Chapter 12
Ascending the steps far enough to be sheltered by the great rounded arch, Daisy paused to shake out and close her umbrella. It was drizzling again, yesterday’s sunshine forgotten.
At the top of the steps stood a familiar figure, shifting impatiently from foot to foot. Rudolf Maximilian had arrived early at the museum. His long nose touched the glass as he peered through the door into the interior.
Daisy glanced at her watch. She was dead on time. A shadowy shape unlocked the central doors as she reached them.
“Good morning, Grand Duke,” she said.
He started, turning. “Ach, it is Miss Dalrymple. Goot morning, gn?diges Fr?ulein.” He bowed, and rather reluctantly let her enter first.
Sergeant Jameson had unlocked the doors and stayed to hold one open for Daisy. His greeting to her was friendly enough, but his harried gaze was on the Grand Duke behind her. “What’s he want?” he muttered. “His blasted ruby’s gorn, innit.”
“Mine ruby, he is finded?” the Grand Duke demanded.
“Not it, mate. Sir. You sure you haven’t got it at home in a teapot?”
“Teapot? Vhy you talk about teapot? Vhy you not busy mine ruby to find?”
“Not my job, sir, is it? There’s been dozens of men searching all night, and a new lot come on this morning. Just the second floor and the towers to go.”
“I help,” said Rudolf eagerly.
“Not on your nelly you don’t,” exclaimed Sergeant Jameson, but he made no great effort to stop the Grand Duke when he pushed past. “D. I. Wotherspoon’ll put a spoke in his wheel soon enough, or someone else will if he’s dropped off.
Poor ole Spoony’s been up all night, but he’s set on seeing it through.
And I’ll take it kindly, miss, if you won’t mention what I just called him. ”
“I shouldn’t dream of it,” Daisy assured him, hoping that Alec had managed a good sleep last night. She stuck with Jameson as he went to unlock the other doors. “Have they not found anything at all?”
“They think they found the handle the flint was stuck to. Leastways they found a spare handle for a ge‘logical hammer with a splodge of the right kind of glue on it in the right place, and what might be bloodstains. It was in the basement, but they’re all over the place in fossils and minerals both, any road. They all use ’em, so it don’t mean much. ”
“And anyway it was probably Dr. Pettigrew’s. No fingerprints on it, I suppose.”
“Nary a one, miss.”
“They haven’t found any skeleton keys?”
“Nor reckon to,” said Jameson, strolling back towards the police post. “The thief’s had plenty of time to get rid of ’em, seeing it could be weeks since the jewels was pinched. Me, I think it was done at night when Dr. Pettigrew was on holiday.
He’d be the most likely to notice some little thing not quite right, but after a few days away he might not. Makes sense, don’t it?”
“It certainly does,” Daisy said warmly, leaning on the L-shaped counter as the sergeant opened the flap and stepped inside his sanctum. About fifteen feet square, it backed onto the front wall of the museum, with a partition filling the fourth side. “When was that?”
“First two weeks in July. I looked it up.” Jameson flipped back through the pages of a large date-book, then swivelled it for Daisy to see, and pointed. “See?”
“A couple of months ago. That’s about how long Mr. Grange said since the cases were opened, isn’t it? Just right. I bet you’re right. Were you on duty nights then?”
“No, miss, I was not,” said Jameson emphatically. “Not neither week, though some chaps’ shifts changed in the middle of that fortnight, and I done my share of night duty since. The fakes was discovered on my watch, but no one can’t say the real jools was swiped on my watch.”
“Mr. Fletcher asked for a list of all you museum police, I remember. Has he seen everyone yet?”
“Every last man Jack, or rather Sergeant Tring did, and no one saw nothing odd. Course, some of ‘em wouldn’t notice a stuffed mammoth waving its trunk, ’less you pointed it out to ’em special. Ole Westcott—he’s retired, mind, so I tell no tales—he—”
“Retired? When?”
Sergeant Jameson consulted his tome again. “Well, now, miss, the end of July it was. What d’you know?”
“What do you know?” Daisy riposted.
He opened a drawer and took out a pile of past duty rosters. “Lessee, here we are, July, second week Westcott was on evenings—closing time till two in the morning. And I happen
to know the sergeant in charge used to send him upstairs and not expect to see him again till the end of the shift. But like I was saying, miss, he wouldn‘t’ve noticed nothing in front of his nose ’less his nose was shoved in it.”
“Did anyone mention him to Mr. Tring? Has anyone told Mr. Fletcher that Dr. Pettigrew took a holiday in July?”
“I wouldn’t know about that, miss,” Jameson said cautiously. “’Spect so.”
“Is Mr. Fletcher in the museum now?” Daisy asked.
