‘So I still don’t understand, sir,’ he said to Tynant, ‘why, having taken Dr Lochlure back to the hotel, you did not commandeer a bed for yourself as well as one for the lady, after you had telephoned the garage.’
‘Do I have to keep spelling it out?’ demanded Tynant irritably. ‘Susannah and I were resolved not to return to Holdy village together. I am deeply concerned for her reputation. We were not supposed to have spent the weekend together. She was supposed to have stayed at the home of Fiona Broadmayne and nobody cared a damn what I did on my own, but there soon would have been wagging tongues if it was known – as it is now, unfortunately – that we spent the weekend together at Holdy Bay. I may add that I have made a formal proposal of marriage to Susannah.’
‘So all’s well that ends well, sir.’
‘No. If you must know, she turned me down. If you really want something useful to do, you might find me another couple of stalwarts to help on my dig. You remember them, Stickle and Stour? Well, I’ve enquired at the hostel in Pureford where they were living, but they seem to have walked out from there without giving notice and it’s three days now since anybody has seen them.’
‘Pureford seems a long way off from here, sir. It’s all of fifteen miles, isn’t it?’
‘They came in on a motorbike and sidecar every morning and rode back to the hostel at midday. We don’t work in the afternoons because of the weather and the women. We paid the men a generous petrol allowance. They were not permanent residents, I believe, but itinerants who usually picked up jobs on building sites or any other casual labour they could get. They were glad enough of this job here, I thought, because it offered steady work for a couple of months or even longer. I can’t see any reason why they should have walked out on me.’
‘Had they asked for better wages and been refused, sir? Had there been discontent?’
‘Not so far as I know, but, of course, Veryan engaged them in the first place, not myself. They may have got involved with something at the hostel, but on the site here I never heard of any trouble. I suppose they just got tired of the job or maybe they got to know of something where the pay was better or the work easier. I’m very anxious to replace them. My volunteers are getting fed-up at having to carry on without any extra help.’
With the assistance of Detective-Sergeant Harrow, that lissome lady-killer, Mowbray had re-checked all the rest of the evidence, if such it could be called, that he had collected concerning the availability of the fire-escape at the Horse and Cart for nefarious or legitimate entry into and departure from that hostelry. He had discovered that, on those luminous summer nights, any figure standing or sitting at the top of the castle keep was silhouetted against the sky and plainly visible from the flat part of the hotel roof. Except in respect of height, however – for instance, Priscilla could not have been mistaken for Veryan or Susannah for Saltergate – there was a less than even chance of a name being put to any person seen by night on the tower. He had tried the same experiment from the Barbican, but the church tower obstructed the view from the highest windows in the hotel and there was no flat part of the roof on which any observer or watcher could stand.
‘It comes back every time either to Tynant or the Saltergates,’ said Mowbray, ‘and that, I reckon, means him, not her. I like him and she is a very nice lady, but they did have a row with Veryan and these academics can be real nasty to each other when they roll their sleeves up and start in.’
‘They’re only nasty to one another in print, sir. They don’t
‘Saltergate is a nutter where that restoration of the castle is concerned.’
‘He wouldn’t have thought about wiping his dabs off the telescope, sir, and that’s all we’ve got to go on in thinking this is a case of murder. I reckon Tynant’s our man.’
‘So what
‘What I told that other policeman,’ said Fiona. ‘I took him along to my home and he saw the paint on the window frames.’
‘He also touched it, miss. In this weather, and with the window and door wide open, it ought to have dried, but it hadn’t. Come on, now, miss. Do yourself a bit of good. We know we’ve got a case of murder on our hands and it’s obvious that a fit, lovely-made young lady like yourself could have made mincemeat of a string-bean like Professor Veryan, had you felt the urge.’
‘Well, I didn’t feel the urge. I had nothing against Professor Veryan. I have nothing against anybody in our castle party which would make me want to injure them physically.’
‘I believe you absolutely, miss, so why not come clean? You must have been up to something you didn’t want known, but, whatever it was, it can’t have been as serious as finding yourself on a murder charge.’
‘I think your argument is shaky.’
‘Not as shaky as your alibi, miss. Do yourself a bit of good, like I say. We’re interested in nothing except the death of Professor Veryan. If you went out and burgled a house or robbed a bank, that doesn’t concern us in the least, but in faking an alibi you give rise to our worst suspicions, don’t you see?’
Fiona looked at his handsome, concerned and friendly young face and, although she wondered for one passing half-second what the serpent in Eden must have looked like when he overcame Eve so easily, she decided to trust her present tempter.
‘Well, I did spend most of the weekend at my parents’ house, as I said, but on Sunday night I came back to do some poaching.’
‘Poaching? Where, miss?’ Harrow was sceptical.
‘On the Holdy manor estate.’
‘Did you get anything?’
‘No. I walked slap into a keeper. He had a gun, so I didn’t argue with him. He marched me off and locked me in a little hut. After about two hours he came back and unlocked the door and made an unacceptable suggestion to me, so, gun or no gun, I bashed his face in and ran to where I had left the car.’
‘I shall have to check your story, miss.’
‘Check away,’ said Fiona calmly. ‘That dirty-minded little lecher will remember me all right and, anyway, I went poaching because I was bored and fed up, but I didn’t get a pheasant or a salmon or a rabbit and nobody can say I did.’
