’t putting out feelers—”
“I second that. Hem!” Miss Wade.
“Well, thanks a lot. I certainly appreciate—”
“Good Lord,” said Alleyn, “he’s going to make a speech!” And sure enough, make a speech Mr. Ogden did. He used every conceivable American business phrase, but what he said might be summed up as follows: They were all under suspicion of murder, and they all wished to clear themselves. No doubt each of them had his or her own theory. He thought it would be to their mutual benefit to share these theories. After the disaster of Sunday it was unlikely that their ceremonies should or could be continued. The House of the Sacred Flame was a business concern and therefore should be wound up in a businesslike manner. At this juncture there was a confused but energetic protest from Father Garnette, Mrs. Candour and Miss Wade. The word “spiritual” was used repeatedly.