employer found he owned.”
Superintendent Leeyes grunted. “But to lessen the risk,” pursued Sloan, “Dillow put a dud electric light bulb in the fitting over the picture. It’s in a bad light as it is and Miss Cleepe is shortsighted anyway and isn’t an expert.”
“Then what?” demanded Leeyes.
“I think he killed him when he took his tea tray in, ate the tea himself, and left the body in the Library.”
“Sloan”—irritably—“there’s something very old-fashioned about all this—butlers and bodies in the Library.”
“Traditional, sir,” Sloan reminded him. “You said we could expect the traditional at Ornum.”
Leeyes grunted again.
“He left him in the Library, sir, while he deflected the Vicar. It’s not the sort of Library anyone uses much in the ordinary way. Then after he sounded the dressing bell”—the only dressing bell Sloan knew was that on his own alarm clock, which went off every morning at seven o’clock, not every evening at seven-thirty, but he was prepared to believe that there were others—“while all those in the House were changing he carried the body down to the armoury.”
“Quite a good time to choose.”
“Very. Except for one thing. William Murton was watching him from the spyhole above the Great Hall. As well as seeing Dillow carrying Mr. Meredith’s body he also saw the chandelier lying on the table—which was what put us on to him having been there.” Sloan discreetly omitted Lady Alice from the narrative. Ghosts were all very well in Ornum House: in the stark, scrubbed police office in Berebury they became too insubstantial to mention.
“What put you on to Dillow?” enquired Leeyes. “That’s more important.”
“Teacups,” said Sloan. “There should have been three on their Ladyships’ tray.”
“Teacups?”
“There were only two,” explained Sloan, “which meant that by the time he took them their tea Dillow must have already overheard Meredith telling the Vicar’s wife that he would be waiting for her husband in the Library and guessed exactly what discovery Meredith had made.”
“Meredith could have told him himself that he wasn’t going up to the two old birds,” objected Leeyes.
“If he did, sir, then Dillow was lying when he said he hadn’t seen him earlier. Six of one, half a dozen of the other.”
“And Murton?”
“William Murton decided that in future Dillow could subsidise his pleasures—he therefore didn’t ask his uncle for a loan this weekend—which I gather was something so unusual as to be remarkable.”
“So he got what was coming to him.”
“I’m afraid so, sir. As soon as he tried it on, probably. He was dealing with a tougher nut than he knew. Than we knew,” Sloan added honestly. Dillow hadn’t gone quietly, but there had been policemen everywhere.
“Hrrrrrrmph,” said Leeyes. “And what stopped Dillow just clearing off with the picture?”
“Michael Fisher, Mrs. Laura Cremond, and me,” said Sloan. “The boy found Mr. Meredith too soon, Mrs. Cremond stirred up the Muniments, and I sealed the door. If I hadn’t I think it would have gone out today under Dillow’s arm.”
“Today?”
“His day off. Bad luck, really. He parked it in the safest place he knew. He tried to break the door down in the night and to lure the Archivist out with food today.”
“Hrrrrrrmph,” said Leeyes again. “And Murton?”
“I expect,” said Sloan, “Dillow suggested he and Murton go somewhere for a nice quiet chat—like the dungeons.”
Inspector Sloan had left Constable Crosby and Constable Bloggs on duty outside the door of the Private Apartments with firm instructions about the Ornum family remaining undisturbed.
The door, therefore, in theory should not have opened at all at this juncture, still less should an incredibly old lady in black have got past them armed with nothing more intimidating than a lorgnette.
But she had.
“Why,” demanded the querulous voice of Lady Alice Cremond, “has Dillow not brought us our tea?”
Detective Constable Crosby turned the police car in that wide sweep of carriageway in front of Ornum House where the coaches of the Earls of Ornum had been wont to go into that wide arc of drive that brought them to the front door.
There was room to have paraded the entire County of Calleshire Force and to spare—but there were only two members of it present: Inspector Sloan and Constable Crosby.
“Home, James, and don’t spare the horses,” commanded Sloan, climbing in.
“Beg pardon, sir?”
Sloan sighed. “Headquarters, Crosby, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
They drove through the Park, past the Folly, ignoring the Earl’s prize deer. Crosby steered the car between the gryphons on the gate finial without a sidelong glance.
Sloan looked at his watch and thought that—with a bit of luck—he’d be home in time to nip round his garden before the light went. Yesterday—was it only yesterday?—there had been a rose—new rose—nearly out. It might not be good enough for showing, but he thought he would try.
You could never tell with judges.
They left the copybook village of Ornum behind and got on the open road.
They were on the outskirts of Berebury when they saw the ambulance.
It was in a hurry. Crosby slowed down and eased to the side of the road as it flashed by in the opposite direction. The sound of its siren was nearly extinguished by the roar of the motorcycle that was following the ambulance at great speed.
“That’s Pete Bellamy, that is,” observed Crosby inconsequentially.
“Well I hope Traffic pick him up.”
“Always follows the blood wagon, does Pete.”
“Say that again, Crosby.”
“About Pete Bellamy, sir? He lives opposite the ambulance station.”
“Where does he work?”
“Some garage in the town, sir. He’s just got himself the bike.”
“So that each time the bell goes down he chases the ambulance.”
“That’s right.”
“Only when he’s not at work of course.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“What’s his dinnertime?”
“I couldn’t say, sir. It is important?”
“And if it’s a smash-up he rings his boss.”
“I expect so, sir. They don’t pay them a lot you know. Not apprentices.”
“And his boss comes out with the breakdown truck on the off chance.”
“They do it in other places,” said Crosby defensively. “Big mainroad counties. Near black spots and so forth. The truck just follows the ambulance.”
“Maternity cases,” said Sloan sarcastically, “must be a big disappointment to them.”
“It’s probably worth it,” said Crosby. “One good roundabout’s worth a lot of swings in the car trade.” He said anxiously, “Is it important, sir? Shall I have to tell him to stop?”
Sloan breathed very deeply. “No, Crosby. Just to drive more carefully.”
He reached into his briefcase for the formal charge sheet.
Presently he read it out to a sullen silent prisoner.
“Michael Joseph Dillow you are charged that on Friday, June 20, last, you did feloniously cause the death of one Osborne Meredith, against the Peace of Our Sovereign Lady the Queen, her Crown and Dignity…”
