John Dickson Carr
Writing as
Carter Dickson
White Priory Murders
CHAPTER ONE
Certain Reflections in the Mirror
'Humph,' said H. M., 'so you're my nephew, hey?' He continued to peer morosely over the tops of his glasses, his mouth turned down sourly and his big hands folded over his big stomach. His swivel chair squeaked behind the desk. He sniffed. 'Well, have a cigar, then. And some whisky. - What's so blasted funny, hey? You got a cheek, you have. What're you grinnin' at, curse you?'
The nephew of Sir Henry Merrivale had come very close to laughing in Sir Henry Merrivale's face. It was, unfortunately, the way nearly everybody treated the great H. M., including all his subordinates at the War Office, and this was a very sore point with him. Mr. James Boynton Bennett could not help knowing it. When you are a young man just arrived from over the water, and you sit for the first time in the office of an eminent uncle who once managed all the sleight-of-hand known as the British Military Intelligence Department, then some little tact is indicated. H. M., although largely ornamental in these slack days, still worked a few wires. There was sport, and often danger, that came out of an unsettled Europe. Bennett's father, who was H. M.'s brother-in-law and enough of a somebody at Washington to know, had given him some extra-family hints before Bennett sailed.
'Don't,' said the elder Bennett, 'don't, under any circumstances, use any ceremony with him. He wouldn't understand it. He has frequently got into trouble at political meetings by making speeches in which he absent- mindedly refers to their Home Secretary as Boko and their Premier as Horse face. You will probably find him asleep, although he will pretend he is very busy. His favorite delusion is that he is being persecuted, and that nobody appreciates him. His baronetcy is two or three hundred years old, and he is also a fighting Socialist. He is a qualified barrister and physician, and he speaks the world's most slovenly grammar. His mind is scurrilous; he shocks lady typists, wears white socks, and appears in public without his necktie. Don't be deceived by his looks; he likes to think he is as expressionless as a Buddha and as sour-faced as Scrooge. I may add,' said the elder Bennett, 'that at criminal investigation he is a good deal of a genius.'
What surprised Sir Henry Merrivale's nephew was that he fulfilled the description exactly. Two hundred pounds of him were piled into a chair behind the big untidy desk, wheezing and grumbling. His big bald head showed against the window of the dingy room, high up and quiet above the bustle of the War Office. H. M.'s room, spacious in decayed finery, is in the most ancient part of the damp old rabbit-warren, once a part of Whitehall Palace: it looks down over a bleak strip of garden, the Victoria Embankment, and the river. A smoky blue twilight the frosty twilight of Christmas week — blurred the window now. Bennett could see reflections from the lamps along the parapet of the Embankment; he could hear the window rattle to the pelting and hooting of buses, and the stir of the fire under the battered white-marble mantelpiece. Except for the fire, there was no light. H. M. sat morosely, his glasses pulled down on his thick nose, blinking. Just over his head there hung from the chandelier a large red-paper Christmas bell.
'Ah!' growled H. J., peering at him with sudden suspicion. 'I see you lookin' at it, young man. Don't think I hang things like that all around my room. But I never count for anything. That's the way they treat me around here. That's Lollypop's work.'
'Lollypop?' said Bennett.
'Secretary,' growled H. M. 'Good girl, but a pest. She's always got me talkin' on the telephone when I give her strict orders I'm busy. I'm always busy. Bah. But she puts flowers on my desk, and hangs bells all about.
'Well, sir,' observed Bennett reasonably, 'if you don't like it, why don't you take it down?'
H. M: s heavy eyelids raised. He began to make violent noises like, 'Rrrr!' and rumble and glare. Then he changed the subject abruptly.
'Fine way for a nephew to talk,' he said. 'Humph. You're like all the others. Let's see-you're Kitty's son, hey? The one that married the Yank? Yes. Do anything for a livin'? Yanks are hell on people working.'
'I do something,' admitted Bennett. 'But I'm not certain what it is. Sort of international errand-boy for my father: that's the reason for my crossing the ocean in December.'
'Hey?' wheezed H. M., peering up. 'Don't tell me they've got you in this business too? Bad. Keep out of it! Mug's game. Dull. And they pester you to death. Home Office is always gettin' a scare about protecting the battleships we haven't got. - Are you in it?'
Bennett took a cigar from the box that was thrust at him across the desk. He said:
'No sir. I only wish I were. All I ever do is shake cocktails for visiting celebrities to my father's department; or else carry messages full of platitudes from the old man to the Foreign Offices of smaller governments. You know the sort of thing. `The Secretary presents his compliments, and assures His Excellency that the matter suggested will receive the fullest attention and so on. It. was only a freak of luck that I came to London at all.' He hesitated, wondering whether he dared broach the subject on his mind. 'It was because of Canifest. A certain Lord Canifest; maybe you know of him? He's the one who owns the string of newspapers.'
H. M. knew everybody. His slovenly figure bumped everywhere through the crush; and even Mayfair hostesses had long since ceased to apologize for him. 'Canifest, hey?' he inquired, as though the smoke of the cigar were unpleasant to his nostrils. 'Sure I know him. He's the one that's whooping for an Anglo-American alliance, and damn the Japanese with their evil eye? Uh, yes. Big fella, with Prime-Ministerish airs and a manner like the world's grandpappa — buttery voice — likes to talk on every possible occasion, hey? Uh huh. Gay dog, too.'
Bennett was startled.
'Well,' he said feelingly, 'I can tell you that's news to me, sir. 1 wish he had been; it would have been easier. You see, he came to the States on a semi-political mission, I gather. Good-will tour and all that. How about an Anglo-American alliance? Of course nobody could do anything, but it made a good impression. They gave him dinners,' said Bennett, with dreary recollections of the platitudes that flowed of Canifest standing impressively bland and white-haired above a microphone and a table of roses. 'And he spoke over the radio and everybody said what a wonderful thing brotherly love was. Part of my job as errand-boy was to go with his party and help conduct him round New York. But as to his being a gay dog-'
He paused, with a few uncomfortable half-memories that, made him wonder. But he saw H. M. regarding him curiously, and went on:
'I'll admit you never know quite what to do in those circumstances, because you have to know your man. The distinguished foreigner says he wants to see American life. All right. You arrange a lot of cocktail parties. And then it turns out that the distinguished foreigner wants to see Grant's Tomb and the Statue of Liberty. All Canifest wanted to do was ask a million questions about the state of America, which nobody can ever answer anyway. It's true, though, that when Marcia Tait arrived..”
H. M. took the cigar out of his mouth. He remained impassive, but there was a curious disconcerting stare in his eyes.
'Hey? What's that,' he said, 'about Marcia Tait?' 'Nothing, sir.'
'You're tryin',' said H. M., pointing the cigar at him malevolently, 'you're tryin' to intrigue my interest, that's what. You got something on your mind. I mighta known it. I mighta known nobody ever calls on me out of filial piety or whatnot. Hah!'
All the baffling images of the past two days crowded in on Bennett. He saw the flat above the bleak park-the brown-paper parcel — Marcia Tait, laughing amid her furs, being photographed in the sleek torpedo of a roadster- and, finally, the red-haired man suddenly doubling up and sliding sideways from the stool at the bar. It had missed murder. But murder had been intended. He shifted uneasily.
'Not at all, sir. I was only answering your questions. After Canifest's visit, my father made a gesture of sending me here to carry a sort of thank-you-for-the-favors-of-your-noblecountryman letter to your Home Office: that's all. There's nothing to it. I had hoped to be back home in time for Christmas.'
'Christmas? Nonsense!' roared H. M., sitting up straight. He glared. 'Nephew, spend it with us.
