Death of a Peer by Ngaio Marsh Page B

think it most unlikely.”
    “Pray God he does!”
    He looked sharply at her and it would have been impossible to say whether he felt doubt or relief at her exclamation.
    “We shall have a second opinion, of course,” he said. “I’ve telephoned Sir Matthew Cairnstock. He’s a brain man. I’ve sent for a nurse.”
    “Yes. Will you look at Violet — my sister-in-law? She’s in my room.”
    “Yes, certainly.”
    “I’ll come if you want me. She asked to be alone with the maid.”
    “I see.” Dr. Kantripp hesitated and then said: “They’ll want to talk to the servants, you know.”
    “Why the servants, particularly?” asked Lord Charles quickly.
    “Well — the instrument. You see it looks as if it came from their part of the world. The kitchen.”
    Frid spoke abruptly on a hard, shrill note. “It was a skewer, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes.”
    “Then it wasn’t in the kitchen. It was left on the hall table.”
    “Dinner is served, m’lady,” said Baskett from the door. iii
    Roberta would never have believed that dinner with the Lampreys could be a complete nightmare. It seemed incredible that they should be there, sitting in silence round the long table, solemnly helping themselves to dishes that repelled them. Charlot left the room twice, the first time to take another look at Lady Wutherwood, the second time to see the nurse and to ask if there was anything she needed for her patient. The specialist arrived at the same time as the men from Scotland Yard. Lord Charles went out to meet them but returned in a few minutes to say Dr. Kantripp was still there and that he, with one of the police, had gone into the room where Lord Wutherwood lay. Only two of the police were in the flat now. They were plain-clothes men, Lord Charles said, and seemed to be very inoffensive fellows. The others had gone but he did not know for how long. Robert wondered if the Lampreys shared her feeling that the flat no longer belonged to them. When they had chopped their savouries into small pieces and pushed them about their plates for a minute or two, Charlot said suddenly: “This is too much. Let’s go into the drawing-room.”
    Before they could move, however, Baskett came in and murmured something to Lord Charles.
    “Yes, of course,” said Lord Charles. “It had better be in here.” He looked at his wife. “They want to see us all in turn. I suggest they use the dining-room and we go to the drawing-room. In the meantime they want me, Immy. There’s a change in Gabriel’s condition and the doctors think I should be there.”
    “Of course, Charlie. Shall I tell Violet?”
    “Will you? Bring her to the room. You don’t mind bringing her in?”
    “Of course not,” said Charlot, “if — if she’ll come.”
    “Do you think—”
    “I’ll see. Come along, children.”
    Lord Charles moved quickly to the door and held it open. For as long as Roberta had known the Lampreys he had made the same movement each night after dinner, always reaching the door before his sons and holding it open with a little bow to his wife as she passed him. To-night they looked into each other’s faces for a moment and then Roberta saw Lord Charles walk by on his way to his brother. That one glance gave her a vivid, indelible impression of him. The light from the hall shone on his head, making a halo of his thin hair and a bright-rimmed silhouette of his face. He wore that familiar air of punctiliousness. The placidity and the detachment to which she was accustomed still appeared in that mild profile, but she afterwards thought she had seen a glint of something else, a kind of sharpness so foreign to her idea of Lord Charles that she attributed the impression to a trick of lighting or of her overstimulated imagination. The hall door slammed. Roberta was left with the others to sit in silence and to wait.

Chapter VII
Death of a Peer
    Inspector Fox sat in a corner of the dressing-room, his notebook on his knee, his pencil held in a large,