“This is a dreadful thing, Alleyn,” Lord Charles was saying. “We are quite bewildered and — and of course rather shaken. I hope you will forgive us if we are not very intelligent about remembering everything.”
“We know that it must have been a very grave shock,” agreed Alleyn. “I shall try to be as quick as possible but I am afraid that at the best it will be a long and unavoidably distessing business.”
“What happens?” asked Henry.
“First of all I want to get a coherent account of the events that preceded the moment when Lord and Lady Wutherwood entered the lift. I think I should tell you that Fox has seen the commissionaire downstairs. He was on duty in the hall all the afternoon and although he does not work the lift he can account for everybody who used it after Lord and Lady Wutherwood arrived. He also states very positively that no strangers used it earlier in the afternoon. There is of course the outside stairway, the iron fire-escape. To get into this flat by its aid you must pass through the kitchen. Your cook is prepared to make a definite statement that during the afternoon nobody came in by that entrance. Of course the commissionaire and the cook may be mistaken but, on the face of it, it appears that no strangers have been up here since lunch.”
“I see.”
“We shall, of course, make much more exhaustive inquiries on this point. But you will see that under the circumstances—”
“It m-must have been been someone in the flat,” said Stephen loudly.
“Yes,” said Alleyn, “it looks like that. I only stress this point to make it clear to you that we must have a very accurate picture of everybody’s movements.”
The Lampreys all murmured “Yes.” Alleyn placed his hands palm down on the arms of his chair and looked round the circle of faces. Patch, huddled in her woollen dressing-gown, still sat by Roberta. The twins, long-legged and blond, were collapsed as usual on the sofa; Henry sat in a deep chair, his hands driven into his trousers pockets, his shoulders hunched, his head dipped a little to one side. Henry, thought Roberta, looks like a watchful bird. Lord Charles sat elegantly on a thin chair and swung his glass like a pendulum above his crossed knees. Frid still leant against the mantelpiece in an attitude that was faintly histrionic.
“Before all this business starts,” Alleyn began, “there is just one thing I would like to say. It is not very much use my pretending to avoid the implications in this case. It is scarcely possible that it can be a case of suicide or of accident. The word that must be in all your minds is one that, unfortunately, calls up all sorts of extravagant images. Detective fiction has made so much of homicide investigations that I’m afraid to most people they suggest official misunderstandings, dozens of innocent persons in jeopardy, red herrings by the barrowload, and surprise arrests. Actually, of course, the investigation in a case of homicide is a dull enough business and it is extremely seldom that any innocent person is in the smallest degree likely to suffer anything but the inconvenience of routine.”