Chapter 6 #2
Recalling Tring’s mention of Daisy’s acquaintance with Rudolf Maximilian of Transcarpathia, Alec glanced again at the statement she had made last night.
He frowned. No reference to the Grand Duke there, so at what point had they talked about him?
After she turned “peculiar,” had Tom let her stay on listening to the rest of the interviews?
If so, he was bloody well going to rap the sergeant’s knuckles—except that Tom and Daisy would never give each other away, and Alec could not stoop to asking Ross. Especially as he himself had more than once been manoeuvred into the same misdemeanour.
“By the way, how is Mr. Tring’s cold today?” Daisy asked, with the innocent expression which always made Alec suspicious.
“Much improved.”
For some reason, she laughed. “Spiffing! Right-oh, Chief, that’s all I have to tell you about yesterday, so now you can leave me to get on with my work.”
“Not so fast,” Alec said reluctantly. “Who was nice to Belinda and Derek may be irrelevant, but as Tom pointed out to me, you’ve been consulting these people for your article. You’d better tell me about them.”
Daisy tried hard not to look smug. “Right-oh, Chief,” she said again.
“Unofficial notes, Ernie. Let’s go through them in the
order in which Tom interviewed them.” He reached for the file he had laid on her desk.
“Dr. Smith Woodward, Chief,” said Piper, who had a phenomenal memory for anything to do with names or numbers, “Keeper of Geology. But he was with Miss Dalrymple when the incident occurred.”
“Yes,” said Daisy, “I can’t see how he can have had anything to do with it.
Besides, he’s the epitome of the dedicated scientist, and though Pettigrew was pretty offensive to him, I don’t believe he would waste precious time retaliating, even in words.
He’s twice broken limbs because he reads while he walks. ”
“Cor, honestly?” interjected Ernie Piper.
“Honestly. I heard it from more than one person. He wouldn’t even go to hospital to …”
“Thank you, Daisy!” Alec cut her off. “Only evidence of some sort of incredibly complicated booby-trap could implicate Dr. Smith Woodward. Piper?”
“Mrs. Ditchley, Chief.”
“Ah, yes, grandmother and ex-nurse. You’re not telling me you knew her, Daisy.”
“Not before. I talked to her quite a bit while we waited. But she’s not a suspect?”
“She was very close to the scene. Tom didn’t ask the children if she stayed with them the entire time, but as he says, we couldn’t rely on their testimony where their grandmother is concerned. We’ll have to investigate whether she had any link with the deceased.”
“I suppose so. I’m pretty sure she didn’t, and still surer that she wouldn’t have killed him there and then, however good a motive she had, not with her grandchildren liable to run after her.”
Daisy was going to argue that he should talk to the children
anyway. It had dawned on her that she had really only asked the two eldest what they had seen.
At least, only they answered, and she was not sure the younger ones were even attending to her questions.
They might not have been attending to the toothy Megalosaurus either, so they could have noticed something Arthur and Jennifer missed.
But she doubted they would speak freely to a policeman, especially little Katy, whereas if Daisy just dropped in to ask after … .
“Daisy?” Alec said in his patient voice, dark eyebrows raised. “Are you going to emerge from your trance? What about Miss Fellowes and Mr. Chardford?”
“I’ve never heard of … Oh, the young couple? I didn’t exchange a single word with them. I’d say they were far too wrapped up in each other to care about anything else. Come in,” she called as someone knocked on the door.
Mrs. Potter entered, panting, with cups and teaspoons rattling on a precariously balanced tray. Piper jumped up and took it from her to set it on the desk.
“Ta, ducks. I shoulda put the teapot in the middle. It’s a mite early for elevenses, miss, but I thought you’d want a cuppa while the gentlemen are here. We’re clean out of biscuits,” she said reproachfully.
“Oh dear, I ate the last of them yesterday evening when I was waiting for my egg to boil. I’ll buy some more today, promise.”
“I could pop round the shops.”
“That’s all right,” said Daisy, who had no intention of paying for the char’s time while she “popped”—and gossiped. “We’ll manage without, and you can have bread and jam with your elevenses. I’ll buy something extra special to make up.”
“Don’t you go wasting your pennies on fancy biscuits, miss,” Mrs. Potter advised. “Nothing but a boiled egg to your
supper? Well I never!” She fixed Alec with an accusing glare and marched out.
“I’ll take you out to dinner tonight, Daisy,” said Alec, looking abashed.
“That will be spiffing, darling, but don’t worry, I’m not starving. I was just too tired last night to cook. Lucy and I don’t live entirely on eggs, cheese, and sardines since I started writing for the Americans.”