“Don’t think so, miss. Sergeant Wilby that I just took over from would’ve said.”
“Do you know if—” Daisy started.
“Yes, miss,” Jameson said loudly, straightening, “you can go anywhere below the second floor, ’cepting the Mineral Gallery which is closed.”
“Thank you, sergeant.”
Turning, she saw a constable approaching.
Jameson did not want to be caught gossiping by his subordinate.
He had been helpful, but obviously he was not deeply involved in the case.
Daisy doubted whether the unknown Detective Inspector Wotherspoon would be equally receptive to her questions, especially as he’d been up all night.
She had come to the museum to finish her research, she reminded herself, and she headed for the east wing.
A few visitors had straggled in, but in the fossil mammal gallery she found the one-armed commissionaire alone. “Good morning, Sergeant Hamm,” she greeted him.
“Morning, miss. Tomorrow will I bring the locusts, and they shall fill thy houses and shall eat every tree.”
“Really?”
“Yes, miss. They’ve bin told they’re not to be let into the Mineral Gallery till tomorrow. Not but what there’s bound to be a few wandering around today, taking pictures of the
gallery gate and barging through here to the pariosaurus again.”
“Oh, the Press,” said Daisy, enlightened.
“And the rubbernecks,” Hamm added, descending from Biblical misquotation to American slang. “But the mighty strong west wind shall cast them into the Red Sea.”
Daisy had no answer for this dire pronouncement, so she asked, “Is Mr. Witt available, do you know?”
“Far as I know he’s in his office, miss. You go and ask Wilf Atkins in dinosaurs to knock him up for you. Tell Wilf I said.”
Thanking him, Daisy proceeded through the hall where she had been with Dr. Smith Woodward when Pettigrew was killed.
When she reached the reptile gallery, she was relieved to see the remains of the Pareiasaurus swathed in dust-sheets.
Mummery was just lifting a corner to peer underneath.
He dropped it and swung round as Daisy’s footsteps approached.
“Oh, it’s you, Miss Dalrymple,” he said gloomily. “I have no idea yet whether he can be repaired. It’s iniquitous, they won’t even tell me when they’ll give me back the broken bones. I wish you would have a word with your Chief Inspector …”
“My Chief Inspector?”
“Are you not engaged to Fletcher? I understood …”
“Actually, yes,” said Daisy, a bit cross, “though I can’t imagine how you know.”
“Someone told me,” Mummery said with a vague wave, then went on irritably, “Does he really grasp that fossils must be handled with extreme delicacy, and as little as possible?”
“I’m sure he does, and has given the proper instructions.”
“I hope so, but I have little faith in his understanding since he had his men search my house last night. Jewels! What do I care about jewels after this terrible occurrence?”
He gently smoothed the cloth over the reptile’s massive shoulder.
That he was referring to the fate of the Pareiasaurus, not Pettigrew, was all too obvious. Losing patience with him, Daisy excused herself and went on into the dinosaur gallery.
Near the far end of the 150-foot chamber, a space had been roped off. Atkins, in his bottle-green uniform, stood nearby looking on. Several men were inside the rope, gazing down at something on the floor. Daisy’s heart jumped and her breath caught in her throat—another body?
No, they were talking calmly. She recognized Steadman’s lanky height, in a white coat today, while three of the men were in their shirtsleeves, the fifth in a blue suit.
Drawing near, she saw behind them a wooden box some five feet high.
Shavings on the floor and a hammer in the hand of one of the men suggested the box was newly constructed.
On the floor between the men, the object of their interest, was an oddly shaped piece of metal about two feet long.
The commissionaire moved to meet Daisy. “Morning, miss. Can I help you?”
“I was going to ask you to find Mr. Witt for me, but what is going on here?”
At the sound of their voices, Steadman looked round. His thin cheeks were flushed, and a glitter of nervous excitement brightened his eyes. “Miss Dalrymple,” he greeted her, “you might find this interesting. I’m about to start mounting a skeleton.”
“I’d love to watch,” Daisy assured him.
“May I introduce Mr. Willis O‘Brien? Mr. O’Brien is visiting from Hollywood. He’s going to be in charge of creating dinosaurs for a film of The Lost World. You know the Conan Doyle story? It will be an American film, but set partly in
London. Mr. O’Brien came over here with Mr. Hoyt, the director.”
Judging by Steadman’s excitement, he was as keen to be “in films” as any teen-age girl.
“I’ve done dinosaurs before,” the American informed Daisy. “You maybe saw The Ghost of Spirit Mountain, ma’am? But Mr. Hoyt wants them realistic as can be, so I guess I can’t beat seeing how the real thing’s put together, before I turn Delgado, my modeller, loose.”