'Benson, escort the lady to her room.'
'Yes, sir,' the man named Benson said as he followed Miss Pembroke out of the conservatory.
'Her story sounds reasonable, more or less,' Dalton commented.
'She acted guilty enough,' Thaxton said.
'Lord Peter,' Motherwell said, 'can you state positively that you saw Miss Pembroke in this room?'
Thaxton shook his head ruefully. 'It was dark, and I got only a glimpse. It could have been Amanda Thripps. They both have long brown hair, as I recall. And I was only bluffing about recognizing the nightgown, hoping to gull her into a confession. All women's nighties look alike to me. I'm afraid I couldn't swear to anything.'
'Pity,' Motherwell said, then yawned. After recovering he said, 'I must get some sleep!'
'Shall we take the prisoner to the station, Inspector?' Featherstone asked.
'No, I want him kept under guard all night. I'll question him first thing in the morning.'
'Right, Inspector. We'll take him down to the wine cellar. It has a door with a bolt on it.'
'Good thinking, Featherstone. Take care not to fall asleep. And as for you, Mr. — '
'Vespal. Shrinam Vespal.'
'Mr. Vespal, we shall see you again come daybreak. You had best get your story straight in your mind.'
'There is nothing in my mind but thoughts of freedom for the people of my country! I spit on the body of the dead tyrant!'
He spat several times in the general direction of the Mahajadi.
'Take him away,' Motherwell said calmly.
Thaxton was kneeling to examine the body. 'This dagger certainly looks Oriental.'
'Yes, we'll test it for prints, of course,' Motherwell said. 'And if we find Mr. Vespal's… well, it'll be open and shut.'
'And if you don't?'
'Then, gentlemen, we have another mystery on our hands.'
'As if we needed one,' Dalton said. 'I'm for sleep this time, Lord Peter. No more talk.'
Thaxton rose. 'Right.'
Back upstairs, Dalton collapsed on the bed.
'Rats. They always seem to squeeze us together into the same bed.'
'They?' Lord Peter said as he shed his smoking jacket.
'People who own castles and big houses where murders are done.'
'Come now, old bean, we don't do this sort of thing often enough to establish patterns.' As he spoke, Lord Peter opened the closet door.
Dalton sat up. 'You know-' His jaw dropped.
'I mean,' Lord Peter went on, 'it's not as if we get into murders every day of the week. We… what is it, old man? You look as though you've seen a ghost.'
Dalton pointed toward the open closet, inside which someone-rather, the whey-faced remains of someone- was standing. Or had been propped.
Thaxton's back was to the closet. 'What the devil is it, Dalton, old boy?'
The body teetered and fell against Thaxton.
Thaxton absently pushed it back. 'Pardon me,' he said, half-turning. Then the realization hit him. He yelled and jumped away.
The body, in an advanced state of rigor mortis, teetered forward again and fell with a resounding thump.
Both men stared down at it. 'Sir Laurence,' Dalton said.
Thaxton said, 'By God, there's something fishy about all this.'
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
'I'm telling you,' Hochstader 3 insisted, 'I didn't have anything to do with the life-switching scam.'
'One of you has something to do with it,' Max said.
'Not necessarily true, if you mean one of us, here.' Hochstader 108 was the standard issue, maybe a tad younger-looking than Hochstader 3. The only thing really different about him was that he was decked out in some ridiculous medieval outfit: doublet and hose. The anachronistic note of orange athletic shoes somehow failed to be jarring.
'Okay, one of an infinite number of you,' Max amended. 'But somebody's responsible, and his name is Hochstader, and both your names are Hochstader.'
'But neither of us cooked up the life-swap con,' said 3. 'Get that through your head. We're variants of each other, but we're both innocent. Got that?'
'Yeah, I guess. Jeez, this is so gonzo, so absolutely far out.
'Right, but it's not totally incomprehensible.'
'Sure, it's all so simple,' Max sneered. 'Here we are in King Iodine's castle-'
'Incarnadine.'
'Whatever-and there are an infinite number of portals and magical doors, and pretty soon Rod Serling is going to come out of the woodwork and start talking to the camera.' The Hochstaders shrugged at each other.
'So,' said 3, 'what do we do?'
'Well,' said 108, 'first we'll have to get you back to your variant of the castle.'
'Got any suggestions?'
Hochstader 108 leaned back in his swivel chair and thought about it. 'I might, if I knew anything about tuning a portal. You seem to know a bit about it.'
'I admit I've fiddled with the idea.'
'Wait a minute. Didn't Max find you in that office?'
'Sure, I opened the portal and rented the office, or vice versa. But I hadn't started anything. I was just thinking about possible approaches, when Max barged in and started yammering about how I hoodwinked him.'
'You must have had some swindle in mind,' said 108.
'1 resent that. I was doing research into probability universe variants. It all relates to quantum theory.'
'Yeah, I'll bet,' scoffed 108.
'Listen, I know you. Hell, I am you. And we've done some sneaky things in the past.'
'Yeah,' 3 admitted, 'sure, the computer scams. But that's the past.'
'And this is the present. What were you really up to?'
Hochstader 3 sighed. 'Oh, I admit, I was toying with some ideas. Like, noting a stock trend in one world before it started in another. But there's no guarantee these kinds of phenomena will cross worlds. Anyway, stuff like that. But as long as I thought about it, I couldn't come up with any surefire scheme to make money.'
Hochstader 108 nodded. 'Yeah, I've always been aware of the possibilities…'
'See!' said 3 accusingly.
'I said we're more alike than you're willing to admit. Sure, you'd think that there'd be some way to milk some bucks out of a thing like this.' He gestured expansively. 'Out of something like the castle. Hell, you could charge a mint for people to come and stay here.'
Hochstader 3's brow went up. 'Hey. I never thought of that.
'Of course, Lord Inky wouldn't take to that too kindly, but you might be able to get away with it if you stuck your guests in some far part of the castle. A little dangerous, maybe, but what the hell.'
'Nah,' said 3, shaking his head. 'Inky would be all over you like a cheap suit.'
'Eventually,' 108 agreed. 'But my question is, why do it at all?'
'What do you mean?'
'You have the castle, and everything in it, and access to any world you want. Why do you need money?' Hochstader 3 considered it. At length he shrugged. 'I dunno. I guess money's superfluous.'
'Right.'