“I don’t want to keep you from your typewriter longer than I need. Let’s get on with business.”
“The Grand Duke Rudolf Maximilian of Transcarpathia,” anounced Piper grandly, as Daisy poured tea.
Handing cups, she told them all about the gaudy but threadbare young exile and his grandfather’s jewel.
“He’s pompous but rather pathetic, in a way.
Pettigrew was really foul to him. I don’t know if he (Rudolf) properly understands that he (Pettigrew) doesn’t …
didn’t have the authority to turn over the ruby.
He (Rudolf) honestly seems to believe he’s entitled to it. ”
“So he could suppose a new Keeper of Mineralogy might be more accommodating,” Alec mused. “Motive, opportunity … as yet we don’t know enough about means. That’s a big help, Daisy. We might easily not have tumbled to your Grand Duke’s connection. Who’s next, Ernie?”
“Sergeant Wilfred Atkins, Chief, the dinosaur gallery commissionaire.”
“Is he a sergeant, too?” Daisy asked.
“D. C. Ross said lots of the commissionaires are ex-army, miss, and most of ’em sergeants. But all the commissionaires in the east wing ground floor give each other alibis, Chief.”
“Any comment, Daisy?”
“The only one I talked to much was Sergeant Hamm, in fossil mammals. In between quoting and misquoting the
Bible, he told me Pettigrew was perfectly beastly to Reg Underwood, who lost a leg in the War.”
“We don’t know much about the means yet, but I wouldn’t say this was a one-legged man’s crime. Pettigrew was pretty hefty, Tom says.”
“Yes, but all the commissionaires were sympathetic to Underwood and loathed Ol’ Stony, as they called Pettigrew. Isn’t it possible they might provide alibis for each other?”
“Possible,” Alec agreed with a sigh. “We’ll have to bear it in mind, and also for the two assistants who claim to have been together. Do you know them?”
“What are their names?”
Piper provided the names, and Daisy shook her head.
“I was introduced to them in passing, that’s all. I don’t know of any particular motive, beyond the general one applying to all the fossil people, that is.”
“Which is?” Alec asked, sitting up.
Daisy explained about the overwhelming scorn the Mineralogy Keeper poured on fusty old bones of no practical or pecuniary value, and those who studied them. “It’s hard to see it as a reason for murder,” she said, “though I know it doesn’t take much when tempers flare.”
“I wish you had understood what Pettigrew said! If it was extraordinarily insulting, it might have led to unpremeditated murder. We don’t know what he was doing in the reptile gallery, whether he met his murderer by chance, or had a rendezvous, which could mean premeditated murder.
Great Scott, we don’t even know what the murder weapon was! ”
“Dr. Renfrew’ll know by now, Chief,” Piper said. “D’you want me to telephone?”
“No, Ernie, I’m just letting off steam. Let’s get through this list first. Did any of the museum staff have more particular reason to hate Pettigrew, Daisy?”
“Next on the list’s not museum staff, Chief. Leastways, not that museum. A Mr. ffinch-Brown with two small f’s.”
“The British Museum anthropologist,” Alec recalled.
“He has quite a temper,” said Daisy, “and he and Pettigrew were mixed up in a dispute over flint tools. Also, he feels that the Mineralogy Department’s cut gems belong in his custody.”
“Ah!”
Daisy and Piper looked at each other and grinned.
“What … ?”
“You sounded just like Mr. Tring, darling. The oracular ‘ah.’ I don’t think I can tell you any more about ffinch-Brown. Who’s next, Mr. Piper?”
“Mr. Mummery, Curator of Fossil Reptiles.”
“He has an explosive temper, too. If he had a specific, personal reason to hate Pettigrew, I don’t know of it. On the other hand, Pettigrew was killed in his gallery.”
“Point noted. Ernie?”
“Mr. Witt, Chief, Curator of Fossil Mammals.”
“Good-looking,” said Daisy, “youngish, smart dresser, public-school, charming, helpful …”
Alec’s brows met in a straight line above his grey eyes. “This is not helpful,” he growled.
“ … ran a mile when I mentioned having Derek and Belinda with me,” Daisy concluded her teasing list of Witt’s attributes.
“He was working with ffinch-Brown on the flint tool thing. Pettigrew bodily hauled him away to look at some flints when he was talking to me. He looked pretty fed up. It must have been rather humiliating.”
“Aha!” said Alec.
Daisy chuckled. She nearly added that Tom Tring had got on very well with Witt, to the extent of joining him in a Latin music-hall turn. She remembered in time that she was not supposed to have been there.
“Mr. Steadman,” said Piper, “Curator of Dinosaurs.”
