‘It seems, ma’am,’ said Phillips, recounting to Dame Beatrice the story he had had from Maisry, ‘that after Miss Machrado had threatened him with a knife, and after she had run halfway down the street after him – he having taken the knife away and smacked her face – all this is vouched for by the landlady – he went on a drinking spree with some of his friends and then those who were sober enough got the drunks, including Otto, back to the lodging house where they were staying while they were ashore.’
‘And after that?’
‘He went back to his ship on the following day.’
‘What about his story that his mother brushed and pressed his clothes?’
‘Quite false. You were right when you called him a psychopath, ma’am. He’s a pathological liar. Seems incapable of telling a straight story. Must enlarge and embroider.’
‘Some of that might show a misplaced sense of humour, of course.’
‘The police don’t appreciate misplaced senses of humour, ma’am.’
‘Who does, except the humourist himself? But if, after he had recovered from the results of this drinking bout, he returned to his ship, what reason have you for suspecting him of killing Miss Machrado?’
‘I don’t suspect him, ma’am – although I well might, if there was the slightest chance that he could have strangled his sister – it’s Maisry who insisted on pulling him in. He went back to his ship, yes, but Maisry has unearthed one of the men-students at the College who alleges that Miss Machrado came to his digs and told him that her landlady had kicked her out, that she had nowhere to go, that she was pregnant by Schumann, and begged him to help her. Well, the poor young chap wasn’t prepared to do anything much, but he suggested that she should go to Schumann and threaten to report him to his captain if he did not marry her. This, the student asserts, she decided to do. She went to the ship in his company because she claimed, probably rightly, that he might be allowed on board, but that she would not. To sum up, the student’s story is that he persuaded Otto to come ashore and speak to the girl, and that the two of them strolled off together.’
‘And does Otto agree that this happened?’
‘Yes, so far. Then his famous inventive powers came into play again. He told Maisry that he persuaded the girl to throw herself on his mother’s mercy, and that he gave her a note to take to his mother, acknowledging that the coming child was his, and begging her to take the girl in because he proposed to marry her on his next leave.’
‘And Mrs Schumann?’
‘Denies that either the girl or her son’s note ever came anywhere near her.’
‘So Detective-Inspector Maisry has plumped for Otto, but you yourself are still on the trail of Edward James?’
‘I’m not happy about Schumann, ma’am. I still think both murders were committed by James, or, if not by him, at least by the same hand.’
‘If not by him? You are wavering in your opinion that he is our murderer?’
‘Not altogether. The only thing is that James really did spend his Christmas holiday in London, and went every day it was open to the London Library. That I proved, but it doesn’t take into account how he spent his evenings. He gave me the address of the boarding-house where he stayed, but I couldn’t get much help there. James was not often in of an evening, and claimed that he did a round of theatres and cinemas. I asked him to show me the theatre programmes as a bit of a check, but he says he never kept them – always left them behind at the theatre. He could certainly give me a pretty good idea of what the plays and films were about, but, of course, an educated man like him could have memorised all the main points from newspaper reports or from what other people had told him.’
‘Were you able to convince yourself that Mr James and Miss Machrado had met at least once at Mrs Schumann’s cottage?’
‘Oh, yes, he doesn’t deny that, but says it was only once, although Mrs Schumann thinks it may have been twice.’
‘Well,’ said Gavin, meeting Dame Beatrice at her house in Kensington, ‘I’ve an open mind about who killed Karen Schumann, but I don’t think there’s much room for doubt about who killed Maria Machrado.’
‘When you spoke to Laura over the telephone you made the intriguing suggestion that, but for an odd coincidence, Otto would have been in a position to kill his sister. To what circumstances did you refer?’
‘That he was almost sacked for setting about and half-killing a Lascar seaman. The shipping company took a dim view and threatened to sack him there and then, but his skipper stood by him and claimed that the man was insufferably lazy and had also given lip and refused to obey orders, so, reluctantly, (the captain told me), the directors gave way, issued a stern warning to Otto that the sort of conduct which obtained in a whaler in the sixties of last century would certainly not be tolerated in any ship of theirs, and allowed him to make the next voyage. As it chanced, it was during the next voyage that his sister was murdered, and, of course, he had a fool-proof motive for killing her – only he didn’t.’
‘You mean the money she refused to give him, don’t you? But he still would not have obtained possession of it. She left everything to her mother.’
‘Who may possibly have killed Maria Machrado, but who cannot, surely, be suspected of having killed her own daughter. I can’t think why the idea ever crossed our minds, can you?’
Dame Beatrice wagged her head, but made no reply.
CHAPTER THREE
Done to Death by …
‘Her lips
