style="font-size:15px;"> II
Up in the ballroom Hughie Bronx’s Band packed up. Their faces were the colour of raw cod and shone with a fishy glitter, but the hair on their heads remained as smooth as patent leather. The four experts who only ten minutes ago had jigged together with linked arms in a hot rhythm argued wearily about the way to go home. Hughie Bronx himself wiped his celebrated face with a beautiful handkerchief and lit a cigarette.
‘OK, boys,’ he sighed. ‘Eight-thirty tomorrow and if any—calls for “My Girl’s Cutie” more than six times running we’ll quit and learn anthems.’
Dimitri crossed the ballroom.
‘Her ladyship particularly asked me to tell you,’ he said, ‘that there is something for you gentlemen at the buffet.’
‘Thanks a lot, Dim,’ said Mr Bronx. ‘We’ll be there.’
Dimitri glanced round the ballroom, walked out and descended the stairs.
Down in the entrance hall the last of the guests were collected. They looked wan and a little raffish but they shouted cheerfully, telling each other what a good party it had been. Among them, blinking sleepily through his glasses, was Lord Robert. His celebrated cape hung from his shoulders and in his hands he clasped his broad-brimmed black hat. Through the open doors came wreaths of mist. The sound of people coughing as they went into the raw air was mingled with the noise of taxi engines in low gear and the voices of departing guests.
Lord Robert was among the last to go.
He asked several people, rather plaintively, if they had seen Mrs Halcut-Hackett. ‘I’m supposed to be taking her home.’
Dimitri came up to him.
‘Excuse me, my lord, I think Mrs Halcut-Hackett has just left. She asked me if I had seen you, my lord.’
Lord Robert blinked up at him. For a moment their eyes met.
‘Oh. Thank you,’ said Lord Robert. ‘I’ll see if I can find her.’ Dimitri bowed.
Lord Robert walked out into the mist.
His figure, looking a little like a plump antic from one of Verlaine’s poems, moved down the broad steps. He passed a crowd of stragglers who were entering their taxis. He peered at them, watched them go off, and looked up and down the street. Lord Robert walked slowly down the street, seemed to turn into an insubstantial wraith, was hidden for a moment by a drift of mist, reappeared much farther away, walking steadily into nothingness, and was gone.
III
In his room at the Yard Alleyn woke with a start, rushing up on a wave of clamour from the darkness of profound sleep. The desk telephone was pealing. He reached out for it, caught sight of his watch and exclaimed aloud. Four o’clock! He spoke into the receiver.
‘Hullo?’
‘Mr Alleyn?’
‘Yes.’
He thought: ‘It’s Bunchy. What the devil—!’
But the voice in the receiver said:
‘There’s a case come in, sir. I thought I’d better report to you at once. Taxi with a fare. Says the fare’s been murdered and has driven straight here with the body.’
‘I’ll come down,’ said Alleyn.
He went down thinking with dismay that another case would be most unwelcome and hoping that it would be handed on to someone else. His mind was full of the blackmail business. Bunchy Gospell wouldn’t have said he’d found his man unless he was damn certain of him. The cakes-and-ale fellow. Dimitri. Well, he’d have opportunities, but what sort of evidence had Bunchy got? And where the devil was Bunchy? A uniformed sergeant waited for Alleyn in the entrance hall.
‘Funny sort of business, Mr Alleyn. The gentleman’s dead all right. Looks to me as if he’d had a heart attack or something, but the cabby insists it was murder and won’t say a word till he sees you. Didn’t want me to open the door. I did, though, just to make sure. Held my watch-glass to the mouth and listened to the heart. Nothing! The old cabby didn’t half go off pop. He’s a character.’
‘Where’s the taxi?’
‘In the yard, sir. I told him to drive through.’
They went out to the yard.
‘Dampish,’ said the sergeant and coughed.
It was very misty down there near the river. Wreaths of mist that were almost rain drifted round them and changed on their faces into cold spangles of moisture. A corpse-like pallor had crept into the darkness and the vague shapes of roofs and chimneys waited for the dawn. Far down the river a steamer hooted. The air smelt dank and unwholesome.
A vague huge melancholy possessed Alleyn. He felt at once nerveless and over-sensitized. His spirit seemed to rise thinly and separate itself from his body. He saw himself as a stranger. It was a familiar experience and he had grown to regard it as a precursor of evil. ‘I must get back,’ cried his mind and with the thought the return was accomplished. He was in the yard. The stones rang under his feet. A taxi loomed up vaguely with the overcoated figure of its driver standing motionless by the door as if on guard.
‘Cold,’ said the sergeant.
‘It’s the dead hour of the night,’ said Alleyn.
The taxi-driver did not move until they came right up to him.
‘Hullo,’ said Alleyn, ‘what’s it all about?’
‘’Morning, governor.’ It was the traditional hoarse voice. He sounded like a cabby in a play. ‘Are you one of the inspectors?’
‘I am.’
‘I won’t make no report to any copper. I got to look after meself, see? What’s more, the little gent was a friend of mine, see?’
‘This is Chief Detective-Inspector Alleyn, daddy,’ said the sergeant.
‘All right. That’s the stuff. I got to protect meself, ain’t I? Wiv a blinking stiff for a fare.’
He suddenly reached out a gloved hand and with a quick turn flung open the door.
‘I ain’t disturbed ‘im,’ he said. ‘Will you switch on the glim?’
Alleyn’s hand reached out into the darkness of the cab. He smelt leather, cigars and petrol. His fingers touched a button and a dim light came to life in the roof of the taxi.
He was motionless and silent for so long that at last the sergeant said loudly:
‘Mr Alleyn?’
But Alleyn did not answer. He was alone with his friend. The small fat hands were limp. The feet were turned in pathetically, like the feet of a child. The head leant sideways, languidly, as a sick child will lean its head. He could see the bare patch