“He was very good with the children,” Daisy recalled, “as well as helpful to me. He shared the general dislike of Pettigrew, but that’s all, as far as I know.
His disgruntlement was aimed at the museum’s trustees, for not sponsoring a dinosaur-hunting expedition, and at the Americans for sending a model Diplodocus, not the real thing. ”
“So we’ll know where to look when we find a dead trustee or a dead American on the premises,” Alec said sardonically. “Do stick to the point, Daisy.”
Daisy folded her hands and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Any detail may prove significant,” she quoted his oft-repeated maxim.
“Mr. Ruddlestone,” Piper inserted hastily, “Curator of Inver … in-ver-tee-brates. What are they when they’re at home, Chief?”
“Animals without backbones, Ernie, like so many petty criminals.”
“Daisy darling?” The door swung open and Lucy appeared on the threshold. Alec politely stood up. “Oops, sorry, darling! What am I interrupting? Good morning, Alec. Or is it Chief Inspector today? You’re looking rather official. How fortunate, Daisy, that you didn’t fall for a uniformed policeman!”
“Good morning, Lucy,” Alec said dryly. “I am official this morning, which is why I’ve brought D. C. Piper.”
Lucy nodded to Piper, who had jumped to his feet when Alec rose, but she turned at once back to Daisy. “Good gracious, darling, what have you done now?”
“I suppose you don’t know. You were out when I got home last night and up at some ungodly hour this morning.”
“Yes, Lady Ashton wants her photos toot sweet and the tooter the sweeter, and they needed some delicate touching
up. Darling, can you lend me half a crown for a taxi, or I shall be late.”
“Not if I’m going to buy biscuits, and if I don’t Mrs. Potter may quit.”
“Horrors! And likewise blast and bebotheration!”
With a resigned air, Alec reached into his pocket. “Here you are, Lucy.”
“Gosh, darling, thanks. I’ll pay you back this evening—well, I’ll give it to Daisy to give to you. Toodle-oo, I must run.” Lucy never ran, but she had sauntered through the doorway and half closed the door when she stuck her head back in to say, “By the way, what is it I don’t know?”
“A murder at the Natural History Museum,” said Daisy bluntly.
“Darling, how too, too tiresome. You must tell me all about it later. Pip pip.”
“Toodle-oo,” Daisy responded as the door closed and the men sat down. “Don’t worry, Alec, I shan’t tell her more than I ought. Besides, she isn’t really frightfully interested. Murder is vulgar. Where were we? Ruddlestone?”
“Yes. Do you know him, or did you skip the invertebrates?”
“For the first article I did, but they have to go into the Dilettanti article. Luckily Ruddlestone is enthusiastic enough about his field to make it sound interesting. Again, I don’t know that he had anything more against Pettigrew than the general dislike.
Pettigrew rubbed him the wrong way, but he didn’t let it rankle. ”
“All right. That just leaves Dr. Bentworth, doesn’t it, Ernie?”
“Right, Chief. Curator of Fossil Plants, retired.”
“Blind as a bat,” said Daisy. “If he tried to kill someone, ten to one he’d get the wrong man.”
“You mean Pettigrew might not have been the intended victim?” Alec groaned.
“No, no, darling. Dr. Bentworth couldn’t possibly have stabbed anyone, on purpose or by accident. You’ll see as soon as you meet him, though, knowing you, you won’t cross him off your list just because he’s ninety.”
“Certainly not,” said Alec, grinning, “but he can sink to the bottom. Mummery, ffinch-Brown, Witt, and the Grand Duke seem to have floated to the top. All right, Ernie, let’s go and see them all.”
“Right, Chief. ’Bye, Miss Dalrymple.”
“Cheerio, Mr. Piper. I’m sorry you didn’t get a biscuit with your tea.”
“Never mind. Most places, we wouldn’t even’ve got tea,” said Piper philosophically. “Ta, miss, be seeing you.” Tactfully he removed himself.
Alec leaned with both hands on the writing table. “Thanks, Daisy, you’ve given me some useful pointers.”
“Loath though you are to admit it.”
“Not at all! You won’t go back to the museum, love, will you, till this is cleared up.”
“I have to, Alec. I shan’t go today—I’ve plenty to keep me busy at home—but I’m nowhere near finished with the Geology Department, and the deadline approaches.”
“For heaven’s sake, Daisy …”
“I’ve given my word,” she said stubbornly. “They need the article. If I let them down, news will spread and no one will give me work. And don’t tell me I shan’t need to work when we’re married!”
“I wouldn’t dare! You know I don’t expect you to drop your writing. But Daisy, if you really must go to the museum, please try not to talk about the case.”
“I’ll try,” Daisy promised.